Transcript from 527: At The Jellyfish Conference with Christopher White and Elecia White.

EW (00:00:07):

Hello and welcome to Embedded. My name is Elecia White. I am here with Christopher White. This is going to be one of those shows where he and I just chat.

CW (00:00:16):

Just you.

EW (00:00:18):

That is much harder.

CW (00:00:20):

Well, the dog is here.

EW (00:00:22):

Last time I had a podcast with a pet-

CW (00:00:25):

People got mad.

EW (00:00:25):

Half our listeners got really mad. The other half [thought it was] hilarious.

CW (00:00:29):

To be fair, at the time we had eight listeners.

EW (00:00:31):

Fair.

CW (00:00:32):

So by absolute numbers, it was not a big deal.

EW (00:00:34):

<laugh> True. Okay. So I have a list. I have a list, but I do not know where to start. You see the list.

CW (00:00:42):

I see the list.

EW (00:00:43):

Where should I start?

CW (00:00:44):

Do you want to order them by most technical to least technical? Do you want to order them by least technical to most technical? Do you want to randomly bounce around the list? Do you want to...

EW (00:00:55):

Now I have two lists.

CW (00:00:56):

Roll it- <laugh> Remember, whenever you have a problem, throw a Molotov's cocktail-

EW (00:01:01):

<laugh>

CW (00:01:03):

And then you have a different problem.

EW (00:01:04):

Exactly. Thank you for that. Well, there is one thing I did not put here, and it has got an exclamation point. So I assume you are excited about working with Rust?

CW (00:01:14):

No, I am more acknowledging that people will be shocked and horrified or whatever, after years of explaining that I am hoping to retire before having to use Rust.

EW (00:01:28):

But you recently got a Rust assignment.

CW (00:01:31):

Well, <laugh> the more accurate thing to say is I had no reason to use it. So I am looking at it, and unfortunately or fortunately, depending on your perspective, I now have a reason to use it. I am trying to very quickly learn enough Rust to port something from what is basically desktop Rust, or whatever you want to call it, to an embedded device.

(00:01:56):

It is a series of algorithms that someone has already ported from Python. And I would like to not have to convert that to C, if at all possible, and just have it run in native Rust. But there are things that need to be done to make it more embedded friendly.

EW (00:02:16):

And the rest of your embedded system is in C?

CW (00:02:18):

Yeah. It is a Zephyr project, nRF, SDK, standard stuff. All in C.

EW (00:02:25):

So what are the first three things you like about Rust?

CW (00:02:31):

<sigh> <laugh> That is a loaded question.

EW (00:02:32):

You were sure I was going to ask, "What are the first three things you hate about Rust?"

CW (00:02:35):

Three? Three things?

EW (00:02:37):

I would accept one. You know.

CW (00:02:38):

So there are a lot of things in Rust that are very similar to Swift, that I like. Swift, of course, is object-oriented, and has a lot of inheritance and stuff. Rust is, as far as I can tell, not really that way. It is more like C.

(00:02:49):

But there are kind of some nods to object-orientedness. You can have structs that have functions associated with them, which basically feel like classes. You can have all that in one file, you do not need a header file. So you can have your implementation and your interface in the same place. That is kind of nice.

(00:03:07):

The enums are nice and the way, which is very similar to Rust, enums can be any type mixed within the enum. So you can have an enum that is not just a bunch of ints, it can be another struct, I think even a function. Stuff like that.

EW (00:03:25):

Do they have good iterators? Like if you have a enum, can you say, "For each in the-"

CW (00:03:28):

Yeah, you can do that for most of the collections of things.

EW (00:03:33):

That is something I find myself doing in Python, that I really want to do and see.

CW (00:03:36):

Well, Rust has vectors. So you can do lots of Python-like stuff with slicing, and go from here to here, but it is all kind of, "For each thing in-". So that is nice.

(00:03:49):

What was the other thing? Still getting my head around the memory. I like the way Swift does it better, but Swift is object-oriented so they have a little leg up on making that easier. Rust is-

EW (00:04:02):

This is the borrow checker?

CW (00:04:04):

Borrow checker and lifetimes and stuff. It is kind of weird. I have been using Rust for a week, okay, so-

EW (00:04:14):

This is initial feelings.

CW (00:04:16):

Do not come at me, bro.

EW (00:04:17):

<laugh>

CW (00:04:17):

So I do not even understand some of this stuff very well. But it feels to me like they got around a lot of the memory issues with pointers and things, by just being amazingly strict. You cannot do stuff. So pointer aliasing is way super locked down. If you like set a-

EW (00:04:37):

No "cast to void*"?

CW (00:04:39):

No. If you set a pointer equal to another pointer, that original pointer is now gone. Not gone, but it is not aliased anymore. If you do, "Let A equal B, where B is another pointer," you cannot do anything to B. It is an error.

EW (00:04:56):

I do not understand, but sure.

CW (00:04:57):

Right. It is confusing, but it is protecting you from having a bunch of things pointing at something else.

EW (00:05:03):

Oh, so I cannot have two things, three things, ten things pointing at the same structure, and all of them can edit it.

CW (00:05:09):

Right. Right. You can do immutable things. So I can say, "Let A as an immutable, reference to B," and that is okay. But as soon as you make something mutable, like I am going to-

EW (00:05:21):

Changeable.

CW (00:05:22):

Changeable. Then it gets really mad.

EW (00:05:25):

Does it end up making copies of everything?

CW (00:05:29):

No. It changes the ownership. It wants to keep track of who the owner is, and if you have got 16 owners, it cannot really do that very easily. If there is only one owner and it is guaranteed, then at the exit of scope, it can free things. This is my rudimentary understanding.

(00:05:48):

So it will make copies of tiny data types and some things like that. Those will be copied by default. But things that are structs or have pointers within them, like a struct with an associated data buffer, that will be something that is very strict about.

(00:06:06):

I have not had to encounter that much, because this is, again, just algorithms. I am dealing with one buffer, it is iterating through it, doing arithmetic. Very simple stuff. So that is interesting.

(00:06:15):

Things I do not like about Rust, which you have not mentioned. I cannot stand the syntax. I do not know what people were thinking.

EW (00:06:23):

It is funny, I have started- At one time I had started using the language based AND and ORs, and I really liked that. In C, it would be like, "A AND B," and instead of the ampersand or double ampersand for not bitwise, it would be just the word. It is valid, and I loved that. I was just like, "Why do we have so many symbols, when three characters is just not that big a deal?"

CW (00:06:56):

Because in 1979 or whenever or the '80s, terminals were very narrow and text- No, I am not explaining to you, but- My point is, we do not need to do that anymore.

EW (00:07:13):

Yeah. So I was surprised when you said that Rust was very symbolic.

