This white movie critic is facing some backlash for his tweet and review about the new movie Joyride But let's talk about if the hate towards him is warranted at all and maybe what did he say that was so wrong? We're talking about lights camera Jackson versus Adele Lim who wrote crazy rich Asians produced Joyride Andrew We talk about a lot of things on this podcast from silly to serious I'm gonna go ahead and put this firmly in the silly category and but you know what's not silly your favorite song Race Wars in America So make sure you like subscribe turning your notifications and your long story short man Of course anybody is entitled to their opinion on anything right that is one of the tenants And especially when it comes to like reviewing media pieces your extra entitled however And sometimes you can feel something from your tone that makes it feel like how do you really feel about our entire group of people? Especially now that there's a big Asian American representation movie movie a movement and you can identify With certain pieces more as a part of your internal identity than others. Yeah for sure. All right guys We're gonna get into the comment section. Please hit that like button as always All right Let me just read his tweet that kind of went viral and then it caused Adele Lim the producer to respond Joyride is embarrassing incredibly unpleasant like most modern adult comedies It's a raunchy simply to be raunchy forgetting that there has to be humor attached and there's definitely none of that It objectifies men targets white people all shock value with a look at me attitude to which she replied I'm a need objectifies men targets white people on a t-shirt But she also said you know This is not about the thing but she said it's the first time that we are putting four Asian faces in the middle of a R-rated comedy if you f up if a project with a queer leader black leader or Asian lead fails the industries need your Reactions to blame it on the otherness so you don't want to that fear to paralyze you and keep from Creating from a place of joy because that is how you create great art. Obviously is creating from a place of joy Yeah I think when you have the producer of the movie respond to your tweet obviously gets more attention and now you know from just Being your 10,000 Twitter followers. It becomes this whole thing You know he had to turn off his replies and because he was getting roasted. Yeah I don't think people were threatening him But I think a lot of people are like, oh, you can't handle the jokes blah blah blah all this other stuff So I guess we want to get into it real quick Andrew I gotta ask you because you watch this movie I did anything that lights camera Jackson said do you do you feel like it was what he said or is it the Way he said it or what is it? Just how he looks and it's a identity race war. Well, it could be all of the above right?  I think that the things he said are not like outrageous I think the movie objectified Asian men in a fun and positive way But like in a jokingly way it did in a way that they never get objectified Which is a historical context for anything. There is some shock value in it. Of course It is a raunchy comedy. Is it meant to just be much is there funny joke? Yes Did a hundred percent of the jokes land with a hundred percent of the people watching? No Does it so contextual does it target white people in the beginning it does it makes some jokes about white corporate men But it's not that bad man, but I guess I just think that his tone He didn't say anything positive about it and he just sounded super whiny and and and this is another reason why people are hating on it They saw him tweet about everything everywhere all at once and he was hyper critical about that too But he did give what a 50-50 review to the other past lives. Yeah, I mean, here's the truth, right? Everything is contextual like what anytime you see a white guy say, oh, this is targeting white people He's obviously not following up with a tweet being like yes I understand that white people dominated Essentially most of the globe in the past 300 years. So technically it's not really punching It's punching up and not well down here. Let me tell you this action Jackson whatever lights camera He's called him action Jackson. All right, if I is an Asian man Wanted to crap on every movie that ever played out an Asian male character Then I would be just writing off almost 50% of the movies that had an Asian male character if not more like right off the bat I just be like well this was targeting Asian men because they put Asian men in a nerdy light It said that we had small PPs. This is a bad movie like easy That's why we have to get into the comment section because a lot of people were talking about white fragility A lot of people are not used to white people in 2023. I guess you could say it's more It's more okay to joke on them. Yeah, it's true. It's true. That is true No, it's true that they are kind of the more joked on race right now Um, I hope it's not hurting too many feelings, but I would just say, you know, I don't think the jokes are too harsh So I got three sections of comments today. I got some from Asian commenters that were obviously defending George I'd primarily I have older white conservatives They have their own section and sort of like very liberal progressive whites That are like against this Jackson guy. Well, all right, David, you know, I love a good race war So let's go through the comments. So these are comments from Asians off Instagram Somebody said after reading his review of everything all at once. I knew his reviews cannot be trusted Somebody said there are valued valid critiques of this film. This man's critiques. However are not valid Um, is this true or not? Can you invalidate somebody doesn't look like he's I would say that this guy certainly doesn't seem like He's spotting the Asian representation movement any additional points No, and I think that would he go this hard on a movie with black people in it, David Latin people Yeah, that's the classic question guys Is he going extra hard because it's Asian movie and Asians are the not super oppressed minority I don't know somebody said when the entire existence of white people comedy is based on homophobia Fatphobia, transphobia and racism. Um, this was like another thing obviously, you know from the previous I guess previous decades Andrew there for sure was a lot of white male bro comedies that they did sometimes make Yeah, I mean listen the all famous hangover, you know, they still did they kind of make some Asian jokes?  Yeah, for sure I would also say that Asians don't have to take what he said with so much weight either because who is he? Is he just one of those tomato reviewers that pop up? I'm rotten tomatoes Then who cares somebody says not everything has to revolve around white men being the alpha and every type of minority Woman swooning over him, huh? Finally, it's nice to poke at fun of white people for a change This is clearly white fragility talking about their waning dominance over the world Yeah, trust me not every comedy moving forward is going to make fun of white dudes all the time Okay, this is truly one of the only movies that kind of does that to be honest Somebody said man other races have had jokes targeted them for decades It seems like he never turned learned how to take a joke. Obviously. There's a lot of attacks Somebody said man, I'm just playing this tiny violin for him and somebody said why are people just giving him so much attention? It really should be about global adoption too Like people need to talk to what this is doing for the global like adoption trade bringing light to it Oh, that's a really interesting point and maybe this person is has a friends that are adoptees or isn't an adoptee themselves But yes, it is a story about an adopted Asian girl So, of course, you know that could open up that conversation, but you're right. That's not getting any light, right? But to be fair, I'm not by the way. I'm not taking with this guy's name side I don't know if everybody has to speak to somebody About what this movie means to that community to review the movie Oh, no, no, no listen to review a movie or to review anything Especially in the age of the internet all you got to do is watch it and have an opinion But of course this guy is touts himself as a Emmy award-winning critique critic or whatever So I'm saying like I guess he Does feel like he has some more weight. I mean to be honest what he said is fair Critique in a way. I think it's just that he didn't say anything positive about it Which is crazy, right? But at the same time does a critic have to and why does everybody care about what this guy was like 10,000 reviews Maybe maybe we shouldn't care what a white guy thinks. Yeah, let's get into the Yahoo news section And you know, there's gonna be something spicy here someone said so she gets called out for anti-white bigotry and her response from her And her fellow leftist is to double down on it remarkable This is what actual privilege in 2023 looks like it's minority privilege Minorities are allowed to ridicule stereotype and make fun of white people in their culture and even do whiteface But if the situation is reversed, it would be called racist and the artist would be hounded out of their jobs Somebody said show me one example of whiteface and somebody said white chicks. All right Middude, I think when comedies are so ridiculous like Joy Wright is or the movie white chicks There is a little bit of a pass. You can't always pull the well reviews reverse it then, you know I mean you can but like obviously we are all operating in several centuries of I guess you would say whatever you want to categorize as white if you want to say it's Anglo-Saxon whatever like white global dominance Right, everybody has to acknowledge that if we're being super real in P in the layers of the onion back But if you want me to be super real all these people leaving the more conservative comments will never and have not seen the movie Right somebody said if if she was darker He would not have made that comment that was against her initially, right? No, like that's that's I think this comment is saying that if it was Joy ride with like four black women Maybe he's not tweeting that maybe action Jackson isn't tweeting it that hard What if he is just a heritageist instead of being a racist? He was like if your group wasn't in America past longer than 50 years. That's when I don't care about you. I Notice that that's like a thing actually.   Um, that's an interesting comment This is a oh yeah And by the way when he says fans of Asian entertainment what Asian entertainment is that the hub? Mr. Jesse, you know, it's the hub moving on to liberal white comments going against lights camera Jackson Andrew Somebody said oh no Will somebody think of us the poor targeted white people and this guy said we white men will just have to be satisfied with controlling the Overwhelming majority of political offices cultural output and financial capital in this country. What was us? What is us? Yeah, I here's my thing when it comes to white fragility. Listen I Understand that maybe as a white guy you feel like you're getting made fun of a little bit more because for sure The heat has got cranked up a little bit as a white man You are getting made fun of more and getting joked on more than it was in past history But I just want to ask the question. What are the statistics to show that white men are being discriminated against or? Oppressed in any way right show me the stats That are measurable. Yeah, instead of just being like, oh, well I didn't like that joke about what men in a movie when white guys should just always begin with the Asian girl But instead it seems like Ling Ling is talking back. Let me turn off joy ride and throw on some of these James Bond movies What's up with these women man?  