Summary
🎙️ Check out episode 461 of The Chris and Sam Podcast for a mix of hilarious and intriguing discussions!
From Die Hard movie night and the Schweeb human-powered monorail concept to gift card security and kiwi sightings, we’ve got it all.
Tune in for some holiday cheer and laughs. Hear it on our website or your favorite podcasting app.
Links
Furry Christians worried about be targeted for their faith
Risk of penile fractures increases over Christmas
Kraft been lobbying for word of the year
Old people buying gift cards for Disney
CosMc’s
Top tip for moving a 200 year old building
Man loses suing the Tolkein estate
Quest pro now has tongue control
Shweeb Transport Idea
Show Transcript
This transcript was generated by an AI and may not be 100% accurate. If you have questions about any of the information found here, please reach out to us.
Sam [00:00:19]:
Hello, and welcome to episode 461 of the Chris and Sam Podcast.
Chris [00:00:23]:
I’m Chris.
Sam [00:00:24]:
I’m Sam. Welcome along. Your weekly fix of randomness technology in life on Christmas Eve. Yes. I know you’ll be listening to this and not doing anything else with the family, sorting out presents, Doing anything Christmas related, that is the way. Welcome. Most people are gonna listen
Chris [00:00:37]:
This is the way.
Sam [00:00:38]:
Most people are gonna listen to this, like, 4 months later or something and go, what is going on? Guess what? I’ve got the Arepa brain drink made from pine bark or something something from pine trees and blackcurrants.
Chris [00:00:50]:
Yes. And it’s also a little on the Sarah side. Maybe not as Sarah as the other one who had No.
Sam [00:00:56]:
This is worse. So much worse. Oh,
Chris [00:01:01]:
dude. You could’ve give me a camera for that sort of thing when you’re doing that. You should have seen his face. Anyway, moving on. So first thing, Christmas movie time this week, Went to Die Hard at, The region. Yes. Yeah. It was really good, actually.
Chris [00:01:20]:
It’s really cool, and it’s funny because, Adam brought Ben along.
Sam [00:01:24]:
Yes. Cool.
Chris [00:01:25]:
Ben had never seen Die Hard before. Ben is
Sam [00:01:29]:
I was gonna say 10.
Chris [00:01:29]:
I was gonna say about 10. Yeah.
Sam [00:01:31]:
Yeah. So That’s my guesstimate.
Chris [00:01:32]:
That’s my guesstimate too. Yeah. Because I’m not very good at guessing ages of kids. But yeah. Yeah. He’s about 10, so, I I asked him what he thought afterwards. He was like, yeah. Yeah.
Chris [00:01:41]:
It was really good. And Adam, his dad’s like, Yeah. He just liked all the swearing. Yeah. That that
Sam [00:01:48]:
that is a big thing. You’re v
Chris [00:01:50]:
c I a. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:01:52]:
And it’s weird because you get that transition in kids. Like, my daughter’s 15 now. So every now and then, it’s just swear word this, swear word that. I’m just like, what’s going on? So then that was me too. Like
Chris [00:02:01]:
Yeah. I never swore at
Sam [00:02:04]:
school. Oh, right.
Chris [00:02:04]:
Yeah. The other kids used to, the other kids used to, you know, tease me To try and make me swear. And I’d say Oh, okay. And crumbs.
Sam [00:02:15]:
Okay. It’s
Chris [00:02:16]:
just so sad. It’s just so sad.
Sam [00:02:18]:
Well, it’s another little, segment of looking into the past Chris, like
Chris [00:02:23]:
I said. And of the peccadilloes of my past.
Sam [00:02:26]:
Okay.
Chris [00:02:27]:
Okay. So, speaking of well, I don’t know if peccadillos is the word, but, I I thought this this is a little
Sam [00:02:35]:
Do you wanna talk about the movie night, though? We haven’t
Chris [00:02:37]:
Oh, no. That was it. It was great.
Sam [00:02:39]:
No. Adam’s movie night. Oh, Adam’s movie night. That’s alright.
Chris [00:02:42]:
I forgot about that. Yes.
Sam [00:02:43]:
Come on, Chris. So we went to Adam. I went on this one. I didn’t go to Die Hard. I was working. We went to Adam’s movie night. He puts on these little movie nights. He has some crazy ass movies that we’ve never heard of.
Chris [00:02:55]:
Yep. Generally. Yep.
Sam [00:02:56]:
And, it was a great time.
Chris [00:02:57]:
It was really, really good. Sorry. I forgot because we Saw that before the last one came out.
Sam [00:03:04]:
Yes. I know. Lucky Armandoid are keeping drink on things.
Chris [00:03:07]:
Cool. Cool. Cool. Cool.
Sam [00:03:07]:
Drink some more of your sour sour drink.
Chris [00:03:11]:
The brain drink. I need more brain is what he’s saying. So, yeah, so there were 3 movies that we watched. We watched, what was the first one called? Tigers are not afraid Yep. And then, Sisu and then Glorious.
Sam [00:03:23]:
Yeah. Check them out. Very interesting.
Chris [00:03:26]:
Very different. Lots of, well, Well, tigers, we’re not afraid, are not really that gory.
