Okay, let's go find the dragon prints. Do do do do do do do. Done with mollybone. You're getting destroyed by snake ladies. Those snake ladies in aquila they come and get you. They get you real good. They come out of nowhere and just boom, you're dead. It's kind of crazy. More walking. Why am I stuck? Game please. This was not the right way to go. This was definitely not the right way to go. This is going to be a lot of walking I believe. Welcome to the start of the stream where Brent was unprepared and should have done this ages ago, but instead he was stupid and decided, you know what, who needs to start streams when you can just, you know, who needs to be organized, when you can just walk everywhere where you need to go on stream, because that makes exciting, fun content for everybody, for the whole family, you know. That's what I thought when I did that. That's my, that was what I was thinking to be honest.  I think that's the Tower of Mu Manchu, I think, I think. I've never actually done Mu Manchu, so that'll be something I do. Sometime, I need to, what's really annoying about it is that there's a whole bunch of side quests that you have to do to get it, and it's not really, not really what I want to do, but you know, I'll do it sometime, eventually maybe.  This game, I swear, is sometimes very, very, very broken. Very, very, very broken. Not gonna lie, super duper broken. You're so tired, please send help. You should sleep after I finish streaming. That's cheeky. When you get to mechs, would you like to do Mu Manchu with you? I mean, I've already got two mechs, level pirates, so I probably should do it already. Are we going? I can't move, yes we are. Good job, good job. Good work, good work game. It's just something that I need to do probably sometime very, very soon. Anyway, we're about to hop over and actually start questing finally. How much XP do we get by the way? We get 100, yep, that's great. 100 XP, because that's gonna level me up to nowhere near level 50. Good game. Are we going all the way back? I think we are. Where does that go? That goes to Temple of the East Wind. I can't remember if we have to come back. I'm gonna leave a mark here and if that's a mistake then you know what, sue me. We're just gonna have to walk all the way. You will try, no guarantees. Well, I'm gonna be eating a lot of sleep, I know that for sure over the next couple of days because of your boy 24 hour live stream in less than a week. This time next week we would have finished it yesterday. Isn't that exciting? I know, same. Same, it's great. If you don't know about that, you gotta know about it. Do I have a link to it? I probably do. Exclamation point 24, does that work? Does that also work? I think it should. 24, there's also a special announcement that I have to do. Oh, it does. Look at that. Yeah, there's also another command that goes along with that. I don't know whether I want to announce just yet, but there's another command that is that enabled as well that should be enabled, right? It is enabled. It is very much enabled that goes along with that because I've decided that we are going to be doing something during that live stream. People who are in the discord and have looked at the stream schedule will know exactly what I'm talking about, but there's another command there that if you find out, if you find it, you can go and do it. If you don't find it before Friday, actually no, not before Friday, before Thursday, actually it's not on YouTube either. Before the stream, then you get a something. You get a something. Hey, Dylan. Welcome. Thank you for the host. I appreciate it. Not going to ask you how you are. So, haha, I win. I win. I win this time. I win this time. I win this round. I'm not going to ask you how you are. Not because I don't care, just because I want to change things up, and now I'm talking about it anyway, so it's great. You get free coins. You get free brink coins. They're kind of like Bitcoin, except they're like specially for me. Give me free plane ticket to New Zealand. No, thank you. That's a bit too expensive. We are fighting in Wayno Shrine, unfortunately. No, the prize is free crowns. Nah, we ain't about debt life. I don't give out stuff for free. Who does that? Not me. Okay, let's do that. Let us do... Wow, Bonnie, you're just not quite good enough. Just not quite good enough. Nearly there, but not quite. So unlucky. Yeah, it's not... It's not Exclamation Point, please. What was it, Exclamation Point? Please love me. It's not that one, unfortunately. Do I actually explicitly state it in the streaming schedule? Yeah, I did. It's an abbreviation that happens to be two letters long. And if you find that out, congratulations. And if you don't, that's unfortunate. I'll be telling you in less than a week anyway. So, haha, yes. Exclamation Point commands. Actually, that won't work. So, haha, I've thought through it. It's good. I've thought right through it. That's not how you will find it. Well, I didn't say anything about how you're doing because you knew you weren't going to ask. No, you fooled me. You outplayed me. Exclamation Point GG, no. Those commands... Half of the... Basically all of those commands don't really work. So, it's none of those. It's none of those commands there because it's not through that bot. And I don't have a commands list for my other one. So, haha, the joke's on you. I fooled you. I fooled you again, childs. You will never know. But if you look in the stream schedule, it will tell you basically. How do you do it? What's the prefix? It's Exclamation Point and then two letters. But it's not those ones because I've switched bots. And that's no longer the bot that I use and half of those things I don't use anyway, even if I didn't have that bot because ain't about that life. But, yeah. Wow, the block. Amazing. So good. Wow. I don't know what I'll give you, but I will give you something if you manage to work it out beforehand. Like I said, stream schedule is the best way to look at what it could possibly be. Very, very good. Is it Exclamation Point EL? Maybe. Maybe you should try it, Rose, and you should find out. It's not Exclamation Point 24. That was the one that I did before. You can use that one. That gives you a bit more information, but it doesn't tell you everything because I don't keep that. It's not Exclamation Point 24. That's the one that I did before. It doesn't count. That one doesn't count. No, there is one command that I've got right here that no one has played yet. No one has played it. It's a consistent of two letters, not numbers, two letters. Why, Rose, why don't you just try Exclamation Point EL? I said letters, not numbers. Exclamation Point 13 is not letters. There we go. Finally, someone got it. It only took you long enough. Rose wins. She didn't play it, but Rose found it, so she wins. But yes, the 24-hour stream is actually for charity. I've decided as of a couple of weeks ago, a couple of weeks ago, last week sometime. So yes, during that stream, any proceeds will be going directly to that Extra Life page to help little children in America's, because I apparently care about little children in America's, I do. So yeah, that's fun. So any bits that you donate or any subs, all of that will be going straight to them, and then there's also a link in that where you can donate straight to them through that link as well. You don't have to, but if you want to help little children as you can, you can if you want. So yeah, that's the thing, but you can do that whenever you want, but I won't be really looking at it until the 24-hour livestream. We will probably do something on the later in the November when the actual day is for that. We will probably do like a eight-hour livestream or something, maybe 12, I don't know. But yeah, it just happens that what Manfin wanted to do for the 24-hour livestream happens to have to be in October before he is busy and goes away. Slightly unfortunate, but yeah. Yes, on my screen you played it first. It's technically Rose Wins because she did the investigative work and found it out, and I just happened to say you should try it. And then she did. On my screen, who did it first? I mean, on my screen, Rose did it first, and it played only once because there's a cooldown. But yeah, so unfortunate. I'm lucky. They will not harm me. I will harm them. Don't worry, I do not have a heart. You cannot lie to me. I am incapable of looking into my heart because I lack one. Isn't that a shame? Yes, it is.  But who knows? These guys aren't actually too difficult. We're gonna do this. At least the last people weren't really. I kind of just talked right through that battle and didn't realize that it was over already. It's kind of just normal. Just normal, you know. Is your friend code okidoki? I forgot you cannot copy and paste in this game. It's ridiculous. DJR. DJR. 7K. 7K. W6B. Boom. Is that right? That is Patrick Walker. Congratulations.  I hope you enjoy the taste of being on a friend's list of me. I hope you enjoy that really much. And I hope you, yeah, yeah, yeah. You wish you had 7K. Yup. Doesn't everybody, though? Wow. Rude. That's really, really rude. I don't know if I like that. That's pretty rude. That's pretty rude. Pretty rude. Here we go, El Toro. Good job. You're actually critting and blocking so much better than yesterday when you couldn't do anything because you were bad. Yeah, I see you, El Toro. Trying to be good, but you're actually bad.  