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00:00:01
Crooked Rover Cast Show 6
16 Plays2 months ago
Crookedrivercast@gmail.com
Special show!
Why are we doing this show and a little on who we are.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Episode Context
00:00:03
Speaker
This is a Crooked Rivercast special where we talk about the who, what, and why are doing this show. And maybe even get a chance to know a little more about us. Again, I am Robert, joined as always by Tom.
00:00:16
Speaker
Hey Tom, how's it going today? Pretty good. Feels like we just did this. Yeah, it feels like this is deja vu. So this was a Crooked Rivercast special. One of us is not able to do the show today, so we have this kind of banged when this when these types of things happen, because we don't want to miss a show.
00:00:37
Speaker
And this show is going to be a little bit even more special because it's our first special. And we're probably going to just talk a little bit but about why we felt like we had to do this show, why we wanted to do this show, and kind of maybe who we are a little bit.
Future Episode Ideas
00:00:50
Speaker
And maybe some of the other shows will probably be a little different if we do when we do on other specials. I'm thinking more deep dives into certain topics. Does that sound about right?
00:01:02
Speaker
Sounds about right to me. Okay.
Podcast Origin Stories
00:01:04
Speaker
So then there's the question, why are we doing the show? I'll leave it to you first.
00:01:11
Speaker
Usually about Saturday morning when we start to record. so what way Why are we doing this show? Yeah, why what you tell me first. but you why What's your gut? what Well, I think I reached out to you the first time, right?
00:01:24
Speaker
Yes, not too long ago. And I was thinking of doing a podcast with me and my wife, and we were considering doing more of a pop culture, what's happening around town type of thing for Cleveland and for the surrounding suburbs.
00:01:43
Speaker
And I reached out to you and funny, i i was thinking of you joining that podcast or or maybe having you would offer up some news stuff for that podcast.
00:01:55
Speaker
And then you said you were thinking about doing a podcast also. So we're here. Yeah. Yeah. i I had thought many times over the years, actually, and about doing something.
00:02:07
Speaker
You know, people have told me that I should, my personality, i have no problem sharing my opinions on many issues with people.
Local Politics and News Coverage
00:02:17
Speaker
so you know, i think over the years people have put it my head, but i also, you know, I kept thinking initially that I know so much about what's going on nationally, but I know almost nothing about what's going on in my community.
00:02:32
Speaker
i i know almost nothing about what's going on just in Ohio alone. And that bothers me. it' It feels like we get pushed always to the national level. And we've always been talked about, we've always talked about in our and lives that the more local you are, the better with government.
00:02:48
Speaker
Well, you know, the funny thing is me and you would go out, have a bourbon, have a cigar. We always end up talking about national politics and...
00:02:59
Speaker
We always talked about how we should know more about local politics. And i think part of the reason I wanted to do the show with you, and I think it was your reason too, was this will force us to think about local politics more. Exactly.
00:03:15
Speaker
Exactly. We'd always talked about, well, we got to go to our Senate council. so we got to look more local because we spent an hour talking about one topic on the national level and We never talked about what happened in our local communities, let alone Northeast and Ohio, let alone anywhere in Ohio, usually, unless it had some national.
00:03:35
Speaker
So what I found was just complete loss. ah I don't know anything that's going on. and And I can see how much is out there to pay attention to. There's out there.
00:03:48
Speaker
Yeah. you're You're right about that, but have an idea why we don't know that much about it. yeah The news reporting is awful. ah ah It's horrible.
00:04:00
Speaker
um It's quick. It's never really in any type of detail. And that's and i don't i don't think that's the fault of the news station. you know They got segments. They got two minutes. They got a fill.
00:04:14
Speaker
But
00:04:17
Speaker
We were never given a good, concise report on what's happening, especially ah as far as like legislature goes. We definitely don't get any of that.
00:04:29
Speaker
We get a 30-second to two-minute segment that highlights what they're talking about, but they're not they're not giving you any type of detail on anything.
00:04:41
Speaker
So it's similar to... I mean, on the national level, you have the the main, you know, the Fox, the CNNs, and MSNBCs, where have talking heads, you got 30 second, you got an eight minute segment, four, three to four guests and a host.
00:05:00
Speaker
If you split that up, you get about 30 seconds a piece. It's similar on the local news. There's not a lot of long form local podcasts or anything, shows in any way that,
00:05:13
Speaker
or like a Joe Rogan, or like whoever else you want to ah put in there. well Joe's obviously the biggest one. but a national On the national level, we have ah a ton of podcasts that are covering long-form government um you know topics, or big news topics, I should say. you know you got You got the TimCast, you have ah Joe Rogan. I don't consider him a news guy, but he does have good guests there that do talk about national politics and and other topics.