Sam [00:03:32]:
No. Not gory, but The contact, content detail The content is a bit dark.
Chris [00:03:37]:
Yeah. Dark. That that’s a good word. But, yeah, Sisu’s definitely gory.
Sam [00:03:41]:
And On purpose.
Chris [00:03:42]:
On purpose. I mean, purposefully over the top gory, which is great.
Sam [00:03:45]:
Yep.
Chris [00:03:46]:
And then, Glorious. I don’t even wanna try and explain Glorious at all, and and, really, you shouldn’t look at any of the trailers for any of these. You should just watch Watch them.
Sam [00:03:56]:
Just go watch them. So what else have you been doing this week apart from that?
Chris [00:04:00]:
I’ve been just working.
Sam [00:04:01]:
Excellent.
Chris [00:04:01]:
Working a lot, And deadlines today, be my last day of work today, and, yay, hope I’m sort of on track.
Sam [00:04:10]:
Sort of on track to squeezing in this podcast.
Chris [00:04:13]:
Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:04:14]:
I I we saw the Christmas lights at, Temple View. They’re okay. From my memory, they’re not as good as what they used to be. We looked at the ones at Harrowfield, and I shot over to Toldanga to, Check out the Road to Bethlehem, churchy thing. I think we talked about it once in the past. I went
Chris [00:04:31]:
Oh, yeah.
Sam [00:04:32]:
They changed it this year. So instead of going all around a field that was all set up with different, like, scenes. You only went into 1 giant tent outside, and then you’re inside a church itself, And they did a little stage production thing.
Chris [00:04:46]:
Oh, okay.
Sam [00:04:46]:
It wasn’t as good, but Yeah. There’s some funny I I really wanna If anything, I’d love to see a little documentary someone would make about behind the scenes of the people arguing about who does what wrong.
Chris [00:04:58]:
Because The they could be a sitcom.
Sam [00:05:00]:
Yeah. Yeah. Because there’s some people The, aren’t that good, but for whatever reason, they must have some power or pulling, they must know something.
Chris [00:05:08]:
See, any sitcom on a voluntary organization would be hilarious because we both have so much experience of
Sam [00:05:15]:
Okay. That’s it. Let’s apology. That’s it. Let’s write it. We’re not busy enough. We got nothing else to do. Let’s do it.
Chris [00:05:21]:
I’ve got so much on so much on. Hey. I’ve got, and more Christmas
Sam [00:05:25]:
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris [00:05:26]:
Yeah. And 1 more, Christian thing, which I just thought
Sam [00:05:29]:
was funny.
Chris [00:05:31]:
Okay. So the Christian thing is, I I that’s just I have to read some of this because it just cracked me up. So Okay. The title is evangelical Christian fairies are worried they’ll be targeted for their faith. So Hang on. Leaders of the Christian Furry Fellowship say they could get doxxed if people discover their anti gay beliefs.
Sam [00:05:55]:
Hang on. So The anti gay and Christian and a furry. Yeah. So they’re niching down, like, 17 levels.
Chris [00:06:02]:
And I’m like, okay. So It’s bad enough that you’re Christian or bad enough that you’re bad is not the word, but you know what I mean. It’s specific enough that you’re
Sam [00:06:11]:
Christian or
Chris [00:06:12]:
it’s specific enough that you’re a theory, But combining the 2 of them is starting to make my brain ache a little bit. Yeah. So here’s a problem, and this is I’m reading this. Here’s a problem you never knew existed. Christian theories are worried people will come after them for being Chris. Not for being fair fairies, which is probably weirder, but for being Christians. That’s the premise of a religion’s news service article, who spoke with, leaders of the Christian Furry Fellowship, Quote, bringing the good news to furry fandom
Sam [00:06:44]:
Okay.
Chris [00:06:45]:
About 2 things they feel obligated to hide from people in their lives, their faith And their personas.
Sam [00:06:52]:
Oh my gosh. The okay. I’ve never heard that. 1st time I’ve heard that. Have you not? No. That makes sense. But yeah.
Chris [00:06:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They all have fursonas.
Sam [00:07:00]:
Of course they do. That would be the thing you’d wanna hide, wouldn’t you?
Chris [00:07:05]:
Far away. Gonna hide and from the other. It’s like it’s like having a a mistress on the side. You don’t wanna talk about your wife to the mistress. You don’t wanna talk about the mistress to your wife. You you had talked about the The Ferdinand to the Christians. You can’t talk about the Christians to the Ferdinand. That’s weird.
Chris [00:07:20]:
I know. It just
Sam [00:07:20]:
I can’t believe this is a problem.
Chris [00:07:23]:
I’m glad you found it as amusing as I did. I wasn’t sure if it was just me. The the other thing is more a public service announcement. If you have kids in the car, maybe you wanna stop at this point, but The it is stay safe in the, this Christmas. So, The Guardian has reported that the risk of penile fractures rises at Christmas. Okay.
Sam [00:07:50]:
I I I thought it would have been accidentally slipping on stuff and it going in your rectum because The
Chris [00:07:56]:
What are you talking about?
