Hello, welcome back to infoquest podcaster.
Totally different recording session.
I done with one, rest, stop recording and then start again
from the last. It was listen to on Tuesday,
definitely we're wearing different clothes, different
things have happened, and how was your Wednesday?
Wow. My Wednesday happened, it sure
it's freshly. Did that time has elapsed you
get hit by a bus tomorrow, you're going to be sewing. - oh,
I don't want you to get hit by a bus, but there aren't many buses
around here, so there's little be okay.
No, there's actually, no buses. Yeah, I think that's what that's
why you have to seek out of us to get hit by.
That was that's what put me over from moving from California.
I was like no significantly less like it's part of your life and
the need to pay for gas that oh God I see you forgot about how
much it sucks painting. I think we're not screwed years.
I lived in a city. I would just fucking Transitive
it sucks. Dude.
Also Saudi listener. This is a continuation of our
last weeks or last two on Tuesday's episode.
So if we're just jumping in the middle of a conversation here,
so that's and the last week's fire, early yesterday, is
podcast titled something? Interesting, something
interesting, but I so I on my Twitter and today I ended up
telling a long story about cooking.
So I've been thinking about my life as a cook lately, I was a
cook for the last 48. Years, before I started doing
this. Specialized in sour dough pizza,
but I was very seriously in the cooking world in in California.
Thanks, your welcome is my ear, it is visibly.
It is God's. Sorry.
I have an appointment tomorrow. It's okay.
I have an ear infection. Don't really bad for you.
Just looks really uncomfortable. Handed me a thing.
A total kleenexes, but We have an appointment for tomorrow.
Yeah, I'm so proud of you for making it.
It's about an hour away. You all come with you if you
want. You look, I mean, sure.
But I'm with you go on a doctor's Adventure.
Hello dr. Adventure, you know, the most
common kind of Adventure kind of license plates or something
where I said in the parking lot and try and find coffee.
The last time I did that with you, I had to like I like went
into a hotel and I hid in a hallway and it was really fun.
I felt like a spy. When was that it was when the
first day that you went to therapy, when you drove, There's
like a hotel and it has like a bunch of like Conference Center
like rooms on the second floor and so like a went up into the
conference room. She's like completely can just
like vibed and it was great. That sounds really nice.
It's really fun. It's got like, I have a bunch of
work to do before finals. Yeah, it was very, it was very
much like chilling in the library, but anyway, used to be
a cooker. Well, so, I used to be a cook
and I So a long time, this is the podcaster tired of hearing
me, give this explanation but for contacts, so every like a
line cook shift, which is what I was the first half of it is
prep. So you show up for hours or so
before service. However, long before service you
prepare your shit, make sure your workstation is fucking and
the second have a service where you're actually taking orders
and you're doing the stuff second have the service.
I was very like I was always just intuitively sort of good at
because it's fast paced. It's you know, all you have to
think about That is the next five ish seconds, you know.
Yeah. I mean you're ultimately you're
thinking about very long-term things but it's always just
blocks very small blocks of time which freaks a lot of people
out. But for me, it was perfect.
The part I sucked at was the much slower Pace, too much more
methodical prep session. The first four hours when you
have just a set of tasks that have a certain priority in a
certain duration in a certain location in which they need to
be done and all that stuff and you need to organize that time
sufficiently. So that you're ready for service
because if you're not serving Going to fucking suck.
So my day had a bunch of small tasks that needed organization.
However, over time I got very pretty good at the prep section
I had to because I couldn't sort of do it for a lot of people
sort of automatic. They just I'll be able didn't
write like prep lists. They just kind of knew and it
was fascinating to me. Crazy.
Oh yeah, there's some like mental superheroes and kitchens.
I don't know how they do it but For me, the driving factor of
like getting better at the prep section and learning how to make
prep list and all that stuff was made much easier by the fact
that ultimately every day I had one and exactly one goal which
was to have a good service, that's it.
I was like that was the goal, have a good service.
Get my orders out on time. Don't hurt yourself or anybody
else make obviously make the food properly and and you know
all that. That's tough.
