The Machine Stopped

There will be no show this week as events have conspired against me to the point where I simply do not have the time to do it properly. Even though the show is freely available, I take pride in my work. Putting out a crappy show just to put up something is worse than not doing a show in my view. While the perfect is the enemy of the good enough, you still have to have standards.

In order to do the show each week, it takes about four hours of time. Putting aside any prep work, it takes about ninety minutes to record the show. It is very hard to talk for an hour, so you have to take some breaks. There are always weird noises and interruptions to slow things down. The kittens now have the habit of crashing onto the desk whenever I sit down to do anything, so that slows up the process.

Once the show is recorded, it has to be edited. When your studio is your home office, there are always weird noises that get picked up by the mic. The mic is also much more sensitive than my ears, so editing brings surprises. Last week, one of the kittens was sitting on the desk while I was recording. The mic picked up his purring so it sounded like I was doing the show from a lion’s den.

Editing takes about ninety minutes on good days. Since I am not a sound engineer, there are times when it takes me half an hour to edit out some weird background noise or my own weird noises. If you want to know how poorly you speak, spend a couple hours every week editing your own voice. I can now recognize my verbal tics just by the shape of the sound graph.

On top of the four hours to put the show together is prep time and compiling it for the various locations. Uploading to sites like Rumble only requires a few minutes, but it is not always trouble free. Most weeks it takes an hour to get everything compiled and uploaded to the various platforms. Add it all up and the one-hour show is up to five hours of work each week, spread out over a few days.

This week I was thrown a curveball by the day job. A client had been working on a project for months, but forgot to tell me about it. They needed me to do something that would normally take a couple of weeks, but I had a week to get it done. This week I have been strapped to a screen twelve hours a day. As the deadline grew closer, the work required to finish the project kept growing.

By the time Wednesday rolled around I had done nothing on the show and I had no time to do even a slapdash job of it. Around midnight Wednesday I decided to call it a day and do the show on Thursday. I had got ahead of the project, so I figured I could take the morning to knock out the show. Thursday morning more bad news from the salt mine hit my desk and that meant no free time at all.

The next plan was to do it Friday afternoon or evening, but there is a limit to how much you can use your brain. Around five yesterday I realized that my brain was no longer working very well, so that was it for me. I popped open a Guinness becasue nothing heals the brain like alcohol. As the great philosopher once said, beer is the cause of and cure for all of life’s problems.

A funny thing happens to you when you get consumed by a project. It is as if you have been in exile on a remote island. All of the daily tasks you do out of habit fall by the wayside as you focus only on the work. I have 160 unread e-mails in my work account, which is something that I never let happen. I answer work e-mails right away and then move them to a folder. I am done for the day when the inbox is empty.

Of course, you realize that some of those daily tasks are not important. A man’s schedule is like an empty drawer. It will be filled with many useless things that for some reason you think are important. A week like this revealed a lot of pointless tasks on the schedule that can be removed. On the other hand, feeding the cat and taking out the trash are not things that should be ignored.

The other thing a week like this brings to the front of the brain is that the number of capable people is shrinking. For this project I was dealing with a group of people I only met this week. Only one from this new group was competent. He was not always easy to reach becasue he is competent so the demand for his time is infinite. Luckily, he knows this and is also conscientious.

This is something happening all over. The reason Elon Musk could fire eighty percent of the Twitter staff is they did nothing useful. It was not just that they were there for social justice causes, but that most of them were useless. This is always a problem, but it seems to be getting worse. Every company is loaded down with useless people and must rely on a tiny minority to keep the machine running.

It is always a good idea to remember that the cemeteries are full of indispensable men, but I do wonder what happens when the capable retire. For now, there are enough capable people to keep the plates spinning, but at some point, they simply stop either because they are dead or they are tired of carrying the burden. The Western world is headed for a great reset, but not the one the rulers imagine.


If you like my work and wish to kick in a few bucks, you can buy me a beer. You can sign up for a SubscribeStar subscription and get some extra content. You can donate via PayPal. My crypto addresses are here for those who prefer that option. You can send gold bars to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 432 Cockeysville, MD 21030-0432. Thank you for your support!


