Are you hearing five of yourself?
I think today it's only two. That's fine.
That feels like nightmare fuel to me, man.
I know, but I don't know what else to do about it.
I applaud your tenacity.
Is it tenacity or stupidity?
Yes. Indeedy.
Hello, Alison.
Hello, Matthew.
let me, sorry. Let me remove the creepy picture.
Matthew's favorite thing to do, put things on the screen that'll make me scream.
Oh, yeah. Uh, demons, demons anyway. Hello, happy Friday.
Love it.
Um, so it's a rainy gray Friday. It's been 40 days of gray.
That's a lot of gray.
Two sunny days in 40 days. That's too much. That's too much.
I just, I feel sometimes like you and I just need to trade where we live. I just think you're more wired for where I am. And I'm more wired for where you are.
That could be true. I'm definitely not wired for here and I never have been.
Wired for here. I
I'm not wired for there either!
Where are we wired for? Where do we belong? Oh, God. This is taking a, uh turn. This is what happens when we record on Fridays. Normally we don't dear listener. Normally this is a midweek party for us. This week it's a Friday, not even Friday. It's 5:30 on Friday for me. So like my brain is out of my head. Just over there.
That's okay. If it happens. If it doesn't happen. This could either be episode five or the Lost episode. What if we did. An entire episode. Where we recapped all five—six?—seasons of Lost.
That wouldn't work because I only watched seasons one and whatever the last season was, I just skipped the whole middle. And I'm probably the only person that didn't hate the ending as a result because I didn't invest all those years in between. And that seems like what people were most mad about. Like I watched all that... for that? And I'm like meh! I watched 18 episodes for that. I didn't lose a lot of time on it. So we'll have to pick a different show.
If you want me to go deep on a season by season breakdown.
What show would that be, by the way, Alison.
the other thing is, I don't know that I don't know what show we've both watched all of.
I wonder if we share any sitcoms, like The Office or. Oh Friends
Friends or Firefly.
Firefly. Wait, you have seen all of Firefly?
Yes.
You left Buffy and order to get to Firefly.
Now I've seen all of Buffy too.
Oh, wow.
We could do Buffy, like. The end was a slog for me. The last season of it was great, but three through five. Absolutely not. Except for the musical episode.
I would say four through five. Three four is when she goes to.
It's for when she goes to college, three is all high school. Okay. then you are correct. Okay.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. So see. There is some overlap. Well, and you were there for my launch into Buffy. there the first time I watched the very first episode ever and then we condensed the entire season and to something stupid, like 13 days.
Let me share something with the listeners of ADHd20. My friend, Alison.
I'm about whatever you're going to say.
My friend Alison made an enormous deal of being frightened of things, horror movies. And then the list was very long, but I had faith that she could pull through. And now we play this game called Dungeons and Dragons that is set in a land that is chock-a-block full of vampires, zombies, nightmarish things. You were truly worried that you would be afraid of Barovia. But you were really worried that...I can't even do it. You were really worried that you were, gonna be afraid of Buffy.
My God. No. I know there's a couple of moments here and there. Hush.
Uh, I hated Hush.
Hush is very scary.. That was genuinely scary.
I will admit that Hush is one of the best episodes.
Yeah.
But it was scary. So I didn't love it.
Yeah. Yeah, but you have just come so far is what I'm my point is that you crave. You crave the night now. You crave the night.
For whatever it is, I've never had a problem with vampires and zombies. Those have been the two horror genres that I'm okay with.
Really.
It's more like I do not do anything ghosty supernatural, like that. Or just gruesome, like anything along like the Freddy Kruger and, Centipede and like any of those
Wow. You went from Freddy Krueger to Centipede
Quite the leap!
Whoa. There's so much in between that. Yeah.
Between those two. I really, really, really wanted to love Supernatural because I have a massive crush on Jared Padalecki. And it scares me too much. Like I, that, that was one that I gave a…yes, Supernatural scares the shit out of me, which is probably why you guys had to drag me into Buffy.
Yeah. Interesting.
First of all, the first two seasons of Buffy, like you could see the strings holding up the baddies. I didn't have to willingly suspend my disbelief there.
You could absolutely see the,
the zippers. You know,
But Anyway, I've been very impressed. The scary things can be fun.
This, our whole friendship has been a journey of you pulling me into the scary woods and the nerdy woods. And I've come very far in both plights.
And that is a great segueway to what I wanted to talk about today, Alison. We've actually talked about this already. Chances are, we'll talk about it many times in this podcast. One of the reasons we wanted to start this is because you are a woman with ADHD, but more impulsive type. And I am more inattentive type and they're suppose quote-unquote supposed to be, generally the other way around. And you said something the other day to me, that struck fear into my heart.
