Finding Inconvenient Places and Tracking Walks

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The solid impact resistant design prevents cracking, and the clear basein sides make items easy to find even when the tots are stacked Find select shelving and tote storage up to fifteen percent off at the Home Depot to organize every room in your home, from your garage to your attic Visit Homedepot. com how doers getet More done Hello and welcome to the Bird Cast, flagship podcast of throwing your phone into the ocean going on vacation I'm your friend David Perce. and on today's episode, we're going to talk about disconnecting This is the beginning of a long holiday weekend for a lot of us here in the U. S. In general, I hope a lot of you are planning some big, elaborate, exciting global multinational summer vacation And I figured it might be helpful to poll a bunch of people on our team for the best tips that they have on disconnecting. I will say the Verge is not famously a place everybody is really good at being offline But we still grabbed a bunch of people and decided when you want to get offline, particularly somebody who spends a lot of time online on devices looking at screens How do you get off of it We asked a bunch of people with some great tips coming up. think you're going to enjoy I have two before we get started My first one is especially on vacation to designate a place for technology. have all of your laptops and phones, all of your chargers, all of your everything in one place, whether it's a table or like have this be the phone couch make it so that technology is available. I think in general, the idea of like ot looking at your device for a week is probably not realistic to most people, but it should be a thing you have to go to, especially on vacation, rather than something that is just in your pocket all the time. You will be amazed at how many fewer times you find yourself just absentmindedly checking it when you have to stand up and walk across the house to go open your laptop That's number one. numberber two is Get everybody on board with whatever disconnecting plan that you have. I've found that phone usage in particular is sort of a cascading problem. You sit down on the couch and it's like, okay, we could do a puzzle, we could play a game, we could watch a movie together, We could all go do something. But then one person takes out their phone the mood sort of shifts downward. and then somebody else takes out their phone and it sort of shifts downward. And all of a sudden, you just have this waterfall effect of everybody being on their phone But if you can get everybody to buy into this strategy of like whether you want to put your phones into a bowl and have nobody look at them all day, whether you want to have the technology placed and it's like, okay, we're all going to sit around the table and do our work for an hour while we are here sort of in a communal technology space, and then we're going to go back to something else Getting everyone to agree on the approach to screens goes an incredibly long way. And I have found that Sitting around being the boored one while everybody else looks at their phone sort of defeats the purpose Making it so that no one else can do it and you all have to figure out something to do together is the whole point So that's my other tip Get everybody on board, designate a place That's my plan for the weekend. We'll see how it goes All right, let's get into all of our other tips. bunch of stuff for you for disconnecting. My great hope is that you get to the end of this episode Turn off this podcast. you go enjoy your long weekend and you don't even think about screens for a while. That's what I'm hoping for me. It's what I hope for you too Let's get into some tips. Vir senior reporter Haydenield, Hi Hayden Hey You I've known you a while and you are not a person I would say is like terrific at disconnecting. but do you have a good disconnecting tip for when you really want to do it number one Any app that I feel like I spend a lot of time on, I just make it a little harder to get to. I just put it in a folder on like the second screen of my phone, which is a really all my tips are pretty like low tech, but I think sometimes that's the best because we're all lazy intntroducing any amount of friction in like a thing that you usually do mindlessly, I feel like is a huge help. So that's a big help for me. and then My other tips are just about like notifications. L I don't have notifications on for any apps at all. I only have like of course, texts and calls, but Every other app, I don't think it's a big deal if I just check it when I check it. So someone Instagram messages me, okay, like that's probably not time sensitive. if they really needed to get ahold of me, they would text me or call me. So that's a big tip for me. It's like just turning off all notifications, E email because it's like I check email enough I don't need to be notified the second an