Ep. 502: "Dr. Guy"
Merlin: Hello?
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: How are you?
Merlin: It is good to speak with you.
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: We've become much more fancy.
John: We never start the show in a fun way.
John: So fun.
John: Oh.
John: No, I don't mean that way.
John: No.
John: We started this show in a really whimsical way.
John: Oh, you mean like having fun with it?
John: Yeah, just having fun.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: You know.
Merlin: It's not you.
Merlin: It's not the show.
Merlin: It's just everything.
Merlin: Oh, is it everything?
Merlin: I don't know what happens over the weekend at this joint.
Merlin: I think this is why people, this is why industrialists don't want people to have time off.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: All right.
Merlin: Go on.
Merlin: I didn't realize we were going to get Marxist here, but let's do it.
Merlin: Well, it's not even that.
Merlin: It's worse.
Merlin: It's Malthusian.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: My entire office just gets its own agenda over the weekend.
Merlin: Things unplug, things re-plug.
Merlin: I came in this morning.
Merlin: My hard drive was full, and I don't know why.
Merlin: And then things were unplugged.
Merlin: Something fell over.
Merlin: My elephant fell off the desk, and I think it pulled down a power cord.
Merlin: Do you think nature is healing?
Merlin: Is that what it is?
Merlin: I saw a sign that nature is healing 15 minutes ago.
Merlin: What was it?
John: I mean, other than the elephant escaping its bonds.
Merlin: The elephant in my room.
Merlin: Uh-huh.
Merlin: These surly bonds.
Merlin: The coffee place where I just picked up this reasonably sized iced coffee.
Merlin: They just took down their big COVID plastic.
Merlin: Oh, wow.
Merlin: Nature is healing.
Merlin: Well, that's what they say, you know.
Merlin: Did anybody sneeze on you while you were in there?
Merlin: Not that I saw, but I wasn't paying a lot of attention because, you know, it's tough.
Merlin: Oof.
Merlin: But no, I congratulated the, I don't think I know her name.
Merlin: I knew her name several years ago, but the coffee lady's plastic is down.
Merlin: And, you know, nature is healing, I suppose.
John: My friend Chad, friend of the show, Chad.
John: Hi, Chad.
John: Hello.
John: Chad got COVID again.
Merlin: Really?
Merlin: I heard it's coming back.
Merlin: I heard it's in the water.
John: It is.
John: He's down in Bend, Oregon right now with COVID for the 15th time or something, and I just don't know what to do about it.
John: I mean, nothing I can do.
Merlin: Did Chad, like, oh, see, I shouldn't ask this.
Merlin: I'm not asking this about Chad in general, but, like, do you see a higher incidence of people who get COVID and re-get COVID in, like, people who were like, whoo!
Merlin: Getting back into it.
John: No, but, you know, they are in show business.
John: So they do meet, you know, they do have to get out and meet people that are traveling around.
John: It's got to get in that yellow zone.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: Get in the yellow zone.
John: And so, you know, it's out there, but I still haven't had it as far as I know.
John: I mean, maybe.
John: Yeah.
John: So still don't want it as far as I know.
Merlin: Yeah, I don't either.
Merlin: Maybe that's what my computer has.
John: How did the hard drive get full while you weren't watching it?
Merlin: Well, I mean, it's not interesting, but I think a couple things can happen.
Merlin: I think one big thing that happens is...
Merlin: Dropbox will sneak up on you.
Merlin: Oh, it sure does.
Merlin: Because as with your email, something Merlin Mann used to say, your email is also everyone else's email.
Merlin: And your Dropbox is also the Dropbox anybody you share it with.
Merlin: So when things start to pile up at a rate of 35 gigs per episode, that starts to edit itself.
Merlin: A lot of gigs.
Merlin: And I'll try and address this.
Merlin: I have so many other things to address.
Merlin: I don't know if I can address the computer today.
John: But I'll do my best.
John: Mr. Computer?
John: Yes, I see.
John: Mr. Computer was my father's name.
John: I see you.
John: My thing fills up all the time because I keep a local copy for some reason.
John: I have no idea why.
John: I have local copies of all of the Friendly Fire episodes, and it's really only my side of the conversation.
John: I could throw them all in the garbage.
John: I know.
John: You could just delete it all.
Merlin: I know, I know, I know.
Merlin: And there's a funny thing in life.
Merlin: I've seen two instances of this observation, which I think is an interesting observation.
Merlin: And in the last couple of days, somebody was talking about how in political polling, the only probabilities anybody understands are zero and 100.
Merlin: And I found myself in a friendly way yesterday.
Merlin: It wasn't in a brow-beating way.
Merlin: But I was saying to my family yesterday how I've long held the belief that you're either early for something or you're late for something.
Merlin: There is no such thing as being on time for something.
John: There is no on time.
John: There is only due.
Merlin: And I think when it comes to stuff on your hard drive, you either have all the room in the world or you're out of space.
Merlin: It's like gas.
Merlin: So your car doesn't run, most cars, most cars, maybe your car, most cars don't run that differently when they're low on gas.
Merlin: True.
Merlin: No, that's right.
Merlin: They run exactly the way they run so they don't run anymore.
Merlin: Also kind of like, you know, what is it, Ernest Tummingway, you know, and how you go broke.
Merlin: Oh, sure.
Merlin: Baby shoes.
John: Sure.
Merlin: Slowly at first and then all at once.
John: Yeah.
John: Yes, there must have been something in the water yesterday.
John: Yeah.
John: The water.
John: The Father's Day water.
John: Father's Day water that goes between Seattle and San Francisco.
John: But I got a message that popped up.
John: I love that we are doing a Mac podcast because I've always wanted to be part of one.
John: I've always wanted to be like one of the guys.
Merlin: You didn't get invited to the goggles, and I don't have any control over that, but I want to make sure you know that your Macintosh talk is always welcome here.
John: Thank you.
John: Thank you.
John: Well, I got a thing that said, oh, your Apple cloud is full and you need to upgrade to one billion terawatts.
John: Yeah.
John: And I said, well, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
John: Try the seven gigaflop.
John: I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
John: I am not, first of all, I am not joining.
Merlin: I do not consent to this commercial offer.
Merlin: I was told, I said, put me on your do not contact list.
John: Do not contact list.
John: I am not joining a new streaming service just to watch this show for free.
John: I am not going to get, you know, 1.1 gigawatts of memory for my Apple cloud because I don't need that.
John: I want you to give me a button that I can click on to manage my stuff.
John: And so there was no button because that's not what they want.
John: And so I went online.
Merlin: All they give you is like the I'm a fucking idiot button.
Merlin: Cancel or I'm a fucking idiot.
John: And so online they were like, oh, we'll help you manage your stuff for only $6.99 a month if you download manageyourstuff.org.
John: And I was like, I'm not going to download your thing.
John: I don't want to pay $6.99 a month.
Merlin: Did you try the three pita chunks pseudo offer?
John: I didn't want that either.
John: Click to continue.
John: I went into the Apple Photo app, the Apple Photo, as they call it.
John: And I was like, show me the money.
John: Show me the button where it allows me to manage my money.
John: Your cloud is full.
John: My cloud is full.
John: And so then, you know, and if your cloud is full, it's going to start precipitating.
John: But in this case, I wanted to.
John: Oh, that's just physics.
John: Yeah.
John: And I was like, all right, show me what is taking up all the memory.
John: You know, let me get in there.
John: I'm sure there is some hour-long video of my phone in my pocket.
Merlin: I'll tell you what it is.
Merlin: It's the time.
Merlin: If you follow the Merlin method, it's where you thought you'd been recording an entire child's recital, but actually that's when you turned it on, was at the end of the recital.
Merlin: And then it just ran in your pocket for a while.
John: Yeah, that's right.
John: I'm sure there are half a dozen of those that have taken up a... Oh, the camera's great, man.
John: The blacks are so black.
John: The blacks are really black.
John: Really crisp.
John: And the thing is, there's one of those.
John: There's one where my phone was in my pocket while I was going on a nature tour of...
