life comes at you fast most of it is just smoke and mirrors we're here to clear the air whether
it's the can't make this up moments or the hard truths hitting our streets in our state
we're finding the signal and all that noise no spin no nonsense just the facts the fallout
and a little bit of humor. Grab your coffee. It's time for The Morning Drip on WRTO.FM, Radio Free Georgia.
Hey, everybody. Welcome to The Morning Drip for Thursday, August 13th, 2026. It's me, Grady D.,
along with Mike B., here with you this morning. Word. Oh, I call in number. Phone lines are open,
229-520-5957
or you can text 247-365
same number
229-520-5957
or shoot us an email
morningdrip at wrto.fm
so as we normally like to do
on a Thursday
try to go with
maybe some
I hate to say lighter shows
lighter topics
but
we try to stare away from
the politics and all the BS that's, you know, we're inundated with almost constantly. I mean,
if you watch any news, you watch any, anything on YouTube. I mean, I watch Philip DeFranco
religiously Monday through Thursday, but you know, you want your daily dose of BS
and what's going on in the world. You watch stuff like that, but yeah, we, we try to keep
it a little bit of light. That doesn't mean that we're not going to talk about some important
things. But, you know, we're we won't necessarily talk about what Trump's doing or not doing. And
we'll even steer away from flat cameras today. How about that?
Also on this day in 1921, Governor Thomas Hardwick signed the act granting Georgia women
the right to vote. And also on this day in 1942, Colonel James C. Marshall, who led the Army Corps
of Engineers, Syracuse, New York District, set up the Manhattan Engineer District in New York City.
It's more commonly known as the Manhattan Project that created the first atomic bomb
at Los Alamos, New Mexico. You know, it boggles my mind, and I guess it shouldn't,
but it boggles my mind that there was a time in this country when women couldn't vote. I just,
i can't wrap my head around it but it was a different time so yeah it was and there are
people today that believe that they still shouldn't vote but you know that's well they'll be dead soon
yeah they will probably at the hands of a woman if they're if they're old enough to
to think that women shouldn't vote they're pretty old no that's the problem a lot of these [bleep]
or just Gen Xers or millennials.
It's wild, man.
It's wild.
Oh, so like proper adults?
Yeah, proper adults
that you would think should know better,
but instead they think that
the 19th Amendment should be repealed.
I think that's the right one.
And the man is the head of the household,
so he makes all the decisions.
Funny, not that I want to veer into politics, but it just occurred to me.
So I mentioned Philip DeFranco, right?
So his wife, Lindsay, is running for a seat up in North Georgia where they live.
I forget what district it is, but it's a pretty good size district.
And one of the things that she said, I saw a video on Instagram,
and she was talking about how she was canvassing, and she's doing the right thing.
She wants to have conversations with people, you know, even if they don't vote for her.
She wants to find out what it is that matters to them and that forms how they vote, which I think is good because we're all I say we're all guilty in a general sense of sometimes it's it's an us against them.
And there are times when that is that is accurate and needed.
But the funny thing was that she was talking to women and she's like, I don't know how to overcome this.
And the this that she was talking about was that when she would talk to another woman and she was like, yeah, well, normally my husband tells me who to vote for.
So let me talk to him.
And she was just dumbfounded.
She's like, how do I get past this?
How do I reach these people?
And I'm like, I don't know, man.
I know.
How?
Talk to her husband.
I mean, fair, fair.
If she wants to know what people like, what people want, just talk to everybody.
That's true.
But shouldn't put two people against another.
No, no, no, no.
And I'm not saying she's not doing that, but it's just the fact that she's running up against.
And I don't know how rampant this is, but she's running up against the fact that there are women in this country that base their voting decisions on what their husband.
tell them, either the information that they share or at the direction of their husband.
You're, you know, husband says you're going to vote for so-and-so and the wife's like,
okay.
I'm like, okay.
I mean, my wife doesn't vote.
She hasn't voted since we moved to Tifton in 2006.
So, you know, I, I can't throw stones, but I would never tell her who she should vote
for i will answer questions that she may have if she you know wants to know something about a
particular candidate or something like that but well i told my wife who to vote for and that's
because she asked that's she's like i don't know i don't know i don't care who i vote for yeah see
that's different that's different so well she she depends on me to to reduce her anxiety and
making decisions. So that was just one of them. I mean, isn't that what husbands are for, right?
Every day is a school day. It is. It is. So that's going to roll us into, I was, I'm curious
what you think about this first story. Why does everything feel so joyless? Welcome to the age of
decadence without pleasure. This is an article over at The Guardian, and it goes on to say that
modern life offers an endless supply of entertainment, convenience, digital distractions,
yet many people feel less joy and more emotionally empty than ever before.