email comes in, especially since like in our workplace, no one's emailing us if they want to get a hold of us right away internally. But wait, when you say all notifications, do you lit you literally mean every single No exceptions, all notifications on your phone I guess now that I think about it Venmo I have no decisions on because I'm like, I mean, obviously I want to pay someone right away. But otherwise no. yeah, no noions. I'm very proud of you for that. Signal because it's messaging. but yeah. And then my very last tip is this is kind of crazy, but I don't check who views my story on Instagram, who likes my posts on Twitter or Instagram I only read comments. I don't check like likes, I don't check views on any social media platform because it helps me feel like I'm just posting into the void. I'm like I don't it's none of my business who's looking at my stuff. I don't want to know. If they comment great, otherwise, I don't want to be like too aware of who's perceiving me because I think that is the biggest thing that is our detriment on social media a lot of the time. So yeah, those are my tips for maybe not unplugging totally, but for not being as negatively affected by if you don't want to unplug completely. That's pretty good. Do you do you like turn that feeling on and off when you're like, sometimes I will go look at who viewed my story or is this just like a blanket rule you have for yourself Post into the void, don'try about it I haven't looked in years because I think that if you start, you never stop. you know what I mean? It's like if you like it's kind of a blanker rule for myself in my mental health, I'm like, I don't want tona know. And also I can note, I remember from years ago when I would check, I would act differently. I' would be like, oh, well what if this person sees it? like, oh maybe I shouldn't post this. And it's like, who cares? It's like And same with Twitter, I don't need to know individually who's liking my stuff Okay. it just doesn't matter. So if you need to know something, there's a comment, you know? So I just think for some people, maybe they can handle that. but for me, I think I just become too aware of who's perceiving me and I would rather just be myself. the normal way. I love that. All right Hayden, than you. appreciate it Thanks. All right, next up, the Vverge is Jen Tui from a hotel room somewhere in Dep, South Carolina, H Jen. Hi We're talking to people about disconnecting and how they get offline and We are a uniquely online group of people How do you discnect? Give me all your good tips Okay, so I have two. I have one for when you stay at home and one for one sort of quality of life tip. So quality of life tip Go camping O, okay. no Wii anywhere out in the woods. In fact, I'm in northern South Carolina right now and surrounded by mountains and woods and my husband's already planning our next camping trip. So yes. We're gonna do this from like a yurt next time, B. Yeah. And he selects campgrounds that do not have cell service or wiFi. So you have no choice. Although my children do manage to find like the one edge of the mountain, they can go stand on and hold their phone up in the air. But other than that, that is becausecause you just disconnecting isn't just about disconnecting from the internet, it's about disconnecting from everyday life and there's nothing is more of a contrast for me from my technologically advanced home to a travel trailer. I don't do the tenth thing. do need I do need a trailer like that And you know, that That is the perfect experience for me for disconnecting Simple to do, anyone can do it. That's the other advantage. and then the other simple to do, anyone can do it I have in your home So if you're staying at home and you want to disconnect is just turn off the Wii It's simple But it works. And in my home, especially So I use an ero router at the moment and you can just literally hit a button in the app. Wi Fi off. And it does mean that nothing in my home will work anymore. The lights go off. Everything The fridge doesn't work, but you know some things will continue to work thanks to local control. But yes, but for me, it's just For the whole family, it's a way of forcing everyone to get off their devices and hang out together. I mean, are you can buy, like there's a device called the Brick that you can buy but you don't really need that. If you've got dedicated downtime, you're like, okay, let's just turn off the internet. And that gives no TV, no cell phones, no music just family time. It's very good. Do you do that on a regular basis or is that like a sort of break in case of emergency? I try and do it When we're all at home and we're doing something together, I do. because yes, you can do do not disturb on your phone or you can use parental controls to turn off their iPhone, you know, there's things you can do. The problem with that is I'm still on my phone trying to do it. likeike And then I get distracted. and whereas just