Collin is fueled by caffeine and rage. Brandon embraces late stage capitalism with car washes. We pick a book!

Fueled by caffeine & rage
Nose products
Fraud is how you make money
Banks or churches…for dispensaries
Car washes - late stage capitalism
Can you cook steak?
raging at city planners
We’re reading Great Expectations!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Expectations

Collin haikus

Counting syllables
Experience fills our page
More stories ahead
OR
We pause, then we write
This week, like all the others
Finds its perfect shape

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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

PROVIDED BY OTTER.AI

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

city planners, nose strips, community college funding, tax increase, election day, conspiracy theories, government distrust, urban blight, beautification project, economic development, micro foundry, winter reading list, Charles Dickens, Great Expectations, haiku anniversary

Collin Funkhouser 00:00

Oh. Welcome to Oh brother, a podcast where we try to figure it all out with your hosts, Brandon and Collin on this week's show, raging at city planners. Ahoy. Ahoy. How's it going? Not bad. How are you

Collin 00:24

I am, I am, well, I am fueled on caffeine and rage, so we're good.

Brandon 00:31

What a strange thing to say

00:35

late at night that's definitely, definitely healthy.

Brandon 00:42

It's not a great, yeah, totally good for your sleeping habit, right? I don't think, I don't think magnetic nose strip can pull you out of that.

Speaker 1 00:52

One, what about, what about two? Oh, yeah, one

01:01

and two. Oh, my goodness.

Speaker 1 01:05

Oh no, ah, why are you full of

01:09

rage? Oh, who isn't these days, you know, that's fair.

01:14

No, there's no rage here. It's all happy,

01:18

but it will say that I am

01:21

i i on the no strips things. So I've been wearing those. They've been great.

Collin 01:26

They have different sizes for, like, ostensibly, different size of noses. However, there is this, like, subculture of the no strips.

Brandon 01:42

I've seen this advertisement. I almost said advertisement,

01:49

out, out. Yeah.

Collin 01:52

So there is this subculture of these where they at the ask. The opening line is, have you made it to size

Brandon 02:01

four, it's not, it's not levels guys, yeah,

02:05

yeah.

Speaker 1 02:06

And it's all these like influencers who are asking this question, oh no about this. And they totally view it as this, as this like

Collin 02:19

system that you work through to obtain, I don't know, like enlightenment or something, make it your chakra. I don't know, but somebody on one of the posts I saw somebody commented and was like, it's not like that. It's for your nose size. And the company itself commented back, and they were like, we know this, because I think they were worried about being slapped with, like, false advertisement or something. You could tell they kind

Brandon 02:50

of, I mean, yeah, maybe something done like that, like, jumped

Speaker 1 02:53

on it. And they were like, this is these are claims not made by us, and this is just something that some of the fans of this product like to do. So,

Brandon 03:04

gosh, yeah, I see that on the thing on my like, it shows up every once while on, like, a YouTube ad or whatever it's like, if you even like, blah, blah, blah, like level four or five or whatever. Like, wait, I'm pretty sure that's not how that works. I don't think

Speaker 2 03:28

like that people, yeah, come on, man. And so this

03:33

was it yesterday.

Tori L. 03:34

Two days ago,

Speaker 3 03:38

Noah was having trouble breathing through his nose. Oh,

Brandon 03:45

and you're like, boy do I have something. I was like,

Speaker 1 03:48

Come hither. Let's see something, right? And I clipped, I got the little, smallest one that it comes with, so cute. And it would click,

Speaker 1 04:07

click, oh, it's great. And then he refused to take it off.

Brandon 04:14

Where have I heard this before? I know

04:18

it's so good. I'm like, attaboy.

Speaker 3 04:22

There it is. Yeah, we went to like we

Speaker 1 04:28

went to like function with our friends. He was out at the library with it on, representing, great. Oh my

Brandon 04:43

twin. What is happening,

04:44

right? I know it's so adorable. Beer.

Brandon 04:49

Look at his sister, completely ignoring him in the picture, not wanting to look at him,

Speaker 1 04:55

desperately wishing to disappear into the Lego Yeah. Like, Oh, my God, really

05:01

angry about what's going on. Like,

05:07

no, right,

05:09

don't they know you're not supposed to wear this all the time. I'm like, oh,

Speaker 3 05:14

except for the part where you are.

05:18

I know. I know.

Brandon 05:21

That's hilarious.

Tori L. 05:29

Yep, yep. It's great. It's great.

Collin 05:37

That's That was the biggest revelation this, this this week was

Tori L. 05:41

that you could, in fact,

Brandon 05:44

uh, have him wear that, and he loved it like, I know, not that you're up to level four, that that's not the biggest revelation

Speaker 1 05:51

of the week. Oh, no, I started at level four. What are we talking about? I didn't play games. People,

Brandon 05:57

internet. People take that. I came here

06:01

to get oxygen and high five and I'm all out of high fives people's

Brandon 06:10

boss, That's harsh.

Speaker 2 06:16

Real harsh, I know. So I'm don't mess around. I just went straight before I was like, Yeah, whatever.

Speaker 1 06:24

I have a massive nose, and it is massively damaged. So this must work.

06:31

Was all the thought process involved in what I

06:34

did. So that is a thought process, yes, indeed, it is,

Brandon 06:46

oh, man, yep, yep. Big election day today, spoilers, people, yeah, I didn't look at any of the stuff because I can't be disappointed again. So I

Collin 07:00

know in our local area there was lots of,

Speaker 2 07:07

oh, like the so this is, this is the other thing that's weird that I just had no idea about how certain things get their funding. We have a community college up by up by us. And it

Speaker 4 07:23

is partly funded by local like, sales taxes and property taxes. I didn't, I didn't know this, and they can independently request to have that raised. I thought that was something that was allocated at like, I don't know, like the county level, or something like, I don't know, but no, it's a specific line item tax that goes to the community college. And so they were requesting a tax increase for that.

