These Are a Few of Our Favorite Things (2024 Edition)

Intro

Jeff Battersby (0s)

Love you Tom

Tom Anderson (0s)

I know you do, I know you do, why you're here even though you're in a pissy mood?

Jeff Battersby (6s)

Season

Tom Anderson (19s)

Putting the B into "Influenza Types." This is Basic AF, a mostly tech podcast, too cranky. Oh, dude,

Jeff Battersby (28s)

Dude, it's been a morning already.

Tom Anderson (28s)

Happy holidays, Jeff.

Tom Anderson (30s)

Yeah, wow, man, we started off both of us griping about different things and then we had,

Jeff Battersby (32s)

Angry old men.

Jeff Battersby (38s)

Yeah, and we're a half an hour into checking in.

Jeff Battersby (41s)

We haven't done anything yet.

Tom Anderson (43s)

we haven't done jack.

Tom Anderson (44s)

We had a recording fail.

Tom Anderson (46s)

We had lagging video, me being slow and Jeff saying, you know, if you would speak complete sentences, I would know if it was working or not.

Jeff Battersby (53s)

Yeah, it's hard to check whether or not your audio is working.

Jeff Battersby (59s)

If you go, yep, hey, yep, yeah, and yeah, head nods don't work at all.

Tom Anderson (1m)

[LAUGH] Yeah, nod your head people, [LAUGH] so happy holidays everyone.

Jeff Battersby (1m 7s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (1m 8s)

Nod your head.

Tom Anderson (1m 15s)

As we record this, it is Saturday, December 21st.

Tom Anderson (1m 18s)

So we're just a few days away from Christmas and then rolling into hopefully some downtime for you and some relaxing time in there as well.

Tom Anderson (1m 30s)

Jeff, how have you been, sir?

Jeff Battersby (1m 31s)

Oh, it's been an interesting week to say the very least.

Jeff Battersby (1m 35s)

We don't need to go into the details, but as I shared with you on the side, I had an interesting night at work last night.

Tom Anderson (1m 44s)

Yes, you did.

Jeff Battersby (1m 45s)

Yeah, yeah, you know, I won't say anymore.

Tom Anderson (1m 47s)

You sure did.

Tom Anderson (1m 53s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (1m 54s)

Speaking speaking too much.

Jeff Battersby (1m 55s)

I don't need.

Jeff Battersby (1m 56s)

Told you the truth, and now my cranky butt is ready to record.

Tom Anderson (2m)

I'm glad we had those issues.

Jeff Battersby (2m 1s)

podcast with you

Tom Anderson (2m 4s)

We've both seemed to have moved into better moods at this point.

Tom Anderson (2m 7s)

It's just laughing at the absurdity of all of it.

Jeff Battersby (2m 7s)

Yeah

Jeff Battersby (2m 9s)

Right, uh at the idiocy of ourselves so day so be it

Tom Anderson (2m 10s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (2m 14s)

Uh, so this is episode 51.

Tom Anderson (2m 17s)

Show notes can be found at basicafshow.com/51.

Tom Anderson (2m 22s)

And for this episode, you know, we did this last year.

Tom Anderson (2m 24s)

It's kind of a little holiday show.

Tom Anderson (2m 25s)

So we're doing a 2024 edition of it.

Tom Anderson (2m 29s)

a few of our favorite things.

Tom Anderson (2m 30s)

So some things that we like, some will be tech, some won't, but it should be fun to kind of go through the list.

Jeff Battersby (2m 38s)

Yeah, I'm excited. Not very much tech on mine, but I bolstered it near the end. But it's a lot of non tech sitting in my list,

Tom Anderson (2m 44s)

That's how we take use of that, make use of that "mostly" that we've got in the title there.

Jeff Battersby (2m 51s)

but that's okay. Mostly, right, the mostly tech podcast. That's exactly right. Is there anything newsworthy this week?

Tom Anderson (2m 56s)

Mostly.

Tom Anderson (2m 57s)

Right.

Tom Anderson (2m 58s)

Uh, Newsworthy this week, um, no, I mean, there probably is.

Jeff Battersby (3m 6s)

Okay, I will say our friend who's gonna be making an appearance in January to

Apple Vision Pro

Jeff Battersby (3m 13s)

Benjamin you savage

Jeff Battersby (3m 15s)

Whose name looks like it's spelled Jen Kowitz, but it's young savage as it's properly pronounced

Jeff Battersby (3m 23s)

he you know, he visits me on the regular he travels between

Jeff Battersby (3m 28s)

Baltimore and Canada His significant other is in Canada. And so we were having a visit on his

Jeff Battersby (3m 36s)

way up there, and he was talking about possibly doing a vision pro and maybe a Mac mini as a work, you know, travel work tool. That was one of the things that he, yeah. So he actually sent us an email about that as well. And he texted me

Tom Anderson (3m 48s)

I remember that. Yep.

Jeff Battersby (3m 57s)

shortly after, after he arrived across the border and said that his pretty

Jeff Battersby (4m 6s)

like 10 year old, maybe a little older than that MacBook pro was about to do him dirty. And so he was going to go to the Apple store and kind of check those things out. And so he did a vision pro demo and loved it, but said the thing was

Tom Anderson (4m 20s)

Yep.

Tom Anderson (4m 21s)

Yep.

Jeff Battersby (4m 22s)

too heavy to work all day plus two hours. So I think he has ditched the idea, at least for now, of a vision pro and Mac mini, but he was bowled over. He was bowled over by the Vision Pro.

Jeff Battersby (4m 36s)

Really, really impressed with the quality.

Jeff Battersby (4m 39s)

I know you have hopped on recently the, um,

Jeff Battersby (4m 44s)

you were, you were using it, I think, because you were hacking up a lung or having one of several other diseases in having to work from home, you, uh, you

Tom Anderson (4m 50s)

I've been rekt out, I don't know what's going on man.

Jeff Battersby (5m)

download, was it the beta or the latest version of, of Vision OS that you downloaded and you started using the...

Jeff Battersby (5m 6s)

the full-screen display, right?

Tom Anderson (5m 8s)

Yeah, so it was 2.2, so the official release.

Jeff Battersby (5m 12s)

Okay.

Tom Anderson (5m 12s)

I also picked up that Belkin head strap that looks very very similar to the one that Apple showed like if you recall when they did the announcement and like introduced Vision Pro and they had the guy that was doing the creepy spatial video of his daughter's birthday party or whatever and they kind of everybody was like yeah that you know that that missed the mark.

Jeff Battersby (5m 32s)

Yes.

Tom Anderson (5m 36s)

section of the video he had.

Tom Anderson (5m 38s)

showed a headstrap with the solo knit.

Tom Anderson (5m 41s)

Um, but when they shipped it, they didn't ship that.

Tom Anderson (5m 43s)

They just shipped the solo knit and then the dual band.

Tom Anderson (5m 46s)

Um, and so the Belkin one looks very similar to it.

Tom Anderson (5m 48s)

So I picked that up.

Tom Anderson (5m 49s)

Um, and so I have been playing with it a little bit, um, Since the update,

Tom Anderson (5m 56s)

the biggest thing with the update that I wanted to try was the new Mac virtual display features, which you get the wide and the ultra wide, uh, displays.

Jeff Battersby (6m 2s)

Yes, yep

Tom Anderson (6m 7s)

And that's pretty nice.

Tom Anderson (6m 8s)

Like it really opens up the canvas for the Mac, um, which was kind of nice,

Tom Anderson (6m 15s)

but I still run into the same issues.

Tom Anderson (6m 17s)

Even with the Belkin strap that is like you just mentioned there for Ben.

