Halloween Fun & Tech Tips: AirPods as Hearing Aids?

[00:00:00] Speaker A: There we go. We're ready to go now. All right, Mr. Clark, how are you? [00:00:06] Speaker B: I'm fine. Happy Halloween. [00:00:08] Speaker A: Happy Halloween to you, too. [00:00:10] Speaker B: Are you. [00:00:10] Speaker A: You got a. You got a outfit? [00:00:13] Speaker B: No outfit. No outfit. I think one of my favorite podcasters say I'm a skeleton, but I'm wearing all my muscles and things on top, so it's good. [00:00:36] Speaker A: I like it. I'm going as Kung Fu Panda for the fourth year, I think. [00:00:40] Speaker B: Oh, that's funny. I like that. [00:00:42] Speaker A: I put on my karate ghee, and I. I have a nice panda head that I made a couple of years ago from a kit, and my. And my granddaughters love it, so I'm going with that. It's been fun to go trick or treating in the neighborhood with them dressed up like that. Other kids in neighborhood seem to get a kick out of it. [00:01:02] Speaker B: I tell you, I've been really impressed by some of the Halloween festivals and things that they do in neighborhoods. Someone told me that they have a neighborhood where 3,000 kids show up. I'm like, I can't imagine. I can't imagine 300 kids. 3,000. It's got to be something crazy. [00:01:20] Speaker A: But a lot of candy to buy. [00:01:21] Speaker B: That's a lot of candy to buy. [00:01:23] Speaker A: A lot of candy to buy. [00:01:25] Speaker B: I bought a few bits and trinkles, and I might even go to somebody's place and hang out, but. But I don't know. I'll probably end up staying here, just giving a couple pieces of candy out. Yeah, we have a few people to walk around the neighborhood. Yeah. So I got a neighborhood that's got, like, you know, some 3,000 kids are going to show up at. I'm like, I can't imagine what that's like. You know, I can't imagine what 300 kids would be like. 30 kids is a lot to me, but. But I guess, you know, it's the beginning of the holiday season and not just Halloween. Boy, you know, what Thanksgiving will be here and Christmas and New Year's and college football. I just had to. [00:02:04] Speaker A: That's all good. [00:02:05] Speaker B: So we all, you know, it's starting up a thing. And I know there are all kinds of things that go along with that, especially as a caregiver. Your situation can change drastically depending on how the health of your of your loved ones is. So you know how easy it can go from, oh, we'll meet everybody's house to, okay, well, now we have to coordinate everything. [00:02:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:02:26] Speaker B: Somebody has assisted living or somebody's not here anymore or things like that. So, you know. [00:02:32] Speaker A: Yeah, that conversation with them or pick them up and bring them to the gathering or, you know, those kinds of things. [00:02:38] Speaker B: Yeah, it can get complicated. So I think I am always lamenting the idea that my carefree days of having those things be pretty easy to do are not here anymore. Everything's complicated because people are in different places and things like that. [00:03:00] Speaker A: Yeah, it is. It's kind of challenging, isn't it? There's a lot to that. [00:03:05] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure. [00:03:08] Speaker A: Well, back to Halloween, though. We can't go on to the other holidays till we talk about Halloween. And Halloween is often filled with scary stuff. And I got scary story I can tell you. Scary for us. [00:03:22] Speaker B: Yeah. Let me see here. [00:03:23] Speaker A: I was at a relative's house the other day, and late in the afternoon. And I say late in the afternoon because the mail had already come for the day. And I was getting ready to leave, and I looked out and I saw the little red flag on the. On the mailbox up. And I asked my realtor, what you mailing out? I'm gonna go right by the post office on my way home. You want me to just take that for you? Well, it's credit card bill. I just put a check in there, and they'll pick it up in the morning. And I just kind of paused for a second, and my first thought was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't do that. But I stopped for a second. I said, well, you know, it's not a problem. I'll just. I'll just take. Because it'll go out quicker and let me go. But the scary part to me is putting a check in a rural mill. Well, not really a rural mailbox, but just a front of your house mailbox on a busy road where it's going to stay there all night. And you're never real sure who might just come by and say, hmm, I wonder what's in there, and take it with me. So to me, that's kind of scary. But I hear that you have been researching some alternatives to the sending all that in and sending a check in like that. And what you got to tell me, Tell me more about that. [00:04:39] Speaker B: So for. For my parents on both sides now, we've determined that it's not always a great thing to have the process. You know, baby boomers are always used to doing this. You get a bill, you write a check, send it to you send it out. [00:04:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:52] Speaker B: You know, in the world today, that's that. Although you still can do that. There are lots of ways to avoid that. The biggest Thing is direct deposit. Not only can you. Can you save the conversation of, okay, we're gonna set this up, sort of automatically take things out of the bank account. There are lots of vendors that if you do that, you get a discount, it goes down, your price goes down. So, you know, you should really think about it that way. [00:05:18] Speaker A: So like ach transfers and, you know, they just pull money directly out of the checking account. [00:05:22] Speaker B: Money directly out. And you can even secure those things in ways so that only that account can be used for that purpose. So there are ways that say, like a power bill, if you do it that way, you can get a number from your bank that only works for the power bill. [00:05:39] Speaker