Collin 07:54

And that it, I know that it did not pass.

Speaker 4 08:00

Yeah, nice, yeah. And it's, it's always, I love, how around elections, a everybody's an expert in everything. Which was very helpful to help cut through the clutter, is that everybody becomes an expert in, like, funding and taxes and, you know, land grants and weird things like this. You know, it's just, it's so much, yes, who knew how many experts there were just out there, hidden in the normal population. But it also is all of a sudden, like, just watching people dig up old stuff. It's like, it's so amazing. That's like, where, where was all of this interest, like, even a week ago, people, like, like, even just, like, a week why? Why? Suddenly, this is the thing that you're, like, really, really passionate about, and the you know a lot about, and I'm not to say that, like, because there's enough going on in the world that no one person can keep up with everything all the time. Like, I definitely understand. And if there's any point to become invested in something, it's around elections, to do your research and to look into stuff and like, know what you're doing and what's going on.

Tori L. 09:13

It's just like seeing the things

Collin 09:16

that people pop up with and like, there's sudden conspiracy theories too. That's the great part that I love watching, is like, these full fledged,

Brandon 09:24

obviously, like,

Speaker 1 09:27

conspiracy theories about why they're needing a tax increase and where's the other money gone. That was, I'm just asking questions over

Speaker 2 09:34

here. Don't mind me just, you know, trying to figure out

Speaker 3 09:39

you're like, oh my goodness, can you just, like, it's just so much, so much.

Brandon 09:48

Yeah, it's not that things are expensive. And also it really helps that the federal government did not pay for anything, you know, the thing that they're supposed to do that's very useful, yeah, as well. So like, you.

Speaker 4 10:00

That, yeah, well, and, and it's also it just doesn't help, because there's enough, at least in my little town, of like, distrust of government, which we can all agree that, like, a healthy distrust of government is good. Like, sure have that, folks. But like, to the point where they are claiming that the council members are making, like, raking it in on the backs, obviously,

Collin 10:26

our taxes, and it was so bad that, like, they had to read the the pay into the record, like, back into the record. Like, you can go look this up. They may, oh, yeah, right. Like, he was just like, Okay, I guess we'll read it for you. Like, here's what we make guys, because there was all these circulations, like, they're just raising taxes to line the pockets of them, and look at the money they're making, and blah their pay increases. And they're like, they to be on the council. They pay us $136

11:00

every two weeks, yeah,

Brandon 11:03

to be on the city council, you're making, if you're making money on the city council, it's through fraud, slash embezzlement, not just directly from Tech. That's not how this works, guys, come on. There has got to do a little fraud, right? You have to, like, cook the books a little bit. That's how it works. That's what you got to do. Everyone knows this, yes, like, you see it all the time, like, it's always, like, the random County Commissioner lady, or like, some random dude in the office that they all of a sudden have much money, like, where to come from? Ah, moving decimal points in a ledger. That's where it comes from, right? That's where it comes that's where it always comes from. Nice, simple, sneaky, that's that's how you do it. Yes, okay, it's not like, actual, just like, Oh, I'm just gonna take this money direct from the taxpayers, put in my

11:58

pocket. No, no, no. Has

Brandon 12:00

to go round about circuitous ways.

12:03

Yes,

Speaker 4 12:04

you have to find ways that suddenly, the county commissioners excavation business miraculously gets like, three fourths of the bids that they put out throughout the year, like, or they somehow, you're talking the subcontractor to the subcontractor, they're always the ones that haul the gravel, like, that's weird.

Brandon 12:30

Or you vote for a thing, and your friend's business gets taken care of, gets all the contracts, and then you get to go on, like, all of a sudden, your friend takes you on, like, magical vacations, I just out of nowhere, right? For no reason whatsoever, totally unrelated to all the business contracts received.

Speaker 3 12:46

See this, guys, that's how it actually works, right? Come on. I'm

Brandon 12:52

disappointed that people don't know this, right? I'm disappointed that they make up elaborate schemes when very simple schemes exist right in front of your face.

Speaker 3 13:05

Guys, you don't have to like create ways that people in those positions will take money, right? These ways exist, and they do it all the time. I mean, you don't pay attention to those ways. No, no, you like, you don't just be like, hey, auditor.

Brandon 13:27

Like, that's all you got to do most the time, right? Like, it's always the auditor. It's not, it's not dude. It the it the breakfast spot drinking coffee with like eight other guys, not him. You're not the detective uncovering situation. It's the auditor guy, right, looking at the book and being like, Wait a minute. Every month for the past eight years, $12 gets, oh my god, goes from this account of mysterious third party account. Boom, yeah, right, a mysterious third party account in the Cayman Islands. So strange. Who owns this one, by the way? Oh, it's a mysterious LLC. Yeah, guys, come on, this is just so disappointed. People don't

Speaker 2 14:26

know. I mean, quid pro quo. Quo is a is a thing. We have terms for this thing, right? Yeah, like it is one

Brandon 14:33

way, right? That's one way that happens, right? You give money to some politician, and then your name mysteriously appears on a plaque in a, I don't know, a ballroom or something, perhaps

Collin 14:46

like, that's, yeah, it's just, it's just just house or or that that that piece of legislation that you were really hoping wouldn't pass just gets, you know, lost at the behind the counter and never get seen again. You know, that's weird.