00:05:45
Speaker
news topics. and But you you know, you have, for me, there's like the quartering, there's, you know, Sticks is a pretty good, he he he analyzes stuff pretty good. um Yeah, there's a lot of them available. And on both sides, if if you lean left or right, you you can find podcasts that do a pretty good job either way.
00:06:06
Speaker
Yes. But but locally, there there's there's a couple. I found a couple, and i'll so I'll share them with you. I don't have them in front of me. I haven't shared one with you yet, Rob, because I i just found them. One of them is called like Ohio Republican News and something like that. um We'll put in the show notes, I think. Yeah.
00:06:25
Speaker
Because it's it i guess they're kind of... i I don't know if we're really competition
Importance of Local Engagement
00:06:31
Speaker
because we're focusing little bit more on the Northeast Ohio. They they focus more on the central, um ah more of the legislative central government politics.
00:06:43
Speaker
And other than that, there's really nothing. I found, you know, i found... ah a couple of Cuyahoga things, but they're like, they' they're government putting news out there. So I don't, you know, I don't really.
00:06:59
Speaker
I did see a Cuyahoga based. and Need to know Cuyahoga, something like that I found. But they hadn't posted in two years. Yeah, there was that. There was one other one. It wasn't really news based.
00:07:13
Speaker
It was more culture based. Yeah. Yeah. So I think it's probably the same one. We do have magazines. You know, you have Cleveland Magazine. You have Cleveland.com. You have ah you have ah Seen. Cleveland Seen. But those are really slanted um as far as politics goes.
00:07:32
Speaker
I believe you're correct on that for sure. Yeah. But also nothing... audio video based that, that gives a chance to flush some of these ideas out. And none not to say we're doing a great job at that anyway, but we are, and and originally we didn't even talk about doing this kind of a podcast. We were talking more of a, just a very news based, here are the stories kind of podcast.
00:07:55
Speaker
And it, it, I mean, it, it very quickly turned into what did it, what it's becoming now, which is, you know, when we, we kind of pick a few stories, go in deep with them on them. deep in depth, pull some clips and this and that, and try to give, give people just an idea of but what's going on, at least on a few and big topics. And then I guess what we're finding is, you know, doing some shorter ones on some minor stories.
00:08:22
Speaker
But I think what we're finding is there's a lot of stuff that we want to cram into every show. And the 15 to 30 minute show that we originally talked about has never been even close to that. I think the shortest you've done is an hour, an hour 35.
00:08:34
Speaker
Yeah, you know what? We're both opinionated, so that that adds an extra couple minutes to every news story at least. And, um you know, you're you're talking about like a like legislature. You have to kind of... When you're talking about budget issues in the and ah and ah ah hundreds of million dollars budget, you know, you got to get in some depth with it. you can't unfortunate That's what we found out. You can't just go, here's the headline, move on to the next one because...
00:09:02
Speaker
Yeah, you can't do that. you have You have to mull over what they're actually doing. And, you know, we're we're going to be wrong, of course. You know, we don't know we don't know the ins and outs of all this stuff, but we do have opinions.
00:09:15
Speaker
And i think we should, you know, we we kind of, so far what we've been doing is we've kind of, we we bring up a subject and we kind of give our thoughts on it, but also kind of maybe pull back on it and maybe think of a different reason why something's going on.
00:09:35
Speaker
And we hope whoever's listening to this is kind of... Actually, all i want is somebody to listen to us, hopefully have a little fun listening to it, but also kind of so they can have their own thoughts on it.
00:09:51
Speaker
Right. and b And just being... I guess the biggest point is just to try to inform people. And and how do you, and i because that's what i so kind of where it started, is i I am going to try to look for something that's more local-based or locally focused that I can do a rundown every week or every ah bi-weekly or every twice a week, whatever.
00:10:13
Speaker
Like the national podcast do, where they hit the the three or four big stories, they talk a little bit in depth about it, you know like a Timcast or a quartering or something like that. for for luck So that I can be appraised of what's going on in my state, in my community.
00:10:28
Speaker
And there's almost nothing out there that I can do that with. And that's kind of what I feel like we we're trying to do is is just inform people and and do it and and in a convenient way where you could pop it in your car and you know maybe you got a 30-minute drive and there and back you get most of the show.
00:10:49
Speaker
Yeah, you can you can listen to you can listen to the whole show, probably three commutes to and from work, you know? Yeah, right. and and And because we're all busy, because we don't have, I mean, you get so sucked in and spun up by all the national stuff.
