Black Friday; Apple And Android Are Doing What?; How To Protect Your Packages From Porch Pirates

• Black Friday deals you can get NOW

• Apple to make nice with green-blue bubble controversy

• How to protect your packages from Porch Pirates

Episode Transcript

(00:06):
Is Michael Garfier. Michael Garfield.Michael Garfield's joining US and the high Tech
Texan. Michael Garfield is here witha high Tech Texans items to make life
easier, some new technology. SoMichael Garfield has something you might want,
Texas. Michael Garfield is your highTech Texan three decades helping you make magic

(00:32):
with your gadgets. I heard worldwideon the iHeartRadio add now your high tech
Texan. Michael Garfield will take alook at your calendar's people because this is
the last high Tech Texan show beforeBlack Friday twenty twenty three, which means

(00:52):
phone calls, emails continue to comein. Garf I know the Black Friday
deals? Are you started? Whatdo you think I got this television?
I'm trying to side between these twothings. I my friends have been doing
this for twenty two years. Thisis a long time to do it,
back when Black Fridays actually happen onFridays. Now, as we know,
they seem to happen throughout the monthof November. And I hope your November

(01:18):
has been well so far. Phonenumber if you would like to ask them
questions. Last minute deals and thereare some that I'm going to start running
down because I've had my eye oneverything from your earbuds, to your TVs,
to your phones to actually remote controlof cars. Seven one three,
two, one two five nine five. Oh there is Calum read Hello,
Callum, Happy early Thanksgiving to you. Wait for some turkey. Actually,

(01:44):
I hope I get some turkey.I do need to buy my turkey because
it is Thanksgiving next week and wewill get on that, including my annual
Hey, open phone lines. What'syour favorite Thanksgiving food? And don't you
dare if I hear that sweet attatawith marshmallows. I'm really I don't think
I've hung up on anybody in mytwenty two years i've been doing this.

(02:06):
I may hang up on you ifyou come with me with the same with
the marshmallows and this week potatoes.Michael is my name, Michael Garfield.
By the way, goods. Youknow what, I've been very busy these
past few weeks. Lots of events. I dig that, man, I
do a lot of MC events.Restaurants for some reason have been opening or
they've been having their anniversaries, andso I've I've been out and about quite

(02:30):
a bit. And it's it's niceseeing so many listeners. They come up,
and it's funny because people do recognizemy voice, which I still think
is bizarre. Either if I'm standingin line or ordering something at a Chick
fil a, though, Hey areyou Garfield? Do you high tech Texans?
But I'm walking around and people actuallyrecognize me. And maybe that's just
because I do a lot on television. Still, hey, throw some makeup

(02:52):
on a pig, people, andyou're probably gonna get recognized. Earlier this
week, I saw some folks.Where was I at? Was? How
do you know where? Oh gosh, I feel like a entertainment tonight dad
a Garden Gray Steakhouse Downtown fourth anniversaryparty. A really nice couple who listens
to me for a while came upto me and they actually recognized me.

(03:14):
Then lady taps me on the onthe back. Are you that guy on
the radio? I'm like, well, there's a lot of people on the
radio. Husband's been listening forever.They came over and they talked, We
took some pictures and she actually hada flip foe, Samsung flip foe.
She's got a Samsung flip I thinkit was version three or four. She
thought it was the latest. Notso fast. There is a version five

(03:35):
with a bigger screen. This iswhy I exist. This really is why
I exist. So anyway, Ido thank everybody for coming up and saying
hi and listening all these years,two plus decades, and I'm here to
serve you, including some Black Friday. He does you want to start with
this, Let's just get it startedright off the bat here where as we
do this for the next two hourshere on KPRC nine fifty in the Southeast

(03:57):
Texas area of specifically use if you'relistening on iHeartRadio, we do thank you
for downloading that app. I wasplaying around on and again everything I'm about
the app. There's not one thingthat has been it's sponsored, it is
not. I don't endorse it.They have not paid me to do this.
I wish these companies would pay me. I wish I would endorse them,

(04:17):
but I don't. But this isa it's a labor of love.
Sometimes it's just a labor that Igo down this list for you play it
on Amazon. As you know,I'm not the biggest Amazon guy. I've
ordered a few things here and there. So again, if I see something
that comes across my desktop. I'mgonna I'm gonna jot it down, starting
with the Amazon Echo Show. Thisis the fifth This is the third generation.

(04:40):
It's the Echo Show five. Thisis one of those smart voice things,
but they also have video too.It is it's made by Amazon,
and generally you're gonna see Black Fridaysales or Amazon Prime deals earlier this year
on Amazon products. Why not.It's Amazon. They're they're eating their own
dog food, as they say,and they put some of this stuff on

(05:00):
sale. The Amazon Echo Show five, it's the third generation. It's a
smart display and also listens to you, so you can ask it to show
you some YouTube recipes if it's inthe kitchen. And I actually I don't
have an Amazon Echo Show, butI do have a smart display that can
play music that could show videos.I have it in my kitchen. I
have one of them in my kitchenones in my bathroom too. Because they're

(05:24):
small, they're out of the way. Normally they're about ninety dollars they're taking.
I saw this fifty dollars off,so forty bones at Amazon normally ninety
bucks. That's a pretty pretty gooddeal. It's the Amazon Echo Show sho
w five. All right, nowget it as I do. This show

(05:45):
is plausibly live on Saturday, theeighteenth of November. They may not be
on now, but these are thethings that I saw of this past week.
Apple AirTags. Now, if youdon't know what an AirTag is,
they're actually pretty unique for all youpeople who lose something, who lose your
keys, who maybe can't find yourphone, or even your car. Maybe
your car potentially could get stolen,which happened not long ago to one of

(06:09):
my kids. If he had anApple air tag in his car, he
could have tracked where that car was. These they have a four pack,
and they have a four pack onsale. They're eighty six dollars and eighty
eight cents. Oddly enough for somereason Amazon normally they're about one hundred dollars
or so, So that you're gonnasave some money. This is a good
gift. Listen. Samsung makes thesetags. They weren't the first to market.

(06:33):
There. There's a number of theseother smart tags. I carry one.
I put one in my backpack whenI travel with my backpack. Sometimes
maybe somebody can run off with it. I could leave it on an airplane.
You could go online and you couldtrack these things. Apple makes these
air tags. You've heard people puttingthem on cars, and actually there are
cities. I think it was atNew York City there was a brand of

(06:55):
a car that was getting stolen alot, and the police in New York
they literally it was mayor too.They recommended putting an Apple AirTag in your
car to track it. Listen,get a four pack, get you know
one for what twenty twenty five dollars. It could save you a lot of
hassle, especially if you lose things, if you lose your keys. I
guess you could put it on yourkid kid's belt if you get a little
kid. You don't want to losethat kid. I don't know. Sometimes

(07:17):
you may want to use a kidlose a kid. What else? We
have Apple AirPods Pro. I sawthe second generation. They're about twenty percent
off. They have a holiday discount'sabout two hundred dollars. Listen, if
you want air air earbuds there areyou can get a heck of a deal
if you don't mind them not havingthe word Apple in front of them.
Everybody seems to want an Apple airpods, the AirPods Pro. Listen,

(07:41):
they're fine for two hundred dollars.You know, active noise canceling. You
can get earbuds, the little tinythings that go inside your ears, for
thirty dollars forty dollars. Not goingto be the biggest name brand, but
they still work and talk about losingthings, This to me has to be
one of the biggest things that youlose. I have a number of different
earbuds I do not have. I'venever had a pair of Apple once because

(08:01):
Apple doesn't give me crap. Theydon't let me test anything. But Samsung
and many other companies do. Theyfall out of my ear. I don't
run with them really because I'm aswitzer. But I wear these things sometimes
on airplanes. How many times hasone of these things fallen out of my
ear? It falls on the groundand under a seat. I'm sitting there
looking for it. I just seenasty crap under some of these airplane seats.

