WEBVTT 00:00:03.270 --> 00:00:12.930 There we go, and then I make sure it shows up over here, and I retweet it, 00:00:13.530 --> 00:00:17.630 and then put this back over here. 00:00:19.410 --> 00:00:24.930 Okay, all the preliminaries are done, let's get this sucker started! 00:00:50.950 --> 00:00:57.250 Welcome to Curmudgeons Corner for Saturday, July 12th, 2025. 00:00:58.330 --> 00:01:01.730 As I'm starting to record, it is just after 18 UTC. 00:01:02.070 --> 00:01:07.190 I am Sam Minter, and we do not have Mr. Yvonne Bowe with us today. 00:01:08.270 --> 00:01:12.710 He called out sick. He messaged me Friday morning U.S. 00:01:12.830 --> 00:01:17.890 Time saying, Hey, I'm sick. I don't think I can record. I've called out of work, too. 00:01:18.550 --> 00:01:23.550 And at the time he mentioned it to me, I was still at home, but just barely. 00:01:23.770 --> 00:01:27.570 I had to leave and run to work. And so I left and ran to work and blah, 00:01:27.670 --> 00:01:30.890 blah, blah, and didn't get to send out my email to folks, say, 00:01:31.090 --> 00:01:33.910 asking for co-hosts until I got home, like, many hours later. 00:01:34.650 --> 00:01:40.270 And no responses this time. Because, I mean, I gave only one time I could possibly 00:01:40.270 --> 00:01:44.530 record, and I didn't give much notice. 00:01:45.190 --> 00:01:50.670 And, you know, sometimes nobody's available anyway. So it's just me. I'm going to do a solo. 00:01:51.230 --> 00:01:56.210 As usual, when I do a solo, I'm going to, you know, you'll listen to one episode 00:01:56.210 --> 00:01:59.250 unless you're on the YouTube live stream. 00:01:59.530 --> 00:02:04.130 But, you know, in reality, I'm going to record each segment separately. 00:02:04.130 --> 00:02:08.490 And in between the segments, I'm going to go off and do other things for hours. 00:02:08.810 --> 00:02:12.890 I have, like, stuff to do and things I want to do. 00:02:13.010 --> 00:02:16.970 So I'm not even going to go two hours straight. I mean, I could do two hours straight. 00:02:17.330 --> 00:02:21.590 It is possible. I have done it. I do it with Yvonne all the time. I could do it solo, too. 00:02:22.030 --> 00:02:28.570 But, you know, whenever I have the extra freedom of it just being me, I take breaks. 00:02:29.070 --> 00:02:33.150 Like, I do a little bit, take a break, do a little bit, take a break, you know. 00:02:34.230 --> 00:02:39.570 Anyway, agenda-wise, this first sort of but firsty segment, I'm going to give 00:02:39.570 --> 00:02:43.130 an update on my car situation. I mean, I did put a little thing at the very 00:02:43.130 --> 00:02:47.030 end of last week's episode for anybody who stayed past the closing music. 00:02:47.510 --> 00:02:54.450 But I'll give an update on my car situation. and do a couple movies. And that'll be it. 00:02:55.540 --> 00:02:58.980 And then I'll take a break and we'll come back with more newsy stuff. 00:02:59.140 --> 00:03:07.820 But honestly, honestly, as I sit here looking at it right now, I'm like, I don't know. 00:03:08.680 --> 00:03:16.220 There's not that much exciting on the list. I mean, look, as always in every week, things happened. 00:03:16.420 --> 00:03:18.820 I mean, if Yvonne was here, we'd probably talk about tariffs. 00:03:19.020 --> 00:03:21.260 There was more crazy, stupid tariff stuff. 00:03:21.720 --> 00:03:25.060 There's stuff about the Epstein investigation. 00:03:25.060 --> 00:03:30.620 Not the investigation itself, because there's really been nothing new there in years, 00:03:30.820 --> 00:03:36.220 but about the Trump administration people self-imploding over the fact that 00:03:36.220 --> 00:03:39.680 they built up a conspiracy theory and then had to come out and say, 00:03:39.820 --> 00:03:40.940 oh, really, there's nothing there. 00:03:41.720 --> 00:03:47.740 You know, other stuff, Elon's starting a new political party, or said he was anyway. 00:03:49.760 --> 00:03:54.360 Well, we'll talk about something. But first, yeah, but first, 00:03:54.440 --> 00:03:57.320 that's why I call it the but first segment is because sometimes I call it but first. 00:03:57.520 --> 00:04:00.660 You know, actually, I stole that. 00:04:01.080 --> 00:04:06.360 There was a podcast called Tank Riot that I used to listen to. 00:04:06.500 --> 00:04:09.960 They haven't put out a new episode in a decade plus. 00:04:10.120 --> 00:04:15.500 I think it's defunct. I think one of the co-hosts died, I think, 00:04:15.640 --> 00:04:19.780 or one of their close family members died or something and they just stopped. 00:04:19.780 --> 00:04:22.780 But i liked it because what they did 00:04:22.780 --> 00:04:25.740 was they would have this but 00:04:25.740 --> 00:04:29.400 first segment where they talked about bullshit oh 00:04:29.400 --> 00:04:33.540 they talked about like you know whatever and 00:04:33.540 --> 00:04:37.840 it was just random and all over the place sometimes personal stuff sometimes 00:04:37.840 --> 00:04:43.940 media sometimes whatever and then after doing that for a while they would go 00:04:43.940 --> 00:04:48.600 on to their official topic of the show generally speaking it wasn't like a news 00:04:48.600 --> 00:04:51.240 and politics show like we do here. 00:04:51.480 --> 00:04:55.940 It was sort of a, they would pick a topic to deep dive into. 00:04:56.720 --> 00:05:00.440 And then they would spend time talking about the topic. 00:05:01.000 --> 00:05:04.080 And anyway, it was, I liked that podcast. 00:05:04.360 --> 00:05:09.340 I had fun with it. And they did the but first. And anyway, that's where that comes from. 00:05:09.460 --> 00:05:12.360 I think their archival episodes are all still up online. 00:05:12.500 --> 00:05:14.620 You can go check them out, Tank Riot. It was fun. 00:05:14.840 --> 00:05:20.400 And sometimes they did talk about politics and stuff too. It just wasn't the 00:05:20.400 --> 00:05:25.500 always consistent theme like we sort of do, although we get away from it sometimes. 00:05:25.840 --> 00:05:29.080 Anyway, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, 00:05:29.080 --> 00:05:29.560 blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. 00:05:30.780 --> 00:05:35.540 I'll start with the car stuff. For those of you who listened past the end of 00:05:35.540 --> 00:05:43.500 the episode last week, you know I did go out and get a 2025 Ioniq 5 SEL model. 00:05:43.500 --> 00:05:47.100 Actually, I don't know if I said that in the after podcast, but it was the SEL 00:05:47.100 --> 00:05:49.320 trim level. I'll talk about that a little bit in a second. 00:05:50.680 --> 00:05:55.080 Basically the, you know, I'd been looking at them for a while. 00:05:55.240 --> 00:06:01.920 You know, I sort of had it in my mind that that's the one I kind of wanted if we could swing it. 00:06:02.440 --> 00:06:07.900 And it was probably a little bit more money than we would actually want to spend. 00:06:08.040 --> 00:06:10.800 As I told Yvonne, the amount of money I wanted to spend is zero, 00:06:11.140 --> 00:06:16.940 you know, like, yeah, like I didn't want to buy a new car right now. 00:06:17.120 --> 00:06:20.020 I'd hoped that this one would last a couple more years you know 00:06:20.020 --> 00:06:23.160 i knew it was in bad shape in various 00:06:23.160 --> 00:06:26.260 ways but i hope it would last a couple more years and yes 00:06:26.260 --> 00:06:29.240 yvonne was like oh let's uh get the prius 00:06:29.240 --> 00:06:34.740 just get the prius but i kind of wanted to do the all electric thing the subsidies 00:06:34.740 --> 00:06:38.600 were you know are being canceled in a couple months so like if i'm gonna do 00:06:38.600 --> 00:06:42.780 it like now seems like a good time to do it i'd been looking at this one for 00:06:42.780 --> 00:06:48.460 a while as they pass me on the street i'd been like you know hey, that looks cool. 00:06:48.460 --> 00:06:51.740 I think I like it. I was like, I need to see the interior. 00:06:52.600 --> 00:06:57.720 I'd only seen them passing by. And I had tried to peek in the windows of some 00:06:57.720 --> 00:07:03.040 parked ones, but I was always a little self-conscious about that and only took 00:07:03.040 --> 00:07:06.060 a quick glance. I didn't actually stop and stare. 00:07:07.240 --> 00:07:13.640 So I hadn't really gotten a good view of the interior. My wife had at least one friend, 00:07:13.640 --> 00:07:16.420 i think two who actually had them already and so 00:07:16.420 --> 00:07:19.320 she had actually ridden in them and said yeah it's a nice car you know 00:07:19.320 --> 00:07:24.080 i don't know her worry was it was like slightly bigger than my current car and 00:07:24.080 --> 00:07:30.120 it was like i i've said over and over again like the the size of car i had in 00:07:30.120 --> 00:07:37.020 the 2012 subaru imprasa was just about what i wanted like i i could see i didn't 00:07:37.020 --> 00:07:38.460 really want to go any smaller, 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:41.860 but I also didn't really want to go much larger. 00:07:41.900 --> 00:07:45.500 I'd consider a little bit larger, but not a lot larger. 00:07:45.660 --> 00:07:49.520 Like when occasionally when my car's been in the shop and I've gotten loaners 00:07:49.520 --> 00:07:53.020 from Subaru, they've put me in like Foresters or Outbacks or, 00:07:53.020 --> 00:07:55.080 you know, things like that. 00:07:55.200 --> 00:08:00.420 And I immediately felt like they were too big. I did not like them. 00:08:00.780 --> 00:08:06.040 I mean, they were fine. And after I drove them for a little while, I got used to them, but, 00:08:07.100 --> 00:08:09.900 Size-wise, I didn't like them. So she was worried that, you know, 00:08:09.980 --> 00:08:14.960 look, you may not think so, but the Ioniq's actually bigger than your current car. 00:08:15.120 --> 00:08:18.320 And I looked up the dimensions. It's a little bit bigger. It's like, 00:08:18.540 --> 00:08:23.000 you know, a couple inches wider and like four or five inches longer. 00:08:23.120 --> 00:08:25.360 I forget the exact numbers, but it was a little bit bigger. 00:08:26.600 --> 00:08:29.800 But you know so that was a concern and and 00:08:29.800 --> 00:08:32.820 also yeah like you know if you if 00:08:32.820 --> 00:08:35.780 you did a straight up purchase the the 00:08:35.780 --> 00:08:39.060 monthly payments were pretty large like 00:08:39.060 --> 00:08:41.920 larger like and i guess in the in the grand scheme 00:08:41.920 --> 00:08:44.780 of things i mean lots of pain lots of car payments are like that 00:08:44.780 --> 00:08:47.720 level you know yeah it was it was like 00:08:47.720 --> 00:08:50.460 a 700 and change car payment if i 00:08:50.460 --> 00:08:53.580 did a straight up purchase of the model i wanted and like 00:08:53.580 --> 00:08:56.640 you know it's i've it's 00:08:56.640 --> 00:09:00.320 been years since i've had any car payment i'm like 00:09:00.320 --> 00:09:03.260 i don't want any car payment and when i did 00:09:03.260 --> 00:09:06.420 like the last one was a lot less than that it seems like 00:09:06.420 --> 00:09:09.880 i mean it was you know what 12 plus years 00:09:09.880 --> 00:09:12.800 well i guess i'm still paying it for a while after that 00:09:12.800 --> 00:09:15.880 but like it's been a long time so things 00:09:15.880 --> 00:09:19.040 were cheaper and so like i get sticker shock 00:09:19.040 --> 00:09:21.840 anyway so those those were all concerned so i 00:09:21.840 --> 00:09:24.660 was like okay fine yvonne i'll look at the other ones too and 00:09:24.660 --> 00:09:27.520 like blah blah blah i'm i i didn't look at 00:09:27.520 --> 00:09:30.680 the other ones at all so my wife had a 00:09:30.680 --> 00:09:33.800 friend of hers yeah okay fine 00:09:33.800 --> 00:09:39.860 they they she has friends who own the dealership the hyundai dealership so she 00:09:39.860 --> 00:09:45.400 texts her friend is like you know hey we're looking for a new car it was unexpected 00:09:45.400 --> 00:09:49.360 yeah unexpected like it was an old car we knew it would happen sometime but 00:09:49.360 --> 00:09:51.280 we didn't know it was going to happen at that moment. 00:09:51.980 --> 00:09:55.360 And we wanted you know what do 00:09:55.360 --> 00:09:58.180 you have you know and she's like i i talked 00:09:58.180 --> 00:10:01.140 to my folks we have something in mind for you come on in 00:10:01.140 --> 00:10:05.260 we'll take care of you so you know 00:10:05.260 --> 00:10:11.660 i will say and i and look it it's been however long i mean my car brandy's car 00:10:11.660 --> 00:10:18.880 it's been forever since last time we bought cars the last couple of times we've 00:10:18.880 --> 00:10:24.760 had one connection or another that you know i mean. 00:10:25.640 --> 00:10:28.420 It it helps like i am the kind of person who 00:10:28.420 --> 00:10:32.580 like i don't want to go in and haggle i don't want to go in and do whatever 00:10:32.580 --> 00:10:37.040 like i i want to look at the sticker say this is what i want buy it and out 00:10:37.040 --> 00:10:41.660 you know i've talked to yvonne about this before like my car before the subaru 00:10:41.660 --> 00:10:46.380 was a saturn and And that was their whole deal was like, yo, 00:10:46.920 --> 00:10:48.780 no haggle. It's just the sticker price. 00:10:48.940 --> 00:10:51.240 Go. I love my Saturn, by the way. 00:10:51.940 --> 00:10:55.500 I like that car. I like the Subaru too. 00:10:56.160 --> 00:11:00.520 You know, even though I wish it had lasted a little bit longer, I liked both those cars. 00:11:01.280 --> 00:11:05.200 Oh, I went through, I tried to figure out my entire car history. 00:11:05.960 --> 00:11:11.500 And I can't remember all the years. And I have this sneaking suspicion that 00:11:11.500 --> 00:11:14.000 maybe I forgot one, but I don't think so. 00:11:14.160 --> 00:11:22.980 So I think it was the first one was a 1976 Dodge Colt that had originally belonged to my grandmother. 00:11:23.200 --> 00:11:27.080 I called it puke green. It was sort of a shiny metallic green. 00:11:27.740 --> 00:11:34.000 I still have its dashboard in my garage to this day because when it finally 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:37.780 died, I removed the dashboard and I kept it. 00:11:38.660 --> 00:11:42.080 Anyway, 1976 Dodge Colt. That 00:11:42.080 --> 00:11:45.100 was my grandmother's, then it was my mother's, then she let me drive it. 00:11:45.700 --> 00:11:48.840 I guess I technically never owned it. It was always my mother's, 00:11:48.900 --> 00:11:53.680 but I got to drive it. Then there was a Ford Taurus station wagon. It was blue. 00:11:54.620 --> 00:11:58.880 And that was also my mom's, but I got to drive it. 00:11:59.420 --> 00:12:02.620 And then after the Ford Taurus died, 00:12:02.620 --> 00:12:05.540 i got a toyota corolla and i had that 00:12:05.540 --> 00:12:08.760 that that's the one i remember the least about 00:12:08.760 --> 00:12:13.140 because it didn't last that long it got 00:12:13.140 --> 00:12:16.120 totaled in an accident i got rear-ended like i 00:12:16.120 --> 00:12:18.880 got in a multi-car pile-up where i 00:12:18.880 --> 00:12:22.460 was driving along the highway and you know 00:12:22.460 --> 00:12:25.300 i i had to stop because there were people stopped in 00:12:25.300 --> 00:12:28.040 front of me i successfully stopped you know 00:12:28.040 --> 00:12:31.520 i was not moving and then 00:12:31.520 --> 00:12:35.800 multiple cars hit me from behind and that 00:12:35.800 --> 00:12:39.200 one i i had bought used and wasn't worth 00:12:39.200 --> 00:12:42.280 that much to start with probably and yeah it was totaled 00:12:42.280 --> 00:12:47.540 by that accident luckily everybody walked away it was like you know multi-car 00:12:47.540 --> 00:12:53.180 pile up but nobody's severely injured i think i ended up going to like a chiropractor 00:12:53.180 --> 00:13:00.280 for a little bit which like it was a sports medicine slash chiropractor because like Like, yeah, 00:13:00.360 --> 00:13:03.720 I guess my back was hurt a little bit, but I don't know. 00:13:03.880 --> 00:13:08.060 Well, I don't even remember. It was a long time ago. But then after that, I got the Saturn. 00:13:08.810 --> 00:13:17.090 Green Saturn SL2, I think it was, and then the Subaru Impreza, and now Hyundai Ioniq 5. 00:13:17.250 --> 00:13:21.830 That's my entire history of cars, my entire life, unless I forgot one. 00:13:22.070 --> 00:13:28.470 I feel like maybe there was one in between the Taurus and the Corolla, 00:13:28.590 --> 00:13:32.370 but then I think back and I think there wasn't that much time in that interval. 