John: in a little in one of those little uh trains on wheels with a with a like a train a tram a tram okay uh where they were driving us around a nature preserve and there was a woman on a microphone going and on your left you can see the buffalo are beginning their their yearly rut and and the phone was in my pocket for like an hour and an hour and a half oh geez
John: And you can hear it in the background, but you can also hear me talking to my kid when she's about four or five.
John: Oh, really?
John: And I'm like, look at the buffalo.
John: And she's like, the buffalo.
John: And Millennium Girlfriend was there.
John: So Millennium Girlfriend is also talking.
John: Oh, wow.
John: And I can't bring myself to delete it.
John: Not that I've ever listened to it all the way through, but I'm like, 25 years from now, I'm going to sit and listen to this buffalo tour and
John: And I'll hear just this sort of incidental conversation.
John: It'll be, and it's probably, it's at least a Google of, of memory that it's taking up.
John: It's probably most of a Google.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah.
John: Close to a Google.
John: Yeah, but you can't get rid of those.
John: So what am I going to do?
John: I don't want to upgrade, but I don't, I don't, I don't want to, I don't want to spend a dilemma, my friend.
John: Like, so you've got to engage.
John: Do I want that picture?
John: Do I want that picture?
John: Do I want that picture?
Merlin: And it's so odd and opaque.
Merlin: There's a service that I got.
Merlin: There's so many things I get from my family and they don't know about and don't use or hate.
Merlin: John, I don't like receiving nuisance phone calls.
Merlin: I wish I could just shut off my phone.
Merlin: There's the simplest thing that I want.
Merlin: Oh, God, I just got another warning.
Merlin: My disc is full.
Merlin: You can shut off your phone.
Merlin: I do it all the time.
Merlin: Right, but I don't even want the residue of a phone call.
Merlin: The easiest one in the world for me, and this is hard because we're all dealing with these legacy contacts that go back a million years, and who knows how long ago somebody's phone number changed and blah, blah.
Merlin: But I've always wanted the simplest little button in the world, which is only ever accept a phone call from people in my phone book.
Merlin: and, like, don't even let them leave a voicemail.
Merlin: Like, you know, to me, it would be like... It's like going to, I don't know, something like... It's like going through the garage, where you're like, there's a chance there's something here that I want, but I doubt there's any... Anyway, all that kind of stuff.
Merlin: But then, okay, so anyway, I don't like those kinds of calls.
Merlin: I don't like the warranty calls, and...
Merlin: Long story short, there's a service through our... It presents itself as an iOS app, but it's provided by our cellular provider.
Merlin: And it does a neat thing, which is it does nuisance call and known spam call blocking at the network level.
Merlin: It's not happening at your phone.
Merlin: Lots of stuff you want to happen on your phone.
Merlin: Other stuff you don't even want to touch your phone, right?
Merlin: But the problem is... And that's great.
Merlin: I get so few nuisance calls.
Merlin: The ones I do get, I block, whatever.
Merlin: It's not a perfect solution, but it's pretty good.
Merlin: The thing is...
Merlin: My wife is a grown person who has to use her phone for things.
Merlin: And she gets unknown callers all the time, and she doesn't mind.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: So what she did was, and this is a totally sensible thing to do, which is she deleted the app that lets you control that.
Merlin: And I said, well, you're going to think this is crazy, but deleting the app doesn't make it go away.
Merlin: That only gets rid of your ability to control it because it's happening somewhere besides your phone.
Merlin: I think there's a lot of stuff like that where you're talking about this manage settings or whatever button.
Merlin: And you're like, well, what am I looking at here?
Merlin: Where does this live?
Merlin: There's not much sense of where things live anymore.
Merlin: And sometimes it's difficult.
Merlin: Do you understand the value proposition?
Merlin: If you were to go buy another Jigga Chick of iCloud, do you have a clear idea of what you'd get out of that?
Merlin: More phones, more videos, more photos?
Merlin: What would you get out of it?
John: Uh, you just, you would get out of the $2.99 a month that they want you to pay for it.
Merlin: Until it gets to that red bar again that says Merle's got too much Dropbox on his thing.
John: So this morning, so what I realized not very long ago, on my trip around Europe, I realized something, not Europe, on my trip around the Middle East, I realized something important, which was, and this is not going to be surprising, but
John: But it's, you know how things sometimes aren't surprising, but they're still kind of a realization.
Merlin: There's a phrase people used to use about the twice impeached, disgraced, twice indicted ex-president, where they used to say that it's, what did they say?
Merlin: It's not surprising, but it's still shocking.
Merlin: There are those things in life where you're like, oh, it's not that I never could have anticipated this, but still when it does happen.
John: Yeah, right.
John: It's like, well, so on this trip, and when I first came back from the trip,
John: I was really in this space of like, oh, wait a minute.
John: I'm really good at this.
John: I can go to the Middle East and travel all around and see all kinds of things that probably weren't on anybody else's list of things that even sound like a vacation.
John: And some of them sound perilous even.
John: Right.
John: But I never felt... Oh, you're talking about off the beaten path type situation?
John: Well, that and just like why... If you're in a place like that, you should be going to the museum and not just parked outside of the Gaza Strip watching people go through security.
John: Why would you even spend two hours doing that?
John: And I'm just having the time of my life, right?
John: But also like navigating all of the...
John: All of the, like, oh, you shouldn't go into Palestine.
John: Well, actually, it's really easy.
John: You just go into Palestine.
John: Well, you shouldn't.
John: Well, I know, but yes, you should.
John: Of course you should.
John: And going between these countries and staying places and stuff, I never once...
John: I felt incompetent or stressed even.
John: Things happen.
John: You deal with them.
John: Right.
John: I'm good at dealing with that kind of thing.
Merlin: You didn't go into it with the mindset of, okay, I'm going to avoid this big topic I want to get into.
Merlin: But let's just say you didn't go into it with this idea of a philosophy of privation and fear.
Right.
Merlin: Of like, I've been told by everybody I know that I shouldn't do this at all.
Merlin: And if I do this, there's all these things I shouldn't do.
Merlin: And I've been admonished not to do these things.
Merlin: And so far, you have not adopted that attitude and you haven't suffered from not having it.
John: Right.
John: I just ignored all of that and was like, I know what I'm doing.
John: I mean, you know, yes, you probably shouldn't go into this part of Lebanon because that's who you are.
John: But I'm definitely going there because that's who I am.
John: And I won't get in trouble.
John: And you probably would.
John: Because you, you would already be, but even that, who cares?
John: I came back from that trip going, wow, I'm really good at that.
John: And then I got here and I sat down on the couch and the next day I got an email from somebody that said, you need to print out this PDF, sign it and fax it back to me by the end of the day, or the bank isn't going to accept the, the, uh, you know, the change, uh,
John: And I was like, I wrote back and said, I don't have a printer or a fax machine.
John: And they wrote back and said, well, and so, oh, so I digitally signed it with DocuSign.
John: DocuSign.
John: DocuSign.
John: And then they wrote back and said, the bank won't accept DocuSign, a thing that it took me two and a half years to actually learn how to use.
John: You have to actually sign it.
John: But here's the thing.
John: You can sign the paper.
John: And take a picture of it with your phone.
John: You still have to fax it?
John: No, as long as it's a real signature on a real piece of paper.
Merlin: What's the point they're objecting to is that they don't trust the, whoever, DocuSign, Adobe or whoever, they don't trust them as an intermediary for passing that through to them?
John: Pete's the ever-loving shit out of me.
John: It's all just bullshit.
John: It's all just scribbles on paper.
John: So I'm sitting here on the couch.
John: I've been back in the country for 12 hours.
John: And I immediately feel absolutely incompetent.
Merlin: Just like this is the story of my life.
Merlin: I wish you hadn't said this.
Merlin: Oh, that's how I feel all the time now.
John: Yes, exactly.
John: Well, it's how I feel all the time.
John: Like, I'm not made to live in this world.
John: I don't know how to do this.
John: Not only do I not know how to do it.
Merlin: Anytime anything I do, I mean, let alone like little easy things, but certainly anytime what I do touches any institution, any institution, I find out that there's like, there's some kind of a process that they act like makes complete sense and makes no sense.