Some cultural critics describe this as, quote, decadence without pleasure, arguing that society
has embraced the appearance of luxury, excess, and technology, but they're losing the deeper
satisfaction that comes with genuine human experiences. And rather than enjoying life
for its own sake, many people are encouraged to constantly optimize themselves through biohacking
and beauty standards, artificial intelligence, social media, and productivity, turning the
pleasure into another goal to be measured and managed instead of just, you know, simply
experiencing it.
The concept contrasts today's culture with the late 19th century decadent movement, whose
artists believed beauty and art and pleasure should be valued simply because they enrich
life and contrast modern technologies, artificial intelligence, algorithm-driven social media,
And even weight loss drugs like GLP-1 medications, they're presented as encouraging efficiency, optimization, and endless stimulation rather than genuine fulfillment.
And the result, according to this perspective, is a society that is constantly connected and entertained, yet increasingly bored, isolated, and emotionally numb.
I think I can resonate with that emotionally numb part.
Yeah.
The central message is not to reject technology, but to reclaim real embodied pleasures by taking time to appreciate art, nature, food, music, conversation and everyday experiences simply because they bring joy.
And rather than trying to optimize every aspect of your life, the argument is that our limited time is better spent fully experiencing the moments that make life meaningful.
I think you can also connect this either directly or adjacently to the lack of third places that we've talked about before.
Yeah.
And this is one of those squishy topics to me because you have to get in touch with your feelings and, you know, really do an introspection of yourself, I guess.
Because like I said, the emotionally numb part, the being bored part, and I always caution myself on saying I'm bored because the universe has a way of going, really?
Oh.
Hold my beer.
We can, you know, tomorrow's Friday.
We can arrange for some fiber to be cut.
Exactly.
I made that mistake.
You really want something to do.
I made that mistake back at CityNet going, well, I'm kind of bored.
And I swear for the next four days, everything that could possibly fall apart started falling apart.
And the guys looked at me and said, don't you ever utter that word again.
I'm like, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
But, and I, you know, I've got to admit, I find the joy that I actually find, and this is probably not healthy, but this also goes toward undiagnosed ADD or ADHD, but I find the joy in doing the artificial intelligence stuff, you know, creating these projects and working on them and seeing, you know, these ideas that I know that I personally do not have the skill set to sit down and hammer out the code.
But that I can be a director that has essentially a pseudo team of software developers at my disposal and just go, here, this is what I'm thinking and work through all the process.
And I mean, it's short lived, but.
Well, I mean, some folks are using AI to try to make an attachment.
You know, they're not using it to construct things like we are.
mm-hmm they're not using it as a as a tool they're they're leaning on it oh yeah like the ones that
use it uh for as they have a relationship with it is what you're saying yeah i mean there's uh
the ai girlfriends and whatnot but i mean just somebody in chat gpt they're just spilling their
guts and um you know basically nobody's responding they're hearing stuff but it's
just all in context and um that kind of ruins it you know you're supposed to do that with people
yeah and the problem with the ais is they're always they're always so accommodating you know
they're yes men they are they really are absolutely right yeah yeah you're absolutely
right to feel that way and you you definitely should go kill your significant other and here's
how links resources yeah let me farm chat gpt's let me farm it over to gemini so that i can be
taken out of this equation and i can't be found at fault for you murdering your wife
i think it would actually turn that over to grok that's true that's true it would be grok
grok's crazy one because grok could be like really okay yes let's go um well i'm sorry you
feel that way, but I guess we can do that. Yeah. I guess we can do that. Uh, how, how messy do you
want it? Uh, how, how easy to hide do you want it? Uh, do you want me to provide you with resources
on, on disposal of bodies? I'm like, really? Not look for a clarity. I've never, I've never
questioned or asked an AI any of this because I'm, I'm not, I don't need to murder my wife or
anybody okay i might have some clients that i felt that way before but that's a joke everybody
not really but anyway yeah that is kind of sad um and i think it could be definitely connected to
this everybody's looking for connection and yeah but they don't want to talk to anybody
like i mean i i don't have that many friends like you and i hang out yeah and that's about it
same as my my people here in the house and then it was you yeah and every once in a while i go
golfing with a friend like maybe once a quarter yeah i mean i got rid of the golf club set that i
had because i the the one time that i went i went with a friend and co-worker and we didn't actually
play golf we went to the driving range and um and it was his golf clubs at the time so and he wound
of giving them to me later, but, and I mean, I had fun, but that was 20 years ago. I was sore for two
days, but that was a lot of fun. Just taking out my frustrations and hitting that ball and something
I'd never done. And, you know, he was, he was good company. He was good friend. And, uh, but I guess
that was like a one and done for me and I never did it again. And then he, he wound up giving me
the golf clubs. And honestly, I can't remember what I did with them. I tried to give them to
somebody. I can't remember if I gave them to somebody or, or if it was one through, through
one of our massive cleanings where we brought in a, a roll-off container and I just threw the
damn things away. I don't know. Cause I did ask another friend that is, is a golfer. I sent him
pictures of them and I said, are these really worth anything? He goes, eh, those are entry level.
