S2 Ep.8 DNF Pile

Transcript

DNF Pile - Transcript

[KARLI] I have discovered through typing our transcripts, how often I speak incorrectly on purpose. [Jamie laughs][ And it irks me. Poor grammar, holy crap, poor grammar. It's so bad.

[JAMIE] You say it jokingly. And then when you have to write it, you're like, [gasps] “Oh no!”

[KARLI] I itch to fix it. My brain is like, make this correct grammar. I'm like, oh….

[BOTH] But that's not what I said! [laugh]

[KARLI] I mean, we both do it. But I do it like, we interrupt ourselves in our line of thinking. And so the amount of times we stop and start, and then we start the sentence with one form of a sentence, and then we finish it with another and I'm just like, dear gods help, I— [frustrated dramatic sigh]

[JAMIE] Karli's finally, finally, feeling the intense pain of what I felt all last season—and this season—of trying to make the crap we spew out, [Karli laugh] make any sense to somebody else.

[KARLI] [squeaky talking while laughing] At all.

[JAMIE] And you're getting it after I've edited it.

[KARLI] I know.

[JAMIE] So that it's the best it can be. Welcome to the suck. [Karli laughs] It’s it's real. Well as storytellers and like people who watch a lot of movies. People in movies and books often don't interact like real people interact. That's why if you've ever watched It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, they interact more like real people, because they are always interrupting each other, they're always talking at the same time, and they're always yelling. [Karli laughs] And there's a few movies that do this, as well. But I can't think of them off the top of my head. But it's much more chaotic. But in story and film, we don't do those things because it's hard to understand. [chuckles]

[KARLI] Right? Absolutely. I apologize. I sincerely apologize. [Jamie laughs]

[JAMIE] Like I'm like, Yeah, I know. I know. I spent hours. [Karli laughs] And that's short. Last year it was uh—

[KARLI] And this is why we do thirty minute episodes now. [laughs] The truth is revealed!

[JAMIE] [dramatic groan] I am so sorry. But like part of me is like really sickly like—

[KARLI] You feel vindicated.

[JAMIE] Yeah, yeah.

[KARLI] I would too.

[JAMIE] That's what it's like!

[KARLI] One hundred percent.

[JAMIE] Season two baby.

[INTRODUCTION MUSIC PLAYS]

[JAMIE] Welcome to The Act Break, where we're talking about all things story.

[KARLI] Take a break from your creative endeavors and hang out with us.

[JAMIE] Have a little simulated human interaction.

[KARLI] Because internet friends totally count.

[INTRO MUSIC FADES]

[KARLI] I'm kind of introducing us both today if that's okay.

[LAUGHTER]

[JAMIE] I thought we had to do the audio cue so people know.

[KARLI] Well yeah. I mean, I guess it's true. So I mean. [both laugh]

[JAMIE] Well that's what you said.

[KARLI] I will, I will say a whole thing. [laugh] And then you can decide what you want to do with it. Or if you hate it, we'll scrap it.

[JAMIE] Okay, just do your thing. Just remember that next time, I want to introduce you.

[LAUGHTER]

[KARLI] No, only I'm allowed to break the rules that I arbitrarily set forth.

[JAMIE] We must abide by these rules that we're making up as we go along. [Karli laughs]

[KARLI] Yes. All right. Welcome back to The Act Break. [silly announcer voice] Today we have a real challenge on our hands, folks. In that corner we have reigning champ, the queen of DNF, Jamie. [Jamie laughs] In this corner, we have the obsessive compulsive, will read anything to completion because, reasons, Karli.

[JAMIE] Wow. The epic battle I want a belt when this is over.

[KARLI] You'll—I'm sure you get a championship belt.

[JAMIE] I'm gonna hold it up over my head and [stage whisper shout] the crowd goes wild. She's the queen.

[KARLI] Yeah, also known as an argument about not finishing books.

[JAMIE] That was that was me realizing that we never talked about the format of the episode before we started.

[LAUGHTER]

[KARLI] True story. We did not so um...

[JAMIE] We're really busy. Its just gonna be what it is.

[KARLI] We'll do our best. [laughs]

[JAMIE] If you don't know what DNF stands for. It's, did not finish.

[KARLI] Yes.

