Brett Cannon - Core Python, Fountain Pens
Cool. We're recording with Brett Cannon. So, Brett, thanks for, joining the show.
Brett:Thanks for having me, Brian.
Brian:You're involved with Python so much, but it's changed recently. I mean, you you do so much for Python. But are you are you no longer on the steering people?
Brett:I am still on the steering council, but I am serving my last year. So I will be on until the end of this calendar year, end of 2023.
Brian:And I'm,
Brett:choosing not to run again because I when we were setting this all up, I thought we should have term limits, and we didn't set them up. And at the time when we were discussing this, I I said I thought people should have, like, 5, maybe 10 year term limits, and I'm hitting your this is my 5th year on the council, so I just I'm following through with my own promise and thoughts on the topic and stepping down.
Brian:Okay. Is that how much free time is that gonna give you, or will it give you any extra free time?
Brett:No. It will. We meet for hour and a half every week, plus homework, plus having to keep up with conversations and stuff in that regard versus maybe getting to be a bit more blase about certain topics. Like, yeah, I really don't have to care because that's not gonna come onto my plate. I don't need to express an opinion kind of thing.
Brett:So, no, it'll definitely free up a couple hours a week.
Brian:Cool. One of the reasons why I'm I'm really excited to have you on the show is because of the focus on community, and, you've been a big part of the Python community for me and for a lot of people.
Brett:Oh, thanks.
Brian:But, there's this quote that I think came from you. Is that Mhmm. Is the, it came from the language, state for the community. That about it. Is that from you?
Brett:Yeah. So the story behind that quote was I came up with it spontaneously on stage at PyCon when it was held in Montreal, Quebec. I was asked Diana Clark asked me to do the opening, remarks for the conference. You know, the whole, we have a code of conduct, abide by it, here's what's happening over the next couple days kinda opener. She just didn't wanna do it, so she asked me if I was willing to as a fellow Canadian.
Brett:So I said, sure. So I did it, and I ended with 10 minutes left to spare. So I took that opportunity to thank the community for everything they do and everything, and I quote that quote on the spot. I have actually subsequently found out Fernando Perez, also apparently had a similar quote at some point in some talk somewhere. But I didn't know about it at the time.
Brett:He told me later years later, like, oh, by the way, I happen to have actually said something somewhere, like, in 9 like, I can't remember what year. And he said, but, totally, it's it's your thing. You came up with it on your own. I love the fact that people have latched onto that, comment. So, yeah.
Brett:No. I came up with it, yeah, randomly on the spot, and thank goodness it turned out to be a good quote because that's not the one everyone keeps quoting, not some of my stupid quotes I may come up with over the years. The
Brian:so this was this was not that long ago, maybe 6 years ago or something. Or, when was Quebec?
Brett:Quebec would have been was Quebec just before Portland?
Brian:I don't remember. I jumped on in Portland. So
Brett:Yeah. So I think I think Quebec was before Portland, and Portland was 17th. So would this have been 13, 14?
Brian:So about that get it go? Maybe a little less. Okay. But you you were already, like, well in the community. You're you're part of the community.
Brian:So is that, like, true was that quote, that sort of, an idea true for you? Did you do you think you came for the language and stayed for the community, or is that just what you observe other people do?
Brett:No. No. It's totally true for me. So I got involved with pie I learned Python, the fall of 2000, and then I subscribed to the Python dev mailing list in June of 2002. And then I made my first commit April 18, 2000 3 as a core developer.
Brett:And so at that point, I'd already been involved for a decade, and I already, had been I'd already made a big contribution. Right? Like, at that point, I had already done import lib in the whole import thing, so I'd already had that big thing I'm known for code wise done. I had already finished my PhD at that point, and I was working. So I was already past the whole tons of free time to actually contribute as much as I used to.
Brett:Right? Because as a grad student, I had plenty of free time. So I was able to kinda finagle some of my research back into Python and do school assignments around Python and all that stuff and just flat out having more free time. So at that point, I'd already gotten to the point where what I was getting out from the language itself wasn't the technical learnings like I was when I first joined. Right?
Brett:Because when I first joined, there was a lot of just, like, how to develop code, how to work in a team, all this all the things you talk about when you that you learn when you join an open source project and get involved had already happened for me. I had already done all that. So at that point, the reason I was sticking around was honestly for the people, and it still continues to be true to this day. Right? Like, I'm motivated to try to make Python better because, a, it helps the people who I've come to consider friends', lives better and also just the general world out there in terms of people in the community, the scientists and stuff who are trying to fight climate change or make massive discoveries in physics or all these people who are doing, like, good work, right, just with this and not just for money, although that's totally fine too because lord knows I gotta get paid too and pay my bills.
Brett:But just that kind of stuff. Right? It's it's really is, for me, about the community at this point because it's not it's not as much about the technical learnings as much as it is about just effectively helping people out.
Brian:Well, you also, you do help a lot of people out, and you also give a lot of time, give your own time to people like me on podcasts and stuff. But you also so you one of the I wanna, I guess, appoint people to a couple other podcasts. You were on the Change Like recently. Mhmm. And that was an excellent, discussion.
Brian:And they kinda you discussed some of your past there too. Mhmm. And then there was some other I I wish I I would've looked this up. I should've wrote it down. You're on something else recently too, weren't you?
Brett:Oh, I was on, DjangoTalk.
Brian:That's it. Yeah. The Django
Brett:chat. The Django chat. Sorry.
Brian:That was actually I really I I guess I I would I'd encourage people to go, listen to both the changelog interview with you and the Django chat. Those are really great. I I thought they were great discussions. And, I guess I I think I've shared this before, but I'm gonna share a story. I knew you as, like, one of the Python gods, essentially, when I came in, when I started paying attention to the community.
Brian:So I've been using Python since, like, 2,000 ish, maybe 2,001, 2,002. But I didn't really jump into the community too much until I started getting involved with the the podcasting and stuff and blogging. I guess blogging would give it a start, but that was more like 2,021,011 or something like that. Mhmm. And, but and then I started doing public speaking, trying my hand at it.
Brian:And my first that I spoke at, I was nervous as get I'll get out, and it didn't go as planned. And I don't think it went that well. That's been with Paul. Right? Well, supposedly with Paul, but he didn't show up and was supposed to be, yeah, Paul Everett and myself.
Brian:And, in about an hour before, he said, Yeah. You were gonna do the talk, and I was gonna do the demo, but you're just doing it all right now because I didn't have time to practice the demo. And I'm like, it's all good, but it's probably not gonna go well. And, you know, excuses, technical issues, or whatever, trying to just like I was flustered with just trying to switch between, like, the console and the and the everything and the the, oh, Zoom pie chart. The pie chart window and the and the slides going back and forth that didn't work that well.
Brian:And then also the res the resolution of the pie chart was so awful on the screen that it couldn't see anything. But, oh, well, I should have put it all in slides instead. But in either way, I got off, and, like and then later, I I I, attended a talk, that you gave. You gave, like, one of the closing keynotes or I don't know. One of the keynotes, what were you talking about?