I was like, okay. But yeah, I'm right. I'm right there with you. I hang out with you. Like we do
this we chat basically on and off all day working on projects or you know sharing information and
that kind of stuff um i got one friend up in kentucky that you know we might talk since he's
not with us on podcast anymore might talk to him about once every two weeks or something yeah
so and and that's a thing that i've i've tried to my wife is is somewhat suffering from too is
lack of friends. And I pointed out to her the other day because when you go to a job, you and
I have a job, we have a business, but we are the business and we work out of our homes.
But when you go to a job, you have co-workers and you develop relationships with those co-workers.
I mean, for the longest time, my best friend was someone who worked for me and we had a lot of
shared interest. And I had a best friend and I had a really good friend there. And we all played
World of Warcraft and all of that. Well, not being there since 2012, those friendships started
suffering. And one of those friends I haven't actually spoken to in five years. The other one
I spoke to earlier this year or latter part of last year. And my wife is seeing that too. She's
like she used to communicate with these people that, that she classified as really good friends,
but now occasionally, you know, they'll pop up in their Facebook chat or whatever.
And for the most part, it's only when they need something, like they have a question that they
know she can answer, but that, that camaraderie that you would have where you're working together
and maybe talking about each other's lives, that part's now missing. Yeah.
nobody well one one person uh my golf buddy uh texts me every once in a while just how are you
and he's the only one
you know everybody else who calls need something yeah if i don't see you if i don't see you in our
discord chat for like a day i'm like dude everything all right yeah
yeah so um i think it's for for me it's not the lack of people i mean there are people around
it's it's um intellectually lonely yeah i can't there's nobody i can actually have a conversation
with who's not going to bring up something that's just [bleep] crazy um it's i don't know
it's like everywhere you everywhere you go somebody worships trump or they believe in the
Flat Earth or something off the wall.
Exactly.
Bill Gates bought up a bunch of land and he's going to control the food industry.
And I was like, oh, come on.
Oh, don't forget the nanites or whatever and the 5G and the COVID vaccines and all that kind of crazy nonsense.
Oh, yeah.
I couldn't name all of the stupid theories.
Yeah.
Yeah, no.
Contrails.
Yeah.
I mean, chemtrails.
Yeah.
I'm right.
I'm right there with you.
I'm right there with you. It's so difficult. I, you know, we, we contemplated moving at some
point. I do it every day. And I'm like, but you know, and now I've got, I've got one of my wayward
sons moving back here because at one point we were actually looking at, you know, could we pull it
off? How would we do it? What would, what would I do for an income? You know, could we move to
Washington state or maybe Oregon or something like that? And unfortunately I did not win the
one billion dollar Powerball last night. So I'm stuck in South Central Georgia for the foreseeable
future. But every time I look at trying to, you know, what would life be like to move to another
state? You know, I've even looked at Wyoming and places like that. You know, do I want to get out
there on some really flat land where there's a bunch of cows and that kind of thing? It's pretty
windy yeah yeah and you you know they do have tornadoes and things like that and of course
tornado alleys kind of shifted a little bit but but every time i look at that i come back and and
i believe it or not i see the good aspects of living in south central georgia we'll never be
the target of a terrorist attack i don't think we will be though that doesn't form my decision
on where i want to live quite honestly but like we were we were incredibly lucky during the pandemic
yeah we weren't stuck in an apartment in a city true um yeah we had a good time yeah i had a good
time i couldn't comparatively i mean honestly i i kind of did too but i've been overindulged
unfortunately it was too easy three o'clock on a tuesday afternoon yeah i'm cracking open a beer
because I'm not going anywhere
and I can do everything I need to do remotely,
but that's not healthy.
It's not healthy at all.
I wouldn't move to Florida.
No, I wouldn't.
I mean, every time you turn around.
South Carolina's off of the table too.
Really?
Mm-hmm.
Any particular reason?
I mean, I'm legitimately asking.
I mean, you take a look at I-95
all the way through the state
over the last 15 years.
Yeah.
They clearly don't know what to do with their money
or they don't have any.
because it's been a parking lot for the past 15 or 20 years.
Oh, so it's difficult to get through.
Well, it's just the attitude.
They're not keen to improve anything.
I got you.
What about North Carolina?
Oh, yeah, North Carolina is great.
The Raleigh-Carrie area, the Research Triangle.
Lots of beer up there, mountains.
Asheville is a pretty cool town.