CW (00:07:20):

<sigh> The Swift is similar in some ways. There is just a lot of stuff when you are constructing functions and things. It is mostly the function signatures and stuff. There are just a lot of keywords and- Not keywords. Just symbology and things that have to deal with return values and alias and types.

(00:07:40):

I will get used to it, but I am looking for good suggestions on crash courses, for C programmers who have used Swift.

EW (00:07:53):

Do you have a cheat sheet?

CW (00:07:54):

I have a cheat sheet. Somebody at work did suggest a book that I am looking through.

EW (00:08:00):

What is the book? Do you know the name?

CW (00:08:02):

I do not have my work Slack in front of me, but it was from- It is not a book. It is a website. Hang on just a second. It is opentitan.org made it. It is some open source project that they are doing root of trust chips and stuff. But they had a page. I will find it and put it in the show notes. It is from opentitan.org. It is basically Rust for C developers.

(00:08:28):

That is my very short experience with Rust. It is fine. I am hoping that I can port as much of this wholesale without making a lot of changes, because that would be a big win. Short story is these algorithms run on the backend of our product. I would like to move some of them to the device for various advantages.

EW (00:08:54):

Moving from cloud to edge computing.

CW (00:08:56):

Well. Long story short, there is a lot of stuff to move over Bluetooth. If I could move less stuff over Bluetooth, that would make-

EW (00:09:04):

To reduce communication.

CW (00:09:05):

A million people's lives-

EW (00:09:07):

Improve battery life.

CW (00:09:07):

Okay. Several people's lives easier. But I do not want to maintain it in both places. If there are minimal changes I can make, and somebody makes a change to the algorithm, I can just bring that over. We will see.

(00:09:17):

It is definitely a exploratory project. But I was handed Rust. I had an option between porting the Python, or trying to port the Rust, and since Rust can be compiled and called from C, easier than Python on nRF52840. Yeah.

EW (00:09:37):

Are you going to put it on your résumé?

CW (00:09:40):

Résumé?

EW (00:09:41):

It was the next thing on the list. So this is my attempt at a smooth transition.

CW (00:09:47):

I see.

EW (00:09:48):

Are you ready for it? This is the smooth transition between topics.

CW (00:09:51):

Sure. I would put it on my résumé, as soon as I feel marginally competent with it. And assuming I was ever looking for another job that required me to send a résumé. Résumés!

EW (00:10:05):

I did a résumé review for a relatively senior engineer, and I was a little surprised. I felt like either they had not heard the latest techniques, or... I do not know. I am going to go with that.

CW (00:10:23):

Techniques or things you need to do to be seen by robots?

EW (00:10:32):

Not the robots. The search engine optimization and the robot feeding is definitely separate thing. I do not know that I am good at that, so I could not possibly give advice about it. But my advice did have a lot to do with action verbs on your résumé.

CW (00:10:54):

Okay.

EW (00:10:54):

You know about that, right?

CW (00:10:56):

I guess at some level it sounds right.

EW (00:10:58):

<laugh>

CW (00:10:58):

Look, I took a whole- My last class in grad school was résumé writing. But that was 2009, so I am sure things have changed since then. Do not ask me why I had to take that class. It was required for all graduate students of any subject. I left it to the end, because at the time I thought maybe it would go away and I would not have to do it.

(00:11:19):

So action verbs.

EW (00:11:23):

Okay. When you are writing a résumé, you are writing it from your memory, you are like, "I did this." And then you realize, "Okay, well, people do not say 'I'." So you say, "Wrote driver for..."

CW (00:11:38):

Weirdly passive voices, where you are active but you are not involved anymore.

EW (00:11:41):

Right. Things got done. And because it is on your résumé, you must have done them.

CW (00:11:46):

Yes.

EW (00:11:49):

There are lists provided by CMU and MIT, and all of the big engineering universities. They are online. It is like search "action verb engineering," and you will find several of them.

(00:12:04):

Instead of saying, "I made the data do things," you can go with, "Analyzed data for demystifying robotic movements." Your goal here is to make it sound like you did cool things. Even though you know you did cool things. Even though I may be able to figure out you did cool things, because of the way you talk about them. You want them to make it through the business person filter.

CW (00:12:42):

Okay. So be cool.

EW (00:12:44):

So be cool. And do not- Okay. I know a lot of people are having their AI chatbots write your résumé. I am not going to suggest that is a good idea. I will say it is not a bad place to get it checked for grammar or inconsistencies or typos, because those just kill résumés.

(00:13:04):

Write your own résumé, but use action verbs, and it will help you. It will help you remember what you did.

(00:13:14):

Like, "Is there any time when I dissuaded somebody?" I am looking at CMU's and they have leadership skills, communication skills, technical skills, and teaching skills. Even financial skills. All of these have verbs that are associated with them. "Did I in fact allocate anything? Well, I allocated resources to work on a schedule at least once or twice."

CW (00:13:39):

I allocated memory all the time. No?

EW (00:13:44):

"Remodeled source code," instead of "refactored," because "remodeled-" No, I do not know whether I would use that one.

CW (00:13:51):

"I took the bathroom out. I replaced the toilet." No, "remodeled" does not work.

EW (00:13:57):

"Pioneered a plan to do blah, blah, blah."

CW (00:14:00):

Evangelized.

EW (00:14:02):

Inspired, implemented, improved. These are all better than "led," which is just kind of a not enough description word. So if you are working on your résumé, look up action verbs. They will help you so much. It is just- I do not understand how you got here without knowing about them.

CW (00:14:26):

Got where?

EW (00:14:27):

Well, yeah.

CW (00:14:29):

To the show.

EW (00:14:29):

To the show. <laugh> I will put a couple in the show notes. But whatever your career is, if you want to do marketing, if you want to do managerial tasks, look up action verb and that, so that you get a nice list of words that will make you think about your job from a more erudite?

CW (00:14:56):

Wow.

EW (00:14:57):

From a more wordy, but a descriptive manner.

CW (00:15:03):

Okay.

EW (00:15:03):

It will make you sound cool.

CW (00:15:05):

You want to take the vector of words that makes up your résumé, cause it to shift the point of your résumé in that space of word vectors, to a different outside the origin that people cluster around.

EW (00:15:23):

Part of it is not sounding like other people. But actually part of it is sounding like more professional people.

CW (00:15:30):

But do not sound like an LLM, because 99% of résumés probably sound like an LLM. So good luck with that.

EW (00:15:35):

Yeah, that is a hard problem. It is a little weird to give résumé advice, when I am not actively hiring so I do not know what is out there. And yet the other piece of advice I had for résumés and for interviews, is the STAR method.

CW (00:15:54):

Okay. I have never heard of that.

