Tucker & Thompson
Troy and Jim sit down and discuss life, politics and coming together!
Tucker & Thompson
From Kitchen Chaos to Community Connections
What if the line between hero and villain isn't as clear as we think?" As we navigate through this episode, we explore the multifaceted challenges within the restaurant industry post-COVID-19, revealing personal tales of resilience and unexpected twists, like a shocking criminal past of a local business owner. These stories highlight the unpredictable narratives within our communities, emphasizing the courage and complexities of running a business in turbulent times.
Join us for a humorous yet profound exploration of leadership, honesty, and the chaotic dynamics in the bar and restaurant scene. From the struggles of maintaining order amid burglaries and staff upheavals to the humorous parallels between bar culture and church culture, we shed light on the critical role of attitude and competence in service industries. The discussion is peppered with personal anecdotes, illuminating the lessons learned from navigating the stormy waters of the business world.
Our journey also takes us through broader societal themes, examining the blurred lines between fortune and hard work through the lens of sporting greats like Michael Jordan and LeBron James. We reminisce about the camaraderie of college days, the pivotal "Decade of Decision," and the quest for authentic community bonds. Ending on a thought-provoking debate, we question whether characters like Luigi are heroes or products of a flawed society, leaving you with food for thought and a fresh perspective on success, community, and personal growth.
May God Be with you!!!
judge whether it's, you don't know, unless you're selling a specific amount exactly. You just see what I'm saying. No, so like spaghetti? Well, but you figure it for two-thirds. You know what I'm saying. You add, you take a third. So if it's 30 cents, you charge nice, nice. You know what I mean. Okay, but at the end of the day, you, at the end of the day, it's going to be based on overhead, is based on how many you sell right in a day, cause your daily cost or your daily cost. So you can't add that into the plate of the food it's. It's like a separate thought process. I mean at your daily cost.
Speaker 2:I've often wondered about like you people, you food people. How do they make money? I just don't.
Speaker 1:Well, it used to be easy. But well, it depends, I mean, if you've got enough customers coming through. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So you're just working on volume.
Speaker 1:Well, kind of everybody is theoretically. I mean, your overhead costs are are going to be based on. I mean everybody is that's just like you. If you're paying for your whole church and there's two customers in there, I mean yeah, yeah, you know you gotta have more people and they're giving you a thousand dollars each. A month more people it's not enough, right? Yeah, you know what I. A month More people it's not enough, right? You know what I mean?
Speaker 1:Volume yeah, so it's it's not really like you're per se going for volume per se, but at the same time it is, it is in fact that's what it is, it's value you gotta. You gotta have butts in seats buying food.
Speaker 2:You gotta have people spending money for sure, A hundred percent, and people spending money for sure, a hundred percent, and you're saying that because of Biden, you lost money. That's what I hear you say. Um, what do you? What do you attribute it to?
Speaker 1:Uh well, it's hasn't come back since COVID. You think it's COVID COVID. During the shutdown, we did great, but after afterwards, like the, the summer after was a nightmare. I mean mean, we were busy, yeah, and in 2020, but it was the wrong customers people that were just wiling out.
Speaker 2:You know what I? Mean right, hey, so they're just wiling out a bunch of bar fights and everything. Oh, a bunch. Yeah, I got punched in the chin for no reason.
Speaker 1:Just I couldn't do that man. I don't know how you do that. That was horrible. It was horrible. And then the following year they shut down 254 all summer. They had the whole thing, completely tore up. So that was rough. And then 2022, it was like Then the economy started to tank? Yeah, it started to kind of do okay, but it never really got where it was supposed to. And then this year it's just I've never seen the.
Speaker 2:You just saw the effects of the first three years, and now it's just gotten.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's just totally true, and I mean, you see it, where Maple closed down the street it did, faze has tried to open and they closed.
Speaker 2:How did that close when I saw Maple in? Is it still open? No, it's closed.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, wow, it's closed. The owner now is like, I think, making Coquito or maybe some kind of beer or something. I mean, it's what he's doing over there. That's it as far as I know.
Speaker 2:So he still owns the building, he just doesn't.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah Well, frank, that owned him. He died. But he had given that up to his son, brent, a while ago because he got in all that trouble. He was the one that was molesting his. He was having his son have sex with his own mother and recording it and it was all over the newspaper. I didn't know that Frank was. Oh yeah, it was in the newspaper. It was horrible, like it was. I'm reading it how old is his son?
Speaker 2:When this is happening.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure A hundred percent, I don't know, I can't, I don't want to speak out of out of term, but I mean I don't, I don't know a hundred percent. I know that his son is the fire chief and Avon, I think, or was the fire chief and Avon, and, um, his dad said something to the effect of I still watch the tapes, or something, like it turns me on to him, or something. And it clicked and he was like oh my God, this sick bastard, like it turns me on to him, or something. And it clicked and he was like oh my god, this sick bastard. And he filed charges and the whole thing got brought to light and he went to prison and but he died since then.
Speaker 2:But oh my goodness. So oh yeah, it was bad. It was horrible. Where I was during that whole thing, I don't know I wasn't paying attention it was bad, it was rough, it's all over.
Speaker 1:It was all over the news. It was crazy crazy.
Speaker 2:So the son still owns that.
Speaker 1:The son. Somebody owns the building. I'm assuming it's the son. He's the one that's over there, but I don't know if his siblings are involved at all. I don't know.
Speaker 2:I mean, they put a lot of money in that building and all of a sudden it just turned off. It seemed like they did the parking lot, I guess.
Speaker 1:Well, they didn't put any money into it. Oh, that wasn't done.
Speaker 2:No, what happened was Every time I see a car hanging over the edge I'm like that was not a good idea. What?
Speaker 1:happened was the city came through or the ODOT came through and put, like, they put the turning lanes and stuff in there, so they took some of their property. They took some of Hassan's at that Good Deal car dealership and they took some of their property and then put it back. So when they made the road and put the turning lane, they readjusted how they did it and that's what you've seen whenever you saw the parking lot and stuff, that was them basically taking property from them, essentially Because you used to be able to pull up right up front. If you remember I do remember and then they cut the road down and they had to raise it up.
Speaker 2:So that was, yeah, that was all the odot basically that that did all that work.
Speaker 1:I thought they did that. Yeah. Well, I mean they fixed it up a while back, but that's been a long, long time ago now. They'd put that new siding and all that and. But I mean, yeah, so they closed down and then, like I said, this phases tried to open across the street and they didn't last Faze's yeah, it was right across the street in the old Union Hall, right next to the dairy mart there. It tried to open and it closed down. Right there, right there, right there yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm so confused.
Speaker 1:And then my Uncle Dale's opened down the street but he's struggling. He's not doing very well with it. Where is that? He's got the old McDonald's which was Rosie's. So he's doing more breakfast now because nothing was doing anything. So he was doing okay for breakfast. So he just started closing at 2 o'clock now and he just does breakfast essentially. Yeah, I mean it's hard to compete with McDonald's, that's crazy. Well, I mean it's hard to compete with McDonald's that's crazy. Well, I mean they're not that cheap either. I mean you really think about how much it costs to go to McDonald's anymore. I mean I haven't been there. Are we on? Yeah, oh yeah, we're on.
Speaker 2:I just went right into the conversation I was guarding myself Right when the music came on, we went live.
Speaker 1:Are we hot? There's some things I'll tell you, but some things I won't. But I mean, mcdonald's is like 99-cent McDoubles and stuff weren't that long ago. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Ten years ago, back in the day when I worked for the city man, we'd always go to Rosie's, to Rosie's, yeah.
Speaker 1:That was the main spot Right there. That one, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, back in the day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I wasn't a big fan of that one. I always was a George's fan myself. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was my high school years. That was George's. George's yeah, I'm still. I mean nostalgia, I don't know if there's any.
Speaker 1:You know in my mind because as a kid you know what that was originally. That's a Perkins originally.
Speaker 2:Is that what it was? That's originally. I don't know that. I've ever known it as a Perkins.
Speaker 1:I've only known it as a you know, I only know it was Perkins because I know people that work there in the dishroom Like my maybe my dad did, maybe it was something else before.
Speaker 2:It was what it before.
Speaker 1:George's yeah, what was it before that? I assume perkins. I didn't know, I don't know, wasn't it something else, though, wasn't it, like you know that I know of?
Speaker 2:no, I don't remember it being anything else man, I just remember like going in there when I was young, going in there yeah, I never went in there as a young man, never.
Speaker 1:I don't think I went in there until I was probably like 24 it was pretty.
Speaker 2:It was a pretty happening breakfast spot. Yeah, still is you serve breakfast here?
Speaker 1:no, I did for a while. I tried it for a little bit, but it I was getting oh, I was I wasn't getting as much business as I would. I would have hoped for we weren't getting the business, because people don't like going to breakfast at a bar. Essentially, you know what I mean. I think it's the vibe. I mean that is a. Yeah, you know that's.
Speaker 2:I mean it eliminates a certain demographic of.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if you had a separate dining area, like Dale has a separate dining area, right, so he's away from the bar. He does have a bar in there. In what? In the separate dining area? The right, so he's away from the bar. He does have a bar in there in what you done in the old rosies really. Yeah, he did put a bar up front where the counter was up front. He put a bar in there, no way, but it doesn't do anything. So I mean, it's just, basically, people were there for breakfast and the bar business just is not doing anything, really so, but he does have a little separate area where they can go eat breakfast. They're not in a bar, you know, they don't feel like they're in a bar. People just don't like in vacation You'll do that Like you'll go to a bar, because in all your vacation spots things are doubling Right, so they're like a bar at night and a breakfast spot in the daytime, okay.
Speaker 2:You know what I?
Speaker 1:mean, so people do that, but in a local type place I just didn't seem like it did enough with that. I don't know. We were losing 500 bucks a week essentially when I did breakfast, but it was really good breakfast. Yeah, breakfast food is the best.
Speaker 2:I think it could serve it all day.
Speaker 1:I think it could have took off. Uh, well, the I think it could have took off. Well, the problem with serving it all day. The problem I had with it is that I use garlic butter in a lot of my food. Okay, yeah, so the grill, like you can't have the garlic butter, and cook breakfast.
Speaker 1:Can't cook eggs with butter. No, that's disgusting, yeah, you don't do that. I don't think so, anyways, maybe people would love it, but I'm not doing it. No, so I would that. I don't think so. Anyways, maybe people would love it, but I'm not. I'm not doing it. No, so I would have to clean the grill at shift change, basically when we went from breakfast to lunch. I would clean the grill, you would. You would cook the food. Um, no, I had to cook at that time. I had. Well, I would do some of it sometimes really just back there flipping eggs and all that stuff.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, you still do that today.
Speaker 1:I sometimes on occasion back there flipping eggs and all that stuff. Oh, yeah, you still do that today. I sometimes on occasion Back there cooking burgers and stuff. You didn't hear what happened last year? No, bro, I don't know what happened the end of the summer in 23, I fired everybody. Oh, why'd you do that? Because I got fed up and I was the only one cooking. Oh man, I cooked, yeah, I cooked. And so I was the only one cooking. Oh man, I cooked, yeah, I cooked. And yeah it was. Oh yeah, I got rid of everyone that's.
Speaker 2:That's a bad gene to have. Man, I got it. You know what I mean. That that thing was like. I'll just do it myself. You know, I had to.
Speaker 1:I was what happened was so sean was my cook forever and sean I known Sean, me and him worked at Campbell's together and when I got this place he was the first person I got a hold of. I wanted to run the kitchen. At the time he was working for nursing homes, like he was running their kitchens basically at the nursing homes. So he turned me down and then he ended up calling me a few months later because something he wasn't happy with traveling because he was going to Columbus. He was, you know, he was a district or regional guy, you know, so he would have to travel too much. So he calls me and he wanted to do so. He did it. He ran a kitchen and he at first did a great job, slowly, kind of like.
Speaker 1:His big issue was he was drinking on a job, you know. But he did a good job. He worked the whole time he was there but he was drinking. It was always, and when you drank he did start to, you know, not clean as good from your bar. No, he would know. In fact he would bring tall boys to make sure I knew it wasn't mine, like they would be tall. He would make sure that I was nothing I had here just to be certain.
Speaker 1:But you were cool with that, I wasn't. No, I wasn't, I would, I would, I would threaten him and threaten, but he's a friend. I mean no-transcript, and I was thinking about, when I got back, getting rid of him. Me and Guido had the whole conversation. I go, hey, he's just getting out of hand, he won't stop drinking. And then like I just have to bite the bullet and get rid of him. I just don't want to, cause he covers, shifts, he does everything. You know, it handles the kitchen 100. How are you gonna fire, right? I mean, yeah, so you just fired. Like what, what was I gonna do with it?
