236: Segue Champions

Christina

Brett: [00:00:00] [00:00:00] Hey Christina, it’s your turn to do the intro.

[00:00:02]Christina: [00:00:02] Hey guys. So, you’re listening to overtired. I’m Christina. He’s Brett, how are you doing Brett?

[00:00:09]Brett: [00:00:09] You kind of screwed it up. I mean, it all got there, but I sense the hesitancy,

[00:00:14]Christina: [00:00:14] Yeah, I w I messed it up this

[00:00:17] Brett: [00:00:17] you were second guessing yourself as it was coming out of your mouth. You know why?

[00:00:22] Christina: [00:00:22] Why?

[00:00:22] Brett: [00:00:22] Because you just got your second vaccine.

[00:00:25]Christina: [00:00:25] That’s exactly right. I did. I’m now full of the 5g and got my second dose of the vaccine, had a little fever some joint pains, arm pain some feeling like everything was sucked out of me, but I’m on the up and up now. So not a hundred percent, but I’m feeling a lot better. And honestly, Would take this times 10, right?

[00:00:47] Like I’ve never, like I said before, like I’ve never been happier to feel kind of crappy for a day or so, like bring it on.

[00:00:54] Brett: [00:00:54] Yeah, I just got my second Pfizer shot on Wednesday. And. [00:01:00] I had taken like Thursday off. I figured like the first shot I was pretty sick for the day after was not really up for doing anything. So I took a Thursday off with the assumption that I was going to feel like crap. And I actually felt pretty much fine.

[00:01:15] Like my arm hurt like crazy, but uh, in a low grade headache all day, but my energy didn’t like, I was fine. And then today I got some of the other symptoms, including having to spend some extra time in the bathroom. We’ll just call it that. Yes. That seems like a a polite way to put it. Yes. But that’s settling down now, too.

[00:01:39] So all in all, like I, the second shot was actually easier for me than the first one for anyone who’s, got that vaccine hesitancy because the second one sounds scary.

[00:01:51] Christina: [00:01:51] It totally sounds scary, but I’ve been, I would try to tell people it’s like a everybody’s responses seem to be different there’s people who are older or who [00:02:00] have immune systems that might not be as great, apparently have less side effects, which great. B, because this is what they claim anyway, that like, what you’re getting is like your immune system fighting stuff.

[00:02:09] But even if like you’re hesitant, you’re kind of worried. It’s not the end of the world. It’s not like the worst thing you’ve ever had is just like, Oh yeah, this is more than what you would get from a flu shot. Which makes sense. Because as we’ve been trying to tell people for the last year, plus this is not the flu.

[00:02:27] Brett: [00:02:28] And there’s a time limit on these side effects. Like for the vast majority of people, it’s max 48 hours.

[00:02:35] Christina: [00:02:35] Exactly. That’s the thing, right? So if you can schedule it, like towards the end of the week, I would say to do that if you’re really worried, but I mean, I think even like the most unhelpful employers are all like, at least in the United States and the rest of the world tends to have better labor practices than we do.

[00:02:56] So, we’re talking about the U S here. I think that’s probably where most of our audience is [00:03:00] anyway, but I think even like the most like horror, like bad employers are like, yeah, we’ll understand if, you’re feeling kind of, shitty, for 48 hours max, after your vaccine dose, like it’s a small amount of pain for a huge amount of upside and I’m.

[00:03:18] What strikes me and I don’t, I’ve been thinking about this a lot. We haven’t talked about this, that much on our podcast and we don’t talk about science and I’m not a science person, but I’m so just still stunned in Ford by what they have been able to do with the vaccines in such a short period of time.

[00:03:35] Like it gets, it’s nothing short of remarkable. I was I was recording a podcast earlier this week for Microsoft and Microsoft CTO. Kevin Scott was interviewing a molecular chemist at university of Washington and they were talking about some of this stuff and the doctor, I can’t think of his last name right now.

[00:03:52] He was saying that the technology that we have. 10 or 15 years ago, we wouldn’t have been able to do what we’re doing now. [00:04:00] And just thinking about how impressive it is, especially like all of that work is impressive. I’m not wanting to take away from one type of vaccine over another, but especially with the MRN vaccines like that from a technological standpoint is so fascinating and is so incredible that they’ve been able to do this in such a short period of time.

