Emu Wars

On this week’s episode, Brandon shares his YouTube recommendations. Collin is in pain. And Aaron tells us how to win wars and influence emus. PLUS, a discussion on extinct (OR ARE THEY) animals.

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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

PROVIDED BY OTTER.AI

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, bad, nice, emus, home, big, email, shelby, person, hogs, apartment, talking, question, world, ankle, department, happen, sidewalk, boxing match, internet

SPEAKERS

Collin, Brandon

 

 

Welcome to Oh, brother, a podcast of three brothers trying to figure it all out with your hosts, Brandon, Colin, and Aaron. On this week's show, emu wars

 

 

Hello. Hello. How are you?

 

 

Oh, okay, fine. I was just like, I was like

 

Brandon  

I don't like this zoom update nonsense because it's all weird when I try to log in now it's like it doesn't give me thing. And it's like well cuz I just joined from the web. I don't like have the deal or whatever, because it's easier because my computer doesn't really love the little app thing it downloads. Again 12,000 year old laptop we're dealing with here. So the first time I tried it didn't give me the joining URL button that I push. Oh, just wasn't there. Sorry. Like, close the tab, reopen the link from the email. And then it showed up. I was like what? Tada. Banks. So handy.

 

 

Yeah, I was just like setting my mic up or like pulling it over towards me because it was over there on the, to my right, just off to the side. We started talking Creek a little bit.

 

 

was like in the process of bullying over you.

 

 

Yeah, totally ready.

 

 

What's up now ready? Hello.

 

 

How's it going?

 

 

Oh,

 

 

not too bad to start here. And

 

 

Shelby's mom's house is kind of out in the middle of nowhere. So we're flying out tomorrow so he's gonna drive us at like, freakin early in the morning so

 

 

yay.

 

 

Everyone loves and all excited a morning flight on

 

 

every vacation with father

 

 

as discussed last episode sure Oh,

 

 

yeah. All right. No yeah

 

 

830 but down there relatively early. Yeah beer 75 hour check in. And you're

 

 

here.

 

 

Oh, so we're gonna fly. We're flying in the Tulsa

 

 

in there for me

 

 

In charge on a

 

 

one way

 

 

layover, but like these are really possible be sprinting

 

 

to gate and they're like oh

 

 

yeah, our layover like that's not enough time. So I mean and then from there

 

 

we'll probably be fine yeah mobiola love bye but only there this weekend was a wedding. Is that what you said? at all? Yes So

 

 

iron

 

 

he just got kicked off. Was he robotic like super hard For you really bad. Okay, I was just I saw it That was it. So we should confirm that with him.

 

 

All right not now that was

 

 

that was him. Like I could not

 

 

have you read text you was like, is that just for me or? Yeah, me, man I know.

 

 

He's back. He's back. Yay.

 

 

Aaron, you are a robot. You're really nobody just FYI. Oh, my bad sound now. Actually. Yes. Ah Hello, wins. Yeah, so where where did I leave? Oh, well, yes, early morning Tulsa fly to Carolina unknown for one hour layover, which apparently is not enough time to get across an airport and then to Mobile, Alabama. Yes. So

 

 

Shelby is bridesmaid

 

 

in her friend's wedding, and then I got invited by the the bride. So therefore by law I have to go

 

 

I mean and so I've not gone into that I've been invited to just saying

 

 

I don't think it's a law

 

 

it's just a just a nice chance to to get away and go on vacation not you know a deal but yeah in

 

 

the middle of a global pandemic

 

 

vacation call it it's gonna be they're gonna recreate Did you see the photo of weirdly, by Google's mind Google News has been giving me others like Britney Spears news this week. I don't know what year thinks it is. Apparently 2001. But there's a picture of her and her boyfriend or whatever, just like laying on the beach in swimsuits and masks. It's gonna be Aaron and Shelby to recreating that.

 

 

Check. If you check things like Twitter, the Loch Ness Monster was was trending earlier today.

 

 

So

 

 

that's the world weird world that we're living in currently. It's true. I also just on this topic I have gotten, or some reason this week on my YouTube recommendations. I don't know what's going on, but I have like 75 not 75 but I had like five recommended videos of Caitlyn Ohashi. I think her name is a gymnast from UCLA. It's like super bad to the bone. And I have no idea why these are she made like a big deal last year because she scored like a perfect 10 on her floor routine. It was like Oh, yeah, yeah. But like January last year? Yeah. But I've got like five or six videos this week in my YouTube feed, like suggesting me that like what do you think? Hmm What about guitar videos and Dark Souls? Let's Plays thinks that's the video that I need him. I don't understand.

 

 

It doesn't sound like you're really complaining if I'm hearing this right but I didn't

 

 

really watch them but I was just like, What? What was happening? Yeah, well, I have

 

 

RTV

 

 

and she watches a lot of like vlogs and but they're like the very kind of like, oh she's not here so like the cringe worthy vlogs that are like, you know talking about like, he's looking around, you know, they're like, where to safe oh she's not here Nevermind. Like they're still there they're like they're they're kind of vlogs that talk about like, the drama that's going on with different you know social media influencers that's like and you'll never guess what blah blah blah did this Begin with, they said in a tweet. It's a lot of those kind of videos. And so I'll be scrolling through. It's like oh, here's a Markiplier video. Here's a game grumps video and 10 things you need to know about blah, blah social media person. Ah, scamp. No, I don't need this. There is I have I have a side topic of that as well if you'd like to hear it real fast. Sure. So this isn't necessarily about social media influencers, but this is like a this comes from the world of strongman. Okay, going back a few months. Eddie Hall and half Thor Bjornsen apparently have mad beef, right? Yeah, coming back to World Strongest Man 2017 Eddie Hall wins. afterthought he was cheated out of the Viking press. Yes. Okay. Cuz he been he doubled it Disney's right Watch thing he's all good I didn't do it but anyway anyhow wins. Right? Half Thor is mad I have Thor Aaron by the way the giant Game of Thrones case you need some Yeah.

 

 

I was like yeah

 

 

next year half Thor wins. Okay

 

 

so they've been going back and forth for years jab and jab and jab and this year during lockdown mode half Thor decides he's going to break well he'd already planned to do this obviously because this isn't something that you can just do. He's gonna break Eddie's deadlift world record. Okay, Eddie Hall has the world had the world record deadlift 500 kilograms that's a stupid weight. I'd like over 1100 pounds something crazy like that right? But because the world is ending, and we're in lockdown mode after says I'm just gonna break it from my home gym and livestream it and this this makes a lot of people kind of like it does that count though because it's not traditionally even though strongman has no like actual governing body and it's just kind of like a made up you know crazy thing traditional traditionally all world record attempts have been done in some sort of contest setting where there's other people who have chances to try to beat you and that kind of stuff. Right?

 

 

So he says no, I'm gonna do at home.

 

 

This makes me very bad.

 

 

Right and the fact that half there it is deadlift was 501 one kilograms. Yeah. Right. That was, that was kind of like a I'm gonna beat you, but not really. So there's a lot of things because in a contest, the weights are like, actually calibrated by a judge. No, because home gym, you know, your weights could be off or whatever. So there's, there's all this controversy and then contest setting adds all this other stuff. So apparently now the plan is because they've got so much beef and they're both kind of mad at each other about all this history they've had, they have decided to have a boxing match. So two

 

Brandon  

of the world's strongest men

 

 

have now decided that the only way that they can settle their differences is to have a sanctioned boxing match. next September, they're giving themselves a whole year to train for this. These two dudes weigh over 350 pounds man is just Thor is what six, seven? Something Yeah. Eddie's only like, Eddie in the world of struggle. He's only like six foot, I don't know, three or four or something like that.

 

 

I love that.

 

 

They decided that they're gonna have a boxing match.

 

 

And like, I haven't I've I've watched some of like haftorah stuff. And he's all like, yeah, you know, Icelandic guy. Big Iceland accent He's like, yeah, I'm gonna win. Eddie's little punk blah, blah. Eddie is like, taking this so seriously. It's almost terrifying, right? He's like, no, I thought before I grew up in this rough neighborhood in England. Yeah, I know how to kick people. Oh my gosh. This is gonna be

 

 

what who's gonna be able to rest that and get pulled those two guys that

 

 

is the second question. Who reps does Matt just have to be another one of the world's strongest men to like pull them off their chest anyway? Is it Brian Shaw?

