425: Always Sunny Girl

Always Sunny Girl

Introduction and Birthday Celebrations

Brett: [00:00:00] Hey, it’s, it’s overtired. I’m so tired. Oh my God. Um, we all, all three of your favorite hosts are here today. We’ve got me, Brett Terpshire. We’ve got Christina Warren. Hey, Christina. And we have Jeff Severns Gunsell, who is. Fresh off of a birthday celebration. How’s it

Christina: Happy birthday, Jeff.

Jeff: Thank you. Thank you.

Reflections on Turning 50

Jeff: 50, 50, 50. The last day of the rest of my life.

Christina: You know, 50 is the new 40 is what they’re saying. So like,

Jeff: Yeah. I,

Christina: the start.

Jeff: it’s a weird number. I don’t, it’s a weird one. I was like saying to somebody, maybe I wrote this, that like, I feel like I, turning 20, turning 30 felt like skin in my teeth, like I barely made it, and, uh, 40 felt like inevitable and kind of, uh, disappointing, and, uh, and 50 feels [00:01:00] good, weirdly, just feels good, feels like, yeah, I made it, it feels like I made it, like, uh, it feels like a, not a finish line, but like, alright, cool, I made it this far, everything else is bonus.

Brett: I’ll turn 50 last year. I uh last year I started dating a 50 year old woman, which is weird because Or a 50 year old person. Sorry Um, which is weird because I still think of myself as like 25

Jeff: Did you just say last year you’ll turn 50?

Brett: last year last august. Yeah 50.

Jeff: My God, start over. I’m so tired. I, and I know you, you’ve been up beginning sleep. I got sleep and still I’m just hung over from not, I didn’t even drink at my party, but it was, we had it at a venue and, uh, and, and it was so much work getting ready, bringing everything over there. It wasn’t even that much stuff, but like, it was enough.

It was like a mini van load [00:02:00] and then like, get it. We had an hour for setup and then we did the party and then we had to break it down and. For some reason, maybe it’s cause I’m 50. That was exhausting. And I felt hung over the next morning despite not drinking at all.

Christina: No, I think that that’s fair. I think that’s fair. I think that that’s one of those things where it’s like, um, you’re totally like allowed to be, um, what was it going to say? Like tired and, and all that other stuff. Like, it’s just, just one of those things.

Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. And also it’s a tiring day.

Inauguration Day and Mental Health

Jeff: We don’t have to get into it, but it is inauguration day. Um, and we can. Probably

Christina: Yeah. And, and that, and, and that’s basically all we have to say about that.

Jeff: no, but it is, I do think it’s, it’s lending to a sense of, um, of malaise.

Christina: Oh, for, for sure. For sure. No, I, cause it was one of those things. So like, um, uh, I’ll get into it with, with, when we talk about mental health corner, but like, I’ve got like some stuff going on myself and, um, I, um, you know, it’s a, it’s technically like a [00:03:00] public holiday today because it is, um, Uh, Martin Luther King Day and so it was just like one of those like things where I’m just like, okay,

Brett: the, is the inauguration always on Martin Luther King Day?

Jeff: No,

Brett: Okay, that’s just such a fucked up coincidence then that we’re,

Christina: I mean, I’m sure it’s happened

Brett: inaugurating a racist on MLK Day.

Jeff: we’ve inaugurated our fair share

Christina: say, I was going to

Brett: on MLK Day? Come

Christina: Oh, I’m, I’m sure that that has also happened before. I

Jeff: On my birthday.

Christina: and yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Um, yeah, no, I mean, the irony is, is. Is right there. And then of course it’s happening like a week after two weeks after Jimmy Carter’s funeral and they had to have it indoors because of the, the cold or whatever.

And so like I made a comment that got way more viral than I expected it to be because the joke was in the comment, but I was like, you know, it’s kind of fitting that this is taking [00:04:00] place, you know, indoors because it feels really claustrophobic and like a funeral. And then everybody responds is, well, it is a funeral for democracy.

And I’m like, yes, that was the joke. Literally. Literally. That was the

Jeff: uh, I find, I find discussing it, for the most part, I’m not referring to this. I find if I am in a small group and somebody brings up the moment, I find it deeply unsatisfying to engage because it’s just like. I don’t know, I can’t even put my, my finger on it exactly, but it’s like somebody says something intensely obvious, and then everyone else shakes their head and we do need to vent and we do need to like, have some sense of sort of solidarity and community but there’s something about this moment that that’s not quite what it is, it’s like we’re all just Prepared, including myself to just like blurt out the, the last terrible thing we heard or thought about.

