Back after a week's hiatus, Mark and Jeff discuss the significance of synchronicity and it's impact on your life.  When are things coincidences and when are they more than that?  We also discuss things we learned this week including tales of time travel and what media we have been consuming.

In this episode Mark and Jeff discuss fake bands and in particular the virtual band Gorillaz.  A band that has had a fair bit of success and was created as a bit of a thumb towards the music industry.  The band has a complicated and detailed back story for the animated band members.  Gorillaz is the brainchild of Damon Albarn (from Blur) and Jamie Hewlett (a graphic artist known for Tank Girl)

There are a lot of misconceptions about what ASMR is and why people might like it.  Mark and Jeff discovered that ASMR is not really what they thought it was and its a little odd/unusual, bordering on fetishness.  Today's episode is a little shorter than usual but in this episode Jeff/Mark used an additional microphone to capture some ASMR trigger sounds.  Unfortunately this podcast is recorded in mono, so you won't get the full effect of the sounds in each ear but you can hear the sounds of the triggers chosen for ASMR.  Neither Mark nor Jeff were triggered by these sounds.

Mark and Jeff explore the famous photo essayist W. Eugene Smith and his life, particularly when he went to Japan to cover something called Minamata disease.  One of his most famous images was taken there and there was a feature film based upon his life and travels to Minamata starring Johnny Depp.  The movie is excellent but did not do well at the box office and is a little harder to find.  Worth your time as Johnny Depp does an excellent job portraying the difficult photographer that was Eugene Smith.

Dr. Temple Grandin is know for two things, her autism and how she has used it to help inform her professional career in Animal Science.  She has singlehandedly changed the food processing industry by making it significantly more humane.  She is a fascinating individual and the main topic of this podcast.  As usual we discuss what we learned in the past week, as well as what media we have been consuming.

Mark and Jeff take stab at predictions for 2024.  Recorded during the Christmas break, Mark and Jeff discuss what they were most surprised about from last year as well as predictions (with differing confidence levels) for 2024.  This episode covers a lot of territory and is pretty free ranging.  Enjoy and have a happy new year!!!

Mark and Jeff discuss how a retirement age of 65 was originally arrived at.  Hint, it's not what you expect and its not scientifically arrived at.  The original reason for a social security program was to support people whose physical jobs were something they could no longer do to support themselves, but few were expected to take advantage of the programs at the time they were introduced.  Times have changed and so have expectations.  Not Christmassy (sp?  is that even a word?) and not a rerun

Bryan Johnson is a Silicon valley millionaire (almost billionaire) who sold his company at the age of 34 and now focuses on his anti-aging quest through the Blueprint protocol.  This protocol is an open source method of trying to extend your life based upon empirical data and evidence based science.  He sounds a little crazy (and he may be) but there is something to what he is proposing. It's also important to note that he is not running this to make money.  He provides his entire system for free. 

Most small businesses do not have pension plans or easy ways to extract their business' value.  To that end sometimes small businesses think they should buy their building to reduce their costs or at least having their payments to back to them.  There are pitfalls to this approach and anyone considering doing it should really think it hard and carefully.   Mark and Jeff discuss and provide context on what business owners should consider when looking at buying real estate.

As part of our series on Neurodivergent (or suspected) celebrities, this episode dives into the enigma that was Stanley Kubrick the auteur film maker known for feature films such as the Shining, 2001: A Space Odessey, Eyes Wide Shut to name a few.  A man obsessed with detail, his meticulous attention to all aspects of a film would often mean they would take a long time to come to fruition.  He would often take an extraordinary number of takes and he would spend an inordinate amount of time sourcing historically accurate props and practical lighting effects.