Speaker 3 15:00

Yeah, it's good. This we don't need, we don't need this crazy

Speaker 2 15:06

stuff, and it will never, like you said, Be as blatant as, like, No, I'm just gonna raise my pay by 40 800%

Brandon 15:14

Thank you. I mean, yeah, I mean, sometimes they do that, well, like, but that's not, not usually the county commissioner, this is, like, the state legislature. Well, sure the federal government, they do that county clerk is not really. I do the if you're looking to get into politics, to make money and be corrupt, I feel like county level politics is not really where it's at, right? No, gotta at least move up a bit from there, right? Like, or at least it needs to be a large county slash large city, not random small town in middle Missouri, okay, no, it's not, there's not even any, like waste management businesses there to, like,

Tori L. 15:55

take control of, Right?

Speaker 1 15:57

You know, mysterious, seriously or serious concrete business.

Brandon 16:03

I mean, there are, there's, there are, just, there are a large amount of cement businesses. Now, think about it.

Speaker 1 16:10

CFO mentioned hypothetical situation, mentioned by Collin earlier, about the county commissioner

Brandon 16:16

and his Yeah, but like, yeah, it's gonna be those things that you're not it's like gonna be like the

Speaker 3 16:22

dump truck thing, right? Is there a large amount of

Brandon 16:27

random, large amount of like, dump truck contractors in Missouri? Yes, yes. Give me one

16:35

of those. Just look over here. Yeah,

16:39

yeah. Come on. Disc test.

16:48

I learned.

Collin Funkhouser 16:50

Sorry, go ahead. No, you go. This sounds like a better segue. I don't know. I learned, speaking about things we have too much in the Midwest, we always complain about, like, banks, banks. So yeah, turns out that when they did the legalization of the greens here in the state,

Brandon 17:10

it's still federally banned, and so they can't bank anywhere,

Speaker 4 17:16

right? They can't drop off money, they can't run things right. They can't accept debit cards like they can't do those kind of transactions. So a lot of them will have a little ATM in the corner. They'll take your card, they'll walk over, they'll get the cash out for it, and then they'll have a cash transaction, and they they

17:33

basically have to self bank in order to do this,

17:37

yeah, which is totally

Brandon 17:38

safe, and those places never get robbed at all. Right? So I learned, I

Collin 17:43

learned that the goal, the like the most prized possession, locations

Tori L. 17:50

for dispensaries

Brandon 17:53

are old bank buildings. It's not strip mall. No damn what. Man, how all the ones I've seen have been doing

Speaker 4 18:00

it wrong. I know how. Many, how many old bank

Speaker 1 18:04

buildings are there? We right, like we don't. There's not very many of those, but that's true. I was talking to put different banks in them.

Speaker 4 18:11

Typically, another bank just slips in, but now they're the banks are competing with dispensaries for those locations because, yeah, because vault, they need the vault. They need to wear store all of this cash. And so it's actually created like little bidding wars across these towns for these old bank buildings and these

Brandon 18:34

strange bidding war it's too bad they also can't put them in old churches, because that's the other building that there is a lot of in the Midwest. It's either banks or churches. Every time there's a new building, right? If something is being built, the first two, the first two options are bank or church, right? Yes, one of these inhabits random strip malls. It's not the banks, but it is price,

Collin 19:03

yep, always, always, just, just count down, see how many, how long till we can figure out what it is. And and I never like looking at the signs, because I want to be like, I want to figure it out as it

Brandon 19:13

builds. A lot of times the sign is just like, oh, being built by so and so, yes, why doesn't help me, no. And then you just get disappointed. Like, the thing that we had built up here is like, what's is, like, what's it gonna be? It's a car wash.

Speaker 3 19:25

Wow, oh my gosh, that's not I have, there is car washes.

Brandon 19:32

I'm a bad car owner. I don't care what I know. I

Speaker 2 19:35

don't watch them either. But that's the that's the new hotness for if you pay, if you look at all of the coaches in the like. So there's a speaking of subsets of the internet. There's like this

Collin 19:51

whole communities dedicated to figuring out what is the best franchise to be a part of.

Brandon 19:57

Yeah by the dude bros. Yeah. Yeah, like they're dude bros, and they always, course,

20:04

this is my favorite. The

Speaker 1 20:06

YouTube videos typically start out like this, of like, if you had like, $100,000 in your bank, what would you what would you invest it in? What would you do with it? $100,000 in my bank, I wouldn't be watching this stupid YouTube video. Is what I'm doing, like, I buy, like, a pile of gold and be like, yeah, Scrooge McDuck in my

Collin 20:28

I would Yes, in my little my bathtub, I'd get out my little gold coins. I'd splash them

Brandon 20:32

around that much. I mean, in 2025, prices, probably like eight coins. But

Speaker 1 20:36

still, I would totally still bathe in something, right? Like, I wouldn't be watching video, but you're always like, yeah, if you have an extra five but 50,000 or $100,000 what would you invest it like? What a weird premise. I have

Brandon 20:51

said is a weird premise, that if I have an extra $100,000 I'm worried about not having enough money. Yeah, if I just have a spare $100,000 sitting around that I'm not using for anything, yeah, that I somehow need to make that I need to make more money in my life.

Speaker 3 21:15

Yeah? Like, that is, that is a sentence, I guess.

