Is anyone here an ace audio editor?

I need help salvaging a podcast. I'm looking for a volunteer.

I had Vladislav Davidzon on the podcast yesterday to talk about Ukraine, the counteroffensive, the destruction of the Kakhovka dam, the fate of the Black Sea grain deal, and much more. Alas, the sound quality of the recording is unacceptably bad. The connection went out a few times, so we wound up saying, “Hello? Hello? Are you still there?” over and over in between long periods of silence. There was some kind of lag, too, when Vlad spoke, which caused me to think we’d lost the connection again, which caused me to say, “You still there?” just as he was speaking, which caused the whole audio file to just sound really annoying.

I’m pretty sure it could be salvaged by editing out the parts with all the cross talk and hello-hellos. But I have to confess that I don’t know how to do it. My initial experiments with the software that came with my Mac have resulted in total frustration: It’s just not obvious to me how it’s supposed to work. I’m sure that if I set myself to the job of teaching myself how to do this properly—which I ought to do, anyway—I could figure it out. But I know that if I do, today and tomorrow will disappear, and it’s just not worth it.

Someone who already knows how to do this, though, could probably show me how to do it in about twenty minutes. There’s got to be someone on this mailing list who knows how, right?

Might it be you? Do you have a few minutes to spare? Could you help a sister out? I’d be grateful forever and I’d probably give you a free subscription to CG, too.