This week we invite two of the "great guys" from our Hill Murray High School days..Mike McGinn and Tony Yocum. Turns out, one is a legit super-hero and the other one prayed for cold weather. Cold weather that ultimately led to extraordinary generosity.. These two guys are the embodiment of "Kindness Chronicles."
This week we invite two of the "great guys" from our Hill Murray High School days..Mike McGinn and Tony Yocum. Turns out, one is a legit super-hero and the other one prayed for cold weather. Cold weather that ultimately led to extraordinary generosity.. These two guys are the embodiment of "Kindness Chronicles."
All right. Welcome to the Kindness Chronicles. Mike, put that up to your mouth. Where we hope to inject the world with a dose of the Minnesota nice that it desperately needs. Steve, it's Friendsgiving Yeah. It's the Monday before Thanksgiving. And we're having a special event tonight. We're calling Kindness Chronicles Friendsgiving. And Steve and I last week were trying to decide what we wanted to do. We wanted to do something special for the, uh, for this week. For the Thanksgiving holiday. For the Thanksgiving holiday. And, um, we said let's invite nicest guys from each of our graduating classes. And they were busy so we got these guys. And they were busy so we got these guys. And, and mine was Mike McGinn and I've always adored Mike. Mike, hello. Speak into the microphone. Mike recently retired as a St. Paul police officer. So his life is better than mine at this point, but that's okay. And then Steve, you chose two because you couldn't decide between the two guys. Right. Paul D'Inzio and Tony Jochum. Welcome Tony. Well, thank you. I appreciate it. You got to put the mic up to your mouth. That's it's much easier when we up with, and there's no question, Paul, Paul D'Inzio wins a prize for nicest guy that I think he was voters. I think he was actually. Yeah. That's something like that. That wouldn't surprise me or best eyes or something. Well that too. He's, he's dreamy. He's got it all. He is dreamy. But good to fill in. And Paul is probably listening. Hi, Paul. Sorry that you, uh, had a work function tonight, but, uh, yeah. Thank you guys for coming. We, uh, we often talk about the fact that, you know, in life, one of the greatest compliments that you can pay to somebody is, oh, he was a great guy, or, oh, he is a great guy. And we consider you guys a couple of those great guys, so. You can, there'll be trophies handed out later. So congratulations for that participation. I gotta say back at you guys. I mean, we, we hung around a lot in high school and afterwards and you guys were. You're top notch. So we're all class, we're all, um, students, uh, graduates of Hill Murray High School. Mike and I were class of 86. Tony and Steve were class of 88. Yep. We couldn't find anybody from the class of 87 that was worthy of, uh, joining us. No, not a, not a kind grade, really. You know, pretty, pretty known as a non kind grade. Non kind grade. They, they were an unfriendly bunch. They're still that way. Yeah. Yeah. All kidding aside. Who would you pick from the class of 87 to be a part of this? Tony Reif? He was 87, wasn't he? Yeah. He was a good dude. But you look at guys like Steve Thomas and... Oh God, I forgot about Steve. You know, Kevin McMahon and... Oh, Mac, of course. Okay. Alright, you're fine. Okay. Yeah. Let me just point out to you that... Maybe I should edit that out. Let me just point out, The Kindness Chronicles... The Kindness Chronicles is not about... Where we think we're kind guys and we're just inviting kind people. We are acknowledging that. We need to put a highlight on people that are doing kind things and being kind of the world and doing great things. So it isn't a nice guy fest, even though it kind of is here. Cause we feel that, but that I'm just trying to state that with the audience where if you're not a good person, you can't be a part of this or you can't listen, or if you, we don't think that we're. You know, we don't. Well, no, we acknowledge that it's a good thing to be. That's what sounds like you need a therapist because I'm feeling pretty good about myself clarifying for audience. I thought you were the gatekeepers. Yeah, there is that. No question about it. Um, so as this is, uh, the holiday season, um, at Hill Murray, we'd refer to it as, you know, Christmas season is upon us and Thanksgiving. Um, I have a number of questions that I would like to explore with you guys. But before that, I just want to talk a little bit about what you guys have been doing with yourselves for the last 35, 40 years. Mike, you are retired a, uh, St. Paul cop, and one of the things that I've always admired about you is your interest in, uh, the kids in the St. Paul community, specifically your connection to Parks and Rec. You were always a Parks and Rec guy growing up. And, uh, tell us a little bit about that program that, uh, that you and I have discussed in the past. Yeah, well, I mean, thank you for that. Um, In high school, when I hit Hill Murray, I started working for the city at, uh, 15 years old in Parks and Rec and did that through college. So that kind of gave me a good foundation working with kids, doing a lot of coaching and... Um, so full disclosure, your dad was like a master commander or something to the police department. He retired. He retired as a commander. He's a commander. So there was some nepotism getting that job with the city of St. Paul. Let's just be honest. Yeah. The city of St. Paul. Tony, we're going to talk about nepotism. Oh yeah. Get ready. You'll come. Well, no, there's, there's, there's a lot of, uh, my family that's worked for the city of St. Paul in one form or another. I can say though, when, when I did decide to move over to the police department, um, my dad was already retired, so I didn't have, I didn't have him working there kind of watching over my shoulder. I had, I had to earn it. So I wasn't, uh, how long are you with the police department? Uh, 21 years. Oh, wow. So all, all, all in all with the city of St. Paul, I worked 39 years and with the program that you're, you're talking about, um, It's called the PAL program and Police Athletic League is what it's known as nationally. We called it in St. Paul the Police Activities League because we did more than just sports. We wanted to introduce kids to other things to kind of enrich their lives. And um, after I had gotten promoted, uh, to sergeant, I had the opportunity to work in community engagement unit. And uh, my job was specifically to work with youth. Well, having a parks and rec background, definitely being childless yourself. Oh, I'm a huge child. Yes. And, uh, so I just started coming up with programs, reaching out to who I knew. And then. One thing just kind of snowballed into something else and I would meet somebody from the DNR or I'd meet somebody from the Herb Brooks Foundation or I would meet somebody from the Minnesota Twins and we would get to talking about things and say, Hey, we could do a program and especially we're looking at underserved and underrepresented. So with those organizations, um, you just develop things in partnership and we just kept going and, uh, we were building programs, uh, like I said, with her Brooks foundation doing, uh, kids how to skate. And it started out just at the local, um, arenas like the Oscar Johnson arena, Johnson and Harding arena. And then after a while we were at Tria. Skating where the, the wild, very cool. And that was, that was an amazing thing. And the cool thing was we have a lot of officers that participate in hockey. What a great way to connect. And that's just it. We wanted to kids to meet these officers and kind of humanize who