(08:22):
I don't actually use earbuds. I'lltell you what we're up a break.
I'm going to tell you specific.I'll give you the brand, or
one or two brands. I'm playwith the specific type of earbuds headphones that
I use when I exercise when Irun, and they are guaranteed never and
I'm talking never to fall off ofyour ears, fall out of your ears,

(08:43):
and fall off your head. Wegot that so much more, Michael
Garfield, I wish you and earlyhappy Thanksgiving, Happy early Black Friday.
As we continue the High Tech Textshow, interesting choice of bump music.
You know, I'm not in controlof the bump music like I used to
be in control. And I thinkthat's because of licensing fees. I think

(09:03):
if I say, you know,because I'm an eighties guy and I say,
hey, Callum, uh, let'sbump out with a little little Michael
Jackson, the little earth Win infire, It's correct me. If I'm
wrong, Callum, is Zach costsus a bajillion dollars? Is that one
of the reasons why we're paying generictunes? Man radio used to be so
much fun? Whatever the reason,thank you Callum Reid on the other side

(09:28):
of the glass for pushing all thebuttons and making me sound sexy as you
have for such a long time.Phone number here. It is a black
pre Black Friday high Tech Text andShow seven one three, two, one
two, five nine five. OIteased the last segment about some earphones and
headphones. It's it's it's a it'sa good gift. The ear earbuds that

(09:52):
sticking to your ears, you losethem, they get sweaty. The new
technology comes out, Maybe you wantactive noise canceling. Maybe you want all
our ones, maybe one of differentbrand. I will say this, and
again I actually used to did Iused to endorse these. I don't know.
I've been using a pair from thiscompany for years and I absolutely love
it. They're not paying me tosay this. Again, I am not

(10:15):
on their pay roll. But again, my job is to review products and
tell you what is in my opinion, what are some of the better ones,
and what are some of the onesto stay for. I run,
and I run a lot from marathonsand whatever, and so I listen to
music and so I have to schlapmy phone on me somehow, and I
usually have like a little running beltor something, and I bluetooth it to

(10:37):
some ear ear They're not earbuzz,They're not in your spirit speakers or headphones.
What I use is bone conductive headphones, all right, What bone conductive
headphones is as a category, that'snot the name of the product. They
slip around. They're not two separatethings. It's one separate thing. Looks

(11:00):
like a little Do you remember when, if you're old enough maybe now,
when you have braces and you sleepat night and you had to use this
headgear and you have this and Ididn't have braces. I remember my younger
sister had braceist but a lot ofI see this in movies anyway. There's
this thing that goes behind your headand connects. Maybe it's over ears or
something. That is what these boneconductive headphones are. They're very thin.

(11:24):
What they have is they have theselittle tiny speakers that do not go in
your ears. They do not goon your ears. They rest right in
front of your ears, like righton your sideburns. All right, are
you with me? And what happensis they bluetooth to whatever and they've got
a microphone and speaker for phones,calls, what have you. There is

(11:45):
a cheekbone that they're resting on andthe sound waves go through your skin.
It's a dumb serious into that cheekbone, into your ears, and it sounds
great. I'll put an asterisk foryou audio files who want the most elegant
and eloquent sound with the highest amountof decibels and active noise canceling. No,

(12:11):
these aren't that. These are foractive people, if you're walking,
if you're at a gym, ifyou're running, and just generally out and
about. Generally they are waterproof.Let me put it this way. Water
resistant. There's actually one there's anotherone from I got from a company that
was waterproof, and I'm testing thisout right now. The company that I've

(12:33):
been using the buying and recommending thesefor it, it's called shocks sho k
Z and I guess at shocks dotcom. They used to be called after
shocks. I saw that at ConsumerElectronic Show. I'm gonna go back eight
years, eight nine years, andI have been using them since. These
cannot fall off your head because theyare it's like a round headgear type of

(12:54):
thing, and they have hooks,little rubber hooks that that come over your
ears. You cannot shake these thingsoff. So that's number one. You
can't lose these things. The soundis good. But here's why I think
it's important, especially if you areoutdoors, you're walking, in you're running,
you need to be aware of yourenvironment. And I remember when I

(13:15):
ran marathons, there was always arule you couldn't run with earphones or earbuds
or music back in day and again, my first marathon was as I look
here at my studio nineteen ninety.I ran in the nineteen ninety six Houston
Tenneco Marathon, and I ran tenconsecutive marathons. So I ran from nineteen
ninety six to I guess what twothousand and five as marathons. And back

(13:37):
then, I mean technology was such. I mean cell phones were, I
mean they were massive. There werebag phones in nineteen ninety six on most
But you couldn't run simply because therace officials wanted you to be aware and
hear any announcements if a firetruck,if an ambulance, if somebody said there's
a road closure, or what theyneeded you to hear. This actually takes

(14:00):
scare the situation because your ear isopen, there's nothing covering your ear,
there's nothing in your ear. Youcan hear somebody talking to you if you're
walking next to them. Oh,by the way, if you have an
ADHD wired brain like me, youcan also listen to the music or be
on a phone call. Why you'rewhile you're listening, where you're wearing the
headphones. So it's an open earthing. That's it. It's and again

(14:20):
that is a neat device. NowI just got a and they run.
Actually, you know what, letme do this. I'm gonna get online
for you because there's several different versionsof it shocks. I guess at shocks
dot com, shokz dot com.Yeh, that's it. Shop. What

(14:41):
do we got. We've got openfanana like those open run pro. I'm
gonna look at that one open run. Well, there's an over that's one
hundred and eighty dollars, but that'sa pro. Let me go see if
we're gonna give you the cheaper,cheapest wonder and then this is direct from
them. They Amazon may have cheapones. There's one one hundred and thirty
dollars, all right, and let'ssee if there's even a cheaper one than

(15:01):
that. Should see open move upentry level. We like those words.
Eighty dollars. There you go,eighty dollars. Again, this is shocks
Now. I also just got tosend a pair bone conductive, same design
by a company called H two ohAudio H two oh Audio, and these
are a little more plastic key versusrubber. I like the rubber because the

(15:24):
rubber flex is more the plastic.It's it's just a little more brittle,
same thing. It goes over yourears. They are let's see, now,
this one is one hundred percent waterproof, and this is really good if
you're a swimmer. You actually canuse these in water. Now you're asking,
well, how can the Bluetooth connect, Well, Bluetooth sometimes Bluetooth works

(15:48):
within about thirty feet, so maybeif you keep your phone near the near
your pool's edge, which I don'trecommend, it could work. But these
also have a built in storage soyou could preload music on these h two
h two oh audios. Now youdon't need at this point to connect it
to your phone to listen to music. So they are designed by water.

(16:10):
These are let's see, this lookslike about one hundred and sixty dollars,
but I think I don't know,I'm seeing some coupon for Black Fighter or
something. But anyway, the pointis if you're looking for active earbuds,
and everybody has their favorite earbud andear pod and thing. I like the
over the ear bone conductive ones,and only because I'm just active. They're
easy to carry. They're relatively easyto charge the battery is great. These

(16:34):
things have lasted so far for years. The shocks one and I do like
it, so no, there yougo with that. Seven one three,
two, one two five nine five. Oh, you can tell me your
favorite pair or I don't know,give me your give me your best deal,
give me your what's your favorite earphoneor headphone? Do you like the
over the ear ones? The cansthat when I started in radio, that's

(16:56):
what we used to have. Thoseare almost too big. Nowadays you can
get over the year ones, whichI think are great for traveling. If
you're in an airplane, you wantsomething that's active noise canceling because you don't
want to hear the kid behind youyap and are throwing up, and it
also it just pumps in noise.Now, these things that they do need
charge and they do need batteries.I mean you get those from Bows,

(17:17):
you can get them from Sony.But again they have to cover your ear
to be active noise canceling, whichmeans they could actively cancel out noise.
And it's a switch that you'd goon and off. And if you got
any of those favorites, let meknow it's seven one three two one,
two, five, nine five.Oh coming up, as we say,
are Apple and Android about to getmarried. Oh my goodness, people,

(17:40):
the color of your text bubbles mayno longer divide friends in family. So
I action finally win some of myfriends back who have ostracized me all those
years for having green text bubbles.Yikes, lack coming up next to the
high tech text and show bottom ofthe hour on the show before thanksgipping.

(18:04):
Everybody taking a diet. Everybody dietand so far, I don't know what
do you got cooking? And Iknow what you got in your cocktail drawer,
cocktail cabinet. If not, youbetter go get it. Some Papas
Pilar rum. I've become a rumfan. I've always liked rum along with
other spirits, but rum really isvery versatile, especially when you get into

(18:25):
the higher end RUMs. Like PapasPillar Ernest Hemingway family. They have given
the ok and they actually distill thisin beautiful Key West, I mean exactly
where Papa Hemingway used to hang out. Saw this on the shelves of specs
Total wine. Also, they haveseveral I think I have four different varietells
right now. A blonde Rum,which is interesting. You don't see a

(18:45):
blonde. It's called blonde. Youknow, it's not a true white rum.
It's a blonde rum. And listen, blondes do have more fun and
they do actually taste good when yousip them out of his wonderful bottle.
Bottle is shaped like a canteen.Just you know, he was in the
war pop hemingway. But some ofthese have been sitting in casks, some
rye flavored, it's just really neatsipping. And some also some good cocktails.