00:13:32.590 --> 00:13:34.750 There can't have been. That has to have been it. 00:13:35.150 --> 00:13:38.790 And I'm hallucinating that There might have been another because I also can't 00:13:38.790 --> 00:13:42.610 remember anything about another car. So I think that's probably just it. 00:13:42.950 --> 00:13:48.390 I just like keep thinking, did I miss one? Is there? No, but I think that's the entire history. 00:13:49.570 --> 00:13:54.910 Anyway, it helps to have someone like because apparently it's a family business. 00:13:55.310 --> 00:14:00.950 The person who's a friend of my wife's wasn't there. She was traveling, 00:14:00.950 --> 00:14:02.790 but her daughter was there. 00:14:02.950 --> 00:14:08.250 And so her daughter came in. And her daughter did sort of the beginning and end of the process. 00:14:08.250 --> 00:14:15.150 And in between, they assigned us to some regular salesperson to do the test 00:14:15.150 --> 00:14:18.670 drive and all the intermediary stuff. 00:14:19.270 --> 00:14:22.730 But it was very smooth. There was no hassle. 00:14:23.010 --> 00:14:25.930 We didn't do any negotiation. They gave us a price. 00:14:26.170 --> 00:14:30.410 I mean, I did send pictures and everything to Yvonne. And Yvonne's like, 00:14:30.470 --> 00:14:31.650 that's a good deal. Go for it. 00:14:32.700 --> 00:14:36.860 You know, like if Yvonne had told us they're screwing you, you have to like 00:14:36.860 --> 00:14:39.160 negotiate or do, then we would have tried. 00:14:39.360 --> 00:14:43.880 But like, no, the very, the first thing I sent, you know, it's like, 00:14:43.980 --> 00:14:45.940 it's like, okay, they're taking care of you. 00:14:49.100 --> 00:14:53.980 Anyway, I, we did the test drive and, you know, the worries about it being bigger 00:14:53.980 --> 00:14:55.600 or whatever, it felt the same to me. 00:14:55.700 --> 00:14:59.820 Like, I mean, I know, I know intellectually it was slightly bigger. 00:14:59.820 --> 00:15:06.140 I can feel a few things where like it's slightly taller off the ground, slightly, but not a lot. 00:15:06.580 --> 00:15:10.980 And like the other dimensions may be a little bit bigger, but not a lot. 00:15:11.140 --> 00:15:15.580 It wasn't enough that like when I, I mentioned, I felt sort of uncomfortable 00:15:15.580 --> 00:15:20.300 in the forest or the outback or whatever. I got into them and I immediately 00:15:20.300 --> 00:15:23.460 felt like, oh my God, this thing's huge. 00:15:24.980 --> 00:15:29.240 And I didn't feel that with this. Like it immediately felt like a normal, 00:15:29.560 --> 00:15:32.320 I'm just normally driving the car, whatever. 00:15:32.780 --> 00:15:38.580 And, and I liked it. And the, the one thing that bugged me, I'll tell you the 00:15:38.580 --> 00:15:43.180 one thing that bugged me, I bought it anyway, but this is one of those things 00:15:43.180 --> 00:15:45.780 where I'm like, why would people do this? 00:15:45.980 --> 00:15:52.440 This seems like an obvious flaw is that from the driver's position, 00:15:52.760 --> 00:15:56.820 at least at my height and, I guess, 00:15:56.940 --> 00:15:59.900 my posture and where I like to set the seats, 00:15:59.900 --> 00:16:04.660 although I tried to adjust it to avoid this and couldn't, the bottom left corner 00:16:04.660 --> 00:16:12.340 of the infotainment display screen, not the one with the dials directly in front of you, 00:16:12.460 --> 00:16:17.560 but the infotainment display screen, the bottom left-hand corner is obscured by the steering wheel. 00:16:18.230 --> 00:16:25.050 And I'm like, all you have to do is move it an inch to the right and you wouldn't have this issue. 00:16:25.670 --> 00:16:31.270 But no, no. And so my wife's like, I don't know what you're talking about. I can see it all. 00:16:31.730 --> 00:16:35.750 I'm like, and I'm looking at the geometry and trying to do physics in my head. 00:16:35.850 --> 00:16:37.570 And I'm like, there's no way you can see it all. 00:16:37.770 --> 00:16:41.610 You're just, you just don't care or don't notice, or, you know, 00:16:41.710 --> 00:16:44.550 you just automatically sort of move your head a little bit to the right. 00:16:44.550 --> 00:16:49.310 Because you can see the bottom left of the screen if you move your head a little 00:16:49.310 --> 00:16:55.170 bit over to the side, you know, or maybe she just sits tilted to the side. I don't know. 00:16:55.750 --> 00:17:01.130 And of course the, and so I'm like, I want to see that corner of the screen. 00:17:01.370 --> 00:17:05.890 They could have just moved it an inch and it would have been fine. 00:17:07.010 --> 00:17:10.510 You know, I'm like, I'm not going to let that stop me from getting the car, 00:17:10.570 --> 00:17:17.130 but it did sort of annoy me. You know, but nothing else annoyed me. 00:17:17.390 --> 00:17:21.570 Everything else was like nice. I enjoyed it. I tested the stuff. 00:17:22.410 --> 00:17:27.430 I had asked to test the SEL trim from the beginning because I'd read somewhere, 00:17:27.530 --> 00:17:31.270 I think it was car and driver or somewhere, that that was sort of the sweet 00:17:31.270 --> 00:17:36.630 spot between cost and value of the packages you can get on it. 00:17:36.730 --> 00:17:41.410 I think there's two packages below and two packages above, if I remember right. 00:17:41.410 --> 00:17:42.430 I'm not going to look it up. 00:17:43.470 --> 00:17:47.230 But here's the thing, and I talked a little bit about this on the Curmudgeon's 00:17:47.230 --> 00:17:51.390 Corner Slack with our listener, Bob, who also has an Ionic 5. 00:17:51.490 --> 00:17:55.950 He got it a few months ago, and he apparently has the next trim level up for 00:17:55.950 --> 00:17:59.570 me, like the Limited or whatever. I don't know. 00:18:01.110 --> 00:18:10.570 I did not, I could have looked and said, okay, I remember that the review said SEL was the sweet spot. 00:18:12.450 --> 00:18:14.530 But what's in the next level up? 00:18:15.720 --> 00:18:20.760 I did not do that. I intentionally avoided that. 00:18:20.880 --> 00:18:26.980 I did look at one level down, and I asked him, okay, one level down, 00:18:27.140 --> 00:18:29.700 what's it missing? What doesn't it have? 00:18:30.060 --> 00:18:33.860 And the big thing for me was actually the wireless charging pad in the middle. 00:18:34.020 --> 00:18:38.800 And I know they're slower than plugging it in, but it's so convenient. 00:18:38.800 --> 00:18:42.280 You just put the thing down, and you're done. and it 00:18:42.280 --> 00:18:45.220 it it the the speed of it is annoying 00:18:45.220 --> 00:18:48.620 compared to a wired one i i will give you that but it's 00:18:48.620 --> 00:18:51.700 so convenient and also like apparently a power 00:18:51.700 --> 00:18:57.780 adjustable passenger seat as and back seat for that matter as well as the driver's 00:18:57.780 --> 00:19:02.600 seat and like those things are cool i i would want that i would miss not having 00:19:02.600 --> 00:19:11.460 the wireless charging pad and i would be annoyed knowing that the driver's seat has, you know, 00:19:11.680 --> 00:19:13.860 is powered, but the others aren't. 00:19:14.040 --> 00:19:18.080 I would just be, if I ever have to ride as a passenger, that would annoy me. 00:19:19.060 --> 00:19:23.440 But here, this is exactly though, why I didn't look at the next level up. 00:19:23.540 --> 00:19:31.840 Cause I knew 100% that if I looked up what was in the next level up, 00:19:31.960 --> 00:19:34.560 I would convince myself that I had to have them. 00:19:34.720 --> 00:19:39.940 I still, to this moment, have not looked up what's in the next level up because 00:19:39.940 --> 00:19:46.000 I know if I did, I'd be like, oh man, I could have got that. 00:19:46.060 --> 00:19:51.760 It was only like this many dollars more and we could have folded that in and 00:19:51.760 --> 00:19:56.740 the monthly payment would have only been like 20 bucks a month more or something. 00:19:57.000 --> 00:20:03.080 And I could have done that. And oh my goodness. and now I'm missing out on doodad X. 00:20:04.200 --> 00:20:10.340 I 100% know that if I'd looked at the higher trim levels, I would have talked 00:20:10.340 --> 00:20:13.180 to myself all the way up to the maximum trim level. 00:20:14.800 --> 00:20:19.020 And because I know myself, I know I would have done that. 00:20:19.180 --> 00:20:25.080 I know I would have been like, and you know, I know, I just know. 00:20:25.940 --> 00:20:29.280 It doesn't even matter what those things were. 00:20:29.280 --> 00:20:33.180 You know i would have convinced myself 00:20:33.180 --> 00:20:35.860 i needed them as it 00:20:35.860 --> 00:20:38.840 is i got what i got and i'm happy i'm 00:20:38.840 --> 00:20:46.460 like this is an amazing upgrade from a 2012 subaru impreza like and and look 00:20:46.460 --> 00:20:52.500 a lot of the things i'm amazed in i guess just to finish that up i guess at 00:20:52.500 --> 00:20:57.760 some point maybe i'll look up what was in the higher trim levels, but I'm going to wait. 00:20:58.120 --> 00:21:02.480 Like, yeah, I know I could do it instantly. I could bring up another window 00:21:02.480 --> 00:21:06.920 right now and check, but I don't want to, because right now I'm happy. 00:21:07.140 --> 00:21:11.560 And I know if I looked up those trim levels, I'd be like. 00:21:12.610 --> 00:21:15.650 Sad that i didn't get them 00:21:15.650 --> 00:21:18.590 because i know like our finances are such 00:21:18.590 --> 00:21:21.350 that i wanted to spend as little money as 00:21:21.350 --> 00:21:24.770 possible i mean and obviously not as i could 00:21:24.770 --> 00:21:28.010 have gotten something much much cheaper than what we got yeah i 00:21:28.010 --> 00:21:31.630 could have gotten a really basic traditional gas 00:21:31.630 --> 00:21:35.850 car with no bells and whistles and you 00:21:35.850 --> 00:21:39.030 know i i could have gotten something for half the price of 00:21:39.030 --> 00:21:42.390 what i got there are still cars out there for 25k 00:21:42.390 --> 00:21:46.450 or so not very many but you 00:21:46.450 --> 00:21:53.050 can get cars you know you can get basic cars with absolutely nothing hell i 00:21:53.050 --> 00:21:58.770 could have gotten a used car i i could have gotten a a newer used car i i could 00:21:58.770 --> 00:22:03.750 have spent a lot less than i did but you know i wanted this but, 00:22:04.270 --> 00:22:07.110 I could have spent more like, you know. 00:22:07.830 --> 00:22:12.350 They're, they're, you know, and I know I could have convinced myself up, 00:22:12.470 --> 00:22:17.270 up, up a trim level or two that once I, I mean, the big decision was you're 00:22:17.270 --> 00:22:21.470 getting this car one, once you're within that range. 00:22:21.470 --> 00:22:26.030 You know I know it was 00:22:26.030 --> 00:22:31.710 a better choice to be more frugal the stupid review said this was the sweet 00:22:31.710 --> 00:22:37.230 spot so I let myself fixate on that and get this one and it's probably the right 00:22:37.230 --> 00:22:43.830 thing to do but I know the moment I look at those other trim levels I would be like oh man. 00:22:44.670 --> 00:22:49.990 I should have done that I could have done that oh I'm missing the blah blah blah. 00:22:51.440 --> 00:22:59.880 And yeah, anyway, so I've been driving it around for just under a week now. 00:23:00.200 --> 00:23:05.500 I ended up getting it driving away from the lot Saturday night or before sunset. 00:23:05.500 --> 00:23:12.940 So it's still light out, you know, so it's, and it's Saturday midday as I'm recording this. 00:23:13.080 --> 00:23:15.640 So not quite a full week, but close. 00:23:15.800 --> 00:23:18.200 I am enjoying it. I like the car. 00:23:18.460 --> 00:23:25.280 I am having, having fun with it. I've, I've, I've charged it up twice now. 00:23:26.040 --> 00:23:32.980 Once I didn't really need it yet, but I was like, you know, I was at like 50% or something. 00:23:33.360 --> 00:23:36.160 I'm like, I want to figure out how to do it. Both times I've charged, 00:23:36.200 --> 00:23:37.400 I've charged a supercharger. 00:23:37.860 --> 00:23:43.340 I have not tried the trickle charge at home because I know Yvonne and others 00:23:43.340 --> 00:23:47.300 were saying if I trickle charge at home overnight, that's probably enough for 00:23:47.300 --> 00:23:51.460 my daily commute. And so I only need to do something else if I'm really going somewhere. 00:23:53.180 --> 00:23:58.320 Honestly, my daughter's car has been parked in my parking spot in the garage. 00:23:58.940 --> 00:24:03.820 Not in the garage, in the driveway. My daughter's car has been parked there. 00:24:05.020 --> 00:24:07.280 And so I've been parking on the street. 00:24:09.020 --> 00:24:13.520 So further away that I could stretch an extension cord. Because I'm parking 00:24:13.520 --> 00:24:14.940 on the street down the block. 00:24:16.020 --> 00:24:19.180 She she's due to like take that car and 00:24:19.180 --> 00:24:22.360 drive east to pennsylvania to to live 00:24:22.360 --> 00:24:27.900 with her grandmother for uh for like at least a year soon she's been she's been 00:24:27.900 --> 00:24:34.520 preparing to leave for over a month now as she like makes sure she feels like 00:24:34.520 --> 00:24:38.600 everything is settled and then she was going to drive cross-country which by 00:24:38.600 --> 00:24:41.460 the way she's got an even older car she's got like a 2002, 00:24:42.780 --> 00:24:50.060 pontiac aztec so who knows if it'll even make it cross country but fingers crossed anyway. 00:24:51.580 --> 00:24:54.300 Yeah the charging was fine went so the 00:24:54.300 --> 00:24:59.780 first time i had to charge it took took some figuring out had to like okay how 00:24:59.780 --> 00:25:03.500 do you do this exactly what do you what do you push and where do you plug and 00:25:03.500 --> 00:25:09.800 what do you do the 2025 ionics use the new standard port that's the old tesla 00:25:09.800 --> 00:25:13.600 port that Now everybody's standardizing on, you know, 00:25:13.800 --> 00:25:19.940 and so like using the Tesla supercharger, I didn't have to use any adapters or anything. 00:25:19.940 --> 00:25:23.560 It's, it came with a bag full of adapters for other types. 00:25:24.260 --> 00:25:28.100 I haven't tried any other types yet. I've got chargers at work. 00:25:28.380 --> 00:25:31.120 But, you know, the thing I've noticed is when I come in in the morning, 00:25:31.300 --> 00:25:32.720 all the chargers are always full. 00:25:33.580 --> 00:25:39.300 By afternoon, they've emptied out. But if I want to do that, I have to remember. 00:25:39.500 --> 00:25:43.500 I'd either have to get there earlier or remember somewhere midday to go move 00:25:43.500 --> 00:25:44.920 my car to the work chargers. 00:25:45.360 --> 00:25:49.420 And I don't think they're the fast chargers like superchargers. They're a lot slower. 00:25:49.620 --> 00:25:55.420 But, you know, I will at some point experiment with them as well. But charging was fine. 00:25:56.780 --> 00:26:00.980 When I was at 50%, it took like 15 minutes. The second time I charged, 00:26:01.100 --> 00:26:04.900 I'd let it get down to like 25 or something, and it was like half an hour. 00:26:05.060 --> 00:26:09.220 And that's charging to 80%, because apparently the advice, I don't know, 00:26:09.380 --> 00:26:12.420 like anybody else with an electric out there, feel free to give me advice on this. 00:26:12.420 --> 00:26:18.800 I saw in a number of places saying generally speaking try to keep it between 20 and 80 percent. 00:26:19.700 --> 00:26:25.160 And only charge to 100 if you're actually like you're gonna need it you're like 00:26:25.160 --> 00:26:28.480 on a large road trip and you feel like you're gonna need it just better for 00:26:28.480 --> 00:26:33.420 the long-term health of the battery whatever so i've i have it set to charge 00:26:33.420 --> 00:26:38.300 to 80 at the moment and you know yeah it's different than like the quick, 00:26:38.440 --> 00:26:41.140 you know, fill up at the gas station and go, but it's not bad. 00:26:41.520 --> 00:26:47.340 And I do plan, I, we, we will get one, an L2, I guess, whatever they call it, 00:26:47.400 --> 00:26:51.540 the next level up charger, we will get one installed at home. That is part of the plan. 00:26:52.060 --> 00:26:55.800 The, it, it came with a coupon for free hardware for that. 00:26:55.960 --> 00:26:58.780 You still have to pay installation, but it comes with the, you know, 00:26:58.880 --> 00:27:05.000 so it came with, you know, here's a $600 value or whatever, 500, 00:27:05.340 --> 00:27:10.580 $600 value for the actual hardware for the charger, and then you got to get somebody to install it. 00:27:10.880 --> 00:27:14.300 And so I'll go through that process. I started that process. 