Speaker 2:yeah, I don't even hadn't gotten that far.
Speaker 1:I just told guido. Guido's like ah, you're crazy, you know he said no, no. He just didn't think I would. Guido thought it should happen. He just didn't think I ever would do it so?
Speaker 2:so you would say, guido has good business sense yeah, maybe.
Speaker 1:No, that's a no, no, no, guido would like guido would? He would definitely bury himself alive to show he can handle the shovel. That's, that's guido, 100. But um, so I leave for vacation and I I make it as far as north carolina. Well, what happened was the day before I was leaving, we got a break in here, a guy named Larry Fisher. He's a local guy here.
Speaker 2:He was just in the paper.
Speaker 1:Recently he stole a car or something and was in a high-speed chase with the police and got caught. But yeah, so he breaks in, and when he breaks in it's the night before I'm leaving. I'm supposed to leave in the morning. So now I'm here at the, you know, the police are here, all this stuff's going on and as I'm getting ready to go, I'm trying to. You know, the girl back here tells me she's got, you know, new locks that I could put on. I go I don't need new locks that I could put on. He goes I don't need new locks. She goes she's trying to give me these locks. They're residential locks. I go, I don't need locks. First of all, the guy didn't get through my commercial locks at all.
Speaker 1:He got through the glass door over there by spreading the mullion. What's that? Well, he spread it. He put a pry bar and spread it enough that the throw, which was at least two and a half inches on that lock on the glass door going out to the patio. He spread the door wide enough that he got through that door right there and the door I don't know how it spread open that wide. The only thing I could think is that when I opened up the door because after he was done I opened it up to see how that could have happened and when it was installed it was installed with wood shims and my guess is that the wood smashed like he actually smashed enough of the shims out of the way, so I reshimmed it with plastic and steel to make sure that that can't happen again. In case you get any, ideas out there.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2:It was wild.
Speaker 1:I couldn't believe that he even got it open. That's just crazy to me. So, anyways, and you'd be on video now so. Right. So I tell her no, I do not want these locks.
Speaker 2:I tell her.
Speaker 1:I leave, I go home, I take oh no, oh no, we leave for vacation, oh no. I get to north carolina and my phone is blowing up sean quit, so he's the one running the kitchen and he quit. He's done, he can't do it, no more. He's tired of this bullshit. You know, I change the locks and don't even give him a key, which for one. I never even ask you to change the lock. I call Guido, what the fuck? He goes. Well, she gave me the locks and said you wanted them changed. I'm like, dude, I want the other locks. He goes, I already got rid of them. I don't even have the parts. I'm like, oh fuck. So now I don't have my commercial locks. We have these other residential locks she gave him and Guido puts them on because nobody, just I just do whatever you want as soon as I walk out the door to go on vacation, I guess. So now I got nobody to run the damn, I got nobody to run this, this, uh kitchen while.
Speaker 1:I'm in, I'm in and I and I get down as and luckily everybody the guys that were working here at the time stepped up and took care of it the best they could and I walked them through orders and stuff. I ended up having to stay a little extra because my brother-in-law actually went at that time. He had an appointment to have a colonoscopy done which he had canceled when my brother died. He was supposed to have it done then because he was having some issues. He was younger. He didn't, shouldn't have been. You know, he's only 40 years old or whatever, 41, maybe 40, 39, 40. So he was shouldn't have been getting one yet, but he was getting one done because he was having some issues.
Speaker 1:Well, it turned out he had cancer and he had a huge, huge blockage and they need to do emergency surgery. So I ended up having to stay down there a little longer with my sister and watch the kids while they got their stuff taken care of, you know. So it was so by the time you get back. So by the time I get back, I got no choice You're, you're just done?
Speaker 1:Well, I'm not done. No, no, no, that's not it. No, I kept trying to hold on. I kept letting everybody work, I kept letting everybody and all this stuff is just like it's just constant problem after problem and it's aggravating me and I'm just trying to like figure out what I'm going to do. Who's going to run this kitchen? Now, you know, and I've got everybody, I've tried different ones. They're not working. One of them started proclaiming he was the kitchen manager, which I would never make him the kitchen manager, but he was proclaiming, he was the kitchen manager, so everybody was taking him, as he was the kitchen manager.
Speaker 2:The king is dead.
Speaker 1:Somebody's got to fill the throne. Yes, so this is all going on, oh man.
Speaker 2:And my mom comes up. This is awesome, man. I feel like the bar culture is not far from the church culture, bro, like there's a lot. I'm like oh, all these problems sound so familiar.
Speaker 1:Well, I've said that often, Aren't they both the same?
Speaker 2:thing. They sound very familiar.
Speaker 1:Just a social environment. I mean one based on religion, one based on drinking, but it's just a social gathering place.
Speaker 2:basically it's a place of fellowship. Fellowship. There you go, that's a good. It's a loose word, loose word, yeah it's not really fellowship in a bar, but it's. I mean it's a social, it is, but it just produces. It doesn't produce the same product. The fellowship of the saints produces the product of Jesus. Yeah, that's what the Bible says. Wherever two of us come together, the presence of Christ is tangible. So, in in faith, you produce the presence of the divine. In in outside of faith, you produce the presence of problems.
Speaker 1:Very little customers that aren't Christians yeah, they're. Most aren't. Yeah, regardless, regardless, yeah.
Speaker 2:But outside of faith. I mean I'm not suggesting that, but just like, yeah, so, but I mean faith is, they're not worship. Yeah, yeah, faith has to manifest to produce the presence of Jesus, but I see what you're saying, so the problems are very similar. You know this whole vacuum of leadership Wherever there's a vacuum of leadership, like, chaos ensues. That's what I've learned after doing this. Wherever there is a vacuum of leadership, if you don't fill that, like if you don't fill a spot, it will get filled.
Speaker 1:And that's what happened. And that's exactly what happened. You're right, yeah, that's what happened. So now what happens is I have people that are trying to run things their way in there and it's really getting bad.
Speaker 2:I mean it's a free-for-all right. I mean there's things that are.
Speaker 1:oh, it's a free-for-all, oh God. The one that's calling himself a manager is literally got the lights off in the kitchen all the time and it's so he can see his phone, I think. I think he's just trying to see his phone and he's watching. His wife owns a hair salon and he's watching the cams and watching to see what she's doing at her hair salon. I think and forget about her man make them sandwiches bro. I mean, this is the stuff that's going on, though I mean and I'm getting aggravated.
Speaker 1:Kitchen's getting dirty. It's bad. I mean, it wasn't the cleanest when Sean was here either. Are you a patient? Do you consider yourself a patient person? I, I, I try. I'm not that patient. No, I, I, I give the illusion of patience, but it's built. I feel you. I feel you when you say those words. I'll pretend to be patient.
Speaker 2:I do my best to project patience, but inside I have lost it.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I've lost control. I'm with you. I'm with you. So my mom comes up, and it's in the summer 23. So mom comes up.
Speaker 2:She's on the patio, she's going to help you. No, no, no, no, oh ma.
Speaker 1:Well, she has. My mom works still, though, so she can't just constantly come up. But she comes up and we're on the patio and she puts in an order hey, get out of here. She puts in an order and the girl says, oh, we don't have that. I'm like, I know we have it, I'm positive we have it. I ordered it myself, because I'm doing the orders at this point and I get annoyed. My mom goes oh, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it, cause we're relaxing. My mom wants to just visit. You know what I mean. She goes I'll just take wings.
Speaker 1:He says well, we don't have wings. Now, I know for a fact we have wings. Now, I'm, I'm, I'm, I mean steam's coming out there. My mom can't even stop me if she wants to at this point. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, I walked back there and, uh, I go, we don't have wings. He goes well, there's none cooked off. I go, you've been here for how long you ain't cooked on off? He said nobody cooked off any in a daytime. I go, I cooked off any in the daytime. I go, I go. So your answer is just tell everybody there's no wings, there's just no, they just don't exist.
Speaker 2:I can't imagine.
Speaker 1:Oh my God. And he says he says well, what else you got? I go, well, do your job.
Speaker 2:And he goes.
Speaker 1:I'll walk, I go. You might as well, dude, you ain't doing nothing anyways. Get the hell out of here. So he leaves, sends him on his way. So when you say you got to precook the wings, I do. I bring in fresh wings, okay, and then a wing takes about 13 to 15 minutes to cook off, okay. So in order to speed up that process, I cook them for nine and then we refrigerate them until the actual order gets done. Oh, okay, you see what I'm saying. That way we can get them out in a reasonable time, and that's the process for pretty much any restaurant.
Speaker 1:That's how they do it. Yeah, got it. Okay. So that's the way that. Never knew that. So okay, so here goes. So that makes it worse.
Speaker 1:The orders could have took longer if you had to cook them for 15 minutes. Yeah, but this guy was here for hours and hadn't done anything and I had been fighting these guys. They're not doing anything, I'm fighting them. They had milk crates that they were sitting on. I empty, I threw every milk crate you couldn't find a milk crate in this restaurant. I chucked every damn one of them out of here, every one of them. I was pissed off. I got everyone out of here. I threw them all out, and if I find one, I'd go find it and steal it and take it away, and throw it away too, cause they would just sit on milk crates instead of working and doing what they're supposed to or cleaning or whatever else they're doing. So I, I fire him, I get rid of them.
Speaker 1:I get ready to start cooking. I go all right, I guess I'm cooking. I go on it. Nothing's prepped, there's nothing done, there's nothing ready. There's no way you can cook on this line. I could not make one. I got two orders. I couldn't make either one of them because nothing was done, I go, that's it. Kitchen's closed. I closed the and I gutted it. I prepped everything, I cleaned it and I pissed everybody off in this restaurant, including Guido, including my wife, including some of the other. I mean, I lost it, dude. I chucked everything out the back door.
Speaker 2:You say you chucked everything. What do you mean?
Speaker 1:Anything that was not supposed to be in that kitchen was like oh yeah. And then I scrubbed that thing top to bottom because it was disgusting. I mean, I went through, scrubbed the whole thing top to bottom.
Speaker 2:So you're making a statement now? Oh, I was there for that night.
Speaker 1:I was there about five and a half hours, I think, and then from there out, I handled the kitchen myself, okay, and as I did it, I scrubbed that kitchen top to bottom. Were you training anybody?
Speaker 2:at that point, or you just handling your business.
Speaker 1:I tried a couple. None were working out. But then summer came along and summer's amazing. Okay, I mean summer, that's down there right now. She cleans as good I thought.
Speaker 2:I had cleaned the person, not summer the season. Correct, yes, when I I thought I had cleaned Some are the person, not some are the season.
Speaker 1:Correct yes, when I I thought I had cleaned that kitchen as good as it could get, I mean it was spotless, and she found everything else that I couldn't. I mean she's, she's, she's anal.
Speaker 2:So she showed up.
Speaker 1:So she showed up. She was somebody had had worked for me in the past, okay, and I she had some issues back then and I just didn't know if I. She kept asking and asking. Finally, at this point I go what do I have to lose? She was a good cook. So she comes back in and I'm like, oh my God, you know and everything, and she's gotten some things that she's had to work out and fix in her life in the process.
Speaker 2:But man, she is amazing in that kitchen. I mean, she just she doesn't have a job. Oh yeah, oh wow, oh yeah, she's a yeah, Summer.
Speaker 1:Summer took over, but it took me. I did that basically for about four months, I think.
Speaker 2:So what we want to know is if you ate food here between the month where Jim was cooking the food, was it any good? I cook all the time.
Speaker 1:I still go, you still go down there. Oh, I can, I can run that kitchen. You're still down there doing it yeah, I can not a lot, but I mean, if nobody shows up, I get in there. Same with the bar. If somebody doesn't show up, I, and I can't get nobody to cover, right, what would you think I will?
Speaker 2:bartend, I will serve. I always say this. I'm curious, like do you, what's your like if, if, if, you have an employee, what's what's the most important attribute for you to have to work for you Like, for your employees? Like, what are you looking for in a, in a good employee?
Speaker 1:What do you look for in a good employee?
Speaker 2:Yeah, somebody that you're like this is I can. I can trust this person. And and what are you looking for?
Speaker 1:Honesty, I guess that's the most important thing, honesty covers all bases. Yeah, I think that Honesty stops stealing. Being lazy is just stealing. In my opinion, it is. I mean, honesty is it? That's it If you have a good, honest person.
Speaker 2:So you think honesty is a greater attribute than competence?