flip the switch. and everyone's offline and it's Fair and equal. And yeah, so have I try, I mean regular basis maybe like once a month. I should do it I should do it more though. You've inspired me, especially this summer Yeah. I agree. I think Turn off the wiFi, we're all going outside. It's a thing I should probably say more in my house. It's simple and it works, so that would be my advice. It's a good one. All right, thank you, Jen. appreciate it All right, next up, the Virg's senior tech editor, Marina Galperina, Hi Marina. Hey You You have a tip seemeems like it is born of just the pure anarchy of living in New York City Tell me about it. Let your phone die Just don't charge it Is this not the same as just turn your phone off, whichs like a lovely, but totally untenable idea. But you can't turn it back on. That's the. Oh, that's interesting. So Okay, is this a thing you actually do in your life? This is a thing I actually do in my life. I have an alarm clock on my Apple Watch, so I don't need my phone necessarily. I tried plug it it in in the other room. That doesn't work. I tried screen time limits I just keep snoozing them, doesn't work. So Thankfully my outlet doesn't work by my bed, so the phone just dies And then the evening's over So you take this to me and it is time for me to go to bed because my phone is dead now. orr watch TV, whatever, yeah. I kind of lo that actually. I'm just I'm in a race against my phone. The news is just over. No more news more Instagram. Is this a thing you started doing on purpose or just discovered because literally your phone just dies sometimes because your outlet is broken the outlet. And it's not the first outlet I recently moved and the outlet in my old apartment also didn't work. There was like one working outlet per room because So like, you know This is the universe sending you a sign that this is a good idea and you should keep doing this. Yes So okay My actual philosophical question here is I'm trying to decide if this is the same bit of advice that people give who are like, just have more discipline. donon't look at your phone as much. And I always just want to give those people a middle finger and be like, if that was if I could do that, we wouldn't be having this conversation Why is letting my phone die not being a more disciplined person and not looking at my phone. Well, they always say that willpower is not a way to overcome addictive behaviors. so create barriers between yourself and the behavior and that is for me to keep the phone not charged I mean, it's pretty bad if there's like a family emergency, I guess This is this is the problem I sincerely grapple with this because that's theact thing, right? It's like Sure, I I could charge my phone in the basement. I sleep upstairs. It could be fine. I could be far away from my phone. There is that little tiny part of me that is like, well, what if something happens? What if someone needs to get touch with Has this ever happened in the time Has it haveave you ever missed anything in the time that you have been letting your phone die at night I've missed questions about weather for my mother When she hears there's rain in New York But nothing. But I get up so early and most of my calls that are important would come from three hours beforehand so It's still evening, almost If there's an emergency we're good. No, this is this is a good tip and I like the idea of having external forces require you to not use your devices. This is a thing that's kind of coming up over and over as we talk to people for this episode, like I need to engineer some act of God prevents me from using my devices M it a way that bely helpful. Yeah I think that's right. All right, Marina, that's good stuff. Thank you. Thank you Is Donald Trump still cool? Well, at first it was what he was promising to America. He was promising change. Yeah big change. Has he lived up to that? No, no. I wouldn't say so. sur I'm disappointed. We're in Washington, DC for one of the events that Donald Trump is throwing for America's two hundred fiftieth anniversary, and it's UFC night. Proud to be American, we got free tickets It's gonna be a great time. That's about it. It's an opportunity to talk to a group that was central in the twenty twenty four election, young men Why do we think Trump and men seem to have a connection? just knows how to advertise himself younger proud? It aligns with masculinity, I feel like, to a certain extent If they don't like Donald Trump, what do they prefer politically otherwise?? I Care about my family, I care about my country. I want people to be safe and happy where they live. Care about my wallet too, man.. I'm Estad Hernson, and this is America Actually. Catch us every Saturday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast ne I'm standup comedian John Marco Serezi, and I'm actor penis model Russell Daniels. The downside is our podcast where we bring on guests to talk about how miserable their lives