Okay. Let us do that. Boom. Easy peasy. We're going to do that. We'll get him down quite a bit, I would say. All of those boys are nearly dead. Epic. Good job. Good work there. Good work. Go, Monkey King. Go, El Toro. Go, El Toro. Do it again. And again. Yes, thank you so much. I appreciate that. You actually did good. How did you do good? He just did good. He's good. He good boy. Okay. I think we're going to get up to the Great Turtle today. And I think we're going to stop there because Great Turtle is quite a long area. And we'll save that for next time. So just for all of those who wanted to know how far we're going today, I think we'll be getting up to the Great Turtle and then stopping. And we'll do that next week. And then start Mali Bone the week after. So that'll be what? Like November? By then? Wait, will it? And what is it? What is the date today? The day is the 8th. So the 15th we'll be going into. Yeah. So, oh, we've got a couple more weeks. Yeah. We'll be into Mali Bone by the end of October, which is cool.  You love turtles? Well, this turtle is a big boy. It's a big boy turtle. You'll be surprised at how big the turtle is. You know, that's great. Let's do that. Let's crit a bit more because that's always fun. We're going to do that and that. Actually, that's probably better. Get some damage on him. Very big boy. Super duper big boy. He's quite a scary boy as well.  Not good enough. Disappointed. Disappointed. Can you block, please? That'd be great. That would be really, really great. Just saying. Can we block? Nope. Okay. We cannot, apparently. Can you block, please? Just for fun. Nope. Okay. Can you block, please? Yes. Thank you, Altora. You're the only good person in my team. How do you be the only good person here? Thank you so much. Look at this. This is how Altora should be. Altora was like the beast. Seriously, the beast. Ear picket. Good work, Millie. Can you block? Nope. Okay. You cannot block either. Can you learn from Altora and be good now? Please? That'd be great. That'd be great. Okay. Thanks. Bye. Okay, let's just do this and pretend that I'm good at the game or something. I don't know. I don't know. Who knows? Not me. Haha. Can we get a relent, please? That would have been great. But of course not. Oh, we did. Nice work. Oh, look. We're good. Um, she's doing her best. Don't push her. I'm pushing her because she should be better. She's higher level than me and she can't even dodge someone. It's not good enough, you know? It's just not good enough. Collect Staff of Temperance. Who's that? That looks cool. I want that one. I want it. Thanks. I'm just going to yank that right out of you. That sounded so weird. That's me, though. Just so weird. Um, you were helping a noob with General Soul last night. No damage swashbuckler. Oh my gosh. That sounds terrible. General Soul can be a bit of a pain. I think it was during the Musketeer walkthrough, or maybe it was my witch doctor. When I was leveling them up, I always had issues with like my connection to the game. This was like two years ago. I had like terrible issues with connecting to the game. It wasn't my internet. It was like connecting to the game itself. And like, I never... I think there was one time when I got to the last fight and I died, but I did it like 20 times and I would always like lag out and like not be able to connect to the game. And then all of my companions were dead because apparently that's how things work. If you lose connection, your companions die because that's a great mechanic right there. Not salty at all. But yeah, that wasn't fun. That was a fun story though. I like telling that story to people who don't know that's a story that I like telling. That's a fun story with Brent. Okay, well, that's fun. Let's just leave you there. Monkey King can move up. These guys can do this. Are they good? Vengeance is nice. Repel borders, well, they're coming to me, so it's fine. Good job. Oh, buddy. Yikes. Yikes, skiddoodles.  They're allowed to be bad at the game. You can't criticize them for playing how they want to play. And if you do, really, are you the bad person or the good guy? That was deep. That was very deep. I hope you enjoyed. I hope you enjoyed. This has been this episode of Talks with Brent. Cue the title card. JK, I don't have a title card and I don't hear that these episodes when they go up to YouTube. Fun fact. Speaking of games, Tyler and I acquesting. Congratulations. That's good. That is very, very, very good. I cannot wait for Tearstrom, though. Tearstrom is going to be so hype. I'm like on the edge of my seat at the moment, just waiting for Tearstrom. I think it's going to be next week when it drops. I think. That's my opinion. I think it's going to be next week. Yeah, I really do hope it's not this week. I mean, it could be, but I kind of think next week. Middle of October. Sounds about right. I'm thinking on the Wednesday. Either the Wednesday or Tuesday. American time, obviously. I'm not thinking the Monday. They don't usually release Tearstroms on Monday. That's a bit weird, but like... But Wednesday is quite a popular day for them. Thursday's a bit too late, because then you only have two days. Thursday and Friday, so not the best. But I'm thinking, I'm definitely thinking Wednesday or Tuesday next week. I'm thinking personally. That's what I think. Could be the week after as well. I don't think it's going to be this week. This week is a bit too... soon with the amount of teases that they've teased us currently. It's not significant enough to have Tearstrom be, like, yeah, we're basically ready for it. In my opinion. This is for Wiz as well, by the way. Waiting for Pirate to get another update? Well, I mean, we only just got one, technically. Skeleton Keybosses, and they were fun. They were fun. So, you know, you might want to leave back and relax. That's true. That is true. I mean, they say they have another thing up their sleeves, so I'm expecting probably, like, November. Possibly. Or it's going to be another Christmas update, like, last year in December, and not even have a Tearstrom. So, who knows? Who knows? But yeah. I'm thinking November for Pirate, honestly. Honestly, I'm thinking November, really. Let's go for him. Actually, you know what? We're going to go for him, because he's nearly dead as well. So, we'll do that. Pirate just hanging on life alert? Not really. I wouldn't say hanging on. It's still there. They still think about it sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes. They released Imperial Part 1 when you were at London. Yee-yikes. And you were getting withdraws. Oof. Yeah, I'm really, really hoping that Tearstrom's next week. I think it's going to be next week. And that's going to be super duper high. I'm really excited for that. So yeah. We'll see. The evil sea. Oh, Gigi. Good work there. Gigi, good work there. Fantabulous. Okie dokie. Here we go. Fantastic. Ok. Good job. Good work. Um, not the best. Way no shrine. No way. In other words, you need to make Tyler Quest even more. Yeah, probably. I'm expecting character copy to be sometime probably next week. Probably in the next week's maintenance. I'll probably do character copies, what I'm thinking. Luckily, there's going to be a video coming out later this week that kind of goes over all of my gear at the moment. Yesterday, if you weren't here, we managed to get the Cabales boots on my death, which is super duper hype. And then also I crafted the Darkmoor deck as well. So I now have, like my stats are actually kind of okay. Like they're not a disappointment. Where am I going? Did I? I'm bad. I need to like follow the quest arrow. I always do this. You're not the first one to say that, but that's just my accent. And you guys are terribly minded people apparently, because you should know what I'm saying. Why would I say those type of words? Geez. Who do you think I am? Okay. Well, that was a lot of XP. Nice work. Oops. I like this quest. It's called Oops. It reminds me of my life. Oops. That's some spicy gossip for the day. Um, okay. Let's head over to a LAN poll. Yeah, I'll be ready for character copy as well. I mean my character like it's not perfect, but I mean there's still more that I can get. And I'm kind of thinking that I will get it probably after Testron who's come out and after the death walkthrough is finished again. Um, but you know who knows who knows. I'm also planning a new series for to be hopefully hopefully leading up to the continuation of the death walkthrough. Hopefully I think I've talked about this quite a bit, but I'm really excited for it. I've got some really good ideas. And hopefully the first episode of that will be coming out to this week sometime. Not tomorrow. This week sometime. I think Road to 100's tomorrow. I think. It depends how much time I have to edit. Till night. Um, we'll see. Where are we even going? Are we going to the icy dock? Oh, oh, oh. We're going to the- Wait, whoa. Temple of the Westwind. I left the mark. I'm so good. I'm proud of myself. Um, well there's the Aphrodite damage ring. Yeah, I know. I know. Like I said, my gear is not perfect at all and I never want it to be. Like it's not going to be perfect for a long time. But um, you know. There's only so much you can get with RNG luck of getting drops. So, yeah. Unfortunately. A bouquet of oopsie daisies. Yup. 24 hour challenge. Take a shot every time someone says that. Wow. Yeah, maybe that's for people watching, not for me. I don't know about that one. I would get way too drunk. Don't know if that's the side of me you want to see, you know. I don't think that's what you want to see. Mainly because I don't want to see that either. Well, let's do that. My 18 health. Yup. Okay. Good job. I forget the cheats of this fight. I know this is probably a cheat. This is probably a cheat and good fight. Who knows? Who knows? We'll find out. Dun dun. Um, there's an, that's fine. You don't have to deduct more. Um, don't worry. Don't worry about your gear. That's fine. I mean, I'll be jading. I'll be jading. So, as long as you're, um, as long as basically you have a character, for character that is like, even if you haven't defeated Medulla, I will help you before we start streaming. Do that. But um, I mean, I would prefer not to, obviously. But um, you know, if that's what it comes to, I will help you finish off if you don't make character copy. But like, um, I'll be jading for all of the test drums. So don't worry about that one. Don't worry about that one. Hi magic. Welcome.  