Welcome everyone to this fireside chat. I have with me Chris Blackman. Chris, for those of you working on conflict, doesn't need much of an introduction. For the others, Chris is a professor at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. He was before at Yale, at Berkeley, and several other places. And he's been for a number of years now doing a series of pioneering research on conflict and political violence in many parts of the world. Chris, thank you very much for joining this UNU wider conference. It's really great to see you again. Yeah, thank you. So we have several young scholars in our audience that were really looking forward to hearing from you. And a lot of questions that I often hear is how does an economist end up working on such a topic as conflict and political violence? How did he end up working in this area of research? Can you tell us a bit about your trajectory up to this point? Sure. Well, I was for a long time been interested in international development. And I was, you know, like, there's this famous saying that once you start thinking about economic growth, it's hard to think about anything else. And I was sort of in that I was thinking about that. And I was working on a fact, I was working on a survey of factories and firms in Kenya, because I was very interested in industrialization. And and then one day to two con men started talking to me at lunch. And while one of them engagement conversation, the other one stole my my laptop. And so I was in an internet cafe for the rest of my trip whenever I needed to send emails. And back in 2004, I think each email took like 10 minutes to load. And so I would chat to the people next to me. And I started chatting to a woman who was working in a humanitarian crisis, who's a psychologist and a PhD student and working in Northern Uganda for many years during the war. And I admit I followed her there because I was mostly interested in her rather than the war. But then I realized that once you start thinking about conflict, it's hard to think about anything else. So we've now been married 15 years, we have two kids. We wrote many of our papers together. And that and that collaboration where we decided to were basically I jumped onto her qualitative study of child soldiering and turned it into also like a mixed methods study by doing the quantitative end. And that sort of launched me on a career of studying conflict. So it was it was sort of love and happenstance. That's a good story. And the best part is my for all the students out there, my dissertation committee told me it was a terrible idea and I shouldn't go. So I defy them as well, unfortunately. But but so yeah, so you never know, you never know, don't listen to your advisors as maybe the punchline of the story. Thank you for that because I think I may have some PhD students in the audience. So yeah, but that tends to be the advice often in this area. So I have a few more questions for Chris, but I see the audience has increased now. And anyone that would like to ask Chris a question, please, you're very welcome to do so. We have a Q&A button. So we don't have a raise hand button like you might be used to. But if you just drop a note there or on the chat, I'll be able to see you and Eva will kindly unmute you and you can ask the question if that's okay with Chris. Okay, until I see someone raising one thing to ask. So let me just carry on.  And the first thing I was asked is have I been able to see a dance copy of the new book for the record? I haven't yet looking forward to it. But I was hoping, could you tell us a bit about the new book and what is it about? It's entitled Why We Fight. Can you give us an advanced summary of what we can expect? Right. And for the record, I don't have an advanced copy of the book either. It's just gotten submitted for, I just turned in the copy edited version and these things move along slowly and I'll come out in April. So I guess the idea is I was inspired to write this because I talk to people and I read in the newspaper how there's this sense that it's easy to look around and feel like violence is everywhere. And so a lot of people think that war is common place or that it's humanity's natural state. And Patricia, you'd know, as a lot of political scientists know, that's not really true because when it comes down to it, most adversaries don't fight. And we could be talking about ethnic groups. We could be talking about countries. We could be talking about political factions. We could be talking about Chicago or Latin America or Africa. It doesn't really matter. Most enemies compromise and they do that for a really simple reason, which is just war is incredibly destructive. And so people are better off finding some other way, some way to avoid it. And maybe the problem is nobody writes books about these million little compromises. We all read books, we all buy books about wars that happen. And I get that I buy a lot of books about wars that happen, but it ends up distorting our thinking. Partly it makes us think war is everywhere, but it's not. And but actually really most importantly, it makes us get the causes of war wrong because we're only looking at the time something broke down. It's sort of like a doctor that would only look at sick patients and never realize that most people are healthy and never really observe people in the healthy state that's broken. So the book's designed to fix that. And so even so I start off with a book that's called Why We Fight. I actually talk about why we don't fight. But then of course we do sometimes. And so part one of the book is actually about why that breaks down in some cases. And I make an argument that you can put all these explanations like there's a reason for every war and war for every reason. There's basically five types of reasons, five logics. Some of them draw on political science and economics. Some of them draw on on game theory and strategy. Some of them draw on psychology. And then the second part of the book walks us through the paths to peace. So basically how societies resolve these sort of five sources of breakdown. And how they basically every intervention in an institution we have, political institution, peacekeeping, police, whatever it will be, when they work, it's because they actually reverse these sorts of five problems. They make settlements more durable and they sort of get they get enemies back to their natural state, which is to just load one another in peace. And so why do you think are the main motivations that would lead someone to actually fight? I mean, I give these examples sometimes I ask this question actually to my students, which is, you know, we all ordinary people sitting in the room having a seminar. What would it take for you to pick up arms at fight against someone that you might know? And I guess this is the question we all struggle with. Well, I mean, I'd say the five logics that I think cover almost all explanations for conflict. So one is just that whoever's deciding to go to whether or not to fight doesn't bear a lot of the costs or may even have private incentives. So economists and political scientists would call that an agency problem. But we could just think of that as unchecked leaders. So it's maybe in my personal interest to take my group to war. The second thing that and that's maybe the most common in human history, even though it's surprised, it's maybe the least focused on I think in a lot of our academic literature. Then there's then then I think, you know, economists and political scientists have really dwelled on a couple of other sources of war. One is basically uncertainty and private information and different information sets so that basically, I think I'm stronger than I am or I misjudge how strong you are or I'm not sure. And so we have to fight to work that out and working that out, basically trying to figure out how learning by fighting can actually take longer than you might think. And so the third is another sort of game theoretic and strategic, which is that we basically have dynamic incentives that basically I have a window of opportunity to really cement the balance of power in my favor. And if I don't take it, then I'm probably going to be, I think you're going to be more powerful in the future and you're going to take that away from me. And so it's this sort of changing power dynamics over time, which which economists and political scientists call commitment problems. And so those are sort of our three more economic political science game theoretic reasons. But then I also talk about the psychological reasons. One is when groups or their leaders have intrinsic incentives to go to war, either they value violence itself or they value something only violence can deliver. So there's maybe an unwillingness to compromise on certain ideological issues, which could be liberty, which could be religion, it could be something as noble as human rights. And it could be something as base as exterminating the heretic or exterminating the ethnicity or the religion, whoever that you happen to disagree with. And so that's another logic that breaks down these bargains. And the last I would say is what political scientists have called misperceptions, which have to do with all the ways where they misjudge ourselves persistently or misjudge others. So it's like persistently erroneous beliefs, which we're amazingly capable of. So it could be over confidence or could be a misconstrual of your motives and your actions. And so, you know, the book is sort of talking about all the different things that people say. This war happened for this reason, this war happened for that reason, whether it's the first World War or an African civil war or gun violence in Chicago, how we can understand them all through these sort of five lenses. That's really, I mean, that's pretty, that's really insightful. You also have, I noticed you know, the blurb about the book, a very provocative sentence, which is, well, peace is actually easy. It's fighting that is difficult. Why do you think peace is easy? Well, I think a lot of people think, I mean, I guess is the, because we've underestimated how many enemies find