00:27:14.500 --> 00:27:18.260 Like I, I clicked the button to claim the coupon code or whatever. 00:27:18.260 --> 00:27:24.140 And as soon as the coupon code arrives, they said it'll take a few days and then I'll get. 00:27:28.180 --> 00:27:30.980 And then I'll just like plug it in and charge in my driveway. 00:27:30.980 --> 00:27:33.420 And that'll be, you know, a lot more convenient. 00:27:33.540 --> 00:27:37.720 But even the superchargers aren't not convenient. 00:27:38.740 --> 00:27:44.940 And anyway, so the main things I'm struck by in the actual car, 00:27:45.060 --> 00:27:48.580 and I don't know, this is not a car review podcast. 00:27:48.620 --> 00:27:55.960 And I'm not a car person. But, you know, mainly the main things are just the 00:27:55.960 --> 00:28:03.440 kinds of things you'd see in almost any transition from a 2012 to a 2025 and 00:28:03.440 --> 00:28:06.700 not a top end 2012 either. 00:28:06.700 --> 00:28:10.580 Like, so like there are a lot of features that were already in like luxury car 00:28:10.580 --> 00:28:17.460 models that weren't in a 2012 Subaru Impreza that are just standard features 00:28:17.460 --> 00:28:22.220 now that I think I have experienced in loaner cars, 00:28:22.400 --> 00:28:24.460 but have not had in my daily driver. 00:28:24.900 --> 00:28:28.020 And so most of it was like, these aren't even new things. 00:28:28.040 --> 00:28:33.180 These have been around for many, many years, but it's the first time I've had them in my primary car. 00:28:33.180 --> 00:28:36.940 And so things like the backup camera, you know, 00:28:37.580 --> 00:28:43.140 things like having a whole bunch of charge ports built in instead of a couple 00:28:43.140 --> 00:28:48.900 cigarette lighter adapters that you have to like, you know, put your little 00:28:48.900 --> 00:28:52.340 charger doohickey in and then plug into. 00:28:52.340 --> 00:28:59.200 Having a built-in screen for like apple carplay instead of having an aftermarket 00:28:59.200 --> 00:29:03.960 one that i added a couple years ago and before that bluetooth only you know 00:29:03.960 --> 00:29:06.600 but you know all this kind of stuff. 00:29:08.620 --> 00:29:17.840 And and the biggest one though that actually will make that has made an impact 00:29:17.840 --> 00:29:24.160 in my daily quality of life is modern cruise control. 00:29:25.060 --> 00:29:29.180 And by modern, well, what do I mean? Well, first of all, even my regular cruise 00:29:29.180 --> 00:29:31.980 control hadn't worked in my old Subaru in years. 00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:37.580 It's one of the things that stopped working. I'm pretty sure when the second 00:29:37.580 --> 00:29:44.040 or third time the rat ate through the wiring harnesses and we decided just not to repair it this time. 00:29:44.520 --> 00:29:47.280 So I hadn't had any cruise control at all. 00:29:47.860 --> 00:29:52.980 But 2012 Subaru Impreza was old-fashioned cruise control. You set it at a speed 00:29:52.980 --> 00:29:54.720 and it goes that speed. End of story. 00:29:55.900 --> 00:29:57.240 Modern cruise control. 00:29:58.450 --> 00:30:02.150 Detects the traffic in front of you and adjusts your speed appropriately. 00:30:02.150 --> 00:30:06.190 You set a maximum speed, but it slows down if you need to. 00:30:06.410 --> 00:30:10.450 And it detects the lanes and helps you stay in the lanes. 00:30:11.510 --> 00:30:17.970 For my 25-mile approximately, slightly less than 25-mile, 00:30:18.250 --> 00:30:23.650 25-mile approximately commute each direction into work now that I have to go 00:30:23.650 --> 00:30:30.550 five days a week into the office in Seattle from where I live, where a significant, 00:30:31.030 --> 00:30:36.950 like sometimes the entire length of that drive is heavy traffic. 00:30:37.670 --> 00:30:42.070 But even the sort of normal is at least half of it is. 00:30:42.970 --> 00:30:51.710 And, oh my goodness, letting the car deal with most of that, 00:30:51.870 --> 00:30:55.510 you know, I put myself in the correct lane, 00:30:55.710 --> 00:30:59.570 like for where I need to be, like right when I get on the highway. 00:31:01.010 --> 00:31:08.150 And set the cruise control for, okay, a couple miles above the speed limit, speed limit 60. 00:31:08.370 --> 00:31:12.710 I put it at 65. I will admit, because if you actually set it to 60, 00:31:12.870 --> 00:31:14.530 people will just get really annoyed at you. 00:31:14.830 --> 00:31:19.090 Some people do want to go 70, but 65 seems like a reasonable compromise. 00:31:19.470 --> 00:31:23.310 And most of the time, not going anywhere close to that anyway. 00:31:23.430 --> 00:31:27.670 There are only a few open stretches where you actually get up to that. 00:31:28.570 --> 00:31:34.910 But having it deal with speed up, slow down, speed up, slow down, 00:31:35.190 --> 00:31:40.770 speed up, slow down, stop, wait 15 seconds, start again. 00:31:42.450 --> 00:31:46.150 And, you know, drive around the curves and stuff. 00:31:46.290 --> 00:31:51.970 I mean, you know, this is not even, you know, full self-driving where people 00:31:51.970 --> 00:31:57.210 are tempted to, like, read a book or whatever or play video games or whatever 00:31:57.210 --> 00:32:00.530 those Tesla people do who end up getting in severe car crashes. 00:32:00.910 --> 00:32:03.210 I mean, I can't not pay attention. 00:32:03.710 --> 00:32:06.090 This thing is not that smart. 00:32:07.370 --> 00:32:16.710 But it's pretty good. And, you know, just the amount of mental energy required for the drive is less. 00:32:17.130 --> 00:32:20.910 Even if you are still paying attention and making sure it's not doing anything 00:32:20.910 --> 00:32:26.030 stupid and blah, blah, blah, the amount of mental energy needed is less. 00:32:26.030 --> 00:32:34.050 Even in just the one week driving to work, I can tell I arrive at the office 00:32:34.050 --> 00:32:39.150 less tired because one of my complaints, generally speaking, 00:32:40.090 --> 00:32:42.950 about, you know, since I've been commuting every day again, 00:32:43.150 --> 00:32:47.790 is just that no matter how much sleep I've had the night before, 00:32:47.790 --> 00:32:54.770 I arrive at the office already tired and feeling like I need a break before 00:32:54.770 --> 00:32:59.130 I can start for real because I've just been in the car. 00:32:59.490 --> 00:33:04.390 You know, if a really good traffic day will be less than an hour, 00:33:04.790 --> 00:33:10.110 but, you know, like Fridays are usually a little bit better than the rest of the week. 00:33:10.230 --> 00:33:12.370 If you're around a holiday, it's better. 00:33:12.510 --> 00:33:17.130 But I'd say my typical time is approximately an hour. 00:33:18.390 --> 00:33:25.670 And if it's a bad day If there's bad weather Or there's been accidents or whatever 00:33:25.670 --> 00:33:27.130 It can hit an hour and a half. 00:33:28.490 --> 00:33:35.930 One day this week And I was so glad I had the car helping with this But it did 00:33:35.930 --> 00:33:38.350 take me over an hour and a half To get into work, 00:33:39.970 --> 00:33:46.150 But here's the deal You know, it's 25 miles to work. 00:33:47.850 --> 00:33:51.690 The last mile the 00:33:51.690 --> 00:33:55.190 exit ramp off the highway and the 00:33:55.190 --> 00:33:58.030 like four blocks from there to my 00:33:58.030 --> 00:34:00.750 actual building took more than half an 00:34:00.750 --> 00:34:04.690 hour all by itself you know 00:34:04.690 --> 00:34:08.710 it was actually you know a decent drive 00:34:08.710 --> 00:34:14.410 and then boom you hit you hit the line waiting to get to the exit to get off 00:34:14.410 --> 00:34:23.770 at the exit and then it was crawling forever I remember like I messaged the 00:34:23.770 --> 00:34:25.970 person I was supposed to be meeting and had to like. 00:34:26.790 --> 00:34:29.710 Move a reschedule apologize for 00:34:29.710 --> 00:34:33.290 being late whatever because like it wasn't 00:34:33.290 --> 00:34:36.350 happening yeah i i'd left enough buffer 00:34:36.350 --> 00:34:39.230 that i was intending to 00:34:39.230 --> 00:34:42.350 be at the office half an hour before this meeting i ended up 15 minutes 00:34:42.350 --> 00:34:46.250 late to it anyway if the 00:34:46.250 --> 00:34:49.030 the the finance person when we were signing all 00:34:49.030 --> 00:34:51.950 the papers asked me what's the favorite thing about the new car 00:34:51.950 --> 00:34:55.450 and i was like i haven't 00:34:55.450 --> 00:34:58.310 really driven it yet i hadn't driven the actual car yet 00:34:58.310 --> 00:35:01.350 because like the one we test drove was a different color it 00:35:01.350 --> 00:35:04.350 was otherwise identical so i i didn't say okay 00:35:04.350 --> 00:35:08.110 i need to test drive this actual vehicle i'm like it's the same other than the 00:35:08.110 --> 00:35:12.870 color right and they're like yeah it's the same other than the color so i hadn't 00:35:12.870 --> 00:35:15.450 actually driven the vehicle at all yet so i don't know i'm like what's my favorite 00:35:15.450 --> 00:35:21.370 thing oh so i said the the modern things that would be in here that weren't in a 2012 12. 00:35:21.970 --> 00:35:27.450 But I will say after driving a week, it's the goddamn modern cruise control. 00:35:28.210 --> 00:35:29.870 And I know this is not new. 00:35:31.510 --> 00:35:34.950 You know, I know cars have had this for like a long time. 00:35:35.190 --> 00:35:39.490 It's just, this is the first one I've had that has this, and it makes a big 00:35:39.490 --> 00:35:41.790 difference to my quality of life with my commute. 00:35:42.830 --> 00:35:48.470 So anyway, I'm happy with the car. I'm happy to have switched to a full electric. 00:35:48.810 --> 00:35:51.850 So far, you know now we have i haven't 00:35:51.850 --> 00:35:54.710 tried doing any road trips there are no road trips 00:35:54.710 --> 00:35:57.610 on the agenda i haven't done that 00:35:57.610 --> 00:36:00.870 kind of i haven't done a serious road trip 00:36:00.870 --> 00:36:04.410 in a long long long long time the 00:36:04.410 --> 00:36:08.010 last time was probably like a decade ago where 00:36:08.010 --> 00:36:10.810 i had a work i had a conference i was 00:36:10.810 --> 00:36:17.830 going to in at work in san francisco and for some damn reason i decided hey 00:36:17.830 --> 00:36:23.390 it'll be fun to drive instead of instead of taking a plane so i drove back and 00:36:23.390 --> 00:36:28.150 forth to the conference in san francisco which seattle to san francisco is a decent hike, 00:36:29.120 --> 00:36:35.360 And, you know, so I did that. Let's see. How long is that? Let's just check Google Maps real quick. 00:36:36.940 --> 00:36:41.380 Maps.google.com. Let's do this. 00:36:41.980 --> 00:36:52.320 So let's see. From my home to, let's just say San Francisco without specifying a specific place. 00:36:52.580 --> 00:36:55.800 And if I can spell Cisco correctly. 00:36:56.800 --> 00:37:01.640 Okay it says oh i 00:37:01.640 --> 00:37:05.300 had looked something up earlier as a pedestrian 313 hours 00:37:05.300 --> 00:37:11.160 as a pedestrian if you were going to walk from my house to san francisco now 00:37:11.160 --> 00:37:18.860 let's let's put this in a car 13 hours 13 hours and change okay 12 hours 34 00:37:18.860 --> 00:37:23.900 minutes 831 miles for the preferred route the fastest route. 00:37:24.960 --> 00:37:31.040 Yeah and and i stupidly as well decided i would do that in one day you know 00:37:31.040 --> 00:37:37.580 you can do 12 hours in one day but it's nicer to split that up anyway i did 00:37:37.580 --> 00:37:38.980 it in one day in both directions, 00:37:39.620 --> 00:37:42.520 i'm just dumb i mean i call it one day 00:37:42.520 --> 00:37:45.540 but i actually ended up like you know taking naps at 00:37:45.540 --> 00:37:49.300 rest stops and stuff like that for multiple hours anyway 00:37:49.300 --> 00:37:52.000 that's probably the long time i've 00:37:52.000 --> 00:37:55.100 done a real road trip and we have none planned i am 00:37:55.100 --> 00:37:58.000 i am thinking like since i have a new car i'm 00:37:58.000 --> 00:38:01.000 like you know maybe not road trips like 00:38:01.000 --> 00:38:04.340 that oh because we also yvonne convinced 00:38:04.340 --> 00:38:07.460 us it was okay to get a lease because there were all kinds of additional deals 00:38:07.460 --> 00:38:11.000 and the the the the rebates and 00:38:11.000 --> 00:38:13.680 stuff due to the that's ending and blah blah 00:38:13.680 --> 00:38:17.060 blah you could get into with a 00:38:17.060 --> 00:38:21.220 lease in ways you couldn't get through a purchase although i believe there was 00:38:21.220 --> 00:38:26.120 a there was a weird thing around that with we actually got a subaru rebate instead 00:38:26.120 --> 00:38:29.460 because the particular model we got wasn't eligible for the other but they matched 00:38:29.460 --> 00:38:35.040 the price anyway blah blah blah whatever we we we had plenty of rebate the. 00:38:35.900 --> 00:38:40.880 Anyway what was i saying oh yeah you know i i used to do these random trips 00:38:40.880 --> 00:38:45.300 that were like you know pick a random spot that's less than a certain amount 00:38:45.300 --> 00:38:51.040 of airfare go there the next one for a long time for like 20 plus years has 00:38:51.040 --> 00:38:53.500 been to Quintana Roo, Mexico. We still haven't gone. 00:38:53.740 --> 00:38:56.420 Maybe eventually I'll go. Yvonne said he'd go with me. 00:38:57.290 --> 00:39:04.670 I want to do that someday. But in the meantime, I was thinking short-range random 00:39:04.670 --> 00:39:06.350 trips, like within 20 miles. 00:39:06.570 --> 00:39:10.970 Like pick a random spot within 20 miles. I recently fixed up my random spot 00:39:10.970 --> 00:39:13.650 generator on abelsmay.com so it works again. 00:39:14.350 --> 00:39:19.030 And it had been broken for years because it used an old Google Maps API that 00:39:19.030 --> 00:39:21.630 had been deprecated and I updated it. 00:39:21.770 --> 00:39:25.570 And it's now, yeah, got a cool 00:39:25.570 --> 00:39:28.490 like spinning globe map that like 00:39:28.490 --> 00:39:31.150 when you pick a random spot and you know the 00:39:31.150 --> 00:39:34.250 actual random spot picking never broke but the part 00:39:34.250 --> 00:39:38.150 that showed you where it was on a map had broken anyway i'm thinking you know 00:39:38.150 --> 00:39:43.730 i could do that i you know just you know random spot within 20-25 miles drive 00:39:43.730 --> 00:39:48.910 there see what's there explore a little bit that would be like a fun thing to 00:39:48.910 --> 00:39:52.950 do on weekends It's not that I have a lot of extra time on weekends and, you know, 00:39:53.190 --> 00:39:59.130 I could like do a quick, like mount my phone and do a time-lapse of the trip 00:39:59.130 --> 00:40:03.330 or something and, and make, make, make TikTok content out of it or something. 00:40:03.710 --> 00:40:06.630 I don't know. Of course that makes it even more work. 00:40:07.550 --> 00:40:11.510 I don't know. I want to do something, but even that's like, that's a short drive, 00:40:11.770 --> 00:40:13.390 like no, no road trips spent. 00:40:13.510 --> 00:40:16.270 Anyway, like the range anxiety, I don't think it'll be a real problem because 00:40:16.270 --> 00:40:20.210 my actual driving doesn't require 00:40:20.210 --> 00:40:23.530 the main thing is i probably will have to charge more 00:40:23.530 --> 00:40:28.810 often than i filled up with gas but again the plan is to get one of those chargers 00:40:28.810 --> 00:40:32.030 for home and then that won't really be an issue you know just plug it in at 00:40:32.030 --> 00:40:36.050 home when you park at night like not even every night but every few nights you 00:40:36.050 --> 00:40:42.950 do that i don't know okay enough about cars and i think enough for this segment. 00:40:43.170 --> 00:40:49.850 I do have, I do want to talk about one movie and one book, but let's wait for 00:40:49.850 --> 00:40:52.050 the next segment to do that. I will take my break. 00:40:52.210 --> 00:40:54.350 I will do other things that I want to get done. 00:40:55.170 --> 00:40:58.730 And we'll come back and talk about that. And then I don't know what I'll do 00:40:58.730 --> 00:41:01.030 for the third segment. I don't know if I'll do a third segment. 