EW (00:15:59):

Okay. So STAR stands for situation, task, action, result.

CW (00:16:03):

Situation, task, action, result. Okay.

EW (00:16:07):

The idea is instead of passively describing what you did, instead of saying, "I led the team in completing PRs-"

CW (00:16:17):

I get it. You start with the sitch.

EW (00:16:20):

You start with the sitch.

CW (00:16:21):

Here is what was going down.

EW (00:16:23):

Company was not doing PRs because they decided-

CW (00:16:27):

Did not know what one was.

EW (00:16:28):

They did not know what one was. So then you- Situation, and then you have the task. State what you were responsible for doing, or the problem that really needed solving.

CW (00:16:39):

I love this!

EW (00:16:43):

This goes back to the action words. You are-

CW (00:16:45):

You are right.

EW (00:16:46):

You did something. You have a task. What were you really responsible- What was the kernel of the task? And then the next step, "A" for action, is the specific steps you took. This really needs to start with those action verbs.

(00:17:07):

And then finally is the result, which is the positive outcome. Ideally with a number or some way to quantify the impact, which is so impossibly hard in engineering.

CW (00:17:18):

I got five fewer insults a day from people, nearby cube mates.

EW (00:17:26):

I may still have on my résumé- I do not know, I have not seen it in a while. About solving a DC motor puppetry problem-

CW (00:17:37):

<laugh> That is not where I thought that sentence was going.

EW (00:17:41):

With a 25 cents PID system. Even when that was on the second page of my résumé, everyone would ask about it. Because it was just- If you knew about motors, it was impossible. If you did not know about motors, the puppetry aspect was so amusing.

(00:17:59):

One of the things you are doing with your résumé, is you are trying to get people to ask you the questions you want to be asked. You are trying to set them up. You are trying to give them a way to give you the slow pitches, so that you can just hit this out of the park, because you already know what the question is going to be, and you have a great answer for it.

(00:18:23):

The STAR method, even if you do not end up putting all of those things on your résumé or on your performance review or on wherever you are doing this, if you can memorize this situation, task, action, result, it gives you a way to tell a story about what you did.

CW (00:18:45):

One of the reasons I like this is the kinds of questions that I personally do best with, is when an interviewer asks, "Tell me about a time you had a difficult- Tell me about a challenge you overcame." Or, "Tell me about a difficult problem and how you solved it," or something like that, which sets up this.

EW (00:19:05):

Absolutely.

CW (00:19:06):

You naturally would answer using the STAR method a question like that. But thinking about the STAR method, means you can answer questions that are not phrased in that way, which makes it sound better.

(00:19:19):

I do not know. What would somebody ask that was not really, "What is one of your biggest technical challenges you overcame or something?" but you could use the STAR method on?

EW (00:19:32):

"What were the difficulties associated with using Rust in this project?"

CW (00:19:35):

Right. Yeah.

EW (00:19:37):

Or, "What were the benefits of using Rust in this project?" Now you are like, "Okay, the situation was company wanted to use Rust because it existed." That is kind of a boring story, but it is a situation. It is a start to the answer.

CW (00:19:51):

Or that, and then also questions that are very vague, like, "Tell me about your role at X."

EW (00:19:57):

Yes.

CW (00:19:58):

Pick a challenge. "I was a developer and I was responsible for the following things. One of the big challenges we had was blah."

EW (00:20:08):

For example.

CW (00:20:08):

"When I came into the company, this was the situation. Here were the things I did to improve things." Stuff like that.

EW (00:20:16):

"When I came into the company, they had no version control."

CW (00:20:20):

Happens more often than you would like.

EW (00:20:21):

"I was responsible for FAA certification, and I felt like that was not going to work. I implemented..."

CW (00:20:30):

Especially since it was for something that was not for airplanes. I am joking.

EW (00:20:35):

Oh. Sorry.

CW (00:20:37):

FAA certify a LeapFrog toy. No. Kidding.

EW (00:20:41):

But then if I get to the result of it is an FAA product now, then-

CW (00:20:47):

That is impressive.

EW (00:20:50):

That tells the story of we went from no version control to FAA certified. I can leave out a whole bunch of things, because if I manage that much, there must be a whole bunch more.

(00:20:59):

So yes, the STAR method, if you are not familiar with it, it is a great way to work on your résumé. It is a great way to practice interviewing. Like I said, it is even good for when you are doing your self-review for performance reviews. Should you be so lucky as to have those.

(00:21:17):

I will link to it. There are a whole bunch of different people talking about it, people giving examples on how to do it. It is a good process to have, because it is a good storytelling process. And it leaves you a way to anticipate questions, as well as to draw up questions, which I think is more important.

(00:21:39):

Okay. So that was my résumé advice. Was there anything else under that?

CW (00:21:45):

Nope.

EW (00:21:47):

Okay.

CW (00:21:48):

Now you need to find a clever segue into whatever we are going to talk about next.

EW (00:21:52):

We went to our 30th- Oh my God, 30.

CW (00:21:56):

30 month college reunion.

EW (00:21:58):

Sure. Go with that. It is hard to believe it is that. For those of you who think that we are like 20, I am sorry we are not.

CW (00:22:07):

<laugh> I do not think anybody thinks we are 20.

EW (00:22:10):

Kind of wish- Sometimes I act like I am 20. But then my knees remind me that- Even when I was 20, I had crappy knees. Anyway.

CW (00:22:20):

<laugh>

EW (00:22:22):

We went to our college reunion. Did you have fun?

CW (00:22:26):

I did have fun. I was also exhausted at the end of it. But, yeah, it was nice to see some people I do not think we have seen since college.

EW (00:22:37):

Since college. Right.

CW (00:22:39):

Some people we had not seen in a decade or two.

EW (00:22:41):

Right.

CW (00:22:41):

It was interesting to see the school and how much it had changed, and how parts had not changed.

EW (00:22:49):

It has changed so much.

CW (00:22:49):

It is very strange to see the mix of vast changes and stuff that has not changed. Like the dorms look exactly the same. They have the same character, the same individual dorm personality. They had the same- Not the same signs, but the same signs reflecting their character, let us put it that way, outside. Same kind of-

EW (00:23:15):

West still clearly lights everything on fire.

CW (00:23:17):

A sort of esprit de corps. So, yeah. But there was weird stuff. It felt like there was as much drinking in evidence as I remembered, and I thought that had gotten better in colleges. But maybe I was just noticing it more.

EW (00:23:36):

It was the last day of classes.

CW (00:23:37):

Yeah. The facilities way better.

EW (00:23:42):

So much better. The food is so much better.

CW (00:23:45):

Lots of new buildings with- They have a gigantic makerspace. Much better classrooms and offices and things. Remember, this is Harvey Mudd. It was a very small school when we went. I think there were 600 people total in the student body when we went.