Brian:I think you were talking about burnout or something.
Brett:Yeah. So that would have been Cleveland then when I was giving one of the opening keynotes, I think, on a well, like, Saturday about contributions to open source. And, yeah, it it focused around burnout and just how to treat each other nicely to actually keep this whole open source thing going. You know?
Brian:Well, I just love the talk, so I stuck around to try to just say, hey. I like the talk. And you walked up to me and said, hey, Brian. And I was like, oh my god. Brett knows my name.
Brian:And then, also, you gave me positive feedback on the talk even though I know it was a crash and burn. But that encouragement of, just encouraging people to speak, public speak, because that's something that we're not as nerds, a lot of us aren't used to doing. So I guess thanks for for lying to me and telling me it was a good talk.
Brett:No. I mean, actually, I do remember that because I think we ran into each other Sunday during the poster session the next day, if I remember correctly.
Brian:I think so.
Brett:Yeah. So I actually do remember that. Yeah. I mean, I've been there. Right?
Brett:Like, I've been lucky enough to have spoken at PyCon US many times, and I've had talks rejected, just to be clear. I do not always get my talks in regardless of who people think I am. So, f y, never feel bad if you get a talk rejected. But I have had that stage right and the problems and all that, and I've lived through it. And it's one of those things where it takes time.
Brett:Right? It took me years to deal with the bulk of my stage fright when talking in a room, and I still get it. Right? Like, effectively, unless I've given the talk at least once already publicly, I have I I'm nervous up there. It might not always come through.
Brett:But as a good example, for instance, I gave a talk about Cascades this year, and I was nervous. And I don't know if it shows through. I hope it didn't, but it's one of those you never quite know how the timing's gonna go, or is slide gonna make sense, or just kinda where things might trip up. And it's just the the demo gods might not play in your favor, and same thing with the talk gods and whatever. And, I mean, the only time I didn't feel nervous giving that talk was when I gave up PyCon US because I'd already given the talk live.
Brett:I already knew what slides I tripped up on and what slides people didn't find clear enough. And I'd already gotten feedback from that talk from many people. Thank you to those who gave that to me as well. And I just know that it's also really hard to know objectively why you've given a talk, what went well, and what didn't. Right?
Brett:Because it's another one of these things where I've given talks where I feel like every little joke I made landed flat. And then afterwards, I have people come and say, oh, that was so funny. It's like, really? I didn't no one's lap. Exactly.
Brett:Right? And it's one of those things where you think all that talk must have gone over horribly, and everyone was like, no. I loved it or what have you. And so I also just realized that, I mean, giving feedback is just something that's just helpful. And it's a small small gesture, and it's a small thing, and you don't have to be rude about it when you do it.
Brett:But everyone, I think, typically wants to improve and do better. And as long as you can deliver that feedback in a constructive, caring way, it's helpful. And so I recommend you, and it just is like, hey. I you said at the start of your talk. This is your first talk.
Brett:It's like, well, I've been there, and I know feedback is important, and it's hard to get. And so I wanted to offer that to you and give it to you and just, like, good good going. Good it's hard enough just to get up on that stage. Like, that's helped. So many I talked to be accepted is step 1.
Brett:Step 2 is getting to the conference and giving it. And then step 3 is just learning from the experience so you can repeat again next year. So
Brian:That's awesome. The I I wanna talk about a bunch of other stuff, but I, I think it's a cool time to throw in, some some tips about public speaking that I've learned over the last few years, handful of years, that I've learned from other people. From Hinnick, he's given some great advice. The advice I got from Hinnick really was practice it a lot. Like, the just practice your talk a lot, like, the whole thing out loud, standing up, and, and so it and then also, give it to several people.
Brian:So, like, I think pike my talk at pike cascades, talk there also. It was probably the best time I've ever had, and I think it went really well because I'd given it publicly for 3 times already.
Brett:Oh, nice.
Brian:And It did go well, by the way. And I practiced it, like, a 100 times. I just it was a short talk, and I just I'm like, it's worth it. I'm just gonna practice it a lot. And I probably practiced it even, like, 5 times that day in the morning.
Brian:So, anyway and that's not and, also, the other thing, the other advice I got from somebody was you don't have to come up with a new talk for every conference. You can you can sub you get get a good idea and give it locally, maybe at a local meetup. And then if it goes well, submit this pretty much the same talk to Python. Why not? So I'd tweak it maybe.
Brian:But
Brett:Yeah. And to back up both of those points, I can't remember their name, but the author of the blog, Wait But Why, gave a TED talk once and effectively said what you said. Like, his whole talk was about how to give talks and kinda how he screwed up his talk and changed it last minute, but very much about the repetitiveness of it really helps with your cadence and your pacing and really helps just deal with the nerves because at that point, it's a recital. Right? It's Yeah.
Brett:Because, otherwise, the nervousness typically comes from where am I going to mess up. But if you've more or less memorized it like it's a one person play, it goes away because at that point, you're just literally just repeating the words you've memorized at a certain pace and tone, but that's it. There's no, oh, is this going to work or not? Is this am I gonna make my time? It's like you've literally practiced it so much, those nerves go away.
Brett:So if you can do that, that's obviously fantastic. About giving it to multiple audiences too, I remember when Python US actually had to switch to telling people, hey. Sorry. We couldn't have, accept your talk, but do give it to a smaller give it somewhere else. And I do think that actually works really well for the nervousness to go from a small audience to the bigger audiences.
Brett:Right? As you said, like, give it to your friends, give it to your coworkers. Right? So giving at work, giving it to your local meetup group or whatever, giving it then at your regional Python conference, and then going to one of the big international ones like EuroPython or Python US and kind of working your way up such that you've had that practice, but also giving it to smaller audiences. So everyone benefits, And, honestly, most of those conferences are totally happy to take talks you've given previously because they were at a smaller audience.
Brett:It's it'd probably be a little different if you went from PyCon US down to your regional because there's a much bigger chance people have seen that video. But going small up, I've historically not found conferences having a problem with having you give a talk you've already given somewhere else.
Brian:Yeah. Anyway, it's I think it's fun, and I also I think it's fun to give a talk, and, also, it's a it's a it's a growing experience. The other Yeah. Okay. The the last bit was when I first started talking, I thought I'm never gonna get asked again, so I'm gonna try to instill every bit of information that I know.
Brian:Yeah. That's not that's that's not a good strategy. Yeah. Folk focus is, focus on something small and narrow is way easier. And then the last bit for me, at least, is don't do demos.
Brett:The one thing I will add to this is try to stay calm by believing that you are the expert at your talk. That helped a lot for me is I would always go into these talks going, oh, man, or oh, jeez. Is someone gonna trip me up in the q and a or something like that? Which is why I always loved it when podcast case, did away with q and a's public q and a's, and you get private q and a's. But I basically started to go into talks going like, well, okay.