Oh my gosh. Dog and discord. I like the, oh my gosh. It's a doggo in discord. It's a big doggo. I love it. I love it. Um, you want it to be semi good, but oh dark wall. Yeah. I mean, it's fine. Yeah. It's fine. Don't worry about it. Really, really don't worry about your stats. I mean, as long as you have like decent damage, and your stats at the moment are perfectly fine, like it will do. I will be healing, so it's not like that's too big of an issue really. Um, so yeah. Don't worry about it too much. But then again, I'm expecting probably the first update of next year to be a dungeon. Okay. Bye. Farewell, dude. You can go away, I suppose. Um, rip your sub. It comes back on the 23rd. Oof. Well, that's fine. You can just enjoy. No, did you win, but you can still watch. It's fine. And you might get ads as well. Probably would get ads. Knowing Twitch, unless you have ad blocker, which I would completely agree with, because the ads on Twitch is so obnoxious. Like they are really, really obnoxious. This is actually really good. They're just dying to the flames. It's great. I don't mind, honestly. I really do not mind about this. Actually, you know what we're gonna do? We're gonna do that.  You can do that. Actually, wait, El Toro, can you go? No. Monkey King, can you go? Okay, you can't. Let's just go there, whatever. Done. Um, yeah. We just encountered the bat, if I remember correctly, and forgot a bunch of vacuums. Yeah. Yeah, there's a lot of vacuums that you have to fight, so don't worry about that one. Don't worry about that one. You have ad block turned off for Twitch so you can get through. But that's actually true, yeah. The ads before streams, though, are so obnoxious. Like I completely understand if you use ad block on Twitch. Like I would. It's just so obnoxious. It's terrible. It is really, really terrible. And the ads aren't even like, like they're legitimately just the same.  I really, really do. Like I have ad block turned off on Twitch, but I hate the ads so much. I really do. I do not encourage turning off ad block, though, because that makes, obviously, I can't do that as a Twitch affiliate, you know? I think I'll probably be in a bit of trouble if I did that, but um, you know, I could understand, possibly, if you did. Okay, back to defeating Low Fang. Oh gosh, he's back to full health. What, no way. No, hey, I do not depressed yet. This one.  Whatever. Um, yeah. You never get ads because of Prime. Yeah, that's true. That is true. I think that runs out. I think, I think Twitch Prime doesn't offer ad previewing anymore, though. You have to get Twitch turbo. That was the thing that was, is about to be rolled out, I think, at the end of the month or something. I can't remember when that was happening. But yeah.  It's legitimately just the same ad.  I mean, I really shouldn't be talking about this, but you know. Your boy has Twitch turbo somehow. Wow. Congrats. Congratulations there. That's really, really good. You have like ad previewing, so you're safe, my dude. You're safe. You're safe. No Twitch Prime. It has the same. Yeah, I know it is at the moment, but I think they're rolling something out at the end of this month. I think it is. I got an email about it like two months ago, where it no longer does that. You still get your free sub to a streamer, but they want to incentivize getting Twitch Turbo more. So yeah, apparently. Mega hit on 18 health. Skeleton, congrats. How tall are I? I know it's ridiculous. It is really ridiculous. He was just making sure he killed, you know. He was just making sure he could kill, you know, because 18 health is quite a lot. Fool. Gotta be careful with that 18 health, you know. Be careful. Yeah, sure. We'll do that. He's dead. He did. Frick heads. Yeah. 18 HP. That's how much enemies head in Skull Island. Yo. Okay. Well, well, there's just one chest. Okay. That's cute to begin. Anything. Wow. 1599 gold. That's not too bad. Master of three storms. That's pretty cool. Are you kidding me? Are you really kidding me? We have to go back to Wayno Shrine. No way. Yeah, depends what air block you have. I know some that do work on Twitch and stuff, but the one that I use does not work. I know that, so I just turned it off anyway. But yeah. Deru, I think it's... I can't remember what the name is, but there's one that works really, really well and works every single time. But there's quite a few that don't actually work. But yeah. But yeah, that's the thing. That's the end of that conversation. I probably should not be speaking about it a lot more, otherwise Twitch might fight me 1v1 and was no shadow pips. I would die. Actually, no, I'd just spam Headless. Welcome to Death PvP in 2018. Just spam Headless, it's fine. You know what I realized the other day that Headless is actually better than Kraken? It does a lot more damage. And has a higher accuracy. It's actually kind of good. Like, Headless is very, very, very OP. I knew it was OP. I didn't realize it was that OP. Fun fact. Headless actually does more than Kraken. For the same amount of pips and has a less chance of fizzling. It's great. Okay, let's head over here again. Hello. Can we go and do something fun now?  That'll be really, really, really fun. Um, really, really, really fun. He's up here. Hi, dude. Can you speak to me please? Speak to me please. Please, please. Please and thank you. Okay, Laurel leaves. I don't know where that is. Where are we going? Um, Defeat Amber Horde? No way. And then Sacred Mountain? Ugh. This sounds terrible. This sounds terrible. This would be one of the times if I was actually recording this properly. I would kind of just, um, just, you know, just end the game here. Just end that bit. And I would continue on later when I actually felt like doing this, because I get so bored of these sort of stuff sometimes. We're actually nearly, we're actually really close. There's only what two more quests to do. So, um, yeah. Not too bad. Did I actually? Okay, no, I didn't get it wrong. Um, let's get the leaves first and we can do the other stuff later. I don't know where the leaves are. Where is the Sacred Mountain? Where is the Sacred Mountain you speak of? Um, Crimson Dock. Where is that? Oh, over here. Okay, that's not too bad. It's not too bad. And then we can defeat some of those, um, Amber Horde ships, I suppose. I suppose not that I want to at all. Um, but yeah, we're actually really close to, um, finishing off here. Finishing off Mushu is kind of scary. Who is this? What are you? You are Lily. Um, no, Bloody Jacob Collins. Bloody Jacob Collins. Damn him.  What a lad. Bloody Jacob Collins. You know, just out of here. Um, okay, let's head over this way. And we will see what we got to do next. I don't know how, we're just going to leave a mark here just because I can. Um, and it's free, so why not? Temple of the South Wind. Can we get some Laurel Leaves? Can we please? That would be great. Can we, can we, can we? I was going to make a really, really bad joke, but I'm not going to because I'm I'm not about that life. Um, so I'm just going to bite my, bite my tongue with that one and just continue on collecting these Laurel Leaves. Um, I'm terrible at jokes. I'm not funny. I'm really not funny. Sometimes I can be funny, but I'm not funny. And if anybody says otherwise, they're probably wrong. Probably wrong. I mean, if they want to believe that I am funny, that's fine. But you're probably wrong. Just letting you know. Just letting you know you're probably wrong. Sorry. Um, Laurel Leaves. Hi, can we get you before we get this game hates me?  