And if that's the case, if you're fully prepped and your,
you know, it's a joyous experience has the lights
euphoric in a way because you're just, it feels effortless
almost. When you get into the flow of
it, you're just producing like excellent food and you're just
like, how you just sort of float above yourself?
Like, how am I fucking doing? This is amazing, but ultimately,
it was only that one goals, have a good service in order to do
that, you know that broke into several things, were having a
good service means being prepped, on time, for whatever
and being you. Attentive during service.
How do you do that? Well, those break into more and
more tasks and then it gets more difficult.
But so anyways, my cure is the reason I'm talking about this is
my curiosity, is why Is one. How did I get good at that?
Given that it was so counter to my nature.
To do that first half of service, the prep organizing
time in a very precise way. How did I get good at that?
And for what I don't want to say, like I got amazing at it.
I think I got proficient at it. Yeah, it took me eight years to
get proficient and I got proficient and then became not
proficient. Several times during the process
during those eight years, which is fascinating, you know, I
would get really good at it and then I would move restaurants,
or Or move stations or whatever and all the sudden all those
procedures that I had put in place to get proficient or now,
I just forgot the existed and so I'm trying to extract as much
information about my process there, such that I can apply it
to this and I've been singing this song for two years.
I better get on it, but I'm trying to figure out what a good
day of this looks like, what is my one goal for the day?
Yeah, one not, make sure to make content and This is what is the
one thing, and how do I break that down?
I mean, that's, that's exactly why I tried.
Like, I wanted to reconfigure my calendar.
That is precisely precisely was my goal was I want to have one
goal per day, like one tangible thing, but the problem was that
I literally sat down on my twitch stream and I was like,
okay, I'm gonna do this gonna break this down to make a
calendar and then I realized East.
There cannot be just one like there can be one like you know
super mega Ultra goal. But it's like the the nature of
this work means that I have to have multiple smaller goals you
know. Yeah.
And and that was so frustrating. That was so frustrating because
I like I sat down and I was like, okay, my goal for Monday
is going to be, you know, make a tick tock which is such a small,
go, like in the grand scheme of things.
But it's like, okay, but I also really want to start going back
to the gym. I also need to make sure that
Bailey goes out. I also need to make sure that I
check my email. I also need to make sure that I
do this that and the other thing, you know, and so it's
like by the time twitch stream, you know?
And so is like by the time I got through just the basic sort of
like admin of. Like when do I eat when do I
pee? Is my dog taken care of?
Like, I was like, I'm already so far behind schedule that I'm
just like fuck, you know, and it and I feel like the same thing.
I mean, I don't want to speak for you, but I feel like the
same thing with your prep. Stationing happened to me with
Stage management, like in like because it's very similar in a
lot of ways where I would prep a show you know and my goal is go
in you know you get to you get To the theater, a couple hours
early and you set the props and you check the costumes and you
check in with the actors. And you make sure everybody has
shown up for their shift and you know all of that stuff with the
goal being to have a good show to have a good show you know.
And so like I got really good at that.
I was I was such a good stage manager but the difference
between this work and a stage manager, is that the and I think
this is the part where like the neurodivergent see really.
Like shine through was that, when you're a stage manager,
it's the same every night. You know, it's the same as the
same props, get set in the same location and they're picked up
by the same person and the costumes were the same, and
everything is the same. And so, once you have your prep
list, once you have that established, you just go down
the list as you checklist checklist checklist and then
it's done now stuff might go wrong, you know or like stuff
might break or the costume rips or whatever.
But like that was where I accept that was like my version of
service where it was like you know I knew that I had okay.
Like in this bot if anything goes wrong I got five minutes
until the next change. I've got five minutes until the
next shift or seven minutes or whatever.
And I had all of that broken down in my script.
So I always knew like do I have time?
Do I not have time? When do I pee?
Like where do I eat when? Is it snack time?
Zach time was always between act two and three of Peter and the
starcatcher. You know what I mean?
So like that kind of thing and so like but I don't have we
don't have that anymore. And we don't have a service or
shares, there's no service, there's no show and it's just,
it's just moving constantly. It's just, you know, because
someday like Thursday, it's seven interviews, seven
interviews with Isis and then, you know, Friday, I had like one
interview Buzz. I kind of You know, and so, you
know, stuff has weight stuff has more weight and less weight.