 

 

Yeah, it's like you're gonna have to I don't know. We're just attaching both to cranes to keep pulling back whenever they start going. Yeah,

 

 

right like it Like

 

 

I've been watching some This is this where this kind of ties in is I've been watching some Eddie's blog because he has a YouTube channel right? and a half close to halfway has been doing a lot of like, gaming on Twitch, which is doesn't really sound like preparing for a boxing match. But um, you know, you're probably doing some other stuff, but and he's all like, yo, here's my supplements and here's my stuff and I can't hire a trainer right now because you know, I can't leave my house but here's my workout like, Okay, he's like, I'm gonna try to slim down you're like, did you weigh 360 pounds? What's happening right now?

 

 

Right? What is a slimmed down? You can only make a barge.

 

 

So no so swift can only get so much I mean, he does. He does talk a lot about trying to do the cardio so he doesn't get himself out. But this is good. This is a good plan. It's what he needs. Are but yeah, this is what you need. Because otherwise that's gonna be really embarrassing, right? She's too big usually like like, That's not good. No one's gonna watch that like

 

 

cheese. So this is the this is this is supposedly going to be settled September 2021

 

 

was ridiculous.

 

 

But like also weirdly like intriguing but also like what the heck's But why? What are you doing? Seriously guys? Like seriously this is it this is like whatever. I love it. So eyes on that ongoing drama. There's some. There's some strong man drama for you. Love it.

 

 

Love it, love it.

 

 

That would be interesting. It's really funny to listen to people talking about it. There's some there's some boards, podcasts and sports things I listened to. I wonder if they'll be talking about that coming up because I haven't heard it. I have not heard that before. And I am most excited to definitely. Yeah, it'll be it's still they still got a year of training, but I imagine closer to it. It's gonna be a big news story. So it's going to be because I mean, that's that's world Strongest Man 2016 world strongest may 2017 in a boxing match. So be prepared for the world's strongest boxing match. I guarantee you can be called that World's Strongest boxing match that's going to be in there somewhere. It's gonna be in the

 

 

I thought for one at more than once, but I guess

 

 

you just like you. I'm not sure if he did. I just know that was not like that one. Yeah, I don't know how many times he's one. I know. He's one one for sure. Yeah, I don't know about that. I don't know about any other ones. I know seven. 17 was the next year after anyone. There was this whole thing like he was like trying to shake his hand and he wouldn't do it. So it's like

 

 

what is this?

 

 

Nonsense? What is it magic? madness is what it is. But yeah, there we go keep that under your on your radar as as we go forward, putting it on my calendar right now you go

 

 

with a few reminders.

 

 

Gee, well, the only thing that I that I had on my calendar was this vacation and then on July 3, the Broadway play Hamilton will be streaming on Disney Hulu, so that's the only thing I got to clear schedule so we should be fine. Oh, nice. Hey, nothing on my schedule is summer school is over on Friday. So come out. It's all I got. So clear skies of hiding. And

 

 

that's it. I have nothing for July

 

 

for Shana is packing up, getting ready to move out? Ah, what is the school start for her? I'm not entirely sure. I think that middle of August still they're still planning on opening on time or in person classes. Mm hmm as of right now, so she's going to live on campus. Now she's gonna get an apartment. Apparently there's only the only campus housing there is for student athletes.

 

 

I couldn't remember I couldn't remember if they

 

 

what it was. Oh, it would have been nice if she

 

 

she started looking for apartments.

 

 

Yeah. Okay, good. Does she have one? Not yet, then, but she's been looking for them.

 

 

There's not a whole lot in town. I mean, that's kind of

 

Brandon  

what I told her.

 

 

So like, like so she would needs to be prepared to

 

 

drive. Yeah.

 

 

From like, I know a lot of people come in like, seriously the four points of, of Marshall knob noster and Warsaw and ends in not really anything out to the east but yeah, though. Yeah. They've been. They've been looking online and stuff and so good. We'll see they're supposed to go up there and a couple weeks or something on Irish here to do some check in about stuff. So good. We'll see See? So yeah, that's the kind of weird things like they were kind of like, Oh, we don't know. And then is that and actually gotta find a job there too. So just kind of freaking out about that thing, though.

 

 

Okay, we'll see.

 

 

Yeah, there's something very stressful. So yeah, yeah. I don't know. Let me let me know what I need to keep an eye out for. And I can because random places posting signs all the time. So yeah, well, she's been right now she's working as a server. Right? So she's doing that down here. So that's her most experiences in waiting and customer service. Okay, so she is the second place. National fbla customer service champion. So right exactly place an fbla nationals customer service, so haha. The customer service Yes, this is all about that. So Congress has been doing so far she's right now working so well. That stressful time is upon us

 

 

yeah, that's not

 

 

Yeah, it's a lot to do so we'll see how it goes and go from there I guess so.

 

 

No

 

 

one ever remember that first you know, experience of you know, apartment shopping. Like just that not No, not kind of Well, I would say has gone through but just that now like, oh man, now I'm starting out into the world. Look for you guys. Remember that any year? Yeah, my Basically, mine is, here's the condensed version of my story. After college, I was living in a house with some other people, right? There was three of us in there. And then the guy who is renting the house, he all of a sudden went, yeah, I'm moving. So you got to be out of the house by two weeks. And I was like, What? Sorry, come again. So we had to move out. Like, I had to move out, like, record speed. Right. And I just like, basically, it was one of those like, Well, how about this place? Yep. Okay, got it. So it wasn't really a hunting. I wasn't I didn't really have time to like, look about, you know. I just, that's all that other apartment I used to live in over there. And here in town. That was in I was I found that because Susan had already moved up there and she was living there. And then she was like, Hey, I'll ask the guy. If There's another one you can have like, okay, boom, got it moved in. I was at but I was homeless for like, two days, because I didn't think I had to move the last of my stuff out in the dark, because I'm trying to stick it power off bag. So Oh my god, that was fun. It was stressful. By like, wasn't bad. It was just like, the timeframe was very condensed and not exciting. Yeah, exciting at all. So I can't imagine so yeah, that was a rapid mode of like, dang it now I have to go sign this paper and now have to go to find the city hall and pay all this stuff and do all that nonsense. So luckily, I was already like working and I had a job and it was doing stuff. So like, it wasn't really a big deal. But like I was working in a factory so I was making pretty decent money but like, all of a sudden, like oh snap, here we go. I was like doing it. Oh no, that was mine. It was very dramatic. Yeah.

 

 

Mine was

 

 

my first apartment was when Megan I got married.

 

 

Sweet rented. I had rented a house with Kyle and Kevin during Yeah. In college. But that was more like because their their parents were renting it for us. Yeah, thing. So that was a little different, like, didn't have a whole lot of say in that if like, where that was going to go what was going to be so a little different.

 

 

And then

 

 

we got Megan I got married. We moved to Texas. And we rented we did all of our search and paperwork and everything online, which was, which was not fun. I didn't like that at all.

 

 

Because you know Did you have to base it off by your pictures?

 

 

That's true. Which are never actually what it looks like. No, that's typically keep like one really, really nice and that's what they take all the pictures out. Yeah. So, but that was different and then kind of the same thing happened when we moved from Lubbock to Dallas to Arlington DFW area because we did all that remotely to try and find one down there.

 

 

Yeah.

 

 

So yeah, it was it was interesting because it was a lot of like, Okay, how do is like okay what what are the steps that I need to take to make this process work? Who do I need to how much does the apartment complex handle for me versus how much do I need to and our first apartment complex was nice, because all like it included Wi Fi, and some utilities were included in your price. Like put they handled all of that billing. So yes, got one bill, because they broke out the apartment stuff. And it was basically I guess allocated where they took the apartments total and divided it by number of occupancy basically.

 

 

And and then

 

 

you got that you Everyone was paying the bill not

 

 

Yeah. For the bill. So it's a little different. It's a little different. Yeah.

 

 

But it was it was nice because it took a lot, you know, was our first one and

 

 

I didn't know. Yeah,

 

 

it kind of made it easy. Nice, I guess. Yeah. One bill from one person.