[00:04:20] Brett: [00:04:20] As a side note though, and this isn’t to belittle that this is in support of that the, especially the MRN. Vaccine, they didn’t start developing this when COVID started like these vaccines of this type, the idea of a global influenza pandemic has been predicted for some time. And companies were kind of banking like research R and D was banking on the fact that this was bound to happen.

[00:04:49] So like, it wasn’t that they were starting from scratch and suddenly surprised by the idea of COVID.

[00:04:56] Christina: [00:04:56] no, absolutely. But the interesting thing is because what they can kind of do [00:05:00] now is they can program, the types of proteins and molecules and, like, I guess like, RNA kind of like outline things of what they need. Like, that’s the impressive thing is they’re basically able to like, program what they need, to, to combat these things.

[00:05:14] Whereas in the past how the scientist was explaining it is that historically stuff has been like, you look at, it’s like, you look at nature and you’re like, okay, how does this occur in nature? And what can we take that is already naturally occurring? It wasn’t intentional. So like, if you wanted to solve a problem, like you would look to nature and you’d find something there and then you figure like how do we modify it?

[00:05:36] So you look into nature and you’d be like, okay, what naturally exists that could counteract this disease or whatever, but now they can actually design these things within tent. And as you said, they’ve been working on this technology for years and they ready for this, so they’re able to do it, but it’s this culmination of all the scientific and technological research that has, sped up to the point that even with that, [00:06:00] headstart, it’s still nothing short of incredible to me that we are from like a scientific and tech technology, like standpoint at that place where they can do these things and they can be effective.

[00:06:11] Like it’s it’s truly Saifai right. Like in a good way.

[00:06:16] Brett: [00:06:16] spilling over into other areas of research too. Like the strides we made working on the COVID vaccine have had implications and everything from Alzheimer’s to cancer research as well.

[00:06:27] Christina: [00:06:27] Yeah. Without a doubt. And I think that it’s kind of invigorated that community a little bit. One of the other things that the the professor and scientist said was that the actual thing, and I think this is true and fair, but this actually goes to the cancer and Alzheimer’s step two is that evaluating safety takes longer than the design.

[00:06:45] And so a lot with a lot of these things. And certainly we saw this with the vaccines and that’s why they did testing. And they certainly are trying to be cautious with it, but we’ve been seeing like what the real bottlenecks have been. And I would argue this is accurate. Like, [00:07:00] I don’t think this is a bad thing.

[00:07:01] I think that this is the right bottleneck, but the real bottleneck hasn’t been, how long does it take to design this it’s been okay. How do we ensure that this is safe and. But still, when you think about that, like historically with vaccines and with other sorts of scientific breakthroughs, the amount of time to design that system would be many times longer than the time that you would need to evaluate it, is this safe or not?

[00:07:28] Brett: [00:07:28] Yeah.

[00:07:29] Christina: [00:07:29] So it’s interesting that it switched and I love it. Like it’s really great. And I hope that we see more of these breakthroughs in areas like Alzheimer’s and cancer and the rare diseases that we haven’t ever maybe been able to spend a lot of money and time focusing on because it, they affect such a small portion of people and you can only do so much, but it’s like, okay, if you, again, if you’re able to design these things with intent and you’re able to kind of, map these things to solve specific problems that could really change things for a whole lot of people.

[00:07:58]Brett: [00:07:58] We’ll get to star Trek [00:08:00] level medical science at some point. Did you know that there, like there is a non-trivial amount of physics research that goes into warp drives? Like, I mean, they’re currently in an impossibility and we have, Einstein’s kind of speed limit of the speed of light for objects of mass.

[00:08:21] But like the idea at first floated in the thirties of being able to warp space, time to move faster than the speed of light became kind of the premise for star Trek and all like space travel since then. So like all of these physicists have been working there. They’re peer reviewed, published papers on this dating back 50 years and they’ve been working to figure out like, how can we make warp drive real?

[00:08:50]And that’s

[00:08:51] Christina: [00:08:51] Which I love that I am Ad. It’s funny. You mentioned that because actually some of the other people that Kevin Scott has interviewed over the course of the couple of years, we’ve done our podcast. [00:09:00] Like he interviewed a science fiction, author and technologist. I can’t think of the guy’s name, but he’s relatively famous.

