Reconcilable Differences

John has thoughts on Merlin's baked ziti recipe, and Merlin tells John about his family finally getting to see "Hamilton."

This week kicks off with John iteerogating Merlin's authentic Italiano recipe for baked ziti. Merlin says it's a hit with his family, but John has a lot of problems with the ingredients. Not least the yogurt. John has a much simpler approach, but Merlin is anxious about stirring the sauce.

Sometimes, recipes come with very long anecdotes, and we should be woke about that. Tall poppies think they're better than you, and sometimes, it can be hard to frame the things you choose to make with the world. Merlin's ideas for podcasts are considered and rejected for practical reasons.

You really get an idea in your head about how something should sound, and then you get all mad when somebody doesn't do the thing. Alex did get better, but his Mother definitely went quick. Also, Éponine loves him—but only on her own.

Finally, the boys settle in for a Spoiler Slot on the HBO miniseries, Chernobyl. Spoiler horn fires off at 1:02:14.

Simon has said that despite its framing as a crime drama, the show is "really about the American city, and about how we live together. It's about how institutions have an effect on individuals. Whether one is a cop, a longshoreman, a drug dealer, a politician, a judge or a lawyer, all are ultimately compromised and must contend with whatever institution to which they are committed."

Did you have a question for Lane?

"Issue One: Monkey Beards"

Provided it makes it into the final edit, your hosts finally discuss the Japanese Moving Video.

This week kicks off with Merlin doing John's bit. Merlin has a new ATP shirt but hasn't earned it yet. Your hosts disagree on which of them has the worse taste and sense of humor. Merlin gender-swaps his face and sends it to John, and this leads to a discussion of hairs. John has some information on genes and earwax. The history of product packaging is discussed.

Merlin shares some things he made for a different podcast, and John preemptively declares that he failed at the challenge. Merlin still doesn't understand what's allowed in show notes, and John isn't nearly finished demonstrating that this wasn't the actual challenge.

The guys tease some visual homework you might want to watch.

In a mini-topic, Merlin complains about words he doesn't like and phrases that should probably be replaced. Maybe he should just pen a piece on their ouster. Unless John takes him to task.

There's a brief fever dream on references and pronunciation. John blew the chance to do some of Merlin's bits on his other program, but John couldn't get in. John wants to revisit knife sharpening, but Merlin realizes it's a trap. John thinks the Floppers don't listen to the program, and Merlin implores Stu to please reach out. Miyazaki is quite a smoker. So, of course, smoking is discussed.

Believe it or not, John has high expectations about the moving process, and Merlin unsubscribes. Do you have any idea what goes into properly packing books? Do you?

(Recorded on Tuesday, May 28, 2019.)

This week's challenge: draw a diary comic.

The science behind why Japanese people don't have as much body odor as us unfortunate foreigners!

About 98 percent of Europeans have the smelly-armpit version of the gene, and along with it comes stickier and smellier earwax.

For a main topic, your hosts fire off the Spoiler Horn to talk about "Game of Thrones."

John is coming in hot this week, and Merlin is kind of struggling to keep up with him. Merlin tries to compensate by making up some lyrics, and John explains canary traps. Merlin forgets things.

John intērrogates the virality of podcast mispronunciations, and before long, the listener is subjected to a blinding fusillade of quips, japes, references, bits, and metacommentary that you will be forgiven for finding exhausting. John incepts Merlin, and Merlin regrets doubling-up on his 100-year words.

Merlin catches John up on his cat's costly health issues, and John has a nested solution for dealing with feline proprioception issues.

Then, they almost talk about the Japanese Moving Video, but they don't actually talk about it, so John says it still can't be in the show notes.

Apparently, people are drinking bleach, and Merlin's mouse starts to die.

In particular, they consider fan reactions to the final episode (including their own), but also want to explore why those reactions were so strong. Also, what is a rational response when a bit of media that you love breaks the rules that made you love it in the first place?

(Recorded on Tuesday, May 21, 2019.)

It's not just bad storytelling—it’s because the storytelling style changed from sociological to psychological

This week's main topic is "Jobs We Were Terrible At."