Merlin: I hate to invoke Franz Kafka, but that really is how it feels sometimes.
John: And this was the, this was the, because it was so proximate.
John: Yeah.
John: And then I'm sitting on my couch and I just feel that crushing.
Merlin: In your own home, John.
John: Yeah.
John: Where my children play with their toys.
John: I know.
John: And so, and I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, and I have this, this pow of like, oh, wait, there is no need for a person like me in the present world.
Hmm.
John: The people that are thriving in the present world are a different kind of person than me.
John: And they feel like normal people and they don't understand why I can't just...
Merlin: x can't just figure it out no but like why can't you just x why can't you just just the variable like there's this thing that oh my god you are like the only person i have ever met who manages to be an adult who can't figure out how to do x and everybody else does this just fine several times a day john it always feels like somebody saying
John: Oh, you're depressed?
John: Well, why don't you just get up at 5 in the morning and go for a run like I do?
John: Then you won't be depressed.
John: And it's like, why don't I just get up at 5 in the morning and go for a run like you do, and then I won't be depressed.
John: Wow.
John: I mean, that's amazing.
Merlin: That's a pretty sophisticated understanding of other people.
Merlin: You have a problem that I don't have, and I have a solution that you don't need.
Merlin: Have fun.
John: My psychiatrist does it to me all the time.
John: He doesn't say it, but he basically says, well, you know, I married my college sweetheart.
John: And I ended up not having any of these problems that you're talking about.
John: And I'm like, hmm, wow, thanks for that insight.
Merlin: So you get an email from Thomas Aquinas.
Merlin: He's like, why don't you just learn to love the Lord?
John: It worked for me.
John: So what I realized in that moment was, oh, wait a minute.
John: The world...
John: I was made as a herding dog, right?
John: And the world only needs lap dogs now.
John: Nobody needs a herding dog.
John: Nobody's got any sheep anymore.
John: There's no sheep in my world.
John: What this world needs is dogs that sit on your lap and cuddle and look at you with big, loving, droopy eyes.
John: And I wake up every morning and I'm like, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep, sheep.
John: Where, you know, where are my sheep?
John: Where am I supposed to herd?
John: I've got a job to do.
John: And there's no job for me.
John: Right.
John: And the only job.
Merlin: And so what ends up happening is what feels like your job or your role, perhaps, what feels like a natural role.
Merlin: And we're being silly with calling it this or that, but it isn't just that you want to, it's not you're bossing people around or hurting all the time, but you're like, you don't have, there's no role for what you do.
Merlin: And if everybody has a lap where they like the dog to sit, you're just going to be disruptive.
John: Well, yeah, I'm going to they're going to put me in the lap and I'm going to fidget and I'm going to I'm going to grab the magazine and I'm going to shake it in my teeth.
John: And people are like, why can't you just look at that other lap dog?
John: He's so content.
John: Why can't you just sit on the couch and lap?
John: And it's not even sheep.
John: I don't give I don't give a fuck about your sheep.
John: I was, you know, I'm meant to stand on the top of a craggy rock and look at the horizon.
John: fuck the sheep i mean there's a and i can see a thousand sheep you know that's all oh you've got to you develop that thing a lot of dogs have the thousand sheep stare the thousand sheep stare right i mean whatever whatever god put me here to do sir yes it was it is not something that modern life requires and sitting on that couch and realizing that i i went oh i've known this my whole life
John: But this is just such a dramatic contrast between feeling like the most competent person in the room to the least competent person in the room within the space of hours.
John: And the world I live in is the one that I feel the least competent in.
John: And the one that I feel the most competent is like – The one where you're theoretically the outsider.
John: Well, or the one where I was like, oh, I should have been a war correspondent when I was 21.
John: I might be dead by now, but that's what I was supposed to do probably, right?
John: To just like show up at a bombed out hotel somewhere and say, does anybody have a pencil I can borrow?
John: Like that's what God put me here to do.
John: And so I went to the people closest to me.
John: Oh, no.
John: And I said, hey, everybody.
John: Am I the weirdo?
John: I'm the weirdo, aren't I?
John: No, I said, listen, here's where I'm coming from right now.
John: I'm comfortable now asking for help.
John: And what I need is help doing things that you don't think...
John: Are things that I should need help doing my whole life every relationship I've ever gotten into when I have said I have a really hard time Finding the form that I'm supposed to send back that was due yesterday
John: And all of the people in my life who have no trouble doing that stuff think that it's a teaching moment where they go, oh, well, here's where you start with a stern lecture.
Merlin: Does it start with, see, this is that thing I told you about.
Merlin: You should be better with your forms.
John: Some of that, but a lot of this kind of like condescending, like, oh, aren't you an infant?
John: Let me teach you how envelopes work.
John: Right.
John: And I go, I know how envelopes work.
John: I know that forms exist and I know that, but I, that's not, that part's not the problem.
John: Yeah, that's not it.
John: I need something else.
John: And you've seen me and you love me.
John: So you've seen me enough times fail to get that into the bank in time.
John: And then I default on a thing and then I'm putting out fires and
John: And I know to you, it sounded simple that I just do it and get it in, but I, but it was not simple and I can't tell you why, but you've seen that it happens over and over.
John: So, you know, I'm not just being intransigent.
John: I'm not just a child because I do other things that are that nobody could do.
John: I just, and so, you know, uh, a person close to me said, what do you want for father's day?
John: And I said, here's what I want for Father's Day.
John: The windshield of my truck has a big crack in it.
John: The crack has been there for six months.
John: Every time I get in the car, I look through the cracked windshield and I think, what an incompetent person you are.
John: You should have fixed this windshield six months ago.
John: Now, every day, that's my first thought climbing into my own car.
John: What an incompetent person you are.
John: This is an easy thing to do.
John: Fix a windshield.
John: And yet you cannot do it.
John: You have not done it.
John: You cannot do it.
John: Another day will go by.
Merlin: Tell me if I'm wrong, but for some reason, it's not fixed.
Merlin: For some reason, I haven't fixed it.
Merlin: For some reason.
Merlin: Again, it's not that you don't know what forms are.
Merlin: It's not you don't know what signatures are.
Merlin: It's not that you don't know that there is a pathway.
Merlin: It's just that it seems like everybody else thinks it's so easy to just get the windshield fixed.
John: And it's never that easy.
John: And that's what happens when I say, I got this windshield.
John: They say, well, just call the windshield company.
Merlin: And my friend and then it took a week and a half they but the first time they came out They brought the wrong windshield every story like that takes a year off my life a year off a year off because I'm canceling other things I'm moving things around and I'm every single one of these just fix the windshield things to all these fucking normal people to them That's the only thing in the world that they act like that's the only thing in the world that is on my mind today Or is it needs to be done today, but it lives amidst
Merlin: 300 other things, maybe 100 of which I know about.
Merlin: They're constantly being sprung on me.
Merlin: And now I've got to change it.
Merlin: And I don't have a project manager.
Merlin: There's nobody who's making sure that both these things get done before this one day.
Merlin: There's dependencies nobody else is aware of.
Merlin: And then on top of it all, the windshield guy brings the wrong windshield because I guess he only does it for fun and he's not really a professional.
John: and and at least for me and i think probably for you too the the the first thought i have is you're an incompetent and then i carry that around in my in my backpack all day because i forget about the windshield five minutes later because i'm thinking about some other shit you should have done yeah i'm thinking about the war on mars that's going to happen in 2279 and
John: But I've still got the you're an incompetent on my shoulder.
John: And then when I can't solve the war on Mars problem, I add another like, well, you're too fucking incompetent to do that even.
John: If we can't solve the war on Mars, then what can you do?
John: And so the people around me that, scare quotes, want to help me, they go the extra step, which is I got the number of the window replacement guy, right?
John: Here it is.
John: And I say, finding the phone number of the window replacement guy was not my problem.
John: I too could have Googled window replacement guy.
Merlin: Like I know of printing out that form for you.
John: Here you go.
John: Here you go.