EW (00:24:00):

Yeah. I think that is right.

CW (00:24:00):

I think it might be up to 900 or something like that, but it is not- It has expanded some, but it is not like a giant school.

EW (00:24:12):

It also was not the most expensive school in the United States when we went there.

CW (00:24:16):

Yeah, and it is pretty close now. But when we went, the facilities were definitely in transition. We had a couple new buildings happen while we were there. A new dorm, or two? At least one new dorm. And the new sciences building. But that was pretty much it.

(00:24:37):

Since then they have a computer science building, a giant gym and activity center, another big- The Shanahan, is that the math building?

EW (00:24:49):

Yeah, it is the math building.

CW (00:24:51):

Two new dorms beyond the ones that we had. Yeah, so it has expanded quite a bit, and things look modern. Oh, and the new dining hall, which does not suck.

EW (00:25:02):

<laugh> Sorry, we are still bitter about that. They have 905-

CW (00:25:07):

Okay. So they expanded by-

EW (00:25:09):

As of 2021.

CW (00:25:09):

50%.

EW (00:25:10):

So they expanded quite a lot.

CW (00:25:12):

The gender ratio is now no longer five male to one female, and-

EW (00:25:21):

Now it is like fifty-fifty.

CW (00:25:22):

I think it is more women identifying than male. That is 51, 49 or something like that. But anyway, not important. I mean, it is important, but it is not- The exact figure does not matter.

(00:25:34):

Yeah. So we were definitely in a transition where the college was getting old while we were there. Not old, but the facilities it had originally built had started straining.

EW (00:25:47):

Definitely.

CW (00:25:49):

In many of the departments, the original set of professors from the '60s and '70s, were on the verge of retiring or retiring while we were there.

EW (00:25:58):

Yes.

CW (00:25:59):

So the faculty mix was-

EW (00:26:00):

The math and engineering faculty were elderly.

CW (00:26:04):

Yeah. A lot of new math people came in while we were there, and then continued. There were very few professors at our reunion that we recognized. Only one or two, because most had retired at that point. The people who were there, were the new professors while we were there.

(00:26:19):

But yeah, it was good. It was a lot of socialization for people who do not socialize a lot. A lot of loud group events, people shouting because everyone was talking, that kind of thing. But yeah, it was worthwhile. What did you think?

EW (00:26:41):

I thought it was good. I thought it was interesting that I really am averse to crowds now. Before 2020, before the pandemic, I did not like crowds. But I was not "I need to leave now" did not like crowds.

(00:27:04):

Now I am a little more aware that when I get overwhelmed, I get really unhappy. I am more willing to say, "I do not want to be unhappy. There is no reason for me to be doing this. I am going to go over there."

CW (00:27:25):

Yeah.

EW (00:27:26):

You ended up missing things because I was-

CW (00:27:29):

Missing what?

EW (00:27:30):

I wanted to be on the edges of everything.

CW (00:27:33):

I think you are discounting how much I also-

EW (00:27:36):

Oh, that is true.

CW (00:27:36):

Have trouble with crowds. But. Yeah.

EW (00:27:41):

It is kind of embarrassing when you are sitting outside, and-

CW (00:27:45):

Yeah, but it is a hundred decibels and everybody is shouting.

EW (00:27:47):

And people come over and hang out with you, and then you get to this level, and even though everybody came over to our table, we were the first to leave.

CW (00:27:59):

Yeah, but then people would come over to a quiet area. It was fine.

(00:28:01):

Everybody- Like you said, we are not 20. Everybody there is our age or older. Well, except for the younger reunion people. But the people we were hanging out with are our age or older. Everybody gets peculiar and has things that bother them more as they get older. Nobody is judging anybody for that.

EW (00:28:26):

One of the things that I heard from a woman who did not go to Harvey Mudd College, but who is a close friend and was there. Her husband went to Harvey Mudd. She is an MIT Sloan graduate, so she is a MBA.

(00:28:48):

She said something, I think she said it in passing, and then I was like, "What?" Do you remember? Jane said that Harvey Mudd must not have the MBA tag line? I do not know. Commandment?

CW (00:29:09):

Ethos?

EW (00:29:10):

Ethos to always be attractive.

CW (00:29:13):

Oh. Okay. <laugh>

EW (00:29:15):

Do you remember?

CW (00:29:17):

No, I missed that.

EW (00:29:18):

Okay. I was kind of boggled by this. I think we were talking about what people were wearing to the party the night before, because one person was dressed very nicely and the rest of us were-

CW (00:29:33):

That person was not a Mudd student. He was the husband of somebody in our class.

EW (00:29:37):

Exactly. I had a dress on. I even had heels on. I looked cute, but I was not formal. If you had pushed me in the pool, I would not have cared.

CW (00:29:52):

I think you would have cared.

EW (00:29:53):

I would have cared, yes, but I would not have worried about my dress. Anyway, Jane says that there is this idea in business school about always being attractive. For some reason that just really struck me as not something I have ever thought about.

CW (00:30:13):

I thought business school was always be closing. <laugh>

EW (00:30:16):

I thought so too. But as I was thinking more about it, it was not necessarily always be pretty. Because all of the Mudders were hygienic and-

CW (00:30:29):

Well, let us not go that far. Oh, at the reunion. <laugh>

EW (00:30:33):

At the reunion. I remember college just fine, thanks. But everybody was presentable and everybody was wearing nice-ish clothes.

CW (00:30:44):

Yeah.

EW (00:30:45):

But nobody was intentionally being attractive. They were being-

CW (00:30:51):

Normal?

EW (00:30:52):

Normal.

CW (00:30:52):

Okay.

EW (00:30:55):

And then after Jane said that, I started looking for that in some of the other people. Not really in the Mudder, because I knew what to expect there, but in some of the spouses. And I realized that she did not just mean always be pretty.

CW (00:31:11):

Yeah.

EW (00:31:12):

She meant always be attractive, which is not the same as pretty. Attractive is-

CW (00:31:19):

Open.

EW (00:31:20):

Make people want to talk to you.

CW (00:31:22):

Yeah.

EW (00:31:23):

And even that level of attractive is something that I am like, "No!"

CW (00:31:29):

Why would I want that?

EW (00:31:31):

I would not want that.

CW (00:31:31):

I see. I see. But you do want that sometimes.

EW (00:31:34):

I want it sometimes, sure. But for the most part, I am like, "Oh no, talk to the hand, way far away." In fact, do not even get close enough to talk to the hand. I do not-

CW (00:31:47):

She says to 6,000 people.

EW (00:31:49):

I know. I do not usually want to be attractive. It was weird to hear that as advice.

CW (00:32:00):

You do not want to be noticed.