No.
No. It didn't, it wasn't that bad, but, you were like something about getting all the, not knowing how to do anything. And. And I, I was thinking about it because it, I'm in a situation. My wife's father is just a salt of the earth Midwestern man. He is old school. And an amazing person. Somehow he ended up being a liberal in a family of, not as liberals and. he's giving and kind and strong. And the man refuses outright to even try. To even try technology.
And it's something that we laugh about because it's so easy to do, right? It's so easy to, as you get older and as technology moves faster. To let it go. Right. I just let it go. Certainly with something like social media, I don't always have the energy to quote unquote, do it to create it, to be a part of it. That doesn't mean that I don't know how. But when it comes to a new something, a form of communication that supersedes older communications, when this new technology becomes ubiquitous.
You have to get on it because I've seen my wife's broken heart. Because she used to be able to communicate with her dad. And now she can't. I don't know. I wanted to just see if that's interesting. I don't know whether we might've started off talking about this. I don't even remember what it was. Was it virtual tabletops or.
No. I remember exactly what it was the very software that we use to edit these here, podcasts, Descript. And so I am learning Descript so that way Matt does not have to become the one man show on the editing train. I've watched him do it, but I hadn't like actually put my toe in. So the first thing that happened is I wanted to create like a backup, a fail safe. And you were like, just do it. There's versioning! You're not going to break it. There's that mentality that everything is precious.
It's like I buy a beautiful new journal and I don't want to write in it because it's too pretty. And I think I might ruin it, And that's why did I buy the journal then? Journals were not meant to sit on a shelf and be blank. And so that was what started the conversation. And then you were telling me some hotkeys. I do not use keyboard shortcuts in anything I do. And I have a lot of developer friends, I surround myself with you guys apparently.
And it drives them crazy, that I move my mouse to where I needed to go and click on things rather than just hit, alt + option + Q. That was how we started. Cause you be, you. If you're not willing to learn it, you know, like there's going to become a time where it could be too late, not to go doomsday on us.
And I, that was a terrible example from my point of view, because of course you don't need to learn shortcuts. Though I have seen you and your first reaction be, "No. nuh-uh, no."
i...I...I... We didn't mean to do this. This was a beautiful accident. I think That we've come full circle from how we started talking, which was around, like you had to work so hard to get me into Buffy and Strahd and other like horror adjacent things. But once you get me there, it's
Yeah.
And it's almost the same thing you know, you have to work so hard to get me to try. And then once I'm in, I'm all in.
Yes. Yes. The reason I wanted to bring it up was just how different it is from me and my incessant need to learn that new stuff. And so I do not have a fear that I will fall behind on the tech train necessarily. I certainly don't have the energy for as much stuff as I used to. And I certainly I understand that there will be generations that grab on to these new devices, this new technology faster and more, efficiently. I see that happening and that's just, that's human nature.
Um, One of the most inspiring people that I knew was this fella that lived in Chicago and he was a fan of the band that I was in. He found out that I was in Chicago. And just tried and tried to meet with me. And he ends up being one of the most fascinating people I've ever met. And he looks like a hobo. He's 70 years old. and I, I'm like almost scared sitting down with him in this public place. But I realized that he is just a teenage 70 year old, right?
He doesn't take care of himself physically. He does a lot of drugs. He started talking about virtual reality and this is There's a lot going on 10 years ago And, and he did not ever want to let go. And he told me. Matt you. You've got to keep using it, because there's so many good things. There's so many good things that can happen. Don't be afraid of it. You can't break anything. I was like, man, I need, I want to live by that. And I have, and I want to.
And so I feel like even loving technology, just blossomed even more thanks to having him in my brain. And, anyway. I just, I want to urge anybody listening to this. You can't break things as Alison said, and number two, don't become like Lindsay's dad, because it, it will make you sad. I think it makes him sad. I'm not saying this to like, Shake a finger or anything, or, don't be like me. I just wanted to discuss, like, why do you think that is that for you?
Like, where does the impetus come from? I know we talked about how your default. comfort is rewatching things. All of that's fine. That's totally great. But what do you think it is? You've also talked about how You don't want to be bad at something, but. You're not though. I mean, you as a person, you've got to know that you're not bad at something. So what do you think that, what do you think that
I think I know exactly what it is. And I, I think I can take it right back to ADHD, which is when you're at the beginning, you can't see the end, and the total like brain scramble and mind fuck that that is.
Yes.