they were and then take away some of the stigma that we get bombarded with, but, um, nice. I was able to spend five years doing that. And, um, then COVID happened and we wound up getting pretty much shut down. And, uh, in the meantime, trying to figure out what can we hold together? I wound up getting transferred, but still kind of have a hand in, in that. And as a matter of fact, after I retired, um, Uh, St. Paul Parks and Rec reached out to me and said, Hey, we know what you've done in the past. Would you mind doing, we have a DNR grant, would you mind doing a afterschool fishing program four days a week, uh, for two hours, uh, working with kids? And so, yeah, right after school started this year, I was retired about. a month, month and a half. So you took a long break. I took a huge break and, uh, I got into this little, little gig, uh, uh, teaching kids for four weeks and it was, it was amazing. That's awesome. It was, and all these kids, the, the, here's the best part about it. It was four different groups, uh, the, the four days that we were doing it Monday through Thursday and On the final session of each one, you know, I would thank the kids and tell them, uh, you know, it's been an honor to be working with you guys. You guys did a great job. You guys are the best group that I've ever had. And, uh, just spontaneously, they're just like, Oh, thanks. Mike and, uh, um, I wind up getting hugs from all these kids and these kids are about middle school age. So I wasn't really expecting that. It's just time, right? It's just time. Along those lines, the flip side of that coin, tell me what it was like, tell us. I'm so self censored. Yeah, we're here too, John. Shut up. The flip side of that coin, what was it like to be a police officer late May of 2020? That had to have been the flip side of getting hugs when they were throwing rocks at you. And tell us about that adventure. It was horrible. Um, this is related to the George Floyd. Yes. Um, I was, and I have explained this, I've gone to several. community meetings. And uh, because the way I looked at it after that happened, I need to be part of rebuilding. And right now, I'm understanding that the community, the Twin Cities community and in pretty much the whole world, we're going through stages of grief and they're angry. And I get it. Um, having watched the video, I looked at it and very selfishly, I When I saw it for the first time it wasn't oh my gosh a man has died My my first thought was oh my gosh everything that I've worked for and built has now been destroyed Oh boy, and and you get that pit in your stomach and then then you cannot wait You pull yourself back and it's like, wait, this is even, this is way bigger than me. And so, yeah, it's going to lead to, it's led to a lot of reform. It's led to a lot of self examination within the law enforcement community as to how do we do things better? We can't be stagnant. We can't just think that we do things perfect. We don't do things perfect. We have to evolve. We have to change or, or the community is not going to trust us. And so again, May of 2020, it was, I mean, it was already bad enough that March we shut the world down and, you know, St. Patrick's Day was canceled and everybody's in isolation. And then you have this. Tragedy happened and it's like, what can go wrong? Yeah. What's next? Yeah, exactly. And, and we weren't, you know, we're not prepared for it. And then you still have the fallout of everything that happened afterwards. Um, with COVID all of the, uh, homeless shelters have to cut They're available beds all because by, by two thirds a while. And so you had facilities like the St. Paul hotel and, uh, uh, the other hotels in St. Paul that were, nobody's traveling. So they're all empty. So the County's making deals with them to house homeless people. but there's still a whole bunch of people that are wandering around the streets. They have nowhere to go. And then we're seeing the, uh, opioid epidemic, uh, really hitting us hard. And so drugs were very prevalent. During that time. And then plus you have the, all the anger that comes from that event and those protests. Frustration. Yeah. Yeah. And so as police officers, you're trying to manage all of this stuff and you're trying to do it with grace and empathy. But that doesn't come across because everything that you're hearing on, on so I just have to interject here. So Mike was the captain of our football team, uh, offensive tackle and, um, I can't believe how well spoken you are because you weren't this smart in high school. I mean, not to, this is the Kindness Chronicles, but clearly, you're, you're... No, but no, I, I... I agree, I agree with you. We need to have, you know what, we need to have you on for your own episode because there's, I'd love to explore this some more. Sure. But speaking of, um, nepotism, um, I would just like to admire our friend Tony Yocum the 5th, right? You're the 5th. So just, full disclosure, I'm John Lawrence Schweitz the 4th. Um, the guy that just called that interrupted us is the 5th. And I realize that I'm never gonna catch up to you. Unless my kids start having kids like teenage, as teenagers, and you know the, the closer we get. Yeah. So, cause you have a Tony VI. Yeah. And, uh. You've got a math and, math and, uh, age problem there. Math and age, it's just, I'm not great at math, but, uh. But Tony, what have you been doing with your life? I know that you are a part of the family business. Absolutely. You know, I just want to take a, take a second though to congratulate Mike on his retirement. It's wonderful. You know, you've, there's some really unique pieces about Mike, too. He's got a story about lifting a 300 pound engine off a boy. Oh, man. That was racing way back. That's... That was a long time ago. Oh, we gotta hear about that. Okay. On the next one. Yeah. Yeah. And so. Well, just give us a real quick, what the hell is he talking about? A bunch of street racers down on Plato Boulevard, and they were all gathered in a parking lot. We go to clear them out. One car takes off down, um. Uh, going into the wrong lane. He shoots across Robert street, a nurse coming home from regions hospital. She slams on her brakes and just, he takes off her front license plate, but it's enough to put him out of his car, out of kilter. So. I thought he made it through and I'm like, well, I'm going to head, I checked with her, make sure she's okay. And I go, I'm going to head down to the next intersection to see if I can maybe he stopped at the light there and I can have a talk with him. And um, unfortunately, I passing by, I see all this garbage looks like garbage stacked up against a tree. And then also, then I realized, no, that's the car and it had been cut in half and, uh, the young man who, uh, that Tony's talking about, he, uh, was ejected from the car and I ran up there. I don't see any people and, uh, but I can hear this, this urk, urk, urker noise and the engine sitting on his chest. What? Yeah. And, uh, I mean, thankfully it's just like a Honda civic, so it's not like a. Big Buick or something, but uh, ran over there and it's one of those weird stories, kind of superhuman strength guy. We've always kind of been superhuman strength. Well, it's a, I grab it, I pick it up and turn and I. I set it down and I'm dealing with him. Ambulance comes and takes him off. He survives, but he had some, he has some serious injuries. I would expect so. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, very serious injuries, but he, he survived. And uh, but then the long, the end of the story is when the tow truck came to start picking up the pieces of the car, I told the tow truck, well, here, let me give you a hand with the engine. I couldn't budge that thing. Wow. Yeah. I mean, it was, we, when they did the specs, it was, I think they said it was 500 pounds or something like that. Holy cow. Either way. Sure. Drellin was just pumping when you pulled up and when you saw that, realize who it was. I was complaining about how heavy a gallon of milk was when I was putting it on my cereal this morning. How do you know that story? That's God. That's God lending a finger. You bet. I was a tow truck driver, right? Was that right? Yeah. How did you know that story? Oh, uh, I recalled it from way back when, uh, you got a couple of awards and I was trying to remember about that. That was the year the department started doing life saving awards. And um, I got. For that one, I was nominated and then there was another one, a bridge jumper and we, yeah, we kind of, we got a whole show with this guy, we pulled him off, you know, tune in next week for more of Mike McGinn, Superman Mike McGinn. I will say this though, cause I did have, uh, uh, Mara Gottfried from the, uh, St. Paul Pioneer Press. She was one. The reporter's covering this one and she asked me, you know, do you want to, you know, would you ever want to meet this kid? And, uh, I'm like, no. Um, one, if he wants to meet me, absolutely, I totally would, but why would I want to meet him? Because it's the worst day of his life and what that for my own self, yeah, look at me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't be, aren't you grateful? No, no. I wouldn't expect that. And I think that's completely wrong. I'm, I'm sure I'm shocked because that's. Oh my gosh. That's a long time ago. It's about 15 years. But you could do it again. You could do it. For sure. In fact, we're, we got a weight bench down here. We're going to see how many plates we can put on and see what Mike's, uh, maxes these days. Now, coincidentally, I was meeting with the CEO of St. Paul Public Works guys, Shane Wurst and Ron Mundall last week. Oh, sure. And they said you were very tough on vehicles yourself. Is that true? I don't know what they're talking about. Why were you meeting with public works people? Well, you know, and this goes back to the story that I've got is that our family, Yoakum Oil Company, um, you know, supply diesel fuel and gasoline to a lot of the commercial and retail and, and, uh, and government customers of, you know, the metropolitan area, the Twin Cities. And, uh, one of the things that I helped build, you know, this is 20 years ago, is, uh, being able to actually fix the fuel pricing for these, uh, city and state governments. Because think about it, as taxpayers, you know, we give, we give, you know, the, the city of St. Paul police a certain amount of budget for fuel, as taxpayers, and, and they have a It's your responsibility to, you know, to manage that. Well, fuel prices all of a sudden go up by two bucks. You know, all of a sudden, you know, they've got to lay off two Mike McGintz or three Mike McGintz. So they don't want to be in that position. And so we, we came up with a big program and that's still ongoing. So we didn't, we still deliver all the fuel and I get, I make sure I made sure that Mike got the fastest, the highest. Oh, nice. That I did not get. No, because it was, uh, it was more what vehicle has the most interior room. Oh, because you know, six foot four and uh, well north of 200 pounds. Yeah. Well north. Well north. Okay. Let's be honest here. Yeah. When, when, when we had the Crown Vix, that was, oh, that was not pretty. Yeah. Especially when you're all geared up. So yeah, I thought there were big cars, isn't a Crown Vic kind of a bigger car? It's a great big car until you put a cage in the back. Oh, and all the electronics in the front. Nice, and a moose in the front with, uh, his, bulletproof vest and all that other stuff. All of a sudden things get, uh, yeah, they say the best adds 30, 40, 50 pounds. I'm wearing one right now. Right. So Tony, go back to your, don't yoke them. Yeah. So, so my family, um, who started that business? Was it your grandfather side? Yeah. Yeah. On the side. And he, he went to, uh, to heart Johnson. My grandmother went to Harding soil East side folks and, uh, grew up and, and actually was delivering a heating oil to a lot of customers and, and, and a full circle. It's funny. I'll mention this now is that, uh, the Yocum family would sit around at Thanksgiving dinner. And they would pray. Every one of them required to pay, pray for cold weather, a very cold winter. Because for us, you know, then we deliver a lot of heating oil and that's what made our family money. And my family is super generous. That's hilarious. They are very generous. And that was one of the things I was going to talk about, you know. The, the Hill Murray has been the beneficiary of many generations of, uh, of Yoakum family and now many branches of Yoakum family. And as a, as a pioneer, I want to thank you and your family. You know, you guys are up there with The Regans of the world and the Garofalos of the world and man, it's a it's amazing what you guys have done with that school Well, it's you know, and and there's one common bond There is is, you know, the the patriarchs and the matriarchs that have incredibly large hearts You know If you look at a lot of those folks it's just amazing and when you sit around at the auctions or you sit around at different events and see what a difference that generosity makes And, and I tell you what, it's really neat, and this is a great time to talk about this too because, you know, we're sitting here with good friends and things like that and, and we come from, you know, modest backgrounds, um, but we look at some of these other kids, uh, that, that barely are scraping together a meal for Thanksgiving. And some of those kids are at Hill Murray now. Which is, which is unbelievable. It really is. You know, for the tuition and everything else, it's just really wonderful. So yeah. And our family still, every Thanksgiving, we're saying, thanks around the table and holding hands and saying, what do we thank God for? Bring on the cold. And it's still coming out. It's cold weather, right? And we all look at each other, are we still praying for that, really? So. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, that's very fine. Good. So we still have those. And your connection to Hillmurray continues. You've got children that, uh, have graduated and that are students there right now. I met your daughter a couple of weeks ago. A freshman. Yep. And she made the, uh, soccer player, girls, girls, hockey too. And soccer player. Yes. Pioneer hockey player. Oh, she's having a blast. Really fun. Just having a great experience. Chase is a junior this year. Okay. Yep. Soccer player and hockey player. And then, uh, Hey, congratulations. The soccer team had a pretty good season this year. Yeah. Let's say incredible. Incredible. Yeah. And hands hats off to the, uh, to the coaches. That's Jeff and Chris suffer that have been leading that program. And they've just done just a dynamite job, getting a lot of kids in and making sure they meet, you know, make the team. And then she's really working the development. So it's full rosters, but all the kids are playing. It, it really panned out. And Chris is the head of separating people from their money. Yes. At Gilmore. Yes. So I'm sure Chris has you on speed dial, and you're on speed dial, and God bless him for that. As a guy in that business, it's, uh, it's not easy separating people from their money, but it's... I always like to say, nobody gives till it hurts. Yeah. They give because it feels really good. And that's true. Yeah. Oxytocin. That's oxytocin. That's right. So, can we get to a