TAGQ (That's A Good Question)
TAGQ (That's A Good Question)
Scooby Doo Island
Ever wrestled with the heartache of parting ways with a cherished piece of technology? We've all been there, and in this playful debate, we tackle the timeless conundrum of whether to breathe new life into an old computer or embrace the shiny allure of the latest gadgets. Join us as we wade through the sentimental swamp of tech obsolescence, the adventure of seeking third-party repairs, and the warm embrace of nostalgia for the devices we've grown to love. And for a twist, we'll take you on a Scooby-Doo escapade with a ferry captain mystery that's sure to tickle your funny bone. Plus, we get a little introspective, pondering the puzzle of labeling decades and why it's so hard to name the era we're living in as it unfolds.
Strap in for a sensory trip from the electrifying Sphere to the tranquil realm of meditation and self-care. Discover the magnetic pull of curating your social media to spark unexpected joy and the personal journey of resisting Las Vegas' siren call. Unleash your inner 'cat energy' with us, learning to embody the traits of our feline friends for a life of cool composure. We'll also dive into the transformational power of attention and how meditation can steer the course of our lives, gently guiding our focus back to the present moment, without judgment. Prepare to leave with insights on personal growth and a hearty dose of laughter—this episode has it all.
All righty then.
Scott:Seems like you're slowly going backwards.
Ben:Yeah, going backwards in time. Yep, embracing my animal nature.
Scott:Animals can do that.
Ben:Human animals can do that.
Scott:They can go backwards in time.
Ben:And make primal sounds.
Scott:Oh, I see.
Ben:The way nature intended. Cheers. Hear, hear Right, Hear, hear, Ma'am. Do I get a new computer battery or do I just throw this into the electronic recycling in my backyard?
Scott:How old is that computer? Eight years.
Ben:Nine.
Scott:Nine Might be time for a new one.
Ben:But could I just? I mean, it really seems like it's just the battery that's the issue. Yeah, but at some point something else could go wrong.
Scott:You probably still can replace a battery.
Ben:I think, what happened was. I looked it up on Apple's website and they no longer service this computer, so I'd have to find a third party that would have the parts.
Scott:Still probably doable.
Ben:Yeah, seattle trip, take a trip to the mainland.
Scott:The mainland.
Ben:Get a new battery. There is a computer shop in Langley, though. Could give them computer shop in Langley, though I could give them a call. See what they say, mm-hmm.
Scott:How's, how's, um, what's the name of the podcast? I just edited a whole one and we didn't say who we were or the name of the podcast the whole time.
Ben:Yeah, we just opened with people know by now. People know by now.
Scott:You think, I guess okay, all right it's true.
Ben:It's true we're. We are father and son coming at you from the West Coast on our podcast. That's a good question. It's been a while since we've had a conversation. It's been a bit. A lot has happened. A lot to chew on.
Scott:We've probably got a lot of email of people wondering why this episode is a week late.
Ben:Is it going to be a week late? I thought you accounted for it.
Scott:I just always like get the previous two ago out the day we record. It's kind of like a limitation, that it's like, well, whatever I got, then boom, that's it.
Ben:You put two out at a time.
Scott:No, so there's one recorded already that's not out, and when we're done with this, we'll have two that are recorded that aren't out. And in how many weeks time I will do another one. Wow, I, I can not even hear your hands clapping. How do you? How do you do that?
Ben:I'm not actually clapping.
Scott:I'm not actually clapping, looks like you are.
Ben:I most definitely am actually clapping clapping is filtered out.
Scott:Wow, that must take a lot of. How can?
Ben:they do that so cleanly? I don't know it's the talked about it before.
Scott:Yeah, we talk about it every time. The text Seems to be a recurring theme on this podcast.
Ben:I should really call this podcast the mysteries and miracle of modern tech. Isn't it incredible? Isn't it incredible? Isn't it incredible? Steve Jobs can't do his navel gazing anymore, so let's do it for him, yeah.
Scott:And now that I'm using this, AI generated summaries and transcripts. All the words are there. The big search engines can pick them up.