Tom Anderson (6m 20s)

It's just heavy.

Tom Anderson (6m 22s)

Um, and the whole thing is just messy.

Jeff Battersby (6m 23s)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tom Anderson (6m 26s)

Like I hate dragging that battery pack around and even when it just sits on the desk, it annoys me because it's messy.

Tom Anderson (6m 33s)

Um, because you've got that long cord attached to that battery pack.

Tom Anderson (6m 38s)

It's like an hour and a half, two hours, but to be honest,

Tom Anderson (6m 41s)

that's longer than I can wear the thing for.

Tom Anderson (6m 42s)

So the battery life hasn't been an issue for me.

Jeff Battersby (6m 43s)

Hmm.

Tom Anderson (6m 44s)

But anyhow, I did watch football the other night, made it through the first quarter, um, and then I had to take it off cause it was getting too heavy.

Jeff Battersby (6m 46s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (6m 46s)

He said he did.

Jeff Battersby (6m 47s)

Okay.

Jeff Battersby (6m 48s)

How was that?

Jeff Battersby (6m 49s)

Oh, okay.

Jeff Battersby (6m 51s)

And what app were you watching football in?

Tom Anderson (6m 54s)

Uh, the Prime app.

Jeff Battersby (6m 56s)

And that's, so you're watching the Thursday night game and, and that was, um, we can talk about that too, get our, get our good friend, Chris Freitag in here for a minute about how Denver blew that one up pretty badly.

Tom Anderson (6m 58s)

Thursday night game.

Tom Anderson (6m 59s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (7m 8s)

They did, and I told you, how much did I call that?

Jeff Battersby (7m 11s)

Yeah, you did.

Tom Anderson (7m 12s)

[LAUGH] That junk there at the end of the second quarter didn't burn the clock and then the free kick after the penalty and it changed the whole game.

Jeff Battersby (7m 13s)

He's like, yeah, totally.

Tom Anderson (7m 21s)

I was like, there you go, there's the game, there you go.

Jeff Battersby (7m 22s)

Anyway, we don't need to talk football, but does the, does the prime app support,

Jeff Battersby (7m 27s)

like, is it legit or is it just big TV screen?

Tom Anderson (7m 32s)

Um, yeah, it's kind of big, it's the iPad app basically.

Jeff Battersby (7m 35s)

Okay.

Tom Anderson (7m 35s)

Um, but I mean, it, it was good enough.

Tom Anderson (7m 37s)

Like I had it, you know, up, I'll say up on the wall and part of the ceilings, it was big, um, but I could do other things while I was watching the game, which was nice.

Tom Anderson (7m 46s)

Um, and I did a little bit of that, but like I said, it just got, it just gets heavy, um, and I think especially if you don't wear it frequently, cause when I first got it and I was using it more, it didn't bother me, it seemed to bother me less because I think you adapt.

Tom Anderson (8m 2s)

And if you take a break or something like that, but again, it's.

Tom Anderson (8m 5s)

something like that, but again, it's.

Jeff Battersby (8m 9s)

Yeah, that's what Benjamin said. He said it would be hard for him to wear the thing for the whole day If you could get past two hours of work He said that's the other killer is two hours is just not enough for him to get any actual

Jeff Battersby (8m 20s)

real real work done with what he's doing, so

Jeff Battersby (8m 24s)

He did not tell me what it is that he is planning on doing whether or not he picked up a new MacBook Pro Or something like that but the idea at least presently of a Mac mini and the big vision Pro not a

Jeff Battersby (8m 37s)

and not a way he's going to play, so.

Jeff Battersby (8m 39s)

It will be interesting to talk with him when we get him on, we're going to have he and Joe Moyer on

Jeff Battersby (8m 45s)

after the first of the year to talk about, really, Apple TV's

Jeff Battersby (8m 53s)

show offerings, which are flipping brilliant. So anyway, it'll be interesting to ask him.

Tom Anderson (8m 57s)

I'll be behind the scenes producing that episode.

Jeff Battersby (8m 59s)

Yeah, yeah, that's it. This show produced by Tom Anderson. Yeah, it'll be, it'll be interesting to to talk with them, you know, and get a little.

Jeff Battersby (9m 9s)

Get a little insight about what his thoughts are now that he's had the opportunity to play with it and see where he actually went.

Jeff Battersby (9m 15s)

And he's a he's a graphics guy, really amazing graphics guy, does some

Jeff Battersby (9m 20s)

good artwork. We initially wanted him to do our show artwork, but he was too busy for us. And so we

Tom Anderson (9m 28s)

It's got real work to do.

Jeff Battersby (9m 29s)

yeah, yeah, a couple of schmucks that want to look like robots.

Tom Anderson (9m 31s)

Not that Randall doesn't, but Randall was nice and squeezed us in.

Jeff Battersby (9m 34s)

Yeah, yeah, Randall's busy too, but and you know, they are absolutely.

Tom Anderson (9m 35s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (9m 36s)

Yeah, they both are.

Tom Anderson (9m 37s)

And they're both really good.

Jeff Battersby (9m 39s)

So anyway, interesting, I just wanted to get your feedback brief, and then we can go into our favorite things, as we typically do.

Tom Anderson (9m 46s)

Because Vision Pro didn't make the list.

Favorite Things of 2024

Tom Anderson (9m 48s)

What did make the list, Jeff?

Jeff Battersby (9m 51s)

So, as I said, mine's not very tech heavy. But we'll start with and we can, I guess, bounce between the two of us.

Jeff Battersby (10m)

One of the tech pieces that I did get this year is a beetle x 31 SSD, it's a little one.

Beetle X31 SSD

Jeff Battersby (10m 9s)

That I got is a one terabyte golden looks golden, like a golden scarab. If you remember what those were from old Egyptians, it's a cool little SSD fix fits into a little pocket that I have on my backpack.

Jeff Battersby (10m 26s)

Because my other SSD walked with my stuff a while ago, and I hadn't really got one. But I like having an SSD with me in case I have a client that needs, you know, big files copy off and

Jeff Battersby (10m 39s)

you know, move from one place to another, I like to have more than just a thumb drive. So I picked that up really tight, cute looking thing, not too expensive. I think it was in the 60s, I'd have to double check and see what it is that I

Jeff Battersby (10m 53s)

that I paid for it because I got it at a discount. It was on sale, I think on Amazon, who's currently on strike.

Jeff Battersby (11m 1s)

I'm looking up the to see what the price is. But it's a it's a cute little, little device.

Jeff Battersby (11m 9s)

Really like it fits easily in the palm of your hand pretty gold color comes with a plastic safety thing that you snap around it. So it looks like kind of like a mouse.

Jeff Battersby (11m 23s)

And

Jeff Battersby (11m 25s)

It, it really is. It's a cool. It's a cool little thing. So I can highly recommend that as one of my tech choices for this year. I don't really have a lot. Like I said,

Jeff Battersby (11m 37s)

but it's a three-year warranty.

Jeff Battersby (11m 39s)

It comes in a one terabyte and 512 gigabyte models and I got it for way less than this. The one terabyte is listed as $135 and I got it for well less than $135. I got it for about half of that which is kind of crazy.

Tom Anderson (12m 3s)

Nice, that's a good deal.

Jeff Battersby (12m 4s)

Yeah, I would say. Champagne gold they call it.

Tom Anderson (12m 9s)

Yeah, look at that, that's pretty interesting looking. It doesn't look like you'd expect

Jeff Battersby (12m 9s)

It looks like, no, no, it's really, it's really slick.

Tom Anderson (12m 14s)

like an external hard drive to look. Looks almost like a candy tin of sorts.