Sam [00:07:59]:
Well, you know, those those people, they always they’re just like, I don’t know how that Jar of war. But, you know, Barbie doll ended up there. I just slipped.
Chris [00:08:06]:
Because I was walking, naked out of chris Yeah.
Sam [00:08:09]:
Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Because there’s a Instagram Instagram story I saw the other day was a doctor
Chris [00:08:14]:
Yep.
Sam [00:08:14]:
And he says, oh, you know what? Some of my patients got me the best gifts this year. So good. And he had all the X rays pop up, Barbie doll, Rubik’s cube, bowling club thing, I think, bowling pin, some other random oh, a gun. He goes, oh, no. I’ll get that and back. Yeah. Anyway, let’s have dinner.
Chris [00:08:33]:
Sick. Okay. So, basically, it may be the season of loving and giving, but doctors have warned against embracing the spirit Too enthusiastically. What? At least, what does
Sam [00:08:45]:
that mean?
Chris [00:08:45]:
I I I’m going to explain Good. Good. Good. At least with sexual relations sam the Christmas period is associated with significant risk increased risk of penile fractures, which is a medical emergency in which the erection Producing regions of the penis snap usually is a
Sam [00:09:03]:
You know, I get that. I
Chris [00:09:04]:
of forceful bending during overenthusiastic sexual intercourse.
Sam [00:09:09]:
Okay.
Chris [00:09:09]:
The injury tends to occur during wild sex, particularly at positions where you’re not in direct eye contact with your partner, such as the reverse cowgirl
Sam [00:09:20]:
Oh, yeah.
Chris [00:09:21]:
Says doctor Nicolaus Pergides.
Sam [00:09:23]:
I bet he does. He’s studying it hard.
Chris [00:09:26]:
The this made me win, so I’m gonna read it anyway.
Sam [00:09:29]:
Good. Good. Here’s what we wanna hear on the podcast.
Chris [00:09:32]:
Merry merry Christmas. Christmas snap. The the fractures are often heralded by an audible crack Yep. Followed by severe pain, rapid loss of erection, and severe swelling and bruising, quote, when the patients present to their doctor, their penis often looks like an eggplant. That’s a
Sam [00:09:52]:
bold new use of the eggplant It sure is.
Chris [00:09:59]:
Anyway, so, suspecting that the intimacy and euphoria of the festive Stephenson might be a risk factor for this type of injury. They have examined hospital data for 3,421 men who stained these fractures in Germany between 2 2005 and 2021, so it’s a whole study. Yeah. And I’m not gonna go further, but I really had never come across the term. I don’t think I have to worry about it.
Sam [00:10:28]:
Probably not.
Chris [00:10:30]:
Probably not.
Sam [00:10:31]:
Probably not. The they’d yeah. Hey. I know you’ve got, like, a bazillion emails you haven’t read and Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. In the podcast, we’ve spoken about spam emails. I got a couple this week, and they’ve stepped up the game.
Sam [00:10:44]:
Oh, yeah? They must be using chat gbt. I was
Chris [00:10:46]:
gonna say they’re using AI.
Sam [00:10:47]:
They have to be. So I just get this thing saying order confirmation, and there’s a picture of a PayPal payment, for something off eBay. Actually, it’s an iPhone. Actually, it’s the exact phone I’m holding my hand right now. So an Apple iPhone, randomly. And it goes in the tapestry of your order, Threads of your email weave seamless seamlessly dispatchneers. Yet in the mosaic, the name and address form a subtle rift. The item, a whisper among echoes, may linger for a familiar soul.
Sam [00:11:18]:
Should this quandary be put sorry. Should this quandary be but a fleeting news, let The missive dance away. Else, beckon swiftly before the courier’s lyrical arrival. And that’s it. Like, this That’s
Chris [00:11:32]:
a big big game. My god. That’s terrible.
Sam [00:11:35]:
Hang on. Normally, it’s like lyrical. Yeah. No. Normally, it’s It makes Normally, it makes no sense.
Chris [00:11:40]:
It still makes no sense.
Sam [00:11:42]:
I mean, no, it makes more sense. It makes more sense than, hey. Click these links. Money Money now. I need money. Okay. I got I got and more. Here we go.
Sam [00:11:52]:
Same thing, different person.
Chris [00:11:54]:
Okay.
Sam [00:11:55]:
Get ready to welcome your eagerly anticipated package. Order, and it’s got a number, as our Hyperloop courier zoom towards your location. However, the recipient details appear as if they’ve taken a detour through a parallel universe. Verify your purchase or reach out pronto.
Chris [00:12:12]:
Oh, yeah. That’s that’s a bit better. It it’s a And
Sam [00:12:16]:
apparently apparently, I sent a a a payment of $1,000, which is funny to me, to new zealand_digital_seller, and there’s a problem with that.
Chris [00:12:29]:
That’s pretty good. That’s pretty good. Hey. I I wanna talk about this is another older one. I’ve got I’m going through some of my older ones because, you know, I I love my research so much. Kraft has been lobbying earlier this year, a couple of months ago now, November.
Sam [00:12:45]:
The food manufacturer? Yep.