few, questions that I have for you guys? And this is one that I Holiday, holiday marked questions? For, for example, let's just start with Yeah, What is your, this is very simple, what is your, what food item at Thanksgiving do you most look forward to? I'm gonna start. I'll start. I'll give you an example. So there are two items. So my dad makes this stuffing that he puts sausage in. And it's just absolutely incredible. I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. Is that a problem that I have, like a physical reaction to thinking about food? And my mother in law makes this scalloped corn that is like a dessert. And, uh, let's just say my blood sugar... Uh, is a little higher than it ought to be on, uh, at about two o'clock on Thursday. Oh, that sounds good. We should take a five minute break. We could. So, our favorite food item, who wants to go? Tony, what do you got? Yeah. Well, you know, it's funny because we've got the Scandinavian background. So, um, Lefse's got to be part of that. Now, not, not Ludefisk, that's a different deal. But left some, you know, it's really a potato, the unleavened potato bread. And whether you like brown sugar or what do you, we do brown sugar in our family. And, and roll that up and that's always a little treat, you know, but typically it's a big turkey. This year we're doing three turkeys. We have 28 people coming over. So we've got, Didn't they come into your house? Yeah. Very nice. Great. I'll be gone. Three turkeys. So we've got a turkey on the grill, a turkey on the, uh, in the oven. Yeah. And uh, and then my son Chase and I shot, uh, wild Turkeys, uh, this spring. And so we're gonna deep fry a wild Turkey Oh, wow. This year. Oh wow. So we're gonna see how that all flavors. Yeah. Yeah. That's cool. It's be fun. We do two turkeys. We do one in the Traeger, one in the, uh, the oven, and we do like a, a, a taste test. And the Traeger always seems to Yeah. To win. Oh, yeah. And now Becky thinks that we're just gonna do'em both on the, the Traeger this year. Yeah. That's a good grill. Okay. How about you, Steve? Well, I would agree with you. I kind of go with you in that there's, in my family, my mom makes, uh, Ronnie's special stuffing. I think it's my grandma's recipe, but there's raisins in it. Oh, it's, it's to die for. Interesting. Spiced bread with all that. I'm not a huge fan of raisins. I know. But in certain things, Things that work. My family does a lot of raisins when it's cooked. It's different. It's not like, uh, yeah, that's what I crave. It's really, really good. You got turkey and, you know, KG is not here tonight. Yes. He, you know, goes to a lot of movies and he loves those chocolate covered raisins. What are they called? Raisinets. Oh, does he? Oh my God. He, he goes to a lot of movies and he pounds out a lot of raisinets. That's an old school candy so, so, so grandma's? Yeah, it's my, it's my mom's, but I think my, my grandma, it's an older tradition, but my mom makes it really special. That's what we all crave too. Mike? Even though Last Name's McGinn, I have an Italian background, my mom's side of the family, so. And actually, John, you've had this before. My mom's manicotti. Oh, gosh, yes. Um, it's just those, I don't know exactly how she does the stuffing and the cheese mixture that goes in there, but it's, it's been a staple on our table for years. Even for Thanksgiving? Oh, Thanksgiving. So that's a different kind of stuffing in the manicotti. That's uh, mostly a cheese mixture. Sometimes there's meat in there, depending on how you want to do it. And then. Um, then I started, I started doing a seafood manicotti because my grandmother really liked seafood manicotti. But then we had two manicottis and that's just overkill. So it's a lot of manicotti, but I, so I changed it up and I made, I went way out of the box and I made a, instead I do a seafood lasagna. Oh, because lasagna is totally different. We're talking about this. Wait a second. Hold on a second. It's so funny. It's pasta, cheese, and uh, yeah. Yeah, totally different shapes. So yeah, it's a totally different shape. Way back in high school, I went over to Garofalo's, you know, down in Pat, Garofalo's, and for Thanksgiving stopped by and it was all pasta. It was a pasta buffet. Yeah, that's our Christmas, too. I have Italian on my side, too. Thanksgiving is always, like, traditional, but Christmas is always... Italian food. Like my mom makes amazing Italian food as well. Well, you can't go wrong. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter. It doesn't matter. There will be Italian food in some shape or fashion. It's comforting. But well, that's exactly, exactly it. You're there to be grateful for, for things. And that's one, I think if, uh, I think if mom ever. Didn't make it. Oh, yeah. Look out there. There would be a big revolution. Yeah. Yeah Can I just push pause for a second? You mentioned Garofalo? Yeah, and not to get somber on the deal but I know that Tony Garofalo was one of your dearest friends if not your best friend and Tony was from the class of 88 and If Tony were still with us, he'd probably be here Instead of you. No, I'm teasing Tony. No, but he was seriously funniest guy. Yeah, so let's just take a moment and and you know Let's let's acknowledge Tony Groff because he passed it. How old was he? He was Yeah. 23. Jesus. Something like that. Yeah. 23, 24. Yeah. Wait, was it, was he playing at Augsburg? Or something like that? No, no. He, uh, graduated and was working at Aspen Research, uh, which was conjunction with Anderson Windows and he had, uh, just done an interview and got up from the, he was interviewing a perspective, uh, employee and he had just gotten up. Uh, got up and just toppled over and died of a massive heart attack. And we just couldn't believe it because he was part of the squad with Pete McGurn and Chris Silva that won the relay in track. Unbelievable. Yeah, he was a track athlete. I ran track with him every day. Yeah, we ran track, you know, and incredible. We just, we couldn't believe it. But a lovelier guy there could not be. Oh yeah, super, super good. Great, huge heart, super funny. Super silly, um, and uh, and a great friend. Oh, I really miss that guy. Makes total sense because his whole family is just, they are some of the most amazing people. Yeah, Julie was, I think she goes by Julia now, Dr. Julia. Yeah, she's my dentist. She's Mike's dentist. Yeah, she was our class. When I was president of the student council, she was vice president. And then Barb Peterson was president of the senior class. But I always kind of felt like they reported. So Barb, I know you're listening. I was the boss. Let's just get that straight. I never understood those politics. I know, the politics of student council is really off the charts. Okay, Steve's got a question. No, I've got another, we're going to continue the list. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, well, there was another question. You had four of them. I posed you some questions, yeah. I'm just, I'm just helping. I know, you're trying to move it along. Keep the show moving along. Do you have to pee or what's going on? No, everything's going to get all sad on us here. Um, so. So, favorite holiday tradition is one of your questions. Favorite holiday tradition. So, no matter, Thanksgiving or Christmas, like, go around and... I'll tell you, what immediately came to me is one of my favorite things as a kid, and um, it's kind of continued, uh, on is going upstairs in a dark room and trying to see Santa Claus and Rudolph in the sky. And just getting really excited about it. And I'll never forget, like, my grandparents, we'd, we'd run upstairs and we'd be, you know, you would see, like, a red light because of a plane flying over. And they'd just play it, play it up, and we would just lose our minds. It was so exciting that Santa Claus was coming. And then, of course, they would say, Well, Santa's not coming yet. He's just flying over because he's probably going to another neighborhood before he comes to ours. And I do remember, at a very young age, I was always, I was always trying to figure out how's he doing this all in one night. I was very skeptical. At a very young age I thought, the math doesn't work. Kind of a Randy Quaid, uh, you serious Clark? Yeah, are you serious Clark? So are you following that app that tracks his movement? Yeah, absolutely. So that's kind of the modern version of that. There we go. I do it. It's still an open question. That's brilliant. How does he do it? How does he do it? And who supplies the fuel? Well. Oh, I hope it's yoga oil. I'm sure it is. There's no other way you can do it. Um, you know it's just a No wonder you're a successful businessman. He's automatic. Always got it in. Got to figure it out. Tony, were you an econ major? What kind of major were you in? No, finance major. Finance. Yep. Good for you. Well, I could sell. I just, uh, want to make sure if I could make money at it. Yeah. Very nice. Very nice. Okay. Your favorite, uh, holiday tradition? Uh, my favorite holiday tradition is, uh. Not manicotti. We've already covered that. Not manicotti, but still staying with the Italian Theme. Um, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, my family gets together at my, my brother's house in Shakopee. And, uh, we've been doing this for probably 15 years now. And, uh, we make pizzelles. And for those of you who don't know what pizzelles are, it's an Italian cookie, but it's kind of like a waffle cookie. Oh yeah. Like black licorice kind of well, and that's, that's one of the traditional flavors is anise, anise, uh, vanilla and almond are the traditional ones. Yeah, we go a little crazy with it. And we've like, we were trying to figure out how do we make up a cell that tastes like an old fashioned. Ooh. And so we were pouring bourbon and bitters in there in the mix, and we're, we're working with that. And, uh. So like the little kids that eat them, they get like little drunk cookies? You cook them. Oh, okay. They all cook the alcohol. The alcohol burns off. But, uh, no, so we, when we give them away as gifts and, uh, the tradition started, um, at some point, I guess I realized that my grandfather's getting old and he has all these recipes in his head. Love it. Yeah. And I think I was probably in my late thirties and it's just like, grandpa, when you get together and you make the bezels and the rum balls and, and all these other. Things that would, would be the staple. Somebody needs to know how to do this. So I would spend, you know, every year I'd go over there and we'd make up whatever he was making and I'm writing it down feverishly trying, trying to make sure that. We keep it and so now my whole family they all have the puzzle. That's cool Puzzle recipe good and hopefully with that passes down through Kids and grandkids. I was a side note for you Mike. I was over at Lino Rulli another graduate former podcast Yeah, he's been a guest guest of the pod. He uh I was, I was at his house and it turns out his mom has, uh, made those cookies as well. And I hadn't had them just at my family. Cause my mom makes them too. My grandma made them, but they had their name in the cookie. Yeah. Do you have them again? You got to do that. Well, that wouldn't be my, do not have. Oh, well, it'd be paying Pangle or Pangeli. Okay. What I do have is I have the original irons because it looked like it looks like a. Campfire sandwich maker. Yeah. Oh, cool. But these irons are super heavy and you have to do it over like a gas stove. Almost like a waffle maker. It is kind of. But, but these... Heavier duty. I mean, these are old and so we don't use them anymore and they would make a really dense cookie. True. But now you get these, uh, uh, waffle irons that look like, uh, uh, what's the Swedish, uh... I think it's Swedish krum kaka. Krum kaka. Oh yeah. Yeah. So it's like that. But careful. We don't talk like that on this podcast. Yeah. We don't talk about Swedish people. I know. What'd you say about raisinets? Yeah, that's true. That'll be edited out. Oh my, you set the bar, but no, we, we, we line it up. We got a huge table and there's probably about. 10 of those machines running and we got people making batter. It's, it's an assembly, like a bunch of elves. Yeah, it's just, it's an assembly line. We probably get about a thousand done. Oh my gosh. They stack up to those are good cookies. How about you, Tony? And what do you do with all those Mike? Give them away. Oh, I'll be in line. Yeah. Yeah. I keep going to the mail for the rum balls, rum balls who don't like a good rum. That was the first taste liquor when you were at a three or four years old. Yeah. What's your, what's your family tradition? Well, your holiday tradition. I want to your favorite one to one. One is that, uh, my parents are, they always have Christmas Eve and it was always fun when, when we started having little, little kids is to, um, You know, go outside and ring the big sleigh bells. So you need a big bell to sleigh bells. Ring those sleigh bells and start, you know, and eat the cookies, slog down the milk and everything else on the doorstep. And then, uh... What are you talking about? Well, and then all of a sudden the kids would hear those sleigh bells. And they would run to the door. And open up the door and of course, there's all their gifts and the Christmas cookies on this front. What are you doing eating Santa's cookies? Well, well, well, gotta maintain. You know what? I don't like where this is going. Well, I hate to break it to you, Jim, but uh, I eat a lot of cookies. Okay. Yeah. So. Okay. So that was always fun. That's cool. The bells there. I have to talk to my therapist about this. You know, the oldest one is 25, Tim's kid. And so we still do it. You still do it? Yep. And the presents are set out in the front step. Oh my God, how fun. Three brothers go out and we ring the bells and, and uh. And eat Santa's cookies. You know, it says, Oh, listen to that. I think Santa, Santa just came. Kids, all the kids are rolling their eyes. Like, okay, here we go. Yeah. Oh, the kids are smart. Um, as long as there's a president. That's right. I believe my mom always said, if you don't believe you don't receive, there's a second tradition I want to talk about. Uh, and it's actually my neighbors up the street now, uh, Kevin and Paulie heart. And. You know, when we first moved in in 2020, uh, all of a sudden, right after Thanksgiving dinner, it was about four o'clock or five o'clock, all of a sudden, just a big parade of people come down, walking down the street. And I looked out and sure enough, Kevin and Polly were down there. So I went down and said, hi. And I said, what are you guys doing? Taking a big walk? Well, the whole family was taking a big, big walk. And they said it's a Thanksgiving tradition we do because it just gives us the ability to get out in nature, of course, walk off the full meal. But instead of everybody just sitting around drinking and watching football and everything else, we have family time. We walk down, you know, all the way down the road and it's probably, you know, a mile, you know, so it's not a big deal. Uh, to give you a background on that, uh, Kevin and Polly Hart actually met at Hazelden in recovery. Really? 