[00:09:04] And it is interesting to see, and I love this because as nerds like this does appeal to us, but it is so interesting to see both the ways that CII has had a direct influence on people researching the real ways to make that happen. And then you also have the corollary, which is, the real things that are out there have been inspirations to Saifai like, it’s this really cool fulfilling prophecy, like, like self, like, like circular kind of, thing which is awesome.

[00:09:34] But no, I love actually thinking about the fact that you have, like high-minded physicists who are having to write papers that are in some ways, not different, not that different from. The papers that I wrote in college when I was a film major, like, like analyzing star Trek, except they’re taken from like a very scientific standpoint versus, me, which was like looking at the structure and the other stuff, but at the same, but at the same [00:10:00] time, it was like about the same thing.

[00:10:01] Right? Like you’re taking this fantasy, this medium and being like, okay, but how could we make that happen? And I mean, I think that’s brilliant. I love it.

[00:10:09] Brett: [00:10:09] I’ve gotten back into reading William Gibson recently.

[00:10:12] Christina: [00:10:12] Oh, I love William Gibson.

[00:10:13] Brett: [00:10:13] Like, and like, Neuromancer, I can’t remember what year Neuromancer came out, but late eighties, early nineties and like 84. Yeah. Like he was prescient about all of this stuff. Like, I mean, this is this guy who coined the term cyberspace. Like he, he knew what was up,

[00:10:33] Christina: [00:10:33] So he did. Yeah. Grant my

[00:10:35] Brett: [00:10:35] to the matrix and all of that is in there.

[00:10:37] It’s cool stuff.

[00:10:39] Christina: [00:10:39] Yeah, I grant actually, when we first started dating bread, Durham answer to me, and that was the first time I’d ever gotten into pivotal. It is actually, and like, I’d read Philip K Dick, and I done some scifi stuff, but not a lot of it, to be honest. And I really wasn’t familiar with cyberpunk when we started dating, because I was relatively young and like I was into other types of fiction and whatnot, but [00:11:00] like, yeah, the cyberpunk genre I mean, I’d seen a Kira and things like that, but I like, I really wasn’t familiar with like the to be honest, I really wasn’t familiar with the reading stuff and yeah, like, Neuromancer or I want to go back and read that because it’s so good.

[00:11:16] And I would like to read some of his other things too, because everything I’ve read by him is just incredible.

[00:11:20] Brett: [00:11:20] I had I had Patrick Rhone on systematic yesterday, and it was a great episode. Anyone who hasn’t heard that should check it out, but William Gibson came up in a larger literary discussion, but also Neal Stephenson and snow crash. And I think I’m gonna finish Neuromancer and then I’m going to do MonaLisa overdrive, but then I think I am gonna go revisit snow crash.

[00:11:44] Christina: [00:11:44] Yeah. I read snow crash. I don’t remember how long ago I read it, but I remember also like being really good and it was so weird for me. I’m reading some of this stuff after basically a whole lifetime of those concept [00:12:00] being infused in my culture and my upbringing, but without knowing like what some of the basis for that was right.

[00:12:06] Like that’s the interesting thing is that it’s like if you ask the average person have you read Neuromancer what’s it about, most of them would be like, no, but when you bring in the themes that were explored there that maybe came out before people were born, maybe right after, or maybe, just, but I’ve become like touchstones to our culture, even for people who think that they’re completely disconnected from all of that. Right. Even people who don’t identify with that, like those concepts, like th like the matrix lives on, like, it’s depressing and upsetting for me that the term red pilling exists.

[00:12:39] Right. Like, like that’s very upsetting. Especially given, the the things that they stand for and whatnot, but like, that’s just goes to show you, like, there are all these things that have been these cultural touchstones that have become infused in ways I’m repeating myself, but like, you wouldn’t even know it.

[00:12:53] And I think that like, snow crash is one of those, like, Neuromancer, there’s some of the others blade runner gets, I think the [00:13:00] right amount of praise and the right amount of recognition, because it is like that outsize, like the one everybody knows, even though if you ask most people, have you ever see blade runner?

[00:13:10] They would say no. Which is like the funny thing but I think he gets the right amount of recognition, but some of these other things, it’s just so interesting to think about, like all these little things that we’re not even aware of that have just become part of our culture and yeah.