John: And so what I said in the answer to that, what would you like for father's day?
John: I said, I would like help replacing the windshield of my truck.
John: I don't want you to pay for it.
John: I will pay for it.
John: I want you to organize it.
John: And the person said, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know.
John: But what do you want for Father's Day?
John: Like a present.
John: And I said, the greatest gift you could give me is to help me replace the windshield on my truck.
John: Yeah.
John: The greatest gift anyone could give me.
John: is to help me print out that PDF, sign it and send it back.
John: more than any material thing, more than love, more than cuddling, more than it would just be... Because I would get in my truck and I would go, la-da-da-da-da, I'm not in cuddling.
Merlin: Also, John, it's did the form go through?
Merlin: Did they get it?
Merlin: Was it signed right?
Merlin: Did the right person get... Like, there's not one thing to do anything.
Merlin: There's infinite follow-up to almost everything, and every project has five other projects hiding inside of it, because almost every system we've built up today, for somewhat materialist reasons probably...
Merlin: The onus is completely completely on the individual to do all the heavy lifting follow-up of every single part of it It's not that I need somebody to help me with the concept of the window needs to get fixed.
John: I want you to call me when it's done Yeah, yeah Like I don't need the phone number and and and I don't need that, you know And so so then the next step happens and that's what happened this morning My phone rang at nine o'clock in the morning and I woke up.
John: Huh, huh?
John: It was a phone call from my daughter's mother slash partner.
John: Yes.
John: Saying, the painters are there at your house.
John: And I said, the painters?
John: And she said, yes, they tried to call you four times, but you didn't answer.
John: Oh, boy.
John: Well, because my phone is set somehow to not let people who don't know me call.
John: So there, so what happened was I said, my basement has needed to be painted for two years.
John: And for father's day, if you're not going to replace the windshield of my car, will you help me organize some painters?
John: And she said, yes, I will do that.
John: And so just clear here.
John: She's, she's good at stuff like this, right?
John: So if she needed her basement painted, the painters would be there on Friday, the basement would get painted.
John: And then on Monday it would be painted.
John: This is how it happens at her house.
John: And I said, all I need is that whatever that is, is it four phone calls?
John: Is it two emails and four phone calls?
John: Is it four emails and two phone calls?
John: I don't know.
John: It never, I don't know because it never happens because I live in a house that for two and a half years just needs somebody to come paint the basement.
John: And so she set it up, but she did the thing where she was like,
John: Uh, okay.
John: I called them and they are coming, but they need you to reply to the email where they ask whether you want eggshell semi gloss or whether you want tooth enamel, a flat gloss.
John: And I forgot about the email or I lost, I don't know.
John: I looked at it and then I didn't reply to it immediately.
John: And then I forgot it existed.
John: And I,
John: What I was trying to tell her was, I need you to see it all the way through.
Merlin: This is the part where the present really comes in.
John: Yeah, like pick the color for me and just tell me when it's done, right?
John: And I'll pay for it and I'll do whatever.
John: If you call me and ask me a question, I will answer it.
John: If you tell me that I need to drive to Yakima to pick up the thing, I'll drive to Yakima.
John: but just give me orders basically in real time, things to do.
John: Don't give me a list of things to do.
John: Just tell me the next thing to do.
John: And I can do it with a lightsaber.
John: And so she says, the painters are at your door.
John: And I wake up and I throw on my pants and I run to the door and I go, painters.
John: And they go, yeah, we never heard back from you about what color of eggshell you wanted.
John: So we need to
John: go in the basement and you tell us what, and I was like, whatever you normally do, do that.
John: Like the normal thing.
John: Don't, don't do the special.
John: I don't need any special.
John: Just, is it normally this?
John: And they're like, well, normally we would do.
John: And I'm like, that's all.
John: Don't even, don't say another word.
John: Just do the thing that is the most normal because anything more than that is going to completely derail me.
John: If you give me a choice between two colors of eggshell and
John: We'll be here until July.
Merlin: And John, as your friend, I continually, I'm sorry I keep interrupting you, I want to keep chiming in with this other part.
Merlin: This is not the only thing in the world that you're dealing with.
Merlin: No.
Merlin: No.
Merlin: This today, let alone this month.
Merlin: Well, and they don't even know.
Merlin: There's like 80 of these things going on all the time where people are asking you how glossy you want your eggshell to be.
Merlin: I could spend two weeks troubleshooting an incredibly complex problem with some kind of smart home thing.
Merlin: There's all kinds of things where I can do stuff other people, it would make them shudder to think about what weird mind you have to have to deal with that.
Merlin: But I can't have 80 different projects about what color I want the eggshell to be and whether the person got my call or whether the form was received in the right way.
Merlin: That is killing me.
John: Do they know how full my cloud is?
John: I wasn't even prepared for my cloud to be full.
John: And the problem is none of those things are even close to being within a mile of things that I have the talent to do, right?
Merlin: Not for lack of trying.
John: No, if they had knocked on the door and had said two blocks up the street, there is an army of, you know, like not zombies.
John: If there's like an army marching on our town.
John: I would have said, I'll be right there.
John: And I would have walked around the house and picked up all my spare swords, and I would have said... You would say, I've learned lessons from General McClellan.
Merlin: We're not going to do that again.
John: No, no, no.
John: You think you want the high ground here?
John: I'm not going to be your McClellan.
John: But the high ground is actually a MacGuffin.
Merlin: You know, sometimes being safe is not safe.
Merlin: You've got to get out there and fight those Confederates.
John: And I think a lot of the people around here would go, Ah!
John: And they'd go into their bomb shelter and I would be like finally something to do and they're not even none of these people are even aware I'm fighting a war on Mars in 2242 with a full cloud and so that so this morning so then I wrote you and I was like I got to cancel the show today
John: And I got the message back from your cloud that said Merlin has his notification silenced.
John: And I was like, Merlin has his notification silenced.
John: But it's time for the show.
John: But it's almost time for the show.
John: And then you wrote me and you were like, I have my notification silenced because our show isn't for another hour and a half.
John: I didn't say that.
Merlin: I said, no, I didn't get it.
Merlin: I'm a big do not disturb boy.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Because my only bulwark against madness is turning off almost all notifications almost all the time.
John: Me too.
John: But then that's how you get it.
John: That's how you get painters at the door that you're not even that you're like, oh, well, I hung up a wing.
John: We've been trying to reach you for two days.
John: Why?
John: And so so at that point, you know, at that point, I was.
John: I realized that it was 9.30 and not 10.30 because we don't record at 10.
John: We record at 11.
Merlin: But you felt kind of back on your heels at that point.
John: This is another thing that I don't think anybody in my life understands, which is I often don't know the difference between 9.30 and 10.30.
John: because i don't have any other reference points like i'm trying to triangulate my location in time and i don't have a i don't have a third place to ping one hour is not going to make a difference once the war on mars starts just be ready for that thinking that all of these skills that you've accrued over time of being good at doing what you're told with forms once the battle of mars starts that's not going to count for a lot when i got turned away at the border to jordan
John: And the guy at the border crossing in Jordan said, oh, we're only letting Palestinians through this border crossing because they're firing missiles right now at Jerusalem.
John: And so we're closing this to outsiders.
John: I walked back to the hired car guy who was a Palestinian Catholic.
John: And I said, well, I guess we got to go past Jericho up to the next border crossing.
John: And he said, well, there's only three border crossings into Jordan.
John: And I said, I bet you the next one's fine.
John: And so we drove, you know, two hours up to the other one and went through there.
John: And they were like, welcome to Jordan.
John: You're like a Middle Eastern Mr. Magoo.
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John: I'm coming through this entrance.
John: And I walked in to that place and there was a guy sitting behind a desk and I was like, where do you rent a car in this place?
John: And he was like, uh, well, there's a guy, there's a guy sitting at a, at a folding table, like, like on the other side of the, of the, uh, the barrier.
John: And I was like,
John: Thank you, sir.
John: Thank you, good sir.
John: And I walked out there and I was like, give me a car.
John: And the guy was like super friendly, smoking a cigar.