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Vinnyvette
Vinnyvette
1 year ago

I used to listen to Rush,I used to read National Review, and The American Spectator. In the early 2000’s I realized I was being lied to and gaslighted and promptly kicked their asses to the curb. I came to this epiphany by discovering alt right or dissident writers such as Zman and others on the internet. The problem with mainstream conservative grillers is they refuse to pull their heads out of con inc’s ass! Listening to the same con inc pundits, voting harder for the sane con inc candidates, and getting the same results. The truth tellers, even the old… Read more »

My Comment
My Comment
1 year ago

Outside of whites and Eastern Asians, no one expects competency so the lack of it won’t be perceived as a problem by customers.

A great example is Mexico, the source of most of our replacements. Mexicans just accept that trying to accomplish anything is a nightmare because the person they are dealing with likely is both incompetent and determined to do the least work possible.

Yes, it will hurt productivity and the economy but things will still be better than Latin America, India and Africa.

Plus soon, whites won’t be able to complain without being labeled a racist

Chicago Streets n' San
Chicago Streets n' San
1 year ago

I appreciate the circumstances, Z. I’m a patent attorney and federal trial liar continually stretched.

Take a few here-and-there timeouts. For sanity. You won’t lose any worthwhile readers.

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
1 year ago

zman, what’s your take on mr kennedy? he is definitely picking up momentum, and appeals to disaffected voters in both parties.

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
1 year ago

ChatGPT, the status of David, as done by Tom of Finland.

Glenfilthie
Glenfilthie
Member
1 year ago

Been there, done that. Took my last job rather than retire because I believe people should work, even if it means taking a junior position. I figured I’d do inside sales and the money sucked…but it would give me something to do and keep me out of jail. The kids were pooch screwing morons glued to their phones. My outside guy was a pajeet that never left the office or did anything. That includes the managers. The manageress decided she would only work 7.5 hours a day and I could pick up the slack. In short order my days were… Read more »

B125
B125
Reply to  Glenfilthie
1 year ago

Sounds about right for Canada lol. If you show up on time, shower regularly, and don’t steal from the company, that puts you in the top 50% of the workforce. Bonus if you can speak English at a literate level. If you hit those 3 criteria you can basically do whatever you want, since firing you will be worse for the company than having to sift through all the bums to find another seat filler. Certainly unfortunate, but it also opens new opportunities to make money if you can do a little bit more (but you have to be smart… Read more »

Glenfilthie
Glenfilthie
Member
Reply to  B125
1 year ago

Yeah but…it doesn’t work like that.

I’m in Alberta, home of eeeeeevil Big Oil in Canada. Liberals hate them and are crippling the oil companies with confiscatory “green taxes”. They can’t make a buck, so the oilfield operates at minimum capacity. And for every single oilfield job lost… 4 more pink slips go out in the supporting industries.

We have the same problem that the US military does: the cream is not rising to the top.

But turd floats …

Ben the Layabout
Ben the Layabout
Reply to  B125
1 year ago

I’ve heard a similar lament for U.S. blue collar or lower tier workers: In many trades, if one is an employee who merely shows up sober and at the expected time, he is far ahead of his competition. 🙂

imbroglio
imbroglio
1 year ago

How do you have the time to do everything that you do? Full time job, daily postings, a weekly audiocast, other platforms and your voluminous reading. I take it you live alone and have to do all the regular errands and chores single people do plus care for your cats. I can’t imagine you have much of social life.

We should petition Tucker to have you on his new show if he were to have one. You’d be sitting a curtain, I suspect.

imbroglio
imbroglio
Reply to  imbroglio
1 year ago

…behind a curtain…

Dinodoxy
Dinodoxy
Reply to  imbroglio
1 year ago

How do you have the time to do everything that you do?

No wife
No kids
No substance abuse

Ben the Layabout
Ben the Layabout
Reply to  imbroglio
1 year ago

I guess you never read Tim Ferriss’s “The Four Hour Workweek.” I can’t prove it, but I suspect Z has outsourced the entire operation to some grauduate student outfit in Balgalore and/or some iteration of ChatGPT, while he luxuriates under a palm on a tropical isle somewhere in the South Pacific. 😀

Bartleby the Scrivner
Bartleby the Scrivner
1 year ago

Thanks to the person who posted the link to Z’s sub stack account. One of the organizations he does work for came to him to “help save them from themselves”. I hope that Z added a few zeros to the end of any fee Z is charging. I recently bid a job and lost it, because my price was higher than the competition. I related to the end user that my product guaranteed a 3 year warranty on parts and labor. I was selling a rolls Royce, the other guys a Yugo. Needless to say, last weekend I got a… Read more »

Bartleby the Scrivner
Bartleby the Scrivner
Reply to  karl von hungus
1 year ago

I watched the video, and people were clapping. Clapping.