[00:13:24]Brett: [00:13:24] The weird thing about snow crash is like the book, the title refers to static on a monitor. And that’s a concept that kids today they’ve never seen a TV turn on and be nothing but static. And so it’s got it. Wasn’t it was the same at the beginning of Neuromancer there’s he refers to this kind of this blue haze that was intended to reference the the warming up of a CRT tube.

[00:13:51]That, that moment before the picture comes on and Gibson’s like, yeah, I made these references that seemed so in embedded in our [00:14:00] culture, That I never imagined, there would be a generation that had no idea what that looked like, but speaking of red pilling did you know Prager, you did a breakdown of 1984 where they tried to cast Donald Trump as Winston.

[00:14:16] Christina: [00:14:16] Oh my God.

[00:14:18] Brett: [00:14:18] I feel like they got it a little bit upside down.

[00:14:21] Christina: [00:14:21] I mean, Oh my God. It’s like, it was so interesting to me is. Okay. And it’s not like I like Iran because, she had many problems, but people like to take her politics and her things and like apply it to the whole dystopic fiction genre. And it’s like, you couldn’t be more wrong.

[00:14:40] Right. Like Huxley and Bradbury and Orwell. We’re not that. And so a lot of these books and these things that people on that end try to like use as, confirmation for their own theories. It’s like, you’re not understanding what this is saying. Right. Like, I’ll be honest. I think that on the left people [00:15:00] go way too far too.

[00:15:01] And sometimes veer into stuff where I’m frankly uncomfortable and I’m like, okay, hold up. But they’re certainly not like trying to reframe 1984 and to being something that it wasn’t like,

[00:15:10] Brett: [00:15:10] And to be the opposite of what it was.

[00:15:12] Christina: [00:15:12] that’s what I’m saying. Right. I mean, it’s always been funny to me because I’ve seen this where I’ve seen like people on the right trying to retake Brave new world and trying to apply it to their own things.

[00:15:22] And I’m like, okay, first of all, you don’t understand the historical context of when it was written. You don’t know anything about Huxley. You didn’t know anything about what it was saying. Like this is not what you think it is at all. And,

[00:15:34] Brett: [00:15:34] Cancel culture is not big. Brother turns out.

[00:15:37] Christina: [00:15:37] exactly. It’s like, like brave new world was published in 1932. Like it, it is, if you look at like the social climate of the UK, then you look at like what Huxley believed in. He is not someone who was railing against the same things that the right wing today is railing against to, to be fair.

[00:15:56] There are also things that he rails against imparities that I think [00:16:00] sometimes people on the far, far left would embrace. And I think that’s a problem problematic as well, but that doesn’t mean that it is in any way, something that like the right can claim, because it’s not about that. It’s like, no, he’s actually, anti-fascism like, anti-state control.

[00:16:18] Like what are you not understanding?

[00:16:21] Brett: [00:16:21] Yeah. Speaking of people off their rockers you want to do a health corner?

[00:16:26] Christina: [00:16:26] Yeah, let’s do a health corner. What’s up with the Brett’s mental health update.

[00:16:29]Brett: [00:16:29] I took a week. I did I didn’t even work on bunch. I should say I took three or four days and in anticipation, I’ve got a start date for my job.

[00:16:39] Christina: [00:16:39] Awesome. Yeah. I saw that on Facebook, I think, or Twitter. When, once your start date.

[00:16:43]Brett: [00:16:43] May 3rd. So, so at the, when I got the start date, it meant I had two weeks. So I decided to take that first week and just fuck off and and kind of gather my wits, I suppose. And then now I’m onto the part where I [00:17:00] try to wrap up as many of my personal projects as possible. But yeah, it was kind of weird.

[00:17:06] Like I’ve watched a lot of YouTube and played a lot with kittens and just and just, I just took some time. It was unusual for me. I feel okay. It’s all gonna work out.

[00:17:22] Christina: [00:17:22] I’m happy for you. I’m happy for you.

[00:17:24] Brett: [00:17:24] did this background check. That’s still ongoing. I’m not supposed to talk too much about the hiring process. That’s part of, but one of the things that you’re welcome to talk about your new job, but here, the, so I’m going to tiptoe around this, but the the hiring process includes a background check just to verify stuff on your resume.

[00:17:46] But I’m being asked to verify that I was self-employed from 2014 till now. And like I’ve had income coming from so many different sources that most of them weren’t [00:18:00] enough to trigger tax documents or anything like that. So I have my blog. I have years of podcast episodes. Like I have an online trail that shows exactly what I was doing, but I don’t know how to verify it.