And it’s, it’s very exhausting right now. I was like, when you need that, when you need me for the resistance, call me. [00:05:00] Uh, but I don’t want to talk about it. Just assume I’m in.

Christina: Right. Right. No, but this was, this was just like a one off, like a knock on innocuous post that

Jeff: Well, you know, Christina, it is a funeral.

Christina: and I’m like, right, that was what I put in the post anyway. It has like 425 reposts and like 7, 200 likes and 401 responses. And all the responses are the same. That’s what I’m saying. Like this, this, this got, this was like blue sky viral.

I was like, okay guys, I’m like muting thread because I don’t. This is too much. Um, also it’s like, again, yeah, that was the joke. Like,

Brett: Well,

Jeff: Well, in case you missed it, Christina, someone was there to help you see,

Christina: I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m so glad that like people were able to like explain my joke to me. Like, I’m really, really

Jeff: And if you need us today to explain anything to you that comes from you, we’ll do that. Because you got, you got two men here. We’re ready.

Brett: just say it and we’ll jump in and we’ll tell [00:06:00] you

Jeff: we’ll tell you what you’re saying, why it’s funny, why it’s wrong.

If it’s wrong. I mean, we’re here

Brett: We got you, we got you.

Christina: repeat what I said back to me. Oh,

Brett: we’ll just

Jeff: Yeah. Just repeat.

Christina: what you mean is this. I love

Brett: so I do want to talk about why I missed Jeff’s birthday party. But first, uh, well, let’s do a mental health corner.

Christina, you alluded to some stuff going on. You want to start?

Christina: Yeah.

Christina’s Career Transition

Christina: So, um, as we were recording this on, on Martin Luther King Day, um, on a January 20th, 2025, God, 2025, that sounds so weird to say, uh, this is my last day at GitHub. Um, and, uh, so after almost three years there and, uh, seven and a half, um, little more than that, um, within the Microsoft family, I, I’m done.

Um, I’m not going to announce where I’m going, um, for my next job. I’ve got, um, two weeks off. Um, but, uh, that news will be coming up. But that has been the thing that has kind of defined my mental health for the last couple of weeks is trying to kind of figure out [00:07:00] like, am I going to take this new job, this opportunity that I’m excited about?

Um, but with that excitement comes like the sadness of leaving a team and a company that has been fantastic to me and people that I just adore working with and, and people that I couldn’t be more proud to, or honored to have had the opportunity to be with. Um, you know, I was a GitHub fan long before I ever joined.

Um, uh, tech and, and I will remain one, you know, until the end. And so that’s been, that’s been it. Cause this is, you know, putting in all the time here. Like if you count the Microsoft and GitHub time together, this is the longest job I’ve ever had. And, uh, and so obviously there were like a lot of emotions around that.

So that’s, that’s, that’s my mental health corner basically.

Brett: Yeah. That’s, uh, that’s, that’s a, that is a long time in tech, um, to stick, to stick, even, even if you switch from Microsoft to get hub and still stayed in the Microsoft kind of umbrella, [00:08:00] that’s seven, seven years. That’s crazy.

Christina: Close to eight. Yeah. It’s seven, a little more than seven and a half. Yeah.

Brett: I did, I did the indie thing for that long, but I’ve never held a tech job for that long.

Jeff: So are you, what, like what combination, uh, sad, uh, excited, um, whatever grieving, like what is the, what is the stew right now?

Christina: I think that I’m now mostly, I think I’m at peace, right? So like last week was like the week that I had to kind of like make the You know, it was kind of, you know, telling people and kind of, you know, um, you know, just all that stuff and like there was a lot going in with that and we also had an offsite last week.

So my whole team was together in person, which was awesome, but was also makes it that much harder, right? Because you know, you’re talking about the things to me doing, you know, in the next little bit and talking about, you know, processes and whatnot and then seeing people and then knowing You’re going to be saying goodbye.

And so, um, I think peace is where I’m at now. So I went [00:09:00] through the grieving stuff and I went through kind of the sadness and I definitely cried a lot last week. And then I went and did karaoke with my teammates and, and we had, um, the final day of the offsite, which was actually, this was a great concept and shout out to, to Ashley for, she’ll never listen to this, but, but shout out anyway.