This week kicks off with John confronting Merlin about his lack of a checklist and Merlin confronting John about his paltry micturition. This leads to Merlin explaining why he's a recycling whale who deliberately withholds his bounty from one particular Tusken Raider. Going to the bathroom can be a sleep-extinction event.

John's kids can't print, and now it's his fault. Merlin's kid still can't activate planning mode. There are generally concerns about declaring "done." Preparedness drills and contingency protocols are implemented. John worries that his children will die of exposure. Everybody's pretty much done with buying nice clothes.

Suddenly, John gets all aggressive about getting to the main topic, and Merlin has a terrible time adjusting. He's supposed to be ready for anything, and now John has gotten thrown off his rhythm.

No spoilers provided here except to say that John wanted a job related to computers, and Merlin wasn't as good as he thought at one of his favorite and canonical jobs. Lots of good talk about understanding (or misunderstanding) your own expertise, and trying to learn something useful from "failure."

Finally, John utterly eviscerates Merlin's links on behalf of you, the listener.

(Recorded on Tuesday, May 7, 2019.)

Listener @themillsap found the comic Merlin was thinking of! Thank you, Listener @themillsap!

Finally, the boys tackle the topic of jobs. First jobs, early jobs, what they did or didn't learn from them, and how their younger work lives shaped their later future employment choices.

Merlin needs some help finding an artifact from his youth, and John has beef with whether the artifact is actually funny.

This week kicks off with some follow-up on John's epic fridge journey. In addition to many photos of uneven refrigerator doors, John has also received several warnings about what he needs to be watching out for. John also appends his anecdote to include a related new appliance, and Merlin recommends a tactical ice option. Your hosts discuss the mysterious tween Whisper Network. Merlin thinks John might be a Buddhist.

John revisits Merlin's oopsies with apparently not remembering to record podcasts. There's initially some confusion about lists, but there's clearly no confusion about Merlin's overdue need for a checklist. Merlin hopes that John can help remove his defects of character.

John shares that he didn't get his money's worth from a recent podcast.

In a mini-topic, your hosts talk about Game of Thrones and kids. Hey, everybody likes dragons, but could you ever really produce a suitably kid-friendly version that makes any sense at all? An edited collection exists, but John is definitely not sold on how the edits got made.

Merlin suffers a brief distraction to perform some financial tech support, and John briefly impersonates a YouTuber.

Then, that becomes a whole thing, and the guys reminisce about old newspaper cartoons.

Next up is what John describes as a "quick item" about buying a couch. The struggle is real, people, and John hasn't seen anything he really likes. John has twice as many kids as Merlin, and they loosen the legs of things.

Your hosts seem to agree on the widespread problem of improper furniture scale, but they do forgive the monsters their Brobdingnagian home furnishings since they live in the midwest. Which is large.

Is it okay for a couch to be permanently moist?

Finally, John closes by extolling the benefits of a proper headboard.

(Recorded on Tuesday, April 23, 2019.)

Your hosts discuss John’s new refrigerator.

(via @jadegordon)

“Mom, can we talk about ‘Game of Thrones’?” my 4-year-old daughter asks at the dinner table, looking up at me hopefully. My 6-year-old son nods vigorously.

A head mirror is a simple diagnostic device, stereotypically worn by physicians, but less so in recent decades as they have become somewhat obsolete.

Your hosts discuss John’s new refrigerator.

Your hosts respond at length to a listener’s question about things they’ve given up

This week kicks off with a critique of the GUI for Skype. What’s Merlin’s problem with Swing anyway? John introduces the “MPU” then mostly agrees to drive.

John interrogates Merlin about a recent and notorious technical problem with one of his other programs. There is talk of check lists plus more fretfulness about the topic that cannot be discussed.

Status is less pursued, insight on privilege is sought, and hope for interesting side projects is, alas, abandoned.

Finally, John looks for help regarding the help he was offered by an internet quiz.

(Recorded on Tuesday, March 26, 2019.)

Merlin Mann and Dan Benjamin discuss ADD, Buddhism, mindfulness, concentration, and insight.

