Megatron

[00:00] All right, Coalson, do you have an under Google under Googles for us this week?
[00:11] We do under Google rules that was the play of super excited told us we had to
[00:19] We signed up for it
[00:22] In the end it's gonna be better and more true than Google can give you I
[00:28] Do so this week it probably is an actual under Google Bulls, but I was thinking about this
[00:34] my folks were getting ready to go on a road trip to go into Florida and
[00:40] I was helping them get together the Garmin because they they don't like using their phones
[00:45] and they sometimes lose reception and whatnot, so and
[00:49] I
[00:51] Was thinking to myself. I don't know how I don't remember how I got around before
[00:59] Cellphones and
[01:02] I know we had atlases and stuff
[01:07] And I know we had maps, but I'm thinking about this like I have my phone on me at all times
[01:13] Atlas in your
[01:16] Car at all times and and like I even use my my my phone to get to Joey's house
[01:22] Even though I know where he lives now, so I just want you guys to see if you can remember how you got places
[01:29] before
[01:30] We had cell phones
[01:33] Well, so I heard this thing recently and I hadn't really I didn't know this was a thing
[01:40] But yeah, I was telling someone on one of the coasts
[01:44] Like you know, I'm terrible at directions. I've always been terrible directions. They're like, yeah, you're from the Midwest
[01:48] I was like, is that is that a thing people from the Midwest are terrible directions?
[01:53] Hmm, and I was thinking about it and you know, we're super spread out
[01:58] We have like grid streets like you don't actually need to know where you are
[02:02] on some level right because you've got numbers on one side and then
[02:08] Names on the other right if you're in a confusing old city like Boston you had to actually learn where crap was
[02:15] Right because nothing makes sense. We've got a lot walking around that place
[02:20] Right. We did now granted. We're both from the Midwest. So
[02:24] I
[02:27] Was thinking about this story about the time that we went to Vancouver and you made me in charge of the maps
[02:34] And I spent I poured over the maps for weeks before we left
[02:39] Mm-hmm, and I still got us incredibly lost at 5 a.m. Well
[02:44] I
[02:45] Mean for the most part, I remember
[02:47] You know if I was going if I mean I first of all just remembered things better because I knew I needed to yeah
[02:54] You know now
[02:55] Now I just you know, you know, for example, this is totally normal is last night
[03:03] Catherine I went somewhere we we've not been before and
[03:06] Somebody text you an address, you know three minutes before you leave you tap it on your phone and you've got directions
[03:12] You just go you don't even think about it. Yeah, I waste but zero mental energy on directions
[03:18] You just turn your brain where the hell I am. Oh, no, there's no reason if you have a smartphone with you
[03:24] It's got GPS. It does not matter
[03:26] So back back then you didn't have any of that, you know pre smartphone. You didn't have any of those things. So
[03:33] you know, I
[03:35] You know, I got to know the area around me very well and then
[03:41] But the problem was once you get outside of that area
[03:45] You know in this was Jason
[03:48] was involved with this one many years ago, but I you know grew up on the south side of Indy and
[03:55] He was trying to they were he and some friends were coming down
[03:59] to see me this is when we were in college and meridian on the north side is is
[04:05] Keystone and meridian the south side is State Road 135 and I you know gave him to her
[04:10] I just verbally gave him directions like here's what you do and then turn it this way. I'm meridian and and
[04:17] What it ended up doing was was sending him
[04:20] Down to Franklin or white Lind or something
[04:24] Well past where he was supposed to be and I was so confused
[04:27] So mistakes were made that is something that that happened
[04:33] But yeah having having a map of you know, if you're going on a longer trip, you know out of the state
[04:40] I mean, I just had like a
[04:43] You know a good like a book
[04:46] Map of it or a you know good map of the state that I was gonna be in for the highways
[04:51] You know involved talking to people which is something I know we all try to avoid these days
[04:56] Sure, so you'd stop and ask directions. Yeah, cuz once you basically can figure out where you were on the map then
[05:04] You know, you could if you could
[05:07] You know figure out where you were on the map that you had in your hand this era
[05:11] We need to go east or west and whatever whichever direction you need to go
[05:15] So I feel like this was the primary reason that everybody was a triple-a member
[05:21] Prior to some yeah, right because you tell them that you were going somewhere and they would print
[05:27] This book for you with like flip pages
[05:30] Yeah, that showed you directions, right? I do remember that. Yeah, and they had
[05:38] That's start to finish
[05:40] Start to finish. Here's every road you did like highway
[05:43] At least you need to take to get there and they broke it down like by step
[05:47] So if you miss something, oh, yeah
[05:49] You had a greater chance of figuring out because it wasn't like it's like they were just throwing a highlighter on a map
[05:53] It was like a you know, eight inches
[05:56] Tall by like three inches freakin flippa. This is I have like I remember driving out to like, Colorado or something
[06:01] I was a kid see have like 40 pages in it, right? Right. It was like every turn was its own page
[06:07] and
[06:09] Told you how many miles were in between like it was GPS before GPS, right?