EW (00:32:03):

Occasionally I want to stand out. But when I do not actively want to stand out, I do not want to be noticed.

CW (00:32:10):

Yeah. Okay. I understand.

EW (00:32:16):

Okay. So I had this conversation and it made me think a lot about various things. It was one of those, "Huh. Other people do that?" You are looking at me like I am crazy. Do you not have those times when you are like, "People do that?"

CW (00:32:35):

No. I know people are different and- What is an extrovert to you, if not somebody who wants people to talk to them?

EW (00:32:46):

People who want to go to loud places, and have people talk around them?

CW (00:32:53):

Okay. <laugh> I do not think that is accurate.

EW (00:32:57):

<laugh> People who get energy from being around other people.

CW (00:33:00):

But why do you think that is?

EW (00:33:01):

I did not think it had any- There is so much I do not know.

CW (00:33:05):

You cannot be around other people if you are unattractive, by your definition of attractive. If you are pushing people away as an extrovert, that makes extroversion difficult. It is very difficult to be an extrovert in a vacuum.

EW (00:33:21):

Well, you can still be around other-

CW (00:33:23):

EW (00:33:25):

People. Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, <laugh> ramifications, I did not-

CW (00:33:32):

I think you should read less "Murderbot."

EW (00:33:38):

<laugh> Did you like the new "Murderbot"?

CW (00:33:40):

I enjoyed the new "Murderbot."

EW (00:33:43):

But you did not love it.

CW (00:33:44):

I did not love it. It was good. It was in the- I am not going to put down a "Murderbot" book and turn it away, but I felt like it was half of a story.

EW (00:33:55):

Yeah. I felt like I wanted more. I definitely wanted more.

CW (00:33:58):

It is definitely worth reading. Even if there is no story, just reading through Murderbot's thought processes and how they are dealing with the situations that keep being thrown at them is amusing. On that level, it was great. I felt like the plot was a escort mission in an RPG, with not a lot of substance.

EW (00:34:25):

I thought the end payoff was good, but I wanted more. Murderbot, while the star of the show, still did not play quite enough of a role. It did not really grow.

CW (00:34:45):

It felt a little bit on rails.

EW (00:34:47):

Yeah.

CW (00:34:48):

There were not a lot of choices that they could make. But it was a good story. It was good. It was not super long.

EW (00:34:57):

It would have been hard to drop into, if you did not remember all of it.

CW (00:34:59):

Definitely. Definitely. I had trouble, even having read all the books. I kept asking you, "Who is this person?" and "What happened before?"

EW (00:35:08):

So it was a bit tough. But it was a "Murderbot." I am happy.

CW (00:35:11):

But it is like- I do not know, what is it? The eighth or ninth book in the series? So that is going to happen. You cannot drop into a book series that long and expect to remember everything.

EW (00:35:19):

Not that long and detailed.

CW (00:35:22):

Two things about the reunion before we move on, that I thought were interesting was-Well, interesting. Things that I noticed. Smart kids are still smart.

(00:35:32):

I was worried that there was going to be evidence of brain rot or something from the kids we interacted with, from too much chatbot use or whatever. But they had posters up and they explained them well, and they were not all about chatbots or machine learning.

(00:35:48):

Having said that, walking through the CS department, every single poster in the entire CS department was about large language models. All of them. There is no work being done in CS, as far as I can tell from this evidence of one college CS department, that is not focused on large language models, which I think might be a mistake.

(00:36:17):

We were walking around and there was a professor talking to an alum, and they were talking about transformers in LLMs. Yeah. Big, big hype. Perhaps there is something else out there to research, but not right now. Anyway.

EW (00:36:39):

The always be attractive thing came up again for me as I was giving somebody networking advice. They were going to a conference and were worried about being awkward. Do you have any advice for networking?

(00:36:57):

There is, "Get a podcast. Become very accustomed to interviewing people. Then basically if you are in a networking situation, just interview people. Because at least now you are good at that."

CW (00:37:10):

That is the thing, is do not- This is true of talking to anyone, in a date situation or networking or anything where you are-

EW (00:37:21):

First contact.

CW (00:37:22):

Right. First contact. An alien. Do not make it all about you. Ask people what they are interested in, what they do. Ask follow-up questions, and try to let the conversation- It goes back to the always be attractive thing. Which I really do not like the attractive part, that has too much weight, that does not mean what it means.

(00:37:44):

But most people like talking about themselves, or things they have done that they are proud of. And most people do not like being talked at or being lectured or hearing just about somebody else's stuff, without an invite.

(00:38:04):

So I think that is a general good advice, is get interested in somebody else and let them lead the conversation, so that you can start talking about yourself in a natural way. I think people like to feel like somebody is interested in them.

(00:38:23):

So if you establish a good rapport with somebody who you have just met, then you created a better link for networking, than if you are just going around and saying, "Well, I am going to read my résumé from memory to you. Do you like me?"

EW (00:38:42):

Yes.

CW (00:38:43):

Is that the kind of thing you were thinking about?

EW (00:38:47):

Well, it is part of it. For people who have not been networking, or who are out of the habit of it, or are new college folks, the first thing you need to do-

CW (00:39:03):

Find the places?

EW (00:39:05):

I would not think so. There is a thing called an "elevator pitch."

CW (00:39:10):

Oh, right. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

EW (00:39:13):

And IEEE teaches this. I assume other places do as well. But the idea for an elevator pitch for a startup is, "You have 90 seconds in an elevator with a venture capitalist. How are you going to explain your product?"

CW (00:39:32):

Sorry. I was thinking about that "Captain America" scene, where he is in the elevator with all the people who are trying to kill him. That is all I could think about, with 90 seconds in an elevator with a venture capitalist. But please, do go on.

EW (00:39:47):

<laugh> Okay. The idea is that instead of a product, what you are doing is pitching yourself. So 30 to 90 seconds of summarizing you. For me, "Hi, I am Elecia White. I write embedded software, which is software for things that are not computers."

CW (00:40:07):

That was seven seconds.

EW (00:40:08):

I sometimes will add in podcast, author, whatever. For most people, if they are not in the embedded space, the next question is, "What is software for things that are not computers?" It goes back to invite the question you want. But you going to a conference should have this, and it may be conference specific.

(00:40:33):

If you are going to a Jellyfish Conference, you may not want to talk about your embedded security. Sorry, there was a Jellyfish Conference. I really considered signing up. It is not far, but I have no reason to go. But it is about jellyfish, so I am torn. Anyway, I would not introduce myself that way.

CW (00:40:57):

At the Jellyfish Conference.

EW (00:40:58):

At the Jellyfish Conference. But at a hardware security conference, I might lean into being a host of the podcast where we talk about security and other things.