Chris [00:12:46]:
Yep. Been lobbying what is it? Merriam Merriam Webster dictionaries? Do you know?
Sam [00:12:52]:
Okay. To to
Chris [00:12:53]:
do that, The, word of the year because every most dictionaries have a word of the year, and they’re trying to make this word of the year
Sam [00:13:01]:
Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Chris [00:13:02]:
Do you know where they want it to be? No. Moist. And they’ve done this by putting this statue outside of their, So
Sam [00:13:12]:
Okay. So it’s a giant jar of mayo, like, really tall, and it says real moist is on the jar. They must
Chris [00:13:18]:
is that what they That’s the brand of that That particular product is called real moist mayo or something. Okay. All it is
Sam [00:13:26]:
is is that marketing gimmick?
Chris [00:13:27]:
It’s a marketing gimmick. Yeah.
Sam [00:13:28]:
Yeah. Okay.
Chris [00:13:28]:
But they’re like, Make moist the word of the year. I thought it was pretty good because it’s,
Sam [00:13:34]:
It’s alright. It’s not the best marketing gimmick I’ve heard of. Nah. True. Like, it doesn’t hit me as clever.
Chris [00:13:39]:
Okay. Alright.
Sam [00:13:40]:
I don’t know. No. It’s interesting, though. Like Yeah. Hey, old people, they never know what’s going on. There’s family overseas in America. They want to go to Disneyland. Have you heard this story? No.
Sam [00:13:52]:
So, it’s a whole a whole bunch of family members. I don’t know how many. Quite a few. And, they’re like, hey. We’re going to we wanna go to Disneyland. And they’re saying, hey. We’ll, save up, and we’ll get vouchers For Disneyland because that’s a thing apparently. Mhmm.
Sam [00:14:07]:
And, so they’ve been doing that, and her parents decided to get the Disney park gift chris, 10,000 US dollars worth, Which is 16,000 New Zealand. Right? Damn. Yeah. So which is pretty cool because then they can all just dish them out, and you can just go. And you preload those cards onto your Disney account, I think, before you go. So anyway, the, old the she goes and visits her parents and they’re like, hey. Yep. Here we go.
Sam [00:14:29]:
Got a stack of chris, like, you know, big cards. And it turns out they were buying, $10,000 worth of Disney plus gift cards. So they got more than 70 years of access to the streaming service now. 16 members of her family had taken time off. They’re leaving in 6 days, and they’ve literally got no money for this Disney trip apart from these cards. And the thing is, The parents had gone through and were trying to activate all the cards on the Disney website, so it scratched all of them. So no worries. Disney came to the party.
Sam [00:15:00]:
We’ll sort it out.
Chris [00:15:01]:
Good job.
Sam [00:15:02]:
You know, as you should do, they just transfer it over.
Chris [00:15:04]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They’ve got your money. They’ve got the money.
Sam [00:15:07]:
They can
Chris [00:15:07]:
just switch it over. But, yeah, also, it would be horrible PR if they didn’t.
Sam [00:15:12]:
Exact you bet you imagine turning up and your parents are like, yeah. We’ve got you all the stuff for you. It’s like It’s like that meme, hey. What’s that meme, like, when they when the kids back in the day and, like, a Super Nintendo system, and then they give them, like, a VCR or something? Hey, Rick.
Chris [00:15:26]:
That by the way, that’s a a big deal in the States right now. The gift cards have been really hammered, with fraud this Yeah. Alright. The the last couple of months. So what they’ve been doing, as I understand it, they they didn’t go into too much detail in the story because they didn’t want to hear how to
Sam [00:15:41]:
They don’t want to hear
Chris [00:15:42]:
how to. Yeah. But, effectively, I think what they’re doing is, people are going in and buying some gift cards.
Sam [00:15:48]:
Yep.
Chris [00:15:48]:
Then they are activating them or getting the number off them and using them
Sam [00:15:56]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:15:56]:
And then they got leaving them in the packaging because the barcode’s on the back, then Then going back in and switching the ones they’ve used for new ones
Sam [00:16:03]:
Oh.
Chris [00:16:04]:
And when people freaking I can’t figure out how it works exactly. But, basically, you buy Gift cards
Sam [00:16:10]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:16:10]:
And they’re they’re empty by the time you’ve Yeah.
Sam [00:16:12]:
Okay.
Chris [00:16:13]:
You get them. Yeah. Or maybe they just scan the barcodes And then just keep waiting and trying them until somebody’s bought it and used it. Yeah. That’d be a bit that’d be a day.
Sam [00:16:24]:
That’d be, I think. Maybe. I don’t know.
Chris [00:16:27]:
So The the big thing they’ve been saying in the States is, you know, only buy gift cards that are behind the counter. Don’t buy them off the off the shelf. You know?
Sam [00:16:35]:
Yep. Yep.
Chris [00:16:36]:
Yeah. Which makes sense.
Sam [00:16:37]:
But here, they’re all hanging up like The brought a couple.
