EXPERIENCE 208 | Superconnector in a Small Package - Ann Baron, Founder and CEO of Northern Colorado Community

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Ann Barron is the founder and CEO of Northern Colorado Community, an events and networking and business support organization with members across Northern Colorado.

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As the name would imply, Anne has lived an extraordinary journey, in some ways starting when she was adopted from a South Korean orphanage at four years old and raised by a family in Oregon.

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She became a teacher fresh out of college, didn't like it, and went into her father's industry of insurance.

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She moved to Colorado with State Farm and did everything from claims to sales training, and later worked in payroll, business development for the Loveland Chamber, and did freelance event planning and more before launching NoCo Community.

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Anne is wise beyond her substantial years and shares abundantly from her practical toolkit on networking and sales.

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Tune in and sharpen up your skills and enjoy, as I did, my conversation with Anne Barron.

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Also, congrats to Anne for winning Best of NoCo for 2024 Networking Organization.

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Let's have some fun.

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Welcome to the Low Cove Experience podcast.

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On this show, you'll get to know business and community leaders from all around Northern Colorado and beyond.

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Our guests share their stories, business stories, life stories, stories of triumph and of tragedy, and through it all, you'll be inspired and entertained.

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These conversations are real and raw, and no topics are off limits.

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So pop in a breath mint and get ready to meet our latest guest.

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Welcome back to the local experience podcast.

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My guest today is Anne Barron and Anne is the founder and owner of Northern Colorado community.

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Thank you.

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Welcome, Anne.

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Thanks for having me on your podcast.

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I wanted to share with you that, uh, usually Jill asks me who's on my podcast this afternoon and she's like, Oh, that's nice.

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And today she's like, Oh, yay, give her a hug from me.

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So Jill says hi.

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Hi.

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Tell Jill hi and give her a hug from me too.

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Yeah, you sure he's got to stay together.

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Sure people unite.

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When, when my, uh, when my uncle John, uh, who passed on about a year.

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But, um, when he first met my wife, Jill, uh, or I guess she was, she was still my girlfriend that at the time and she's like, Oh, pocket size.

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You ever get that?

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Uh, that compliment?

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I don't.

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That's cute though.

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I like it.

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Pocket size.

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I like it.

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Or people say about our little dog Tucker that he's travel size.

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Yes.

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That's probably more normal for dogs than for spouses.

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For people.

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That's alright, I don't take any offense.

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I think it's cute.

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So, uh, tell the people a little bit about Northern Colorado Community.

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What, uh, what does that mean?

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What are you doing?

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Yeah.

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So Northern Colorado community was founded by me over eight years ago.

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So it's a boutique networking group that the goal is to see the businesses thrive and grow and be that resource to the small businesses in Northern Colorado.

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And you're especially focused on.

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I guess pure networking.

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Is that a fair statement?

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Yeah, that's true.

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You do some activities and lunch and learns and stuff, but it's mostly about the networking.

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Yes, that's correct.

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So we have business after hours, we have a happy hour, we have mind maps, lunch and learns, um, activity night.

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So we do a good variety of events.

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Yeah.

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And, and the purpose, the goal is really to connect people who need to connect with each other, kind of.

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Right, right.

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To get, get folks in front of folks they want to get to meet or be a referral partner.

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Yeah.

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Very good.

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Can you talk about what a monthly rhythm looks like?

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Like, what are you doing?

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Like, all these different kind of connecting events.

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You feel free to do a shameless plug, that's fine, it's cool.

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You shamelessly plug so many good causes in the community that I can't help it.

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Anna and I also are, uh, together on the Ambassador Board for Realities for Children, so we've been fighting over the, uh, Ambassador, what's the?

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Trophy.

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The Ambassador Trophy, uh, last few quarters.

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Yeah, exactly.

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Well, uh, thanks for asking.

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So we do have three to five in person events each and every month.

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So they vary from a happy hour to a business after hours, lunch and learn, a salon, an activity night.

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So we really try to change it up.

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And my other saying this year is, I'm putting the fun back into networking.

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Okay.

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Um, instead of just kind of the same old boring.

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you know, thing that everyone does.

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We do, we might do axe throwing, we might do a vision board, putt putt, and we might do a mind map.

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So we do a lot of different things.

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Very good.

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Very good.

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Um, And do you do a lot of events like with, with your member locations or in things or not always just kind of wherever you find fun stuff to do?

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Yeah, that's a good point.

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So generally, we do try to do events at a member location, especially the business after hours are all member and you're going to be hosting one.

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Yeah, we've got another one coming up this year.

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In August, I believe.

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But we do do those at a member business.

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Um, that's one of the benefits of being a member.

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I have to say like the happy hours and the socials, those are actually, um, you know, whatever fun brewery, winery, there's a lot of them around in town.

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And, um, generally a lot of them don't market through networking because they can get businesses other ways.

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But, um, but anyway, so.

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They don't join networking groups necessarily.

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That's not their thing.

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Yeah, not generally, but yes, uh, usually.

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But they sure like it when you bring people in.

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25 people to the brewery.

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Yeah, yeah.

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Tuesday afternoon.

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Yeah, exactly.

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Yeah, they always welcome it.

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Um, we've take, we've brought people to Verboten.

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I see you have a Verboten, um, container.

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Oh yeah, I've been using this forever.

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Beer for all is their theme.

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Yeah, no, Angie and the folks over there.

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So that was our first, uh, I kind of lifted their first or their tagline for my first one, which was pure advisory for all when local think tank was first getting going.

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I like it.

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Yeah, it's always good to borrow good themes.

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Yeah.

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So, um, anyway, we, we do do a lot of fun events.

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We're going to do a luau up at sunrise ranch in early May, and that's for men and women professionals.

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So we're going to have a Hawaiian food and pig roast it could be but maybe if I talk nice Kimberly Yeah, I could help you with the pig roast.

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That'd be fun.

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Yeah, so it'd be a lot of fun.

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Okay, very nice And how did you like come to put this together?

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Like what was the?

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The inclination or have you kind of built what you were trying to build when you, when you set out or did you not really know what you're trying to build when you set out?

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Well, I think when you're a new person, a new business owner, you don't know what you don't know at the beginning.

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Just one moment here.

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Sure.

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A lot of talking.

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It is.

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And I have to say, I'm more of a morning person, but hey, this is good.

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Make me do something in the afternoon.

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I'm sorry.

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No, no, that's great.

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It all works out.

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I can get you a cup of coffee to follow the tea if you need to.

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Yeah.

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So, um, what got me started was I, as we shared, um, I was in the chamber world and really enjoyed that helping and meeting and connecting small businesses.

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And then it kind of had an aha moment.

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About nine or 10 years ago, and I thought, maybe I could do my own networking group and just charge a small fee.

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And if you remember, Kurt, you and I talked about it, I charge only 149 for the year for members to join.

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I'm pretty sure I told you to raise your price.

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People are like, what are you doing?

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Are you going to make any money?

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So we're now at almost 500 for the year.

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But the point, still very affordable.

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Yeah, exactly.

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So I just thought I'd Uh, put it out there, see who joined, um, folks like you and Eric Whedon and Pecky Calloway.

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Folks just jumped on board right, right away because they already knew me.

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And so they already trusted me and felt like that regardless what happens, they wanted to be a part of the group.

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And it's grown and we have great members like you and, uh, Blue credit union and alpha graphics um, computer doctors.

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Yeah, we have a lot of just wonderful professionals who are part of the group.

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Yeah.

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No, it's been a really steady, like, it's fun.

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I'm probably guilty of only coming to maybe a few, a few events a year, you know, maybe, maybe a dozen or so once a month or something, but the Like some of the people that have been there for years are still there.

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You know, while you still see a lot of new faces and get to meet a lot of new people, you've grown a lot, and so that's nice to always see, but there's still some of those stalwarts that have been bumping around there for, you know, almost since you started.

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Yes, there's definitely the, the early adopters, as you know, with groups that trust you, regardless what you're going to do, what's happening with the group down the road.

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And then, uh, this last, I don't know, I guess I just decided to kick into gear.

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Kurt's probably about like, you've been, you should have been doing that like 20 years ago.

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But anyway, no, Kurt's always been very kind to me.

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But, um, in the last 40 days, I've had 18 new members join.

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That's awesome.

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Yeah.

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So it's, it's great.

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That's great.

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I hope you keep growing it.

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And is that the vision?

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Do you want to do anything different with it in the future?

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Just kind of more of what you're doing or would you want to franchise it to other communities or grow more regionally?

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Right.

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Great questions.

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Probably more doing what I'm doing because I really enjoy being able to be hands on and get to know everyone.

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I'm not saying I wouldn't franchise, but that's probably not a goal of mine right at this point.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Well, you mentioned already.

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Like.

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You're a lot older than you look, like, I don't remember how old you are, but I know you're quite a bit older than me and you look younger.

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Oh, thanks.

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Um, so like you said, you could retire if you chose to or whatever, but, um, Um, I guess, would you want the Northern Colorado community to live on beyond you?

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Are you, like, would you try to find a successor?

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Or will you just do this until you're 93?

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Because I can see you being healthy and fit and running around having tea with people.

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20 years, 30 years from now, still, well, I'll probably do it as long as I can.

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I mean, I can definitely see probably seeing doing this 10 or 20 years.

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There's a lot of, um, networking leaders that have done it for a long time.

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And I don't know.

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That's a good question about as far as would I have like a successor or person that would be put all this stuff together every month and handle the plethora of emails.

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Right, right.

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How many email introductions, how many connections with people a month do you think you have?

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Either an email introduction, or a coffee, or a tea, or just a meeting, or Oh boy.

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It's like five to ten a day, isn't it?

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Um, yeah, I would say, especially with a lot of the onboarding of new members, I'd probably say I do probably close to a hundred in a month.

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And then that's not including my other in person meetings, Zoom, phone calls.

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Yeah, your free consultings with your existing members, stuff like that.

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Yeah.

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What do you think your special sauce is?

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Like, when you've gotten your head underneath the hood of a of a small business person, maybe a first or second year.

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High opportunity, uh, but maybe not getting as much traction.

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How do you help them the most?

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Well, I would say the, obviously the, well not obviously, but I think the free consulting, um, I've had folks, double their income.

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I've had folks say they, um, obtain the most customers through my networking group.

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But the thing is really getting to know the folks and what their need is and what will help them and be that resource.

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So some of them it's they want to be a speaker.

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Some of them, they just want a little help How to do customer attainment, customer retention, uh, maybe how to use their time.

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And so there's just a lot of different ways.

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You're a bit of a strategist in general, but also a connector is I think what I'm hearing.

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Yeah, so for instance, there's, um, it's not just the events, but for instance, it's.

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Someone might say, Well, I had someone say, I'm gonna think it over.

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That's kind of a common thing when you're trying to sell a service or product.

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I'm going to think it over.

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Sure.

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And really, sometimes it's just better.

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There's a sound or training thing, but sometimes it's better just to get to the know, like, Okay, Susan, that's okay if you don't want to be a part of the group, but that's all right with me, you know, and it's not maybe the group for you, and that's okay.

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That's not a problem.

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But if you get people to the know, then you don't spin your wheel, spin your wheel.

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Oh, that's so smart.

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Wasting time talking to folks.

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You still are friendly, and you still are very You leave the door open to potentially, but you're not gonna spend any time on it.

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You're still very positive to them when you interact with them.

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So, like, the What's the technique, not to steal from Sandler, like you say, but how do you, how do you get, do you just, do you declare the no almost?

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Is that what I heard you saying there?

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Well, this is not new to me, but just saying something like, well, Kurt, maybe this is not the group for you, or this is not the time.

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And then people can either, you know, Um, you know, give off, get off the potter, you know what?

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So.

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Kind of indicate to you through that, that's almost your way of asking for the sale.

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Yeah, exactly.

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You're right.

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And it's the, the takeaway, but just not a new way of kind of strategizing or doing a sales technique.

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And then people will go, well, actually I am interested or no, I don't really think this is the group for me now, or I'm going to think, think about it.

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And if they say, I want to think about it.

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maybe a few months down the road, they might say check back.

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And the thing is, is you want to then check back with them because if you don't, then it just, you know, really won't ever probably resolve into a new client.

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I talk about, uh, even on this podcast, I've talked about the Colorado slow, maybe you've experienced it.

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Yeah.

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You know, the where they don't really want to quite say yes, uh, but they don't want to say no.

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But, you know, I think I'm, uh, uh, refresh that.

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I've got some techniques to change that.

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Um, what's your, like, if you were going to describe Northern Colorado, especially the small business community to somebody listening from far away, maybe in a city somewhere or whatever, um, how, how would you describe, Our region here.

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Oh, wow.

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Especially your little slice of it.

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Well, I would say the folks are very friendly, and I do think people do want to be a community and support and help one another.

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Yeah.

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Um, it's not a big city here, as you know, so.

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Folks, folks do get to know each other and you will bump into people even out of the grocery store or just out about town.

00:14:21.238 --> 00:14:27.388
So you always want to keep things positive, no matter how things happen and whether they become your client or not.

00:14:27.408 --> 00:14:33.498
You just want to keep things positive and the door open, like you said, but, um, and it's a fairly safe area.

00:14:33.498 --> 00:14:36.357
I think folks have, we have a good education system.

00:14:36.368 --> 00:14:39.342
We have, um, Fairly safe area to live.

00:14:39.653 --> 00:14:41.202
So I think there's a lot of positives.

00:14:41.202 --> 00:14:50.993
Um, I recently went to a new hairstylist and she had moved here from another state and I asked her Why did you pick Colorado and why did you pick Fort Collins is where she lives?

00:14:51.403 --> 00:14:56.923
And she said she did her research and this area was in one of the top like 10 or 20 towns.

00:14:57.263 --> 00:14:57.493
Sure.

00:14:57.503 --> 00:14:58.533
To live in, in America.

00:14:58.643 --> 00:14:58.852
Yeah.

00:14:58.942 --> 00:15:03.003
And then she also looked at culture, and then the type of work she does, so.

00:15:03.533 --> 00:15:04.513
And where did she come from?

00:15:04.533 --> 00:15:05.732
She came from California.

00:15:05.802 --> 00:15:06.043
Okay.

00:15:06.052 --> 00:15:06.962
Southern California.

00:15:07.033 --> 00:15:07.312
Yeah.

00:15:07.393 --> 00:15:11.003
So, yeah, she just, she liked it here, and she decided to move here.

00:15:11.482 --> 00:15:13.923
And you were a West Coaster too, before, right?

00:15:13.932 --> 00:15:14.413
Mm hmm.

00:15:14.452 --> 00:15:15.123
Like Oregon?

00:15:15.472 --> 00:15:16.373
Yes, exactly.

00:15:16.373 --> 00:15:18.572
So I lived in Oregon for over 30 years.