(19:08):
I'm gonna post more and more ofthese fun cocktail rum making things on
my Instagram. You can go tohigh Tech Texan. But in the meantime,
why not give a great bottle.It's a beautiful package for a holiday
gift giving and bringing over to somebody'shouse for Thanksgiving. And if somebody does
invite me over for Thanksgiving, Iwill bring a bottle of Papa's PLR Rum

(19:29):
so we can mix up some cocktailsas we watch the Cowboy Game, which
is an annual Thanksgiving Day tradition forthe Garnfield family. Papa's pr p I
l a R Papa's PILR Rum.Go get it, go sample it and
you will thank me. I'm actuallykind of for clemped about this next news.
I have been ostracized by so manyof my friends because I am an
android guy, and it's still itstill amazes people. As recently as two

(19:53):
days ago, I was at anevent Thursday night that the high tech textion
doesn't use an iPhone. I donot use an iPhone. I actually bought
purchase the very first iPhone in thecity of Houston when they came out June
twenty eight, two thousand and six, two thousand and seven. I was

(20:15):
there six pm the Big AT andT store, right across from the Oasis
of Love. Six hundred dollars Ibought I wanted. They didn't give it
to me. Apple gives me nothing. Apple doesn't. When I say Apple
does not give me the time ofday, I am not kidding you.
I do not know what time itis right now. I am a technology
entertainalist, journalist, reviewer twenty plusyears. I do TV, I do

(20:40):
radio. I got a lot offriends in the industry where they get invited
to the Apple things. I'm notill towards Apple. I think they are
gorgeous products. I think they arepricey, but I've never been a shield
for Apple, and people think,oh my gosh, how come the high
tech Texan I talk about iPhones.Well, I'm not going to go out
and buy a new iPhone because Ihave to test. I probably get four

(21:02):
or five, six seven new phonesper year from other manufacturers that I am
constantly testing. If I go getanother iPhone, that's one that I'm going
to have to purchase. And again, the ones I test generally, I
signed a thirty day review and Iand I send it back to the company.
So I am never going to bethe guy, nor do I want
to be the guy who's going totry to switch you from one operating system

(21:23):
to the next. Yes, Iam, and I love Android. I
love everything about Google again unpaid,they don't pay me to say this.
I just it works well everything together. I have a Microsoft Windows desktop because
I used to work at Microsoft,and back then I think Bill Gates planted
a chip on our brains that We'realways going to be Windows operating system.
Not that it has anything to dowith Google, but they work together.

(21:44):
It sinks the calendars and everything,and so I'm just not Apple guy.
I think androids for midi aspects.They have much better features. There's every
foldable phones, flippable phones. Mostevery manufacturer in the world makes one,
except Apple. It's their prerogative.A ton of money and a lot of
people use the Apple iPhone. Iwill say this. One of the reasons
I do talk about Android is becausemore people in the world and this is

(22:07):
a massive fact than you could jackfact check me not false news. More
people in the world use the Androidoperating system three to one, almost more
than iPhone iOS. Seventy percent,maybe seventy five percent of the market worldwide,
okay worldwide. I mean I wentwhen I went to South Korea last

(22:29):
July on behalf of Samsung. Thisis a this is an Android dog Samsung.
I don't think they let iPhones inthe country. I may be joking
about that, but I went tothe Samsung manufacturer factory. I mean there
is just there's no iPhones to befound. Conversely, I bet you if
you go down Coupertino, you're notgoing to see any Android phones over there.
But I'm talking around the world becauseit's free. The Android op sitting
is free, and they give itto other manufacturers LG. Motorola, Google,

(22:53):
Pixel, which is its own SamsungOnePlus those are androids. Okay,
think about that. There's only onemanufacturer that uses Apple iOS, the Apple
iPhone. So by sheer numbers,that's why Android is used by more people,
is more popular. I didn't saythat. It's a fact that is
used by more people around the world. And I do want to talk to

(23:14):
more people around the world, andI want to text with more people around
the world. And people know whenyou are texting or chatting with someone who
is not on an Apple iPhone,because the Apple iPhone famously goes through your
eye message and all of the messagespop up those little cute little bubbles with
the color blue blue collum. That'sa cue for you to play blue by

(23:37):
a famous country. And then again, we'd have to pay a bazillion dollars
for the licensing for the storry aboutthat big news, because what happens is
when someone from an iPhone and theychat with me, my little bubble shows
up as green. Oh you're agreen bubble. I mean you talk about
ostracizing. I mean this goes beyondreligion sometimes or your beliefs, the color

(24:03):
of your skin. If you're ademocrat, if you're a republic you're a
green bubble. I mean people,you phone snob, get out of my
face and then we land they laughit off. I might just leave me
A long point is And that wasa big build up people. In a
very surprising move, a few daysago, Apple, probably through gritted teeth,

(24:26):
they sit out a press release andthey announced that it will adopt the
RCS messaging standard, which is RichCommunication Services. It's a feature should launch
next year on iPhones with a softwareupdate later next year, twenty twenty four,
and it's going to bring a goodrange of new eye message style features
to messaging between iPhone and Android.There you go, Hey, Bunny and

(24:53):
WOI live together in perfect hu money. I just dated myself because no one
remembers that song. If you're youngenough to have an iPhone, it's about
time. Apple did not want todo it. Apple is very closed knit.
They want proprietary everything. But thatgreen bubble Blue bubble divide is gonna

(25:17):
get smaller pretty soon. Again.This is reported by an online gossip rumery
type thing. It's called nine tofive Mac nine two five Mac, and
I'm gonna quote them, but they'rereporting that Apple has confirmed it will support
this RCS messaging standard that it longdid not want to do. Now that's
not to say the messages from Androiddevices will no longer appear green on Apple's

(25:37):
Messages app, but it does meanthat text from iPhones to non I you
know, iPhone operating system devices willsupport the newer rich communication services. And
it works like this. If youever trying to send a video, if
you're an iphoner, you ever tryingto send a video via taxs to someone
on an Android on the Android receivingend, and the mayword vice versa,

(25:59):
it's if rainy, it's choppy.This should fix that. It's a standard,
it's an industry standard, so it'sgoing to work along with I Message
Listen. Google is long taking somepotshots at Apple for not supporting RCS,
and they're saying that the texting listen, the texting experience really between iPhones and
not iPhones. It's so outdated.Might as well have pagers or smoke signals.

(26:25):
Google said it was happy to seeApple support RCS. I mean,
just can't we all get along.We're on an iPhone fifteen right now.
iPhone fifteen. They finally went theway of Android because it comes with a
USBC charger. Nope, that's right. See Apple can change. They were
actually forced to put a USBC inby the Europeanian Union. There's no more
lightning charger devices on the new iPhonefifteen and going forward. Now. I

(26:52):
don't know where this is brought byEU regulations or other motivations, but it's
nice that Apple is opening up partsof its walled garden to play nice with
out of the devices. And sonow you're not gonna have to buy your
mom an iPhone so that can bea blue bubble person. Come on,
peep, listen, I got this. If you don't want to go blue
or green, let me go backto when I was in second or third

(27:12):
grade ARC class. If you mixblue and green, doesn't it give you
red? Or is it purple?I'm not even sure. This is what
an idiot I am. Make thatthe new color. If you mix blue
and green, maybe it's like ateal or something. Makes that the new
color. So we can live ina harmony like Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder.

(27:34):
All right, we're back out ofhere. Happy early Thanksgiving on the
High Tech Textan Show. If youknow my phone number, you feel free
to text me and if you havean iPhone, you're going to get a
green bubble because we're just talking aboutthat. But next year, people,
I don't know, we may bethe same color. I don't know.
One world, people, one world. As we bring you back to the

(27:55):
high tech textan show. If youmiss somewhere part of the show you want
to hear it again. Need todo is go to iHeartRadio download that app.
Great app. The show you canhear as long as many times as
you want, especially after giving youwonderful information on Black Friday deals that have
already started. No longer do youhave to wait till Black Friday to actually
experience Black Friday deals. Black November, then it'll be black December. Actually,

(28:19):
we need a new white December.I'm dreaming of a white Christmas.
January comes. I'll be in LasVegas the second week for the annual CES
Consumer Electronics Show, where I actuallyI find a lot of neat early adopter
type of gadgets. We could talkabout phone number here if you want to
say Hi, seven one, two, nine five Oho. If you are

(28:41):
shopping for things I do, I'ma very good shopper. I compare.
I give you some good, goodproducts, better products, best products,
products to stay away from. SoI'm more than happy to answer that for
you. I had another conversation earlierthis week about TikTok. Was it with
Deborah? No? Yeah, Iwas out with Deborah Duncan because I do

(29:03):
a lot of stuff on Great DayHouston, and we were reapping about apps.
Deborah also an Android user. That'swhy we get a lot and the
one app we're all on social media. Again, we are of age where
we're above fifty, where we don'thave a lot of the apps that you
young whipper snappers out there have.And you know you're a whipper snapper when
you don't know what the word whippersnapper means. That is the definition of