They have beaches.
know yeah i used to have a friend that lived in nashville there's there's snow and skiing in the
in the western part of the state yeah he actually he was he was the one that that um that put
everything together about how much the uh the cable broadband department was worth and how much
it could be sold for and all of that and he lived in nashville and uh the last time i i think i
chatted with him he had moved to i want to say illinois or somewhere like that to be closer to
his grandkids and i'm like well that's a contrast but okay yeah but he did talk about the time
because his house was positioned in such a way that his driveway had such an incline
so whenever they would have inclement weather like if it got icy or whatever
it was a, it was somewhat dangerous trying to get in and out of his house.
I'm like, yeah, that, I wouldn't want to live where you're living.
But yeah, I mean, I look, I look around, you know, we, we owned, did own property in Ben Hill
County and I sold it in 2023. But at one point I was legitimately looking at, as I got closer to
retirement age, would I want to, you know, sell this place and just build something over there?
Of course, that's off the table now because I sold it, but I don't know.
I'm thinking where we are going to be until I no longer breathe.
I don't think I'm going to be able to go anywhere.
Well, maybe not move, but you can go have experience.
Well, that's true.
That's true.
We actually saw a video the other day.
You ever heard of Jungle Gyms in Ohio?
Maybe.
So it's a, it's like a Walmart, but it's a, he's got, I think he's got two locations now, but you would need to look it up. But this, the guy who owns it and runs it, his name is, is Jim something or another. I can't remember. They call him Jungle Jim. And the store is so unique because there's a bunch, I mean, you, things that you would not normally find, you can find in there.
each, they've got animatronics everywhere. Each department, the way he set it up, I mean,
it's almost like going to some kind of fun house. And you, each department, the department heads
are basically tasked with running their departments like independent businesses.
And his attitude, whenever we saw the video, my wife was like, I love this guy because his
attitude is that he bought a monorail, a monorail that wasn't working and had it brought over to the
place and put a couple of million dollars into it. And the guy interviewing me is like, why? He goes,
because I wanted it. He's like, I don't, I don't keep up with what I'm spending. He said,
I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm just having fun. And I'm like, okay. But after that, my wife
was like, we got to go visit. I'm like, I looked it up and I said, well, that's a 13 hour drive
because she doesn't fly. And she's like, you can sit in your office for 13 hours.
Yeah. Well, she said, she said, well, that'd be a road trip. You know, it'd be fun. And, uh,
I said, well, we'll have to, you know, we'll, we'll have to book a room and stay there a couple
of days. And she's like, sounds like a good vacation to me. I'm like, yeah, well, we can't
do it until I buy a new vehicle because I don't trust either one of these vehicles we have to make
it all the way to ohio and back i don't know it could be a good story i don't need that kind of
i don't need that kind of pressure man but just having fun you don't know what you're doing yeah
that's true which i mean i'm with her i would love to go visit the place and it looks like it
would be a lot of fun and i've never been to ohio i can't say i have either but yeah he started he
started the thing back in, I want to say 71 or something. He was one of these like little roadside
selling produce things. And it just got bigger and bigger and bigger. So I never knew it existed
at all. So ultimately we're just bored. We're, uh, we're emotionally exhausted and numb.
Yeah. And everywhere you go, somebody's got their phone out taking video of themselves or taking a picture of something. I went to New York City for a week and I might have taken 40 pictures. None of them were posted online. I sent a couple to you.
yeah sent a couple of the kids um and that was about it i i met uh i went to a comedy club and
had the greatest experience that i could have ever hoped for because three of well-known comics
whose names i know uh who've i've seen specials on netflix and and all you know they're they're
pretty famous um i got to i got to hear him do their sets and then afterwards i got to i fist
bumped one of them said thanks for being here he made the night and then i i patted the other one
on the back and said you know it's a good job he turned around and we talked for five minutes
awesome i was just gonna say thanks for being here it's great and i was gonna keep walking but
he uh yeah and then uh my wife got a picture of us but i haven't even seen that picture
that picture's gone nowhere i didn't want a picture i just wanted to tell him thanks for
being here yeah i didn't i didn't want to what am i going to do with the picture
i just wanted the memory for myself [bleep] everybody else no i get it i get it i don't
post pictures online i take a crap ton of pictures but most of the time i'm either doing
it to show, to share with you or I share it in our family signal chat. Yeah. Or it's a serial
number or it's a serial. Yeah. It's a Mac address, a serial number. Yeah. Honest, honest God's truth.