Speaker 1:um, competence is wonderful, but it doesn't help. It's it's like uh, it's different. Competence is different than intelligence. Okay, all right, you see what I'm saying? Okay, yeah because, I've had a girl. I've had girls that work here that are very smart and and I know I see them. That's the one you got to watch out for, because she can outsmart me. I can see it. The not honesty part. You see what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:yeah, but okay, then I'm gonna add you a third component here so we talk about. So we just mentioned four things. We mentioned, uh, we mentioned honesty, competency and you just said intelligence, intelligence and attitude. So those four of those four, let's rate them.
Speaker 2:What's the most important Cause? For me, it's attitude. For me, it's attitude I can teach. Competence I can teach, I can give you. You can't teach honesty, no, I can't. No, I can teach, I can give you. You can't teach honesty, no, I can't. No, I can't.
Speaker 2:But if your attitude is right, you'll. You'll become like, if you have a good attitude, like you'll want to be honest. I feel like like your attitude, like I just can't. For some reason, I've I've discovered that certain people can't overcome what they went through and they wear it every day and it's just like they're, they're just negative, or they're cynical, or they're, uh, they complain, or or they're just, they're just angry, and it's like, oh, I don't, you can't overcome any of that, like I don't care how good you are at your job If you have a poor attitude. It's like it doesn't matter how good you do it, because you're serving eggs with a terrible attitude, like here's some stupid eggs, or you know what I mean. Like you can't teach that, so like for me, I want people that have a great attitude. I mean, of course I, I would never have anyone.
Speaker 1:Attitude is everything. You have to have a great attitude, but I'd put it second to honesty. Yeah, I guess, but that's because this business is about there to give a good deal to your customer too. Oh, because you get it. Yeah, you know, like if you forget to ring in a couple beers. If you forget to ring a couple in. How do you keep track of that? I?
Speaker 2:always wondered about that.
Speaker 1:When I'm at a restaurant.
Speaker 2:I'm like, how did they know that she didn't just give us our soft drinks for free? It's tough, it's real tough. There's been times when they have and I'm like, oh thanks.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and sometimes it's an honest mistake. Sometimes, I mean, sometimes, you can honestly forget. Yeah, I mean I've been bartending back there and I've honestly forgotten myself to ring something in. You know what I mean it's. I mean it's in your benefit. I mean, if you don't ring in some beers, your tip's going to be a lot nicer, isn't it?
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, you just got the cost of that beer in your pocket, right, it's yours.
Speaker 1:Pretty much, Hopefully. I mean, yeah, they'll at least tip you that you would think right, you would think Right. So there's that. I mean my liquor is okay, Cause liquor is a liquor, is is poured through a system I have a Berg system Like it. It won't come out of the bottle unless it rings to a tab. It will no way. Yeah, it will not come out unless it does man?
Speaker 2:that is some witchcraft. Wow, it's just magnets.
Speaker 1:But it rings it in for the price and everything. So it does it. It's like when you ring it I have seven tiers of pricing. So each bottle has rings on it. It's called the Berg system. There's metal rings on it and then you have a thing you put over and you pour it, and so I don't lose on liquor. I mean per se, the numbers are good on my liquor and beer. The fact of the matter is that I have that system because you watch your numbers. Same with food you watch your numbers. So if I've got my food cost is you know far more than what you know have you raised your food?
Speaker 2:cost over the last four years? Oh god, yes. Oh yeah, kidding me do you? Do people complain? Oh, every time really. Oh god, yeah, I would be so sympathetic to it. Like I go into a restaurant now and I'm like I'm not even, yeah, I'm sympathetic to it, I'm like man, it's, it's gotta be brutal.
Speaker 1:It's oh, it's horrific, it's gotta be tough, but by comparison to what it was, and especially when the sales aren't there, you know the sales aren't what they were Like they just the pure numbers of people coming in and going out to eat are just not what they were.
Speaker 2:What's it?
Speaker 1:gas is more, you know your utilities are more, your groceries are more, your wages haven't moved. I mean that, that's, that's the key. And we're being taxed Like, yeah, and then they just raised all your property taxes, so everybody's house payment just went up. You know, they say you know, taxes went up on average in lorain county 40 percent on average. No wonder, man, no wonder. So that means that everybody's house payment went up. What 10 percent, five or five? Or ten, yeah, I mean everybody's house.
Speaker 2:Everybody's payment just went up and then the schools want money. If you live in a place that schools want some more money and then like, man, it's enough, yeah, it's got to stop. Like when is it going to? You think your boy's going to come in and what do you think is going to happen?
Speaker 1:I don't know if he can fix it. What he says he's going to fix, I think he can help. I mean I don't think it's going to be immediate. I mean could put things in motion, but I don't know if you can just undo everything so fast. I don't know that.
Speaker 2:That's the case, I don't know if it doesn't, if it doesn't happen, like don't you? I just feel like if something doesn't happen, something's gonna happen. You know, it's kind of like that dude that got shot, the the united health care guy. Yeah, it's like if something doesn't happen, something's gonna happen. And I'm amazed that like the amount of the arrogance and I and I don't even know if it's naivety it's just like evil, disconcern about the average person and the, the pressure that they have to deal with every day, like the average american citizen is like it's just like the pressure that they have to deal with every day, like the average American citizens. Like it's just like the people that are in that are supposed to be representing you are exploiting you to such a degree that you can't even take it anymore and it's becoming explosive.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean there's I think that some of the expenses that are out there, like the grocery expenses, fuel expenses, I feel like they had to go up. I think that more of the problem is getting those wages up. I think the earnings have to start to come into play with. That's my opinion of it, because and that's happening, and it's happening in a way you don't even realize because capitalism is doing what capitalism does. What do you mean? These kids don't want to work. That's true. You know why they don't want to work. A lot of people don't want to work. Yeah, you know why they don't want to work.
Speaker 2:It isn't worth it. What's the alternative, son?
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, what's the alternative, son? Well, I mean, what's the point of going to work if you can't make no money while you're there? Enough to survive anyway.
Speaker 2:Well, how are you going to survive if you don't make a little bit of money?
Speaker 1:That's always been my question. You hold it out. You're waiting until something comes along that's worth it.
Speaker 2:So in the meantime, are you living in your parents' you do.
Speaker 1:Are you homeless? I mean, you got to remember in the 60s and 70s, you know they used to say they didn't want to work either. Well, you know, wages went up. People got. They got enough money where they finally went to work.
Speaker 2:Or they got hungry enough and they finally went to work.
Speaker 1:Maybe I think the wages were there, though I think the wages need to come up. The wages aren't. The wages haven't compared to anything that's out there.
Speaker 2:How well do you pay?
Speaker 1:your employees. I pay them pretty shitty. No, I'm just kidding, I pay them as good as anyone else, let the record show.
Speaker 2:Let the record show. I am right beneath average.
Speaker 1:No, I mean well, okay, so I'm a small bar and restaurant. Yeah, but I mean, Don't give me no excuses pal, you just said I am paying cooks 15 an hour. I'm not paying a minimum wage. Is that like industry standard? I don't know what the industry standard is Well you're supposed to know.
Speaker 1:Buddy, minimum wage is minimum wage. What's the minimum wage? It's $10. Really, yeah, $10, something that's crazy. I didn't know that. Yeah, so we're at $15, I mean where they start at here. Now that's not summer. Summer don't make $15. Summer makes more. Okay, quite a bit more. But if they show up for work on time all week, on all their shifts and on time, they get a dollar more. So they're $16, really. So, really they're $16 an hour if you come to work and do your shifts.
Speaker 2:So you mean you check every week At the end of the week? Do you show up every day?
Speaker 1:if you did, I actually went and got a time clock just so I could do that. No way, yeah. So I have a time clock just so they'd have to clock in, and most of that had to do with them just coming in late. Like the coming in late is stressful. When I was cooking, I bet, when I started cooking and I'm running the kitchen and I'm cooking and I'm waiting for somebody to come in and they just show up a half hour late, that half hour I'm is he even showing up? Am I working all night now? Like it just it was stressful. I mean I can't imagine these other girls, you know, and cooks having to deal with that.
Speaker 2:So I mean that was why I did it because I they do it at my mom. That's a big thing for me too, like consistency, like if I see somebody that's consistent, like that, that's a very appealing like I want that person, like I'll, I'll pay that person, like I want that person around me as much as possible. I mean I I'd be consistently late. No, no, I mean consistent in like, like the good stuff.
Speaker 1:Well see, now, that just depends on how you look at it.
Speaker 2:John Maxwell has this saying he says your work has to stack up before it shows up.
Speaker 1:When I when I was a carpenter working, even when I was an apprentice, I was Mr Five minutes late.
Speaker 2:You were five minutes late, all the time Always.
Speaker 1:Why? Well, what happens is that you go. There's guys that like to go to work early, you know, and they'll do it, and that's in the trades you got to remember. Our drives to work are a half hour to an hour, I remember. Yeah, you know what I mean. So you're driving a half hour to an hour to work, so you leave on time. Yeah, if you get stuck in traffic or whatever, something slows you down, whatever it does, Well, that's not on me, I don't care, I'm not leaving my house. You don't get more time than that, I don't care, I am. I'm just. That's the way I'm built.
Speaker 1:So, you're not giving the man. I'm not going to go sit. I'm not going to go sit for a half hour an hour and read a paper and drink coffee and hang out with everybody before work. I'm just not doing that. It's just not happening. I'm not doing it. Yeah, I'm not that guy, I'm not, I'm not ever going to do it.
Speaker 2:It depends. It depends what my position is in the company that we're building.
Speaker 1:And my argument always was at the end of the day, I'm doing three times more than anybody else that's here on time, so fuck them.
Speaker 2:That was always my argument You're like, I will work you under the table. It doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:That's right. I will show up five minutes late and I will, in four hours, do what you did all day. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:That was the problem. That was always the problem in the trades when I was working in it. It was like most guys were there to put in the time, not do the work. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Like they were there to work the clock, not to work the job, and that was where that's when I got out, because I'm like no, no man, if you're not going to promote me based on my, my ability to perform for you, and then you're not going to reward that, I'm out. I can't. I can't work for people that are just here because they're dinosaurs, they put in more time to me and therefore they're making more money than me. Dude, you can't. You know I can't. I can't do that I need.
Speaker 1:I'm okay with putting in my time. That way, I just am not going to deal with the crap. I'm not Like. I'll give you an example the owner's son, kevin, he was late all the time and it would annoy me He'd be like 15, 20 minutes late. And he's the owner's son, you know what I mean. He's running a job, we job. If he's late period and he, well, he was one, he was running. He might have said stuff, but he wasn't running it. Who was running it? Tell me who was running it. No, he was running it. He wasn't. No, kevin run it.
Speaker 2:Kevin knows his shit. That's a bad dude, I'll give. Okay. Well then, I'll give his props. That way, I'll give him his props.
Speaker 1:But I say something smart ass to him about him not showing up for work. When I'm an apprentice. I'm a cocky kid, you know what I mean. And he's because you could sling a nail right, right, well, screws, we never use nails, metal stud guy. So so, anyways, I I say something well, boy did I, boy did I? Learn a lesson at 20 years old that I'll never forget, really.
Speaker 2:Interesting. This is a lesson.
Speaker 1:This man's wife was carjacked oh, the one time, or but? And the car was wrecked and she was decapitated. And you said something. I didn't know this. He's late because he was taking his kids to school.
Speaker 2:Oh, every day he was late because he was taking. Oh, I didn't know this, he's late because he was taking his kids to school. Oh, every day he was late because he was taking. Oh, I didn't know, dude. Yeah, he should have said something.
Speaker 1:Tell him about that pig. He's not that guy, dude, he's a man.
Speaker 2:You still got to say something like that, he ain't going to say nothing. Look, I take my kids to work, guys.
Speaker 1:He ain't going to say nothing. Don't know, and he don't. Don't question me, he's a man.
Speaker 2:No, I'm gonna question you if you tell me to be at work and then you're not there and you're the one that's supposed to be in charge of me being there.
Speaker 1:No, I'm gonna say something and you're gonna have to tell, but I'm just a dumb kid, apprentice 20 years old, I don't know well maybe the rest of the guys knew they just set you up.
Speaker 2:You should have talked to your other fellas man, they should have should have told you.
Speaker 1:So what happens is I feel bad about it. I didn't say nothing to him. Granted, I said something to another guy, you know what I mean and they were the ones who squared me up and I felt like shit that I even mentioned it. So I never did say nothing to him. But at any rate, he was the first guy I worked with outside of Jimmy Dean. I think I worked with him like three days after I got into the union and he was the first guy I worked with and he's smart, he knows his shit, he's sharp. I give him his props 100%. He's one of the better carpenters I've ever met. He's had trouble getting his life together for the most part, but I mean now he's got a house and stuff he's doing good. But smart, I mean I mean he's, he knows his shit, he's sharp as a tack, but he has an attitude issue for sure. He doesn't like, like he doesn't get enough respect for what he does and stuff like that but whatever, that's fine.