They more go off the normalized baseline of what they expect rather than like contextualizing everything in terms of like the Raw score of everybody right so obviously if white guys were are used to being up 60 points in a basketball game and all Suddenly they're only up like 35 technically mathematically. That's minus 25. I think they're up still 45 you guys are good Somebody said objectifies men targets white people sounds like a line from legislation Originating in Texas or Florida and then some white person said I mean it's true We're so lame and then another person was a little bit more moderate They said the critics lying about targeting white people is silly having seen it every other part of what he said though is Fair so this was more of like somebody being like oh, I didn't like that part But yeah, that movie is just like raunchy. It just is a hangover for women Yeah, you know why the targeting white people line is important here because it all it makes it a race thing Because he could have left a review at I didn't like the story. I wasn't into the characters. It was raunchy for no reason I think that's like critique that like, you know, you can have but when he said well and it's targeting white people and then Objectifying men. It's like bro. How it objectifies men is that's crazy that those two lines it is that's what it del Limchett It sounds kind of goofy. Yeah, it does sound. It's she didn't she didn't get bad She didn't get mad at him about oh, this is too raunchy.  He called it like jumbled But yeah, I mean what do I think this guy is a good movie reviewer? No Do I but I do I think he's entitled to his opinion But do I think this also turned into a race war in the Instagram comment section David in the takeaway You know, do you think it's kind of like open season on white people when white people are like, man They're making fun of us man. It's open season on why we're the only people that it's okay to make fun of yeah I feel like in Hollywood right now. There's a moment where it is more acceptable, but it's kind of weird because It's like very very nuanced I don't even know if I have enough time to explain this but like there could be people who like most of their friends are white Like they only date other white people whether they're a guy or a girl or whatever that orientation They are but they only date other white people, but they still tweet a lot of like white jokes And there could be people living in an Asian enclave or and they're completely life is like so Asian And they would never tweet anything bad about white people, right? So it's kind of hard to say like just because you make jokes on white people It doesn't mean that you're anti-white hegemony or supremacy either exactly But you could totally be buying into it while dissing them because that's what's in vogue right now Yeah, I have an Instagram clip where I kind of poke fun and maybe dating white girls I had fun with it's a joke. Yeah context So what I'm saying is like these slipstreams within like culture of what is okay to make up fun of or punch up Or punch down at I don't know if there's always the macro translation to like global society that people are drawing Yeah, you know what in the movie?  It's not that bad. It's honestly. I have a pretty good sensor of this guys It's not that bad But you know what the funny thing is Andrew people want to make this about joy ride But it's basically about like it is about white dawn it's globally and white fragility about Potentially that dominance feeling endangered. Well, thank you action flick Jackson for making it about white guys But you know the interesting thing is nobody in the comments section wants to take it to that macro like almost like Earth-stopping level right people want to keep it within the context of the movie They don't want to take it to the race wars of America Even though that might be the symptom, you know the core of the symptoms This should be our theme song. Anyways, all right guys Let me know in the comments down below. Have you seen the movie joy ride? Do you think his critique has any merit? Did it seem like his tone was off? And are we just going to get mad at every single critic that that that that critiques an Asian movie? I mean I get why we do because it's a kind of our identity But I feel like that's an attack on us because we're finally getting our shot after what a hundred years in American cinema Since 1920 or whatever. Sorry. Sorry. Listen if I'm a numberist, but he only had like 9,000 followers on Twitter I don't really care. Hey guys, honestly, I think there's valid arguments on all sides Like I said silly to serious to me it's silly, but some people took it real serious Until next time let us know what you think in the comment sections. We out. Peace


Video Friday with Art Resin. Hey guys, it's Friday, which means it's video Friday, and today I'm gonna be talking about layering. Pouring multiple layers or second layers. We actually have two different methods to do it. I'm not sure if you knew that, so I'm gonna walk you through both of them. The first one is the 24 hour method. This is the one that you see us use most often. So we poured our resin yesterday, and as you can hear, it's absolutely dry to the touch. So this method you would use if you had an imperfection, if you had or something you needed to repair, or you found a hair, or a bubble, or a bug in your dried resin. The most important thing to remember is when your resin is dry, you have to sand if you wanna pour a second layer. And the reason for that is you wanna create some tooth. You wanna rough it up so that the fresh resin layer has something to bond to. Okay, so for something like this, we usually use sanding paper to create that tooth. Okay, so I'm just gonna sand it down here with 80 grit coarse sandpaper. Okay, so it's all scuffed up. I'm just gonna get rid of all this residue here because we don't want that in our fresh pour. Okay, so this tooth, all these scratch marks here, that's gonna give some bite for the fresh resin layer to hang on to. Because if you poured fresh resin on a smooth layer, the two layers aren't gonna be able to adhere to each other. They won't be able to bond.  It delaminates off your first resin layer. So creating some tooth by sanding is super important. Another way you can create tooth is by painting on your dried resin that the paint itself will provide that tooth for the fresh resin layer to grit to. Okay, I'm just gonna torch here and you can see all those scratch marks have disappeared. Okay, so that is your 24 hour method. So the second method is called the three to five hour method. So if you wanna take a look down here, I actually poured this resin this morning. It's been sitting for about five hours and you can see it's kinda, it hasn't cured yet. It's still soft and pliable, right? It's thickened up, but it's still very pliable and it's still sticky as well. If I put my finger in there, it's still very tacky. Okay, so now with this method, because it's tacky, that's providing the tooth. I don't need to sand this and in fact I couldn't sand it because it's too sticky. So one instance when the three to five hour method would be a good choice is for something like this. For a wood board here that has a hole that requires like six or seven layers of resin. It's gonna take you six or seven days if you use the 24 hour method. So pouring every three to five hours would be perfect on a project like this. Another method is embedding. So if you wanted to embed something really light, like glitter, if you poured glitter into wet resin, it would just absolutely float away. So the three to five hour method is perfect. You can see for something like this, I'm gonna pour the glitter, it's just sitting where I want it to be. Also, if you're embedding something really heavy like rocks, if you poured these into liquid resin again, they would just float right to the bottom. So this method is super handy for embedding heavy items. And then last, if you're pouring into a mold or even something like this that has a really high lip and you wanna pour multiple layers again, this is super handy using the three to five hour method. Okay, so I'm just gonna show you. Now, because this resin that I poured this morning is still wet and tacky, this fresh resin layer is gonna stick right to it. The two of them are gonna bond with no sanding required. So that's it. Two layers of resin, two different ways. That's your video Friday. Video Friday with Art Resin. Oh, thank God that's over.


And welcome to another episode of Kondo Insider. My name is Jane Sugimura, and I'm your host today. And we are going to be talking about how the coronavirus pandemic is affecting Kondo living. And I have as my guest, my co-host, Richard Emery. Hi, Richard. Aloha, Jane. Nice to see you. Nice to see you. And today you're wearing your associate hat, and you're going to be talking from a standpoint of a property management company. Well, yeah, I think I've been in the industry for 25 years, so I'm an industry veteran, and I think it'll be a mistake for anybody on an association board to think that the COVID-19 pandemic is not going to have an effect on association budgets. Okay, but this COVID-19 pandemic, it's resulted in an order from the governor and from the mayor for people to stay at home, work at home, and it's resulted in a situation where you've got people in your condominium, home all day long, and people who are out of work.   Are they essential workers under the government mandates? Everything that I have read says that the employees of an association are an essential worker. They even encourage associations to look at their staffing level, look for areas they might be able to mitigate the social distancing type of issue. But the people necessary to maintain the association and safe living and the contractors who serve the association are all essential workers. Okay, so if you have people who live in condos and serve on boards, I mean, they, you know, you kind of answered the question about what do we do with our workers? Do we have to lay them off or, you know, how do we get around the social distancing? How do you do that with these workers? Well, I think it's hard, you know, because if you have two plumbers working together on a bad pipe and one has to hold the pipe, the other holds the wrench. You know, it's hard to have pure social distancing. But I think what they want you to use is common sense and do what you can do to create social distancing. But you certainly have to maintain the property and you have to have in a safe, healthy environment so people can live there as best they can. And I think that's the standard rule. And, you know, what I'm hearing too is that a lot of associations are instructing their housekeeping or maintenance whoever does the cleaning. I mean, they've got people now wiping down elevator buttons, right? And doorknobs and things that people touch regularly? Well, I think associations in general are taking a more proactive approach in telling their janitorial services. I know even the ones that contract that I've gotten notices from them, what they're doing to wipe down the buttons, the doorknobs, the railings and those things that are more regular basis with the proper cleaners. So I think that's going to be pretty much a given. I think the other issue that's out there is if you do have a case of a COVID-19 resident, what do you do then? Because you get into all these notice issues and discriminatory type claims if you're talking about people's health conditions. So it's open to a whole new world for association. Yes. Now that you brought it up, what do you do when you find out that somebody in the building has been tested positive for COVID-19? Because if HIPAA, you can't tell people, you know, oh, Joe Blow in Unit 1B has got tested positive. You can't say that, right? Right. Everything I've read says that you don't want to say that. You don't want to say the person in Unit 102 has COVID-19 and their name is Joe Blow. What you want to do is, A, talk to your attorney and the Department of Health because there are people who are coming back from the mainland on that automatic 14-day quarantine that don't have any symptoms. And you don't want to create widespread panic because of the fact they happen to be in this 14-day quarantine for self-protection purposes. So I think it'd be very, very careful. And if you have a real case and it's a full-blown issue, I'd be talking with the attorney about the things you can say and you can't say. Okay. And another thing that is near and dear to people who live in condos, the amenities, the pool, the basketball court, the tennis court, what about those amenities? I'm hearing that most associations are closing them. Well, I think they can. And if the board feels like it's really a self-governance issue, what associations want to do, every association is going to be constructed a little differently with different security and different amenities. So I think the boards