John: And he was like, how many cars can I get you today?
John: You know, like all of that just is fun.
John: No stress about it.
John: Just like if I don't find a car, then I'll buy a donkey.
John: Like I just know it's going to work out.
John: But these people standing at my door are like, what color eggshell do you need?
John: And I'm like, I am.
John: I'm about to die.
John: I'm literally about to die from a feeling of total incompetence.
John: It's so difficult.
John: Can I jump in here?
Merlin: It is all you, my friend.
Merlin: It's so...
Merlin: It's so difficult to talk about because for a variety of reasons.
Merlin: One of the things is it really sounds like when I say things like what you're saying, I'm not going to comment on what you're saying.
Merlin: When I say things like what you're saying, it's become clearer and clearer to me over the last couple of few years that I am the weird one.
Merlin: And I'm going to say a thing I'm not supposed to think.
Merlin: And I'm going to say a thing I'm probably not supposed to say because it sounds so kind of sociopathic.
Merlin: But I'm...
Merlin: I don't know what that is.
Merlin: I'm asking for patience.
Merlin: I'm asking for something.
Merlin: There are just things where like the skills that I've developed in life to get by, some of which are just plainly practical adult skills that anybody hopefully kind of comes up with other kinds of things.
Merlin: Sometimes it's a little clever or trick.
Merlin: And then honestly, a lot of my life is just kind of spackled together to cover up the parts of me that are broken.
Merlin: And I know that I'm totally aware of that.
Merlin: But, like, it's just something, I have to admit, it hurts my feelings.
Merlin: It's galling to me how many people go, pfft, just pick a collar.
Merlin: And it's like, look, I understand why you say that.
Merlin: The same way I've always understood why you don't think procrastination is real.
Merlin: And you say, oh, just go do the thing.
Merlin: And it's like, well, okay, I understand, I understand, I understand.
Merlin: But, like, and so now at a certain point— Get up at five and go for a run, Marlon.
Merlin: You'll feel a lot better.
Yeah.
Merlin: There's a funny bit.
Merlin: I love the comedian Amy Schumer.
Merlin: She has a pretty funny new Netflix thing.
Merlin: She's talking about how she's like, she can't sleep.
Merlin: She never sleeps.
Merlin: She just can't sleep, and she's terrible at it.
Merlin: And then you've got that friend that goes, have you tried melatonin?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: And I'm like, oh, my God.
Merlin: It's the perfect joke.
Merlin: It's the perfect example of that joke.
Merlin: No, it never occurred to me to try melatonin.
Merlin: I'm so fucking stupid.
Merlin: Why don't I just try melatonin?
Merlin: That's good.
Merlin: I'll sleep fine.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: So, wait, did you used to have trouble sleeping and then you heard about melatonin and tried it?
Merlin: You never had a single job?
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: Why did I not do that?
John: Why don't you, why don't I buy a fax machine that's also a printer?
Merlin: Just get a multi-use thing and then use it.
Merlin: Yeah, plug it in, hook it up, get it working.
Merlin: But like, I mean, and like, so the part where I'm just begging, I'm throwing, like Nello Contendria, I'm just throwing myself on the mercy of the court is like, look, I...
Merlin: I'm really reluctant to say I'm sorry for this because I'm not sorry for this.
Merlin: What I'm trying to let the people who care about me know is that I'm not built the way you all are.
Merlin: And every attempt I make to try and explain, not because I want you to cut my steak for me, but because I want you to understand why things are sometimes difficult or easy for me and not for you.
Merlin: Because we're different people.
Merlin: But I no longer even get people's interest in talking about that.
Merlin: And so now I'm in this position where I'm like, I'm not sure, should I just agree to become somebody to act as though I'm somebody completely different from who I am?
Merlin: Or do I become a complete nut and just go live in a cardboard box somewhere?
Merlin: It throws me off because sometimes I feel like I'm at the end of my rope.
Merlin: I've had a really hard time and I go like, fine, I'll just do whatever anybody wants me to do.
Merlin: But you can't.
Merlin: That's the thing.
Merlin: You can't say, yes, please, eggshell to everybody at the same time.
Merlin: That problem doesn't go away just because you go, I lost.
Merlin: You still have to get through all those things.
Merlin: That's the problem.
Merlin: These 70, 80, whatever dumb projects, your cracked windshield or like...
Merlin: I mean, the unevenness at one point on the sidewalk where you know that's got to be fixed someday.
Merlin: Or just, you know, whatever.
Merlin: And then there's just all the psychic drama that goes on inside.
Merlin: But, like, I end up coming back.
Merlin: Then I get my dander up a little bit, as much as I try not to.
Merlin: And I think...
Merlin: The problem with so much of this stuff is I don't under, and this is where I get into Holden Caulfield mode, is my reaction to power, my reaction to institutions is very unwholesome.
Merlin: It always has been.
Merlin: I used to be better at covering up, and now I can't even cover it up.
Merlin: I'm so put off by people who act like because I said so is an answer to anything.
Merlin: Whether that's like why you need to be on Instagram, why you're waiting in a two-hour line for Japanese pancakes, whatever it is you're doing, you're doing all this shit that makes no fucking sense to me.
Merlin: And you just do it because that's what people do.
Merlin: It starts to feel, and I know this makes me crazy, like it's all cut from the same cloth, which is like this dumb fucking society has told us all this crap we need to do to fill every second of our day with horse shit.
Merlin: That when this dumb idiot approaching senior man says, so why do you need me to do that?
Merlin: He's the weirdo.
Merlin: He's the outsider.
Merlin: And it's not just why do I need to stand in line for two hours to get Japanese pancakes.
Merlin: Hey, if you enjoy that, go nuts.
Merlin: But like the why do you need...
Merlin: John, I order groceries through Instacart fairly often because they've trained me well over time.
Merlin: And one thing that I'm not complaining about people, but I am just saying this is what it's like to be in my head.
Merlin: I've been yelled at so many times in a Kafkaesque way.
Merlin: I've been admonished about, we tried to call you.
Merlin: And I say, well, look.
Merlin: I've already picked a replacement for each one of these items.
Merlin: And I've also added a note here that says, for anything that's out of stock, a refund is fine.
Merlin: Thank you very much.
Merlin: Whatever, you know, all those kinds of things where it's like, as always, you would never know this to hear this podcast.
Merlin: My goal in life is to always be the least annoying person somebody has to deal with each day.
Merlin: I always want to go out of my way to make it easy.
Merlin: It's like I'm approaching this soup nasty to order my Mulligatani.
Merlin: I want to have all my ducks in a row and I want to be, I want to be nice and I want to like let you win and I want everything to go fine.
Merlin: And then like, but then the things like we texted, not just Instacart, but all kinds of things like what you're describing.
Merlin: Like we texted you three times, contacted you.
Merlin: It's because it's truly Kafkaesque.
Merlin: Like, I don't know what this is about and why you need this answer to do what you're describing.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Like this, what is this form for?
Merlin: Is this a different form from before?
Merlin: And like, oh no, that was with Jeannie and she's out for the week.
Merlin: And then you're like, and, but all these things.
Merlin: And I'm like, I keep, it keeps falling apart for me at the point of like, when I feel like I'm ready to break and say, fine, just let dogs tear my corpse apart in the public square if that's what pleases the system.
Merlin: But then that dumb little fucking part of me, that little eight year old kid who got tired of being pushed around goes, wait a minute, what?
Merlin: what is this for?
Merlin: Why are you so worked up about this and contacting me about this?
Merlin: I just gave you this detailed set of instructions that I actually don't care.
Merlin: I just ordered a bunch of stuff because I wanted to order a couple things and I needed 30, but like reach one of these, it's okay to refund it.
Merlin: And I even know, listen, listen, you who are Instacart pros, I know.
Merlin: I'm not even doing that bullshit.
Merlin: Where I order one thing that's $85 and say refund.
Merlin: No, no, no.
Merlin: I'm getting like normal stuff.
Merlin: If they don't have this half and half, get that half and half.
Merlin: A specific brand and size.
Merlin: And this doesn't matter to you.