(00:41:10):

Elevator pitches are practiced. You are not coming up with this on your own, right at the second. You are thinking about it ahead of time. You are saying it two or three times, maybe even seven times if you want to really memorize it. You are thinking about where your hands are, and what your face is doing the whole time.

(00:41:29):

Okay. So now you have memorized this speech. But you are not giving it as a memorized speech. You are trying to make it seem natural.

(00:41:34):

While you are doing this, you have this 30 to 90 seconds to figure out what you are going to ask them. So when somebody says, "Tell me about yourself," you give your elevator speech, and you start thinking about what you are going to ask them. Now, if this sounds like the very start of our shows, there is a reason for that.

(00:41:57):

So you do your elevator pitch. The other thing is it is okay to have canned questions. You do not have to come up with what you are going to ask at the moment. You are going to a conference about jellyfish, write down your top ten questions about jellyfish. You are going to a conference about security, write down your top ten questions about security.

(00:42:21):

You do not necessarily want to rapid fire them, but the things that you might want at either conference is, "Have you gone to any really good talks? What was your favorite talk? What are you looking forward to going to?" You find somebody with a speaker badge, "What are you going to talk about?"

(00:42:44):

Those are all things to have ready, so that you do not have to sit down to lunch with someone and then go, "Crap, what am I supposed to say? Do I know this person?" It is okay if you know them or not. They do not remember if you know them or not. You do not remember if you know them or not. It is all fine.

(00:42:59):

You just say, "Have we met before? You look familiar." And if they say, "I do not think so, " or they say, "I think so, but I do not remember your name." It is all good.

(00:43:05):

Now, if they say, "Yes and we were best friends in high school," then you can feel embarrassed. But anything other than that, you just accept that everybody is at a conference, there are a lot of names and faces going by.

(00:43:20):

So, canned questions, elevator pitches, and then possibly for my own enjoyment, find the outliers. Find the people who are on the edges who cannot stand the noise. I like to believe the wallflowers are interesting.

CW (00:43:37):

Hey, there was the crochet table right next to us at the quiet tent, where the current college students were crocheting while I was crocheting.

EW (00:43:47):

It was pretty cute. And they had big yarn, which made you want big yarn.

CW (00:43:50):

Big yarn. Yeah, big yarn. Got to do some more crocheting.

EW (00:43:55):

Okay. So résumé advice, networking advice. Awards or plastics?

CW (00:44:04):

Plastics. Plastics? Plastics! Oh, right. Plastics. Projects. You have been doing something new with your origami, which involves plastics.

EW (00:44:19):

Right.

CW (00:44:20):

And heat.

EW (00:44:21):

So I make an origami mold.

CW (00:44:25):

What is an origami mold?

EW (00:44:28):

I make a pattern, like the curvy patterns that I like. Then I make two of them, that are as precisely the same as I can make them.

CW (00:44:36):

Okay.

EW (00:44:38):

Now, since I use a computer to generate the pattern and to score it onto paper-

CW (00:44:43):

You can be reproducible.

EW (00:44:45):

It is pretty reproducible. I take these and then I put them in the form I want. Because usually what I want to do is crush them, so that the curves are interesting. Then I spread them out again, which is something really I cringe doing, because you make it all the way you want it to and then you destroy that.

(00:45:09):

Then I put some organza fabric, synthetic fabric, thin-

CW (00:45:15):

Polyester.

EW (00:45:16):

Polyester. But the "organza" means it is very light and looks like silk and you can see through it. It is translucent. The cheap stuff I have is rainbow translucent, so that is kind of cool.

(00:45:27):

So I have my piece of paper and I have it clamped onto something that keeps it straight now, flat. I put the organza down. I add the clamps to the organza. So now the organza is flat onto the paper. I put the other piece of paper on top of that and clamp all three together. So I have paper, organza, paper.

(00:45:55):

Now I make a paper go back to the curvy pattern.

CW (00:46:02):

Okay. So you have crushed it back down.

EW (00:46:03):

So I have crushed it back down and I have highlighted- I have creased all the creases again, which is easy this time because they are all ready to go.

(00:46:11):

Now, I tie it up with fabric or wire or whatever, and chuck it in an oven.

CW (00:46:20):

Chuck it in an oven.

EW (00:46:22):

I am using the garage oven, which is used for soldering stuff, although it is too small. So now I am thinking about getting a larger oven for the garage.

CW (00:46:32):

I thought you figured out that heat gun worked better.

EW (00:46:34):

The heat gun does not work better.

CW (00:46:37):

Oh, okay.

EW (00:46:38):

I have decided the heat gun ones they did not hold.

(00:46:40):

So you put it in the oven for like ten or 20 minutes. 250 degrees, maybe 350 degrees.

CW (00:46:47):

That is a big difference.

EW (00:46:47):

I have not really quite figured out what exactly. It depends on the fabric. It depends on the pattern. But the goal is not to burn things, which I did once.

(00:46:59):

Then you let it cool down, totally let it cool down. That part is very important. And so like the next day, open it up and now the fabric holds the pattern. So this fabric that is super light and very airy and very wobbly, now after you pull it straight or put it in the wind, will jump back like a spring to the wavy pattern that I put it.

CW (00:47:30):

Neat.

EW (00:47:30):

This is called "plissage," which is French for pleating. It is something they do with expensive fabrics. But sometimes they do it with steam instead of heat, for natural fabrics.

CW (00:47:48):

Oh! Oh.

EW (00:47:50):

But a lot of people do it with the synthetic fabrics, because synthetic fabrics then can hold it, as long as you do not like put it in the dryer.

CW (00:47:56):

Okay. Interesting.

EW (00:48:00):

This is thermoforming plastics.

CW (00:48:02):

Yes.

EW (00:48:04):

Thermoforming plastics" sounds so engineery.

CW (00:48:10):

Well, yes.

EW (00:48:12):

But "origami molding organza" sounds so crafty.

CW (00:48:15):

<laugh>

EW (00:48:21):

I did that a few times. I had a really good time with it. Then I tried using the heat gun. Then I kept getting bigger and bigger ideas, until it became clear that I could not actually implement the ideas in my head, because it just required more and more stuff.

(00:48:37):

Anyway. I am working on it. It is fun. It is weird. It means that all the weird patterns I make with origami, as long as I am willing to do two of them, I can then make something else that is weird and cool. But I do not know what I would do with it.

CW (00:48:53):

You do not know what you- There are clothing applications.

EW (00:48:58):

Yeah. I started to make myself a really fancy, weird scarf. But then I realized I would never wear it. Then I started to make you a fancy, weird scarf, then I realized you would never wear it.

(00:49:07):

Really, the only person in this house who would wear that scarf is the dog, and she has already wandered around with some of it in her tail.