00:11:10
Speaker
where Then you have to stop doing that and go dig through all the similar BS to get the local stuff.
Voting and Ballot Issues
00:11:16
Speaker
I just feel like there is a need for you know an hour, hour and a half show where you can just bust through some stories and at least inform yourself and be educated about what's going on in your community, to some extent at least.
00:11:28
Speaker
We're not going to catch everything. You know, the the way I've recently started viewing the national news is it's a diversion process. It's, a I, there's, there are people in my family, there's people in my community that have lost their ish on national news. And, and really the important thing is the local news.
00:11:53
Speaker
Unless your community and unless your state is what you want it to be or you know you are informed of what's going on, the national news really doesn't matter all that much.
00:12:06
Speaker
Right. We are the United States of America. We have our own Senate here. All politics is local. Yes.
00:12:17
Speaker
That's the saying I've heard all my life. All politics is local. And i think the other thing is you know,
00:12:26
Speaker
there' people are tribal. you have You have the Democrats and you have the Republicans and they vote with an R or D. And and in in my opinion, I think they should take the r and D off the...
00:12:39
Speaker
off the um ballots here and let people vote on the issues. And so the person that is running doesn't just run because, or I should say, they're not going to win just because there's a D or an R in front of there. They're going to win they're going to run on their ideas.
00:13:02
Speaker
Yes, for the most part, you would hope, right? because Yeah. Because you're going to limit you would limit some people from just going all R, all D. I mean, it used to be that way. you know I don't think you could do that anymore, but you used to be able to just click one button or one whatever it was on the ballot machine and it would just pick all Republicans or all Democrats. I don't think you could do that anymore.
00:13:21
Speaker
that You can't do that anymore. that is some states you can. That was before I even voted. Some states do that. yeah Some states still do that. I don't know how it used to be that way, but my parents told me that they got rid of that a while ago.
00:13:32
Speaker
So here's a perfect example of that. If you're watching the news about the current budget bill going through the House or the Senate state legislature here, and what we're recording this. What is it?
00:13:47
Speaker
I guess we could tell them we're recording it. It would make more sense. it It's April nineteenth So right now we're the the big thing is the budget. So they are talking about cutting school funding.
00:14:01
Speaker
But if you read the articles, they're not talking about school funding. They're talking about increasing school. They're just not increasing it to what they want. The other thing was what we talked about was, um shoot, the, what did we just talk about in one of today's stories?
00:14:20
Speaker
Issue two. Issue two. You know, is that a tax increase? but You don't even know what it is. You read the story or you listen to the story and it's like, is it a bond? It's going to the locals. What is it all about?
00:14:33
Speaker
So I think there was something else too, I thought. It was something to do with with more funding stuff. and Oh, the um the issue. Yeah, sorry, stupid. Issue two.
00:14:49
Speaker
If you listen to that report that we played on issue two, which is um state giving issuing bonds and giving money to a local ah municipalities for infrastructure projects, you know roads and such.
00:15:02
Speaker
If you listen to a report that we played today, what it said was they're going to add this $250 million. know No one ever mentioned the fact that this is a bill, this is something this is the fourth time we'll be voting on it, and it's been a ah ah part of the budget for 25 years.
00:15:20
Speaker
Meaning if you if you vote no on this, it would be a cut. They didn't mention it at all. like That's important for people. they're They're thinking it's an addition. but So this is what I mean by it.
00:15:33
Speaker
It takes somebody to sit down and read it to to cut through the crap. And most people don't want to do that. I know I don't want to do it. Who has time? I mean, right I'm forcing myself to do this because of this podcast.
00:15:45
Speaker
Yes, yes, so yes. Which I feel so much more informed than I ever have been about my local community. right It's a lot of work, though. I mean, it's oh it's a lot of work. But you've got to read the stories. what we've What we're finding is if we're not prepared, you can tell.
00:16:00
Speaker
ah we sound like we're not prepared because we're fumbling through stuff. So it takes reading and thought to come up with what's going on. And for example, see... i see My ability is, i can read an article a lot of times, the article is for one thing, but i see these i see these things and go wait in a minute, what what what's what's going on here? What's going on? It's maybe nothing to do with what the article is talking about, but you can pull different, you know, for example, we talked about in this last show, oh, the Ohio budget or county budget.
00:16:37
Speaker
Well, the reason I got to the county budget is I was listening and watching some news about the Public Safety Committee or the, um what are they calling it now? Cuyahoga Sheriff. The Downtown Safety Patrol.
00:16:49
Speaker
Yeah. And in that article, taught that they're spending $1.2 million dollars a year during a time when the county has a $25 million dollars but budget deficit. Had no clue. I mean, there's stories there. Nothing on the main, I i searched it on on the internet and the only thing I came up with stories was from cleveland.com, which is basically the plain dealer, right?