Ben:So they can't filter out human singing. All right, sweet potatoes, yellow yams have mercy here I am string beans I think that I think that will be recorded.
Ben:Good, you can hear me. Yeah, can you hear me? Can you hear? It sounds like a foghorn. Every once in a while I'm able to hear the foghorn out here. There's also this interesting sound that my housemate, Maddie, doesn't agree with me, but I think it's well. I shouldn't say that. Maddie says it's the highway, but I don't think it's the highway. It sounds like a train, Sounds kind of like the train does from where you're sitting, but I'm on an island. There's no train tracks on this island. It's like where is this coming from? So I wonder if it's the mainland and it actually does travel across the water and then travels up the bluffs and through the forest.
Scott:Well, it could be the freeway.
Ben:But it happens in these two minutes. It lasts for a minute or two and it only happens at different times a day, like every once in a while I'll just like hear this kind of drone come through and then after a couple of minutes it's gone.
Scott:Yeah, it could be a train on the mainland.
Ben:Yeah, yeah.
Scott:Or Air Force something. Could it be a helicopter or a jet, maybe.
Ben:It's just such a consistent sound in terms of the distance. You hear it clearly and more like a train than a plane going you're clearly in a particular range and similar timber and so it's like the distance and whatever is making the sound is like really consistent this sounds like a like an episode for Scooby-Doo.
Scott:It's like the mystery of the rumbling train.
Ben:Mystery of the rumbling train.
Scott:On an island off the coast. The only way you can get there is over a bridge called Deception Pass. That's exactly, it, exactly, or a ferry you or a ferry you can take a ferry.
Ben:But the ferry captain is a little strange. He only shows up to work sometimes.
Scott:What's his?
Ben:name Donnie Darko Donnie.
Scott:Darko, that's probably his internet name. That's probably his Instagram handle, I think. I don't think that's really his name, do you? I see?
Ben:The Scooby-Doo of the 2020s. What do we call the? Did you call it the 80s when you lived in the 80s?
Scott:Yeah, I don't know.
Ben:Do you call it the 20s right now?
Scott:No, I don't think of it that way yet.
Ben:Why do you think that is?
Scott:You never call the current decade the decade, because you're somewhere in it.
Ben:So you didn't call the 80s the 80s when you were in the 80s.
Scott:No, it's easy.
Ben:it because the term sticks for a whole decade, so you're never looking back on a whole decade because it hasn't happened yet, right, okay, and it's always just awkward to say the teens, teens or the tens so we don't use that language 1989,.
Scott:We moved into 1999. Green and friends back home in. Minneapolis thought like, oh, that's cool. You know, Prince did that song 1989.
Ben:1989. It's cool, prince did that song 1989 and you moved into a place 1999 and the year was 1989, the year that he made the 1989 movie.
Ben:I remember being really excited. I still tell people this about how, how Peter, the 1989 movie. I remember being really excited. I still tell people this about how, peter, my older brother and your son, how the day was it the day yeah, I think it was the day Prince died. Yeah, peter had a gig on a stage in San Francisco Right, and that stage in Sanisco was the last stage that prince played on when he performed in san francisco for the last, yeah um I talked to the sound guy and he told me
Ben:about that night yeah, and all the lights were purple and everything. And I tell people that without I don't know. I remember hearing that from you and being like whoa, that's really wild, that's pretty special. But it's one of those things that's special, you know, just for the family Tried to tell people about it and they're like I don't get it and it's interesting because I'm like it's freaking, prince, and I don't know there were to me. It's like well, the spirit is very much alive in that. In that instance it's like, okay, that's pretty cool, but uh, the outside of my relationship with you and outside of my relationship with Peter, people just don't care and it's it's interesting to me and maybe it's because I just it's uh, maybe I'm just hanging out with different people. I don't hang out with anyone that like looks at that sort of situation and thinks of it as anything more than just a coincidence. I think a lot of people look at that situation and don't even think of it is like a coincidence that even has any significance.
