Latest / APD Pod Squad / Season 2, Episode 10; Cadet Jaylan Gaines, Cadet Jonathan Speessen, and Lt. Brian Hogan

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Season 2, Episode 10; Cadet Jaylan Gaines, Cadet Jonathan Speessen, and Lt. Brian Hogan · APD Pod Squad

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is the APD5 squad.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Rick Wright, and I hope your 2026 is off to a good start.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: In this episode, we continue celebrating a new year with new officers.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: This time, it's cadets from the current B L E T class set to graduate in February.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: Cadets Jalen Gaines and Jonathan Spacet.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: From Community Engagement, Lieutenant Brian Hogan joins me.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: He's got some big news about the spring edition of the Citizens Police Academy.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe another nugget or two.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: It's all coming up on episode 10, year two of the APD Pod Squad.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's part of our January New Year New Officers.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Today we introduced and get to know Cadet Jalen Gaines.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for sitting down with me.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_05: I appreciate having me.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we just uh met like what five minutes ago for the first time.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: So we're really getting to know each other on this one.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: You guys are 20 of you, I believe, right now that are getting close to graduation.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: Is that right?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's pretty exciting stuff, isn't it?
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, yeah.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_05: I'm excited.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_05: I'm ready to get out there.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_01: So is it like a big extended family at this point?
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Because you guys have all been together, classes together, and PT together, and all of these things.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm guessing sometimes, you know, lifting each other up and helping each other out.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I've enjoyed it since the very moment I met them.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_05: Everybody got up, walked around and introduced each other, 20 of us, so it's a lot, and there's a lot of different personalities that we're dealing with every day.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_05: And sometimes I kind of want to be by myself, but then again, yeah, they're like they're like another family.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_05: Um we hang out with each other outside of outside of this.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_05: And yeah, we've been together for since July, I believe, of 2025.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: So that'd have been the pre-B L E T.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: So you were there for pre-B L E T.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and so so yeah, it's a long journey, right?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then after this, we're about a month away from graduation.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: And then of course, you'll have to go and do your uh field training, and then that's another process.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: So it'll be probably into the summer, it could be around July of you know this year, when maybe you're a solo officer.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: So beginning to end, it takes about a year.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's a long process.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a big part of it, though.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you're you guys are taking your tests like this week as we're talking.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so uh thanks for taking time away from that.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, how's that going?
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_05: It's going pretty good so far.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, the only thing you can do is just continue to read, continue to study.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_05: Um, I literally just got back um from we're doing a group session in one of the training rooms.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_05: So that's all we have to do is just come together.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_05: They give us the questions that we miss, and we come together.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_05: Some people wrote down the questions and then like, hey, what's the what's the answer to this question?
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_05: I think I missed this one.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_05: It's just a team effort altogether.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: You learn more that way too.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, as opposed to just staring into a book.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: You you learn from each other, and that'll be the same way out in the field, I would imagine, right?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_05: So where were you born?
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_05: Ridgly was born in um Macon, Georgia, which is near Atlanta, Georgia.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_05: In 2019, unfortunately, my mom passed away.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_05: Um, so I moved down to Camden County, Georgia, which is near like the Kingsland, Brunswick area.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_05: Uh moved in with my grandmother, came down here and went to college at Morris Hill.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: Here's what I know about Macon, and they might have been disbanded by the time you were living there.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: You might not remember, but they had a hockey team.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: Do you remember their hockey team?
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_05: Uh remember the original one, but uh do know they have one currently called the Macon Mayhem.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_05: So they changed their name.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, they changed the name.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know what it was before, right?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_05: Um I don't remember the name of it.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Macon Whoopi.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_05: I remember now.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_05: Yes.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Because I was the uh public address announcer for the hockey team we had here, the Asheville Smoke.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so the Macin'Whoopi were part of the United Hockey League, the UHL.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so it just there's a lot of things you can do when your name is Macon.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_05: You know, so yeah, they they rebranded and changed it to Macon Mayhem Mayhem, and then we also have a semi-pro baseball team now called Make and Bacon.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you got to.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you almost have to, don't you?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_05: So yeah, um I mean I've been to plenty of those games.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_05: I I enjoy like all different types of sports.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_05: So I've been to a couple make and mayhem games.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so uh you graduated from Marshall then?
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: I did.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: Is that what got you interested in law enforcement?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Did you go for that, or is was it something else?
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_05: I did go to school for for criminal justice.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_05: I graduated with my bachelor's in 2023, and then I got my master's in 2024.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_05: But I went for that, but when I was in Macon, I had um a couple of little league coaches that were um a part of law enforcement.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_05: They were part of the Macon Bibb County Sheriff's Department.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_05: And they were kind of my influencers, my mentors, being my coach and everything, and they kind of just, I don't know, I was looking up to them and decided that's what I wanted to do.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_05: I wanted to come into this field and do the same thing and mentor kids my age or you know, yeah, go out in the community um and do good.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: Not a lot of people would go and and get their masters if they were just going to join like a local police department.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: So was there another kind of plan in mind before you did this?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_05: It was.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_05: Um actually, right when I was getting ready to graduate, I applied for um the Secret Service.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_05: So I applied for the Secret Service March of 2024.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_05: Um and I was in that process for a very, very long time.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_05: It was very tedious and long.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_05: Um and then I believe it was October, November 2024.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_05: I went and got my medical exam and uh I hurt my knee playing football in high school, and then um also I had pretty bad eyesight.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_05: So with those two things together, they kind of they moved on for my application, and then uh decided to apply here, applied to a couple local agencies, and Asheville PD got back with me, but then they got applied Friday and they got back with me that Monday.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_05: So I was like, you know what?
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_05: Let me just let me give it a chance and go local and see what comes of it.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's meant to be, maybe, right?