Um, Ashley Billis for, um, putting the whole thing together because what she did for the final day, and I thought it was really smart and if I ever have opportunity to do something like this, I would steal it was, we had like the first two days were traditional kind of offsite stuff. And then the third day, it was all just like board games.

Cause some people were flying out. Some people already flew out Thursday night, but some people were still there. People who were still around, we had like, we played like board games and like had movies and snacks and just like hung out. And it wasn’t, you know, it was just kind of like, um, like, like, like, uh, a rain day at school and,

Brett: not a big party, but like actually a more kind of quiet, intimate thing.

Christina: and it was cool because, um, like playing some of the board games and stuff, like we played this one called, um, [00:10:00] Spyfall, I think is what it’s called. And, uh, it’s like this British card game. It’s really fun. And, um, they have, um, a, um, uh, there’s a sequel, apparently to like, uh, um, uh, an online version would.

Would fuck would be really fun. But like, we played like games like that. And, um, uh, I can’t remember what the other one was called, but there was one where like, you’re either like spies or you’re, you know, like on the good team and you have to like, try to figure out like. If you can, you know, keep the mission or not.

And, and it was, um, I don’t know, games like that. I feel like you get to know people better and there are also some really like fun opportunities from a bonding perspective, you know, getting to see how people work and whatnot that can actually be really good for, for team building, but also for figuring out like, okay, well.

How can we think strategically or like how, you know, I don’t know. I feel like there are like non interpersonal corollaries where like doing these interpersonal types of games can pay off. Anyway, I thought it was great and it was just really nice to be chill. It was just kind of like, you know, like I said, kind of like a snow day sort of thing, even though it [00:11:00] wasn’t snowing.

And that was, that was a really nice way to be able to say goodbye to folks. And, and I really appreciated. That so, so I think I’m, I’m, I’m at peace. Yeah. It’s been, it’s been sad at goodbyes and, and, and endings, even when like they’re for the right reasons. And even when you do it, like out of no sense of malice or anything other than it just being like, I had an opportunity that I, that I, you know, that is the best thing for my career.

And that’s all it is. It’s nothing not indicative of, of, you know, how happy I am with the company that I work at or what they’re doing or anything like that, like. It’s, it’s literally just about, you know, what’s, what’s best for me right now. Um, and, um, so, so I, I’m feeling okay, you know, but like, it is also one of those, like I went through all those grieving process steps, you know, the sadness and the fear and the excitement and all that other stuff.

And so, um, but I think the good part of that is I feel like I went through all of that and now like we’re here and I’m like, okay. Now I can just be, you know, I have two weeks off. [00:12:00] Um, I’ve never had two weeks between jobs before.

Jeff: That’s awesome.

Christina: Yeah. Like when I moved across the country, I like, my final day at work was like on a Friday.

And then like, the movers came or something I think like on Tuesday. And then I think we flew out on Thursday. Or Friday, um, to, to go to Seattle. And then I started work on Monday. So I, I had, I had a week off. That is insane, right? So I had a week off, but the week off was spent like literally moving across the country.

So, so I’ve never had two weeks between jobs in my life. So I’m, I’m a little bit unsure what to do.

Brett: are you not moving for your new one?

Christina: I’m not. I’m at least not right now. Um, uh, you know, so, so, so, so staying put, so I don’t know. I’m, there’s like a part of me. I’m like trying to find these things like last minute is, is hard, but I’m like, I’m kind of like, and I’m, I would love to, you know, take someone else with me if I could, but it’s way too last minute for that.

But I’m like, can I go on a cruise? So I’m [00:13:00] trying to see if I can get on a cruise next week or

Jeff: Oh, nice.

Christina: Yeah.

Jeff: Nice.

Brett: All right.

Jeff’s Birthday Party Recap

Brett: Well, Jeff, how are you?

Jeff: I am doing good. Yeah. Doing good. I, it was, it was nice to have a birthday and have a birthday feel good. That’s nice to have a party. It’s nice to see a lot of people. I haven’t had a party since I was 33. Um, and, uh, that was a kickball game. It was really fun. Um,

Brett: Wait, what? Oh, not, not, not today

Jeff: no. Cause here’s the thing when I had a kickball game when I was 33, someone broke a rib, someone else broke a finger.