That's why you know, like we've talked about my anxiety around going to new places, because I don't know the steps involved, what the inside of the room is going to look like, where I'm going to need to be, how I'm gonna hook up with whoever I'm there to see. And yet it was all it takes is somebody saying, Alison walk in and turn left, you'll see a door, walk through it. I'm in that room and that's it. Anxiety done. And I think it's very similar to like pages and screens.
When I look at a blank page or screen, or don't know what I'm doing with
Ah,
I do not have the mental dexterity or whatever it is to map out the directions myself. And so it's just easier for me to shut down. Now there are probably other layers of my personality that have nothing to do with ADHD of like the asking for help. Could somebody just show me? And so one of the things that you and I were talking about specific to this is I now feel so far behind. And that's another big thing is that like ADHDers tend to just shut down at a certain point.
There was a meme that came out a few months ago and I remember like myself and all my other fellow ADHDers were like, does the world not feel this way? And it was basically something along the lines of I have a meeting at four o'clock, which means that I need to, you know, have this done by two o'clock, which means that I have to have pushed all of those things out by noon, which means that I need to shower and get dressed now, but it's already 11:30 so the day is done.
I should just go back to bed. You know, And that's how, like, if we don't stick to the schedule we laid out for the day, I guess neuro-typicals just get back on the track. Right? Like eventually it's like, okay, well I missed that hour's worth of whatever. But I'm still going to hop back on the train at 11:00 AM and we're like, nope, day's over. Why bother.
My coach said that people with ADHD often have an easier time beginning. Not all the time, but you may be able to open the app and get started. And you may see the big picture and you know what you want to do, you know what the end result should be. It's all the middle stuff that tears us apart. And it does create just buckets of anxiety that is difficult to understand. But it is the middle. It's the middle every time. Because I will always like dive into something and go, okay.
Yeah, no problem. And then I hit that point of I'm stuck. I'm stuck. It's terrible.
I can't get to the next step. It's why people get frustrated. We tend to have a lot of started, but unfinished projects, because something happens in the middle that just takes us off the track. And then there's this attitude of why bother? That's one of the most frustrating things, you know, I think we've spent the past few episodes talking about some of this shiny, funny quirky, parts of ADHD, but this is the part right here that can be really debilitating.
Um, And it means that, you know, as adults, and in life, we just have to strategically pick who we align ourselves with professionally, personally. In friendships and romances and things like that. To make sure that there's balance and we eventually can find the finish lines. I think.
1000%. And I don't even know whether we've talked about this on the podcast. Our business, our team has discovered something that gets me personally through the starting part. And the middle part. And that is, you know, in development, they call it pairing. And that's what we're calling it too. But, the crux of it is, you just sit with someone else and do the work. A lot of times you were working on one thing together, like developers will actually work on the same lines of code for complexity.
And. Evan is our designer. I'm the developer. So he's not helping me on that kind of level, but simply him being on the other side of something. Like hearing him tapping away at whatever he's working at has changed the productivity completely. Because. If left up to me, a lot of times. Unless it's something that I am endlessly excited about. I may not start it. I may start and quit sooner than I should. I may start and work on the wrong thing. All kinds of other options, right?
All kinds of like little side roads that I can take. and so this is really great because Evan will occasionally say, what are you working on? And then I can occasionally say, Hey, I have a question about this, Designer. And we tried this the other day in editing this and you were like, Wait a minute, you just. There's no. You don't turn on the camera? You just sit there. Who?
I'll tell you why. I was surprised that we weren't turning on cameras in that moment. So in the non-development world, and this is, we talked about this a few episodes back. This is thanks to TikTok, that I know about this, this approach, this technique is called body doubling. I've also heard it called anchoring. Where it is helpful to just be in the presence of someone.
And so now there are online services for body doubling, where if you don't have anybody, college students will use these websites. And so you sign up for a time and you're matched with a stranger anywhere in the world and you'll log into zoom and you put yourself on mute and you do your work and they do their work. And I think that's what I thought our pairing was going to be, not so much that I wasn't getting, oh, we just do our work individually without talking.
It was more like, and this goes to the different, like, learning styles. I am a visual learner. I am not auditory at all. People get really frustrated with me when I'm driving somewhere. I don't have the sound on my GPS cause hearing it doesn't help me. You telling me how to do something, doesn't get me anywhere. I need an example. I need to do it while you watch me and say no. put your mouse there.
And so I think that's why I was surprised, but like I realized that long before I knew that there was a name for this coping mechanism. I've literally been doing this all my life. When I need to get my house clean, I will have a friend come over and sit on the couch. You don't have to do anything. You can binge watch whatever you want to. Your one job is to be a presence in my living room, so I get my stuff done. I've done that since college.