Speaker 4 21:21

Yeah, that sudden, suddenly, like I have, I've, I've sold my couch. It's as it's getting hauled out of my front door, 100 grand, just plops down in the entryway. And I go, Huh, well, what could I do with this? That's, that's not life changing in any stretch of the imagination or any, any sense of the man. I'll just, I guess, I don't know, I was gonna throw it out, but I guess if you could tell me something better to do with it, I'm all ears. And the new hotness in that world are car washes.

Speaker 2 21:53

This is, this is where everybody's wanting to put all their money and all their investments, because it's just this new hot thing that's kind of a bubble going on in the car wash world. And because it's, it's, quote, easy money, right? You just, you invest, and then people just pay you 20 bucks a month for the unlimited and all this

Brandon 22:14

stuff, yeah, first of all, subscription Car Wash service is about the most late stage capital thing I've ever heard in my entire life, right? Like, what? Guys, no, I'm not paying you a monthly fee so that I can wash my car. Are you insane? How often do these people think you need to wash your car. Because I can tell you the answer is actually a lot less than that, right? Like, this is not,

Speaker 4 22:46

I know and but, you know, I'm sitting here thinking, Yeah, but there are people who are in, like, if you're a realtor, if you're a lawyer, like, if you're a salesman, like, if you're these things, you could see how that would just become part of, like, what you're supposed to do to keep your car looking nice, so that your people impress. I don't know, like, I

Brandon 23:10

like how? Okay, let's think about this just like, let's, let's. Let's extrapolate on this very bizarre premise that everybody is in desperate need of to wash their car right?

Tori L. 23:27

Number one,

Brandon 23:28

you can't just invest, like random money here. A lot of times, if you're going to, like, you have to

Tori L. 23:34

construct a car wash, right?

Brandon 23:39

I suppose you could buy an existing car wash, but a lot of times you need to build the car wash, right? And so

Tori L. 23:50

I don't like that's not

23:54

nothing inexpensive,

Brandon 23:56

yeah, and not to mention a massive headache because of construction costs and fees and blah, blah, blah, then, right, you still have to pay. Like, I want to know, what is this ceiling for your water bill if you are

Speaker 3 24:15

running a car wash, right?

Brandon 24:18

Like, how many car washes is the city even going to be like? Yeah, we need more of that, because at some point they're going to be like, Guys, no, they're not granting a permit to build a fourth car wash, because that's dumb.

Speaker 2 24:36

So this gets to another point of watching local city and county politics is the role of the city planners in this and what people think can be done and cannot be done.

Speaker 3 24:59

We recently. He saw something about the Oh,

Tori L. 25:04

what was it?

Speaker 2 25:06

Oh, well, yeah, there was, like, this big community get together, and somebody was like, why don't we have a steakhouse?

Brandon 25:16

Because nobody's wanted

Speaker 4 25:18

to so, so that's how this meeting was like county commissioners, the mayor's work, the economic development people, the Chamber of Commerce, some other thing. It was supposed to be like, whatever, and they're like, why don't we have a steakhouse?

Collin 25:33

The Chamber of Commerce person turned and said, I don't know. Can you cook steak?

25:38

Yes, that is the correct responses,

Speaker 2 25:42

because people have this view of their local government that like they're the ones who are building this stuff like these are the same people

Brandon 25:55

that think anything that has the S word in it, socialism is the worst thing of all time, right? Like, oh my gosh, you're going to destroy the fabric of humanity. And then they're saying words like, why won't the city build a steakhouse? Like, I need you to understand that is absolutely the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my entire life, what is wrong with you, sir, sit down and never speak again. Like, what

Collin 26:27

it just it makes me so sad, because I'm going really, like, like, civics, like, no, like, you have no idea how you're you know your representative democracy works.

Brandon 26:41

Or like, how you want to open a steakhouse you like, obviously, like, the reason there isn't one is because not enough people would go, right? Nobody has, nobody has been like, yes, people will patronize this establishment. I can then make money.

Speaker 4 27:00

This is capitalism at work. The market has said no steakhouse so there's no steak house. Yeah, wanted try. You can, in our society, go try, like, and Godspeed. All the best to you, right? Like, it's just this. I The more I've paid attention to this kind of stuff as we've, like, worked as we've been involved in, like chambers and like economic development stuff and things like, I didn't know that that was a mindset that people had, that that the city people genuinely think the city is the one who builds these things, and the city is the one Who is Now sure, they have to approve

27:41

building permits. That's what they have to do

Brandon 27:44

the city. Somebody has to come to the city, in the chamber and whatever, and be like, Hey, we

Speaker 3 27:49

would like to open this thing. And then they can go, yes, or where

Brandon 27:55

are you going to do this? Where are you going to put this thing? Like, that's what they do. They say, Ah, this is a good idea. You can put it over there, right? Or they say, like, can I put it? Here? They go, No, but you can put it over there instead. Yeah. Like, okay,

28:11

yeah. Like,

Speaker 4 28:12

the zoning, right? Here's where they start zoning. Like, what do you zone to do?

Brandon 28:15

Because that is an industrial zone, can we cannot put a steakhouse there? No, no, no.

Speaker 5 28:21

Or that is a residential area, sir, you cannot put a smelter

28:26

in that. Build, yes,

Brandon 28:28

build a forge the school zone,

Speaker 1 28:33

not putting a concrete plant there, even though the county commissioner, anyway, no, like, it's just I then I get I get sad, because then I realize, like, these people, like, what do they think they're voting for? Like, what I what?

Brandon 28:51

Okay, you just said think in voting in the same sentence, and I need you to know that has not been the case for quite a

29:00

long time.

Brandon 29:02

You just look at the little letter next to the name, you're like, yep, that's what I'm voting for. I mean, all the rest of it, you're like, I don't know what these says. I'm not gonna vote on that.