 

 

And then when we moved into the other one in Arlington, it was all broken out and had to figure out Yeah, who I love the Who's your electrical utility person going to be? And I was like, they all from the like that that really broke. My brain was like, are they all coming through the same wires like Yeah, what do you No, there were there were like 20 different electrical providers in the DFW area. That's messed up, man. That's the one that's what I do like about like mo nets. It's just like you You set it up that like so I have my apartment rent, but everything else is due the city everything water, sewer electric trashley it's just the city does it? Oh, yeah. So there's one utility bill for everything. So that's super handy. Yeah, right. Because I don't have to worry about Oh, who do I don't have to pay the trash person in this neighborhood and the water is this thing now it's all just the city does anything. So we do that now. Where the city does gas Nope. Sorry, city does does water sewer trash. And we still had to, we had to quote unquote, find our electrical or electric provider. There's only one then we had to quote unquote, find a gas provider. There's only one there was really well, yeah, but like, yeah. And then the internet was Yeah, we had two options that we have that one that one's a fiasco around here. It's there's not lots of good options for internet. Yeah, I cannot stand Internet Options. They are all suck. They're all terrible. They are terrible. They're the worst. It really there's not not one good unless I guess unless you have someone with like, true Gigabit

 

 

Ethernet, then yeah,

 

 

then it's a little more palpable. palatable. But yeah, it's like, you don't I mean, how much? Yeah, it's pretty bad Southern I know, Southern Ray county like cassville. They just did. I don't know a couple years ago, they ran fiber optic through like everything. And so they my friend that lives down there there and it's like, super good. Right. And so there Because they live like right outside town, but her husband is like a lawyer so they got him to you know, get out that way. Oh, we should take that street to like God.

 

 

Yeah.

 

 

So that'd be nice if they expanded dad, because that's some good stuff I guess but up here the northern part of the county we got nothing. Yeah, you got it. Yeah, no way no. Yeah. And here I don't know I think what just galls me about it. Is that how it's never it's only symmetrical on the really really high end networks or x you know you get 400 down but 10 up like what's Yes, no. What? Why? What is that about? Like, well, most people are downloading and streaming and stuff. Oh, I upload so much stuff. I don't keep people up. Up, lots of people upload lots of stuff, like their pictures and all that stuff. And it just takes them 1000 years to do it. And my favorite part is the fact that they always have like 18 tears of internet, like, Well, you could get this speed or this other speed for way more money. But why don't you just have? Why don't you just let people have fast speed? Like, why would you even bother? Nobody wants big, slow internet, we're doing well. And I know and you know, that's where that idea that people start coming in as far as treating it as an actual utility. Right, Aaron? Back Aaron Gaiden left us Yeah, nice. Oh, God. Okay. Very, we're very fine. Very, oh, no.

 

 

Where were the people trying to regulate it like

 

 

not, not just the utility But what is that? What is that where the trend to like basically necessity where it's just like water like everybody gets the same? Yeah, water kinda think, I guess unless you're Flint, but you know, yeah,

 

 

sorry guys. Real sorry.

 

 

Yeah, I know it's like, that's the hard. That's the hard thing, right because you like, do you the question that you kind of have to deal with currently is like, Well, do you need internet? Yep. You know, I think do you need Internet access? And I think the answer to that question is increasingly becoming Yes, actually, you kind of do. And so I, but it's also hard because it's also traditionally been treated like a television service, right? Yeah. Yeah like a luxury. You need TV. Right? It is a luxury item. Like for my old apartment when I lived there, I didn't have TV for years. Number one, I wasn't home ever. So why, but like to have it. Susan had it. And I spent all my time with her. So I didn't need it right. Got up. But you know, it's not a necessity. Question mark. I mean, you could argue I mean, that was the benefit of like the old analog signal television was everyone had access to something because of the news and all that right. Mm hmm. So there is the free TV stations. So you can say, Well, everyone does have access to some kind of television, for news and weather and that kind of stuff that you need to know about. But yeah, the question that we are grappling with is do you need internet? Yeah, I think yes. I think the answer is definitely becoming Yes. It needs to be reliable. It needs to be good. Because I mean, if you can't, you have to be able to rely on it. Right. And it needs to be decent. We're not talking like, praise, although Ilan is launching those starlink satellites next week. So hey, you

 

Brandon  

have some more of those bad boys. So

 

 

who knows how much that will cost the guild man? Yeah. But yeah.

 

 

It's an interesting question. Just like

 

 

do you need it and then how do you access it?

 

 

You know, how do you regulate it? Do you regulate it? Does it matter?

 

Collin  

You know the drill head on over to over the counter. cast.com Follow us on all social media platforms at over other podcasts to stay up to date with everything that we've got going on show notes, extra links, all sorts of good stuff. Especially as consump ways of consumption are drastically changing, with more and more people are being pulled away from their TVs to look at a tablet or a mobile device or an other mobile device.

 

 

Yeah.

 

 

And if you I know several people who don't have home internet, because they just basically do everything on their phone. Yeah, that's all they need, which makes total sense. And with 5g, that kind of mentality is going to get a lot more ubiquitous, I think.

 

 

I think so too, because it will be that much more reliable and fast.

 

 

And you know, so you will question we'll do it that house and this you know,

 

 

mean Yeah, I'd love to

 

 

not have to pay for home internet.

 

 

I'm already paying a literal

 

 

button for Yeah, cell phones and data.

 

 

No, that's true. Yo, it's like, that's real bad.

 

 

I can't can't get some spillover here. Can't please,

 

 

please, please, please. Yeah, that's true.

 

 

But the amount of data I guess I'm not, it's just it's not really there yet. Just looking at, like the amount of data usage on cell phones on our cell phone bill, versus our home Wi Fi. Like, we use a lot of data all the time.

 

 

It's, yeah, it all goes right. Like it's

 

 

Yeah, it gets eaten up and just weird bots. So

 

 

yeah, that's tricky one that I don't think we're necessarily caught up with trying to figure out because You know, we are just treating as a business still like, Oh, you know, by the way you want ease, and it's nice to have options. Don't get me wrong, because some people don't need it, you know, but having the ability to access it. Even if you don't necessarily use it is still not bad. Right? Because you don't, you still could have it if you needed it. So that's the tricky part. And then plus, you get those really hard questions like, well, is it regulated because, you know, like, the European Union's doing all that crazy regulations and prepare that, versus, you know, the US where it's all privatized companies and literally, they don't care what you put on there, as long as you pay for the ads. Don't care at all. You could just write the most hateful racist things ever. And Facebook's like, fine, don't worry about it. No. And,

 

 

but they're not a publishing platform. They're not

 

 

they're not right. Yeah, I think that's just them lying so they don't get in trouble because that's not that's not how most people view it. But yeah, they're still regulated. Yes. And then the other extreme versus, you know, China, which is like, this is the only part of the internet you're allowed to see. Right? Oh, yes. Other internet doesn't exist. It's not there. Or the actual extreme North Korean internet. Holy cow. What the heck? Like, here's the five websites that exist. Welcome that you can get on. Have you ever been on a North query and internet site?

 

 

Have you?

 

 

Yeah. Okay. Dude, it's so trippy. Brandon. Right. It's the trickiest thing ever. Get on there somewhere. You can get on there. That's fine. Yeah. Hello, NSA agent. How are you? Hi, Tom. I'm doing well. Hope you're staying safe. I'll be family as well. Yeah. Right. Like, if you get on there you can get on the the North Korean net. It all looks an awful lot like 1998 internet. Right? It's like text heavy, like really? Bad Java, old java script. Right. So it looks like there's like I saw one time it was like a set of recipes. Right? recommended from the Dear Leader. Oh, dear leaders favorite XYZ whenever it was, right. And it was like, Oh, this is great. This is like the cookie big like some weird thing. Like, it's bizarre. But definitely there but those are the only websites that they can go to. Right. That's it. That's the only internet exists for them. Is this handful of websites specifically curated North Koreans to keep their masquerade going, you know? So that's a hardcore extreme. Yeah, it's everything's fine. It's great.

 

 

Look how lovely it is here. North Korea.