You know, stuff takes more time and less time, it's not like
Hamlet where, you know, the runtime is 2 hours and 37
minutes. It's maybe this interview takes
an hour, maybe this interview takes three, you know.
And I'm bad at that. I'm realizing just how bad I am
at a job where everything is changing all the time because
it's fast paced isn't as challenging, and as Pressure
heavy as stage management is running the Renaissance Festival
is what was changing their on the day-to-day was like the
emergencies, the problem solving, it wasn't the
foundational core of the job. Hmm.
And I think I just had a podcast break who like in this moment
but yeah and so like I think that's one of the reasons why
I've really been Struggling is just because I'm just, like, I
don't know, like know what can I be today?
Who knows? Maybe PBS will call, you know.
Yeah, that's the thing that happens.
Now, casual, I think I know I qualified too much but just to
call II, you know, before I say, one of us, I just want to.
I never, this isn't to imply that I have the answers or I'm
holier than anyone else or anything like that.
But I think the reason The you know, taking like just prep for
service. The reason I was at all capable
of managing that was because I was able ultimately I didn't
notice at the time but sort of in retrospect I was turning many
goals into one goal. Yeah.
So You know, I had to blanch the blabbity blah up and peel the
whatever's, But ultimately, my goal was to complete the proper
list. Yeah, it was, it was I only had
to do one thing which was completely fabulous.
That is composed of many things, but the goal was just that one
complete the prep list. So perhaps like, you know, what
is your one goal for the day? I think, The goal should be
General and Consolidated. So like the goal is not make of
this and complete that email. It's, you know, finished the
list, one goal, finish the list, what's on the list but but the
one goal is finished the list and, you know, and I think that
I mean, and I've done that before with this job but I think
anytime we can consolidate many tasks into one because most
people do that automatically, most people I made a video a
long time ago. Apparently it is but I made a
video a while ago now about Romanesco as an analogy.
So Romanesco is a type of well technically Romanesco is Oh my
God. All over, Asia.
Brassica oleracea. I think is the name is the
technical name for the plant but it's a bunch of different like
kale collard greens cabbage, brussel sprouts.
All of those are technically the exact same plant.
They have the same DNA, it's a plant called Brassica oleracea.
I swear to God look it up. It's just, we've selectively
bred them for a long time till the, so, that now they produce
this very different results, these different strands of it.
But ultimately it is exactly the same plan.
It's pretty crazy right? Brassica oleracea.
I promise, look it up. I really thought you were about
to describe an art technique. We've been watching so much
pottery and I was like, yes brass a Cola with caught the
ball in metal and scrape it away.
I don't know. It's like I just like made up a
whole thing of my head about what you were going to talk
about and then he complete and then he started talking about
brussels sprouts and I was like, what?
Well, we just got too many pottery wheel, so maybe we'll
invent some shit tonight. Yeah, Yes.
Sounds like a Monday and a half right there.
But anyway, so Romanesco is this type of that.
It is kind of like cauliflower, but basically what it looks like
is, it's fractal. So, a fractal is a thing that
branches off into smaller things up, branches off into something
so, on, so on infinite. Yes, what, what the movie Frozen
is that from Frozen? What know, there's, there's a
part and for have I ever told you my fractals rant, you know,
but oh, there's this part where I'm sorry, this is so stupid.
Please, please, please, there's this part in.
Let It Go with the classic song. Let It Go.
She's like singing about whatever and then she said his,
it is spiraling in, frozen fractals, all around.
And it's like this really weird moment.
And so I always just like and it doesn't really go with the rest
of the song, like it's in the bridge.
And so, I always pictured this like thing where, like, the song
writers were sitting around and then somebody's like, hey,
Jerry, I'll give you 25 bucks if you can fit fractals in the song
and then yours like that and then, so that's why that line is
in the song. But that is why, I know what a
fractal is because I Like that's such a weird fucking word to put
into a song, sung by Disney princess.
And that I was like, oh frankly could because it's like, he's
like shattering the ice and it's like, okay, that's cool.