do have the right to close the pool and close the gym and close the areas. But I do know of condos that have created indemnity agreements. And you can use the pool, but only four people at the pool at one time and you have to reserve the space. So they've tried to create some tolerance on the amenities. But frankly, the board has to write and should look at that very carefully about closing common areas to help prevent the spread. And what do you say, what do you say, Richard, when you have homeowners who say, hey, this is our, this is private property. The government can't tell us to shut it down. Well, when they're arrested and they're in jail because the police said, like there's been several what they call covenients, I guess, people who say, you can't do that because I'm an American. I have my rights. The truth is the governor has rights under the law to take any precaution necessary for the health and safety of our residents. And he's ordered, he and the mayor have ordered these items close. And of course, I'm going to say mayors because it's not just a Wahoo. So I think you have to say it's a difficult time right now. They have the right to do it. They're doing it for your best interest. Okay, then let's get to another subject that we know was happening. What about delinquencies? What are you seeing in the industry? Well, I think we haven't seen anything yet because this is so early on, but I would say that it's coming. I think for any board to not believe that they're going to end up with some delinquencies, they're going to have people with lost jobs, lost hours, circumstances. Maybe they were furloughed because their company's business is down, like restaurants and things like that, which aren't pure tourism. And I think we're going to see delinquencies and I think what you need is a proactive approach because there's two hurdles with this with me. Number one, the administrative nightmare you're going to create by not doing something proactive and be what you can do to survive the loss of temporary income during this situation. You said temporary income. You're talking about people not paying their maintenance fees. Right. You have a short term payment of maintenance because let's just say I've lost my job and I go to the board and say, I can't pay my maintenance fees. I'll make it up on a monthly basis when I get my job back. And then another person comes and said, well, I want to pay 50% of my maintenance fees because of this problem and that problem. And then Richard says, well, you know, my neighbors aren't paying. I'm not going to pay. It's a very slippery slope. If you don't create a financial cash flow plan to deal with this interim period while we're in this shutdown of the state. Okay. So, you know, so, so what do you suggest that boards do? I mean, they should anticipate that people aren't some people, not everybody, but some of their owners will not be able to pay. Well, I'm getting a little notice across my computer saying we need to take a break. So I'll give you my four points right after we take the break. Okay. Why don't we take a break and come back. I'm looking forward to you joining me every Monday at 11am. Aloha. Aloha. My name is Duration. I'm the host of Finding Our Future here on Think Tech Hawaii. I'm here every other Tuesday from 1 to 130pm. Here on this show I cover issues around sustainability, you know, global issues that matter for young people for future generations and other social justice issues. Please join us. It's live streamed on Think Tech Hawaii and also uploaded on YouTube. Okay. We're back for the second part of our condom insider show. And this time we're talking about how the coronavirus pandemic is affecting condominium associations. And my guest today is Richard Emery, Vice President of Associate Hawaii. And Richard, you were going to tell me about the four points that we have to do to address these delinquencies that are going to happen. Actually, there's five points. Let me take them one at a time. The number one thing that I would do is, first of all, the condo statute allows the board to mend its budget at any time. The fact you adopt one annually doesn't mean you can't in the middle of the year because of new circumstances amend your budget. I would look at going back and following my logic here, amending your budget and look at the contributions you've made to reserves through March. That's three months. And making that the total contributions for the calendar year 2020. Therefore, indirectly, you've made 100% of your reserve contributions for the year and you're suspending what you originally planned for the next nine months. By doing that, for the next nine months, you can reduce your maintenance fees for all owners and treat them all the same by the value of the reserve contributions, which in some cases is $200 or $300 a month. That's the first thing I would take a look at. Look at amending my budget, amending the reserve study in the budget so you still comply with the law and have a reserve study, and just amending it so the contributions only reflect the first three months. Therefore, you've met that requirement and therefore you can adjust your budget downward for the balance of the year to get people a break. But there are people who say, well, this is April and Hawaii doesn't have as many incidences of COVID-19 and the rate of death, although we have some, way six, I think, it's not like it is on the mainland. So why don't we just wait and see? Maybe it will flatten and it will go away sooner. But that's apples and oranges because when you look at the COVID-19 problem, flattening, less death, people get well sooner. That doesn't mention the economy getting well sooner. If you think people are going to be flooding back to Hawaii, these jobs and restaurants are going to go back to norm instantly, they're not going to. There's going to be a loss of jobs. You've already had 200,000 unemployment claims here in Hawaii. It's going to take at least a year for that to come back to any reasonable norm and probably not back to where it was when we had this problem begin. So I think it's a terrible decision to think that all of a sudden two months, yeah, maybe safer for your health, but it's not going to be safer for your condo finances. Okay, and then before we started the show, you were talking to that Hawaii depends on their visitors. And since this is a worldwide pandemic, which means that people not only on the mainland USA, but in Europe and in Asia, these are all people who come to Hawaii to vacation. And they don't have any jobs or income now. And so it may take them a while before they can even pay for a ticket to come to Hawaii. Absolutely. The ultimate greater effect is going to be on the economy and jobs. I think we'll survive the pandemic. I think that the state has done a good job and the federal government. I think they're doing things to have people survive this by these, I'm going to call them grants or money they're putting in everybody's pocket, but it's not going to solve the problem at the end of the day. It's treading water. It's just keeping us ahead of the above water until this gets behind us and the economy can rebuild. And that's going to take one or two years. The depression of 1929 took 10 years. Okay. And then so what do we do while we're waiting, you know, instead of waiting, you mentioned that we could do the, we can adjust the budget. Yeah, amend the budget. Reduce your maintenance fees by the amount of the reserve contributions for the balance of this year. Number two, I would then extend the payment plan. Most companies, most associations have a payment plan in the 10th of the month, sometimes the 15th. I would extend the deadline before late fees are charged until the 20th of the month because people are going to be looking for this money coming in from the government. And my concern in part is that if you can imagine all this is electronic world, all these late fees automatically applied and people making partial payments, it's going to screw the bookkeeping up to no end. And then if the owners who have to pay this get the sense not everybody's treated equally, you're going to find maybe even greater delinquency saying, well, you're giving those guys a break with no interest. I'll just keep my money just in case I need it. And I'm not going to pay either. And associations depend on enough cash flow to cover the operating expenses. Think about it this way. If we did nothing and only part of the people paid, you're not going to have the money to make the reserve contributions anyway, because they're not going to have enough cash flow. So go ahead and address it head on. Okay, and then there are people who can pay their maintenance fees and they have a problem with other people not stepping up to the plate and doing their part in paying their maintenance fees. And because they feel like, oh, well, I have the money in the bank, you guys should have saved. You should have saved and for this, you can't look to us to bail you out. So what do you say to the people who talk like that or who have that feeling? Well, that's why my plan works because we can't deal with the what it could have shown us of what people should have done. But we can say we're going to treat all the owners equally. We're going to adjust our budget so the maintenance fees, the reduced maintenance fees, apply to everybody equally. And so if you have the money, you're getting a break during the time being. If you don't have the money, you're getting a break to help you survive this period of time. And at the same time, you're dealing with the financial reality that everybody's going to have the money.  And why should we take less if they can pay if they can pay?  But what do you say to the person like that says, you know, this says, well, I'm against a 10% cut across the board because there are people who could pay the maintenance fees and they should pay it all. Well, so I can say the same thing. Why is the federal government giving every single person $1,200, every married person $2,400 plus $500 a kid? The economic times require it. And you're better off having a balanced plan that addresses this head-on reduces the fees of people have the best chance to be able to make their obligation and then we'll adjust the reserves down the road. But you know, if you don't do anything, you're not going to have the money to put in the reserves anyway. And one of the things that has come about because of the pandemic and this is from the federal government. Associations can't do foreclosure. Well, they can't do foreclosures on government-backed mortgages, but, you know, the courts are all closed. You couldn't do a foreclosure if you wanted to do it. I don't think you want to do foreclosures. I think you want to have payment plans and you want to have, see, I would never stop the late fees. By me moving the payment due date to the 20th and having the late fee thereafter, I'm still creating the center of the pay because you're going to have a late fee. I'm just giving them some wiggle room because we don't know when they're going to get paid and how they're going to get paid and where they're going to get the money. You're better off not letting your computer take control of all these ledgers and blow it up into another area because the other thing I would do is if you have short-term cash flow, not enough people are paying to cover the operating expenses, I've been asked time and time again, do these government payroll protection plans, where they're going to theoretically wave the loan at the end of the day if you follow a certain step, do they apply to associations? Well, I'm not sure if they do, but the reality of it is the statute today without the 50% owner approval required in the statute allows you to borrow from reserves. And on your reserves now, you're making a half a percent. If you have to borrow the money to help cover this period for this year, I'll say 2020, you're better off covering shortfalls from your reserves and then refunding it according to the statute is cheaper than trying to go to a bank, which the rates were 3.5% last time I looked at it. So if you want to borrow from your reserves, what do you have to do? The board has got to do a resolution. Do you have to get owner's consent? Word resolution, that's it. We don't have to get a owner's consent. No. And this would be just a temporary borrowing. Well, the statute says under emergency conditions, you can