 

 

No slaves being sold to China. Definitely not. None of that's happening. So let's do that today. Yeah, sorry. Sorry, got dark there. But that's the questions like, is it if you have access to it, is it you know, how do you regulate it? Do you regulate it? Is it necessary? I would lean more towards that. No, because it's like a platform for stuff. You should have access to all the things but no tricky questions.

 

 

Sorry, dragged on a weird rabbit hole. didn't meet him up there.

 

 

And you mentioned Britney Spears in 2001

 

 

Oh Dad. Yes.

 

 

Something else that came back from 2001. Today was Collins coordination all down. You know, I counted about one o'clock and I went, I haven't been on a bike ride in a while. I need to get that oil then I actually need to get a new water bottle. I'm gonna go for a quick run. And so I got everything ready. I got my phone charged, and I started jogging down the lane. And I got about 100 yards away from the house and my ankle rolled over. I mean, I heard up top like Loud audible pop, and I went and I went down. I went I just went into his shoulder into the grass Luckily, oh sidewalk and my ink and, and I was literally 100 yards away there there were tree trimmers down the road, staring at me as I lay on my back clutching my leg. There are people having a nice picnic by the park and then many people driving past me constantly. No one stopped which is fine. I didn't need that. Because I was so close to home. Thankfully. It's I mean she back home by the time I got home, my ankle was swollen probably two to three times the normal size of a normal ankle dourif it was it was bad.

 

 

It still is bad. I

 

 

Oh

 

 

yeah, that's pretty nasty. Did you were you on the grass or the sidewalk

 

 

I was on the sidewalk but when I rolled my basically my left ankle is what gateway and so when I rolled I had enough momentum that I just went to the left. I didn't go straight down yeah, I just rolled and I was able with it with it. Yep Yep. Did you like step on the edge of the sidewalk or did you That wasn't a sidewalk is your sidewalk one of those beautiful Missouri sidewalks that are like, people don't use these haha and they're just like an uneven disaster with like, tree roots. And one panel a sidewalk is four inches height difference from the other one there is

 

 

right in front. So our sidewalk right in front of our house is brand new within the past six years

 

 

or they're at a jaunty angle. This is

 

 

like I'd walk in for the house on our west is so bad. I don't think you could take an off roader across it. There's no

 

 

way I was.

 

 

I mean, it's it is jagged edges like really cool like geological uplift and sort of like induction zones going on through this with like, like eight inch differences in height and somewhere yeah it's really awesome anyway no no no no this was on a nice flat paved even no debris nothing my ankle was just like I was did that today too but I was running through the grass and so my my one of my steps was a lot lower than I thought it was gonna be. Right Oh, I did that thing where you kind of go and your knee kind of go straight and you smack it real hard and go oh, that that wasn't what I wanted. Okay, let's go down. Yeah, so I am, I had elevated and iced pretty much ever since. And it

 

 

is not really helping. So I will

 

Brandon  

I will but it's Yeah, takes forever. cuz I've done that too. I busted mine like that and swelled up the like softball sized ankles. You'll mine's my left ankle too, and they go like that, and hatching. Wednesdays

 

 

I would like to say, I find it odd that you went, I haven't ridden my bike for a while. I shall go for a jog.

 

 

I know my bike, it needs some maintenance. And I didn't just want to jump on it without oiling. So I was like, that's a lot. And I need to do some tuning up on the derailleur. So let me just do this because my shoes are right back there. And I'm just gonna go for a quick one mile jaunt around our park like it's a nice one mile rectangle effectively. I'm just gonna do that. Just go out

 

 

real quick. 30 minutes and get done. No, no, no,

 

 

no boy. No.

 

 

Megan was like, you really gone for 15 minutes and I was like, yeah, and Nine. Yeah 12 minutes of that was hauling my butt back to the house like

 

 

I was laying on the ground and the agony is what happened effectively. Oh my gosh.

 

 

Wow and get to the good part of the song that I was looking forward to like,

 

Brandon  

start the song. Imagine, go to the playlist. Here's this one. Wow.

 

 

Oh, man. Oh, goodness. Well, yeah, hopefully it'll be better some more. We'll see. Here's the day tomorrow. See how it's doing there? Yeah, fortunately, I do not have a really big gravel mining site visit in Benton County tomorrow that I have to go on.

 

 

Well, your boots will maybe hold your ankle together. This is

 

 

oh this thing Yeah, I did a little test tonight. Where I Ace bandaged it. Put on a sock. shoved in my boot. I was

 

 

like, okay, roll the other one. Yeah, exactly.

 

 

Because it was so bad.

 

 

Because I have 100% done that with my football cleats. Like, I was, yeah, I was in the locker room and I stood up this was when they built the new facility. And I was like, likely it's gonna work on concrete roll. No, it's fine. I'll put the other one on and then took two steps on a roll the other one I was like, Well, I'm not playing tonight. This is fun.

 

 

No, but tomorrow his other his right knee will definitely hurt from compensating for walking on that bank. Oh, man. Yeah.

 

 

Yeah, it's gonna kind of be Yeah, yeah, looking for not looking forward to this. Other bands in the boodle help keep it stabilized at least so you can. Yeah, you have you have thick thoughts you have to be aware about.

 

 

Do you have a walking cane or walking stick

 

 

should get one It's true. My mother in law could steal you when it's fine.

 

 

steal other documents.

 

 

nosy I tease her about this like it's having died years ago. So she's ready. She was a Walmart and she like went to the bathroom. And like Parker cart by the bathroom, you know. And then she came out and she's grabbed a card and walked off. She could have some other lady's card or dinner call then later they called you know, with the with the person who took the cart with a cane by the bathroom. Please bring it back to customer service. She was going, she was going, you know, man, that's terrible. Who would do that? I can't believe someone would take somebody's cart when somebody came in it. And her her husband who was still alive at the time was like

 

 

why do you have a cane in your cart?

 

 

Oh my gosh.

 

 

I've been calling her cane thief for years. Wonderful.

 

 

But she might have an extra one for you.

 

 

You should ask her please do or hear me out. Get a big stick wandering Gandalf style, right? Like, yes, I'm thinking, like, because no one no one's gonna test that. They'll just think like, oh, wow, that's the

 

 

that's that crazy.

 

 

You know, wilderness person that works for the state conservation and be like, well, he's true. He's wise beyond his ear expert,

 

 

expert contractor, looking him majestically walking.

 

 

gonna say it's like, Oh, come on. You don't have some track cogs no more because he can't walk. Just milk it for all four of Colin Yeah, I can't I can't buy my ankle hurt. Seriously,

 

 

you know, and he's gonna actually be stuck in a holler somewhere like broken ankle like 100% they

 

 

I can't

 

 

lay at the bottom ravine, no.

 

 

They sent out they sent out a call for more people. There's like

 

 

60

 

 

trapping spots that they still need to build. Why?

 

 

I'm telling you, it is bad like it is

 

 

good.

 

 

Because I mean they started in the past. They started last winter they started in the winter, they moved into the spring. Now they're in the summer, last winter also known as

 

 

12 years ago, 12 years ago,

 

 

the before times it was bc in the before times.

 

 

They started PC and the PC You know, before COVID, right? That's and now it's just I'm looking at their calendar and I was just going, there's like, this is gonna burn out so fast. So I told him, I said, Be prepared for me the next couple weeks

 

 

to get

 

 

tapped to go because I'm looking at this going, they're going to start really, really fine combing through through that. It'd be like,

 

 

Mister,

 

 

please sign up right now.

 

 

Now that they're not going to ask you to sign up they're like, Oh, look, you've been signed up. That's what's gonna happen. You're gonna be told

 

 

Exactly. voluntold

 

 

just just hire a bunch of people from Texas and their helicopters to come fly through Missouri. Just shoot what they can.

 

 

Yes, because that wonderful tree cover just allows very low fluctuate breeze.

 

 

Good God.

 

 

Conspiracy but oh no I. So this was on Fort Leonard Wood. I tell you what they did what happened on Fort Leonard Wood.