A: Oh, that's very cool. [00:05:40] Speaker B: Somebody got it, they couldn't do anything with it. So that's really an interesting way to look at it. And you can talk to your bank about options for that. I mean, and there were some apps, I thought, in some of the mobile spaces that did those kind of things. I can't think of the name of them off the top of my head, but I think they still do, where they can generate personal car card numbers that are functional only for the cable bill, only for the. For the power bill. And so you might, if you're in the process of doing that for your loved one, you might want to consider those kind of things. Plus, a lot of banks have a service now where they'll actually send a check for you. [00:06:18] Speaker A: Yep. [00:06:18] Speaker B: You can actually start a service. You can write in items, make it an annual or monthly thing, and if you know the fixed amount, you can have that sent in a check, part of it. [00:06:30] Speaker A: There's not usually a charge for that, is there? It's usually just, I don't charge at all. [00:06:33] Speaker B: I know credit unions do it. I think Wells Fargo has it. So there are lots of services that do that kind of thing. And that could be peace of mind, because what you don't want to do is have it in somebody's head and then you have an incident where that memory or, or that process is endangered because they're not doing it anymore, or they can't forget, remember anymore. [00:06:53] Speaker A: Absolutely. You know, gosh, I guess you're always in danger if in that case of the power being turned off because they forgot to send it or, you know, that kind of stuff, that's. That's a little scary as well. [00:07:04] Speaker B: Yeah. And, you know, most of the time your. Your loved ones are dependent on those things, and they're not always aware of what they did to change the status of that. So right Right. [00:07:18] Speaker A: There's an inherent lag, too, because a lot of folks aren't used to online banking and, you know, going in and looking at your account on a regular basis online or on an app on your phone. And that inherent lag is kind of scary, too, because you might have a month in between bank statements and not really know what's going on, or they may not. So. [00:07:39] Speaker B: Yeah, that reminds me of another thing you got is that email notifications for low balance or for large balances can be set up so that you're aware of things that are happening. If you're a loved one, that means you don't necessarily have to have access to the bank. Just you get on their machines and you set up an email reminder that says, goes below $100. Let me know. Okay. Well, I need to call mom or dad and we talk about why is this account. [00:08:05] Speaker A: Look, well, now that you mentioned that, it makes me think of. I've got one account myself that whenever I. I want to know when money's deposited into that account, and I want to know when money withdrawal money's withdrawn from that account and it'll send me a text for that. So, yeah, it could be the same sort of thing. Very cool. [00:08:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I think we ought to take advantage of a lot of those things out there. And then, you know, the differences between some of the pay services. So as you get people who cut the grass, who, I don't know, wash the house, wash the car, you know, maybe caregivers, in some ways, you can pay them in different ways. So Zelle is certainly popular for that. [00:08:46] Speaker A: And tell me about that. [00:08:49] Speaker B: Well, so the way Zelle works, it works through your bank. You have to link an email address to it. So it does work by email. And so you can't use the same email for different accounts. Zelle has is big enough that you try to use the same Gmail account. It won't work, but you want a unique email address for that. And then it allows you to send payments and receive payments for people who are using Zelle. So it's often free. [00:09:15] Speaker A: Okay. [00:09:16] Speaker B: Kind of like writing, like actually writing a check. [00:09:18] Speaker A: All right. [00:09:19] Speaker B: It's not. It doesn't cost you that much because the banks are usually doing it with internally to themselves. So. So there's certainly something you can do about it. And it's pretty instant. So if you do it with Zelle, people get money right away. So my wife has done that with me. I've done that with people that I, you know, pay like, pay to grow, to cut the grass and whatnot. And I think it's, it's very useful for people who are doing those kind of services that are, you know, under the radar kind of services that you only have an invoice or place to put a credit card or anything like that. And so I know it's really popular with young people, but it should be more popular for caregivers too. [00:09:57] Speaker A: So on your side, say you go into your bank, your banking system, and you register an email address with them. And you say this email address is going to be tied to this account and I'm going to, I'm going to send money and receive money from that account. And on the other side, say your person who cuts your grass, they've done the same thing. They've registered themselves an email address. And then when you. So when you send money, do you do it through your bank account or an app or something? [00:10:26] Speaker B: There's a, there's a panel on usually in your banking app. Okay, I noticed, I think there's a, an app too, but I think. I know it's on the, in your banking app where you can choose Zelle put in an email address. It'll confirm it, that it knows that address has. Goes to this person. [00:10:41] Speaker A: Okay. [00:10:41] Speaker B: And then you can send basically a request for money to be transferred to them that they work in the background. [00:10:48] Speaker A: And it just drops into their account wherever they. [00:10:50] Speaker B: Yeah, they get it. You get an email and says, hey, you got this in your account. You