it. Like think about, I live in a city in Chicago, which is cleaved by race and class, right? And yet there is no civil war in Chicago, right? There is gun violence and gang violence, that's totally separate, that's a few hundred individuals and totally different. But generally, like there's this incredible divide. And you could say the same thing about the United States, right? There's an incredible polarization and yet there's no conflict. So clearly, we're able to find settlements all the time. And we just don't see it. So, but once you hear that, like you start reading history books, and you'll notice that for every king that takes his country to war, there's like a privy council that's whispering in another king's ear saying, this is too expensive. Or there's some treasurer saying, we can't afford this. And that's what happened. So 99 times out of 100, they don't do it. So that's why it's easier, I think. But if we don't notice that, then we I think we chronically overestimate how difficult it is to achieve. But I guess the difficulty will be once in our conflict is so ingrained for so long. I presume those are the situations where peace, like in everyone else here with Afghanistan comes to mind, right? That's when things become really tricky, right? Yeah. And I think these long ongoing conflicts, one, they fall into warfare and then they sort of have these circular dynamics that can make it harder and harder to resolve. So, you know, those psychological hatreds and those sort of misproject, misperceptions about your enemy and your misjudging of yourself can get worse, right? You may also have these intrinsic incentives to keep fighting nearly out of vengeance and out of a desire for revenge. And there and that the other one of the other buckets I talked about, one of these strategic buckets, commitment problems can get worse in civil wars because at the end of, especially in the civil war where you have to put down your weapons and submit yourself to a government, essentially. And that's profoundly risky because there's an opportunity for a more powerful faction to use that window of opportunity to sort of wipe you out completely. And so once a war is started, it has these dynamics that can actually make it difficult. And that's that I don't want to diminish that, but I do want to point out that most enemies never get there. And so most of the time, but not all of the time, most of the time pieces easier than anything. I fully agree. We have a few requests for questions. I think Collette, Collette Salemi was asking to share with you. Could you click the blue button on the right hand side of Collette? Let's see if we can. Oh, here we go. Hi there. Hi, I didn't realize that video was going to come on. Anyway, so here's a black man. This is really exciting, especially because I feel like you're offering a paradigm shift away from the common economic framework around conflict is very focused on resources. And and I was wondering if you could comment at all on sort of the the persistence of the neo Malthusian framework with respect to resource scarcity leads to violence, how that actually could probably fit in quite well or how we could actually probably better understand those dynamics through the five lenses that you've laid out. Mm hmm. So I mean, it's a great question. It's that's true. The I guess what I would say is that, you know, if we're if we're splitting a pie, the pie could be a policy issue and could be control of territory. It doesn't as long as war is going to cost something as long as war is going to be destructive. It doesn't matter if the pie is very small or extremely large. It's always going to make sense to try to carve up that pie peacefully rather than fight over it. And so resource stocks shouldn't resources and shocks to resources shouldn't really matter. And indeed, I think a lot of the literature says they don't I think partly this comes from a miss, I would say a misinterpretation of regression coefficients where people have regressed conflict on resources or conflicts on shocks to resources, whether it's droughts or prices. And then they they they see a relationship because there is a relationship there, but they forget then that when you regress conflict on these things for every one year where conflict breaks out, you have maybe nine years or 20 years when conflict continues or gets more intense.  And so and so when you actually separate those things out, you find that there actually isn't much of a relationship between war breaking out and whether you're poor or rich or there's resources or not. There's a tiny bit because it matters a little bit. It's but it's a little bit like it's one of the many idiosyncratic forces that can be destabilizing a big resource shock makes, you know, everybody has to rebar again. Everybody has to find a new settlement. And that's tricky. And so sometimes that breaks down.  But if we say like why why did this person die? On the one hand, yes, they died of cold. But but actually it's fundamentally that was there was mother that was a very fragile state that because the fundamentals of the health were poor. And so we just need to we need to still pay attention to the cold, right? Especially in this environment, we have to we have to pay attention. We have to have come up with vaccines and wear masks and and such things. But we have to fundamentally focus on people's health. And that's kind of what the book is is pushing people to do. And there's a question from Yanika Makat. Yanika, do you want to join us? Yep, she does. Hi. Hello. Hi. Hi. Yeah, so I think the least categorizations were really good. I've actually used that in my African politics class, because it kind of like explains the debate in political science between greed versus grievance explanations quite nicely, because then you don't have to debate about the motivations, right? Because these are really good categorizations. But I think I wonder, in terms of like, when we want to test the political implications, and like, are the ways in which we could operationalize these categories, because some of them are quite similar in terms of like, can be empirically non-differentiable of each other, I think. That's a good point. So I'll say a few things. One is, I mean, the first thing I should mention, this isn't my theory of conflict. Like, this is, the book is really me trying to document, maybe bring sort of a unifying framework to what everybody has talked about, and just bring some, and for a, if you were in this literature, and you were steeped in the psychology, you might not know the game theory. And if you know the game theory, you often don't know the psychology. So I'm trying to bring that. So think of this as like a typology of theories rather than a theory. And I think that's what, it's very hard to, so the question is, how do you do diagnosis then? And operationalizing and heuristic thing is, it's so tricky that, you know, when I write about the First World War, or the Peloponnesian War, or a Civil War in Africa, or gun violence in Chicago, the literature can't even agree on what the causes are, right? In fact, they all, and they debate these things endlessly, especially things like the First World War, where this is probably more written. So this is what makes it so challenging, I think, is the fact that it's actually really difficult to diagnose. It's like trying to diagnose a patient who's sick with five or six different ailments, all of which are sort of manifesting in a similar way, and could be any number of different things, and you just have to try to figure it out. And so the last chapter of the book actually is, I call it, the piecemeal engineer, which is sort of after Karl Popper's piecemeal engineer, except now I spell piecemeal piece, like, worn piece. And I talk about how, because this is so difficult, as with any complex or wicked social problem, what we have to do is we have to tinker, and we have to work on the margins, and we have to explore with care, and we have to recognize that a lot of the time we're going to get it wrong, and we're going to make mistakes. And only through that tinkering and experimentation are we ever going to sort this out. Thank you. And I didn't realize that 20 minutes were actually so quick. We almost it's just one final question. I know people are listening to you, as myself, thinking, well, it's a great idea to produce a book like this. I'm sure it will reach why the audiences will reach policymakers, and so forth. And others might be thinking with repudiation about it. What are your views about the importance of a book like this, for us as researchers in trying to reach broader audiences? So do you mean what is the effect of the book on research, or what's the effect on how we speak to? How we speak to the broader public, which I assume is what the book will try to do, right? No, very much. Even from a postdoc, I started my blog, I've been active on social media. This is the point for me. I joined academia, partly because I love the science and the investigation, but mostly I wanted to make social change, and I thought the best way I could do that is to change the conversation. And so that's kind of what I see. I think we as academics underestimate how powerful a tool that is, which is to just sort of change the way many, many people talk about a problem in a room together, and you give them a vocabulary and you give them ideas, and if I could make people think more like piecemeal engineers, which is in some ways the purpose of the book, then I'll probably have done, even if only a few people do so, then that'll be more good than anything else I did with any of my research. Great. We're pretty much out of time, and it's been really great to talk with you, and we haven't even reached other issues around. I mean, if everyone is interested, Chris is also doing an awesome project on gangs, which would be great to hear another opportunity. And I thank you very much, Chris, for your patience and answering the questions and joining us and everyone that joined in. And I hope to see you in Helsinki at some point. Yeah, thank you. Well, thank you so much. It was a pleasure. Thank you.