 

 

And I can only imagine the lunacy that happened before later. So, so he,

 

 

they were doing not MDC, but the military was trapping hogs because they manage that stuff. And oh, God, they they ran the hogs as they did do run into or hold on. For the listeners unfamiliar Fort Leonard was the home of the Missouri National Guard as the like base headquarters of all Missouri National Guard activity is Fort Leonard Wood. All right, continue, please. So they ran into a Cedar Grove and they were flying. We're flying helicopters in the area and you can see in a Cedar Grove is really thick.

 

 

Now they just

 

 

lit the Cedar Grove on fire.

 

 

Sir Suresh

 

 

surrounded it, it just waited. And I don't know if you know this or not, but the vast majority of pigs will just lay down and be burned.

 

 

Yeah.

 

 

And cedar just kind of our bonus

 

 

hot, high and fast.

 

 

So I was like,

 

 

Oh, that's not standard operating procedure breath is it

 

 

this whole kind of thing for some reason is reminding me of the 1930s me war in Australia. Yeah.

 

 

After I'm sorry.

 

 

So in in the 1930s

 

 

not the episode, okay? Not title.

 

 

Go 1930 emus. Our

 

 

sounds true. In Australia in the 1930s

 

 

emus were in such high population that they were like just migrating the north to the west part of Australia, like destroying farms. And so because there's a big settlement thing after the the First World War, where they gave soldiers a bunch of farmland be like, Alright, good job. Here's some farmland soil. Yeah. And so,

 

 

like, for all of our Australia listeners,

 

 

you're welcome. It's in us we're just in such high population and someone's like, well, we need the government are like we need the military out there. And so it was like, five guys a truck and like two machine guns. And they, it I remember seeing a whole documentary of it and like, I remember the announcer saying, and on the first day, he was alluded to soldiers, by them not firing a single shot, but on the second day, they unloaded 5000 rounds. ones into emus and only killed like

 

 

50. Like how many emus are there?

 

 

But it was just like, it was just a problem where like, they were out there for like a summer. And then they just kind of said that, well, we can't do anything else and then just left.

 

 

So the one thing

 

 

so, yeah, I just remember I remember seeing like pictures of like, these guy, like, five dudes went out field, and they set up like guns. And then they said, hey, what if we take a truck and put a machine gun on it, and chase after emus? And this is like, the whole time column was talking about this. Like, this reminds me of something. I was like, you're 1932.

 

 

Like, oh, this would be a great idea. Please, please, I just pulled it up, please. Anybody who's listening, please just pull up the email or Wikipedia page because it's absolutely hysterical.

 

 

Which you can find by going to over there podcast calm Oh,

 

 

in the podcast app that you're listening to right now.

 

 

Boom. Oh, the great Aviemore war I'm sorry. Oh, the Yes. It's beautiful. Yes.

 

 

You're right that there has been nagging me That does sound like something I've heard before, but it could not like me figure out what north is was. Yeah, it's the email war.

 

 

I also remember watching like YouTube videos and people like drawing, you know, overdramatic pictures of it to make it like, like a full documentary of like this, like, you know, what they used to do with the Civil War documentaries. Like, in late 19 1932, over 12 million, watched across the west, like, oh, wow, this is really Oh, this is Oh, this actually happened. Oh, no. So this is what I imagined Colin having to do with with hogs is another great Evie. War. Yes, pretty much only without the Any firearms

 

 

for now?

 

 

Ridiculous.

 

 

Oh bad. Pretty bad news.

 

 

be way too long to it's gonna be like extra mega hot. Be like, end of August, August Yeah. Do you

 

 

have a ship out Date column? Do they actually

 

 

do you like, do you have a time? Or is it just like you're still just kind of like waiting and

 

 

I'm it hasn't been drafted. Yes.

 

 

I'm waiting for my deployment details. Yeah, gotcha. My papers. Well, because they, they start off by saying, here's all the slots that need to be filled, fill them and then of course, I delete that email immediately. You Another email saying here are the remaining slots, we need these filled by next Friday,

 

 

and I delete that one. And then

 

 

they say this, these needs to be filled by tomorrow. And I delete that one. And I just kind of wait for somebody to send me an email saying, Colin, here's where you're going to be doing this. Because I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna play that game. I'm not gonna.

 

 

And then I'm gonna say,

 

Brandon  

Well, yeah, but if you don't play that game long enough, what's gonna happen is you're going to go to the boot heel,

 

 

which is that's what's going to happen.

 

 

You know, I've never I've never really spent any appreciable time down there. So

 

 

that is how you spend your time in the swamp.

 

 

Looking for swamp low lad bottoms and in the hearts

 

 

of minds will hunt them in a swamp

 

 

is the cool show, I suppose. If however, if you were in the boot, heel, you could be serving A two fold purpose. Right? You could be, you know, like official on official business or hog tracking but like clandestinely it's actually an ivory billed woodpecker tracking mission. Boom he

 

 

Oh, there we go.

 

 

There we go.

 

 

Free on my free time. Yeah, he's like

 

Brandon  

this way. Now just spend all your time looking up instead of down you see me hogs no

 

 

like i was i was reading you know some My old history textbooks and I can't remember, like, avoid event it was but you know, there was there was some, you know, isolated company in like, you know, some country and they're like oh they have you know 100% success rate whenever they go on patrols. But then when the military actually did investigations on this company is like how are you guys being so successful, but they would just like, go to the next town and like, go see movies and like do all this other stuff and then just report that they saw and did all these things like oh yeah so comments if you need to budget paper, I corral a dirty hog, but they alluded me got away, got away. I think I think every bill is the best. Right? I rebuild. I know I remember Becker This is one of my this is one of the the closest Is it still alive animals on the extinct list right so it's definitely it's been declared extinct but is it right so the thing is it was a definitely habitat loss through logging in the late 1800s because it lives in like lowland like hardwood bottom forest right and swamps and stuff. I definitely think I said those words out of order, but it's fine. Um, some words and uh, but uh, so habitat loss killed this thing. You know, the last real good recordings and stuff they have is like 19 3040, something like that. Maybe at

 

 

the university got some pictures and

 

 

stuff. But after that, it's been just kind of gone. Nobody's actually seen this thing. Wait. Except for the famous video from Arkansas. Yeah, in 2004 this guy is just paddling through a swamp. He's got his camera on his lap and then boom this bird just flies right in front of him. And it definitely appears to be an ivory billed Woodpecker. Although Martin since validated to basically be everybody Yeah, I owe in the video. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, almost certain at this point that it's either with anger but like nobody seemed like more of them. Yeah, right correct me if I'm wrong here. No, you're like right. Since then they haven't seen anything else. Yeah, no sides. There may be some support, like, alleged like, calls and stuff like not a lot of like no sightings. So these Things have like enormous ranges, you know, and they make for really long term stuff and they kind of stay in the same area forever, but they're their range is enormous so they don't really overlap too much. So they're very spread out. finding them is very difficult. But allegedly, could still be everbuild woodpeckers in the swamps of Arkansas, and possibly the bootheel of Missouri, Missouri, call him

 

 

call is gonna go search for them.

 

 

Consider it done.

 

 

Ah,

 

 

excuse me.

 

 

Other than icing, anything else? exciting happening other than your gravel quarry, visit No, oh, more fun. I mean more rants from the department. Hey,

 

 

this is everyone loves deed.

 

 

So we are going through I know I've talked about it before a massive restructuring reorganization of the department. It's been fraught with terrible decisions and bad leadership and poor communication. Yeah, misunderstanding zuri what

 

 

and

 

 

clueless people and manage direction and no vision and all this stuff. We are barreling headlong into it July 1, we will officially be in the new structure. Oh, and on recording this June 24. I record it on. So we have to submit these hours. Even though we're we're salaried. We still have to account for our for lots of reasons, but anyway,

 

 

we

 

 

submit them on the 15th. And the end of every month, submit, you know, twice a month they have to submit ours. Well on the on June 11.

 

 

No is June 13.

 

 

They were like, Oh, ah,

 

 

by the way, all of the codes that you have been using and that the department has been using for the past 15 years are no longer in the system. Here is a list of over 300 new ones.