Ben:I'm just like well you know what it's cool yeah I think it's cool.
Scott:I think it's cool can you hear this?
Ben:no damn it yeah stop putting mittens on, but I've confused the zoom so, oh, I had a question.
Scott:What's your question? Did you have? Did you have one fired up?
Ben:he asked you what should I do about my computer? Yeah, okay, I think that's a pretty good question.
Scott:That's pretty good. What you know? This sphere in Vegas, the sphere in Vegas. It's this spherical stadium or theater where U2 and Grateful Dead and Phish have played, so it's the big Las Vegas stadium. Pardon.
Ben:It's the big Las Vegas stadium.
Scott:No, it's this new thing. It's actually a big sphere with LED displays all around the inside and outside.
Ben:Okay, which casino owns that?
Scott:Pardon.
Ben:Which casino owns that?
Scott:I don't know, it's probably its own thing. I don't know the sphere.
Ben:Yeah, it's a venue.
Scott:It's a venue, own thing. I don't know the sphere. Yeah, it's a venue.
Ben:Brought to you by geometry.
Scott:Right. So, like YouTube, went and played there for a couple weeks and had this incredible light show, basically because you're inside an IMAX movie environment, or yeah it's kind of like IMAX, maybe bigger, yeah, 3d all around. Anyways, my question is if Bob Dylan does a residency there, what will he do for the videos that play? What will he want for the videos that play? What will he want it to look like?
Ben:Is that in the works, or are you just wondering?
Scott:No, it's just a good question. I had asked myself that and I don't think he's going to, and then I got an answer to it, so I shouldn't come with the answer to my good question, should I? That's not fair, yeah that's is it.
Ben:Did you, did this answer just come to you, or had you thought about it beforehand?
Scott:no, you said it came after asking the question well, that's fine yeah yeah, so long as the question came first I mean, I think he would just use it to, like put himself into um musical venues that he wanted to be in, you know just a stationary image of a inside of a theater or a stadium or something you know, a club he would use the like groundbreaking, massive, monumentous technology, technology of the sphere. Just to recreate his grandfather's analog feeling His grandfather's theater and hippie On a different scale.
Ben:Yeah, I believe it. I believe it.
Scott:You know the reason being like well, no, you're here for the music, you know, Right, you don't go to concerts to like have moving castles floating around you in the air, you know.
Ben:Well, people do now.
Scott:Sure, sure, I grateful dead. And fish, of course, yeah, they, it was not distasteful for them. They've been into this trippy stuff for a long time.
Ben:Yeah, u2, uv Actong baby live at Sphere Also. The Sphere is owned by the Madison Square Garden Holding Company.
Scott:Okay.
Ben:Actong. Why is it Actong?
Scott:Why is it called Actong? Such a bunch of investors in that space?
Ben:Oh well, I believe it Owning and running big venues. What does U2 mean by Act-Tung in this case? How do you?
Scott:pronounce that. Did they have an album named that or something? No, it's just for attention. I think Ak-Tung.
Ben:Do you ever read the book Gravity's Rainbow?
Scott:No, it means danger.
Ben:Oh yeah, I just pinched and wrote this book um called gravity's rainbow, and I only started reading it and then I realized that I'm like you know I don't know if I have to do this right now it's one of those really trippy, hard to follow kind of, depending on who you ask, and I think a lot of people would interpret as him just kind of swinging his giant intellectual dick around, which you know you could unpack that and actually debate over it, which I think is the important part. But it's about, I believe, people in World War II and it's about this particular group of soldiers or whatever people that are fighting and their intelligence unit is called ACTANG, but it's an acronym and here it's I just found it Allied Clearinghouse Technical Units and they're there to monitor attacks from, I think, the Germans or something like that. I wondered I had never heard ACTANG like that.
Scott:I wondered I had never heard Akhtung before that. Yeah, I always heard it pronounced as Akhtung.
Ben:Well, you're the German speaker, so I just read.
Scott:I had German relatives, I guess, yeah, akhtung.
Ben:Akhtung, I don't know if that's right.