00:41:01.650 --> 00:41:04.810 We'll see how it goes. Like none of those topics really excite me. 00:41:05.030 --> 00:41:08.710 Maybe while I take my break, there'll be some really exciting breaking news. 00:41:08.830 --> 00:41:10.270 And then there'll be something to talk about. 00:41:11.330 --> 00:41:15.730 I don't know. Anyway, so this is it for part one. 00:41:17.070 --> 00:41:22.450 I hope you enjoyed part one. It was another story time. It was the continuing 00:41:22.450 --> 00:41:26.670 of the thing, the story from the other day. 00:41:27.590 --> 00:41:31.610 Oh, you know, the break I'd had picked is a new break. 00:41:31.790 --> 00:41:34.850 I'll save that for one where Yvonne is here. 00:41:34.970 --> 00:41:37.630 And the next break was an apple dream, which he hasn't heard. 00:41:37.710 --> 00:41:42.670 So I'll save that for Yvonne, too. So I'll just do this other break We'll do 00:41:42.670 --> 00:41:46.330 those others And the new one's really short It's like the shortest break we 00:41:46.330 --> 00:41:50.090 have in rotation But you know whatever It was something. 00:41:51.270 --> 00:41:57.170 Alex had me record like A long long time ago And I just recently told him Hey 00:41:57.170 --> 00:41:59.770 if you send me that I'll make it a break So anyway, 00:42:00.350 --> 00:42:04.250 But that's not what you're going to hear now This is one of the other breaks 00:42:04.250 --> 00:42:09.690 So here goes We'll be back to talk about movies and books after this, 00:42:09.930 --> 00:42:12.790 and after I take many hours. 00:42:13.010 --> 00:42:15.970 For you, it'll be short. Here you go. 00:42:59.020 --> 00:43:05.720 And we're back. As I said, for me, it's many, many, many, many, many, many hours later. 00:43:06.320 --> 00:43:12.760 For you, it's probably just a minute or two later, unless, unless you also paused 00:43:12.760 --> 00:43:15.440 the show, went and did other stuff and came back. 00:43:15.860 --> 00:43:18.140 Which if you did, awesome. 00:43:19.880 --> 00:43:23.140 Anyway first up the this will 00:43:23.140 --> 00:43:25.860 be the media segment i'm going to talk about one movie and one 00:43:25.860 --> 00:43:28.820 book i think it's becoming clear as the 00:43:28.820 --> 00:43:31.940 weekend progresses that absent some new breaking news 00:43:31.940 --> 00:43:37.460 the last segment is going to be about the epstein stuff because the maga implosion 00:43:37.460 --> 00:43:43.440 appears to be growing again no new actual revelations on anything actually epstein 00:43:43.440 --> 00:43:50.920 related but the reaction in MAGA world seems to be spiraling. 00:43:51.120 --> 00:43:56.560 So we'll talk about that a little bit. But first, first, a movie and a book. 00:43:57.400 --> 00:44:03.540 So the movie is Why We Fight from 2005. 00:44:04.180 --> 00:44:11.700 This is a documentary. So it's probably unlikely that many of you have heard of it. 00:44:11.700 --> 00:44:18.220 It was i guess it was at sundance it's like one of these film festival release films, 00:44:19.220 --> 00:44:22.760 it won it did win a prize for 00:44:22.760 --> 00:44:31.320 documentary there i guess and also won another award in like the information 00:44:31.320 --> 00:44:39.080 and culture category in germany and and it won a peabody so what is it i i i 00:44:39.080 --> 00:44:42.380 said what it was, right? Why we fight 2005. Yeah. 00:44:43.160 --> 00:44:48.460 Here's the synopsis from Wikipedia. And we'll go from there. Synopsis. 00:44:49.670 --> 00:44:55.290 Why We Fight describes the rise and maintenance of the United States military-industrial 00:44:55.290 --> 00:45:02.470 complex and its 50-year involvement with the wars led by the United States to date, 00:45:02.650 --> 00:45:06.690 especially its 2003 invasion of Iraq. 00:45:07.390 --> 00:45:12.750 The documentary asserts that in every decade since World War II, 00:45:12.750 --> 00:45:19.490 the American company was, American company, the American public was misled so 00:45:19.490 --> 00:45:21.590 that the government, incumbent administration, 00:45:21.930 --> 00:45:26.090 could take them to war and fuel the military industrial economy, 00:45:26.270 --> 00:45:28.850 maintaining American political dominance in the world. 00:45:30.010 --> 00:45:34.770 Interviewed about this matter are politician John McCain Political science and 00:45:34.770 --> 00:45:40.330 former CIA analyst Chalmer Johnson Politician Richard Pearl, 00:45:41.450 --> 00:45:47.490 Neoconservative commentator William Kristol Writer Gore Vidal And public policy 00:45:47.490 --> 00:45:53.850 expert Joseph Cerinconi I probably murdered that last pronunciation, 00:45:53.850 --> 00:45:58.690 sorry Why We Fight documents the consequences of said foreign policy with the 00:45:58.690 --> 00:46:02.550 stories of a Vietnam War veteran whose son was killed in the September 11, 00:46:02.670 --> 00:46:08.390 2001 attacks and who then asked the military to write the name of his dead son 00:46:08.390 --> 00:46:10.970 on any bomb to be dropped in Iraq. 00:46:11.690 --> 00:46:17.890 A 23-year-old New Yorker who enlists in the United States Army because he was 00:46:17.890 --> 00:46:21.910 poor and in debt, his decision impelled by his mother's death. 00:46:22.930 --> 00:46:28.470 And a military explosive scientist, An Duong, who arrived in the U.S. 00:46:28.470 --> 00:46:31.790 As a refugee child from Vietnam in 1975. 00:46:32.730 --> 00:46:34.210 So that's the synopsis. 00:46:35.190 --> 00:46:39.270 Basically, I mean, it seemed like a well-done enough documentary. 00:46:39.490 --> 00:46:40.770 It seemed well put together. 00:46:41.530 --> 00:46:46.190 You know, production values was good. It sort of tried to make its case. 00:46:46.810 --> 00:46:50.090 And, you know, there were good interviews and there's lots of, you know, 00:46:50.850 --> 00:46:53.690 good backing information that, you know, 00:46:54.190 --> 00:46:58.550 his thesis is at least part of the picture and that, you know, 00:46:58.710 --> 00:47:02.290 you need to give the military something to do and you need to have something 00:47:02.290 --> 00:47:06.550 for all the military contractors to do and build and make money and blah, blah, blah. 00:47:07.290 --> 00:47:13.050 But I kept thinking honestly through the whole thing that, yeah, Yeah, 00:47:13.150 --> 00:47:20.950 I'm sure that factors in in some places, but this made it seem like they were 00:47:20.950 --> 00:47:22.990 trying to convince you that that was the whole thing. 00:47:23.890 --> 00:47:27.890 And I just don't buy it. I don't even buy that it's the biggest thing. 00:47:28.450 --> 00:47:33.550 Obviously, lots of people make money off war and want to make money off war. 00:47:34.610 --> 00:47:40.070 But in each one of the situations they talk about, and it really was mostly 00:47:40.070 --> 00:47:42.830 about, you know, the 2003 invasion of Iraq. 00:47:43.610 --> 00:47:48.450 You know, I remember 2003, you know, I was, I was there. 00:47:48.650 --> 00:47:52.770 I mean, I didn't go to Iraq or anything, but I was paying attention to the news 00:47:52.770 --> 00:47:55.270 and I was following what was going on. 00:47:55.430 --> 00:47:59.210 And look, yes, there were lies about this. 00:47:59.390 --> 00:48:06.970 But, you know, from other interviews I've seen from the participants in that 00:48:06.970 --> 00:48:09.550 and the people who drove us to war, 00:48:10.430 --> 00:48:14.810 I honestly believe that there was actually a lot of self-delusion in there. 00:48:14.970 --> 00:48:19.230 Like, you know, the whole, you know, there's weapons of mass destruction. 00:48:20.210 --> 00:48:23.230 A lot of the people involved believed it. 00:48:23.590 --> 00:48:26.690 You know, it turned out to be completely false. And of course, 00:48:26.850 --> 00:48:30.490 lots of us were pretty sure it was completely false. 00:48:30.690 --> 00:48:33.170 And there were plenty of warning signs that it was pretty false. 00:48:33.310 --> 00:48:38.310 And they selectively paid attention to things that supported their case and 00:48:38.310 --> 00:48:39.650 ignored things that didn't. 00:48:39.650 --> 00:48:46.030 And there were, you know, there were motivated informants who made up stories 00:48:46.030 --> 00:48:47.770 because they wanted to get the U.S. 00:48:47.930 --> 00:48:50.550 Involved and all of this kind of thing. 00:48:50.910 --> 00:48:56.650 And look, even when there were even for those who sort of like maybe they knew 00:48:56.650 --> 00:49:03.070 that they were lying about weapons of mass destruction, they had other larger agenda things, too. 00:49:03.070 --> 00:49:07.730 I mean, a lot of the neocons felt that George H.W. 00:49:07.930 --> 00:49:15.470 Bush had betrayed them by not going all the way in the first Gulf War and that 00:49:15.470 --> 00:49:19.930 this was unfinished business left over from the first administration and they 00:49:19.930 --> 00:49:20.910 needed to deal with that. 00:49:20.910 --> 00:49:25.790 They needed to deal with Iraq and that there were sort of geopolitical power 00:49:25.790 --> 00:49:31.170 play things about, you know, advantages in the region if you took over Iraq 00:49:31.170 --> 00:49:33.690 and if you controlled that. 00:49:34.250 --> 00:49:38.930 And, you know, I think there certainly were a lot of people who knew, 00:49:39.530 --> 00:49:43.030 look, fundamentally, you know, that it was sold to the public. 00:49:43.030 --> 00:49:48.650 And if you were paying attention carefully and parsing words carefully. 00:49:49.530 --> 00:49:55.230 You know, no one in the administration ever said Iraq was involved in 9-11. 00:49:55.650 --> 00:50:01.910 You know, but they said things in a way that left the implication that dealing 00:50:01.910 --> 00:50:05.050 with Iraq was part of the retribution for 9-11. 00:50:06.810 --> 00:50:09.870 When you parse them carefully, it was sort of more like, 00:50:11.420 --> 00:50:18.940 if we leave Iraq alone, they could do something like 9-11 or, you know, 00:50:19.300 --> 00:50:24.900 after 9-11, they've supported terrorists more generally, not just the, 00:50:25.060 --> 00:50:28.180 you know, anyway, there was a lot of, you know, 00:50:29.160 --> 00:50:37.260 manipulation where, you know, if you do the careful parsing of language, like lawyer style, 00:50:37.620 --> 00:50:43.740 you realize that they're not saying what the casual observer would think they 00:50:43.740 --> 00:50:46.300 were saying from not paying very much attention. 00:50:48.440 --> 00:50:53.060 And look, that's a theme. I think you're getting a lot of Trump supporters right 00:50:53.060 --> 00:50:56.960 now who are like, wait, what do you mean he's doing X, Y, Z? 00:50:57.180 --> 00:51:00.080 Well, that's what he said. Well, that's not what I thought he said. 00:51:00.600 --> 00:51:02.060 You weren't paying attention. 00:51:03.060 --> 00:51:10.320 But anyway, I think, and especially if you expand the scope to every decade since World War II, 00:51:10.700 --> 00:51:17.880 I just never bought the thesis here that it's all about, you know, 00:51:18.060 --> 00:51:23.140 the American public was misled so the government could take them to war and 00:51:23.140 --> 00:51:25.220 fuel the military industrial economy, 00:51:25.660 --> 00:51:29.280 maintaining, you know, maintaining American political dominance in the world. 00:51:29.820 --> 00:51:35.240 Yeah, the second part. The first part, the fuel the military industrial economy, 00:51:35.380 --> 00:51:40.420 I think is something that the people involved would say is a beneficial side effect. 00:51:41.460 --> 00:51:46.100 Of course, they like that. Of course, they want that. But I don't think that's the primary goal. 00:51:46.220 --> 00:51:50.960 The second part there, maintaining American political dominance in the world. 00:51:51.100 --> 00:51:54.720 Well, of course, I don't think any of them would even deny that. 00:51:54.720 --> 00:51:59.940 I'd say they'd like say that that's one of the primary goals of American foreign policy and should be. 00:52:00.440 --> 00:52:04.720 Now, you may disagree with that statement, but I think the... 00:52:06.040 --> 00:52:11.300 Foreign policy consensus, both Republicans and Democrats through all of those 00:52:11.300 --> 00:52:15.000 years is going to be that, yeah, of course, 00:52:15.440 --> 00:52:23.000 to serve American foreign policy interest, you want America to be as dominant as possible. 00:52:23.720 --> 00:52:29.640 Now, you're going to have disagreements on exactly what that means, economic, political, 00:52:30.160 --> 00:52:34.220 how is influence, are you using soft power, 00:52:34.220 --> 00:52:37.120 are you using hard power are you doing this whatever 00:52:37.120 --> 00:52:43.620 but yeah the the i don't think the notion would be controversial that well yeah 00:52:43.620 --> 00:52:48.460 of course like if you're serving american form american interests you're going 00:52:48.460 --> 00:52:55.120 to want to be able to exert influence all over the world as much as possible. 00:52:56.260 --> 00:53:04.240 Now, we now have the growth of sort of the isolationist views as well that say, 00:53:04.400 --> 00:53:08.380 you know, no, let's worry about home and the rest of the world can do whatever it wants. 00:53:09.200 --> 00:53:13.680 And we're starting to see some of the consequences of that. And even there, 00:53:13.760 --> 00:53:16.140 it's mixed. I mean, we still attacked Iran, you know. 00:53:17.080 --> 00:53:21.380 But anyway, I just fundamentally don't buy the premise. I think there's all 00:53:21.380 --> 00:53:24.920 kinds of the military industrial part of it anyway. 00:53:25.720 --> 00:53:30.800 The dominance in the world part, sure. But I don't think that's surprising or 00:53:30.800 --> 00:53:32.520 interesting in any sort of way. 00:53:32.660 --> 00:53:41.480 I think that's like, you would expect that kind of behavior on any large country. 00:53:41.620 --> 00:53:46.480 I mean, if you're like some tiny country, maybe you don't have visions of grandeur 00:53:46.480 --> 00:53:48.400 where you're going to take over the entire world. 00:53:48.400 --> 00:53:53.380 But any, and it may not be take over I'm being, you know, it's, 00:53:53.380 --> 00:53:58.320 it's exerting influence for your own benefit, but. 00:53:59.090 --> 00:54:02.430 Anyway, because I just think there are all kinds of other factors. 00:54:02.690 --> 00:54:06.350 There's the there's the personalities of the individual presidents involved. 00:54:06.550 --> 00:54:07.850 There's what they want politically. 00:54:08.230 --> 00:54:14.450 There's just generally like what is the situation going in at that moment? 00:54:14.450 --> 00:54:21.590 You know in the 2003 example again i i honestly feel that george w bush. 00:54:22.650 --> 00:54:25.770 Wanted to bring democracy to iraq and 00:54:25.770 --> 00:54:30.330 like that's part of his vision of like what he wanted and the benefit that he 00:54:30.330 --> 00:54:35.250 thought would be great and get rid of the dictator bring in democracy though 00:54:35.250 --> 00:54:41.110 greet us as liberators blah blah blah blah blah and in an alternate universe 00:54:41.110 --> 00:54:43.250 maybe that could have worked out better. 00:54:43.730 --> 00:54:46.970 But of course we had no idea what we were doing, 00:54:47.250 --> 00:54:52.310 which seems typical in many of our foreign interventions where we, 00:54:52.350 --> 00:55:00.010 we, we come in and whatever our stated goals are, we screw them up royally and 00:55:00.010 --> 00:55:01.110 end up with something different. 00:55:02.090 --> 00:55:06.130 Anyway, it is a good enough movie. It was, it was thought provoking. 00:55:06.710 --> 00:55:10.050 I will, I will give it a thumbs up. 00:55:10.650 --> 00:55:13.810 You know, if you're interested in this kind of thing, watch it. 00:55:14.150 --> 00:55:19.650 This does not mean I agree with it, but, uh, it's thought provoking and you 00:55:19.650 --> 00:55:21.590 listen to what they have to say. 00:55:21.770 --> 00:55:26.210 And then, you know, you can decide, like, again, I was not convinced, 00:55:26.210 --> 00:55:30.150 but it just seemed too simplistic in the end to me. 00:55:30.250 --> 00:55:34.070 It tried to boil everything down to one or two factors where I think the real 00:55:34.070 --> 00:55:38.890 world is complicated and all kinds of, there's all kinds of reasons for everything 00:55:38.890 --> 00:55:41.470 and it's multifaceted and all kinds of things come together. 