Tom Anderson (12m 20s)

[laughs] Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (12m 20s)

Yeah, exactly. Your Altoids box. So yeah, I got that. It does come, by the way,

Jeff Battersby (12m 29s)

with a couple different cables too so it's suitable for whatever device you currently have. So that's my first choice. What are you going to ask?

Tom Anderson (12m 35s)

Sweet. I like it. Yeah, I like it. Looks good. So for me, first choice, I'm going to go with a software app title. So if you recall last year, I had the Bear Notes app in my list, right? And spoke highly of it. Still think highly of it. It is still a very, very great app if you need a note-taking app. This year though I moved back.

Jeff Battersby (12m 38s)

Yeah, me too.

Craft 3

Jeff Battersby (12m 55s)

Yes. Mm-hmm.

Tom Anderson (13m 6s)

Much to Jeff's chagrin at times. To Kraft.

Jeff Battersby (13m 8s)

Yeah, right this minute when I'm trying to put a stupid link in for something. Go ahead

Tom Anderson (13m 15s)

But I went back to Kraft. I know you do. I know you do.

Jeff Battersby (13m 16s)

Love you, Tom

Tom Anderson (13m 19s)

Why you're here even though you're in a pissy mood.

Tom Anderson (13m 22s)

And part of the reason being the Kraft goes a little deeper with.

Jeff Battersby (13m 23s)

It is the season

Tom Anderson (13m 36s)

What you can do with the notes craft is kind of like a document writing app, but it's got a ton of stuff built into it and I found something that I really missed was the slash commands.

Tom Anderson (13m 48s)

Um, I just feel like I can go much quicker with formatting and adding elements to the page and things like that, but they had a big release just this fall, uh, craft version 3. I think it was right around just before Thanksgiving here in the US that it came out, uh, had been on the beta.

Tom Anderson (14m 4s)

had been on the beta.

Tom Anderson (14m 6s)

of taking it to the next level, almost like a Notion-type competitor, if you've ever used Notion for documents and databases and things like that, so they kind of had a to-do system into it previously, but they were just checkboxes, but they've built in the beginnings of a proper task manager with...

Tom Anderson (14m 35s)

scheduling and reminders and things like that.

Tom Anderson (14m 38s)

They've added some style stuff, which makes it a little easier to make the pages look nice.

Tom Anderson (14m 44s)

I don't tend to do too much of that.

Tom Anderson (14m 45s)

I just put text on the page.

Tom Anderson (14m 49s)

But the thing that they added that I was waiting for and really liked is a feature they are calling collections, which are...

Tom Anderson (14m 57s)

They're similar to tables, but they're more like the databases that you would find in Notion.

Tom Anderson (15m 3s)

and build your collection, add the column.

Tom Anderson (15m 5s)

or the fields that you want in the collection.

Tom Anderson (15m 8s)

You can relate fields between different collections.

Tom Anderson (15m 12s)

So just like a little database, relational database there.

Tom Anderson (15m 14s)

So for example, I have a collection for the podcast.

Tom Anderson (15m 18s)

And so I've got the episodes that we've got planned up,

Tom Anderson (15m 21s)

the publishing date, the status, who the guest is.

Tom Anderson (15m 25s)

And the guest field is actually a relation field that goes over to another database that have all of our guests that have come on.

Tom Anderson (15m 32s)

So when I add them to a note.

Tom Anderson (15m 36s)

or the show, it shows up in their list in the guest database that I made.

Tom Anderson (15m 42s)

So the relational piece there.

Tom Anderson (15m 43s)

But what I like about that is it gives me that kind of ability to plan out everything.

Tom Anderson (15m 48s)

I can slice and dice it based on filters and things like that.

Tom Anderson (15m 52s)

So I can see, okay, here's what's coming up with the podcast.

Tom Anderson (15m 54s)

Here's everything that's planned.

Tom Anderson (15m 56s)

Here's everything that's kind of more unofficial at this point that are just ideas, those kinds of things.

Tom Anderson (16m 4s)

So that's been a nice addition.

Tom Anderson (16m 6s)

Uh, they're running a sale.

Tom Anderson (16m 8s)

I think it's still going on.

Tom Anderson (16m 9s)

They did call it a black Friday sale, but I think they extended it to the end of the year, where if you sign up, you get 50% off of the subscription for as long as you have your plan.

Tom Anderson (16m 18s)

So that's kind of nice.

Tom Anderson (16m 19s)

So did that, went ahead and got the family plan set up for that.

Tom Anderson (16m 23s)

Um, my wife's been using it with her PhD program and she's, she's enjoying it too.

Tom Anderson (16m 27s)

So.

Jeff Battersby (16m 28s)

Oh, cool. I didn't realize she was doing a PhD, either. That's great.

Tom Anderson (16m 28s)

Crap.

Tom Anderson (16m 30s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (16m 31s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (16m 32s)

She's a couple semesters in.

Jeff Battersby (16m 32s)

Smarter than both of us. I mean...

Tom Anderson (16m 34s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (16m 35s)

Well, she married me, so it shows how smart she really is.

Tom Anderson (16m 41s)

I kid.

Tom Anderson (16m 41s)

I kid.

Jeff Battersby (16m 42s)

I've got comments, pal.

Tom Anderson (16m 42s)

She, she's way smarter than me, so she's definitely elevates me.

Tom Anderson (16m 48s)

So, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (16m 51s)

Good for her. Couple of semesters in, you said?

Tom Anderson (16m 54s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (16m 54s)

She's two semesters, I think at this point.

Jeff Battersby (16m 58s)

What's it in? Just so we can give a shout out to...

Tom Anderson (16m 59s)

Um, organizational leadership.

Jeff Battersby (17m 2s)

Oh, okay. Nice.

Tom Anderson (17m 4s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (17m 5s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (17m 6s)

So she, she, she just loves that process.

Tom Anderson (17m 8s)

Um, and so she's, she's having fun with it.

Tom Anderson (17m 11s)

So she's, she's.

Jeff Battersby (17m 13s)

Good. Congratulations.

Jeff Battersby (17m 15s)

Look forward to referring her to her as a doctor,

Tom Anderson (17m 20s)

Yes.

Jeff Battersby (17m 21s)

which you'll have to do around the house every day after that.

Tom Anderson (17m 22s)

Oh, of course I will.

Tom Anderson (17m 24s)

Oh, doctor.

Tom Anderson (17m 25s)

She'll be like, I hate you so much.

Jeff Battersby (17m 34s)

Too funny.

Jeff Battersby (17m 36s)

All righty, cool.

Jeff Battersby (17m 38s)

Yeah, I was on craft for a while.

Jeff Battersby (17m 41s)

I'm back to Apple Notes,

Jeff Battersby (17m 42s)

which works perfectly fine for me.

Jeff Battersby (17m 43s)

And continues to be fine, but I understand your love of craft.

Jeff Battersby (17m 48s)

And so, all good.

Jeff Battersby (17m 50s)

All right, for me, next.

Jeff Battersby (17m 52s)

So, very analog here.

Jeff Battersby (17m 54s)

When I say very analog, I will do these one at a time,

If We Were Villains

Jeff Battersby (17m 59s)

so we can bounce back and forth between them.

Jeff Battersby (18m 4s)

I'm going to recommend three books,

Jeff Battersby (18m 7s)

but I'll do the first one right now.

Jeff Battersby (18m 10s)

And what's interesting, and I didn't realize it

Jeff Battersby (18m 13s)

until I was making this list,

Jeff Battersby (18m 15s)

is there are interesting connections in each of these novels that I'm going to recommend.