borrow from the reserves. I would hate to have anyone argue before a judge that says it's an emergency condition. And you have then three years to repay the money. And so if you had to borrow the money, you would then have three years under the statute to repay the money into the reserves. Okay. And you also have some other suggestions for associations on how to deal with this economic, their economic situation. What about the capital improvement projects that are in the queue for 2020? All of us who sit on boards of associations, we have a list of capital improvement projects that were budgeted for 2020. What do we do? Well, I would defer as many of those as I can. Think about it this way. If you had a capital improvement project which was necessary but not critical, you now have the problem of people coming on site, social distancing, getting people to come out right now. Certainly, I don't see a lot of contractors out there for the next month or two just because of the circumstances. So I would defer as many capital projects as I can that aren't going to affect the health and well-being of the project. And then what do we do? We just tack them on to our list for 2021? Well, I think that I would be, if I was on the board, I'd be looking at taking 2020, treading water, getting through it as best I can with the cash flow to pay the operating cost. And then when I did the 2021 reserve study required, I'd be looking at then repositioning some of these deferred assets and what my contribution should be based on the circumstances. And what do you say to board members who say, well, let's not do anything now. Why don't we just wait and see what our delinquency is going to be? And then we can come up with a proposal. Why don't we wait till May and see how many, see exactly how bad our cash flow is going to be? What do you say to people who say that? Well, I don't think you'll know in May because people may have their plan. They think they can make the payment in May, but it turns out they lose their job. They can't make it in June, right? Or something else comes up that they can't make the money in June. I don't think you know that. And when you wait, you actually create unknown. People don't have any stability with the plan is. Are we not better as an association board saying, here's our plan. We're going to reduce these fees and costs and contributions. Adjust in 2021. Treat everybody equally by reducing the fees by the amount of reserves theoretically. And we've also reduced some other costs and operations, custom labor and payroll hours, whatever it may be to get through this. So we're reducing the fees for the balance of this year as such. Treating everybody exactly the same, giving them a little bit more time to make their payments by the 20 day grace period. Continuing to charge the late fees and having a solid plan before everybody that they know what to expect and how they're being treated and they're being treated the same as everybody else in the project. And so, you know, and talking to associations, I mean, even if we are able to come out of this and let's say the government says it says makes an announcement in mid April that they're going to extend the shutdown orders to the end of May. And if we are able to flatten the curve, maybe we'll open up in mid June. And let's say that happens. Or that's, that's what the plan is. I mean, what do you say to associations to say, well, you know, that's only three months. I think we can tough it out three months. Like I said earlier, that may be true. They open the doors in June. But there's not going to be a floodgated people coming here. It's not going to restore the jobs. You know, and this is going to be a great economic hardship in a lot of our residents. Most people in the world today live somewhat hand to mouth. They don't have a lot of extra cash. And the people who have the extra cash saying that don't realize the reality that they can put people under by doing this. And the courts aren't going to support this. The courts aren't going to allow you to go simply foreclose. And I'm not sure if you foreclose who's going to buy. You know, you have to get mortgages and they've got to have a job too. So I think the better thing to do is to say, look, we have a problem. You know, we have a problem, Houston. I think what the exact words were not movie, but anyway, and have an aggressive budget to say, here's how we're going to cope with it.  And you mentioned something in passing about the about the proposers about the courts being closed. And that is true. And right now they are closed. Both state and federal courts are closed through the end of April. And right now, you know, we're getting signals that maybe they may be extending it, but we don't know until the end of, I mean, maybe in mid April they will know whether or not they're going to be extending it. And let's say, you know, it gets extended to Mayor June. That means that if anybody wants to take any enforcement, if any association wants to do any enforcement issues, they can't do it anyway. That's correct. But the reality of it is under the current condo statute, the owners can get a guaranteed 12 month payment plan period. I don't want to see an association going before judge and trying to say during this pandemic why they're going to throw somebody out. They're going to want you to find solutions, payment plans and things like that. So my answer is don't let it get out of control. You can amend your budget and take some aggressive action now. And then you can always amend your budget again in September if you find everything is much better than we thought it was. And so do you have any kind of last words that you want to, words of advice that you want to tell associations that they might want to consider in these times? Well, certainly I wish everybody to be safe out there. And I think they should follow the instructions of our mayor and our governor about social distancing and wearing masks and doing what we can to do. But my advice is simply why I said in the beginning, be proactive, develop a plan now that treats everybody equally, make some hard decisions, and then you can adjust in the future if you have to. But don't wait. It'll be too late if you wait. Okay. Well, thank you, Richard, for being on Condo Insider. This is the show for people who live in condos and work in condos. And we hope that you will join us next week for another episode. And Richard, you're going to be on, you're doing the show next week. I am doing the show next week. Can you tell us what you're going to be doing the show on? It's a surprise show, but it'll be really exciting. Okay. So now you have it, so you need to tune in next week. Thank you for joining us today and Mahalo for tuning in. Thank you.


Hi, this is Marty with Living Pittsburgh where we look to bring Unique businesses people unique areas around town to you guys so that you can go out and explore them on your own and today We have joining us. We have Lynette with a really unique business probably the most unique business I've seen in a long time Called calamity where Lynette, would you say hi to everybody? Hi there. Good evening Good evening. We've got a few viewers out there. Thank you guys for joining Well, one of the things we like to do at the start of our show We like to do what we call the Living Pittsburgh give back program where we give Money based on how well you can guess locations in and around town So we we give a donation so let's talk about how this works So we're gonna give to the greater Pittsburgh community food bank and the way it'll work We're gonna yeah. Yeah, I hope you like that nonprofit. I thought you would with with a type of Plateware and stuff that you guys make But we are gonna show you five pictures for everyone you that you guess correctly We will give a $20 donation so up to a hundred bucks here and We we've added a few more flavors into the pictures in the past shows. It's always been kind of like purely a location But now we've added in like events in and around Pittsburgh Ah, as well as local artists and I I was hoping that you guys might have a leg up in this area Because of the type of work that you guys do but I could be wrong All right, we'll see first one. I'm hoping this one will be pretty easy. Well, this looks like PNC park Yes, perfect One down. Oh That is that children's hospital it is yeah, I Have a quick little story. Can I tell you a quick story about Children's Hospital? Yeah, yeah, the company I used to work for thought-form design designed all of the signage for inside the building All the directional signs. It's how you where to go in that new building. Yep. It's lovely All right, let's do the next one so you got to write so far this one's harder goodness This one let me give you a couple hints This one's harder because it's it is brand. It's a brand new development the building in the background is not You'll you'll remember it It looks like this like in the strip district when you're going down small men on the left-hand side But I don't know if that's what that is it is. Yes, that is The old terminal so it where is it trucks back up get the produce right off the train run behind it Well, that's all being redeveloped now into a Multi-use commercial space for various stores to come in Hardscaping I guess you'd call it. Yeah It's lovely. Oh Goodness. Hmm. Okay. You gotta draw on your art strings here. I Mean, it looks like it's like at Gateway Center, but I don't know what all the umbrellas are I mean, is it just like during the the arts festival? Yes You And this is this was a harder one absolutely. Okay, the last one I think is really hard. Are you ready? Okay, by the way people You know that are are watching the show the Pittsburgh art festival is Quite frankly is one of the gems in town here. It's something that Michelle I go to every year. Of course not last year. We couldn't do that Hey Dion, thank you for joining We couldn't do it last year because of COVID but we actually have a one of our favorite artists Comes from Hungary if you can Singing Budapest which is in Hungary But he comes here every year to show his work. He's run the grand prize at the festival many years. It's really really cool That's me. Okay. Last one. I think you might go five for five. I don't know Okay, this is You might know the location of this because it's a pretty prominent mural or or the artist Well, I don't recognize that. I don't know where that is Dang it Very nice So for Lawrenceville often that's that's my problem It is yeah, this particular artist and I was hoping you wouldn't recognize his name at the in the bottom center It was actually on there I was really hoping you wanted I didn't know How to pull that out so But yeah, Jeremy Reimer is Just a phenomenal artist muralist. He started Super young and has now become kind of this read a regional or maybe even national really really well-known artist He he's done Michelle. What are some of the I don't I'm thinking transformers, but that's not the right name Yeah, he did Roberto Clementi over on the North Shore This ask watch. Yeah, a bunch of the Marvel heroes But yeah, he's had a lot out here in Freeport. Well, we're at he did the yellow jacket On one of the buildings in Freeport. It's pretty prominent out our way. That's cool. Yeah muralists amaze me I don't know how they can see the big something so big It's spaffling. I Let's talk a little bit about The business that you have you you your husband and your partner Don Calamity where I think I actually see some behind you on the mantle pop possibly.  