lungs. That means there is some problem outside of this building that God has called your life to solve. That if you are not dead, God is not done. That if you're not six feet under, that means that there is still something out there that your life is called to solve and fix. And the moment you find the problem you're called to solve, you have stumbled headlong into purpose.


this weekend on Ireland's fittest family it's back we started last week actually back with the the usual coaches David Fitzgerald and Anna Geary and Donahoe Callahan and also a new coach and Nina Carberry and the the way it works of course families put through the toughest challenges and there's some new locations this year but there's a family from Donegal from the in fact the Gollacher family and Lisa now joins us and we're streaming on YouTube and Facebook as well Lisa good afternoon good afternoon John how are you good good now we're going to see you this weekend as tonight is it on Sunday at six okay thank you pardon uh Sunday night okay now um this is in the heats and uh you're doing this then to get through to the the next round and so on obviously you know you're not allowed to tell us how you got on but you can tell us how top it was oh so you'll see on Sunday night this is heat two so already had heat one and two families have gone through so two out the four families have gone through so yeah we take part in two events and one's called fast and furious which is uh so it'll be the four of us against the other three teams and it's basically an obstacle course and you have to go as fast as you can and uh obviously to win and then the second event is called slingshot which is like a timed event where you have five minutes and you're kind of harnessed up to like a bungee and you have to get across a swamp with a ball and get as many balls into the drums as possible right sounds tricky and tough yeah really hard really hard yeah yeah and and where was your part filmed was it down at down in Wicklow uh we were down in me for the first week for the first you know so they start there and then any families that progress and they go to um Wicklow okay okay and we are prepared for it I mean you know how you know was it kind of as tough as you expected or or worse or different uh I don't know any training you can do can prepare you for what you actually have to do because you don't know what events you're gonna do and then until you arrive and then you'll get the safety walkthrough and that's the first time you get to see the event so you're trying to kind of take it in and kind of then think tactics how are we going to manage this event between us who will go first you know you're kind of trying to weigh it out as a team um and but it like we've all done different types of training but we all kind of agreed that I don't know what you could have done to train for it okay and tell me who's in the team so it's myself and then my daughter Molly she's 23 and then my son James is 19 and then my son Connor who is 18 and I take it they're all sporty they're all sport yeah Molly was like a gymnast and uh the boys are both into the football and Connor uh he he used to box as well so yeah they're very sporty you've always done sports yeah but as you say you know it's hard to know what sort of training or what sort of sport you need to be into uh in order to um be fully prepared for this because just some of the um uh some of what you're put up against um it's it's just it's really really tough and and you in specialist training just just wouldn't be possible no no you kind of know you need to have like um quite good endurance but then you know you need balance you need flexibility I mean I don't know if you saw last week's our events are different to what they did last week but they all want to raft put themselves at raft and it's like you're going to need upper body strength you're going to need balance to stay on the raft you know a lot of the families fell off because obviously how would you know that's coming up to practice so no no you just don't know what you're gonna get and you know all the families all the competitors seem really tough and you know obviously very sporty and they train for it but often it's uh it's the smarts that let people down that they you know it's the tactics the tactics is definitely number one like I know some of the you know read that some of the families have built the courses in their back gardens obstacle courses and ramps and walls and everything like we just carried on with our normal sports like I go up to intensity fitness three times a week so that's my training and I run Molly was doing just the gym the boys were doing gym and stuff but we never done anything extra we just thought you know it's it's teamwork you have to be able to communicate as a family because if you if you can't communicate you're not going to get anywhere hmm absolutely and without giving anything away is all the filming done now right through to the final is it it's all done dusted before the series starts yeah so um what happened is we actually applied last year for the show right and we so like so many families apply you have to do a fitness test and record it and send it all off as as well as you do like you know video interviews so we came 20 out of 16 so we all know we were kind of like reserved last year so they actually emailed me this year and said would you be interested in entering again but my son James he was going he's got was going to America at the time and and I didn't think that we would be able to compete so we kind of didn't know what we were going to do and then because the leaving set was late it kind of opened up a window for us that we could film because the filming was from July until September okay we just knew we had to be available for any of those days that they that they give you um well there's a new element well there's always a new element every series and that they throw in different challenges and they're thrown in a different location this time that uh rat begging lakes uh in in need but uh we can see how uh you get on uh uh all of you on uh sunday night had or sunday evening half past six on rt1 and and who knows Lisa I could be chatting to you again I just have to show that team now uh huh team what oh yeah all right I think it's not jerseys oh brilliant team got her okay well we're going to be rooting for team got her on sunday evening then so and did you get were you wearing that in the show we like this is the jersey wall well that's it okay well it's nothing else you have that as a memento yes and lots of memories okay well that's it we look forward to seeing you on sunday evening Lisa thanks a million thank you have me on thank you john bye bye thanks john


Well, good afternoon, everybody, and welcome. I'm excited to be standing here with these beautiful ladies and gentlemen here today. All these folks are big supporters of the mayor's campaign against breast cancer, and these ladies right here actually do all the hard work. I get to show up and serve pancakes and smile and have fun, but they really do all the hard work, and I want to make sure that we acknowledge and thank them for what they do for our community. As you know, breast cancer is the most common cancer in women, and one in every three women are affected. This personally has affected me, has affected a lot of the people standing here today.  And so it's very important as we remind ourselves to always make sure that we're checking and treating and making sure that we are taking advantage of all the upgrades in technology and opportunity, but that only happens if we support it. And so while we're standing here today along with our chief, our assistant chief from the fire department, and this great committee is, is that we want to continue to support Prisma Health, and we do this annually at our breakfast. And we do this because, A, we're their survivors. We're family members of survivors, and we are a believer that we want to have a healthier, smarter, and better community. And the only way we can do that is continuing to bring not only awareness, but investing and helping. And all the funds that we're raising will go to the bosom buddies fund to provide resources for recovery and emotional healing of individuals undergoing treatment of breast cancer. And we do this with a great passion, but we want to raise $50,000, folks. We want to have the biggest year we have. And so we're starting off the campaign with a T-shirt. You have an opportunity to buy a T-shirt short and long-sleeved, $20, folks, reaching your pocket by one, by two, by one for your mother, by one for your sister, by one for your husband, and your children. Spend some money, and, hey, we even got folks here ready to put their credit card out, so we'll take it. But we want you to invest, and you can do that at our website, ColumbiaSC.gov, or you can reach out to Ms. Alford at<PHONE_NUMBER> to get more information. And obviously, we will have this out on our website, a way for you to go ahead and pre-order. But we also want you to look at our sponsorship opportunities for the breakfast that we'll be having on October 6th, Friday here at City Hall. Once again, we're putting some twists in it. So it's not like it always has been. It's going to be the hot ticket that day, so don't miss it. We want to make sure you're all there, and very excited that we have an opportunity to kick off today, months in advance, and take advantage. We need to be wearing pink more often. Try to wear pink once a month. Make sure that you're talking to your family members and to your friends and neighbors how important it is to go through screenings and take advantage of all the opportunities that the hospital systems and our healthcare systems here in our community provide to help do this, because one in three is not a good number, folks. I want to see that number change dramatically, and the only way we do that is by working together. And this is your little way in helping make that happen, so thank you.