I really, really do. Really, really, really do hate this game. Sometimes it's kind of obnoxious. Well, there we go. Back to square one. Let's go back over. Haha. That's fun. Um, hmm. Well, we've got one of six. What I really hate about pirate is the areas are just so huge. Like really, really, really huge. And I do not like that. I really dislike that. It just takes forever to get places. And the mounts just seem so slow. Like I don't know what I would do without a mount. Like that would just feel terrible to me. Like really just terrible. Honestly have no clue. It would just be so painful. Like really, really, really painful. And I would hate it. Um, you don't have a mount. And you get places fast as heck, boy. Well, congrats. I just feel, I just always feel that just pirate is just too big. Like way too big. It's just way, way, way too big. I just don't like the size of the areas in pirate. It just takes forever, in my opinion at least. I mean, my opinion is allowed to be wrong to you. But in my opinion, that's what I feel. It's what I feel, you know, deep inside me. Deep inside. If I didn't have a mountain pirate, I would be like not playing. I can guarantee you that. Where's more laurel leaves? Give me some leaves. Laurel, give me your leaves. Sounds weird. There's one. There was one. Is there any more over here? There's one that hasn't respawned yet. Hi, Slice Plays. Welcome. How are you? Here are you. You used cheat engine? No, no, no. We ain't about that life. Who's this? Two-faced someone. Congrats on your name. It looks cool. There's another leaf. We good. We did it. There's six. I can count. I can count what six is. I'm good at that. I'm telling K.I. ban. It's a jokie-pokie. Understandable. Understandable. Jokie-pokies are great. You can have jokes. Jokes are good. Jokes are really good. Got some chicken chowder. Amazing. Sounds great. Food is great. I'm getting hungry. I was up really early this morning. Somehow. I was up at 6 a.m. It was a bit weird. It's a bit weird for me. I'm not usually up that early. It's kind of strange. I don't know if I'm feeling right now. It's just, you know, it's a bit too early for my liking. Just a bit too early. Um, I was, it was not a field. It was actually a park. Um, it just happens to be where rugby is played. Um, and you need a lot of space to play rugby in a park. Um, and there's like six rugby fields there. So it looks like a field, but it wasn't. And the grass has been just mowed. So that's why it kind of resembled a fieldy sort of situation. Because of all the like loose grassy bits there. But it wasn't a field. It was a park. Um, yeah. You're not, you should not be worried about me. I'm perfectly fine. Don't worry. Don't worry. Don't worry. After that relaxing walk in the park, I feel really good. Really, really excited and exuberated and, you know, just that need to do things, obviously, because that's how life works. What? I don't know. Um, he isn't stable. Listen to him. You wish I wasn't stable. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Understandable have a nice day. Exactly. That's what I'm, that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. You know, it's just understandable. Have a nice day or don't. That's also perfectly fine. You don't have to have a nice day. I'm not forcing it upon anybody. Um, yep. Why would you wish that? I don't know because I'm bad. Who's this boy? This boy is salty, salty Cyrus. Yep. Cyrus is very salty. I can guarantee that for sure. That's 100% confirmed already. We knew that when Wiz was first released. You don't need to tell us again with your name. Oh, look at all this. Look at all this. Well, GG. Who is salty Cyrus? We need to summon the thing. That's cool. Um, we can actually equip these. These are actually good. Um, E, is that how we do it? I think it is right. Is that the, that is the, that is the thing. Good job. Kenan's, um, is it that one? Yes it is. What is that one? No, they're good. Okay. Good job. Look at that. We do more damage now. So good. And the ravaged valley, whoo. Getting spicy up in here. We're going to leave a mark here. Just in case. Um, Cyrus, Drake and pirate 101 confirmed. Probably definitely. I would say yes. I would say definitely yes. I would definitely, definitely say yes. What a, what a lad. Cyrus, Drake and pirate 101 would be, you know, he would still be upset and angry. And he would still have a brother that torments the spiral every second world. Um, I mean, that's actually 100% correct. If you like add up all of his like appearances in worlds.  Then you also go from, um, Wizard City, Crocatopia, Mushu, Mali Bone and, um, Dragon Spire. That's six of the, what, 13 main story worlds. So it's basically, it's basically every second world. He's a part of it. Statistically, I'm correct. There's just as nearing not so correct anymore, unfortunately, but you know, it's nearly correct. It was correct like two years ago. Dragon Spire after Valencia part two confirmed. No way. That would be terrible. That would be really terrible. We've already been to Dragon Spire. We don't need to go back. The Skyway was enough. The Skyway was enough. Um, where are we summoning this Karen? I have no clue. I really have no clue at all. That would be terrible though. Imagine Dragon Spire. We should just, we should just get Polaris. I think Polaris is where we need to go. Honestly, I think Polaris would be far better. Um, all the way over here, of course, because that makes sense. Why make it easy to get to? Who knows? Um, there's another Stormgate and Avernus. It could be the S.  And like, you can't take a Stormgate, which takes you between worlds to the same world. That doesn't make sense, in my opinion, at least. Um, because Avernus is Dragon Spire. Oh, come and port to me if you want a group plunder chest right now. Do it. Do it, Patrick. Do it. Do it. Do it. Imagine Dragon Spire. Good job. Do it. Do it. Do it. Big McFanKies from McFanKies, congrats. Oh, I got a health doubloon. That's cute. What is that? Oh, that's actually really good. I've never seen that one before. That's cool. Jeez. Um, that's really good. I'm proud of myself. I'm proud. I'm proud that I managed to do that. That's actually the first group plunder chest I've ever opened. When they first came out, I had no friends. And I still don't have any friends.  If this is not relatable, I don't know what is. Um, don't even get my Jimmy Neutron reference. No, I don't. Sorry. I'm sorry. I'm not, you know, I'm just sorry about it. Really sorry about it. You know what I really just like? This bamboo.  And it doesn't make sense. Bamboo is meant to be luscious and like lively. This could sound really, really racist, but that's not what I'm trying to imply. Um, just so you know, I'm not actually trying to imply that. I'm just going to shush for a bit and think about my actions and sit in silence and think about how bad I've been. I'm sorry. Um, um, okay. It just doesn't look luscious. You know, I prefer my bamboo luscious. Burns is not luscious. Yay, we did it. So good. Okay, let's go back to the spot of Skyway. Shun Zhang. Are we good? Are we good yet? Are we needed? I think there's what? One more boo. One more dude. Yeah, there's a boss. There's a boss boy. And then we, then we good. Then we summon the turtle boy and we finish off for the day, which is great. We're nearly an hour. So that's fun. Basically well timed Brent. Well timed. How did I do that? I don't know. Have no clue how I did that. It's just how I did it. I'm just apparently really good at timing exactly how long stuff is going to be. Except in Mirage. That was my downfall. Mirage was meant to be shorter on the episodes in the death walkthrough than it actually was. But I kind of just, you know, I didn't want to have like two hour long episodes because that would be kind of crazy. Agrabah is annoying. Really, really, really annoying. It just takes way too long. Just saying. That's one reason why I hate Mirage. I don't hate it. I just dislike it. Mainly for its gameplay. The story is fine, but the gameplay is, it brings it down. A few pegs. It's the least favorite of my Third Arc worlds. The Third Arc is so good. It would be even better if Mirage was better. It's not hard. It's just, it's just so grindy. I don't know why I get that feeling, but I just feel that Mirage is just way too grindy for me. I don't know why because I generally like doing that sort of stuff. But I think it's just the constant like defeating collect and like defeat sort of stuff that kind of gets me down. And there's just way too many boss fights that cheat. And I don't like that. It's not hard.  Once you understand the cheats, it's not difficult. It's just annoying. Yay, level 50! We did it! Woohoo! Basically finished the first part of Pirate. Where it stopped to start with. And how many levels have we got after that? Oh yeah. Only 20. Wow. Um, that's fun. Uh, let's drain up some companions. Because we can do that. Bonnie Anne. Good job. You can't be trained. El Toro foe show. Who else? Let's train up Bat Jim. Sorry. Not Bat. Bat's on my witch doctor. And oh, we don't have enough for Lucky Jackross. Well, that's a shame. That's unlucky. Well, there we go. Fantastic. Let's go to the Evil Shrine. We're actually gonna mark here because I know we're coming back. Um, when you're done with Big Turtle Boy, come help me with Aquila. We're not doing Big Turtle Boy today. Um, and we're going on the Buck next because I haven't been on my Buccaneer for five years, plus probably more. And I want to go back on my Buccaneer. I haven't been on him for so long, and I miss him dearly. Um, defeating collect, defeating collect, yeah. Yeah. My buck's in Skull Island, so I'm pretty sure I cannot help you. I'm sorry. I will, I will quickly help you. I can help you with one quest. I'll do one quest with you on my, um, musketeer because I like him. He's kind of cool. And I've already got you added on my musketeer, so I'll do that. Okay. One quest, that's all you need. Okay. Well, once we've done, we've, once we've done the Hammercaller Temple, and we've summoned Turtle Boy, we will, um, I'll come and help you then. I will come and help you. Then we'll hop on to Buccaneer and do some fun, fun time. Are we finishing? I don't know if, I can't remember where we're up to, but I think we're finishing off Captain Gun, Treasure Line, Storyline, Treasure Line. Geez. I can't speak. I'm good. You can come and help me, sure thing. You can definitely. I think it's around the back, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's around the back. It's around the back. It is around the back. We got to go around the back side of this big mountain in the middle of the way. I have to say, when I first came into the Sabata Skyway, I was quite excited because I'm like, wow, it's so cold and frosty. I love it. Where did this come from? I love how when you drive, you don't even use your hands. I mean, you don't have to. I don't need to use my hands, you know? It's not how I roll. Okay, we need to zoom out of here, boys.  