You know, how does it work? Just tell us about the So back in late 2013 Don Moyer who is was he's the artist behind all of the products that we sell he had decided to He draws every day and so he was drawing in his sketchbook and posting things to Flickr and one of his drawings was of an old-fashioned dinner plate like the ones behind me the blue willow and And he drew a pterodactyl in it and all his Flickr followers were like, oh, that's really cool You should make an actual product and so then he decided to try crowdfunding. So that's where using a website like Kickstarter You are able to Like list the details of your project the thing you want to produce and oh, that's my cat. She's so cute So, you know put up pictures of things of the thing you want to produce and get people to give you money up front To help you pay for a production run to make that product and then if the if you meet your goal Then you get that money from those backers and then you're able to produce the item and then Give the reward to all of those people that supported you and so that's how he got started So he did one plate and he had fun doing it So he started did a second plate and that was fun and then he did a third plate Well in the middle of the third plate project He realized that he started a business and he didn't he didn't mean to but he did so at this point by the third plate He had so many backers that project alone made over a hundred thousand dollars and here's poor dawn by himself You know, he's semi retired from his from his other job where he owned a design firm And and he needed help and so my husband and I were working at the old design firm That's how we knew him because we worked for him years ago And and we just started talking to him about ways we could help him And we realized that our unique skill set dawn is artist creative. He sees brilliant has great ideas My background is all operational So i'm doing all the stuff behind the scenes in running the business and keeping the finances and the accounting and Customer service all of that stuff was kind of my responsibility and my husband started doing He was managing the website. He was processing the orders and when I say processing It means like clicking buttons because we use outside sources to ship the products and so just the three of us together really had a gelled team for many years and And so we just kept running Kickstarter project after Kickstarter project Which was super helpful because you you get the when you're in business If you have a brick and mortar store you have to buy the product You have to have money to buy the product to be able to sell the product in your store But with when you're selling online and you're doing these Kickstarter projects You get the money up front, which is fantastic So we get the money that we need to pay for the product We get enough that we can buy extras and then we sell those extras on the website And so over the course of time, we've been able to build up a nice inventory of products I couldn't even tell you how many products we have at this moment But some of them are back here behind me. We've got a cookie jar. We've got 12 different dinner plates We've got small plates. We've got shallow bowls. We've got deep bowls. We've got a teapot We've got puzzles bandanas silk scarves All kinds of really neat things They're great gifts. They make great gifts for people and uh, yeah, it's just been A lot of fun and over the course of time We got to the end of 2020 and 2020 was really amazing because This business just kind of boomed which was not expected, you know in the middle of a pandemic I kind of assumed that people would stop buying but that's not what happened more people were buying And so by the end of 2020 we found ourselves needing to make some additional hires We swore we were never going to hire employees But um, but you know you reach a point where you just can't do it all yourself anymore So we we brought on two people and um, and they certainly don't feel like employees. They're just Part of the team and they're wonderful and they're they're just geniuses at what they do And we're very grateful that that we've got the team that we do so Yeah, I think that background It started right. I think the background is phenomenal when when you think about where you started which was somebody put something out You know Into the internet and that's part of what the show is all about we keep talking to people about how powerful The internet is and I don't think people Understand it because really it's only been around for about 20 years May you know, maybe 25 years right in our lives on an everyday basis back when you used to get the little aol discs in the mail But if you think about what you described here, you've built this massive I don't want to say massive, but you've built a very large business successful business Um off of Kickstarter That's just amazing to me like you put an idea out there in the ether And then people gave you money for your idea and then you were able to actually transition that back into product And and talking about product. I think that's the other unique thing you do you you manufacturer You find manufacturers from all over the world. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Sure. Yeah, so um the all of our the bulk of what we sell is porcelain porcelain dinnerware and porcelain accessories And so we have a supplier that we use that's in maryland but he works with Factories that are in poland and thailand and china And so the bulk of our stuff comes from the factory in poland They've been in business for over a hundred years making porcelain the old fashion way with transferware and everything And so like they they print the designs that we do we send them digital files and they print them on to transfers And there's like a little transfer sheet and that then they run it under water And that's what they do they somehow get it off of the transfer sheet and onto the porcelain Then it gets fired in the kiln at very high temperatures to produce an in glaze finish On everything and and it's just it's lovely, but it's you know, it's a lot of hand process So um, it's it's done the old fashion way, which is really cool But anyway, so that's our porcelain and go ahead. How did you how did you find the porcelain guys?  That's a good question. So um back in 2014 we were looking we had a an original Porcelain supplier that was up in new castle that we were using But then we reached a point that we needed to kind of expand beyond what they had the capacity to do So my husband just started searching.  I feel like we're one big team You know producing our stuff because we couldn't do what we do without his help and his His intermediary, you know with the polish factory and everything. So So it's been great. Um, but we also have like we have um, we're currently Getting ready to start a new Kickstarter project on Monday for a throw blanket And so that product, um, again, we just kind of research online We try to find Companies that that do what we do. We use Alibaba Alibaba is a pretty good site for searching for suppliers worldwide And um, but sometimes like we have uh, we sell puzzles and we had a puzzle manufacturer that was in Buffalo And then he retired so we needed to find a new puzzle manufacturer And we happened to find a puzzle. I don't even remember how we found it, but um, it was from a company in california We ordered one of their puzzles to just see like do we like the way it feels and and do we think it's a good puzzle And then we just found out who their supplier was and went to their supplier So it you know, it just kind of you try things out and and uh and find your way But the internet has been very helpful Oh, it's it's just amazing. Yeah, I want I want to you you talked about gifts earlier and um It took a while to find this particular video. Give me a minute to pull it up okay, but um I just love the re and unfortunately the sound won't carry through but if you can talk to us a little bit about um The person that's opening this and I think for the audience the The pure joy on her face when she discovers what it is that she's looking at and for the viewers online if you haven't figured it out yet like These are the plates these look like the plates that you have at your grandmother's house Maybe you even have them in your own house But until you get up close Yeah, look, look, there's a pterodactyl. There is a I don't know what that is. It's a giant frog. Yeah, there's a frog Yes In it's really little Yeah, and if you're not really paying attention, it just kind of looks like your grandmother's flatware, right? You know the dinner tableware until you get up close and then it just really opens your mind And actually if I remember right when I was reading about the bio of the company that that is how it started, right? He had a a plate from his parents or grandparents Yeah, and don sketched a dinosaur on it or something like that. Yep. Yep, exactly right exactly right Yep, so anything to make him laugh. That's that's the goal Yeah, yeah, so this was this video Um, uh customer had actually emailed us to say hey, did you see this and I said no, I don't know who this is Isn't that cute Anyway, so she this woman has a youtube channel. She lives in a In a castle in france and she has a youtube channel Um where she just talks about her life in the castle But then she started receiving gifts from people all the time And she wanted to start a new youtube channel where she opens those gifts on air And so that's what this was somebody a customer of ours Thought she would like these so they sent her the mugs And then some other random customer happened to notice it and sent me an email and said did you see this and Wait, it was just so charming. It's it's really really cute when she opens them and she's so surprised at what's on there Yeah, yeah Look at look at her assistants. Look at that I mean She's doing the same thing I just did Yeah, you just can't appreciate it unless you get up close. I love it Yep And I also happened to love this this woman's um youtube channel. I I love how she gets into You know what she's doing and and how they're rehabbing this huge I mean to me it looks like a castle. I think I think it's in france. So I probably call it a chateau But um, it's great We call it castle and then I did I did some more snooping and and really digging And uh, some some information that I shared with me tell me about this. I mean This is so silly. So um, one of our Kickstarter projects was for this bowl. We call it the omnivore bowl So it's just a deep cereal bowl. It's good for chili popcorn. Whatever. Well, all those things that you see going into it And uh, my husband Yes, my husband being the silly guy that he is and and he's you know, he's skilled in animation It used to be what he did at our old job And uh, and he likes to compose music So he wrote a little ditty to uh to go with this Kickstarter project and it makes me laugh every time I watch it So and there's dawn That's dawn drawing I love pictures pictures of the bowl with stuff in it Yeah, I love it Yeah, that's that that video cracked me up And if you hear the sound on it, um, is that is that your husband singing as well? Yes. Yeah Yeah, and at some point my daughter and I join in at the end, you know When you you need the big group sing at the very end we join in so yeah, that's great Uh, that's great Hey, thank you for the comments online. I'm starting to see it. Um, we are getting a lot of love it's on That are popping up. So people really are enjoying I think and that's the beauty of what you guys do And why I'm so excited to have you on the show is you bring smiles to people's faces and yeah Could we yeah Yeah, it's nice. We we uh, we get a lot of emails from our customers Um, we have an email that we send out so many days after their package You know should have arrived and it's just kind of says hope you got it and you know Just checking in make sure you like what you got and I it's it's funny because I when we created that email I kind of didn't think that people would use it as a means to write back to us But it prompts everybody to write back. We get so many emails every day with people writing back saying Oh, I love it. I love it. I'm so happy or I gave it to my friend and they love it And then they told their friend and so on and so it's really it's just been lovely We get a lot of love and and smiles and it it really puts the smile on my face Makes me happy that we're they're doing happy things for the world. Yep. Absolutely You are Talk a little bit about Pittsburgh because if I understand right You and your family are from here. You're from the Pittsburgh region. You've been a long time residents Both North Hills and South Hills for those those of us that care.  