Scott:I'm just trusting my neurons.
Ben:U2, the sphere, the sphere, the sphere, yeah, at the Venetian resort, is where is probably is where the actual real estate is.
Scott:Okay.
Ben:Owned by the Venetian resort, so it's kind of just like the biggest IMAX theater on the planet. That's pretty much what it is.
Scott:But inside and then for publicity. The outside is full-blown videos A light show.
Ben:that's all going on.
Scott:Yeah, yeah, you haven't seen those on the. You must be in a very clean corner of the internet to avoid.
Ben:I don't spend very much time on the internet yeah you go to my Instagram feed.
Ben:One, no, twitter two. You go to my Instagram feed and I really got to start on following this account. Right now there's a meme account and it's just like it like twists stuff inside of me where it's just like I don't really want to surround myself with this messaging. This is one of the first things on my on my feed picture of someone who putting deodorant on with clown makeup on. Because when I was in uh, bellingham this past weekend, my friends and I were playing pool in a club and then this person with clown makeup on came by and said hey, can I put clown makeup on you? And hannah, who I was with, has really sensitive skin. So they're like, sorry if I, if I, can't look at the whole ingredients list, I'm not going to let you put anything on my face. But I was like, yeah, you can do that. And so they put clown makeup on me and they took a picture of me while I was playing pool.
Scott:We're going to see this picture.
Ben:No.
Scott:No, no, I'm not going to put it up. This is an auditory medium.
Ben:So no, you won't. No, we got websites, you know. No, you can follow them on instagram, though they're called one a day by max. No, no funny business with the instagram handle.
Scott:No spaces, no hype on a day by man or no numbers.
Ben:One a day by Max. Max is the person that put me in clown makeup and took pictures of me, so you can find me on Instagram. I brought that up. Yeah, I have a pretty wholesome Instagram feed. I have to say. I just yeah, things not divided up at all, I just yeah.
Scott:Things not divided up at all.
Ben:I cannot stand Las Vegas. I'm not sure I'll ever step foot in that city ever again, to be honest, I say that. But who knows, I could have fun there. It would be fine. I'm just not going to actively seek it out and I'm not going to be organizing any trips with my friends. But if someone says, hey, let's go to Las Vegas, and I'm like you, do all the organizing, I'll bring the vibes.
Scott:I will.
Ben:I will people love me in those places wow kind of like the cat energy. You just don't give any fucks and people are kind of drawn to you.
Scott:I'm trying to, I'm working on that giving fewer fucks yeah, it would be more like a cat yeah, I love the cat energy.
Ben:I'm embracing it at this point in my life.
Scott:You know, a catophile or whatever. But yeah, Sometimes I think I could be cooler. Cat Lost in Las Vegas yeah sometimes they think I couldn't be cooler. Cats lost in las vegas yeah, you wish you could be cooler. Cats are just so cool. They just like don't.
Ben:Don't give a shit, you know, it's like you want to be cooler, all you got to do is do a few things that provide evidence that you are that kind of person that is cool, and then then you can be like then that's when the manifestation actually works, because people are always like, oh, just manifest it. Just tell yourself this. Just tell yourself what you want, just pretend you have it and it's like well, that doesn't really work, because you got to feel in your body that you have it and really what that means is do something that that kind of person would do. If you want more cat energy in your life, you want to be cool. Ask yourself what would a cat do, and it's probably going to be really scary to do it, but then you do it and then you can feel what it was like and then it's like, oh, I did that thing. Okay, Maybe I am the kind of person that does that thing.
Scott:Yeah, I could drum in the June jam.
Ben:Yep, and then you have that pointer that when you want to embody that feeling, you're like that was it. How do you keep a pointer to that?
Scott:How do you get a reminder to be cool and not?
Ben:It's a muscle.
Scott:It's a muscle.
Ben:It's a muscle. It'll fall back a little bit, then you take another step forward. It's a muscle. Energy flows where attention goes. Feel me, you feel me, you feel me.
Scott:You don't need money, do you? Are you running the church here?