Merlin: But I'm just saying, I am a good boy at this.
John: I do all this.
Merlin: And then I still get yelled at because I didn't... Usually I respond pretty fast.
Merlin: Like I'm watching the app at this point.
Merlin: Because at this point I'm so frayed from being yelled at about shit that's not my fault.
Merlin: That I'm like...
Merlin: They've broken me down.
Merlin: I'm Winston Smith.
Merlin: I got rats on my head.
Merlin: I'll do whatever you say.
Merlin: Let me out of room 101 or whatever.
Merlin: And like, it's not those people, but it is this system where it's just become normal and okay to have incredibly Byzantine systems where everything, and I'm not, this is not, just so we're clear here, this is not anti-bureaucracy per se.
Merlin: It's anti-bureaucracy.
Merlin: This idea that there's a Byzantine system where it always falls upon a single person to make that work, whether it's getting that form in, or being at the right place at the right time, or you read all the signs except this one, and therefore your form can't be accepted, and you can only get the blue form if you've gone through.
Merlin: And if your life's not like that, and your interactions with medicine, commerce, if you don't feel that good for you, guess what?
Merlin: You win.
Merlin: your doctor has sent you seven messages on my chart and you haven't replied to any of them you laugh i have so much to say about this i've gotten my charted so many times just log on to my chart can i tell you about the time it cost me 400 to have a 50-minute meeting with a 16-year-old kid in a t-shirt who was an osteopath did i tell you about that and then they told me it was going to collection and i said well that's interesting because my wife
Merlin: never misses an opportunity to tell me we have the best insurance in the world and yet somehow now this fucking kid okay well there's that okay well you know what I finally did good I'm so fucking sick of doing these I've added a filter to get rid of these and you know what the my chart was telling me my primary care physician whom I've never seen is retiring
Merlin: Oh, no.
Merlin: So now I've got to go find... Now it's my job.
Merlin: You've got to find another one.
Merlin: Oh, by the way, did I mention John, my doctor I've never seen?
Merlin: I have to go find another primary care physician.
Merlin: We took my kid to the emergency room last week, and everything went fine.
Merlin: Everything went fine.
Merlin: But my... People around me...
Merlin: Let me just say, if you're fat, if you're queer, if you're neurodiverse, going to the doctor is a fucking nightmare.
Merlin: Oh, I can't imagine.
Merlin: And people... Well, no, no, no.
Merlin: I'm kind of... At least two of those things.
Merlin: Like, you don't understand how stressful it is for me to go to the doctor.
John: Oh, I do.
Merlin: But just ask any of your friends who are...
Merlin: Considered heavy by BMI bullshit standards doctors treat them like shit and it's not because it's not healthy It's because they hate fat people.
John: Yeah, they just need to eat less and exercise Have you thought about that?
John: Have you thought about that?
Merlin: I don't know how I think it might have had to do with parking yesterday.
Merlin: I was a pre-diabetic.
Merlin: I Oh, no, really?
Merlin: I'm pre heart loss.
Merlin: I said, here's the thing.
Merlin: This is the problem with power.
Merlin: This is the problem with institutions.
Merlin: If you wanted to get real crazy for a minute and just follow me on principle, you don't have to agree with me, but I want you to think about a thought technology, which is this.
Merlin: Power is the ability...
Merlin: to describe what makes something normal, and therefore something I should care about, or what makes it something abnormal, and that makes it something I mostly need to punish.
Merlin: Ask yourself how much power, whether that's insurance coverage.
Merlin: We were talking about how the BMI came along, which is a pretty fucking crazy story.
Merlin: It's total bullshit.
John: And it keeps changing.
John: They're changing it now.
Merlin: Well, and it doesn't mean anything.
Merlin: It's meaningless.
Merlin: But also, how did we arrive at 98.6?
Merlin: Well, we had a sample of a handful of European men, and we said, oh, they have roughly the same temperature.
Merlin: That must be it.
John: I run a little cool.
John: 96.9 or something.
Merlin: Every single one of these things, it's like, and I don't want to get into the whole thing about that, but I'm just saying that, like, power and institutions are really about the ability to... This thing that seems, if you're a child, probably seems pretty innocent, which is defining what's normal.
Merlin: But once you get to define what's normal...
Merlin: You also then, you get to decide what slice of the pie equals normal.
Merlin: And what is normal?
Merlin: Normal is this is covered by your insurance.
John: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: Right?
Merlin: Normal is that we can see you in this amount of time and not that amount of time.
Merlin: Normal is, well, sir, you missed your window because the form wasn't in on time.
Merlin: But also, but like, and this is, admittedly, this is at least a couple different issues, because part of the normalcy with which I wish I had more normal was to be able to deal with stuff like the forms and stuff like that.
Merlin: But I also despise, we took my kid in, I'm going to leave out a whole bunch of anecdotes and come down to one anecdote, which is at least three or four times.
Merlin: Now, see, I say this to my wife, I say this to my kid, and they look at me like I'm out of my fucking mind.
Merlin: I said, did you notice how many times the doctor said to go...
Merlin: follow up with your primary care physician?
Merlin: And they're like, well, yeah, that's how the system works.
Merlin: There's a primary, I look, honey, I've been to the doctor.
Merlin: I understand how that works.
Merlin: But do you notice how many times they said that?
Merlin: Every time the doctor says that, you know what I hear?
Merlin: We're done here.
Merlin: And I also hear... Yeah, I know.
Merlin: So let me give you a trick question, so be ready.
Merlin: Oh, yeah, be sure to follow up soon with your primary care physician.
Merlin: Okay.
John: A person you've never met.
Merlin: What if you don't have a primary care physician?
Merlin: Aha, trick question, Merlin.
Merlin: We have everybody here that's in the hospital must have insurance.
Merlin: Hmm, isn't that interesting?
Merlin: Okay, well, we're all insured, so therefore we must have a primary care physician.
Merlin: And I'm sure everybody listening to this has an amazing relationship with their quote unquote primary care physician, which might as well be like saying from now on your customer service person is Linda, whether or not it's Linda.
Merlin: It's a fucking warm body that has a number associated with it for the system.
John: I'm willing to bet you remember this story from 10 years ago.
John: I had a primary care dentist.
John: Oh, I sure remember.
John: A woman I knew, a person I liked, somebody that I would sit and talk about mud honey with.
John: And she sent me to an orthodontist because I needed to have braces and my wisdom teeth out before I could have the corrective surgery where they were going to break my jaw and put it on top of my head.
John: That's the thing.
John: You were here when she had that.
John: I was.
John: I was.
John: And they were going to fasten it to the top of my head with bolts or whatever it was.
John: It depends on your coverage.
John: And so I went.
John: You get the brass bolts with this package.
John: Oh, yeah.
John: Because I only have a silver plan.
John: But I went to that.
John: You could upgrade your iCloud.
John: And I got those braces.
John: And I wore braces as a 40-year-old man for two and a half years.
John: Got all four of my wisdom teeth taken out, which were not.
John: There was nothing wrong with them.
John: My mouth had plenty of room for them.
Merlin: They got to make room.
John: Got all four of them taken out so that whatever the circular saw that needed to get in there could get in there.
John: And then went to the surgeon that literally had a Porsche parked in a private parking spot out in front of his place.
John: Went in, sat down.
John: He was this guy that looked like Doc from Back to the Future.
Merlin: It wasn't Mr. Guy.
Merlin: That was Dr. Guy.
John: This is Dr. Guy.
John: And he said, okay, well, we're ready to go.
John: We've got, you know, the braces, we've got the thing.
John: So just go out and talk to my receptionist, Brenda, and we'll set up your thing.
John: And I went and stood at the counter while Brenda said, oh, it looks like your plan doesn't cover this surgery.
John: Okay.
John: But the surgery is only $60,000, and we can put you on a payment plan.
Merlin: Well, they can put that on Klarna in four easy payments.
John: Where it's only $1,200 a month or whatever.
John: That's actually not that bad, John.
John: 7,000 months or whatever.
Merlin: For taking a circular saw to your head, that's actually not that bad.
John: Yeah, well, this is, you know, $2,010.