What a bunch of evil savages.

But remember, they be just like you and me!

mmack
mmack
Reply to  karl von hungus
1 year ago

Last weekend The Lovely 🥰 Mrs. and I went to a beer festival. It was set up in a small town and individual breweries set up tents to give out small pours of their beers. Some breweries used those tailgating “pop up” tents with a metal frame and a snap on fabric top. At the end of the fest one such unattended tent got caught by a big wind gust and thrown atop a fence and into some live power lines. Some nimrod ran up to grab it and pull it down not realizing or understanding the frame was resting… Read more »

Xman
Xman
1 year ago

“The other thing a week like this brings to the front of the brain is that the number of capable people is shrinking… For now, there are enough capable people to keep the plates spinning, but at some point, they simply stop either because they are dead or they are tired of carrying the burden.” Yep. My own experiences in the job market have been very negative. Consequently I simply DGAF any more. I have personally been canned from jobs and replaced by people far less competent, and seen the same happen to other white men. This is partly due… Read more »

ray
ray
Reply to  Xman
1 year ago

‘But I will not waste the limited amount of time I have remaining on God’s green Earth making somebody else rich or making somebody or else look good if I am being treated like shit’ You are not alone. Millions of other men — in the U.S. alone — share your experiences and sentiments. In one way or another, they are checking out of a society that has made clear its resentment and hatred towards them for four decades. Now, of course, their Glorious Woke-Fem Empire is coming unglued, due to the infiltration and domination of every institution by .… Read more »

Bilejones
Member
1 year ago

We all know what the solution to this problem is: Ditch the day job.
It looks like that is the goal and that there is a plan.
There are a number of people seemingly making a living online, most with less insight, discipline and work ethic.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Bilejones
1 year ago

Learn to code, Bile!

Maniac
Maniac
1 year ago

“I popped open a Guinness becasue nothing heals the brain like alcohol.”

Do they still make Guinness Black? That stuff was just about perfect.

Jack Boniface
Jack Boniface
Member
1 year ago

Thank you for all your work. Here and on SubscribeStar since the beginning. My Daily Jolt of Sanity.

RabbiHighComma
RabbiHighComma
1 year ago

I went back to my old job this week. I left because I was the only person in the department working, and the stress of a seven year software project that was about to go live was leading to chest pains. I was the only person anyone contacted, and boy did they. Supervisor, who was also overloaded, eventually informed me I was on call 24/7 – for no extra pay. So I left, and spent a year gardening, playing with my pets, and making expensive purchases that made me happy. But like many Huwhytes….I need more purpose, and two capable… Read more »

Rando
Rando
1 year ago

I think a large part of the lack in competence is also due to the smart fraction (i.e. White males) being frozen out of the good schools in favor of the vibrants.

Without those credentials, useless as they are, you see more and more young White men being underutilized and forced to work in lower paying, less important jobs. Many are dropping out altogether. Then you have the problem of competent people having a hard time starting a family, while the dummies seem to have no problem breeding like rabbits.

Xman
Xman
Reply to  Rando
1 year ago

True. Nobody is born an expert at anything, people need to be given work experience, internships, admission to educational programs, and hired onto entry-level jobs that lead to promotions. All of that stuff — literally all of it — may as well have a flashing neon “no white men need apply” sign. Look at the HR ads of literally any major corporation, or the advertisements for any government agency or university program, and you will see nothing but Negroes and women depicted in the most unrealistic manner, e.g., railroads advertising for employees showing a colored woman standing on a locomotive… Read more »

B125
B125
Reply to  Rando
1 year ago

I’m also seeing white men retreating to smaller organizations. We may end up like South Africa, where if you are white and want to work, you need your own business. I wouldn’t say they’re dropping out, but their potential is definitely getting under utilized as “middle manager at some small town construction company” (compared to say, multionational senior manager). Also noticing some rural migration from whites. For the first time in a long time small towns look better kept, and seem to have more activity going on. People have been leaving the cities. Most of them still have families which… Read more »

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
1 year ago

i wonder how many competent people are sitting on their hands, letting the machine run down intentionally?

Dave Davenport
Dave Davenport
Reply to  karl von hungus
1 year ago

“i wonder how many competent people are sitting on their hands, letting the machine run down intentionally?”