open the email, it will probably acknowledge or go into your bank app or maybe on the web as well. And you know that something's been deposited. So it's like someone wrote you a check. [00:11:06] Speaker A: That is very cool. That is very cool. You know, I might. [00:11:09] Speaker B: That's different than, yeah, cash app or Nemo or Venmo, something like that, and things like that that are out there. They have their own service and they're basically charging you like a credit card or a debit card. And so there can be either delays with that money being transferred or sometimes they'll charge you money to do it instantly. Something like Zell is not run through the banks. [00:11:36] Speaker A: Zell's more bank to bank, bank account to bank account, and less potentially credit card to bank account or vice versa. I see what you're saying. I have a Venmo account that I don't use very often. I have it tied to a credit card, but I haven't tied it to a bank account yet. And from best I can tell, I get a. There's a little extra charge for using it just with a credit card. But if I were to register a bank account with it, it would be either a lesser charge or no charge. So it may be a, that may be something. [00:12:07] Speaker B: Or it could be just a bank transfer, which might be free. [00:12:11] Speaker A: Well, you know, in. Beyond just bills, it's one of those things we were talking with, I was talking with somebody the other day talking about that their, their grandmother sends them a check every year for, for the birthday. And it's. And it's awesome. But there's, there's that whole depositing the check and working through getting it into the bank account. Something like that would be a lot, a lot easier for the, for the receiving person at least, and maybe not that hard to teach on the other side if they're. [00:12:38] Speaker B: At least, you know. The other is that there are features out there that let you deposit a check from your app. So you can use an app to deposit the check. In most cases there may be delays, and I think there may be limits on how much the check can be. You want to check with your bank to be sure about that, but I've done that before, too. It's not always perfect. Sometimes it doesn't work, so you have to be careful with that. But, yeah, using those kind of bank functions is pretty cool. And, and if you're going through your finance for your loved one, making it as automatic as possible, especially with the things you know they're going to want. You know, they want power, right. You know, they want the gas bill paid, they want the cable bill paid. Those things are done. So get them out of the habit of writing so many checks for things that they have out there. Mom still prefers that. She still likes to write a check. Her handwriting is immaculate for doing that. And she's lived in that world for a while, so she's comfortable with it. So I'm not taking her out completely out of it. But for the main studies, I just try to figure out what those are and let's make those automatic. [00:13:45] Speaker A: Yep. Yep. This is kind of, kind of funny. We were talking about being able to do deposits via your app. And I'll confess that I already knew how to do that one because I do it a fair amount. But it made me think about. I've got this one relative who likes to send me checks from time to time or to pay me for doing a few things. And, and she writes the check and it's great, but when she signs it, she has some descenders in her name. There's a Y in there and the descenders always seem to go so close to the actual bank account number that I've had a few cases where I tried to deposit it by the app, but the AI can't read it because there's the tale of the wise going right through A four or something along those lines. Little things to look out for. [00:14:34] Speaker B: We need to go back to it and say a little bit that, you know, sending that in the mail, although it's probably safe from most places. [00:14:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:14:41] Speaker B: You don't want to put a check in with a routing number, and it's in a check number in it, because there are people who go through people's mailboxes and take things out. So, you know. Yeah, it's. You know, it always. You have to always think about that, especially for things where you're not watching it. So I. I commiserate with your story, because you know what? I've done that for my mother, too. She's putting stuff in there, and she uses that mailbox like it's her personal mailbox, which it is, you know. Yeah. Putting the flag up. I know. For a long time, I didn't even know what that flag meant. I just thought it was a pretty decoration. I didn't know what it was. [00:15:18] Speaker A: But, you know, I kind of wish we would get. We would. I'm gonna go a little on a little side quest here. I got my wife and I watch a lot of British tv, and I see so many that they do in Great Britain that I'm thinking, why. Why are we not doing that? And one of them is the mail slot on the front door of the house. You know, just put the mail in through the mail slot rather than it be sitting in my. In my mailbox out there by the road. I get it's probably a little bit more difficult on the. On the. On the post office, folks, but there's something to that. You know, it's more secure, for sure. [00:15:54] Speaker B: You know, England is a small country compared to us, and so. Good point. But I get it. I totally get it. You know, a simpler time with simple things. And some places. I know it's okay. Nobody's coming around your place, but you got to be careful, especially in bigger areas. [00:16:14] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. I mean, if. If the rise of Amazon and the subsequent rise of porch pirates didn't teach us anything, is that, you know, just because it's in front of your house doesn't mean somebody won't come along and try to. Try to take it badly. Yeah, yeah. Luckily, I think a lot of bank accounts also Have, I mean, a lot of banks and