Jeff Battersby (18m 22s)

And that is that they are linked back very clearly to other pieces of literature,

Jeff Battersby (18m 29s)

which at the time that I was writing them down,

Jeff Battersby (18m 32s)

I was like, "Okay, I like this one, I like this one, I like this one."

Jeff Battersby (18m 35s)

The first is a book by M.L. Rio,

Jeff Battersby (18m 40s)

titled, "If We Were Villains," which was just reco-

Jeff Battersby (18m 43s)

amended to me by a couple theater people that I work with. It is essentially a murder mystery,

Jeff Battersby (18m 52s)

but it is about a bunch of students that are at the Shakespearean Theater Conservatory,

Jeff Battersby (18m 58s)

so you can kind of see where my brain goes with this. It's theater-related, and what's really interesting about the novel, a couple of different things, is that it, one, is for

Jeff Battersby (19m 13s)

a play. So it has a prologue, and then we have act one, and then a multitude of scenes in the first section. It goes through five different acts, and then it has an epilogue at the end.

Jeff Battersby (19m 27s)

What happens is, without giving away too much detail, a college actor is kind of a P. Rick.

Jeff Battersby (19m 40s)

Um, cough laugh I think goodbye on that one.

Jeff Battersby (19m 44s)

Um, it winds up dead in a lake.

Jeff Battersby (19m 47s)

And, uh, this is kind of the backwards telling of this story.

Jeff Battersby (19m 51s)

It's, uh, it's really interestingly written, kind of a barn burner as far as stories like that go.

Jeff Battersby (19m 57s)

Um, integrates a lot of Shakespeare, which is really interesting, as part of the normal conversation.

Jeff Battersby (20m 4s)

And it just makes me think about, you know, being a kid in college, which I never really was a kid in college.

Jeff Battersby (20m 9s)

I was, but I wasn't a very good student when I was a kid in college.

Jeff Battersby (20m 13s)

Um, but the idea that you're so embedded in things, and in this particular case they're embedded in Shakespeare,

Jeff Battersby (20m 19s)

that their normal day-to-day conversations, uh, have quotes throughout it that they kind of connect to.

Jeff Battersby (20m 28s)

Um, so it's, it, it's not in any way a, you know, boring because they're throwing Shakespeare in or lines from various plays from Shakespeare.

Jeff Battersby (20m 39s)

I don't know, it's like a particular mindset that you have when you're in college.

Jeff Battersby (20m 44s)

where everything is about what you're doing at the moment, and you're so thoroughly embedded in a way of thinking and the things that you're reading and doing, that what you're reading and studying, and in this case, acting, becomes a part of who you are, such that you're correlating everything that you're doing back to the place that you're studying, your language is peppered with the various things that you're learning and seeing.

Jeff Battersby (21m 14s)

It's from 2018, so I'm a little late to the game on this, but really quite good.

Jeff Battersby (21m 19s)

Highly recommend "If We Were Villains" by M.L. Rio.

Tom Anderson (21m 24s)

Nice. You said you had two more and they were kind of interlinked.

Jeff Battersby (21m 28s)

Yeah, I'll explain as we get to the other two, so you can move on to your next thing.

Tom Anderson (21m 31s)

Okay. Great.

Tom Anderson (21m 35s)

All right. Why we're keeping, why we're keeping it analog.

Tom Anderson (21m 38s)

I'll go ahead and do that too. Another book recommendation. Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (21m 40s)

Okay, oh

Tom Anderson (21m 43s)

So if you lived in or grew up in as a kid or whatever, you know, the DMV as it's called DC, Maryland,

Capital Centre: A Retrospective

Tom Anderson (21m 52s)

Virginia in the 70s, 80s, 90s.

Tom Anderson (21m 55s)

I think into the early 2000s, but not much.

Tom Anderson (21m 57s)

Um, and you attended any type of a live sporting event, concert,

Tom Anderson (22m 2s)

something like that.

Tom Anderson (22m 3s)

You did it at the Capitol center.

Tom Anderson (22m 6s)

Um, so the Capitol center was an arena, just, uh, it was outside of Washington,

Tom Anderson (22m 11s)

DC, wasn't in, in the city, like the current arena is, but it was in Landover,

Tom Anderson (22m 16s)

Maryland and was built in the, I believe the 70s.

Tom Anderson (22m 20s)

Uh, gosh, I saw a bunch of shows there.

Tom Anderson (22m 25s)

Hockey, wrestling, you know, all that kind of stuff.

Tom Anderson (22m 27s)

And so I stumbled upon a book.

Tom Anderson (22m 30s)

I think I saw it.

Tom Anderson (22m 31s)

Actually, somebody mentioned it on Facebook capital center, a retrospective

Tom Anderson (22m 35s)

by Richard friend, Kevin Leonard and Jeff Krulik.

Tom Anderson (22m 39s)

It is a wonderfully put together book.

Tom Anderson (22m 43s)

That is pretty good size.

Tom Anderson (22m 45s)

You guys won't see it, but Jeff can say, see, I brought props today.

Jeff Battersby (22m 46s)

Oh, look at you Tommy. Yeah, you did. I'm giving you props for bringing props.

Tom Anderson (22m 48s)

Um, we're not a video show, but anyhow.

Tom Anderson (22m 52s)

Um, but kind of.

Tom Anderson (22m 54s)

Goes through the story of how the, the, uh, arena came in to being.

Tom Anderson (23m)

It was built by the Poland family.

Tom Anderson (23m 2s)

He's got a long history in DC with sports and entertainment.

Tom Anderson (23m 6s)

Uh, but talks about, uh, kind of the design principles, a lot of which were new, um, including the big, uh, jumbo Tron up on the ceiling that would show,

Jeff Battersby (23m 18s)

For you in the nosebleed section, you can see what's actually going on.

Tom Anderson (23m 19s)

show the event, um, you know, with.

Tom Anderson (23m 22s)

They are, of course, a rare commonplace now.

Tom Anderson (23m 24s)

Right.

Tom Anderson (23m 25s)

So you could see, right.

Tom Anderson (23m 26s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (23m 27s)

And, um, but it goes through, talks about has what's great about it.

Tom Anderson (23m 31s)

It's got tons and tons of photographs.

Tom Anderson (23m 33s)

They've got pictures of models that they put together, a lot of ticket stubs, even so you can go back and laugh at the insanely low ticket prices for concerts back in the day.

Tom Anderson (23m 42s)

Go see, you know, the stones for six bucks.

Tom Anderson (23m 45s)

Uh, so, um, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (23m 45s)

Dang, wouldn't that be nice?

Tom Anderson (23m 49s)

And, um, but just a, a great history of the facility, a ton.

Tom Anderson (23m 55s)

Um, they talk about, of course, the sporting events, college graduations, high school graduations that were held, rodeos, wrestling, hockey, basketball, whatever.

Tom Anderson (24m 4s)

Um, and then really cool at the end, they have a, it's probably the last 60, 70 pages lists every event chronologically that ever happened, um, which was, was pretty cool because I could go back and see, oh, yeah, it was at those two shows.

Jeff Battersby (24m 18s)

Wow

Tom Anderson (24m 21s)

Oh yeah, I was at those two shows, I saw...

Jeff Battersby (24m 23s)

Well, that's great

Tom Anderson (24m 24s)

that. So it's just a lot of fun. I think it's about 50 bucks. But we'll have a link to it in the show notes. I mean, if you're not from the area, you probably don't care too much. But if you are in the area, I mean, the Capital Center was, you know, a huge part of events and event culture, 70s, 80s, 90s. So yeah, fun, fun book. Really is.

Jeff Battersby (24m 45s)

Yeah. And from what I've seen in the book, it's really beautifully designed.

Jeff Battersby (24m 49s)

Like it really does have some good stuff.