My friends call it, uh, they have to come project manage for me. So they are not doing anything along what I'm doing, but even, you know, it's why I think study halls are, big in high school and college because it's, a group of people not necessarily working together, but doing the same often unsavory tasks at the same time, strength in numbers. And things like that. So, I do I feel more productive.
And maybe that's, in part, because we all live in different cities and work alone, out of our home offices. And so sometimes it's just nice to convene with your coworkers and,
Yeah. But I never liked going to an office. I could see how that would work. But when I went into an office, with other developers, it was still me alone working on my own thing. There wasn't enough time or enough bodies or enough people to pair with, which is strange. But then it was probably just me.
are always People are always shocked when they learn how much I love living alone, and working, from home. Are two things that were a part of my life long before the pandemic. I think people think by nature because I'm a very talkative person, that I always have to be stimulated by other people. That's just not true. But I know how to do it well, and when it works, it works, which is why. I agree with you completely. I think pairing is.
A great way to get body doubling, anchoring, anchoring name we're going to put on
Yeah, it really works out. I'll turn on the video for you. Whatever, whatever is best for you.
Honestly so and paired, and it was only over Slack's audio, so no video involved. I still liked it.
Okay. Okay
First of all, I think it's an accountability thing. I got to get this done. Matt's got to get his stuff done. We're getting it all done together. So there's that kind of unity and, getting through these tasks. And it's kind of like what you were saying with you and Evan. Even if you're not doing the exact same work or experts in one another's fields. Sometimes it's just nice to be like, Hey, can you give me an opinion opinion opinion this paragraph?
I this I just made this graphic I just created. It's a lot easier than me having to send Evan a message and him type out his, you know, no, no, no, but this there use this this color you
Right. I am with you on that for sure.
So it's a meeting without being a meeting
And it is, and it's shocking how well it works for yeah. Anybody that doesn't know about our, or doesn't know how well it works. It's shocking. It doesn't make me want to do the job anymore. It doesn't, but that's the thing is that oftentimes I can slip into hyper-focus if I just have the right impetus to get me there. Again, hyper-focused doesn't always have something to do with, I don't have to like something to be hyper-focused on it, but. Yeah.
In fact sometimes. I get more hyper-focused on things I don't like. Because I'm also stubborn, So then into the flow, you're like, no, I just want this out of my life. I want this project done. I want this delivered. I want to bill for it. I want to move on from this thing. Whereas If I'm, right now I'm building out my first little mini campaign to DM for some friends. You can distract me from that any time, because I know I'm going to want to come going to want to love on it.
Right before you were saying that I was thinking that I'd like to try pairing with prep as well.
What do you mean?
Meaning. dungeon master prep. Which is,
I I thinking that before we even got on to record record record like, what? I think I need to do. I think Matt and I need to pair while I prep for this mini I
do too.. And the reason that I would like to try it. Is because I'm well aware that in the world of Dungeons and Dragons and specifically game master prep. There's too many things that I like. There is the world building idea. There is the character development idea. There is the technology idea. And oftentimes one will supersede the other. As far as my focus and time, and then one will suffer.
So I, even for something I know we just said, I don't usually pair with things that I love doing, and that's also true, but I would like to try it. I'd like to see what that would be like for all the GM's to prep. And how fun would it be? To start a freaking body doubling GM group. Because. You're not supposed to distract the other person. and you can it's. It's a possibility. But if you like set, little time timers.
So you took breaks and in those breaks, you shared GM tips and tricks and stories. Oh, God, that would be fun.
Time well-spent.
That would be so much fun.
I do wonder. Like this even between you, me and Evan. We've done pairing, we've done body doubling. I wonder if tripling. Triading. Whatever we would call it. I wonder what would happen cause I feel like once you get over two people, the opportunity for interruptions and distractions probably increases exponentially with each addition.
I totally agree with you. I feel like it could break down if it's a triad. A trio. All the words that I'm saying today are so weird.
I the one that tried to make triad a verb. I'll take, you're not on this
boom, boom, boom
you.
Um,
Try harder!
Try harder.
Triad harder.
Anyway. To try to wrap that idea up. I also want to say that I am extremely, I always feel bad saying that I'm proud of someone, but. You
do hate saying that.
I do because I don't want it to be construed as condescending. And in this case, in this specific situation, both with horror movies, horror television shows.
hear that thunder?.
I did.. That I thought you had done that on purpose because I said horror. That would be cool if you did. And then like these other things. As long as you've got a friend. To say, Hey, look, I'm here. Not only will you not break anything on your own? I've been through this. I know that. Don't be afraid of this. You did that for TikTok with me. You're like, no. I really liked TikTok and it's not that bad. And. Yes, I still don't use the app, but I see it now.