[JAMIE] So there you go. [both laugh] Words are so hard. That's what that means. You're welcome.

[KARLI] Yep. So today, we're going to chat about our experiences with DNFing things in general. Books, movies, shows, whatever it is that we decided to not finish. We're going to talk about our experiences just in general as a concept. And, you know, I'm sure we'll give some examples in the process. Alright, so if you listeners listened [Jamie laughs] to Jamie's interview. You will know her philosophy on this matter.

[JAMIE] Yes, yes. I'm very, very passionate about—about this particular topic. [laughs]

[KARLI] Yes, you are. And the goal, the goal here is not, we're not here to throw shade. We're not here to like talk crap about things that we didn't finish. We're just wanting to have a conversation about what are some things that make us want to quit?

[JAMIE] [chuckles] Right. Quicker refresher, if you haven't listened to that episode yet—'cause I know you're going to eventually—my philosophy is there's too many books out there that I want to read. So I'm not going to waste any time on something I'm not enjoying or invested in. I'm just going to move on. Just move on. It's fine. It's fine.

[KARLI] And I think I stated my philosophy fairly clearly in my [laughing] introduction of myself. [Jamie laughs] It’s, it's quite squishy as a mood reader. It's all a mess. Mostly. I can't stop myself and I have to finish it. And I don't know why.

[JAMIE] I just imagine in your head, you're like, "I'm no quitter. I'm not gonna be a quitter.”

[LAUGHTER]

[KARLI] I kind of what it is. It's—I am a problem.

[JAMIE] I'm a quitter. I am a quitter. [both laugh] I’ll say it. I quit ten things this week, it doesn't matter. [laughs]

[KARLI] Good for you. Life's too short. Why don't we start with, what are some examples of things that will make you quit reading or watching something? Like, for example, a big one for me is pacing. If the pacing is wrong, I'm more likely to quit a TV show than I am a book. But I have quit a few books.

[JAMIE] Your own personal guilt, like seized you.

[KARLI] It did.

[JAMIE] That’s I mean, that's valid, especially in television, usually the first two seasons of something, a lot of shows don't know what they are yet. [Karli laughs] And so their pacing can be quite erratic.

[KARLI] They're trying to discover the meaning of their existence.

[JAMIE] For example, two super popular shows, The Office and Parks and Recreation happened to be very similar as well, the first and second seasons of those, they're really just trying to figure it out. But then after that, it gets a really, really good. So I get what you mean where it's like, I don't know.

[KARLI] Well, I love that you brought up those as examples because I think it's such an interesting case study for me, because I love Parks and Rec. And The Office is one of the things that I brought to attention today that I DNF’d, and I know that that's like one of your favorite shows. So it's interesting to think about what works for us and what doesn’t. Pacing wise, initially was a problem for me for The Office, but it became more about a particular character that I couldn't invest in.

[JAMIE] Yeah, that was a different. I was thinking mostly in the pacing. Because it's really common, especially in Parks and Recreation. I've heard it a bunch of times, and I've said it a bunch of times with Parks and Recreation, you're like, get through, get to the second—like halfway through the second season.

[KARLI] Yeah.

[JAMIE] And then you'll be hooked.

[KARLI] Right.

[JAMIE] But you kind of have to push yourself to get to that point.

[KARLI] Which is so funny, because usually I'm like, I shouldn't have to push myself.

[JAMIE] But it's worth it. [laughs]

[KARLI] But it's worth—but sometimes it's worth it. And so it's such an arbitrary [laughs] thing that we're... Yeah.

[JAMIE] Yeah, pacing is not usually I didn't have pacing as one of my particular things. Because I didn't think about shows as much. My number one reason is lack of interest, or not being invested in the outcome. [chuckles] If I just am bored, or I don't care. [both chuckle]

[KARLI] Well, I'm curious, can you put your finger on what about it is boring you or do you just not put in the time to figure it out?

[JAMIE] It's usually the lack of connection to the main character.

[KARLI] Okay, so it's a character problem.

[JAMIE] Yeah, it's usually I'm not invested in that character. And I don't care how they solve whatever problem; or whatever their problem is, doesn't really seem like a problem to me. So I'm like...

[KARLI] It's not worth investing your time.

[JAMIE] Yeah, there's no objective to this story. So I’m just like, bleh.