[06:14] Like it was giving you where you needed to, you know, exactly what interchange you needed to be on every single step-by-step direction
[06:23] Without that yeah, I
[06:25] Don't know how anyone would have gotten anywhere because you're right Joey
[06:29] I think you knew your immediate area once you got outside of that things got pretty shaky pretty quick
[06:34] Yeah, my the joke about me and at least in high school was that I could get anywhere in the city as long as I
[06:40] Went from my parents house first
[06:41] So if I was on one side of the city and needed to get even somewhere on the same side of the city
[06:46] I'd have to drive all the way back to my parents house to get myself oriented to be able to go back to
[06:52] somebody else's house or whatever
[06:54] and
[06:56] I mean, that's just crazy when you think about like somebody calls you up and you're like, hey, let's hang out
[07:00] And they're like I'm I live on
[07:02] 59th and
[07:03] Whatever towel bed or whatever and you're like, I don't know what any of that means and then somehow you were able to figure out
[07:09] How to get there. That's just crazy to me. I
[07:11] Don't know how we did it. There was a lot of you know, it's like, oh, do you know where you know where this street?
[07:16] Yeah, that's what happened. Right? It was like it's between, you know
[07:21] Kessler and Keystone or 54th and Kessler or whatever it is, right? It's like yeah you need
[07:26] Yeah, people knew exit numbers a lot off the interstate. They'd be like, yeah
[07:29] You know take the interstate to this exit number now
[07:32] We just it just tells us to get off. Yeah. Yeah
[07:36] Yeah, there was a short period of time when
[07:40] When I would like go to what was the there was a map, you know map website
[07:49] Map quest
[07:50] Map quest you'd map quest it before Google Maps you print, you know, you do the same thing. You just type it in a print
[07:58] Yeah, print the whole thing out. Yeah, you print that print that out
[08:02] That was for, you know for a couple years
[08:06] And that was you know doable but you still have the same problem is once you you get lost or get off
[08:17] So I'm assuming we lost a lot of good people that
[08:24] So the other thing about being in the Midwest which is why I
[08:28] Actually think that people in the Midwest are so bad at ordinal direct
[08:32] Like if you go to the East Coast people tell you to like turn east and stuff like it's right, right?
[08:37] But there but they have actual like landmarks, you know what I mean to orient themselves at any particular time
[08:43] Like we're so flat
[08:46] Yeah, and without landmarks that I feel like that's part of the reason why we're so bad
[08:52] Like I never know which way is north if it weren't for my phone
[08:55] I'd be completely hosed
[08:59] I'm not bad. I'm pretty good at that kind of stuff, but I mean
[09:03] Well, we just relied we relied on people like Jason who has an incredible like internal sense of direction
[09:10] Some people just have it. It's yeah. Yeah, and so basically if I got lost I just like call Jason
[09:16] Stop at a payphone
[09:18] That's the thing. You'd have to stop at a payphone in some shady neighborhood. That's right
[09:22] That's right in the hopes that someone's near their landline
[09:27] And hope that you had quarters on you or they had a pager so you could page them
[09:33] the other
[09:37] The thing was in India
[09:39] Yeah
[09:40] I mean Indy is is in other cities to DC's like this and lots of cities do have a nice grid
[09:46] But some don't like I lived in Cincinnati for several years
[09:49] It is not like that the downtown is like that but outside of that is you know
[09:53] It's a hilly area. It's near the river and I couldn't find my way around that place
[09:59] I goes I did the same thing. I had to go home. I was like, all right
[10:01] I know
[10:02] I'm going from this place that I know how to get to and this place
[10:05] I was like I got to go home first because that's the only way I can do it because nothing made sense to me
[10:09] because all the roads were so
[10:11] windy and
[10:12] You know, and then later you'd look on a map and we're like I was two minutes from the other place but
[10:18] There's no way you would know that or no way. I would know that at least and the roads names would change like oh
[10:26] No, actually, it's funny. I'm like no reason
[10:28] I was driving the airport the other day and I was going down Kessler and it turns into 56 and Kessler like like actually directly
[10:34] Yeah changes because and I remember that used to be a big deal when you gave people directions, you know to the airport or whatever
[10:39] But now it's just like oh you just follow your GPS and it doesn't matter
[10:43] right
[10:44] there's
[10:45] There's that SNL skit called the Californians
[10:48] And yeah, basically the whole stick is that a hundred percent of California conversation is about how to get to places
[10:55] What's the fastest most efficient?
[10:58] Exactly cuz it's a confusing place to begin with there's tons of traffic like yeah, they're entire mental
[11:04] You know
[11:06] State is just totally obsessed with like traffic right now to get
[11:12] Yeah, I guess that ultimately isn't maybe that's the answer right we just spent a lot more mental energy
[11:17] I'm trying to figure out how to get from one place so much. Yeah, and now I spend zero mental energy
[11:23] Oh, it's none. Yeah, I I don't think twice about going to a city
[11:27] I've never been to right and go into a place that I've never heard of like I need a name or an address
[11:33] And I'm there
[11:34] You know we used to stuff
[11:35] It's funny cuz my mom will still do this when we're on road trips like she'll want to she wants to stop at the visitor
[11:40] Center because that's what she did her entire life because that's where you get the map to understand what the city is now
[11:46] It's like why are we going to the visitor center? There's nothing there for me except maybe a bathroom, you know
[11:52] It's your busy big sky two weeks ago or a week and a half ago and
[11:58] From Boise, this is like a seven-hour drive
[12:01] My pre-planning boiled down to like five minutes. I looked at the Google map then I looked at the ways map
[12:09] Then I looked at the weather predictions and I just made sure that they were all on the same page
[12:15] And then I left my house and I drove for seven hours. I had no idea where the flip I was, right?