29:11

And then that's what they do. That's what happens.

Brandon 29:17

Yeah, there's right. And then you get really, really mad about a roundabout for some reason, because that ain't American or something, I don't know, and they're just like, No roundabouts, because this really important building that hasn't been opened for 45 years needs to stand there empty on street corner. Yep, still there, still empty, still not in business. Oh, no. Real cool. Good job, guys, yeah, but we had to save that really important historic landmark for some reason,

Speaker 4 29:49

that's sad, yeah. And then you get the those, like, those, those underutilized properties and stuff, and, yeah, and this is where, again, the city, Collin. Involvement with local towns is, is tricky, because, like, I am definitely more for like, hey again, like, distressed government, like, let's not have, like, total control and power there. But I also go right, but they're the only ones who can make buildings more usable, in some cases, because, like, like, if, if there's a case where you can't get private and outside investment to revitalize and restore a certain area, it may behoove the city and county to do that, to buy that property, to spend money, to get the ball in the project rolling. Like, I can understand that, yes. And there are people who, like, who can't see that aspect, and all they see is, like, look at the city buying all this property. Look how greedy they are. Look at all this stuff and it's already in the city. What

Brandon 30:55

do you think they're gonna do with it? Like, right? It's, well, yeah, cuz that's what it is like. So this, I remember what I was going to talk to you about last time, like I discovered that the reason that I have jauntily and merrily painted fire hydrants, right, is that the city has they're doing like a renewal project, right? Where they are looking at like these little things, right? I believe they use the word urban blight, but that's weird for a town this mall, but anyway, I call it beautification, yeah? Well, they were combating, oh, that's what they

Speaker 1 31:33

urban blight, yeah? Like, it's, like, it's central St Louis. What are we talking

Brandon 31:39

Exactly? That's what I was like guys,

31:42

what ex nay on the Blight

Brandon 31:45

a right? It was just like, those, like, random things that, like, need to be done but haven't been done in a while, like painting certain things, or like, you know, relining some certain streets, or, like, the fire hyg, so what they've done is they have, like, gridded the city out into like, quadrants, right? And they're just, like, through, they've got it budgeted out through some point next year. They're just gonna, like, work. They're gonna go Quadrant by quadrant, yeah, doing the stuff, right? These little projects. They've like, earmarked Caleb, we're gonna, they're like, we're only going to do these certain

Tori L. 32:22

things right, and you're going to kind of roll through that, that, that, and

Brandon 32:27

then the plan is to, once they're all done with that, with like phase one, or whatever, they're gonna, like, look at because they've allocated money for this. So now they're gonna look at what money they've allocated for that like thing. And then, like I said, What can we do next? I just kind of like, roll through gradually, upkeeping and fixing like little things, yeah, including making cooler fire hydrants. Hopefully that's right. So this is what their plan is, I guess, to do that to make it like, like, the beautification thing. Because, like, they are trying to work on, like, the downtowny bit, right? They are. That's why they wanted to put the roundabout in there so that they could, like, make it more accessible from one end of the street, right? Like, bring more traffic this way. Like, there's just a bunch of buildings down there that are empty. Yeah, right. The thing that they said, everybody says, they always say, oh, man, I wish they weren't like that. And then they go, Well, what if we could do this? No, no, you can't do that like well, then it didn't. How are we going to help to fill them? No, just stare

Collin 33:43

at them. Just stare at them and be happy. No, this is exactly the thing of we in our town, the city has been forced to go in they buy foreclosed and derelict

33:54

houses and because

Collin 33:57

of you know of poor stewardship by the former owners, or they've just been straight up abandoned. And the city is like, we can't have these here, because this is tearing down property values in the area. So we have to destroy this home. Because, no, no, nobody is spending anyway money. Yeah, so we just have to destroy it. And then if worst case, we just get a nice little one, you know, little plot of park, or we're going to open this up to for people to buy, then and buy it from the city. And this is, this is seen as, as corporate and government greed in in our town, and people can't understand why this is happening, and the city doesn't need to own this stuff. And I'm going no this is exactly the purpose of having the government to come in and say, no one else is going to do this. We will take on the risk for you to take care of this. Because if we don't, this house is just going to sit there and rot and rot and finally collapse in on itself, and then somebody's going to get sued, because some. Got hurt, right? Like, yes, and then, and then, because if a town, oh gosh, like, I did, never knew how passionate I was about this stuff until I started to pay attention to stuff

Brandon 35:09

in our time. You say you're very wound up right now, oh my gosh.

Collin 35:13

Like, and so it's just like, it's like, what's the point of this? And it's like to create communities for for people, where they can have livelihoods and be safe and like, raise families and like, do all this stuff right, be educated and have a life and like. And then there is a role of private investment and outside investors and things like that. But also the city is contending with maintaining what they have and making sure that the infrastructure and everything is there. And I people just basically think what, you know, one side of the aisle will definitely go well, you just need to cut taxes and not stop, stop doing all this stuff and and just be be as little as possible and be as small as possible, and that has the detriment of under investing for the future to make it a place that people want to continue to live in in 50 years.

Brandon 36:10

And initially, right? Like, yeah, I don't. I just sometimes I want to ask people, like, what do you think the government is

Tori L. 36:20

for? Yeah, right. Like, what are you like? You'd say that they shouldn't do all of these things, but then what are they actually doing? What do you

Brandon 36:37

what do you think they should be doing? Like, because all these words that you're saying are like they shouldn't be taking care of people.