[KARLI] That's yeah, that's fair. I definitely think that character is a big one for me as well. I think pacing and character are my, my top two reasons.

[JAMIE] My number two I listed as, characters that don't use their brain, or I don't like. When a character is doing something where I'm like, why, like, that's the stupidest thing you could possibly do. And I know, people do stupid things, or people make bad decisions, or whatever. But when that is like the theme. They just are making bad decision after bad decision, just to advance the plot, not for actual reasons.

[KARLI] Oh, that's yeah.

[JAMIE] Then I'm like, no. Or I don't like the character. And they kind of go hand in hand where I'm like, I don't like this person. So I don't care what happens. That's not how I feel in real life. [both laugh] But in a story, you know, in story. It's not—I don't need to invest my time into finding out what happens to this person.

[KARLI] Fair. It does. It's not a burning question for you. I am more willing to sit around and watch people do stupid things than you. [Jamie chuckles] Which is probably not the smartest choice on my part, since I don't have a ton of time on my hands. But I never said that my choices make any sense. So there you go. [laughs] A couple of other things that I feel are lower on the list, but they will pull me out of a story; and if it's happening often enough, I might quit. And that was—those are like, style choice. But mainly like lots of errors, like spelling or typos. Or just poor writing un general. I'm like eh, I can’t, because I'm just sitting here trying to correct your book. But those are, those are lower on the list, I'm more willing to excuse that because I understand that it's tough. An error or two here and there, that's no big deal. People are human, like they're gonna miss the things here and there, you know?

[JAMIE] Yeah. Another big one for me, is when the book is not making good on the concept, or it on the promise of, you know, the cover.

[KARLI] The promise of the premise.

[JAMIE] Yeah. Or even if maybe I interpreted it, like it was going to be something else, and it wasn't what I expected. So if it doesn't make good on the promise of the premise that deters me from pushing onward, because I'm like, oh, well, if I'd have known this was what it was about, I probably would never have started it.

[KARLI] Yeah, absolutely. That makes a lot of sense.

[JAMIE] The last reason I would DNF a book, I don't consider DNFing in a book, which is, I need to come back to it when I have more energy or more focus. Like, so there are books I've put down, but plan to come back to and I don't usually actually call those DNF. But I wanted to mention that.

[KARLI] Those are those are NRN. Not right now.

[JAMIE] Oh, see, I'm learning.

[KARLI] Somebody posted about it on Twitter or something like that a little while back. And I really liked that idea. Because sometimes either it's, you don't have the energy for it, or you're not in the mood for it at that time. DNFing, and NRN are two different concepts, I think.

[JAMIE] All of my books that are all weird. It's like, yeah, I tried to start reading Alice in the Quantumverse, [Jamie said quantum verse but the actual title is Alice in Quantumland] [both laugh] but maybe my brain wasn't up for it. So I had to come back to it.

[KARLI] I don't know why you can't just casually read about the quantum verse and have a great time with that.

[JAMIE] It's an allegory for quantum physics! That's just light bedtime reading. [laughs]

[KARLI] Just casual stuff.

[JAMIE] Yeah.

[KARLI] I did think of one more thing.

[JAMIE] What's that?

[KARLI] That is if the subject matter ends up being triggering, for me. There's just certain things that if you didn't realize going in which—there’s usually trigger warnings out there for a lot of different stuff, especially stuff that's been around for a while, but I can't stand spoilers to the point where most of the time I don't even read the back of the book, before I decide if I want it—I look at the cover, look at the title, I'll read like the first couple of lines are the first page or whatever, or I go off of somebody's recommendation that I trust. But sometimes there's stuff in there that I'm like, oh, if I had read the back of the book, I probably would have known this and it probably wouldn't have picked it up to begin with. And you know, maybe I didn't maybe it's not on the back of the book. There's a couple that I DNF'd and after that are like that, that I'm just it's not for me, I understand why other people can read it, but I can't do it. So how far do you go in a book or a show before you decide if it's not doing it for you? Do you have um, I guess, like a feeling that pops up? Or thoughts that are popping up for you that that's when you recognize like, this isn't doing it for me.