00:15:18.643 --> 00:15:19.013
Okay.

00:15:19.452 --> 00:15:21.732
And how did you land in, in Colorado?

00:15:21.732 --> 00:15:21.768
Colorado.

00:15:21.768 --> 00:15:21.802
Colorado.

00:15:22.432 --> 00:15:28.123
I moved here with State Farm Insurance, it was a company relocation and move, yeah, just stayed.

00:15:28.273 --> 00:15:40.418
Okay, we'll circle back and jump at the time machine to your earliest years, uh, but, uh, I was curious, and, and did you, you, so they, they said hey, Do you want to come to Loveland and work at our big State Farm office here?

00:15:40.418 --> 00:15:42.437
That was when they built that new building over there and whatnot.

00:15:42.538 --> 00:15:43.518
Right, that's correct.

00:15:43.518 --> 00:15:45.118
So they built that new building.

00:15:45.418 --> 00:15:50.967
They did a countrywide call for anyone who was a State Farm employee to apply for the job.

00:15:51.288 --> 00:15:54.408
And I lived in Washington State, so I applied for the job.

00:15:54.788 --> 00:15:55.927
Didn't think I would get it.

00:15:56.327 --> 00:15:58.868
They flew me out with other people for an interview.

00:15:58.908 --> 00:16:00.107
Didn't think I would be hired.

00:16:00.628 --> 00:16:04.937
They hired me, and they actually hired me at a job level higher than I applied for.

00:16:04.947 --> 00:16:04.998
Oh, wow.

00:16:04.998 --> 00:16:05.437
Oh, wow.

00:16:05.967 --> 00:16:07.067
You must have made a good impression.

00:16:07.788 --> 00:16:08.607
What did you think?

00:16:08.618 --> 00:16:10.467
Like, had you been out to Colorado before?

00:16:10.918 --> 00:16:15.138
We had just driven through it as a family, as a child, but I had not really been in Colorado.

00:16:16.957 --> 00:16:17.827
I did like it.

00:16:17.827 --> 00:16:22.927
I do have to say, coming from the Northwest, that it, it was pretty dry and barren.

00:16:23.268 --> 00:16:27.258
Yeah, it's flat and, and um, there wasn't, except for where it's not flat.

00:16:27.327 --> 00:16:28.187
Yeah, exactly.

00:16:28.722 --> 00:16:34.863
And there wasn't quite as much like variety of restaurants and things to do, but that's changed a lot in the last few years.

00:16:34.873 --> 00:16:35.373
It has.

00:16:35.373 --> 00:16:35.543
Yeah.

00:16:35.543 --> 00:16:39.442
The last 10 years, especially, but it's always kind of punched above its weight.

00:16:39.783 --> 00:16:48.173
In terms of restaurants and things to do, um, and what have you seen really change, especially in Northern Colorado in that time?

00:16:48.633 --> 00:16:57.842
Well, I think there has been more of the variety, like culture and restaurants and variety of activities to do that I didn't see when I first moved here about 30 years ago.

00:16:57.942 --> 00:17:18.182
I think in my banking days earlier, um, Like, there was kind of an anti regionalism, like Fort Collins was Fort Collins proud and Loveland was, you know, proud to be Loveland, and they still have that, but now there's so much more of an acknowledgement that, hey, a third of your, you know, people drive over here for their jobs and vice versa.

00:17:18.212 --> 00:17:29.282
And there's really no point in being other than, uh, regional friends and partners and, uh, you know, bringing the smart people up out of Denver and bringing their businesses with them and stuff.

00:17:29.982 --> 00:17:30.403
Yeah.

00:17:30.893 --> 00:17:31.563
You are right.

00:17:31.563 --> 00:17:39.282
There's definitely more of being cooperative in the different towns because I saw a lot of the towns kind of being in their own silo.

00:17:39.593 --> 00:17:49.307
So Fort Collins kind of stated themselves, It's Greeley, Loveland, but I do think there's more of a coordination between the towns with resources and, and connecting.

00:17:49.428 --> 00:18:02.048
I think some of those small businesses really help drive that, you know, if you're a small business in Berthoud or Johnstown or Windsor or something, you probably will need to expand your service area ultimately to build a sustainable size.

00:18:02.413 --> 00:18:10.752
Yeah, that, that is very much the case, and I do find that quite a few of the business people own more than one franchise or business in more than one town.

00:18:10.782 --> 00:18:11.113
Yeah.

00:18:11.123 --> 00:18:18.262
So one of the, the newer clients, Alpha Graphics, they own the Loveland one, but now they own the, the Greeley location too.

00:18:18.262 --> 00:18:18.833
Yep, yep, yep.

00:18:18.833 --> 00:18:23.182
So it, it makes sense, and none of that, those towns are that far apart.

00:18:23.397 --> 00:18:30.627
Yeah, it makes it fairly straightforward to have staff even shift staff from the Greeley store to the Loveland store if you need to for something or whatever.

00:18:30.778 --> 00:18:31.667
Yeah, right.

00:18:31.788 --> 00:18:51.663
Um, well, I think, you know, if you were gonna give, um, because I would say, you know, you've got a lot of established business people that have been in business for 10 plus years, but also you're still a gathering place for a lot of First, second, third year kind of business people to, to get their start in the networking world and kind of have connection.

00:18:51.702 --> 00:18:56.462
What do you see are some of the, the consistencies among the people that succeed?

00:18:57.032 --> 00:19:00.792
Like, what do they, what do they got to bring to the, to the, to the table to make it?

00:19:01.242 --> 00:19:10.712
Yeah, so I would, I would say consistency and top of mind awareness, as you know, is that just keeping your face out there for people to know you're still around, that you're in business.

00:19:11.153 --> 00:19:17.248
Um, because people have a short memory and they forget, you know, that you're still in business and you still have that service or product.

00:19:17.417 --> 00:19:21.978
And a lot of times people aren't going to need what you're selling right away.

00:19:22.018 --> 00:19:23.028
It may take time.

00:19:23.028 --> 00:19:25.198
They might like, Oh yeah, I need that roof.

00:19:25.198 --> 00:19:26.218
I had the hail damage.

00:19:26.248 --> 00:19:28.458
Now I need, who is that roofing person?

00:19:29.097 --> 00:19:29.438
Right.

00:19:29.438 --> 00:19:30.798
So those are examples.

00:19:30.857 --> 00:19:33.097
Some perseverance is, is one of the things then.

00:19:33.498 --> 00:19:45.728
Yeah, and then always building those positive relationships when you go to events, just really, really making sure that you're positive, even if things don't go the way you, you want, but don't be expressing that when you're out in a group.

00:19:46.117 --> 00:19:54.198
Um, if you're with a friend, that's fine, but if you're on a networking group, you want to keep it upbeat that things are going well and that you're, uh, positive about your business.

00:19:54.248 --> 00:19:57.488
So you're not talking trash about me and other circles or anything like that.

00:19:57.557 --> 00:19:58.397
I've heard over there.

00:19:59.117 --> 00:20:01.867
He pays for his membership, but he doesn't show up very often.

00:20:04.167 --> 00:20:10.258
So you just want to get, um, keep the relationships being really positive and, and ongoing.

00:20:10.298 --> 00:20:15.538
And there's some folks that I have known for 15, 20 years, and they suddenly decide to join the group.

00:20:15.857 --> 00:20:17.307
So it's just timing.

00:20:17.327 --> 00:20:21.807
Sometimes it's not, not Like there's anything wrong with them or with the group.

00:20:21.807 --> 00:20:30.748
It's just timing for them, you know, it's easy to say yes to things And you've probably experienced this as well where you say yes.

00:20:30.847 --> 00:20:31.218
Yes.

00:20:31.248 --> 00:20:31.597
Yes.

00:20:31.627 --> 00:20:31.948
Yes.

00:20:31.988 --> 00:20:36.367
Yes And then you realize that you've got to start saying no to some things.

00:20:36.367 --> 00:20:49.942
Otherwise Mama's going to say no more, you know, or whatever, your relationships can be challenged by, you know, especially if you're, you and I both have it in common that we're married to introverts more.

00:20:50.323 --> 00:20:51.303
Yes, that is true.

00:20:51.303 --> 00:20:54.553
We're, yes, my husband's a writer, so he's definitely an introvert.

00:20:55.202 --> 00:20:59.992
But the other thing I would say is also find your, your peeps or your, your tribe.

00:21:00.042 --> 00:21:00.403
Yeah.

00:21:00.423 --> 00:21:00.873
And.

00:21:01.387 --> 00:21:12.678
It may not be my group, it might be a Chamber of Commerce, it might be a BNI, but find the people that you really click with and that you feel like you could refer business to them or do business with them or vice versa.

00:21:12.807 --> 00:21:18.077
Yeah, I'm sure you have some members that are members of yours and other organizations as well.

00:21:18.157 --> 00:21:19.143
Yes, many of them.

00:21:19.363 --> 00:21:22.643
Yeah, many of them are in multiple, yeah, networking groups.

00:21:22.893 --> 00:21:37.232
But yeah, I think one, my boss years ago said, you know, find three groups, one that you're really invested in, one that you always attend and you consistently participate in, one that you are on the boundaries of, and don't spread yourself too much thinner than that.

00:21:37.432 --> 00:21:43.178
Yeah, that's great advice, and that's what I do say to folks who are new to networking is, two, three, four.

00:21:43.387 --> 00:21:49.327
two or three groups, three at the most, and then be involved, somewhat involved in, in those groups.

00:21:49.387 --> 00:21:50.188
Yeah, I dig it.

00:21:50.557 --> 00:21:52.827
Um, let's jump in the time machine, shall we?

00:21:52.938 --> 00:21:53.127
Okay.

00:21:57.538 --> 00:22:02.961
I would like to be one of those, uh, you know, the rapper type guys, but I don't have the skills yet.

00:22:02.961 --> 00:22:03.907
I can see you doing that.

00:22:03.907 --> 00:22:04.488
I can see it.

00:22:04.728 --> 00:22:08.577
I don't have to get some lessons, but anyway, we landed our time machine.

00:22:09.048 --> 00:22:17.452
And, uh, you were sharing with me when we, when we booked this podcast Um, you were raised your first few years in an orphanage, right?

00:22:17.482 --> 00:22:23.153
So I was born in Seoul, South Korea, and I was in orphanage until I was four years old.

00:22:23.563 --> 00:22:25.833
And then I was adopted and raised in Oregon.

00:22:26.232 --> 00:22:26.962
So, yeah.

00:22:26.972 --> 00:22:28.373
Do you know the circumstances?

00:22:28.403 --> 00:22:31.002
Were you, were your parents killed in some fashion?

00:22:31.012 --> 00:22:32.192
I don't know.

00:22:32.383 --> 00:22:35.272
I wish there was more records, but there was no paperwork.

00:22:35.272 --> 00:22:36.712
So it was probably where I was.

00:22:36.807 --> 00:22:42.407
Dropped off at the orphanage and my parents, for whatever reason, couldn't or won't be able to take care of me.

00:22:42.817 --> 00:22:46.678
But thankfully, I had a really great loving family that raised me.

00:22:47.117 --> 00:22:50.798
And so you land in a family in Portland, Oregon?

00:22:51.248 --> 00:22:52.057
In Eugene.

00:22:52.067 --> 00:22:53.708
Eugene, okay, the college town.

00:22:53.718 --> 00:22:55.377
Yes, yeah, University of Oregon.

00:22:55.397 --> 00:22:59.657
Go Ducks! And so, like, uh, talk to me about probably some early memories.

00:23:00.178 --> 00:23:02.508
You're seven years old, you're starting to go to school.

00:23:02.917 --> 00:23:04.228
Did you have siblings?

00:23:04.228 --> 00:23:05.317
What was your family environment?

00:23:05.317 --> 00:23:06.498
What did your parents do?

00:23:07.597 --> 00:23:08.857
Yes, I had three brothers.

00:23:08.928 --> 00:23:09.268
Okay.

00:23:09.307 --> 00:23:10.428
So I was the middle child.

00:23:10.768 --> 00:23:10.798
Okay.

00:23:10.807 --> 00:23:19.248
So like I said to people, uh, or shared, is that I had to play basketball and football with my brothers, but they would not play Barbies with me, but anyway.

00:23:19.468 --> 00:23:21.998
Were they natural born children of your parents?

00:23:22.008 --> 00:23:25.557
So one of them, my oldest brother, was their biological son.

00:23:25.827 --> 00:23:29.597
And then the other two brothers were adopted from Korea as well.

00:23:30.028 --> 00:23:31.417
But none of us are blood related.

00:23:31.417 --> 00:23:35.028
But we would, you know, fight like, fight the same.

00:23:35.178 --> 00:23:35.678
Yes, exactly.

00:23:35.948 --> 00:23:36.817
Fair enough, okay.

00:23:37.167 --> 00:23:38.792
And what did your parents do?

00:23:38.792 --> 00:23:40.028
What were they up to in Eugene?

00:23:40.337 --> 00:23:40.708
Right.

00:23:40.718 --> 00:23:43.607
So my dad was an insurance agent for state farm insurance.

00:23:44.807 --> 00:23:52.538
That was the connection with getting into insurance for 20 years, but yeah, he was a successful insurance agent in Eugene and he did that for 31 years.

00:23:52.567 --> 00:23:53.038
Oh, wow.

00:23:53.057 --> 00:23:53.438
Okay.

00:23:53.877 --> 00:23:58.347
And your mom mostly chased, uh, four little rugrats around.

00:23:58.538 --> 00:23:58.758
Yeah.

00:23:58.758 --> 00:24:00.048
So it was a full time job for her.

00:24:00.048 --> 00:24:11.333
She was a state home mom, but my mom was the type of person that every meal was homemade and she, Clean the house herself and they had a big garden canned and did all that stuff.

00:24:11.343 --> 00:24:14.292
So everything about the house was kind of on her dial.

00:24:14.432 --> 00:24:14.803
Yes.

00:24:14.982 --> 00:24:18.813
And what was the range in age, um, from the oldest to the youngest?

00:24:19.103 --> 00:24:19.942
Um, yeah.

00:24:19.942 --> 00:24:24.532
So the, I had a brother who was two years younger and then one, two years older.

00:24:24.532 --> 00:24:27.313
And then my oldest brother was eight years older than me.

00:24:27.373 --> 00:24:27.742
Oh, wow.

00:24:27.742 --> 00:24:42.198
So it was almost a second, uh, Second path or more kids kind of yeah, kind of like a second group of yeah I checked second group a little the older brother was almost An uncle figure or something probably by the time you guys were getting teenager.

00:24:42.248 --> 00:24:45.428
Yes So Paul my oldest brother was eight years older.

00:24:45.428 --> 00:24:47.077
So he was almost like a second dad.