This week, Merlin feels a little thin, and John still has to re-position his windows. Every time.

John has follow-up on peanut butter and a theory about the balls in Merlin's brain. In further follow-up, John has achieved success in his ticking-clock Destiny project, but it doesn't mean quite as much as his achievement in Super Monkey Ball. In related news, a regular Destiny segment is not currently planned.

Merlin is very happy with the streaming quality of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and your hosts agree it's sometimes hard to know exactly what you're getting with iTunes movies.

In one of their least controversial discussions, your hosts also agree that The Godfather Part II is very good.

John shares follow-up on his Apple ID adventure, and Merlin doesn't like when Apple payment stuff acts weird. This leads to some long-overdue exploration of the terribleness of credit cards and banks' erratic fraud detection. Why are you mad at me? Do you recognize this purchase?

Daylight Saving Time and childhood bedtimes are discussed. This is not a juggling time.

This week, we fire off the horn at 1:12:16 for a Spoiler Slot on the 2018 documentary, Free Solo.

@hotdogsladies @siracusa Minions have already tracked the first use of “peanut butter” (see http://giveusyourfuckingtime.com on the Aftershows tab), but it comes from the card game Bullshit for getting away with a lie (https://m.wikihow.com/Play-Bullshit#Tips …)

John shares a harrowing ordeal involving Apple IDs.

Merlin thinks John is late, and John thinks Merlin needs to check his NTP server. Merlin's family is watching The Office, and this leads to a discussion of sitcom conceits. John assigned some secondary homework this week, so the trailer for Yesterday is considered. Merlin realizes he shouldn't look at links, and John almost admits to liking a given time-travel movie.

John has questions about the provenance of "karmasuck," and Merlin accidentally talks like Mario. Other purported Merlinisms plus business jargon are discussed. In one of the greatest reveals of the podcast, John reminds Merlin what "peanut butter" means.

Merlin almost did his primary homework, but John agrees it had arrived really late. It's called Free Solo, and you should watch it for future discussion. John's palms have only ever been more sweaty when playing the video game, Super Monkey Ball. Then, John describes the video game, Super Monkey Ball.

This leads to updates on John's current video game project in Destiny. Merlin thinks John should have a podcast about Destiny, while John thinks John shouldn't have a podcast about Destiny, and he explains why. Merlin has a possibly-apocryphal anecdote about The Beatles (assuming they existed).

John has trouble finding tickets for a movie, and Merlin's wife is going to run for a very long time. John thinks Merlin should encourage his family to save themselves.

Merlin needs to be rebooted.

John says you can't locate a corpse using RFID since that's not how it works.

(Recorded on Tuesday, February 26th, 2019.)

"Fandango?"

Can't we just always have the flaps face the same way? Shouldn't we just stack the forks here in the forks area? Why is Daisy leaving caltrops in the hallway?

This week kicks off with some weather talk but quickly pivots to the frustrating world of presentations and bad presentation culture. Why does this have to take over the whole screen, and why is that control thingee covering a bunch of the slide? Also, who just joined the call?

In a mini-topic, Merlin risks John's wrath by asking a technical question: why does turning something off and on fix so many problems? John has answers, and anecdotes about state-confused devices are shared. Why won't children let parents share their expertise with them? Just, why?

John has a mental model about how the TV remotes flow, but no one seems very interested. Unsurprisingly, this leads to the airing of household grievances.

Does a child's backpack really need to extend seventeen feet? Can we please just leave some space that accommodates the snack bags? Do we really need all this toothpaste?

Good try!

In mathematics, a combinatorial explosion is the rapid growth of the complexity of a problem due to how the combinatorics of the problem is affected by the input, constraints, and bounds of the problem. Combinatorial explosion is sometimes used to justify the intractability of certain problems. Examples of such problems include certain mathematical functions, the analysis of some puzzles and games, and some pathological examples which can be modelled as the Ackermann function.

On improving presentation culture.Dan and Merlin talk about bombing the deck, advancing the slides, and striving to improve the self-perpetuating bad culture of presentations.Slide?!?