[00:18:13] Christina: [00:18:13] No. Yeah. I ran into a similar issue with my like background check when I joined Microsoft in so far as I worked at digital media companies who don’t answer their phones. And so verifying employment became like this really stressful thing, especially at mashville where I’ve worked for seven years and they wouldn’t answer their phones and they wouldn’t do other things.

[00:18:33] And finally, I had to like email the HR bitch and I was like, Hey, I need a letter verifying that I worked here because. I’m starting a job and this is of utmost importance. And then she blew me off. She was like, yeah let’s pay all the stakes and might be a while. And I was like, bitch, fortunately this very nice kid who worked for her, who ironically we’d switched jobs like the same week.

[00:18:55] Like he left a Gawker and went to Nashville and I left Nashville and went to Gawker. [00:19:00] So, and we were also located in the same building. So it wasn’t one of those things where I couldn’t just pop upstairs and grab this, it’s like, it would have taken her two seconds to print something out and I could have gone upstairs and grab this.

[00:19:11]It, it was the dumbest thing. And he was like, no, I’ll get this out to you. And he got me a letter and I was able to get it to them, but it was frustrating. Also Univision, ironically, the phone number on the paycheck didn’t work because it was one of those things. Like, you don’t want to blow up, like, in your case, you didn’t have this issue, but like, I didn’t want to blow up my spot necessarily.

[00:19:31] Like with my. Coworkers would be like, Hey, I got a new job and I haven’t told people yet. Cause I didn’t tell people until the background check was clear cause I’m not dumb. And and I was trying to be, cause you never like, I wasn’t, to my knowledge, I hadn’t done anything that would preclude me from working,

[00:19:48] Brett: [00:19:48] I, the same nervousness. I have a clean history.

[00:19:52] Christina: [00:19:52] totally, you have just that the natural paranoia and so Univision wouldn’t do it. So I got my W2’s but finally I just told Sarah the receptionist, I was [00:20:00] like, somebody’s going to call and they’re going to ask if I work here and if you could just say yes, she was like, cool, no problem.

[00:20:06] Congrats on the new job. I was like, thanks. But it ended up taking like another 10 days because of that. So I, I feel you on your issue because you have all this stuff and you’re like, how do I verify this? I.

[00:20:19] Brett: [00:20:19] for like, for four years of my quote unquote employment history, I was running my own business that I eventually like it bankrupted. So I don’t have like the, that was 10 years ago. I don’t have the like incorporation documents or anything. Fortunately, they don’t seem to be asking about that.

[00:20:39]I mean, there’s an incorporation record that the business at some point existed, I’m sure I’m listed as the owner. I think that one’s going to be okay, it’s this this years of being a writer, podcaster, blogger, freelancer that I, I.

[00:20:54]Christina: [00:20:54] It’s it’s called the creator economy or you’re an influencer or creator, I think though is that’s the term designer.

[00:21:00] [00:21:00] Brett: [00:21:00] Creator. Alright. That’s what I’ll tell them. Cause it’s an outsource company. It’s not, I’m not actually working with Oracle on this. Some working with a third party.

[00:21:10] Christina: [00:21:10] Yeah. That’s usually how that works. Unfortunately. I don’t remember who Microsoft used to use somebody and then I have to go through I think it’s a, it’s much shorter, but I have to, every two years I have to go through like a much smaller background check because I work on cloud. So, because I work on cloud stuff that have to go through like another, like, like every two years they have to like, verify like, okay, you haven’t been convicted of financial fraud.

[00:21:34]And that’s what I’ve been told are like the things they care about. Like they don’t care about other types of, convictions or whatever. They’re like, have you been convicted of financial

[00:21:41] Brett: [00:21:41] It’s very specific crime that affects our our credibility in liability. Yeah.

[00:21:47] Christina: [00:21:47] Right. Right. And I’m like, no, I have not. So, yeah. But,

[00:21:52] Brett: [00:21:52] of financial crimes

[00:21:53] Christina: [00:21:53] she’s all amazing segue.

[00:21:55]Brett: [00:21:55] W what did you think I was segwaying into?

[00:21:57]Christina: [00:21:57] The doge coin.

[00:21:58] Brett: [00:21:58] that is correct. I [00:22:00] thought you were, I was worried. You thought that was a sponsor segue.