systems around doing automatic debits have some more safeguards in place. Like a lot of times you have to actually send a voided check along with it rather than just, just the account number and the, and the routing number. So I think that helps a lot. So worst case, if someone were able to use your routing number and your bank account number, you might lose one payment, but I don't think it'd be catastrophic. But you know, it's still something to look out for. There's a, there may be, they may be precautions in place, but they aren't necessarily fail safe. So anything you can do by not making those things physically available, I think it's better in the long run, don't you? [00:17:17] Speaker B: I agree. Yeah, I do. [00:17:19] Speaker A: Well, cool. All right, well, I think that's a good one to talk about today. So what else you got today? What would you like to, like to jump on to? [00:17:31] Speaker B: My mom watches certain shows. [00:17:33] Speaker A: All right. [00:17:34] Speaker B: Right. Don't bother her. Between 7 and 8 she's watching Wheel of Fortune. Jeopardy. [00:17:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:41] Speaker B: Want to be called. And it used to be back in the day. And you and I are not baby boomers, but we, we are children of baby boomers. [00:17:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:52] Speaker B: When, when TV was simple, you know, there were four networks, including pbs, and four things to change. That's it. [00:18:02] Speaker A: Yep. [00:18:02] Speaker B: One remote, if you had it. Usually that remote was you as a child. Go change the channel for me. That kind of thing. [00:18:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:18:09] Speaker B: Now we live in the world of streaming. All kinds of options, even options within options. Not just Disney, but Disney with ads, without ads, Disney Bundle, you know, espn. It's complicated. [00:18:23] Speaker A: Oh yeah. [00:18:23] Speaker B: So one of the things I think is really important is having a sit down with your loved ones and making sure their world of entertainment is as simple as you can make it. Doing things like how many remotes do you have? You know, maybe take a picture of them and put them in your note so you can know, oh, you got that remote. The button is a yellow button on the right. Yes, that one. Preparing yourself so you can have the phone conversation. When they say, I can't make it work, what do you do? Now that might be. You have a caregiver come over every day and they kind of look at it and make sure it's all right. Not saying that that's not a good idea, but you will get a call at 8:30 one day. Or for me, 6:59 says I can't make Wheel of Fortune. Come on, what do you do? So if she got three remotes and you don't know which is in her hand, that could be a problem. Simple as knowing where the power button is on your cable but box so it can restart. Yep, really good idea. If you have caregivers, maybe the last thing they do before they leave is make sure the television works. That's a great idea. Yeah. So, you know, having an idea of what your habits are for your loved one and then having what you do if something goes wrong, even if it's okay, I'm gonna call my friend next door. He'll come over and help you with the thing. And that's easy to do. Think about that. Absolutely. [00:19:57] Speaker A: Man, that, that, that is so apropos today. This morning I woke up just in my house and I got up pretty early. I like to go up and watch a little YouTube early in the morning. And I turned on my TV, which has a Roku attached to it. And that's how I usually watch YouTube in the morning. And for some reason today it just could not connect to the Internet. It just what was a problem? And I rebooted it twice, still couldn't connect. And then I found out it. Oh, oh, it was the router that was having trouble. So I rebooted the router and rebooted the Roku again and everything came up. It was fine, but I was. The whole time I'm doing this, I'm thinking, okay, about a year ago I bought my dad a Roku TV and he, he watches YouTube occasionally through that roti Roku TV and he actually has his old cable box attached to it and he'll flip over to the cable box and then he'll watch his normal shows over there. But I was just sitting there this morning thinking, man, if this happens to him, how exactly am I going to explain how to do all these things and what steps am I going to do? So yeah, man, that's perfect. That's a great idea. Have. I do have a picture of his remote which is handy. I do know where it's plugged in, where the TV is plugged in. Luckily, this one is just a full on Roku tv. It doesn't have multiple components like a separate screen versus the Roku. I have in the past showed him how to reboot the routers and it's usually just by unplugging them and plugging them back in again. So I think I could do it. But it is something to think about. And if you're, you're out there and you've got a similar situation, listen to Bobby the Man knows what he's talking about. You go ahead and get prepared for that because it's not if it's going to happen, it's when it's going to happen, and it's going to happen in the most inopportune time. [00:21:40] Speaker B: So absolutely right before that important show, you know, when the Great Pumpkins ready to come on and they want to see it, whatever it is. Yeah, you, you want all the football games about to start. So. Yeah, you really want to know where that is and how to manage that. That's really important. I'll tell you the other thing that you really should be aware of is for us, and we live in the eastern part of the US we have a thing called daylight Savings time, and it's about to hit the weekend. It's about to hit weekend now. And so I already know that I need to be in a place where I can check and change the time on the oven in the clock in the corner. My mother is very obsessed with the idea that that clock is wrong, but this one is right. So she throws her off completely. So, you know, get ready. Time to change all that stuff or figure out how or at least be able to explain what's going on. And that might do some things with some of your technology too, if you're not careful. Well, now she's missing the time for her show because she thinks it's 7:00 and it's really 8:00, so. Good point. [00:22:59] Speaker A: You're aware I had a TV coming out last week for someone known reason, decided it was on central time as opposed to. To eastern standard, and that it threw me off. So. Yeah, yeah, that. That's confusing for sure. So you going, going to her house this weekend? [00:23:20] Speaker B: Well, I got. We have a thing Saturday night, so. But I think I'm gonna come on Sunday and so I might stay until election day, which by the way, another reminder to. About election day. We can bring that up in a minute too. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, I think I'm gonna go Sunday and just sort of make sure her stuff is right. [00:23:41] Speaker A: I think that's settled. Oh, and something to add to your TV thing. If your parents or your real loved ones still have a cable box, if you can get it or find it somewhere, get yourself a copy of the channel guide with the television networks and the numbers for what the channel numbers are. I haven't lived with real cable for like probably 10 years, so the idea of what channel does that come on always flummoxes me when I get that question. But I think my dad asked me the other day, is that, is that on channel 254? Like is that when it's coming? I got no idea what 254 is. So you know, so we, if you can, if you can get a chance to get yourself a copy of that, keep it because it'll come in handy. [00:24:28] Speaker B: If you know the service. You can actually look up some of the channel guides on the online and be able to pull some of them down. Like I know Spectrum does that, I know DirecTV has some of that. So just find the one you need. Don't figure it out when the problems happening because that's, that's hard. But, but you know, think about it. What would you do if they called you and asked you what channel ABC was on? There you go. So that can be really helpful. [00:24:55] Speaker A: Cool. Well, I think it's time to move on to. We're kind of tech adjacent with TVs and phones and stuff like that. But I think let's move on to a little bit more, more involved tech if you got a minute. [00:25:08] Speaker B: Okay. [00:25:09] Speaker A: So this week, well you told us about this a week or two a couple episodes ago that iOS 18 is out and that along with that, that's ipados 18 and max sequoia there, that's the version for the Macintosh 15. And as y'all all know, if you've listened to us, we're big Apple heads and that's the way it goes. But there's something about, I waited. I didn't automatically upgrade my stuff and I waited because there specific feature that I wanted that wasn't coming out till 18.1. And what that is is that the AirPods Pro, which are, I'm holding it up for the camera for people who are just listening to us on Audio. But AirPods Pro are some Bluetooth headphones that come that, that you can get for Apple equipment or really they'll work with anything. But most, most people who have them have Apple equipment and they as of this week and as of this software update are now FDA approved hearing aids. And as you probably know, if you've ever looked into hearing aids, even the over the counter ones these days, which in the last year or so over the counter has actually become a thing. The over counter wound ones are you know, in the couple hundred dollar range and they're reasonable. But these things are incredible. A pair of AirPods Pro 2 here run. I think it's $249. They are on par with a lot of the way higher Priced hearing aids that are out there on the market. I'm talking anywhere from 1,000 to $5,000. They come with a. Well, with the software update, they allow you to do a hearing test on your phone. So you pop these things in your ear, you start up a test, and it takes you through an audiologist approved hearing test to show you what level of hearing problems you have. So in my case, I did it. It took maybe 10 minutes. They do one ear at a time, and you go through the same sort of hearing test you'd go through in an audiologist. I can't even say that word. An audiologist office. You hear the little beeps and the boops and the varying volumes and that kind of stuff. And all you have to do is just listen and tap screen whenever you hear a sound. So you do that for both ears and it does a little, little computation on that and it'll tell you like, in my case, I have my left ear, I have some mild to moderate hearing loss. Came from too many, too many concerts and shows where I stood way too close to the stage and too close to the speakers. And in my right ear, hardly anything. So for now, I've been able to use these as a, as a, as a hearing aid. And they've added some special, special features where, like if you're in a crowded room or a restaurant or a place where you got a lot of people, you can turn down, you pick your phone up, go to a little control panel, make it do a slider, move a slider around, and you can control the ambient noise in the room. So you can turn down the ambient noise in the room, but you can still hear who you're trying to talk to or the voices are all there. So, I mean, I think that's incredible for $249, when the capability of that in the last few years has been in the $5,000 range. And a good thing I just heard this week, and I never really thought about it, is you don't really have to own an iPhone or use an iPhone every day to get this, get the hearing aid. [00:28:49] Speaker B: Oh, really? [00:28:51] Speaker A: And the way you do it is if you know anybody who has an iPhone, you can buy a set of these, set it up with their phone, take the hearing test, get it all set up right, and then go along your merry way. You don't have to have the iPhone nearby to actually use them as hearing aids. It'll go with whatever you