(29:26):
whipper snapper. And the one thatdeb and I particularly are not on is
TikTok. For some everybody has thereasons TikTok. Maybe because it started out
as just really really young teenagers they'redoing this. Maybe we're not great enough
to do the dances. Maybe becauseit's owned by a Chinese company called Byte
Dance that allegedly gets every bit ofinformation from your phone. We don't know,

(29:52):
but I saw this was interesting.More and more people are getting their
new news on TikTok, and thisis in contrast with other social media sites
because consumption has either declined they stayedabout the same in recent years. But
roughly one third of adults under thirtyunder the age of thirty regularly scroll TikTok

(30:18):
for news. That is, accordingto Pew Research Center, a two hundred
and fifty five percent increase since twentytwenty COVID. This is not just younger
Americans too, this is across allthese demographics. Facebook, by the way,
still the most popular social media platformfor news consumption. About one third
of US adults get their news fromthe site. Twenty five percent of people

(30:41):
get their news from YouTube, alongwith Instagram, TikTok, and x they're
following that popularity. But I thoughtit was interesting TikTok because I just I
my kids, all three of myboys, they're their twenties. They use
TikTok for business. Also, they'revery very good at it. I just
think again this is me. Ijust think TikTok is for showing off how

(31:03):
to do some kitchen recipes and dancevideos or something. So I don't know
what kind of news they're getting.Hopefully it's not fake news because I'm sick
of all the fake news on Xand actually Threads, man, I've been
using threads. That's the Twitter killer. I'm using air quotes right there.
That launched in July, that startedup with unbelievable response. I mean,

(31:26):
millions and millions of downloads. Worksthe same thing as X slash Twitter,
and they were very nice. Therewas they were just getting launched. There
was was. There was no youknow, fake news, bad rhetoric like
that. It's I don't know whatThreads is getting a little bit nasty right
now. And again it's hard toyou know, monitor all that stuff.

(31:48):
Elon must doesn't want it. Whetheryou like Elon or not, who is
it? I guess officially a textan, so we should like him, I'm
not sure. Seven one five oh, but do this. You can get
your news from me, get youruse from nay oh on Black Friday.
A lot of people, so manypeople that we use. We don't even
shop in regular stores. We goonline. This show is so twenty two

(32:13):
years. I've been doing this tothink about this, so two thousand and
one, two thousand, yeah,one is two thousand and two hours.
I started the show and was AmazonAmazon was around, but Amazon was stelling
books. Every Black Friday or everyMonday after or Cyber Monday, they would
release how many millions or tens ofmillions of dollars were sold online. And
I used to every year it wastwelve million dollars were sold over the Thanksgiving

(32:37):
Day weekend online, and then itwould go to fifteen. They were going
to twenty five, and they wouldbe impressive that I would give interviews like,
hey, Michael, you cover technology. You know it's just going to
be the new norm. I don'teven know what the number is going to
be this year. It'll certainly bein the billions of dollars. But the
point is you shop online, whichmeans they have to mail these things to
you. And when they mail itone of the big issues about this.

(32:58):
I have a few issues about this. I like immediate returns. Oh I
want that return on investment, butI want if I buy something again.
I grew up where I went toa store, I paid for something,
they would give it to me rightthen and there you walk out of it,
just like you do a grocery store. Well, for the most part,
people may not even go to grocerystores. Right now, I don't

(33:19):
like waiting. Okay, yes,with Amazon now you can get it the
same day. Maybe Prime you're goingto get one to two days. But
the point is your packages are deliveredto your door and sometimes after the ups
Amazon, whoever deliver it, yourpackage wherever you order from, it ain't
there because it's stolen. And weknow what we call these people, bad
people, porch pirates, porch pirates, And nearly a third of people will

(33:45):
track their package delivery online, whichis good. I'm going to give you
we got to buy what two orthree minutes some quick ways to protect your
purchases and stay away, and hopefullyporch pirates will stay away. Seventy four
piers of staff seventy four billion dollarsin e commerce items are expected to arrive

(34:05):
on doorsteps this holiday season seventy fourbillion, but only sixty eight percent of
shoppers have preventive actions planned to dealwith the risk of theft. Those porch
pirates forty four million package staffs inthe US last year, forty four million.
This is a security dot org.How do you do it? Because
online shopping is bigger, how doyou discourage package theft? Well? Number

(34:29):
one, don't deliver to your house. Send them to a UPS store,
a FedEx store, an Amazon locker. I live near all Whole Foods.
I walk in, I see anAmazon locker's Amazon lockers a lot of places.
I live right around the corner froma FedEx store. There's a UPS
store not along with me. Ifyou know you're not going to be home,
send it there at that point afterwork, you go over there,

(34:50):
you show your ID, then youpick it up. That's that to me,
is the easiest. Is it themost convenient because it's not at your
door. No, But if youhave something you absolutely positively want delivered overnight
but also notte send it to oneof those stores. Amazon has something called
in garage delivery. You can giveyour Amazon delivery driver a key that will

(35:14):
open your garage and they will slideit under the garage door. I don't
know if you want to do thatyet, but that's pretty cool because Amazon
is trying to help this. Youknow, porch pirates. A lot of
people now have these video doorbells,and that's a big, big opportunity to
see that package and see and catchsomebody if they're stealing it. You know,
it doesn't have to be ring thereare so many more on the market.

(35:35):
Home security cameras and those doorbell camerasare really good. I highly recommend
getting some of those. Is thatgoing to stop that security, because no,
you're not going to be home,but maybe you can catch these thieves,
deliver it to your office address,maybe pick it up in a store.
But wait, think about this,because I don't want you to be

(35:57):
victim of all the great items thatI am telling you to potentially get.
His gifts, ask for a gift, forgive a gift to be stolen.
Because it is a big, bigbusiness. As as I said, seventy
eight billion, seventy four billion dollarsin e commerce items are expected to be
delivered. If you want to sendsomething to me, right here, iHeartMedia
and Houston right here on the Loopsix to ten, you're the Galery.

(36:17):
Put it in care of Michael Garfield. I do thank you in advance for
that hour Number one is Oba NextHour got some other ideas including if you
want to buy a car, itis going to be so simple to buy
a car next year for at leastone manufacturer. I love this announcement that
ties my love of cars and mylove of online shopping. And everything technology.
You're going to like that. Andalso kid parents, if your kids

(36:40):
are Taylor Swift fans, I gotsome news for you. Oh if that's
not a tease, I do notknow what is is? Michael Garfier Michael

(37:04):
Garfield. Michael Garfield's joining in thehigh Tech Texan. Michael Garfield is here
with a high tech Texans who itemsto make life easier some new technology.
So Michael Garfield has something you mightlike about. Michael Garfield is your high
Tech Texan? Three decades helping youmake magic with your gadgets, occurred worldwide

(37:34):
on the Iheartware. Do you adnow your high Tech Texan? Michael Garfield
halfway through the High Tech Texan Show, and it is a pre Black Friday,
halfway to half hour. You knowwhat a lot of people aren't working
this coming way right? You get? Does everybody get you should get Thursday
off? Hopefully maybe Friday. Somepeople are taking the whole week off.
Happy Hour starts right now. Don'tworry about it, even tho we're halfway

(37:57):
to half hour on my show.You guys go ahead and start your hope.
You're drinking papas p laur rum goodrum mix it in there. I
hope everybody had a good first hourand we are entertaining you still taking calls
fave Thanksgiving food. I'm getting alot of stuffing. I love stuffing and
I'm a weirdo, but just giveme the stove top box stuffing. I

(38:19):
want to make it simple. AndI like cooking. I'm not like the
Okay, I'm a bachelor and Okoyd, I don't want to go No,
I'm more than happy to cook.I also like mash I do like mashed
potatoes a lot of carbs. It'svery simple to get the box mashed potatoes
where you put water in there.I like those, but it's just that
they're they're kind of creamy. Sometimesyou want the lumps in there. That's
the one that actually divides people whenI tell people, like I love just

(38:43):
make me a stove top stuffing.Just open a box, you put the
stick of butter in there, andit's just so good. And then I'll
say, for you know, I'llsettle for box mashed potatoes. What I
can't believe you eat box mashed potatoes. You don't buy real mashed potatoes and
mash them up? My new Idon't. I'm too busy outside smoking my
turkey and getting ready for the Cowboygame on Thanksgiving? So what is your

(39:06):
What is your pumpkin pie? Idon't need a lot of pie. I
yeah, I pumpkin's okay. Iwill eat a little slice of pumpkin pie
just to just say I have pumppie seven three two five zero best turkey
recipe. Feel free, more thanhappy to uh have you on the the
or if you if you buy you'reuh if you, I guess we could

(39:30):
talk about ham if you're really donetoo. I don't need ham, but
the ham turkey. I'm here foryou people. I need some good recipes
too, because I'm giving I'm givingyou good information. Do I do?
I talk about the Taylor Swift thingnow. I tease the fact that I
have some Taylor Swift news, andso I've got now every kid probably in
the country whose parents listen to me, I'm you're twenty years old, they're
tuning in right now. Hey kid, how you doing? Uncle garfy here?