Speaker 1:But one day I come in and this is after his kids and he's showing up for work on time. And I show up and, uh, if you want respect, you got to kill a lion, but go ahead, I did. Yeah, okay, so I I show up. We're building a walgreens and it's like out in cleveland heights or something.
Speaker 1:I'm about five minutes late you know, I pull up and uh, he says if you can't show up for work on time, don't show up at all. Right, okay, pulls that smart ass boy. So I I had my tool belt on my shoulder, I was getting ready to come in just turn around, I just put it in the truck and left, right, oh, fuck this guy. So, so I go home and I'm like freaking out like what am I gonna do? I'm probably fired. I gotta go look for a job. You know what I mean. But it's all right, I will if I have to. That's what I'll do. But I get a call from the owner, his dad, and he goes what the hell happened over there? I go, kevin said if you don't show up for work, then don't show up at all. So I left.
Speaker 1:Kevin goes, tell, why didn't you call me? I'd have sent you somewhere else. I said I took the kids to the zoo, which I never did. I just made it up. You know, I figured I'd take the kids to the zoo, what the hell, you know? And uh, chris goes. I'm there. You guys get on my nerves. I don't know why you got to fight all the time. This and that, blah, blah, blah. So long story short I didn't get fired, I get sent to another job the next day and I ended up I was at that time was like I, just I. I was like a second year apprentice. I was already running work by then and doing pretty good size jobs.
Speaker 1:Well then, the next time I have to work with Kevin you know, I got an attitude I'm going to show up 10 minutes early, you know. And I and I and I show up 10 minutes early. Here's Kevin right behind me, right, literally a minute later. What'd you say? I didn't say nothing. Nothing was said. Nothing was said, right. So he shows up right behind me. So I beat him. I was there 10 minutes early, you know. So then the next day I'm 15 minutes because he's going to show up earlier. I know it right. By the time it's over, I'm showing up an hour early for work and he's right behind me every time. He never beats me, ever right. And he gets out of the car, he goes dude, we're not gonna keep doing this, okay. So the next day we both show up late five minutes late, no man oh, it was great.
Speaker 1:But yeah, I mean, I love Kevin to death. We still have problems, we'll still get on the job. In fact, we just did one this summer out at Cleveland Central Catholic. We put an addition on. We were out there, working together out there and love the guy to death. But we will still get nippy at each other still. Really, we still do this day.
Speaker 2:There's something about us I think we're just both alphas and that's just the way it goes. There's no who runs the job, don't you know? I mean there's somebody should run the job, right, like I always say this, like somebody's leading. Well, it may not be the guy that everybody says is leading, but somebody's leading.
Speaker 1:No, kevin's running a job. If he's there, that's Kevin's show For one. I've never went to a job with Kevin where Kevin wasn't the one that's permanently there. If he showed up on my job that I was always there, then I'd be running it. Yeah, but if you're talking, you know what I mean. As far as this is driving me nuts, this dog. Is somebody out there Hello.
Speaker 2:Somebody come in. Somebody come in.
Speaker 1:I don't know what they're doing out there, but anyways, yeah, if it's my job, it's my job. Typically, we wouldn't be on a job together. I'd run a job, he'd run a job. That would be the way it is. But when it's slow, like I just told you construction's slow right now you would end up putting me and Kevin together at the same time and I was just there filling in to help him out. Anyways, I wasn't even. He works for the actual company that's doing the work.
Speaker 2:I was just giving them filler guys to help them out because we were slow. Yeah, it's always interesting to hear um like that kind of stuff, you know like from guys who who run things. You know, like, how do you hire people, how do you fire people?
Speaker 1:I'm really good at hiring.
Speaker 1:I think I've always been as far as like staff, like I do okay here, I'm not, I don't do as good here, but in construction, like when I hired my crew, my crew I had when I was young my first company. I had a hell of a crew. All those guys are still doing it. They're all. I mean that was a hell of a crew. But I mean you, you look at the, the guys that are out there, they're all running work now all you know what I mean on their own or all, or should be.
Speaker 2:That's good sign you know what I mean they were just a good group of like, it was just a good people you hire have the ability to go and replicate, then you know that you you hired the right guy and you you gave them something. Sure, you know that was a value.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're all doing the same stuff still, yeah, and they're all mad at people when they, when they leave me.
Speaker 2:That's one of the things I don't. When, when I hire a leader and then that leader leaves me, I don't get. I don't get mad. It's a compliment to me that you left, especially if you're doing it well. When you leave me, yeah, like so when I, when I see somebody because you want to hold on to the, to the good ones you you know what I mean You're like I don't want that person to leave. You know Like so you're like I want you to stay. And then, when they leave, you're often judged for like oh man, your best guy left you. You must be doing something wrong. But that's not how I look at it. You know I'm like no, no he's.
Speaker 1:he feel like I feel accomplished. I feel a little bit that I learned from. They taught me. So for me to walk onto a job and try and take over their show, I would never do that.
Speaker 2:That's just out of respect. You said your guy felt like he didn't get enough respect or something. I heard a story one time about that. This guy's like I want to be at the table with all these big guys. I want to be at the table. And then one guy said well, you, you got to go kill a lion. And he said why? So you? Will you go kill a lion and bring it back here? Because you're sitting at a table with people who have killed lions. So don't come in here and tell me about how you how you know how to kill a lion come back here once you kill a lion, lay it on the table and then you'll earn your spot of respect at the table. You know, and a and a lot of guys today, they don't want to go kill the lion, they just want to. They just wanted a spot at the table. That says I know how to kill a lion, we'll go kill one and bring it back and we'll have a conversation about whether or not you can kill a lion Makes sense.
Speaker 2:Telling me you know how to do these things and go do it. John Maxwell says your work has to stack up before it shows up. I mean you can't just do it one time. Let me see you do it over and over, and over and over again. And then there's this book, this really good book I read. It's called the Compound Effect, and most people think that success happens like, oh man, you got lucky, you got lucky. But success is daily increments of investment that stack up over time.
Speaker 1:And, before you know it, after a while they stack up to the point to where, one day, I just had this conversation with Keith One day.
Speaker 2:It takes off and you're like wow, man, you really built something. Wow, it must be, you got lucky.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Keith said that's what annoys him the most. That was his big thing is like when someone says he's lucky.
Speaker 2:But Because you walk into a certain set of circumstances or scenarios but you don't know the challenges that came with that.
Speaker 1:There's lots of challenges that come with everything, but you still need a little luck, and that's what he was getting offended at me saying it, but it's true, you need a little luck regardless.
Speaker 2:No, matter what you do.
Speaker 1:I do too. Actually, I don't even call it luck, I say it's. What did I say? What's the word I was using with him? It's not probably what you were going to say.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I'm going to call it blessed, yeah, blessed Favor. I'm going to say man, God's hands on me to do what I do and you shouldn't try to compete with me. You try to compete with me, you lose.
Speaker 1:You can't fortunate. That's what I say yeah, fortunate is a good word, fortunate yeah is the word I like, and not as much as luck. You can still be fortunate. Yes, that. Yeah, it takes a little bit of being fortunate to be successful regardless.
Speaker 2:It's funny how fortunate you become. It's funny how fortune finds you inconsistent. You know, know, like showing up.
Speaker 1:Fortune will find you. I'm not saying I'm not when I say you got to get lucky, but what I'm saying is there are people out there that have put it all in, yeah, and have ended up with nothing. In the end it happens. Yeah, I mean many times, it's happened.
Speaker 2:And what happens to everyone? I mean it happened to you, it happens to everybody, it's happened. It happens to everyone, though I mean it happened to you, it happens to everybody. Everybody fails, everybody misses, yes, Everybody.
Speaker 1:But that doesn't mean that they weren't working hard and smart.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, I don't think that. No, not always.
Speaker 1:But yeah, Not always, but sometimes. Yes, I mean yes, 100%, but a lot of times that's not what it means. But that's where you know, like Keith can't grasp that, you know what I'm saying. Michael Jordan said I never lost.
Speaker 2:I just ran out of time. Isn't that good? That's true. That's why he's the greatest I never lost. I ran out of time, and that's the truth. He just keeps shooting, jack. He just keeps shooting, no matter what it looks like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's, he's a Michael Jordan is. I mean, you remember when we were kids, man? When we were kids, I was like that's. When he started, he hadn't even won a championship yet, but he was still amazing.
Speaker 2:I felt like LeBron was gonna, was gonna take over, and then his, then his.
Speaker 1:I just remember watching LeBron and I and I've, I'm an I'm a LeBron fan to this day. I love LeBron. I think he's I mean, I know I don't like his politics, but I mean, well, I think his politics affected his game, but his skill level is phenomenal. But he's not the greatest. His heart isn't there. No, not like that. I used to watch him and I watched him in the Cavs, whatever. His heart just isn't there. He doesn't have that championship heart that Michael Jordan. He does not have that Larry Bird had. Magic Johnson didn't either. None of those guys that Larry Bird, michael Jordan the only two I've ever seen with that kind of heart. Isaiah had heart, but he was just yeah, I guess.
Speaker 2:I mean, I just hate.
Speaker 1:Isaiah Thomas.
Speaker 2:Don't let your feelings get in the way. That dude was mean.
Speaker 1:Did I ever tell you that I met Joe Dumars? Yeah, alexa, alexa. We went to the game and Joe Dumars was there. Oh yeah, we were sitting. I used to get tickets all the time like right behind a visitor's bench. I mean we?
Speaker 2:would hate those guys, but man.
Speaker 1:And this was back with when Rashid and Ben and Rip Hamilton and all them are playing against LeBron and we're like fourth row, right behind the bench and Joe Dumars is sitting three door, three seats down from me, you know, and Alexa's got her basketball. I go go have them sign it. It wasn't a Cavs basketball. So she goes over to have them sign it. She's a little girl, just a little girl at this time, and this is like pre LeBron, like leave in or any of this stuff. So I mean this is, she was real little and she goes over there and ask him to sign it. The game's going on, you know, and his seat next to him is empty. He grabs her by her shirt and just drops her in the seat as soon as there was a break in play, he signs it, says thank you and goes about his business. But Alexa, when he grabbed her by her shirt, she sat there her eyes wide open. I mean that's kind of cool, you know, like she's a big dude baby.
Speaker 2:She's just a little girl.
Speaker 1:I mean, he was mean. Anyways, he was a mean guy. He looked scary too, yeah oh yeah. It was something else, but yeah, those seats were cool. When I would get those like where'd you get them? The Burns interior supply that I used to buy from they would give me tickets anytime I won basically, so we would sit in those seats a lot.
Speaker 2:Dude Marlon has season tickets. When LeBron won the championship oh did he.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's pretty sweet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we went to the games and everything, of course. Then we got to the playoffs. I don't know what he did, I don't know how that played out, but yeah, yeah, we were going to the games like crazy back then.
Speaker 1:I was down there for what was it? Game six, I was working nights and I showed up for work and I just went, nah, I just went drinking. And then I went to like that little party they were having outside the remember they had the jumbotron and all that up and yeah, yeah, I was like yeah, I'm not going to work tonight. That ain't happening. This is a once in a lifetime. Are you kidding?
Speaker 2:me, did you go down for the uh, that big no I did did you? I did biggest mistake of my life. Were you climbing on poles and stuff? Oh my gosh, we stayed out there we were, were so thirsty His son was baking you and then eventually like it never like the whole. You were waiting for them to come by. We just left. We walked out of Cleveland Literally I had to walk across the bridge in the Lakewood, caught an Uber out of Lakewood and then went home.
Speaker 1:It was just like yeah, I wasn't going out for that mess, I was working anyways, I think I had a worker, I think I had stuff going on. I didn't have a choice. It was nuts, it was insane, it was bonkers, it was nuts. Yeah, it was crazy Insane man. But yeah, I think I had to work. I don't think I got the break for that. Yeah, that was one of the coolest things, I think, as far as like being downtown Cleveland, that was one, and if we would have won against the Cubs, it would have been. That would have been better. I was down there for that too. Yeah, down, I was just like hanging out, like at an outdoor bar, sitting there at eating and listen, watching the game. You were literally hearing the bat before. You were watching it on TV, but I wasn't in the actual game.
Speaker 2:You need to they need to get rid of the Cleveland Browns.
Speaker 1:Take it back. It doesn't matter what you.
Speaker 2:I'm just saying, man, this town does not need that kind of heartbreak, it's enough Like we don't need it. Just you look, man, if you need somebody's not going to buy the Browns and do right Like, just let them go, just let them go to nebraska or something. You know, you know give them away.