set them as. Now, you know, if you wanted to do the moving the ambient noise up and down and that kind of stuff. It would be handy to have an iPhone to do that. But you know, if you just want the plain hearing aid features, you can set it up one time, walk away and you've got them every time you pop them in your ear. They're your hearing aids. [00:29:23] Speaker B: That's really cool. I mean, I have a pair of those too. I'm going to be doing that test to do that. And if you have elderly loved ones who are in who have hearing ear issues, doing the test would really tell you a lot too because I think it told you what kind of hearing loss you had. And even being aware of that goes, okay, I need to make sure I talk to grandma on the right side. That kind of thing will really be important. So yeah, I think that test is really cool too. I looked at it that way. Even running that test is a cool idea. [00:29:56] Speaker A: And you know, there's a stigma thing too. Like for me, I'm. You'll be shocked. I'm a 57 year old man and I'm vain. I did not want to have an hearing aid. [00:30:06] Speaker B: I did. [00:30:07] Speaker A: Even though I have silver hair, for some reason I still think I don't look old. But yes, I look old. I know that. But I didn't want to have a hearing aid back there and I think it was all vanity. But I don't mind wearing these for some reason. I mean, they're kind of more socially accepted. That's a weird thing, but. And I'm hoping that's the same same thing with a few of my relatives who are resisting the idea of having a hearing aid. Part of it is the social stigma. Part of it I think is just the cost because they've always heard, man, it's, I can't afford hearing AIDS. That's like $3,000. How am I going to do that? People just got to speak louder, I guess. Well, I think it's wonderful. [00:30:46] Speaker B: Some of this equipment has been, is so well made, these kind of alternatives, functions come out possible. [00:30:52] Speaker A: Absolutely, absolutely. So, you know, and one other thing too is even if you want to have the features about being able to move the ambient noise around and some of the other things, if you, if you use an Android device every day, that's cool. You can buy used Apple equipment fairly cheap. So let's say for instance, I think iOS 18 goes back to like an iPhone 10 or 11, something along those lines. 11, 11, okay. So iPhone 11, you can go on Gazelle or some of the used sites out there and find those relatively cheap. Probably Less than the cost of a pair of these honestly. So all in to have an iPhone to pair these with just to kind of get the extra features, you're still under $500. And that you know, compared that's, that's a tenth of what some of the high featured things a year or so ago were costing. So something to think about if you're, if you're into that and need that sor of thing for you or for a relative. [00:31:53] Speaker B: I agree. [00:31:54] Speaker A: Cool. [00:31:54] Speaker B: You really need is a WI Fi. Matter of fact, you don't even have to connect it to a cell. I have one iPhone 11. No cell service on it at all. I just use it kind of like an old ipod touch. [00:32:04] Speaker A: Absolutely. Don't even have to have it connected to cell. You just, you just need the, the, the Bluetooth piece in there so that these guys can, can, can talk to them and do the, do the setup for you and then you know, you get it set up. Leave it at home if you need to. But if you want to, want to go to a restaurant and turn everybody else down, you can do that. You. So it's pretty cool. All right, so I've got a couple of other things on the list here. You got anything else you want to go for right now? [00:32:31] Speaker B: I tell you one thing that has a story on it that I think might be good. So my father in law recently has had to move into assisted living. Yeah. And one of the things I found with him, he had some memory loss that really worked was that my wife and her sister set up a picture frame that had memories on it. [00:32:51] Speaker A: Yep. [00:32:52] Speaker B: And those pictures are really steep now. They, most of them you can set up and have them run all the time. And he really enjoyed seeing old pictures of himself with other things and it helped his memory therapy I think. So don't forget if you're doing that, that not just a static picture you can pretty easily buy. I think they're under 50 bucks now. Something that would let you put many pictures on it and stimulate that person with multiple pictures. [00:33:23] Speaker A: Oh yeah, yeah. And if you've, if you spend just a little bit more on that, I think they're around 100 now. There's, there's several brands that even, do, even do it where you can set up, set them up with a WI FI connection and then give an email address to your family and friends and then they email photos to that, to that email address. You would tell them. They show up on that, on that, that thing and it, and my mother in law loves her. She Talks about it every time we see her and we, we take time to send the photos to her and you know, she loves getting the surprises when they, when they pop up. It's a good thing for sure. [00:33:59] Speaker B: Yeah, it really helps my dad, my, my dad. But I also think it would be good just for, for us, you know, the kind of memories you want. Your phone always does that now, but if you had it in a place you could do in other places, you can certainly do that. And most streaming TVs have an ability to do this, so you might want to think about that as well. Most streaming boxes have ability to do this. So don't ignore that screen share part that has photos on it because you can do a lot of nice things that bring up memories for people and for our, the generation we're taking care of, they love that, they like to see that kind of thing. So just keep that in mind as an option shoot. [00:34:38] Speaker A: Yeah, that's awesome. You know, when you talked about your father in law going into assisted living, it reminded me of