John: That's true.
John: And I said, wait a minute.
John: You mean...
John: The last three years, I've been doing all of this, like, Marquis de Sade bullshit with everything.
John: And I played the Sasquatch Music Festival, where my face was 100 feet high on a screen, and I had braces.
John: Yeah.
John: And now you're telling me that... And so I went to my dentist, my friend.
Merlin: You think it's bad when they take stuff off your streaming service?
John: And I said to her, why did we not...
John: know this before we went through this whole thing.
John: Wouldn't this have been the first thing?
John: to figure out whether we could pay for it.
Merlin: If the goal state is fix John's face and the penultimate step is doing the surgery, right?
John: Yes.
Merlin: The penultimate step to the end state is this thing.
Merlin: And I mean, I'm going to take everything you're saying here with a grain of salt.
Merlin: Like, why haven't, why wasn't, shouldn't we have talked about this or done more research on this before we got to this particular stage this time later?
John: And what she said was a version of
John: A polite, medicalized, you know, all of a sudden the conversation got very professional.
John: We were not talking about Mudhoney anymore.
John: And she said, well, although I was the one that set all this in motion, and although I was the one that was going to bring this all to a close at the end by finally...
John: putting your titanium bolt in that was going to hold the missing tooth that was the problem.
John: This is Dr. Guy speaking here.
John: This is Dr. Lady.
Merlin: Dr. Lady.
John: Although we were going to go, this was all about replacing this tooth that we couldn't do until your teeth were straight and your jaw was broken and your thing and thing and thing.
John: And even though that all started here in this office,
John: This is where the old lady first swallowed a fly.
John: This is where the lady first swallowed a fly.
John: She said in a certain tone and in a certain way, she said, I am not your project manager.
John: You needed to figure out the insurance.
John: And you needed to be the one that put all this together.
John: And I said, I don't know how to find my insurance card in my wallet when I get pulled over.
John: I know it's in there, but there's also a lot of other stuff in there, including some notes I've been taking on the war, the coming war on Mars.
John: Yeah.
John: And it's going to take me forever.
John: 40 minutes with the cop standing there tapping their foot.
John: And the thing is, I can entertain a cop for 40 minutes.
John: That is a skill set I have.
John: The cop won't be mad because we'll be talking about all kinds.
John: Oh, the cop loves me.
John: But I don't know how to find the card.
John: And you're telling me I needed to look into the future four years, although nobody told me, and figure out whether my insurance was going to pay for the penultimate and most expensive...
Merlin: If I could say, now you are the weirdo.
John: Yeah.
John: Oh, not only the weirdo, but all of that.
John: Sir, please, sir, calm down.
John: The picture I have of me on the festival stage where I'm 100 feet high in front of 40,000 people and I've got braces on, that's my fault too.
John: You look like a Sasquatch in Metropolis?
John: Like I was just doing that because you told me.
John: And I will do anything you tell me to do.
John: If someone I trust comes to me and says, I need you to stick your head in a bucket of water for 20 minutes, I will go, okay, sure.
John: I'll wear braces.
John: I'll get my wisdom teeth taken out.
John: I'll let you break my jaw in half.
John: You're the expert.
John: Just tell me what I'm supposed to do.
John: But I needed to know to check my insurance and nobody told me to do that.
John: And that was something I should have just known as a normal.
John: And now I'm here three years into this and tens of thousands of dollars into it.
John: And the whole thing is a wash because I don't have $50,000.
John: John, that must have been.
John: I still, I mean, that was 10 years ago.
John: And I still every morning wake up, look at my fake tooth that's glued into my mouth.
John: Right.
John: And go, wasn't there another way we could have done this?
John: Like, wasn't.
Merlin: But that sucks so much, and it's certainly not the only time that's happened.
Merlin: So a couple just real quick final things here.
Merlin: So the other part, the one part is like when you go to the hospital, you go to wherever, you go to an institution, and there's always this like, when I say professionalization, I mean, by that I also mean impersonal.
Merlin: kind of feeling which is fine because like you know you can't if you're on oncology you can't you can't cry all day right whatever but like but you say to somebody blah blah blah follow the primary care and every time they said primary care person i just kept ringing in my head of like get back in the system get in the system get in the system and if you're not in the system why don't you have a primary care person what do you mean did you not respond to the thing about your doctor who retired oh dear
Merlin: It was right there on my chart.
John: All I had to do was log in.
Merlin: It was on my chart.
Merlin: Why don't you just do that?
Merlin: But it's also getting into the thing I said a minute ago, and it's not by any means restricted to fat people, queer people, and neurodiverse people.
Merlin: But for y'all who really fucking love going to the doctor and filling out forms, can I just ask you to please just consider the idea that for some of us, that's really not as fun.
Merlin: really inconvenient it is harrowing to face doing that and if you don't understand that that's okay but then let me bring it all home with the part that makes me your new favorite outsider here which is which is after all of that all of the sawing open of the faces all of the eggshell all of the like infinite recursive kafka-esque stuff at the end of it
Merlin: Somebody like John might say to that person, well, why didn't you tell me about that a few years ago?
Merlin: Or in my case, I would say, well, if I'd known I had to do that, I would have prepared for that because I have anxiety, I have ADHD, I have issues with trauma, and my entire life is about over-preparing things.
Merlin: And the only way that you could add so much insult to so much injury is at the end of the entire process to say to me, yeah, well, you should have prepared better.
Merlin: Because my entire life is about fretting about things I don't need to prepare this much for because I'm so traumatized.
Merlin: I know.
Merlin: It's not very cool.
Merlin: I'm so traumatized by all the times that I've been told that I did it wrong.
Merlin: In your case, well, you better go find $60,000 with your primary care, Portia.
Merlin: You better go take care of that.
Merlin: But, like, all I do all day long is fret about fixing stuff, and everybody yells at me because I fret too much about fixing stuff.
Merlin: And then I get into this situation where they're like, you have to go take your blue form to Mr. Buttle and get a double stamp by Mr. Tuttle, and then bring that back, and that converts it to a yellow form, but only for yesterday's visits.
Merlin: And I'm like...
Merlin: You think I'm weird because I'm so fretful of about this This is the world that I live in and you don't see any way in which that's incredibly stressful to me Like I don't need you to like it.
Merlin: I don't need you to approve of it But if you even potentially like me a little bit I would love for you to try and at least understand why that's so fucking overwhelming even when nothing is happening Well, and this is this is the insight that I had the other day or when I got back from my trip which is
John: Which is two things and one of them is that I Am I do not need to define this relationship with the world in terms of what I'm not capable of because I can walk out on a stage in front of 20,000 people with no notes and no plan and be fine and
John: You can put me anywhere.
Merlin: Short of assassination, unless Paul Lazaro is out there about to take a shot at me, I'm never more comfortable than when I'm on stage doing something that you would never in a fucking million years want to have to do.
Merlin: Just push me out there.
John: Make it weirder.
Merlin: Make it harder.
Merlin: I would love that.
Merlin: Make it so strange.
Merlin: I would love that.
John: You were at the XOXO where I got up and gave one of those keynote speeches on the stage, and the whole premise of the keynote speech was, I have done zero preparation for this.
John: I'm about to do a 45-minute long speech on how you can do this.
Merlin: I used to do an improvised rap every Sunday night, half drunk in a gorilla suit while I called bingo numbers.
Merlin: I can handle that.
Merlin: That'll be fine.
John: I've heard about that.
John: I was Jungo.
John: But, you know, not only can I do that, but I could get you from Jerusalem to Lebanon or to Beirut in a day and you won't even notice it.
John: You won't feel a single bit of stress because I can do that.
John: And the thing is, I know people celebrate me for that, right?
John: I do not feel unappreciated for that.
John: People go, that's what's amazing about you.
John: We know that.
John: We love that about you.
John: It's just that they don't understand why every time I reach out for a doorknob, I have to remember how it works and whether or not I can do it right.
Merlin: And like doorknob or otherwise, what the implications are if this happens, and especially if this happens and I get it wrong.
John: That's right.