Jeff Battersby (24m 50s)

And I did see those, uh, in, in some of the screenshots that are available, I can see those tickets, which is absolutely crazy, as you said, that you can go see

Jeff Battersby (25m 2s)

the capitals for 14 bucks and the bullets for, you know.

Tom Anderson (25m 5s)

Yeah, I think the first Capitals game I went to was against the Boston Bruins and they were like $10 tickets I mean they were in like the lower midsection of the bowl - they weren't up in the nosebleeds. So

Tom Anderson (25m 17s)

Yeah, it's different different lifetime [laughs]

Jeff Battersby (25m 18s)

I yeah, yeah, absolutely a different life.

Jeff Battersby (25m 21s)

I mean, I have tickets upstairs from the Oakland Coliseum when the A's were in the World Series and bleacher tickets, which is kind of what you went to, but they're six bucks.

Tom Anderson (25m 33s)

laughs Right.

Jeff Battersby (25m 36s)

World Series, six bucks.

Jeff Battersby (25m 38s)

Can you imagine?

Tom Anderson (25m 38s)

Yeah, yeah this is, you can't even buy a drink for six bucks now.

Jeff Battersby (25m 40s)

Those were the days.

Tom Anderson (25m 44s)

Bottle of water's ten.

Jeff Battersby (25m 47s)

Right.

Tom Anderson (25m 48s)

Yeah, good.

Jeff Battersby (25m 48s)

100% correct.

Jeff Battersby (25m 50s)

So very cool.

Jeff Battersby (25m 51s)

Yeah, I could be enticed by that book, even though capital center means

Jeff Battersby (25m 57s)

absolutely nothing to me.

Jeff Battersby (25m 59s)

So there you have it.

Jeff Battersby (26m 2s)

Alrighty, next up for me, another novel.

Demon Copperhead

Jeff Battersby (26m 5s)

Now, when I said that these are interestingly linked together, these books, the last one that I talked about, if we were villains, linked to Shakespeare.

Jeff Battersby (26m 18s)

The next book that I'm gonna talk about is linked to Charles Dickens' David Copperfield.

Jeff Battersby (26m 25s)

It's a book by Barbara Kingsolver called Demon Copperhead, and it is a modern retelling of David Copperfield that takes place in Appalachia, and I'm telling you, he's such a powerfully brilliant, fun, interesting, dark, much like David Copperfield.

Jeff Battersby (26m 49s)

dark story that takes place amidst what's happening still presently in Appalachia, where coal mines are kind of not really anymore, and money's hard to be found, and opioid abuse is rampant, and kind of the things that are going on.

Jeff Battersby (27m 19s)

So closely told to the way that Charles Dickens told the story of David Copperfield.

Jeff Battersby (27m 29s)

What Barbara Kingsolver does with Demon Copperhead is like right in line with that.

Jeff Battersby (27m 35s)

I started reading, I don't think I'd read David Copperfield for a bazillion years,

Jeff Battersby (27m 39s)

if I even finished it.

Jeff Battersby (27m 41s)

And we'll harken back to my earlier conversation about being a crappy student

Jeff Battersby (27m 46s)

in my earlier days.

Jeff Battersby (27m 48s)

I was reading parts of David Copperfield side by side with this when I read it.

Jeff Battersby (27m 54s)

And I'm telling you what, it's a brilliant retelling.

Jeff Battersby (27m 59s)

And it has the same cadences as David Copperfield does.

Jeff Battersby (28m 4s)

So highly recommend Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead.

Tom Anderson (28m 11s)

Nice. There you go.

Jeff Battersby (28m 12s)

There you have it.

Tom Anderson (28m 15s)

This is this wasn't on my list, but as you were talking about that and made me think about it, so you were talking about, you know,

Peter Santenello on YouTube

Tom Anderson (28m 20s)

Appalachia, their YouTube channel, Peter Santonello.

Tom Anderson (28m 25s)

I'll go ahead and put him on there.

Tom Anderson (28m 26s)

He's he does these little documentaries

Tom Anderson (28m 30s)

where he walks around this GoPro.

Tom Anderson (28m 32s)

Basically, he's done some in Europe, but they're mostly in the US.

Tom Anderson (28m 36s)

And he goes and he'll find a local there a lot of times now because this channel is big, somebody will reach out.

Tom Anderson (28m 41s)

But he did a whole series on Appalachia, just with the locals and the stories and everything.

Tom Anderson (28m 49s)

Highly recommend that. It's not part of the official list here today, but we'll put it in the show notes too. But yeah, he does interesting stuff. So next for me is a very, it seems like a very small thing, but because I was on the fence with it when I first got it, I thought I'd add it to the list. Uh, the apple silicone case for the.

Jeff Battersby (28m 52s)

Yeah, put it in.

Apple Silicone Case

Tom Anderson (29m 11s)

iPhone 16 pro max. And I've, you know, so when I got it, yeah,

Tom Anderson (29m 16s)

I wasn't super excited about it because the one that I had for my 14 pro,

Tom Anderson (29m 21s)

I didn't really like it. It's kind of too, too sticky for lack of a better word,

Jeff Battersby (29m 26s)

Lint collector

Tom Anderson (29m 26s)

like lent it would,

Tom Anderson (29m 28s)

and it would stick in your pockets and it just didn't slide around much.

Tom Anderson (29m 31s)

It was, I didn't like it. These seem to be better.

Tom Anderson (29m 34s)

So I've kind of come around on it. And the reason I went with it, of course,

Tom Anderson (29m 38s)

Apple doesn't make a leather case anymore.

Tom Anderson (29m 41s)

Um, they dropped the fine woven case for these, which, you know, was hit or miss.

Tom Anderson (29m 46s)

It sounds like for people anyway.

Tom Anderson (29m 48s)

Um, but I wanted something that had the camera control button and not just a cutout for the, for the button.

Tom Anderson (29m 55s)

Like a lot of third party ones had.

Tom Anderson (29m 56s)

Uh, and I've been very pleasantly surprised by this case.

Tom Anderson (30m)

I actually like quite a bit, have not really had any major issues with it,

Tom Anderson (30m 3s)

getting it in and out of any pockets.

Tom Anderson (30m 5s)

Um, it does not pick up a bunch of lint, uh,

Tom Anderson (30m 11s)

and has been overall very nice.

Tom Anderson (30m 13s)

So that is on my list this year, which I did not expect to happen.

Jeff Battersby (30m 16s)

Cool. All right.

Tom Anderson (30m 18s)

Honestly, I did not expect to really like it.

Tom Anderson (30m 20s)

I thought I'd use it by time to a nice third party case came up, but I think

Jeff Battersby (30m 26s)

Cool, like it.

Jeff Battersby (30m 28s)

I'll add to that, even though it's not on my list,

Jeff Battersby (30m 30s)

I have two Bullstrap leather cases.

Jeff Battersby (30m 33s)

One green, one brown.

Jeff Battersby (30m 36s)

Had been disappointed that Apple

Jeff Battersby (30m 42s)

did not have a leather case.

Jeff Battersby (30m 46s)

Although, unlike some people,

Jeff Battersby (30m 47s)

I did pick up the fine wovens and I picked up one at the end,

Jeff Battersby (30m 50s)

which I still really do like for certain purposes.

Jeff Battersby (30m 54s)

But bull straps stuff is.

Jeff Battersby (30m 57s)

Completely solid.

Jeff Battersby (30m 59s)

So can highly recommend those as well.

Jeff Battersby (31m 1s)

We can add that into the end of the list.

Jeff Battersby (31m 4s)

Alrighty next in my list of books and last for the moment in my list of books again, harkening to that theme of books tied to the other literature.