Speaker 1:You just need come on man, you just need one good manager, talk about systemic brokenness. It's because they just keep the management teams are like they are broke from the front office to the.
Speaker 2:To the no linemen do, they are no. How do you explain the culture of loss? It's they just know how to front office period, just a front office. You don't think it has anything to do with the coaching.
Speaker 1:I mean how?
Speaker 2:is Pittsburgh.
Speaker 1:Steelers their front office has stayed the same Right and they just make winners.
Speaker 2:They can have, you can give them a high school football team and they will win. They will take you to the playoffs, yep. But what do?
Speaker 1:you think would have happened to Ben Roethlisberger if he was in Cleveland? Oh my gosh, he would have. He would have folded and it had been a Baker.
Speaker 2:Mayfield yeah Well, yeah, yeah, yeah, how everyone leaves the Browns and they go away and they're like throwing up records, Except Odell Beckham Jr Odell, I mean, he's still playing isn't he?
Speaker 1:I think they just got him, I think they just caught him.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, poor guy. I think I heard they just caught him. That's because he's hanging out with Diddy, right. I don't know if that's true or not. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I don't know. What do you think of this, luigi, guy Luigi, I think that he is. I think that's a real crazy Hero or horrible. I mean, he's not a hero, but he is an expression of culture. He's an expression If everything gets fixed.
Speaker 1:Is he a hero then?
Speaker 2:What do you mean? If everything gets fixed, if next year?
Speaker 1:Like they fix the healthcare industry and the insurance industry. If next year we're paying half for our premiums and they're covering everything, is he a hero then? No, he's still not a hero.
Speaker 2:I mean Are you?
Speaker 1:sure Listen, I'm not going to call him a hero, are?
Speaker 2:you sure he's not a hero? Are you sure? I think what I think is outrageous is the idea that nobody is in touch with that sentiment, that that mainstream media and everybody out here is just ignoring the idea that the middle American guy is struggling and we're so outraged, we're so oppressed by it that, like they would, that's the extreme. That's the extreme. That's the extreme that this guy says that he tried to get health care. He tried to get coverage. You kept denying him. Like I said, my kid had a degenerative eye disease.
Speaker 2:I don't think that's true with him, though, didn't he say, isn't that? Well, the story has holes, and I don't believe that he's filthy rich, right. I don't believe that has anything to do with this. I think he set up, and I think that he was getting ready. I think that that healthcare worker guy was getting ready to roll over on some people.
Speaker 1:I think something happened, because you know what he's a small guy. He's a small business guy or small. How do you call it? He's a, he wasn't a small, he was, he worked. I'm going to take a break so I can pee.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so he worked. So they're taking a break so I could pee. Yeah, so they're. They painted this guy as if he was good man. I got it. Okay, I'm gonna sit here, talk to nobody, talk to everybody.
Speaker 2:They painted this guy as like this. He's just this guy who, who raised himself, you know, pulled himself up by his boot straps and and then he earned his way. But but that's not how most of America sees it. Most of America sees it through the lens of their their skyrocketing healthcare costs, the insurance premiums that they have, and then they're forced legally we are forced legally to pay for these things.
Speaker 2:So I think most of America, if you're out there, I think that what you're feeling and that's why you're not very outraged by the fact that this, this guy who, uh, who now the narrative suggests that he had enough and he just wanted to take out his outrage on a CEO, I think that fits the narrative because because of the extreme oppression that's happening in America. So I think that's what most people resonate with and most of society misses. Most of mainstream media Miss it. They miss the idea that that most of Americans are feeling marginalized by what's happened in society, like we don't feel, like our representatives are taking notice of the. The extortion this is extortion dude Like metal, the medical industry is extortion this is extortion dude Like the medical industry is extortion and for the most part, so do you think he actually is the guy that did it?
Speaker 1:I don't think he is the actual. You don't think he's the actual guy? I?
Speaker 2:think he did it, but I think he was hired to do it. I think this is way more nefarious. It's just, they're just covering up their tracks.
Speaker 1:How do you hire a guy with?
Speaker 2:that much money to do it. I, I, I don't know, I know I mean, but it's way too convenient. Money was driving you. The whole thing is way too convenient. I mean it's just way too convenient the way it all got solved so easily and the way he was. He was already in possession of the manifesto, his firearm, the bag, you know. All the evidence was conveniently placed in it, like it.
Speaker 1:Just a lot of it just didn't make any sense to me, like that's why I'm asking, like you think it was the actual guy carry the bag with you with the evidence, like you're gonna, like you don't know enough to fall off the map, but I think that I think that they said they went back to his apartment and the stuff was there. I don't think it was actually on him in mcdonald's that day. Put it in your apartment. There you go.
Speaker 2:I mean, like I don't know, I'm not saying I'm that guy or that you know, but uh, if I'm gonna commit a crime on that level, in, in and I'm semi-educated, you don't even have to be that smart. And he was super smart and he's supposed to be kind of genius, valedictorian and all that yeah.
Speaker 2:He's not going to do these things. It doesn't make any sense why he would do it. And, from what I understand, this CEO guy was supposed to roll over on some very powerful people in Washington and he was going to. He was going to rat him out for some of the stuff that they were doing. And before he could do that, guess what? Lo and behold, he's walking out of a conference and he gets shot in the back. And this guy makes it all the way to Tuhula, who 10th Pennsylvania or wherever it was, you know, and he's sitting at a McDonald's. He, come on, really, you know I was born in a dark bro, but it wasn't last night. I mean the way the government plays.
Speaker 2:I mean, okay, we got we got stuff flying around in the sky and our government doesn't know what it is. Come on, man, that's our government. I know it's our government, but what do you think they're looking for government? I have no idea.
Speaker 1:It's got to be a dirty bomb, but it's something bad.
Speaker 2:It's got to be a dirty bomb. It's something bad. Right, they're going through all these areas. It's not good. I can tell you that it's got to be a dirty bomb. What would prevent them from not shooting? Why wouldn't they shoot them down?
Speaker 1:Because they're ours.
Speaker 2:There you go. And why would you wait until the middle of the night to run them all?
Speaker 1:Well, I don't know that that's true.
Speaker 2:Well, you don't see them flying around in the middle of the day.
Speaker 1:Well, because I don't think you see them in a day. What? Yeah, of course you would. I don't think they stick out like they do when they've got lights flashing.
Speaker 2:They're not even that high in the air.
Speaker 1:I don't know, because I can't tell what's real and what's not. I don't know which ones are real or not.
Speaker 2:And don't you think that's the point? Isn't that the point? Let's create enough confusion here to where they don't know if we're coming or going. They don't know what's going. They don't know if they're from Iran. We don't know if they're from.
Speaker 1:I think they're looking for it, dude. I think that there is. I think.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think these two stories we need to like, really hone in on them and as Americans, we need to stop allowing our government to do such ridiculous things.
Speaker 1:Well, if that's what they're doing, what? I think that's not ridiculous. Do what you do, no you have to like.
Speaker 2:If you're going to fly drones around the little sky, then you're going to have to be transparent about it, Because you've got my relatives. You know we live here. We live here. You know enough to get your family out before it's too late, but we live here. Say something to us so we can get out of these places.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but where are you going to get out of They've?
Speaker 2:got them flying everywhere.
Speaker 1:They're flying over Lorain, they're flying over Cleveland, they're flying over Columbus, toledo. They're flying over Pittsburgh.
Speaker 2:They're flying over New Jersey. So tell us what's going on so we can help you solve the problem, or stop being corrupt, stop being so duplicitous If it's not corrupt.
Speaker 1:It is corrupt. We know it's corrupt, I don't disagree. But if it wasn't, if it wasn't, you have no issue with them just flying the drones looking for it.
Speaker 2:No, no. You just got to let me know, you got to let me know.
Speaker 1:You got to let me know If you can't give an answer. You can't give them. You can't, you can't.
Speaker 2:You can say we suspect.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, no. Not if you don't know where they're at, not if you have no clue anywhere in the US.
Speaker 2:Then at least lie to me nicely, okay, well, give me a percentage of truth.
Speaker 1:You ever watch Criminal Minds? I'm sure you did.
Speaker 2:A little bit.
Speaker 1:I think I watched it for a little, for like a season I think. There's an episode on there where they get anthrax, poisoning at a restaurant from a restaurant or a bank or something. The restaurant or a bank it was a bank, I think, but that I think it part of it was at a restaurant, and the whole time the news is saying that there's poisoning from a local restaurant, the whole time he's going, say the restaurant, say the FBI agent, he's going. Please say the restaurant, say the restaurant, and they never do. And all of a sudden all the phones go off. They're like what the hell's going on? It's 911, everybody's calling 911, they don't know. So it's mass panic. If you can't give a detail and say cause, the worst thing you can do is tell everybody in the world that somewhere there's a dirty Bob. The whole country is panicking.
Speaker 2:Okay, then why? Don't have an answer, then you could say, like we're using these, we're using these drones to survey potential terrorist attacks, or we're we're using these, we're using these drones to survey potential terrorists attacks, or we're we're we're surveying, uh, for your safety, but but don't tell me that you don't know what they are.
Speaker 1:I mean, you don't know Like well Trump yesterday. You've seen what Trump said yesterday, right? I didn't see it. No, they Trump did an hour question and answer yesterday and he answered every question they asked too. It was great. You know what it was breathtaking actually. Wow, good for you.
Speaker 1:It was somebody sitting there answering the questions, even the tough questions and just answering them flat out and you know what. They weren't asking questions where you had to come back and say you're fake news or anything. But one of the questions was what about these drones? He goes, they know what the hell it is. He goes, it's our guy. They know why. They're not telling you I don't know that, but they know. They know where it came from. They know what garage it was in. They know. Trust me, he was flat out about it. He just goes. I mean, it's not he can't tell you what he knows. You know if he even I don't know if he knows now I would assume that he's probably getting updates now.
Speaker 2:He's got to know something. He's getting ready to take office.
Speaker 1:I don't know, does he get updates already or no? I don't know. I don't know how that change of power works.
Speaker 2:It feels like he's the president regardless.
Speaker 1:So just let the dude take office, like Canada's like, getting rid of fricking. Yeah, did you see that? Yeah, that's like. And did you see his, his, his conference this morning that he said? He said that he was a feminist and pro woman and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah and this and that, and you know, america just proved how much they hate women by not voting a woman in again. That's funny. Yeah, trudeau said that. Trudeau's about to go. He's down, I think that they're talking about resignation letters already.
Speaker 1:I did see something like that. I love how Trump was just dogging him.
Speaker 2:Just trolling him man. Just trolling him, that's brutal man. You get trolled like that man, especially on a world stage. You're getting trolled man.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, let's be honest.
Speaker 2:I mean, if I mean we, just as.
Speaker 1:Americans, we got to stop tolerating the trash. But Canada is? I mean, they're just our bitch, regardless, always. I don't care who's in charge of them. They don't have a military. They use us as their military. We're their like privacy fence we're their security gate.
Speaker 2:I see they're threatening us a little bit, you know, with the with not cutting off our fuel. Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah. I feel like that's gonna get solved day they're going to open up all of these.
Speaker 1:They're not going to freaking.
Speaker 2:They're already. Providences have already said yep, we're not doing that. So for that reason, don't you feel like the economy's just going to? Like the doors to the economy I feel like are just about to break wide open, because he's going to do all of these and he's just going to reverse a bunch of stuff.
Speaker 1:He's reversing a bunch of stuff. But it takes time. You got it and it takes-. I mean, interest rates are going to drop and he's already in process. I mean yesterday he met with somebody who's going to invest like $100 billion in the AI technology in the US from Japan, yeah, and they're supposedly bringing 100,000 jobs with them and stuff. But again, that's wonderful, but how long does that take? $100 billion takes a while to spend. When you're building something you know what I mean and you're not running for office, and if you're running for office.
Speaker 2:You could probably spend $100 billion in a week. Man, you just feel like that kind of cash would have an immediate impact on the economy.
Speaker 1:Well, but I mean.
Speaker 2:Like just opening up the drilling, just turn it back on.
Speaker 1:Don't get feel like the drilling but the pipeline. You know it's going to take them a little while to get the pipeline up back up and running If they start going. I know we used to get a lot of people in here that were work staying in a hotel. We're working on a pipeline.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the pipeline was coming through here to ever staying in a hotel and they were coming in a restaurant. Where was the pipeline?
Speaker 2:going. I'm not sure I sound dumb, but what pipeline and where was it?
Speaker 1:headed what pipeline? Yeah, what pipeline? What was it? The north, northern, I forget what it was called. It's around here. It's all across the country. Yeah, I know that back. I think it was coming from. I think it's coming from Canada, to be honest with you, no way. Yeah, I think it's coming from Canada, to be honest with you, no way. I mean, this pipeline was a big deal, but people, you don't remember them protesting the pipeline. You don't remember all that, like the protest and catching the. It was a nightmare.