30 years ago. And so when they got, they got married, um, you know, they've, uh, they've lived a life of sobriety. And have given back to organizations, been on the chair and actually, I mean, literally thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars to help, uh, organizations like the retreat in Y Zeta and also step up program at Augsburg to provide. Living to, you know, college kids going through addiction. And so, just a lot of, you know, big, big heart. And, no pun intended. Yeah, that's good. But, I mean, just absolutely fantastic people. So, does your family now go take that walk? Uh, we don't walk with them, but we... Go out and, you know, say hi to them and talk to them every year. So what you're doing is you're recognizing a tradition of another family. I love that. I'm just saying how wonderful that is that they do that. We walk all the way from the counter to the grill, to the pie, to the couch. And then it's always upsetting that, you know, somebody's in my spot on the couch sleeping. So I just go upstairs and take a nap. Speaking of sleeping. Yeah, this is my tradition. Okay, we We started doing this when I met my my wife She had a four year old little boy named Trent, right? So my I'm we got married and my he's my stepson We shared him with his dad and his stepmom So we ended up changing things up and having a Christmas a day earlier than everyone else. Okay for him And it worked out great because then he could do his families and both families. So we started doing that and we really continued that. He got married and he had kids and we have sleepovers. So when, when they, we, the day before Christmas Eve, we, they come over, we pretend like that's Christmas Eve. And we all stay up late. The kids go to bed, but we stay up late and it's a big breakfast morning. It's, it's my, you know how your family moves from your, your time with your pa your mom and dad? Yep. And your, and you move in to Now I have, I'm kind of the, you know, you're the guy arch of our group and I make food. It's just the greatest to wake up with everybody there. You stay up late and stuff. But to have everyone there together in my house, it's, I love it. And we've been doing it forever and we probably will continue to do that. So the sleepover is, and we also go to, to my. Mother in law's in st. Cloud For a bunch of years we used to do a cookie party where it was a big sleepover So I guess I'd love the sleepover aspect of Christmas how many people? For art for my little family, it's like eight eight of us or whatever eight or nine. That's still a good size group Yeah. Um, and then with my brother's family was a big family, so she had a big house and that was always super fun. So, I guess I love the sleepover. That's all I'm trying to say. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Very fun. We have the, so the big sleepover here will be Wednesday night into Thursday, because everybody comes over Wednesday night. Um, most of them might drink more than they should. And then, um, yeah, like I mentioned earlier at, uh, 10 o'clock on Wednesday night, I go to bed and everybody else goes to the dugout. And then, uh, Thursday morning I'm the only one that's feeling halfway decent. Um, what else? What other questions did was a question about, uh, holiday memory, which we kind of... Yep, yep. touched on that. The last one, one... The last one would be, uh... Favorite Christmas movie or holiday movie. Yeah. And he wanted to jump on that one. You know what, it's Die Hard. Die Hard? Oh, it's controversial. So that was the question I was going to ask. Is Die Hard a Christmas movie? That's a classic controversy. I think it is. Absolutely. In home alone. See, we got the Legos Home alone. Uh, house here. Yeah. Oh. Home Alone's a great Christmas movie. You mean one? There you go. Wow. There's two grin. Gr Is that Yours is good. Oh, I love that. It's good. I love the Grinch. You love the Grinch? Yeah. I always got scared of the Grinch. Oh. And that live action Grinch with Jim Carrey freaks me out. Just, oh my God. Some movies need to stay animated. Christmas story. Christmas, of course. Love that one. That does not surprise me. And Marvin bought my brother a leg lamp. Oh, of course you did. It's Italian, Fregile. Yeah, Fregile. Must be Italian. I have two. Okay. Classic. It's a Wonderful Life. Of course. Didn't watch it until I was, you know, I don't know. Older old and it hits you, man, every time you watch it. And it's from the forties it's, you know, but it's a classic movie. It just, it's so relatable and it just may it's amazing movie. And I will always watch that during holidays. And then a newer, uh, sillier family classic with our family is the movie called just friends with Ryan Reynolds. It's a funny, that's funny holiday movie. It's a, it's Ryan Reynolds at his, he's really funny in that movie. Him and Amy smart. It's it's great. My family loves that. We turn it on and we giggle the whole way through all the time. So it's kind of a newer one. I mean, I'm in the friend zone. Yeah, it's actually not a new movie. It came out in like 2000 something, but yeah, it's, it's a while now. It's funny. Well, it's still 2000 something with, it's a wonderful life. I think it's funny. It would, that movie was a bomb. Wasn't it? It didn't, I think you're right. And then because of the licensing, yeah, they were right. They put it on TV. That's why. It's trying to make some are watching it. Yes. Well, what went Mary? If you want the moon, I'll get you the moon. I'll listen to us. This is so there's a lot of talent in this room. We can do a live version. Let's do it. Yeah. Okay. So my favorite is Elf. I love Elf. I could watch Elf. It's just. Yeah. It's so clever. Um, but how about your favorite cartoon? So you went with the Grinch. Yeah. Are you a Rudolph or a Frosty guy? I, I will, I will always say I love claymation stuff. So that, that Rudolph is, is good. Um, Frosty is, it's a little weird. It is a little weird. Kind of a seventies weird. Happy Birthday! Like this weird stuff happens. But I remember very, very vividly watching it as a little kid. Just loved it. It was just the time of the year. I always got freaked out when, uh, Yukon Cornelius would throw the pick up in the air and then he would lick it. He's trying to tell if there's a... He knows. He's an experienced miner. He's looking for gold. Silver and gold. He's got some good voices over there. Beautiful voice. Well, beautiful singing voice. Oh, here it goes. Just give me a shot. Very lovely. So go ahead. The animated one would be, uh, for me, it was Charles Schultz's, uh, Charlie Brown. Oh, there you go. Yeah. The music. That's the music, that ridiculous branch. So for a lot of years, the church that I grew up going to, they would sell Christmas, they sell Christmas trees and, uh, Um, I worked in their Christmas tree lot and for a lot of the kids, I'd offer up money. You can have a free Charlie Brown tree if you want. It's all it is. The saddest one in the bunch. No, it's, it's the, uh, the, the, the bottom branches that we've cut off. Oh gosh. Put an ornament on it. There you go kid. You can have a Charlie Brown tree. There you go. Yeah. Don't get one of those balsams. Yeah. Loses its needles. I used to do that. I used to go to Menards and get the cheapest spruces you could get and then take a chainsaw Zip up all the, all the limbs and then make spruce tips out of the pots. Oh, yeah. Okay. That's a very, like a finance major kind of way of doing it. So smart. A little cheap. Because if you go and buy the spruce tips at like Gertens, for example, you're going to pay 30, 40 bucks for a bundle. Yeah. And that's about a, 600 in a tree, right? You got to do some cutting. You got to get a little, little needles. You got to get some, uh, some sandbars. Sawzall. What kind of sawzall do you have? Oh, chainsaw. Oh, chainsaw. Oh, yeah. Real