Now for the thrilling adventures of lightning Jim is the Fort Anderson Jr. and that fancy reformatory we got last time yeah no special ladies department here that was just the cold that just all into the Michael's trap shut up all of y'all tired with the phone brushes just the only difference between you and a pack of cold cats is just on your back I yell and get out white all the yellow in a yard white shut up shut up shut up shut up let me out of here lightning Jim and Whitey have just returned to their headquarters at Fort Anderson following a successful adventure down in Indian territory where they managed to capture the notorious woman banded bell star and date of the outlaws riding under her leadership and now we find Whitey reclining in the comfortable depth of an armchair shoes off feet resting on a convenient table buckling over a bit of gossip in the local newspaper so I'm coming up ready better close them windows oh you're at close them yeah sure load off my my known bell stars locked up good and tight I can tell you that they'd like me you don't need to tell me that you got buried over what the bell said about the deep into it well I reckon it is time to pull his wedding to let a bragging bother me but you know her record for luck at all the time he had been sentenced to jail the only time that woman ever left the prison for the front door was when her and Sam did that spectacularly Detroit reformatory last year you remember that oh I know all that like him but don't you forget that he had never been before yeah I reckon you're right buddy we've got a long way to the good luck ourselves oh good to be home there everything is so quiet he's so hey hey Whitey you haven't taken a look at this guy will you sure hey dim cut they look just like my divorce sure do I've done it like this get to me this guy looked at him he wasn't at the middle of the night yeah hey look what he up there in the distance that well and just he doesn't talk to me about guys sure let's come it's pretty sweet see we better get down in the cell come on hurry up look out for the help there all right opera you've lost to me you've got a whole spot on me without you you big get me get me in for me like this don't walk me like this you're all I'm all in it you don't have this reason I I saw that George was going to hit you Whitey thought I could touch it break the blow with my shoulder but was fast enough to reckon stop it with my head it's not there you go why did you do that to me why did you do that like this why did you do it to me why nothing but the don't get me you're your biggest man in the world why did you do that like this like this like this upon emergence of the seller Whitey discovered that it was hopeless to seek help for Lighting Jim close at hand all about him lay a scene of havoc and confusion cries of distress lent the darkness feeling his hope upon the slim chance that the Garrison might have his fate destructed he started out half blinded by the heavy downpour tumbling and groping in an uncertain passage among the wreckage ruined in the wake of the savage tornado he pushed doggedly towards the army post at the gate he was accosted by the sentry hi there half a moment, Ed what's the audience for? let me pass to Chris before I call for help Lighting Jim look in Lighting Jim I've never heard of him I've got the orders not to oh, oh, who goes there? oh, oh, oh girl I don't see a problem let's see and make this franchise cough me up let's get the scene that got to my ribs will you why you're a wibbly, prerated all the line call girls sorry, he's a US Deputy Mitchell sorry, sir I didn't know you sir, I feel I come for help Lighting Jim got in a cellar the head force is all alone it's been hurt Lighting Jim injured did it serious he's bleeding there from his second beat coughed and he said he'd see my life come and steal and not he might be dying the army post to Fort Anderson had lain outside the direct path of the tornado and thus had escaped to some extent the destruction which had claimed almost every home and building in the town. A portion of the barracks had been swept away by the wind, but enough had been less tending to provide shelter for the more seriously wounded of the townspeople who are being brought in by the dozens for medical attention. Into this crowded confusion, such a barracks carried the unconscious form of lightning gym. And Major Bowman McGrath and Kindly Old Army Surgeon deserted his other patients to give the famous marshal immediate care. Weakened by exposure and loss of blood, lightning gym condition was critical, and the conscientious surgeon was able to say no more and that the next few hours would tell the story. What is it? Are you here? Oh, I'm here, Lightning. Oh, you see, you know. Oh, my goodness. Where are we, Mighty? Well, what happened? There's no lightning. We're at the garrison. Now I remember. Mighty, what about thunder? Oh, thunder's all right, Lightning. You didn't get a scratch. Thank God. We could keep it at that. Oh, I know. How are you feeling, Lightning? I don't know. I can still just come to her, Lightning. Oh, Mighty, can I speak to you in a minute? Oh, sure. Let's go in my office. We'll be right back, Lightning. Hold on, Taddle. What's up? Why, uh... Why, nothing at all, Lightning. I just wanted to see you, Lightning. You're fooling me, Taddle. What is it?  And Mighty can take care of what I want. Yeah, I'll be sick again. Don't satisfy my curiosity. I know something's up. Well, you can't do anything about it, so you might as well know. The jail was partially destroyed by the tornado, and it killed the women. Did Belle's star get away? No, she was slightly injured, and one of the gang was killed. The gate leader in London stole a couple of horses and was seen heading for the border. Mighty, you gotta go after them. Lightning, I ain't going to leave until the doctor says you're all right. Thanks, partner. But I'm hard to kill. I'll be all right.  Duty comes first. Oh, I know.  Oh, yes, yes.  I'll have a man waiting at the north gate. Uh, listen, Mighty. Your mamrie's got a good hit. It's hard on you. Better take Thunder. Thunder? Lightning, you mean that I can write Thunder? Yeah. But don't let nothing happen to him, Mighty. And go on. Get going. Hold on there, Marshal. Hold on there, Corporal. Well, let's just stop him before this time.  