CW (00:49:16):

Not intentionally.

EW (00:49:17):

No. Do you have any fun projects?

CW (00:49:22):

I just finished putting a kit together, that I am having fun with. It is hard to explain, but it is a piece of audio gear. Without going into a great deal of detail, analog audio gear for recording, imparts different kinds of character to things you are recording.

(00:49:40):

If you record things perfectly, straight from a clean preamp from the microphone, straight to digital, it tends to sound pretty dead. Then people notice that and they do not know what is wrong. This is why things- There was a whole thing about digital sounding cold in the '80s, and things like that. It is part of it, but not the whole story.

(00:50:02):

But a lot of what makes recorded music sound good are a lot of subtle things. Subtle harmonics and distortions and saturations that happen naturally going through a lot of circuitry that is between the microphone and whatever you are recording on.

EW (00:50:20):

This is not the environment. This is not like recording in a church gives you nice echoes.

CW (00:50:25):

Right. No, it is not the environment.

EW (00:50:26):

This is about the recording gear.

CW (00:50:27):

This is about the recording gear. So there are various things. There are transformers that work traditionally on preamps. There are tubes, which everybody knows imparts-

EW (00:50:38):

Sound warm. I do not know what that means. But I have heard that it sounds very warm.

CW (00:50:43):

What it means is harmonics. Basically, if you are recording a very perfect tone- From a bass guitar, straight out of the bass guitar tends to have a very, pretty pure tone.

(00:50:54):

But as you add harmonics, which are frequencies that are multiples of the main note you are playing, things get more interesting. It feels warmer <laugh>. It sounds more full. It sounds softer. So there are a lot of things like that, without going into great detail.

(00:51:15):

I have some equipment that does things like that. I have some preamps that have transformers in them. The preamps we used to use for the podcast had transformers in them.

EW (00:51:25):

Is it like guitar pedals?

CW (00:51:28):

Not exactly. Yes, similar. But guitar pedals are a much broader category of things, that includes digital and echoes and other stuff like that.

(00:51:36):

Anyway. I got a kit for- I have been getting more analog preamps, so I can record acoustic drums. Because I have been doing some more acoustic drums instead of electronic drums, for the record we are working on. Which is very difficult.

(00:51:50):

It is not that much different to play, but recording acoustic drums is a major pain in the butt. But I have kind of got it dialed in and I am happy with where I am at. But drums in particular really benefit from going through a lot of character inducing gear. Drums straight off the mics, even in a good room, even with a good player, generally sound kind of flat.

EW (00:52:17):

Flappy?

CW (00:52:18):

Not flappy, just there is something missing, body. There is often a lot of compression on drums. Which is an analog procedure usually, but can be simulated in digital. And some EQ and other things that generate character. Because drums are very complex and percussive sound, so when you push electronics hard with loud sounds, interesting things happen that sound kind of cool.

(00:52:45):

Anyway, so I have wanted some gear to impart some character deliberately, beyond just the analog preamps I have that can do some different things. I was doing some research and there are a lot of options out there. There is something called "500 series Lunchboxes," which are these little racks that you can build or buy modules that go in.

(00:53:06):

They are, I do not know, about five inches by five inches. They are a complete piece of equipment. So you can get your Lunchbox that is basically this desktop rack, and make or buy a bunch of modules, and have an analog signal chain that you customize, that has got these blades that go in.

(00:53:25):

They are kind of expensive. You have to buy the Lunchbox, power supply and all that stuff. I did not really want to go that route. But I found this other company that does make 500 series stuff, but they also make standalone rack-mount units. It is called "Do-It-Yourself Recording Engineering," DIYRE.

(00:53:41):

They make a lot of products, from compressors to preamps and other things. But they also have this format they have developed called "The Colour Format," spelled like the British, even though it is a company from Pennsylvania, with a U.

(00:53:57):

It is a preamp that is very clean, but it has little tiny modules that are about the size of an Arduino, maybe a little bigger than an Arduino dev board kind of thing. Those have just the minimum set of electronics to do something characterful.

(00:54:17):

One I have has a transformer and a discrete op-amp. You can push that hard with signal and that does transformer saturation.

(00:54:26):

Another one I have is a little mostly surface mount, very tightly packed analog simulation of a very famous compressor called the 1176 from Universal Audio. That is very cool and fits on a module.

(00:54:45):

Another one I have is just a few transistors and resistors, and it simulates the sound of recording to tape. So it saturates very softly as you push it hard, which is what tape does, which is a desirable thing.

(00:54:56):

But these little modules just pop in and out. So I have got this one U rack-mount thing, you can slide it out and it has got the carriers for each of these modules. They just have an eight pin connector and they snap right out. You can put a different one in, so you can edit your signal chain however you want.

(00:55:15):

They sell a ton of kits for different little modules like this. And they sell the protoboards, and everything is open source. They have the schematics for all of this, and a guide for how to build your own modules.

(00:55:27):

So I also bought a couple of bare protoboards from them. I am looking for circuits that might be fun to build, to do myself and put in this preamp. So that is what I did.

(00:55:37):

It was a very, very big soldering project, hundreds and hundreds of parts that I did not do a great job with. I think I am better at soldering at the end of it. I have done a lot of soldering, but I have never quite gotten great at it. I think I am a little better after doing this.

EW (00:55:52):

Part of it is because you solder a largish project like once, maybe twice, a year. It is hard to retain skills on that.

CW (00:55:59):

Yeah. And there is always a thing where you make one big mistake. I made one big mistake building it, which was there is a daughterboard- It has, I do not know, a two by 18 connector between it and the main board, just pins, the header. I put it on the wrong side of the daughterboards, both of them. And there were three on each daughterboard.

EW (00:56:26):

That is a lot of pins, too.

CW (00:56:27):

It was a lot of unsoldering. I tried our desoldering gun from HAKKO, and it did not work great. It got most of it off, but there was still enough contact with solder that those were not coming off without tearing the pads. And our HAKKO soldering, desoldering is having a problem.

(00:56:44):

So I eventually learned how to properly use solder wick, which was actually what worked. So I got them off, but I had to very carefully clip them- I was a pain and I did damage some of the pads, but ended up not mattering.

(00:56:59):

But worked the first time. I did not make any mistakes in assembly such that something was not working. So I was pretty happy with that. It was fun.

EW (00:57:12):

And you actually used it yesterday.

CW (00:57:14):

Yeah, I used it on bass, some. I am working on the bass part for the song. I routed the bass from my bass preamp through that and dialed up some of the stuff. It sounds pretty cool. I am probably using a bit too much, because it sounds cool! Wow! Look at that. Yeah. I need to get used to it.

EW (00:57:36):

Why cannot you just do this in software, with like a Eurorack?

