Latest / The SEANC View / Another attack at Bertie is a stark reminder of crisis

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Another attack at Bertie is a stark reminder of crisis · The SEANC View

• 0:00
  Music.
• 0:08
  Hello, and welcome to another edition of the Scenic View podcast.
• 0:12
  This is Jonathan Owens, your communications director.
• 0:15
  I'm here with Artis Watkins, the executive director of Scenic,
• 0:19
  government relations director Suzanne Beasley, and Sam Klein,
• 0:23
  our digital communications specialist slash podcast producer.
• 0:27
  I got you all this time. You did.
• 0:29
  Sorry, I stepped in a little late in here. I was watching a press conference
• 0:33
  with our latest state employee to sign up.
• 0:37
  Head coach bill belichick i didn't see it he
• 0:40
  was he was bill belichick he didn't
• 0:43
  have a whole lot to say really they gave him a sweatshirt and it was supposed
• 0:47
  to be like a funny thing and he was like oh okay did they have the arms cut
• 0:52
  out i was gonna say they have to get the arms i don't see okay okay john chancellor
• 0:57
  roberts gave it to him so we're both unc graduates we we know the crowd Well,
• 1:03
  they're usually, and we know the criticisms we've gotten over the years for
• 1:07
  being the wine and cheese crowd, not necessarily the most team spirited in the
• 1:12
  tough and scrappy way, right?
• 1:15
  That's just not been us. No. Yeah, it's going to be interesting to see the stands
• 1:19
  full for once at Kenan Stadium. I'm sure they will be.
• 1:23
  Okay, but do you think people are going to take their three-quarter zips and
• 1:27
  cut the sleeves up? That's what I'm wondering. Their vineyard vines. Right.
• 1:30
  And their curcule. He did wear, I'm reading on Twitter right now,
• 1:34
  he did wear a $140 tie from Alexander Julian. Oh, there you have it.
• 1:40
  I don't think I've ever seen a breakdown of fashion at the press conference
• 1:44
  for a football coach, but that's pretty cool.
• 1:47
  Yeah, we'll wait to see, and we'll try to get him an application for Scenic.
• 1:51
  Maybe we can get him involved in our district over there. He's probably listening.
• 1:55
  You know, you need to become a member. Yeah, we have. Be state employee number.
• 1:59
  Great opportunities for you to wait here. I'm sure he's listening.
• 2:03
  And not to be outdone, I mean, let's talk about the fact App State got a new
• 2:07
  coach this past week as well.
• 2:10
  I was surprised they fired their coach. He had a good record.
• 2:12
  I'm not very attuned to what's happening in Boone.
• 2:16
  App State's super, super intense about their football. Yeah.
• 2:19
  So their love is forgiving.
• 2:22
  Yeah, Dow Loggins. I think it's Loggins. We looked it up to try to make sure
• 2:26
  we pronounced it correctly. And I still almost said it wrong.
• 2:29
  But welcome, Coach Loggins. We also need you to be a scenic member.
• 2:34
  And WCU has a new band director for the Pride of the Mountains Marching Band.
• 2:38
  It's Matt Henley. There you go. Welcome, Director Henley.
• 2:42
  I'm thinking, did anybody else get a new head coach? It feels like everybody's...
• 2:46
  Yeah, there's a lot of change.
• 2:47
  There's a lot of change. I remember talking to Steve Lawson one time,
• 2:51
  and he went over to Chapel Hill and recruited Dean Smith to be a member.
• 2:55
  Dean Smith was a Scenic member. I just want to let that sink in for effect.
• 3:00
  Half of the listeners probably are not old enough to know at this point who
• 3:03
  Dean Smith was, one of the greatest basketball coaches ever.
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  And he was a member of Scenic. He was an active member from what I understand.
• 3:11
  Well, we'll move on from there. But that was sports talk.
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  I got some sports talk in on you guys. So this week at the legislature,
• 3:18
  they came back once again.
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  What happened this week? It was a long day yesterday. So it was a lot of hurry up and wait.