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of people before they go away to college or do they have this idea of what they want to be.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like in my my mind, I had an idea of what I wanted to be, and then like I was like six different things along the line in my life.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's the way it is, kind of, you know, sometimes it's like you might think you know what you want, yeah, and maybe something else is better for you.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe, you know, you said you like working with kids and things like that.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: It could be an SRO job might be great for you.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Or or if you like working with kids, I'm sure just members of the community.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe that one-on-one with the community, uh, the community policing concept, maybe that's for you.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: You know, something along those lines.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_05: Being local, yeah.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: Something like that.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: So now I did I give you the tease in advance of the one question I always ask before the podcast.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: What's one thing most people don't know about you?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: Did I tell you that or no?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, you did.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Are you prepared to answer that today?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_05: I am prepared.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so what is the one thing that most people don't know about you?
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: Now that now being said, we don't know much about you at all.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: So you can probably say just about anything, and it would be news.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_05: So the one thing people don't know about me is that I am a huge um sneakerhead.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_05: I love sneakers.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_05: Like most of my shoes are pretty much Jordans.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_05: Um and not many people know it because I don't really go out much.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_05: And when I do go out, I'm normally in work boots or you know, dress shoes because I'm in a professional setting.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_05: But when I do go out, it's majority Jordans.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_05: I just ordered a pair that's coming in tomorrow.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_05: It's like$400.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: So talk about your staying power for a brand because so I'm old enough, you can probably look at me and figure this out.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: But when the original Air Jordans came out, I was playing high school basketball and I wore them.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: And now there's no way you're like, oh, you should have saved those.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: No, I beat those things up.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: Those things were I mean, I s literally sweat through them to the point where they just got tossed.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: But I had the original air, not so the original ones didn't have any white on them, if you remember.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: Because the NBA made them have a certain percentage of white to wear in a game and this whole thing, right?
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: This whole so I had but I had the original black, red, white Air Jordans, the ones that were the biggest popular ones.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: That was my official basketball shoe, my senior year in high school.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: And you're go ahead and throw the number out there.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: What year do you think that was?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: Come on, come on.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: You're a sneakerhead.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: You ought to know this.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: As a Jordan guy, I don't know.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: 1986 is when I graduated high school.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, but probably before you were born.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: So how many pairs of Jordans you got?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_05: I think I have maybe 11.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_05: I had a lot more, but as I got older, I kind of was like, at one point I was just buying a pair every week because I could and I had the money.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_05: But like once I got older and I like started having bills and stuff to pay, and I was like, maybe I should like come down a little bit.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_05: I don't have the money for that, especially like with the resellers these days, like overcharging.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_05: Like maybe once a one pair a month is would do me just fine.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Do you have like one pair that's like the one you're not wearing that's like the collector pair that maybe it'll make you some money someday?
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: Do you have one of those or do you wear them all?
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_05: I wear, I I pretty much wear my shoes.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_05: I I don't really care too much about the you know, and retailing it.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: Have you been to the uh the place where you can make your own Jordans?
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: I haven't.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's in New York.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there's probably more than one place.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: I would guess Oregon, probably at their factory as well.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: But a buddy of mine went to New York where you can like you can design it.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: You go into their store on a computer, you design, you know, whatever this, this, this, what fabric, what you can do all these different does he had some kind of, I don't know, it was like a some sort of like lizard skin thing, leather this, all that.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna I gotta tell you, it was like the ugliest thing that I have ever seen in my life, but he was so proud of him.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, yeah, those are nice.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_05: I'll probably spend all day in there, honestly.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_05: So but I'll I just love shoes.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, well, we were just talking right before uh we started recording here.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: You had mentioned lacrosse.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: So you played lacrosse.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_05: I did.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_05: It wasn't really my a big thing at first for me.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_05: My football coach, he wanted me to play a sport in the spring, which I didn't really have a sport in the spring.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: Which is like a baseball time, and if you're gonna play baseball.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_05: I wanted to play baseball.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_05: I didn't I hated track, I didn't like dragon.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, so he's like, you gotta play something.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_05: A couple of guys in my class was like, You're fast, you're strong, come play lacrosse.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_05: We're starting up a lacrosse team.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_05: And at that time, uh my high school had just created a lacrosse team.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_05: I think my lacrosse team was it was founded in 2016.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_05: So it was fairly new.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_05: So they were like, just come out and try out, maybe you're good.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_05: And then the first day of practice, I was like catching the ball, like it was like natural for me.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_05: And most people don't have that hand-eye coordination right away.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's not easy right away, it's it's a different type of motion playing that.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: So lacrosse was big where I grew up, outside of Buffalo.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because you probably know this.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: It was basically a sport that was created by Native Americans.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there were a lot of Native American tribes up there in in New York State, like the the Iroquois and the Sequoia and all those different things.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And the college that I wanted to go to couldn't afford was Syracuse, who's got like the number one lacrosse program like ever.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like they got so many national titles and whatever.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I was a big fan growing up.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then my uh next door neighbor uh out back, he was Native American.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: He was adopted by our neighbors, and he and he had no one to just throw with.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: He would give me a stick, and I was just a kid, like 10 or 11 or whatever, like that, and he said, Rick, throw with it.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Tim was his name.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so we would just between the yards throw back and forth.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_01: I never played the game, you know, I never was on a team, but I enjoyed that.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: And the sport itself is is very similar to hockey.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_05: It is.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm a hockey guy.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: I did play hockey and love hockey.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so that part of watching it, I watched the Buffalo Bandits all day long, indoor lacrosse team, and they've got like 10 championships, and so they're awesome too.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a big deal up there.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so I love watching lacrosse because it's very similar to a sport that I love hockey.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: The only difference you really you're not wearing skates.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: Pretty much.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: Other than that, there isn't I mean some of the rule differences, of course.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: So what was your favorite part of lacrosse?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_05: The hitting or the Oh, yeah, of course.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_05: I play I play defense.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_05: I didn't play offense.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_05: I I literally was just there to hit people and stop, stop them from scoring.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um it it looks like fun.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, like I said, I've never played it, but it looked, you're allowed to hit guys get into fights, like in like the pro level at least.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, the pro level, but we got I've been into my fair share of fights in college.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: So but um even though we weren't supposed to, but you know, well you know, sometimes things get spirited.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: You get the you know, they get the best of you.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so let's get back to you know, the job at hand, which is the Asheville Police Department and your graduation coming up in a month.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: Have you thought much about that?