That's, I can't half see most of the time now, you know, without putting my glasses on anything
up close. And especially if it's, you know, if it's on the back of a fricking printer or something
and I'm not moving that printer, I get the phone back there and I do my damnedest to take that
picture, but yeah. Yeah. Or take, you know, I take a picture of an installation so that I can
put it in the documentation system and go, I did that, you know, but I'm not, I'm, I've never been
one of these. I'm not saying that I've never done this, but I'm not one of these that's like, Ooh,
let me take a picture of this food. And I'm not knocking your Instagram thing. I think what you
do is kind of cool, but you do it so sparingly that when there's a picture there, that is something
to behold you know yeah it's not like oh i just got a number three at mcdonald's look at this
no to hell with that no i don't no no no no but i will think my last my last post was a beautiful
salad my wife made yeah yeah yeah exactly um i i took a picture uh not this past sunday but sunday
before we had pancakes and bacon and yeah i saw that all that yeah i took that and i shared it
with all of y'all and of course a lot of times when my two boys are on the west coast put it in
family chat and i might see what you guys are missing you should be in georgia i mean one of
them will be here soon but i really like for the other one and his significant other the move i
think they'd be better off but because the cost of living is cheaper in georgia especially south
Georgia than in San Francisco or Seattle.
What's the reason?
I mean, yeah, the income's also not evenly matched, but yeah.
It's the weather.
Nobody wants to be here.
I mean, you go outside right now, you realize this is not a place to be alive.
Oh, no.
I mean, matter of fact, there is a heat advisor.
I'm glad you brought that up.
For this area, there's a heat advisory that kicks in at 12 o'clock today, Eastern time,
expires at eight o'clock tonight with the heat index values up to 111 expected for parts of
South Central and Southwest Georgia. Yeah. I mean, for me, the calendar is red from like
second half of June through August. Yeah. It's going to be hot or it's going to be raining.
Yeah. Both. I mean, we're looking at real fields of 109, 110, 107, 110, 111, 112, 109. And that's
from here through next Wednesday. So, yeah, I mean, a lot of people and my son that lives in
seattle right now talking to people that have never been to georgia when he explains the weather
and i think he had a friend who actually did visit georgia and she was like you weren't kidding
and i mean she was just in north georgia yeah so yeah we flew in from colorado one day we went
through minneapolis but when we landed in atlanta we got off the plane and it was just wow
mm-hmm it's just it takes your breath away it does it takes your breath away i mean i
i actually have to keep my my door sort of semi-closed here and sometimes i'll turn out
these these lights and it's still 80 degrees in here but oddly enough it's a comfortable 80 for me
because we've conditioned ourselves with um since we moved into this house you know i've got friends
it's like if their air conditioner is any anywhere above 72 they're gonna die you know and for the
longest time we kept ours on 80 and was very very comfortable i run it at 78 now because i'm older
and i'm i'm i get cranky when i get hot but yeah yeah weather wise it's not a great place to live
but there are places worse so yeah i guess but i mean for me it's the it's the general attitude
of the public um and my daughter saw this last well this summer she just got back from colorado
she's a counselor at a summer camp in estes park and the people uh basically the people west of
mississippi are just more approachable they smile more they they share more they're just
they're more of how you're doing kind of thing and here i think it's i think it's more of an
economic history thing but people are guarded here they don't they don't open up to somebody
outside they don't trust people they don't trust anything except their family yeah especially if
you don't go to their church yeah man that's not really a thing that i've seen i've been invited
to church but i haven't been shunned because i don't go to church but um just somebody some
random person who grew up here it's probably not gonna be the one to get to know yeah i mean i've
been here over 20 years in this area and i still feel like an outsider because i didn't go to school
with anybody here i didn't marry a local you know i mean technically i didn't either i i went to
school in ben hill county so i didn't go to school with anybody in tiff county and my wife's from
cordial so you know and she she and uh her family moved to ben hill county in 82 so we got to know
each other you know there but uh and my mom and dad are gone so i don't have you know i don't even
have family immediate family other than you know you know my wife and my kids that are in this area
So I don't have any any ties like that.
Yeah, I don't either.
Her folks are still alive, but they live in Benton Hill County.
Her sister's still alive and she lives in Benton Hill County.
But yeah, now and I get what you mean.
I mean, it's when you find somebody in this area that you can just click with and you're
you're you know, you start talking about some of the things that you like and they're like,
yeah, it's like, oh, my God, you got it.
You found a kindred spirit and then suddenly and then you find out that I'm going to say this and then we're going to go to break.
Then you find out they're a Trump supporter and you're like, well, [bleep].
All right.
With that, we're going to take a short break.
Phone lines are open.
You know, love to hear from you guys out there.
What do you think about, you know, this?
are you feeling joyless, you know, emotionally exhausted and all of that?
Philip actually has a shirt called I'm Emotionally Exhausted.
I thought about getting that one one time.
But the phone lines are open, 229-520-5957.
Or you can send a text to the same number.
Shoot us an email, morningjip at wrto.fm.
We'll be back in a bit.
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Warning, make all sudden outbursts of free thought.
Hey everybody, welcome back to The Morning Drip.
For Thursday, the 13th of August, 2026, you know, if it could have shifted, we'd have had a Friday the 13th.
I don't actually know when our next Friday the 13th is, but, you know.
Yeah, I don't know. I don't count those.
My wife loves them. You know, she, her favorite number is 13.