Collin 36:46

Yes, what, I think often it's a complete pushback against the like nanny state that is perceived of like they're going to tell me what side they're going to tell me what shoe I need to put on first, and there's going to be red tape, and there's going to be all this stuff. And like, Sure, we can, we can avoid that. But also we need to avoid having a government that's, that's, that's unable and inefficient, not not inefficient, but, like, useless, useless, right? Like, if you starve it of money and you starve it of resources and everything. Don't be surprised when everything is traveling in 15 years, right? Like, don't I'm

Tori L. 37:24

fine at some point, right? If, like,

Brandon 37:30

if you're really worried about the government telling you what you can and

Tori L. 37:33

can't do, maybe you should think about making better choices, right?

Brandon 37:39

Because a lot of the things that people are mad about, you're like, That's dumb. And why would you even do that? Like, that's a terrible like, why would you what? What is the point of doing that? Right? This is the response that everybody had when they were like, you have to wear your seatbelt, bro. And they're like, oh my gosh, what do you mean? I have to not die in a car crash. That's crazy. Like, what? Yeah, what? Guys? Or when they were like, guys, hey, guess what? Drinking and driving is illegal. Like, people freaked out about this, this. They were so upset. Have you seen these videos from like, the 80s? Like, oh my gosh,

Tori L. 38:16

wait, I can't do that. You're like, wait, what? What do you How is this the thing you're upset about?

Speaker 2 38:23

Yeah, yeah, you're right. You're like, what is to what end is this? And why don't you? Yeah,

38:31

like, some of the stuff, like, we really need to be crazy.

Collin 38:35

But one, that one that came up recently, so in our town, we actually had, it's called a micro foundry, micro foundry, micro smelter, or something. It's a, it's a micro Ford to make steel, right? And they and something that I don't know, like it the economic development the county and the city, basically the this big manufacturer came to them and said, We want to build here, basically. And they asked, and this happens everywhere you go. They say, make it attractive for us to build here. And so, you know, they have discussions on, like property tax rebates, or like discounted rates on electricity, or like X percent on water and things like that. And and they they negotiate that at the city, county and economic development level to see if they can put together a package that makes it worthwhile for these people to come in, invest and yes, and

Tori L. 39:30

like that, that's part of it,

Speaker 4 39:34

because you're trying to do what you're trying to attract people who are interested to come in and make jobs and stuff. And it's like, it's interesting, because you go, Well, sure, they have a cut rate on their electrical usage, but they did bring hundreds of like, really, really well paying jobs to the area, local jobs, people who. Are now buying houses and spending money at the, I'm gonna sound old at the car wash.

40:06

The car wash, right? No, they are grocery stores.

40:09

And so it's like this.

Speaker 4 40:13

The goal is, is that if the planners did their job, the company that's coming in has an incentive that the county and city will benefit from, on the back end, from the wages and sales tax increase that comes from those people living there. And they're going to have a time a payoff. Time horizon is that five years? Is that 10 years? Is that whatever? But the hope is, is that that's going to be a long term investment in the community to bring those there. And instead, what people view this as is, well, this is obviously cronyism, offering discounts to these corporations coming in, and this is obviously they must be getting underhanded deals to make this on them. And why did my property taxes go up? But they're stayed the same, and

40:59

I, you know,

Brandon 41:01

because they're generating revenue, right?

Speaker 4 41:06

And sure, can it go can it can it go wrong? Absolutely, I'm not saying can't, but I'm saying this is a basic principle of of of economic development and and trying to work with what you have. I don't know like it. I just see these arguments online and on city council meetings and things like that. And I'm going,

Speaker 3 41:27

you've, you've, you've never,

41:31

daughter generated anything in your what, what? Oh, my goodness, like

41:35

at all.

41:39

Okay, maybe this is the rage I was talking about, whenever

41:41

I think we found it,

Brandon 41:44

we have discovered it, right? We found it. Here it

Speaker 1 41:49

is. Turns out Collin is really passionate about county politics. This is, yeah, what a

Brandon 41:55

weird sentence. Okay,

42:00

here we go.

42:02

Oh, my goodness,

Brandon 42:03

Collin raging at city planning. That's what we've learned here.

Speaker 2 42:12

Yes. So yes, that's been my bug boo with bug bear recently is just listening to that. So,

Brandon 42:23

I mean, that's fair, because very confusing, so I don't

Brandon 42:33

anyway, this is all very it's fair. It's okay. I

Speaker 2 42:53

So did you want to talk about books? Yes, we need to talk about, okay,

Tori L. 42:59

all right, so what is

Brandon 43:04

winter reading mean to you? That's what we really gotta the heart of the matter.

Tori L. 43:10

Like,

Brandon 43:12

what are you feeling in the mood for,

Tori L. 43:15

right? Like, do you feel

Brandon 43:18

really disparity, or do you feel a little bit more whimsy in your life? Like, where are you right now?

43:27

Um, I, I

Brandon 43:29

don't worry. I'm not gonna recommend any toast away. It's too long.

43:32

Okay, okay, thanks, thanks.

Brandon 43:35

Need to be under 1000 pages for sure. Thanks.

Speaker 2 43:40

We're gonna steer clear from Ernst Hemingway,

Brandon 43:43

yeah, we just did that.

43:46

But there was one. There was one that

43:50

I in my

Speaker 2 43:51

thoughts. I did have one idea when I came across his his book, what is it? Winner Take nothing. I was like, Oh, yeah. Like, I don't need that in my life. Save that one

Brandon 44:01

for later, for some other time, right? You could revisit maybe, you know, I

Collin 44:07

It's This is tough, because also, I don't want to be like, too on the

Speaker 4 44:11

nose. But did we right, like, but did you? Was it? Was it you who

Collin 44:17

sent this over? Or did I have a fever dream about this, because I was recently thinking about doing was, was it Charles Dickens?