And also, when I'm doing it, I also swap between arrow keys and WASD as well. Don't judge me. I use arrow keys still a bit. I used to use them all the time. I don't anymore, but I still use them occasionally when I'm sailing. It depends what I'm doing and what other keys I need to press at the same time. I will still use arrow keys. And depends what hand I want to use as well. That's terrible. It's terrible. I used to use them all the time, though. It was so weird. I don't know why I did that. Who knows. But when I'm sailing, I generally use arrow keys. Mainly because if I'm like going into flight, say like to use this hand for like one, two, three, four to use the ship powers. So like that, I can spam it with this and use the arrow keys to like dodge and stuff, even though that doesn't help. Just move. Fun fact. Fun fact with Brent, how I sail my pirate ship how I sail my pirate ship and pirate 101. This music got a bit weird. I love this place. This place is honestly so cool. Such a short lived area as well. You're only here for like one quest. But it's such a cool place. Such a cool place. Into now. Let's do this.  Hi, Chantal. Hi. Hi, are you good? Yeah, she good. She happy.  She loving and living. Boys. Locate Evil Shrine. I don't know if I can do that. That sounds pretty difficult. Pretty difficult to locate Evil Shrine. Here we go, boys. Defeat Temple Guardians. Whoops. I can click properly. I'm good at the game. I can click. I know how to click properly. Okie dokie. Wow. Look at this. Amazing. Oh, we got a health one. Um, we need to feed all. Well, that's fun. Let's just drop some bombs over there. You can move up to there. Probably Monkey King can go right up. El Toro can do his Buffy Boy. And we should be good. Dropped in bombs. Yep. Gotta drop the bombs. Dropped the bombs. Favorite part of Privateer is just dropping the bombs on first turn. I don't know why. I just always love that. That's great. I'll do a crit buff next. Probably. Is probably a good idea. Yeah, I know. I know you can. But mine are better. Mine are better bombs. Mainly because Musketeer bombs don't go everywhere. Where Privateer ones do as well. And you only get the first tier. And the later tiers are better. Because I said so. So that's fun.  Look at Bonnie Ann. Doing some work here. Look at this. Look at this. She is just a god. She is just a god. She is OP. Really, really OP. Job. Good job. Vengeance blocked. Good job, Monkey King. You're great at the game. You're doing well. You're doing good. I'm proud of you. Yep. Really, really proud. That's 600. Whoo! Did a lot. You're great, Monkey King. I hope you could do good. Because he's got arm ripost 3. So does Altora. He's got ripost 3 as well. I love ripost 3. Like it's such a good talent. Such a great talent, really. So yeah, that's how he gets extra dodge when he blocks. You love me. You just had to remind me. That's fine. I completely understand. I understand that you just have to remind me these things. Understandable. Have a nice day. My Bonnie Ann's going off. I love it. I love it. This burst fire chain though. Geez, hello. Hi. Block, thank you. Bonnie is very OP. She is. She's really, really, really OP. Mega hit. Easy. Oh, and another mega. Good job, Monkey King. You're great. I respect you. I respect and appreciate you, Monkey King. I've never really used Monkey King much. I haven't really used him much. This is like the first time I've actually genuinely used Monkey King to his ability. And he's actually kind of pretty good. But I guess, which doctors and musketeers are completely different and you kind of need different setups to the other schools because they're just so unique. Oh, more summoning. That's great. I love when that happens. I love when that happens. When you knock one down, just more calm. That's great. Alter Brings better than Monkey King, yeah. But I ain't about that. I ain't about that pay to win life. Geez. I don't need none of them pay to win companions like Norsica. Geez, who needs that? Oh, Bonnie Ann's getting big hit here. Oof. Yikes, that did some damage. Good job, Monkey King. You are great. I respect you really greatly. Good work, Monkey King. You the man. You the man. My dude. You the dude. You the dude, my man. Because that makes sense. Um, okie dokie mega hit. Good job, Millie. Millie's so good. Millie is my fave. I love Millie. Millie's great. What is next? What is life? I'm going to do that because I can. You can do... That does three. That does two. So we'll do three because that sounds fun. You can do that. You can do that. Done. Okay. Easy peasy. Super hit. Oh my gosh. Hello. That did a lot. Good job. Good job, Brent. You're great at the game. Really good. Super duper good. Hooyah! GG. He did. Block. Damn it. Where's your block? El Toro. You crit. So I'm proud of you El Toro. You crit.  Even if you don't block and don't relentless. Okay good. I was about to say. I would have been slightly mad but not really. Not really at the same time. Where did they all go? I can't see them. What? Kind of weird. What? What? That's strange. So strange. Oh then legitimately not there anymore. What is this? That's very very weird. Wow. Look at this. You were just popping off here. You popping off. Geez. Hello there. Hi. Amazing. He's not there. What are you shooting at? There's no one there. Maybe that's... I'm so confused honestly. So confused. I have no idea what the heck. I've never seen that happen before. Like there's legitimately not here. Weird. Okay whatever. Whatever. You can just be weird again. Game be weird. Um you can come over here. Sure. Done. They were on my screen. Then I come to stream and then they just disappear. That was weird. I don't know. Strange. Strange. I have no clue. No clue at all. Broken game is a broken game you know. Well GG. Good job Monkey King. You're great. I respect you. I respect and appreciate you very much. I'm gonna try out using Catbed I think in this. On my privateer like severely using him. Like actually using him properly. Where did Monkey... I was about to say where did Monkey King go. Don't say he disappeared. Monkey King looks like a devil. Yeah he does. Surrounded by that fire. He is a devil. Not even gonna like sugar. Oh thank you GG. GG. We did it boys. We're so good. Amazing. Okay we good. Easy peasy. Oh and there's a doubloon chest. I love it. I love it when that happens. What did we get? What was that treasure bath? Oh my fave. My fave. T.Y. Survivor of Hama Color. That's great. I love that badge. Good job. Oh we need to actually go up. Of course we do. Look it's the turtle ball. Amazing. Well let's go back and summon the turtle and then we're gonna finish off there. For this episode. Number something. What actually what actually what number is it of the... What number is it? How many numbers have we gone through? How many numbers have we gone through? Let's find out. I have done it. I know I'm great. Thanks. Whoa whoa we get a weapon. Oh Destiny's Defender. I can defend Destiny. That sounds fun. This is number. Number 47. That's crazy. That's a big number. That's a big number. Let's quickly summon it and then we will end off here for Z. Live recording bit at least. We will continue don't worry. We got a war spear.   No they don't. But you know it's allowed to be whatever they want to be. Okay. Let's summon the turtle. I can't remember where we do it. But it's somewhere. I mean we'll just follow the quest error until it says go the other way and then we know where we've not been anymore. Is it over there? No it is not over there. I always forget where we summon this boy. I think it's over the side is it? Yeah it is. That is correct. I am correct about it. Let's summon the turtle. This way whoopsies. I know where I'm going. Hush I know where I'm going. I know exactly where I'm going to summon this turtle. Obviously right here. Duh geez. Okay. Here we go. Let's listen to the dialogue because it's kind of funny. I don't know I can't remember it. Uh uh look at it. It's a big boy. There's big boy here. Amazing. Hi. Yeah we actually have to sail there which is great. So next time we will be sailing you know what we should just hop on the we should we're gonna hop onto him. That sounds really weird. Really really really weird.   He's a super big boy. Super duper big boy. Um look at Dim Nostrils I know. You could put a boat in that. That's so true. But there's animal abuse so through. Um that is not our ship. Okay sad reacts only. Why is our ship all the way over there? I don't know. You tell me you love him. Well you'll see a lot more of him. Probably not actually we don't actually see a lot of him. But you will see him next episode because we're about to finish off here. He should be summoning right about here. Oh there he is. You know what's really funny? He looks so close to here but he's not actually. He's all the way over here. Um it's kind of funny.  I always thought he was so much more closer. I swear they moved him. I swear they moved him. He was never this far away. He was never this far away. This big boy. Big boy. She's allowed to love pixels. That's fine. So this place which we will be heading into next time is a lot of fun. Lots of dungeons. I mean not really. It's one big kind of boss fight of like one two three four five boss fights I think. So that's fun. We will do that next time. But now thank you for watching this. If you're watching this on YouTube. Remember to leave a like and subscribe. If you're already subscribed press the little bell so you know exactly when I post another video. And remember craft outside the box.