And what are the competent peepul doing for a paycheck while sitting on their hands?

The novel “Atlas Shrugged” is not the same as real life. Ayn Rand is not a reliable guide to real life.

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Dave Davenport
1 year ago

To some extent you have to believe in the system to be a good consumer and thus need a large income.

What exactly is stopping you from just wearing your socks upside down once the bottom part gets holes? Half of the sock fabric is still in good condition, you’re just worried about what all the other consoomers will think of you if you have to take your shoes off. All of you people, getting suboptimal use out of your socks, lining the pockets of Big Underwear, you all make me sick!

ray
ray
Reply to  Ploppy
1 year ago

‘All of you people, getting suboptimal use out of your socks, lining the pockets of Big Underwear, you all make me sick!’

Dammit Ploppy you are right.

From this day forward I vow to double-side my socks and never to change my underwear again. Viva la Revolucion!

mmack
mmack
Reply to  ray
1 year ago

“From this day on, the official language of San Marcos will be Swedish. Silence! In addition to that, all citizens will be required to change their underwear every half-hour. Underwear will be worn on the outside so we can check. Furthermore, all children under 16 years old are now… 16 years old!”

Esposito, leader of the rebels in the movie Bananas

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
Reply to  Dave Davenport
1 year ago

they are collecting a paycheck same as all the incompetent people around them. surprised i had to make this point explicit.

cg2
cg2
Reply to  karl von hungus
1 year ago

There’s also deciding when to retire, 2 weeks ago I said F it.

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
Reply to  cg2
1 year ago

one of the nice things about retirement is not having to deal with the irrationality of modern day workplace. no more managers or supervisors is pretty nice too.

Ben the Layabout
Ben the Layabout
Reply to  Dave Davenport
1 year ago

Agree on the whole. But (in my opinion) the novel was apt dramatization of the destination of socialism/collectivism/communism carried, perhaps, to its (il)logical conclusion.

By the way, Rand’s “prediction” of the future US Government was remarkably prescient, in the most general terms of course. The novel emphasizes an ever growing government-business partnership. Better known as coporatism or fascism.

Obviously, a core theme of the story is that the competent men* who really keep civilizaiton running are being shit on until they’ve had enough and drop out of sight.

*Rand even threw in one broad (Dagny), rather progressive for the 1950s.

mmack
mmack
Reply to  karl von hungus
1 year ago

My wife and I visited a friend and his wife this weekend and we enjoyed dinner, drinks, and conversation. I worked with the husband for nearly three years on a project at his employer. I haven’t worked with him for about three and a half years but we keep in touch and have phone calls or dinners together. So he and I get to talking about work. He’s older than me, and very close to retirement age. If he wanted to he could quit and go on Medicare for his insurance. But he’s a bright guy and on the ball… Read more »

Bartleby the Scrivner
Bartleby the Scrivner
1 year ago

“The number of capable people are shrinking.”

When I read that sentence, my mind immediately traveled back to earlier in the week, when I was in a doctors office.

The nice south Asian lady behind the counter was having difficulty inputting basic information into the system, and couldn’t open a new patient file. I was patient. She was apologetic.
After struggling for over ten minutes, she had run out of ideas.

The solution? Thirty Something White dude was asked for help, and three keystrokes later….problem solved.

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Bartleby the Scrivner
1 year ago

I recently had to open a couple probate accounts at banks. Quite a lot of sitting around waiting for them to figure out how to do it.

Evil Sandmich
Evil Sandmich
Reply to  Bartleby the Scrivner
1 year ago

In fairness the rot is at both ends. Anyone who has used Windows 11 can see that the people writing these systems are making them more difficult to use at a time when people struggle to use the easy stuff.

mmack
mmack
Reply to  Evil Sandmich
1 year ago

Microsoft: What Can We F-ck Up For You Today?

Microsoft: Change For The Sake Of Change

Ben the Layabout
Ben the Layabout
Reply to  Evil Sandmich
1 year ago

Agree. My daily driver ancient (Windows 7) PC finally died so its replacement is now Win11. When I first studied Win11 I was appalled that — upon initial release at least — Micro$oft intended to lock down the system. Only approved apps obrtained from the MS Store could run. Fortuantely, there’s a way to bypass that. I’ve rarely if ever used MS’s bells and whistles and ignore what I can’t uninstall or disable. To MS’s credit, all my preferred apps work..including a few obscure ones from the 1990s. I still Use Office 2000 which installed — not without complaint, and… Read more »

Paintersforms
Paintersforms
1 year ago

No explanation owed, Z. Some of the best free content out there. Beggars can’t be choosers!