Chris [00:16:39]:
Yeah. Yeah. So but my point is, You know it’s gonna start happening here because once it starts happening there, somebody gets onto that
Sam [00:16:48]:
I think it’s prob I think it’s quite a robust system here, though.
Chris [00:16:51]:
I don’t know. I don’t know.
Sam [00:16:52]:
You buy a gift card at the supermarket, you go over, it gets scanned, and then the supervisor has to come over and approve it. And then it gets loaded, and you get an extra docket because it’s a different system.
Chris [00:17:02]:
Yeah. Because I’ve got, I got a couple of gift cards from The, Landlord that owns this property? Yeah. So for for countdown, which is pretty cool.
Sam [00:17:11]:
Nice. So yeah.
Chris [00:17:12]:
And it came with The card and, receipt. I haven’t used them yet. Cisco.
Sam [00:17:16]:
We got that too, actually.
Chris [00:17:18]:
Yeah. This is the same this is the same landlord on this as well? Because We got the card with the names. I’ll Yeah. Yeah. Have a look afterwards, see if it’s the same names.
Sam [00:17:26]:
They must get into it. Hey. The family in, Bay of Islands woke up, Checked up on The chicken, and there was a kiwi in there with it just hanging out. Is it random to see?
Chris [00:17:39]:
Yeah. I suppose it’s nice and quiet.
Sam [00:17:42]:
Well, they said Kiwi sightings are becoming more common in the far north because, all the predator control efforts are working. Nice.
Chris [00:17:50]:
So they’re
Sam [00:17:50]:
just roaming around and whatever they want.
Chris [00:17:52]:
Have you heard of, Cosmix?
Sam [00:17:56]:
Yes. I have. Yeah. Yeah. So, I can actually tell you a bit more about it, probably. I don’t know how much you read up on it. So they think they’re gonna open maybe a maximum of 10 only in the states.
Chris [00:18:06]:
Oh, in the states.
Sam [00:18:07]:
Yes. And I think they’re doing 1 in Australia. Yeah. Like, don’t
Chris [00:18:10]:
I think they may have been doing some in in Canada.
Sam [00:18:13]:
Yes. That sounds about right. So and it’s very drinks focused.
Chris [00:18:17]:
It’s all drinks, Fergus, basically.
Sam [00:18:18]:
No. They do have, like, a little menu of there’s a menu of a couple of random things that go with the drinks, and then there’s a menu of Favorites like cheeseburgers and Big Macs.
Chris [00:18:27]:
Oh, right. Okay.
Sam [00:18:28]:
But mainly, they have said it’s drinks focused because that’s where the profit is, isn’t it? Is it? Well, if it’s just you paying 90% of water
Chris [00:18:37]:
Yeah. True.
Sam [00:18:38]:
True. Sam flavoring. Think about it. Starbucks. That’s what Starbucks do. Have you been there anytime recently? Gosh.
Chris [00:18:43]:
No. It haven’t actually.
Sam [00:18:44]:
That’s expensive for what you’re getting.
Chris [00:18:46]:
Because The only it’s only drive through.
Sam [00:18:49]:
Okay. What they’re doing? Yep.
Chris [00:18:50]:
And, yeah, it’s a retro drinks is what they the story here I was reading it.
Sam [00:18:56]:
Oh, right. I wasn’t sure on that.
Chris [00:18:57]:
So, Like, tart, mildly sweet blackberry mint green tea? No.
Sam [00:19:04]:
It sounds terrible. I’d rather drink this brain drink that I just had.
Chris [00:19:09]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. It’s I was because my thing was, do you think they would take off here? I I really don’t think retro drinks would take off here.
Sam [00:19:19]:
No. No. We don’t have any history of anything. Retro drinks here would be, I don’t know.
Chris [00:19:23]:
Yeah. Yeah. But
Sam [00:19:24]:
No. No. I I wouldn’t.
Chris [00:19:25]:
If The couldn’t do it here I mean so the only thing close to that here is Bubble tea. Have you ever been to one of the barbecue things?
Sam [00:19:32]:
Yeah. That’s pretty that’s pretty, but there’s heaps of them. Right?
Chris [00:19:35]:
Yeah. But that’s that originally was serving the Asian market assassination thing. Right?
Sam [00:19:41]:
I
Chris [00:19:41]:
think The was the milk and it.
Sam [00:19:43]:
I think it was I don’t know. But there definitely there’s 2 segments to that. You’ve got the milky bubble tea thing. Then you’ve got basically any type of flavored fizzy water you want, and they’ll put bubbles and stuff in it. That’s real refreshing. You eat like a passion fruit of mango with Yeah. Boba in it.
Chris [00:19:59]:
Yeah. Okay. No. I don’t know. I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong, but I just could not see that Flying here.
Sam [00:20:05]:
Oh, no. We we just we don’t have the population for anything.
Chris [00:20:07]:
True.
Sam [00:20:08]:
True.
Chris [00:20:09]:
How
Sam [00:20:09]:
do you move a 200 ton building That’s almost 200 years old.
Chris [00:20:14]:
Railway?
Sam [00:20:16]:
Oh, you’re just moving it a little bit. So there’s apartment blocks being built next to it. You’re moving it, like, Couple of meters to the left.