CW (00:57:40):

Well, first a Eurorack is a different thing.

EW (00:57:43):

That is a music creation tool.

CW (00:57:46):

A Eurorack is that big modular synthesizer, which is also fully analog.

EW (00:57:50):

Well, it is, except you can have digital ones.

CW (00:57:53):

Yeah. But most people do analog with patches and stuff. You mean in software, with plugins in the software?

EW (00:58:03):

Yes.

CW (00:58:04):

"Why cannot you just do this in software?"

EW (00:58:05):

Yes.

CW (00:58:06):

You can. But two things. It is very, very hard to record with that stuff in software, because software has latency. You cannot get away from latency. Even with the best simulation of whatever, it is going to be a few milliseconds, ten milliseconds, whatever. If you are listening to that and your original signal at the same time, does not work.

EW (00:58:28):

Oof. Ow.

CW (00:58:28):

So if you want to record and print with any of this stuff, you cannot basically, without very expensive stuff that may or may not do what you want. So that is one thing. If you want it in the actual signal path, you cannot.

(00:58:45):

Second thing is, I do think it sounds better when it is real. Because there is that wabi-sabi stuff, where things change a little bit. Digital does not do that. You record through this a couple of times, and maybe even in the course of a track, that the temperature changes a little bit and things get a little different. That does not happen in a digital plugin, unless somebody adds in heat-related effects.

(00:59:13):

I do think there are limitations to what analog- But I do use a lot of digital plugins too. It is impossible to buy enough of this stuff, for the number of tracks you need. So, yeah, you are always throwing things that are analog simulations on. But it is also nice to have physical knobs.

(00:59:32):

It is really hard to- The thing about plugins is they all look like the original equipment. I have several 1176 plugins, which is the compressor I was talking about. They all look like an 1176, with the same knobs. You have to grab the knob and turn it with your mouse. It is stupid.

(00:59:49):

I understand what they are going for. They want you to be able to take any setting you had on a real asset 1176, and put it on. But it is just clunky and it is weird. But just grabbing a knob and turning it, is still much more satisfying.

(01:00:02):

And it is fun. It is more fun to be putting your signal through a board that you built, than something you bought on sale for $20 from somebody's website. I do not know.

EW (01:00:15):

Are you going to put any- No, because we would be using it now, if you were going to do it.

CW (01:00:20):

No, there is no need for that, for this.

EW (01:00:23):

But what if I wanted to sound like I was on tape?

CW (01:00:26):

I can put you through a tape sim.

EW (01:00:30):

But then it will not get warm.

CW (01:00:32):

You are already through a simulator of an analog compressor.

EW (01:00:35):

Oh, good. I have always wanted to be compressed.

CW (01:00:38):

Well, you do want to be compressed.

EW (01:00:42):

<laugh> Someday we should talk about your chain for us.

(01:00:44):

CW (01:00:46):

Chain for us has gotten very simple, because I divested my music gear from the podcast gear.

EW (01:00:53):

Do we sound different?

CW (01:00:55):

Not really. Not much. A little bit, probably. I do not know that anybody has noticed. But we are not going through the expensive mic preamp anymore.

EW (01:01:02):

All right. So I only have one more thing.

CW (01:01:03):

Okay.

EW (01:01:06):

I wanted to have an award for the show, this show that you are listening to, that you are talking to. So I made a New Year's resolution that I would apply for an award every month, until I got one.

CW (01:01:20):

<laugh> Okay.

EW (01:01:23):

And, I did!

CW (01:01:25):

EW (01:01:26):

That is right. <musical note> We got an Communicator Award, which is to recognize excellence, effectiveness, and innovation across all areas of communication. It is about setting the standard for impactful communication and blah, blah, blah.

CW (01:01:50):

Okay.

EW (01:01:52):

We won it for the giraffe episode.

CW (01:01:57):

Of course. Which was a great episode.

EW (01:01:59):

It was a great episode. This was where Akiba and Meredith talked about the landscape of fear and I put it in the science category. So it is Individual Episodes - Science & Technology, Distinction for 2026 which is second place, which is still really good. So yeah. It was cool. And now I have won an award, and we are an award-winning podcast.

CW (01:02:31):

Congratulations. Do you feel different?

EW (01:02:34):

We were also nominated for the IEEE Educational Activities Board, Meritorious Achievement Award in Outreach and Informal Education.

CW (01:02:43):

Wow!

EW (01:02:44):

That is going to look great on a trophy-

CW (01:02:45):

<laugh> A trophy?

EW (01:02:47):

Which recognizes folks who volunteer their time and effort to improve the informal education community, helping to promote engineering to students, parents, and the general public.

(01:02:58):

This one was harder. Where the Communication Award is one of many awards where you pay your hundreds of dollars, and then you probably get an award.

CW (01:03:12):

Okay.

EW (01:03:12):

Unless you totally suck. I should not say it, because I did apply to other awards, which we did not get. So anyway.

(01:03:19):

The IEEE Award, we had to be nominated, which Mark did, after I gave up on the process because it was too hard. Then we had to be endorsed by IEEE members, which several folks did.

(01:03:38):

Thinking about it, I do not care if I win. I truly am honored to be nominated. It was both Chris and me, but Chris does not care as much. Because a lot of people put time and effort into telling folks that the show was good.

(01:03:58):

I know that those people often put in some time and effort to telling other people the show is good. I really appreciate that. It is amazing to me that you listen. It is even more amazing to me that you are willing to tell other people that you listen.

(01:04:16):

So I am not going to continue to apply for awards, except for one in August. Which is the AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award, which is one that is juried and not super expensive and not a popularity contest. This one is actually pretty cool. It would be nice if we even ranked at all on that one.

(01:04:42):

But I have fulfilled my goal of getting an award, and I have fulfilled my goal of feeling like people like us.

CW (01:04:52):

Mm-hmm. <laugh>

EW (01:04:52):

So that is it. I am done.

CW (01:04:58):

All right.

EW (01:04:59):

I mean, I am not done with the show.

CW (01:05:00):

Oh. Are you done wth this show?

EW (01:05:04):

Yes. Let us be done with this <laugh> show.

CW (01:05:06):

Okay <laugh>.

EW (01:05:09):

<sigh> Thank you for listening. Thank you to the folks who nominated and endorsed us for the IEEE EAB Award. Thank you to our Patreon supporters. We do appreciate your funding, primarily because it means you really like us. Also, the Ko-fi supporters. You are not second class.

(01:05:32):

Thank you to the Embedded.fm Slack for their community and amusement value. And thank Christopher for producing and co-hosting and all the other things he does. And now there will be some "Winnie the Pooh." I seem to call it was very exciting last time. All right. Right.

(01:05:53):

[Winnie the Pooh excerpt]