I'm going with you. You are going with me. You mean that Jordan and Colonel still said to work this job with me? Yes, sir. Corporal Oakley's at your service, sir. Well, for the rotten lot. Hold on, sir. You ain't got no cold to feel that way. I've been only carrying out orders when I stopped you a while ago. Oh, well, that's for sure. You're staying on the horse, then? Yes, sir. Well, he's a marshal, aren't he? Well, Mighty, sir. No, come on. We've got the time to live. Mighty seems to have no premonition of the danger into which he so gallantly rides. What happens when he meets those murderous bandits, Jake Leader and Russ Finn, and one of the notorious bell-star whose threat to escape has caused Lightning Jim's such concern? The story unfolds in part two of the Adventures of Lightning Jim, which follows immediately. Powerful part two of the Adventures of Lightning Jim. It's the morning following the tornado, and Mighty and Corporal Hawkins are following the trail of the escaped outlaws. While back at the army barracks where the injured were brought for treatment, Lightning Jim is talking to Bell-star who occupies a neighboring tot. Well, that means the man he likes is in the balance list for eight hours ago.  Yeah, Bell. No saying. He says he's a good man down. No, a good woman either, Mawson. Don't forget that. Rather threat her stage, say, Bell. Forget any way you like, Latin. Well, I hear there was nothing to do. I'd like to know how you got into this good business of sports, healing, and bank robbing. Well, you're interested in Flattening, Flattening. Well, I must say your distinction of career is somewhat lacking in delicacy. I heard you were Confederate 5 during the war. Is that right, Bell? Yes, Flattening. Oh, it was wonderful. Flattening is Flattening. I don't exist in the nation I've known in the history, but there's no place to what real I live in to be. Oh, an old story, eh? Like the Danes and younger boys, you just couldn't settle down to decent living after the war was over, hm? Well, think about the size of it, Latin. Oh, I suggest Danes, who's totally under. I'll say it under Mr. Quantrell. You don't come to think of it. I did hear you were the Quantrell 5. Colonel McDougall over at Fort Besson. But tell me, he had had a run into you when he was just a non-Tom. Flattening made it mean a sounding southern Missouri. Yes, it was the first day of that encounter with Macedia, but I had my first drive with this as a federal companion. That's so, Bell. You see, Flattening, Quantrell was in pretty just a state for that time. He was operating in a political little tent for now 50 minutes in a political but literally two million soldiers and militiamen. And it was badly needed supplies and no militiamen could return. I've seen it was up to you to find out Well, ladies and gentlemen, the station's in the town in the canyon. So I went up there, heard it was one of these soldiers and got the information out of there. Well, it wouldn't sound simple enough, but what about passing that information on to Quantrell? That was a hard part, like this. I knew Quantrell was trying to get a man through the federal lines and that if he spoke up, that man would be waiting just outside of the town of Quantrell for me to bring Flattening to town.  Well, no. This is very early in the morning for a last-bill ride, nook. Well, good morning, Sergeant McLean. I just got my way to college and it's a long ride, so I hope you'll excuse me for those long calls. Well, I'm sorry to have to detail you, Miss Bell, but the fact that the matter is that Major Enos wishes a word with you. Tell him I'll see him the next time I come to McLean. Now, I'll be on my way. Can I do it, Miss Bell? We all did it but to bring you to the Major and bring you, I must. Well, you're wicked and highly-dissed, but I don't think it's a problem without you. I heard a lot about that figure temporary yours, Bell. Well, he didn't want to do that at all. I was taking the drugs and he was catching them to contrast. Only like you're locked in the car. Oh, so if you again, is it so all he's got? Yeah, what do you want now? Them rebels, you and you have been banging out for an hour past. Now, Major Seth, I can tell you there was fear driving him mad.  He doesn't have enough brains to go mad with. I'm glad to know my music tonight. I need to tell him to leave but it'll stop as soon as he sets me free. I'm not on duty to call. I might be a fickle arrestable war spy to me. Oh, I hadn't been arrested as a spy, Lightning. No.  I was going to have another reason to find out about an hour and a half.  Well, if you're a chemist, go to the show church. Come on, have the rest of the day yourself and look for me during your design. Okay. I'm going for it. To go the loop. I'll be free to go to traffic. That's it. But should you meet a detachment at Union Cavalry on the way, be certain to take a good look at their prisoner. I'll bet your yanked dollar to a rebel one will be captain Ed Sheeran, if he says. Oh, your brother Ed was the man that Cornfell had sent through the federal lines, eh, Ben? Yes, sir, I was simply surprised about you. You'd be seen somewhere along the route you headed north. But by some miracle, you were safe kept and made it through to Cavalry. Later years, Major Ines had dispatched the Cavalry suit to surround his hiding place and take him prisoner, get all out. Yeah, but that Cavalry group had a good hour, two hours start on your bell, and Carthage must be 35, 40 miles from Newtonia.  Carthage, right, 35 miles by road map, Lightning. And that was throughout the keep took. I knew a step cut across the hills, and there were several pickets that entered over all along the countryside. I'd have turned them to get to the Carthage, ahead of that trip. Come on, you couldn't do that. Yeah. They started to stop. That's it. That's it. One of the bullets creeped through for me. But it kept on. Mile from the other road. Poor little mayor, but she didn't already know about scary pictures I taught her that day. But I made it, Lightning. I got feeling kind of worried. When that Cavalry's creeped right in the Carthage, my brother was right on his way back to Cronkjell's camp. It's information that made possible one of the most successful and dear neighbors' career. A raid that cost the Federal $50 and the lives of over a hundred men. Well, Belle, all I got to say is that the scene that didn't turn that standard curve through a good cause when the war was over, they were riding the plains with a band of murder and cut roads. And they'd convert me to decide a law and order, Lightning. Well, maybe so. Well, how about you making a first-year scene having these handcuffs taken off you and annoy me? Well, sorry, Belle, but you'll have to stay on till the gales have had your face behind barbed again. You might take it, but you'll have to try to speak, you know. When I get ready to escape, Lightning, you may be sure a little thing I got to our home that has won't stop me. In the meantime, many miles south of Fort Anderson, Whitey and Hawkins forced their weary horses along a rocky trail. Fort Anderson, two boys, say Hawkins, take a look at these tracks. They're more than an hour old by galley. Oh, boys, what you say, Whitey? I say these tracks is right here, Hawkins. That means you ought to spot those here specifically as soon as we get out to this court. I hope you're right, Whitey.  