serious stuff here, guys. Very, very manly. That's good. He can have the holiday. Or Clark Riswold. Yeah, likes to do his own lights. You know. There you go. There's another good one. Christmas vacation. Christmas vacation. You know, those are all, here's the funny thing about this. All these movies, they're. They're on in the lead up to Christmas and then try to find one that's available to watch with the family when everyone's together and sometimes you can't, you have to buy them because they're not, they're so smart. They are smart. They hold on to them. I got them all. I got them all. Yeah, they play them, you know, but then when it Time comes. You want to watch it like, ah, it's not free anymore except for, uh, one. Uh, the Christmas story is always on 24, seven nonstop. You kind of hit, you got to make sure Christmas has got its time. You got to make sure Thanksgiving has its time now. I don't know about you guys, but. You know, I'm adamant that Christmas tree doesn't go up until after Thanksgiving. No, of course not. That's interesting. And I had to fight it again this year. What? They wanted to put it up this week. Oh no. But no, you're hosting. Oh my God, I can't wait for my wife to hear this episode. So why, does she have hers up already? We, she, like all the neighbors, we put the lights up. Yeah, I'm fine with that. Right, when it was beautiful weather last few weeks. Yeah. So I did that and I said, they're not going on until after Thanksgiving. She's like, oh. What? No. Do you know that? She knows that. But some of the neighbors are turning them on. I'm like, no, that's the part. That's when holidays start. She's like, no, we're not doing that. So what did we do last night? We put up, she got a new tree, so she's putting the tree up. We didn't, nothing's decorated, nothing's on, but she did have the lights on this weekend because we had the grandkids over. So I had to kind of bend to it. I'd believe that too. Yeah. Why do, why do people turn them on before Christmas? Oh, right. They're, they're making it, ruining it for all of us. Yeah. So, when you guys. Before Christmas? Before Christmas. Or, sorry, before Thanksgiving. Yeah. So, what does Amy let you do? Well, we, we host like you do. Yep. So, we're gonna have probably 20, 30 people over at our house, so. Put them to work. Well, no. Oh. The plan is to have, now, we'll not go out there, cause I wound up inheriting a bunch of these blow up. Come again. Oh boy. Ornaments, things, those things. We're getting into a weird area here. no, no. It's a Santa Claus. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Um, but, no, no, no lawn ornamentation is out there. Until, at least those on the ground. But, uh, but it's weird. If we don't have lights up. Or the tree in the corner. It's like, wait a minute, how we don't get to see your house for Christmas decorations, but this is Thanksgiving. It doesn't make sense. I know getting away for that. I do have a question for you guys. Cause I'm, I'm confused about something and it goes back to the movie stuff. The Nightmare Before Christmas, I don't know where that fits in. I've never seen it. Oh, it's a Tim Burton one? Really? No, never seen it. It's brilliant. My kids grew up with it. They loved it. Really? We still, our family loves it. I think it's great, but it's not a Christmas movie, it's not a Halloween movie, I don't know what it is. It's kind of both. Yeah. It's a Tim Burton movie, but he didn't direct it. He was doing Batman when that started. I got all kinds of information about this. But it's, it's a, it's, it's a long story. It's incredibly popular. Through video, uh, the movie flopped in the theater. It became huge on video. So that's like a cult classic, a cult classic. And, um, I think there, I think they're doing a Broadway musical for it. It's going to be, it'll be a huge, if not now they're going to do it. It's going to be a huge hit because it makes sense. It's a musical kids. My, my kids, you know, my kids are now. 1920 when they're that's their their generation generation of holiday kind of stuff. They love it I have to quick tell you about a holiday disappointment that I'd like to share with you So when you leave and I'll be asking you guys to leave here shortly because this is getting very When you guys leave, notice in the, uh, it would be the south east corner of my lot. There is a huge pine tree. Huge. And a couple of years ago, my wife and I were like, let's do the Clark... Griswold deal and get that thing just stuffed full of lights. You know, when we build our rink, we call it, we call it Schweitzefeller Center. So we thought, wouldn't it be cool to have a Schweitzefeller Center tree? And then on Thanksgiving night, You turn it on like the bell, like the Yoakum's bell. Like the Yoakum's bell. A tradition. We would turn on the lights. So we hired this company to come and, and put the lights on, and it was not going to be an inexpensive endeavor. No. When you're driving down Matamitai Avenue, like you'd be able to see it from You'd see it from, from the space station. That was our, our, our hope. You'll also notice that there's some power lines that are awfully close and OSHA would not allow the lighting company. We even, uh, reached out to XL energy to like shut down the power. To this thing and because it was too close because it was too dangerous too dangerous And they weren't allowed to do it and i'm like, well, you know, and it's so high It's not like i'm going to be able to do it, but they know so i'm still bitter Yeah, and every time I look at that tree during the winter thinking that you know This is something that you could what it could have been space. Yeah, people could have said meet me, you know Meet me and mommy die it just follow the light Follow the light, follow the schweizfehler light, schweizfehler, you'll know it when you see it, yeah, just so disappointing, sorry about that john, it is really sad, and I'm so mad, I don't think I'm building my rink this year, cause my, there's no kids here, I can't skate, I have weak ankles, um, so, what are you going to do with all your time john, what am I going to do, build a rink, You know, I'll probably be, um, Journaling? No, I was going to say praying for cold weather. For Tony. There it is. That's probably the plan. Good callback. Thank you. Didn't you love the callback? Yeah. All right. Well, this has been a delight. I hope this turns into a holiday. Or as we like to say at Hillary. a Christmas tradition, getting you guys together. I do want to, uh, a quick shout out. Um, Mike and I have reconnected since our 35th class reunion. We were part of this committee that put together the class reunion, and we have developed this really awesome friendship with this group of people that they weren't people that we hung around with very much in high school. We knew all of them. But, it's really this eclectic group of, of really neat characters. So, Barb Bean, who's now Barb Beamer. Uh, Barb Peterson, who's still Barb Peterson. Uh, uh, it's Sean Hewitt, who we just love. We went to college with Sean. Lisa McCauley, and then Brian Thiel. And Brian Thiel was a guy, I always knew him in high school, didn't really know him since. Love the guy. And it's the whole group, and we get together every couple months or so. So that was the planning committee. And so we're, we're trying to do about every six weeks or something like that. But then we also kind of learned with planning the reunion. There's a lot of people that have anxiety and to get together with a large group. Cause we, we had a pretty good size reunion. And we had a great reunion. And, uh, but there was a lot of people who have anxiety about that many