And I was like, all right, when I’d be getting too old to be doing this stuff for birthdays. Um, so I kept it real, real simple.

Brett: Tell us about the party though. I like, I got the invite. It said it was a like TV party and I didn’t know if it was a black flag thing or what was happening.

Jeff: No, I okay. I’m going to tell you what it was. And then I’m going to tell you, [00:14:00] uh, my reflections on the difference between sentimentality and nostalgia.

Brett: Okay.

Jeff: basically what I, I’ve had this idea forever. Like the original idea, like a couple of years ago, it was like to do, to do three straight nights in my, in my living room on the TV with different guests every night of watching some primetime show from my youth.

Um, and, uh, so I had this idea of like one night it’s like grizzly Adams. He served like meatloaf next night. It’s like Barney Miller and you serve TV dinners and like that kind of thing. And I really liked that. Um, but what I, what it finally became was like, we rented a space, really lovely kind of open space near our house.

And, um, it was like a. It’s where they do music lessons and stuff, but it’s a big open room. And so they have all these sound baffles and they have a PA and I rented like a screen and a projector. And then I, I cracked in into Adobe premiere and I edited together like 40 minutes of essentially like simulated, uh, simulated, uh, 40 minutes of channel [00:15:00] surfing in roughly 1983.

Um, and, uh, and so it was like, you land, you kind of hover over a couple of shows that you land on for like an act. And then there’s commercials in between. So I had, um, the pornographic bakery episode of Barney Miller. Um, which for anyone that doesn’t know was an, a cop show that lasted like eight seasons that was only ever in one room.

Yeah. It was amazing. It just happened in one room in their filthy headquarters in what seemed like a basement. Really strong cast. Then I landed on, um, we hovered on Laverne and Shirley for a minute, um, episode where they’re training for a wrestling exhibition. Um, and then just a quick scene from WKRP in Cincinnati, uh, Johnny Fever and Venus Flytrap, uh, featuring in this particular one.

Um, and then ended on like the final act of an A team where like the oxy acetylene torch comes out and Mr. T is wrapping dynamite and, and they’re getting ready to make, they’re making their villain trap. Um, and then, but the really fun thing was, um, [00:16:00] I went looking for commercials to put in between and, um, and I found some amazing commercials that there was, there was a fair amount of like really great early computing commercials and the way that I found the ones that were kind of the, my favorite was like, people have posted like all these YouTube videos where it’s like two hours of, of VHS, like SP recording of television, 1983, 1982.

I mean, I don’t know if it would have been. It had to be VHS, but anyway, um, and so you can just scrub through it and pull commercials. There was an amazing commercial, uh, that was just a montage of people. Someone pops up and they’re like, they’re like CRT monitors behind them. And he’s like, I bought a computer, but then I found out.

I don’t like computing. And it’s just like back and forth between people who go, I love computing and I don’t like it. I hate computing. Um, and, uh, and then there was just like, it was like a great Commodore 64 ad that was like the, [00:17:00] the only computer you’re ever going to need. Um, and then like, there was a great, like Bell labs, like.

Uh, phone commercial, uh, advertising, one of those phones that has like buttons along the side with names of your people and you just press it. It’s like, imagine making a phone call by just pressing their name and like, as obvious as that is, because obviously tech has changed. I managed to find this like grouping of commercials that were kind of fascinating to take in and realize like.

It’s that thing where you’re like, Jesus Christ, like I remember when I was growing up, I was like, Grandma, you, you grew up when there wasn’t TV or like, Mom, you were there when it went color and like, we fucking, we’ve surpassed that. We’ve surpassed many of the horrors that like our parents experience, not our grandparents.

They had World War II. Uh, and it’s just like one of those. Things that helps you kind of mark time. And it was just lovely to have to go through a bunch of Laverne and Shirley and Barney Miller episodes and what charming stuff that was. Um, okay. So the nostalgia versus sentimentality part, cause I was like, I don’t [00:18:00] like, um, theme.

Birthday parties. I’m not against them. I just don’t like them. Um, and I don’t really like like era theme, uh, birthday parties. And so I was sort of doing that. Um, and, but it was just that, like, there was not really much else going on that was on sort of the theme of the eighties or something other than that.

I come from the seventies and the eighties, by the way, because that’s when I really started remembering TV. Um, but like, I realized like nostalgia, like star Wars fandom and things like that, like always feels like this. This like longing to go back to a time and a place or to go back to a you to embody a moment that you were in.