Brett:I'm the one giving this talk. No one knows the content of this talk as well as I do because literally no one else wrote this talk, so I know what's in it and what's not. And it's always okay to say you don't know because guess what? Chances are the vast majority of people in that room don't know. And even if someone comes up in the q and a and gives the answer kind of q and a where they're just seeming to kind of just boast or trip you up, which thankfully doesn't happen too much, you can always just go, oh, okay.
Brett:Thanks. Or, I didn't know that. Or, Let's talk afterwards. Right? It's always okay.
Brett:It's okay to show your ignorance or your lack of knowledge. It it's just we all have lack of knowledge. There's always some gap. You're not expected to be perfect, so it's okay to do that. And when you and I found for myself, at least, it took a lot of stress off when because then I don't feel like, oh my oh, did I prepare enough?
Brett:Do I know enough? Am I gonna handle all the questions? Like, no. Probably not, but that's fine. It's not a big deal.
Brett:So that helped me a lot.
Brian:It's also okay to get feedback and learn
Brett:Oh, yeah.
Brian:After a talk. Like, the so when I, talk at, like, cascades, it it was just, like, filmed at that one. And so that then then other people got to watch it. And then I got contacted by the talk one of the talks maintainers and said I had a problem with the talks configuration. I'm like, thanks.
Brian:It's not a problem. Just like something in talks 3 you had to say, you had to specify that it was, like, a a different kind of build to do a project build. Mhmm. But I can't remember the keyword now, but it's not necessary in talks 4. I'm like, oh, okay.
Brian:Cool. I didn't know that.
Brett:Yeah. I had the same thing with my talk. I got a bunch of feedback from people afterwards because my my talk was on Python Syntactic Sugar, and I said, oh, I don't think I can I can get rid of this syntax? And people come up to me and say, actually, I think you can. And they gave me some ideas, and I went back.
Brett:I was actually able to write more blog posts on that whole series and then tweak it and then have a even better talk at Picon US because I was able to have even more of the problem solved and be a little bit more prepped. So, yeah, paid off.
Brian:And then bringing those skills back to work, I, like, don't worry at all about speaking in public at work. I used to. Like, even, like, 10 people or something, I'd get I'd be nervous to get up and talk in front of a a meeting room. And now it's like, if I can talk in front of a cup a few hundred people at a conference, then talking it to 10 people is no big deal at all. Yep.
Brian:So
Brett:Yep. Exactly. Like, when you've talked in front of an audience of 1,000, like you easily can at PyCon, talking in the middle of a meeting to some people to really stop stressing. Like, I Yeah.
Brian:I used I used to be one of those guys that would like, I have no problem taking over a meeting from the sidelines. To stand up and like, oh, that's wrong, and then, you know, go around and I wasn't that bad. But, but if I'm the one actually starting the meeting or the the discussion, I would be nervous for some reason, but that's all gone now. Yeah. So I think that's one of the benefits of, trying to do a public speaking is because private speaking is that much easier.
Brian:But Yeah. Anyway. On a different note, I don't know. So there's a lot of history of, like, how you got into Python and stuff, and that's why one of the reasons why I'm gonna point people to those other podcasts because you cover that, and if people don't know it already. Plus, they're interesting questions.
Brian:But, what do you do? Like, you live up in Canada and stuff. Like, I can't remember why you're in Canada. You were you born there? Or Yeah.
Brett:Yeah. So I was actually born here, in in Vancouver, and, I was born to American parents. And then, before I turned about 1, we moved back down into down to Washington state, Bellevue, Washington, technically. And then I basically grew up between I was in Washington state for a while and then as a kid, and then we moved down to various suburbs of Los Angeles, all the way through junior college and went to Pasadena City College. And then, yeah, and then Bay Area for my bachelor's at Berkeley and then, Central Coast, California, where I went to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo for my master's and then back to Canada for my PhD, because my supervisor at Cal Poly, had suggested, oh, why don't you try applying to Canadian schools?
Brett:I know you're Canadian. I'm like, okay. Sure. Sure. Why not?
Brett:I'll give it a shot. So I did, and lo and behold, I got in, and it turned out actually a friend of his from his PhD days was a professor at UBC and, actually became my, PhD supervisor. And then I met my wife while I was here. We tried to move back down to the States for a bit when I got my, job at Google, but, US immigration decided to lose her paperwork. And we
Brian:Oh, yeah.
Brett:That point yeah. And the green card application we did required her to stay here. So we did that, and we'd been there separated right after getting married for, like, 5, 6 months. And we're just like, why are we doing this to ourselves? We're both Canadian.
Brett:We don't need to do any weird integration stuff. So Google had a office in, Kitchener, Ontario. So we just moved out there for 4 years, and then decided, no. We want the West Coast lifestyle, and that meant moving to Vancouver. So moved out here, and that's when I also started Microsoft.
Brian:Okay. I didn't know Google didn't I would assume would have assumed Google had something in Vancouver also. But
Brett:No. It never happened. They came up and looked, but didn't decided not to. Most honestly back then, I left Google in 2015. Back then, a lot of the offices were due to acquisition, and they just never acquired a Vancouver company.
Brett:So it just didn't happen. And Google didn't do remote back then except in very extraneous circumstances, and I did not qualify as extraneous for that. So I had to leave when I moved out here.
Brian:So, okay. So you're you're coding a lot. You're helping out. You live in Canada. So my, in it, I'm gonna have to be respectful because my, I grew up in the eighties, so Bob and Doug McKenzie just hopped into my head whenever I think about Canada.
Brian:I still don't know what back bacon is, but
Brett:Oh, Canadian bacon?
Brian:Is that what is that the same? Same thing. Okay.
Brett:There it is. It's just back bacon's Canadian bacon. It just depends on where you are, whether they bother to label it Canadian or back bacon.
Brian:What are the is that, like, the the the Egg McMuffin at McDonald's has got back back bacon on it in Canada?
Brett:I honestly don't know. I mean, obviously, it's what you typically end up with on your pizza, but,
Brian:Oh, that okay. Got it. Yeah. No. I don't eat red meat anymore, so that's that's not an issue.
Brian:But, anyway, and I also don't really know what a 2 kit, but
Brett:It's a beanie. Really? Yep.
Brian:Is that something that's common in Canada or just a joke in the eighties?
Brett:No. No. We all for those of you who don't know, Canada is, north, as it were, and even the so funny enough, a large proportion of the Canadian population actually lives below the 49th parallel, because so much of the Canadian population lives in the Greater Toronto area, which is actually parallel to Portland, I think, roughly, maybe Salem. So it's actually surprisingly far south, but it gets frigid out there. And even so Vancouver and, Victoria, BC, which is the capital of British Columbia of BC, we have, like, some of the mildest weather in terms of winters, and it still gets below 0.
Brett:Right? And our our highs and lows in winter, before climate change, were typically, like, lows of 2 and highs of 5 in the winter. And so just everyone the vast majority of people just have toques or beanies just to keep your head warm because it's just perpetually cold in the winter.