[JAMIE] I would say that it could happen at any point. [both laugh] If it's something that from the start doesn't have me sometimes if it doesn't catch me, I’ll quit in the first twenty pages if it sort of catches me, but then I have to slog through… it can happen at any point. I think you just have to like feel it out and be like okay, do I want to give it till page one hundred? Do I want to whatever?

[KARLI] Yeah.

[JAMIE] And then on the opposite end, I've had books that I almost nearly finished and had fifty pages left and was like, I don't care what happens. And I just put the book down and I DNF it with fifty pages left.

[KARLI] I don't have that much self-control. [laughs]

[JAMIE] I just I, that's the biggest reason where I'm like, if I'm not invested in what's happening at the end of the story, why waste my time when I've got fifty other books on my shelf that I'm interested in?

[KARLI] See, I hear you speaking logic. [Jamie laughs] I hear it, I do. But my heart and my mind have yet to internalize it and make it a part of my life.

[JAMIE] I have a question.

[KARLI] I have an answer.

[JAMIE] What benefit are you getting from reading the last fifty pages of something you're not enjoying? How is that enriching your life?

[KARLI] It's not.

[JAMIE] That’s what I'm saying. [laughs]

[KARLI] [laughing] I know. I know, Jamie. But some of us don't make good choices for ourselves, okay?

[JAMIE] Hot take. Controversial. If I make it seventy-five to whatever percent through a book, even if I don't finish the last couple pages, on occasion, not all the time, I've counted that book is read anyway. Which I think is funny, because I know some people are like, you can't count it as read if you haven't read the whole thing. And I used to say that too. But reading goals are self-imposed. So you can pretty much do whatever you want with them. [laughs] I might count that book has read towards my reading goals, because I read 400 of the 430 pages or whatever. But I don't write reviews. I would never form an opinion and then iterate it to somebody else based on a book I hadn't read all of.

[KARLI] Yeah, unless it's the opinion that it didn't hold my interest, I marked it as DNF. And if they want to ask me more about it, I'm happy to have a conversation about it. But I'm not going to give unsolicited negative feedback on a book that I chose not to finish.

[JAMIE] Yeah, absolutely.

[KARLI] Sounds like you're very aware of when something isn't working for you and why. That you're able to say it's for this reason, and you choose to quit and it's not out of like vindictive or spite or anything like that. You're just like eh, I'm done.

[JAMIE] Yeah, I'm very, I'm not the kind of person that like, gets mad at the author. [Karli laughs] Because of my robot brain, I think about things very analytically, like 90% of the time. [chuckles] So I'm like, I just don't connect with this. There are tons of books, I'm sure I've DNF'd that lots of other people like and I'm happy that other people like them. It just wasn't for me. But yeah, usually I can say very specifically, why I chose to quit a book.

[KARLI] I struggle with that.

[JAMIE] You’re a vibes person. [chuckles]

[KARLI] I am a vibes person, my dragon brain hoards everything, even if it's not really worth it to me. [both laugh] It's been something that I have had to challenge myself to, to check in about how I'm feeling about things. I power through a lot of things. And I am learning in more recent years how to go, hey, why am I forcing myself to do this? Why am I powering through this thing? Is this serving to make me a better person, a better writer? I have had to learn how to do that. And DNFing more books has helped me with that, which I think has been a good exercise for me. So sometimes I do finish things because I like to see—I mean, sometimes it's good to have an example of how not to do it.

[JAMIE] I—there was a time where I knew you would finish any book you had started. [both laugh] No matter how trash. [Karli laughs]

[KARLI] True. True true.

[JAMIE] Yeah. And that's why I think it's interesting everybody's process of why they would DNF something, or if they know why or whatever. All of us think differently. So like the way all of our synapses are connected, and then send our brain signals. It's all different. [chuckles]

[KARLI] Yeah, we're all wired different. Okay, do you want to give us a couple of examples of some DNFs and maybe maybe a little, little while you've you DNF'd that thing?

[JAMIE] Yeah, I want to start by saying when I was trying to think about books, I had DNF'd, because my number one reason is I was bored. I couldn't even remember [Karli laughs] what books I've DNF'd because I clear the mental cache. [Karli laughs] If I ended up DNFing it, it's not really important for me to remember that book. If somebody put it in front of me, I'd be able to be like, yeah, I DNF'd that. But like to pull them out of my own memory. [chuckles] So all of the ones I have were fairly recent. [laughs]

[KARLI] Okay.