00:17:08
Speaker
right There was no Channel 3, Channel 5. Nobody's mentioning that the Cuyahoga County is in a $25 million deficit this year.
00:17:18
Speaker
Those the things that I think we can barely bring to the table. Like, here's here's the article, but also look at this can of worms that we just found. i That most people won't. This is going to be a little off subject subject, but why don't they report on that? Is it just because they know that people aren't interested or is it too in-depth?
00:17:39
Speaker
why don't they report on the budget deficit? Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. It's a good question. I, I, I am trying to think of a good reason ah than laziness.
00:17:51
Speaker
It's a story that people don't care about. but i I think people would care about it. It's. I would think, but can they do that in a short form news? You know, what like, you know, in between commercials, right?
00:18:06
Speaker
Yes, I think they can, but they don't. Yeah. I think they can. I think you could you can touch on it in three minutes. i mean, you're not going go super in-depth, but at least inform the people that they're, hey, by the way, your county is is falling short of their their budget goals.
00:18:23
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting. Yeah. It seems conveniently omitted from the story. I don't think it really is. I'm not saying there's anything nefarious, but... Those are the type of things that I keep seeing coming up with that I think we can add to the mix.
00:18:39
Speaker
don't I don't see anybody else doing it. I think there's a huge hole. So that's why we're doing the podcast. I think that's a pretty good rap of yeah why we're doing it. And that's kind of our our mission statement really is just to just to get the news out there and in as what as most concise as we can so that you can do...
00:19:00
Speaker
and your At your leisure, you can listen to what's going on instead of having to stop what you're doing in the middle of your week. And when you go to the voting polls, you kind of at least have an idea of what you're voting for.
00:19:11
Speaker
That's the other thing. like The other other thing I was going to – reminds me is that you go and read these issues on voting day and you're like – you're kind of scratching your head going, I don't – you really don't understand what this issue is.
00:19:28
Speaker
Yeah, and that's kind of what has pushed me to to do this, I think, is elections. i I will go, and I'll do some research, which I think is way more than most people.
00:19:40
Speaker
I still can't find what these, there's so many judges on the ballot usually that are and on ah on ah with no opposition. and the and know and And even ones with, I'm not just voting for you because you've got an R next to year your name.
00:19:57
Speaker
because I've seen time time it doesn't mean... a pretty good website that I found this last election that that showed what the judges... you know it was an interview with each judge. It was pretty good, but it...
00:20:09
Speaker
That's so much you can take from it. But it's something. Yeah. Because most of the times I in there and don't. You thing is, had to dig for it. It's not out there. It's not like it's on the news. It's not like it's reported on.
00:20:20
Speaker
I had to do a search for it. I had to sit there and read it. And I don't think people are doing this. I would actually, next time there's an ah you know election, there's judges running. I wouldn't mind doing a segment on...
00:20:33
Speaker
who you're voting for. I think it's a lost cause in Cleveland though. I'll be honest. um You have a demographic there that's going to vote one way and one way only. um I'll tell you what, most of them on my ballot, most of the judges are unopposed.
00:20:48
Speaker
And I just don't yeah even, I don't vote for an unopposed judge. I mean, that's yeah i don't kind of silly. all they They just have to vote for themselves and that's all they really need. yeah all are gonna there are All their campaigns are funded.
00:21:00
Speaker
The ones that are unopposed are being funded with big big money and nobody can really oppose them yes unless they get a campaign fund, you know.
00:21:12
Speaker
Unless they're somebody with yeah independently wealthy and stuff. so it's And it makes it harder. makes it hard to figure out what the heck you're doing. and And then you start seeing why. Well, this is why things don't change.
00:21:25
Speaker
yeah. yeah Because you basically vote for the same people over and over again because there's choices. Well, mainly lack of education a lot of times. And when you panic, you go into the voting booths and you don't know who to vote for.
00:21:39
Speaker
vote for the name you know.
Podcast Mission and Improvement
00:21:41
Speaker
the Or the DNR that you know, that you trust yeah say you trust. you know that's there's There's a reason like Sherrod Brown was in a few of the guys who were in the Senate for for a long time.
00:21:52
Speaker
Just name recognition. Yep. So that's why we're doing it. That's kind of what our mission state is, just to just inform <unk> people how we want to be informed. and And so forth hopefully we can get better at it.