But yeah, it was sorry. I don't roll know, it's funny.
I was trying to put your weird digression.
I was trying to fit the word. Paw goes into my brothers.
I'm glad you said in summary, I'm glad you did a good job
after meeting all the people that were there and I just quote
it for tonight. Yeah, probably.
It's like A lot of foreign a close, but you did a very good
for everybody wondering at home. How Eric did officiating
brother's wedding? Thank Eric.
Did the best job and he's now ordained so air can host your
wedding. He can, or he can marry you.
That's funny. My sister Lee.
My now sister-in-law was like, you know, Eric you better be
careful what you say around, people, you might like
accidentally marry, some people might in line at the store,
like, I accidentally got assigned something, I'm pretty
sure. But, you know, well, as far as
God is concerned know, like, if I Pretty crazy, right?
It's like yeah. Nah, they're cool though.
He said it. That's they said the thing that
that's the words. But anyways for one interesting
practical and sorry anyway it's sort of let's reminds me of like
some Dog Millionaire, how like everything he liked, all the
answers, they had like a story about why he knew it like that's
your fractal answer. Okay, that's why I know.
But so anyways, I was using a Romanesco or as an analogy where
tasks are fractal. Every task is Posed of smaller
tasks, which is in turn composed of smaller tasks.
So on like pretty, I mean, you could argue infinitely down to
like specific muscle movements. Like, I mean, ask somebody who's
had like, you know, from attic brain damage like yeah, tasks
are individual muscle movements. But apparently people without
any HD, they're like base level of task is like, doing the
dishes. That's like a task and
unloading, his water is like a task.
That makes I physically cannot comprehend that for me.
That is absolutely not the case. I can't read some tasks.
Yeah. It's, you know, one, it's
getting out of your chair to ask.
Everyone has number one standing up.
Cool going downstairs. You know, are you going to wear
gloves? Do you have gloves with Yahweh?
We totally bought gloves. All right.
Now the task is remembering where you put the gloves?
Wait, but I'm not actually sure if we did buy gloves, task.
Number three, trying to find the receipt from the store that you
need to see if you bought gloves and there are infinite It's of
ways to spiral away from the original task between all those
smaller tasks. So yeah tasks are fractal.
Most people can sort of group tasks in a button, you know all
these tasks together as one task called doing the dishes for us.
That's not the case. I literally just posted a tech.
Talk about this. Did you really like two hours
ago? Did you really?
Yeah, I'm opposed to my posted at one, I might join to I'm out.
I'm doing this for long enough now where I have to start
repeating myself and it feels weird but yeah, it feels weird
but I've been reposting because it Have you helpful?
Yeah, alright, dude, it's good. I mean, I already worked really
hard to say it exactly how I wanted to say it two years ago,
Ray, I could re record the video but it already exists, but
anyways, so I think we have to do that manually.
Yeah, we have to take those that group of small, tasks and
manually in our heads, or on paper, turn it into one task.
Where like I, this is one of those like, I working in
kitchens for me was as much Like an existential exercise for me
as it was a study in just other people and how other people
operate for a lot of people. It was fucking incredible.
Like, I incredible. I mean that literally like,
well, I do believe it but like it's really hard for me to
believe that some people could just Do stuff.
I didn't know they could just do stuff like they would go to the
walk-in and just grab the stuff that they needed, they just knew
and would go back to their station and they would like
process the vegetables from left to right and then it was done,
which is where I eventually ended up doing that, but I had
to do it manually. I had to manually.
Go. Okay, what do I need these
things like which seemed is so intuitive.
Apparently to some people, but for us we have to do them in
many ways. I think it helps me to remember
that, at least makes me feel But remember that that it's not our
fault that we have to do that. We don't intuitively.
Do these things but we can do it manually.
You have that agency. And it's frustrating.
It's fucking hard. But any time we can turn all
those little fractals of I have to do a million tiny things.
Anytime we can turn that into one thing or less things is good
lists help. It's also such a good explainer
about, like, why It'd be like this all the time.
No, because you're just constantly, right?
Like your, you constantly have to do everything manually.