Speaker 2:Pay attention to those tree huggers.
Speaker 1:Well, they're worried about the pipes leaking underground, which is a fair up. They leak, we don't go clean them up you know, go fix it that's the, that's the the thing. Nowadays, there's, there's equipment that that tests that area. You see that there's and they don't want to admit that you know, or they don't want to deal with that you know. There's oh, they're going to poison our lakes, but we're not going to poison our lakes.
Speaker 2:I feel feel like. Did you see that new series on?
Speaker 1:I have not Landman or something like that Landman, I haven't, but I want to really bad it seems interesting it does look good yeah, they're kind of tackling that.
Speaker 2:I feel like Hollywood is nothing more than a forecast of where we're headed in our country most times.
Speaker 1:Well, you know that, like the Pentagon, one of their largest budget is for Hollywood, right? Is that right? Yeah, you didn't know that. I did not know that. It's a fact, yeah.
Speaker 2:No way. Why though they fund?
Speaker 1:movies like top gun. They fund movies that put America in a better light, like that. They they. I did hear this. Okay, but the question is the question is okay when you're talking militarily and stuff. Yeah, that's wonderful, it looks great. What else are they doing?
Speaker 2:I mean, it's propaganda, man. They're feeding you a narrative period to form an opinion before you get there. Correct, I guess it's the answers on the horizon of the you know of the issues, right, yeah, right, and so not until you get out of the matrix. Are you able to like, be, you know, critically, think through the process? And most, most that's the problem with most of Americans is they. They belong to the matrix so so they're so deeply entrenched in the matrix that they don't even know what's happening. You know, like, like, I think the education system in America was a part of the matrix.
Speaker 1:I think that for sure it is. There's no question, right? They don't want to teach you that that that my brother-in-law is a perfect example. We've been we've talked about this before I don't know if me and you did, but we I have on other podcasts but so he was in school in Avon and at the time that was when I was just topped out as a journeyman, I was making like $25 an hour or something like that.
Speaker 1:I mean good money. Back then I was only got 22 years old or whatever topped out making good money, had a house, all that stuff and Brandon's in school and his teacher literally tells him something about not not studying or something like that You're going to end up a carpenter, so he told him.
Speaker 2:No way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and Brandon goes. My brother in law makes more money than you do and he's a carpenter Exactly which I mean. But that's what they're teaching the kids. They're not teaching them that. They put it as non-value. There's no value to that. And then what I've seen happen was when I had my company. Originally, I had no problem. I could hire kids that were younger 20 to 30 years old all day long that wanted to work. They wanted this opportunity. It was a good job. Now you get guys that are 40, 45, nothing else has worked, and now they'll settle for construction. You know what I mean. Like, if I have to, that's what I'll do. Yeah, you try to get those young kids.
Speaker 2:You can't get them to do it. I always saw the money in it at a young age, like I'm like we did man, like you can go make money now and I don't even need to like and I can learn some stuff. That's how I always looked at it, like manuals over there working at Popeye's chicken. You know, I'm like bro, he's like you'll come work with me. No, I'll go slings. I'll go sling drywall or you know what I mean? I'll clean up. And that's how we were taught different.
Speaker 1:These kids got taught that. That's not the good way to do it.
Speaker 2:I mean, and they so seduced. They seduced every aspect of society. So they seduced women to go to work. They seduced, then, women to forfeit the greatest, like the most sacred thing a woman could do, and that is raise children. And they seduced them in the like going into the workforce. Then they seduced them like take your children and give them to the government.
Speaker 2:Like they didn't call we didn't call it the government, we called it school systems. But then we put our kids in these school systems and then they teach us to do what you got, to get ready to go to college, which is another form of of subjugation by the system that's set in place so they can indoctrinate your mind to think in a way that keeps you in in the matrix. But it was only like I look back on it and I go, man, I was fortunate, I was really fortunate that I was so disagreeable, so rebellious, so anti, like stop talking, like that whole thing that's in Young Boys that says, like don't talk to me like that you know like don't tell me what to do, kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Instead of fostering that leadership in Young to, they tried to smash it down and and and force you in the.
Speaker 1:I remember a teacher told my mom that. I always liked to stand on my soapbox yeah it's crazy.
Speaker 2:But you look back now with such clarity and go thank God I did. Thank God I didn't do that.
Speaker 1:I went to college for like two years, I remember I remember, I remember because I, me and my first wife, ran into you at Midway Mall, right there by the food court, really, and you were, you were in the nursing school and I'm like, yeah, but I think you were working for a home improvement company or something, but you were in nursing school or something. Yeah, I was going to college?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I was like a nurse.
Speaker 1:I'm like he wants to be a nurse.
Speaker 2:Not really. I wanted money, Jim Sure, and that's a good that's a solid career.
Speaker 2:And I saw a dude. I saw a dude. It was Brandy Giese's father, mike Flaherty. Yeah, and he was. He was a, uh, um, emergency room nurse and he was for me. Like he just felt like, oh, if he can do it, I can do it, like I'm going to, I'm going to go do what he did, because he got out, I'm going to try to get out. And so, and then one of the one of the most defining moments in my life happened when we were.
Speaker 2:You remember the day they brought you into the guidance counselor's office and you had to decide. Like I remember it, like so vividly. They brought us all, one by one, they took us into the guidance counselor's office, mr Novak, and they and they said, okay, here's, here's what you're preparing for. And I was. I just happened to be before Marlon and I was outside of the office and I heard his recommendation to Marlon Marlon, you're getting ready, you're going to college, man, these schools are going to be looking for you. You should do this, you should do that. He was mapping out. Then Marlon walked out Troy, come here. I remember sitting down and he's like well, troy, same story. He said well, Troy, you're same story. He said nope, nope. He said no, he didn't watch. He said he said well, clearly you're not made for college, so you should probably, kind of, you know, get yourself ready to go work in the labor field. He said that to me.
Speaker 2:But you're not you're not Troy, we, we, we can, we can guess that you're not made to be. This was our junior year and so you, you, you're probably not, you know going to be in college. So you should start preparing to enter the labor field. I remember him saying it to me sign up for OWE right now. He said basically I was just saying so I walked out of the room. I was so disheartened by it, like, oh, he, he thought Marlon was great, he was going to go to college, not me. I got it, I know, but I didn't see it that way as a kid. As a kid, I felt like I was a gut punch, like I'm not smart enough to go to college. So you know what I did? Tried to prove them wrong. Literally, I tried to that day forward. I was on the honor roll. So for the rest of my junior year and into my senior year, which is too late by then I mean, your GPA is already set by then. But I was. I guess I was dumb because I didn't really figure it out until then, but I was like, oh, I'll show you, I'll get on the honor roll. So I did the honor roll all the way through high school, then went to LC. I mean, I took some time off, I had a party for a little bit, but then I went to LC and entered the nursing program.
Speaker 2:Well, when I was in college, I'm like when I got there I was expecting this to be, because they had told me I'm not made, I'm too dumb. But when I got there I started doing the classes. I'm like this is dumb. It was at that moment that I'm like these people this is the 13th and 14th grade. I got honors. I got high honor roll there. I can be on an honor roll here. This is dumb. And I literally spent the second year of college in the field house playing basketball. So much so that the psychology teacher, when I went into my psych three class, he was like look man, you're gonna fail. You got to come to class he's. If you don't get an a for the, for the, for the last quarter and on your final you, I'm giving you an f you got to get an a. So I got an a, I got an a. You know, I mean like it was. It just wasn't that hard, but do you?
Speaker 1:remember we had when we were in in our, our, our years, when we were grad, like our senior years, you had I forget how it worked exactly, but we only had to pass those tests. Do you remember those tests? What aptitude tests? Right, aptitude tests. I don't know what they were called, but I remember taking I think that's what they were aptitude tests, two tests and that's all. If you pass that, you pass the grade. Yeah, I just didn't pass every one of those tests. You hand me any given time from the moment I got to high school it didn't all the way to senior year.
Speaker 1:Pretty much. There's none of them that I couldn't have passed with no studying. They weren't that kind. You look back on it and you go man, and that was, your grade too was based on those tests. They don't do that no more. I don't think.
Speaker 2:And they were really trying to put me in in a spot that they had already predetermined for me to walk in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you know what? That that's proven people wrong is what built Michael Jordan right?
Speaker 2:It definitely, it definitely did. But then it there was a part of it where I'm like I wasted my time trying to prove myself or prove them wrong. I could have spent those two, three years building a wrong. I could have spent those two, three years building a business I could have. I could have spent those two or three years walking in the confidence of what I, what I was called to do. I could have been, I could have I. You know, I could have been 10 years in front of myself if I had just took taking those three years and just like, all right, I'm going to, I'm going to go do what I was, what I was called to do, I mean, but you know, or you could have just been content going to college because you thought that's what you should have done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but then what is then? Then I would have been miserable.
Speaker 1:What if they didn't make you prove yourself wrong?
Speaker 2:I mean, obviously I believe that you know I had a purpose and I was going to walk in it, but but it definitely, well, it definitely gave me confidence. It gave me confidence Once I went to college. I'm like this is dumb. Then I left. But the reason I left it was not because I thought it was dumb. The reason I left is because they told me I was going to have to do my clinicals in a nursing home changing diapers. You didn't know that right away. I didn't know that right away Because I was hanging out with Matt Stevenson and and all these guys and we were cutting it up one night at this place and and he said, yeah, bro, you're like, you're getting ready to, you'll be working with me over at this nurse.
Speaker 2:I'm like, no, I'm not doing, I'm going to the emergency room, that's where I'll be. You know blood and guts, you know I'm not doing diapers. And he said, no, the next two years of your life is going to be diapers. And I'm like, bro, I can't do that. My gag reflex you see the way my gag reflex works is I can't smell or see certain things. If I smell or see certain things, man, it's over, you know.
Speaker 2:So I quit, I quit. And you know what I did. I went to the. I went to the trades. I went, I went right away, got a job working for an asphalt company out of Oberlin, Started operating equipment for them, setting up jobs for them. So I'd be on the setup crew. I'd go out and get the jobs ready for Blacktop before they got there and I made stacks of cash, stacks of cash, bro, for that year and a half, two years of my life, man, I had, literally I had checks in my closet Because I didn't go to a bank at that point.
Speaker 2:I just had the checks in my closet and when I wanted clothes, I didn't wash them, I just went and bought some. That's how much money I made. You were living good, huh, dude. I made so much money during that point in my life. And then, ultimately, just to you know, you look back on it and go man, I could have, I could have been 10 years in front of myself if I had just made some bigger, if I wouldn't have been brought up in the system that told me I should have done it this way or that way.
Speaker 1:And well, you know, that's what they're saying now, Like that's Elon Musk. That's one of his arguments is that we got to stop, you know, putting so much emphasis on, on, uh, we are with the, with the, with the higher education, you know, cause that that's the problem is, education is is exactly that. It's an education. It it doesn't reflect your intelligence, it doesn't it doesn't.
Speaker 2:You can remember something and you could put it back on a piece of paper later. It doesn't mean you have any ability to survive and figure things out or whatever it is Common sense. That's what I realized, man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you got to get in there and figure things out on your own, solve problems Like that's survive, that's real survive.
Speaker 2:That's what we should be teaching kids in school. Yeah, critical thinking. You can't, though, because you know what the problem is you need some robots too Well, the robots are the ones that wash out, but we got to find the use. We got to find the jimmies in this thing.
Speaker 1:I think that's how you find them.
Speaker 2:I think you find them no because they're not being taught to think critically, they're being taught to comply. They're being taught to comply.
Speaker 1:You're doing nurture over nature.
Speaker 2:I think nature is there and I think that yeah but how much time are they wasting being suppressed, being told that you should do it this way, not that?
Speaker 1:way. Nah, you're learning. That's all learning. First of all, you can't run a business. Typically, at 18 years old, you don't have the intellect to do it.
Speaker 2:I think you just said something that should be repented of. There's no way you should say that we should be raising kids today to start businesses. Instead of giving them money at college campuses, instead of giving them credit cards to go rack up ridiculous bills at a bar, how about we give them startup money for their own companies, their own businesses? How about we do that? I get it, but it takes some time. You've got to learn a little bit. How about we give them startup money for their own companies, their own businesses?
Speaker 1:How about we do that? Why don't we encourage them? I get it, but it takes some time. You got to learn a little bit, you got to get in there and you got to have something to sell.
Speaker 2:How about we implement a mandatory trade training that happens in high school the last two years. You have to learn a trade. You have to, you have to. You have to learn at least one trade.
