i’m generally an easy-going person. it’s pretty hard to ruffle my feathers, because most things are easy to laugh off if you don’t take them too seriously. not easily insulted, not often that frustrated or angry at the world, etc.

last night though, spencer and i sat down after weeks of down time to finally record another podcast. a couple minutes of test audio led me to believe everything was sounding great, and we were off on an almost 90-minute episode. it was a great show. covered some really cool stuff i think people would’ve liked to hear about. had great conversation, were appropriately funny and insightful. good podcast.

then afterward, i went back to listen/edit, and for the entire duration (minus the couple minutes of test at the beginning), the audio was all distorted and fuzzy. it sounded like spencer was talking into a makeshift walkie talkie on the planet hoth. for some reason, my voice was fine the whole way, but he was not just fuzzy but mostly indecipherable. a total loss of show.

like i said, i take most things in stride, but i was fucking pissed. more so, because there was nothing to be pissed at. the equipment just failed us despite working fine in a test, and there was absolutely nothing to be done. i think that was the difference that drove me nuts, really. most things are out of my control, so i don’t feel injured when they aren’t perfect. but most things can also be corrected, or at least tolerated. this was a freak incident that was irreparable. and it’s actual creative work that’s just totally lost. i could have punched a baby, i was so mad. especially now that he lives farther away, and it takes a decent amount of drive time just to get together in the first place.

lessons for the future: maybe invest in better microphones? don’t trust audio software that comes free with a mac? i’m not even sure. definitely going to be checking the recording as we go in the future, instead of assuming it works at the end because it worked at the beginning. but goddammit, that would have been a solid episode.