00:55:41.810 --> 00:55:46.130 It's not a simple, you know, this thing caused that. 00:55:46.570 --> 00:55:49.670 It just boils it down way too much. Okay. 00:55:50.790 --> 00:55:51.830 And then the book. 00:55:52.840 --> 00:55:58.020 Complete shift. First of all, this is the first book I've talked about in a while. 00:55:58.760 --> 00:56:02.140 The whole book stream here has slowed down dramatically. 00:56:02.140 --> 00:56:06.700 I am now reading absolutely everything out loud with my son, 00:56:06.860 --> 00:56:09.200 have been doing this for several years now. 00:56:09.200 --> 00:56:12.620 Now, I've actually got, well, three, 00:56:12.820 --> 00:56:17.640 actually, three, two, I've got three streams related to books. Okay. 00:56:17.820 --> 00:56:25.120 I've got my main reading stream, which is I alternate a fiction and a nonfiction 00:56:25.120 --> 00:56:27.160 book from myself for myself. 00:56:27.380 --> 00:56:33.460 And this comes from my big master list of books I might be interested in reading 00:56:33.460 --> 00:56:37.280 someday, which have so many thousands of books, I will never complete them in my lifetime. 00:56:38.540 --> 00:56:45.280 And I have that. I also have a list that I'm specifically choosing to read with 00:56:45.280 --> 00:56:50.060 my son that, you know, I don't have a big master list. 00:56:50.200 --> 00:56:53.280 It's sort of like we went through the Lord of the Rings Hobbit and then the 00:56:53.280 --> 00:56:54.340 Lord of the Rings series. 00:56:54.860 --> 00:56:58.320 Then we finished up a book that we'd been reading together that he had been 00:56:58.320 --> 00:57:01.340 assigned for school. Wait, no, wait, I'm forgetting. 00:57:02.580 --> 00:57:06.220 I'm jumping ahead of fear. We'd read The Lord of the Rings, and then we were 00:57:06.220 --> 00:57:07.680 reading The Hitchhiker's Guide series. 00:57:07.820 --> 00:57:14.020 So these were sort of like things I remember enjoying when I was younger, 00:57:14.380 --> 00:57:17.880 around his age, and let's read them together kind of thing. 00:57:18.880 --> 00:57:22.900 And the one I'm going to read is in The Hitchhiker's part. But subsequently, 00:57:22.920 --> 00:57:29.480 we did read a book that he was assigned for school, and now we're doing some 00:57:29.480 --> 00:57:32.320 stuff on the Earthsea series, if any of you know those. 00:57:32.440 --> 00:57:34.940 But we'll get to those in good time. 00:57:35.920 --> 00:57:48.400 But this book is the sixth and final installment of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy. 00:57:48.500 --> 00:57:52.880 So the increasingly inaccurately named, as they said. 00:57:53.580 --> 00:57:59.540 The last one of these I talked about on the show was Mostly Harmless, 00:57:59.840 --> 00:58:03.740 which was the last one actually written by Douglas Adams. 00:58:04.480 --> 00:58:07.480 And I when I reviewed this on the podcast 00:58:07.480 --> 00:58:11.100 I mentioned that you 00:58:11.100 --> 00:58:14.640 know this was a 1992 book and he 00:58:14.640 --> 00:58:21.200 he ended it in a really depressing way he basically killed all the characters 00:58:21.200 --> 00:58:25.700 he put them all into really like depressing scenarios and then killed them all 00:58:25.700 --> 00:58:31.820 and that expressed later that, 00:58:32.620 --> 00:58:37.260 he kind of regretted that and he was at a dark time in his life or whatever 00:58:37.260 --> 00:58:44.280 when that happened and maybe he would write another book to sort of not end 00:58:44.280 --> 00:58:46.400 it that way. And then he died. 00:58:48.480 --> 00:58:58.480 Yeah, he died at age 49. So he was not an old guy, but this next one they brought 00:58:58.480 --> 00:59:02.340 in another author to sort of bring it up. 00:59:02.480 --> 00:59:06.020 It was Eoin? 00:59:06.320 --> 00:59:11.060 I don't know how to pronounce this name. It's E-O-I-N, Culfer. 00:59:12.160 --> 00:59:17.760 And anyway, they brought him in, was given permission by Douglas Adams' widow 00:59:17.760 --> 00:59:23.040 to basically fix that bad ending. 00:59:24.700 --> 00:59:29.140 I want to say tie off loose ends and stuff, but a lot of the loose ends were 00:59:29.140 --> 00:59:31.120 actually tied off by killing everybody. 00:59:34.220 --> 00:59:39.160 But, you know, and sorry, spoilers for that previous book, Mostly Harmless. 00:59:39.620 --> 00:59:42.820 But anyway, this one came out in 2009. 00:59:44.280 --> 00:59:49.020 So years and years and years after Mostly Harmless, which was 1992. 00:59:51.980 --> 00:59:56.320 And look, the whole series, like this is one of those, 00:59:57.300 --> 01:00:02.300 I've talked about this phenomenon before in terms of this particular book series 01:00:02.300 --> 01:00:07.540 and also in terms of movies, where the first one, 01:00:08.100 --> 01:00:15.020 maybe two or three, are really unique and interesting and have something. 01:00:15.260 --> 01:00:19.080 And then it's like, okay, now you're just doing the money grab. 01:00:19.420 --> 01:00:23.840 And sort of, like, they become less interesting. They become very repetitive. 01:00:24.240 --> 01:00:26.740 It's sort of greatest hits. 01:00:27.300 --> 01:00:32.760 This one is even more so than the last couple in this series. 01:00:34.000 --> 01:00:41.160 I'd say, first of all, they do some sort of random thing to pluck these people 01:00:41.160 --> 01:00:45.120 out the moment before they are killed so that the story can go on. 01:00:46.700 --> 01:00:52.680 And then there's a story. I mean, the story's kind of interesting. 01:00:52.680 --> 01:01:00.060 I won't read the whole plot summary, but they're taken off to a colony of surviving 01:01:00.060 --> 01:01:04.360 humans, which is, of course, weird, and having an internal war, 01:01:04.520 --> 01:01:06.440 and they're shopping for a new god. 01:01:11.500 --> 01:01:16.880 One of the main characters is friends with Thor, so they try to get Thor to 01:01:16.880 --> 01:01:19.760 be their god, and then there's stuff going on. 01:01:20.440 --> 01:01:24.980 It's all rather silly, which of course the whole series is rather silly, 01:01:24.980 --> 01:01:28.260 but this really felt like, 01:01:29.700 --> 01:01:35.180 okay, we're going to bring up fan favorites from the previous books, 01:01:35.320 --> 01:01:40.040 especially from the first few books that were the ones that are really more classic. 01:01:40.640 --> 01:01:44.580 And we're going to talk about, we're going to bring them back up. 01:01:44.720 --> 01:01:49.280 We're going to reuse that idea, that trope, that character. or we're going to bring it back. 01:01:49.800 --> 01:01:57.120 And you can tell it's an author sort of trying to emulate the Douglas Adams 01:01:57.120 --> 01:02:00.660 style, and sometimes they get it and sometimes they don't. 01:02:02.700 --> 01:02:07.980 And then since they reanimated everybody and brought them back to life, 01:02:08.100 --> 01:02:11.360 they now have other things to close off. 01:02:11.520 --> 01:02:17.140 And there were some things that weren't completely resolved from the previous books. 01:02:18.040 --> 01:02:25.900 So, yeah, they look bottom line, thumb sideways at best. 01:02:26.260 --> 01:02:27.960 This seemed like. 01:02:29.630 --> 01:02:34.110 It seemed unnecessary. I mean, I didn't like how they closed off the last book either. 01:02:34.850 --> 01:02:40.170 I wish you'd ended it some other way, or maybe just ended the whole damn series 01:02:40.170 --> 01:02:46.130 a couple of books earlier, because they were declining in quality and interest over the course. 01:02:47.750 --> 01:02:53.470 If you're being a completist about this series, read it. If you're not, don't bother. 01:02:54.190 --> 01:02:58.970 It wasn't outright bad. I'm not giving it that thumbs down. 01:02:58.970 --> 01:03:01.730 It wasn't painful to read or anything like that 01:03:01.730 --> 01:03:05.570 it just wasn't it didn't have like it 01:03:05.570 --> 01:03:08.510 it didn't have what made the first 01:03:08.510 --> 01:03:11.570 couple of books interesting it didn't have that 01:03:11.570 --> 01:03:19.670 new unique flavor it didn't have like the i don't know and and i've said even 01:03:19.670 --> 01:03:27.110 for the first couple they to some degree They seem to be ones that I enjoyed 01:03:27.110 --> 01:03:31.390 more as a teenager than I do as a 50-plus-year-old guy. 01:03:32.070 --> 01:03:36.270 And some of that may be a product of the time. Some of that may be a product 01:03:36.270 --> 01:03:41.250 of my age and the target group. I don't know. 01:03:42.530 --> 01:03:46.050 But yeah, it's just sort of, it exists. 01:03:47.310 --> 01:03:52.890 And it wraps up some things. some things still aren't like fully wrapped up 01:03:52.890 --> 01:03:57.070 in a way I would consider satisfying but I guess that's okay. 01:04:01.310 --> 01:04:07.770 Yeah, anyway. That's it. It's called And Another Thing. Did I ever actually give the title? 01:04:08.090 --> 01:04:15.770 And Another Thing, dot, dot, dot, from 2009, the sixth and final installment 01:04:15.770 --> 01:04:17.670 of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. 01:04:18.150 --> 01:04:22.750 Of course, they say, and final, this is one of those franchises where every 01:04:22.750 --> 01:04:25.010 couple decades they're going to do something new with it. 01:04:25.010 --> 01:04:27.730 I kind of doubt there'll be 01:04:27.730 --> 01:04:30.630 more books you never know 01:04:30.630 --> 01:04:33.750 i guess but it's one of those things where every once 01:04:33.750 --> 01:04:38.150 in a while they make a new tv show or a new movie or whatever but i imagine 01:04:38.150 --> 01:04:43.470 those are going to if they happen again they will as they usually do start from 01:04:43.470 --> 01:04:51.210 the beginning of the story i doubt any will ever get so far as to get to the 01:04:51.210 --> 01:04:53.450 events that happened in this sixth book, 01:04:54.390 --> 01:04:59.090 Really, anything really interesting happens in the first two, maybe three books. 01:04:59.570 --> 01:05:02.330 And then, you know, I don't know. 01:05:02.450 --> 01:05:07.710 I can remember that things happen in the other books. It's just, I don't know. 01:05:07.870 --> 01:05:12.150 It goes downhill as the series progresses. What can you say? 01:05:14.590 --> 01:05:19.310 Okay, that is it. We're going to go get some food now. 01:05:19.670 --> 01:05:23.170 My wife and I and maybe my son. I don't know. 01:05:23.970 --> 01:05:27.510 And I have to hurry because I have a call scheduled, so I have to make sure 01:05:27.510 --> 01:05:29.090 to eat and be back in time. 01:05:30.870 --> 01:05:35.850 Okay, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so we're going to play a break. 01:05:36.150 --> 01:05:41.130 We're going to play a break. We're going to play this break right here, 01:05:41.750 --> 01:05:45.550 and then I'll be back, and we'll talk about the Epstein stuff, 01:05:45.670 --> 01:05:51.170 I guess, unless there's some other cool breaking news that changes everything. Here we go. 01:06:41.270 --> 01:06:48.870 And I'm back. Had some food, did some stuff with my son Alex, 01:06:48.870 --> 01:06:51.830 and now it's time to finish out the podcast. 01:06:51.830 --> 01:06:57.230 As I said, we will do the Epstein stuff. Epstein, Epstein, whatever. 01:06:58.790 --> 01:07:02.730 And, you know, in introing it earlier in the show, I've said a couple times 01:07:02.730 --> 01:07:05.930 now, There's nothing actually new here. 01:07:06.830 --> 01:07:12.770 You know, there's fundamentally—look, there may be more Epstein revelations 01:07:12.770 --> 01:07:16.090 to come at some point, we'll see, but this week particularly, 01:07:16.090 --> 01:07:18.430 we haven't learned anything. 01:07:18.950 --> 01:07:27.630 There's no new facts. There's no release of something that was private before and is now public. 01:07:29.510 --> 01:07:32.910 Everything that i mean look we've known 01:07:32.910 --> 01:07:41.170 for 20 years about like epstein being a scumbag about donald trump being associated 01:07:41.170 --> 01:07:46.550 with him about a whole bunch of other prominent people being associated with 01:07:46.550 --> 01:07:50.650 him in terms of like riding on his plane visiting his island all of that kind of stuff. 01:07:51.110 --> 01:07:58.510 Way back in the 2016 campaign, we had reports on this. 01:07:58.690 --> 01:08:03.090 We had people passing around the pictures of Trump and Epstein together. 01:08:03.290 --> 01:08:08.290 We had call, not call logs, but passenger logs from the plane revealed that 01:08:08.290 --> 01:08:13.010 showed like Clinton and Gates and all kinds of other people on the plane. 01:08:13.010 --> 01:08:23.330 So we've known all of this, but the fundamental thing that is happening this week is that, look. 01:08:24.200 --> 01:08:29.940 The MAGA side of the world, remember, a whole bunch of them are all associated 01:08:29.940 --> 01:08:31.440 with the QAnon thing, too, 01:08:31.680 --> 01:08:40.540 like at least some of these rabid ones that posits that there's this vast conspiracy 01:08:40.540 --> 01:08:48.940 specifically among Democrats and liberals to do child trafficking for sexual purposes. 01:08:49.660 --> 01:08:53.020 Remember, that's the whole Pizzagate thing was related to that, too. 01:08:53.020 --> 01:08:57.220 And so there's this fundamental thing that's 01:08:57.220 --> 01:09:00.960 been propagated within those circles for years 01:09:00.960 --> 01:09:04.300 and years and years now that the Epstein 01:09:04.300 --> 01:09:13.600 files contain a client list and that Epstein was procuring girls for all of 01:09:13.600 --> 01:09:21.700 these clients and specifically that these clients include all sorts of prominent Democrats. 01:09:22.500 --> 01:09:26.340 And that's the reason they care about this, is that we're going to expose all 01:09:26.340 --> 01:09:30.260 these prominent Democrats and the fact that they were actually clients of Epstein 01:09:30.260 --> 01:09:34.620 and he was procuring teenage girls for them to have sex with. 01:09:34.780 --> 01:09:37.220 And that's what's going on. 01:09:37.440 --> 01:09:43.840 And that's the big thing that Donald Trump and his administration, 01:09:43.840 --> 01:09:49.280 when they got back into power this time, were going to reveal the full Epstein files. 01:09:49.280 --> 01:09:52.480 And specifically, they were going to reveal that client list. 01:09:52.640 --> 01:09:56.560 And that client list would have a whole bunch of evil Democrats on. 01:09:57.440 --> 01:10:00.280 That was the bill of goods that was being sold. 01:10:01.380 --> 01:10:07.660 And, you know, part of the problem here now is that some of the prominent people 01:10:07.660 --> 01:10:09.100 like, how do you say his name? 01:10:09.300 --> 01:10:14.120 Boingo, Boingo, Boingo, Boingo, Boingo, Boingo, whatever, you know, 01:10:14.600 --> 01:10:19.120 and Kash Patel and our our lovely attorney general. 01:10:19.360 --> 01:10:24.900 All of these people fed into this, like, conspiracy theory. 01:10:25.840 --> 01:10:30.480 And then they ended up in the administration. Now, I'll point out, 01:10:30.980 --> 01:10:36.860 first of all, a lot of the stuff that happened with Epstein actually being convicted 01:10:36.860 --> 01:10:40.840 and him dying in jail and all this kind of stuff happened while Donald Trump 01:10:40.840 --> 01:10:42.160 was president the first time. 01:10:42.480 --> 01:10:48.960 So, like, if all of this information was in the FBI's files and they wanted 01:10:48.960 --> 01:10:52.980 to reveal all this stuff, they could have done it last time, too. 01:10:54.100 --> 01:10:57.880 And I know deep state, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. 01:10:58.140 --> 01:11:01.020 The FBI was against them last time. And this time they have their, 01:11:01.100 --> 01:11:04.240 their people, their really their people in there. 01:11:04.440 --> 01:11:13.460 I mean, you know, look, honestly, like, it seems like what happened to me seems 01:11:13.460 --> 01:11:14.280 like what happened to me. 01:11:14.280 --> 01:11:20.080 No, it seems to me that what happened is that these folks who'd been pushing 01:11:20.080 --> 01:11:24.080 these conspiracy theories all along got in there, 01:11:24.420 --> 01:11:30.340 actually saw the information, and realized there wasn't a lot there there. 