00:22:06
Speaker
We're still kind of crappy at it. Yeah, we're not that great at it, but we're going to get better. Yeah, it's just we're amateurs. What are you going to do? we're we're We're fumbling around a little bit, but it's fun. It's going to be fun. Yeah, is fun. And like I said, I feel can speak on topics I never spoke on could spoke speak on before until after the issue that was already done.
00:22:27
Speaker
Yeah, the other other thing I wanted to hit on, just a little bit of why I want to do this, is I do want to debunk, and I guess we touched on this a little bit, the the news really kind of has a narrative often, and I do want to debunk the narrative when it's inaccurate.
00:22:48
Speaker
Yeah, hold them accountable and have somebody else holding them accountable. It's like we're talking about the school funding. Why why are you guys they' shaping it this way? Yeah, yeah. And you know what? it It doesn't even make sense why they're shaping it that way. The only thing I can think of is that the news stations or the, they they have some kind of money behind them that's kind of pointing them in the direction that they need to go. Maybe advertisers? I don't know.
00:23:14
Speaker
Yeah, that's usually the case. That's a good point.
00:23:21
Speaker
Because it it really doesn't make sense. Like, why are you calling it cuts when it's not really cuts? Is it to to have a have a um ah headline that sounds like you need to click on it Yeah.
00:23:36
Speaker
You know? yeah i don't know. That could be, that's probably the best case scenario, I would think. Yeah, but. Because anything else is pretty nefarious, if you ask if there's any other reason. Even that's a little bit.
00:23:47
Speaker
It is nefarious. And the thing is, you get you get these people that are that loser-ish on a headline and they don't read the article.
00:23:58
Speaker
Or if they do read it, and i I have people in my family that will read an article, will will share it, will complain about it, and then when you really look into it, they have nothing to complain about.
00:24:12
Speaker
Yes, they didn't read it. They're infuriated over something that they don't even understand.
00:24:21
Speaker
And usually pretty easily flushed out by just asking, why? What about this don't you like? Or, you know, a simple question usually, and I've seen it many times and times again with something like this, people, all of a sudden, it feels like they snap out of it and go, oh, well, actually, I don't know, if
Hosts' Backgrounds and Personal Connections
00:24:39
Speaker
they're honest.
00:24:39
Speaker
That, you know, when when you're talking to somebody in person, that's that's pretty easy. Yeah. but You know, when when you get people that are afraid to talk, to other people in person, they often are just posting bat-ish crazy stuff online and calling it facts and getting all worked up over nothing.
00:25:05
Speaker
and And you can never have it. You can't you can't you can't have a conversation. Usually not with those things. and The mind's already made up. They're closed.
00:25:15
Speaker
Yep. Wow. Yeah, I agree. it it's it's It's rampant and needs to stop. I guess the the other thing is, who the hell are we, Tom?
00:25:28
Speaker
Well, my name's Tom. My name's Robert. And that's who we are are in Northeast Ohio. Yes. A couple of schlubs. yeah we're slow I'm just a working stiff.
00:25:41
Speaker
i I've been working in the manufacturing industry on the shop floor for over 30 years. For about 25 years, i at the same time, I was a musician and worked about three, four nights a week. So I've always had a... um ah what do you call that? ah as A aside ah side hustle.
00:26:05
Speaker
yeah And for for about 10 years, I had a photography studio, actually a brick and mortar studio that was ah mostly wedding and portrait photography.
00:26:17
Speaker
Me and my wife ran that. And it was it wass pretty good, but we got burnt out. we yeah was I wouldn't call it successful, but it was... ah surviving. it was we We thought something that would be a nice side hustle, part-time type of job would be part-time, but it actually was more of a full-time job than our full-time jobs. And thankfully, we closed that down in about 2018 and COVID hit, you know, the pandemic.
00:26:52
Speaker
yeah And I don't know what would have happened if we would have stayed open because I think that would have just, they had to devastate some of these companies. Well, yeah, for a short time, there were no weddings.
00:27:03
Speaker
Yeah, for almost a short year. year yeah Just the scheduling and all that with the with the wedding vendors and all that would have been a nightmare. So I'm thankful we closed that down.
00:27:17
Speaker
um And since then, I haven't had a side hustle until, I guess, this. so yeah And ah in um I do plan on getting back out there and playing playing gigs again here soon. I just got to get my old ass up out there again.
00:27:33
Speaker
Yeah. I am ah working stiff as well. Maybe not as stiff as you're working. don't know how that went, but I'm in sales. I do sales basically in the construction industry.
00:27:46
Speaker
And so i do I do have some occasionally boots on the ground moments over the last few weeks on certain things that kind of cross territories. up But i basically I'm in sales. I've been probably doing sales for...