Ben:I'm sorry. What Are you saying? You're going to pay me for all of this amazing wisdom that I have for you.
Scott:How much do you want?
Ben:You're my dad, dad? Oh, that's right, my dad, I can. I can park here for free, I can. I can get paid in other ways. This is just me. This is just me. This is me talking.
Ben:Okay, yes, but energy, I think it's true.
Ben:Energy flows where attention goes and the important thing is that you just it's kind of like meditation the whole idea and practice of meditation is sitting in your body, and then you find yourself lost in thought, and you could have been lost in thought for 15 minutes and then you finally are like oh, wow, oops, and meditation is really just the practice of noticing that and then returning back to your anchor and not and it's a practice in letting go of any judgment or and if and when you do judge yourself, noticing that judgment and just continuing to return to your.
Ben:Really the anchor of the present moment. And the actual practice of meditation is just doing that. Dozens and dozens and dozens of times over and over then, over the course of a lifetime, you'll have done it thousands and thousands and thousands of times and you know, by the time you've been practicing meditation for a few years, your attention is going in a completely different place than it was when you first started and energy starts flowing into that different place. But it's all the muscle, you know, it's all about consistency. So when you find yourself slipping back, you're like, oh, it's happening again, because patterns are patterns and you know the patterns are just going to keep reinforcing itself until you invest some attention and energy in a different place anyway, it's what.
Scott:It's what? Uh, when your mom was in med school, our landlady taught me the secret to gardening, which I couldn't comprehend. I couldn't keep houseplants alive, was um attention complicated relationship with hospitals. Attention exactly this is what you got to watch them. Then you'll know what to do yeah, exactly yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ben:It's a more, uh kind of relational way of being, yes, with the garden and it's. You know, it's a metaphor for everything yeah more relational way of being with your mind. It's like you're treating yourself. If you treat your plants as a close friend, you treat them how you would want to be treated as a friend and you treat yourself as you would want to be treated by a close friend. It's just a different approach, it's a different attitude and that's really the important part.
Scott:We have a seed company that we could sponsor this week, since it's kind of spring, you know.
Ben:Oh, it's spring, Spring's spring has sprung. Indeed. Beautiful view, beautiful, beautiful view of spring at the sunny window, of flies. The flies are flying, there's pollen all over my window. The double pane window is broken and their moisture is dripping. The double pane window is broken and there's moisture it's dripping. My screen window is a little bit broken. So I think once in a while a yellow jacket will fly into my room and I'll freak out a little bit and have to decapitate it, cause I'm a scaredy cat. You know, it's that cat. When they're in danger, a lot of the times, or they get a little scared, they, they act. It's like they lose their cool a little bit, and that's okay, you know, they're just.
Scott:they allow, they allow that fear to just like oh god oh so in the, in the, in the interest of yellow jackets everywhere, we need to plant more, more uh pollinator friendly stuff in the interest of yellow jackets. Yes, yeah, I don't know if that I know it's controversial to be pro-yellow jacket. I don't know if it's good publicity for flowers to be pro-yellow jacket it wouldn't get me any money for this ad because it's not really going anywhere we haven't even stated a capitalist entity yet.
Ben:Oh, okay, seeds. This episode brought to you by Seeds Seeds. None of us would be here without Seeds. This episode brought to you by Seeds Seeds. None of us would be here without Seeds.
Scott:Yes, and photosynthesis, but every time we do this we expand.
Ben:That's like saying oh, we wouldn't be here without Seeds? Well, yeah, and we wouldn't be here without photosynthesis? Well yeah, and we wouldn't be here without the sun? Well yeah, and we wouldn't be here without photosynthesis? Well yeah, and we wouldn't be here without the sun? Well yeah, and we wouldn't be here without chemistry. Well yeah, we wouldn't be here without DNA Well yeah, yeah, okay, we've done this before. You know the shtick we can't spread our gratitude too thin. It's like today.
Scott:let's just stick to seeds okay, seeds okay. That's a good point.