I think it's really better if they ride on it that way in this town. Oh, Eric, it's so much fun to spend 16 hours in this town rather than being used to it. But we get to keep them riding used to seeing. Get out from there. Come on, Hawkins. We'll take the kind of stroll going out to this court. We'll go as far as we can. As soon as we meet up with little buddies, try and fix the epitome at Oral Beach. Bring them out loud, Daddy. And don't find no fun of them at Oral Beach. Get out from there. Peace to you, boys. Whitey, it's the same flight as we've been trying. You all want to get the drop on it? Yeah.  But when you started out to take leaders, you ain't like men doing, you know. Oh, and that's enough to take for you. I ain't, Rick. But just a couple more weeks to live. Good to get them, Drake. Yeah. Feel good for any hideout weapon, too. We were taking no chances. Yeah, leave it to me, Drake. Well, it's the end of the prayer for you, too, King Sari. We're taking a back in them caves and building that. And this cave is the trouble of burying them. Well, that's not the case. All right. Now, get down off them horses, you two. We have a couple to do for charges. No one can see our service better, eh, Drake? Eh, right here on torches, you. I always thought that porchette could see in the door. And that's what we're even doing to tell her if I lose my patience and decide to give you the hard way. Damn, no, I ought to give you a bling. Pick a whitey. Yeah, let's all look like it was, man. And we've got to keep our eyes peeled first and have to yump this little porchette. Hey! I didn't say to pull up the whole desert. We're back here to get all these, will you? This isn't a gun, Whitey. Look, got into this. Well, that's the kind of wood, yes? Yeah, it's about time. Now, stand walking. Don't make a fault. Move or I'll let you have it in a match. Come on, Rice. Yeah, there you go. Well, but yeah, they're talking. I never thought they'd be walking at the head in my own funeral protection. See, I need dark leaf-tailed Whitey.  I'm Christian, the New Yorker man. He didn't pay me back. That's fair enough. I like them talking and running around, my baby. Hey, it works out some kind of animal. Look at that. Why, Whitey? Yo, it doesn't work. I like them talking at the bottom. You do it, Whitey. My hands are shaking. That's a mess. Come here, my darling. Hey, look at that. Looks like we've got into a dinner man in line. Look up, and come to the town to get out. Oh, quit leaving that side, sweetie. Oh, look out. That's not going to work. Oh, it's going to get to us. Look at that. Oh, that's not going to work. No. No, it's not going to work. Oh, don't leave it here. Come on, my. Put it in. Oh, that's not going to work for me ever. You know, come on and help me drag these freaks in here.  They've got their kids in Fort Anderson. They're print storming. They're hangin'. Why do you, ma'am? Never mind me. You get them. Yeah, we've got them all. Good work, Whitey. Well, now we've got all the prisoners together again, huh? Yeah, they're all old and gray. They're all existing then. Well, they'll tarry into the jail. Oh, they're asking for a cell here at the army porch. The head spray and dance. Well, you're welcome, Whitey. But as soon as they told me the jail had been repaired, I told the prisoners to take the bell back and put it behind bars. But that was two hours ago. The prisoners? Yeah. I won't say that. Reminds me. It has to be noted for you. The prisoners left the little iris table man and they told him not to finish over for a couple of hours. Well, I'll be dog-gone. Just done it, Whitey. Bell stars are safe. Yeah, listen to this. Yes, sir. I hope you will excuse me for what I am about to do. Bell star is a real lady and she tells me she is a widow, too. She wants me to settle down to a new life and joy and happiness. So we are eloping in place of me taking her back to jail. Truly yours, John Harder. Thank you, Fort Anderson. Well, I'll be a monkey dog. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then start a loop. Let's turn it. Yeah. Let me explain it. Just what happened. Bell stars are safe. Yeah, so we just found out. He looked with a turn. He looked, eh? Yeah. Well, all I've got to say is that it was sure a short honeymoon for him. Huh? Oh, what's that? It's a turn she's been taking in, aren't it? Taking in is right. Taken in by Bell star. How? He was just found lying on the ground about ten miles out of town. Clubbed over the head. And so ends another chapter in the lives of Lightning Jim and his faithful deputy, Whitey Larson.


Welcome folks, we have the Dow industry is trading down 12, NASDAQ is down 252, S&P is down 38. Gold. Gold contract down $6.70, trading $18.20 an ounce. We have Silver off 8 cents, $23.12 an ounce, late-sweet crude off 84 cents, $81.80 a barrel. That's a big number of oil, no doubt. Notes and bonds. 10-year note, right now up 4 ticks, $128.23, 30-year up 17 at $156.18, and with the 30-year, it has done folks, is that the 30-year got back inside the higher range. This is going to be intriguing watching how this whole thing is going to shake out. 10-year is not inside the higher range yet. King Dollar, King Dollar continues lower, that's down 122 ticks, trading 94, 792, Euro, 114, Yen 114.6.06, and the British pound at 137 to 1 US Dollar. We get over and take a look at the spy, and this is going to, this is an interesting setup folks. Because what you have here now is that you're pulling back, and guess what, you're in a contraction of volume as to what we're going into. The bottom line is that when we had gone down on Monday, the high of the low there is 465.76. We have volume there of 119 million. We came off of that with 74. Now it doesn't even look like we're going to lose 74, so you dig into the 74 aspect of it, and we'll see how this baby shakes out. Very well we could set up here, as you get into the highs of the lows, maybe tomorrow it rejects lower price, and bottom line is still going to go after its highs. It's telling us quite a bit right now that you do have a contraction as we are going south. We take a look at the NDX100, NDX100, same type of setup. The difference is that the NDX is, did it hit it yet, 380, 64, yeah it did, okay. So the NDX, this is going to tell us a lot, the NDX we know is weaker. The high of the low is 380, 64, we're underneath it right now, 91 million shares versus 54 million, so keep your eye on that because it would very well possibly happen here. If we dig into, we've dug into that 40 cents, if you dig into that another, let's say 3, yeah another buck, buck and a half, you're going to go to the bottom of that baby. And if we do that tomorrow, you're going to have light volume tomorrow because it's a long weekend. You know, Monday markets close, plenty of trade is split. If you're from the northeast, I always remember this was always a big deal, getting on the plane, getting to Florida, grooving and you can expect those desks are going to close down early. Stay right there folks, come right back.