are. becausecause let's face it, things are not getting better. Every episode we talk about what's wrong with our lives, our guests' lives, the world But in a fun way. Bottom line is you're gonna walk away feeling better about your life We've had so many cool guests, Caleb here on Buszy Phillips, Stavros Halkias. Laverne Cox. Hassan Piker. Alana Glazer. I promise you're gonna have a good time. Now on the Vox Media podcast network. This is the downside No one could blame you if you thought this men's World Cup was going be a disaster The President of the United States isn't exactly a welcome mat for the world, and there have been plenty of embarrassing stories for the country. There was the mom of Kate Bird's goalkeeper who wasn't let into the United States to watch her son play until the team started doing well and people clamored for her entry. The team from doctor Congo hadn't made a men's World Cup in fifty two years and hardly made this one The United States was supposedly worried about Ebola even though no one on the team had Ebola. If you were watching Senegal Norway last week and were wondering where all the Senegalese fans were They weren't let into the country, but you probably notice we let in like a million Vikings? I wonder what's different about their fan basases Oh, and who could forget we're literally bombing one of the countries that up until Friday was playing here? Missiles aren't the problem But But somehow the vibes at this World Cup are mostly positive. The World Cup might just be healing us on today exxplain from Box. I'm Seth Mattins. My new show, Creator Destroy reimagining Marketing explores how every decision a company makes, not just the marketing ones, but the HR, IR, pricing, or design and planning ones Oes most don't consider marketing at all contribute to either creating value or destroying it Each week I sit down with CMO, CEOs, founders, cultural thinkers, the people building, breaking and reimagining how businesses grow or don't conversations about what creates value and what destroys it It's a business show, it's a marketing show. Creator destroys the show that argues, they've always been the same thing the Box Media podcast network and the Wisdom is com. New episodes drop weekly on YouTube and your favorite podcast app. As America reaches its two hundred fiftieth anniversary, how should Americans assess their country's strength relative to the rest of the world We're moving into a genuinely multipolar world. and that's a world in which every nation is basically for itself becausecause nations can no longer rely on the United States to protect them I'm Jhn Fyer, and I'm Jake Sullivan, and we're the host of The Long Game, a weekly national seecurity podcast. This week, we sat down with historian and foreign policy expert, Bob Kagan to assess America's role in the world at two hundred fifty and the future of American Power. The episode's out now. search for and follow The Long Game, wherever you get your podcasts Next up Meredith Hagerty, Verge editor. welcome having first time in the first cast. Yeah, yeah It's a huge day for you. It is a huge day for me. Yes. Thank you. I'm honored. Tell me your disconnecting tip. What's your plan? Okay, my disconnecting tip is basically the library, but not just like going to the library, it is having something to read that is not on your phone that also has basically a deadline. They're like little time bombs. If you especially if you get new releases You have to return them or someone else is waiting for you. And that pressure Uh sometimes occasionally keeps me from playing a game called Drop the cat on my phone that I hate, and I just wish I wasn't playing it U wait okay. so walk me through this tactically Yeah. You're like a You're like a put yourself on the list for a hundred books Yes. and then return them on time or risk the wrath of the librarians kind of person. Yeah, I really need to get a grade A in library, obviously. So yeah, whenever I go to a bookstore, I will just put stuff on my like Brooklyn library app list That did result in me like maybe two weeks ago getting seven books at once and showing up and being like, I actually need to come back with another bag. And I'm not going to read all those books, but you know, the ones that are most urgent I will I will get to and I will feel guilty about them if I don't, because I've been waiting for strangers, the Bell Burden memoir for like three months or something and now it's mine. and I I like it fine, but it's really important that I read the whole thing before it has to go back. I feel like you're basically just creating for yourself an endless set of read this book deadlines. Oh, yeah, absolutely. They're and they're, you know The guilts is very important to me as an Irish Catholic. So Okay. So are you a read only on paper kind of person? or are you doing this through like Libby and stuff too? No, I am a paper reader only. I have never like I will just forget that I'm reading a