This is Think Tech Hawaii, Community Matters here. Greetings all, and welcome to Working Together on Think Tech Hawaii, where we discuss the impact of change on workers, employers, and the economy. I'm your host, Cheryl Crozier-Garcia, inviting you to join the conversation. You can do so by calling us at area code<PHONE_NUMBER>, or by tweeting us at thinktechhi. Today we're very fortunate to have a successful author and military officer joining us. Lieutenant Colonel Michael Zacchea is a retired Marine, and he was one of the advisors who trained the Iraqi Army's Fifth Battalion. His new book, The Ragged Edge, a U.S. Marine's account of leading the Iraqi Army's Fifth Battalion, chronicles the way a loosely associated group of individuals can be turned into a successful fighting force. He's joining us today via Skype from his home in Connecticut, and in addition to that, I must tell you that we are proud to call him an HPU alum and fellow sea warrior. So please help me welcome Lieutenant Colonel Michael Zacchea. Hi Michael. Hi Cheryl, how are you? I'm fine, how are you? I'm well, thank you. Good. I read your book and I was shocked and amazed at so many levels. I don't want to give it up chronologically because I really want people who read it to have a first-hand example of what you experienced, but there were some things that surprised me that I wanted to specifically ask you about because I think there are some misconceptions about what it is that U.S. military officers do when they are in these kinds of advisory roles in other countries. So that's what I want to focus on. And the first thing I'd like to ask you about is why do you think you were also grossly under-resourced? That's a great question. I think that we were grossly under-resourced because the Bush administration had not thought about what happens, what do we do with the Iraqi army after we beat it, what do we do with all those soldiers. I don't think they anticipated the Iraqi army, I know they didn't anticipate the insurgency and there was no plan for reconstituting an Iraqi army. So I think that they just didn't put any thought into it and then I think they panicked when the insurgency sort of exploded and they said, oh my God we got to get people and we got to do something to get us out of this. I think it was politically motivated and not from the military. Now you mentioned the insurgency and I was very interested to read that the people who enlisted and who eventually became the Fifth Battalion came from many different sides of the battle. You might have had former regular Iraqi army personnel or other military personnel. You might have had people who were members of fringe kinds of political groups, etc. And you had to figure out a way to turn all of those people who may have disagreed with one another and literally have been trying to kill each other in the past. You had to turn them into a team. How did you figure out the best way to approach that kind of a divergent workforce for one of a better term? So just to put this in context, I need to give you props because the class that I took with you at HPU and my master's program included was about culture, business culture. And so I had a vocabulary and cognitive structure to understand those concepts and what I had to do. Very specifically a book that we used in your class, Franz Trompendors, writing the Waves of Culture. I actually brought a copy of that with me and I taught that to my Marines and soldiers as we were developing the training program. I was extremely aware that there was an entire ocean of cultural shared meaning and communication that we did not have access to, that we were not privy to. I always emphasized that we were guests in their country and we were their guests specifically. We emphasized and we used, resorted to our Marine Corps training, I refer to this in the book, every Marine is a rifleman. And that's what we said, every soldier is a rifleman, we're all in this together and we tried to overcome and build a spriticore shared hardship and misery which is already built in because we had no buildings, we had very little electricity, we needed water supply, we had very little running water. We had food, bad gear and so those things, those hardships and that privation actually helped to gel our battalion in what the Iraqis actually called the crucible of hardships. Hardship can certainly help to build a team, I mean just ask the Chicago Cubs, so that's an interesting approach to it. Even within the group of soldiers that you had to deal with, they among themselves had many different cultures because it sounds like you had Sunnis, you had Shiites, there were Yazidis, people from other tribal types of associations, many of whom may have had historical conflicts going way back and yet somehow you had to figure out a way to have them put it all aside for the good of the entire organization.  You know what's amazing is how profoundly ignorant of Iraq and its history and its peoples we were. I had a little bit of knowledge about it because I, when I was in college, I majored in classics and I had read and I knew of Lawrence of Arabia so I understood a little bit about the region what he did and I used that as a template for what I was doing. Again in the book I write this but I think that there was a lazy political assumption or assumption by the politicians that you know an Arab is an Arab is an Arab whether they're Shi or Sunni or whatever it didn't matter to them. I think that that was probably an easy assumption to make. I think that what we came to find out is that Iraq actually had a history of multi ethnic multi religious history was very integrated at one point during Saddam Hussein's reign. It was a very vibrant and thriving Jewish community which eventually was driven out of Baghdad but you know it had this history of getting along in terms of ethnicities of Chaldeans the Assyrians the Turkmen you know there were Zoroastrians so which I was surprised by the Yazidis I learned about a lot about the Yazidis their religion goes back to traces back to the last Ice Age and even within the the Muslim blocks there are separate sects not just Sunni and Shi and other smaller sects that we were not aware of and I learned all this and I had to try to figure out how to make it work and I can't say that I had a plan I just sort of did the best I could when things came up and tried to you know given over and they seem to respond to this idea of wahed Iraq which means one Iraq a unified Iraq they're very interested in the idea of unity and singularity or oneness so I that was a theme that I played in fact at one point in the book I talk about when I said that we speak with one voice and that was very motivating to them and they liked that a lot it also sounds like you had the opportunity to surround yourself with experienced Iraqi personnel who who were able to really provide assistance as the US military was learning how to work with the Iraqis Captain Zane and Sergeant Major Iskander and those folks did you become friends with them what was your relationship like with your Iraqi counterparts a couple pieces that one it was all luck of the draw and you know some of the Iraqi soldiers and were very very good and many of them were mediocre and some were just outright terrible I refer to all three Iskander was a character and you he was great and I loved Iskander and yes I was friends with him same thing with Zane and you know Zane is like my brother I have helped a number of later on when I came back to the United States I formed a nonprofit with Kirk Johnson from USAID we called it the list project and we basically formed a pipeline for helping Iraqis come to the United States and I've helped a number of both interpreters and soldiers from my old battalion come here so yes I was you know I talked about how sad and you know we weren't friends exactly but we knew each other very well and he was very corrupt and he has now gone on to become he's a major general in the Iraqi army and he is the commanding general of the Western Baghdad Defense District Zane you know at the end of the book I talk about how his when Mosul got overrun and his brother was executed by ISIS the commanding general of the Iraqi forces that we took Mosul was a lieutenant general Najem al-Jaboury and so he was from Zane's tribe and that was for Iraqis they would understand this is the Jaboury taking back Mosul and getting avenged on ISIS for the execution of Zane's brother so we in the United States would not recognize that but because I know to look for this stuff I recognize the dynamics there yeah it sounds like just an amazing an amazing lack of knowledge that we have in the West and particularly in the United States about people that we would like to have as friends tell me a little bit about this story I shouldn't I shouldn't say it made me laugh but it did tell me about the massive food poisoning incident yeah well you know and again I read about this in the book and it was actually a serious deal yeah it sounded bad you know we had a food a kitchen crew that were Yazidis and we had no idea at that time who they were what they were just you know the contractors that showed up and you know we didn't have a place to put them and they were sleeping in the kitchens with the food and you know doing the ritual cleaning of themselves and stuff in the kitchen etc the contract required only cultural standards of cleanliness for food preparation and so that met the requirements of the contract but you know they did not believe or they did not make a distinction the way we do about food preparation food safety and food cleanliness etc so with the Yazidis what they began doing is marking the walls around where we lived with feces to scare the devil away and of course they were also eating with you know handling food and so everybody got sick we had massive food poisoning you know well over hundred soldiers it was a real mess but then when I tried to teach and I called in like food specialists from the US Army we did inspection we did a whole thing to overcome because that's real serious especially with the hydration in the desert I mean it could be fatal and you know when I was trying to teach these guys and most of them have little more than a you know fourth or fifth grade education most of them are semi-literate or functionally illiterate and I was trying to tell them all you have these invisible bugs that live on your fingers that can get you sick and they were like looking at me like you're crazy they didn't believe me and you know how do you prove that I don't know I don't know you know it never occurred to me that they wouldn't believe me that there were you know tiny bugs that were invisible living on their hand think about it when you put it like that sounds ridiculous would you believe somebody if they told you that no I wouldn't but you know we taught them you have to wash your hands before you handle food and you got to wear shoes and you can't wash yourself in the kitchen you know do your take a shower where the food is etc and I got them beds and all kind of stuff and after that we didn't have any problems but yeah but again this came out of you know we had no idea what we're dealing with I was amazed to find out when you relate in the book where the food sanitation people that came in said that the entire kitchen crew had to wear shoes and for many of the people you went out and found them shoes and for it and for a lot of those folks it was the first pair of shoes they'd ever had yeah and you know these people are for the most part desperately poor yeah you know at one point I talked about them playing soccer in the gravel barefoot I mean you know their feet are like you know like leathery cut you know they can do that I could not but like Louis right they think nothing of you know being barefoot in the gravel and all that kind of stuff but and you know it's interesting so Islam requires the ritual cleaning five times a day before prayer cleaning of your hands and feet before prayer and I wonder if that was not Muhammad his way of introducing you know ritual cleanliness into you know the daily lives of the Arabs then yeah for exactly that reason it could have been listen Michael we need to take a quick break so that we can show our viewers some of the other wonderful programming here on think tech Hawaii but can you stick around because I really want to continue this conversation sure happy to great we will be right back right after this we all play a role in keeping our community safe every day we move in and out of each other's busy lives it's easy to take for granted all the little moments