“The Western world is headed for a great reset, but not the one the rulers imagine.”

Yep. At the risk of indulging dark, lingering thoughts from the plague era, there are too many consumers and not enough producers.

One wonders against his conscience if the depop crowd don’t end up being antiheroes in spite of being evil bastards. One also hopes if it comes to pass, they go down with the bloom they caused. Play God, get played by God lol.

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Paintersforms
1 year ago

Painter, you mention the depop crowd and the loathing that they inspire. I understand your reaction. There is something ghoulish about the great reset Davos crowd.

But don’t we need depopulation? Doesn’t the planet have a finite carrying capacity?

For me, being a white nationalist, the issue is simplified. I want my people to flourish, and, if necessary, at the expense of other peoples. I don’t wish for such an outcome, but am ready to face it, if necessary.

Paintersforms
Paintersforms
Reply to  LineInTheSand
1 year ago

“But don’t we need depopulation? Doesn’t the planet have a finite carrying capacity?”

That’s the thing. I don’t know what Earth’s carrying capacity is, but I’m sure it’s much higher than what we’ve got today. Maybe Earth could be turned into Coruscant, but I wouldn’t want to live there, so I’m in favor of fewer people.

I’m an advocate of living closer to nature and letting nature do the dirty work. This people-farming business doesn’t sit well with me at all. But I think the deed’s already been done, so my opinion on the matter is moot, I guess.

Tashtego
Member
1 year ago

If China guaranteed Iranian territorial integrity as we have postured to do in Taiwan, what GAE-ZOG could do about it?

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Tashtego
1 year ago

Thanks to some good history by Neofeudal, I think we’re seeing “two man press”, two ganging up to remove the larger one. China, her lands polluted, barren, and with little fresh water, gets good plantation farmland in the US, EU, and Commonwealth; the browns as an enforcer, maintaince, and farm labor class, since the whites will suffer the same fate as urbanites wearing glasses in the Mao Cultural and Pol Pot Cambodian revolutions. (Those not reduced to smuggler enclaves in hostile terrain, that is.) The Middlemen will gain permanent class employment, a ruling niche, as they did in the USSR.… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Alzaebo
1 year ago

China’s ZOG Rainbow Plantation to give it a name. I leave out further thoughts on the driving force behind the nonwhites and the broken; as Line says, there are too many of them, fed by our gifts given too freely.

Paintersforms
Paintersforms
Reply to  Alzaebo
1 year ago

A US-Russia alliance would offer the best prospect of peace and prosperity everybody claims to want, but ancient grudges and extant ‘British’ Empire interests have never allowed it to happen, and that pisses me off.

John Smith
John Smith
Reply to  Paintersforms
1 year ago

Eradicating whiteness and destroying Europe is an original American aim. Nothing to do with my country.

Are you French?

Paintersforms
Paintersforms
Reply to  John Smith
1 year ago

Read Tragedy and Hope; read up on Imperial foreign policy wrt Germany and Russia; read about the origins of American intelligence services; or listen to Jay Dyer. He covers it all well and goes into things I don’t have the knowledge to speak to. Yeah, American corporate money got America on board, but America didn’t start the thing. Fabian socialism isn’t American, nor was Weimar. We hardly have the monopoly, or even the pride of being first. And I put ‘British’ in quotes because it has about as much to do with your country as ‘Americanism’ has to do with… Read more »

TomA
TomA
1 year ago

First, “that which does not kill us makes us stronger” is still an evolutionary truism.

Second, life would be boring if not for curveball challenges to stimulate the cerebral cortex.

Third, yes the West is now drowning in deadweight, but we cannot wish or persuade our way out of that dilemma. Only a collapse and return of real hardship can sort the wheat from the chaff.

Fourth, its best to watch the sorting process from a distance.