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: About the excitement of because it's so close now.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_05: It is.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: This long process.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_05: Uh I was just talking, I was like, it it just feels surreal.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_05: It doesn't feel like in a week's time we'll be done.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: Mm-hmm.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_05: My motto is just like take it one day at a time, one test at a time.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_05: You can only think about so much at once without being overwhelmed with everything.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_05: So I kind of just take it one day at a time and then I think about it when it comes, you know.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: What's been your favorite part?
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Has it been the the firearms training, the driving training, the is there anything that stands out?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_05: I think a lot of people would pick out a particular class, but for me, I think it was just the this lesson plan is kind of scenario-based a lot.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_05: So it's a lot of scenarios.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_05: And I think I got the biggest takeaways from just doing the scenarios because it was so realistic, especially the sexual assault and the domestic violence scenarios.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_05: We had detectives come in from the sex crimes unit, but they've been working with the victims of sex crimes and they know how they will react to certain questions, and when you ask something, they would react and jump at you, and then you would kind of learn like, hey, maybe I I need to change my approach.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_05: And like I got my biggest takeaways from all the scenarios and just like learning and taking the constructive feed feedback.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_05: So when I get out on the road, I know what to do.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: You've watched cop shows on TV, right?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody has of of some nature, right?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: There's different ones.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: Is it way different?
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like from what you you what you thought it might be?
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, yeah, it's completely different.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_05: You never know how people will react.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_05: Everybody's different.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_05: You don't know how people react to you coming up to them and you know, just being friendly.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_05: Some people are gonna be angry and some people are gonna be nice.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_05: It's just different.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_05: You never know what you what to expect until you're till you're there.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and TV makes it seem like there's car chases and gunshots it's always the same thing.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_05: It's like all day long.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not what the job is.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_05: No, it's not.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's a lot of just helping people, meeting with people, de-escalation things along those lines.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: And and those are things that you'll obviously only get better at as you get more experience and get out there in the street.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: So here is your chance to give a shout-out to some of your instructors.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Anyone wanna wanna give anybody's uh name, give everyone some props right about now?
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um So the problem with that, of course, you leave somebody out, they're gonna get the grieved too.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_05: Well, all all of my all of our instructors were great.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_05: They provided good feedback, but specifically Captain Silberman.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_05: I learned a lot from Captain Silverman.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_05: He was also a pretty fun instructor.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's a softie.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_05: He he's he's he's very cool.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_05: Don't tell him that though.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_05: He's very funny, and he's he's a he's a great teacher.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_05: And um also um Michael Swanson, he was our instructor in pretty much like maybe I think four classes, including PT.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_05: So we've had a a lot of him as well.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_05: So but those two mainly I learned a lot from.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: Any family members you want to give a shout out to now?
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: You can tell them to listen to your podcast, people that were influential along the way, any old teachers, any old you just mentioned some coaches, some things like that.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, they're um all my family are very very supportive.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_05: Um, my dad, he was a police officer himself.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_05: So he gave me a lot of motivation and tips and tricks and everything.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_05: He now works um emergency management for state of Florida.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_05: Um, and then also my my grandmother, even though she's six and a half hours away, she calls me every every Sunday, like, how's it going?
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_05: Is everything okay?
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_05: And if I miss if I miss a Sunday, I'll hear it.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: What do you call your grandma?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: If you're you're not Granny.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: Granny?
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so hey Granny, you did good.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_05: Yep.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate everything you've done.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: Cadet Jalen Gaines, thank you so much and for being part of the biggest class we have had, 20 in a long time, uh making a big impact in the city of Asheville with the Asheville Police Department.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you and good luck.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you for the opportunity.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: As we continue a month with a theme of New Year, New Officers, we're getting to know another member of the recent B L E T class that graduates in a month.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: And this is a busy week for you guys.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm taking some of your time today, so if any of you fail, it's not my fault.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: Cadet Jonathan Space is with me.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for sitting down.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me, Rick.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: I did that right, Spacein, right?
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: That is correct.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we're we're gonna focus on this just for the first part because people can't see your name written.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: They're just hearing us talk, right?
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: But spell your last name.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: So my last name is spelled S-P-E-E-S-S-E-N.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: So everyone's gonna say to you, Speisen.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: My entire life.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: So do you know the origins of the name, the family history?
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: And uh tell us a little bit about that.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm kind of curious myself.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: I've always been a little bit of a somewhat interested in like linguistics and history and family genealogy and stuff.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Yeah, absolutely.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: So from my understanding, uh my last name comes from a Dutch origin where the double E looks like an A.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: Not unlike a lot of languages.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_01: I took Spanish uh in school, and the letters, some of the vowels, are used differently than they are in the English language.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I guess it's just very similar to that.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: But you see it here in the States and you look into that, you're like, oh, it's bees it.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: But it is not.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: So you had to deal with that as a kid, didn't you?
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: And even as an adult, I guess, right?
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: I've been cursed of it.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but it's unique.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Also unique, I happen to know you've got a nickname.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: So we're so first of all, Rooster.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: I gotta know the story.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think uh when you put a bunch of people in an office together, they they try to get creative.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I guess that's where Rooster came from.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but there's gotta be something like foghorn, leghorn.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: I mean what what's the deal?