[JAMIE] But there have been, I'm sure hundreds. [laughs] The ones I'm going to list like I DNF'd them all for different reasons. I really like to read comedian [trying three different pronunciations, increasingly more dramatic] memoirs, memoirs, memoirs.

[KARLI] I say memoirs.

[JAMIE] It makes me think of, my grandparents had this jokes book from like, way back in the day. And I remember opening it up, and it's just it's just joke after joke after joke after joke. And I just that's what it made me think of.

[JAMIE] So I had seen on my Library app, I could get Is This Anything? by Jerry Seinfeld, which just came out in like, 2020. I'm not a huge Jerry Seinfeld fan. [chuckles] But I mean, comedy memoirs, I'm like, oh, and it's free. It's library book. And this was one of the ones that I didn't ask because it wasn't what I hoped. So I really like books talking about, like, how people got started and their breaks in the industry. And this was the weirdest comedy memoir I'd ever picked up. It was basically just all of his one liners over the last twenty years, put into a book one after the other. [Karli laughs] And I am not here for this. [laughs]

[KARLI] It makes me think of, my grandparents had this jokes book from like, way back in the day. And I remember opening it up, and it's just it's just joke after joke after joke after joke. And I just, that's what it made me think of.

[JAMIE] That's what it made me think of. [laughs] Yeah, I would have been more interested to hear like, the behind the scenes of industry stuff, of his career, like an actual memoir. [Karli laughs] But um... so I DNF'd that earlier this year.

[KARLI] Well, I think that that's a great example of something—it not being what you thought it was going to be. You went in thinking it was going to be what it was marketed as, and it's not. That happens sometimes.

[JAMIE] So that's—that was one of mine. Especially like, my some of my favorite comedy memoirs are like Mindy Kaling, Tiffany Haddish. Like, they both have really good, like memoirs, that was the kind of thing I was looking for, things I'd never heard, so anyway…

[KARLI] I have something that had my interest initially, and then it fell off at the end or towards the end-ish, I think. I didn't keep track of exactly which season I quit on. But Once Upon A Time, I really enjoyed the first few seasons, especially everything with Rumpelstiltskin. Obsessed.

[JAMIE] I actually do enough that show two but not like, super intentionally.

[KARLI] Well, I think that that's just it. I didn't super intentionally DNF it either. I wasn't like, well, this isn't working for me anymore. I just lost the motivation to go back to it. And I think that that is a symptom of them repeating kind of the same scenarios-ish, like, oh, the world is in jeopardy and we got to save it and over and over and over and over again, just like trying to bring in new characters. And it just kind of got, it got old.

[JAMIE] Played out.

[KARLI] Played out. Thank you. Like, I would have liked it to maintain my interest. But it didn't. I have gone back and rewatched the first couple of seasons, though, because I enjoyed them so much. So I enjoy what it was for the time that it was that thing. And I'm happy with that. But I choose not to participate [chuckling] in the later seasons. And that's just my opinion.

[JAMIE] I didn't even think about shows. Most of the shows I haven't finished I really want to finish [chuckling] I just don't have the time.

[KARLI] I think you're much more cinematically minded, you are able to tell pretty quickly, even just by the pilot, if it's going to be something that you're into. You don't often start things in—at least that I'm aware of—that you don't end up following through on because you are able to know what you're looking for in it. I don't know. That's just, that's just my take.

[JAMIE] I am good at like starting a show and then binging it to the end. [both chuckle] There’s two shows that I'm really interested in finishing that I started. But if they were on Netflix, I'd be done. But if they're on like any other sort of weird streaming, [Karli laughs] I'm very much Atomic Habits, make it easy. I want to finish Orphan Black and Fringe.

[KARLI] Yeah. Oh, yeah!

[JAMIE] Maybe this year, I'll try and finish those. But anyway, back to the topic.

[KARLI] Back to the actual topic. Stay on point. All right, any anything else that you'd like to share?