[12:22] I mean, but it knew exactly when you were gonna get there. I should have done a party
[12:27] I mean, yeah, no from the second I left my house to the second I got there
[12:30] I mean ways and Google were off by like six minutes and there was a snowstorm like
[12:38] It's amazing. It is amazing. You're right. Should have been the donder party
[12:41] Yeah, you used to tell people like I'll be there sometime between, you know
[12:46] Five and midnight, you know, cuz you just don't know anything depending on how lost I get
[12:52] Because I'm just gonna I need to factor that in. Yeah, they have to hunt at some point to stay alive. I
[13:00] Remember we when we we did the
[13:03] Undebedecond in Texas, I think that was the one yeah, we were driving
[13:07] We were driving for driving in that crash. Oh, yeah, it was crazy
[13:11] But we were driving from San Antonio to okay, baby. Okay. See ya. Okay. See and at some point
[13:17] you know, I was using the GPS at the time of course and at some point it's just like
[13:23] Exit here. I'm like
[13:25] Okay, like yeah, even though I was supposed to be going I was supposed to be going north for the next, you know
[13:29] Four hours and it's like get off here. It's like okay, and then sure enough
[13:33] We get off the highway and about, you know quarter mile ahead is this huge backup
[13:41] And it just sends us down state roads somewhere to you know, get around this enormous, you know accident that had piled
[13:48] You know backed up for miles and miles and miles and you know, I just said yes. Okay computer. I'll do that
[13:54] Seriously, tell me what to do. I will do it
[13:56] I don't know and the thing about it is you never actually know whether it's better or not because you never took the other path
[14:01] right, right
[14:03] That one I could actually see so it was nice
[14:06] As well in the limited instances where someone made the other decision or you could physically see it
[14:12] Turns out the computer's always right and I
[14:17] You know, I battle our future robot overlords
[14:20] without a doubt
[14:22] the only thing that
[14:24] still gets me is
[14:27] Google hasn't figured out that you're willing to walk across the street
[14:29] So
[14:31] Like if you when you put in an address, it wants you to be exactly, you know, especially when you're taking an uber or whatever and
[14:38] There's like one-way streets and it has to go all the way around and take this time once
[14:42] Once Google has figured out that I no problem walking across the street to get to a place. I'll know that they've won
[14:50] Until then you you're not far off brother
[14:53] Yeah, are there crosswalks on these streets? Maybe it just doesn't want you to get hurt. That's true. It's protecting you
[15:02] I mean, they don't want to encourage you jaywalking, right?
[15:08] Well, thanks. That was a silly question
[15:10] It's really under Google but I just it blows my mind that we used to live in a world where
[15:14] we spent enormous amounts of mental energy on trying to figure out how to get from one place to another and now
[15:20] Like Harper said you take spend five minutes and then you can be across country in no time
[15:26] Without worrying about a thing you could you could listen to this pod the entire time
[15:29] I remember a thing when I was a kid
[15:31] Like when you got into a city you had to turn off the radio
[15:34] So that you could think and figure stuff out signs cuz signage was so important. So important. Yeah, exactly and
[15:41] you know
[15:42] signage is usually
[15:45] Terrible and and and that's why people get lost because it's just not you know, oh god
[15:51] I mean it probably depends on the person but the short answer to question is I
[15:56] Was lost then and I'm still always lost now
[15:59] You just have a robot telling you where to go now
[16:02] Joey knew where he was then and knows where he is now probably most of the time
[16:06] Some people just have a crappy sense of direction
[16:08] Maybe the the next time to google we can discuss what makes a good sense of direction innate new human, right?
[16:14] Like hmm. There you go. We need Jason Jason for that one. Yeah, exactly
[16:19] Does he have a true north in his body at all time? Yeah, his brain may have some like magnetic, you know
[16:27] Magnetometer or something that figures out your north form
[16:31] Yeah, lots of animals do all sorts of crazy navigation. Mm-hmm. Sure. I I feel like
[16:37] Magnetometer should be his new nickname JT's new nickname. That's pretty hardcore
[16:44] magnetrometer
[16:45] Say magtrometer
[16:47] magnet mag magnetrometer
[16:49] Is that right?
[16:51] magnetometer
[16:53] Magnetometer, I thought you're trying to throw a trip in there
[16:55] Magnetrip lot magnet trip ommeter. Let's just call a Megatron. Okay, you're on
[17:03] Pretty sure that one's been taken. Oh, yeah, we've never worried about copyright fridgeman up until now
[17:10] Why start today?
[17:13] All right gentlemen, I think that should wrap it up for the show we get sued
[17:18] Yeah, we we hit our we hit our mark