Like every single time I take a shower, I have to remember to
wash my face. I have to remember to wash my
hair that I have to second-guess whether or not.
Did I put in conditioner? Yeah, did I rent out the
condition? I always forget to read
something. Every time I take a shower I
have to remember that that's what I was doing by the time I
get there like I'm just like all right you know?
Like and it's that kind of thing we're just like but it's like
constantly that's like you have to run your entire life on me.
Annual those like on, you know, it's like, oh my God, like I
actually got up and eat breakfast and walk my dog.
Like, all your life is so hard and it's like, no.
But like, within that are like 48, separate tasks that usually
begin with Bailey took, one of my shoes in the night and now I
have to wander all over the house, looking for the shoe in
order to take her outside. And whether or not we even get
outside because by the time that I get up to my office, to find
my shoe, like, oh shit. I guess I'm here, I could check.
Email. And managing those tests have
Gardens fractals. Yeah.
Those tests have margins in, which you can get lost and like,
if you were to think of each task as having, like, there's a
period between one task and another one where you have to
transition, transitional period. Yeah.
Like, as you divide, those tasks into their constituent Parts,
eventually, it starts to look like all margins.
Yeah. And it's all opportunities to
get lost, which is, I think what I struggle with the most call
dibs on that are going to make a Tic Tac.
I'm also going to be okay, mine's going to be Or than yours
because I'm going to, I already know what I'm going to use as an
example. Oh cool.
I'm going to use visual metaphors.
So who I was in the user visual metaphor?
Well, although I am talking about this on podcast but I
discovered that I may well be have hyper faiza.
Fuck off where my brain compulsively thinks of things
visually you dick, which is pretty cool.
Yeah. What's that like that must be
nice. It is pretty nice.
You know I got real sad last night thinking something that I
didn't bring up at the time but I would like I wanted It.
I want to like open a discussion about this so please do email us
at ask it infinite Quest podcast.com but like I like art
a lot, like visual art. Yeah, I like it.
Yes. And I can picture it.
Like I can picture the Mona Lisa right now, I can picture manet's
Olympia. I can pick whatever like I've
seen, I can picture it, right? So the vast majority, the
overwhelming majority of the times that I have quote-unquote
seen the Mona Lisa has been in my own head, okay?
We're as a person with a Fantasia can only see the Mona
Lisa, if they have access to it and can look at it.
Yeah, which is kind of makes me sad.
Well, it's like why like Bailey so much is because I always
forget what Bailey looks like. It's like when I go home I got
my dog is so cute. Yeah, pleasantly surprised by my
dog, every time I see my dog because I can't remember what
she looks like. And then there she is.
That Sarah, she is. I like she's very cute dog
shockingly. But I like I can't like like I'm
aware that she's cute. Like I know that like his
information but it's also weird because I think If you were like
sketch the Mona Lisa, I was like, no, I couldn't do that.
But I think like if I'm if I'm like trying to picture the Mona
Lisa, I'm like I'm like trying legitimately and like I can like
it's sort of, like, It's sort of like if you like if you made it
into like a 3D model but then you exploded it.
But it was only in black and white and it was all in like
like relief layers, you know, she liked putting the so you're
going like layer by layer by layer can MRI.
There's like I could. Yeah.
So it's like so I can like think about.
Like like I have an awareness of what the Mona Lisa looks like.
Like that is just like information.
I can't conjure like a Mona Lisa in my head but I can go.
Okay, I know that she's you know, Sitting like this because
I know that isn't formation. I know that she's like, doesn't
have eyebrows. I know that she's got like, fuck
off like, you know, I know that the the record.
That's not how she's holding your watch like a documentary
one time about how like, the land behind her is like,
off-kilter a little bit. And so, like, you know, I know
that as a fact because I heard it in a documentary about.
So then I like kind of put that there and then it's like, okay,
I know that she has like a weird forehead and so I put like, got
like the, you know what I mean? But it's like I can't picture
the whole Thing, I just know the facts, like I know empirical
facts about the Mona Lisa that inform like, but I can't just be
like, oh yes, the Mona, Lisa, and my head is weird.
I was talking to Pappa member of the quest graph server.