 

 

But the system cannot input them yet so you can't actually input your time. We hope you will be able to put your time Oh, by the first of July, to just write down all of your hours on a piece of paper until then. What

 

 

did they not know? Did they have

 

 

what

 

 

they can pay for guide? That's a hard

 

 

guy is what they happen. And then there was a frantic email going. I don't own it, like many people left on vacation or you know Java stuff. And so they submit their hours early, we'll always have returns submitted and all that's

 

 

valid. And so it was like, I think I, again, I'm not writing things down on paper of ours, like my code, I write down my daily logs of what I do, what tasks I got accomplished. And I will just go back and resubmit my time. Whenever they tell me to do it. It's always gone. It's very weird. Very, very odd. Well, first of all, that's a very autistic delay anyway for a salaried employee. Right? Like, why? So part of the reason is like, we're paying you this much money and no overtime ever. That's exactly that's one of the reasons why Well, I mean, they don't mind overtime. But I think the big thing is, is that they have to track a lot for reimbursements like federal reimbursements. Work on certain projects at certain times, and they can apply for grants based off work. And there, they budget. They've redone the budget. So now it's more important than ever, in that we have to account for staff time.

 

 

Yeah, for

 

 

object goal or objective. Yeah, for the strategic plan. That makes sense. So that's how they have to justify what they what they put in their their budgets. Um, it's a pain, and I don't like it at all.

 

 

Oh, yeah, I

 

 

get that. But it's like this. It's such a big system. It's such a key keystone of the entire department. And they were

 

 

like, No

 

 

jokes made anything this week. You're getting Just you'll get more directions. And then it was like, yeah, it may be the first of July or a little bit after that whenever you'll get something.

 

 

I was like, how are you?

 

 

So weird. Oh my gosh, and they're working on their

 

 

tequilas

 

 

Valley values statement for the department. And I'm going to walk, why, why it just it reeks of corporate

 

 

structure. It just reeks of,

 

 

we have to have a statement that defines our values and what Yeah, no, they like, and we have to get a mission statement. totally get it, but they have a whole values team to figure out what the values of their personnel are in our match them and all that stuff. I'm going,

 

 

what does that

 

 

I get it, like some people think that's important. I don't think that really helps me get my job done, though, doesn't it? Last Superintendent was way into that stuff. Right? He's all about it. And like we're talking about all the time we had this dump staff meetings are like right on paper, the important values above it. I have things to do. Like, you want my like pacing guide and all that stuff, I can go to that. This is not the end of the last all staff meeting, they had everybody submit what they valued.

 

 

And I knew I knew the I

 

 

knew as I was writing this down on a piece of paper, they were going to do a stupid word cloud at the end of this, and I hate word cloud

 

 

so much now.

 

 

We value these things too. And you know what it was? You know, guess what? The I also guessed the biggest, the two biggest words. The biggest word of them all was

 

 

family. Of course,

 

 

of course. And of course, they take that to mean that we We're all family here in the department. And

 

 

I say

 

 

anytime

 

 

an employer starts talking about being part of a family you know you are in a very toxic work environment and you don't

 

 

because because in no

 

 

other family is it structured of it between an employer and an employee, that's not family that's a job. I'm sorry. Period End of story.

 

 

Yeah, like right.

 

 

Like those are such twisted toxic expectations to place on people. Because what does it do? It means Oh, you the employee, sacrifice everything for your family.

 

 

You don't get anything man. Your boss

 

 

me. Yeah, I'm your family. We're your family. We're not your but you are ours. Right. It's just

 

 

bad. I just, I was so so angry. I want it I was just really, really frustrated with that. It really burned me to see them go and yeah, we're failing to evaluate and I was like, No, my family, my family, I don't value my relationship with any of y'all.

 

 

Right? Like Don't take this the wrong way but no.

 

 

That's so do you guys remember a few months ago when I was going through that core training stuff? And how completely miserable I was, I mean the longest drives

 

Brandon  

in the history of the planet. Yes.

 

 

They had, they had

 

 

this thing called connections where all of the bigwigs from DHS come and talk to you people that from the big administration thing and they come and they first thing number one, I've been training all week. I don't like people in general. So being in a crowded assembly room, or gathering Hall of any kind, just automatically invoicing and then having People that are like, I'm gonna make a difference. And oh, this is I've been dreaming about this for years. Like, don't talk to me, don't talk. And then the president of DHS comes in. And I was like, I was in the business sector for blah, blah, blah, years. I'm like, Oh, cool. This is exactly what we need. And yeah, they, they went back and they talked about, you know, the, you know, the value cores and our beliefs of DHS and, you know, got a standing ovation. I was trying not to, I know, the loudest groan of this. And then everyone on my table agreed, because we all been through core.

 

 

Nah,

 

 

no, kind of almost talking. I get Britain, you know, emails daily. of, please take this work survey. I get to there's two different kinds of them and I it alternates each day. One of them is please tell us what you're doing. So that way, you know, you know, you know that you're working bball blah, blah and it's like, oh, I'm doing this on this date.

 

 

We got a, he says, definitely not present the wild. Sorry. That's what Aaron says right?

 

 

Shut up with your back. But the but the other one is it's like, you know, tell us how you're doing. Tell us how you feel? What are some of the, our order some of the strengths that you think DHS has? Do you feel valued as a worker? Do you feel that you have a strong voice in your hours in your team? And I like every it's like, you know, between excellent pour and I have to pour in every single one of them. And I write a lengthy thing at the end of it. It's just like, Look, I am working from my home. It is a Tuesday afternoon. I am talking to 12 different people over the phone right now. I don't have time for this. It's amid. And so I'm just waiting for a call from you know, administration and then I get like a weekly email from the government. Rector, it's like, Hey, everyone, I was having a rough week last week. And then I read blah, blah, blah. I'm like, I don't care.

 

 

Because those are our principles in those two.

 

 

When this first started, then I was I had to, I had to email my supervisor daily of everything that I did, from what time I got up to who I call that what time how much I tied, and like I had to do that daily. Turns out, I was like, the only one doing that I was like, well, this is crap I'm not going to do and then they actually got the system fixed. But and then they started to in, you know, what I talked about last time. The state of Oklahoma has lost so much money, that they're closing offices, and they conveniently forgot Osage County, which we got a nice little email. It's like, Oh, hey, by the way, we're closing our office, but didn't get a close date.

 

 

And so

 

 

I can't wait. Around from my office to close, but they got us and though we're just kind of limbo state again but like all these offices are closed and all these other offices are open and I was like can I go to my office or not like our district

 

 

in the game 20 years when

 

 

I you know, it's gotten a lot better because I'm born routine, but they stopped doing overtime because they can't pay anybody.

 

 

You can't sell more

 

 

to my office to get a van when it takes me just so they say you have to take your own car but we're not going to pay you for it. And so like they're not doing overtime, which I had to fight with my timesheet lady on every single time I submitted to go well, we're not during a time saying like, Well, this was submitted on this date get to me now. And it's, it's just a, it's just a cluster. I'm tired, and I want to play Breath of the Wild. All I want to do. You're listening, I actually am really good at my job. If I can just deal with one or the other, I would much rather deal with clients than administration. That's how terrible the state of Oklahoma is,

 

 

and put it in writing.

 

 

Because and then I found out like, well, who's making all these other decisions? And it's like, oh, it's our governor. Like, Oh, cool. That's not helping anything.

 

 

Yeah, there is over

 

 

there. He's talking about uses governance, none of the time because ours is useless also, but like, when you were trying to say, No, he's garbage. But I do I have, I just have that like that. There's something about that administrative like the bureaucratic administrative thing that just like, it's so off putting to my personality type that I just can't deal with it right? Like, like, I guess our old Superintendent used to do all this stuff. And it was a very, like, very kind of corporate centric stuff for a staff meeting in school. It's kind of weird, right? We he has his favorite thing in the world was this stupid chart. It's the he calls it the plus delta chart. Like we're going to talk about our plus deltas now. What? What, why? Why would you do that? Yeah. What the heck is this? A mistake. Get out of here. And our current superintendent, the new one, she kept it, at least for the beginning of this year. So when I thought that he was gone, that thing was gone forever. And she pulls out this sheet. In our first staff meeting at the beginning of his last school year. I was like, Nah, still here.