Jeff Battersby (31m 14s)

So, you know, if we were billions Shakespeare Demon Copperhead, David Copperfield, Percival Everett's James, Percival Everett is.

James

Jeff Battersby (31m 26s)

Brilliant writer has written a lot of really good stuff.

Jeff Battersby (31m 30s)

His novel erasure was turned into the movie American Fiction this this last year, which I thought did quite a good job of of taking that novel and and turning it into a really good movie with Jeffrey Wright.

Jeff Battersby (31m 47s)

James is a modern retelling of Huck Finn.

Jeff Battersby (31m 54s)

So Mark Twain's Huck Finn.

Jeff Battersby (31m 57s)

Told from the perspective of Jim, who was, you know, in in Mark Twain's novel, Huck Finn's sidekick.

Jeff Battersby (32m 8s)

So he was the you know, he was the guy that was was traveling with.

Jeff Battersby (32m 12s)

He was a essentially a runaway slave and in in Twain's novel in Percival Everett's novel, he takes on a very kind of subversive character.

Jeff Battersby (32m 26s)

He's presenting himself in one way for all the white people that are around him and then in a completely different way in his mind with, you know, with the other people that he's enslaved with is such a good retelling of this story and kind of a hopeful ending.

Jeff Battersby (32m 49s)

Won't go into too much.

Jeff Battersby (32m 50s)

So it's not to spoil it.

Jeff Battersby (32m 51s)

But again, another piece of literature that's taking older

Jeff Battersby (32m 56s)

literature and in some ways turning that original literature on its ear in terms of how it's handling what is a main character thematically.

Jeff Battersby (33m 10s)

So Percival Everett's James, highly recommend that one as well.

Jeff Battersby (33m 16s)

And those are my three books, Tom, all tied together in some strange way.

Tom Anderson (33m 22s)

Well done, sir.

Tom Anderson (33m 23s)

Well done.

Tom Anderson (33m 24s)

Yes.

Tom Anderson (33m 25s)

Let's see.

Tom Anderson (33m 26s)

Next up for me is going to be the Anker USB-C charger.

ANKER USB-C Chargers

Tom Anderson (33m 35s)

Had this in my newsletter as one of the recommended gifts or gift ideas, I should say.

Tom Anderson (33m 41s)

And so what I like about this charger and others like it,

Tom Anderson (33m 46s)

Anker makes a whole line of these things,

Tom Anderson (33m 48s)

and other places.

Tom Anderson (33m 50s)

This is just the convenience and flexibility that they offer. So if you've, uh, you know, Apple, you buy your laptop, you get the charger. That's got the block. It just has the one outlet on it. You can, I believe opt in to get two outlets maybe on it. Um, but, uh, there's always the Apple price. And so.

Tom Anderson (34m 14s)

What's nice with this one that I have in particular, I mean, and you can get larger, more powerful ones, but this one.

Tom Anderson (34m 20s)

65 watt charger, and it has three, uh, plugs on it. So it's got two USB C one USB, uh, a, and, uh, like I say, it's 65 wide. It's a GAN charger. Uh, and so, but it plugs in vertically. So like, it's two pronged. It doesn't have three prongs, but what I like about it for me is I've got on my desk, I've got outlets on the top of my desk, so I can just drop it right into that.

Tom Anderson (34m 48s)

That doesn't take up a ton of space.

Tom Anderson (34m 50s)

And I can plug my watch charger, my MagSafe charger for the phone, and then something else into that USB-A if I want, and I've actually started to use them back here in the closet for when we record just because I'm trying to drag fewer things back and forth because I have to tear up or set up and tear down every time we do a show.

Tom Anderson (35m 13s)

And so what's nice with that being USB-C is I can drop that in, power the laptop.

Tom Anderson (35m 17s)

I can plug the RODECaster in there too, if I want.

Tom Anderson (35m 20s)

It's USB-C as well.

Tom Anderson (35m 23s)

Travels very well because power prongs do actually collapse inside of the thing they fold in.

Tom Anderson (35m 28s)

So it's nice and small, perfect for traveling.

Tom Anderson (35m 31s)

If you've got multiple devices that you need to charge and you don't want to carry a bunch of charging bricks for it, and you can get them pretty cheap.

Tom Anderson (35m 38s)

The one that I have was $39.

Tom Anderson (35m 41s)

I looked this morning, they've got a, it's a hundred either.

Tom Anderson (35m 45s)

Yeah, it's a hundred watt and it's like 85 bucks.

Tom Anderson (35m 48s)

So it was a little more, but the one--

Tom Anderson (35m 50s)

The one that I have is perfectly fine, so 40 bucks.

Jeff Battersby (35m 53s)

love it yeah anchor makes amazing stuff so cool all right on to the next still with a kind of an arts theme and an album that I came to a little late so this is the Mars Volta's self-titled album the Mars Volta came out in 2022 so a couple of years ago it is strange not for me but for a lot of people to

The Mars Volta

Jeff Battersby (36m 23s)

listen to an album end to end any longer you know you remember back in the day when we were but we children having to go to the record store to buy an album and we listen to it the whole thing

Tom Anderson (36m 37s)

We got two good songs and paid $15.

Jeff Battersby (36m 39s)

yeah in some cases that was true in some cases though albums like played amazingly well from end to end like it if it wasn't necessarily

Jeff Battersby (36m 54s)

being told you know one song after the next musically the way that those songs went together they there definitely was a link from one song to the next one band that I think that does that all the time is spoon it's a it's a another one of my favorites but the Mars Volta I just started listening to this album probably I want to say early on in the year maybe April

Jeff Battersby (37m 23s)

or May and it's one that I keep coming back to and it's it's you can pick out single songs from this album but this album really is something that you need to listen to from end and to end the segues from one song to the next are quite good you know each song kind of is is integrated in that way I haven't really sat with it like I used to sit with albums and look at every single the lyric and, you know, read the album notes and try.

Jeff Battersby (37m 54s)

But it has a cohesiveness, the whole album has a cohesiveness that's really amazing to me and something that I miss from, you know, when I used to get albums as a kid, even if two songs were the only good songs and everything else was garbage.

Jeff Battersby (38m 12s)

This is really not that. So the Mars Volta and their self-titled album, The Mars Volta, well worth listening to.

Jeff Battersby (38m 23s)

A considered listen from beginning to end, even if it's on Apple Music, you know, sometimes albums that are like that, you still get gaps between songs. This does not have that. This plays one song into the next.

Jeff Battersby (38m 38s)

So thoughtfully done, really brilliant. The main lyricist has a falsetto that kicks A. Really pretty amazing. And they bounce between Spanish and English, which is kind of interesting.

Jeff Battersby (38m 53s)

I believe they're a South Texas band. That's where I originally come from. And I highly recommend it. You'll have to, Tom, I recommended it. There you go. Yes. And have the brains you have today.

Tom Anderson (39m 1s)

nice i'll check it out I will I got downtime this week so I could just start it and let it go

Tom Anderson (39m 9s)

pretend i'm 13 again listening to the whole album god 13 again uh

Tom Anderson (39m 18s)

well I don't know about that part

Tom Anderson (39m 23s)

all right so the right well i'm stupid 50 something so it's what's the difference i I suppose.

Jeff Battersby (39m 23s)

You still wanna be a stupid 13 year old, okay, great, good for you.

Tom Anderson (39m 31s)

So the last thing that I have is a small little app that was just released in the last month or so.

Festivitas

Tom Anderson (39m 42s)

Festivitas.

Jeff Battersby (39m 43s)

Mmm, for the rest-a-veetus.