Um, do you guys have a favorite restaurant? That you guys go to uh, well, so um during the pandemic it's been hard But our favorite restaurant even before the pandemic and now Our first watch breakfast cafes like we just love first watch and we go there We used to go Way more often than we go now. We probably go about once a month now, but for breakfast That's and we love going to breakfast out. So that's that's my favorite my favorite place to go It's like a treat to get to go and uh, and that's fantastic but also right down the street from us is a brewery spoonwood brewery And they're fantastic as well. So we we get a lot of pizza from them and my husband likes their beer and So those are those are two of our favorite places I love that. I Michelle, I don't think we've been to either one of those No, is first watch is that a a chain? What is that exactly? It is. Yeah, it's a chain And so there I don't know if they're totally nationwide But they're definitely in more than just pennsylvania and there are multiple locations in the pittsburgh area So there's one out in the canless. There's one in bridgeville. There's one out here in near us in bald win and Yeah, there there's a bunch. Um, I bet there's probably at least five Or six in the pittsburgh area Got it. So they close it too though. So you got to go early It's truly a breakfast place Yes, but breakfast and lunch, but yeah, it's it's my favorite Great michelle. Do you have any questions? So, um, what's one of your favorite activities that you'd recommend for somebody Coming to pittsburgh a newbie to pittsburgh. Where would you tell them to do? I know goodness big thing I think it would have to just be going to pnc park Like i'm not a huge baseball fan But even for me to go there and sit out in the stands and especially on a fireworks night. Oh my gosh It's just like the breeze Yes, the breeze is just blowing and it's just beautiful and the lights in the city are gorgeous and Yeah, a night game. I wouldn't go to a day game. It'd be too hot I'm gonna go at night You just mean I want to go downtown I know it's like, yeah, I miss those days. Yeah Well, lisa's been nice enough. We were able to open the windows. So Yeah, and and then a nice smell goes through the house when you can do that. I love that It's right I um, let's go back to to calamity where can you talk a little bit so When I was on the website and I was looking through things it looked like you had like silk scarves You had bowls. You had plates There was a puzzle. Um, what else do you guys offer? Yeah, so we've got a lot of different things. We've got bandanas. We have note cards. Um, Oh gosh Now my mind is drawing a blank Yes, no pads. Um, yes, we have two little books this one here. Let me grab this This is a silly one. We call this one monster etiquette And uh, it's an illustrated guide to gentile behavior Now this this book is not necessarily made for children There are a few pages few spreads in here that might not be quite appropriate We've had customers write and complain that it's not quite child friendly.  I don't know if you can see that Yeah That's awesome encounters relationship pressers out of the gate if you're thoughtful and consider it. Yeah, I mean come on That's very considerate gotta make it rhyme So we have this little book. Um, there's another book called stay home, which I don't have handy here That is a guide for why you should not leave the planet That's a funny one too. So that's quite cute. Um, and we have some letter press prints Don did a series. We have a set that are called follow your passion And it is um, it's about the the debate between Pie and cake. So are you a pie lover or are you a cake lover?  Yeah, so it's nice because don, you know, he's since he draws all the time we're we're every year We introduce a new letter press print and they're usually limited runs So, you know, we print like maybe two or three hundred of them sometimes a little more Depending on the print, but uh, yeah, so that's a nice. It's a nice gift like item, you know To if you want to give something, you know, if you know somebody that's a cake and pie enthusiast. Yeah We know a few actually in our household Actually, we have pie people for birthdays and we have cake people for birthdays. Yep. Yep, the two shall not cross Same is true in my house. I am the pie person. My husband is the cake person I don't I don't want the cake Last thing for the audience before we call it a night, uh Is I think you know people may be watching that saying I think I recognize her or What do you think? Tell me about this Oh, this is funny. So, um, several years ago. Gosh, I can't even remember when it might might have been like 2013 2014 around that time period We, um, my husband and I we both just love music and we love to sing and we love to I we play guitar. He plays bass. I play guitar and so, um, we were just itching for something to do And so we decided to start a glee club for kids here in white hall And so we put an ad in the I don't know what like the almanac or something like that And somehow we ended up with this rag tag group of kids. They're all old now In college, which is like, oh my gosh, how did this happen? But anyway, so yeah, so we used to meet once a week and we would rehearse at the white hall community center and Then we would perform. That's my daughter singing when she was like, oh my gosh, so little Anyway Yeah, it was a lot of fun I mean we would have like a little you know a little recital at the end at the The father ryan art center in mckay's rocks And it was fantastic because we had this nice stage that they could perform on and And uh, it was so much fun and my husband. I swear I can't tell you how many of these recitals we did where he set the camera to record And instead of pressing start like it was already running and he actually stopped the video So like there were multiple shows that we have no footage from because that happened It was so sad because we love it was so much fun. How many arguments is that spark? Just push the button But yeah, so we were it was awesome And it was a lot of fun because we were big fans of the show glee and we loved school of rock So this was kind of our way of like meshing the two of those things together Very cool. Yeah, I I think you know Maybe as we kind of wind down this particular show Just talk about how people can can get in touch with you folks how you guys operate where they can buy your your wares Um for the folks watching. I mean calamity wear if you need a gift I don't know that there might be anything else better out there right now. I mean, this is Yeah, this is a bit of a smile on people's face and it really was why I was so excited uh to have you guys on the show So you want to talk about it and get in touch? Yeah, so we only sell online. We do not have a physical presence anywhere So in order to buy you have to go to w w w dot calamity wear dot com To make a purchase and the orders ship out of new jersey And so we normally ship like the same day if not the next day after you order So things will ship quickly and since we're here in pittsburgh They'll probably get to you within a couple of days, which is really handy. So Yeah, and we also do Kickstarter projects often So like I said, we have another one starting on monday for a throw blanket So if you were to go to www.kickstarter.com And search for don moyer mo y er You will find all of his past projects as well as come monday You'll find the the new one that we're starting as well and you could become a supporter of that So in that, you know, when you become a supporter on Kickstarter You're paying money up front But you're not going to get your your reward for several months because we need time to make it We get them shipped here and that sort of thing. So spell don's last name again mo y er Just like it sounds Let's um, let's just put that up there for folks. Uh, so that they can find it in the In the future and that's correct right kickstarter.com There's a search bar somewhere on there That's great Very cool. Yeah Thank you so much for being on. You're welcome. Thanks for being interested in what we do 100 love it and for those of you that um, join the show on a weekly basis next week We're going to go to Aspen wall, which is right north of pittsburgh. Just a tad bit Right in the fox chapel area and we're going to talk with the owner of botanical vegan Cafe and market. She's going to talk about how she's you know, built her business from nothing How they set up this kitchen and how she has this new juice shop In vegan cafe that you can all participate in so thank you guys for joining us Please please please support our local businesses here in pittsburgh It's really really important to us and it's important to them. So thank you guys. Have a good night. Thank you. Have a good night


As an applicant, I remember trying to really figure out the differences between the different genetic counseling programs. And so one of the things I really was interested in is what was unique about the National Human Genome Research Institute and Johns Hopkins Genetic Counseling Training Program. Yeah, I'm so glad you bring that up because it does feel like, although it's probably very clear in our own minds what makes us unique, it's probably not so clear to applicants applying to our program and how you begin to make distinctions between programs. We really think of our program as having three pillars of our educational system, the first of which being at the NHGRI is, of course, strong genetics and genomics training. The second pillar is a real commitment to psychotherapeutic counseling training. And then the third is developing research skills and social behavioral sciences. And because we have the luxury of a two and a half year program, students really do get exposure to a wide breadth of course opportunities and training opportunities. And we really ought to also emphasize that we're able to capitalize on the public health courses as well as at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. And I think in terms of kind of the genetics and genomics aspect is that something that we're really lucky is to be a part of the NHGRI here at the NIH. And being here, we have access to the great faculty here as well as kind of international experts on different human genetic conditions, which I think is something that makes this program super unique and really beneficial to the students. Yeah, we're really lucky to be able to capitalize on that here. And then with regard to the second pillar, the psychotherapeutic training model really is a core of our training. And we've managed to capture that by having coursework that spans the entire breadth of the program. So starting in your first year and then sequential coursework that builds on the training in the first year throughout. And in addition to that, we have a professional supervision process, which goes on top of the strong training you get from your clinical supervisors in clinic. And in professional supervision, you meet each student, meets for one hour every week with program faculty to work on their longitudinal development as a counselor. And I think also important is that like other programs, we also have that time to meet with our clinical supervisors as well. So to talk about things specific to that clinic as well as talking about the specific needs of those clients. And I think that that's one of the things that really drew me to this program is the emphasis on growing as a counselor. And I think kind of after this program and that emphasis, I feel like I'm very prepared now to kind of enter into the workforce as well as just having the skills to remain a lifelong learner. I'm so glad to hear that because we of course care so much about that piece of our program. And then I would be remiss if I didn't talk a little bit about the third pillar of our training program which is the strong emphasis on social science research. So we are of course situated within two strong research institutions so we have a very strong commitment to research. And we want to train students who are good at critically thinking and also contributing to the research literature. So every student in the program has their own independent research study that asks a social science research question. And then at the end of the day comes out with a product that is of publishable quality. So that is something we really put a strong emphasis on. Yeah and I think kind of as someone who's went through that thesis process can say that it is intense but such a great experience. And I've kind of come out with a thesis that I'm really proud of and I can't wait to publish it. And then I think what's important with that too is that we kind of start the thesis process by creating our own idea and can really develop that over a lot of time. And I think something that's also really helpful to that is we get so much coursework on developing research projects including a thesis proposal development class. That was a huge, huge help.