00:24:47.347 --> 00:24:51.212
He was I was, when I was four, he was already 12 or 13.

00:24:51.232 --> 00:24:56.952
So he was older in school and, but, um, a great brother and cool.

00:24:56.982 --> 00:24:58.553
We've got a lot and we all got along.

00:24:58.772 --> 00:25:08.393
What was young Ann like when you got to, uh, say early years in school, um, were you sassy and outgoing already?

00:25:08.393 --> 00:25:09.192
Were you?

00:25:09.387 --> 00:25:10.887
More reserved.

00:25:11.428 --> 00:25:12.728
I was actually quiet.

00:25:12.778 --> 00:25:21.117
I mean, I was always a social person and had friends, but no, I was kind of the nerd and the bookworm and would volunteer at school.

00:25:21.258 --> 00:25:29.222
I was always the person out there, like helping at sports events, helping take the money and one year book and.

00:25:29.222 --> 00:25:31.413
Yeah, all that stuff.

00:25:31.472 --> 00:25:37.823
The, uh, overachiever, but also, uh, striving to make good relationships with the teachers.

00:25:37.833 --> 00:25:40.125
Sounds like a brown nose a little bit to me.

00:25:40.125 --> 00:25:40.700
Teacher's pet.

00:25:40.700 --> 00:25:41.272
Damn people.

00:25:41.272 --> 00:25:42.373
You weren't a hall monitor, were you?

00:25:42.383 --> 00:25:43.093
No, I wasn't.

00:25:43.093 --> 00:25:43.623
That's good.

00:25:43.623 --> 00:25:44.593
I don't mind.

00:25:44.593 --> 00:25:47.173
I'm good for all the other stuff, but the hall monitors.

00:25:47.173 --> 00:25:47.748
I got, I got that.

00:25:47.887 --> 00:25:49.188
No good time for them.

00:25:50.018 --> 00:25:52.458
Or bad memories of all monitors, right?

00:25:52.698 --> 00:26:00.958
Were you, uh, uh, Were you, this is going to be a terrible question, but Were you like height challenged right from the start?

00:26:00.988 --> 00:26:02.798
Like, first grade, second grade?

00:26:02.857 --> 00:26:03.897
Oh, was I always short?

00:26:03.948 --> 00:26:04.438
Yeah.

00:26:04.508 --> 00:26:05.048
Oh, yeah.

00:26:06.008 --> 00:26:10.633
So when I was, like, 12 years old when most girls get their growth spurt.

00:26:10.663 --> 00:26:16.553
I was always please please God Let me be five foot tall at least nope didn't make it four foot ten.

00:26:17.113 --> 00:26:22.232
Yeah, I'm sure we've talked about it But do you know that I was like four foot eleven in seventh grade?

00:26:23.252 --> 00:26:41.837
And then I was still only five foot one at sixteen going into my tenth grade year Oh, wow, so I was Kurt the squirt All through in my high school like I was like your size basically and I was surrounded by all these My, like, 7th and 8th grade friends were abnormally big, too.

00:26:41.837 --> 00:26:50.498
They were all like 5'10 5'11 6 tall, and then there's Kurt at 4'11 So you got your, you got your growth in, uh, in high school?

00:26:50.557 --> 00:26:56.048
Yeah, last high school, and then first year of college I got the last inch in there, or something like that.

00:26:56.048 --> 00:26:58.228
But I was convinced I was never going to be fit.

00:26:59.698 --> 00:27:05.768
Like, I was kind of doomed to a, which is basically the same as, uh, four foot ten or whatever you are.

00:27:05.778 --> 00:27:09.637
Well, and for guys, I think it's much worse for them when they're shorter than average.

00:27:10.097 --> 00:27:10.627
It's harder for them.

00:27:10.627 --> 00:27:11.667
When you're a girl, you're just pocket sized.

00:27:11.667 --> 00:27:13.488
Like, every guy kind of wants to have pocket sized girls.

00:27:14.258 --> 00:27:15.617
Makes them look tall and strong.

00:27:15.907 --> 00:27:16.248
Yeah.

00:27:16.548 --> 00:27:16.968
Yeah.

00:27:17.357 --> 00:27:20.728
I actually dated someone in college who was 6'4 That was interesting.

00:27:21.307 --> 00:27:22.917
But anyway, yeah.

00:27:23.428 --> 00:27:29.627
So you're doing all kind of the nerd stuff, getting good grades, Dean's List, uh, things like that.

00:27:29.998 --> 00:27:33.698
Um, helping out in the journal, newspaper things.

00:27:33.728 --> 00:27:34.167
Right.

00:27:34.167 --> 00:27:34.518
Yes.

00:27:34.518 --> 00:27:43.278
I help out with the yearbook and then at different activities whenever they'd have basketball, there's always, you know, a place where you buy your tickets.

00:27:43.278 --> 00:27:44.137
I'd help with that.

00:27:44.147 --> 00:27:44.528
So.

00:27:44.587 --> 00:27:45.917
You weren't a cheerleader or anything like that?

00:27:46.647 --> 00:27:47.988
Well, you're nice and small.

00:27:47.988 --> 00:27:48.917
They can throw you around.

00:27:48.917 --> 00:27:50.357
I thought that was a bonus.

00:27:50.538 --> 00:27:51.347
I'm not athletic, though.

00:27:51.768 --> 00:27:52.637
Okay, alright.

00:27:52.708 --> 00:27:55.928
I'd probably, like, do a split and, you know, break something.

00:27:55.938 --> 00:27:56.857
Fair enough, okay.

00:27:57.307 --> 00:28:00.518
So, um, you're getting close to the end of high school.

00:28:00.528 --> 00:28:03.807
Did you have a plan, or did you know what you wanted to do from there?

00:28:03.807 --> 00:28:03.857
Yeah.

00:28:04.157 --> 00:28:11.708
Well, so my plan since I was a little girl, because my dad was an insurance agent, that I would work for him when I got, when I graduated high school.

00:28:11.768 --> 00:28:12.067
Really?

00:28:12.067 --> 00:28:12.857
You were eager for that?

00:28:13.157 --> 00:28:14.097
Uh, I don't know.

00:28:14.097 --> 00:28:15.557
I think my dad was more so.

00:28:15.698 --> 00:28:16.317
He just kind of channeled you in there.

00:28:16.317 --> 00:28:18.178
He's like, man, she's really smart and hardworking.

00:28:18.178 --> 00:28:20.798
I'll have, I'll build an employee.

00:28:21.248 --> 00:28:23.008
So, uh, I started working for him.

00:28:23.008 --> 00:28:24.367
I was only 17 years old.

00:28:24.377 --> 00:28:24.417
Okay.

00:28:24.508 --> 00:28:27.428
Started working for him in his insurance office.

00:28:27.587 --> 00:28:27.847
All right.

00:28:28.018 --> 00:28:32.692
And, uh, I have to say, you know, I don't know if you've worked for family, but it's quite challenging.

00:28:32.903 --> 00:28:52.163
You know, um Not too much, but yeah, I can understand even even Jill and I have found for our relationship because we work together for some in the food truck business and things and it's just In a business, I need somebody to keep me inside the guardrails and stuff like that and and Jill does that for our household?

00:28:52.163 --> 00:28:53.803
But I didn't work that great for us.

00:28:53.803 --> 00:28:58.893
So I don't know that tension between father daughter there, too Yeah, I think we were too much alike.

00:28:58.893 --> 00:29:06.373
So it yeah, but we did it for six years Um, yeah, My dad had the highest average auto premium when I was working for him.

00:29:06.383 --> 00:29:07.083
Oh, so he was killing it.

00:29:07.093 --> 00:29:11.363
Um, we were selling, he was a high producer in life insurance.

00:29:11.673 --> 00:29:13.803
Um, mainly because Oh wow, that was early for State Farm too.

00:29:14.303 --> 00:29:15.073
Yeah, exactly.

00:29:15.113 --> 00:29:18.492
Mainly because you were I was helping him write and talking to folks.

00:29:18.702 --> 00:29:18.932
Oh, interesting.

00:29:18.942 --> 00:29:23.333
And then, uh, decided that, um, after six years that was enough of working with dad.

00:29:23.333 --> 00:29:23.393
Alright, alright.

00:29:23.452 --> 00:29:25.962
So, I went on to college to Oh wow.

00:29:26.133 --> 00:29:28.063
To get a degree in, in education.

00:29:28.153 --> 00:29:28.603
Oh wow.

00:29:28.603 --> 00:29:28.657
Oh wow.

00:29:28.988 --> 00:29:30.488
I wouldn't, wouldn't have guessed that.

00:29:30.488 --> 00:29:31.258
Why education?

00:29:31.258 --> 00:29:36.778
What, uh Well, it kind of went back early on, like a second, third grade.

00:29:36.928 --> 00:29:43.407
So I was, um, as you can probably imagine, being adopted and coming to a new country, I, I don't know.

00:29:43.428 --> 00:29:47.048
I guess I had issues, but anyway, so my mom and dad helped me back.

00:29:47.147 --> 00:29:50.377
Um, so instead of going to third grade, I repeated second grade.

00:29:50.417 --> 00:29:50.837
Wow, okay.

00:29:51.018 --> 00:29:57.053
Um, but, but Because I was a little bit more advanced than the other students, I already knew how to read.

00:29:57.323 --> 00:30:00.413
So I was sitting there reading to the kids and also loved reading.

00:30:00.752 --> 00:30:02.373
And I thought, oh, I want to be a teacher.

00:30:02.492 --> 00:30:02.853
Oh, wow.

00:30:02.863 --> 00:30:04.873
And that was the motivation.

00:30:04.873 --> 00:30:07.613
And then you kind of got railroaded into the State Farm thing.

00:30:07.613 --> 00:30:08.883
And then you're like, okay, I'm out of here.

00:30:08.883 --> 00:30:09.863
I'm going to go be a teacher.

00:30:09.952 --> 00:30:10.222
Yeah.

00:30:10.222 --> 00:30:15.732
So I decided to go and get my degree in education and actually taught for four years in Portland, Oregon.

00:30:15.762 --> 00:30:16.192
Okay.

00:30:16.303 --> 00:30:16.623
Okay.

00:30:16.663 --> 00:30:22.548
That was kind of your first Were you Were you living on your own and stuff, even while you worked for your dad?

00:30:22.798 --> 00:30:24.498
Yeah, most of the time I was living on my own.

00:30:24.498 --> 00:30:27.018
Okay, so just a single gal in Eugene.

00:30:27.087 --> 00:30:27.768
Yeah.

00:30:28.317 --> 00:30:28.837
Yeah?

00:30:28.877 --> 00:30:33.278
Yeah, Eugene, Oregon is, I don't know if you, you probably know, it's like the runner's capital.

00:30:33.278 --> 00:30:37.428
I mean, you had a lot of athletes that lived there.

00:30:37.428 --> 00:30:40.887
So you dated a lot of, uh, Oh, no, no, no.

00:30:45.048 --> 00:30:46.147
My goal is to make you blush.

00:30:46.147 --> 00:30:54.428
No, I was just like one of these really slow, I don't know what the word is, but I always did everything late.

00:30:54.478 --> 00:30:57.327
Like I didn't get my driver's license until I was 20 years old.

00:30:57.678 --> 00:30:59.897
I didn't have a boyfriend until I was 20.

00:31:00.288 --> 00:31:01.357
I just, yeah.

00:31:01.688 --> 00:31:02.498
You weren't in a hurry.

00:31:02.637 --> 00:31:04.222
Yeah, I wasn't.

00:31:04.823 --> 00:31:07.313
Pretty sheltered, but yeah, that's fine.

00:31:07.313 --> 00:31:07.752
So okay.

00:31:08.113 --> 00:31:10.063
And what was the the home environment?

00:31:10.573 --> 00:31:14.353
What was the the family dynamic if you will like was it?

00:31:14.853 --> 00:31:20.012
Like did you have all your meals together with all these siblings and stuff to go to church on Sundays?

00:31:20.012 --> 00:31:22.042
Yeah, exactly all of that.

00:31:22.042 --> 00:31:42.022
So we ate pretty much every meal together Once in all occasion when we'd go out for dinner But that was I don't think going out for dinner was as common back then so it was more rare but Yeah, and then we regrouped Lutheran, so we went to the Lutheran Church and went through Confirmation and all that, Catechism, yeah.

00:31:42.053 --> 00:31:42.373
Sure.

00:31:42.742 --> 00:31:46.143
Um, okay, so we moved to Portland?

00:31:46.722 --> 00:31:47.222
Yes.

00:31:47.343 --> 00:31:49.333
And you're teaching, uh, what kind of?

00:31:50.442 --> 00:31:51.143
Eighth graders.

00:31:51.182 --> 00:31:51.563
Okay.

00:31:51.623 --> 00:31:52.063
Yes.

00:31:52.303 --> 00:31:54.583
And it stuck for four years.

00:31:54.663 --> 00:31:55.123
Right.

00:31:55.182 --> 00:31:58.303
What, uh, like talk to me about that experience.

00:31:58.303 --> 00:31:59.623
What were the pluses and minuses?

00:31:59.913 --> 00:32:04.553
Well, I enjoyed it when the kids got the aha moment and really enjoyed learning.

00:32:04.913 --> 00:32:11.403
And, uh, I had went, this one student, we were doing a session on, uh, on poetry.

00:32:11.893 --> 00:32:17.073
And the student at the end of the four weeks said, I really thought I was going to hate this, but I really enjoyed it.

00:32:17.442 --> 00:32:18.932
So try to make it fun.

00:32:19.282 --> 00:32:23.952
And, uh, but the stress was it, you have 38th graders in one room.

00:32:24.692 --> 00:32:25.512
I can imagine that.

00:32:25.952 --> 00:32:28.732
Hormones and things going on.

00:32:28.732 --> 00:32:31.212
So, yeah, it was, it was kind of a stressful job.

00:32:31.393 --> 00:32:31.813
Fair enough.

00:32:32.073 --> 00:32:36.472
And so what did you, what, what ring did you pull?

00:32:36.482 --> 00:32:37.113
What did you do?

00:32:37.853 --> 00:32:38.893
Uh, you mean to move on?

00:32:38.893 --> 00:32:39.143
Yeah.

00:32:39.143 --> 00:32:39.405
Yeah.

00:32:39.405 --> 00:32:39.667
Yeah.

00:32:39.907 --> 00:32:44.938
Well, then, um, after four years decided that, and it was a pretty tough school.

00:32:44.968 --> 00:32:45.887
It was inner city.

00:32:45.897 --> 00:32:52.637
So there was a lot of fights and gangs, teenage pregnancy and things going on even back 30 years ago.

00:32:52.948 --> 00:33:00.268
But anyway, then I looked around and thought, well, State Farm is a good company to, to work for because not for dad, but for State Farm.

