Relay FM - Reconcilable Differences

Your hosts discuss John’s new refrigerator.

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. Next, your hosts respond at length to a listener’s question about things they’ve given up. 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._)

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_.

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, and John shares a harrowing ordeal involving Apple IDs. John says you can't locate a corpse using RFID since that's not how it works. (_Recorded on Tuesday, February 26th, 2019._)

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. 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? 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!_**