Speaker 1:I don't even think you need to do that. I think they need to bring back some of the old ones that they already have, definitely Because they just don't have them no more Nope. Those are all gone. Autobody's gone.
Speaker 2:And when we were in high school, you know how they looked at those classes. Yeah, classes, oh yeah, that was, yeah, that was only the dark glasses.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we looked at that and we're like oh yeah, that one kids down there. Yeah, what did we call it southview? We called it, uh, damn it. I wish I could think yeah, we called that hall the wing, yeah, all the auto body, but really those dudes rejects hall or something.
Speaker 2:Those guys can make money right now they can make money right now. They go, walk down the road and be like what do do you want? Um, you got to pay me this much money I want. I want 50 bucks an hour to work on car.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they just don't have that stuff, no more. No, like me, and like me and Guido had that. We went to Harrison. That was a cool school, that's pretty awesome, and they don't you didn't know they don got put in an incubator of leadership yeah, I mean that place was. Yeah, it was different. And you know all those guys are in are all still working construction. They're paying their bills that way and every I mean it's they thought they were punishing you, but in actuality, no, it wasn't punishment.
Speaker 1:It was never punishment no, that wasn't like.
Speaker 2:That wasn't a bad school. No, that was charleston.
Speaker 1:Okay, that was charleston, but me and guido guido didn't go to Charleston, just I did. Charleston is where I went from Clearview. When they kicked me out of Clearview, I went to Charleston. Harrison was after I went back to mainstream school. It was an option, it was like a JVS type thing which we still have. Jvs, it exists, but that little school like Harrison, that was cool. They just took an old school, they put us in there, we redid it. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:And it was just well. What did you like go there to do?
Speaker 1:You went to school. You went to class half the day and the other half you'd be like we learned a trade. Well, I didn't. I went to work, but Guido's group, they all did construction and stuff like that. Like that.
Speaker 2:You got to remember as a kid there was only one thing I knew I wasn't going to be a carpenter. You knew. You said I'm not doing that. I had no idea what I was doing. No, I didn't either, but I knew it wasn't going to be a carpenter.
Speaker 1:I knew I wasn't going to be a carpenter. That much I knew. I knew for sure, if nothing else, I was not going to be a carpenter. But that's what I am. But yeah, I knew for a fact Well you're a business owner, not a carpenter.
Speaker 2:I mean, you're a business owner, you are, you can do carpentry, but you're a business owner on several levels.
Speaker 1:I'm a journeyman carpenter. I mean that's, that's my trade. And then I'm in a union journeyman carpenter, so you can make money. But that is not what you are. I get it, but that was the one thing I wasn't going to be, but that's exactly what. So when I went to Harrison my point is I wasn't going into building maintenance class like like Guido was I was there for the OWE version, which is I got out of school early and went to work.
Speaker 2:You know, at the time, because I struggled so much in it, I developed a class that I teach today and it's called the decade of decision. Between the ages of 16 to 26, you make the most important decisions of your life, but you are the dumbest you will ever be. That's a fact, facts, right Facts, super facts, right, horrible. You are the dumbest. So in that 10-year window, you're going to decide what you're going to do as a career. So you're going to decide vocation. You're going to decide who You're going to, what You're going to decide who you're going to marry for the rest of your life. In the 10 year window where you are the dumbest you will ever be and you will develop your moral, your morality, your compass will be put in you. In that 10 year window You're basically how like. Whether or not you succeed or suck in life will be based on that 10-year window. I teach a class today called the Decade of Decision. If you can make good decisions in vocation, mate selection and morality in this 10-year window, the chances of you succeeding in life increase by crazy, crazy statistics. If you marry the right person, if you get the right career and if you make good decisions based on your morality, you will succeed, then you will spend the next 10 years of your life, from 16 to 26,. You will build on your life. You make the wrong decision in any three of those areas.
Speaker 2:If you get a DUI, if you marry the, if you marry the wrong broad right, or if you get the wrong, you go to school for the wrong thing. Yeah Right, you, what are you going to do? You're going to spend the next 10 years doing what? Recovering. You're going to have to recover Now. You got to recover. You went through a divorce. You had to pay off that DUI. You had to now change your career up. Go back to school, do this other thing get better knowledge. Now think of what would happen if you or I would have been taught the Decade of Decision at age 16. Somebody would have sat you down and said look, I'm telling you, you are not smart, troy. You think you're smart, but you're not smart. You need to stop. Pay attention to who you're going to marry, what you can do for the rest of your life and the decisions you make?
Speaker 1:Do you think that those 16 to 26-year-olds believe you?
Speaker 2:I don't know, but I wish somebody would have told me Troy and mapped it out for me.
Speaker 1:Like, give me the scenario I feel like they did See, that's where I get it.
Speaker 2:Nobody told me any of that stuff.
Speaker 1:I remember my Uncle Dale. I remember he told me never to get any credit cards. Don't ever get credit cards, nobody ever told me that.
Speaker 2:They never told me about a credit card system. They never told me about credit.
Speaker 1:But I thought I can handle it. He don't know what he's talking about, so it doesn't matter that he told me.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. I mean I that smart. But if somebody would have told me, hey, troy, you're not that smart, especially somebody I would have respected. Yeah, it's got to be somebody, you believe. Like get led a John Sally, uh uh, ashford, uh poke, uh, hoagland, mrs Hoagland, actually, I took her out to lunch. When I finally, like, discovered my purpose in life, I'm like, oh my gosh, I was made for this. Discovered my purpose in life. I'm like, oh my gosh, I was made for this. I was made to do what I'm doing right now. And and I look back on some of the formation of my life and some of the stuff that, like laid and resonated deeply in me. It came from her. It came from her. She saw value in me, she put me in the front of her class. She put, she put me in advanced comp. What? What is Troy Thompson having? You know what I mean? I look back and I'm like, why was I in advanced comp?
Speaker 2:I should have been in, like, oh, yeah, I should have been in the dumber version of whatever that was Applied math, yeah, just like. Yeah, I was too dumb to be in there, but she saw value in me, she put it in me and now I look back, man, that was formation, that she was doing it. So the decade of decision I think, if we can, we have to teach our kids the value of making positive decisions.
Speaker 1:Again, I still think you got nature over nurture. You still got to. Some people are just naturally not going to listen to any of it, even if they hear it. You know what I mean and some people will, but that's the whole argument they have nature over nurture.
Speaker 2:I think that your nature can be influenced. I don't think this, I know this. Your nature is definitely influenced by relationships, oh yeah positive relationships.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying that they don't play.
Speaker 2:I think they do form your nature and can harness your nature like if you ever had like. Well, there's just certain people like I love. I love the mavericks, I love the, I love troubled kids, love you know. I see myself and whenever I see a kid out here doing dumb stuff, I'm like oh yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1:Come here, let me help you, let me try to help you make some better decisions, but when I was a bad kid, there was those people that would talk to you that I just blew off, did you?
Speaker 2:Oh God, yes, Was there any in your life that you didn't blow off? That you were like I like?
Speaker 1:that dude I mean Jimmy Dean. Once I became an adult, I would say when you say you were an adult, when did you become an adult?
Speaker 2:then I was 20 at that point. Ah well, 20, 20 is better than 26.
Speaker 1:It's in the 16 to 26. You're not wrong, right, but he was the first person that I looked at like as somebody. Okay, I get, yeah.
Speaker 2:I'll listen to this guy. That was the first time. Yeah, that was the first time. This guy makes sense to me.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, to some degree, and he was kind of doing it, and he was doing it in his own way. It's kind of a rebel anyways ways. You know what I mean. So, yeah, I kind of was alright with him. But most of the time when someone would approach you and say something, he's just like whatever, dude, get away from me what you talking about. Or like yeah, or like my uncle Dale, it's like just because you, that's what you think. You know what I mean. Like I don't. I mean my uncle Dale used to think I was gay because I combed my hair. It's like why do you think I was combing my hair? Stupid, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Like how do you like you? Yeah, like, don't. You know he's the player. Did you not check his resume?
Speaker 1:I mean yeah I did, but that's james tucker. So how do you respect somebody like that? That that's the kind of shit I mean. I mean maybe not him.
Speaker 2:Maybe I'm not him, but there's I love dale to death.
Speaker 1:I mean I follow him everywhere he went. He was always working at cars or he was doing this or he was I mean. But I mean he would tell me things like that and I would just, you know, I did what I wanted to do and just thought he was wrong To some degree.
Speaker 2:But these people, there are people that that come into your life, that have such an influence on you that if they were to give you this information, if they were to like guide you positively in these decisions, like you could, you could increase, you could be more efficient with your time.
Speaker 1:You don't have to wait until you're 40 to start building my thing was whenever I, when I got to be like at that 20 range or like 19 range, somewhere in that range, to be like in that 20 range or like 19 range, somewhere in that range as I found a new group of friends that I finally I think that might've been part of my problem when I was younger my adults that were in my life didn't have their shit together, Right, okay, so you doesn't listen to a lot of them Like my uncle Dale yeah, he worked at Ford, but he also, like you know, had a wife that was stealing the money out of his car and driving into his car in front of the house, like you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Like just, he was always in chaos with his relationship. So I really had nobody in my life that was really like had their shit together, that was an adult, other than like my grandparents, which I mean you really like they're old. Things are different in your mind, yeah, but when I got like 18 or 19, I got like a group of friends that kind of changed me and I'm glad for it.
Speaker 2:I think I mean college did that for me. It like at least exposed me to more.
Speaker 1:Like I had, they were like they could. They were still having fun Like I like to have, but they were keeping their shit together. Man, I didn't like Mark Blandon and Seth and all and uh the dope, and I mean they all had their jobs in Dre Mike injury. I mean all those guys, what age did you? I was like that was when I worked at subway, when I was like 19.
Speaker 2:Oh, man, so you were way ahead.
Speaker 1:of the game man, because they all like had their kind of, had their shit together. Like it was weird, like injury was valedictorian but he drank every day.
Speaker 2:Yeah you, you were. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:They were a different group of people and I liked them, I enjoyed being around them and I felt like I could, like they were before them. Everybody knew it was like just destroying their lives with. I mean, most of the kids I grew up with in South Lorain, I mean most of them went to prison by the time I was like 25, you know what I mean. So I just found myself staying away from them until I met that group of guys. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Once I started hanging out with them through injury and stuff, then all of a sudden I I really feel I really had a hard time, like after high school, like and I heard somebody say this and it made so much sense to me because I was lost for probably three years, three, four years, and I was just, I was swimming in just like. I felt depressed, like what in the woods is this all about? Like, obviously, for me it was like I was just looking for us a sense of meaning and I felt very nihilistic, like at the end that season of my life and and I remember just being like man. This, none of this makes any sense. And and I couldn't find my people Like it.
Speaker 2:Just, I, just everyone I was around was just like nah, you're, you're not it, you know. And I just and I heard this, this, this saying like in high school you're the main character. Sure, your parents make you the main character, your teachers make you the main character, your coaches make you the main character. Man, everybody comes and watch you on Friday night, everybody. You know you're the main character. And then in college, now, all of a sudden, nobody cares about you.
Speaker 2:You like you you're living on like man, then I'm wandering around like what now?
Speaker 1:you know, I didn't go to college, but I always thought that that would be the greatest time oh, it wasn't for me.
Speaker 2:I remember going to like the parties at the at the universities, you know, and I remember waking up and, oh man, it was horrible. I remember going to akron university one night with John Webb and Brandy Giese and all of them, and I woke up on John's couch over there oh my God, they were like shooting out the window at the next dorm. I'm like, bro, these aren't your enemies. Like I went and laid down and I remember waking up next to like a pallet of ramen noodles, yeah, and that's what we were eating for breakfast on a hot, you know. I'm like this is depressing, dude. Like I remember. Like I'm going home.
Speaker 1:It seems right. To me it seemed terrible. The thing is but when I cause, I used to go to the parties a lot to Toledo and Akron you know, friends of mine, yeah, and uh, I just remember thinking it's kind of the way to go because you get to be a kid a little longer. Yeah, I don't know. And everybody thinks you're being responsible and you're really not. No, but your parents are like, oh, he's doing good, he's going to college, but you're just like out, wilding out, basically, yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I didn't like it at all.
Speaker 1:I feel like it's good for every kid to do that, though. I mean, it's good to go wild out for a minute before you have to go be an actual adult.
Speaker 2:I didn't like it at all, man.
Speaker 1:I was ready for some success. I think it's a good idea.
Speaker 2:I think, if you're raised and you have a good family and you've got a disciplined life, I think maybe that's appealing to you. But by the time I was 18, man, I was done. I'm not done drinking, I was done, you know when.