• 3:26
  There were a lot of protesters. So I still have this little line of mine stuck in my head.
• 3:32
  They hummed and sang the whole time they were there.
• 3:34
  But the House took up Senate Bill 382, which was overridden by the governor,
• 3:40
  contained some money in there.
• 3:41
  I think it's part three for Helene Relief. And it also had the power grab provisions
• 3:46
  that we spoke about in the last podcast. So they overrode the governor's veto.
• 3:51
  There were two Democrats missing yesterday. Representative Joe John,
• 3:54
  who has some health issues going on.
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  And our thoughts and prayers are with him.
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  We're with you, Representative John. Such a good guy. Such a good guy.
• 4:04
  We're thinking about your representative.
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  And Cecil Brockman was not able to be there. So there were two Democrats out
• 4:09
  yesterday. And then, you know, some of the Republicans that had an issue didn't
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  apparently have an issue yesterday. How close was the vote?
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  It was 76 to 42. So would those absences make a difference? They didn't.
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  They wouldn't have changed. Okay. They wouldn't have changed the outcome.
• 4:24
  Okay. But yeah, that was, they took up the constitutional amendment for voter ID.
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  So in case y'all didn't get it this year in the past election,
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  when you have to show your ID because it's state law now, then you're really,
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  really going to have to show it next election if it passes.
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  And there's still, there's a whole process. We'll get to vote on it.
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  We have all gotten that memo at this point. I think it's safe to say.
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  Truly. But yeah, it was a long day in that there were a lot of meetings just
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  back to back, you know, circling the wagons, getting their ducks in a row.
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  And, you know, with the protesters in the building, I think they always try
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  to wear them down a little bit.
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  You know, if you can extend the day up to a quitting time, then people got to
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  go pick up their kids and stuff.
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  But it was still there was a good crowd of protesters.
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  And similar to the Senate, they disrupted the session from the gallery and the gallery was cleared.
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  So no, no surprise. Was it more protesters than you've seen in a long time?
• 5:18
  There were a lot. There were a lot of people there yesterday.
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  They were not, but it wasn't as loud a protest as we see a lot of times.
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  I was about to say, it's been a while since you've had those protesters.
• 5:28
  And there was at one point, they actually roped off the house quads so folks
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  couldn't get around that side. I know that because we were very politely asked
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  to move from the table that we like to sit out outside the speaker's office.
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  So we had to move. But they did that because earlier in the day,
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  the protesters had completely lined up around the chamber and they were they
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  were shining their flashlight, singing this little light of mine.
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  And it was it was really low key and but just a lot of people.
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  They literally were lined up around the chamber.
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  So it was just interesting to watch. Those days are always interesting.
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  Yeah. So at the end of the day, we're still in terms of hurricane relief.
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  That's been some money has been moved and that'll be spent come January.
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  And then these other things took effect in terms of moving certain responsibilities
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  from the attorney general's office.
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  The governor's office. Yeah. Right. Two other offices.
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  So nothing's different than what the way it passed out of the House and Senate.
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  So at the end of the day, the legislature did not pass an expansion budget.
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  The budget's written for the biennium, so it's not like we were running without a budget.
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  There just wasn't any extra spending. As far as our issues go,
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  there was some extra spending, but not in the big picture of the budget.
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  No extra raises, no bonuses.
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  No, no. And any traction that we may have had there, Hurricane Helene hit and
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  everything refocused to storm recovery. But the feds have now said they will
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  cover 90 percent of the costs of the storm.
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  So that's that's a pretty massive, important shift financially for the state.
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  And, you know, Representative Green, when he was speaking on the floor yesterday,
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  he said something that just made me stop for a minute because I thought, good point.
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  We have a thirty four billion dollar budget and about five billion dollars in
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  the rainy day fund. And he said, even if we took the whole state budget and
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  everything that's in the rainy day fund, you wouldn't have enough money for
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  the western part of the state.