 

 

Never fill it out for like, one thing on each one. Like, yeah, here we go. Yeah, I find it hard to be be nice. Whenever I found out the president of DHS used to be in the business field like, Well, I was in, you know, this company for X amount of years. And I, because at the time everyone in my group had already known where I stand and how I felt on the training and how, you know, monotonous and dumb it was, and I because they're like, oh, does anyone have any questions for the president? No, don't be nice. Don't want a job. Because ever everyone asked questions or like, how do you feel about people and it's like, I feel very strongly about people and I think they're

 

 

a great resource to explore. I mean, I mean, welcome people.

 

 

Serve and grow Simon say Yeah, and then my group got got ticked. We had the DHS as a slogan, which I forgot. Okay, we they gave us like letters and we had to go like, or they gave us like words and we had to go put the words in the sentence by standing up and I was just trying not to chew my piece of paper up and I was like, I don't

 

 

like those team building group things are not fun. Yeah.

 

 

Like, just Just let me do my job. Not with you people. Do people actually need it? I think there's an overemphasis on, like this vague term of like business minded, right? Because people seem to think that like, that model, translates into other things. It's not it doesn't belong there. Like it doesn't belong in the school. The school is not a business. You don't have budgets. Yeah, we're not we have no product. Yeah, we're not producing. We're not consuming resources and producing stuff, not what's happening. Right? So that model, that mindset doesn't really fit in that environment. And the same way DHS, that's definitely not a business. So just because someone's a business person, doesn't mean that they can lead in that environment, right? say, Yeah, I know at all just because you're a man of business, like, you know, to one big extreme, in my opinion, if you're a man of business, doesn't mean you can be the president. Jeez, Louise man doesn't have to do with that. Not. Well, yeah. And that's like, like, the department like, Okay, how do I go about running a business that does watershed conservation, but we're a nonprofit, and we can't make any money and all of our funding actually comes from taxpayers. Yeah. It's tell me how to run that as a business. It's not a business. You can't do it. And yet, they're like, well, we need it. We need to find our values. And oh, here's the Other things they're trying to do. They have a culture committee to figure out what the account structure of the department is,

 

 

like, again, I go, Why?

 

 

Why is that just so important people can sit on another committee? Yes. Like, that doesn't tell me anything, right? That's gonna change. The I'm afraid that they're gonna let it's actually going to be is actually gonna come out some very bad stuff. But whatever it says I don't know of like, we think, again, it's their idea of what they think culture is gonna be. They say they talk to people, but they don't know. They don't tell you. Here's the part of anytime you solicit for public feedback, or feedback on anything, tell the other person what you're going to do with the feedback how to be tell them how it's going to impact your decision or not. Right, you need to tell them that because otherwise, you're leaving on false assumptions.

 

 

If you say something Hey,

 

 

how am I how's my work today? And they respond with that's, you know, you're actually a terrible worker. And I don't know why you're here if you Oh great,

 

 

glad we talked I

 

 

really appreciate it and you don't change a single thing.

 

 

You asked for feedback next time The point is you're not even listening. Yeah, it's like do a lot of times it is the illusion of is one airing one reason what it is

 

 

yes, it is somebody somebody told them along the way,

 

 

you have to ask

 

 

for feedback through this process. And they went we have to ask for feedback along this process great. And they get this all this information and they go select all delete

 

 

are we doing on our Patreon?

 

 

Anyway, back to what we're doing. Yeah, exactly.

 

 

At no point have they said, they said, oh, here's here's as specific as they've gotten. We look at your feedback and we take it into account when we are making decisions how how to do that. You have to tell me how I was aware at the beginning of this year because we had a new superintendent, she Bryce Addison, and she had that we had that, but we had that face to face. So it was kind of awkward. So I was like, Well, you know, she's like, well, what are some things that you think are good? And then she was like, what are some things you think were bad? And I really kind of held back a little bit. Because I was like, Yeah, I have a big list. But let's start here. Because I think that, you know, like, like everybody else. I think we all have certain expectations of things. And then what we end up getting is like, me, so that's my biggest You know, I think that's like universal dilemma in many environments, but like, Oh, yeah, I didn't I didn't lead with that one as much stuff. Like Yeah, that's all Yeah, big thing is like we get this big expectation build up. And then what we end up getting in the end is like

 

 

me. Here it is. Yeah, I love. I love getting the emails

 

 

that say like, Oh, we hear you and we understand your complaints. Because like, I remember I was in a staff meeting on I think it's like zoom or something. And it was, you know, we're talking about like, Alright, so our supervisor, as supervisor asked this guy, what do you need God we need access to, you know, you know, scanners and printers and stuff. And we need to because, you know, we have to send, you know, a lot of medical requests, and, you know, and different referrals and stuff. And so, it got so bad. I was taking a picture of paperwork, and like, attaching it to a Word document and emailing it to people. I'm like, hey, look, I don't have an office. I hope this works.

 

 

So I can suggest to you there are many scanner apps for your phone that actually take those pictures and convert them directly to PDFs

 

 

and then email them I can't download anything on my work phone, and I can't use my personal phone for anything. They won't let you download stuff on your phone. And

 

 

yet, well then yeah, they get pictures. So I submitted stuff to my university with pictures from my phone. So it's fine, I'm sure. Because like I did, like just literally take a picture of it, and then email it to myself and then converted into PDF, Doc. Well, hope that's good enough. I got an email. And that's like, we hear your voices and we are working together to strive and progress towards this difficult times. So after hear your complaints, we have now decided to give Oklahoma County blob or like it was like one of the Oklahoma City districts like we're giving them two new vehicles like that's not

 

 

so like, yeah,

 

 

yeah. And so we have four vans for the entire county of Osage. And we have like 30 workers like what do you like, that's cool, but how I was going to fix me, because I got a call from the other day from a hospital and they're like, um, I mean, we can kind of use this we prefer you scan it like, Look, I can't help you. Sorry. That's not the best thing to do. So yeah, I just that I've never thrown anything but I just wanted to check my laptop when I got that email listeners for reference. I also just looked it up Osage County 2300 square miles.

 

 

Kaboom. Yeah.

 

 

It takes me

 

 

a good hour to get to my office from where I live. And then takes me another hour to get to two of the closest towns.

 

 

To to me where I where I live.

 

 

So just put that into perspective of, oh, hey, I got a call. I gotta go out there.

 

 

Oh, let me take a picture of this on my phone. That'll help me.

 

 

I'm fine. I'm fine. This is my hat and put my head on. Yeah, 23,004 square miles, excuse me, population of 46,000. In the whole county, it is one of the densely populated in in the state but it's just you know, everything is so spread out. Yeah. And yeah. Oh, fun, fun bureaucracy bullcrap. For sure. Yeah, that's like, whenever this whole reorg started, people were complaining about chain of command and not getting consistency about messaging. How often did you hear the term streamlined?

 

 

We have, we have whole classes that you

 

 

can take on the streamlining process. You can get, you can get you can get a white belt, a black Yep.

 

 

Profit process improvement. It's awful. It's Terrible. Terrible. It's this is why this is why I don't this is what people ask me all the time. They're like, Hey, are you gonna go to these like, teacher like, in service training things, right? A lot of the off site ones that they're like, Oh, go do that. It's that stuff. Like, I want to go to that. I want to learn more about science. Yeah, I want to learn more about this. I don't want to learn about weird things like that. That doesn't help me DJ, anybody get out of here? I don't understand. Like, I don't know. I took one. And I walked away from going. What? What do you mean, Woody? You're trying to teach me about process improvement to make processes more efficient by taking up 90% of my time for who knows how long

 

 

because apparently, that's all the department has been doing for the past five years.

 

 

I don't understand that. I don't understand like, Well, here's what you write everything down that you Every single step in every hand that has to touch the document, and you write that out, and then you put them on a big board, and you see if you can line them up in a better way.

