May 20, 2026

Ep. 03: Remote Work, Connection & The Culture We're Losing

1 hour 26 minutes

Welcome to age, where four people from four different decades throw topics in a trash can and see what happens. This week: Remote.

Tim, Mary, and Dylan pull the topic from the can while Reggie's on vacation, and they bring in special guest Adrienne Muken to hold down the fourth chair. Dylan flashes back to high school COVID lockdowns. Tim thinks about literal remote controls piling up on his couch. Mary reflects on the freedom and isolation of working from anywhere. And Adrienne shares how remote work brought her from New York City to Asheville and changed everything.

They dig into what remote actually means now, whether it's killed regional culture or just redistributed it, the exhaustion of managing fifteen communication channels at once, and why Slack feels like social media for your job. There's talk of Wi-Fi deserts and kids trying to learn on iPads with no internet, the myth that remote workers aren't really working, the difference between introverts and extroverts and the newly discovered "omnivert," and whether corporate real estate is the real reason everyone's being dragged back to the office.

They get into Hannah Montana as a social experiment, Michael Jackson's contested legacy, the death of third spaces, and why old people have been left behind by a society that evolved without them. There's the realization that growth culture might be collapsing, that capitalism requires dissatisfaction to function, and that we have enough food to feed the world but choose not to distribute it. Tim gets heated about intrinsic versus extrinsic value. Mary talks about building a virtual office and why behavior matters more than tech. Adrienne brings up the quiet luxury of niche Reddit communities. And Dylan admits she's tired of every app trying to become the all in one solution.

It's sprawling, vulnerable, and doesn't resolve cleanly. But what if that's the point?

Follow Reggie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/reggietidwell/

Follow Tim: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timscroggs/

Follow Mary: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mary-greene/

Follow Dylan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dylanngarciaa/

Follow Adrienne: https://www.east12studio.com/

Produced by Mary Greene.

age the podcast is edited and engineered by Will Canady.

All episodes are filmed at the 40 Hearts Studio in Asheville, NC.

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