[00:22:03]Christina: [00:22:03] No I

[00:22:03] Brett: [00:22:03] fact how I would segue into today’s sponsor.

[00:22:06] Christina: [00:22:06] no, I did not think that you would segue into it into a sponsor segue that way because that would not be what we would want. Nope.

[00:22:15]Brett: [00:22:15] Tell me about where you’re at with your doge coin.

[00:22:17]Christina: [00:22:17] All friends. There’s a great episode of the Simpsons from there, I think it was the seventh season, the best season Bart on the road where they go on spring break and Bart gets a driver’s license and then is able to rent a car. And Martin joins them because he’s rich because he won a bunch of money in the futures market.

[00:22:35] And there’s this scene where he’s buying things like soy always. And he’s getting all of his money and he’s like, you’re Europe, $5,000 or whatever. And he was like, very happy. And then he was like, you’re down to everything, but whatever dollars Barton, you got greedy Martin, that’s basically my doge coin stories.

[00:22:51] So I’m still up. And I took out my $500 initial investment. I did go ahead and take that out. [00:23:00] Having said that the whole thing has like hit a high of like 42 cents. I probably should have sold it all then, but I didn’t, but now it in crypto in general have just crashed. So I’m still up from where I was to be clear, but like the whole thing is just it.

[00:23:17] Yeah, it is it is down.

[00:23:19] Brett: [00:23:19] Times? No, it made the wall street journal.

[00:23:23] Christina: [00:23:23] Oh yeah, it was on

[00:23:24] Brett: [00:23:24] it was like a bubble of sorts, but.

[00:23:27] Christina: [00:23:27] massively and we all knew that this is dumb and it’s up a little bit from where it was yesterday it dropped a ton. But yeah, I mean, it is yeah.

[00:23:35] Brett: [00:23:35] It’s a product with it’s all futures. There’s like absolutely no like real value to this. Like it’s nothing but up bubble. If it has any value at all, it’s all

[00:23:46] Christina: [00:23:46] has no value. It is literally the most era and I’m explaining to people for it. It is the most irrational, stupid thing. Cause there’s no limit on how many coins can exist. Like. Like, like, like, like it was literally created. [00:24:00] So I like, like with literally created, she make fun of Bitcoin. Like the, literally the reason it was created was for that reason.

[00:24:07] So like the dose creator is not happy. I’ve seen, I haven’t seen recent interviews, but I’ve seen interviews in the past where he was like, not happy that there’s actually like demonstrable value in this thing that he created, like to be a meme and to make fun of the stupidity of stuff. Like there used to be a Reddit bot that would like alert, like, or word you dose, for doing certain things.

[00:24:27] And I just, I didn’t even buy it the right way. Like I bought it on Robinhood, which means that I don’t even own the coin in the sense that I couldn’t transfer it to a wallet and then do other stuff with it. I just like bought it with beyond exchange. It didn’t feel that which is the asshole term for real money.

[00:24:41] And. I knew that. And I was like, I don’t care. Like, this is just the easiest way to do it. I don’t want to go through like trying to get an exchange in a wallet and all that. So I don’t care. Cause this is funny to me. Like this whole thing is just stupid and I’m still up, but I’m down. Like from where I was like, if I had sold, like I should’ve sold last [00:25:00] Friday and I would have like, I would have tripled my money.

[00:25:04] Brett: [00:25:04] was like 500% at that point.

[00:25:06] Christina: [00:25:06] yeah, totally. It was ridiculous. And I did not, but I have no regrets because I went into this thing for the meme.

[00:25:13] Brett: [00:25:13] The wall street journal did point out that the first woman elected to office in the U S was put on the ballot as a joke. And that sometimes things that start as joke do end up having real value.

[00:25:26]Christina: [00:25:26] Yeah. I mean, it’s look it’s whatever the market wants to pay for it. Right. If the market thinks that something is real enough and they can do that like, but there’s no rationality here. Like, it is truly like a GameStop sort of situation, but even dumber because again, like there’s no limit to this.

[00:25:44] Like that’s the thing. And it’s like, if you just wanted to, grind and, create more and more of this, like there’s not like at least with Bitcoin as dumb as it is, like there’s a finite number of them and that’s it. And so you could theoretically see that’s why the value will go up because you can’t create any more.