Johnny dollar. Oh, I beg your pardon. This is Earl Perman's residence. Well, it better be who's that Earl? Who else? Listen, Johnny, the idea of speaking out of the house on me this way and at the crack of dawn Where are you? Well down here at my office. What why not? I thought you and I were going fishing this morning Yeah, we are look when you got down here to Sarasota. When was it a week ago today? That's right, and you promised me this was one trip to Florida for nothing but fishing well not Johnny So what happened?  What else? Well, are you you remember that item in the hurl tribute in the other day about your being here? Yes, and the one in the evening paper and the blurb on WSPB, and I thank you for the publicity Oh, right. What does that got to do with the weather and the fishing when I said will you listen to me? Okay, and it better be good. Well, it is You're gonna love it Now all that publicity you just mentioned as every fishing guide within miles make an office to take you out on the gulf You know to prove to you once and for all that the fishing down here is just as good as Todd's mom and his chamber of commerce Advertise so so I came down here to look over these offers and decide which one we take advantage of today now that the weather's clear And have you I have Old captain Barney B. Good. He runs a half-baked fishing camp down at Lemon Bay And there's not only a good skipper, but he happens to be a client the policy holder Ah, and he guarantees to find a snook sea trout blues Bonito Pompano Kings anything you want So if you'll hop into my car and pick me up, we'll be on our merry way Now you sure there isn't some teeny little unimportant insurance matter that maybe I'd better just kind of look into before we head For the briny deep. No, sir Johnny. I swear it. I promise cross my heart and hope to die Well coming okay, I'm coming But if he tries to get me involved in another mess The CBS radio network brings you Mandel Kramer and the exciting adventures of the man with the action-packed expense account America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator yours truly Johnny dollar Expense account submitted by a special investigator Johnny dollar to tri-state life and casually insurance company branch office in Sarasota, Florida Where I thought I had gone for a few days of fishing But following is an account of expenses incurred during my investigation of the guide to murder matter Spends account item one Well after all as long as I was on expense account why not be nice about it So item one is 438 to fill up the gas tank and Earl poorman's fancy air-conditioned car Five minutes later. I walked in on him at the office. Come on Johnny Help me up in my crutch and we'll go fishing. I'm with you Captain Barney Bill down there at Lemon Bay was quite a character about 65 I'd say Paul lean and wiring his skin tanned of the color of Cordeman His deep-set eyes were that peculiar blueish gray that made you wonder if they were looking right on through you and Sharp enough to spot a seagull diving after bait a half a mile away It's both the Barney be looked as well weathered as he did and the faded lettering across the stone showed the old craft To come from Blastom mass which helped to account for his speech instead of a southern drawler was pure New England Yeah, oh and in New Hampshire, Mr. Dollar But I learned my sea fishing down off the Cape Cape card captain. Yes, sir After George's bank and the dang tuck of shoulders Develops a kind of instinct in the man it does well. I hope that instincts working today yet Not an all the seven years. I've been a guy down here to this country Now you see that long stretch up ahead With the mangrove islands on to either side. Yep Snoop alley, they call it Now then Let's see if we can hook up one or two One or two we took no less than seven biting Snoop out of that spot and all of them over ten pounds Then out on the gulf there were Pompano and Jackson Kings and just about everything else you can think of By mid-afternoon, I was completely and happily exhausted from hauling him in Earl meantime had laid himself across the floor and slept So we went on back to the dock selected a couple of nice Pompano to take home then trudged wirrily over to where I'd parked Earl's car That's your mighty pretty car you got there, Mr. Foreman. Oh Lot of good. It's doing me these days with us muster danko Having to depend on Johnny here the speed demon to get me around That's more fancy than my old max worth is did you say max well? Yeah Go over the old way down here from New Hampshire, and I did 1922 max world and it's still running. Yeah Had it up to Venice after groceries just a week ago at our Saturday You'd like to see it. I sure would Earl. Would you mind waiting? No go ahead Johnny? Right over here in the garage. Mr. Dollar 1922. Yep, and the finest car I have owned Time to think of it. The only one Real cheap to run to That's why I keep it Now Well, sir, there's it My mr. Dollar Who is he? What's happened to him? The he that Captain Bonnie spoke of was slumped there in the front seat of the ancient Maxwell His face against the wheel and turned in our direction The face was gray a mask of death Are we being the CBS radio network to be able to bring you on this station each weekday the songs of Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney In addition to the sparkling Bing Crosby Rosemary Clooney show We're equally delighted to present at this same time each weekday the assorted talents of art link letter the house party man Gary Moore and Irwin Kirby and the rousing Arthur Godfrey time There's no business like show business and nowhere else such a fine sampling of same than on this blockbuster CBS radio network entertainment fest the nicest thing about it is should you miss any or all of these great stars on a Monday You can catch right up with them the next day or any weekday. You're so minded Remember nowhere else can you enjoy each and every weekday the Bing Crosby Rosemary Clooney show The conversational gifts of Gary Moore and his foil Derwood Kirby the kids comedy and cut-ups of art link letters house party and The air of Glee with gusto that's a specialty of Arthur Godfrey time quick examination of the body made it pretty evident that the man whoever he was had died of carbon monoxide poisoning What's more the ignition switch of the old Maxwell was in the on position? The gasoline gauge set empty More important I could find no marks on the body that might have indicated a struggle of any kind My my mr. Dollar. This is a terrible thing terrible You know who he is kept money.  He's certainly dead and some man too Can't be more than maybe 50-55 years of age Look at that beautiful head of hair Nice clothes to you better not touch him. Oh, don't you worry about that? When did you say you last use this car of yours kept me to go last Saturday? You fill the gas tank then by any chance. Yep, there's up the top See Empty now. Yes And the garage has been locked ever since ever since mr. Dollar Nobody else but me he has a key for it Now look if I don't touch anything. I won't I won't I won't You see here That's on this window is open. Let's see Yeah To these spider webs all over it though, so this must be the way that he got into it to do this to himself I Yeah, I know that should have always kept the keys this car Captain do you have any idea who the coroner is for this neck of the woods? Yep old up hill It's over to the side of Kate Martin and you better call him have him get over here right away Yes, sir Do that right away and ask mr. Porman to come in and have a look Look for yourself there behind the wheel of the old Maxwell, huh? Yeah Mr. Dollar I'd say about Day I see or maybe two or or maybe even three So for the sake of the record, I'll say it's been two days. Yes, and the cause Well exactly what you said mr. Dollar carbon monoxide poisoning no question of it, sir That's what it is. That's what I'll put on the certificate any idea about who he might be doctor No, and I'll tell you this sir There's no patient of mine would ever commit suicide this way. You're sure it's suicide Well, well, of course it is you don't see any marks on the body to indicate otherwise do you know? Well, of course you don't but I assume you'll do an autopsy anyway, won't you Autopsy no, sir. No need for it. No need for it. Oh, no I'll be on my way. Just one minute doctor. Are you just stop worrying about it, mr. Dollar I'll have the boys come along over here and pick him up and take him to the market keep Martin where I keep my office and Anybody wants to claim them all well and good just the same so nobody claims him Why they'll see that he gets a decent burial in the potter's field and that'll be that So you just stop worrying about it, huh? Okay. You're the doctor. That's right Good day. Good day, mr. Pullman Well, mr.  Dollar Well, I know he isn't any client of ours. So The doctor says Johnny why worry yourself about it. No point in it. Yes Maybe you're right or sure leave it up to local police if there is anything to investigate and you don't really think there is I hope Come on come on Johnny Let's come on back to Sarasota before you start trying to blame me for getting you involved in something Oh, why don't you and Captain Barney load those fish into the carton? Well, I take just one more look at this instead of wasting time on further examination of the body I went back for another look at the window that Captain Barney appointed out with a dead man Had apparently made his entry carefully closing it after him One of the pains was a brand new one put in only recently By whom No, why? There were several shards of glass from the old pain there on the floor So I picked up one of them cleaned it very carefully and then by the simple expedient of moistening the corpse's hands Took a set of fingerprints Then I joined the others at the car Oh, at least let me pay you something for the trip today Not a big of it. Well, I thank you, mr. Foreman It was a pleasure and a privilege to be a guide for a famous man like mr. Dollar Rit up and all them papers and all and on the radio Well, we're certainly much obliged then aren't we Johnny? Of course Next time I'll have to make my regular charge. Don't you worry Captain Barney. We'll be down here again Right, maybe very soon pleasant day But I told you I'd get you some good fishing Johnny And if you meant that about coming down here again, I'm all for it Of course, that means you'll have to stick around a bit longer than you may have planned because tomorrow I thought we might take my boat out and maybe just Excuse me. Oh, no, of course Um, see Captain Barney again, you said Now, well, that's uh almost well. I said Look, what's bothering you anyway? You mean maybe the kind of casual way that he took the finding of that body in his own garage Among other things Hey, wait a minute. We better go back there again We forgot to look and see if there was a wallet or any papers or anything to identify the doctor and I both looked very carefully There was nothing Well, I suppose a suicide wouldn't want anybody to know who he was. That's wrong They're almost suicides practically advertised their identities and almost all of them leave a note of some kind But if you're thinking in terms of murder Johnny Are you? I'm not sure yet But you said yourself there were no marks on the body or anything like that and I know And I'm the chode If only that old dr. Hill would make an autopsy after I find out who that body belongs to Oh now look Johnny, what's the point of it? And you're supposed to be down here on vacation and you're supposed to What? What's the matter?   