My first reaction was, nah, no it's just another ding dang thing. But I think if we if you have a friend or groups of friends that say, look. I got ya. It's really great. If you can just get over this little hump. If you can get past the blank page.
Yeah, no, I think that 99% of our friendship partnership and otherwise is us pushing the other ones to do things they would not naturally be inclined. And therefore naturally wouldn't do. And I appreciate that about you, that you do not accept no from any of us and say, Try harder.
Yeah. I'm glad that you appreciate. And don't curse my name. You might cause my name first. And Then. Then.
Well, here's the thing is that you usually can see to the other side, like you don't push me into things that are like,
Dangerous.
Organically, an antithesis to everything I stand for, you're not.
Right.
And you've never once forced fed me an olive. We'll use tha t bad example.
Though, here's a weird thing, Alison.. in the back of my mind, I know that someday I'm going to get you to like an olive. The back of my mind. I'm I want it
No way.. It's not going to happen Matt, it's not going to
happen. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to find a way.
It's just go ahead and hang that one up. I am, and I think I lean optimistic more than pessimistic. I tend to skew more like realist than anything. And so I rarely say no, and I rarely say never, but that is one thing I'm willing to go down swinging on a never but everything else I'll be open to. And, and, and so many things that I do love. You either introduced me to, like, I was never vehemently opposed to Dungeons and Dragons.
I just had never been really exposed to it or had the opportunity to play it.
Yes.
So that's more introduction than push, but other things have been just a straight get in there ya chicken.
Okay. I feel like this could be a cap on this topic and the podcast. You've said, why you got into this, I know you said that a friend was the thing that he had a group going, he was going to start it and we had been talking about it. But why do you, what do you think made you turn? Like you could have easily told Jeff. No, no, no. I'm not interested or you could have said, my friends Matt and Evan are going to play it. So I don't really have the time.
What was it that twisted your arm to that? At that point. Do you remember like what makes Alison's ADHD kind of kick in and say, okay. no. I'm going to give it a try.
I think that, and we've talked about this before. With things like Stranger Things and otherwise it got a little more mainstream in recent years. So I was just more aware of it. So there was always this curiosity and I just never had a platform for it. I never had anybody interested in doing it with me, and Jeff was willing to teach me. I was going I'm I don't know anything about it. And he's like, I will sit down with you and put.
a character sheet together, and then we will have our first encounter and then we will play a game and you'll see, if you like it or not.
So for you, it really has a lot to do with the instigator. That's cool.
And I knew in the first I did not want to stop playing our first session. Our first session we played for like six hours. It was ridiculous.
I know, I know.
And I remember that not wanting to end. And then I couldn't wait until the next Saturday and the next, and that has, there is yet to be a time. Everything else, man, I've burned out on even things that I once was on fire for.
That's cool.
What made you say yes.
When, like when I was little?
What. No, like with the, I know that you had talked about wanting to be, get back into it and you guys just hadn't had a way, but it was not a hard sell for you or Evan. When I was like, My friend, Jeff has thinking about Dungeons and Dra- and you both were like, yes, absolutely. When. What do we need to know?
I think. what I don't remember is why we started talking about it so much, but we definitely started talking about it before the pandemic, but I don't know why Evan and I started talking about it, but I feel like there were episodes of the BivBros Show and other things. We were talking about it all, we gotta do this. We gotta do this.
At one point on BivBros Show did want to go through like a, let's do things as adults that we loved to do as kids. You want it to like rewatch movies and TV shows. You want it to like replay games. So it may have been that. I don't remember how exactly it all came together, but I think you're right. You guys had been talking about it. Jeff had been talking about it and then we were all locked in indoors for what we thought was going to be six weeks.
We just started thinking about it all the time and I don't. I wish I knew why I don't. I certainly have people that I respect and love that do things. And then I'm like, Ooh, I want to try that. But as we discussed, I also have this thing where I want to try things that no one has ever tried. To be the first one there, but, I think. Yeah, but it was when Jeff said, yeah, it's just, we had been talking about it so much. I was like, okay, dang.
I think that with D&D I was like, yo, I really want to do this, but. I know it's a lot of work to get started. So we had this, in and we said, yes.
And we're just getting started.
And scene. Yes. Um, Well, how do you feel about this podcast?
Done and done. Checkmark. How do you feel?
It's like therapy, free therapy.
It's like free. I know that's exactly what it's like.
Thanks for podcasting with me.
Thanks for podcasting with me. I will see you tomorrow to and Dragons.
I'm excited. Wackow wackow wackow wackow and that's the end.
Amazing.