Brandon 44:23

Yeah, I did. I was at the bookstore the other day, like, oh, bro, yeah. I was I, you know, I was thinking Dickens, right feels wintry, yes, right, londony and foggy and stuff, right feels right,

Tori L. 44:38

yeah,

Speaker 2 44:39

yep, because I don't want to do anything too dark like night. Oh, right. No, right. Like

Brandon 44:46

not, we're not equipped to handle that. No, this is not that kind of show. All right, we are not really ready for, like we dabble in literary analysis because we're not ready. For there are certain books that we're just really not equipped to deal with. No right, like, they would be good, I think. But like, at the same time, also, I think maybe we are not the people that need to be maybe discussing them, you know,

45:16

the perfect ones. I think maybe,

Brandon 45:17

maybe you might be right, right? I don't know. I don't know. But like,

Speaker 1 45:23

No, I think I think we are bit too jovial and light hearted at times to cover

Brandon 45:29

the Well, I mean, at times, right? Except for see last discussion. But like, hey now counties.

Collin 45:38

So I do agree, because I had been thinking of Charles Dickens anyway, and then you had sent that over. And so I like that. But also I think there it might be interesting to do. I don't know, like I was also thinking Frankenstein may also be a really good one, because there's also, like, icy Arctic scenes and moody winter, like winter plays a big role in several of those things. So, yeah,

46:11

I know that's, uh, I have a few more, but like, where are you? No,

Brandon 46:14

that's fine. I just wanted to hear yours first. Like, I wanted to hear where you're at. So keep going, Okay,

Collin 46:22

it's definitely not again.

Tori L. 46:25

I'm trying to figure out, like

Collin 46:30

it's an interesting thought for me to be like winter reading list versus summer reading list, yeah, because when I think of winter, I'm definitely more in lines of, like, like, dark, moody, kind of more somber tones for that

Brandon 46:50

stuff. Yeah, that's kind of where it's developed recently, right?

Collin 46:55

Yeah, also with our overlying theme of, like, books you should have read in high school, things. So, like, there's like that too. So another one may, another good one maybe, like, Lord of the Flies. Oh, okay, so not

Brandon 47:09

winter, but it is, yeah, this is what I was thinking. Because I was thinking, like, I don't think also maybe I think, like, Faulkner might be a little heavy, but like, that's, it's a lot. It's usually like, hot southern blah, but it is also like despair,

Speaker 1 47:24

yeah, dramatically, thematically, it's cold, right? Somatically,

Brandon 47:28

it's wintery, right? So you know that I was thinking about that kind of stuff as well, right? Like, yeah. I was like,

47:35

yeah, yeah. That's,

47:38

I think that would be an interesting one too.

Brandon 47:41

So that's true for the flies will be good. Or I was also considering,

Speaker 3 47:47

just because we've talked about it so much, actually

Brandon 47:51

reading something wicked

47:52

this way comes, you know what? Yeah,

Brandon 47:56

okay, like, but, you know, or we could put that a list for later, too, if you want. But, like, I was like I was like that, you know, since we, since we reference that, you know, at least once a month,

Brandon 48:11

we don't need to read it, because we do reference it all the time. Yeah, it'll be funny, right? Like, you know, since we only talk

Tori L. 48:19

about it all the time,

Collin 48:21

all the time, you know what? And that would have a great follow up, because then we could talk

48:28

about the movie

Collin 48:31

and do comparisons between the media anyway. That's true.

Brandon 48:35

Well, there's media with other stuff too, yeah, find some sort of theme, theme here.

Speaker 3 48:39

Yeah, right. So all right, depending on where we go.

Brandon 48:43

But yes, so I was thinking about these issues. I had also thought about that. Those are basically what I thought. I was thinking about something Dickensian, right? Because it just feels

Tori L. 48:54

correct, right?

Brandon 48:56

I was also, I was looking at,

Speaker 3 49:00

I else

Tori L. 49:04

was I looking at? Right?

Brandon 49:06

Every list I just it's like, I'm having to, like, actively not look at it, because every single list keeps showing me F Scott Fitzgerald, right, right, yeah, and it was written in 1925 so that's like, really, kind of keeps showing up here all the time. Yeah, right. But I don't really want to read Great Gatsby. But I mean, could read, like, This Side of Paradise, right? Like something else that he wrote, uh huh. But I don't really know if I like Fitzgerald that much to go with that, but that would be a possible option. And then the other book that I saw that was, like, wildly interesting, was worth ring heights, because that's all like, weird and like, yeah, creepy mansion II, with like, weird people in it and stuff like that. So I don't know, plus a Bronte sister, so, you know. It. So,

Speaker 3 50:04

you know, yeah, huh, that's where I was at, what I kind of come up with. So yes,

Brandon 50:15

that's where I was pondering today, is I was just staring at all these being like, Huh,

Collin Funkhouser 50:20

what would be? What would be, would be a good one, good one here, yeah, I man, I'm, I'm kind of leaning towards something Dickensian, okay, as really what I'm thinking here? Okay, I like this plan, yeah, yeah, I think. I think that's what I'm all right, what we need to do here. I

Tori L. 50:53

think that's good, right?