Tom Anderson (39m 44s)

May not be pronouncing that right, but maybe I am.

Tom Anderson (39m 47s)

I don't know.

Jeff Battersby (39m 47s)

Vest-a-veetus for the rest-a-veetus.

Tom Anderson (39m 48s)

Um, or the rest of it is that's right.

Tom Anderson (39m 51s)

And it's gotten quite a bit of publication here in a while.

Tom Anderson (39m 55s)

It's a silly little app.

Tom Anderson (39m 57s)

It costs four bucks.

Tom Anderson (39m 59s)

and it.

Tom Anderson (40m 1s)

Has a sole purpose of stringing Christmas lights on your Mac display so you can put Christmas lights on the dock or you can string them up along the top by the menu bar.

Jeff Battersby (40m 6s)

I like that.

Tom Anderson (40m 16s)

But, uh, it's fun. It's it's whimsical. It's light hearted and, uh, I've enjoyed it. You can have it set so that it floats above content. Um, so you can see them all the time.

Tom Anderson (40m 29s)

It was intelligent.

Tom Anderson (40m 31s)

We built so that if it's in the way, say of a interface thing that you need to click when you put the mouse up there, the lights jump out of the way. So it doesn't really get in the way too much.

Tom Anderson (40m 40s)

But yeah, it's a lot of fun. There's a lot of settings where you can adjust the number of lights on the strand, you can control the blink rate, you can do lots of fun stuff with it. And for $4, why not?

Tom Anderson (40m 52s)

So, a lot of fun, especially for the holidays. And again, link to that will be in the show notes.

Jeff Battersby (41m)

Yeah, and you know what, it kind of harkens back to the, you know, the original Mac OS's,

Jeff Battersby (41m 6s)

you know, System 8, System 9 that always had these kind of little fun things that you could do,

Jeff Battersby (41m 12s)

you know, it was, it was as much about being goofy as it was about getting work done.

Tom Anderson (41m 19s)

Right. Should have all these little desk accessories and little control strip things.

Tom Anderson (41m 24s)

And yeah, the old Mac OS was a lot of fun. And so it's good to see these little things,

Tom Anderson (41m 29s)

developers taking some time just to put together these little fun sole purpose apps. They're,

Tom Anderson (41m 34s)

you know, a few bucks to support the developer and it's fun. Always like to see those.

Jeff Battersby (41m 39s)

Awesome. Yeah, me too. All right. I'm going to do my last three together, because two of them are not going to be surprises at all. There are three apps that I find myself using on the regular. The first one is Halide, which I've made my default camera. I still use Apple's built-in camera for particular situations, but one of the things that Halide does is they have what we'll call an ultra unprocessed image takes raw photo that you can.

Halide, Highland Pro, Apple News

Jeff Battersby (42m 9s)

And then tweak it in, you know, whatever. Yes, process zero, which, you know, is like Heineken zero, no alcohol.

Tom Anderson (42m 13s)

Is that what they call press a zero?

Tom Anderson (42m 18s)

Nice

Tom Anderson (42m 22s)

Which by the way friend of mine hit me up this week he goes your damn podcast keep costing me money

Jeff Battersby (42m 24s)

Good, good. Excellent. We've done our job.

Tom Anderson (42m 28s)

He just got a live subscription. So

Tom Anderson (42m 32s)

Yeah, we have yeah and made by the way, we don't get kickbacks from that stuff so

Jeff Battersby (42m 35s)

So it-- no, we don't get Jack.

Jeff Battersby (42m 39s)

I get kicked in the, uh, right.

Tom Anderson (42m 42s)

Yes.

Jeff Battersby (42m 44s)

That's about all we get, but we have fun with each other.

Jeff Battersby (42m 46s)

So, um, so yeah, Halide, not a surprise.

Jeff Battersby (42m 50s)

The other, not surprise is going to be Highland Pro, which is my writing app of choice, um, that's I've been using now for really, as long as it, uh, has been out and, uh, hands down my favorite writing app, very distraction free, you know, they're doing, and I didn't see where it is.

Tom Anderson (43m 3s)

Do they have the iPad app out for you yet?

Jeff Battersby (43m 9s)

It's a play we're producing this year, I'm stage managing, we'll be doing it in May.

Jeff Battersby (43m 28s)

Musical, I should say.

Jeff Battersby (43m 31s)

But Big Fish, he's the writer of that, and he has created this, and it's great for screenwriting,

Jeff Battersby (43m 39s)

but also, when I was in graduate school, used it for all of my papers, and as I'm currently working on some fiction, it is my central app, and it provides a number of features.

Jeff Battersby (43m 57s)

One of the things I really love about it is for that version, for working on

Jeff Battersby (44m 7s)

the novel that I'm writing.

Jeff Battersby (44m 10s)

I am able to break out various chapters and have them all linked in another document,

Jeff Battersby (44m 18s)

basically, that allows you to import all the chapters.

Jeff Battersby (44m 20s)

So as I begin writing,

Jeff Battersby (44m 21s)

it gives me the ability to keep a tally,

Jeff Battersby (44m 23s)

but I'm able to focus on the individual chapter that I'm working on,

Jeff Battersby (44m 26s)

rather than having a 500-mile-long Word document,

Jeff Battersby (44m 31s)

which I would never use for writing this stuff anyway.

Jeff Battersby (44m 34s)

Word's got so much busyness going on.

Jeff Battersby (44m 36s)

I might use Pages, but not that.

Jeff Battersby (44m 39s)

It's text-based, which means after I die,

Jeff Battersby (44m 42s)

the text is still there for my kids to make the money I never will writing.

Tom Anderson (44m 47s)

Poetic justice.

Jeff Battersby (44m 49s)

It's good, it's my legacy.

Tom Anderson (44m 52s)

They'll get royalties from this show too, so your kids are set.

Jeff Battersby (44m 53s)

Yeah, right.

Jeff Battersby (44m 56s)

So anyway, what are my favorites?

Jeff Battersby (44m 59s)

Right, right, right, yeah, they're gonna be (laughs)

Tom Anderson (44m 59s)

Yeah, our kids are in good shape.

Tom Anderson (45m 1s)

Poor.

Tom Anderson (45m 3s)

Well, if they depend on us, now if they're smart, they won't be, right?

Jeff Battersby (45m 11s)

If they won't, right, right.

Tom Anderson (45m 12s)

If they're just waiting around for inheritance, God help you kids.

Jeff Battersby (45m 13s)

That's exactly right.

Jeff Battersby (45m 14s)

We'll we'll be depending on them.

Jeff Battersby (45m 15s)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (45m 17s)

Have a nice day.

Jeff Battersby (45m 18s)

Um, but here's the one that's surprising me.

Jeff Battersby (45m 21s)

So if you paid any attention to the show early on, uh, or any other, you know,

Jeff Battersby (45m 27s)

convention that I've done in the past, um, I thought Apple's news app was going to be janky and I didn't have any need for it whatsoever.

Jeff Battersby (45m 37s)

Um, I will tell you that, uh, the news.

Jeff Battersby (45m 41s)

app now is probably one of my biggest go-to's, um, you know, as part of my

Jeff Battersby (45m 47s)

Apple premier one or whatever it's called these days, um, uh, subscription.

Jeff Battersby (45m 52s)

I have access to the news app, which means I have access to a lot of magazines, um, that I would not normally have a subscription to.

Jeff Battersby (46m)

There are a couple that I pay for, for example, um, the Atlantic, which

Jeff Battersby (46m 5s)

I pay for print edition, uh, for that, um, that's accessible within.