Welcome back, fish and freaks. Been a while since we've done a Roland truck intro. I'm heading after stripers today. And I've seen some of you on The Ketchum Cooks asking for OSG's cheesy grits recipe. So the idea today, we're going to get some stripers, we're going to bring them home, I'm going to show you how to cook them, and then we're going to put them in the grits. It's going to be delicious, so let's look at the ceiling.  But if they're not on top water, we're going to go after them with spoons and swim baits. Well, fish and freaks, I've never encountered this before. But the only way to get into this butt ramp is to use a credit card machine. It is just declining. The guy in front of me said it was doing the same thing, so this is no taco bueno, oh no. Our reverse is locked up right now, this is really not good. This is really not what you want to have to start the day, oh my gosh, my brakes are locked up, I don't know if I'm going to be able to get up this hill. Well, we got untangled, thank goodness, I had a little reverse safety pin and I had some wood blocks, I was able to chalk my tires and get it in there, back up, but this is going to back us up about 30 minutes to the next boat ramp, that stinks, but we're going to keep trucking. Hallelujah, thank you Jesus, we in the water right now. It's been a grind, it was like an hour from the first ramp to get to here, now anyway, we're past all that, we've got about half a tank of gas, our trade fly, let's go find them. Yeah buddy, eat that thing, this could be white bass, I don't know, some of them look pretty good size, little stripers, quit fighting me, alright, there's definitely some fish over here. Some bigger ones sitting down closer to the channel, see the top water, they're smacking at it, but that's a lot of little ones, I don't know, this is still happening right now guys, but we missed the main entree, I think I'm going to move guys, I think I'm probably missing it somewhere, we got bait, we got small stripers, but I want a couple of big ones. As soon as I got up on the pad I just saw another school coming up, there's birds, there's birds, driving there's fish buster right here, alright let's see if we can get them right here. Popping up right now, holy cow, woo, little buddies, these things are everywhere, I think I might be in the nursery, hang on a minute guys, I just hooked up on the flutter stand on a bigger one, there's some bigger ones down here, closer to the bottom, just got to get down there to them, a little better, yeah that's a good keeper, there we go, god I was burning it up, woo, there we go now, there's a lively one, woo, alright there's our dinner, it's a decent sized one, the slurping spoon, okay yeah, there's some better ones, I'm just going to absolutely have to rip this thing, this is a three quarter ounce, I would almost prefer a one right here, it can't be slow, oh god, he crushed it, there we go baby, oh yeah pull that drag, there you go, good one, oh he barely hooked, I'll flip you, there we go, alright, figuring it out, put her on her green rod here, yeah that one's almost 22, okay so in order to catch these fish, I'm having to basically burn it, so doing like your standard you know up and down, you know a couple feet up technique, they need it fast, huge pops, huge pops, like normally for white bass, you know I'm right here a couple feet, they need it big pops, oh they're at the bottom right now, these are catchables, you just load up and it's just solid, oh god this is a big one, oh shoot, guys getting into some hammers here, whoo, that one's big, I almost think I need the net for that one, there you are, there you are big stripey, whoo that one is for sure over 20, so fun to catch guys, that one is going to fillay up really nice, there we go now, alright guys so we have our limit of big ones, so just to let you know I'm on a lake called Lake Texelma, this used to be my favorite lake in Texas when I was growing up, I caught my first smallmouth probably 2 miles from this point right here, had some friends that had some campers up here on the lake, I used to come up here and fish a lot and the striper has always been good, that's like a staple, we've got naturally reproducing stripers, salinity is good enough where they can reproduce and they do a good job stocking it as well, to manage it, they're making sure that especially right now that you're not taking home a bunch of big ones, you want those big ones to survive so you can only keep two over 20 inches on this lake specifically, but you also can't cull any, I mean once you catch a big striper, unless you release them right away like I just did, it's really tough on them, I've got the live hole running, full, everything's wide open and you know, two of them are doing okay, one of them is already kind of up, so I've got an 18 incher and then I've got two over 20 and I can keep 10, what they want right now is something really fast, so I'm throwing a 3 quarter ounce slurping spoon, it's a lead jigging spoon and it just does this right here, great for summer, great for when you've got schooling fish in the fall, winter time vertical jigging and then when they see it coming, just as fast as you can reel, then they'll pop, just smack it and it stops it like a freight train, so fun, love it so much, just have to reel it up super fast and then rip it, oh yeah, this is another big one, oh yeah baby, ripping drag, we are probably not going to be able to keep this one, because it's too big, you can only keep a couple over, oh my gosh this is giant, pliers ready, I'm gonna try to release this guy as fast as possible, oh my gosh, just hammers, all right spoon's out, spoon's out, I'm gonna let this guy go, there we go, wanna see those big ones live, don't even like handle them, it's gonna be 106 today, it's tough on them, what would really be fun though is if those big ones would decide to just come up to the top, a lot of these fish are not really on the bottom, striper just they move a ton, you know they might move 20 feet up and down as they're swimming side to side, so there's a school off to my right, you can see them, they're kind of mid depth, oh my gosh can't even move that one, it's big, not even a giant, just so strong, woo, yeah, running beautiful, didn't want to take him out of the water right now guys, spoon's out, oh god, I had him on, there we go, he wants to jump, there he goes, oh what a show, that'll net you up, take care of you buddy, striper chasing it, oh my gosh, stripers are down there chasing guys, big old gizzy, I thought I had a drum, it's just a big gizzy and I had a huge striper chase that up, drop him down, see what happens, even once it's so bad, the striper's on it right now, come on he's trying to figure out how to eat it, see him, he's swimming all the way up to the surface, he's freaked out, oh gosh, oh gosh, we got him, we got him, we got him, he's taking it, he's taking it, look at this thing guys, we got him, got him on the big shad, oh it's a, yeah it's a good one, oh yeah he's running, come here dude, that got the gizzard, that got the striper, that's a freaking big one, get this guy right back in the water, woo what a fish man, that was sweet, see my guy, get back down there, that was sick, so cool, oh man there's school right below me, okay here we go again, ball of shad right here, striper kind of on the outside, oh not mine, hooking another big live gizzard, that was fun, oh I think I got another one, I do, all right boys, let's try this again, yeah sir, there we go, ready to deploy, he's coming up, he's getting chased up, oh big one's on him, big one's on him, look at that, oh my gosh guys, they're right there at the surface chasing him, oh oh he just got hit, oh oh I think they got him, I think he got him, no, he got thunked, oh my gosh he's getting chased up, look at him, oh he's freaking out, he's running up to the surface, that would be too, oh one season, one season he's coming, he's coming, how are you not eating that, oh oh we just got bit, you just got bit, come on baby, looks like he got him, nope he's still getting chased, oh they're whacking him, you can feel him just thumping, they're thumping him right now, oh yeah you just got tugged, just need a big one to eat him, you got cleaned off, that was sick guys, that was sick, well we lost that last one and the bite is going cold, I'm unable to hook any more live bait but we have more than enough to do our catch and cook, that was still a lot, a couple of bigs and now we're going to take it to the kitchen, we're going to clean these up and I'm going to show you guys how OSG, OSG is going to show you how to make those cheesy grits, we do catfish a lot but these meteor fish like these stripers, I've been wanting to do this recipe with them, it's going to be amazing, so stay tuned, let's head to the kitchen, Wabam, good sized stripers like this, they are going to have some red meat, just to let you know, it's going to be a little different and they do have some extra bones in there that usually you'll find, you'll definitely find them with your teeth and you can cut them out if you want to, always remember kind of angle your fish or angle your knife up towards the head of the fish there, if you go straight down at the gills you're going to miss some of this really good thick meat, this is the thickest part of most all fish that I fillet, so if