people. And so we also do. We call them open events about every other month where come, come and meet us. The seven of us will host or as many as the seven that can get there, we're going to host this and then you guys can come and it's going to be, I think the most we've had is about 20. Yeah. Super cool. That's a great idea. I talked to my brother, Dan, who's from your class. Yeah. Yeah. He doesn't come. I don't know. Listen, this is topical because he just said, tell those guys I'm every time they have one of those events. I haven't been able to come, but I, he really wants to go. He's dying to hang out. And that's why we, we've been sending out the notices, the invites. And again, if you make it, you make it. If, if you've never been to one, you can always, we, we just had somebody show up. Uh, I don't know. Uh, Kathy, uh, yeah. Schmidt Bauer. Oh, Schmidt Bauer. Yeah. And she had never been to one and she came and I'd never had a class with her. I don't even think I had a conversation with her at Hill Murray and we sat and talked for over a half an hour. That's cool, right? I was like, wow, you are so awesome. And again, meeting these, this, uh, this eclectic group, I think there's only maybe, well, you obviously knew and Barb I knew, but most everybody else I didn't really know that well. I thought I knew everybody, but I don't. And. You realize, man, there's some really special people and if we just take the time to engage them in conversation, ask questions, don't tell our stories, but ask questions, kind of like what you guys are doing here tonight. Ask questions and kind of probe into their life and you're going to find out, wow, you have some really amazing things going on and amazing stories. And that's why I love the concept of what you're doing here. We had a group, uh, I was with some friends this weekend and I was telling them about that group and they said, Oh, it sounds kind of like The Breakfast Club. And I said, well, it kind of is like The Breakfast Club, except we don't have a smart one in the group. So that's, uh, sorry guys, you know it's true. Um. Would that make you Emilio Estevez? Well, Mike and I would probably be the closest to the Emilio Estevez. You'd be the jock, guys. Mike was a jock, and I had a great view of the game from the sideline for most of the season. But, uh, I probably had the better Emilio Estevez look in high school. Sure. Um, but you know, Brian Thiel, you know, he was kind of a, he's got every rock, uh... Rock concert t shirt you've ever seen so he's kind of the John Bender total heavy metal guy Yeah, he probably followed Marauder. Remember the band Marauder. I remember Marauder from your class. Yeah, I thought they were pretty damn cool They were tell yes, they still are probably I don't know. Well, of course there I think Tony we need to work on that Yeah, I think that's a great idea. I do too. I think and just invite everybody I mean, it's, it's, and just see who shows. Yeah. And one, one of the things we're doing with our next one is, um, so for the open one in general, I don't know if you saw this, but, um, I have it on my calendar, but on there, I also we're putting on there, we're collecting, uh, toys and presents for, um, organization called cops, cops and kids. And, uh, we're going to do a donation back to that program and because again, we meet and it's fun to socialize and gather, but we want to have some purpose for what we do. And also how do we, I mean, how can we mobilize people to do some good for other, other people? So with cops and kids, I've been a part of that for about 15 years and we get. toys and presents for kids that are at St. Paul Children's and Gillette Children's Hospital. We, about a week or so before Christmas, we go over there and these are kids that are long, long term stay there. I mean, there's kids that I've seen for years. And give them presents and Santa Claus is there. Take pictures. So that's Thursday, December 14th. Is that the date? Yeah. And where, where are we meeting and what time? Green Mill, 6 o'clock. It's our, it's our regular meeting place. So bring toys to that event. Oh, you know what, that reminds me, because 87, you were asking about Class 87, who would you have? Tim O'Brien. Oh yeah, Tim O'Brien. Oh God, Tim O'Brien. Oh yeah. Fine, they're in. Bobby Maeda. Bobby Maeda. You know what, I shouldn't have said that. I think I said it. It only took me the whole time to think of one, so, you know, it'll be, but, uh. There were some really hot girls in the class of 87, but, no, sorry. Sorry. All those are purged from my memory as soon as you said, I do. Oh, well, I don't. If Amy's listening, I don't remember. Yeah, of course. My wife never listens to this thing, so too bad for her. You guys lost one of your own, you know, this past year, Brooke Brunsman. Oh, my God. Yeah. That was a sad, sad. Yeah. Speaking of it, she was married to one of the classmate. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She was a lovely girl. That was a tough deal. This is actually for our class. This has been the roughest year because at their 35th, our memorial board, we only had seven people, which For how large our class was, we thought, and now we're up to, I don't even want to speculate, it's like 11 or 12 or something. I think we're past that. Wow. Yeah. But again, we're We're at that age, more, more goodbyes than hello. So, so as soon as, so as soon as we, we, we're going to start talking about, so how's your prostate? You know, those are the kinds of conversations guys, podcasts, different traditions covered up. This might be some groaning getting out of the chair, but no, all right. It puts focus. Yeah. It puts focus on the holidays. This has been lovely. It's been lovely getting together with you guys. This is one of our longer episodes. But, uh, we'd love to have both you guys back at some time. Learn a little bit more about, uh, the work that you're doing at Hill Murray. And learn a little bit more about the work that you're doing with, uh, the youth in St. Paul. Just to be clear, Mike and I grew up on the east side. You guys grew up in like Lake Elmo and Mata Mita. So that was very dreamy. We were out in the wild. You guys were out. We had to hunt for food. I don't, I don't think the Payne Avenue, uh, families would really. Agree with the Battle Creek people? Agree that Battle Creek is the east side. Mike, that's not the part they need to know. Cake eaters. Yeah. The mean streets that John grew up on. You know what? It's fun to say I'm from the east side and let them think that we're down there by Schweitz's bar. The mean streets of Warbler. Warbler Lane. Alright. See, really, I mean, we were east of east. We were. Yeah. You guys were out in the country. That was good old country. Oh, yeah. When we rode our horses into your town, I'll tell you what's right. Have you been to the St. Croix Saddlery yet? No, I haven't been in there yet. It's unbelievable. I tried to do takeout there and they remind me that Rome is gone. We had our kids meet us there thinking that they were going to Rome and they're like, what the hell happened here? Okay, enough about Mata Midi. Thank you very much. Thanks, guys. It's been a real treat, guys. I really appreciate it. And, uh, you know, now that Now that we know it's a podcast now, we don't wait, you know, you're on the map. You have to listen to this episode at least. Yeah, if you haven't been a listener, we don't need you. We got plenty. No, I'm just, well, I, you know, it was nice as I, I actually went back and listen to all the podcasts. It only took me 10 minutes. I skipped it. Okay. And off we go. All right. This is the kindness Chronicles signing off. Off we go. Thanks guys. Thank you.