Ben:He's your gratitude junkie. There's a part in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance where he has this flashback and he's teaching a class I don't remember Is he a philosophy professor, whatever it was and he tells his students to write a paper, like on the history of a town or something, and they can't do it. And then he goes a little bit smaller well, tell the history of just this one building. And then they're like I can't really do that either. And then he says, okay, tell the history of this brick from this building. And then that opened up this whole world. And he had these students end up writing the most amazingly, both like simultaneously creative and intellectually stimulating, just like well-balanced essays, by telling them like don't do it all at once, just pick something and focus on that and bring your, bring your attention down, and that opens up a whole new realm of possibilities. That reminds me of meditation too. My eyeballs have been my anchor recently. I'll get super lost in thought and I'll be like what did my eyeballs feel like?
Ben:okay that helps bring my attention back to the present moment. Uh, seeds, seeds. Just show some gratitude. Don't even worry about the flowers. Just the flowers don't be there, just don't, just don't worry about it flowers are just a thing that there to generate seeds that's exactly right, see're just a factory that creates seeds, yeah just a beautiful factory creates seeds.
Ben:Yeah, consider the seed just for a little bit give it your attention, if you flowers are just so demanding. They are, yeah. Flowers are just so demanding. They are, yeah, they're just like look at me, look at me, look at me yeah, that is a thing Well. I guess they're so showy. The seeds. Still the seeds have the flowers to thank for that, because if the flowers Didn't do that, then the seeds wouldn't be there. Oh god, look at me getting off track Seeds. Just think about the seeds.
Scott:Yeah, there, we better end it there, since we got back to seeds Brought to you by seeds Seed.
Ben:That's a good book. If you're interested in preparing for doomsday, learn how to save your own seed and buy that book called Seed to Seed. I bought that like four years ago and I still haven't read it, but I wish I did. It could just save your life. And also, if you're worried about doomsday, well I would say consider the phrase energy flows, where attention goes.
Scott:Written by Suzanne Ashworth.
Ben:That's exactly right. Okay, anything else we have to do. Got to wrap this up. Wrap it up. I'm going to the Langley Historical Museum today. I've been meaning to do it for a long time. Go to your local historical museum if you want to know what the ecosystem was like before white people showed up and you can ask them about those mystery trains going by that you hear. That's actually a really good point. I can ask the old white person so what's up with that mystery sound?
Scott:that sounds like a train yeah yeah, yeah um, no, it's, I didn't. I didn't mean the scooby-doo year, since, yes, I did mean the scooby-doo year since he did, and I appreciate it, it was it was a callback and I was like so excited, hey, I get to use the name of the account I need to unfollow on instagram.
Ben:it called Scooby-Doo Food Snacks. Okay, I think they called it that instead of Scooby Snacks. Well, one that handle was probably taken Poop.
Scott:Snacks Okay, I think I no Fruit Fruit oh okay, there's no poop here. Wow, well, it will never. Oh, okay, there's no poop here. Wow, we'll never get sponsored by them.
Ben:By the Instagram page. I don't know. I don't want them as a sponsor. Okay.
Scott:Yeah, I'm going to prescribed fire classroom training.
Ben:So I'm going to go to the historical museum in preparation, See if I can find pictures of what this place used to look like. Bring that knowledge into my next step of prescribed fire. See what human touch this land is missing.
Scott:That's the motivation, Anyway that's what I'm doing today. Are you got a minute?
Ben:you got a minute to say what you're doing today. Tell these people what you have, plug yourself I'm doing podcasts today.
Scott:What do you plug in?
Ben:wait, I'm practicing bass.
Scott:Yes and uh, that's about it beautiful, beautiful.
Ben:Yeah, you got your bricks. Focus on those bricks, snatch yes yes, and well, now I gotta go drum pleasure talking and I wish you a day full of seeds and sounds that you can hear that Zoom doesn't cut out Sounds. Here's the sound. All right, all right, peace out, everyone. See you next time.
Scott:Next time Much love.
Ben:That was a good question. No, and that was a good question. No, that is a good question. That was a good question. All right, bye, bye.