an ad I saw this week that I think is something that I'm going to look into and I think it's going to be kind of cool. Netflix, Ted Danson of Cheers fame back in the 80s, if you happen to be that old and saw that is going, is doing a new series and it's called Inside Man. And Inside man, the premise is, is that he is, you know, he's getting up there but he, he's, he's, his wife's passed away, he's at home, he's, he doesn't have a whole lot to do. And he said, you know, I want to, I need to get a job. I just need something to do. So he looks into the classifieds and he sees an ad for a, for a position working for a private detective, an assistant just to kind of help out. A private detective says like, all right, I'm going for this. So he goes in, he talks to the person and turns out they need someone to go and be a plant to investigate some crimes that are going on in assisted living facilities. And he goes and he goes, he gets this job and he goes in and he, he moves in at this, this facility and he turns out not only to, to help solve some crimes, but he turns out loving the place. So I think it, it looks like it's going to be great. It's going to be a comedy and something that, that I'm going to get into and I think a lot of folks probably would, would dig too. So that's kind of cool. But, you know, that, that brings me back to another thing about moving into assisted living. I have a relative that I've spent a lot of time with lately who is getting ready to move into assisted living. And they're there. There's a kind of a paring down or a downsizing effect that goes along with that. And, you know, in this case, they are leaving a house they've lived in for 50 years. There's a lot of stuff in there. There's a lot of stuff that are tied to memories, tied to memories of their late spouse. And there's kind of a tough job there. How do you pare down a lifetime to something that's going to fit into a small apartment? And what do you do with the stuff that is a really hot topic these days? I saw an article in Business Insider this week about, there's a lady who's built an entire business about helping people pare down and get rid of that stuff. And I think what she's calling it is navigating the boomer stuff avalanche, because there avalanche of stuff. And I. One of the explanations that she gave about why there is so much stuff is, if you think of it, that they were raised by people who went through the Great Depression. So there was a lot of need. And they were raised by tough, resilient people who learned to save and keep everything that they have. And they went from that. But then they became sort of after that, the boomers themselves became affluent. But they grew up in that household or grew up in that era where saving everything you brought into the house was what you did. So now there's a whole bunch of stuff. And what do you do with it? I mean, I've had, I know I've had a conversation with my dad before about, about, you know, he's, he pointed out some heirloom china pieces or something in the house that my mom really loved. And he said, no, these, these are going to stay in the family. And I'm like, and eventually, you know, I struggled with it for several days whenever he would tell me things like that and had to sit him down, said that, I love you, but I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to promise you that those are going to stay in the family. I would rather tell you no right now than lie to you and tell you that I'm going to do that. So, so, so we, you know, we're talking about it ahead of time. I'm. I'm not gonna, not going to do Anything with those things. But I think that's a conversation you got to have because I so agree with you. [00:38:35] Speaker B: And, you know, I. I resemble that remark. I have. I probably have a little bit of that. That. That hoardish behavior on me right now. And I came. Went through a particular situation that you know about. Yep. Where we had to liquid. We had not liquidate, but we had to move everything out of our house and move it back in. And it makes you really consider, like, do I really want to move that back in? So we got rid of a lot of stuff. So we ain't quite minimalist, but we're certainly way better than we were before. And my hope is that I will get even more. What's the. What's the word I'm looking for? Minimalist is probably modern so that we can get rid of stuff. I find myself saving things that don't need to be saved. I'm looking at something right now. I'm going, I need to throw that in the trash. Why are you saving that, Bobby? So not only helping yourself do that, but helping your parents get through that too. Especially if you can do things like take pictures of things that are memorable. You don't have to have the thing. You can have a picture of the thing. A T shirt, the thing you wore in high school that doesn't fit, that you just gonna sit up and take room. Well, take a picture of it and put it somewhere so you can look at it anytime you want to. So you're like me. [00:39:52] Speaker A: You find you don't really look at them that often. I got rid of, like a hoard of T shirts that I had from concerts and races and stuff in the. [00:40:00] Speaker B: Past, and they never gonna fit me again. So, you know, what am I doing? [00:40:04] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. [00:40:05] Speaker B: And then I'm also making sure that I don't. That's the other thing. While you're doing the paper thing that we talked about with bill paying. Go paperless, you know, you don't have to get that bill that always says the same amount every month. [00:40:21] Speaker A: Right. Right. [00:40:22] Speaker B: Letting your loved one know. You can look that up online. You can download a stuff statement. You can do a lot of things. You know, time to pare down on the paper. The paper can be overwhelming. So, yeah, I found it out. Not only do I take that down, also resist it coming to me. So I had a vendor. I mean, I'm dealing with vendors a lot, have their