Chris [00:20:23]:
So you know the Museum Hotel in in Wellington did that. Right?
Sam [00:20:26]:
Oh, did they?
Chris [00:20:27]:
They had the building. It was on the wrong side of the street, and they put rails in the road Yes. And they moved across the The, literally.
Sam [00:20:36]:
But what do you use to do that? What what is the missing ingredient To do The. You’re correct. They put rails down, and they move it and all that. They jack it up a little bit.
Chris [00:20:45]:
I don’t know.
Sam [00:20:46]:
Soap.
Chris [00:20:47]:
Okay.
Sam [00:20:48]:
So they’ve done it before, and this dude sent his wife out and says, go buy all the soap you can. 700 bars of soap she went and got, and he said, yeah. Makes them a bit slippery. And he said, we’ve done it before on smaller buildings. Yeah. The department the Utah Department of Transportation, they use 60 liters of Dawn dish soap dish dish soap Yeah. Earlier this year to shift The bridge 33 meters, and another construction crew in 2016 used dish soap as well to slide a bridge. So anything to reduce that friction.
Sam [00:21:22]:
He said he’s got a few bars left over. He wasn’t sure. That’s the building there, pretty big.
Chris [00:21:25]:
Oh, yeah. That is
Sam [00:21:26]:
But what’s that what’s that, I don’t know where it is, but you see it pop up every now and then. There’s that building in America that back in the fifties, I think it was, They had to jack it up, move it, and rotate it all at the same time, and everybody stayed in the building, and everything was still connected. If you ever see that, it’s pretty amazing. It’s like a real big engineering thing.
Chris [00:21:49]:
Really, really slow
Sam [00:21:50]:
video. Of course. But I think The was, like, a weird time lapse of photos, I think.
Chris [00:21:53]:
Yeah. Yeah. Real slow. Talked about it before. I still haven’t looked it up, but yeah. The, that’s cool. What was I gonna say here? Oh, Tesla. Did you hear about their Recall? No.
Chris [00:22:05]:
I think recall is the wrong word, but that was the word used in the news. But, Basically, there’s been so many horrific accidents. Mhmm. They’ve they’ve basically said autopilot does not need autonomous.
Sam [00:22:19]:
No.
Chris [00:22:21]:
And they’ve they’ve said, we’ve got to recall almost every Tesla in America, which I thought was holy crap. That’s huge. And The, Later on in the story, because this was, on you on the news, American news. Later on in the story, he goes, most most car owners won’t have to go in at all. They just download the update.
Sam [00:22:39]:
They get delivered to you.
Chris [00:22:40]:
Well, that’s not a recall.
Sam [00:22:42]:
Yeah. Well, they push out updates all the time.
Chris [00:22:44]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, anyway, I thought that was interesting. But, yeah, that’s not a good thing if they’re all, screwed like that. Hey. Lord of the Rings. You know I’m a huge Lord of the Rings Yeah.
Chris [00:22:56]:
So I bought a bound copy of The Lord of the Rings, Silmarillion, and The Hobbit when I was 16. Every year, I I read it Yep. For, like, 5, 6 years, and then How
Sam [00:23:08]:
how was that how was that for your social life?
Chris [00:23:10]:
It was great. Okay. Anyway
Sam [00:23:14]:
Where’s where’s Chris? He’s not swearing in the corner reading his, That
Chris [00:23:18]:
that’s my that was my Christmas
Sam [00:23:20]:
Oh, yeah.
Chris [00:23:20]:
Yeah. Yeah. Very much. At that The,
Sam [00:23:22]:
that was before
Chris [00:23:22]:
before gaming.
Sam [00:23:23]:
That was before TV was invented, I. No. Anyway
Chris [00:23:27]:
Okay. So Chris just cracks me up because there’s a copyright claim against the token estate backfired. Right?
Sam [00:23:35]:
Okay.
Chris [00:23:35]:
So This dude, whose name is
Sam [00:23:38]:
There we go.
Chris [00:23:40]:
Demetrius Polychron.
Sam [00:23:44]:
I’m mister Polychron to you.
Chris [00:23:46]:
Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:23:47]:
I’ve got a problem.
Chris [00:23:48]:
Dimitri is Polychron. Oh, anyway.
Sam [00:23:49]:
Yeah. Dimitri is.
Chris [00:23:50]:
Yeah. Basically, he’s a Lord of the Rings fan fiction writer.
Sam [00:23:54]:
Oh, yeah.
Chris [00:23:55]:
So he he wrote, the US based author published what he described as a pitch perfect Lord of the Rings follow-up in 2022, which he titled The Fellowship of the King.
Sam [00:24:11]:
Yeah. Okay.
Chris [00:24:12]:
He planned for the book to be the first of a 7 part series inspired by the franchise. Mhmm. But the following April, He attempted to sue the Tolkien estate and Amazon over the spin off series The Rings of Power, Which he claimed infringed infringed the copyright of his book.
Sam [00:24:33]:
No. No. But yeah. I’m glad. Is he in jail? He should be.