[JAMIE] Yeah, this one was interesting, Anxious People by Frederick Blackmon this one was kind of harder for me to DNF. I know a lot of people like his work and I'm still interested in trying another one of his books. I think I made it like 150 pages into this. And the parts that were captivating, were very captivating. But it was like two different tones mashed together. When these sections kind of stopped and they switched to this other side of the story, it was so dragged out. I'd push myself through the first couple sections, and then I'd get to another one of those really captivating sections. And then it would change again. And I was like, I can't do this for a whole book. I can't, I can't do this all the way through this book. [chuckles] So I ended up DNFing it. It was kind of sad, maybe a different one of his I'm definitely going to pick up his work again. But it was very much a pacing issue? I guess, like you said. The captivating sections were  [laughing] almost captivating enough to make me keep going. But not quite.

[KARLI] I love that you had an example of this too, because I have one that's incredibly popular. Ruin of Kings by Jen Lyons. Exact same problem. The captivating stuff was so cool, and so exciting. And I was like, holy crap. What? That is so awesome. But then it would switch and the pacing would drop and my momentum and I'm dragging. And I'm like, why are we here? Why is this important? It didn't feel important enough to be spending this much time on it. And the pacing swapped back and forth so much between the really fantastic and cool elements that were happening. I mean, like, really cool. And I've talked to a couple of people that felt similarly about it. So it's just interesting. The the compelling stuff was almost compelling enough to help me keep reading, but I made it like 50% in and I—like I—it had dragons and I DNF'd it. [Jamie chuckles] And I'm like, what is happening to my brain?

[JAMIE] I think that those are two good examples of where like, it's not that it was a bad book. It's not that the writer didn't do a good job. It's that the other side of that story didn't captivate me enough.

[KARLI] Personally.

[JAMIE] Personally, yeah.

[KARLI] Is not personally compelling enough to keep going.

[JAMIE] Obviously, I'm interested in that writer, because like, I loved a whole section of that. So I'm definitely going to keep picking up their stuff. One of those things, man.

[KARLI] This one is very popular. And so I'm sure I will not hurt his career by saying this because this is an opinion that I have seen other people have about it. But I DNF'd The Dresden Files. I started the first book, and I just couldn't do it. I even started listening to the audiobook, because I found out that James Marsters narrates it, and I love him. But even he couldn't make me stick with it. The elements didn't fit for me, it, it just didn't track. I kept being irritated. Like, why are we doing this? Why, why? And that is the only portion—that was the only shade throwing portion of this episode, folks. That's a choice.

[JAMIE] It just wasn't for me.

[KARLI] In today's internet era, where anonymous people can say whatever they want about anything, and trolling is a favorite pastime; it is very challenging to strike a balance between having a healthy conversation about what you didn't like about something, and just being vicious, for no reason. And I think it's important to be able to talk about the things that we didn't care for, without it being a direct reflection on the author themselves, or even that—

[JAMIE] Or the readers.

[KARLI] Or the readers that did enjoy it. I do my best to not judge other people for reading what they like. There are times where I think I have an innate like, reaction to certain things. But I choose to keep that to myself, and not put it on the internet. So that’s, that's a whole uh, deeper discussion that I don't want to like dive into too far. But since we are talking about some somewhat negative opinions about certain things, I think that that's important to touch on. It is art and art is subjective. Just gonna put that there and walk away. No matter your philosophy. Do what works for you. Jamie, do you have a recommendation for us this week?

[JAMIE] I do have my two cent recommendation. And that is, I recommend you quit that book that you've been wanting to quit. [Karli chuckles] Give yourself a gift, and just stop. Save yourself time and sanity and just let it go. It's fine. [stage whisper] Nothing bad's gonna happen to you because of it. [normal voice] Not because of that. I mean, something bad might happen to you, but I hope not! [Karli laughing] I’m just saying, my recommendation is DNF the books that you want to DNF. I get it I get people want to be able to count them and they don't want to be quitters. But I mean, be a quitter. It's kind of fun. [Karli laughs] And that is my two cent recommendation this week.

[KARLI] I love it. Thanks. All right. Thanks for listening, folks. Follow or subscribe so you're notified of new episodes. You can find us on Instagram @theactbreak_podcast and Twitter @theactbreak_. Head to the links in our Instagram. Those links will take you to our website, scifiohmy.com/podcast. While you're on the website, sign up for The Breakdown newsletter for more recommendations and updates on what we're doing. If you're so inclined, please leave us a review. Catch you next week, folks.

[JAMIE] Talk to you later, internet friends.