(39:53):
Who saw the Taylor Swift eras tour? I did not see it.
I did not see the movie.I like Taylor Swift. I don't know
Taylor Swift. I think she isin her team and her team are absolutely
brilliant. Her marketing, prowessness,the ubiquity of what she does and where

(40:15):
she is is unmatched. I think, right now, is it I don't
really, wasn't born? Is itbeatlesque? Where she is sweeping the country
and sweeping the world, well wherevershe goes in these erators, I think
show. I think she's doing aphenomenal plus marketing by dating or allegedly dating

(40:37):
Travis Kelsey. So she's getting theNFL kind of fans, and in the
NFL is absolutely loving it because nowthey're picking up new young fans that they've
never seen before. Neither here northere. Congrats to Taylor Swift. There's
a tech spin here standby when Taylorgoes to concerts, and she came in

(40:59):
Houston to NRG. She came toArlington, I think for several stops for
AT and T stadium, but anyway. AT and T data network measures how
much data traffic can be shared ormoves through stadiums for football stadiums, concerts
and whatever, and they measure itgenerally in terabytes a terabyte of data.

(41:23):
A terabyte of data represents about twohundred thousand photos. Keep that in mind.
One terabyte of data two hundred thousandphotos or four hundred hours of video
moving across this network one terriblet.Okay, two thousand photos. A general
football game, A football game couldhave anywhere between four terabytes five terabytes of

(41:51):
data. Dallas Cowboys they push abouttwenty one terabytes of data. Number one,
because the Cowboys is the greatest.Number Two, it's at and T
Stadium. Three. It's a bigstadium, and people call I say this
now leading up to Taylor Swift.Taylor Swift went to stadium. It's actually
stadium, but we're going to callit stadiums. And they measured how much

(42:13):
terabytes of data during her concerts shehas used. Fans of hers have used
record amounts of data. During theaerostur in North America, a staggering twenty
nine terabytes of data glittery data movedthrough AT and t's network when she was

(42:34):
in Arlington, Texas. That's theArlington went on twenty nine terriblet. As
I said, one terabyte is twohundred thousand photos. You do the math.
That's the most data AT and Tnetwork has moved at any stadium for
any event this year again average Cowboysgame twenty one terabytes of data. So

(42:57):
yes, I guess Swifty is aboveor better than the Cowboys. Maybe she
did twenty three terabytes of data inNissan Stadium in Nashville, twelve terabytes in
Atlanta, eight point six terabytes inRaymond James Stadium in Tampa, four gigabytes
in Foxboro Stadium in Gillette. Whatis this? Does this I'm trying to

(43:21):
look at this data and good?What is this show that bigger markets,
bigger fan bases, because it's toughto be a bigger stadium and a big
market between Dallas and Fort Worth.And number two is Nissan Stadium Nissan,
which is in obviously Nashville. Isdoes she live there? Big country,
not to u'st country, big musicfans, absolutely, some music century city.

(43:45):
That's the top two. NRG wasnumber three. NRG was twenty gig
twenty terabytes of data. Sofi Stadiumthough, was twelve. So far that's
the huge one in Los Angeles?Does anybody have any problem going to stadiums
nowadays? In getting a connections connectivityit used to be a bear, I

(44:08):
mean because there was only in thecell system. Maybe there's one or two
cell phone towers outside of stadium rightnow, nowadays it's different. Verizon I
believe has wired NRG Stadium in Houston. I know this because I think I
got a press release earlier this yearwhere there are antennas all over this stadium

(44:31):
and there may be in there's WiFi. I know AT and T did
it for the past several years.AT and T is a big partner with
the Final Four, the March Madnessdan caa tournament when they play the Final
Four in these big, big stadiums. They put a a basketball court on
the floor on the field and it'sa raised stadium. Underneath that raiy stadium

(44:52):
is just an array of antennas,so the potential eighty thousand, ninety thousand
people can actually get better reception outthere. It's getting easier and better.
So anyway, there is your TaylorSwift update, which is probably the first
time I've ever done it on thisshow, and I'd say it's the last.
Are we gonna play any Taylor Swiftpump out music? We'd have to
play up bajillion dollars all right?Coming up after this, how would you

(45:15):
like to buy a car online?Oh? My, the world is converging
next year coming up on the HighTech X Show. I hope everybody is
having got one the whole day.If you are listening live here on Saturday
afternoon as we do it on kpRC Radio nine fifty, if we also

(45:37):
have a encore broadcast that repeaks ateleven PM and goes into one am.
So right now, if you're listeningdriving your life away, it's actually on
Sunday, Sunday morning, so youactually should know what the outcome of the
football game. So, speaking offootball games, I will be hanging up
as I do the show right nowon Saturday, actually early afternoon, I

(46:00):
will be hanging up the earphones andthe microphone and jaunting off to the aero
because I am added to Ames Iowa. Anyone, anyone Aimes Iowa. I
will be going to the university.I have Texas Longhorns versus Iowa State game
tonight. Anyone when I join,no going out with a few buds of
mine. I went there about fouryears ago. It's cold. It's going

(46:22):
to be thirty one degrees tonight atsome point, so I am wrapped up
in my burn orange. I ama traveling long horn honk and could not
be more excited. Hopefully the Longhornson the right track for the Big twelve.
And by the way, the Nattythe National Championship will be held right
here in your home city of Houston, Texas, January eighth. Could it

(46:43):
be the Texas Longhorns that ain't gonnabe the Aggies. I'll tell you that
right now, So Horns. Andalso I need to stop and get some
I need to bring some food onthe plane with some of my buds.
And I want to prove we're goingto Iowa, and I want to show
Iowa's and I like, I gota good buddy of mine who and Iowa
need to show them what real Texasbarbecue is. Like, I'm gonna stop
by jbar M, jbar M.If you haven't been to this barbecue joint.

(47:07):
It's on the east side of downtown, relatively new. It is massive.
It's such a great neat place tofirst of all, eat food.
They're more than happy to take youthrough the pit room with the smokers out
there. Oh it's great. Hawfyis my man. Haffey is the general
manager. And this dude is justso freaking cool, just from his looks

(47:30):
to the way he talks and justto the way he just runs a great
organization. Some of the best slicesof brisket, they got chicken, they
got turkey, big bars, theygot a stage outdoor stage for entertainers.
Out there, you can watch allthe games. It's cool. Definitely a
place that you can take visitors to. Hey, man, I want some
Texas barbecue by anyway. I placedin order and I'm gonna go pick it
up after the show here from Jbar M and we're gonna be snacking all

(47:54):
the way up to Iowa on that. So very excited. I think they
make a turkey too. I mayjust blow off making my Thanksgiving turkey and
go get it. I like smoketurkey, man. I walk back in
the jbar Ms smoking pit room backthere, they I forgot his name.
Who is our pitmaster? What acool dude, man. He like lives

(48:14):
out there for twelve to fifteen hoursa day and night. Puts those things
on what at five six in themorning, and they're just smoking. They
look so good, they look sotender. So for some reason, you
got no Thanksgiving plans, I'm guessing, and I'm probably sure that you can
get to go orders j barr M. The M stands for Michael. It
really doesn't, but I'm just gonnago with that. As we continue the

(48:35):
high Tech Texting Show Kate Percy nineto fifty am, Hook them Horns.
We covered the Taylor Swift thing.Oh, we're gonna tell you how to
buy a car. I cover carsa lot. I test drive cars every
single week, not from a dealership, but straight from the manufacturer. I
will not recommend a dealership. Youjust going. I will tell you what
cars, what vehicles, with minivans, with sports cars, with electric cars

(48:59):
are good, decent, not good, what they need to improve, et
cetera. But generally it's up toyou. At that point, you're gonna
go, oh, garf man,let me go test drive these things all
right, now, let me gofind a dealership, all right, let
me go negotiate with a dealer.Well, those days could be coming to
an end. You may be saying, hey, Alexa, buy me a

(49:20):
Hyundai, because earlier this week Amazonannounced they are gonna sell cars online for
the first time, starting with Hyundai. Starting next year, people, you're
gonna be able to go on Amazonand get all your toiletries, your groceries,