This was a while ago, but we were having a, he's in different
time zones. Sometimes when I can't sleep
will be three in the morning and he's like, so, you know, we were
talking about a bunch of stuff and we talked about a Fantasia
and something that Confused me and can content will continue to
confuse me the rest of my life. There's no way around it, but is
also deeply heartening and in joyful and beautiful, is that
we've talked about poetry and I like poetry because it evokes
imagery it fundamentally like when it when you know homeboys
describing the grass or whatever like I can see it.
As they're describing it, it builds an image in my head which
is the way that I experienced stuff and I kept thinking like,
people with a Fantasia, don't do that, you don't do that.
But you also have a profound and deep appreciation.
I mean easily / founder & deeper than mine.
Obviously, you know, you studied it for years and years to master
degrees like all without being able to picture, which means for
one that was like, oh what? That's like almost a scary
thought to me, like, whoa, but then also, that means that there
are ways of experiencing Beauty and passion and intimacy of life
in ways that are fundamentally inconceivable to me, like as
infinite as my own inner world, is there are other infinite
inner worlds that are completely unlike mine that I thought I
mean. I didn't realize this until we
talked until pep and I talked about it, but I for whatever
reason just took for granted that being able to visualize
stuff was a was a necessary pre-waxed prerequisite for
enjoying literature which obvious, obviously, it's not
admit, but I'd never addressed that thought until but obviously
clearly and obviously, it's not. So there are ways of
appreciating art in a deeper way perhaps than I do that are
completely unlike the way that I appreciate our, which is An
amazing and I'll never understand it because I will
only ever be one person. I can just only hope that I have
lovely and intimate relationships with other people.
Sufficient to, hopefully, get a glimpse of it.
I feel like I have to figure out how to explain How I experienced
poetry for like next podcast. I'll report back.
I'll think about it report back. Oh, it's time.
Is it time? This time for real time.
It is everybody. Thank you so much for being
here. We've been infinite Quest
apologies for how long it's taken me to get the last two
episodes of the first season of ADHD and D out there's issues.
Well as fascinating issues that I won't get into but basically
our mic cables are very long because we had a lot of mic
cables in the computer was far away and it picked up radio
signals. So throughout the entirety of
the last two hours of recording. You can just hear the radio in
the background, those Billy there are ways around it, you
can fix it. I've had kind of that problem
before but it wasn't as widespread.
So I'm just trying to Basically the end product is going to be
less good that I want it to be and I'm just sort of like coming
to accept that. So anyways, apologies, thank you
so much for your patience. I really appreciate it.
If you like the podcast and would like to help support us,
please do consider becoming a member of our patreon
patreon.com infinite Quest. They're all sorts of tears and
whatnot but the only reason we're able to do this is because
of listeners support like yours. So please do consider joining
next episode. We will miss you.
Hear that hallway buff that was allowed hallway through a
flawed, how a puff? I think it's side but next
episode, we will catch up on the patreon song.
If you don't know what the patreon song is Buckle in
because it's the best thing. But otherwise, you can find us
on all sorts of social media is, if you would like, to listen to
us Billy. So, mad at we've been in here
for so long. We have YouTube channels, we
have twitch channels. We have tick-tocks, we have
Twitter's, we Instagrams. And we would love for you to
join us on all of them. I have been dropping more a
barking, dog. Because dogs, huh?
Gasps dog. Um, I've been dropping more D&D
content on YouTube and also some more sex ed content, especially
specifically related to neuro Divergence e and we're really
excited to do. More not Tic Tac.
So indeed, come on down and I'm I've sort of revamped might.
Which dream to be more crafting oriented.
Don't worry, we still chat the entire time, but I'm generally
tinkering. So, if you'd like to see my
chaotic crafting streams, I stream every weekday at 12:30
Eastern at twitch.tv/esa goood, come on by, for cattle, crafting
and classical music. It's, it's a really great time,
but until then remember, to eat a snack, remember to drink some
water, remember to take your meds, remember to be kind to
yourself, remember to be kind of others, I remember that.
We love you now. Did it.
Okay, bye everybody. See you next week for real, for
real. See you next week.
Okay, bye.