RabbiHighComma
RabbiHighComma
Reply to  TomA
1 year ago

Today at Costco I encountered literal zombies. They weren’t just the typical oblivious people who don’t seem to understand how to not block the aisle or drive a cart. It wasn’t just the lumps of flesh eating the disgusting samples – civilized people do not eat in a grocery. These creatures were staggering around with a 1000 yard stare…no cart. They would just stall out in the middle of an aisle and stare into space. Most were boomers so I don’t think they were on oxy – although psychotropics could be in play. It was genuinely scary. Given the local… Read more »

Good ol' Rebel
Good ol' Rebel
Reply to  TomA
1 year ago

I knew a veteran double amputee who, upon hearing some pop song about “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” harrumphed and said with decided acuteness, “well, I should be $*%!*ing superman.”

That which doesn’t kill you, usually just hurts you. It doesn’t often, much less always, make you stronger.

Vxxc
Vxxc
1 year ago

I don’t know whether we’re running out of competent people or they just gave up. Z had often wrote during COVID that you can’t just turn off half an economy without repercussions many of which can’t be anticipated. I observe a lot of links in the chain broke, that a lot of people just this year really came back to work (whether they were officially on leave or not) and are surprised at how long and how difficult it is to get things done now. I had involvement with different occupations lets say and I observed this phenomenon Corporate, globally… Read more »

The Wild Geese Howard
The Wild Geese Howard
1 year ago

Semi-OT:

Turns out me and several others commenters have been spot on about the labor shortages in the STEM space all along as the MIC struggles when massive labor shortages:

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/weapons-makers-suffering-worker-shortages-ukraine-war-drives-demand

Luber
Luber
1 year ago

Imagine not choosing a fine red wine and so, you don’t feel properly reinvigorated! Beer????? Now we know Z doesn’t stand for Zinfandel.

The Real Bill
The Real Bill
1 year ago

Z-man, the dilligent effort you put into these podcasts is much appreciated; and it shows in the consistent quality of your finished product.

OTOH, I’ve especially enjoyed those episodes in which you appeared to be ‘winging it’: talking ‘off the top of your head’, about whatever comes to mind. IMO, those have been some of your most interesting offerings.

So who knows? an epsode in which you go into it completely unprepared, and tired to the point of exhaustion, just might turn out to be your best show ever.

The Wild Geese Howard
The Wild Geese Howard
1 year ago

Anyone looking for something to listen to in place of this week’s show should check out JHK’s new interview on Coffee and a Mike.

Alternatively, there is Naomi Wolfe’s new two-hour interview with a couple Australian senators where she summarizes the horrors her team found within the Pfizer docs:

https://clubgrubbery.com.au/graham-and-john-host-a-panel-discussion-with-naomi-wolf-and-senators-roberts-and-antics-part-1-of-2/

Yes, I know, esquimeaux and all that…

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  The Wild Geese Howard
1 year ago

Esquimeaux! Big tip o’ the hat to the Greats who taught us.

Vince
Vince
1 year ago

*If you want to know how poorly you speak, spend a couple hours every week editing your own voice.* For Christmas 1968 I got a Crown-Corder reel to reel tape recorder. I started recording family and myself on New Year’s Eve at our family table. The next day I played it back and was shocked at the sound of my own voice. It was the first time I’d ever heard it the way others did (and still do). My goodness, what a revelation! Who IS that adenoidal freak on the tape? Anyone who can do what you do and make… Read more »

Vince
Vince
Reply to  Vince
1 year ago

happy *you* stick to it, I meant to say

Shrinking Violet
Shrinking Violet
Reply to  Vince
1 year ago

Yes, Z-man sounds great. he has a nice, rich, deep voice that sounds like brown gravy. I can totally relate to your dismay over the sound of your own voice on tape. Whenever I’ve heard recordings of my own speaking voice I felt utterly mortified, like maybe I should never open my mouth in public again. (Might not be a bad idea, for many reasons.)

Ben the Layabout
Ben the Layabout
Reply to  Vince
1 year ago

What you describe (perceiving one’s own voice as alien) is perfectly normal. I’ve experienced the same. The explanation is probably simply that you’re used to hearing your voice coming from your own mouth, not a disembodied machine. But if you have other familiar voices on the playback, they usually sound remarkably lifelike — except, probably, to the owner of the voice.

Arshad Ali
Arshad Ali
1 year ago

Let me take a stab in the dark: “The machine stopped” is a reference to E.M. Forster’s short story.

Zaphod
Zaphod
Reply to  Arshad Ali
1 year ago

More like hosing down a well-lit hamster cage with a mini-gun 🙂

Run, don’t walk, to the the nearest Vomitorium.