When it is Friday the 13th, I notice, but I never look forward to it.
Yeah, I mean.
It's just a day.
It's just a, it's just a day. Of course, around here, we love Halloween.
We don't really decorate.
We don't go all out, but we do like that.
I don't know.
There's just something about it.
It's the colorations and the spookiness.
And, you know, it's kind of fun.
But anyway, phone lines are open, 229-520-5957.
You can also send a text to the same number.
I'm going to skip down that other longer article.
Let's talk about a Northern California high school softball team
gave up smartphones for basic flip phones for a month as an experiment aimed at improving mental
health and reducing dependence on social media. More than a year later, players and parents say
the experience still influences their phone habits, with teens reportedly becoming more aware
of reaching for their phones when anxious and learning to process those feelings without
immediately turning to a device. One player also underwent brain scans during the experiment,
which her family says initially showed withdrawal-like changes, followed by improvements in areas associated with decision-making, impulse control, and retention.
Parents have also reported improvements in confidence, eye contact, and communication.
And the mother and daughter who helped organize the experiment now speak publicly about more intentional technology use.
You know, we've talked about this.
matter of fact, I think we talked about it yesterday, the day before about, you know,
giving up smartphones or going with flip phones or something like that. Yeah. Um, I don't know.
What do you think about this experiment? I mean, it kind of makes sense. I mean, I'm one of those
who's just grown tired of my phone. I still have a smartphone. Um, but I just, if it makes a noise,
i i don't care i i look at i look at the number and if it's not there's there's not a name
attached to a contact but i don't i'm not answering it yeah me either um of course i
don't i don't do facebook don't get any notifications from any social media
because I was just tired of it taking up so much of my attention and pulling me off of what I need
to do. So I guess I don't need a flip phone to show me that. I just, I don't know. I put it on
the charger on a Friday night, just like I do every night, but Saturday and Sunday, I don't touch
it. It just stays on the nightstand the entire weekend. I can't say that I've gotten to that
point. Now, a couple of years ago, my wife insisted that I do this experiment because I have an Apple
watch and I went a month without the watch on my wrist and I was fine. I was fine. And the funny
thing is, is what I predominantly use my watch for is timers. I'll tell her, hey, start a timer
for 10 minutes while I'm cooking or something like that. Um, I have used it to record audio
because it actually has really good microphones in it. So, and I use an app on it that I can just
record and then transfer over to the Mac mini and do what I need to with it. Uh, and maybe
control the podcast that's playing when my daughter and I go get groceries on Friday morning
and I need to pause it. So, you know, the phone's down in the center console so I can just reach up
on my watch and hit the pause button. Other than that, my watch is, I know I don't use this thing
to its fullest potential and I'm okay with that. So I could, I could do without it. I would miss
the timer part of it, but then I got a phone that I can do that. Or I've got an, we've got an egg
timer, you know, a manual timer. Got one of those at the windowsill at the sink if we wanted to use
that so i i wind up using my phone more for an audio device if apple would come back with the
damn ipod touch there are a lot of people that would probably not maybe wouldn't ditch their
smartphone 100 but maybe do more like what you what you're talking about doing you know just put
it on the charger and then use their ipod touch just to listen to music or what have you yeah i
mean i would yeah i mean it's but if you do give it up you just get a flip phone for a while um if
you're one of those who can't put your phone down um i guess it could help that summer camp that my
daughter was a counselor at this summer that was one of the rules the kids didn't weren't allowed
to have any electronic device yeah no phone no music player no tv um just nature and and i bet
you know the kids enjoy the whole thing i don't think they have very many going away
um i'll heard about it but then again those kids come from affluent or maybe sometimes more than
affluent um it's like a four-week camp and it's like seven or eight thousand dollars per camper
send your kid there and from what i understand um some of them in the past have flown on a private
jet to somewhere in europe for vacation that kind of that kind of affluency yes yeah um
and so they just they have no electronics but they can go um learn all kinds of stuff i mean
my daughter was uh she was in charge of the riflery range interesting um i don't know what
else they have there but it was just activities for everybody you would never board unless you
wanted to be but i'm sure that's good for them um when in the past when we've kind of
taken the phone or or put some restrictions on it for our son um during that time he's
he's like a it's like a better kid yeah no it's just it's more conversational he's more involved
while he's more present um so yeah yeah growing growing up our kids when they when they got to
the point where they had access to a computer and then eventually had their own individual computers
They weren't allowed to just sit there hours upon hours upon hours.
My wife would actually say, OK, you've got an hour, hours worth of computer time today or you've you've earned an extra hour for chores you did around the house or something like that.
And then if they misbehaved, like when, you know, maybe they were out and about going grocery shopping or whatever, which, you know, as a side note, my kids being homeschooled and all of that, they were really well mannered kids.