And I feel like sentimentality for me is like bringing the moment forward and just like enjoying the feeling of right now. And there’s like no longing in it. There’s no regret in it. There’s no desire to look back and that doing this with like that approach. Was really sweet and really fun and I didn’t get locked into, you know, like I was worried if I start going through old commercials, old TV shows, I’m just going to get [00:19:00] like, my stomach’s going to turn after some point.

Cause I’m like, I just want to be back in the now. Um, but I just found it. It was also, it was almost like an academic. Pursuit to go looking at these things as history and super fun. So anyway, and people loved it. It was really like delightful to have people laughing at things that I thought were funny and that I, like I very specifically ordered the commercials and both in terms of like in a commercial break, but then over time, and like, there was the empire commercial, everyone know the empire song, five, eight, eight, two, 300.

Christina: Empire! Yeah,

Jeff: So I put one of those in, I put one of those in and as the, as they were singing that you could hear it rising up in the group of people until everyone hit empire as like a crescendo.

Christina: just like, yes!

Jeff: delightful. Yeah. And then just because I haven’t had a birthday in forever, I invited widely.

And so it was also just delightful to see. It’s like a wedding or some easy people from different parts of your life that should not be in the room together. And, uh, and there they are in the room together and you could introduce people that [00:20:00] you always knew would kind of like, enjoy each other. And that was cool.

Cause I don’t go out. I felt like when I saw all the people accepting the invite coming in, I was like, I think I need to just get up to a microphone and say, I owe you all a call. Like, that’s how it felt. Like, these are all the people I don’t really reach out to enough. Um, but I didn’t feel, uh, obligated to do that.

So I just felt nice. It felt nice to celebrate like a moment and, uh, like allow a ritual or something. Cause I haven’t really allowed that at birthday time, including when I was 40. So it was great.

Brett: Well, happy birthday.

Jeff: Thanks. The most I’ve ever said about my birthday.

Christina: I love it.

Brett: right. Well, mine’s going to be a combination health, mental health, obviously.

Christina: Yes.

Brett’s Health Diagnoses

Brett: So I got some diagnoses. Um, which I’m pretty excited about. Um, I got, um, hyper hyper mobile [00:21:00] spectrum disorder, which is, uh, kind of like, I didn’t have enough hyper mobility to have hyper mobile. Eh, Ehlers Danlos syndrome. Um, so it, I’m more on a spectrum, but that spectrum can include a lot of the symptoms that I do have.

Um, also mass cell activation syndrome, um, which relates a lot to kind of the histamine reactions and burning skin that I have and Oh, what else? There was like a whole smorgasbord. Let’s see, thoracic outlet syndrome.

Jeff: Woo! That one sounds awesome,

Christina: Yeah, it does.

Brett: um, that leads to a lot of like numbness in my face and stuff like that. Um, geez, I’m, I’m totally, the reason I’m blanking is because I’m working really hard to stay conscious right now.

Um, I am

Jeff: Oh my god, it didn’t occur to me you could pass out while we’re

Brett: I, I’m not, yeah, I’m [00:22:00] not usually this faint when I’m sitting. Um, I don’t know what’s going on right now. Um, I, I ran upstairs to get more water and salt and realize that was a really bad idea, like halfway through. Oh, POTS, POTS is the other one. Um, uh, postural orthostatic techie. Tachycardia syndrome.

Um, which is what makes me, you know, pass out when I stand up. Um, it’s why I’m wearing a binder around my abdomen right now, because I have to squeeze blood into my head and I have to drink three liters of water with five grams of salt a day. And five grams is a lot of salt. If you’ve ever kept track of your salt intake, um, we found this stuff called, Element L M N T that has a thousand milligrams of salt per packet.

So five of those mixed in [00:23:00] with four or five bottles of water. And I can stay hydrated. It’s not a matter of hydration that much water and salt increases your blood volume, uh, which makes it less work for your legs to pump. Your blood to your head when you stand up, I also had to raise my bed. I had to put cinder blocks under the front legs of my bed so that it’s at like, uh, maybe a 10 degree slope, uh, so that my blood pools in my legs while I’m sleeping.