00:28:05
Speaker
10, 15 years probably. Now to think about it, shoot, it's been that long. Time flies, man. Time flies. I mean, I've done other things, but always always and with one foot on the sales side, seems as as I go back and look at things, like, yeah, I've always been selling.
00:28:20
Speaker
um Sometimes i was an operations manager and i was selling. Sometimes I was just ah selling. um So always, in it I've been in construction industry my whole life, so it just kind of ties into it. Now na instead of doing all the hard work, I do the easy work, as they say.
00:28:33
Speaker
Yeah, but we're we're still in blue collar industries. Very blue collar. Very, very, very union for me. Very union focused industry. Yeah. Which is great.
00:28:43
Speaker
ah You know, down the earth guys and who talk straight to you for sure. They don't pull any punches usually. But also, I guess the pig the big reveal would be that we're related.
00:28:58
Speaker
You're my brother-in-law. Yes. I married your sister. Damn you. I mean, I know. I can't believe it. I still can't believe it to this day that she did that. But I mean. i i should say also that I've been married for 19 years. I didn't mention that. She's an awesome human being, incredible partner. Yeah, chalk up those brownie points.
00:29:19
Speaker
Yeah. I just had a cigar in my room, so I had to say something nice. Yeah, I've been married. We've been married, well, a year after you got married.
00:29:31
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Approximately. so Yeah. You got engaged at my wedding. Yes, that's right. Yeah. ah Thanks to your wife. Yeah. Talked me into it.
00:29:42
Speaker
it was Yeah. It was a great night. So I, I, yeah, yeah it was. I, I also
00:29:51
Speaker
but touched on the photography business with you, which was quite fun. I learned a lot and I learned how to take pictures of my kids. Yeah, that was two hours before you had your kids.
00:30:04
Speaker
Yes. that was thereabouts yeah was That was actually during her the whole time. I think you kind of bowed out of it a little bit because you you got you got busy with being being a dad. Yeah.
00:30:15
Speaker
yeah I was doing a lot of stuff. I mean, one year, I think I did 12 of my own yeah weddings along with helping you guys out. I think the one I did probably well over 25 weddings. and for part-time was a lot.
00:30:27
Speaker
You got 52 weekends a year and 20, 25 of them. ah People forget too. I mean, I'm going to, when you say like, oh, I shot 15 weddings, it doesn't sound like that much, but you got to you got to remember you met with probably, if you did 15 weddings, you met with at least 30 people to sell yourself.
00:30:44
Speaker
And then you have the engagement shoots. You have the meetings before the wedding. You have the meetings after the wedding. You have the sales pitch after the wedding, you know, so it's it's I figured like 40 hours each wedding.
00:30:57
Speaker
Oh, ah easy. yeah It was easy. yeah you guys so You could have 10, 12 hours just editing photos and and making an album. That's the other thing. It's like, not only that, you're editing albums, you're designing albums, you're selling albums. Blog posts.
00:31:12
Speaker
Yeah. You got to do blog posts. You got to write. I became a writer. which which honestly has helped me in business and in in this venture because ah kind of touched, you would do a, wedding we would do a wedding,
00:31:27
Speaker
And we would try to do a Facebook or a blog or website post that following Sunday, which was quite tough. And, but you couldn't just post pictures. You wanted to talk about the day, which means you had just, you know, before AI could do it for you, you actually had to think of nice things to say and put it in a different, in a nice light.
00:31:44
Speaker
And I've gotten many compliments by, about emails and how I construct them. And I pretty sure it goes back to that. Sure. Like, obviously I'm not, talking I'm not talking about how nice the weather was and all this stuff, but.
00:31:55
Speaker
Making a coherent case in a short span of a couple paragraphs is is not always as easy. so Sometimes when I'm talking about... Yeah.
00:32:08
Speaker
there I learned a lot from that. That's my point. If I talk about that time of my life, I i might sound like i regret doing it. And I i guess i read I wish I would have...
00:32:20
Speaker
I wish I wouldn't have done it that long, but it was a great, we we had the business going for about eight, nine years. That long? Geez. Yeah. For for us, it was. Yeah. And um i I remember after the third year, I was like, mean i was I sat down with my wife. We were contemplating whether we should shut it down. And i i wish we did at that point.
00:32:43
Speaker
Yeah. It's only because um we we just burnt ourselves out and we weren't living we weren't living a life We were just working.
00:32:56
Speaker
But I don't regret the part that we learned a ton of stuff, you know running a business. And meet it we met great people. We had great clients. and yeah And that part of it was really very rewarding. I met i met great friends and and I met great people along the way. So I don't regret that part of it. But man, the burnout was, I didn't know who I was by the end of that.