wonderful presentation, and they keep wanting to hand it to me. I'm like, just send me a PDF. I don't need that. And that mentality at home will help you too, because who wants a stack of bills? My wife makes fun of me all the time. She first met me, I had every phone bill that I have received for the last 10 years in a fold down father. [00:41:05] Speaker A: Because you were taught that, right? Yep. What. [00:41:08] Speaker B: What are you doing with this? All right. I don't know. I just need it. No, you don't. Well, you don't look at it. She's right. I mean, there was no reason for me to have that. Matter of fact, anything that's over seven years, there's no tax liability to it. There's nothing like that. Throw it away. Spread it out. [00:41:26] Speaker A: Be done. Be done with it. Yeah. [00:41:28] Speaker B: Don't wait for a catastrophic event like me, where it throws it. What God says, I'm gonna throw that away for you. All this stuff. So it's one lesson that I now look at and go, okay, I need to do some. There are corners of this house that have come back to that a little bit, and I need to fix that. But I'm also right now happy that I don't have. Have, you know, 50 shirts. What am I doing with 50 shirts? [00:41:53] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. [00:41:54] Speaker B: That is fine. And those kind of things. So you can pare down clothes. You could pare down paperwork. Yeah. And I do things with a purpose, not just out of habit. [00:42:08] Speaker A: Right. For sure. And be mindful about where and how you get rid of stuff if you're helping somebody else do it. It. Or even for yourself, for that matter. I, you know, no. Nobody wants that T shirt from an event that you had 15 years ago. No, throw it away. Throw it away. Recycling is great. Reuse is great if somebody wants it, but recycling is probably better when it comes right down to it. And if you can't even recycle it, it's just time for it to go. To go away. Yep, it is. I mean, I struggle with that on a tech. Tech vent. I can't tell you how many USB cables I have. I have probably 300 scattered around this house. And every once in a while, I just got to go through and say, all right, how many of these do I actually really need? And if, you know, I could probably get another one if I happen to throw away too many of them. You know, if you're in that situation, I forgot who was Merlin man or somebody said, you know, if it's. If you're. If you can replace it in under 20 minutes for less than 20 bucks, might be worth not taking up the space in your House if it's something that's bothering you, you know, so it's worth. It's worth a shot. [00:43:21] Speaker B: Yes, again, I resemble that remark. I have bags full of cables. [00:43:25] Speaker A: Yep. You know, every once in a while you feel vindicated when you have to. When you find this old piece of equipment and you find that one cable that makes it work. But I don't know if it's worth keeping it. What do you think? I could probably go. [00:43:35] Speaker B: Yeah, that's like, you know, that's the Hail Mary of porting. I have that. [00:43:43] Speaker A: Maybe we could talk to the. To the library at the. We're near a university, but we could talk about the library and say, listen, would y'all like to let us help you endow a. A lending library of. Of used tech cables so y'all could keep them for us? And then were we to need one, we come check it out, use it for the 10 minutes that we need, and bring it back to you. [00:44:02] Speaker B: What do you think they probably tell you to go. Go to the Best Buy. [00:44:08] Speaker A: Yeah, that's probably true, but where you going to find a 30 pin cable for an ipod these days? I mean, really. [00:44:12] Speaker B: Well, you may not. But then the other question is, why do you need a 30 pin cable? [00:44:19] Speaker A: Excellent point. Good point. Good point. [00:44:22] Speaker B: A little bit. No, but I. I hear you. I think you're right about some of that. It's kind of cool. I got cables on the wazoo. I probably never need to buy anyone again. Of course, eventually they break, but. [00:44:36] Speaker A: Well, I think we're getting close to our time, and I just want to take a moment to say to our listeners, if you made it this far, we would really love it if you would go and, you know, rate us and recommend this to your friends. Rate us on some of the podcast platforms like Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Send a link to your friends and get them to come listen to an episode or two. We hopefully, hopefully they'll get hooked, and we'd appreciate any of that if you can do it. [00:45:04] Speaker B: Show them the new cards with the key with the. With the. [00:45:08] Speaker A: Cool. You may see these around somewhere. We have a lovely get in the right spot, a business card for care, tech and tips. It has a QR code. If you scan that QR code, it'll take you directly to our podcast site, where you can hit buttons that will let you subscribe in, whatever your favorite podcast app is. And we also have our YouTube address. If you're watching this on YouTube, you already know this one, but it's good to show your friends and on the back we have our nice little bio about what we're all about but I'm going to spread these things around best I can and hopefully some folks will use them and maybe reuse them and give them to friends themselves. [00:45:47] Speaker B: And don't forget to subscribe if you want to. That way you'll get the timely updates and releases as we come out. We do we do these sessions every two weeks or so so come join us. [00:45:59] Speaker A: That's it. Come join us and bring your friends and tell them all about it. Well we appreciate your time today and hope you have a lovely. I guess by the time you hear this Halloween will have already gone by but election day will not have gone by quite yet but I hope you're ready for that. Get out there and vote. Vote. Go. Get out there and vote if you hadn't done it already. Have a good week. See you soon.