00:33:00.298 --> 00:33:00.488
Yeah.

00:33:00.518 --> 00:33:00.768
Yeah.

00:33:00.768 --> 00:33:07.077
Because my dad, I knew with him being an agent, I thought, well, they have good benefits, good pay.

00:33:07.137 --> 00:33:07.438
Sure.

00:33:07.498 --> 00:33:09.542
Um, Be a stable job.

00:33:09.542 --> 00:33:16.643
So I applied and got hired and little did I know at that time that only 3 percent of the people who applied actually get hired.

00:33:17.303 --> 00:33:20.542
So I was one of the few and did that for two years.

00:33:21.143 --> 00:33:22.083
twelve years.

00:33:22.383 --> 00:33:23.573
Including the time out here?

00:33:23.893 --> 00:33:25.323
Uh, yes.

00:33:25.432 --> 00:33:25.883
Correct.

00:33:25.962 --> 00:33:26.363
Right.

00:33:26.393 --> 00:33:26.633
Yep.

00:33:26.633 --> 00:33:28.692
Eight years out in Colorado with State Farm.

00:33:28.722 --> 00:33:35.542
And what were you, what were, like, uh, were you an agent or were you working in, in an office itself or more in the headquarters style?

00:33:35.573 --> 00:33:35.873
Right.

00:33:35.893 --> 00:33:36.962
More in the headquarters.

00:33:37.063 --> 00:33:38.462
So I started as an underwriter.

00:33:38.522 --> 00:33:40.702
One of those hated auto underwriters.

00:33:40.833 --> 00:33:41.242
Right.

00:33:41.303 --> 00:33:44.333
And then when I came out here, I was a supervisor in their office.

00:33:44.423 --> 00:33:45.673
Life insurance division.

00:33:45.843 --> 00:33:46.192
Okay.

00:33:46.192 --> 00:33:50.482
And then I moved into the disability claims as a disability claim examiner.

00:33:50.542 --> 00:33:51.093
Interesting.

00:33:51.262 --> 00:33:51.532
Yeah.

00:33:52.492 --> 00:33:54.903
Is it what, talk to me about the insurance industry.

00:33:54.923 --> 00:34:11.902
Like what is, how do they, like, it feels like those three things are all unrelated to some extent, like life insurance and claims, like, is it more about just understanding the company and man or managing people well, like what were your talents that got you moved around?

00:34:12.262 --> 00:34:14.873
Well, I think I'm a good talker, Okay.

00:34:14.873 --> 00:34:17.362
But, um, yeah, so that's a good question.

00:34:17.362 --> 00:34:22.612
But they do all do in-house training, so they train you so you don't have to have experience in those areas.

00:34:22.643 --> 00:34:22.672
Okay.

00:34:23.032 --> 00:34:27.913
And, uh, I moved from Oregon to Washington and then Washington to Colorado.

00:34:28.123 --> 00:34:30.313
So they had great relocation plans.

00:34:30.702 --> 00:34:32.222
Yeah, fair enough.

00:34:32.603 --> 00:34:34.103
Um, and then, uh.

00:34:35.978 --> 00:34:40.438
Like, what were your, did you fall in love along the way here yet, uh, still?

00:34:40.838 --> 00:34:42.697
Oh, you mean like get married?

00:34:42.728 --> 00:34:43.418
Yeah, yeah.

00:34:43.878 --> 00:34:47.088
So, um, I did get married when I was in Oregon.

00:34:47.157 --> 00:34:47.237
Okay.

00:34:47.478 --> 00:34:50.648
So, this is when, I think it was when I was a school teacher.

00:34:50.737 --> 00:34:51.157
Okay.

00:34:51.168 --> 00:34:56.427
So, I, I, I met, um, a guy and then we were married for 11 years.

00:34:56.458 --> 00:34:56.487
Okay.

00:34:56.918 --> 00:34:58.838
But it was very dysfunctional, so.

00:34:59.697 --> 00:34:59.728
Okay.

00:34:59.757 --> 00:35:02.367
It was, uh, it was really unhealthy.

00:35:02.418 --> 00:35:06.617
So, you came out to here with, uh, Him in Colorado, and then it was about over by that time?

00:35:06.628 --> 00:35:11.387
Yeah, so we, yeah, he moved out here to Colorado, and then Because I knew Mike was your second husband.

00:35:11.447 --> 00:35:12.487
Yes, you're right, yep.

00:35:12.688 --> 00:35:13.907
And how long have you been with Mike?

00:35:14.128 --> 00:35:15.597
We've been married for 15 years.

00:35:15.648 --> 00:35:24.487
Okay, so you were with State Farms still, probably Actually, I was working as an independent insurance agent when I met Mike.

00:35:24.487 --> 00:35:25.748
I haven't gotten to that chapter yet.

00:35:25.748 --> 00:35:27.538
So you, so you left State Farm.

00:35:28.128 --> 00:35:28.378
Yeah.

00:35:28.378 --> 00:35:28.947
So, sorry.

00:35:29.637 --> 00:35:32.907
So this is like one of those don't do what not to do kids.

00:35:33.188 --> 00:35:39.108
Um, so I had this cushy job, owned a house, two cars paid off, went to Hawaii every year for vacation.

00:35:39.108 --> 00:35:43.547
So, you know, it was, I was, um, getting paid pretty well and life was good.

00:35:43.847 --> 00:35:45.518
Then I decided, Oh, I'm going to do it.

00:35:45.797 --> 00:35:48.427
Jump into my own business, my own job.

00:35:48.427 --> 00:35:48.898
Interesting.

00:35:48.947 --> 00:35:50.568
And, uh, did not have enough.

00:35:51.103 --> 00:35:59.362
savings and so within a year or two the runway was too short to Yes get to take off and you probably have seen people do that.

00:35:59.393 --> 00:36:08.123
Yeah, so it went from owning house two cars paid off Vacation hawaii almost every year to where everything I owned was in a small vw beetle.

00:36:08.262 --> 00:36:08.443
Oh, dang.

00:36:09.003 --> 00:36:09.193
Yeah.

00:36:09.193 --> 00:36:16.003
I lost my house uh Of course, around this time, we were divorcing, so my husband got one car and I got the other.

00:36:16.472 --> 00:36:18.353
So yeah, it was a bit of a shock.

00:36:18.353 --> 00:36:29.583
That was quite a, like, you probably, I told people after banking and when I was first in food trucking, um, that I hadn't really eaten much humble pie, uh, before that point in life.

00:36:29.603 --> 00:36:32.503
But then that was kind of all that was on the menu for a few years.

00:36:32.913 --> 00:36:34.713
Does that sound like a similar circumstance?

00:36:34.713 --> 00:36:39.072
You kind of got moved up and up and up in State Farm and then all of a sudden you jump and you're like.

00:36:39.523 --> 00:36:42.273
Oh, the traction isn't, isn't easy.

00:36:42.693 --> 00:36:45.603
Plus you have relationship challenges probably going on at the same time.

00:36:45.682 --> 00:36:46.302
Right.

00:36:46.322 --> 00:36:46.652
Right.

00:36:46.652 --> 00:36:53.123
So it, so it, you just have to, what I say to people is count the cost and before you decide to go into your own business.

00:36:53.302 --> 00:36:58.583
And so it's okay to keep that day job, you know, if you want to, or you can handle doing both of them.

00:36:59.088 --> 00:37:04.487
But, but the plus side of all of that is that it wasn't tied down to any place or location.

00:37:04.768 --> 00:37:11.498
And so around this time, my mom was very ill in Oregon and I, I knew she was probably close to passing on.

00:37:11.688 --> 00:37:16.557
So I was able to just pick up everything in my VW, my VW bug.

00:37:17.307 --> 00:37:17.998
Didn't even need to rent a trailer.

00:37:18.777 --> 00:37:19.217
To Oregon.

00:37:20.063 --> 00:37:28.262
Uh, and uh, so I moved back to Oregon and, um, unfortunately my mom passed away three months after I moved there.

00:37:28.262 --> 00:37:34.393
Well, but it was awesome for you to be there with her, I'm sure, and I'm sure a huge blessing to the rest of your family that you could do that.

00:37:34.603 --> 00:37:38.902
Yeah, I was glad to be there and then I could help my brother with his state and stuff like that.

00:37:39.523 --> 00:37:43.583
That's why God took all that stuff away from you, so you could just drive out to Oregon.

00:37:44.592 --> 00:37:45.213
Volkswagen.

00:37:45.262 --> 00:37:45.483
Yeah.

00:37:45.853 --> 00:37:47.672
And then basically, um.

00:37:47.682 --> 00:37:48.842
I don't think that works that way quite.

00:37:48.842 --> 00:37:48.873
Well.

00:37:49.023 --> 00:37:50.052
He allowed it, certainly.

00:37:50.123 --> 00:37:50.262
Yeah.

00:37:50.472 --> 00:37:51.253
I do think you.

00:37:51.827 --> 00:37:54.268
When you look back on things, you think, yeah, there's a reason.

00:37:54.648 --> 00:38:02.518
But after being in Oregon for eight months, realized I really miss Colorado, um, had a good group of friends and things.

00:38:02.518 --> 00:38:12.108
So moved back to Colorado, of course, starting all over with a job that I did when I was 17 years old, working in a state farm office as a, basically a secretary.

00:38:12.518 --> 00:38:17.438
And, uh, of course the fancy word, they call it a CSR customer service representative.

00:38:18.547 --> 00:38:20.427
And, uh, did that for a while.

00:38:20.438 --> 00:38:22.297
Was it with one of the popular state farm offices?

00:38:22.347 --> 00:38:24.327
It was, uh, with a state farm agent.

00:38:24.327 --> 00:38:25.288
Yeah, locally.

00:38:25.608 --> 00:38:28.077
And then, um, obtained my insurance license.

00:38:28.177 --> 00:38:31.297
And then there was a job opening for an independent insurance agent.

00:38:31.327 --> 00:38:32.507
So I applied for that.

00:38:32.807 --> 00:38:33.757
Got, was hired.

00:38:33.887 --> 00:38:34.177
Okay.

00:38:34.208 --> 00:38:35.057
And did that.

00:38:35.197 --> 00:38:38.898
And, uh, I enjoyed the, the sales and helping customers.

00:38:39.228 --> 00:38:41.478
But they, uh, didn't pay very well.

00:38:41.487 --> 00:38:47.288
They were, they were owned by a bank, interesting enough, but they pay me less than 30, 000 a year to be their insurance agent.

00:38:47.938 --> 00:38:51.898
And, um, when I asked for a pay raise, they said, nope, we don't have the money to do it.

00:38:52.248 --> 00:38:55.288
So that's when I realized that I needed to find a different job.

00:38:55.588 --> 00:38:59.248
Took me two years, about, about a year to find a different job.

00:38:59.248 --> 00:39:01.208
And that's when I got hired at the chamber of commerce.

00:39:02.387 --> 00:39:06.108
Um, and was that directly into like the member kind of engagement thing?

00:39:06.297 --> 00:39:12.288
And who was, was, David must have been the person there at the time or who was running the chamber in those days?

00:39:12.367 --> 00:39:13.347
Oh, it was Brian.

00:39:13.418 --> 00:39:15.668
Yeah, Brian Wilms was the chamber president.

00:39:15.697 --> 00:39:16.288
I remember that.

00:39:16.387 --> 00:39:17.257
Right, right.

00:39:17.637 --> 00:39:19.097
So he hired, hired me.

00:39:19.498 --> 00:39:20.958
But, uh, yeah, I loved it.

00:39:20.958 --> 00:39:24.038
And that was a great experience.

00:39:24.277 --> 00:39:24.927
Did it for a season?

00:39:24.938 --> 00:39:25.668
Would you go back?

00:39:25.938 --> 00:39:33.568
Like if, if State Farm, uh, offered you your old, old, old job back for six figures, would you take it today?

00:39:33.628 --> 00:39:34.657
I really would.

00:39:34.657 --> 00:39:40.677
I mean, even though it was a great job and it helped me, you know, So you With moving around and all that.

00:39:41.097 --> 00:39:41.157
too.

00:39:41.168 --> 00:39:43.047
Yes, build the skill, they trained me.

00:39:43.327 --> 00:39:48.527
But it was a little bit like what I say to people like being a square peg in a round hole.

00:39:49.077 --> 00:39:52.847
I didn't really fit the corporate type of mentality.

00:39:52.887 --> 00:39:53.157
Yeah.

00:39:53.228 --> 00:39:54.358
Of where you just.

00:39:54.427 --> 00:39:55.478
You had too many fresh ideas.

00:39:55.668 --> 00:40:01.518
Yeah, you do what they say and you know, they ask you to jump and you say, how high should I jump?

00:40:01.777 --> 00:40:04.248
But I had too many creative ideas and they really didn't like it.

00:40:04.527 --> 00:40:05.987
They really didn't want that, so.

00:40:06.038 --> 00:40:12.938
It was part of, you could move around from department to department and freshen those places up, but in the long term, it might not have felt comfortable for you.

00:40:13.288 --> 00:40:13.918
Right, right.

00:40:13.918 --> 00:40:20.538
Well, you didn't know what you didn't know after a little while of being out in the real world, kind of, you're like, huh, no, I like this, this, this.

00:40:21.967 --> 00:40:22.668
Yes, you're right.

00:40:22.668 --> 00:40:30.177
And you probably know, too, being a business owner for quite a while is that I don't think I could work for someone else again unless it was a unique situation.

00:40:30.177 --> 00:40:34.018
But I really do like being my own business owner and setting my own schedule.

00:40:34.217 --> 00:40:37.418
That being said, I start working at 5 or 6 o'clock in the morning.

00:40:37.418 --> 00:40:39.438
Sometimes I go until 7 or 8 at night.

00:40:39.458 --> 00:40:39.867
Right.

00:40:40.487 --> 00:40:42.507
Jobs and meetings and events.

00:40:42.557 --> 00:40:43.108
Yeah.

00:40:43.137 --> 00:40:51.697
No, you're you're a hustler for sure Well, I feel like that kind of brought us back to present day Normally, we'd like to take a quick break here.

00:40:51.958 --> 00:40:55.577
Okay stretch and then we'll get into some of the other segments All right.

00:40:55.577 --> 00:40:56.197
Sounds good.

00:40:56.257 --> 00:40:56.518
All right.

00:40:56.527 --> 00:40:56.898
Cheers.

00:40:56.987 --> 00:40:57.157
Okay.

00:40:57.237 --> 00:41:50.548
Thanks We're going to jump into some of the mandatory talking segments now.

00:41:50.619 --> 00:41:50.998
Okay.

00:41:51.099 --> 00:41:55.068
Um, we always talk about faith, family, and politics.

00:41:55.228 --> 00:41:55.259
What?