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't get it.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I guess when I first started, I was growing up this mustache, and it wasn't the greatest looking one.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: And uh they said I looked like the guy from Top Gun.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, the Top Gun Rooster.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Well that's that's much more complimentary than somebody saying you you look like one.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: I can think of a lot of nicknames I could have came up with.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: That sound a lot worse, yeah.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and there were several animals.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: You could have been goose.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I could have there's uh others in Top Gun that could have been used as we are getting to know Cadet Jonathan Spaceon, and this is your exam week, as I said.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, how confident are you?
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: I know you've been taking practice tests and all.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: You feeling good?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I think uh not only myself, but I think the entire class got it.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone seems kind of almost more excited than nervous, which I think is good.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: How's this journey been for you and everyone else?
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, is it been kind of what you expected?
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh 20 guys is a big group.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: Have you met?
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: Have you beencome friends with like all of them, or have people kind of almost been in subgroups?
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like it's kind of like people split off.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's like there's this group over here, these seven guys really started to hang out.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone's buddies, but did it kind of divide that way a little bit?
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Yeah, I think I think that's usually how it ends up working out.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um in this case, I think we have like one pretty big group and then a bunch of smaller groups in there.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: But I think everybody gets along, everybody intermingles really well.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Let's talk about your journey a little bit.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Where were you born?
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: We'll go back to the beginning.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: I was born in Clearwater, Florida.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure you've heard of it because of the beach.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell I had a t-shirt growing up with Clearwater, Florida on it.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: I've got pictures of me.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: I was a kid, I was maybe eight or nine, but we were never there.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I have no idea how I got the t-shirt.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: I I know we made it to Disney at one point, but that's not near Clearwater.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell No, it's it's a few hours away.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: So I I have I don't know where I got the t-shirt.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was a visit to Myrtle Beach and it was like on the sail rack or something.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: But I understand the beaches there are gorgeous.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's the name, right?
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Clearwater beach.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a Gulf Coast beach.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell It is, yes.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell How long did you live there?
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: Your entire childhood?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Ross Powell My entire life.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: I moved up here in twenty four.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: So you've only been in the mountains then for like a year or so.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: So you're more of a beach kid than a mountain kid.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Ross Powell You know, people who live in Florida, they don't really go to the beach very much.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus Well, that's like people here don't go to Biltmore.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's like one of those things.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's like you expect people to do a certain thing when they live in a certain area that's famous for something or whatever, but you're just down there, you're just living your life.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: And it's Florida, so you're doing a whole lot of sweating and things of that nature.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Always sweating.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: It was it's hotter than blazes down there, man.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how anyone lives down there.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: If the mosquitoes don't carry you off, the alligators do, it's just kind of I lived, I listened in Charleston for like three years.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: I get it.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of similar in a way.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I try to explain it to people.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_01: A vacation to places like Florida, Charleston, Savannah, et cetera, that's one thing.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're you're on vacation.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit of sweat among friends, whatever.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: But when you live there, it's an assault, is what it is.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're choosing to be in the heat and be in the sun and enjoy the beach compared to being forced to live there.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a little different.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: But you chose, obviously, the mountains.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: So what brought you here?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: I I think I've always been driven to the area.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: I started visiting up here probably back in 2013, and I was consistently coming back about every year, sometimes twice a year.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: I even proposed to my wife here in the mountains.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: So where?
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Where specifically?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: I proposed to her while we were skiing.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we were both skiing in Sugar Mountain on the bottom of the slope.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Nice.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: So when was that?
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: That was in 2022.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Okay.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: So before you moved here?
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: So you've been here many times, you've visited.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: So was the idea of joining the Asheville Police Department kind of part of moving here?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: Was it a before after thing?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: Where does that fit into the story?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Ross Powell I think we kind of made an idea of where we wanted to move, and then I just looked at the quality of the agencies in the area, and Asheville just is on top.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: So did you go to college anywhere for for criminal justice or did Aaron Powell I did not go to college for criminal justice.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: I have a bachelor's in business administration from Florida.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Ross Powell You're not going to be able to use much of that here.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: I wouldn't think.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: Not much.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Now, was it kind of getting that and realizing that wasn't a good fit for you?
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: Is that kind of what led you to a different path?
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think absolutely.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think I few I had a few different ideas of where I was going to end up in life.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: I just ended up really being drill driven to this.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: I had a buddy who was working in a jail.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I did a few years in the jail and then I kind of got my foot in the door and decided this was what I wanted to do.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: Cadet Jonathan Spacon joins me.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Do you know, and you probably do, that the rest of your cadets kind of consider you the de facto leader.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know that?
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: In a way, I'm kind of forced to do it, but I'm glad to be where I am and have that opportunity.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I saw it firsthand that the Spartan race last year.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm an old dude, but I still like doing those things.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: There was how many cadets there?
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_01: At least, what, eight or nine, maybe more?
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I want to say I want to say around seven or eight.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Seven or okay.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it was it was great to see all you guys there.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it was it was exciting.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: More so than the year before.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not even sure we had any cadets the year before that had come out, maybe a couple.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: But one thing I noticed was all you guys stuck together and helped each other, which is very important for what you're going to be doing here.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: But as somebody that I've never been, you know, a sworn law enforcement officer, but I've done plenty of Spartan races.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's also something in an obstacle course race that comes in really handy.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: Because there's some things you can't do by yourself.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: There was times in that race where we uh definitely lend a lending hand and was able to get everybody through, even when they thought they couldn't.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think that actually lended itself to you know how tight you guys are as a group, too?
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: Does that particular incident, that particular race?
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I think getting out of office and having an opportunity to voluntarily get together and do anything, especially something that's as challenging as a Spartan race, uh, as a good camaraderie.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's fun getting muddy too, isn't it?