Brandon 50:55

I sent a picture of Oliver Twist just because I felt like one might be not too bad. And the book that I looked at in the store was like, not quite as long as the page count would lead you to believe, because there's, like, a big appendix in that book, for some reason. And I was like, What? What is their appendices in Oliver's weird, but either that one or what's the other one that's, like, very, great expectations. Great Expectations. Yeah, what's the one? That's the other. It's the orphany boy one, right? Yes, yeah, Pip. That's Pip, apparently, yes. So I was thinking, like, maybe one of those, unless you had another Dickens one, unless you were really going for a tale of two cities, like, I don't know, really, for that French Revolution.

Speaker 2 51:45

But you know, as much as I remember about that book, I don't, as much as I enjoy la revolution, I will not know. I think, I think I've and maybe it's just because Lillian is going is also reading all of her twists that I'm like, I don't know. I don't know if I want to do that one because she is or maybe we just go full winter and do a Christmas carol. I don't know. I'm just saying, Oh my gosh. You just really, you know, I think, I think maybe we do great expectations. Okay? I think there we go. I think that's what we should do, great because, yes, it's the, it's the, it's the Dickinson. You didn't expect. I don't know

Brandon 52:33

that is true, right? If we're going with our Twain approach, right? Not first choice. Yes, we would like the third choice Dickens or third choice Twain. So why not? Plus, I think the other one that's like, really famous is like, Oh yeah, Bleak House is like 8 billion pages long. I think so,

Tori L. 52:58

yeah, well,

Speaker 4 52:59

that was because these stories were written, most of his stories were written in weekly serials that were later than collected and put into book form and shoved together. Yeah, right. Plus Great Expectations is from later in his life, too. So true. I think that, that I don't know, like that might be an interesting thing to at some point, read Great Expectations alongside Oliver Twist and compare them.

Brandon 53:25

Oh yeah, that's true. Good thoughts. I

Collin Funkhouser 53:29

like this, so, yeah, I think, I think we'll do Dickinson Great Expectations. All right. There we go. So I need to blame that. Look at that efficiency there. Ha, Oh, dang, all right,

Brandon 53:43

well, but we definitely

Speaker 1 53:49

have you could definitely still change it. Change your mind. This is not binding in any way, shape

Brandon 53:53

or form. Oh, no, I think I'm okay with this, because I was already

Speaker 3 53:55

thinking, Dickens. Okay, yeah, right, that's fine, yeah. So big famous one, yeah, I'm okay with this plan. Okay, yep, totally found me very good. We will do this one. Love it. Boom.

Brandon 54:10

Okay, good, dad. There we go. Do

Speaker 3 54:19

official, official, official. Okay, great.

Tori L. 54:24

Well, I had

Speaker 4 54:27

the auspicious and daunting task of writing a haiku on our exactly two year anniversary from starting our haiku shitting.

Brandon 54:37

I looked it up and everything I know, I actually made a calendar note of printing myself. Are you proud of me? I am. I did a thing. I professionals here at the brother podcast, absolutely,

Speaker 1 54:49

absolutely crazy that two years we have been doing this haiku thing. So

Brandon 54:56

because I randomly decided to write a haiku about the. Annoying cricket in my house.

Speaker 2 55:02

Uh huh, yes, yes, you did. You wrote a cricket Haiku, and then my next one was the train haiku about doing I think because we went to a train Expo doing stuff there. So trains big feature here on, oh brother. It turns out they always come back around.

Brandon 55:24

But got a little recurring theme, yes, important,

Speaker 2 55:27

I know, I know. So I wrote not one, but two haikus. Oh, my goodness, what? I figured I could do that to celebrate two years. So, two year, two haikus,

Brandon 55:41

dang Look at

55:45

that. Kind of is

55:47

professionalism, that is, that is,

Brandon 55:49

that's setting a dangerous precedent at the same time.

55:55

And they're kind of both around, I think, the

Collin 55:57

same, same ish, ish theme here. So, so my first one is, I

56:02

think I did these right anyway,

Speaker 3 56:05

counting syllables. Experience fills our page. More stories ahead, yes.

56:17

And then the second one is,

Collin 56:20

we pause, then we write this week like all the others, finds its perfect shape.

Speaker 1 56:29

Oh, man, the double whammy, the double whammy about writing haikus. I know

Brandon 56:39

that's insane. I think haiku about haikus, what? Yes,

Speaker 1 56:47

yes. So that is, there we go. Here's to many more good, good. I know. I know. I do. I do intend to find a way to collect all of the I need to collect all these in some way. And, I mean, I do have all them written down, and they're in transcripts, so it's

Brandon 57:08

copy, paste them into something. Yes,

57:10

I need to get them in just a haiku document. Is what I'd like to do. Oh, that is true, yeah, yeah, be easier to publish eventually, that way talking about

Collin 57:20

and the public, it's going to be, it's going to be a booklet, and the haikus, it's going to be one Haiku, maybe two haikus per page. And what it's, what it's actually going to be, is this going to be a daily haiku.

Speaker 1 57:35

Read a lot, Reading calendar, and it's one of those, like you just flip the page to the next haiku.

57:43

Yes, let

Brandon 57:45

me know how I can assist in making this possible.

Speaker 1 57:51

Brad, yeah, I think that that'd be fun and just a daily Haiku, little flip calendar. I need to figure out how to like where to go for that thing and just have, I don't know, but this is, this needs to be done. So

Brandon 58:04

yes, that'd be sweet.

Speaker 1 58:08

There you go. Okay, well, we will plan out

58:14

our reading program, all right, and

Brandon 58:16

find this book somewhere, I know, go.

Speaker 2 58:20

Go for that. Get it boom, perfect. Done. Very good. Well, we will do this again soon. All right, okay, Love you. Love you too. Bye, bye. You.