Speaker 1:I regret it. You know, when I regretted not going to college more than ever in my life was when my brother died. Oh he, my brother, why, like what did he do? Well, my brother died. He went to college, him, and my sister went to Marshall and he was working for me. He was a journeyman, he had just topped out as a carpenter. He went to visit my sister at Marshall when she was going to college and he decided he's going to go to college and stopped working and went to college with my sister and, anyways, when he died, we had an event here at the bar for him and people came from all over the world I mean the world for this party and they were all his fraternity brothers. Okay, I mean, these guys still stay in touch to this day. They're still close. My sister just bought a house in the same development that one of the guys that my brother got brought into the fraternity. They are close and they have a camaraderie.
Speaker 2:I don't think that you get otherwise, marlon talks like that about his guys, like if I'm his frat, yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, I don't understand it. They're such a great group of guys but I do understand. Like tribalism, community, like everyone's looking for a community to belong to.
Speaker 1:That one is cool.
Speaker 2:You could go downstairs. There's a community, you go. You know, everyone was built for community, but when do you?
Speaker 1:ever live that life outside of your family, except at college.
Speaker 2:You live it no matter what. No, yeah, you belong to a community somewhere. I get that, but it's not the same life.
Speaker 1:But I understand what you're saying, where you're sharing the house, sleeping at each other's house eating ramen going out to breakfast together, Like just, I mean, we do it, yes, but you didn't like you weren't staying at my house. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I think I would have appreciated it more if I wasn't so poor.
Speaker 1:Maybe you don't know for sure.
Speaker 2:For me it was about like I need to. My brother and sister were poor. I'm tired to be. They enjoyed it just fine, I just hated it. Dude. I was just.
Speaker 1:I did not like the loneliness you weren't, you were in lcc, you weren't away.
Speaker 2:But I went to universes every week.
Speaker 1:Man I was, I was either if you went there and it was like that, you were there, like like my brother and sister, that camaraderie they, they have. I'm telling you, I I am jealous, yeah, of what they had and how great that group, that group is. I mean, it's some of the best guys I've ever met and they're hilarious. And I always wonder where my brother-in-law fit in, cause he seems kind of weird, like odd. You know what I mean? He just seems odd, but he's I mean he's married to my sister. My sister loves him to death, but he's just so straight-laced You'd probably love him to death, but he's very, very like militarily straight-laced. You know what?
Speaker 1:I mean, I like that. Yeah, you would like that for sure, but I never understood where, until I seen him with that group. He's just one of them, like I. He gets a couple of drinks in them. All of a sudden he's this different guy. Yeah, there's this whole and I'm going wow, it was. It was just like I it was. I was jealous of it.
Speaker 2:I honestly was looking back on my life, I think, like I, I look at those years where I was really looking for community almost, and I almost went to the military, literally almost went to the military, to the uh, they seem to bossy Marine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, they do. But I mean, that's that same camaraderie that same.
Speaker 2:you know, here's your tribe man. These are your people, you know I was looking for that for sure.
Speaker 1:I considered it only because Joe Destro used to tell me that that was like.
Speaker 2:he said that he thinks every young man should do it the day I was to sign, I got a Pell Grant to go to college, so I went to college instead, just in the nick of time, just happened, just happened.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's, that's. Uh, I just when I seen it, and the fact that they still are so close, I guess, is what really? What really did it was they were. They're just still so close and it's it's everybody's looking for community, man.
Speaker 2:That's what church is. Church is community.
Speaker 1:I get it, but but you'll never get that kind of it's like. It's like. It's not my college years, but the guys I'm talking about, like Mark Bland and them like, those are like, like me and Mark can hang out right now Like and and it's like that. One will just never change Like we've. We can cuss each other out and the next time we see each other we'll be fine, like I mean, it's just, it's it's. It's different. They were.
Speaker 1:I didn't go to college with them, but that's the group I was with and I did. We acted like we were. We were always staying. I stayed at Mark's house with them and things like that.
Speaker 1:But I never seen nothing like like literally my perfect example my sister and Zane who is who lives down the street from, they go shopping together. You know what I mean, and my brother-in-law doesn't care. That's just what they do. He doesn't want to go shopping, zane likes to shop, she likes to shop, but Atusha, his wife, they're. They're I don't know if they're Indian, maybe I don't know if they're Indian, maybe I don't know what it, but I think they are Indian. But Atusha doesn't like to go shopping, but my sister and him like to go shopping. So they go to shopping together, like, but it's like their brother and sister because they've been. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:The relationship is just what it is. Or like when she came down here, he drove her down here uh, zayn did and then drove straight back, dropped her off from South Carolina, myrtle beach, and just drove straight back, just dropped her off and headed straight back. I mean it's just, they look out for each other still to this day. That's crazy to me. Yeah, and they would. They even got turned on to go into Myrtle Beach by visiting in there, you know, eventually or essentially. But I mean, that's where I missed it. I wish that I would have got to do it and I think that everybody should get to do that. Everybody should have that little bit longer to be a kid. There's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean I would have liked it, I just didn't. I didn't like my life at the time, that's because you were uncertain of yourself. Oh, for sure.
Speaker 1:For sure. If you were certain of yourself, you would have enjoyed it a lot more, maybe. Yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, yeah, I was, I was, I felt like I was looking to grow up so that I didn't ever think I was in the opposite of what you are. You were like what's my purpose? Oh, always, oh, mine Mine was like yeah, this'll be over soon.
Speaker 2:Like I, never, I didn't.
Speaker 1:I never thought I'd be older than 34.
Speaker 2:I mean, I did think that I never thought. I never thought I said 32. Really, you thought the same thing, 100%. You can go back and check me on that. I preach sermons. I never thought, I never thought I'd live past 32.
Speaker 1:I never thought. 34 I thought would never happen.
Speaker 2:That's crazy that we didn't matter.
Speaker 1:I mean I always wanted.
Speaker 2:I wanted the hope to like. I just needed hope. And not until I I found Jesus, that I'm like, oh, and it wasn't yeah, when I, when I walked into that church service that day, I didn't nobody even needed to tell me, I knew like I walked in just by my happenstance. I just walked in and I'm like, oh, my goodness, where has this been my whole life? And I, just I was like, oh, my goodness, where has this been my whole life? And I, just I was like this is it? I don't like this is it.
Speaker 1:See, that's different Cause I went to church my whole life.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I mean, there were times in my life when I went. You know, I went consistently my whole life, but my life was a mess at that point. And when I walked in I felt the presence of the divine, I felt God and I was like this is it? I don't know what you guys are making here, I don't know what kind of cookies you're making here, but I want a dozen. You know what I mean. Like I want a bunch, you know, yeah, and then from there developed and it was like oh yeah, and now I have a sense of community.
Speaker 1:That is just yeah, that's all I mean. Yeah, that's awesome, that is an amazing thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for me that's that's, that's the power of church, like when people talk about church, like that's more important than than Sunday. It's that, it's that tribalism like that, like this is. You know, this is your community of people, you know that you do life with and it's, and even even and you and I spent a lot of my time weeding out the ones that aren't authentic. Like you know what I mean. Like I can, you can just sniff them out. You can just sniff out like people who are just there to take and not be in covenant, like no, I'm down with you forever. You know, I remember when I first walked back in here and I heard you over here and I was like, oh, Jimmy's my guy man, and I don't know why, but that's always been in me Like, like, jimmy's my dude, like I'm going to, I'm going to hang out with him, Right, and they were like, and I remember walking in, like, yeah, good job man, I'm, I'm, I'm happy for you, you know, but like that's that you know just, and you can sniff it out.
Speaker 2:I could sniff it out, I could sniff it out of people Like when it's not real, like when it's just like you're here to use and you have an agenda and you're like, I can see it, I'm a pretty good judgment usually, but there's certain people that get me.
Speaker 1:It gets me mad but yeah, usually I'm a pretty good judge of character. Typically, you know what I mean. But yeah, sometimes it sometimes it gets me. Every once in a while somebody will get me and I'll be mad at myself that I didn't see it.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, I mean, yeah, that happens to me too.
Speaker 1:I hate that.
Speaker 2:I hate that. That happens to me too, but you know, I'm just, I've always been a pretty good but I just tell him like look, man, you can, you can do that.
Speaker 2:I'm not you can. Just because you are, it doesn't mean I am, I'm going to be the realest guy. You know, like, just because you have an agenda now, like I'll be your friend forever. You know, if I'm your, if I'm your friend, I'm your friend forever. Yeah, and that's what I, you know. So we got a community of people that and I just tell them that man, stay at the table, don't walk away when it gets hard, don't walk away when you get your feelings hurt.
Speaker 2:Somebody does something you don't like. You get offended, like we disagree. Don't walk away, just stay, just stay, just stay here, just stay here, man, just stay in a friendship. It'll be better, it'll be sweeter. Like, like, at least you know, at least then we got something to talk about, sure, you know, if you walk away, you know you throw away. I'm a good friend. You want me as your friend, right? Like? Don't feel like that. You know you look at people like why would you, why would you not want me to be your friend? Like I hope you buried the body. You want me, you want me to be your friend, that's all. I look at people and I'll tell you the truth.
Speaker 1:I won't help you bury the body. I'll tell you the truth. I won't help you bury the body. I'll tell you to run. I'll be like you should run now.
Speaker 2:Here's what you need to do with the evidence. Here's what you need to do with the evidence. I'll tell you the truth.
Speaker 1:You know how much it costs to get to Mexico. That's what you should probably do, because I'm calling the cops.
Speaker 2:Nah, you wouldn't call the cops, You'd be like I'm going to turn my back and I'm going to go over here and I'm going to turn my back and I'm going to pretend like I got something going on over here. You need to leave. You need to leave. We need to get rid of these UFOs in the sky and the economy needs to get better. You need to come eat all the food over here that's being cooked up. Yeah, madhouse, madhouse Bar and Grill, For sure for sure what we're going to do.
Speaker 1:I think what we're going to do is we're going to change the menu slightly. That's our correction. We're going to slightly change the menu and get rid of specials, but we're going to have those at dailies. We'll have ribs every day, we'll have tacos every day, we'll have meatloaf every day. They'll all just be there every day instead of having them as specials, and we'll try and keep everything consistent and going from there on and see what happens. But that'll allow us to have a nice dinner menu instead of. You know, just, you can only get ribs on Thursday, now, you know, or steak on Friday. Oh, I see what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:So we're just going to have it every day. So there's dinner available every night for anybody that they could. One wants meatloaf, one wants a steak, one wants tacos, one wants fish or whatever. You know which was how we used to do it? Um, we went away from it and went to the specials at one time. Um, and it's not. It's not working right now Like it was. So I'm going to try it the other way and see how that works. But again, that was when before I had control of the kitchen. Once I got control of the kitchen, I know I can run that food every day without the waste that was going on then. So, all right, wow, that's going to be my menu correction. Other than that, I don't know, we'll see.
Speaker 1:Hopefully Trump can get some money in everybody's pocket and then get out to dinner. I feel like that's going to happen. Yeah, I do too. I feel like the problem is, I feel like we need a jumpstart. Yeah, you need something, and I don't know if he can do a jumpstart you know, that's what we need is a jumpstart.
Speaker 2:Yeah, start, you know that's what we need is a jump start, yeah, just a quick jump start and then correct it. I mean as far as like the feeling, like I can feel, I feel hope, like I can feel the national.
Speaker 1:I I you know at this point, right now, has increased. If I never sold another burger and the place closed, I know I'll be all right, I feel okay, that's for sure. But I don't know that. I felt that way last year, like I just didn't know. I mean like, if it stays like this, that you're probably just better off to collect welfare or something if you really want to survive. Yeah, and that's sad, but that's where the country was heading.
Speaker 2:It definitely was working its way towards socialism, that's for sure. Yeah, I feel like it's definitely reversed its course. I hope so. I hope it stays that way. There's a spirit of hope in the air, yeah.
Speaker 1:Wait a minute, I forget. What did you say about Luigi Hero, or horrible?
Speaker 2:He's not a hero, he's horrible, he is a byproduct.
Speaker 1:No, he can only be one or the other Horrible or hero. He can only be one or the other, that's the game you play. I don't play that game. He's either the angel or the devil. He is a residual of what happens when a hopelessness permeates society, if you can't say he's the devil, then he's the angel. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 2:I won't say that he's the devil and he's not an angel. He's not the devil. He is what happens to a society when tyranny and oppression reach the climax that it has.
Speaker 1:But if you have to pick one or the other, Well, if I have to pick one, I'm going to lean a little bit past right.
Speaker 2:You know a little bit past right.
Speaker 1:All right, we're out of here.
Speaker 2:Y'all be good.
Speaker 1:Peace out. Happy holidays. If we don't hear from you guys, merry Christmas.