00:33:24
Speaker
Yeah, there was a lot going on there. was it was It was very fun. i bought a lot of cool stuff. yeah like You could say we didn't really make much money because we we kept pouring it back into the business.
00:33:38
Speaker
I mean, for you for example, you had a studio. I mean, that comes with a whole bunch of costs and stuff. Yeah, yeah, there was was cheap. so but We made, you made money. You just didn't put much in your pocket at the end the week, which is fine. we were You weren't looking to get rich right away, but you got to start somewhere. And, and look, people, if you don't try and fail, then you're never going to get anything.
00:34:00
Speaker
You're never going to go go anywhere. yeah to try We were profitable, but it wasn't, yeah you know, I was, I was making like five bucks an hour. yeah If you, if you took all the time you're um putting into it, it was like, you know, I guess the good part was that we, you know, my wife and I had a couple of nice vacations with the, with the profits that we hit, we took.
00:34:19
Speaker
I did one of those too. Yep. WPPI was it? No. ah Yeah. That was like a working vacation, but you know, we ended up going to, uh, ah We visited Sedona and we did we did a cruise with with us on one vacation. It was ah it was good.
00:34:36
Speaker
Yeah, I got a sweet computer, and i which I just took out of service. That tower that... lastted your while Yeah, the only reason I took it out on the side note is I realized it's like a 250-watt light bulb running all the time. All the time, right.
00:34:51
Speaker
So I bought a Mac Mini for like $150 off of eBay, which takes like 12 watts instead of 250 or something crazy. I think at max it's like 40 or something. It's incredible what the what what computers are now.
00:35:04
Speaker
I got a sweet camera that I still have. Yeah. I still use. and And one of the reasons I'll be using it on my next vacation. Sure.
Show Evolution and Listener Involvement
00:35:15
Speaker
Last one, I forgot it at home.
00:35:18
Speaker
So I didn't bring it, but, you know, it's one of those things you got to learn to, you got to pull it out. And if you don't, Got to use it all. You got to use it regularly. Yeah. That's so that's the other thing I wanted. to There's a couple of things I want to do here in the future is it's get get back into the music scene, which was originally like I i quit i quit up my band back in like it was 2010. Oh, you burned out too, right?
00:35:42
Speaker
It was, you know what it was? ah um Yeah, i started, we I had three, i had two side hustles plus my day job. So I was i was playing music and started the photography business.
00:35:53
Speaker
That's right. And the photography business was actually paying way better. Yeah. And then I, um, I, I meant to quit the, the, I quit the band. I, the guys I played with, I loved them. They're, they're dear friends oh that I don't talk to, but I loved them.
00:36:13
Speaker
And, um, but it was just, man, I was in that band for 12 years. it was three, four nights a week for a bunch of those years. And,
00:36:25
Speaker
Yeah, playing the same tunes for all those years. with the the bit the band I guess the band just didn't offer challenge for me anymore. and I needed a refresh. I needed to start something new.
00:36:37
Speaker
And what what I intended to be like a year or two break is now over a decade. Flash. here It's now 10 years. Yeah, exactly. Like an iron, 10 years go by.
00:36:48
Speaker
and case anybody's wondering, the intro music is yours. Oh, well, I didn't want to say that. Well, I can check. I did cut that out. No, that's okay. No. that was just it was ah It was actually ah i I have a bunch of these things recorded that are just ideas that I never fleshed out.
00:37:07
Speaker
So I just took one and kind of quickly put put it together. So it is i'd bit as I do want to kind of clean that up. We will. We'll get better at it it. It's just way better than any of the royalty-free music that you can get for nothing.
00:37:20
Speaker
Yeah. But it's just a little bit of your time, I guess. Yeah, we've been doing this, so now I don't have time to do that. Yeah, and I think it'll get better as we get more efficient at, and honestly, we're learning so much about the state of Ohio right now and Northeastern Ohio.
00:37:37
Speaker
I think once we get over that learning curve, it'll become easier. Because well we're going to know a lot of this stuff just by reading these articles and getting the lay of the land of what's going on legislative legislatively and all that other stuff.
00:37:50
Speaker
Start knowing the players and who how they are and what their tendencies are. I think it'll easier for us to... You know what's going to make it easier too is... so The part that I found the hardest, not the hardest, I guess, but it's difficult to not find stories, but actually cut stories.
00:38:13
Speaker
So I always save too many stories and then I don't know what we like what I think we should cover. yeah So it's hard um editing what you want to cover. So if people want to share what they think,
00:38:27
Speaker
we should be covering. yes Send an email. Please email us. Tell us what you want to know because I go go through stories. I'm like, oh, this is cool. We should talk about this. And then I think about it. I'm like, i don't know. Does anybody really want this one? Yeah. So it'd be crookedrivercast at gmail.com.