Brian:So it's just
Brett:everyone's got a hat.
Brian:I even had to look that up. I didn't really know what a beanie was.
Brett:It's a knitted it's a knitted cap.
Brian:Just a just a stock cap. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
Brett:It's nothing fancy. It's just we happen to have our own term for it compared to you all down south. Just like we just like like nationally, we call it pop. But down down south in the US, you all have different terms based on what region you live in, whether you call it soda, soda pop, Coke. Right?
Brett:Like, in the south. Yeah. And we even Well Pepsi, so called any dark any dark pop, you just call Coke. Right? It's just we've naturally just decided pop is the term.
Brett:You sometimes see soda pop, but it's typically just pop.
Brian:Well, that's kinda what I grew up with. And I so I grew up in the eastern eastern Washington and think so or pop was common then at the time. But Mhmm. There was a place called pop shop that would, Yep. You could take your your bottles back to, or something, I think.
Brett:I think pop shop is actually now the name of a actual pop making company up here, at least.
Brian:Anyway, but okay. So the temperatures are pretty mild ish. They're probably similar to Portland, not a little colder probably.
Brett:It's pretty darn close. Like, when we've all had the massive heat waves, actually, Portland's typically been hotter than we are, by a degree I'm talking Celsius, but by a degree or 2. Like, when there's snow, I think, typically, there's a good chance at least Seattle will end up with snow as well. Whether or not Portland's gonna get hit quite the same, I don't know. But, yeah, it's it's pretty mild.
Brian:So what do you what do you do in your free time, other than code more coding? More coding.
Brett:Yeah. I mean, that's that's the problem with, open source is when it becomes a habit, it ends up becoming your hobby. A habit, actually, my wife Andrea and I picked up over the pandemic was during the spring summer months when it stays light out because, once again, Vancouver is near the 49th parallel. So in, summer, at its peak, like, sunset, it's past, 21:30. So we're talking, like, daylight past, 10 PM or 22100.
Brett:So you easily go out for a a walk at night at any point and still have plenty of light to get around. So we got in the habit of almost every day after work driving to a different park in town, and then parking the car by the park and just wandering the neighborhood for, like, an hour or so, trying to get in at least 3 kilometers, which is roughly 2 miles of walking every day. Nice. And we're very lucky, living here because, Vancouver's across the water from North Vancouver and West Vancouver, whose names are a little wonky when you think about the fact that West Vancouver is west of North Vancouver. There's there's no South Vancouver, and East Vancouver is just a labeled neighborhood of Vancouver itself.
Brian:Anyway Oh, no. North Vancouver and West Vancouver are different towns?
Brett:Yes. So if you ever come to Vancouver, we have a bridge called Lions Gate Bridge, which actually Lions Gate, Film, the production company is actually named after that bridge. So when you go across Lions Gate Bridge, everything west of that bridge is West Vancouver, and everything east of that bridge is North Vancouver. But it gets even worse too, because North Vancouver, there's the district of North Vancouver and the city of Vancouver, which are two different things. Although, you ask locals who do not live in North Vancouver, and it's just North Vancouver.
Brett:No one cares about that technical, political, bureaucratic difference, but it obviously matters when you live over there based on what services you get and who provides it and all that stuff.
Brian:But,
Brett:yeah, those little weird things. But, yeah, we're really lucky because we're right up against the mountains here. So we have great hiking trails as well, so it's easy to go for hikes over in North Van and West Van. We've got plenty of parks here, I mean, being Pacific Northwest, lots of trees and stuff. So, yeah, I mean, going for walks is the default thing to do when we just wanna get outside and just go do something.
Brian:Any skiing or snowboarding? I skied
Brett:when I was a kid, up until roughly my father broke a bone in his arm when we were skiing once, and so he stopped skiing. So it demotivated him to wanna take a skiing because this was back when I lived in LA. So we had to go up to the San Bernardino Mountains, which was, like, 2, 2 and a half hour drive away to get to the snow. And it was never great snow. It was a fine it was, I mean, it was Los Angeles.
Brett:Right? So there was at least snow. So I did ski as a kid. But funny enough, when I moved here, since I moved back here from my PhD back in 2000, I think I've only gone skiing once. I will admit, though, we have started to try to get do snowshoeing during the winter here because that's easy to drive to.
Brett:It doesn't require coordinating ski rental equipment for anyone, anything like that. There's less risk of anyone breaking anything, and it's still a great workout, and you get to enjoy the scenery as you're going for the walk. So I'm going to do more of that. Cool.
Brian:But every year, Costco gets it, gets them in. And I'm like, how many people in Portland really need snowshoes? But I mean, we have Mount Hood, but, you know.
Brett:Yeah. I mean, we're kinda lucky here. Right? Because we have multiple mountains with multiple ski resorts, and the ski almost all the ski resorts have a snowshoe trail somewhere. Yeah.
Brett:Like, you can go to, like, if you go to Mount Seymour over here, they have, actually multiple trails, which is great. Cypress has a couple. There are just multiple places you can go to very easily, and they're all reachable by public transit or by a bus from the ski resort, so getting up there is real, real easy. Yeah. I'm on skid.
Brett:That's pretty cheap.
Brian:I really enjoyed cross country skiing, the the one time I did it, probably 20 years ago. Anyway, now the other thing that I wanted to ask you about, I guess, you you've your degree is in philosophy. Right?
Brett:My bachelor's is in philosophy, and my master's and my PhD are in computer science.
Brian:Okay. Does do you think that the philosophy affected your career or your attitude towards open source or anything? Or is that just completely separate?
Brett:It's a good question. It's I mean, it definitely helped just because you have to learn how to think logically. Right? Like, like, when I told people I was when I was getting my bachelor's, lots of people are asking, well, what are you gonna do with that? I was like, oh, I'm going to grad school in computer in computer science.
Brett:Like, where's the connection? Like, well, symbolic logic I mean, this is back when people barely knew what software was. Right?
Brian:Yeah.
Brett:Back in the early 2000s. So it was one of these things where, yeah, symbolic logic alone and just having to think logically about large systems and thinking large systems and breaking them down into smaller constituent parts. Right? Or thinking about little little constituent parts of something of a thing and then building up a larger argument. Right?
Brett:Right? It all kinda plays into software. Right? Whether you're trying to take the big problem you're trying to solve and break it down into the functions, the classes, and whatever you wanna do to solve it. Or what are the tools I have available to me, and having that spark of inspiration.
Brett:Like, oh, you know what? If I plug all this together, it allows me to do this thing and have this bigger outcome. So it definitely helped with that. I sis
Brian:I I I don't get how that how that's part of philosophy at all. Maybe I I just don't have enough philosophy background.
Brett:Well, so the thing about philosophy, right, is kind of the way to think about philosophy is philosophy is anything that isn't that isn't in the sciences because it's not solved yet. Right? So it varies, from obviously ethics and metaphysics and epistemology, but political science, political philosophy as well and other things where it's just like we don't have a known answer to it, and so ends up a philosopher. I mean, this is why scientists were originally called philosophers. And the deal is is you kinda have to tackle philosophy depending on what you're trying to tackle from different angles.