[00:25:59] And so [00:26:00] inflation. It doesn’t exist in kind of the traditional way, but this is, even with regular money, like you don’t just print more of it. They have to be very strategic about how and why they decide to infuse more cash and like introduce more money into the system. So this doesn’t have any of that.

[00:26:17] So it’s dumb. It’s just stupid. But I knew that like, as we discussed last week, I knew that I was just like, I was just going to Justin’s advice. He was like, look as long as you’re up even a dollar you’re up. And I’m like, yeah, you know what? Yeah. And then the way I look at it, and this is like from such a privileged, selfish asshole place, but it’s true because I forgot that I had the money in this account.

[00:26:39] So I didn’t care. I’d already like budgeted around it, but B if I lose that’s a tax write off. So I, our way I went, like, I’m not mad either way.

[00:26:51] Brett: [00:26:51] Did I ever tell you about working when I was working in Vegas, like not working. And I, like, I had jobs that would take me to Vegas and we would stay [00:27:00] in hotels. And I learned like I was drinking at the time. And I learned that if you had money in the video poker machine, your drinks were free and they would bring you food as long as you were playing.

[00:27:16] So I would go down to the bar with a $20 bill, slip it into the video slot machines, right at the bar. And then just keep playing enough that I didn’t run out of money. So like, and I basically, my goal would be to drink for free and pull out 20 bucks at the end of the night. As long as I was up at dollar, I was good.

[00:27:38] Christina: [00:27:38] I love that. I love that.

[00:27:40] Brett: [00:27:40] The alcoholics guide to working in Las Vegas.

[00:27:44] Christina: [00:27:44] no, I mean, I think that’s a smart thing to do. I mean, And that is, I think one of Vegas’s greatest Griffes and how they are always able to ensure that the house always wins or whatever is the whole, like, we will give you free drinks and free food, as [00:28:00] long as you’re playing, because people are like, Oh, see I’m making money off of this.

[00:28:03] This is a great deal. And not realizing the drunker I get, like that, the more full I feel, the more willing I am going to be just continuing to shove money into this. Exactly. And

[00:28:14] Brett: [00:28:14] the insidious scent marketing. Have you ever read about the smells they pump into casinos? It’s disturbing, like, I mean, Macy’s does the same thing. Like scent marketing is not bizarre, but they have very, they’ve spent so much money on researching exactly what fragrances and smells will lower people’s inhibition and increase their willingness to spend big, scary stuff.

[00:28:42] Christina: [00:28:42] It is. And then, the lights, that’s another thing too. They like never know what they you’d like, never know what time it is, because it’s always bright, like, like they, they never want you to know that it’s three o’clock in the morning. They never want you to, there are so many things that they do from a psychological article, which is really

[00:28:59] Brett: [00:28:59] going to [00:29:00] lie. I like it. Like I love I’m not a gambling addict. Like I’ve never not been able to walk away, but I really loved that feeling of that the next one’s going to be the big hit for me. Like, no matter what game I’m playing that feeling, the combination of the lights and the sounds and the smell and just this, like on the precipice of winning big feeling, even if full well, you’re not, I do enjoy gambling.

[00:29:26]Christina: [00:29:26] Yeah. I mean, I always was one of those things. I wouldn’t call myself an addict because I don’t have an ID. I do not have an addictive personality and I am always able to stop, but I do like the feeling and like, as a kid, I figured out really early on. That I could maybe like it too much. It could maybe be problematic, but I didn’t like keep myself in check because I had the video game, biggest stakes for super Nintendo.

[00:29:50] And I was like 10 years old. And that was how I learned to play poker and some other things. And I loved that game and I would like it, cause your whole thing is to win like as much money as you [00:30:00] can, and to go to better and better hotels and things and whatnot. And I was miss Christina and that’s, what they would call me and like, you’d get upgraded, to like the next hotel.

[00:30:08] And you go into these nice little suites and all this stuff. And like, it was great. And I had a great time playing it, but it was one of those things where I would play for like hours a day and I’d be like, Oh, okay, this could be a problem. Right? Like this is where my real money. This could be a problem.