(49:42):
your headphones and oh, by theway, I'll think I'll get a
car. They announced the deal AmazonHyunday announced the deal that they're going to
allow dealerships to sell cars through thesite. And just because there's the whole
law of dealers, you have togo through a dealer, but dealers now
will be able to list cars onAmazon to make it, I guess easier
for people to find now. Previouslyyou could browse car showrooms compare prices on

(50:07):
Amazon, you couldn't actually buy acar. All gotta change. Next year,
several Hyundai dealers start to list modelsfor sales on the site, so
you can browse cars, make apurchase using your preferred payment method. Then
you could choose to pick up thecar at a nearby dealership, or you
could have it delivered to your homeat your convenience. But remember this importantly,

(50:30):
the in seller of the vehicle,it's still going to be the dealer.
Amazon's simply a platform between the middlemanbetween the customer and the dealership.
I'm not sure if Amazon's talking toanybody else, but Hyundai first to market
about this thing and at least gettingheadlines, and it's got me to talk
about it. For two or threeminutes. Amazon has been slowly moving into

(50:52):
the car space. I mean theywere offering virtual showrooms for some brands,
price comparison tools, and you canbuy I mean you can buy car parts
and accessories site. But as partof this deal, Amazon's Alexa voice assistant.
Oh, by the way, it'sgoing to be available in Hyundai vehicles
starting in twenty twenty five, andHyundai is going to use AWS Amazon Web

(51:15):
Services for cloud services. Nice dealback and forth. Is this going to
help your car shopping or better?I mean, it's pretty smart on Amazon
because it really nicely sidesteps the issueby ensuring that dealers remain a very crucial
part of the process. Most dealersallow customers to browse and buy a car
through their own websites, but havingAmazon as an additional platform, I mean,

(51:39):
think about Amazon has millions of dailycustomers. I mean, it's going
to it. My guess is makethe process even better. I've got like
four ways of payment on my Amazonand I've got my credit card. I
think I have a fifty dollars giftcard. I've got VIM, I think
I have Vemo or PayPal. Canyou just so I could just buy a

(52:00):
car? Is it one click checkout? Could I just want? Oh?
I like this. Here's an dayKona, which is actually a very
nice vehicle I tested a few monthsago. Let me just get a day
Kona A right way twenty nine thousanddollars one click out of here? Can
I put this on my fifty dollarsAmazon gift car? Oh? You need
another method of payment? I likeit. This is the convergence of technology

(52:23):
and automobiles coming together. I absolutelylike that a lot. I absolutely do.
He speaking of cloud storage, andI also was talking about Taylor Swift
last segment breaking all the data recordsand eras tour all her fans would share
so much terabytes of data more sothan any other event concert football stadium.

(52:43):
That was cool. And then there'scloud Then I just talked about Amazon Web
Services in cloud storage. Verizon isactually getting in the game. Somebody these
companies have cloud storage options, andyou have to understand the pricing and how
much is there a limit? Note limit? Verizon just they announced that

(53:05):
they have cloud storage options for unlimited. I'll repeat unlimited for thirteen dollars and
ninety nine cents per month. Justnew it's coming out, so pretty much
Verizon wants to back up your entirelife for fourteen bones per month. So
it's a new plan, unlimited space, so you can put your photos,

(53:25):
your videos, your documents and everything. That's actually kind of unusual. A
lot of other cloud services come withdata caps. Here's it's just x amount
and then that's it. But thisis a wireless carrier, so I mean
they want you to use their signals, carriers and their system to actually upload

(53:46):
everything. I actually was wondering aboutthe word unlimited, because there's a lot
of different carriers, including Verizon,that have funny definitions of unlimited, and
there are some limited. There's afew limitations, so individual files can ex
see ten gigabytes, you can onlyupload fifty gigs per day. Those are

(54:09):
pretty high ceilings, though I don'tthink a lot of people can hit that.
Before fourteen nine and Night Listen,Dropbox they just eliminated as a unlimited
plan for business customers. There's GoogleOne, There's back Blaze, there's all
of these cloud storagees. If youdon't, I would absolutely because I use

(54:31):
a few cloud services. I obviouslyalso have in my next to my computer
several hard drives that back up everything. As again, I'm an eagle scout.
I mean I want to be beprepared, back back, back,
back protected. For some reason,the cloud servers go bye bye whatever.

(54:51):
At least I have a hard copyhere on my desk. For some reason,
something happens to my home, theft, fire, flood, I've got
the copy in the cloud. Imean, I've got the pictures when I
was a kid, and I gotmy baby, the kid's baby pictures.
Just a lot of documents. Somethingyou should always always do. You should
always back it up. You shouldabsolutely do that, Toway. That's one
option. I just noticed the Hoverzon. It's unlimited, which is is pretty

(55:15):
cool, but fourteen bucks per month. There are a lot of cheaper options
off there, but I don't knowif you're going to get unlimited. That's
what I do. Just give yousome ideas and opportunities. Hey, speaking
of ideas, do it yourselfers Iffor some reason you have issue, you
want a plumber, and you wantTVs hung or you have anything that a
handyman can or can't do. Thereis a company here in Houston, been

(55:36):
around for a while that I actuallyuse their services recently, all through an
app where you could schedule almost anything, anyone to come help you do something
around your home. It's like ahandyman on steroids. I will talk to
this company on the other side.We are back at it. Michael garfieldy
long long, almost too long,running high tech text in show kPr nine

(56:00):
fifty am. If you're in andaround the south East Texas area, and
thank you also for downloading that iHeartRadioapp. You could be listening all over
the world. My next guest,I kind of got some bad news.
If you're all over the world,it may not matter to you unless you
have an idea of actually kind ofcreating what this pretty smart service organization and
app does, because they do servicethe Houston area and a lot of areas

(56:22):
around that. And I want tostart with this for long time listeners.
You know, I'm an eagle scout, so my job is to do things
myself. Do it yourself. Ican figure things out as much as I
can. I can I remember howto do it. I got the life
saving Merit badge. I think Ineed a refresher, but that's neither here
nor there. But when it comesto replacing disposa you know, garbage disposals

(56:44):
and hanging TVs and I could doit. Problem is do I have the
time to do it? And thisis where it gets tricky. There's a
local company here that's been around forquite a bit, but I love it
because of their tech based app thatI just used not long ago, and
I wanted to kind of talk andfind out their history and share the info
with It is called good Smith.It's called good Smith Home Repair. Eric

(57:06):
Klein is one of the co founders, and he joins me right there,
I'll start with this, Eric,were you a boy scout. I was
a cub Scout. I did notgo too far into it, but I
certainly, just like you, wasalways brought up that you need to be
able to fix your own things inyour house. So well, see now
I let my kids do it.Hey, you know what, something wrong

(57:27):
with my computer? That's what youhave kids for. Oltimately like that,
But when it comes to tricky stuff, when it comes to plumbing and just
get other kind of a handyman typeof project. You saw a niche over
there. So for the people Iunfamiliar, they may see your trucks driving
around Houston area. Good Smith HomeRepair give us the overview of the company.
We are a tech enabled turnkey homeservice and repair company. What does

(57:50):
that mean? We, through ourapp and through our technology, we make
it as easy as possible for ourclients to get on their phone type in
couple words, say that their lightis broken, their toilets clogged, and
before they know it, they canhave a goodsmith truck with a vetted professional
heading their way to take care ofall of their issues that they might have

(58:13):
in their home. So what wecreated this because I was a homebuilder for
twenty years. I'd built somebody's houseand three years later they'd be calling me
up and go, hey, Eric, I've got twenty things in my house
I need to get done. I'vegot all the guys and the skills to
get that done. But homebuilders andcontractors aren't set up to come fix the
hole that the door knob punched inthe sheet rock, are coming out to

(58:37):
fix three shingles on your roof.So what we do is we do everything
that large contractors are capable of doing, but just aren't set up to do.
I immediately got it when I sawthe website, and then I also
downloaded the app, which is obviouslyit's very simple to do. I like
how you say it's a tech enabledmaintenance and repair company, because you are

(59:00):
the can I call you this?It's you're a virtual superintendent. You're the
superman. I mean you're like Schneiderokay, reference reference from back in the
day, or or bookman if yougo back to good times that instead of
just calling the number. And obviouslyI have my own home too, It
doesn't matter what it is because youcan hndle everything from that the handyman stuff
to the maintenance, to the appliancesinto everything. The list of things that

(59:22):
you do it continues to grow.Give us again, I just gave some
generalizations over there, but what dowhat? What services do you offer?
So we from the most simple things, we have maintenance programs that will come
out quarterly or bi anally. Ifyou like to change your light bulbs,
change your air filters, plush yourwater heaters, clean your dryer vent,

(59:42):
do chemical drain cleaning on your drainto keep the sinks running. You know,
those are kind of the oil changes, entire rotations that we all do
for our for our cars. Weforget to do those for our houses.
And so we do have programs thatwill take care of that we have.
We are a master plumber, We'rea master electrician. We've got expert painters,
carpenters, sheet rockers, everything toalso just our generalists aka handyman to

(01:00:08):
come out there hang some pictures foryou. We also have in house an
exterier cleaning company that will wash yourexyr windows, power wash, clean your
gutters. Ninety percent of what needsthat can be done in your home,
we have someone in house that cando it that other ten percent that we
don't have in house. We've gotservice partners that will manage that whole,

(01:00:30):
that process all the way through.The biggest glaring part of that is,
as of right now, we don'thave an HVAC service in house, which
we're working on doing that, butwe have multiple, multiple partners that we
trust to come out to your homeand take care of those take care of
any issues that we do not havein house. It's got an email.