Brett:Right? Like, if you're trying to prove the existence of God, like, to take a big dramatic example. Well, how do you do that? Well, you gotta work backwards. Right?
Brett:You gotta work down to smaller and smaller stuff. So, like, I believe it was, see Thomas Aquinas, for instance, has a famous statement's true or false, and that's where his whole logic breaks down, but otherwise, it's the logical statements you just can't argue with. So from that perspective, right, that's that's going, like, how do I make this happen? You know, breaking down into small parts. Another part is just the usual just sitting there, just contemplating the world, and thinking about it and just realizing, oh, well, you know, with this thing and this thing, well, this suddenly leads to this outcome.
Brett:Right? And just once again, taking we could come off as to spare parts of something and then just kind of tying them together in a unique way to have a epiphany or realization that somebody just opens up a new thing. Right? So versus the I I'm trying to prove this, work my way down. It's more of this, oh, hey, I have these things in the world that I know to be true or I believe to be true.
Brett:What does that open up for me? What does that say about the world? And it's kinda going that way. And that's kind of the whole, oh, you know, I could totally use this software in an interesting way and create a new project or a new product. Or, you know what?
Brett:I totally could make some let's I could do something with this. I'm gonna go play with this. And then you kinda have some epiphany about some new new thing.
Brian:That's one of the things that actually, you you talking about that made me think, one of the things I think is really important in software teams is to, give people enough time to to to because they're thinking about the software while they're writing it and Mhmm. Afterwards and in their free time or whatever. Mhmm. But allowing them enough time extra time to do something with that thinking, to whether it's it taking those ideas and building something bigger or taking those ideas and redoing it, refactoring and going, you know what? Now that we've already gone through this whole thing, I don't think I would do it that way again.
Brian:And I'd like to redo it. So I'm proud of it. Yeah. And I think that's really that doing something with the thing think we think about these problems, and sometimes the way we think about them is doing the program, writing it one way at least. Yeah.
Brian:So
Brett:I will say the way I I approach this at work is I tell, people in the team, you're probably gonna have to re rewrite this 3 times before you're happy with it. Right? The first time is gonna be functional, but it's gonna suck, but it's gonna work. The second time, you're gonna learn your lessons, and you're probably gonna over engineer the thing, thinking you need to make up for the mistake to make in the first one. And so then it's gonna be a little harder to me potentially maintain.
Brett:And then the 3rd time, you're gonna finally realize, okay. This is where I need to trim back, and you're gonna end up with a solution where you're not prematurely optimizing for some unknown use case or whatever, and you've got the experience. You know exactly what you want. I will say the other thing is is, so for the Versus Code team that I'm on at work, we actually dedicate, 1 week out of every monthly iteration plan to technical debt, which is how we're able to make sure everyone at work gets that chance to do that refactoring, to fix that API, to do that thing, to make their lives better as a developer. And it's it's a massive win.
Brett:Like, literally giving everyone 25% of their work time to do nothing but just improve the quality of the things they work with to just make their lives better as developers is a game changer, and it's totally worth it. It pays for itself over and over and over again. Because otherwise, you're just stuck having to live with that. It works, but it sucks first version. You don't get a chance to fix things while, getting 25% of your time to just go off and just do whatever.
Brett:You're not being told what to do. You're just told to make your life better, so you're happy to come to work every day. Really, really makes a difference.
Brian:And have you had any pushback from engineers?
Brett:No. Why would the engineers be upset? They get more time to fix all the things that are bugging them every day. Right? Like, literally, it's it's one of these things where I tell people, like, look.
Brett:Go fix that bug that's been bothering you that we just haven't been prioritizing for whatever reason. Go fix that API that's been driving you that's innocent well designed. Go automate some part of our workflow that you've just find too laborious to deal with. Like, it's literally a week a week, a month to just go and improve your life as a developer. So, honestly, if that doesn't fit your ethos, this is not the team for you probably.
Brett:But, no, I've never had anyone push back. The worst I've ever had is people go like, well, I don't know what to work on. It's like, oh, I bet you do. You just you're just you're just overthinking this. Right?
Brett:Like, let's like, let's let's talk this out. Right? Like, once again, is there some bug that's been bugging you a bit lately that you haven't gotten to? Oh, yeah. Well, there's this one.
Brett:Well, there you go. Just go fix that.
Brian:Right?
Brett:It's like
Brian:Yeah. There's always there's, like, a bug that, like, to me is important because it's breaking one of my regression tests.
Brett:Mhmm.
Brian:But Go real test. Cares nobody really cares about it or something.
Brett:I constantly tell the team, like, go fix tests. Right? Like, literally, I'm sure there's some tests that are a bit too brittle that occasionally like, we did that for a while. I was like, see, I got a little too flaky. And he's like, you know what?
Brett:Just spend that week. Just go fix tests. Go make them better. Make them less flaky. Make them less flaky.
Brett:Like, literally, just whatever you need to do to make your life as a developer better, this is the week to do it, and you get it every month. So it also means you don't have to stress, like, oh, man, I I only get this one week a year. What am I gonna do? It's like, no. No.
Brett:But if you don't finish, just carry it over the next month, and you'll just get keep working on it. Go go add new linting rules and make the linter pass. It could be really simple stuff. Like, we introduced, ESLint. We had a we had to add a we had to use a, block list to block files from getting linted because they just didn't pass yet, but we wanna make sure at least all new code met well, thing to do during that week, take a file off the block list, see what fails, fix it to pass the lint, and then move on.
Brett:Like, there's whole bunch of stuff you can do.
Brian:The the interesting thing, to me is the, because I I like to write also. So Mhmm. With writing, the first draft is never gonna we always call it the first draft. That's what we call it. Yep.
Brian:We we we don't treat software like a first draft, or a lot of people don't, and I think they should more. Oh, yeah. Even though it's coming up a lot. I mean, I can't remember who it was, whether somebody said, like, first make, you know, first make it work, then make it fast or Mhmm. Something something like that.
Brian:But, and what the what that means is rewrite it, possibly. And it doesn't take as long. And and one of the things that some people I've, come across have said, well, it took me a month to write that. I don't wanna spend another month. It's not gonna take you a month to rewrite it.
Brian:You already know all the lessons. Yeah. It's gonna and you and you don't have to do it in one hole. You don't have to throw everything away, but you can go. Maybe it's not completely broken, but you can just change.
Brian:But that's where tests help. You you you know, make it functional, write some tests around it, and then, then you can refactor.
Brett:Yeah. I mean, tests can be very freeing that way. Right? It's the Yeah. It it's about feeling confident that your code is still shippable.
Brett:And that's what I told the team, right, is you should write tests such that, if I hit the release button today, as long as CI is green, you're cool with that. You're not gonna be sweat sweating bullets. Like, you're not gonna be stressed that I am shipping your code today because, see, I passed. Right? Like, if you are, you didn't write enough tests, so go write some more tests.