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely muddy that day.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I I tell people, and that's actually not nearly as muddy as some of the ones I've done.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: I tell people that ask, why do you do this?
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: So, dude, you're almost 60.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, what what are you doing out there?
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna break something.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: I go, Oh, maybe, but how often do you get to play in the mud as an adult?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: You get to do that as a kid and as a you know, even a teenager, and and maybe you're maybe into your adulthood a little bit, but after that, at some point you you grow out of it.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: This is like one of the chances you have to do that.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: It just it's hard to explain to people.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: Was that your first race you ever done, or have you done others?
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, I've done a few in Florida.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: I did uh the ones I enjoyed the most was actually in like the Buccaneer Stadium.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: It was uh stadium run.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Stadium runs.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I've never done one of those.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: Those aren't muddy.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: Not muddy, but very cool.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of steps.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: I I was able to tell a few people that had never done a Spartan race before a couple of tips.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm I'm like, okay, here's what you're gonna have to do with your clothes afterwards.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you put a plastic bag and the whatever, when you get home, hose it off, don't put it in your laundry.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's there's all kinds of little things you learn the hard way when you're doing Spartan races.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: So this year we're gonna do a trifecta as a department.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: Are you gonna do that?
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm signed up.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I I haven't signed up yet, but only because I'm doing it.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, Rick, I don't know.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: But I haven't signed up only because when you get to this point in your life, things sometimes don't work.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if you s if I sign up and I pay a hundred and whatever bucks to, you know, to sign up and all of a sudden I'm not feeling it, or I got a torn muscle, or I got something else that day, which just happens as you get older, man.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: I enjoy your youth.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: Let me just let me just say that.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: But I plan to be there with all you guys again this year and doing all of them.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: I because I've done I've got a double trifecta one year, a couple years back.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I I did six.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: And one of them was the hardest one I ever did.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: It was West Virginia.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was a beast in West Virginia at if you know where the New River Gorge area is at in West Virginia, a beautiful area of West Virginia.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it was the National Boy Scout Camp.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And if you can imagine, I mean, there's these suspension bridges and all these, and it's just and it is up and down and up and down.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it was at the end of my day, my like Fitbit or whatever told me that I'd gone 17 miles.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: No, because they tell you it's like between, you know, 12, 13 miles, but then you actually, because of all the detours you do and all the extra stuff, it was ended up being like 17 miles.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: It took me like four hours or something.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: It was ridiculous.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: Pretty good time.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: Cramped up pretty heavy in the drive home.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: Don't mind saying.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't get out of the car.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: But, you know, all worth it in the end.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: So one question I always ask everyone, and I'm kind of springing this on you.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: I I gave everybody else a warning, but we put this conversation together just this morning.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: If you can think of it, name one thing that most people don't know about you.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Now I know that you've listened to a few of the podcasts, so you might have expected this question.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: I have heard you ask it before, yep.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so can you think of just something unique, something it could be a hobby, it could be an accomplishment, it could be an affinity to a certain food that most people do not know about you.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: Something that comes to mind.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think a lot of people know this, if any.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: I am a third generation farmer.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: Cool.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: So what kind of farming?
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_00: Cattle, um, livestock, just uh a bunch of the little stuff, nothing you know, crazy, you know, acreage fielding, but a lot of livestock work.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna continue it maybe?
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: I plan on it, yeah.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: So where do you live in the area now?
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: You're not in the city, are you in the county?
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: Are you where where are you at?
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'm all the way out in Mitchell.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so do you have a little bit of land, a little bit of ability to do it?
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: I have uh 50 acres out there.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, well, then you're all set up.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: Do you got some animals now?
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh chickens, but no nothing big.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, but you got eggs.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of eggs.
• 27:27
  unknown: Oh yeah.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: I expect to get eaten.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_01: I expect some eggs some morning, some fresh eggs.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: I got you.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: So what's your plan now?
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: What kind of other uh animals do you think you can get?
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, obviously you're gonna focus on the job a little bit.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's gonna dominate your time.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's been a little challenging this last year.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I think I think moving forward, a lot of the work is just getting the property back to where it should be.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then um I plan on throwing a barn on.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was considering I was looking into breeding highland cows.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: That was one of the ideas I was going for.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, nice.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: So is the is the property conducive to that kind of thing?
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it can work.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: Does it?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, but it's not fenced, it's not anything like that.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's just so you gotta it's gonna take some work, right?
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: I love having something to look forward to like that, though.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: I've always been a guy that always had like something down the road.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's usually for me, it's a house project, but for you that would be your farm project.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's always nice to have something to do outside of work.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: I always believe a steady mind is dangerous, you know, if you don't have anything to do.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: And when you start slowing down, then I think your body starts slowing down.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I like the idea of keeping keeping moving.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I would imagine, you know, dealing with animals and you know, feeding them and everything that goes with that, that's something that it would entirely focus your brain when you're doing it, right?
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: Too and and be also kind of therapeutic, I would think.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: It is.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, if people like petting a dog, I would imagine they would like dealing with cows or chickens or any of that stuff, right?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's very therapeutic.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's very humbling, bring it down to the roots.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you can go to a store and buy whatever.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: You definitely the amount of work you put into it isn't probably worth it uh monetarily, but it's nice to know where you're getting your stuff, and it's it's a nice experience to be able to do it yourself.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was your grandparents that were the first to find.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: Now, is that in Florida?