00:38:46
Speaker
Yeah. crookedrivercast at gmail.com. I usually, I try to put it in every show notes at the top. So first thing you see, so shoot us an email, tell us, yeah you know, if there's stories that we're not talking about, shoot, shoot us a link. well Yeah. if If you know of a story, send it, send us a link and please use all the help you can get.
00:39:08
Speaker
Trust me. Yeah. I know it sounds like we're really smart,
00:39:15
Speaker
So that's bump. Yeah. Wait a minute. It sounds like we're really smart, but. But don't. There you go. There you go. Finally got to use that.
00:39:29
Speaker
Other than that, i think I think that touches all the things I wanted to talk about. What about you? Yeah, I think so. pretty Pretty good on that.
00:39:40
Speaker
Who we are, what we are, why we are.
00:39:44
Speaker
And as this show evolves, it it will change more? Yeah, this was hopeful before you get more show will. You know, is it's going to evolve because I've talked about, I think we we started talking about this a little while ago, but never really. ah You know what, Rob?
00:40:04
Speaker
What? We need to go and have a bourbon or two and a cigar and talk about a couple of things. but But like one things. I could be ready in 15 minutes. Yeah. But like one of the things I was like, should we do focus more on one story and really dig into it? Or should we, you know, like do what we're doing or there's, ah you know, there's, there's ways this, this show will evolve and we might even try different things and you could let us know what you think. I mean, if it believe if it's.
00:40:33
Speaker
If you're bored out of your mind, let us know. Yeah. Well, yeah. Just be kind. Just be kind. Yes. Be kind. And just like you used to rewind.
00:40:45
Speaker
All Yep. And we want the help from everybody because the more we help we get from listeners, the better we're going to be for the listeners, I guess. So yeah send them over your way um and any other suggestions and checks.
00:41:00
Speaker
We will take money orders, checks. I'm kidding. I mean, we will take checks, but... We will. We're going to set up a donation or a tip jar here
Conclusion and Farewell
00:41:09
Speaker
somehow. Yes. I think.
00:41:10
Speaker
Because we we're not... I don't know. are we Are we ever going to look for sponsors or anything? I don't know. We'll see. I don't know. it depends. I don't... I kind of would like to stay away from the... I don't know.
00:41:23
Speaker
I'm open to The value for value model model is nice. I like that model. I do like the value of value. If nobody knows what that is, would be... Valueful value. So you can give us your time, your talent, or your treasure. actually heard them speak about this in church a couple of times, and I stopped myself from laughing.
00:41:41
Speaker
Not laughing at them, but it was funny that they brought up in that fashion time, talent, and treasure, talking about giving to the church you know time, talent, and treasure. I go, yeah, just like your local podcast, you got give time, talent, and treasure. Whether that's helping us out with stories, helping us out with a jingle, helping us out with your treasure. Yeah.
00:41:58
Speaker
Yeah, one you we're going to have a blog. We might you know might need help help with some blog posts. Yeah, ideas for the blog, hosting, setup, all that kind of stuff. It depends on what your specialty is. and
00:42:11
Speaker
Or treasure. Treasure always works. We love treasure. Green, silver, anything. We'll take it. Gold, Bitcoin. Bitcoin. We've got to set that up. So that would be probably the next on the agenda after next couple of weeks. I think we're going to try to look for ways to throw that But I think we need to like look at a website and maybe the blog would be first because then you can tie in donations to that.
00:42:33
Speaker
My wife wants to start designing a blog, so we're going to start. We'll be talking about that over the next couple of weeks. Yeah, that'll be cool. That'll be fun. something Something to refer back to as you go through these stories. And and and a lot of the stories we're we're trying to maybe...
00:42:51
Speaker
evolved this into is, you know, some, some deep dives and then some heads up stories like, here, check this out. This is what's coming down. Here's some headlines. And then hopefully point you back to our, our blog where the stories would be, or ah maybe more the stories.
00:43:04
Speaker
Hey, you can listen to us on the way to work. And then when you get to work, you can waste the company's time by looking at our blog. Perfect. Sharing it to everybody in your, just texting it to everybody in your office. Perfect. I like All right. um I'm good. You good? You got anything else?
00:43:20
Speaker
Nope. That's it. All right. I will ah we'll see everybody next week. Listen to and talk to everybody next week. I got to get that down one of these weeks. Yeah. Yeah. It'll come.
00:43:31
Speaker
um Nice talking to Tom. Everybody have a good week and see you. Peace.