01:11:30.740 --> 01:11:37.480 Now, I want to be clear what I mean by that, because clearly Epstein was doing 01:11:37.480 --> 01:11:43.900 a lot of bad things, and clearly there were a lot of famous people that were in or around that. 01:11:44.280 --> 01:11:51.660 Now, how many of them partook in, you know, doing something with the young women 01:11:51.660 --> 01:11:55.400 who were coerced into this? I don't know. 01:11:57.040 --> 01:12:03.700 What I suspect is there isn't anything as straightforward as a client list. 01:12:04.300 --> 01:12:09.460 Like where Epstein was going around and saying like, oh, okay, 01:12:10.020 --> 01:12:14.520 Bill Gates is coming this week and I have him on the list and here's what we're 01:12:14.520 --> 01:12:17.580 going to do for Bill Gates and we're going to get like these women or whatever. 01:12:17.820 --> 01:12:20.460 I'm just picking Bill Gates as one possible name. Sorry, Bill, 01:12:20.580 --> 01:12:24.500 if you're listening or Bill Clinton or anybody else. 01:12:25.410 --> 01:12:28.830 Donald Trump because he was also very associated with this. 01:12:29.290 --> 01:12:33.130 Now, all of the people who are upset, of course, never, to them, 01:12:33.230 --> 01:12:37.390 it's always about like all the prominent liberals that might have been involved here. 01:12:37.550 --> 01:12:42.350 They always sort of ignore the fact that Donald Trump was in this circle as well. 01:12:42.450 --> 01:12:48.490 I don't know, but I suspect there wasn't like just a straightforward list. 01:12:48.770 --> 01:12:50.830 Like everybody's saying client list, client list. 01:12:51.410 --> 01:12:56.970 And I know that Pam Bondi actually said, I have the list on my desk. 01:12:57.350 --> 01:13:02.410 Well, she later says she met the files, not just the list. And there is no list 01:13:02.410 --> 01:13:03.570 now is what they're saying. 01:13:04.270 --> 01:13:10.230 But I want to be careful about like, I think people are very intentionally mixing 01:13:10.230 --> 01:13:13.350 up a few different things. There's a client list. 01:13:13.850 --> 01:13:17.810 There's just some list, like maybe the passenger list from the plane, 01:13:17.970 --> 01:13:20.570 which actually was made public a long, long time ago. 01:13:21.750 --> 01:13:26.150 And then there's just evidence of association with Epstein. 01:13:26.350 --> 01:13:31.290 And then there's evidence of actually participation in these, 01:13:31.730 --> 01:13:35.810 I want to use the right word. 01:13:36.250 --> 01:13:42.950 I mean, essentially this is statutory rape because there's no consent for underage people. 01:13:43.550 --> 01:13:48.790 Yeah. Especially with older people. I mean, They carve out gray areas if you're 01:13:48.790 --> 01:13:54.730 17 and you're doing something with a 19-year-old because you're really close 01:13:54.730 --> 01:13:57.170 in age still. There's some exceptions for those kinds of things. 01:13:57.670 --> 01:14:01.770 But fundamentally, 50-something-year-olds. 01:14:02.620 --> 01:14:07.200 And a 16-year-old, that's just not legal. That's rape no matter what. 01:14:07.440 --> 01:14:12.520 And because the younger person is not considered legally able to consent to 01:14:12.520 --> 01:14:14.680 that, regardless of what else is going on. 01:14:15.520 --> 01:14:19.920 So there's rape, prostitution, all kinds of things that are potentially involved here. 01:14:20.960 --> 01:14:24.380 And there may be evidence of that kind of stuff. And that still wouldn't be 01:14:24.380 --> 01:14:27.860 a client list necessarily if it wasn't like a list. 01:14:28.000 --> 01:14:31.140 And people are sort of alighting all these things together. 01:14:31.140 --> 01:14:34.880 So I think, like, my guess, 01:14:35.060 --> 01:14:39.980 if you really had to put all this together as to what's really going on here, 01:14:39.980 --> 01:14:49.960 is that when people like Bondi and Boingo Boingo and Kash Patel and all these 01:14:49.960 --> 01:14:52.980 folks actually got to see the stuff, 01:14:53.200 --> 01:14:59.920 they realized that there is nothing as straightforward as here's the list. 01:15:01.340 --> 01:15:06.200 And I suspect, you know, I know a lot of people are jumping straight towards 01:15:06.200 --> 01:15:09.820 like they're covering this up because they realize Donald Trump is on the list. 01:15:10.180 --> 01:15:14.840 And the way Donald Trump seems to be panicking about this, the more he panics 01:15:14.840 --> 01:15:17.700 about it, the more it seems like he's got to be implicated somehow. 01:15:18.000 --> 01:15:22.460 But let's back up from that a little bit and we'll return there in a minute. 01:15:22.460 --> 01:15:26.940 I suspect there is nothing as straightforward as a flat out list. 01:15:27.280 --> 01:15:32.660 Like these, you know, where there's a direct like single sheet of paper saying 01:15:32.660 --> 01:15:41.040 these 30 people, I went out and we got underage girls to have sex with these men. 01:15:41.360 --> 01:15:44.400 Like, like a written confession, essentially. 01:15:44.680 --> 01:15:50.680 Like if, if such a thing existed, I think it would have come out years and years ago. 01:15:51.660 --> 01:15:55.040 Now i know even there there's like 01:15:55.040 --> 01:15:58.000 questions of well they would have kept it secret if 01:15:58.000 --> 01:16:01.060 if they couldn't prove any of this right because just because epstein 01:16:01.060 --> 01:16:04.120 wrote something down on a piece of paper doesn't necessarily mean it's true 01:16:04.120 --> 01:16:10.540 but there's also you know there are apparently like a whole bunch of flash drives 01:16:10.540 --> 01:16:16.120 that were confiscated when they arrested the guy years back and that supposedly 01:16:16.120 --> 01:16:20.520 have video on them of these underage people with people. 01:16:21.020 --> 01:16:24.820 I suspect on that, like they've said, well, we can't release that, 01:16:24.960 --> 01:16:32.960 obviously, because it's underage girls in compromising positions and... 01:16:34.460 --> 01:16:37.740 It's illegal to even possess this stuff other than law enforcement. 01:16:38.240 --> 01:16:43.380 And we obviously can't release that, even like redacted versions of it. 01:16:43.460 --> 01:16:45.200 We want to protect the victims here. 01:16:45.500 --> 01:16:49.660 And I actually buy that to some extent. But I also think part of the problem, 01:16:50.020 --> 01:16:53.200 like if I had to guess, and this is all guessing and speculation, 01:16:53.520 --> 01:17:00.720 that identifying the men on these is not straightforward, 01:17:01.140 --> 01:17:05.500 like or is not like solid enough that you could prove it in a court of law. 01:17:05.860 --> 01:17:12.800 Like, you know, you could say, oh, it looks like it might be Bill Clinton or 01:17:12.800 --> 01:17:14.060 Donald Trump or whoever. 01:17:14.940 --> 01:17:23.300 But, you know, you got like fuzzy video in bad lighting and just enough that 01:17:23.300 --> 01:17:26.760 there's like plausible doubt there. 01:17:26.760 --> 01:17:31.060 And so they didn't think it was enough to run on. 01:17:31.320 --> 01:17:39.680 I mean, you've got, this stuff has been through enough different people in enough 01:17:39.680 --> 01:17:44.560 different administrations that I feel like if they had something absolutely solid on anyone, 01:17:45.080 --> 01:17:46.760 Democrat, Republican. 01:17:47.500 --> 01:17:53.960 Unspecified partisan celebrity, whatever, I feel like it would have leaked by now. 01:17:53.960 --> 01:17:56.340 Like the specific leak. 01:17:56.520 --> 01:18:02.240 Now you've had a few people like who, who've made comments, like they've seen 01:18:02.240 --> 01:18:05.040 some of these things and they are incriminating and blah, blah, 01:18:05.100 --> 01:18:08.560 blah, but they're all reluctant to give any specifics. 01:18:08.560 --> 01:18:15.940 And some of them like are clearly pushing the, this for their own personal motives. So I don't trust it. 01:18:16.380 --> 01:18:20.180 So I think it's, I suspect 01:18:20.180 --> 01:18:29.220 that it's a bunch of people like on the MAGA side who were really pushing this 01:18:29.220 --> 01:18:36.300 because their agenda was there's these secret Epstein files that show that Democrats 01:18:36.300 --> 01:18:39.420 are corrupt child abusers. 01:18:39.420 --> 01:18:49.820 And so in furtherance of that conspiracy theory, they talked about the list 01:18:49.820 --> 01:18:52.440 and they talked about videos and they talked about whatever. 01:18:52.440 --> 01:19:00.080 And then they actually came into their positions in the administration and got 01:19:00.080 --> 01:19:07.400 to see everything that was there and realized that it just wasn't substantive 01:19:07.400 --> 01:19:10.360 enough to do anything with. 01:19:10.660 --> 01:19:18.220 Like maybe there's some ambiguous stuff, but there wasn't the smoking gun. 01:19:18.640 --> 01:19:23.400 And they actually realized it. In other words, I think to some degree, 01:19:23.740 --> 01:19:30.560 they're telling the truth now for the first time where all of this, 01:19:30.680 --> 01:19:34.100 they just sort of realized that, you know, there is no there there. 01:19:35.300 --> 01:19:38.840 And I suspect, well, let's put it this way. 01:19:39.560 --> 01:19:48.020 Prior to the latest round of Trump's rants about this, that's where I thought things lay. 01:19:48.300 --> 01:19:57.900 You know, look, it's simply a matter of now they didn't want to admit there was nothing. 01:19:58.340 --> 01:20:05.020 Instead, because they'd riled up their base. So this is, this is a matter of 01:20:05.020 --> 01:20:12.600 like people who had lied and lied and lied for years coming face to face with, oh shit, it actually is. 01:20:13.160 --> 01:20:15.140 There's, there's nothing we can 01:20:15.140 --> 01:20:21.840 do there. He really did commit suicide and there's no smoking gun there. 01:20:22.100 --> 01:20:27.240 It is probably all kinds of incriminating stuff, but not any smoking gun on 01:20:27.240 --> 01:20:31.740 any of the big, you know, we're going to go after the Clintons and Bill Gates. 01:20:31.960 --> 01:20:34.800 And I keep mentioning those two names because those are the ones I keep remembering 01:20:34.800 --> 01:20:38.000 are mentioned all the time. But like, there's really a list of all kinds of 01:20:38.000 --> 01:20:39.720 people that they think are associated. 01:20:41.040 --> 01:20:45.620 And, and so we're just going to say that now. Now, of course the push is, 01:20:45.780 --> 01:20:47.420 well, okay, then release the files. 01:20:47.840 --> 01:20:51.180 And they say they can't release the files because of protecting the victims. 01:20:51.340 --> 01:20:55.800 Well, look, there are ways to redact the victims out of things if you wanted to. 01:20:57.060 --> 01:21:02.700 But Yeah. And, you know, look, MAGA is really, really upset. 01:21:02.980 --> 01:21:07.080 They were promised this and they're not getting it. 01:21:07.640 --> 01:21:10.700 And so what next? 01:21:11.700 --> 01:21:16.720 Well, then Donald Trump started protesting so hard, like, get over it, 01:21:16.800 --> 01:21:22.180 move on, like, look somewhere else. And, you know, a lot of people have said, 01:21:22.300 --> 01:21:26.480 like, this is a, you know, he protests too much kind of moment. 01:21:26.860 --> 01:21:31.660 Like, they're not, you know, you'd think the natural thing if they really, 01:21:31.880 --> 01:21:36.900 if they specifically, they said all this stuff and then they got in and they 01:21:36.900 --> 01:21:41.060 saw the details and they realized, sorry, we were wrong. 01:21:41.620 --> 01:21:45.940 There's nothing here. The way to clear it up, be transparent as possible, 01:21:46.160 --> 01:21:48.320 is release as much as you possibly can. 01:21:49.260 --> 01:21:52.940 Obviously redact names and pictures and everything else of the victims, 01:21:53.540 --> 01:21:55.240 but release as much as possible. 01:21:55.840 --> 01:22:00.580 But Donald Trump comes in like being all paranoid, telling people to move on, blah, blah, blah. 01:22:00.780 --> 01:22:05.040 It's just the more he does of this, the more it leads credence to the alternate 01:22:05.040 --> 01:22:10.320 theory that the reason they don't want to release everything has nothing to 01:22:10.320 --> 01:22:15.520 do with everything I just said, but instead has to do with Donald Trump's all over the stuff. Yeah. 01:22:16.490 --> 01:22:25.930 You know but i'll add honestly you know we had four years of a biden administration in between, 01:22:26.550 --> 01:22:33.830 if there was stuff in there that was definitively you know evidence against 01:22:33.830 --> 01:22:38.850 donald trump that you could definitely say donald trump did xyz let's like go 01:22:38.850 --> 01:22:42.910 after him for that then you'd think they would have done something with it. 01:22:43.490 --> 01:22:49.670 You know, so I feel like even if there is something on Donald Trump in the unredacted 01:22:49.670 --> 01:22:54.910 files, it's probably not conclusive stuff where, 01:22:55.130 --> 01:22:58.230 you know, it probably shows Donald Trump palling around with Epstein. 01:22:58.350 --> 01:22:59.470 But we knew that already. 01:23:00.270 --> 01:23:05.110 Maybe worst case scenario, there's a video somewhere of something that you could 01:23:05.110 --> 01:23:10.150 like say, maybe that's Donald Trump in that video doing something he shouldn't, 01:23:10.270 --> 01:23:12.110 but we can't really tell for sure. 01:23:12.570 --> 01:23:17.970 You know, again, it's blurry, it's dark, it's whatever, and we can't tell for sure. 01:23:18.390 --> 01:23:21.730 And so it's unusable in a court of law. 01:23:25.350 --> 01:23:28.290 And that's a worst case scenario. There may not even be that. 01:23:28.410 --> 01:23:31.710 But it may just be that Donald Trump finds this whole thing embarrassing. 01:23:32.550 --> 01:23:36.990 But the fact that he's protesting so hard is spinning everything up. 01:23:37.470 --> 01:23:41.630 You know, someone commented on Blue Sky, I think, that he apparently hasn't 01:23:41.630 --> 01:23:46.410 heard of the Streisand effect, which is that if you want something to go away 01:23:46.410 --> 01:23:49.710 and tell people, please don't pay attention to this, 01:23:49.950 --> 01:23:52.830 all it does is get more attention to it. 01:23:53.410 --> 01:23:57.570 And what we've got here, you know, look, 01:23:58.920 --> 01:24:06.920 Bottom line, I suspect that there's not anything actually actionable in the actual Epstein files. 01:24:07.060 --> 01:24:12.440 If you and I got to look at the unredacted version of all this and went through it all, 01:24:12.760 --> 01:24:20.080 I suspect that although we might find a whole bunch of things that would make 01:24:20.080 --> 01:24:25.220 you suspicious of various prominent people being involved in things, 01:24:25.220 --> 01:24:32.340 there isn't enough to prove anything about anybody other than Epstein and Maxwell, 01:24:32.680 --> 01:24:38.780 who have already been through a process, and Epstein is dead and Maxwell's in jail. 01:24:40.680 --> 01:24:46.500 But that doesn't mean there might not be lots that's embarrassing or might make 01:24:46.500 --> 01:24:51.200 you say it's not provable in a court of law, 01:24:51.220 --> 01:24:57.060 but it's enough that the average person on the street would be like, oh, yeah, that's them. 01:24:57.460 --> 01:24:59.520 They were clearly involved. 01:25:00.000 --> 01:25:02.580 Clinton's guilty. Trump's guilty. Gates is guilty. 01:25:03.820 --> 01:25:10.300 All these other people are guilty, too. And probably on both sides of the political 01:25:10.300 --> 01:25:16.620 spectrum and a whole bunch of celebrities who aren't publicly associated with 01:25:16.620 --> 01:25:18.500 either end of the spectrum politically, 01:25:18.920 --> 01:25:21.120 but just not provable. 01:25:21.360 --> 01:25:25.760 And so they can't just put that out in that form. 01:25:28.200 --> 01:25:35.520 MAGA's going crazy because they have been spun up so much on these files and 01:25:35.520 --> 01:25:41.500 on Epstein and how it was, you know, surely it was going to take down all the liberal elites. 01:25:42.120 --> 01:25:48.380 And now Donald Trump himself is saying, no, forget about it. And they are pissed. 01:25:49.160 --> 01:25:52.560 Like, if you looked at social media all weekend this weekend, 01:25:52.740 --> 01:25:54.980 there's all kinds of, you know, screenshots. 01:25:55.200 --> 01:25:58.180 I'm not on Truth Social. I am not on X, 01:25:58.400 --> 01:26:03.920 but there are screenshots from both of them circulating about hundreds and hundreds 01:26:03.920 --> 01:26:10.320 of people reacting to things like that from the MAGA side who are clearly incredibly 01:26:10.320 --> 01:26:14.900 angry about this and believe that they have been betrayed, 01:26:14.900 --> 01:26:20.020 that Donald Trump is turning on them and why would he do this? 01:26:20.020 --> 01:26:23.980 And some are blaming him on Pam Bondi. 