H: Let’s do the THING.

N: There it is. Now we are doing the THING. Perfect. How do you feel about our THING so far?

H: Um, I have to concentrate on feeling how I feel right now because I’m recovering from embracing the flu. But I think that the THING is so much more time efficient for me that I totally love it. And I find it entertaining because we still can see each other every evening.

N: That’s right, and even for me it’s time efficient even though I’m at the moment the person who prepares the file for upload, because we only have to say things once, and not several times because the audio is poor. And I can always refer back to things, I can always say “I already explained, scroll up and look it up”.

[laughter]

N: Did I kill you with laughter again?

H: Yes, but it’s very easy right now because I have to cough every 10 seconds.

N: Yes, and that’s great, it gives me the opportunity to jump in and speak.

H: I actually have to tell you something.

N: Oh, please do!

H: Yesterday you told me this very uninteresting story about the rapid tests.

N: Yes. And I lied. It’s not with pregnancy. That was on purpose, that lie.

H: I did one today.

N: A pregnancy test?

H: A rapid test and you have to be very strong now. I am not pregnant.

N: Okay.

H: I also don’t have Covid.

N: That’s good to know. It really is, because you know, we met only a couple of days ago, so I’m more concerned about Covid than about pregnancy because pregnancy is not contagious.

H: It’s self imposed.

N: True.

H: So, what did you do today.

N: I was at the seminar and the topic today was self-reflection which I absolutely hate. Oh my god, do I hate it.

H: You are terrible at that.

N: Well, I can choose, I can be terrible at that and then it’s very boring. Or I can be absolutely stunning at that and then it’s very exhausting for me, because you know I have this barrier. And it’s very good. My barrier is excellent and so normally nothing can touch me at all. And I can, you know, move it down, like by pressing a button mentally, if I want that, within half a second or so it’s down and all is fine, I’m a different kind of person, all there, no mental barrier at all. But it takes effort to keep it down if I’m not in an environment where I would naturally do that. So here, of course it’s down without effort, you know, you are not dangerous.

H: Maybe you misjudge me.

N: Ha ha. But in other contexts, work for example, it’s just the default that the barrier is up, which is, for me, a very good thing, because it makes everything so much easier for me. And I can still let it down sometimes on purpose if I want to achieve something by this. It has an incredible effect.

H: But then it’s not letting the barrier down, then it’s pretending to let the barrier down.

N: Not at all, I do let it down. And nobody ever expects it and people are overwhelmed and I move it up again and continue. It’s a very good thing to have. Like a special effect. But to keep it down on purpose for an extensive period of time like three or four hours in an environment where I would not normally do this, that’s very exhausting for me.

H: It’s a mental effort.

N: Yes, a mental effort. And I usually don’t – you know, I’m so clever and normally never experience mental effort. So now I have a migraine.

H: They made you get a migraine!

N: No, I made myself get a migraine, I could choose between being bored and getting a migraine, and I embraced migraine.

H: Such a pity that we didn’t get the triptanes in Prague.

N: Oh, I got the triptans from DocMorris, but they’re at home. And I’m not at home, I’m in Kassel and there is snow here, which is beautiful. I took a walk to the seminar place and back, me in the snow singing merry snow songs for, you know, one hour and a half or so.

H: Why would you walk three kilometers to your workshop venue? I read that this morning.

N: Why not?

H: It’s far!

N: I mean, how would I – no, it’s not, it’s an hour or maybe even less, 40 minutes, something like that. How would you get there? I don’t have a bike here, and it’s uphill, so I wouldn’t like going by bike anyway. There’s no visible bus or tram, and I’m not here by car so yes, I could take a taxi, I’ll do that tomorrow because tomorrow I’ll have my luggage but without luggage, I mean three kilometers is not far. I can just walk

H: Then I have another question. Why didn’t you pick a better accommodation?

N: There are two accommodations available here because it’s not such a big place – well, there are more but they are much more expensive and they have bad reviews so I don’t pay 180 euros per night, and the review says it’s not clean.

H: No, you don’t want that.

N: I picked another location a couple of months ago, that was closer to the venue but there was this lady and she was very nice but she wanted me to sit with them in the living room and on the veranda and speak with their friends and they wanted me to explain to them about the internet and about Vodafone, they had several issues with Vodafone. And they wanted me to watch Tatort with them and I don’t want this. She was very kind and she told me that she is 75 now and she does this Airbnb thing to have contact with people, and this is not what I want. You know if I go someplace and I let my barrier down for four hours without a break I can’t afterwards explain the internet to 75-year-old ladies. It’s not possible. I have to sleep, or to entertain myself. On the internet. Yeah, I have my limits, and here they are. Total disclosure: here are my limits!

H: I think your limitations are quite obvious to anyone.

N :Do you think so? Tell me!

H: No, I’m kidding.

N: Oh, okay.

H: I’m trying to get my wittiness back from embracing the flu.

N: So, what are your limitations?

H: I have none.

N: Okay. Have you ever taken part in a self-reflection workshop and then stayed for the night with a 75 year old lady who wanted to know all about the internet?

H: No, and I think this is a very good example of me not having that limitation because that would never happen to me.

N: You don’t like taking risks.

H: Yeah, that’s probably it. I am choosing my challenges.

N: You want meaningful challenges.

H: I want better paid challenges.

N: Yeah, I’m not that money focused. I just want challenges, whatever they may be.

H: Yes, but I think the challenge for me can never be explaining the internet to le le le le.

N: The THING says le le le le.

H: Oh, the THING doesn’t know the word.

N: Is it maybe a British English expression? Instead of elderly, let’s say ancient.

H: Oh, and now when you say it, it can say elderly!

N: Yeah, your pronunciation is not good.

H: So let us subsume: if I say German it says Toronto. And if I say, elderly it says, la la la la la. The THING is bothering me. And it is only on day three and here I am talking like a person giving a language class. It’s like when I was a student and I gave crash classes in Dutch at the Volkshochschule for the unemployed. The course was eight hours per day for five days a week for four weeks. And after that, I talked like a primary school teacher on drugs.

N: I think now we have to wrap this up somehow.

H: We could explain why we do this very complicated wrapping up and not just stop because I think people asked why we do that.

N: Oh, we already explained that in episode I, so now I can say it – scroll up and look it up!

H: That’s the beauty of the THING!