that make up our every day some are good others not so much but that's life it's when something doesn't seem quite right that it's time to pay attention because only you know what's not supposed to be in your every day so protect your every day if you see something suspicious say something to local authorities I'm Helen Dora the host of voice of the veteran seen here live every Thursday afternoon at 1pm on think tech Hawaii as a fellow veteran and veterans advocate with over 23 years experience serving veterans active duty and family members I hope to educate everyone on benefits and accessibility services by inviting professionals in the field to appear on the show in addition I hope to plan on inviting guest veterans to talk about their concerns and possibly offer solutions as we navigate and work together through issues we can all benefit please join me every Thursday at 1pm for the voice of the veteran aloha welcome back to working together on think tech Hawaii I'm Cheryl Crozier Garcia and we are talking via telephone with Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel retired Michael Zekia who is an HPU graduate and who has written a book about his experiences with the Iraqi 5th Army it the book is available on amazon.com and I highly recommend it but Michael since you've been back your life has taken quite a different turn tell us about what you're up to now sure so I'm doing a lot it took me a while to recover from my wounds I spent a year in and out of the hospital I had no memory for a year basically I was medically tired from the Marine Corps when I retired I moved to Northwest Connecticut and I applied to go to University of Connecticut for an MBA and I started while I was there and I had started with some advocacy before this but I started a non-profit for veterans called entrepreneur bootcamp for veterans and I helped them instruct businesses and it's been very successful and that led to a number of opportunities both with the state I was appointed several gubernatorial task forces on veterans reintegration I am an Obama appoint me to the small business administration I've testified to the Senate a number of times I was President Obama's guest at the State of the Union Address in 2016 all that said right now I am starting a United States Veterans Chamber of Commerce there's 2.5 million veteran owned businesses in the country that account for about 1.2 trillion dollars in gross domestic product which about 6% of the US gross domestic product that's never been organized and we are presently in the act of organizing basically we're we're creating a market we're connecting supply-to-demand for veteran owned businesses to corporate America and to municipal and federal governments federal agencies who want to contract and want to work with veteran owned businesses there's significant research on the importance and the value creation of veteran owned businesses in the community that help build community etc so we've been working on a national level in the next few months I'm going to be working with the Department of Defense on several initiatives and this fall I will have a big announcement that I'll be able to tell you about should you have me back but I have become very vocal and very visible on a national level in terms of veteran business entrepreneurship that's good I'm glad to hear that you know folks that work with military personnel or who have history of association those of us that are Air Force kids and military spouses etc we know that the training that the military provides its service members is easily translatable to professions in the civilian sector I mean we know that but folks that are not as as intimately connected with service members may not be aware of just how valuable military training and the leadership skills and experiences that are provided to service members how they can really enhance the value proposition of any business well if you let me throw a couple of statistics at you part of what's happening is a decline in the population overall so since 2000 since 2000 census the veterans population is declined by 25% and it's projected to climb by an additional 33% by 2030 so what's happening is a loss of political social and economic capital at a time when the US population itself is growing so in the last census there was part of the survey was do you know a veteran and 80% of Americans responded that they did not know somebody who had served in the military wow so we're getting very concerned about the shrinking both the raw number of shrinkage and the relative shrinkage of the veteran population compared to the overall population right so is part of that encouraging people perhaps to consider spending some time in the military yes I think or in some sort of national service to understand what it is that veterans go through and what they have to offer unfortunately and I work a lot with corporations there continues to be talent managers and hiring managers continue to assign a risk premium to veteran job applicants because of post-traumatic stress and medical issues and being lost to the workforce so it's a barrier that we have to overcome but are there any I'm sorry to interrupt are there any statistics to support this this added risk factor there were it's improved but I've been told by hiring managers that there was a risk premium associated with a veteran hire another barrier to entry that we have with veterans is what economists call a suddenly the it's about changes technology and change essentially and I forgot the technical term now it just my mind but essentially hiring managers look at veterans as people have been out of the workforce for four or eight or 20 years so they think that they don't have current technical skills and they're not adaptable to change there's a very severe misperception of the military that's called skills obsolescence yes a technological skills right and well it sounds to me like you could use a really sharp HR person who shall remain nameless who might be able to cut to partner with you to really to tell the real story about just how valuable military experience can be within an organization as a matter of fact I am working with somebody in Hawaii to start a Hawaii State Veterans Chamber of Commerce oh fantastic well as soon as you get that up and going we're gonna have to fly you after I will introduce you to her then to good yes do that but the other thing I guess I would like to say since we have HR people that watch this show if you are under the mistaken impression that people with military experience are not as well qualified as other people based solely on their military experience you are mistaken because there's not another group of people that is as resilient as flexible and as willing to take risks to accomplish a goal then then somebody with military history because that's what you're trying to do ultimately and I think Michael that your book proves that statement to a tee you know had you not been resilient flexible and willing to take risks the Iraqi army wouldn't have had a fifth battalion well actually I'll tell you I actually started so even though it was a fifth battalion it was the first okay I actually started the first Iraqi unit the Iraqi army and at a time when no American had ever done what I did right and that is the historic significance of this and why I wrote the book but if I can just capitalize on what you said so I think that what veterans have to offer in the workforce or or starting a business or a mission accomplishment and a bias for action and oftentimes it's what I call business speak versus middle speak and the two speaks don't necessarily understand each other and I have gotten to a point where I can talk to either one try to bring them to the middle and that's what we're trying to do the overall market well I wish you luck with that because as as I said a person with deep military connections I'm on your side and and I know the kinds of leadership abilities that come out of a military experience we are going to have to wrap in just a minute here but Michael thank you so much for joining us and could you take maybe a couple of seconds to share some props for your fellow Marines and service members sure so if you don't mind I'd like to give you my the website for my book oh fantastic yes it's you know the ragged edge book com and as you said it's available Amazon it's also available through Barnes and Noble so it's also available audio book and you know all that stuff Kindle etc so you know I have the extraordinarily good fortune and privileged to work with thousands of veterans nationwide I am working with the Vietnam veterans of America what they're calling a rotation of policy leadership and veterans issues as they both are leaving the workforce and you know at some point in the future departing into history they're very concerned that and to a man they will tell me we don't want what happened to us to happen to your generation of veterans and I think that that's a commitment that we can carry forward we're going to be dealing with the ramifications and the implications of this war and the veteran population until well into the middle of this century yeah that's true it's war isn't over when they signed the armistice right so there's there going to be a lot of 35 40 years yeah that's true before peak payments for veterans issues are reached so you know we're looking at like 2050 to 2060 right before we even peak with this it's gonna be a big job for many decades to come yeah well you certainly have my support as well as my undying gratitude for joining me today we're gonna have to wrap it up right now but I would urge every single one of you that's watching right now to get online and buy Michael's book and read it it's it's fantastic and it will teach you a lot about our brothers and sisters in the Middle East so that does it for us on working together on think tech Hawaii I'm Cheryl Crozier Garcia and we will be back in two weeks aloha


Hey, everybody, and welcome to another edition of Yes, We're Here. This is the Fordham edition. I'm Michael Kay, along with my Fordham alum friend, Ryan Rucco, Ryan obviously, no NBA, no Nets, no Yankees. How are you holding up? It's weird, man. It's so weird. It's funny because I now have found myself actually fully engrossing in the classic games. I was like, oh, I was close enough to the recent games that I wasn't totally in it yet now. If I see a game on, I'm like, I just need to see some action, man. How about you? How's everybody doing in the K household? It's okay. I mean, I give the kids credit, they're five and seven years old, so this is not normal for them. You know, they miss being with their friends and, you know, technology allows them to have, like, Zoom play dates with their friends, but that's still not the same thing. You know, Jody's obviously getting worn out teaching two full curriculums, and because they go to public school, a lot of the private schools actually have teachers teach the classes on Zoom for the whole day, but in public, you have to make it equal for everybody, so some people might not have the bandwidth or the internet, so you can't do it, so they send, they send it over the computers and you have to teach the kids yourself. So it's kind of difficult. Jody's worn out. Yeah. I would imagine. I think Jody gave that explanation because Andrea, my fiancé and I were literally talking about this earlier, like, how are kids being taught during this period of time? Because who knows if students are going to go back to school at any point during, you know, the remaining, you know, months of this school year? And I've actually, you know, I've just assumed, yeah, they're doing it technologically, but I didn't realize that it's actually on the parents to then, you know, actually deliver the curriculum to the kids. Yeah. And then, you know, there's, there doesn't seem, I know there's a light at the end of the tunnel, Ryan, but we haven't seen it yet. And, you know, Pennsylvania today canceled the remainder of the school year, so I'm sure it's going to happen here at some point. And then you don't know, is it going to start up again before a vaccine? Can you really have a six-year-old and then an eight-year-old go, you know, kids are going to get close to each other. They're going to pick their nose and things like that. So it's, it's, it's difficult. And that's the stuff that fills you with anxiety. I mean, people are, you know, thank God, people we know have, we haven't lost anybody, but we have had people that have had it, that have been in the hospital for a while. And Ryan, I know for a fact that this has touched you in a real way in terms of your life plans, because you had a destination wedding plan for Italy. And you guys, I guess the only thing to do was to cancel it, right? Yeah, we had to postpone it, man. It was, you know, of course, it stinks, right? Like, you know, we're, we're, we're getting close down to the wire. It was scheduled for June. Andrew and I have been engaged for, you know, a year and a half, essentially. So it was like, you know, there was a lot of buildup, you know, and we were, I just had my bachelor party in mid-February. Like it, it really like was, we're down to all the nitty gritty. And, and, you know, we're just so excited in Italy. You know how much Italy means to me. And it's a magical place to both of us. And so when it had started, when COVID had started to really like pop up there, I was following it closely and, you know, the reactions, a lot of people start to ask me like, Hey, you worried about the wedding or about the wedding? And I'm like, yeah, I'm worried about the wedding, but this isn't going to be an Italy problem. This is going to be an everyone problem, you know, and, and the interesting thing is now, like, regardless of where our wedding was, June, you wouldn't feel safe at this point knowing you were going to be able to have a gathering of any kind of people, you know?  