01:26:24.100 --> 01:26:27.240 I think Pam Bondi is the natural scapegoat that everybody's trying to, 01:26:27.240 --> 01:26:29.820 like, make the target of this. 01:26:29.920 --> 01:26:32.980 Because a lot of these MAGA folks, although they feel betrayed by this, 01:26:33.160 --> 01:26:39.640 they're still sort of in the mode of, this can't possibly really be what Donald Trump wants. 01:26:40.080 --> 01:26:45.340 This is like Pam Bondi. It's her fault. And let's get rid of her and then we 01:26:45.340 --> 01:26:46.440 can get back to business. 01:26:46.880 --> 01:26:52.440 And then Donald Trump will do the right thing. And I don't think a lot of them 01:26:52.440 --> 01:26:54.700 have flipped to the position of, oh, 01:26:55.460 --> 01:27:01.980 Donald Trump is resisting this because he's in the files, because he's actually guilty. 01:27:02.820 --> 01:27:08.640 I've seen a bunch of this anger, but not very many people on that side of the 01:27:08.640 --> 01:27:12.460 fence going there. I've seen liberals going there. 01:27:13.480 --> 01:27:17.520 But for the most part, the MAGA folks are upset at the situation. 01:27:17.700 --> 01:27:23.000 They're upset at Bondi. They're upset at Trump. But there's a lot of like, 01:27:23.080 --> 01:27:24.960 I don't understand why this is happening. 01:27:25.280 --> 01:27:29.940 There's not very much, oh, this must be because Donald Trump himself is guilty. 01:27:29.940 --> 01:27:35.980 But there are a lot of people that are so upset about this and some of them 01:27:35.980 --> 01:27:40.640 are adding it and saying on top of like you know the the big beautiful bill 01:27:40.640 --> 01:27:43.060 isn't what we asked for the, 01:27:43.620 --> 01:27:48.000 you know we thought only criminals were going to be deported this isn't what 01:27:48.000 --> 01:27:50.700 we asked for so there are a bunch of those kinds of things going on there too 01:27:50.700 --> 01:27:54.960 and so there are a lot of people out there saying i can't support donald trump 01:27:54.960 --> 01:28:00.760 anymore a lot in quotes a lot of sort of vocal people on social media. 01:28:00.960 --> 01:28:07.520 And I have to say, some of that traffic may be fake from people who aren't real 01:28:07.520 --> 01:28:10.500 people who are just like troll bots and all this kind of stuff. 01:28:10.720 --> 01:28:15.960 But it includes a lot of prominent MAGA people that you know are real. 01:28:17.120 --> 01:28:23.560 Like Laura Loomer is mad, for instance. And a bunch of others whose names I'm 01:28:23.560 --> 01:28:25.100 not going to recall off the top of my head. 01:28:25.220 --> 01:28:30.460 But a bunch of these folks are mad and upset and believe they've been betrayed. 01:28:30.860 --> 01:28:36.240 And it is fun to watch for the Schadenfreude. Is that how you say it? 01:28:36.320 --> 01:28:37.420 Schadenfreude? Whatever. 01:28:38.080 --> 01:28:40.960 You know, to watch because this is, 01:28:41.640 --> 01:28:47.520 Out of all the times that Donald Trump has seemingly gotten in trouble for something. 01:28:48.720 --> 01:28:53.020 I mean, people on the left-hand side of the spectrum are mad at whatever he 01:28:53.020 --> 01:29:01.260 does every single day because his entire existence practically is offensive. 01:29:01.820 --> 01:29:07.880 You know, everything he does every day, the way he does it, what he is advocating, 01:29:08.120 --> 01:29:14.300 what he is pushing are things that we fundamentally believe are wrong and, in many cases, evil. 01:29:14.840 --> 01:29:16.820 And I shouldn't say his existence. 01:29:18.920 --> 01:29:23.960 If he was just a reality TV star doing his thing, he'd be an offensive little 01:29:23.960 --> 01:29:26.740 person, but we wouldn't care and we wouldn't necessarily call it evil. 01:29:27.000 --> 01:29:30.340 But as president of the United States with power, 01:29:30.580 --> 01:29:36.260 he's doing a lot of stuff that is bad, but like it's no surprise when someone 01:29:36.260 --> 01:29:41.040 on the left is upset by Donald Trump in one way or another, either something 01:29:41.040 --> 01:29:42.820 new he's done, something he's said, 01:29:43.200 --> 01:29:46.360 something revealed about his past, no surprise. 01:29:47.560 --> 01:29:53.940 And we've occasionally had sort of the situations where sort of middle of the 01:29:53.940 --> 01:29:57.020 road Republicans temporarily seem upset. 01:29:57.280 --> 01:30:01.920 We had that at the Access Hollywood tape. We had that after January 6th, 01:30:02.100 --> 01:30:07.080 where a bunch of these folks are like, now he's passed the line. 01:30:07.280 --> 01:30:11.780 Now we're moving on. And then of course they come back into the fold a few days later. 01:30:12.060 --> 01:30:21.360 So, but this seems to be for almost the first time where we've seen not just like, you know, 01:30:22.160 --> 01:30:26.920 old school mainstream Republicans saying, okay, maybe now's the time we can escape Donald Trump, 01:30:26.960 --> 01:30:36.260 but we're seeing sort of MAGA faithful who are upset and pissed and expressing 01:30:36.260 --> 01:30:38.500 their extreme discontent. 01:30:39.570 --> 01:30:46.230 So we'll see how long this lasts and for what, we'll also see how big it is. 01:30:46.430 --> 01:30:49.410 Once we see some polling that actually reflects this, I mean, 01:30:49.530 --> 01:30:53.450 Donald Trump's overall approval rating has been dropping lately anyway. 01:30:53.810 --> 01:30:57.390 It's not at his all-time lows. That was back in May. 01:30:57.690 --> 01:31:00.990 He hit a low in May and then he improved a bit. 01:31:01.130 --> 01:31:05.110 Now he's heading back down, but he hasn't gotten worse than he was in May yet 01:31:05.110 --> 01:31:07.590 as of I checked yesterday, I think. 01:31:08.130 --> 01:31:11.130 We'll see how it affects polling and all of that kind of stuff. 01:31:12.090 --> 01:31:17.330 But what's important to remember about this is the people who seem to be upset 01:31:17.330 --> 01:31:22.030 this time are not your marginal Donald Trump voters. 01:31:22.350 --> 01:31:32.170 They're not the people who were Trump-Biden-Trump voters or were non-voters 01:31:32.170 --> 01:31:36.510 who went to Trump for the first time this time around or anything like that. 01:31:36.510 --> 01:31:42.150 The people who seem to be upset seem to be the diehard, the people who actually 01:31:42.150 --> 01:31:47.970 show up at MAGA rallies and who wave the flags and wear the red hats. 01:31:48.230 --> 01:31:53.570 And so not just a Republican who's like, okay, Donald Trump isn't great, 01:31:53.710 --> 01:31:54.950 but he's better than the Democrats. 01:31:55.150 --> 01:32:00.870 No, this is like, this is the people who've been all in on him for a long time, 01:32:00.950 --> 01:32:02.770 or a lot of people like that anyway. 01:32:02.770 --> 01:32:11.930 And so even if the numbers are small, this particular group defecting seems 01:32:11.930 --> 01:32:15.590 like a significant blow if it sticks. 01:32:16.590 --> 01:32:22.110 Like one possible way out for Donald Trump right now, assuming his underlying 01:32:22.110 --> 01:32:27.810 issue isn't just that there's evidence here that shows that he's directly guilty. 01:32:27.810 --> 01:32:33.230 I mean, remember, there was that one case that disappeared right before the 01:32:33.230 --> 01:32:41.850 2016 election where a girl was in the process of submitting a lawsuit saying 01:32:41.850 --> 01:32:46.810 that Epstein and Donald Trump raped her together. 01:32:47.410 --> 01:32:52.190 And she provided all kinds of lurid details in her deposition. 01:32:52.610 --> 01:32:57.110 And then she withdrew it all and disappeared. 01:32:57.810 --> 01:33:05.490 And that's never been fully gone back to like what she paid off. Was she just scared? 01:33:06.790 --> 01:33:11.710 Had she made it up completely and it wasn't true and she just couldn't stand 01:33:11.710 --> 01:33:16.710 the heat and so decided to, you know, cut that off before she got caught having 01:33:16.710 --> 01:33:18.590 made it up? We don't know. 01:33:19.710 --> 01:33:26.090 But, you know, assuming it's not just that Donald Trump knows that these files 01:33:26.090 --> 01:33:27.870 include stuff that would show his own guilt. 01:33:28.450 --> 01:33:31.770 The smart thing to do, fire Bondi, 01:33:32.150 --> 01:33:41.410 blame her for this recent decision to say that there's nothing else to see here, everybody move on, 01:33:41.630 --> 01:33:48.050 and promise to double down and investigate further, and we will release the 01:33:48.050 --> 01:33:50.170 stuff, and we will go through the process, 01:33:50.450 --> 01:33:53.190 and then just kick to count the can further down the road. 01:33:53.710 --> 01:33:59.690 Don't have to actually, I mean, if it really does show nothing of substance, 01:33:59.690 --> 01:34:04.490 like I was speculating earlier, figure out how you can release a lot more of it. 01:34:04.670 --> 01:34:08.510 Now, the true conspiracy theorists will never be satisfied no matter what you do. 01:34:09.030 --> 01:34:12.810 And you have to be smarter about it. I mean, this time, one of the things to 01:34:12.810 --> 01:34:19.150 prove that Epstein had actually committed suicide, they released some video of the hallway. 01:34:19.850 --> 01:34:24.810 But then what they released had a one-minute gap in it and evidence that it 01:34:24.810 --> 01:34:30.930 had been multiple clips compiled together and put through imaging editing software a couple of times. 01:34:31.150 --> 01:34:34.970 Now, who knows whether what they released was actually manipulated in some way 01:34:34.970 --> 01:34:36.050 or whether it was just, hey, 01:34:36.230 --> 01:34:39.910 we're going to use, and I heard someone say it was Adobe Premiere, 01:34:40.070 --> 01:34:44.750 we'll use Adobe Premiere to assemble clip A and clip B, so we put them together 01:34:44.750 --> 01:34:49.810 and then we'll save it to a new format, blah, blah, blah. But then they released 01:34:49.810 --> 01:34:51.030 that as if it was the original. 01:34:51.210 --> 01:34:55.830 Like, you can make up an innocent explanation for that. But if it really was 01:34:55.830 --> 01:34:58.390 truly innocent, that is not what you do. 01:34:58.790 --> 01:35:02.470 You're not sloppy like that. If you say you're releasing the originals, 01:35:02.610 --> 01:35:05.250 you release the goddamn originals. 01:35:05.690 --> 01:35:07.390 You know, without any... 01:35:08.230 --> 01:35:12.290 Messing with them so that you don't get the conspiracy theory people saying, 01:35:12.410 --> 01:35:13.670 well, what about the missing minute? 01:35:13.830 --> 01:35:16.910 And why was this edited? And what did you change? And blah, blah, blah. 01:35:17.830 --> 01:35:21.150 But you could recommit to say, okay, we really will release everything. 01:35:21.870 --> 01:35:25.850 And we, of course, we'll redact the stuff about the victims and that'll take 01:35:25.850 --> 01:35:27.630 some time and we'll get back to it. 01:35:27.710 --> 01:35:32.370 And we will do this right. And we will release everything. 01:35:32.610 --> 01:35:35.810 And you guys will see at that point There's nothing to see. 01:35:36.330 --> 01:35:40.810 And again, you'll never convince the truly diehard conspiracy theory folks. 01:35:41.230 --> 01:35:47.430 One of the nature of these kinds of conspiracy theories is because you're telling 01:35:47.430 --> 01:35:51.810 people that the elite is out to manipulate it, you will never believe anything 01:35:51.810 --> 01:35:54.670 they present. But you could do more of this and you could delay it. 01:35:54.790 --> 01:35:59.890 And potentially Trump could kick this can all the way through the rest of his administration. 01:36:00.530 --> 01:36:04.090 Or he could actually present something in a few months that showed this. 01:36:04.590 --> 01:36:08.570 Of course, that doesn't work as well if there really is incriminating material in there. 01:36:09.830 --> 01:36:16.450 And so, I don't know. Again, my initial impression of all this was there really 01:36:16.450 --> 01:36:21.290 is nothing there, or at least nothing usable that could lead to a prosecution. 01:36:22.230 --> 01:36:28.010 And all of these folks who had been pushing the conspiracy theories, 01:36:28.150 --> 01:36:32.670 just once they were in there, were confronted with the reality that there really 01:36:32.670 --> 01:36:33.970 isn't anything there there. 01:36:34.710 --> 01:36:38.750 Again, at least nothing usable. Maybe there's some of that stuff that would 01:36:38.750 --> 01:36:41.970 be scandalous, but not actually usable in a court of law. 01:36:42.210 --> 01:36:45.690 And then there are all kinds of, you know, maybe they leak some of that. 01:36:45.810 --> 01:36:48.710 I don't know. But like, there are all kinds of reasons why you wouldn't want to leak that. 01:36:49.950 --> 01:36:55.310 And I, you know, that was my initial inclination that there really is nothing 01:36:55.310 --> 01:37:00.330 there there because with 20 plus years of investigations into this man, 01:37:01.190 --> 01:37:04.630 you'd think if there was, they would go somewhere. 01:37:04.790 --> 01:37:09.630 Now, we know, like, the first time he was investigated, a lot was swept under the rug. 01:37:09.770 --> 01:37:13.810 And he got off really, really light. And it was the second time around, 01:37:14.070 --> 01:37:17.730 only after press investigations from the Miami Herald, I believe, 01:37:18.030 --> 01:37:22.310 that led to the second round of prosecutions that led to him actually going to jail. 01:37:22.710 --> 01:37:27.070 And even then, again, the call is like, well, what about everybody else involved? 01:37:27.690 --> 01:37:31.030 Like, he wasn't just doing this for himself, right? 01:37:31.190 --> 01:37:34.330 There are reports of parties and there are all these other people. 01:37:34.450 --> 01:37:35.590 Can't we nail any of them? 01:37:35.730 --> 01:37:38.770 And so the question is, is there really evidence that could nail anybody else 01:37:38.770 --> 01:37:40.130 other than Epstein and Maxwell? 01:37:41.210 --> 01:37:44.830 And I just, it seems to me like with 01:37:44.830 --> 01:37:48.530 all of these years spanning multiple investigations by multiple parties, 01:37:48.830 --> 01:37:55.230 if there was enough to go after anybody else, either Trump in his first round 01:37:55.230 --> 01:38:03.410 or Biden or somebody would have gone after that. There's state authorities involved too. 01:38:03.850 --> 01:38:08.190 Somebody would have gone after him. They can't all be intimidated by everybody. 01:38:08.450 --> 01:38:11.790 I mean, they could even be selective. Like the Republicans could only go after 01:38:11.790 --> 01:38:14.390 the Democrats and ignore the evidence against any Republicans. 01:38:14.570 --> 01:38:19.330 The Republicans could have done it the other way around and gone after, did I say that that way? 01:38:19.490 --> 01:38:23.110 Anyway, each party could go after the other party if they wanted to be unfair. 01:38:23.110 --> 01:38:30.750 Now, I would hope that if the evidence did exist, they'd go after a person no matter who they were. 01:38:31.490 --> 01:38:35.930 Republican, Democrat, famous, not famous, poor, rich. 01:38:36.310 --> 01:38:40.350 If they were implicated in a way that you could prove in all of this stuff, 01:38:40.530 --> 01:38:43.130 we should be going after them. End of story. Done. 01:38:44.270 --> 01:38:47.530 But at the very least, you've got to think like, okay—, 01:38:49.260 --> 01:38:54.400 If the Biden administration had concrete evidence on Trump, wouldn't they have gone after him? 01:38:54.720 --> 01:38:58.380 If the Trump administration had concrete evidence against Clinton, 01:38:58.780 --> 01:38:59.960 wouldn't they have gone after him? 01:39:00.980 --> 01:39:06.200 It's hard to believe they didn't. So I feel like the most likely thing is still 01:39:06.200 --> 01:39:09.660 that there's nothing usable there. 01:39:10.880 --> 01:39:15.720 But the fact that Donald Trump keeps protesting about this makes you think like, what? 01:39:15.900 --> 01:39:20.260 Why? Why is he protesting this hard if that's not the case? 01:39:20.540 --> 01:39:24.580 Why don't they just release enough to prove what they're saying, 01:39:24.620 --> 01:39:28.560 if not to their diehard supporters, to everybody else? 01:39:29.320 --> 01:39:34.940 But yeah, and the Democrats are, I think, piling on this in the right way. 01:39:35.220 --> 01:39:39.760 I know sometimes the advice is if your enemy is destroying themselves, just leave them alone. 