Uh, it’s all very confusing to me, but because I got diagnoses, I was able to start some of these treatments and we were able to. figure out exactly what I needed to do. And I started a couple new meds, um, made a couple of changes to existing meds. And, uh, I’m just, I’m really grateful. I found this EDS clinic because of our friend, Brian Guffey. they posted [00:24:00] it on a Facebook thread. Um, and I, I immediately checked it out and got into, uh, Minneapolis or St. Cloud based doctor. And we did a telehealth session. Um, and I had just gotten some vitals from, uh, Gunderson that morning that I was able to share. And thanks to her, I was able to get a diagnosis that I could then go back to my primary care physician with, and I also got referrals to a bunch of like.

Uh, EDS aware physical therapy places. Um, and I had to, one of the meds I’m on had to come from a compounding pharmacy. Do you know what that is?

Jeff: No.

Brett: a pharmacy that can make drugs for you.

Christina: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I do know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because a lot of people have them for the, the, um, uh, like the, um, Ogilvy and, and things like that. Like you can get them cheaper than, um, paying for like Ozempic over the counter. Like,[00:25:00]

Brett: well, and there are, there are some drugs, like the drug that I’m on is used to, as it’s not Narcan, but it’s used to counteract opiate overdoses, um, naproxen, I think it’s

Christina: Yes.

Brett: um, but it’s not profitable enough that any drug company will actually make it. So the only way you can get this drug is through a compounding pharmacy.

Um, so that’s, I don’t know, it’s kind of fun to like have them manufacture my drugs for

Jeff: And are these from, I mean, are these for lack of any real terminology, like open source drugs that people are like, yeah,

Brett: Kind of, yeah, basically, um, uh, patent, patent

Jeff: patent free, DRM free.

Brett: Yeah.

Jeff: Um, interesting. So these diagnoses, are they things that typically are chained together or are they just

Brett: Yeah. So all of these fit under the umbrella of dysautonomia, which is what I knew going into [00:26:00] it, I knew that my symptoms like had to be dysautonomia of some kind, um, and that encompasses or comprises, um, I think probably 13 different, uh, disorders and syndromes. And so like generally, if you have one, you probably are, there’s probably coma comorbidities with at least one other.

Um, it’s really common to like EDS and POTS almost, I would say 90 percent of the time seem to go hand in hand, uh, based on people I’ve talked to. I know, I know one family where the daughter has EDS and the The sun has, uh, pots, but, but they don’t share the two. Um, anyway, it’s yeah. So like things are better than the last time we talked and in general, I’m functioning better today has been especially rough, partly because the insomnia [00:27:00] the night before I was up because I had like skin burning in the middle of the night and I couldn’t fall back asleep.

I don’t know what got me up last night, but out of the last. I want to say month, there’s only been two days that I’ve slept more than five hours, um, which has me super run down. And like two nights ago, I slept for like nine hours and I had a pretty good day.

Jeff: What’s your magic number for sleep? Like,

Brett: magic number is nine. I do really well with 10.

Jeff: yeah,

Brett: Um, but I can never get 10. Um, and yeah, that doesn’t, 10 hours of sleep doesn’t generally work if you want to have like family time and a day job.

Jeff: yeah.

Brett: Um, and I also enjoy a little TV watching at night,

Jeff: Yes. As, as we do in this day and age

Brett: I’m having, I’m having pretty severe histamine reactions, which means I need to [00:28:00] go on a low histamine diet and there are

Jeff: low histamine diet.

Brett: So things like raspberries and tomatoes, legumes, like all of these foods are high histamine. Um, and I, I could not explain histamine to you at this point. Um, I’m still learning. Um, but like, If I, I tried raspberry sorbet last night and, um, after I had some kimchi rice, kimchi fermented foods in general are high histamine.

Um, so I was, if I, I think I was having an extinction reaction to like knowing I was going to have to give up histamines. So I was like, eat all the histamines. And I got like, Multiple burning spots on my skin, like intense burning. And I went and took antihistamines and rubbed a bunch of aloe on myself and got through it.

Okay. But yeah, like that’s part of the MCAS, the mast cell stuff. Um, [00:29:00] Yeah.

Jeff: what, what, is this something that was dormant in you? Is it something? Okay. Yeah.

Brett: Yeah. It’s very likely that I’ve had the mass. So since childhood, like I’ve had that burning skin feeling since at least middle school, maybe earlier. Um, and I just had always. I’ve made a bunch of assumptions. The first I assumed everyone felt like that.