Chris [00:24:39]:
Well, no. But the California court dismissed the case Good. After the judge ruled that Polychron’s text Was, in fact, infringing on Amazon’s prequel Yeah. Which was released in September 22. And, basically, He’s been, the talking escape then filed a law separate lawsuit against Polycramp for all physical and digital copies of Fellowship of the King to be destroyed And a permanent injunction to prevent any of the fan fiction series from being distributed ever again.
Sam [00:25:09]:
I hope there’s some guy that comes from the court, and he goes, I’m here to make sure you’ve destroyed everything. He just starts hacking everything together with an ax.
Chris [00:25:15]:
And was ordered to pay a 134,000 to the token state and Amazon in connection with the lawsuit.
Sam [00:25:21]:
It’s good. I I don’t feel bad about that at all. I it’s partly because of chris name.
Chris [00:25:27]:
Gotta be so Jump to go. Tolkien Estate. You’re a Frenchie. Oh, my
Sam [00:25:34]:
But you’ve gotta be in and That’s Crazy. But he must be in a frame of mind where, like, that’s his reality. He’s like, I’ve done this. This is amazing.
Chris [00:25:42]:
Oh, yeah.
Sam [00:25:43]:
And he’s like like, he You have to be so down so deep down that rabbit hole.
Chris [00:25:47]:
Yeah. True. I do know some people like that. Yeah. Actually. Yeah. Anyway, I thought there was just mental.
Sam [00:25:56]:
The Quest Pro VR headset thingy that’s coming out.
Chris [00:26:01]:
Oh, okay. So I got the The 2.
Sam [00:26:04]:
Yeah. So I don’t yeah.
Chris [00:26:05]:
Carl got the next one, the flashier one Yep. With The Controllers that have their own
Sam [00:26:11]:
Oh, okay. Cool. Sensors.
Chris [00:26:13]:
I thought that was a Chris Pro.
Sam [00:26:14]:
It might be. It might be. I’m not sure. I’m not sure. But it now has tongue tracking. Oh, wow. So that’s important. So then what’s your initial thoughts on that? You’re laughing away.
Chris [00:26:26]:
I’ll tell you why. I’m laughing away. Because we had our Christmas party for work last Friday because everybody else finished last Friday. I’m finishing this Friday. Me and Lana, No working this extra week. So our our party for work was on Zoom because we’re all
Sam [00:26:43]:
We’re over the country. Right?
Chris [00:26:44]:
So we’re on Zoom, and we end up in one of the immersive rooms. Have you been to an immersive room on Zoom? No. So they they have a background, and you’re in the background
Sam [00:26:53]:
around
Chris [00:26:53]:
it somewhere. Yeah. And we all threw on avatars so you can be whatever you wanna
Sam [00:26:58]:
be. Good.
Chris [00:26:59]:
And some avatars show the tongue. So we’re all switching avatars mainly from and to the other, Like chris, bunny rabbit and a dog and a and a kitty cat. Did you
Sam [00:27:11]:
pull out your furry avatar?
Chris [00:27:13]:
The all furries, really. And a cow and The cow, it was cow with The cow because chris the cow guy always. He’s like, I got a tongue that works and sticks it. So I can just imagine what we look like individually in our homes around the country just sticking our tongues out at the at the camera for things. That’s why I’m laughing at the hilarious.
Sam [00:27:34]:
So initial things online were like, this is a bit dodgy. Like, what what’s The for? But it actually makes way more sense. It’s for people that are, like, Paraplegic and stuff. Oh. They can do controls way easier now because it can track their tongue, and they can literally probably type and move around You see that hung as a cursor. And, yeah, and it wasn’t till I read it, I was like, it makes sense. I wish the title probably should have led with that. I don’t know.
Chris [00:28:03]:
Yeah. Because I was thinking I I I was thinking I guess I was thinking more lip tracking than tongue tracking when you
Sam [00:28:09]:
Well no. The the the well, they were talking about adult content in VR and doing and interacting with it that way.
Chris [00:28:17]:
Like, goddamn. Sam. What do
Sam [00:28:18]:
you not really think about until dodgy people on the Internet bring it up?
Chris [00:28:20]:
The, yeah. Have you heard of or do you know about the Schweeb?
Sam [00:28:26]:
What What the hell is a shoe we oh. In rotator? Remind me what it is.
Chris [00:28:31]:
So it’s a Pedal assisted
Sam [00:28:35]:
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Chris [00:28:35]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:28:36]:
It’s on the track thing.
Chris [00:28:37]:
Oh, it’s funny because I saw it on LinkedIn, And I’m I’m sure it was an overseas dude going, this is amazing. Imagine, And then some New Zealand guy had put or Justin Flitter, actually Okay. Had, you know, reposted and said Yeah. You imagine going across the Auckland Bridge On one of these, which would be pretty good hanging under the bridge Yeah. Yeah. To be honest. But, yeah, I didn’t realize it was a New Zealand thing until I Went to their site because I thought, oh, that’s interesting.
Sam [00:29:07]:
Is it New Zealand invented? Yeah. Is it?
Chris [00:29:11]:
Yeah. I think so.
Sam [00:29:12]:
Nah. I’m sure it’s Dutch or something. I’ve read they’ve signed there once.