00:41:56.719 --> 00:41:59.188
Cause, cause that's what mama told me never to talk about.

00:42:00.898 --> 00:42:08.219
Um, or some people say that, but I know you're a fairly liberal, uh, at least, uh, liberal speaking person.

00:42:08.708 --> 00:42:11.789
Um, We've had a lot of fun conversations over the years.

00:42:11.789 --> 00:42:13.789
So, so talk to me about, uh, where do you want to start?

00:42:13.789 --> 00:42:16.668
You want to start with, well, I guess let's, can we start with politics?

00:42:17.688 --> 00:42:18.759
Let's start with politics.

00:42:18.759 --> 00:42:22.889
Cause yesterday Donald Trump was inaugurated for his second term.

00:42:23.639 --> 00:42:27.134
And, uh, You know, I'm just kind of curious.

00:42:27.224 --> 00:42:29.903
We've never really talked politics before, you and I, I don't think.

00:42:30.083 --> 00:42:30.393
Well.

00:42:30.423 --> 00:42:32.103
Seems like it's probably not something you pay too much attention to.

00:42:32.134 --> 00:42:41.563
I'm, I'm going to be PC and say, I think everyone needs to, you know, vote for the person they think is right for them and, and probably not get into a lot of politics.

00:42:41.563 --> 00:42:41.974
Okay.

00:42:42.023 --> 00:42:42.454
Yeah.

00:42:42.753 --> 00:42:43.804
But we can talk family.

00:42:44.164 --> 00:42:44.273
Okay.

00:42:44.273 --> 00:42:44.449
Yeah.

00:42:44.449 --> 00:42:44.623
Okay.

00:42:44.623 --> 00:42:45.148
That'll do it.

00:42:45.148 --> 00:42:45.322
Thanks.

00:42:45.322 --> 00:42:45.498
Bye.

00:42:45.498 --> 00:42:45.672
Bye.

00:42:45.672 --> 00:42:45.847
Bye.

00:42:46.309 --> 00:42:47.088
Just like that.

00:42:47.188 --> 00:42:48.699
Can we talk local politics?

00:42:48.699 --> 00:42:52.489
You want to talk about, uh, business y, politics y things?

00:42:52.489 --> 00:42:53.983
Or are you just going to try hot tea?

00:42:53.983 --> 00:43:01.829
Yeah, I really, I really pretty much stay, obviously have an opinion, but yeah, I usually pretty much, as far as in the public realm, stay away from that.

00:43:01.829 --> 00:43:02.958
I know he's trying to lure me in.

00:43:02.958 --> 00:43:07.518
Well, let's try to give people whiskey to just begin the podcast, but you just asked for hot tea.

00:43:07.648 --> 00:43:15.728
So I guess I can't, uh, um, is that more of a, is that more of a business decision or something you just don't spend too much time with?

00:43:15.829 --> 00:43:22.219
Yeah, I mean, I do have opinions about politics and religion, but I basically it's a business decision there.

00:43:22.559 --> 00:43:23.509
I think everyone's gonna.

00:43:23.969 --> 00:43:26.445
Have their thoughts on, you know, who they vote for.

00:43:26.445 --> 00:43:30.748
You don't want anybody to cancel you for saying you voted for Trump or not for Trump or whatever.

00:43:30.748 --> 00:43:33.248
What religion they are or aren't, so, yeah.

00:43:33.278 --> 00:43:35.219
Can we ask specific questions around it?

00:43:35.708 --> 00:43:36.708
Uh, like, no.

00:43:36.798 --> 00:43:38.219
I'm going to kill you, Kirk.

00:43:39.778 --> 00:43:40.079
Okay.

00:43:40.079 --> 00:43:42.849
We won't ask about the executive orders.

00:43:42.849 --> 00:43:45.759
We won't ask about the pardons, January 6th pardons.

00:43:46.009 --> 00:43:46.998
Can I ask about that?

00:43:46.998 --> 00:43:48.378
No, we're not going there, Kirk.

00:43:48.378 --> 00:43:48.639
I know.

00:43:49.599 --> 00:43:49.849
All right.

00:43:49.858 --> 00:43:52.155
You're close enough I could, I could.

00:43:52.155 --> 00:43:55.349
If you crawled over that table slowly, you could get to me.

00:43:56.498 --> 00:43:59.530
This is why he's like more than arm length away from me.

00:43:59.530 --> 00:43:59.936
That's right.

00:43:59.936 --> 00:44:00.543
Just far enough.

00:44:00.543 --> 00:44:01.960
I got a poker stick over here.

00:44:01.960 --> 00:44:03.175
I can keep my guests away.

00:44:03.175 --> 00:44:06.228
Um, is that same for faith in that regard?

00:44:06.278 --> 00:44:07.592
You don't prefer to talk about that?

00:44:07.592 --> 00:44:08.657
I mean, it's important to me.

00:44:08.659 --> 00:44:09.289
Yes, definitely.

00:44:09.289 --> 00:44:12.550
Do you remain in the, in the Lutheran church?

00:44:12.550 --> 00:44:15.451
Um, actually, no, I went more non denominational.

00:44:15.451 --> 00:44:15.813
Okay.

00:44:15.813 --> 00:44:16.175
Okay.

00:44:16.175 --> 00:44:16.900
All right.

00:44:16.900 --> 00:44:17.262
Bye.

00:44:17.713 --> 00:44:19.773
Do you want to give your pastor a shout out or anything like that?

00:44:19.784 --> 00:44:20.523
Do you do that?

00:44:20.713 --> 00:44:21.103
No.

00:44:23.264 --> 00:44:23.853
Not that he's bad.

00:44:23.853 --> 00:44:24.653
He's a good pastor.

00:44:24.724 --> 00:44:24.954
Yeah.

00:44:24.954 --> 00:44:25.184
Yeah.

00:44:25.434 --> 00:44:25.623
Yeah.

00:44:25.684 --> 00:44:27.664
It's just kind of a private matter for you.

00:44:27.733 --> 00:44:28.034
Yeah.

00:44:28.034 --> 00:44:28.103
Yeah.

00:44:28.103 --> 00:44:31.353
Is that kind of traditional, like for your family?

00:44:31.384 --> 00:44:31.833
Was that?

00:44:34.108 --> 00:44:36.719
Kind of like just kind of one of those things.

00:44:36.719 --> 00:44:42.969
We just don't talk about like I wonder if that's a Do you remember is that more of like a business person and so that we just don't talk about that?

00:44:43.028 --> 00:44:46.728
Yeah, I think yeah, because I just want to keep things on a business level.

00:44:46.818 --> 00:45:03.768
So yeah, that's You're gonna make 50 percent of people unhappy Well, and I think that's one of the reasons I I talk about it because I want people to know that we're just like, we can still all be friends.

00:45:03.838 --> 00:45:04.289
Oh yeah.

00:45:04.699 --> 00:45:05.079
Oh yeah.

00:45:05.079 --> 00:45:05.739
I do agree.

00:45:06.358 --> 00:45:13.639
And, and I have friends who are on all spectrums of, you know, religion and politics, but yeah.

00:45:13.878 --> 00:45:17.458
You're kind of a low judgment kind of a person, it seems like.

00:45:17.469 --> 00:45:18.588
No, I'm pretty high judgment.

00:45:18.588 --> 00:45:19.583
You are?

00:45:19.583 --> 00:45:20.081
Okay.

00:45:20.081 --> 00:45:21.318
But I keep it to myself.

00:45:21.338 --> 00:45:21.358
Yeah.

00:45:21.599 --> 00:45:21.679
Yeah.

00:45:23.563 --> 00:45:27.273
Although I did, I have a funny, I have a, I have a funny story about my husband.

00:45:27.273 --> 00:45:29.793
So he was speaking to the Rotary today in Loveland.

00:45:29.833 --> 00:45:29.903
Okay.

00:45:30.304 --> 00:45:31.224
So poor thing.

00:45:31.224 --> 00:45:31.594
Oh cool.

00:45:31.643 --> 00:45:32.574
He was the program or whatever?

00:45:32.574 --> 00:45:32.793
Yeah.

00:45:32.793 --> 00:45:33.664
He was the speaker.

00:45:33.693 --> 00:45:35.523
So I was like, okay, honey.

00:45:35.523 --> 00:45:35.914
Yeah.

00:45:36.213 --> 00:45:37.514
Are you going to wear clean clothes today?

00:45:37.514 --> 00:45:37.934
Yes.

00:45:37.934 --> 00:45:39.963
Are you going to, are you going to do this?

00:45:39.963 --> 00:45:40.994
You're going to take your business cards?

00:45:40.994 --> 00:45:41.364
Yes.

00:45:41.954 --> 00:45:43.474
You were like setting him up for success.

00:45:43.583 --> 00:45:46.884
I was trying to help him like, okay, now you're going to be in front of these people.

00:45:47.264 --> 00:45:48.054
Just so you know.

00:45:49.159 --> 00:45:52.179
Um, all right, well then we're left to talk about family.

00:45:52.829 --> 00:45:57.097
Um, we're going to start with Mike, your, your husband for, what did you say, you've been a, 13 years?

00:45:57.099 --> 00:45:58.018
15 years.

00:45:58.018 --> 00:45:58.949
15 years ago.

00:45:58.949 --> 00:45:59.878
Yeah, we've been married, yeah.

00:46:00.148 --> 00:46:02.498
Um, and like, tell me about that.

00:46:02.708 --> 00:46:03.349
Was that a match.

00:46:03.608 --> 00:46:04.588
com thing, or?

00:46:04.608 --> 00:46:05.539
It was a match.

00:46:05.579 --> 00:46:06.168
Oh, no shit?

00:46:06.599 --> 00:46:09.208
Yes, it definitely, it's a match success story.

00:46:09.248 --> 00:46:11.119
Well, was it that specific website, even?

00:46:11.119 --> 00:46:11.449
Yeah, it was.

00:46:11.449 --> 00:46:12.998
It was, it was match.

00:46:13.239 --> 00:46:13.349
com.

00:46:13.918 --> 00:46:15.059
And that was the season, right?

00:46:15.059 --> 00:46:17.018
Like, match was kind of dominating everything.

00:46:17.268 --> 00:46:17.679
Yes, true.

00:46:17.679 --> 00:46:19.318
For that little season of time.

00:46:19.869 --> 00:46:24.708
Yeah, and I say to people, I probably, if we had not met at a match, I don't think we would have met at all.

00:46:24.708 --> 00:46:32.018
Because Mike's an introvert, I'm an extrovert, I don't think we would have been in the same circles, or probably talked to each other.

00:46:32.018 --> 00:46:32.478
Sure.

00:46:32.639 --> 00:46:35.568
And what did he, like, what did he tell the Rotary Club about today?

00:46:36.039 --> 00:46:39.159
Um, he talked about going to Comic Cons, and about writing, and Okay.

00:46:39.648 --> 00:46:52.463
Um, and, uh I would describe him as a very philosophical, very thoughtful, very, uh, he's more vocal about his politics than you are.

00:46:52.463 --> 00:46:52.782
Oh, yes.

00:46:52.784 --> 00:46:53.074
Oh, yeah.

00:46:53.603 --> 00:46:58.257
And, uh, but also a very, uh, like accomplished comic book writer.

00:46:58.259 --> 00:47:01.289
Artist and author right?

00:47:01.298 --> 00:47:03.628
Like he writes some of his own books and illustrates them?

00:47:03.748 --> 00:47:04.048
Is that right?

00:47:04.059 --> 00:47:06.199
So he's the writer and he works with the artists.

00:47:06.268 --> 00:47:06.748
Oh he does?

00:47:07.079 --> 00:47:09.909
I thought he was just the, I thought he was both.

00:47:10.059 --> 00:47:11.568
Yeah, yeah, that's alright, no worries.

00:47:11.798 --> 00:47:15.018
But he's the writer and then he works with artists all over the world.

00:47:15.028 --> 00:47:15.449
Okay.

00:47:15.628 --> 00:47:17.079
And he is very accomplished.

00:47:17.079 --> 00:47:17.438
He's very good.

00:47:17.688 --> 00:47:26.858
Literally written thousands of comic books and he's won the Eisner award two times and the ink pot which is similar to winning the Oscars Okay in the comic book world.

00:47:26.869 --> 00:47:27.088
Yeah.

00:47:27.088 --> 00:47:27.438
Yeah.

00:47:27.498 --> 00:47:32.268
Yeah, very interesting What was what was your first date with this comic book nerd?

00:47:32.579 --> 00:47:33.528
You're a nerd too.

00:47:33.539 --> 00:47:35.938
Like that's why Might have found each other.

00:47:36.259 --> 00:47:47.159
Well, so for instance, you probably know this big comic thick comic books are called graphic novels Yes, which I did not know They were just becoming popular when I was like going to college or at least as far as I could tell You Oh, really?

00:47:47.548 --> 00:47:49.628
So he said he wrote graphic novels.

00:47:49.789 --> 00:47:50.898
He didn't say he wrote comic books.

00:47:51.378 --> 00:47:53.469
I'm thinking he's writing some porn or something.

00:47:53.469 --> 00:47:54.719
I didn't know what it was.

00:47:55.188 --> 00:47:55.579
Right.

00:47:55.829 --> 00:47:57.338
So then we go on You're like graphic cow.

00:47:57.639 --> 00:47:58.599
It's like, okay.

00:47:58.599 --> 00:48:02.599
So we go on our first date, um, and we meet at Abel's, Avogadro's.

00:48:02.599 --> 00:48:06.054
You still went out with him even though he's You thought he was a porn artist or something?

00:48:06.054 --> 00:48:08.454
Well, I thought, we'll meet in public.

00:48:09.983 --> 00:48:12.623
So he brings along a comic book that he wrote.

00:48:12.704 --> 00:48:13.074
Okay.

00:48:13.083 --> 00:48:14.864
And I thought, well, okay, fine.

00:48:15.094 --> 00:48:17.543
But I'm kind of a skeptical person.

00:48:17.804 --> 00:48:22.338
So I went down to the local comic book store later on and said, Do you know Mike Barron?

00:48:22.429 --> 00:48:22.498
Yeah.

00:48:22.628 --> 00:48:24.329
And he's a, is he a comic book writer?

00:48:24.338 --> 00:48:26.898
And they said, yep, they pulled a comic book off the shelf.

00:48:26.898 --> 00:48:28.489
And like, yep, he wrote this.

00:48:28.829 --> 00:48:29.168
Oh, interesting.

00:48:29.829 --> 00:48:33.518
So, so we went to Avvo's and I, and Mike has heard this story many times.

00:48:33.518 --> 00:48:34.219
Avvogadro's number.

00:48:34.219 --> 00:48:35.369
Yes, exactly.

00:48:35.639 --> 00:48:39.048
And, uh, I've said, shared this story in front of Mike several times.