Jeff Battersby (46m 11s)

Within the, uh, the news app, but a number of other new sources, including

Jeff Battersby (46m 17s)

new sources that are in the Bay area where I grew up, um, that are in upstate New York, that, you know, it relates to me in some ways when I say upstate, you know, 60 miles upstate in the capital, Albany, you know, there's a lot of stuff going on up there that I like to be aware of.

Jeff Battersby (46m 33s)

Um, it do get a lot of goofy stuff that I'm still trying to filter out like TMZ.

Jeff Battersby (46m 38s)

I don't need TMZ and yet it.

Tom Anderson (46m 40s)

Right, Buzzfeed, right.

Jeff Battersby (46m 41s)

right follows a slate, you know, all this stuff. And there are a couple of these publishers

Jeff Battersby (46m 50s)

that I don't know who's doing the editorial work, but where it says, I'm a cook in a commercial kitchen. And here's the five things that I, you know, it's like, you know, I don't need to

Jeff Battersby (47m 1s)

have that, but there's some really good detailed news in there. There's audio that goes along with it. It integrates well with the podcast app.

Jeff Battersby (47m 11s)

I wish that I don't do them, but they're there. Yeah, I'm not a huge puzzles guy. But But it is. It's definitely there. So I am surprised because I thought I would never touch that app. And I find that I'm using it more and more. And I note since you send me links from it, you're doing

Tom Anderson (47m 12s)

Still do the puzzles.

Tom Anderson (47m 14s)

the video.

Tom Anderson (47m 32s)

I do. Yeah, I jump in there every now and then, and it's funny like when they, we talked about this a while back, when Apple raised the price of the Premiere, is that what it is? Apple One Premiere, is that the top tier thing? So it's 38 bucks a month. I actually was looking, it's like, okay, some of this stuff I don't use, maybe I could save a few bucks and not do that subscription, just pay for the couple of things. Because, you know,

Jeff Battersby (47m 46s)

Yeah, so yeah.

Tom Anderson (48m)

iCloud storage is the primary thing.

Tom Anderson (48m 2s)

Well, that turns out, thank God I asked, but just tell us, you know,

Tom Anderson (48m 8s)

I better ask, ask her if she's using this at all.

Tom Anderson (48m 11s)

She was like, Oh yeah, I read it every day.

Jeff Battersby (48m 13s)

I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I...

Tom Anderson (48m 13s)

And I was like, what?

Tom Anderson (48m 15s)

And, uh, so yeah, she's got her magazines in there, like you mentioned.

Tom Anderson (48m 18s)

And, uh, yeah, but yeah, she's apparently daily, daily use.

Jeff Battersby (48m 23s)

that virginia news uh newspaper that i'm following that says uh

Jeff Battersby (48m 30s)

Young husband beat to death by phd student in closet

Tom Anderson (48m 33s)

Don't worry, that wasn't me.

Tom Anderson (48m 38s)

I'm not the young husband anymore, but yeah, she's, she's a big fan of it too.

Jeff Battersby (48m 42s)

I'm trying to do you a favor. Yeah. No, it's good stuff. It really it really is a a nice feature. So i'm surprised

Tom Anderson (48m 44s)

So I appreciate that.

Tom Anderson (48m 45s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (48m 50s)

um surprised by my uh

Jeff Battersby (48m 53s)

of that so

Tom Anderson (48m 54s)

Nice all right, I think we have 49 minutes

Jeff Battersby (48m 56s)

Tom we've done it again

Jeff Battersby (48m 59s)

We've burned another

Jeff Battersby (49m 2s)

Yeah, 49 minutes of your time and then of our time trying to figure out why we couldn't get the recording to record

Close

Jeff Battersby (49m 10s)

two hours um, but you know all good and uh, as always tom pleasure to see you pleasure to spend time with you

Jeff Battersby (49m 17s)

can't believe that we're on the cusp of our

Jeff Battersby (49m 20s)

52nd episode, coming up right after this.

Tom Anderson (49m 24s)

Right, we'll be hitting two years officially in January, so we've got some guests coming,

Tom Anderson (49m 30s)

some guests lined up for shows. I think we've got some good stuff coming up and, you know,

Tom Anderson (49m 35s)

again, we say it frequently, but we do really mean it that we're grateful for each and every one of you that are here with us and spend time listening to the show and feedback and the nice words that

Jeff Battersby (49m 42s)

Absolutely

Tom Anderson (49m 48s)

you've shared, so thank you so much.

Jeff Battersby (49m 49s)

Yeah, and really grateful for a random art design and the work that he's done for us and

Jeff Battersby (49m 56s)

Celsius 7 psychokinetics for use of their music

Jeff Battersby (50m 1s)

And for you Tom, you know, I'd say this sincerely. It's always a pleasure to see you

Tom Anderson (50m 6s)

You as well, sir.

Jeff Battersby (50m 7s)

was a pleasure to bust your chops and

Tom Anderson (50m 9s)

Well, yes, we both started off this episode crotchety and crotchety, and I feel in a better spirits now, so that's good.

Jeff Battersby (50m 16s)

I'm still cranky. So that's what I am. But that's, that's okay. That's, that's a daily.

Tom Anderson (50m 19s)

That's all right.

Tom Anderson (50m 23s)

But you're just back to normal, Frankie.

Jeff Battersby (50m 25s)

Right, right. I'm normal cranky. Not my, not the cranky, super cranky I was when we started.

Tom Anderson (50m 32s)

Exactly, that's right, so...

Jeff Battersby (50m 34s)

So, uh, you know, everybody should put on their list, uh, you know, we will have in January 52 episodes. So 52 weeks in a year. Uh, you can go to our back catalog and listen.

Tom Anderson (50m 43s)

Yes, yeah, something like that.

Jeff Battersby (50m 46s)

How good we really gotten over the last 52 weeks. Yeah, maybe you too, Tom. Yeah, you will.

Tom Anderson (50m 54s)

So well, Jeff, my friend, happy holidays.

Tom Anderson (50m 59s)

I'm sure I'll talk to you over the next week or two, but enjoy it.

Tom Anderson (51m 3s)

Listeners hope you have a fantastic Christmas if you're celebrating that and holidays, whatever the case may be, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, all of it.

Jeff Battersby (51m 8s)

Hanukkah Kwanzaa

Jeff Battersby (51m 11s)

Hanukkah and Christmas all the same day in which somebody pointed out. This is just kind of funny

Tom Anderson (51m 11s)

New Years!

Jeff Battersby (51m 17s)

apparently Facebook is saying that uh

Jeff Battersby (51m 19s)

That Hanukkah starts on Christmas Day and ends on Christmas Eve. Oh

Tom Anderson (51m 25s)

Whoa, well, it's all year, so yeah.

Jeff Battersby (51m 25s)

Yeah, bit of a mistake just point that out cut it short

Jeff Battersby (51m 32s)

Well, yeah, wait when I say no and that ends on Christmas Eve, sorry and ends on Christmas

Jeff Battersby (51m 38s)

Starts on Christmas Eve ends on Christmas Day or something ridiculous like that. Yeah, not an all-year. It was it just not the normal number

Tom Anderson (51m 41s)

Uh, good, good job.

Tom Anderson (51m 47s)

Not a good day, right?

Tom Anderson (51m 48s)

So, all right.

Tom Anderson (51m 49s)

Well, I think that is a wrap and we will talk to you again in 2025.

Tom Anderson (51m 55s)

So have a great rest of your day, rest of your night and happy holidays.

Outro Music (51m 57s)

I don't wanna know about your imperfections, dude Prefer to leave you on a pedestal, so I'll improve 'Cause if I'm finding out you know more than I'm just like you That gon' smash my whole world, lost in the loop

Jeff Battersby (51m 58s)

See ya!