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  Well, no, but considering the Fed said they'd pay for 90 percent of it,
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  you don't have to talk about that anymore. We don't. But he made he made that point on the floor.
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  And I thought, yeah, it's a perspective. But what there is something to talk about.
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  Yeah, we got a reminder this week of the ongoing vacancy crisis that's hit our
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  prisons especially hard down in Bertie Correctional.
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  We had, I guess, an incident involving an inmate and a correctional officer
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  and a very sad situation there.
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  We haven't had a lot of details on it, but we did post a story about it.
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  Apparently, the inmate attacked the officer with a broomstick.
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  What we're hearing is that an inmate, and they've published his name in news
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  articles, but I don't want to give it more play, but the inmate more than once
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  stabbed the officer in charge, a captain, with a broomstick.
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  I mean, can't imagine you're doing that for any reason other than to gravely
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  harm, if not kill that person.
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  This is not a shocking event. This is exactly what people who work there have
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  been telling us and people who work in multiple prisons all over the state have
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  been telling us is going to happen.
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  And that's what we had a press conference at the General Assembly.
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  Gosh, I mean, it's been almost two years since we've had that press conference.
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  It's been almost eight years since they had Megan Callahan's murder.
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  Megan Callahan was murdered in that very prison in April, eight years ago.
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  There were multiple fatalities during an escape attempt that became a mass murder
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  at Pasquatank that same year, in October of that same year.
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  But the issue's not gotten better. And the issue is there aren't enough people working these prisons.
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  And the inmates will tell them flat out, you go home at the end of the day because
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  we let you. And they're not wrong. That's just...
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  My brother was a correctional officer for a while, and I'm glad he's not one
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  anymore because of that exact reason. And that's the problem.
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  I mean, people are getting out. Yeah. It's scary.
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  So that's obviously something that will be— Needs a big investment.
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  It's needed a big investment for a long, long time.
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  And it's gotten to be fair. The legislature, after Pasquitank,
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  did bump salaries and did some things at that time to try to make it easier
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  to hire people and to get quality people on. But that's been a while.
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  Well, we had Senator Steinberg was still in office then. He was a champion.
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  It happened in his backyard, but he became a real champion.
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  But you're talking to legislators about it. I mean, obviously,
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  since Saturday when this happened, your team has had an awful lot of conversations
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  with legislators. And what are you hearing from them? With lots of concern.
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  I've had phone calls since we talked to some of them on Saturday after the incident had happened.
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  And through the rest of the weekend, all the way up till yesterday,
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  we had legislators, you know, come to us and ask what the status was of the
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  captain who was injured.
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  There apparently has been quite a bit of talk amongst themselves.
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  Legislators amongst themselves yeah yeah i think we
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  had we let enough people know saturday that this terrible
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  thing has happened you know and these issues still exist nothing has
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  gotten better since the last time you know you address these issues and we haven't
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  quit talking about it so you guys shouldn't quit talking about it either but
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  you know just in case you need a reminder of how bad it is this person was stabbed
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  with a broken broomstick saturday and fortunately she's still alive,
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  but that could have gone the other way very quickly.
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  And the bottom line is there just aren't enough people to work in these prisons
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  to make it safe, not just for officers, but for the offenders.
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  It's not safe for anybody. It's not. It's absolutely not.
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  So I have a question. These prisons like Bertie, Pasquotank are in really small areas.
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  I mean, that obviously makes it harder to recruit employees as well, right?
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  Not necessarily. I mean— Because that's the job to have if you're in one of those areas. Yeah.
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  I mean, we have prisons within a short drive from Raleigh that are struggling
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  mightily, and prisons within a short drive from other urban areas that are struggling.
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  It's the job. The job is inherently insanely dangerous.
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  And we've talked about this a number of times.
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  Law enforcement is dangerous because when you encounter a criminal or a suspect,
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  it could be anybody you encounter.
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  In that time, you're having that interaction. Anything could happen.
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  Something could pop off. But then you get back in your car and go about your
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  business until the next incident.