00:48:39.048 --> 00:48:44.559
But anyway, uh, we went there and it was like the middle of the afternoon because, well, we're old.

00:48:44.568 --> 00:48:45.429
So I guess we go to.

00:48:45.449 --> 00:48:48.018
You know, go on a first date at like two o'clock in the afternoon.

00:48:49.958 --> 00:48:54.579
And then, um, uh, he shows up and I show up and it's really loud in there.

00:48:54.579 --> 00:48:56.268
You know, they have a lot of loud music.

00:48:56.429 --> 00:48:57.168
It's like a Saturday afternoon.

00:48:57.219 --> 00:48:57.909
They got bands playing.

00:48:58.048 --> 00:49:01.898
It's a weekday, but they just have that overhead music was on really loud.

00:49:02.318 --> 00:49:04.429
So then he's yelling at me, like, what do you want to drink?

00:49:04.429 --> 00:49:06.469
I'm like, Oh, I'll have a Pepsi or Coca Cola.

00:49:06.469 --> 00:49:08.998
And then we sat there and we talked for 15 minutes.

00:49:09.228 --> 00:49:11.869
Then he gets up and says, I have to leave and feed the dogs.

00:49:12.778 --> 00:49:13.329
What the hell?

00:49:13.528 --> 00:49:13.858
What?

00:49:14.228 --> 00:49:19.608
So, so I'm thinking oh my god 15 minutes and he's already leaving.

00:49:19.628 --> 00:49:20.659
He doesn't feed me.

00:49:20.858 --> 00:49:23.599
He's you know, kind of yeah, he's just out.

00:49:24.009 --> 00:49:25.048
Yeah He's he's just gone.

00:49:25.139 --> 00:49:26.699
It's not like I'll be back in 10 minutes or something.

00:49:26.699 --> 00:49:27.027
No.

00:49:27.028 --> 00:49:30.148
No, he just he just left Poor thing.

00:49:30.409 --> 00:49:32.063
So anyway I had remembered.

00:49:32.063 --> 00:49:33.583
Was it because he was crushing on you too hard?

00:49:33.634 --> 00:49:35.143
I don't know what the problem was.

00:49:35.244 --> 00:49:41.164
But a girlfriend a long time ago had said, now give them a second date unless they're an axe murderer.

00:49:41.164 --> 00:49:42.384
I'm like, okay, fine.

00:49:42.384 --> 00:49:44.884
So then we went on a second date.

00:49:44.884 --> 00:49:48.724
We went on a picnic down at Benson Park and that turned out good.

00:49:48.733 --> 00:49:49.253
Much better.

00:49:49.804 --> 00:49:51.853
And he stayed longer than 15 minutes.

00:49:52.784 --> 00:49:53.253
That's funny.

00:49:53.893 --> 00:49:59.264
Did he ever give you a description of a reason why he Well, my Like he forgot to feed the dogs?

00:49:59.264 --> 00:49:59.313
I don't know.

00:49:59.393 --> 00:50:05.023
No, my gut feeling is that he was trying to make sure I didn't have a horn and tails and I look like my picture.

00:50:05.023 --> 00:50:08.003
Oh, so he was just scoping you out almost on the first round.

00:50:08.094 --> 00:50:08.293
Yeah.

00:50:08.293 --> 00:50:10.733
I think he was just like, okay, does she look like a picture?

00:50:10.983 --> 00:50:17.793
Because as you know, a lot of these dating sites, the person looks about 40 years older than the picture and about 200 pounds more.

00:50:19.143 --> 00:50:19.514
It's true.

00:50:19.693 --> 00:50:20.003
I don't know.

00:50:20.003 --> 00:50:21.623
I haven't been on a dating site in years.

00:50:21.713 --> 00:50:22.373
Well, you're lucky.

00:50:22.384 --> 00:50:26.884
But, um, and so you guys, uh, had a third date and a fourth date.

00:50:27.333 --> 00:50:28.554
Um, what was it?

00:50:29.148 --> 00:50:33.128
About Mike especially that, that drew you to that third and fourth dates.

00:50:33.318 --> 00:50:41.898
So what, so You never were married before, but whenever you've been through a marriage, you kind of like, I don't want to do this again, you know, make the same mistakes.

00:50:42.759 --> 00:50:43.409
Exactly.

00:50:43.798 --> 00:50:55.829
So I had made quite a long list, like 20 items of what, if I got married again, what the person would be like, like they need to be smart and cause I'm short, you know, certain height, not overweight.

00:50:56.088 --> 00:50:57.918
They need to have a college degree.

00:50:58.389 --> 00:51:03.188
I tend to like guys that are very complected, you know, light hair, like colored eyes.

00:51:03.844 --> 00:51:07.264
Educated, humor, like animals and kids.

00:51:07.844 --> 00:51:15.764
And so it was like, Mike, Mike is one of those people, like the more you know him, the more you like him, because he's really is a person of his word.

00:51:16.094 --> 00:51:17.043
He's really smart.

00:51:17.043 --> 00:51:17.393
He's hard.

00:51:17.954 --> 00:51:18.173
He's hard.

00:51:18.184 --> 00:51:18.784
He likes me too.

00:51:18.784 --> 00:51:21.914
We haven't really shared enough time together, but I know what you like each other kind of.

00:51:22.134 --> 00:51:22.583
Yeah.

00:51:22.583 --> 00:51:22.793
Yeah.

00:51:22.793 --> 00:51:23.474
That's yeah.

00:51:23.474 --> 00:51:24.273
He's hardworking.

00:51:24.273 --> 00:51:29.784
So I just, I really fell in love with the person that he is, but he's a person of his word, is genuine.

00:51:29.873 --> 00:51:30.547
He's kind.

00:51:31.608 --> 00:51:34.358
He loves our dogs and he loves kids.

00:51:34.358 --> 00:51:43.009
He's like really great with, if there's young people who want to learn how to get into comics, he'll take time for free to talk to them and give them tips and help.

00:51:43.018 --> 00:51:48.458
So I, and, and he's got a very quirky sense of humor as you know, he does, he does.

00:51:48.458 --> 00:51:56.429
Um, I'm curious, this is a little bit out of left field cause we were just talking about Mike, but your voice, do you have some accent?

00:51:57.878 --> 00:52:05.599
Um, and is that from, like, time in the orphanage, or was it time with your older brothers and family, or how, like, talk to me about that.

00:52:05.608 --> 00:52:07.719
Well, yes, and I have been asked that.

00:52:07.949 --> 00:52:11.289
So I was four years old, so I'm assuming that I knew Korean.

00:52:11.509 --> 00:52:11.889
Yeah.

00:52:11.898 --> 00:52:13.559
Living in Korea for four years.

00:52:13.588 --> 00:52:13.849
Probably.

00:52:13.898 --> 00:52:17.259
And then when I came to America, learned English, obviously.

00:52:17.599 --> 00:52:30.293
And then my mom, uh, when I was younger, she worked with me, like, we would, you know, say rhymes and poems together to help me because there's certain letters in English that are not in the Korean language, so.

00:52:30.853 --> 00:52:31.213
Okay.

00:52:31.264 --> 00:52:45.918
Yeah, I didn't really think to consider like When your adoption was and yeah, so that's so your younger brother probably has less of an accent Yes, it was only like two when he came over.

00:52:45.918 --> 00:52:56.668
So well, he was actually four years old But he had been adopted by another American family when he was a baby and then unfortunately They gave him up and then our family adopted him.

00:52:56.668 --> 00:52:58.829
So he never had any Right.

00:52:58.829 --> 00:53:01.398
He'd always been around English speaking people.

00:53:01.518 --> 00:53:01.869
Right.

00:53:02.009 --> 00:53:02.389
Interesting.

00:53:02.798 --> 00:53:03.099
Okay.

00:53:03.139 --> 00:53:04.349
Sorry to mention that.

00:53:04.349 --> 00:53:07.628
I just, no, no, I have had people ask me that, like, where's that accent from?

00:53:07.628 --> 00:53:08.318
Like, I don't know.

00:53:09.139 --> 00:53:11.918
I might, my parents were Midwest and I grew up in Oregon.

00:53:11.918 --> 00:53:12.199
Right.

00:53:12.219 --> 00:53:21.958
Like it's like, uh, well, it's like, Partially adopted early child stuff, plus, you know, just an intuitive learner, obviously, as a young person, so.

00:53:22.518 --> 00:53:32.259
So, um, talk to me about your, your siblings, and your, um, your mom's gone, your dad's probably gone by now, too, is that true?

00:53:32.438 --> 00:53:32.677
Yes, right, yes.

00:53:32.679 --> 00:53:33.898
Are your brothers still all around?

00:53:34.099 --> 00:53:35.079
Yeah, so I have three brothers.

00:53:35.478 --> 00:53:35.798
Okay.

00:53:35.878 --> 00:53:39.509
And, uh, one lives in Oregon and one lives in Washington State.

00:53:39.778 --> 00:53:44.349
And then we have, every family has a black sheep, so we have the black sheep brother, he lives in Arizona.

00:53:44.349 --> 00:53:44.873
All right.

00:53:45.023 --> 00:53:48.164
Yeah, we don't talk to him, but it's okay.

00:53:48.253 --> 00:53:49.733
Do you have hopes to rekindle?

00:53:50.293 --> 00:53:51.963
Um, I have forgiven him.

00:53:51.963 --> 00:54:00.597
I mean, I still love him, but he, he basically, um, like one example is he did not come to our mom's funeral, even though our parents were there.

00:54:00.798 --> 00:54:02.289
Our parents adopted him, too.

00:54:02.838 --> 00:54:05.159
So he was, he was mad about things.

00:54:05.159 --> 00:54:05.898
At a certain point, he just, yeah.

00:54:06.009 --> 00:54:07.474
Yeah, so, yeah.

00:54:07.474 --> 00:54:09.949
You can't chase people, can't make people do stuff.

00:54:10.039 --> 00:54:10.789
Right.

00:54:10.869 --> 00:54:19.778
And, and, at this point in my life, I really decided I want to be around people who are positive, and have things good going on in their life, and they're not complaining all the time, so.

00:54:20.088 --> 00:54:22.659
And that, and he does that, he complains all the time, too.

00:54:22.668 --> 00:54:27.039
You go out to Oregon on a regular basis still, is that, that's to see one of your brothers, mostly?

00:54:27.039 --> 00:54:27.077
Right.

00:54:27.079 --> 00:54:27.429
Right.

00:54:27.523 --> 00:54:32.184
Right, so I have a youngest brother that lives in, near Portland, and then the oldest one lives up in Washington.

00:54:32.193 --> 00:54:33.909
So I get to go out and visit them quite often.

00:54:33.909 --> 00:54:36.083
Oh, just by the Seattle area, so it's not too far.

00:54:36.153 --> 00:54:36.954
Yes, exactly.

00:54:36.954 --> 00:54:46.878
Yeah, my, I think I mentioned my wife's twin sister lives in Vancouver, Washington, or actually, Gosh, I forget the name of the town, but it's just, just down the road from Vancouver.

00:54:46.878 --> 00:54:47.829
So right.

00:54:47.838 --> 00:54:50.719
But it's on the Washington side, right.

00:54:50.809 --> 00:54:56.378
But in the Portland MSA kind of thing, Washougal, Washougal, now I finally remembered it.

00:54:56.699 --> 00:54:59.338
Aaron, if you're listening, I remembered the town you're living in.

00:55:00.398 --> 00:55:06.882
She's actually coming out here, uh, just in a few days, uh, we've got some family, uh, my wife.

00:55:07.623 --> 00:55:12.914
Jill's nephew is, is likely to be the state champion wrestler for the 215 weight class.

00:55:13.454 --> 00:55:14.353
Yeah, he's a beast.

00:55:14.353 --> 00:55:19.724
And so we've got, we've been arranging places to stay in Denver for the big state tournament coming up.

00:55:20.213 --> 00:55:20.503
That's great.

00:55:20.563 --> 00:55:21.463
Anyway, I digress.

00:55:21.804 --> 00:55:23.764
Um, it's, it's a family thing though, right?

00:55:23.764 --> 00:55:28.414
Like, so you've never, have you had, have your brothers had, uh, kids and stuff too?

00:55:28.483 --> 00:55:30.463
Cause you, you don't, you and Mike don't have any children.

00:55:30.463 --> 00:55:31.543
Yeah, we don't have any.

00:55:31.583 --> 00:55:32.563
We have the fur babies.

00:55:32.623 --> 00:55:32.853
Yeah, yeah.

00:55:32.853 --> 00:55:33.918
The four legged, uh, four legged.

00:55:33.918 --> 00:55:39.099
But my one brother that is the oldest one, he has two children.

00:55:39.139 --> 00:55:39.418
Okay.

00:55:39.478 --> 00:55:43.018
And then they each have kids, so he has, he has grandkids.

00:55:43.079 --> 00:55:43.358
Gotcha.

00:55:43.369 --> 00:55:45.449
And then the one in Arizona, he had three daughters.

00:55:45.478 --> 00:55:45.778
Okay.

00:55:45.829 --> 00:55:46.809
And he's a grandpa too.

00:55:46.849 --> 00:55:49.239
So you've been around some, some kiddos here and there, but.

00:55:49.648 --> 00:55:49.858
Yeah.

00:55:50.139 --> 00:55:52.318
Your, uh, and fur babies are what?

00:55:52.329 --> 00:55:53.268
Cats or dogs?

00:55:53.349 --> 00:55:54.059
They're dogs.

00:55:54.139 --> 00:55:54.668
Okay.

00:55:54.918 --> 00:55:54.998
Yeah.

00:55:54.998 --> 00:55:55.559
What flavor?

00:55:56.018 --> 00:55:56.798
Oh, they're Mutts.

00:55:56.798 --> 00:55:58.059
They're all rescue dogs.

00:55:58.559 --> 00:56:02.438
We do, uh, we do one word descriptions of the children.

00:56:02.949 --> 00:56:06.059
Would you like to give a one word description of each of your dogs?

00:56:06.059 --> 00:56:06.117
Okay, sure.

00:56:06.119 --> 00:56:10.659
Uh, give them their name and their rough description and then a one word description.

00:56:10.818 --> 00:56:12.219
Alright, so, so Bob.

00:56:12.313 --> 00:56:18.384
Who, if you folks follow me on Facebook, I have words from Bob and I would say he's on the spectrum.

00:56:18.704 --> 00:56:18.733
Okay.

00:56:19.364 --> 00:56:20.393
He's your autistic dog?

00:56:20.403 --> 00:56:21.224
He's autistic.

00:56:21.224 --> 00:56:21.474
Yes.

00:56:21.963 --> 00:56:24.293
And then I have an old dog named Mac.

00:56:24.293 --> 00:56:24.682
Hi Mac.

00:56:24.764 --> 00:56:26.043
She's, she's crazy.