book on ebook. I have been reading a book called Scruples about like a fancy department store for maybe four years on my iPad. and it is incredibly stupid novel from the eighties and I can't finish it. like I should have It should have gone in one year not the other and it's beviling me. So real books only for Meredith So I've gone back to, this is going to sound ridiculous. I've probably read two physical books this year for the first time in a decade. How I read a lot. I read a lot of books, but I have almost exclusively been a Kindle reader for a very long time and I kind of have been amazed at the extent to which I've had that exact same experience of like, there's literally just a thing of like when I have the book sitting on my kitchen counter and I walk past it I pick it up and I read Yeah in a way that like I didn't when it's my kindindle or my phone, even though ostensibly that thing is with me vastly more often. I just don't notice it the same way as a oh, I love this book. I should read it experience. Yeah. I mean, there's just other stuff in my phone that I will do instead if I try to read it my phone. Unfortunately, Twitter isn int there or, you know just checking my email, which is never interesting. and yet, like somehow I'm doing that instead of finhing these books that I really want to read's fair. I'm trying to do more. I have a lot of reading to do for work and a lot of it is like, you know PDFs of books and nonfiction of various kinds. And I'm trying to do more of that on my devices, Kindles and iPads and whatever, because I also have to like, highlight it and do a lot of that stuff But I'm trying to do now all of my purely for fun reading. on physical books. And I'm out there just buying like boxes full of paperbacks and I gotta tell you it's delightful. I' having a. I support you in this. I think this is a great. Books are, you know, books good Deadlines at the library. loveo it Meredith, than you for coming on. appreciate it. Thank you forving. Okay Next up Verge director, Owen Grove closer Hey, how you doing Good. Do you have a good tip for disconnecting? Whenever I vacation, I'm Also normally like filled with camera gear because just the nature of the job, I'm always filming something, I'm always shooting something So to kind of disconnect from that, I would recommend that people bring a worse camera or maybe the second best camera in their arsenal or just be comfortable taking bad pictures. L especially if you're taking something with like a film camera and you're not like building up you're not going to be looking over your photos once you're done with them. You're going to be on your vacation again. So once you just snap something with like a film camera I feel like you're able to escape it a little bit better. Or even if it is like a digital camera but worse It's something that you're not going to obsess over. You're just going to pull it out, shoot it and just forget about it and put it back in the pocket and just like not pay attention to it as long as it's not something that costs like You know, like a three thousand dollars camera that you're kind of agonizing over sure att the risk of asking a question I suspect I know the answer to. Why isn't your phone that camera just because it's going to lead you into other phone things. It's going to make you want to check your texted and check, oh, well, what if I post this photo somewhere? It's going to make you like reconnect to all the stuff that you're trying to get away from. Yeah. Yeah. Are you a proponent of the idea of even somebody who is less into photography than you are Bringing a digital camera on vacation instead of relying on your phone to be that thing That actually strikes me as a pretty universal Take your vacation pictures with something other than your phone just because it will keep you away from your phone. Yeah, also, I mean, especially if it's something that is kind of novel to you too where it's like you're not used to a point and shoot or even a disposable. I mean, I know it's not digital, but like it makes it fun to take the picture and it makes you not overthink it and just snap it and get rid of it, then like that's what you want. because then After the fact you get to like look back on a bunch of pictures you didn't like really think too hard about and you get to kind of like Get a memory, you didn't even remember I love that. Do you? Do you develop all your pictures that way? Like when you go shoot, do you then like keep your albums of vacation photos around Anytime I shoot with anything either like disposable or like polaroid or Anything that's like an instantly printed piece. like Fujif film and stuff, it is just like scattered and skewn around my apartment when I get back. It's always kind of fun like picking up like Pokemon cards that you're like, what is this even from? it's Sometimes it's a little dark and you're like, oh, that's from California, I guess. Okaykay, cool Um so I I don't know if I