[00:30:24] And. When I was 16, I was on a cruise and I was gambling illegally. And I did really well but I cashed out, my sister kept being like, go more. And I was like, no, I think that it would, I would enjoy this too much. So I’m always able to stop myself, but I like you, I enjoy it. Like, I’m always able to set like a clear limit with myself being like, this is the maximum amount you were willing to lose, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not the sort of person like, so I’m I have a strong enough like personality and strong enough, like control to be able to be like, I’m not going to lose more than this.

[00:30:57] And once I hit this Mark, I’m done. What [00:31:00] I don’t have is like the impulse to be like, I’m not going to play until I lose this much. Right. because sometimes cause it can go either way. Like sometimes you cash out and you make a lot in your you’re great. But there’s also kind of that there could be that compulsion, which is like, okay, I’ve given myself permission to lose $500.

[00:31:16]But I’m going to continue to play until I lose $500. Right.

[00:31:20]Brett: [00:31:20] I, yeah, I have like, no, I have no negative gambling stories. Like I’ve always, either had fun losing, the amount of money. I said it was okay to lose or I’ve come out ahead. And yeah I considering my personality considering how easily I get addicted to things, I think it’s actually pretty impressive that gambling has never sent me into a bad place.

[00:31:45]Christina: [00:31:45] I’m pretty impressed with that too. Yeah. And I’ve never had the, like, I would never feel bad about it. Right. Like I’ve always had a good time and I would never do it if I didn’t like, feel good about it. The thing where I have been able to kind of be maybe in a place where you don’t realize how much you’re spending and it never became a [00:32:00] problem, but I wrote a post about it once and I can’t find it, but like I spent $800 on candy crush.

[00:32:05] Brett: [00:32:05] Whoa, that’s problematic.

[00:32:08] Christina: [00:32:08] I agree. like, not at one time, it was just over, it was over the course of a couple of months,

[00:32:13] Brett: [00:32:13] That’s why I won’t play any game where you can pay to get ahead because I will make that mistake or I will think $10 here. Isn’t such a big deal. I’m really

[00:32:24] Christina: [00:32:24] No last thing. That’s the thing. Right. And it was never to get ahead. It was just for extra lives and stuff like that. And it’s just cause you want to continue to play. And when I did the math and I realized how much I’d spent over a couple months on candy crush, like my colleagues were freaked out.

[00:32:38] I

[00:32:38] Brett: [00:32:38] you feel sick to your stomach, huh?

[00:32:40] Christina: [00:32:40] it does. I mean, I was amused more than anything to be honest. Like I wasn’t super, I

[00:32:46] Brett: [00:32:46] yeah. Cause you’re rich. I forgot.

[00:32:49] Christina: [00:32:49] Oh, I wasn’t rich then. And I’m not rich now. Like, trust me. I’m I’m I mean, like for some people’s standards maybe, but I’m not, but it’s like, where I live and what, [00:33:00] yeah.

[00:33:00] I’m not rich. It’s certainly I’m not the sort person you can just lose $800 and be like,

[00:33:03] Brett: [00:33:03] you. It’s okay.

[00:33:04]Christina: [00:33:04] No, you’re not. I’m just trying to be clear. Like this was when I lived in New York and I was certainly not right. And I didn’t have, because I wasn’t getting paid what I’m being paid now. And my cost of living and other expenses and stuff were greater.

[00:33:19] And so, but it was over a couple months and yeah, you do kind of feel sick, but it was not one of those things where I was like, beating myself up over it. If that makes any sense. Right. I looked at it more as like, Oh, this is kind of funny, but this is bad. But it was one of those things I also was like at least I get like writing material out of it.

[00:33:35]But it did make me consider, maybe go, okay, I can’t play these types of games or I have to give myself like a hard limit on stuff like that. That’s actually something I wish that Apple would do. Like they allow you to limit ages of people who can do in app purchases, but like, why not just limit the amount like, and I know why they don’t do it.

[00:33:54] They don’t do it because they make so much money. Right. No, and that’s the thing that’s insidious to me about it. Like, [00:34:00] don’t give me this bullshit about how much you care about privacy and safety and security and all this shit and the integrity of the app store. And then you’re literally making billions and billions of dollars off of people who, because the story is about like the whales who keep a lot of those big games to float are not uncommon.

[00:34:19] And you have people who do what I did, but we’re not in a financial position to do so. And didn’t like, find it funny and like it can destroy lives. And so I find like in general, I’m not in favor of Epic’s position against Apple on a lot of levels. Although I do think that like some of Apple’s rules