(01:00:51):
I just got an email here froman Amy and she says, love this
interview. I think they need toredaim the company to the ultimate husband.
I'd like you ever heard of thatone? That's a good one we have.
Yeah, we joke around here thatyou know, we've been saving marriages
in Houston for the past four years. So yeah, we started this right
before, right before COVID started off. And you know, my partner and

(01:01:15):
I we were looking at each otherand the beginning of twenty twenty going well,
you know, that was a goodfour months. You know, COVID
just killed us a little, didwe know. A month and a half
two months later, our phones areringing off the hooks because everyone was at
home. Everyone was breaking things.You had the one spouse to the other's
spouse was going, hey, howlong is that that cabinet being crooked?

(01:01:37):
And the other spouse is going,well, about seventeen years, and so
it's it's amazing at what we areable to do to really get things around
the household, sort it out.Eric Kleine, he is the co founder
of good Smith. We'll make surewe give you the the web dress and
also how to download that app.This is when I first downloaded one of

(01:01:58):
the first things that I saw andI got because I understand how customer service
works. It's a membership plan andthen you have several maintenance plan and I
and I understand that, and I'llprobably let you kind of explain it this
way, but the fact is youknow I joke about the superintendent. I
mean everybody has them on you know, speed doff. You're living in a
high rise or an apartment like that, but you have a relationship. I
mean, the superintendent of your buildingknows everything that was built, when it

(01:02:22):
was built. What's wrong when you'remaintenance scheduled and I my guess is that's
you want that relationship with the customer. Absolutely, it's being being a membership
and having that relationship. When youput a request in on the app that
your upstairs air conditioner isn't working,we know the model, we know the
serial number, we can we cansend the guy out there and he is

(01:02:44):
ready to work on the house.We're not having to redo work time after
time after time when we come intoyour home. That that relationship allows us
to have that intricate knowledge of thehome. So that makes saves you time
and saves us time when we're servicea service sing your home. It's a
real win win situation because just likemost everything's, a lot of our services

(01:03:05):
are charged by the hour, andif we can come in there and do
it at half an hour and youonly get charged for a half an hour,
that's a win win because I canget onto the next job and you
can get on with your life.What process? Tell me about the process.
I went through it, but youprobably explain it better than I can.
Starting from choosing the plan to downloadin the app to start it to
do list absolutely online at my goodsmithdot com. There's a quick summary of

(01:03:30):
all of our service plans that areout there, everything from maintenance which is
paid upfront for throughout the year,and also describing our three different tiers of
membership that go everywhere from zero dollarsa month to eighty nine dollars a month.
Once you decide you want to becomea good Smith member, you can

(01:03:51):
fill that form out online, downloadthe app, and then from that point
forward once you have the app downloaded, our kind of mantra was if you
have something wrong in your house,you should be able to get a request
in while you're sitting out a redlight. That is how quick and easy
we want that request to go inso that you can get on with your
life. Now, not suggesting youtexted your car, but that's how quick

(01:04:13):
it needs to be done. Becausewe want to be the experts for the
home. So if you tell usthat you're thinking me, jigobobber is leaking,
We'll ask you. We'll ask you, hey, send us a picture
of your thing to need jiggerbobber,and on our end we'll figure out that,
Okay, it's their shower head orit's something else that's going on.
You just need to feed us someinformation so that we can send out as

(01:04:35):
easily and quickly a quick estimate ofhow much the work is going to take,
and then we get it on yourschedule so we can get in there
to get it taken care before you. It's all about ease of use.
Craziest job you've ever been asked todo. Man, a couple of them,

(01:04:57):
probably I'm not going to share onair because they are the very personal,
very personal in nature. There's beensome bedroom accessories that have been asked
for. Man just absolutely stumped meon this one. You know, some
of the most fun things we're doinggoing into the holiday season. Once the
week before Christmas were putting together everyone'sChristmas lots of Christmas presents for them,

(01:05:19):
the things of mom and Dad don'twant to take the time to put together,
or frankly they get halfway through.We get to do a lot of
really fun intricate things. You know. I'll tell you you know, one
of the silliest jobs. We hada member that was just down the street
from another member and they saw thatone of our maintenance crews was there and
they had just moved here from NewYork and they had no idea how to

(01:05:41):
take care of anything in their house. And God forbid, there was a
flying cockroach up on the top ofthe twenty foot ceiling. She called,
She went into the apps, puta request in, and our guide just
walked from three or four houses down, came over there, got the ladder
up and got rid of the cockroach. For like, that's the level of
service that we want to give toour customers, that they know that we
are in the community and we're thereto help them out when no matter how

(01:06:03):
small or how big the project is. Hanging Christmas lights and ornaments outside we
do some. We do some.It's it is something that that it is
a it's expensive to get it rightif you want to intricate process. That's
one thing we really do also prideourselves on that if there's a service that

(01:06:23):
we are we can do anything.There's nothing money in time can't fix,
right, But if we are notgoing to be the best value for you.
We will certainly let our we letall of our customers know that upfront,
because there are certain things that thoseguys that specialize in that you know,
they're really really good at it andthey're going to do it more efficiently
than we are. And so like, yeah, well i'll tell you what,

(01:06:45):
just from personally to go to experience. A few weeks ago, I
downloaded the app. I needed afew things done. And what I like
is I like the communication, theupkeep, the customer service, went back
and forth, confirming with time.I was going to be a confirming with
time, what's your address? Andin everything, so very very upfront and
it's a success. And uh,you know what, maybe you're gonna expand
nationwide. Who knows, but Iknow all my Eustonians they don't care because

(01:07:09):
you're here for them. It's justwhich its counts. Eric Lein, the
co founder of good Smith. Ifpeople, I think you already gave the
gave out the website, hit itone more time along with the app.
Yeah, so it's my Goodsmith dotcom. And if you searched good Smith
Home Care on either app or Android, you'll be able to find the app
right there, simple enough. Listen. Congratinator success my man. And by

(01:07:30):
the way, if you need aneagle scout and do some life saving you
can actually add me to your repertoireperfect. Thank you, Hey, happy
all days, my man. Thankyou so much, and I appreciate your
time. All right, thanks forhaving us suck the absolutely eric lyin that's
it really listened. Really is agood service these I want you to try.
It didn't cost anything to download theapp, and they actually I think
there's a level of membership that's actuallyfree, along with a few others.

(01:07:50):
And so sure, I love Houstonbased companies. I love talking to Houston
based owners and people who come upwith creative stuff like this and good Smith.
All right, get done right now, Michael Garfield, I'll give you
a open phone number seven one threetwo one two five nine five oh as
we continue the long running Hi TechTexan Show. Final segment of the pre

(01:08:14):
Black Friday Hi Tech Textan Show.Michael Garfield, I'm not gonna give out
that phone number because we just gotto have a few other things that we
want to hit. But for somereason, you want to reach out to
me this week, Michael at hightech Textan dot com. Go to high
tech Textan dot Com. I'm gettingmore and more of these fun gift guide
items that I'll be putting on myInstagram, which is shockingly high tech text
and h I G h T ec h t e x a n go

(01:08:36):
check that out. Earlier this show, I talked about some Black Friday deals.
If you want to podcast at Callum, the podcast will be up what
about ten minutes fifteen minutes once wefinish the shizzo, go to iHeartRadio and
just search for kp RC or highTech tex Center Michael Garfield, I think
and you can hear the this show, I talked about some earbuds, some

(01:08:58):
bone conducting, bone conductive earphones,headphones. That's what I use because I'm
always out and about. I don'twant these things falling off or sweating out.
These things have lasted a while,so it'll give you some good ideas
for that. Big shout out tosome of our partners and sponsors, do
US Coins and Jewelry, Kenny andMatt Duncan. I'll tell you what.
These folks busy year round, butthis next month or so they are going