And then as I got older and I started getting into drugs and alcohol, I always associated that feeling with getting sober. So when I started to feel that I would go and do more drugs and it would help. And I thought. And I thought that feeling was just withdrawal and like, so I would go like two weeks without a drug thinking I was getting through the detox, but the feeling wouldn’t go away and it would just never go away.

Um, and yeah, and I would eventually end up doing drugs again, but, um. Yeah, now I, now I know [00:30:00] that feeling is, uh, mast cell and I can do things. I, I can, I have interventions for it. I can’t drink anymore. The, uh, drinking makes the pots pretty crazy. Um, and so like, if I, right now I’m blacking out, just sitting down.

If I had a beer. I, I would, I would be out, I would be unconscious and not from the alcohol, but from the effect of the alcohol on my blood flow. Um, yeah, so this is fun stuff. Um, making progress though, pretty excited, um, to actually be moving forward on this. Like, cause I had, like, I got depressed, um, just how my whole life kind of suddenly got turned upside down.

Oh, in answer to your question, my, my psychiatrist. Kind of your unspoken question. My psychiatrist, um,

Jeff: you can read my mind. I don’t like it.

Brett: uh, said that she, she and her daughter, [00:31:00] both their symptoms really began shortly after their COVID booster. And none of us want to be like a conspiracy anti vaxxer thing about it. Like none of us are anti vaccine.

Um, but her anecdotal evidence or her, and her story was that. Like it, it seemed to kick and she had heard from other people too, that the booster kicked off the symptoms. And I had the booster in October and my symptoms started in November. So just from an anecdotal standpoint, it is possible in my

Jeff: I don’t think those wonderings make you an anti vaxxer or conspiracy minded. I mean, it’s always, this is the problem with the moment we are and we’re in is like, there’s always a possibility that there’s something about this vaccine that we couldn’t anticipate and that we made a sacrifice in order to kind of like deal with an emergency.

Like I, I’m still, I remember like when we, when I got the vaccine first, my [00:32:00] attitude was like, give it to me like acupuncture, like you just put it all over me. I’ll take it. But I also knew in saying that, that like, Down the road. I don’t actually know what’s going to happen, and we’re probably just, you know, in that zone, the beginning of that zone where we start to see and wonder. Yeah.

Brett: But I’m past the depression now. Um, I am, I am on to the, um, just dealing with it. Uh, just learning to exist with whatever’s going on now. Um, it’s already become kind of normal for me to feel like this. And it no longer feels like I’m suddenly disabled. I’m actually. You know, I’m working. I’m, I’m functioning.

I clean the kitchen whenever I can. Um, but when I was getting ready to leave for Jeff’s birthday party, I was feeling well enough to, uh, clean all the litters, clean up, clean up the kitchen, put away all the stuff in the living room [00:33:00] around my little couch nest and leave the house so that Elle could enjoy.

The night of not having me in the house and, and wouldn’t have to do a bunch of chores just to feel comfortable in the house. Um, I tried to, I tried to make that work. Um, and then I think that was, that was the second big bummer for me about missing the party was like, I always get excited to give Al the house because.

Because they get the house so rarely. I am always home. Um, and it like, I got a hotel and I was going to like let them just for a night. Just it was one night and then I had to go home and then I ended up on the couch and then I had a really bad night, uh, to the extent that I was kind of glad that I didn’t go.

But anyway, let’s talk about, so I was going to take a train.

Travel Woes and Train Troubles

Brett: I can’t drive right now, but I was going to take a train to go to Jeff’s birthday party and Um, I’m in

Jeff: so sweet, Brett. [00:34:00] Which is so sweet. And say to the listeners, you’re about how far from us?

Brett: It’s a two hour drive. It’s a two hour train ride. Um, and I was going to take a train, uh, which I was also kind of excited about.

Jeff: Oh, it’s the best! It’s the best.

Brett: for the business seat, business class seat. Um, which I, I’ve never even ridden coach on an Amtrak. I usually end up in a sleeper car or business class.

And I’m from what I’ve seen, the coach seats are nice, like

Christina: I think

Jeff: really nice.

Christina: Yeah. I was going to say, I think, I think they’re fine. I mean, I’ve, I’ve never been in a sleeper car, so I’ve only been on the Acela or I guess like probably coach. I mean, they’re fine.