would recommend people live their life in chaos like I do. Maybe you should have an album and organize these things because it makes it like more fun to look back on, but it's also fun just finding a bunch of Chaotic pictures all over the place. I sort of like the idea of like coming home from vacation and just sort of Fing your photos all over your house and just discover them as you go That's that's like The pure anarchy of reliving your vacation is kind of great. I love that Oh and, thank you. It's good stuff. G to see you.. Joining me now. Yes producer Travis Laruck in a truly remarkable pair of sunglasses, I w U is your su is your tip just wear extremely rad sunglasses? That's one of the tips. Okay. I think I think what you got to do to disconnect is to separate yourself from your Boring quQotidian tech life as much as possible So I have one tip. I don't know, I don't know how many people this gonna apply to, but I have my Apple Watch face is the one that gives you the maximum amount of information possible It's infograph Oh, o, even more so. yeah. okay. And and I and I use this one.' it's not one of the newer ones. I have an ultra. It's not one of the newer faces, but it does give you more information than all of the other ones. So I have U my meetings, I have like workout crap. I have what today's date is. You don't need to know any of that stuff when you're on vacation So my tip is to pick one of those fun watch faces that you're like Why are these here You know Like, like what who who's using this? The one where it's just like, what if huge numbers moved in small waves Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. so like there's one called playtime where the numbers look like they're made like climation numbers with feet I know this yeah T I believe I have specifically asked the question, whyy on eararth does this exist about that one? I mean, I'm like Ohh look, one of them just like sort of dropped off the face of the earth as the time chang. That's dark. All right, here's Snoopy Apple bought that snoopy IP.. and now you can make it worth it for one weekend And by the way, when I first check this one out, Snoopy jumped off of the minute hand into a pile of leaves. How cute is that? That is pretty c. This is the kind of thing. Oh, he fell asleep when my watch fell asleep This is for you adorable. See This is very charming. I actually this is the best case anyone has ever made for all of these. And then the best one is the jellyfish. Anyway, I'm just saying, like, do you need all this information? you're off. Soer either do that or just take off your watch. you know. Do you do this with like your phone home screen? Are you like a focus modes go into vacation focus mode person or just the watch? I think that's a great idea. My focus mode is I literally delete slack off of my phone I'm like, this is easier to me than even figuring out what focus modes are. So that's what I do I've come around to that too. I used to be like a you know, mute notifications, take it off the home screen. and like it turns out I will get around all of those things very easily. Deleting the app is the only thing that actually sticks. Yeah, Delete your apps donon't worry about how difficult it's going to be to set up your outlook again when you need it again. H factor authentication will ruin your life, but that's post vacation use problem I have one more tip Hit me Okay. I know a lot of you' going to want to play video games over the weekend and God bless, but Have you tried board games I think everyone should know about Travis is that you should assume that whenever Travis is not actively making the Vvergecast. He is at some board game convention somewhere in America. becauseuse that seems to be what's going on. What are you playing right now? Trvis Well, I brought this because this has been This has been floating around the office for a while, but this is a copy of the Qacks of Queblenberg. It's been out for a while, but this is one of the best board games available. And in this Ramageddon world, I feel like board games don't have any RAM in them and this is going to be, I mean The reason why board games became such a staple in the first place was during the Great Depression, they were a great value for money. And not to get all dark, but like the more you know seems like seemeems like you know, this still would apply today. So I mean, you pick up a board game for forty bucks, you know, that's cheaper than taking your family out to the movies, you know? So I'm just saying you know, if you're not already into it Travis, thanks for coming on. Sorry for wasting everyone's time One last one, here's a video that Miosato, a reporter on our team sent me a little while ago. two tactics and they work in kind of opposite ways. So one is go places that it is more inconvenient to use your phone than not to use it. So I'll go to the beach where it's too hot and too bright to use my phone. My phone will overheat if I take it out