Redpill Boomer
Redpill Boomer
1 year ago

I can appreciate all the hard work you put in, Zman, especially since your stuff sounds so perfect. I record video on a standard HD camera and edit in kdenlive. I have a terrible habit of stumbling over words and immediately correcting myself which makes it doubly hard to edit. I’ve learned to speak a lot more slowly and carefully.

Auld Mark
Auld Mark
1 year ago

I always figured that you were coming to us from either Platos cave or the Lions den…now we know.

Panzernutter
Panzernutter
1 year ago

A mild Lent this week, no T.C. , no Zman podcast, I took a Zman bike ride this morning and cracked open Brave New World , derb is busting out of jigsaw puzzle, that sounded good too. By the way T.C. replacement is a 30 yr old jogger this week. I’m sure we’re in for the continuos parade of Whitlock and Owens. Steady as she goes. Same old same old. Nothing to see here. I’m sure VICTOR DAVIS is willing and able doing one handed push-ups in the green room.

Chet Rollins
1 year ago

My most poignant experience was working on a project from hell that had your schedule, but the crunch lasted over two years. One of my strongest memories was a contractor who worked himself so hard he had a full-blown panic attack at work, was rushed to the hospital, and was back at the office in the afternoon. Another guy after a year of intense stress didn’t feel well one day, decided to take a hot bath, and died. It’s no wonder some of our best guys said “40 hours, no more”. After some threats, hey basically said they were indispensable… Read more »

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Chet Rollins
1 year ago

I used to work at a new company that had lots of potential and all of us who were there at the beginning had the opportunity to grow and prosper with it. Everyone was gung ho. 80+ hour weeks were the norm. Eventually, we figured out that this led to a lot of errors, so we put a cap on it at 60.

Bourbon
Bourbon
Reply to  Chet Rollins
1 year ago

There are some famous old theorems in the theory of stochastic modelling which hold that once you get “too far” behind the present, you can never “catch up” again, and if you attempt to catch up, then you will doom yourself to being stuck in the past forever [meaning that, say, being two weeks behind on everything will simply be your new normal, from now until the end of time]. In a troubled bidness, management will hire the very moast highly priced “consultants” to invade the orifice and start screaming at the poor wagie wage slave cubicle monkeys to “CUT… Read more »

Redpill Boomer
Redpill Boomer
Reply to  Chet Rollins
1 year ago

Many years ago on a SW development project with a very large team, we discovered that one of our colleague who had just departed (for a better job, curse him) had done absolutely nothing on his task. Two of us had to implement his entire component in a week, working until 2AM eating chocolate covered coffee beans. Mission accomplished, but if I did it at my current age it would kill me.

Clayton Barnett
1 year ago

My only audiobook, so far, was voice acted by me. It’s about eight hours. It took two months to record and three to edit in Audacity.

It’s one of the reasons I did podcasts for about six months then walked away. I have more important things to do.

https://tinyurl.com/bdcu7x2m

Ornery Guy
Ornery Guy
1 year ago

Go have a beer, or three! Things will work out.
Two kinds of problems, living and dying. This sounds like the former type, hope you’re not losing sleep over it.
I’m listening to the Witches episode again, loved it!

KGB
KGB
Reply to  Ornery Guy
1 year ago

I listen to that one regularly so that I don’t forget the lessons within.

Vizzini
Member
1 year ago

This is what happens when you take the red pill:

“I can now recognize my verbal tics just by the shape of the sound graph.” — The Zman

“You get used to it. I don’t even see the code anymore, all I see is blonde, redhead, brunette…” — Cypher, The Matrix

Bourbon
Bourbon
Reply to  Vizzini
1 year ago

Tucker Carlson was talking about these sorts of things recently. “The undeniably big topics, the ones that will define our future, get virtually no discussion at all: War, civil liberties, emerging science, demographic change, corporate power, natural resources; when was the last time you heard a legitimate debate about any of those issues? It’s been a long time. Debates like that are not permitted in American media.” Tucker Carlson Apr 26, 2023 | 8:01 PM https://tinyurl.com/2vm8sv84 =============== ONE DAY LATER Washington Post: Making sense of Tucker Carlson’s weird video after his Fox News firing April 27, 2023 https://tinyurl.com/2msjjeps =============== TWO… Read more »

angelus
angelus
1 year ago

Do like Ol’ Remus did and just cycle down to a once a week slightly longer article or collection of same, we don’t want to have you work yourself to death, take a walk outside and a few deep breaths, the world is still there.