Brett: Yeah, yeah. And I was looking forward to it, but here in Minnesota, it was about, uh, negative 10 and, um, Amtrak canceled the two trains that were running after mine and [00:35:00] left a mine TBD on the app all the way up until departure time. And they never, they never put a departure time on it. So I showed up at the train station to see what was up.

And,

Jeff: this sounds like the beginning of a not terribly great train song. Keep going. I showed up at the train station. Sorry, I got

Brett: just to see what was up. Um, and, and a young woman had just gotten off the phone with Amtrak and informed me that they were going to send a bus, the train was, the train was gone. They were going to send a bus. It was going to be like an hour, but they were going to get us all to the cities. And I just.

Left because a I hate buses. I I bought a train ticket because I hate buses and Be like, I was already cutting it close to get to Jeff’s party. Um, [00:36:00] and waiting an hour for a bus that was going to take almost three hours to get there meant I was going to show up at a point in the evening where I was already going to be too tired to function.

And it just wouldn’t have been fun. And just party was the only reason I was going. And if I was going to miss that, then there wasn’t a lot of points. So I’m currently trying to get. Some kind of refund or credit for my hotel and my train tickets, but I haven’t had luck yet. .

The Romanticism of Train Rides

Jeff: I would love to take a long train ride. I’ve contemplated the Chicago line that they now have, Twin Cities

Brett: There was, they did a promo and Dave Chartier, who you guys may know, um,

Jeff: Who? I don’t know who that is.

Brett: He was a writer at Tua, moved on to Ars Technica. I don’t know what he’s doing these days. Um, he’s the reason I have my career. Um, he started writing, he started writing about Mood Blast. My first, my first app written mostly in Apple script.

And he started writing about it. He [00:37:00] was writing about every release I put out and he was writing about it. And I, I started getting more and more readers and more and more followers. And pretty soon it led to like job offers. And, uh, so, so I credit him with.

Amtrak’s Writing Fellowship

Brett: Everything I am today, um, but he took part in Amtrak’s promotion where they were paying people to write.

Uh, they would give them free, free train rides, cross country, and all you had to do was write about Amtrak now and then, but they wanted you to work on like a novel or your next big thing.

Jeff: That’s

Brett: they were just paying people to ride the train and write.

Christina: Yeah. One of my colleagues, one of my colleagues got, uh, Chris Taylor, um, got that too. And, uh, he got like, they call it like a fellowship or something, I think like the Antrec fellowship. Yeah. Chris Taylor was part of that as well. And I was like, that sounds really cool. Um, I would hate it. Like I would hate it, but, but I think for, for many types of people, there was something very romantic about like that.

Brett: Romantic is the word. [00:38:00] Nostalgic even. Um. Okay. So we’re going to skip talking about Metta and Zuck. And I don’t even want

Christina: care.

Jeff: No

Brett: to talk about, I don’t want to talk about the, uh, the inauguration or about Metta.

Jeff: Hey, I feel like if that’s what you want, there’s a lot of podcast options.

Brett’s Media Corner

Brett: I do want to tell you about the sunny and Philadelphia connection that came up for me this week. Um, so I, I, I watched all the way through, um, Abbott elementary. Uh, starring Glenn Howerton, who was Dennis on Sonny, um, that show is amazing. I’ve seen it through twice. I love it. Um, it’s, he’s a school teacher who refuses to teach AP bio.

Oh no, I’m not, I’m not, I’m not Abbott elementary. I’m sorry. AP bio. We’re talking about AP bio. Um, I get the two mixed up, but, um, he, he’s, he’s a, he’s a school teacher who refuses to teach [00:39:00] AP bio tells all his students, they’ll get an a, as long as they don’t tell anyone he’s not teaching. Um, and he begins using them to, he’s, he’s very revenge focused.

He always wants revenge on somebody. And he focuses this advanced student group on helping him come up with revenge plots. Um, And occasionally to help him come up with like the perfect date or whatever. And he, it’s this bunch of really creative, really smart kids and they help him. Oh, it’s, it’s so good.

So, um, so I’ve watched that and then I started watching, um, High Potential, which stars Caitlin Olsen, who was the sister on Sonny in Philadelphia and. Um, that show, I haven’t watched it all the way through. Uh, it’s, it’s new and I’m really enjoying it. She is a, uh, cleaning lady with a very high IQ that so high that it, they call it high [00:40:00]