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  When you're on post at the prison and you're an officer there,
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  the entire time of the shift, every minute, every second, something can happen
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  to you or something can happen to someone else that you're responsible for trying to prevent.
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  That bad thing from happening. I remember a correctional officer.
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  He's retired now, but he was a former police officer.
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  And his big talking point was, you know, as a police officer,
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  80% of my time was not spent with the bad guys.
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  20% of my time was spent with the bad guys. As a correctional officer,
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  100% of my time is spent with the bad guys.
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  Yeah. And you can literally, you can get a job in a fast food restaurant with
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  benefits now and make more than a starting officer in a prison.
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  So how are you going to get them in?
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  Because, again, not to devalue the work somebody's doing at a fast food restaurant,
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  but they're much less likely to be murdered on the job.
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  They're much less likely to have to worry that when they go to work,
• 12:45
  they might not come home. Yeah.
• 12:47
  It's an ongoing issue that we'll definitely be working on again this session.
• 12:51
  Absolutely. One national topic I wanted to talk about before we send these folks to Christmas.
• 12:57
  I didn't think it was possible, but a news story knocked Donald Trump from the
• 13:02
  headlines there for a few days at least.
• 13:05
  The whole assassination of the UHC United Healthcare CEO in New York and the,
• 13:11
  I guess, the aftermath where alleged killer, his name is? Luigi.
• 13:17
  Luigi something. Mangione. Has become almost a celebrity. I can't say that that's
• 13:23
  a good thing. Obviously, you don't want anyone to die.
• 13:26
  But I think it does underlie some of the opinions of America.
• 13:30
  I mean, I have no idea. I don't know if this guy's just, if he's in fact the
• 13:34
  correct, you know, obviously protecting everyone's rights in the legal system.
• 13:38
  If he is, in fact, the person who did it, why he did it, I don't know.
• 13:42
  Yeah, I'm waiting for the rest of the story. Yeah, but...
• 13:45
  What is clear from all the comments people are making is that the undercurrent
• 13:50
  of absolute, not just dissatisfaction and resentment,
• 13:54
  but kind of fury with the system is much greater than I think some folks in
• 14:00
  the system ever realized.
• 14:02
  And it's the kind of thing that folks like Treasurer Falwell and Senator Bernie
• 14:06
  Sanders and people of both parties have been trying to point out,
• 14:10
  look, people are, they're being taken advantage of and there is a breaking point.
• 14:14
  Now, obviously, I think we can
• 14:16
  all agree, murder's never an acceptable response to any breaking point.
• 14:21
  And again, we don't know if that's what it was. We don't know if he broke because of the system.
• 14:26
  But there are plenty of people who are reacting to it.
• 14:29
  Yeah, and like you just said, the reaction is coming from folks on both sides.
• 14:33
  You know, I think everyone, we have a shared experience in America as,
• 14:38
  you know, with our health system, and it's not always a positive one.
• 14:41
  Well, we've talked a lot about Senator Sanders' help committee and how there's
• 14:46
  been bipartisan, abject anger in some of these committee hearings at different
• 14:51
  aspects of the health care industry.
• 14:53
  But insurance executives, providers, and executives from pharmaceutical companies,
• 14:59
  they have been, there's been a bunch of bipartisan frustration leveled at them
• 15:04
  from the help committee.
• 15:05
  And before we started, I guess, what, five or six years ago with the whole Clear
• 15:10
  Pricing Project and a little before that, and, you know, even 10 years before
• 15:13
  that, we all were talking about that reimbursement rates.
• 15:17
  When I first came here and before even that began, I would have probably been
• 15:22
  of the opinion that the insurance companies were the problem.
• 15:25
  I don't think they're entirely the problem now, though, when I'm a little more
• 15:29
  enlightened into the system. I
• 15:31
  think that we've proven that the hospital reimbursement rates are way out.
• 15:37
  I mean, everybody's a part of that problem other than the consumer using the
• 15:40
  health care. I mean, period.
• 15:42
  The insurance companies and the providers in terms of hospitals,
• 15:47
  doctors and nurses, they've not made out in this process.