Chris [00:29:16]:
Oh, maybe it is.
Sam [00:29:17]:
It no. They’ve brought it into New Zealand. The funny thing is it’s at Velocity Valley, which is the agronome, And, every time I’ve been there, nobody’s ever on it. And then the one time I was like it looked like someone was gonna go on it. It was down for maintenance or broken or something because I wanna see them get into the pod thing because you’re laying flat almost Yeah. Pedaling on your back.
Chris [00:29:38]:
Check out the video on the site because it shows somebody getting in and out.
Sam [00:29:41]:
Oh, okay. Good.
Chris [00:29:42]:
But, yeah, you you’re lying down in a in this, glass. Well, you know, not glass, but transparent pod, and your feet fall forward, pedaling. And you pedal and it. There’s 2 tracks next to each other, 2 The,
Sam [00:29:57]:
so you can
Chris [00:29:57]:
race each other. It looks It’s pretty good. I don’t know that it would work as a mass transit
Sam [00:30:05]:
Okay. Idea. Wikipedia. Schwieb. Okay. No. I already donated. I don’t wanna hear about you.
Sam [00:30:12]:
I don’t no. Go away. Okay. Schwiebe is a proposed rapid transit network in New Zealand based on human powered monorail cars. That is the prototype in Rotorua, And it’s oh, okay. It’s a reference to, the German meaning to hang slash hover slash hesitate hesitate. Levitate. Levitate.
Sam [00:30:34]:
Anyway,
Chris [00:30:35]:
You need more of that brain juice, man.
Sam [00:30:37]:
I don’t know what yeah. And indirectly to the suspended monorail, the The whooper trial. Anyway, so, yeah, that’s cool. What we need to do is we need to raise some funds so we can do it.
Chris [00:30:49]:
Yeah. Because Google paid $1,000,000, put $1,000,000 into The project Really? All their funding. Yeah. It says in
Sam [00:30:56]:
And, well, when you see it, you’re gonna go, where did the $1,000,000 go? Like, I’m not kidding. No. You just make that up.
Chris [00:31:03]:
No. No. I I Well well, it was in the The of the LinkedIn article that I, LinkedIn posted I found it on or it was on the site.
Sam [00:31:12]:
I didn’t okay. Anyway, we’ll check
Chris [00:31:15]:
that out. I’m verified, but I read it. I didn’t verify it or anything. So yeah.
Sam [00:31:21]:
Very cool.
Chris [00:31:22]:
But I didn’t realize it’s a New Zealand thing, and it sounds like it still is, you know, even though it’s got It’s got a Germanish, levitationist name, whatever.
Sam [00:31:32]:
That’s right. What’s happening now, we may not have an episode I’m I’m not sure if we’re gonna have the next episode.
Chris [00:31:40]:
Yeah. Next week, we might have The week off.
Sam [00:31:42]:
We may have a break. Hard to say. What else coming up? Not much Christmas, I guess, the next day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The.
Sam [00:31:48]:
I guess $55 for the The. We go we’ll go up to 55 kilometers an hour. Oh, shit. Here we go. Is there a weight limit? No. No. So the the minimum height’s 1.3. Maximum height is 2 meters.
Sam [00:32:02]:
Number of races at and time, 1 or 2. You race 3 laps of a 200 meter track, and the world record is 1 minute and 3 seconds.
Chris [00:32:12]:
The world record.
Sam [00:32:13]:
And And
Chris [00:32:13]:
there’s only one Sight in the The, but it’s the world record. Oh, yeah. Well, you know
Sam [00:32:18]:
and here’s a fact. Here’s a fact that’s got on the website. It says fact. Selected by Google as the most innovative future eco friendly form of public transportation and brackets in 2010.
Chris [00:32:32]:
Yeah. Okay. Oh, so I wonder if there was a a a grant associated with that. They won it and got us some money.
Sam [00:32:38]:
Of some yeah. I think I think that may be what it is now that you say that. Think there was some sort of
Chris [00:32:43]:
But it
Sam [00:32:43]:
may be
Chris [00:32:43]:
sounds a little bit much.
Sam [00:32:45]:
I don’t know. We’re gonna I we’re gonna find out, and we’re gonna we’ll figure it out.
Chris [00:32:49]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. We should, Organized to, do a field trip and bring Chloe along as The photographer and film that, as, interesting.
Sam [00:32:57]:
So whatever you’re up to this Christmas, hope it’s a safe one. Hope everyone’s good. No drama.
Chris [00:33:03]:
Yeah. Be a get a sober driver. Sam Make sure you’re driving driver when you need 1.
Sam [00:33:08]:
Yep. I don’t know what else. We’ll we’ll do a New Year’s The and New Year’s sometime. Yeah. Okay. Till next time. I’m Sam.
Chris [00:33:14]:
I’m Chris, and thanks for being along for the ride this year.
Sam [00:33:18]:
That’s right. See you.
Excerpt
From movie nights to one of the risks of Christmas. We find out the word Kraft is lobbying for, how to move a 200 year old house and what a Shweeb is. All this and much more.
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