And the number of parents that told my wife that they were impressed with how well that they behaved in public was was very inspirational.
But on those rare occasions, especially my oldest, where he would show his [bleep], the first thing she would do is like, well, you just lost your computer time today.
And I mean, you might as well have just taken a knife and stuck it in his heart, you know.
And it wasn't until they finally graduated high school and were older, you know, we're talking 16, 17 years old, where it was like, OK, you know, you you do what you as long as you're helping around the house and figuring out what you want to do with your life and stuff like that.
The computers, the computer's yours to do whatever you want to do, because at some point we did start allowing them to, you know, they had a bad time, I think, of 10 o'clock most of the time as they got older.
But once they got out of high school and they they hit those 17 and 18 year old ages, it was like you stay up to three or four in the morning and I need you at eight.
Sucks for you. You're now an adult. Figure it out. That kind of thing.
But yeah, and the first cell phones my oldest one got was not a smartphone, but he could do T9T.
Well, actually, this one was one of those where it had a keyboard that would slide out.
He and his mom had the same type of phone, but they were 2G, 3G phones, very limited internet access and stuff like that.
But he would text like constantly.
But yeah, I mean, I would one of the things that I've allowed to happen with me that I wish I had not is the number of clients that text me with issues instead of going through the proper channels of opening up a support ticket or even calling the office phone.
because otherwise I hate texting to that extent
because, and I've got notifications,
audible notifications are turned off on my phone.
That's the reason why sometimes I don't,
it takes me a little bit to get back around
to something that you've posted in Discord.
You know, I'll see the emblem that there's,
there's a, you know, a message,
but my phone does not make a noise for any Discord stuff.
And it vibrates for like texts and phone calls.
Phone calls, my watch actually rings, but the phone just simply vibrates.
So, yeah, because and those mad [bleep] that have notifications every time they get an email.
What is wrong with you?
They don't get much email.
I mean, if I had that enabled on my phone, the battery would be dead in about four hours.
That's how much freaking email I get.
And 99% of it is crap.
Yep. Which, I mean, let's segue into the next story about robocalls. You know, that is a big
issue. Americans receive about 4.35 billion robocalls in July, the highest monthly total
in a year, more than 15% above the low recorded in October 2025. Nearly half were unwanted
telemarketing or scam calls with unsolicited pre-approved personal loan offers among the most
common. One loan campaign alone generated more than 40 million calls using thousands of different
phone numbers and various caller names. What we're seeing here, before I move on, I know in our family,
especially my wife, she gets at least one to two calls every day that's talking about her account
with some financial institution that she's never had an account with. And you can tell it's AI
generated now, you know, used to, it was just pre-recorded. Somebody actually would do a
pre-recorded message and say, you know, you need to call us or blah, blah, blah, blah.
Now they're tailoring it with AI and it's always some, something, some financial company or
whatever. We, you need to call us immediately to discuss the, uh, discuss your, your, uh,
your loan or whatever with us, that kind of crap. And like it goes on to say, Georgia has
hit particularly hard, the 470 area code around Atlanta and even our own 229 area code in South
Georgia both saw robocall increases 13% from June, tying for the second largest increase in the
country. Numbers in the 229 area code receive more than 32 million robocalls during July,
while 470 numbers receive more than 20 million. And I'm sure you, right along with me, the calls
that you, like, if it's not attached to a contact, I'm not going to answer it.
You see a lot of them come from a 229.
They even look like they're from Tifton or Fitzgerald, but they're not.
Yeah.
Most of them are, say, Georgetown, I think.
Yeah.
And I think that has to do with the fact that those numbers, like, if you try to get a Google
voice number today, I have an old one that's actually an Osceola number, believe it or not.
But for years, you haven't been able to get those.
Most of the Georgia numbers you get now are located in Georgetown.
And a lot of these providers are supposed to, because you're not supposed to be able to spoof your telephone number on caller ID.
Right.
But they're still doing it.
And a lot of these providers are supposed to stop that.
I mean, like, so one of my clients, we ported their main number over to this other service that they use because they're a car dealership.
So that meant, because I'm using a local company for the SIP trunk, that the outbound caller ID could no longer be that number because they wouldn't allow it.
They no longer have that number in their switch.
They no longer manage it.
So by the rules that are out there, I guess from the FCC or what have you, they're not allowed to send that number out because they don't quote on it because that's spoofing.
You know, it would make things a lot easier because anybody calling would still be seeing that number going out.
So now it has to be another number, which, you know, has the side issue of sometimes people can bypass the main number, you know, other issues like that.
But the fact that these companies are still getting away with it and they shouldn't is aggravating because it goes on to say that despite efforts by regulators and phone carriers to combat illegal calls, scammers continue finding ways on the telephone networks.
And being on the National Do Not Call Registry can reduce legitimate telemarketing, but won't necessarily stop scammers.