• 15:50
  OK, but insurance companies and hospitals, they've made a lot of money.
• 15:55
  Just objectively speaking, on paper, they've made an awful lot of money.
• 15:59
  And then you've got consumers who are spending more percentage-wise of their
• 16:05
  personal income on health care.
• 16:06
  And then employers who are saying, I can't afford to give it to my folks.
• 16:11
  And then you've got the government saying, yeah, we hear y'all.
• 16:15
  You're frustrated, but doing nothing.
• 16:17
  So I think that's where we are now is kind of, again, a breaking point where.
• 16:21
  Well, and that transparency. Governments need to do something.
• 16:23
  That transparency for the.
• 16:25
  Exactly. State health plan, that's a star. And that would affect,
• 16:29
  I mean, obviously. But to be clear, y'all are mad.
• 16:32
  Don't go after people with weapons.
• 16:35
  Call your elected officials and tell them that last piece of the puzzle,
• 16:40
  the government, that's what you expect the government.
• 16:43
  People are so anti-regulation and stuff like this. That makes no sense to me.
• 16:47
  That means you're anti-keeping a system in place that can hurt you.
• 16:52
  So contact your elected officials and have things handled appropriately.
• 16:58
  Don't try to be a vigilante. Don't kill people. Vote. Yeah, don't kill people. Don't hurt people.
• 17:03
  Yeah. But, I mean, I think it's clear something's got to change in terms of
• 17:07
  health care in this country. Transparency in the state of health care would
• 17:08
  be a great place to start.
• 17:10
  Yeah, anywhere. I mean, to his credit, last time Trump was president,
• 17:13
  he did have a, was it a bill or an executive order asking for more transparency with costs?
• 17:20
  He did, and I don't know. But, yeah, you're right. That's not inaccurate.
• 17:26
  RFK seems like he's ready to regulate some health products.
• 17:30
  So maybe. Oh, my goodness. You know, but you've got people like Representative
• 17:33
  Ro Khanna from California who are indicating, hey, I'm open to work.
• 17:37
  And it's getting a lot of flack from fellow Democrats.
• 17:40
  Just ridiculous flack over saying I'm willing to work with the Trump administration.
• 17:46
  Let's finally get some things in place that keep this system from being one
• 17:51
  that, you know, one of the richest countries in the world and our folks can't
• 17:55
  get healthcare without going bankrupt if something bad happens.
• 17:58
  So a lot of the complaints that I've seen
• 18:00
  tied to this assassination, was that, you know, insurance companies won't cover
• 18:05
  a certain medicine or procedure.
• 18:08
  So I saw Ro Khanna talking about that, and he suggested that the government
• 18:13
  mandate that insurance must cover anything that Medicare covers.
• 18:17
  Well, I mean, that kind of plays into our Ligovi problem at the state health
• 18:23
  plan, right? I mean, yeah.
• 18:25
  And then you got, I mean, And that sounds well and good until,
• 18:27
  you know, changes can always be made to Medicare to where Medicare might be
• 18:31
  paying unreasonable rates.
• 18:33
  You know what I'm saying? It's just very complicated is what I'm saying.
• 18:36
  And the state health plan, you know, we're still with Blue Cross Blue Shield
• 18:40
  at the moment, but it's not a Blue Cross Blue Shield insurance product.
• 18:44
  They are the third party administrator.
• 18:46
  It'll be Aetna come 2025. But it's the state health plan or self-funded.
• 18:52
  Well, here's my hope out of all this, though. Honestly, that this awful thing,
• 18:57
  that maybe the good thing that comes from it is that seeing all that public
• 19:02
  outcry all over social media might be the thing that brings everybody finally to the same table.
• 19:11
  Maybe we will see insurance companies and corporate health care,
• 19:14
  private equity that owns so much of corporate health care now.
• 19:17
  That's arguably another one of the problems. But all of these players and then
• 19:21
  consumers themselves and our lawmakers.