John: What are the implications if I open this door and what's on the other side is not what I expected?
John: What if this today is not a closed closet, but it's a portal to another universe?
John: Am I ready?
John: Right.
John: And the other thing is, I know there's probably nobody listening to this program.
John: That's like, oh, I love filling out forms.
John: Right.
John: This is the conversation that I have all the time.
John: Nobody loves filling.
John: Oh, come on, John.
John: Nobody.
John: Nobody likes bureaucracy.
John: Nobody likes inconvenience.
John: But there are there are most people or a lot of people that just see that as part of the day.
John: And they do it without, they do it not only without complaining, but without really.
Merlin: Here comes the filling out forms part.
Merlin: I do that all the time.
John: Whereas I'm like, but you know, my daughter's mother slash partner has 75 tabs open on her computer and she knows what each one of them is.
John: My family fills up forms on an iPhone.
Right.
Merlin: I know.
Merlin: But it's no big deal.
Merlin: My kids are like, oh, I've got to get this clearance form for one of my two jobs this summer.
Merlin: And I'm like, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.
Merlin: Like, all this stuff.
Merlin: And I'm like, I'm just going to go lay down for a little while.
Merlin: Like, I need to get out of the room where people are filling out forms on an iPhone.
John: So I recognize that nobody likes that, you know, big quotes.
John: Suck it up, John.
John: Suck it up.
John: Right?
John: And so this is just a thing that we all have to do, including you.
John: Yeah.
John: And also, I do get celebrated for the things I'm good at.
John: But what I'm trying to figure out is how to define myself in the world without saying to every single person, hey, before we get started, I'm terrible at this.
John: And I can't explain why.
John: And I know it sounds crazy to you that somebody would actually consider that the closed closet is a portal to another universe every time they're about to open it.
John: I know that sounds crazy, and I can't excuse it anymore.
John: And I also, I need to have pride in myself.
Merlin: And I'm not ready to just say, this is who I will be, let alone who I want to be.
Merlin: That's exactly right.
Merlin: Do I want to be fucking great at just standing in line for Japanese pancakes because it's something that people do?
Merlin: Do I want to get great?
Merlin: Why aren't you on Facebook?
Merlin: I sent you a thing on Facebook and you didn't get it.
Merlin: Well, did you accidentally send it to Franz Kafka?
Merlin: Because I haven't been on Facebook in 10 years.
Merlin: What the fuck are you talking about?
Merlin: Do I want to get good at that making sense to me?
Merlin: I just don't know if that's me anymore at that point.
John: For 40 years, people have been handing me a piece of paper with a phone number written on it going, I found the phone number of the painting company.
John: And I have said, I really want to get better at this.
John: I'm really going to try next time to get better at this.
John: But I don't believe anymore that that is true.
John: I don't believe that that's true.
John: I'm not going to say that anymore.
Merlin: But they do keep handing you the number.
John: They keep handing me the phone number.
John: And I need, and I'm really trying, you know, everybody says like, well, why don't you talk?
John: I'm really trying to ask for help.
John: And what I'm what I'm seeing is, oh, they could have helped me all along.
John: They the help.
Merlin: Or maybe we're cursed.
Merlin: I wouldn't catastrophize.
Merlin: I wouldn't catastrophize everyone.
Merlin: Do you think I fucking enjoy this?
Merlin: Do you think I would catastrophize all of this shit if I didn't have a reason for it?
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Which is like then when it does fall apart, then guess what?
Merlin: It's my fault again.
Merlin: And I get yelled at because I did it wrong.
Merlin: And, and it's, it's, it's, it's, I mean, this is, I can take this back to, for example, like, why do I never want to get stuff repaired?
Merlin: Like when a guy came to fix our oven and then permanently broke our oven, and it turned out that we had a kind of oven that couldn't be replaced.
Merlin: And then, of course, everybody chimes in and says, well, you should do this and you should do that.
Merlin: You should sue this person and that person.
Merlin: And I'm like, are you nine?
Merlin: Are you nine or am I nine?
Merlin: I might be nine.
Merlin: I'm nine and here's the phone number.
Merlin: How would you ever get yourself in a situation like that?
Merlin: I didn't get myself into fucking anything.
Merlin: I have done nothing but do things that are completely within normal parameters until I've been given every reason to believe that... I'm not going to say it.
Merlin: We live amongst incredibly inhumane systems and people who've learned how to get with it, I envy them but I don't want to be them.
John: No, I will never again say, yeah, I really want to try and get up at five.
Merlin: I want to get good at phone number.
John: Yeah, or go for a run.
John: I know that's not a cure for depression.
Merlin: I was bullied into what I ordered at dinner last night by our waiter.
Merlin: Were you?
Merlin: I was bullied into it.
Merlin: Just for a quiet life, I finally agreed to what this obviously very cooked up 23-year-old man with a goatee said, just because it was becoming very – I can't get into the whole thing.
Merlin: We had a really nice Father's Day.
Merlin: But at a certain point, he kept so much telling me how we like to prepare the food here that I finally agreed to what he said.
Merlin: And then my family had this life full of laugh because they knew exactly what was happening.
Merlin: Like I was basically the Jason had, had finally worn me down and I was like George Harrison, Paul, I'll play anything you want me to play.
Merlin: If you don't want me to play, I won't play anything at all.
Merlin: If you think that I should get this, this, my father's day steak.
Merlin: If you think that I should get it pepper encrusted and with a table side butter presentation, I will do it.
Merlin: And so, you know what came out a steak with pepper on it and a round pad of butter and
Merlin: And a Latin American man walked out with a lighter and held it there until the butter melted.
John: Oh, no.
Merlin: And I said thank you to both of them.
John: Oh, thank you.
Merlin: It cost extra.
John: I feel strongly about this because I also feel for a long time, and I know you feel this way too, that when you and I say, listen, we're special.
John: I can already tell this is going to make us beloved.
John: Well, that we also feel, A...
John: Really guilty and stupid.
John: But all I think about all I think about is how shitty I am at this also that when I say I'm I was put on this earth Not to herd sheep but to stand on top of a rock and watch other dogs herd sheep That that sounds like some kind of humble brag or some kind of thing where I'm putting myself above other people You're cut out for bigger better things
John: Yeah, and that you and I, when we're like, we can't fill out forms, that everyone who hears it thinks what we're saying is we're above filling out forms.
John: And all you people who can fill out forms are some kind of lesser bots or non-player characters, and we're the only ones in the world who are stars.
Merlin: To just conjoin the analogies, that people who enjoy being lapdogs love filling out forms.
Merlin: And we won't do it because we think we're better than everybody.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah, and that being a lap dog is somehow a worse form.
Merlin: If I thought forms could fix this, buddy, I would fill out forms.
Merlin: It's just that forms just lead to more forms, more miscommunications, more misunderstandings.
Merlin: And the more that you agree to stick your fucking hand into the gears of this system, the more deeply it will chew you up and then bill you for it.
John: I don't personally feel like a wolf is a stronger or better dog than a Shih Tzu.
John: I don't even know if I could pick a Shih Tzu out of a dog lineup, but I know that people like them and that they're little, I think.
John: But that doesn't change the fact that I'm a different kind of dog.
John: And to be that dog and to say, I'm not ashamed of being this dog.
John: The world no longer has a use for me.
John: But evolution, I'm talking directly to John Syracuse now.
John: Evolution does not work fast enough to have changed.
John: I am still a prehistoric dog.
John: Yeah.
John: And I'm living in a world where people put out bowls for dogs.
Merlin: You're a Neolithic Martian leader.
John: I can't eat out of a bowl.
Merlin: No.
Merlin: Bowls haven't been invented yet, John.
John: It's not what God, you know, it's not how God made me, sir.
John: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
John: But I'm not saying I'm a superior dog.
John: It's just I'm a different dog.
Merlin: When's the Smith that finally learned to love Big Brother?
Merlin: Happy Father's Day.
John: Happy Father's Day to you.
John: I'm sorry that the guy melted your steak with a lighter.
John: That's the craziest thing I ever heard.
Merlin: Oh my God, he was so fucking...