(01:09:19):
to be crazy busy. They arelocated on Katie Freeway just at vos Voss
Road. Go to US coinsand Jewelrydot com. If you want some extra
cash and you're sitting on coins andjewelry that you want to sell, they
will give you top dollar if youwant to buy things for a lot of
collectibles. New mismatists coin collectors.US Coins and Jewelry one of, if

(01:09:41):
not the top dealer in the country, Kenny Dunk I love. I've watched
Kenny back in the back row.He will look. He'll take just a
matter of seconds. He can lookat these coins. He can decide,
Okay, is this of value?What it is? How much they will
pay you for it. They gotgreat security there, so you don't have
to worry about slapping all your valuablesin. They've got Rolex watches to protect
phillips. They've got jewelry. Isee a lot of ice, a lot

(01:10:03):
of tennis bracelets, a lot ofneat stuff for the ladies. Great Texas
memorabilia, I mean real stuff likeflags, you know, and old maps
of Texas before it came a state, and things of that nature. But
do go check them out as youas Coins and Jewelry dot com and they
actually have a great, solid,very strong, secure website too. If
you're not in Houston and so thankthem for that partnership. Papa's PLR Rum

(01:10:28):
go make yourself a nice, goodcold cocktail and just put it on ice.
Go get go, get the caskstrength little sherry oak cask Papas PLR
P I l A R Papas Pilar. If you're thinking about something new to
try during this holiday week, Ireally do like that. I do cover
cars. As I talked about andI saw this news, I've been doing
a lot of I've had a lotof conversations over the past month or two

(01:10:51):
about electric cars. I over thepast three weeks have driven testro for each
week I get, I have aI have a vehicle for over one week.
And over the past few weeks,I have been in an electric vehicle,
one of which it was a MercedesEQB two fifty. It's an suv,

(01:11:13):
relatively small suv, and it's electric. About forty thousand dollars. Okay,
that's actually is that right? Holdon? Nope, sixty thousand dollars
fifty two thousand dollars to just aretail price. As I'm looking at the
AMUNTRONI over here, I was ina Kia and what you're fine too.
I'm not the biggest electric car electriccar fan. Electric cars work for some

(01:11:38):
people and they work for others.If you drive locally and you know you're
going twenty five thirty forty fifty miles, you know your range, You've got
a charger at work and charge youat home. Perfect. It's good as
a second car for taking the caseslepting against the soccer practice. But me,
single guy, kids out of school, living alone, I can hop

(01:12:00):
in the car if I need togo to Austin, which is over two
hundred miles away, Dallas, whichI go to frequently, well over two
hundred fetey miles away. I don'twant to have range anxiety. I do
not want to wait at it thecharger. I do not want to pray
that the charger actually works. Ido not want to sit there for well
over an hour. I don't putsaround. I want to get where I'm
going. And that's it my mind. The way it works, the way
it's wired, it's just not rightready for electric vehicles just because of the

(01:12:25):
charging time. I think they arefast, I think they are quite I
think they are sexy. We don'tknow the long long term of what's happening
or the batteries are so, youknow, biodegradable, what have you.
They can be expensive x so theyare expensive for what they are versus some
of their counterparts. So I'm notgoing to talk you in. I'm not
going to talk you out of one. But I just want the battery system
to get better and slowly but surelyit is because I saw this come across

(01:12:50):
my inbox. BUCkies. We loveBUCkies. BUCkies just announced a strategic agreement
with Mercedes Binz to deliver Premium EVcharging at BUCkies locations nationwide. By the

(01:13:10):
end of next year. There's gonnabe I think thirty one Bucky travel centers
and they are gonna have Premium EVcharging stations. I'd stop at BUCkies once
in a while. They're amazed.I'm not gonna get into this is not
a Bucki's commercial, but they haveso many gas pumps, gas bumps.
I mean, they just got it. It seems what seems like acres and

(01:13:31):
acres of gas bumps at some ofthe larger ones. I don't know if
they currently have any charging stations becauseI just go, I get gas,
I go in, and I spendanother one hundred and eighty six dollars on
crap that I don't need. Welcometo BUCkies. Love them, though charging
stations at BUCkies are dangerous. Followme over here because you already go in

(01:13:57):
and kill enough time and kill enoughmoney while you're waiting for your card.
I fill up in five minutes.Imagine having nothing to do for an hour
while your car charges. You literallymay spend as much as the car when
you walk out of BUCkies. Howmany beaver nuggets can fit in the back
of your electric car? And howmuch is gonna cost you? I kid
because I laugh, because it's theonly thing I can do. I'm glad
that BUCkies there needs to be morelocations of high end, high powered chargers.

(01:14:23):
It's as plain and freaking simple asthat. So good for BUCkies of
actually doing something. So yay,yay yay. On that same note,
people ask me about Tesla all thetime because it Tesla. Again, let's
go first to market at least herein the United States, and they came
out strong with all of their Teslacars. It's electric chargers, but Tesla's

(01:14:45):
charging charging system generally doesn't work withany other charging system and a GARF is
there ever going to be a standardbecause listen, there's a standard gas laid
well. Of course you've got differentlevels of premium unleaded and super unleaded and
everything, but it's gas. Agas station with a typical gasoline powered engine,
and you're gonna be able to fillup. But if you go to
a typical charger, different charging systemsmay not work. But evs soon from

(01:15:12):
four to GM to Lucid to Pollstar, they're actually slowly announcing that they're going
to adopt a Tesla's charging standard.Okay, so this seems like it's a
win for Texas based Teslap, butaccording to who is this? According to
sales of electric vehicles are expected toincrease by thirty five percent worldwide this year

(01:15:33):
and to hit fourteen million sold bythe end of this year. China make
up sixty percent of all vehicle sales. But I'll just say it again right
now, one of the biggest concernsyou're deciding whether to buy an electric car
is how often you're going to haveaccess to a charger when you need one.
You do not want to get stuckin the middle of nowhere with a
dead battery. But Tesla's really quicklybecoming the dominant force in charging infrastruction.

(01:16:00):
Sure, and there's a lot ofglobal car makers now now reaching agreements with
Tesla to make their own cars compatiblewith the Tesla superchargers that are pretty much
widely available. Again, good things, and that's good news. Why I
started this segment going not a bigelectric car fan in terms of buying and
recommending one, because I don't likethe infrastructure, at least here in the

(01:16:23):
United States of how to charge yourvehicle. I don't want to wait.
And there's so many different EV chargersright now. There's two main ways electric
cars are charged. One is calledthe Combined Charging System, which is a
CCS, and then there's another NorthAmerican charging standard in ACS. Tesla actually
devised the NACS over ten years ago, and there's there's technical differences. One

(01:16:48):
is smaller in the cable's more light, way, easier to plug in,
blah blah blah blah blah. Butdemands are increasing and it seems like there's
gonna be a S which Ford actuallypartnered with Tesla, who's by the way,
if you think about it, it'sa competitor, GM followed now partnering
with him too. By partnering withTesla GM alone. The CEO, Mary

(01:17:13):
Bira, She said, Tesla dealthat would save GM up to four hundred
million dollars from GM going to haveto starting a whole new charges system.
This i'ma leave you with this aswe're closing out the show. I love
reviewing so many things. I gotinto cars fifteen years ago because I realized
cars are technology. Technology are cars, and it goes back and forth.
I am lucky to be able toknow the manufacturers. I'm on a board

(01:17:39):
member of the Texas Auto Writers Association. I appreciate you listening to my opinions
and trusting my drives and my postwhether it's good, whether it's bad.
They're not endorsed. These are totallymy opinions right here. But I will
tell you right now, when EV'scoming along and people think EV's maybe the
greatest thing that they have seen sinceHenry Ford and Bit of the Car,
there's a lot of things that areblowing down the growth. Number one,

(01:18:00):
there pricey, but number two,there's a lot of people who just do
not want to worry about the chargingsystem. To me, if there was
a better charging system across the UnitedStates, I probably would be much more
easier. Let's just put it's mucheasier for me to recommend EV's until now.
It's a wait and see thing.Tell you what you're going to wait
and see. I want you towait and see of how much you're going
to eat, how many calories you'regoing to eat, and then how much

(01:18:21):
you're going to expend when you're goingto run them off. Happy Black Friday.
Next week Saturday, it is thebig Saturday Thanksgiving show where I'll tell
you some of the deals that youmissed on Black Friday, and house sales
are only going to get better.So if you miss out on that Black
Friday deals the Saturday next to weekfrom right now, you're going to probably
find some even better deals to buythings for. Everybody who's been a part

(01:18:41):
of the show, I do thankyou for tuning in for all these years.
My name is Michael Garfield. HappyThanksgiving, my friends, hook them
morns. Right now, my showis over.