So consumers are advised to let unfamiliar calls go to voicemail and independently contact banks, utilities, and other companies using trusted phone numbers rather than information provided by unexpected callers.
Same thing can be true about phishing emails.
You know, if you get an email from PayPal or you get an email from, say, Discover or something like that, and it's got a link that says you need to do something with the account, don't ever click that, ever.
That's too bad nobody's listening to the show.
I know, right?
Because the best thing to do is, okay, go and actually log into the account like you normally would, but don't click that link.
Because there's a, there's about a 50, 50% chance that it's going somewhere else.
It's going to look like your bank or your credit card, but now they're getting your credentials.
So, but yeah, I, and it goes in phases too, as far as these, these robo calls, there've
been weeks where I was constantly, several weeks back, probably a month ago, I was getting
three and four of these damn calls daily.
And I mean, they all looked like local numbers.
And but now, I mean, knock on wood, my head, I haven't had any like that in a couple of days.
So I don't know what's going on.
Yeah, I probably miss a lot, but whatever.
Yeah, yeah, whatever.
The people that need to get in touch with me know how to get in touch with me.
Exactly.
Even if I wish they'd stop texting me.
I actually started using a Google voice number for, I'm like, if you need to text me for support,
here's that number. I stopped giving out any, I had actually had one. I was like,
she's like, uh, yeah, you probably wish I didn't have your number. I said, no, you're okay. You
don't abuse it. I said, but yeah, any new people, I say, here's the support email. Here's the support
website. And here's a number. If you absolutely have to text me, this is the number you text me.
They don't get my, my cell phone number for that. All right. Because we're, uh, we went long
on the first discussion point.
Let's cover this last one,
which is kind of like,
eh, okay.
Gen Z has adopted LARPing,
which is short for live action role-playing,
as a new way of jokingly calling someone
a poser, try-hard, or inauthentic.
Instead of dressing up for fantasy role-playing,
someone might be accused of LARPing a lifestyle,
taking a Pilates class,
mainly for social media photos,
Pretending an internship represents corporate life or visiting New York for a few hours and LARPing as a New Yorker.
Mike, did you LARP as a New Yorker when you went to spend a week in New York?
I might have, but I didn't take any pictures.
So you can't prove it.
So I guess I wasn't LARPing because I never presented myself to anyone else.
I'm a New Yorker.
Yeah.
The slang reflects Gen Z's complicated relationship with authenticity online, where appearing genuine is valued, but appearing overly eager or cringe can invite ridicule.
More than half of adult Gen Zers surveyed said they have avoided expressing themselves online because they feared appearing cringe, while social media, influencers, and AI-generated content have also contributed to greater skepticism about whether what people present online is actually real.
You know, there's a number of cases that have come about, not cases like in court cases,
but somebody would present themselves, you know, oh, you know, we're making the Benjamins and all
of that. And they took a picture of them in a private jet and all of that. You can literally
go and rent those places to take photos in by the hour. And they're not, I mean, and the person
does not own the jet. They do not own the Maserati. They don't own any of that crap.
They're LARPing, basically.
Yeah.
Buy my book.
It'll show you how to get this rich.
Yes.
And to round out the rest of the article, although LARPing is usually meant humorously,
some worry the attitude can make young people reluctant to try new things because beginners
risk being mocked as merely pretending to belong.
The result is a strange balancing act.
Gen Z places a premium on authenticity while simultaneously feeling pressure to carefully manage how authentic or enthusiastic they allow themselves to appear.
I have a hard time recognizing this is a problem.
Well, that's because we're not Gen Zers.
Well, if they just present themselves as they are, I mean, if somebody tells you that you're not real, then you don't have to listen to them.
I mean, that's true.
That's the reason why I say one of the best, if not the best, all time invention of mankind or humankind is the Internet.
The worst invention of humankind was social media.
It was the absolute worst thing we could have ever used the internet for.
Started out with a lofty goal, connect with your friends.
You know, your high school buddy moved to Europe.
You haven't seen them in a while.
Easy way to connect.
And that idea, I still think is a great idea, but that's no longer what we have.
It's all about clout.
It's all about, unfortunately, LARPing, trying to show people that you are more than what
you actually are.
Well, I think if it's clear that you don't have a goal of impressing people, I think you'd be all right.
Eh, maybe.
But I think it goes back to there's no joy.
Everybody's numb.
Right.
Nothing's real.
We're not even real, man.
This show's not even real.
It's just a simulation.
It is a simulation.
We are living in a freaking simulation.
And it is optimized for entertainment.
the revolution will be televised.
All right, everybody, that's going to wrap it up
for the Thursday edition of The Morning Drip.
Unless you've got anything else to add, Mike?
Like, comment, and subscribe.
Yeah, like, comment, and subscribe.
Bye, guys.
All right, everybody.
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Good morning, everybody.