you don't angle your knife up there you're going to miss that really good chunk, so angle it up, I usually flip my fish around and go from this direction and I'll start working down that spine, all right so then you're just attached to the ribs, cut that rib cage out, I'm going to cut any little section of pin bones and things out of here, I try to take my time since I'm feeding these to the family, I want to make sure that they like them and they want to eat them again, make it a good clean piece of meat, do it like I was cooking it in a restaurant, so I'm going to take my catfish pliers, started doing it this way now, just play it the whole skin off, pliers work amazing, now I'm just going to go in here and I'm going to cut down the center of this bloodline, I'm going to pull a section of this out, pull that whole little section out of there, I like to take my spray hose and I'll spray the fillets off with high pressure and that will sort of rip any little scales or little fin connective muscles and kind of rip those off, this is a long piece we'll cut it in half, it's also important you want to make sure your pieces are about the same size when you're cooking them together, especially baking or something like that, so they all come out similar, but this right here my friends, this is what is going to go on top of those grits and then it's going to be, oh that can almost be shimmy right there, it's beautiful, hi hi hi for stripers today, boom, boom in the kitchen with osg and family today, yeah we need full details, it looks like you've already laid out ingredients, our fish has been processed, I'm just draining the fish on a little drying rack, the fish is in this bowl, so trying to get some of that moisture out of there, so this is the grit making stuff, normally disclaimer we use yellow corn grits, but we have the white corn, we have fresh okra from the garden, that's going to be included in there as well, we got a little butter, some milk and I am going to take care of the fish, got some cajun seasoning here, this is for blackening, we're going to dump this in our little shallow pan, container, smoked paprika, that's going in and we'll go ahead and we'll do four of these fillets, first steps, sauteing the okra and little onions, is that what's in there, yes I don't have any garlic so I use some green onions, fresh okra that we nourished ourselves, yes, but once it gets hot with the oil then you're going to add your milk and I never measured it, but you basically just want to add enough to where it looks like a soup and then it'll boil down, condense, get thicker, I'm coming, I'm coming over there guys, just hang on a second, hold it with that milk, I'm flopping fish in here, you add about, I would say a cup each time, just enough to where it's like covered on top and then you just kind of constantly stir it, you want it to be kind of simmering a little bit, a cup of grits every so often, oh how much of this did you add, okay and then you just kind of keep stirring it and then once it gets sticky, which we'll show you in a minute, once it starts sticking to the bottom and it gets thick then you add another cup of milk, it's a process, it's a process, okay so it's starting to get a really good consistency, you still don't want to add another cup of milk yet because there's still a lot of milk that it needs to absorb so you just keep stirring, just keep stirring, you're just going to stand here and you've also added a little bit of red crushed red pepper flakes which really kicks it up a notch, I would not recommend that unless you really like spice, black pepper, a little bit of salt, you can keep it basic because a lot of your flavor is coming from the Cajun seasoning right here so it's a nice balance so you lay the fish on top of the grits and then you get that delicious buttery flavor mixed with the Cajun seasoning, oh my, there I just wait until it's kind of completely covered okay oh all right let's see what you're saying the milk is like covers the island yeah there you go covers the island in simple terms how long does it cook until it's like soft this whole process probably about 20 minutes 20 minutes okay and it's probably about time for me to get on the uh the blackening so let's get on that good gobbled butter medium medium high oven's getting preheated to 375 right now you guys need to get yourselves a cast iron no matter what I mean because you got to have a camping and all that stuff or you can get a good quality stainless definitely don't have any kind of rubberizer plastic handles so because you're going to put this in the oven okay the last step of the grits is I just dump a whole bunch of uh cheese I do a Mexican style blend then shred it probably about a cup and mix it into your grits after the consistency is kind of where you want it we've got a nice crust on the fish I'm doing two minutes each side medium high all right timbers going off into the oven it goes watch your knees I'm gonna go 10 minutes I feel good about that that's gonna be delish damn I did that I'm doing that today I went out there I got up early I went to two days folks at home those look awesome notice the the flaking that's usually how you how you can tell the fish is done so we've got a nice muscle tissue starting to uh to separate there be very careful when you go to grab your pan out of the oven make sure you've got a mint or a towel or something because maybe you shouldn't be using the towel that thing is going to be a blazing hunt now I am just I'm I'm like a little perturbed at the red pepper flakes are in there you told me this okay first of all folks hold on hold on let me just say this last time I made the grits and you went to go taste it you go hmm it tastes kind of bland so I kicked it up a nudge so okay did we have blackened fish with that yes the reason I make grits I only make it with fish okay you do you want them to be a little bland cheese is nice well there's plenty of cheese in there cheese is nice because when you get that Cajun flavor on there it's it's gonna pop make up your mind another way you can serve this if you don't want to do the grits y'all because it is kind of a lengthy process it's how I like it but if you want to go with a sandwich doing like a po-boy style some tomato lettuce a good mayonnaise on there maybe some potato bread or Hawaiian bun something like that would be amazing with that a little offset the spice that's another option for you but let's try it on top of the grits time to plate up all right come on with me this is the OSG style you probably won't like this but I want a little bit of lettuce here okay okay oh she's throwing a little shishito in there and she's busting out the ranch to cool down those red pepper flakes put in I'm gonna show you how southern board presents it all right in the south there's a dish called shrimp and grits so we're basically just replacing the shrimp with some fish I think I'm actually going to go with a tail piece I want to see what that's about Steph said the fish was excellent all right we get our fork we come in here we break apart oh my goodness y'all just look at that so you break that apart the fish is flaky and then you get yourself some grits on the bite you get grits on the bite all together and that is oh melt in your mouth delicious flavor blend wow the white grits are not bad the cheese is mellowing out the spice I like that the fish is cooked perfectly it's excellent that's more of those they're amazing there's just not many fish in fresh water that have that thick of meat for you to do these bakings and these blackenings where you know it's a good mix of of flavoring on there and so a nice striper is just perfect for doing this a big catfish and a striper you do try to do this with a crappie and it's just so thin just can't can't really do it with that try the recipe guys you will not be disappointed leftovers for tomorrow get you a filet some shishito peppers some cheesy grits good to go that's two more meals and I got even more I'm gonna back and see y'all great day y'all great day had a little trouble in the beginning but it worked out good and anytime I can bring home fish cook it with Stephanie and we enjoy a meal together or the whole family for that matter it is uh it's always satisfying and she loves fish she loves fish she loves when I bring home fresh fish like that those striper they fought so hard it was just it was a lot of fun if you are gonna go do that make sure that you release the fish quickly if you're not gonna keep them because they do struggle this time of year spoons I would tell you to go get some of google squad.com they're not available yet that's slurping that was the jam we do have a similar bait that is available now and that is the rip which I prefer for vertical jigging in the colder months but you can throw it on schooling fish like those ones that were coming up top early you can just reel it right through there or they'll crush this thing if you are going to order anything from goonsquad.com make sure to use my code LFG so you can save a check out thank you all for hanging with me on the water for another outdoor adventure today I got the camper here it's time it's time to get prepping we're thinking about deer hunting we're thinking about camping I got some ideas to fix this thing up so you guys stay tuned for the videos and I'll see y'all in another adventure