That's what's most important. And obviously people are dealing with incredibly dramatic things during this time and heart wrenching things. But within that scope, it still stinks, you know, it's still sad. And we definitely had our moments of real sadness about it for sure. Now, also, if you went through with it, it's hard to kiss the bride when she's six feet away. I mean, there's social distancing going on and you can't be doing that. Now, most of the time, have you postponed it to next year? Yeah. So we're going to do it in June of next year. Does that mean that you're going to have another bachelor party? Because that would be wrong. Well, that, that my, my bachelor party group chat is already insisting that's what it means. I'm not sure if that's what it means. Well, maybe we'll just have to do like a reunion night in the city or something like that. We went to Bahamas this year. So I don't know if we're going to be able to duplicate that, but we'll have to do something. Whenever the wedding happens, really the standard we're going to be trying to hit is the Kay Applegate wedding because your, your wedding was, I feel like everybody who attended it calls it the greatest party of their lives. Michael, what, like, I mean, what do you remember most about that epic party at the Plaza? It's weird, you know, like we're, we're so fortunate and blessed that people that went to the party and there were 302 people there have said that that's the best wedding they've ever been to. You know, Jody and I kind of look at it and as you'll find out, you know, you are the main attraction at the wedding, but you don't really get a chance to party. I mean, you have to go around to the tables and make small talk and thank people and stuff like that. So, you know, hopefully maybe in 20 years we'll get remarried again and we'll really be able to enjoy it. But the thing that stands out the most in my mind was like when Jody and I came down, you know, the aisle and we came down individually, obviously, and Jody picked out a song and she didn't know if the crowd would get it because, you know, I was 50 years old and I'd never been married, you know, Ryan, you've known me a long time and I never wanted to be married. I never thought I would be. And when I came down the aisle, it was, they played the song at last. Yeah. And it was such, I got like goosebumps down my, my, my neck because the whole crowd started laughing. They got it, you know, Jody didn't think they were going to get it. It was like her private little joke. But yeah, at last, this fool was finally doing it. So I, I heard it was a great night. One of the things that stands out in my mind is the next day in the New York Post, they wrote about the wedding and they had a lot of things wrong. Yeah. Like Bernie Williams jammed with the, with the band and Steven Tyler was up there with the band. They weren't even the wedding. You wait, do you know to this day, I don't, it says Robert De Niro was there. If like, if you go on your Wikipedia, Bobby De Niro wasn't there, was he? You can't really trust Wikipedia because they say that Bob Lorenz dates my sister Debbie. So that's, it's just wrong. But, you know, we had, we had a breakfast at the plaza after the wedding and, and Tino Martinez was a guest and he was there and he was sitting there and he's reading the newspaper as you know, he's eating his eggs or whatever. And Jody and I are at like a table or two over. And he goes, you know what the best thing about this post story is? I said, what's that? He goes, Bernie's actually going to think he was here and he wasn't. He's going to read it and think that he was. Oh my God, it's Bernie has that like, he has that charm, right? Even like, he was in the booth for one of the spring training games with David and I this March. And it's so funny. We see it, Michael, with all the guys, all of his teammates.  It's just to each and every one of them. It is so endearing. His teammates just love it about him. Yeah, it wasn't. It's not a loopness in the pejorative definition of the word. He's just like kind of in his own world. Yeah. And I think that's what made him a great player. And I think there's some, some of his teammates wonder that if he was intense, like an O'Neal type of intense with his skill set, would he be a Hall of Famer?  And he didn't think too much at the plate. It was just Bernie being Bernie. That was the beginning of Bernie being Bernie. So, yeah, those teams are great. I know that on those teams, your favorite player of all time, right? Oh, come on. Andrew, Eugene, Pettit. Absolutely, man. It's funny because now, like when I've seen those like late 90s games on that we're running on, yes, now we're right now with our Yankees classics, I'm even like more in tune to them just because it's obviously we want to see baseball. And yep, there's the stair. There it is. And it's just like it's taking me back. Michael, these are the kind of conversations you can have right now about sports. I don't know how you're doing what you're doing on the air every day for four hours, man.  But it's got to be challenging for you, Peter and Don right now. The thing is that I'm doing with Peter and Don. So even if there's not stuff to talk about sports wise and there has been ironically enough because there are story lines. Obviously there are games going on, but you know, we can kid with each other and have conversations that way. Well, people that do a show alone, I mean, we've done it a month now. So we've done four weeks of shows where they have not been any sports. So NFL free agency was great for us. I think the NFL draft is going to be great for us. All the iterations of how sports might come back. Those are things that we can talk about. But at some point, if this continues into June or July, you really do have to wonder how long my hair is going to be and how great it's going to be. And I don't know how we're going to come up with 20 hours and 25 minutes of content each week. But those are the rules of engagement. And it does give me, you know, I always wondered, Ryan, when players had something going on in their personal life and they'd go, you know what, the best time of the three hours when I got between the lines, because you got your mind off of it. And I thought it was kind of cliche, but it's not, you know, those four hours when I'm on the mic, I have a job to do and I'm trying to entertain people and it does take your mind off this awful situation that the whole planet's going through. So it's kind of like our version of between the lines. Now, that's how I, you know, fill my time. You're with Andrew, you obviously can fill your time talking with her and reading or whatever the case might be. We want to know what all of our, our yes family is doing. So please send us videos and any of our social media platforms and hashtag it. Yes, we're here. Tell us how you're getting through the day, Ryan. I'm sure that people have an awful lot of stories. That's for sure. Absolutely. I would love to hear that because there's just so many unique avenues that people can walk down right now to get through this time. So we'd love to hear from you guys. You obviously are hearing more and more from us about how we are managing this time. So please follow Michael's instructions and tweet at us, post on our Instagram and with that hashtag and let us know what you guys are up to. And you know, we love everybody out there that consumes yes in any way. We love everybody. I think everybody should feel that way at this time. Wash your hands, social distancing and not so much social, just physical because keep in touch with your friends. Keep in touch with people that are living alone. That's really important because social distancing drives people baddie because they do need social interaction. Just physical distancing is the most important thing. So do everything that you're being told by the experts and the scientists and hopefully Ryan will get through this. And I know you're living in Manhattan and that worries me.  That that's like a hotspot too. We need to, you know, flatten the curve and get everybody back and get sports back as well. Amen, man. Well said.  And Michael, same to you and the family there. And thank you for giving us entertainment on the air each day.  All right. Thank you, Ryan. Thank you everybody for watching. Again, we'll continue to have, yes, we're here, all of our different people on the air. We hope that you're enjoying it as well. So for Ryan Rucco, I'm Michael Kay. Stay safe. Everybody see it.


Okay, so we start with the session of the working group three on methods and tools before I invite the first speaker I would like to just remind you a bit What is the scope and motivation behind this third working group? Which is essentially now? initiating It's works now in the beginning of the second reporting period so the the aim of The working group is to provide an overview On the different tools and methods basically the analysis and computations that are involved in the structural health monitoring procedure with let's say a focus on On the value of information aspects We need within this context. We have Also in the past presented together with Daniel who is the chair of the of this working group and I'm the vice the vice leader this Influence diagram which basically summarizes the different parts we consider are involved in the process This was also presented in previous workshops. I'm not gonna Repeat this information, but what is important is the fact that we have now slowly started the procedure of gathering or Organizing the contributions of the fact sheets with respect to the different components of this diagram And so we already have a first fact sheet, which is the overview of this framework We have a fact sheet on Indicators that are based on vibration based Recordings you will together you will today see some presentations related to fact sheets on Bayesian analysis methods as well as a presentation on an approach to decision-making and Excuse me essentially our goal is to Start organizing the different contributions within this map This does not only this is not only limited to the working group three contributions There's actually already some contributions from working group one and two that would fit within this context, but Do keep in mind how you could potentially Contribute to the different aspects of these diagrams Okay, and so one more Note the Second contribution that you have in your agenda for today by Frank Schoff's is not going to be presented It will be posted as a fact sheet later on But it will we would instead have a presentation by Elizabeth Bismuth who works with Daniel Straub In place of that of that presentation So to initiate The presentations I would like to ask him courage to present his contribution on cost models Sorry I made a mistake, so it was the opposite the first first presentation on cost models, which Will not will not be presented. So then I moved to the presentation of Costes for body material on Bayesian analysis methods you


Hello and welcome to another episode of the private property home shopper show again We are visiting the incredible stain city and we are standing in the entrance hall of this one-of-a-kind 30 million rent mega mansion. We've done so many things, but we have never done a house this excessive