Brian:Well, I wanna hear about your fountain pen. Yeah. I just got a new pen recently, too, but it's not a fountain pen. So, it's okay. So fountain pen.
Brett:Yeah. Yeah. So I think it was when I graduated from my master's degree. My dad bought me my first fountain pen. It's a Waterman, and, I never had a fountain pen.
Brett:It was one of these things where, like, growing up as a kid, you never give anything that nice and because you're gonna lose it or break it or whatever, and that that totally made sense. But I had finally gotten old enough where, actually, when I graduated high school, I got a nice ballpoint pen with my name engraved on it, and that was great. And then, let subsequently, I got a fountain pen. And I had never experienced such a nice, smooth writing experience as I did with that pen. And, the feel of a fountain pen is fantastic.
Brett:The and, honestly, just thinking about the mechanics of it has always just been fascinating to me because they're simple. They've been around for centuries. Like, this is not a modern invention. It's not like one of those Fisher pens that's pressurized so you can write upside down. Right?
Brett:So the mechanism of just, like, lowering the physics of just how the ink just gets drawn in because of the capillary the capillary effect and all that, and ends up the nib, and then you just write, and it just gets pulled off and just keeps just pulling in. It's just it's one of those appreciations of the simple things as it were because we all work in crazy complicated technology. Right? I think you meet people, like, in tech all the time who, like, have these little hobbies or appreciates for these the design of things that are way simple from the before times. As it were before computers, there was, like, how do people solve these problems without just using software to do it all?
Brett:And so I had that, and I got another fountain pen later on. And I just basically started to miss having a fountain pen, but fountain pens you don't keep all over the house. Right? Like, I don't know about you, but, like, pretty much in every room where there's a potential need to write something down, we have a thing of pens. Right?
Brett:You just grab the pen in the house and you start writing. Right? I I mean, this was, like, growing up too, but my mom was a, school teacher, so once again, just got used to having pens around the house. And but I always miss getting to write with a fountain pen because you get the you inevitably, you'll grab that cheap pen, and it just writes poorly. It's like, is it out of ink or something?
Brett:It's not very smooth. The writing experience is like, fine. It's good enough for that quick little list. Whatever. And I just got tired of not having one in my office because my fountain pen I keep by my bedside table for writing my gratitude journal, to de stress, at the end of the day.
Brett:Although, graduate journal is not a daily thing. It's a 2 time 2, 3, 2, 3 times a week. But I had kept it by my bedside table to have that nice experience. And so I just got very frustrated not having a pen by my desk. But I also realized at my desk, I don't write that regularly.
Brett:And the other fountain pen I had, the second one I got, kept drying up because that's as I said, the the the drawbacks of fountain pens is the maintenance. Because they're using actual ink, they do dry out. Right? It's not, like, in a sealed compartment as much. And I you can get cartridges too, but they will also dry out, especially if they dry out in the nib because you don't didn't store them appropriately.
Brett:And flushing them out is such a pain. Right? You have to run them under the tap, get all the ink out, shake it all out, and then once again, that water gets really in there. It takes forever to get it on, and you wanna get it out because otherwise, it waters down the ink when you do refill it, etcetera, etcetera. So I said, you know what?
Brett:Forget it. This is annoying. And so I went down to the Vancouver Pen Shop. They're literally named Vancouver Pen Shop, before they moved locations. And I went in and was like, I want a second fountain pen, for or 3rd in this case.
Brett:I'm just like, what do you got? Here's my problem. My pen this this is gonna be the pen for the room where I'm too lazy to go to my bedroom to go get that or the pen every time I need to write, but I don't write constantly, so I need something to last. I was like, well, we have some nice fountain pens, but they're guaranteed not to have the ink dry out in them for a year.
Brian:What?
Brett:Yeah. And it's like, oh, wow. That's nice. Like, they're a bit pricey. I well, let's see how they write, and they wrote beautifully.
Brett:I was just like, yeah. Okay. I'm not gonna make an impulse buy. Right? I'm gonna step away, because it was a couple 100 Canadian dollars, and it's like, okay.
Brett:And then I kept thinking about it, and then I just kept mentioning it every so often. Like, I wonder if I should have bought that pen before they moved locations when was on sale. And I kept thinking. I kept thinking. And then finally one day, Andrea just went, you keep saying you've re you keep thinking about whether you should've bought that pen.
Brett:Just go buy the pen. Yeah. So that day, we literally went down. We bought the pen. So I now have a platinum 1919 pen from Japan that has a guarantee that the ink in it, because it's got a screw cap and such and it's a tight seal, will not have the ink in it dry out for, if for a year's time if I don't use it.
Brett:So right now, my my my biggest problem is you have to store it upside down. So when I do need to write something, I have to turn it pointing down and shape the ink down into the nib, but that's it. And it just writes very nicely and fluidly. And
Brian:Wait. The last I haven't written with a fountain pen for a long time, and I think I let mine dry out too much, and I couldn't save it. I think I still have it around somewhere, but, it had the little cartridge thing go in. Mhmm. But, you do have to write a little different.
Brian:Right? I mean, or at least I I felt I was writing a little different when I was writing with the fountain.
Brett:Are you okay? No. Okay. I know lefties have a problem with them because the ink does not dry quickly enough for them to not smear the heck out of it. Not I I honestly don't.
Brett:I mean, you will write slightly differently just because the fluidity of the ink causes you to not have to press as hard as you used to. Right? Like, with a ballpoint, you typically press a little harder to get the ball rolling and all that and really get the because you've gotta have had the
Brian:the ball rolling.
Brett:Get the ball literally rolling. Right? Fountain pins, you don't need to do that, basically, as long as you just touch the tip. It gets ink instantly. So you just start to press less.
Brian:Yeah.
Brett:But no. I wouldn't I wouldn't I'm not that I can remember, but I've been writing writing off and on with the fountain pen now for
Brian:Okay. Now so now I make I think I wanna give mine out, play with it.
Brett:I mean, they also feel a little better because there's less plastic waste in the world because of this. Right? Because you just buy the ink well. You just stick the pen in it. You have the they have, fountain pens have a bladder that you can get where it literally it's just an empty cartridge that you just turn the back on, and it causes a plunger to come up and suction just will pull ink in.
Brett:And
Brian:So you just get, like, a jar of ink and fill it up? Yep. NATO? Yeah. I I did have a a couple, glass pans my wife gave me many years ago Mhmm.
Brian:That had, that were, they were not fountain pens. They were just they're blown or I guess they weren't blown. They were cold glass. Yeah. And they had, like, these little cuts in them that were twisted so that you could, dip them in an ink well Yeah.
Brian:And it would suck up the ink, and then you could write with them. And that was fun except for the they, you know, they didn't write for very long before they ran out of ink.
Brett:Yeah. Thank goodness for the bladders, right, or the ink cartridges for fountain pens are outside. Yeah. I'd never be able to put up with this. If I had to constantly dip back into the ink well to get more ink into the nib to write some more, no.