00:56:27.054 --> 00:56:28.012
Hi crazy Mac.

00:56:28.014 --> 00:56:28.443
I love you.

00:56:28.514 --> 00:56:32.034
And then we have a little dog named Freddy and he's sweet.

00:56:32.134 --> 00:56:32.554
Oh.

00:56:32.804 --> 00:56:32.934
Yeah.

00:56:33.338 --> 00:56:35.528
One normal one, the other two are crazy.

00:56:36.378 --> 00:56:36.969
Fair enough.

00:56:37.608 --> 00:56:39.338
Um, let's see.

00:56:39.369 --> 00:56:43.208
I think that's the Faith Family Politics as much as you would let me get out of you.

00:56:43.208 --> 00:56:44.938
Would you like to?

00:56:44.938 --> 00:56:49.858
What did you think about the Carrie Underwood, uh, uh, song on the inauguration?

00:56:49.858 --> 00:56:50.548
Did you watch that?

00:56:50.668 --> 00:56:51.458
I did watch that.

00:56:51.518 --> 00:56:52.358
That was pretty sweet.

00:56:52.369 --> 00:56:57.503
That made me really Like how she invited people to also sing with her in that situation.

00:56:57.983 --> 00:57:00.143
Yeah, and the soundtrack didn't work for some reason.

00:57:00.164 --> 00:57:00.673
Right, right.

00:57:00.693 --> 00:57:03.023
She still But she could, she nailed that.

00:57:03.083 --> 00:57:05.844
Yeah, she still went through and did great with the song.

00:57:05.864 --> 00:57:08.943
Well, so I know that you voted for Trump by the fact that you watched the inauguration.

00:57:09.063 --> 00:57:09.414
Ha ha.

00:57:09.423 --> 00:57:10.103
No comment.

00:57:12.074 --> 00:57:13.974
You don't know, I might watch every inauguration.

00:57:14.164 --> 00:57:18.413
Um, we're, um, we're, we're doing a, Ha ha.

00:57:18.974 --> 00:57:19.494
You're so funny.

00:57:19.704 --> 00:57:26.673
We're doing a special segment next, and it's, uh, the, uh, Ping Pong Ball Awkward Question Challenge.

00:57:26.724 --> 00:57:27.193
Oh, okay.

00:57:27.614 --> 00:57:34.813
Yes, and, uh, at the end of this segment, one lucky listener will win the prize that Anne has brought.

00:57:34.853 --> 00:57:35.793
Would you like to share what it is?

00:57:36.043 --> 00:57:43.014
Sure, so I, I enjoy doing artistic things, and if you were talking about Oregon, I don't know if people can see them.

00:57:43.213 --> 00:57:44.713
Yeah, there's cameras shining right at you.

00:57:44.713 --> 00:57:47.634
But these are pictures that I took.

00:57:47.634 --> 00:57:50.273
Pictures of Oregon that you've taken and turned them into greeting cards?

00:57:50.364 --> 00:57:50.893
Right.

00:57:50.974 --> 00:57:51.954
Oh, how pretty.

00:57:52.123 --> 00:57:53.838
So there's four of them, and these are all pictures.

00:57:54.159 --> 00:57:58.599
Pictures of places that I've been at in Oregon.

00:57:58.619 --> 00:58:05.349
They're all the, the ocean thing, kind of, I thought would be a good idea to, but yes, that's what I'm giving away.

00:58:05.349 --> 00:58:05.858
I love it.

00:58:05.869 --> 00:58:10.858
So, um, So we're, I'm gonna pull out, uh, this bowl.

00:58:14.298 --> 00:58:19.369
And there's going to be three professional or business or awkward questions in there.

00:58:19.909 --> 00:58:21.318
And so we'll be back in a couple minutes.

00:58:21.628 --> 00:58:22.380
Alright, sounds good.

00:59:05.724 --> 00:59:05.965
Alright.

00:59:05.974 --> 00:59:10.094
So, here's our new game to win a prize from one of our guests.

00:59:10.094 --> 00:59:15.730
And so, for the Custom, Greeting cards, we'll say, from Anne Barron.

00:59:16.210 --> 00:59:18.530
So choose three of those ping pong balls.

00:59:18.530 --> 00:59:19.711
Does it matter the color?

00:59:19.711 --> 00:59:21.269
No, it doesn't matter the color.

00:59:21.880 --> 00:59:27.880
Let's just have some variety in there, and then I will read the questions right here.

00:59:28.619 --> 00:59:32.219
So we've got 29, 30, and 8.

00:59:35.829 --> 00:59:38.010
So there's 8.

00:59:38.079 --> 00:59:39.210
I'm gonna read the other two.

00:59:39.934 --> 00:59:41.614
Myself before I choose the order.

00:59:42.795 --> 00:59:43.304
Okay.

00:59:44.594 --> 00:59:45.405
I've got'em.

00:59:45.405 --> 00:59:55.155
So I've got, uh, 29 is, uh, what's your death meal?

00:59:55.679 --> 00:59:56.340
Oh, death row.

00:59:56.340 --> 00:59:57.644
Row, Oh my gosh.

00:59:58.719 --> 01:00:01.425
So, uh, 30.

01:00:01.454 --> 01:00:04.485
What's the most surprising thing about running your business?

01:00:04.635 --> 01:00:04.844
Okay.

01:00:05.114 --> 01:00:06.614
And then eight is.

01:00:07.724 --> 01:00:10.204
What's your proudest achievement in business?

01:00:10.215 --> 01:00:11.644
So those are two a little bit similar.

01:00:11.644 --> 01:00:16.184
So I want to start with the business questions and then we're going to make the prize this week.

01:00:16.644 --> 01:00:29.114
Uh, if a listener, uh, DMs us on our Instagram page, I think we'll, we'll share it on our Instagram, but, uh, then the answer to Ann's question of what's your death row meal, that will be the prize.

01:00:29.375 --> 01:00:29.775
Okay.

01:00:29.844 --> 01:00:30.045
Yeah.

01:00:30.045 --> 01:00:32.635
We're doing a little, we're doing a little audience interaction.

01:00:32.675 --> 01:00:33.284
Great.

01:00:33.295 --> 01:00:36.494
So let's start with the proudest achievement in business.

01:00:37.960 --> 01:00:39.480
Proudest achievement.

01:00:39.760 --> 01:00:40.239
Wow.

01:00:42.300 --> 01:00:45.980
I would actually have to say starting my own business, and I feel like it's rather successful.

01:00:46.030 --> 01:00:46.789
Just getting it off the ground.

01:00:46.889 --> 01:00:52.409
Yeah, getting it off the ground and sticking with it for over eight years, because I have a really short attention span.

01:00:52.610 --> 01:00:59.139
Those people who know me really well know that I kind of jump around a lot, but this is something that I love.

01:00:59.139 --> 01:00:59.579
It feeds your passions?

01:00:59.639 --> 01:01:00.110
Yes.

01:01:00.750 --> 01:01:01.150
I love it.

01:01:01.269 --> 01:01:01.679
I love it.

01:01:01.750 --> 01:01:07.690
And um, so the most surprising thing about running your own business?

01:01:08.699 --> 01:01:09.650
The most surprising thing?

01:01:11.900 --> 01:01:16.980
I think it just takes a lot longer than you think it's going to build to what you would like it to be.

01:01:17.570 --> 01:01:24.980
So it's, I, I would have to say probably this last year is really built to the momentum and really kind of gain speed.

01:01:24.989 --> 01:01:25.460
Yeah.

01:01:25.460 --> 01:01:27.019
Where you want it to be or whatever.

01:01:27.210 --> 01:01:27.239
Yes.

01:01:27.329 --> 01:01:34.250
That's, uh, when we started Loco Think Tank, um, or when I started Loco Think Tank originally, but we, it's never been a me.

01:01:34.250 --> 01:01:38.320
Um, but a couple of years in, I had to do some.

01:01:38.974 --> 01:01:42.144
Some thinking about, uh, what Loco really stood for.

01:01:42.594 --> 01:01:48.394
And, and we settled with perspective, accountability, and encouragement was our main kind of pillars at the time.

01:01:48.574 --> 01:01:48.925
Right.

01:01:49.025 --> 01:01:51.894
And the thing you're speaking to is encouragement there.

01:01:52.394 --> 01:02:01.005
Like, even, like, even now, where you want to be is still, a fair distance away from you, where you are.

01:02:01.005 --> 01:02:05.894
And a lot of times as entrepreneurs, we can imagine like where we want to be and be like, well, you suck.

01:02:05.905 --> 01:02:07.735
Cause you're not where you want to be yet.

01:02:08.324 --> 01:02:10.114
But that's part of what makes us entrepreneurs.

01:02:10.125 --> 01:02:18.025
And so that encouragement from other chapter members in our case, or in your case, all the people that you're around that have seen you grow Northern Colorado community.

01:02:18.675 --> 01:02:21.295
They can be like, yeah, you're, you know, you're doing some great things.

01:02:21.934 --> 01:02:26.480
You might be, you know, You know, it might have took you eight years to be where you hoped you'd be in four.

01:02:26.619 --> 01:02:26.929
Mm hmm.

01:02:27.199 --> 01:02:29.719
Um, But it's perseverance to get there.

01:02:29.719 --> 01:02:32.550
So I think that's good wisdom Okay.

01:02:32.550 --> 01:02:33.730
Now you're Death Romeo.

01:02:33.730 --> 01:02:49.420
So you've been sentenced to death, but you've got the best chef you've ever met and You can have as many courses as you'd like Mike's right there with you if you want him to be And I'm gonna add to it to the Death Romeo Any any guests at your table?

01:02:50.110 --> 01:02:55.344
Would just be you and Mike in that situation Well, that's a great question.

01:02:55.514 --> 01:02:59.425
I would probably say eating Dungeness Crab with melted butter.

01:02:59.885 --> 01:03:00.324
Eating what?

01:03:00.445 --> 01:03:01.485
Dungeness Crab.

01:03:01.554 --> 01:03:02.425
Okay, yep, yep.

01:03:02.775 --> 01:03:04.045
Dungeness though, not king.

01:03:04.485 --> 01:03:06.045
Yeah, I grew up in Oregon.

01:03:06.054 --> 01:03:08.244
Dungeness Crab is the best.

01:03:08.434 --> 01:03:08.715
Alright.

01:03:09.125 --> 01:03:11.385
And fresh strawberries and then rice.

01:03:11.849 --> 01:03:12.570
Or noodles.

01:03:12.849 --> 01:03:13.179
Okay.

01:03:13.599 --> 01:03:14.190
Just like that?

01:03:14.289 --> 01:03:14.619
Yeah.

01:03:15.150 --> 01:03:16.670
Um, is it all together?

01:03:16.670 --> 01:03:17.719
Or these are courses?

01:03:18.360 --> 01:03:19.360
Probably all together.

01:03:19.369 --> 01:03:19.639
Yeah.

01:03:19.639 --> 01:03:20.269
Yeah.

01:03:20.269 --> 01:03:24.269
Um, and then accompanied by I'd probably just eat by myself.

01:03:25.019 --> 01:03:26.099
I'm on death row.

01:03:26.480 --> 01:03:28.150
I'm like, I don't want anyone else there.

01:03:28.639 --> 01:03:29.559
I just want to think about this shit.

01:03:30.630 --> 01:03:30.780
Eat my crap.

01:03:30.780 --> 01:03:31.559
What did I do?

01:03:31.559 --> 01:03:33.059
Oh, I killed too many people.

01:03:33.059 --> 01:03:33.449
Dang.

01:03:33.449 --> 01:03:33.980
Dang.

01:03:35.309 --> 01:03:37.840
You're wrongly convicted though, I was wrongly convicted.

01:03:38.389 --> 01:03:39.860
I didn't really kill those AIDS raiders.

01:03:39.880 --> 01:03:40.239
Yeah.

01:03:40.239 --> 01:03:44.340
They said Donald Trump killed them and they set you up for it.

01:03:45.050 --> 01:03:45.389
Yeah.

01:03:46.010 --> 01:03:57.454
Um, and then, uh, Oh, uh, accompanied by like, not just the people, but You mentioned earlier, you're not a teetotaler, but you don't really care about drinks or wine or whatever.

01:03:58.175 --> 01:04:01.985
Would you have a glass of red wine or would it be tequila if you're death rowing it?

01:04:02.724 --> 01:04:06.894
If I was probably going to drink some, it'd probably be like plum wine or some kind of a sweet wine.

01:04:06.894 --> 01:04:07.704
A very sweet wine.

01:04:07.704 --> 01:04:09.005
Daiquiri, that type of thing.

01:04:09.005 --> 01:04:09.295
Okay.

01:04:09.655 --> 01:04:10.934
Something real sugary and sweet.

01:04:10.934 --> 01:04:12.545
Alright, alright.

01:04:13.284 --> 01:04:15.434
Who cares about what's sugary if you're on death row?

01:04:15.434 --> 01:04:18.375
Right, if you're on death row, it doesn't matter what your waistline is looking like.

01:04:18.400 --> 01:04:20.199
Um, all right.

01:04:20.199 --> 01:04:20.889
Well, thank you.

01:04:20.960 --> 01:04:22.570
Thank you for completing all three questions.

01:04:22.570 --> 01:04:27.750
So the answer, uh, for listeners, uh, probably Dungeness Crab gets you there.

01:04:27.750 --> 01:04:32.019
If you DM our, our crew at the Loco Experience podcast, thanks for playing.

01:04:32.019 --> 01:04:33.940
We'll come up with more awkward questions next week.

01:04:35.179 --> 01:04:38.829
And then, uh, Encouragement to young people.

01:04:40.030 --> 01:04:53.469
Um, I'm thinking most, especially like, Maybe the, the middle schoolers or the, or the 15 to 20 year olds in the world today that are going to have to figure out, you know, you got kind of railroaded into dad's insurance agency, right?

01:04:53.510 --> 01:05:02.079
Like, not really, but yeah, it's kind of a little bit, you know, like I didn't know, like people told me I was smart at math and so maybe I should be an engineer.

01:05:02.130 --> 01:05:03.429
I was like, I don't know.

01:05:03.559 --> 01:05:05.329
I don't know what an engineer is or does.

01:05:05.329 --> 01:05:09.179
And thankfully I was blessed to have people that introduced me to engineers.

01:05:09.179 --> 01:05:11.760
I go spend a half day with them and be like, Oh, that's.

01:05:12.619 --> 01:05:13.000
Lame.

01:05:15.530 --> 01:05:17.130
But how do you, how do you figure that out?

01:05:17.130 --> 01:05:23.199
Who do you, yeah, what is your advice to the person that's figuring out what they want to do with their path?

01:05:23.690 --> 01:05:23.900
Yeah.