 

 

Why? What's his workflow? why don't why don't I just as a workflow chart, why don't I just do it? Why don't I don't remember? Exactly why. Why would Why do that? I understand I understand. And I know the idea of like, always be questioning and anytime soon tells you, this is how we do this process. ask why that's a healthy thing to do. Unless neither of you are empowered to make any changes, rather than pointless weightless. But that workflow chart that's from Tech business. That's where that comes from. And that's not that's definitely not applicable to, like, weird that land claim stuff, paper documentation,

 

 

bragging about how they use this process to come up with fuel cards for each

 

 

truck. And I'm like, Last No, no. Because it used to be Didn't you just went? We're just going to sign a card to a truck. Yeah. You went you went? Do people you went do people still do mileage logs for their for for fleet vehicles? No. Oh, they use all cards. Sweet. We'll do that. Like this. You didn't use this process? Yeah, there's no way How did you get? That doesn't make sense. No, no, that's not what happened here, though. Stop, Stop lying.

 

 

Definitely conflating some things to get there. Yeah, it's like, but each step along the way. People kept saying, well, the leadership,

 

 

we don't have strong leaders. There's a problem there. And so they were like, Oh, are you saying you don't like the

 

 

structure? No, no, no, the structure won't change anything. It's the people. The people are the problem. And they went, Oh, so what if we got regional work teams? You're like, No, no, no.

 

 

Yeah, once we made the real Bad leaders like the ultimate leaders for which

 

 

clearly isn't the person now, it's the structure that they're leading, obviously, because because

 

 

I've talked to my I've talked to my supervisor about this like I am totally understand they have to at the same time go. We have the best

 

 

workforce on the face of the earth to manage this do manage our state's land. We do while having to tacitly acknowledge that they have some pretty deadbeat people. force that would be better off not employed with the department. I really think I don't think that's it. Yeah. I don't think you have to say we have the best workforce. I think it's much healthier to say we want the best workforce. Oh, no, they say we have the best word. Well, yes, but I What I'm saying is that I believe as wrong. Yes. Right. believe that they should be saying, We want the best workforce. How do we make it better? Because I don't think I think it's there. Definitely unhealthy to assume that what you have currently is the best iteration of the thing. Yes. Right. That's not just just like, right. Yes, exactly. Definitely included people. I don't think you can just take what you have at face value and say, This is the best iteration. There is. Right? You have to say, this is the current iteration. Yeah, I had to make it better. I think if you're not striving to beat to make it better, and what are you doing?

 

 

Yeah, you're not fine. Like, here's the here's the here's the thing that really need to happen again. Here's the wonderful if everybody just did what I believed things would be better, which you know, runs.

 

 

That doesn't work in the real world. But as someone who does, have you watched the news, that's exactly how it works. As we're going there anyways. All right, great. Here's what needs to happen. They got a new director, she needs to come in and

 

 

fire about 20 people

 

 

and say you have been poorly performing this entire time for all of your careers by and then put actual people in place and go, okay, Is this better? Right? That would be the first step, remove leaders. Instead, what she did was she turned to the deadbeat leaders and went, how can we make this structure better? Basically, how can we make this structure better for you?

 

 

Yeah, how can we make you do less work? 100%

 

 

because they were like, we're streamlining from the top down to

 

 

make a connection stronger.

 

 

And basically what they were like, they really, at first were like, oh, man, they're gonna get rid of middle management, those positions. That's what they're called. They're not called middle managers. But that's the gist if you're thinking corporate, that's right. No, they like added. There's so many more layers between me and the director. Now, it's not even funny. I don't understand how that makes anything better.

 

 

They came up with some ridiculous thing of like, well, no one person should be supervising more than five people, like five to 10, five to 10 people was the maximum number that any one person could supervise, so that

 

 

you could get more mentoring. And I was like, I thought we were looking for consistency of message. Yeah, people. It's a game of telephone.

 

 

You're increasing the number of chains in the game of telephone now.

 

 

Yeah, no, that's why you can have mentors. You have like a person whose job it is to be. Yeah, to like mentor and help with like, a coaching. Right? We call them in, in the teaching world. They're called instructional coaches. That's their job. Their job is to, usually they will in small schools like mine, they also teach a class classes, right. They also have class load, but their other job is to come and see you talk About how you're doing, how is your planning, looking? How is it going? How are you doing personally, like blah, blah, like their job is to kind of be that person that helps you do your job better. Not just like a random person that teaches nearby. Right? That's what it sounds like that they do your department. It's actually a person whose dedicated job it is to come and visit you while you're working and just kind of see how you're doing. suggest other options like Oh, hey, have you tried this? Hey, you could do that. Hey, what about this to like, help make your life better? Yeah. It's like a coaching position, not just like a well,

 

 

they're looking to the supervisors and going and you guys are mentors now.

 

 

And I'm like,

 

 

no. Supervisors job, they

 

 

are the things. They're just supervise me in my current job. Right. Yeah. That's what they're super. Okay. Whatever. Cool.

 

 

Awesome. Good job, guys. Yeah,

 

 

so the end result I'm just like, this is awful. It's really bad. It's really bad. Anyway,

 

 

on that any any funny note we can end on because it's getting late

 

 

in someone say something, nothing

 

 

now. Well, I will I will say into further detail. So, this weekend for Father's Day, you know I took Shelby down and Shelby got to meet Papa and yeah, Brandon and Susan.

 

 

seller, I apologize.

 

 

Okay, I'm just for myself in general. We were sitting there, and we went to breakfast in Marshfield. Because that's what we do. And that's what dad does. Sorry, but he goes want breakfast. 30 minutes later. And then we're Enzo Shelby brought the point. It's like, Hey, is it Laura Ingalls Wilder house in Missouri. I was like, Oh, that's probably like a few hours away and dad's like, no, that's a Mansfield. That's like 20 minutes away. Nothing, not 20 minutes away from from Marshfield. It's like 2030 minutes away. And so we we drove to Mansfield and spent the rest of the day in the Laura Ingalls Wilder History Museum and home de in which my my girlfriend of six months, said the quote and she's not in the room but she can probably hear me and murder me The moment I get done podcast so like, it would be so cool to LARP the 1800s

 

 

like, Hmm,

 

 

maybe it'd be it'd be cool to LARP the 18 hundred's and I was like, no. LARP is the right word, but I mean, it isn't But I understand what she's going for. So some advice shall be free advice. Here we go. First of all, you need to zero in on a particular time period of 1800s. Because the fashion change the fashion change dramatically through each decade. As a time, right? Got to find a time. Second of all, there are people I know that I have seen them online and stuff. And they just do that. They just dress that way. Every day. That's how they go to work. We just dress like we, it's 18 to one ounce, it's like go for it. We found these, Oh, I can't remember the names. But we found these these vloggers on YouTube that are like, well, it's time for me to wake up at you know, 4am to go turn butter. And then like it talks about like them in the process of like dressing in a time period. Yeah, that was just like, fascinated with it. But that then brought me up to do we need to make a road trip to Lincoln land? No, I mean, you could probably go somewhere closer to find Dubonnet

 

 

no no dododo cooler

 

 

so in to encompass a you know, a conclusion. Dad wants to make a trip up to Illinois sometime and we need to make a stop and a new Salem State Park Oh dear. Well there's a plague on so I don't know when that will happen well well

 

 

plagues guarantee flying across the country he doesn't care about that

 

 

that's true Alabama's like two states away it's much more than two we got to get this counting thing to Alabama stop

 

 

listen listen to listeners trees in Alabama and emu wars those The only things you need to take away from this podcast. Oh dear goodness I've just I just want to know I want Shelby do some research. I want to know what specific 1800s time period She wants to just start dressing as I'm curious I want to know 1840s 1870s like Victorian like frontier like I think that's what she's interested in. But I'm currently reading a book of the Civil War so probably not this time but I will get back to at a later date and go over we just want to know we got a we got a four hour we have a four hour layover in Dallas I'm sure they go you do I want you to probe the depths here I wanted I want I'm curious about what report on actual a time period more specific time period and perhaps style question mark of dress that she is interested in pursuing because if he fascinating I will inquire Alright, and in discuss at a later date. Yeah, because there's a big difference between like 1860s frontier versus 1860s like London, right? Boom, like, big deal. Oh,

 

 

I see and yes. Oh go

 

 

Nope. There we go.

 

Collin  

Okay, that'll be, there'll be.

 

 

Yeah, I also wanna know what historical time period Collin wants to cosplay and that's the second

 

Collin  

challenge is cosplay.

 

 

Okay, well,

 

I got some homework to do. There we go. Perfect. Okay.

 

 

All right. Let me let me see you