• 19:24
  Maybe there will now become communication and we can find something that works
• 19:30
  for everyone, because I think the one thing we can agree on is.
• 19:33
  It's not working for people. Sam, what does your generation think of the whole health care debate?
• 19:40
  I feel like my generation, from what I've seen, they're not talking as much
• 19:43
  about the health care aspect as they are talking about the person who allegedly
• 19:48
  committed the assassination.
• 19:50
  And from the side of TikTok that I'm on, I am very much on a book side of TikTok
• 19:56
  where there's a lot of people who really love books there. and they are looking
• 20:00
  at him as a morally gray character that they want to be released.
• 20:05
  So he's becoming kind of a folk hero. He's becoming, for lack of a better term,
• 20:10
  kind of a sex symbol. Oh, for goodness sake.
• 20:14
  People who think he's attractive think that just because he's attractive,
• 20:18
  like, he shouldn't get as much of a punishment.
• 20:20
  Wow. Ain't that America. Well, I kind of looked into it more.
• 20:26
  I wanted to see, like, what the facts that they had behind arresting him because
• 20:30
  the assassination happened in New York City.
• 20:33
  He was arrested in Pennsylvania. I was like, that's weird.
• 20:35
  So I've kind of looked into it. I saw that they did have an alleged manifesto
• 20:40
  that they found on his person whenever he was captured.
• 20:43
  I read that, thought it was pretty compelling as a reason to arrest him.
• 20:47
  But I won't be able to say anything until the trial ends and we know for sure he's guilty or not.
• 20:51
  Well, I would like to retract my thoughts that people might come together and
• 20:55
  find solutions around it.
• 20:58
  My generation is strange. They go to the weirdest places.
• 21:02
  Okay. Well, I'm really proud of you for digging in. Or if that has anything
• 21:06
  to do with them not having to pay for health care until they're 26.
• 21:11
  It's about to say. A lot of us aren't. I pay for my own health care. I have my health care.
• 21:16
  But a lot of my generation is not paying for their own health care yet.
• 21:20
  They're still on their parents' health care.
• 21:21
  And I don't think they're necessarily seeing how difficult it can be yet. Right.
• 21:26
  Okay. Well, let's go on to John's Wacky Weird Question of the Week to end this
• 21:30
  podcast and go to Christmas.
• 21:33
  John's Wacky Weird Question of the Week.
• 21:39
  I was watching TikTok this week, as I do all the time.
• 21:43
  I don't know what I'm going to do when they ban it, I guess.
• 21:46
  No. January 19th, right? It's going away. Hashtag save TikTok.
• 21:51
  But there's a TikTok where a man, he says he does like icebreakers at meetings
• 21:57
  and corporate events and things like that.
• 21:59
  And the most, the best question he's ever asked is, what is your favorite road?
• 22:04
  So that's my question to you guys this week. What is your favorite road?
• 22:08
  We'll start with Suzanne. She looks like she's got an answer. I do.
• 22:11
  So my very favorite road is Cornwallis Road because that's where I live.
• 22:14
  But Highway 80 out west, there is a stretch of that road called the Devil's Whip.
• 22:20
  And back in the motorcycling days, that was my favorite road.
• 22:23
  Oh, yeah. Man, I don't know what kind of shape it's in there.
• 22:27
  Your favorite road is the one that goes to your grandbabies.
• 22:31
  Okay, for the point. I've got a story. That's 264.
• 22:35
  That's nobody's favorite road. How can you love that? I read a story this week
• 22:40
  or last week maybe about like kind of motorcycle tourism in the West and how
• 22:45
  the roads like that are getting big. Well, you know, the Tale of the Dragon.
• 22:49
  Yeah. That's everybody's theme to go ride, which is fun. It's fun.
• 22:53
  But just over the Virginia line, the back of the Dragon outside of Marion is
• 22:59
  even better. Oh, cool. It's an even better road.
• 23:02
  Terrell Hollis Skyway. See, that's a good insight.
• 23:07
  Lots of good memories from motorcycling. All right, let's go to Sam next.