01:39:40.100 --> 01:39:44.760 But I see no problem with the Democrats piling on here and saying, 01:39:44.960 --> 01:39:46.620 you know, let's have hearings. 01:39:46.780 --> 01:39:50.800 Let's talk about why we're not releasing the documents. 01:39:51.000 --> 01:39:56.420 Let's look into who funded what, when, where, and what the details of this were. 01:39:56.580 --> 01:40:01.880 And they're asking all kinds of questions. They're making hay out of the fact that Donald Trump Jr. 01:40:02.220 --> 01:40:05.520 A few years ago was talking about the releasing the files. 01:40:05.740 --> 01:40:11.780 And George Conway responds to the old tweet from years ago by saying, but your dad says not to. 01:40:13.620 --> 01:40:17.900 I love it. They're trolling them. They're pushing forward, all this kind of stuff. 01:40:18.960 --> 01:40:25.180 So we'll see where it goes. I mean, I should look up the right way to say Boingo, 01:40:25.340 --> 01:40:27.440 Boingo, Boingo name, Dan Bogino. 01:40:28.160 --> 01:40:31.300 Anyway, there are reports that he's considering resigning. 01:40:31.880 --> 01:40:34.600 There were reports that Cash Patel was considering resigning, 01:40:34.760 --> 01:40:38.540 but he has denied them. There's questions about will Bondi get pushed out. 01:40:39.420 --> 01:40:43.300 I don't know how it's all going to play out, But right now, all of this conspiracy 01:40:43.300 --> 01:40:49.320 mongering on the MAGA side has been blowing up in their faces, and it's fun to watch. 01:40:50.460 --> 01:40:55.840 So we'll see how it plays out. And with that, I am done. Let's close out the show. 01:40:56.700 --> 01:41:00.800 Everybody go to curmudgeons-corner.com. You can see all the ways to contact 01:41:00.800 --> 01:41:04.020 us. I still have not linked our TikTok. 01:41:04.300 --> 01:41:08.760 I will say, last week's show, I have not posted any TikToks. 01:41:08.760 --> 01:41:11.780 And the reason is like riverside produces 01:41:11.780 --> 01:41:14.980 little automated clips that i can post that i usually 01:41:14.980 --> 01:41:18.060 either take as is or make really minor tweaks to 01:41:18.060 --> 01:41:24.640 in their internal editor but this time for whatever reason my voice and yvonne's 01:41:24.640 --> 01:41:29.580 voice were misaligned by like five seconds so when we were like would go back 01:41:29.580 --> 01:41:35.800 and forth instead of i talk then yvonne talks then i talk it was more like I talk, 01:41:36.020 --> 01:41:37.940 then there's a five second gap. 01:41:38.180 --> 01:41:40.620 Then Yvonne and I start talking at the same time. 01:41:41.020 --> 01:41:44.860 One of which is what Yvonne should have said in that gap. And one of which is 01:41:44.860 --> 01:41:46.260 my response to what he said. 01:41:46.520 --> 01:41:50.720 And it just came up a muddled mess. So I posted nothing from last week's show. 01:41:51.520 --> 01:41:55.340 And like I try, their editor lets you mute parts out and stuff. 01:41:55.500 --> 01:41:59.040 But as far as I could tell, didn't let you slide things around. 01:42:00.000 --> 01:42:04.240 Maybe there's a way, but I couldn't find it. And I just decided not to worry about it. 01:42:04.860 --> 01:42:12.220 Anyway, that I was reminded all of that because there's no link yet on the webpage to the TikTok. 01:42:13.840 --> 01:42:16.760 Anyway, I guess TikTok is staying around forever at this point. 01:42:17.100 --> 01:42:23.060 Like Donald Trump is illegally extending and extending and extending without 01:42:23.060 --> 01:42:24.640 any sort of resolution what's going on. 01:42:24.760 --> 01:42:27.800 So yeah, I'll add the logo eventually, I guess. 01:42:27.940 --> 01:42:32.020 But anyway, the website includes all the other ways to contact us. I said that already. 01:42:32.300 --> 01:42:36.940 And our archives, transcripts for the last couple years of shows, 01:42:37.380 --> 01:42:41.840 all that kind of fun stuff, our archives going back all the way to 2007. 01:42:43.260 --> 01:42:49.960 Wow. It's been a lot of years. Anyway, and of course, a link to our Patreon, 01:42:50.300 --> 01:42:56.680 where Yvonne and I, no, no, that's our Slack. 01:42:56.900 --> 01:43:00.600 Our Patreon is where you can give us money because we like money. 01:43:00.960 --> 01:43:07.500 And the 25 or so dollars a month we make off this right now is not enough for 01:43:07.500 --> 01:43:11.040 either Yvonne or I to quit our day jobs and do this full time. 01:43:11.520 --> 01:43:12.920 And that is the goal here. 01:43:13.500 --> 01:43:18.300 So you folks have got to step up a lot more than you have. 01:43:20.280 --> 01:43:23.580 Yeah, no, I'm kidding. But you know, hey, if anybody wants to help out with 01:43:23.580 --> 01:43:27.960 the minor expenses and all that kind of stuff for the show, we do appreciate it. 01:43:28.100 --> 01:43:33.100 And at various levels, we will mention you on the show, we will send you a postcard, 01:43:33.280 --> 01:43:36.660 we will ring a bell, We'll send you a mug, all this kind of stuff. 01:43:36.660 --> 01:43:39.680 I still owe a couple cards. 01:43:40.680 --> 01:43:45.780 I owe cards to, oh man, my little log of who I owe stuff to. 01:43:45.940 --> 01:43:51.240 I owe Pete and Greg a card, which I have already written, but I have to finish 01:43:51.240 --> 01:43:55.700 up and send to Yvonne so he can add stuff to the cards and then mail to you 01:43:55.700 --> 01:43:59.240 guys. And I just never get around to it. And I owe Todd a mug. 01:43:59.700 --> 01:44:03.980 I'm just so bad at this. I owe Todd a mug for actually co-hosting the show like 01:44:03.980 --> 01:44:05.520 a month and a half ago or something. 01:44:06.080 --> 01:44:09.640 So eventually, I think I owe him a mug. I don't think I've done it already. 01:44:09.940 --> 01:44:13.320 You know, it's all, I'll figure it out someday. 01:44:14.040 --> 01:44:17.320 But anyway, importantly, at $2 a month or more, 01:44:17.480 --> 01:44:20.260 we will invite you 01:44:20.260 --> 01:44:23.700 to our Commissions corner slack where yvonne and i 01:44:23.700 --> 01:44:27.680 and all kinds of other folks have been 01:44:27.680 --> 01:44:30.540 sharing links talking about 01:44:30.540 --> 01:44:33.740 the news talking about other stuff you know i mentioned 01:44:33.740 --> 01:44:37.020 my new car i talked a lot about like new car 01:44:37.020 --> 01:44:40.600 stuff on there oh by the way during this 01:44:40.600 --> 01:44:44.320 last break i did actually look up some of 01:44:44.320 --> 01:44:47.260 the things that are added between the sel 01:44:47.260 --> 01:44:51.200 version of the onyc 5 and the limited 01:44:51.200 --> 01:44:54.200 version which is the the the next 01:44:54.200 --> 01:44:57.420 one up there's also an xrt or 01:44:57.420 --> 01:45:00.680 something but that's that's specifically like marketed 01:45:00.680 --> 01:45:03.640 to off-roading and stuff and i'm i don't 01:45:03.640 --> 01:45:07.120 know anyway there are a number of things i was 01:45:07.120 --> 01:45:09.960 right there's some i'm there's some i'm jealous of like 01:45:09.960 --> 01:45:13.100 i think the the automatic seats have a few more features 01:45:13.100 --> 01:45:15.980 like there's a a 01:45:15.980 --> 01:45:19.840 better audio system like slightly better speakers honestly 01:45:19.840 --> 01:45:24.800 the seat stuff i could see that being cool the speakers okay that's cool but 01:45:24.800 --> 01:45:28.760 i don't really care like i mostly listen to podcasts the audio quality is not 01:45:28.760 --> 01:45:33.380 a big deal for me i sometimes listen to music but i'm i'm not the kind of person 01:45:33.380 --> 01:45:38.380 who would be like oh man that speakers so much better quality. I wouldn't notice that. 01:45:38.940 --> 01:45:42.620 There are, there are some things with like. 01:45:43.520 --> 01:45:48.840 A couple safety features I would like. Apparently, if you're backing up and 01:45:48.840 --> 01:45:53.860 you're about to run over or anything, like something automatic breaks in that situation. 01:45:56.020 --> 01:46:01.820 And I forget if it was the XRT or Limited or both. It has like a 360 camera thing. 01:46:01.860 --> 01:46:05.220 So on your little screen, you can see all around your car. That is cool. 01:46:05.660 --> 01:46:12.640 I would miss that. But then it has a heads-up display. I don't think I really would care about that. 01:46:13.480 --> 01:46:16.260 Like i've never used one but when 01:46:16.260 --> 01:46:20.300 i've seen them i haven't been all that impressed that 01:46:20.300 --> 01:46:23.140 mean like i feel like i need that and like 01:46:23.140 --> 01:46:28.040 a sun or moonroof whatever the it's not the kind you can open and stick your 01:46:28.040 --> 01:46:31.980 head out of but it's the kind that like you know you can see the sun through 01:46:31.980 --> 01:46:36.480 the top and i don't think i would have wanted that anyway and i think i saw 01:46:36.480 --> 01:46:41.820 that it it's like slightly bigger wheels and I wouldn't care about that. 01:46:41.940 --> 01:46:45.660 In fact, I think I saw it like reduces the range slightly because of that. 01:46:45.840 --> 01:46:49.520 So I don't know. I'm not, I'm not as upset as I thought I would. 01:46:49.640 --> 01:46:51.500 There's some of the features on the limited. 01:46:51.760 --> 01:46:55.700 I would be like, yeah, that would be cool. It'd be nice to have, 01:46:55.760 --> 01:47:03.800 but there's none that I immediately was like, oh man, I should have gotten that 01:47:03.800 --> 01:47:06.160 instead. And I'm really pissed I got the one I did. 01:47:06.400 --> 01:47:08.480 I have not felt that way. 01:47:08.860 --> 01:47:16.000 It's mostly like, yeah, okay. And I think the price difference would have been another $4,000 or so. 01:47:16.440 --> 01:47:19.220 And I'm like, eh, I like what I have. 01:47:19.740 --> 01:47:22.220 So I'm okay. I'm not as upset as I thought. 01:47:22.890 --> 01:47:26.350 So, oh, oh, way distraction. 01:47:27.050 --> 01:47:31.490 We talk about all that kind of thing on the, what I just said that I actually 01:47:31.490 --> 01:47:33.830 looked at the list, I have not said on the Slack yet. 01:47:33.990 --> 01:47:37.210 So, and I'm not going to before this show is out. 01:47:37.430 --> 01:47:43.150 So you listeners have a heads up on the Slack on that one, but we do usually 01:47:43.150 --> 01:47:48.930 give a something from the Slack story we shared. 01:47:48.930 --> 01:47:54.350 So I will give the latest one that I shared on the random Slack channel. 01:47:54.490 --> 01:47:59.610 We divide it up into this one that's more serious stuff and the one that's more random stuff. 01:47:59.870 --> 01:48:03.730 And so this is from the random one. This is an article from the CBC, 01:48:04.250 --> 01:48:08.890 the Canadian Broadcasting Company, from As It Happens, which is one of their radio shows. 01:48:09.010 --> 01:48:11.630 Good show, available as a podcast. I recommend it. 01:48:11.850 --> 01:48:18.130 It's a fun sort of news, but feature news. Like it's, you know, 01:48:18.790 --> 01:48:20.630 a bunch of interesting stories and stuff like that. 01:48:20.730 --> 01:48:24.210 I don't listen to it every day or even every week, but it's a fun show. 01:48:24.550 --> 01:48:27.570 If you're not in Canada, you can get it as a podcast, as I said, 01:48:27.690 --> 01:48:30.710 or all sorts of other ways. But I guess in Canada, you could actually listen 01:48:30.710 --> 01:48:32.430 to it on the radio, but who does that anymore? 01:48:34.410 --> 01:48:39.950 Anyway, it's chimps are sticking grass and sticks in their butts, 01:48:39.950 --> 01:48:42.790 seemingly as a fashion trend. 01:48:42.790 --> 01:48:45.530 And it says the new phenomenon appears to 01:48:45.530 --> 01:48:48.350 be a fresh spin on an old fad of wearing grass in 01:48:48.350 --> 01:48:51.110 the ear and so yeah they 01:48:51.110 --> 01:48:55.770 talk about this apparently a couple generations of chimps ago there was a chimp 01:48:55.770 --> 01:49:00.850 that started sticking grass in their ear as sort of a fashion thing as far as 01:49:00.850 --> 01:49:05.710 they can tell and then a whole bunch of the other chimps started imitating and 01:49:05.710 --> 01:49:10.210 that actually got passed down a generation or two before it faded out. 01:49:10.390 --> 01:49:14.010 But then recently they started doing it again for first in the ear, 01:49:14.110 --> 01:49:18.590 but then some chimp apparently came up with the innovation that instead of sticking 01:49:18.590 --> 01:49:22.790 the stick sticks and grass in their ears, they could stick it in their butts. 01:49:23.580 --> 01:49:27.740 And that has now been spreading through this particular chimp community. 01:49:28.420 --> 01:49:34.100 They speculate that sticking it in the ear may have come from them watching 01:49:34.100 --> 01:49:38.560 humans, because apparently these are a population of captive chimps somewhere. 01:49:38.700 --> 01:49:43.880 And apparently one of their caretakers was like cleaning their ear with grass. 01:49:44.020 --> 01:49:45.920 And I'm like, really? 01:49:46.280 --> 01:49:47.700 Do people do that? 01:49:48.340 --> 01:49:53.260 You know, I've, I've heard of people doing it with Q-tips and I've, 01:49:53.280 --> 01:49:57.760 and I've stuck like pencil erasers in my ear. And I know you're not supposed to do that. 01:49:58.560 --> 01:50:04.160 Like I've seen like, I've seen Dr. Mike on YouTube talking about how you should 01:50:04.160 --> 01:50:06.720 not stick Q-tips and other objects in your ears. 01:50:06.900 --> 01:50:10.480 If you're trying to clean out your ears, they're, they're like liquids that 01:50:10.480 --> 01:50:12.260 you can do if you really need to, 01:50:12.420 --> 01:50:15.760 but you should not be like just sticking stuff in your ear because the chances 01:50:15.760 --> 01:50:22.660 of damage are high because you can screw up and like mess up your eardrum. But like, I don't know. 01:50:23.180 --> 01:50:28.400 And two responses that my wife asked, and I had thought about this, 01:50:28.480 --> 01:50:34.200 but she said it out loud, you know, could they have picked it up from watching people wear earrings? 01:50:35.080 --> 01:50:38.800 Did they really have to see someone sticking grass in their ear? 01:50:38.960 --> 01:50:42.940 They could have generalized this. But then she also said, okay, 01:50:43.060 --> 01:50:46.620 if they picked up the grass in the ear from watching humans, 01:50:46.620 --> 01:50:51.660 where exactly did they pick up the sticking sticks up your butt from? 01:50:51.920 --> 01:50:54.280 Were they seeing humans do that too? 01:50:54.860 --> 01:50:59.300 And I'm like, no, the article says they innovated that themselves. 01:50:59.300 --> 01:51:02.400 And she's like, really? Are you sure? 01:51:03.140 --> 01:51:13.400 Anyway, apparently this is now the big fashion trend among chimps at the Chimfunci 01:51:13.400 --> 01:51:16.300 Wildlife Orphanage in Zambia. 01:51:16.300 --> 01:51:20.160 That's where this is going on, but this is apparently all the rage, 01:51:20.300 --> 01:51:23.780 and they're doing it and passing the behavior on to each other, 01:51:24.200 --> 01:51:26.940 teaching each other how to do it, I guess. I don't know. 01:51:27.200 --> 01:51:30.660 And apparently it's a fashion statement of some sort. Okay. 01:51:31.760 --> 01:51:36.960 That seems like a good place to end. Thank you, everybody, for joining us for 01:51:36.960 --> 01:51:37.900 Curmudgeon's Corner again. 01:51:38.120 --> 01:51:41.120 Have a great week. Hopefully, Yvonne is feeling better next week. 01:51:41.120 --> 01:51:45.320 I saw some updates from him on the Slack that he still wasn't feeling great 01:51:45.320 --> 01:51:49.520 as of at least Sunday night, maybe, or at least Saturday night, 01:51:49.660 --> 01:51:51.620 maybe even Sunday as I'm recording this. 01:51:51.700 --> 01:51:55.220 This is now Sunday afternoon as I'm recording this, U.S. time. 01:51:55.880 --> 01:51:58.860 And yeah, hopefully he's feeling better and we do a normal show next week. 01:51:59.040 --> 01:52:01.940 But with that, we end the show. 01:52:02.500 --> 01:52:04.340 Stay safe, everyone. Goodbye. 01:52:35.620 --> 01:52:40.020 Okay. Hitting stop. No, no, no. 01:52:41.420 --> 01:52:44.860 Alex threw stuff at me. Goodbye, folks. Hitting stop.