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh actually it started in Ohio.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think they had uh maybe a few hundred acres out in Ohio and they immigrated from the Netherlands.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: My grandfather did.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: He met my grandmother.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think he served here and then uh started a farm, and then we brought it down to Florida in like the Zephyr Hill area.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: We had cows, pigs, chickens, rabbits, the whole bunch.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: People don't think of Florida as farming, but there's a lot of ranches and agriculture in Florida.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: A lot.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: Some of the biggest ranches in the world are in Ocala, Florida.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: But that's not the image most people get.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: I I stumbled across like an article about it at one point, and even I wasn't really totally aware of it.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: You think of things when you think of Florida.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: You think of the beaches, probably think of amusement parks.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you even think of the swamps, you know, which are right in the middle of the state.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: But the all the populated areas are mostly on the beach areas in the outside.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_01: The middle of the state, it's pretty wide open.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Besides Orlando, of course.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell, Jr.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely on the s uh the southern side of the state.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: There's not much going on in the but if you come up from central to north, it's definitely fully inhabited on the middle of the state.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell But there is a lot of things in Florida that'll kill you, though.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in the world of you know, snakes and gators and I'm sure you had to deal with that a little bit growing up.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you definitely don't go pick something uh pick something up out in the field about checking out what's underneath where snakes are everywhere.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: And and the pythons have gotten serious out there.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: They do this what the big python hunt like in the every year now, and they get these pythons that are like 10, 15 feet, 20 feet long.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: Things are as thick as a thigh.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it is ridiculous how many of those things are out there.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: And really destroying the ecosystem in a way, because they're not native to it.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: Which is one of the reasons they want to get them out of there.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: Probably too late.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: Probably.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Unfortunately.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: Just have to adapt.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: So okay.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: So uh your tests are this week.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: You seem utterly confident.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: Your graduation is in a month.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: So what happens between now and then?
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit of time off?
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: No time off.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: No, no time off.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Asheville Police Department does a really good job on extending the training.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: And they go, the stuff you learn in BLAT is really good, and it definitely sets a you know the ground level of what you need to know as a police officer, but Asheville Police Department doesn't believe that that's where you should stop.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: So the next month until graduation, and obviously continuing throughout an entire career is going to be consistent of training.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: Jonathan Space is soon to be Officer Jonathan Spaceon with me.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_01: Get ready for you know, all the community members that you come across and see your name on your to mispronounce that.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: What was your favorite part of BLET?
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: Were you was there a certain particular part of it, firearms instruction or something else?
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: I definitely enjoyed firearms, but honestly, anything that was hands-on and allowed us to try to figure out a problem.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: That was definitely enjoyable.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: Have you got uh given a chance to think about your future with the APD?
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: Is there a certain department or a certain area of focus you thought about?
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell Specific area, I would say no.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm really big on mastering the task at hand before you keep moving on.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I always want to stay learning, so I'm not gonna stay stagnant in one spot.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I just want to be the best police officer I can be before I take on another role.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell You sound like a chief for what it's you got a long way to go to that, but your answers kind of sound big picture-ish, if I can say.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: So definitely officer material.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate it.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, best of luck in your exams, and then I guess I'll see you at graduation next month.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds good.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Look forward to it.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: All right, Cadet Jonathan Space, and thank you so much for joining me on the APD Pod Squad.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: From Community Engagement, Lieutenant Brian Hogan joins me now.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, Rick.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: I know we've been talking about uh Citizens Police Academy in uh some previous episodes recently with Captain Brown, but uh now is the time, right?
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about it.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now is the time.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_04: The applications opened up two days ago on the 20th.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_02: Mm-hmm.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_04: That are only gonna be open for a month.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_04: So they close February 20th.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_04: So if you're interested, get your application in now because seats are limited and they fill up fast.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I I almost guarantee that we're not gonna make it a month, you know, as far as it uh because we had a whole lot of people that wanted to be a part of the fall edition, and we just filled up and we had to say, okay, hold on, we can't get you in this one, but maybe in the spring.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I know some of them are chomping at the bits.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: So there's gonna be some seats are gonna fill up just like that, and probably already are filled.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_04: So if it's on your mind, go ahead and fill out the application and get your name on the books, and then uh we'll be in contact with you.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Yeah, and it's not complicated, it's not this like 12-page thing that we're asking from you.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: So just uh the best way is just to Google Asheville Police Department, Citizens Police Academy, and you'll see the link right there.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: And it's really a pretty simple application for lack of a better term, just looking for some basic info, like who you are and why you want to do it.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: That's about it.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: And so a lot of people know what it is by now, but for the few people that don't, the 30,000-foot view is essentially it is a 10-week immersive experience into almost everything we do here at the Asheville Police Department.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_04: Thursday nights for three three hours.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_04: About that, give a take.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we're gonna give feed you some dinner.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_04: We have good food that comes in every week.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_04: And then it's just a a chance for you to learn about the police department.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_04: We kind of open our doors, uh, let you get to know us, what we do, we get to learn from you.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_04: Um it's a great opportunity for people to network in the community, meet neighbors, meet other business associates.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_04: We've seen a lot of that.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_04: And uh the thing that I find interesting is um everybody takes something different away each time.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_04: Um the people we talk to afterwards and the feedback we get, um, it's always interesting what everybody enjoys the class for.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because everyone's different.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: So every department is represented.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, so you're gonna hear from the chief, you're gonna hear from the detectives, you're gonna hear from every department, you even my department.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: People even for some reason want to hear what I have to say.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so everybody and you get a chance to ask questions.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: And and I know that lasting friendships are formed, too.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_01: People have told me afterwards that people they never knew before all of a sudden they're friends and they're hanging out.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: So quite an experience and a couple of important things to mention.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: It is absolutely free, and that includes the entire 10-week class and the meals.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you start by breaking bread and you're just kind of getting into it that way.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: You get to eat, you got a full belly, and then we just get into stuff.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, all you need is your time and attention.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_04: Everything else is free.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so kind of on the heels of that, I know last year we had a very successful junior police academy, and we're gonna build on that again this year.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: So we're bringing that back in the summer, aren't we?