01:05:23.900 --> 01:05:36.389
If it's a middle school or high school, I would say probably go out and visit like what you did, different jobs or careers that you think you might be interested in, talk to those folks, find out what it's like, and also don't be afraid to fail.

01:05:36.610 --> 01:05:42.630
I mean, there's going to be things you're going to try and it's not going to work out or be really what you think it's going to be, but that's okay.

01:05:42.630 --> 01:05:49.389
I've had a lot of jobs that I thought, well, this was not going, going the way I thought it was going to, but that's fine.

01:05:49.789 --> 01:05:50.860
You just, you learn it.

01:05:50.929 --> 01:05:51.530
You learn from it.

01:05:51.690 --> 01:05:52.847
You put it in the pasture.

01:05:52.847 --> 01:05:53.050
Yeah.

01:05:53.050 --> 01:05:54.480
You learn from everything too.

01:05:54.530 --> 01:05:54.820
Yeah.

01:05:54.900 --> 01:05:56.760
You're a silver linings kind of gal, aren't you?

01:05:56.809 --> 01:05:57.199
Yes.

01:05:58.295 --> 01:05:59.514
Um, okay.

01:05:59.514 --> 01:06:03.454
And finally, the, the closing segment, the loco experience.

01:06:04.065 --> 01:06:08.655
And this is the craziest experience of your lifetime that you're willing to share.

01:06:09.275 --> 01:06:09.474
Okay.

01:06:09.934 --> 01:06:21.369
So I would say probably And probably the scariest was when I was living in Oregon in college, and my girlfriend and I, we were driving along the Oregon coastline.

01:06:21.380 --> 01:06:22.940
Okay, on the Pacific Coast Highway.

01:06:23.030 --> 01:06:24.480
Yep, Pacific Coast Highway.

01:06:24.639 --> 01:06:30.269
It was dark, and it was rainy, and we were talking about how she's a thrill seeker personality.

01:06:30.280 --> 01:06:30.309
Okay.

01:06:30.309 --> 01:06:32.289
So, she was driving rather fast.

01:06:32.300 --> 01:06:32.780
Okay.

01:06:32.860 --> 01:06:39.039
On a rainy road, and then all of a sudden, the car hydroplanes and goes cliffside towards the ocean.

01:06:39.059 --> 01:06:39.250
Oh, dang.

01:06:39.769 --> 01:06:41.329
And I'm thinking, okay.

01:06:41.554 --> 01:06:42.175
This is it.

01:06:42.614 --> 01:06:42.974
Yeah, I'm done.

01:06:43.304 --> 01:06:44.425
And I was 24 years old.

01:06:44.684 --> 01:06:45.534
I thought, this is it.

01:06:46.045 --> 01:06:46.625
We're dead.

01:06:47.085 --> 01:06:49.324
And all of a sudden the car just stops.

01:06:49.614 --> 01:06:52.675
So there's two passengers in a car and we just stop.

01:06:52.945 --> 01:06:56.664
We're, we don't go down into the ocean, thankfully.

01:06:56.965 --> 01:06:59.144
And just slid off the road, but it stopped.

01:06:59.364 --> 01:06:59.864
It stopped.

01:06:59.864 --> 01:07:00.065
Yeah.

01:07:00.065 --> 01:07:01.994
And, and there's not a scratch.

01:07:01.994 --> 01:07:03.295
There's no damage on the car.

01:07:03.295 --> 01:07:04.284
They come and tow the car.

01:07:04.284 --> 01:07:05.164
The car is drivable.

01:07:05.175 --> 01:07:07.025
We don't even have a bruise or a scratch on us.

01:07:07.054 --> 01:07:07.554
Nothing.

01:07:08.094 --> 01:07:12.795
And I asked, I wrote my autobiography about four years ago and I asked my girlfriend, I said.

01:07:13.355 --> 01:07:14.344
What stopped us?

01:07:14.344 --> 01:07:16.224
Do you remember what made us stop?

01:07:16.525 --> 01:07:17.864
And she said it was a bush.

01:07:19.045 --> 01:07:26.224
I don't know if you believe in angels or higher, you know, uh, higher I don't know if you do either, cause we wouldn't talk about it.

01:07:26.224 --> 01:07:29.164
I, so I do believe that there's something beyond myself.

01:07:29.235 --> 01:07:33.364
Uh, so I do really feel like my life was protected and saved that day.

01:07:33.364 --> 01:07:34.585
Like a guardian angel kind of an experience.

01:07:34.635 --> 01:07:35.025
Right.

01:07:35.025 --> 01:07:42.764
Because there's no reason a bush would stop a car going 60 miles, 60, 70 miles an hour on a road from going down.

01:07:43.780 --> 01:07:44.000
Yeah.

01:07:44.000 --> 01:07:44.289
Yeah.

01:07:44.329 --> 01:07:47.889
But, um, anyway, so that was kind of a pretty bizarre.

01:07:47.900 --> 01:07:52.119
You like stopped it and you like got out of the car like, okay, I guess we're not dead.

01:07:52.210 --> 01:07:52.550
Yeah.

01:07:52.550 --> 01:07:56.039
So I got out of the car and then there were some friends who were following us.

01:07:56.039 --> 01:08:00.099
So I flagged them down and we caught a tow truck and said, the car is drivable.

01:08:00.119 --> 01:08:01.900
We, we didn't even have a scratch on us.

01:08:01.929 --> 01:08:03.400
Nothing was wrong with us.

01:08:03.429 --> 01:08:04.719
But you let him, did you drive it home?

01:08:04.869 --> 01:08:05.090
Yeah.

01:08:05.219 --> 01:08:06.539
She was able to drive a car home.

01:08:07.119 --> 01:08:07.139
Yeah.

01:08:07.139 --> 01:08:07.719
She's like, okay.

01:08:07.800 --> 01:08:10.599
The car didn't even have a damaged grill or anything.

01:08:10.599 --> 01:08:10.775
Yeah.

01:08:10.775 --> 01:08:10.949
Yeah.

01:08:10.949 --> 01:08:11.125
Yeah.

01:08:11.125 --> 01:08:11.300
Yeah.

01:08:12.000 --> 01:08:20.810
Um, you just mentioned, and I forgot to introduce you as author and owner and founder of Northern Colorado Community, but you wrote an autobiography.

01:08:20.810 --> 01:08:22.779
What inspired you to do that?

01:08:23.430 --> 01:08:25.569
So I wrote the autobiography four years ago.

01:08:25.569 --> 01:08:30.909
I wanted to do it when I was 60 years old, but I did it at 61, at least got it finished.

01:08:31.289 --> 01:08:36.770
But the point was, I think, more reflecting on my life and then also hopefully people learning.

01:08:36.975 --> 01:08:46.204
Maybe things I did right and things that not to do like I said, the thing when I left the corporate world and ended up with a VW bug was all my worldly processions.

01:08:46.515 --> 01:08:53.354
But anyway, so it was kind of catalystic, kind of a catalyst on life lived.

01:08:53.574 --> 01:08:53.965
Yeah.

01:08:54.484 --> 01:08:59.130
And you get to that point in your life, you think, well, I'm going to look back on it and Got it published.

01:08:59.130 --> 01:09:00.010
It's on Amazon.

01:09:00.130 --> 01:09:00.510
Right.

01:09:00.859 --> 01:09:01.760
Okay, and what's it called?

01:09:01.970 --> 01:09:03.140
It's called Soul Girl.

01:09:03.239 --> 01:09:04.510
S E O U L.

01:09:04.560 --> 01:09:04.970
Okay.

01:09:05.079 --> 01:09:05.460
Soul Girl.

01:09:05.520 --> 01:09:05.859
Sure.

01:09:05.859 --> 01:09:06.520
Yeah, that makes sense.

01:09:06.560 --> 01:09:07.560
Born in Seoul.

01:09:07.659 --> 01:09:08.159
Yeah, yeah.

01:09:08.170 --> 01:09:08.909
South Korea.

01:09:08.989 --> 01:09:09.109
Yes.

01:09:09.180 --> 01:09:19.824
What an interesting path you've had to Did you And maybe we're not quite done yet, but did you, like, struggle with your cultural identity in any fashion?

01:09:20.444 --> 01:09:29.725
I'm imagining that in the, maybe not in your, probably more so in Portland, Seattle, there's a lot of Korean and Asian communities, but maybe less so in Eugene?

01:09:29.864 --> 01:09:31.255
Yeah, that is very true.

01:09:31.265 --> 01:09:35.375
Yeah, there's more multicultural in Portland and around the Seattle area.

01:09:35.694 --> 01:09:41.130
So growing up in Eugene The high school I went to had 1, 200 students, so it was a good size high school.

01:09:41.489 --> 01:09:45.859
And there was probably less than 20 non white students in that whole school.

01:09:46.149 --> 01:09:47.039
Oh, that's totally white.

01:09:47.069 --> 01:09:47.649
Yeah.

01:09:47.680 --> 01:09:48.060
Yeah.

01:09:48.100 --> 01:09:48.250
Okay.

01:09:48.550 --> 01:09:51.949
And so I did get teased and things when I was growing up.

01:09:52.319 --> 01:09:54.930
But the thing is, is that most people get teased for something.

01:09:54.930 --> 01:09:56.350
Maybe you were when you were short.

01:09:56.350 --> 01:09:56.859
I was quick to squirt.

01:09:56.859 --> 01:09:57.920
Yeah.

01:09:57.920 --> 01:10:00.460
Or they're too skinny, too, too heavy, whatever.

01:10:00.460 --> 01:10:00.630
Yeah.

01:10:00.630 --> 01:10:00.800
Whatever.

01:10:00.909 --> 01:10:08.380
Too tall, too short, but the thing is, is it's what makes you and you just learn to be resilient and yeah, and move on with it.

01:10:08.479 --> 01:10:09.840
Have you ever visited Korea?

01:10:10.060 --> 01:10:11.189
I did actually.

01:10:11.239 --> 01:10:15.149
So I was 39 years old and I went on a tour with other adoptees.

01:10:15.470 --> 01:10:19.079
So everyone in the group were all adopted and raised in America.

01:10:19.319 --> 01:10:23.250
Was that like a big common thing at the time?

01:10:23.609 --> 01:10:25.720
Like this was doing a tour of Korea.

01:10:25.869 --> 01:10:27.390
Like when you were, when you were.

01:10:27.750 --> 01:10:31.489
I don't know how old you are quite, but like, was this post Korean War?

01:10:31.739 --> 01:10:33.750
Was there like a wave of adoptions that happened?

01:10:33.750 --> 01:10:35.300
Was Korea really in tough straits?

01:10:35.329 --> 01:10:37.449
That's why there was a lot of kids being adopted and stuff?

01:10:37.529 --> 01:10:38.300
Yes, exactly.

01:10:38.300 --> 01:10:40.899
Korea was a very poor country after the war.

01:10:41.239 --> 01:10:43.289
And, um, so I'm 64 years old.

01:10:43.609 --> 01:10:47.039
And the Korean War was, I believe, in the late 50s.

01:10:47.239 --> 01:10:51.399
So there was a lot of, uh, babies, um, due to different reasons.

01:10:51.779 --> 01:10:57.279
Um, unwed pregnancies, or people couldn't afford to raise their children.

01:10:57.529 --> 01:10:59.149
So there was a mixed race.

01:10:59.210 --> 01:11:03.500
Yeah, was there even like American soldiers and Korean ladies and whatever?

01:11:03.500 --> 01:11:03.909
Yeah, right.

01:11:03.920 --> 01:11:07.319
And, and, uh, Whether professional or non professional kind of style, probably.

01:11:07.869 --> 01:11:10.005
And then back in those days, mixed race.

01:11:10.074 --> 01:11:13.444
children were discriminated against or looked down on.

01:11:13.845 --> 01:11:18.885
So, um, there's a lot of reasons, but Are you, do you know, have you had testing or anything?

01:11:18.885 --> 01:11:22.135
Are you Korean Korean or are you, like, potentially like a white Korean?

01:11:22.274 --> 01:11:31.244
I, I haven't had testing, but I think I'm probably Pretty much majority Asian of some kind, whether it's Korean, Chinese, Japanese.

01:11:31.244 --> 01:11:32.515
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:11:32.515 --> 01:11:35.015
I'm just kind of one of those people, I don't want to do the DNA test.

01:11:35.024 --> 01:11:35.234
No, it's okay.

01:11:35.564 --> 01:11:37.015
You wouldn't talk about it even if you did.

01:11:39.104 --> 01:11:39.954
Thanks for sharing.

01:11:40.314 --> 01:11:44.069
Um, listeners are, some of them are going to want to, Check out Northern Colorado Community.

01:11:44.069 --> 01:11:45.109
You want to give them a pointer.

01:11:45.640 --> 01:11:45.979
Right.

01:11:45.989 --> 01:11:48.890
So the website is NorthernColoradoCommunity.

01:11:48.890 --> 01:11:49.170
com.

01:11:49.439 --> 01:11:49.909
That was easy.

01:11:49.960 --> 01:11:52.640
And, and the Facebook page, same name, same thing.

01:11:53.060 --> 01:11:55.180
And you can contact me at either place, so.

01:11:55.210 --> 01:11:56.119
Yeah, you can find her.

01:11:56.159 --> 01:11:59.119
If you drop her a note, she'll contact you back pretty quick.

01:11:59.350 --> 01:11:59.739
Right.

01:11:59.829 --> 01:12:07.670
Well, and you've lived a very interesting journey, and you continue to add a lot of value to the, to the business community here in Northern Colorado.

01:12:07.670 --> 01:12:08.840
So Thank you.

01:12:09.010 --> 01:12:10.369
Yeah, thank you for being here.

01:12:10.479 --> 01:12:11.377
Thanks for having me.

01:12:11.377 --> 01:12:12.609
And I know you voted for Trump.

01:12:13.520 --> 01:12:16.439
Thanks for having me as a guest.

01:12:16.960 --> 01:12:17.800
I'll kill you later.

01:12:18.100 --> 01:12:19.920
No, no, it was fun.

01:12:20.789 --> 01:12:21.050
much.

01:12:21.789 --> 01:12:23.140
Appreciate it.

01:12:25.250 --> 01:12:28.779
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Loco Experience podcast.

01:12:28.859 --> 01:12:34.390
Proudly produced and sponsored by Loco Think Tank, Colorado's premier peer advisory organization.

01:12:34.909 --> 01:12:36.380
This is your producer, Ava Manouse.

01:12:36.789 --> 01:12:41.720
To find all of our episodes or nominate a future guest, check out our website at thelocoexperience.

01:12:41.720 --> 01:12:41.979
com.

01:12:42.510 --> 01:12:46.039
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01:12:46.210 --> 01:12:48.279
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01:12:48.880 --> 01:12:51.739
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01:12:52.069 --> 01:12:53.930
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