• 23:11
  What's your favorite road?
• 23:12
  I've never talked about it. I'm going to go with Sandy Springs Road.
• 23:15
  It is a small road out in Cedar Hill, Tennessee.
• 23:18
  It is where my parents built their first house. That's the first house that I remember living in.
• 23:24
  I had, it kind of reminds me every time I think about it, the song by Miranda
• 23:28
  Lambert, The House That Built Me.
• 23:30
  Yeah. I got some pets buried out in the yard there.
• 23:34
  Sometimes when my dad goes out to Tennessee for work, I wish that I could just
• 23:38
  go with him so I could drive by and see that house again.
• 23:42
  Some very good memories. Artists top that one. Cannot. I know.
• 23:47
  I kind of want to hug Sam now. Yeah.
• 23:50
  I mean, everybody loves 12, right? Because that road on the Outer Banks.
• 23:55
  I've never been on that. I want to do that.
• 23:56
  Oh, for goodness sakes. It's, you know, you've got the at points in that road,
• 24:00
  you've got the Atlantic Ocean, just, you know, not not enough feet away on your on your.
• 24:06
  Well, it depends if you're going north or south on it. But if you're going south
• 24:09
  on it, it's over to your left.
• 24:11
  And then the sound is not far through the maritime forest at places on the right
• 24:17
  side as you're going south.
• 24:18
  But it is I don't know. I think it's one of the prettiest places in the world.
• 24:22
  But the very best is not in North Carolina to me that I've seen.
• 24:26
  I mean, I'm sure there's way better. I haven't seen it all yet.
• 24:28
  But there's a road called A, and I had to look it up. A830.
• 24:33
  It's in Scotland, of course. And it goes from Fort William, which is in the
• 24:38
  highlands, towards the coast, out towards this place called Isla Sky.
• 24:42
  And it's one of the only places I've ever driven along and found myself just my jaw dropped.
• 24:49
  Because it's at times like Jurassic Park. And then all of a sudden,
• 24:55
  I mean, it looked like you're in Lord of the Rings. It's bizarre.
• 24:59
  It's nature. And I did not see one other car for about an hour and a half.
• 25:04
  Yeah. So never see anything.
• 25:07
  I mean, nature. She might win. The world's a cool place. Howling Cal, must you see anything?
• 25:11
  Well, I was going to say, I can't say it.
• 25:15
  Why are y'all this way? Sam said the same thing. I've never said it.
• 25:19
  And I'm thinking, what is Deep Star Road?
• 25:22
  It was a getaway road. No, maybe cliche, but I was going to say Franklin Street because it's awesome.
• 25:28
  Oh, that's a worth it to answer. But I think my favorite road is Busby Road
• 25:32
  in Seagrove, North Carolina, where I grew up.
• 25:35
  And it's not the road that I grew up on, but you turn down that road to go to
• 25:39
  our pottery shop, which is far from our house, right?
• 25:42
  Not far, but I mean like five miles from our house. And I learned how to drive
• 25:46
  on that road. I used to drive my dad's blazer home when I was like 13 or 14
• 25:51
  and learn how to drive on the road.
• 25:53
  My uncles live all along that road.
• 25:56
  I rode four wheelers up and down that road illegally.
• 25:59
  So that's probably it. Busby Road. That's awesome. Good memories.
• 26:03
  I think the reason that I said I've never talked about this,
• 26:05
  because I don't think I've ever
• 26:06
  talked about the fact that I lived in Tennessee on the podcast before.
• 26:10
  That I used to live there until I was like 12.
• 26:12
  I don't think you have. Look at all of us sharing.
• 26:15
  See? See? He was right.
• 26:18
  You're emoting. What was it he said? Emoting. Emoting.
• 26:22
  Well, that's our show for this week. But everyone have a Merry Christmas.
• 26:26
  And we'll probably have one more show before the end of the year.
• 26:29
  Enjoy that one as well. And have a good day. Happy holidays.
• 26:32
  Music.