Brett:No way. No way I could keep up with that. The with with this, it's easy enough to get more ink. So.
Brian:Well, I wanna I we went kinda went past the gratitude journal. Can can you tell me a little bit more about that? What's that?
Brett:Yeah. So it's one of those things where if you're one of these people like me where it's very easy to end up accidentally focusing on the negative. Right? Like, what went wrong with your day when you reflect on it, or, like, oh, this could have gone better or whatever. Gratitude journal is basically a way to just force you to think about what went well.
Brett:Right? So it's like, what what three what three things do you think went well today? Right? And then what through name a couple of things that I've just got that are just going well in your o overall life. Right?
Brett:Just kind of forcing you to recognize what you should be thankful for versus focusing on the negative you have. Right? As an example, I've got a couple medical non light threatening, just to be clear, things, like pulled muscles and, like, a little larceny on my thumb that I'm dealing with, that kind of stuff. And so it's very easy to just think about that because it's a little more in your face when it's, like, constant little pains or whatever. But then when you stop at the end of it, I was like, that is minor compared to what some people in this world are going through right now.
Brett:Whether it's locally here in Vancouver or you think about what people are having to go through in Ukraine. I mean, like, you can run the gamut from just just having to put up with horrible stuff right now compared to me just having a bit of pain in my thumb right now. And so it's just the gratitude journal, and actually been shown scientifically in psych in, psych studies to actually help people feel better and have a more positive outlook because it forces you to acknowledge the state of your life, which is typically for us in our current situations, without speaking for you specifically, pretty good. And just kinda making you just reflect on what you do have in your life and what is going well. And so, yeah.
Brett:So I just
Brian:And do you have do you have set times that you'd set days that you do this, or is it just end up being approximately about every 2 to 3 times a week or something?
Brett:Yeah. It's it basically, it's just whenever I go to bed and I'm not dead exhausted, and I just have less than 5 minutes. I mean, it doesn't take very long. You just have to I just sit there, pull out my fountain pen, and just go, like, alright. Let's just think real quick.
Brett:What's gone well and how does it take a couple minutes? Just as long as I'm not dead exhausted and I just sit there and have the time to just kinda do it. I do it right in bed too. Like, I get in bed, it's by on my bedside table. I just grab it, I just write it, and then put it down.
Brett:Hopefully, I also have time to do a better reading, and then, yeah, go to sleep.
Brian:That's cool. Alright. I think I might try that.
Brett:Yeah. I will say I turned on, one of my reports to it recently, and they've said that it's helped them a lot too because they're they're going through a medical thing. And they were just like, yeah. You know, I it really helped me put everything in perspective and just kinda just feel better about my plight in the world as it were and just, yeah, just as I said, just kinda force you just to think about the the good things to kinda help push back the negative thoughts you might be having about just, like, Yeah. That thing didn't go well today.
Brett:It's like,
Brian:Yeah.
Brett:But you know what? Grand scheme of things, so what?
Brian:And what what are you currently reading?
Brett:Right now I'm reading Born a Crime by Trevor Noah. It's not a new book at this point, but my wife read it years ago and absolutely loved it. And, I have multiple book series that I'm reading, and I try to break up reading the books in any of these series with a book not from any of these series. You kinda just get a bit of variety. So I had just finished the next book in the, murderbot diaries.
Brian:Murderbot? Yep. That sounds great. I don't know
Brett:any of these. Oh, it's fantastic. So it's a sci fi book series by Martha Wells. What's really good about the series is it's mostly novellas, so they're, like, under 200 pages.
Brian:Oh, nice. Because I read so slow.
Brett:Yeah. So yeah. I'm a very slow reader myself, and these books engage me enough and are short enough that I can read an entire one in a day if I'm not careful, which is great, but it also means, damn it, I got through too fast. I want more. Luckily, if you start now, she's, I think book I think there's now 5 books now,
Brian:and I
Brett:think the 6th is coming out later this year. And, actually, some of them have now gone book length, but I absolutely love it. It's without spoiling it, but, basically, there there's something called murder bot, that is basically kinda it's not quite a cyborg kind of thing that it's sentient and kinda breaks free of its, controls, but doesn't tell anyone because it's too busy trying to just not get caught so it can enjoy watching, its version of telenovelas and just trying
Brian:to live life and just whatever.
Brett:But it's extremely sarcastic too about always talking about stupidity of human beings and the stupid things they do and put themselves situations they put themselves in because its whole job is to keep people alive. I love it. It totally fits my, humor. So
Brian:I'll have to try it. So I I got was hungry for some sci fi. Mhmm. So I went and I was just a cup read it started a couple books that I would wasn't really enjoying. So I went back and, instead of rereading, stranger in a strange land strange land, I listened to it as a book on tape.
Brian:And it's it's still a fun book, but it's it doesn't date well. It doesn't I don't think it's aged well. I mean, there's a lot of great stuff in it still, but it's, there's a lot of sexism in it that is just hard to take in the in the modern age. But, you know.
Brett:Yeah. Yeah. Well, I also wasn't a voracious reader as a kid. I don't know why, honestly. I mean, my my mom was a school teacher.
Brett:I mean, like, I was I was around books, but it was I I don't think I grew up around I didn't see parents reading in bed constantly as a kid. So it just wasn't a habit I ever picked up. And then I got older and was like, man, these everyone just keeps talking about, by the way, the whole man comment. You can tell I grew up in Southern California. I keep trying not to do that, to be a bit more gender neutral in life, and it's a freak.
Brett:It's a really hard habit to break. Anyway, I just like jeez. Everyone keeps referencing these, like, canonical books that they grew up with. Right? Like like, Dune is a good example.
Brett:I never read Dune until, like, before the movie from Denis Villeneuve came out. Right? So but Andrea, my wife, had read it and loved it and talked about it, and multiple other people and all the references to it. So I was like, alright. Fine.
Brett:I'm gonna find and sit down and read it. And it was amazing. I absolutely loved it, and I have a stupid $200 copy of it because it was such a wonderful book, and I wanna be able to lend a beautiful copy to anyone who I know whoever wants to read the book. It's huge, though. 500 something pages?
Brian:The the largest book or series of books I read were probably Harry Potter books.
Brett:I'm actually reading those now too. Like, I I have multiple I have I'm reading the Harry Potter series, because my wife read them as, when she was younger. And we have an 8 year 8 and a half year age difference, so there are certain things that she got into that I just I didn't quite get into because, like, Potter books happened while I was, like, in high school, so I just didn't latch on like she did when she was younger. So I've gone back around to those. Like, I'm reading Harry Potter.
Brett:I'm reading the Dune series. I'm reading the Murderbot series. I've read book 1 of Old Man Old Man's War and loved that enough that I'm gonna start reading book 2. So, yeah, I got a couple series going. Oh, and I haven't I've read The Hobbit, and I have not started Lord of the Rings yet, but I got a nice copy of that.
Brian:Well, don't you don't spoil it by watching the movies, I guess.
Brett:I actually so funny enough, I prefer watching movies first and then reading the book. Because I actually really I enjoy films a lot. So, like, you were asking what I do on my spare time. Right? Like, we go for walks and stuff, but, Andrew and I like watching movies and bespoke television, like like Sopranos, Mad Men kind of TV.
Brett:Okay. Or or certain comedies. Lot plenty of British stuff, actually. And it led to me seeing a lot of movies of books that I wanted to read well before I read the books. And what it caused me to do is actually, I end up appreciating books more because it's usually one of those things where people go, oh, the movie's never as good as the book, blah blah blah.
Brett:So, okay, then I'll rewatch the movie first, enjoy the movie as a movie, and then I get to read the more detailed back backstory. Right? Like, I mean that with Harry Potter. Right? Like, all the Yeah.
Brian:There's a lot more in the books. Right?
Brett:Exactly. So I get to have the reverse reaction. I get to have enjoyed the films as cinema, and I get to go read back read the books and go, oh, that's interesting that they left that out. And all of this little detail that they kinda hinted at but didn't have enough time to get into. Right?
Brett:So I actually enjoyed the books more because I don't have to expend mental energy on certain things. I already have a mental picture for what who how I wanna choose to view these characters. Yeah. But I get the benefit of all that extra detail. I get to appreciate the movies even more if they're done well or why something was the way
Brian:it was or go Yes. So my my wife and I, like, had what had read, like, the first 4 or 5 Harry Potter books before or whatever. However many there were before the first movie came out. Yeah. The downside of that is neither of us had any idea how to pronounce Hermione, because it's not really a name you run into that Yeah.
Brett:No. Not at all. But It's always funny to to find those words like you or your you think you know how to pronounce or your spouse thinks they know how to pronounce, that you both only ever read in print, and then you find out from each other. Oh, you thought it was pronounced that way in your head? Like, by the way, I don't know, I mean, I don't know if you're one of these people who reads to themselves in their head, because that's I read, and I think partially why I read so slowly.
Brian:Yeah. Definitely.
Brett:Yeah. I've met people who don't. So it's one of those interesting things where you talk to people and realize what goes on in your brain is not the same as everybody else's. And but, yeah, we have this occasionally, which is, like, especially because, right, having grown up in the States, I pronounce things typically more like an American than than she'll pronounce things as a Canadian, finding where the little not cross section is. But, yeah, it's still fun to go, like, oh, that's how you thought it'd be pronounced.
Brett:I thought it'd be this. And we have to then look it up and find out who's right or who's wrong and start doing it the proper way as it were.
Brian:That first conference that I spoke at, you said we ran into each other the poster talk, and that, like, jogged a bit of my brain. And I'm like, I think at that time, we talked a little bit about tea, and we both have, like, the same teapot.
Brett:Tea house? Or are we
Brian:talking about the Breville? Breville. The one or at least at the time. The one that, like, you know, you can set the temperatures and stuff. That's
Brett:Yeah. Yeah.
Brian:I just had some Earl Gray today made with that, but I I like it on the the setting, I think. There's one that's a 195 degrees. I I like that better for black keys than 212.
Brett:Oh, interesting. Well, I I I'll probably not tell Andrea that. So, Andrea worked at a tea shop in university. It's not here anymore. But having worked in a tea shop plus, having English grandparents, led to her getting steeped into the whole world of tea and being very into it to the point that, for anyone who ever visits our home, we have a entire cupboard in our kitchen dedicated to nothing but tea.
Brett:And I mean a cupboard. It's literally 3 shelves full. From individual little bags, like a 100 grams, all the way up to 1 kilogram bags of some of our favorite teas. And, the Tea Maker, assuming Brian and I are talking about the same one, Breville makes one called literally called the Tea Maker, which is, as an engineer, kinda cool when you see it. It's got buttons for water temp, but, it has a metal basket in it and a magnetic railing in the back of the pot.
Brett:And what you do is you put your tea in the metal basket, put the top on, and then magnetically stick it at the top of the rail, set your tea, and then there's the temperature sensor that starts boiling the water till it hits the right temp. And then the medic railing will magnetically lower the basket into the water, kick off the timer for the steep. And then when the timer goes up, raise the basket back out, beep. And then that way, you know your cheese has been brewed at the proper temperature with the proper amount of steeping, and the pot is well insulated enough that you actually don't have to rush over to get to it either because it's just gonna stay nice and warm for surprising long amount of time.
Brian:Yeah. One of my big pet peeves is going to a t like going out to tea, and and they, and having people just pour the the water in the teapot. And I'm like, well, it's it's only gonna be perfect for, like, that first pour, and then every other cup is gonna be too strong.
Brett:You yeah. You can tell how serious p tea place is based on whether or not they bring you the pot with the tea in it or whether they bring you the leaves in a basket over the over your tea cup, and they give you the hot water to pour yourself.
Brian:Right? Because,
Brett:as you said, if they bring it to you already seeping in it, they've already started the timer for you, and it they didn't tell you when they started the timer. Right? Yeah. So unless they immediately tell you when they put it down, oh, pour this in about 2 minutes because they can tell roughly when they started it in the back.
Brian:Well, sometimes they'll give you the little, the little timer thing. The little Yeah. Tea timer.
Brett:Yeah. But, yeah, you can always tell when when we go to we always have to go to tea shops and go to, tea rooms Yeah. When we travel. And it's one of those things where it's like, you can always just tell us, like, oh, yeah. Here.
Brett:Here's your pot with your tea. Like, when did you put this in?
Brian:Like, I don't know how long you've
Brett:been steeping this back there. Did you rush and bring it to me immediately, or did you get sidetracked? Like, has it been sitting here for a minute already, or is it 10 seconds, or
Brian:So we always we always have fun, but we're usually disappointed. But, even the bad tea shops are good stories usually, though.
Brett:Yeah. We've actually been in tea shops where where Andrea has schooled not tea shops, tea rooms, actually, in high end restaurants where Andrea, or high end hotels, at least. And she has schooled them on how to properly do tea, and they actually offered her a job once. So, like, are you looking for a job? We could totally use that one.
Brett:There's the manager for the tea room. He was like, you should know this. If I'm the one having to randomly come in and explain to you how to properly brew and serve tea, I don't wanna work here because you've already started from a low position.
Brian:My wife worked at a tea shop once, and she for her, job interview, she brought her portfolio in because she had, like, a portfolio of different teas, like, teas that she's done at parties and stuff. And they're like, you're the only person that that brought a portfolio. So, yes, you're Nice. So next, next time we're up in Canada, my wife and I should, try to get you and, Andrea to take us out to eat or something. It'd be fun.
Brett:Definitely. You're making a multiple good tea shops.
Brian:Thanks so much for your time, Brett. And I think I've I've I've gotten to know you a little bit better, and I hope everybody else has as well.
Brett:Thanks, Brian.