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_04: We uh started planning this week for this year's junior police academy, which targets uh roughly high school age uh men and women who have an interest maybe in law enforcement as a career in some sector, but we like to plant some seeds and we get some exposure to the police department and police officers and they get to meet and we hang out, we have a great time.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and then also a little teaser here.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_04: There's gonna be a second part.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_04: We're gonna call it maybe Immersion Academy.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_04: We haven't quite come up with a name, but it's gonna be a big announcement and it's gonna target a different demographic.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_04: But it's gonna be super cool, all right, super exciting, and uh more details to follow.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we'll have something on that as soon as we get that all nailed down.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's gonna be very exciting for us as well.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: Lieutenant Brian Hogan joins me right now.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: This is uh winter time and a little bit of a slower time for the community engagement department, but you guys are never not doing things.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: No, I understand right now you're engaging with a lot of the local businesses to see what their concerns are, what they would like us to do and address.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_04: Business associations and neighborhood associations by now, by the time you hear this, should have gotten a survey that we've sent out.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_04: It's a very simple survey, and we're just looking for the top three concerns that you may have currently or what you foresee happening later this year in your neighborhood or amongst your business association.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_04: And it's just a way for us to kind of focus in on how we can help, hopefully, uh what your concerns are and just more of a directed approach for each individual neighborhood and different association.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_04: Because everybody's different, everybody has different problems.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_04: And if there's a way that we can help you out, we want to know.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_04: And uh, we want to help you out the best way we can.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Powell, Jr.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean there's gonna be some similarities.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: Every neighborhood is gonna be dealing with like this thing, but then you know, West Asheville is gonna have some different issues than South Asheville, right?
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: Different than East Asheville, different than North Asheville.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: Without looking at the survey results, if you could just pick a couple of issues, what do you suppose folks are gonna say?
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm thinking, first of all, a lot of the uh some of the unhoused population and some of the things that they bring.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_04: Unhoused population continues to be uh an issue that we we're struggling with on all fronts.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_04: Some neighborhoods have speeding complaints, some business associations have retail theft complaints.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_04: Just like you said, every everybody's a little bit different.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_04: Some neighborhoods unfortunately suffer from a lot of vagrancy, drug addiction, late-night violent crime, but then other residents, different parts of the city, they don't have those problems.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_04: They may have problems with traffic and related issues, all kinds of stuff.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_04: So that's kind of why we don't want to paint a with a broad brush.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_04: Uh we really want to dial it in and focus in on how we can help them individually the best way.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_04: Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: Asheville's a very diverse community with neighborhoods that vary greatly from one to the next.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: So everyone's gonna have some some different issues.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_01: Since winter was mentioned, and of course that is a season, I'm gonna put you on the spot here.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: What do you got?
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_01: Rank your four seasons from favorite to least.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_01: The four seasons.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_04: Fall, winter, spring, summer.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_01: You were quick with that.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I mean, that's an easy one.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_04: That's an easy one.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_04: So why so?
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, fall on top, why fall on top.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_04: Fall because it's the end of summer, and you get the leaves changing and the air is changing.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I love the wintertime.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_04: I live in the woods and the woods are so much quieter, it's a lot easier to walk around in.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_04: There's no rattlesnakes and copperheads, so I can take my dogs and they can run free and I don't have to worry about it.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_04: Um I just I enjoy the winter time uh woods a lot.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell Speaking of that, okay.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: There's nothing so growing up in Buffalo and doing my hikes up there and all the things that I and even then going to college in Erie, Pennsylvania, another very snowy place.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: You don't even have to be in the woods.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: I enjoy when it snows enough and the quiet that you mentioned, right?
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_01: But when you're walking on snow in the quiet, that crunch.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_04: That crunch, yeah.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: We don't get that around here much.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: We don't get the snows like that very often around here anymore where it's thick enough, deep enough that that impacts.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_04: Every two, three years you get that.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_04: And when we do, you got to get out and enjoy it.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_01: The crunch is different when it's like an icy snow crunch, like it is like today.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_01: We're recording.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: We had like a little bit of rain and then a little bit of snow and the roads were icy.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's a different type of noise.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: But that snow crunch, that uh there's something about that that is just in my brain, is one of those childhood and adult memory.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_01: Even walking down sometimes down the street, if it's snowed enough and people are just staying off the roads and it's later, and you got that walk going to crunch, crunch, crunch.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_01: There's just something very nostalgic about that.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_01: Fall is also my favorite, slightly different reason, not just because the summer is ending, but I just really love that change in temperatures and the cooler temperatures.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: You're wearing the hoodie, you can do that type of thing.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then, of course, as a football fan, I mean, fall means football.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so I do love that.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: My least favorite is actually summer.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: I know it seems kind of weird.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm kind of the same way.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: Summer's my last pick.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: There's things I can do in the summer that are great, like I love to golf.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_01: But I can go golf.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm golfing in the next week, okay?
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm just gonna go down to South Carolina to do it.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I just I don't like the heat, man.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_01: I sweat out.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_01: Heat and humidity, it's hot, hazy.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: I don't like it.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm here to tell you the three years I lived in Charleston, it was my wife was never happier because she's always cold, right?
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I was never more miserable than I was down there.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't do it.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: Plus, there's you know a lot of things down there that can kill you just on a regular basis.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: You mentioned the copperheads and stuff.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_01: Charleston can beat you there times like five.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: There's all kinds of crap down there that'll just take you out.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: So that was the one question.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: How about this one here?
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: What along the lines of the kind of the sensory thing with the the sound of the crunch?
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_01: How about the smell?
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: What is the weirdest smell that you enjoy?
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_01: As an example, for me, it's fresh, wet cut grass because I hearken back to my days going to summer camp, and we'd pull up and there was always that smell of fresh, wet cut grass.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_04: Fresh cut hay.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_04: Kind of like that.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_04: Um I'm a big bike rider, so I always enjoy hay season because you can go ride by the fields when they're cut and you can smell it in the morning.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_04: And it is it is nice.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_04: It's a fresh smell.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_04: So maybe using the word weird wasn't the appropriate Yeah, like you yeah.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, some people might say gasoline.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard people say gasoline.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: There's something wrong with it.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's what I mean.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's called an addiction.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_01: I well, I don't think they're they're sticking their face in a bucket, but I mean it just some people enjoy that.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: There's an here's another one.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: Speaking of the low country again, Charleston, there's a thing called pluff mud.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: Have you ever been down to like Charleston in the swampy area?
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so that when it's low tide and the water goes away, there's this kind of real musky, moldy almost smell.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's called plough mud.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's that name.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: In like the marsh?
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's like it's what's left behind.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if you live there, you come to kind of really embrace that as like the smell of the low country.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_01: But for people that are just visiting, the first time they're like, what is that?
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's like it almost comes off as a offensive thing.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: But people that live down there, it's just like that's our low country.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_04: I got another one for you.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_04: All right.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_04: We talk about fall and winter, the smell of wood smoke coming from a chimney when you're outside.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I can if someone's got a fire going within a mile of my house, I know it's the best smell.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's best.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh and the same thing just sitting around a campfire.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_01: But you almost get it more when someone's doing it in their home stuff.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_01: From a chimney.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_01: There's a different it's it's a different smoke.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_01: So this is the first time in 15 years that I have not had a wood-burning fireplace in my house.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_01: I have a gas log fireplace.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: You gave up.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't give up.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: Don't don't be saying I didn't.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: You didn't want to do the work anymore.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it we've we bought the house and it had the gas log fireplace, and there was no way to do it.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_04: Take that thing out.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_01: I And then you can split wood and have sweep every night.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_01: There is a hassle that goes with it.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_01: But I do have a little uh I got a little fire pit thing in the backyard, so I get that in the fall, but you're right, it is different.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: But all those years I had the wood-burning fireplace, man, I love that.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_01: That's just even just poking a fire is nice.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like if you're inside, just uh it's very and and there's something about the log placement, the fun you can just occupy your brain for the longest time and where to put the next log.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's just uh so are when you're doing an outdoor fire, are you a TP guy or are you a stacker guy?
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I like the TP for outside, but uh my wood stove, I use a different technique and it's actually the reverse of what you would think.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_04: So we start the fire on top with the light stuff and then it burns to the bottom with the bigger wood.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_04: So I have uh down to an exact science with my fires now.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_04: See, I I I know exactly when to turn it, when to dial, dial down, how to start the wood, how to sag it, how to s how to cut it.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_04: The size and the shape matters.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_04: It's a very exact science.
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_04: But when it when it works out right, which it does now, I'm a bit of of a perfectionist with it.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_04: But it's super nice.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_04: Knew you'd be the guy to talk to about this.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_04: Oh yeah.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we can talk about firewood for days.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's what I'll be doing this weekend on my weekend off.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_04: I will be in the wood pile and getting ready for, you know, the trees that in the wood will burn two years from now.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_01: So it starts today.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know?
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well it's got a dry out.
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_01: And chopping wood is a good workout too.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: It really is.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_01: I I had a wood pile.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_01: We had a house I lived in in West Asheville that had a really nice backyard fire pit that I built.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_01: And we have this huge wood stack, of course, and you know how it is.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: Here's the drier stuff, here's the water, and you know which to pull from.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_01: But the Black Widow spiders loved that thing.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_01: So at night, sometimes I'd get lazy.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's dark.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: You go to get another piece of wood, and I was always just a little bit nervous.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'd sometimes I'd put the gloves on, sometimes I wouldn't.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_01: Never got bit.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_01: But the next day, a couple of times I would, you know, look and start moving things, and sure enough, there they were.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, stupid, stupid.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_01: Next time put the gloves on.
• 45:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because you're gonna get it one of these days.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because those spiders love those things, black widows, especially.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to be careful with the city.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_04: I stay out of the wood pile in the spring, summer, and early fall.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_04: Man.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_04: Because it's full of snakes, it's full of mice.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_04: It's full of black widows.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_04: I'll tell you another good one.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_04: So when I first got my wood stove, I split by hand.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_04: And I would chip away, chip away, chip away, you know, for four or five months out of the year.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_04: And if there's one good thing that came out of Hurricane Helene, it was that we had copious amounts of overtime.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_04: So I treated myself to a 40-ton log splinter.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_04: It's humongous.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_04: Dude.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_04: It's humongous.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_04: It is the biggest one in Mills River, I bet you.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_04: And I nicknamed it Helene.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, jeez.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_04: So wood splitting is a lot more efficient.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_04: It's like gas powered, or how is that?
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_04: Oh yeah, that's gas powered, but it's hydraulic, man.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_04: That's 40 ton.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_04: My goodness.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_04: It's humongous.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_04: The size of the line that you could split with.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have any.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_04: No, not anymore.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_04: Not anymore.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_04: I couldn't keep up.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_04: It's hard.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_04: If you're out there every day, you might keep up, but I don't have that kind of time.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, we got way deeper into this than I ever thought I would.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'm glad I asked the question.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: Lieutenant Brian Hogan, thanks so much for joining me.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: Take care.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_01: Can bite me over for a fire one of these days.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's it for another episode of the APD Pod Squad.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you to my guests, Cadet Jalen Gaines and Jonathan Space and good luck as you begin your careers with the APD.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: Also, thank you, Lieutenant Brian Hogan from Community Engagement, and thank you for listening.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you've got a question or suggestion, call 828-250-8800 and leave a voicemail.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's 828-250-8800.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_01: Or you can email APD Podcast Feedback at AshevilleNC.gov.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: Listen and subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts and don't miss a single episode.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Rick Rice and this is the APD Pod Squad.