Who knows? Maybe it'll give us the key to a murder Back in Sarasota after leaving Earl at his home on Oyster Bay. I drove into police headquarters The man I went to see was another Barney Lieutenant Barney Phillips He'd been of tremendous help to me many times before and I knew that he would be again if he could Well, sure Johnny be glad to cooperate. Oh, we can all of us But aren't you kind of shooting in dark on this one? Well, maybe and maybe not The point is that unless the police down they show a little more interest than old dr. Hill Look if you can have your lab crew photograph the prints that I have on this sheet of glass Will you well then send them on to washington? Yeah It might take a little time Johnny to get a report back on them. Good. I'll spend it profitably fishing Two days later that lieutenant Phillips called and asked me to drop in on him again Yes, sir.  All right, Johnny His name was morris pincere morris pincere Yes, sir. He used to operate up in new england along the coast dealing mostly in fishing boats. I see Haven't heard from him or uh, that means he hasn't been caught in trouble though for a couple of years He said dealing in fishing boats Racket as old as the sea itself he had steal a boat sneak it into a yard Repainted and disguised it pretty well and pass it off on some sucker who thought he's getting a bargain That's been pretty active too because Well, he sure had enough aliases You look at this Morris pincere alias pincere morris and alias rusty spangler alias boldy spangler alias say boldy Oh, here.  Look, johnny if those prints were his this has to be him Of course Plastic surgery Huh if he had the record you say he had wine not plastic surgery Well, sure an awful lot of crooks have done it, you know Now wait a minute though here in the picture this this bald spot And body had bushy hair all over his head. Well, I never heard of plastic surgery for that and barny even went so far as to mention it himself That nice head of hair Okay, lieutenant. Thanks a lot. Well, we're to now johnny. Maybe to prove that suicide was a murder Not much point in it anymore than there is in the autopsy you suggested Yeah, right in there Hope you don't mind the cold in this place. Where's the light switch? Right is uh No, sir. No autopsy be just a waste of time. What it uh, which drawer doctor?   Well, that's a hole That's a wound there in the skull like from an ice pick or something or maybe from the point of a gaff A gaff hooker the sort of big game fishermen would use It could be a fishing guide and it wouldn't necessarily have killed him instantly We would have been that particular spot one no sir unless it was deeper than this seems to be but it certainly would have rendered him unconscious Yes So that he could be propped up in that old car The engine turned on the garage closed up And the actual death would be as you said it was due to carbon monoxide poisoning. Yes, sir Okay How would you like to round up a couple of the boys on your police force and have them follow us? Yes, sir Us mr. Don or Earl Pormans with me waiting outside in the car But following you to where sir? Well, I thought we might take a little run down 11 day again To see captain Barney He was a murderer. I'm afraid so I helped me though Johnny I never can figure what makes you suspicious in some of these cases Well, there are half a dozen things Earl captain Barney himself for instance. Oh, how do you mean the old shack? He lives in falling apart at the seams broken windows filled up with cardboard and it probably hasn't been painted since he moved in Yes, even his old wreck of a boat in spite of the fact he depends on it for a living held together with bailing wire And his car that old Maxwell Do you see what i'm getting at Earl? No, but go on he doesn't spend a cent that he doesn't absolutely have to Oh, no, I get the message So he's not the type to be giving anything away not even a fishing trip right Unless he has a purpose In this case, he wanted me around so there wouldn't be any suspicion of him Even when he led me to that corpse on the excuse of showing me the old car And he's the one who brought up the subject of cars. Remember you're right, but even so other things too In spite of the way that he neglects the house and the boat in the car He was very careful to replace the broken glass in the window of the garage to seal it up Why? To hold any exhaust fumes after he turned on that engine. That's enough for me.  Dollar I don't think you really could have fooled anybody for long captain bunny. No Maybe not Kind of I guess I didn't reckon on my conscience And oh dear It's been the torture and me Yes, I kind of thought it would be seemed like such a smart idea Avenue round when I made out that I discovered his body Such a good way to keep anybody from thinking that I could have done it, but I guess I just forgot that I would always know Why did you kill him captain? Well, I had to mr. Dollar When I thought of all the people he hurt When I note him down east That is up to new england All the fine old fishing man they rocked and cheated And then sweet talk his way out of it Time after time then When he come down here as bold and brazen as he ever was When he showed the nerve to suggest that I helped him in his filthy work Well, don't you see mr. Dollar Somebody had to stop him Somebody had to keep him from hurting all the nice fine people That I've gotten to know here abouts Well I guess I done the wrong thing. Didn't I? Yes captain Barney. I'm afraid you did Like everybody who tries to take the law into his own hands The police will be here in a few minutes Shall we go out and meet him? Yeah Guess we'd better Who am I to judge? But I hope they handle the old fellow as gently as possible in spite of what he didn't must pay for Expense account total Well this time it's only plain fare and incidentals for the trip back to Hartford Call it 85 bucks Yours truly Johnny dollar Here's our star to tell you about next week's story next week a city held at bay by a single man with a time bomb Join us. Won't you? Yours truly Johnny dollar Yours truly Johnny dollar is written by Jack Johnstone produced and directed by Bruno Zirato Jr. Music supervision by Ethel Hubert Johnny dollar is played by Mandel Kramer also featured in our cast where Ivor Francis is captain Barney Beale Ian Martin is Earl poorman Lawson Zerby is dr. Hill and Jim bulls as the police lieutenant Be sure to join us next week same time same station for another exciting story of yours truly Johnny dollar art Hannah speaking Complete the most complete news in broadcasting is CBS news on the CBS radio network At row 59 on your tri-cities dial. This is W. W. W. Music in Albany, New York Many merchants and businessmen of the capital district offer you expert services and a complete line of fine products When you shop we hope you patronize the civic-minded stores and institutions that display the welcome wagon sponsor emblem That emblem identifies the prestige firms who are playing a vital part in the life of our community Through their sponsorship of welcome wagon service when the welcome wagon posters pays a call Her basket contains a gift from each of these progressive firms along with a warm greeting to the newcomers In this way the welcome wagon sponsors help to extend the welcome of the whole community to the family in its new home If you have new neighbors call state 599640 and give their name and address to welcome wagon And if you have any question concerning welcome wagon service Remember that number is state 599640. It's the welcome wagon number Music time 635 p.m.


The Oshun State Government has launched the state's first-ever youth policy document to set a clear direction for youth education, empowerment, engagement and entrepreneurship in the state. Launching the document in Oshobo, Governor Oyetola said his administration has enunciated a clear policy framework to ensure that an enabling environment is created for the youths to realize their creative and productive potential. Oshubo Miyogumoko completes this report. The newly unveiled youth policy document, which has four components, the four EAS, which comprise empowerment, engagement, entrepreneurship and education, was developed to provide a crucial framework for guiding the state's approach to ensuring that a large number of the youths residing in the state are provided with high quality of life. Governor Oyetola revealed that the Oshun youth policy contains a commitment by the government, the youth of the state and the society in perseverance of development and growth. I want to assure Oshubo all the youth in the state that this new state youth policy deliberately captures walkable strategies for achieving the youth development plan of the present administration and will do all that is necessary to ensure that in collaboration with other stakeholders, this lofty intention of the policy is made a reality for our team in youths. Commissioner for Youth and Sport, Yamila Wao said that the newly launched youth policy document would serve as a veritable tool towards the actualization of the lofty programs of the administration to guarantee a better future for the youths. There is the need to protect the present life of these young persons in order to safeguard their future. With this in mind, the government of Oshun state has been striving to ensure that the youth of the state are given various opportunities through education and employment programs at all levels. The Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Timoti Ooye, attributed a conceptualization and unveiling of the policy to the positive manifestation of the old inclusiveness post-chair of the governor. We must review our education to inculcate STEM, that is science, technology, engineering and mathematics and also encourage technical education and keep our technical schools. It is time we stop turning our graduates without a clear court plan of employment or self-reliance. The President of the Oshun State Chapter of the National Youth Council of Nigeria, Abdelaziz Ismail, loaded the Ooyetala-led government for the effort, geared towards development. As this document is becoming a reality today, we believe that instead of Oshun youth, we have a specific direction from the government. The government described the document as the force and history of the state and expressed confidence in its significance to redefine the social economic fortunes of the young ones. Hello, hope you enjoyed the news. Please do subscribe to our YouTube channel and don't forget to hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates.