Podcasts about functionally

In this week's edition of Overdrive Radio, Hotels4Truckers.com proprietor Dan Fuller, former driver and independent owner-operator, details completion of a project years in the making. The website and now mobile app as well got its start simply as a cataloging of hotels around the nation where parking a tractor and 53-foot trailer was not only possible but welcomed, provided for by the hotel facilities. Within the last year, users of Hotels4Truckers.com, though, noticed some significant changes, boosting the seamless-experience factor with booking possible now, with discounts, right from the site itself. Functionally, Fuller said, "We're like Hotels.com for the trucking industry now. Tell us where you're looking, you do your dates, and all the hotels come back" with a search, showing the discounted rate available to Hotels4Truckers users and with a built-in parking filter you can use to show only sites where parking's available. The new website soft-launched back last Fall -- legacy users, Fuller added, will need to re-register if they haven't already -- and ever since he's been tweaking the design and adding hotel chains and truck parking-friendly facilities. In total, close to 13,000 rooms are represented within the platform (many with parking) among dozens of hotel brands. In Canada, too, with a very recent update for users up North. That just so happens to be where Dan Fuller lives today -- he came off the road in 2017 after much of his life spent headquartered near Detroit. A second marriage to a Canadian health-industry specialist took up to rural far Northern Ontario, where he's been hard at work building out the new version of his longtime service. I'm willing to bet he's looking forward to warmer climes as he preps for an official launch of the new Hotels4Truckers.com upcoming at the Mid-America Trucking Show in Louisville, Kentucky, next month. (You'll find him in the North Lobby near the main registration -- attendees can sign up for the service there for free and with a special gift as part of the bargain. I think it will be worth the visit, I'll say, for now.) In the podcast, Dan Fuller lays out his personal story trucking, likewise the 15 years or so he's spent at work building a network of discounted hotels and with, as noted, verifiable intelligence about whether tractor-trailer parking is available at any site. Find Hotels4Truckers via https://hotels4truckers.com and via iOS and Android app stores. More Overdrive Radio: https://overdriveonline.com/overdrive-radio

Winegrowing regions in Washington State have many unique challenges from salty soils, to low organic matter, to nematodes. Devin Rippner, Research Viticulture Soil Scientist with USDA-ARS and his colleagues at Washington State University are developing a research vineyard to study soil health building practices. They are testing a variety of management strategies including adjusting irrigation volume to correct for salt build-up, mowing for weed management, compost applications and synthetic fertilizers, and different cover crops. The team is tracking the cost of each practice and will ultimately evaluate wine quality in the coming years. Taking a deeper dive into the future of soil sampling, Devin explains X-ray CT imagery. He has used this technology to evaluate the structure and organic matter from soil columns and aggregates. X-ray CT imagery has also been used to evaluate the impact grape seeds have on tannin flavor profiles. Resources:         80: (Rebroadcast) The Goldilocks Principle & Powdery Mildew Management 90: Nematode Management for Washington Grapes A workflow for segmenting soil and plant X-ray CT images with deep learning in Google's Colaboratory Devin Rippner, USDA ARS Functional Soil Health Healthy Soils Playlist Red Wine Fermentation Alters Grape Seed Morphology and Internal Porosity Soil Health in Washington Vineyards Vineyard soil texture and pH effects on Meloidogyne hapla and Mesocriconema xenoplax Washington Soil Health Initiative Vineyard Team Programs: Juan Nevarez Memorial Scholarship - Donate SIP Certified – Show your care for the people and planet   Sustainable Ag Expo – The premiere winegrowing event of the year Vineyard Team – Become a Member Get More Subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss an episode on the latest science and research with the Sustainable Winegrowing Podcast. Since 1994, Vineyard Team has been your resource for workshops and field demonstrations, research, and events dedicated to the stewardship of our natural resources. Learn more at www.vineyardteam.org.   Transcript [00:00:00] Beth Vukmanic: Wine growing regions in Washington State have many unique challenges from salty soils to low organic matter to nematodes. [00:00:13] Welcome to Sustainable Wine Growing with the Vineyard Team, where we bring you the latest in science and research for the wine industry. I'm Beth Vukmanic, Executive Director. [00:00:23] In today's podcast, Craig McMillan, Critical Resource Manager at Niner Wine Estates, with longtime SIP certified vineyard and the first ever SIP certified winery, speaks with Devin Rippner, Research Viticulture Soil Scientist with USDA ARS. [00:00:41] Devin and his colleagues at Washington State University are developing a research vineyard to study soil health building practices. [00:00:49] They are testing a variety of management strategies, including adjusting irrigation volume to correct for salt buildup, mowing for weed management, Compost applications and synthetic fertilizers and different cover crops. The team is tracking the cost of each practice and will ultimately evaluate wine quality in the coming years. [00:01:08] Taking a deeper dive into the future of soil sampling. Devin explains X ray CT imagery. He has used this technology to evaluate the structure in organic matter from soil columns and soil aggregates. X ray CT imagery has also been used to evaluate the impact that grape seeds have on tannin flavor profiles. [00:01:28] Now let's listen in. [00:01:29] Craig Macmillan: Our guest today is Devin Rippner. He is a research soil scientist with the USDA agricultural research service. He's based out of Prosser, Washington, and he's also an adjunct in the department of crop and soil sciences with Washington state university. [00:01:46] Devin, thanks for being here. [00:01:48] Devin Rippner: Absolutely. Pleasure to be here, Craig. [00:01:50] Craig Macmillan: You are on the leadership team of the Washington State Soil Health Initiative. I think it's a pretty cool little program. Tell us what it is and what it's all about. [00:01:59] Devin Rippner: Yeah, absolutely. So the Washington State Legislature allocated funding to study soil health and soil health building practices in a variety of agricultural systems and so to access that money a number of groups put in competitive proposals at the Prosser Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center, we put in a proposal to study soil health in wine grape systems. [00:02:24] Originally, we actually had it in juice grapes as well, but we were not able to get enough funding for both. Juice grapes are actually a big product out of Washington. [00:02:32] Craig Macmillan: I did not know that. That's interesting. What varieties? [00:02:34] Devin Rippner: Mostly Concord? [00:02:36] I'm less familiar with it. It's something I would, I would like to work in cause they have different constraints than wine grapes. [00:02:41] Ours is focused on wine grapes, but there are systems looking at tree fruit, at potatoes, at small crane cropping systems. There are a variety of systems that are being evaluated. [00:02:54] Craig Macmillan: I looked at a flyer that kind of outlined some of the ideas and issues around , the Wine Grape part. Can you tell us a little bit about that? [00:03:01] Devin Rippner: we have fairly unique soils. We have pretty alkaline soils here in Washington. We're on the arid side of the Cascades. So think Reno rather than like Seattle. we tend to accumulate salts. We also have very coarse textured soils. So a lot of sands to sandy loams or loamy sands. Very little clay. [00:03:23] We have typically under 10 percent clay in a lot of the grape growing regions of washington. we also have low organic matter, because it doesn't rain much here. There has never been a chance for a lot of plants to grow. And so we just have never really built up organic matter. So we typically have about, let's say, maybe 1 percent to 2 percent organic matter in our soils. [00:03:44] That's about half a percent carbon to 1 percent carbon, which is typically it's pretty low for a lot of soils. [00:03:50] Craig Macmillan: It is. [00:03:51] Devin Rippner: those are some of, some of the like unique challenges around soil health. There's also problems with pests. Haven't had too much of an issue with Phylloxera. That's changing. [00:04:01] There are a variety of nematode pests that cause problems in grapes here. When you plant a vineyard into an old vineyard, you're basically putting baby vines into a place that might have a bunch of pests that aren't a big deal for really mature vines. [00:04:14] But as soon as you put a baby in that environment, it does not thrive. [00:04:18] Finding ways to deal with nematode pests, things like that over time , is really important. So those are kind of the things that we are, we are looking at, at our site. [00:04:27] Craig Macmillan: What kind of practices are you investigating to address these things? I hadn't really thought of that about it till now, but nematode is a good one. that's a tough pest. [00:04:37] Devin Rippner: funny thing is this is a long term site, right? So, so our practices for those will really come later. I had a nematologist that worked for me. And she evaluated our soils for for the pathogenic nematodes for wine grapes, and we don't really have them but the thing is they build over time, right? [00:04:52] Just because there might be a few in that soil But when they start colonizing the grape roots over time, they can become problematic We functionally have a rootstock trial at the end of all of our experimental rows and, and rootstocks have been found to be very effective at preventing nematode problems or decreasing the severity of nematode problems. [00:05:13] We will be able to kind of look at that with our rootstock trial. [00:05:17] Craig Macmillan: Do you have any of the GRN stocks in that? [00:05:19] Devin Rippner: We don't, so we have own rooted vines and then we have Telekey 5c 1103p 110r. Let's see then I think St. George [00:05:30] I'm trying to remember what, what the last one is. It's escaping me right now. I apologize. [00:05:34] Craig Macmillan: Well, no, it's all right. Some of the more common root stocks, basically the ones that are very popular. [00:05:39] Devin Rippner: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [00:05:41] The reality is that a lot of the like vitis rupestris, vitis riparia, , they are less prone to nematode parasitism. Than Vinifera. , that's the reality of it. [00:05:50] Craig Macmillan: Yeah. Less susceptible. I think it's probably the best way to put it. Nothing's bulletproof when it comes to this, this problem. [00:05:57] Devin Rippner: And Michelle Moyer in Washington has been doing a lot of work with this, with Inga Zasada, who's a USDA scientist. And their, their results are really cool. They're finding that when you try to fumigate, it helps for a little while, but the rebound is bad, and it's just easier to just use rootstocks. [00:06:15] Craig Macmillan: Yeah. Talk to me a little bit more about, you said salinity can be an issue [00:06:19] Devin Rippner: Yeah, [00:06:20] Craig Macmillan: So here's the, the back and forth on that. You would think that a, a coser, your textured soil salinity would be less of an issue, but you don't get the rain to take advantage of that. Is that , the issue here? [00:06:30] Devin Rippner: 100%. That's exactly it. We build up layers called caliche layers, which are evidence of a lack of water moving downward. [00:06:38] So it's, it's really evidence of water moving down and then back up due to evaporation. We get big buildups of carbonates in our soils and carbonates are a type of salt. [00:06:48] So as you apply other chemicals, Salts, a salty irrigation water , we tend to build up salts in our soils. A lot of our irrigation water comes from the Yakima River or other rivers in the area, columbia River. But there are places where people are on deeper wells and they are seeing salt accumulation in their vineyards. [00:07:06] And it's, it's really challenging to deal with. [00:07:09] Craig Macmillan: Do you have any strategies that you're looking at? Anything you're trying out? [00:07:13] Devin Rippner: at our site over time, we're going to look at higher irrigation volumes versus lower irrigation volumes and seeing if that will change the accumulation of salt at our site. , that's kind of the main experiment around that with our soil health vineyard. [00:07:27] Craig Macmillan: Obviously you're doing this with some pretty salty irrigation water and you're comparing that to less salty water. At one site, you're only gonna have one type of water, right? [00:07:36] Devin Rippner: Right. That's not something that we'll be able to do, but one of the interesting things is we are applying compost and. Our compost can be pretty salty. [00:07:45] So we'll, we'll be getting compost. That'll be kind of four decisiemen per meter. I I'm sorry to use those units and so that, so that is salty. [00:07:54] Craig Macmillan: Yeah, it's salty. [00:07:55] Devin Rippner: Young grapevines, if they grew only in that, they would really struggle. It's over the, the two deciSiemen per meter kind of threshold for grapevines. That's something where we're, you know, we are using clean irrigation water, but some of our amendments coming in can be saltier. [00:08:10] When we have kind of a, a low and high irrigation treatment, we can evaluate the salt accumulation in the root zone. From that particular amendment, right? [00:08:19] Craig Macmillan: What about other types of fertilizer? Are there organic fertilizers or something like that that might be less of a salt contributor than let's say a traditional nitrate based fertilizer? [00:08:28] Devin Rippner: As it turns out, at least for us, we don't apply. a massive amount of nitrogen to our grapevines, so we're often applying between 20 and say 60 pounds of N per year which is not a lot compared to say corn or, tree fruit or, or hops or things like that. [00:08:45] And so we, we don't, Exactly. Expect to see a buildup of, of those salts over time. Honestly, some of the organic amendments end up being saltier than our fertilizer. [00:08:55] That's something when we do a high and low for irrigation, we will be able to look at the accumulation of, of nitrates and things like that. [00:09:02] Cause in our arid environment, you do get accumulations of nitrate, which is kind of funny. [00:09:06] Craig Macmillan: Yeah, that's interesting. You also mentioned the soil pH, alkalinity. What, what's going on there? How bad is it in different spots? What can you do about it? I, I'm fascinated by this because like when you look at viticulture, you have like a lot of knobs on the mixing board, right? You got a lot of sliders and, Soil , you can't slide it very well. It's like very hard to make changes to soil over time. [00:09:33] Devin Rippner: it is. [00:09:33] Craig Macmillan: very slow and very difficult. So I'm very interested in , this issue here. [00:09:39] Devin Rippner: It's funny at our site, the soil pH isn't too bad. It's about 8. Across the board, from the, from the top that so, so we've been measuring from the top of the soil down to about 90 centimeters. About three feet. We do see a pH tick up in our sub soil, but still it's, it's around the eights. [00:09:56] We actually have a lot of carbonates in our soil. There's only more organic carbon in the top six inches of our soil. And from that point on, most of our carbon is in the form of carbonates. [00:10:06] Which is kind of unique. And so once you get down to like 60 to 90 centimeters, so two to three feet in the soil, functionally, 90 percent of the soil carbon is carbon from carbonate. [00:10:16] So dealing with that in the region there's wide variation, so people that are planting into old wheat ground where they've used a lot of ammonium based fertilizers or urea, the pH can be in the fives. And then I, I mean, I've measured soil pH is up to about 9. 8 around here. So, so quite high. [00:10:35] Those soils are hard to deal with. So these are carbonate buffered systems. So to try to lower the pH, you basically have to get rid of all the carbonates. And that is not really feasible. We do see in some of the vineyards that we work in. And again, a lot of this data is preliminary. [00:10:51] I'm trying to get stuff out right now. Getting the vineyard set up has been a massive undertaking. And I've been lucky to work with a great team to, to get it done, but it has taken a lot of my time. [00:11:01] Um, but we, we do see seasonal fluctuations with irrigation. So soils might start off with a pH around eight drop over the course of the growing season into the sixes and then as they dry down for winter time. So we cut irrigation. The pH will start to rise back up as the carbonates move from the subsoil to the surface. [00:11:21] Craig Macmillan: Interesting. Interesting. Let's talk about your vineyard. If I understand correctly, you have a research vineyard there in Prosser that you are building from scratch or have built from scratch. Is that true? [00:11:30] Devin Rippner: Yes. . It is a new vineyard to study soil health building practices. We just finished our second season. And we were very lucky. Vina Matos which is a company out of Portugal. They mechanically planted it for us. [00:11:45] Scientist, so it's, it was, yeah, it was a bit of an undertaking. Even now I've gotten a lot better on a tractor than I was. And, you know, I like to run, like, I'd like to do x ray stuff. And then I'm out there on a tractor, like, yeah, doing stuff. It's a unique challenge. [00:11:59] So we do have a vineyard manager Dr. Liz Gillespie is the vineyard manager. , she honestly does most of the tracker work. I only sub in when she's down with an illness or something like that. [00:12:09] It's been a team effort for the last couple of years. [00:12:12] Craig Macmillan: What are you doing in there? You've talked about a couple of topics, but, and how big is this, this vineyard? [00:12:17] Devin Rippner: It's not that big. It's about 4. 1 acres. , [00:12:20] Craig Macmillan: that's, you know, for research, that's good. [00:12:22] Devin Rippner: yeah, yeah, it is good. We functionally have a business as usual. So we call it our Washington 2021 standard. So it's kind of what growers just do. So that's spraying undervined for weed control and then just let resident vegetation pop up where it may and mow it down. [00:12:39] Most people don't spray or till , their tractor rows. They just. Kind of let it go. We don't get that much rain. You end up selecting for annual grasses it's actually a pretty good weed composition for a tractor row. So then we start building from there. [00:12:52] One of our treatments is what if you just mowed everywhere, right? The goal is to select for annual grasses everywhere over time. [00:12:59] And then we have another treatment where we're mowing everywhere. But we're applying compost for fertilization. Our other treatments get synthetic fertilizers for fertilization, and then we have our compost treatment where we're mowing. [00:13:12] Then we have an undervined cover crop, so that's like our cover crop treatment. [00:13:16] We're curious about undervine legume cover crops. So we have a short subterranean clover that , we've seated in to hopefully eventually start adding nitrogen to the system and, and hopefully we'll be able to back off on more of the synthetic fertilizers over time in that system, but we'll let the vines guide us, right? [00:13:35] Craig Macmillan: What species of clover is that? [00:13:37] Devin Rippner: I'm not sure the exact, so it would be like Dalkey. [00:13:39] it's a clover that basically has low flowers and shoots seed downward. And so , that allows it to replant itself really effectively. [00:13:47] The flowers tend to be below the foliage. So we won't have to worry about mowing them down too badly. , they stay low. And so that's why we selected that. just to try to keep the flowers low and keep foliage away from our vines. [00:14:01] Craig Macmillan: Anything else? [00:14:03] Devin Rippner: Yeah, so then we have our aspirational treatment, which is kind of a mix of the subterranean clover cover crop. And then we have compost fertilization and then kind of breaking the full factorial. We're actually changing what's in , , the tractor row. We're planting an intermediate wheatgrass. [00:14:20] We started with crusted wheatgrass. It's so funny with these experiments. , we seeded in crusted wheatgrass a couple of times and just did not take it's not very effective for competing against other weeds, and it's not very good with traffic. And so now , we're seeding in intermediate wheatgrass. [00:14:35] , it is more traffic tolerant and is more weed tolerant. So we're hoping that we'll be able to outcompete all the other annual grasses and just have kind of a perennial grass cover crop. [00:14:46] Craig Macmillan: Is it on these courses? So is this camp is compaction less of a problem? I would think. [00:14:53] Devin Rippner: We do have some compaction. That we've seen out there. Certainly mechanical planting can cause some extra compaction. It, it takes a lot of force to, you know, rip a giant hole in the ground to drop the vines into. And so we do see some compaction from that. [00:15:06] We have taken bulk density cores from all over the vineyard. And we're hoping to see changes over time in that compaction. So we've done bulk density course from under vine and then in the tractor row. And so we're hoping that over time, these various practices will alter the bulk density, hopefully lower the bulk density in the tractor row. [00:15:27] Craig Macmillan: And then I'm assuming that you're also keeping track of costs for these things. [00:15:32] Devin Rippner: yes, we have been keeping track of costs. We are keeping track of the hourly labor , for mowing. Honestly, we've, we've purchased some undervine mowers and , we have really struggled to find a good solution for our young vines. [00:15:45] We're going to, Purchase another one soon. The biggest thing is that if you have a swing arm on it, it's got to be gentle enough that it, it'll push out of the way , with a bamboo stake in the ground. [00:15:55] And a lot of the existing swing arm mowers for orchards and vineyards it takes a lot of force to move that swing arm. [00:16:03] It's been a real challenge for us. So, so we ended up having people go out with weed eaters, which is super expensive and is actually something that some vineyards do either biodynamic vineyards in the area that they'll send people out with weed eaters to go control the weeds under vine. [00:16:17] I don't want this to be just like a hyper specialized science experiment. If we're sending people out with weed eaters, it sounds a little bit ridiculous, but there are folks in the industry that do it. So it's not. It's not that ridiculous. [00:16:28] Craig Macmillan: It's not that ridiculous. It's legitimate. [00:16:31] Whatever tool that you can make work, depending on the size of your vineyard and depending on what your conditions are. But yeah, you're in row mode. That's going to be an issue until these vines are mature to no doubt about that. I hope you still have a vineyard after knocking down these bamboo stakes. [00:16:44] You don't have like real results yet. You've only just gotten started. [00:16:47] Devin Rippner: We've only just gotten started you know, some of the results that we got were prior to our planting, there were no differences among our treatment blocks for our treatments across the site. So that's nice kind of starting at a, a pretty even baseline. [00:17:03] We're going to track the changes over time. Honestly. I hate to speculate, we don't have the data for it yet, but we've been applying, our synthetic fertilizers based on our like compost mineralization rate. And one of the things that's pretty obvious when you walk out there is that weed competition is brutal for young vines. [00:17:23] So where we're spraying with herbicide under the vines, there's less weed competition. Those vines are just bigger., [00:17:28] we're going to up the amount of fertilizer that we apply next year to try to, like, get around that. And it's one of the challenges at our site is that for long term research, we have to manage our vineyard in a way that kind of limits how many comparisons that we can make. Functionally, two out of our three rows are buffers. It just eats up an enormous amount of space and I'm, I'm hesitant to start putting other treatments into those areas. Like, oh, what if we vary the fertilizer rate to see what the effect is with relation to mowing, right? [00:18:01] So can we get over the weed pressure by, Applying more fertilizer. One of my main takeaways is that a lot of the recommendations that you might get for like, for conventional management won't necessarily work if you're trying to change your system [00:18:16] That's where, you know, growers are going to have to play around and understand that if they're mowing under vine, there is going to be more weed pressure and those weeds take up nitrogen. [00:18:27] You may have to fertilize more. I mean, that, that's just a consequence of, of weed competition. [00:18:32] Craig Macmillan: yeah, yeah, yeah. That's interesting. And in irrigation water too, [00:18:37] Devin Rippner: Oh yeah. Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. They use a lot of water. There's no doubt about it. [00:18:42] Craig Macmillan: Which actually brings me back to the clover. I planted crimson clover in my yard once and I irrigated it and it was really pretty and I actually put two and a half foot, three foot high risers off of my lawn sprinklers to get a sprinkler high enough that I could keep growing it. And I was able to grow it up to about three feet tall and it was gorgeous. It was absolutely amazing. But it does make me wonder if, what's a subterranean clover? It's a low growing clover, but how much effect does irrigation have on it in terms of making it taller or taller? [00:19:13] Devin Rippner: That's a good question. I haven't looked into it that much. I consulted with some colleagues here. Who've done work with a variety of cover crops, and they were the ones that recommended the subterranean clover. It has a short stature and part of it is because of how it flowers and seeds, it can't get that tall because it's, it pushes its seeds into the ground. [00:19:32] And so there's no real benefit for it getting taller because then it will be farther away from where it needs to put its seeds. [00:19:39] That's a real concern. I mean, I've learned so much by , having a vineyard gophers, voles, rats, mice, they can be problematic. Right. And if you have a tall cover crop, that's getting into your vines, like that's an easy pathway up. [00:19:52] Keeping the, those undervine weeds and cover crops short is really important. [00:19:58] Craig Macmillan: Yeah. It's also really important for the success of your predators. [00:20:01] Your barn nows and whatnot. They can't really do much when things are tall. So keep going, keep good luck. You're in it. You're in it now, Devon, [00:20:09] Devin Rippner: Oh, yeah. No, that's what it feels like. I feel like I jumped into the deep end of a pool, but didn't realize it was so deep. And so, yeah, I'm learning. [00:20:17] Craig Macmillan: Because prior to a few years back, cause you were, you were at Davis and you were at the Oakville station. Is that right? For a little while. [00:20:24] Devin Rippner: I pulled some samples from Oakville, but no, I was mostly on main campus. I'm a soil chemist by training. Grapevines are relatively new for me. I worked for Andrew McElrone, who , does some great work a lot of my previous work did not involve grapes, and it was mainly, like, tomatoes or other annual crops, and often, like, pretty lab based stuff. [00:20:47] And so this has been a real deep dive for me to do something different. [00:20:53] Craig Macmillan: which is an excellent transition to some of your work which you did at other crops, but you also did some other interesting things related to vines and to soil. And that is x ray CT imagery. You were the first person to introduce me to this concept. I I had no idea I guess I should say X ray micro CT imagery. What, what are the exact terminology? What is it? What can it do? What can we learn? [00:21:20] Devin Rippner: Thanks for bringing this up. Let me just try to keep it simple and I'll build out from there. Just like a doctor's office where you can get an X ray you can actually X ray soils. And plants and look inside of them. X ray computed tomography is where instead of just taking one x ray, maybe you take 1000 x rays as the sample is slowly moving. And what you end up with is the ability to make a three D reconstruction of that sample. Where you're able to look inside of it. [00:21:50] Materials that absorb x rays look different than materials that don't absorb x rays. And so you're able to start Teasing apart structures that are inside of plants and soils [00:22:01] There's different levels to that. Humans have X ray computed tomography done on them, right? You can go in and have that procedure done to look inside of you. It's very much like an MRI there are some tools that it. look at very big volumes. And then there are some tools that look at very small volumes. [00:22:19] That's where there's the x ray microcomputed tomography is looking at very small volumes. And a lot of times those instruments they're low often located. With synchrotrons. So a synchrotron is a particle accelerator that moves electrons at about the speed of light. And then as they're going at the speed of light, , it bends them, it shifts the path of the electrons. [00:22:43] And in doing so , Theory of relativity says that when you have a big shift , in the direction of these electrons they must lose energy. And so they lose energy as the brightest light that we know of in the known universe. And so some of that light are x rays and those x rays are very tunable, and there's a lot of them. [00:23:03] And so we can basically focus on a really tiny area. And still have a lot of x rays. That lets us look at really small things and still have like good contrast and be able to image them relatively quickly. This field is advancing quickly. I know it sounds pretty crazy to talk about x raying soils and plants and things like that. [00:23:23] But the reality is these x rays can also be used to identify elements. And so you can do elemental speciation. So you can be like, Oh, all of the phosphorus there is as phosphate rather than some other form or it's calcium phosphate, not magnesium phosphate. That's called x ray adsorption, near edge structures. [00:23:42] That's how people do that. A long time ago, these instruments used to be unique. You do like a tomography and then you do like these Zains do elemental information, but those things are converging. Now it's possible to do like x ray CT and also do elemental analysis and speciation on the same sample. [00:24:01] in 100 years, that may be how we do our soil testing is you literally have one of these instruments on the back of a tractor. You pull a soil core. You do a quick scan and you say, here's our structure. We can also see the organic matter inside of the soil column. And then by inference from the outer edge of the soil column, we can get What elements are there and what form they're in and then make predictions on their availability. [00:24:27] Were very far from that, but that's like the vision that I have in my head is that at some point, , these will be sensors that people can just use in the field. Will they use an enormous amount of energy? Absolutely. Technology has, shifted in my lifetime and a lot of things that have seemed absurd in the past are now commonplace. [00:24:47] Craig Macmillan: What kinds of things, and it can be other crops as well, but in particular, there was one you did with, I think, grape seeds. Those are the things that can do what, what have you actually. Zapped [00:24:59] Devin Rippner: Yeah. [00:24:59] Craig Macmillan: a better word. [00:25:01] Devin Rippner: You know. [00:25:01] Craig Macmillan: mind here. Okay. So [00:25:03] Devin Rippner: Yeah. So I work with a lot of folks at different national labs. So the Pacific Northwest National Lab is a lab I work at a lot. And we've done a lot of imaging of soil cores and they're big soil cores. So three inches by 12 inch soil cores and to look at soil structure and we're working on segmenting out organic matter from them. [00:25:22] That's something that was not previously possible, but with modern neural networks and deep learning, we can actually train. Neural networks to identify specific compounds in the soil and identify them. We've done it with soil columns. I've done some work with soil aggregates. [00:25:38] So we can look at very small things as well. I've looked at grape seeds, so we had a little study where working with some folks at Davis they pulled out grape seeds, before, during and after fermentation, functionally, and we looked at how the structures of the seeds were changing. [00:25:58] The idea here is that grapeseeds provide a lot of tannins and they're not necessarily like the best tannins for wine, but they do provide a lot of tannins. [00:26:07] People have always wondered like, why do grapeseeds kind of supply a constant amount of tannins during the fermentation process? And as it turns out, it's because the structure of the seeds is changing during fermentation, [00:26:18] They start cracking. And so the internal structures become more accessible during fermentation. [00:26:23] And so that's what we were seeing using x ray tomography is these internal changes that were happening inside of the grape seeds that could potentially promote tannin extraction. [00:26:32] Craig Macmillan: That is fascinating. That explains a lot. I'm just thinking through, Tannin management. The date currently is in the beginning of November 2024. So we're just wrapping up a harvest here in the Paso Robles, central coast area. And so I've been thinking a lot about tannin management last couple of months on behalf of my friends who make wine, not myself. That's not entirely true. Is there a practical application to that in terms of like timing or conditions or things that would contribute to the, the cracking breakdown of these seeds that you identified? [00:27:05] Devin Rippner: We weren't able to go like that in depth and it's some, it's an area that I would like to build on. But the idea is that. The fermentation is a pretty harsh environment. You have a massive change in pH. Microbes are working hard. You have the production of ethanol, which allows the extraction of different compounds. [00:27:24] The seeds are seemingly being modified during fermentation. There needs to be more work done in this area in terms of seed tanning management. We now have kind of a, the more physical. Explanation for why those cannons are coming out of the seeds. [00:27:39] If you are able to pull your seeds earlier from fermentation, I mean, that's like a ridiculous thing to say, but you know, [00:27:45] Craig Macmillan: no, I mean, winemakers are very clever there's a lot of techniques that have become more prominent, I think, in the last 10, 15 years in terms of things like pressing off early, so getting your extraction fast and then finishing out the fermentation off of skins, off of seeds, you know, that's one way that you can do it really using seed maturity as a major variable in your pick decision is another one that I've seen people really draw to. [00:28:09] I remember people crunching on seeds and going, yeah, that's mature. Now I'm seeing people reject a pick date based on that. [00:28:17] Like we were going to wait for these seeds to mature fully before we pull because of, because of these issues with a seed tannin. So just knowing that I think is fascinating. [00:28:28] And if we can put some time and pH things on that, that would be really cool. Are you going to be using this technology with the with the research plot for anything? [00:28:36] Devin Rippner: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, we [00:28:39] already have started that. We've already started down that route. Shortly after planting we collected soil cores from, , the vine row. And then from where the, the planter tires were functionally running just to look at changes in bulk density. So like kind of how compressed the soil is and then trying to get at changes in porosity. [00:28:58] We looked at these cores relative to , a field next door. That has had very relatively little disturbance in the past, like 4 to 10 years. It's kind of variable but has had less disturbance than say, like, right after planting a vineyard mechanically. Some of the things we see are you know, when you mechanically plant a vineyard, the bulk density , in the vine row is much lower than where the tractor tires are running that intrinsically makes sense. [00:29:26] And they're kind of both different than a place that's been no till or low disturbance for four to 10 years. Some of the things that are most interesting, and, and again, this is preliminary, it's got to go through peer review. . But when we look at the CT scans, you can actually see where worms have been moving, [00:29:45] In these, like, low till and no till plots or this field that has just not really been disturbed. [00:29:51] , so worms are actually making sizable holes in the ground, and those holes contribute to the porosity in these, like, low disturbance soils compared to these very disturbed soils. And that was a really interesting thing to visually see. You can see the worm castings in the scan. [00:30:10] I don't know if you've ever seen worm castings before, but they kind of, they're these little, like, kind of football shaped Things that are all clumped together our soils don't really aggregate. [00:30:20] We don't have enough organic matter and we don't have enough clay. And so that's like driving force behind aggregation in our soil seemingly is worm castings. For me, that was just mind blowing. [00:30:31] I was not expecting to see that. I think I was expecting to see a lot of roots or like root channels and they're there, but the worms are like following these roots and root channels around. [00:30:41] I'm a very visual person. And so when I do CT stuff, it's like, Oh, wow. Like I can see it with my eyes. If I can't see it with my eyes, it's hard for me to believe. But when I see it with my eyes, , it's believable. [00:30:52] Craig Macmillan: We've done a number of interviews recently around so the microbiome and just soil biology kind of in general, , is that gonna be part of your analysis as some of these projects go forward? [00:31:03] Devin Rippner: Yeah, absolutely. So we've done something called phospholipid fatty acid analysis. [00:31:09] So that gives us an idea of kind of, The microbial consortium that's there right when we sample phospholipids don't really stick around in soils. They're quickly degraded. We would like to do some sequencing challenges. We don't have a microbiologist on the team. And, and so we would, we would have to pay for the sequencing. [00:31:28] And even then sequencing is really interesting because, you could be like, oh, we did say 16 S-R-R-N-A sequencing. And that's like, that's a particular like region or a particular type of sequencing that is, that only picks up on say bacteria. [00:31:47] Whereas if you want to see fungi, maybe you need to do something called ITS sequencing. And so unless you do like all of the sequencing, you can get an idea of what's happening to the bacterial communities or the fungal communities. But unless you do all of them, it's really hard to get a more holistic picture. [00:32:05] And then, a lot of the sequencing that we do or is done we're missing things. If the regions analyzed aren't big enough, like we can be blind to specific things that we know are there. And so things like my understanding is that fungal mycorrhizae can actually be hard to detect by sequencing. [00:32:21] And so even if you visually see them in the roots by staining, you may not pick them up by sequencing. It is a challenge. Now, I, you know, I think that certainly studying the microbiome and understanding its relationship , with vine performance and soil health is, is crucial and is really, you know, one of the things that it's kind of the Holy grail [00:32:41] Craig Macmillan: Yeah. [00:32:43] Devin Rippner: We're trying to get there. [00:32:44] Craig Macmillan: We're trying to get there. That is definitely the message, but it also, there's definitely the potential. I think that there's a lot of people working on this. I think we're going to get there. It's, genomics is so big. I've talked to people that are like, at some point we, we, we will probably be able to get down to species, so we will know the bad actors from the good actors, we'll get a sense of what the real ecology is. [00:33:05] That's a decade plus away still, but we're going there. Right? We're we're gonna figure it out. We're gonna figure it out at some point. We're gonna get there. [00:33:14] Devin Rippner: Yeah, I agree. And there's, there are some techniques. There's some really cool techniques. So Jennifer Petridge at Lawrence Livermore lab does a lot Carbon 13 labeling of root exudates. So she basically gives plants, she treats them with carbon 13, enriched CO2. And then she looks at how much of the carbon 13 is then incorporated into the DNA of microbes to try to get at how well associated they are with plants. [00:33:41] I think that work is just incredible. And there's some folks at Davis that are, are working that in that area as well. That's kind of the stuff that gets me really excited to seeing when people are trying to really tie it into what's feeding on root carbon, , who's getting these exudates, things like that. [00:33:59] , that to me is one of the, One of the ways that we'll be able to, like, get at these questions is to, to start differentiating, the bulk soil microbiome from like the, the real rhizosphere associated microbiome. [00:34:11] Craig Macmillan: so you got a lot going on. You got , you got a bunch of different things happening. What's the path ahead look like for you? [00:34:17] Devin Rippner: Sure. So, and with with the soil health vineyard. I mean, I'm very excited to keep that going. We'll do another large sampling event in 2027 or 2028. We'll start making wine from our grapes. Not next year, but the year after that. So we'll be excited to see how our different management strategies influence our wine. [00:34:40] The wines that come out of the vineyard, or the wines made, made from the grapes that come out of the vineyard. So those are some of the things , I'm most excited about with regard to the vineyard. [00:34:50] Otherwise, I have a lot of data that I need to process and get out. That's something that's next. [00:34:56] I, I'm collaborating with some folks from the University of Illinois in Berkeley lab to look at changes to the Moro plots in Illinois over time. So that's the oldest agricultural experiment in the United States. The plots there have been in experimental treatments for 149 years. [00:35:15] And the reason I'm involved is because vineyards can be very long lived things, right? I mean, there are vines in California 100 years old. [00:35:23] This is one of the few experiments to me that's like comparable to what we see in vineyards. And so I'm really curious about, you know, how do, how do management practices influence soil structure, microbiome, the metagenome, the metabolome, things like that, on these century long timelines. [00:35:43] That to me is like some of the really interesting questions. If you have a vineyard for, for a century, or if you want a vineyard for a century, what do you need to do? How do you make that work? Knowing that it's going to take 20 years to have your vineyard be profitable. [00:35:57] I mean, you're already on a different timescale than annual crops, right? yeah. And so it's just like, how, how do we make our, our vineyards as sustainable and long lived as possible? Because , that, that initial investment is huge. It is so much money. [00:36:13] Craig Macmillan: I think that's really great. I think coming up with findings on other crops, but with practices that could be transferable is really great. You know, we don't need to be in our little grape silo. All the time. And in fact some of the soil microbiome stuff have been with interviews with people that had no connection to vineyards whatsoever. And it was great. The things that they were learning, they were absolutely transferable to this crop as well. That hasn't gotten that kind of attention. Grapevines are tough little suckers, really from an evolutionary standpoint, they're pretty rugged and so we can kind of get away with a lot just because of that. [00:36:48] And now I think the margin for error is less and less, especially when we get into tougher and tougher sites like you're talking about and different conditions, especially if you've farmed it for a while and things have changed. Being able to look at other, other systems and see what's there. [00:37:03] What is one thing that you would tell growers around this topic of research? [00:37:09] Devin Rippner: vineyard is very informed by grower practices. We have a grower board that like helps us make decisions. A message that I will say is like science is science and science is often pretty, you know, Like straight laced and rigid because it must be. know, We're going to find things and those results hopefully will be interesting. [00:37:27] But it's not the be all and end all . of science and research. Growers continuing to try innovative things push the boundaries of what they think is possible is really how we get progress. And I am hopeful , once this vineyard is more established to start going back out and working with growers. [00:37:48] When I first started in Prosser, I sampled from probably 40 different vineyards around the state just to get an idea of what the soil properties were like. And we've done some, some experiments with that. Some of our results are that permanganate oxidize oxidizable carbon. So this POC C classically it's been called active carbon. [00:38:08] There's some new research that suggests that it's, that's maybe a misnomer and it's really, often plant derived carbon. [00:38:15] It seems like there are some effects from that, that suppress disease. And I think that , that's an area where growers can really kind of play around and see if there's , waste from their vineyard and applying it to their vines trying to look at what that does to their, POC C values and also try, just getting in trying to look at some of the past issues that those vines may have and see if there's any decreases. [00:38:41] A lot of observational science is really important. I like hearing from growers that, yeah, I did this thing and it looks like it made a difference. There's a lot of value in that and, and I don't discount like grower knowledge in any way, shape, or form. Like it is deep knowledge growers know things that I don't, and I find that out all the time. [00:39:02] I value those observations. They they give me guidance on how I want to do my work. And we do try to incorporate that stuff into the soil health vineyard. Over time we are going to have to figure out like, You know, can we sustain funding for a vineyard for, say, 50 years if all we're doing is like a cover crop, some compost, and then a mix? [00:39:23] That seems like it's maybe not the most sustainable thing. Science requires that type of stuff, but it's just not that sustainable. So finding ways to make use of our, border rows and stuff like that is going to be important. And a lot of the research that we do is going to be informed by grower observations. [00:39:39] Craig Macmillan: Yep. Yep. Exactly. Where can people find out more about you and your work? [00:39:44] Devin Rippner: Sure. So you can look me up online. Devin Rippner a lot of stuff will pop up. There's a USDA website that has a listing of my publications and things like that. I also have a personal website. So those are some places to, to check out my work. [00:40:00] I try to make sure that my stuff is open access and usable. So, like the deep learning code, the image segmentation code that I co developed for X ray ct work is now being applied to like other types of imaging on. So people are using it at hops and a variety of other things on. [00:40:18] So that code is online. Like you can find it it's associated with my papers. You can play around with it and try it with your own stuff. Mhm. And, and, and that's a big thing for me is like open data. I, I love sharing a lot of the, the data that I have and the code that I have so that people can, repeat what I did. [00:40:35] Look me up online and yeah, you'll be, you can find that, find those resources. [00:40:40] Craig Macmillan: we will have links to a lot of that on the show page. So please visit the show page and check this stuff out. I was really happy to hear you use the word repeatability. [00:40:49] Devin Rippner: Yeah, [00:40:50] Craig Macmillan: Yeah. And I also was really, it's hard. it's very, very hard and it's often overlooked. You know, the, , the scientific methods we know today was all built around the idea of repeatability. That's how you demonstrate whether something's real, real, or if it's only real under certain conditions, blah, blah, blah, blah. So that's really great. I'm glad you're doing that. [00:41:08] Well, I want to thank you for being on the podcast. This is a Devin Rippner. He is a research soil scientist with USDA agricultural research service and an adjunct position with the crop and soil science department at Washington state university. Really fun conversation, Devin, lots to think about. I will be following this closely. Or annually, probably [00:41:31] Devin Rippner: Cool. [00:41:31] Yeah. [00:41:32] Craig Macmillan: these things are slow. I'm not going to be checking every week. But I just think it's really cool project and is real inspiration. And I would love to see the same kind of thing replicated in other places. [00:41:41] Devin Rippner: Great. Thanks Craig. That was really fun. [00:41:43] Beth Vukmanic: Thank you for listening. [00:41:49] If you enjoyed this podcast, Vineyard Team has a couple of in field tailgate meetings coming up this year that you won't want to miss. [00:41:56] The first is on February 20th in Paso Robles, and it is a dry farming grower around table. Now you don't need to be a dry farmer to enjoy this event. There'll be a number of different growers here talking about their experiences, trials, challenges, and successes. [00:42:13] The second event is on March 12th, and it is Grazing as a Sustainable Practice for Vineyards, taking place in Los Olivos, and we hope to have some adorable sheep on site. [00:42:24] Make sure you check out the show notes for links to Dev lots of research articles, plus, sustainable wine growing podcast episodes, 80. The Goldilocks principle and powdery mildew management, 90 nematode management for Washington grapes, plus a whole healthy soils playlist. [00:42:42] Now for the fine print, the views, thoughts, and opinions expressed are the speaker's own and do not represent the views, thoughts, and opinions of the USDA ARS. As such, the views, thoughts, and opinions. Presented by the speaker do not constitute an official endorsement or approval by the United States Department of Agriculture or the Agricultural Research Service of any product or service to the exclusion of others that may be suitable. The material and information presented here is for general information purposes only. [00:43:14] If you liked this show, do us a big favor by sharing it with a friend, subscribing, and leaving us a review. You can find all of the podcasts at vineyardteam.org/podcast. And you can reach us at podcast@vineyardteam. org. [00:43:28] Until next time, this is Sustainable Wine Growing with the Vineyard Team.   Nearly perfect transcription by Descript

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There have been two episodes lately that have sent me down a rabbit hole that I wanted to bring to your attention. Now, disclaimer: I know you people; you're busy. You listen on average to, like, 26 minutes of any given episode. So, yeah … look at me being self-aware. I say all this to say welcome to this inbetweenisode, otherwise known as The Rabbit Hole. But it's like a 20-something-minute rabbit hole, not a day-and-a-half retreat; so just be kind if you email me and tell me I forgot something or failed to dredge into a nuance or a background point. It might be that I just could not manage to pack it in. For a full transcript of this episode, click here. If you enjoy this podcast, be sure to subscribe to the free weekly newsletter to be a member of the Relentless Tribe. This rabbit hole really, really matters for anybody creating benefit design. It really matters for anybody trying to optimize the health that can be derived from said benefit design. It also probably matters for a whole lot of operational decisions involving patients or members, nothing for nothing. But it really matters for anybody trying not to, by accident, as an unintended consequence, hammer plan members or patients with some really blunt-force cost containment measures that do a lot of harm in the process of containing costs or, flip side, accidentally cost a whole lot but don't actually improve member health. Nina Lathia, RPh, MSc, PhD, kind of summed up this whole point or gave an adjacent thought really eloquently in episode 426. She said there's better or worse ways to do things and doing the worst kinds of cost containment may not actually contain costs. You squeeze a balloon, and that works great for some, like pharmacy vendors who don't really have any skin in the game. (See me using the “skin in the game” term for other people besides plan members? That's some really good foreshadowing right there, by the way.) So, squeezing the balloon works for some when they don't have skin in the game, in the place where the air goes when you squeeze the balloon—like a pharmacy vendor who makes it super unaffordable for patients to get meds so the patient doesn't take their meds and winds up in the ICU, or the patient's formerly controlled with meds condition that is now newly uncontrolled and requires all kinds of medical interventions to get said condition back under control. Like, these are the reasons and the why behind why some cost containment efforts don't actually contain costs at the plan level. But not at the vendor level. You see what I mean? Most pharmacy vendors don't get penalized if medical costs wind up going up. And I'm picking on pharmacy vendors a little bit here, but it's true for a lot of siloed entities. But, you know, balloon squeezing can also work, actually, at the plan level if where the air goes, it's to a place where the member or the patient has to pay themselves. Like, if there's a huge, I don't know, max out of pocket or deductible, does it really matter to a very mercenary plan that's running on a very short time horizon? Do they really care, that plan, if the patient's formerly controlled condition gets uncontrolled? Maybe not, I guess, as long as it doesn't cost more than the max out of pocket that the patient is on the hook for, for any given plan year. So, yeah … again, there are better or worse ways to do things; and a lot of questions kind of add up to, What kind of plan do we want to be? What are our values, and does the plan align with them? But that's not the rabbit hole I wanted to go down today—the aligning with our values rabbit hole—so let us move on. The Relentless Health Value episode that kicked off the rabbit hole for me on multiple levels was the show with Bill Sarraille (EP459) about co-pay maximizers and accumulators. And don't get me wrong, that is a complicated topic with lots of pros, lots of cons; and I am not weighing in on the inherent lawfulness or value of any of this. I am also not weighing in on the fact that there are forthright and well-run maximizers and really not good ones, which cause patients financial, for sure, and possibly clinical harm. But not talking about that right now at all. Go back and listen to the show with Bill Sarraille if you are interested. Where my “down the rabbit hole” spiral started was when I started noticing the very, very common main plan pushback that was given right out of the gate so often when talking about the problems that any given plan sponsor has with these pharma co-pay programs—that if these pharmacopeia card dollars count toward the plan deductibles, then the patient's deductible gets met and the plan member will then often overuse healthcare and cost the plan excessive dollars from that point forward. So again, if you ask any given plan sponsor what I was gonna say their main issue but a main issue that they have with these pharma co-pay programs, that's gonna be it—that if these pharma dollars count toward the plan deductible, then the patient's deductible is met and from that point henceforth, the patient goes nuts and overuses healthcare services and it costs the plan a lot of money. The second episode causing this rabbit hole to open up is the one coming up actually with Scott Conard, MD. So, check back in a couple of weeks for that one. But in the show with Dr. Conard, we get into the impact of high-deductible health plans or just big out of pockets, however they transpire in the benefit design. Both of these scenarios, by the way, the maximizer meets the deductible scenario and the very, very high-deductible plan scenario are to blame, in other words, for this rabbit hole of an inbetweenisode. So, let's do this thing. Let's talk about the moral hazard of insurance to start us off. In the context of health insurance, if you haven't heard that term moral hazard before, it's an economics term; and it is used to capture the idea that insurance coverage, by lowering the cost of care to the individual, because their plan is paying for part of said care, by lowering the cost of care to the individual, it increases healthcare use. So, you could see why this may be related to having a deductible fully paid or not. Pre-deductible, the plan is not paying for a part of said care or paying a much smaller part. And after the deductible is paid for, then the plan is paying for a much larger percentage of care. So, moral hazard kicks in bigger after the deductible is fully paid, when the plan is paying for a bigger percentage or a bigger part of the care. So, before I proceed, let me just offer again a disclaimer to the many economists who listen to this show that this is a short inbetweenisode; so I am 100% glossing over some of the points that, for sure, have a lot of nuance. For anyone who wants a thick pack of pages for background reading, I have included some links below. Because you see, a few weeks ago, my Sunday did not go as planned. And instead of running errands, I wound up reading eight papers on moral hazard. So, my lack of groceries is your gain. You're welcome. I am happy to send you these links if you really want to dig in hard on this. Okay … so, moral hazard is the concept that individuals have incentives to offer their behavior when their risk or cost is borne by others. That's the why with deductibles, actually. We gotta give patients skin in the game because once a member has their deductible paid, it's like member gone wild and they will get all manner of excessive care. Again, I hear that a lot from plan sponsors—a lot, in all kinds of contexts but almost always, again, whenever the conversation has anything to do with manufacturer co-pay card programs and a lot when it has to do with just, you know, high-deductible plans and what happens when the patient meets their deductible. Once a patient or family has a fully paid deductible, their medical trend is like a spike, I hear over and over again. And again, this is the reason why many insist—and again, no judgment here, maybe they're right, I'm just rehashing the conversation—but this is why many insist the moral hazard of letting people have their deductible paid for them by Pharma or whatever is the reason why some believe it is imperative to have maximizers or accumulators where pharma dollars can absolutely not apply to patient deductibles. Because then we have sick patients who now have their deductibles reached, who have very few financial disincentives to go seek whatever care they want. Right. Moral hazard has entered the building. I've beaten this point to death, so let's move on. One time, I asked a plan sponsor, What exactly is it that these plan members are going wild spending plan money on once their deductible gets paid off? And he said, well, you know, they go get their suspicious-looking moles checked. Did you hear that silence just now? Yeah, that was my reaction. I don't know. I would consider getting suspicious moles checked kind of high-value care. There are posters all over the place saying if you have a suspicious-looking mole, it might be melanoma. Cancer. So, you should get ahead of that before you have a metastasized cancer. I'm no doctor, but yeah, this feels like high-value care. So, let's just, in arguendo, say it is high-value care and follow this thread for a sec. Once members reach their deductible, let's say they run around and get high-value care, care they actually need but haven't gotten before because they couldn't afford it earlier or were putting it off until they saved up enough, right? Like, this is the other side of the moral hazard coin. If patients delay or abandon care—and, by the way, there was a survey (it's in the Wayne Jenkins, MD, show from a while ago [EP358])—but 46% of patients with commercial insurance these days have delayed or abandoned care due to cost. But if they delay or abandon care that is high value and medically actually necessary and they put it off or abandon that high-value care because they cannot afford said care, then yeah, we have, again, the opposite of the moral hazard problem. We have members paying a whole lot for insurance that they cannot afford to use, they're functionally uninsured, and it's not gonna end healthfully if they need high-value care and they're not getting it. It's not. Functionally uninsured patients who have chronic conditions that really should be managed will, as per evidence, wind up with health problems if those chronic conditions are not managed. I read another study about this just recently. This is why members with chronic diseases on high-deductible health plans tend to have worse health, by the way. Now, I need to say, same rules do not always apply for healthy patients who, at least at this point, don't need regular healthcare. But do keep in mind, as it comes up in the Dr. Scott Conard show, 30% of patients who think they're healthy, they feel fine—actually they are not fine and will become sick and costly in the coming years. So, yeah … tune back in for that discussion if you are interested, but you get the gist of this whole thing, right? So, that's scenario 1 as to what patients may choose to buy once they're in the moral hazard zone and have met their deductible. They go get high-value care. So, let's move on from the high-value care case study where patients reach their deductible and get high-value care or they haven't met their deductible and fail to get care they actually need. I want to circle over to the other moral hazard potential situation: patients who meet their deductible. And in this scenario, they again embark on a health system jamboree; but they don't get a whole lot of high-value care in this scenario. They run around getting all manner of all kinds of stuff that is well outside of any evidence-based pathway. Like, weird example, I went to a doctor recently asking a question about something that everyone ultimately agreed was nothing. At which point, the doctor asked if I wanted an MRI. I was like, “What?” We and everyone else just agreed this was a big nothing burger. Why would I want an MRI? Is there something else that we didn't discuss to indicate that I need imaging? Like, why are we going there? And the doc said, “Oh, well, everyone in New York City has an anxiety problem. So, I thought you might just want to get an MRI.” Yeah, low-value stuff like that is now not financially prohibitive. So, someone who had met their deductible, in a similar situation to my example, might have shrugged and said, “Sure, I do have some anxiety. Let's go get that MRI.” Or if they hadn't met their deductible, then the whole skin-in-the-game, market-driven approach may work, I guess, to prevent them from getting low-value care that was clearly excessive and pretty wasteful. So, summing up these two scenarios, the implications of the moral hazard issue are, if it's expensive, people don't do it. If it's free or cheap, they will overutilize. And the issue with both of these patient choices is, patients are not good at discerning low-value care from high-value care. And because patients are not good at discerning high-value from low-value care, moral hazard is not mitigated with any sort of binary kind of vote for moral hazard or against moral hazard types of brute-force, broad-stroke tactics. Like, say I'm a moral hazard full-on believer. I assume all or most of the care a patient will go for is low value, right? Because if I try to prevent moral hazard from happening, then by default, what I'm effectively saying is, whatever they choose to buy on the basis of moral hazard is low value. So, I make basically everything I can pretty unaffordable so as not to invoke any moral hazard. But right, the problem with that is that some of the care is actually high value. And it's also expensive for the patient, so they don't get it. And patients are harmed, and balloons might get squeezed. Or the opposite, against moral hazard, right? Like, I'm against the concept of moral hazard. I don't believe in it, so I don't set up absolutely anything to combat it. Maybe because I assume all care that a patient might want to get is actually high value and totally worth it. That's gonna be a problem for the opposite reason. Plans can waste a lot of money this way. Random example, in 2014, the Commonwealth of Virginia reported spending $586 million on unnecessary costs from low-value care. I mean, they say something like a third of all care is waste and unnecessary, so … yeah. Plan sponsors can waste a lot of money on low-value care, and a bunch of that may happen when patients have less skin in the game because they reach their deductible, as one example, and the care is not financially prohibitive and moral hazard is realized. So, yeah … as I said, a couple of weeks ago, I did not spend my Sunday as planned. I spent my Sunday reading papers about moral hazard in insurance and how financial incentives impact patient decision making. And I'm gonna repeat the grand takeaway because this is a podcast and you might be multitasking. So, once again, here's the sum of it all: If it's expensive, people tend not to do it. If it's free or cheap, they will overutilize. And the issue with both of these patient choices is, patients are simply quite bad at distinguishing high-value care from low-value care. Once their deductibles are met, most patients will—due to moral hazard—they will, in fact, go on a spending spree; and part of what they will get done will be really, really important and necessary stuff, like getting their unusual moles looked at or their heart pain checked out or going for that follow-up visit or lab work that their doctor told them they need to come in for. And the other part of what they will do will be things that are outside the best-practice, evidence-based pathway guidelines by the length of the Appalachian Trail—you know, doing what appears to be a tour of specialty medicine physicians for unclear reasons but which lead to a cascade of testing and who knows what else. Why do they do this, these members? Do they do this on purpose? No. There is study after study that shows, again, members/patients do not, most of the time, have the chops to figure out if some medical service is high-value or low-value care. And no kidding. Most members and patients have no clinical training. They're not doctors. They're not nurses. They're not physician assistants. They're humans whose uncle died of cancer, and now they have a pain in their foot and they're convinced it's a tumor. Right? Like, do we blame them when they finally go see a doctor because they crushed their budget that particular year paying thousands and thousands of dollars out of pocket for whatever earlier in the year, and now they've made it to their deductible—do we blame them for taking the very rational step of getting the most out of those thousands of dollars of sunk costs? At that point, it's a “let me get my money's worth” situation because they can't afford to do this again next year. I mean, we hire employees because they're smart and rational, and this is really actually a pretty smart and rational thing to do. It's not somebody trying to commit fraud. Okay, sure … some people are. There's always bad apples. But the vast majority are just trying to live their life and not spend all of their vacation money next year on medical services like they did this year. I'm saying all this because it's actionable, by the way. And I'm getting to that, but indulge me for like 60 more seconds because I want to acknowledge you, listeners of this show, are probably nodding along to this whole thing this whole time and thinking all of this is pretty obvious. Well, yeah … maybe. Except here's the reason I decided to do an inbetweenisode about this rabbit hole instead of doing my normal thing, which is just ranting about it over dinner for three days straight—and God bless my husband for sitting through it—is the bottom line. But the reason we are here together today is the number of emails and posts and et cetera that cross my desk where it doesn't seem like these dots have been connected on all of this or at least connected in magic marker. Like fat, indelible magic marker, which is what I think is necessary for these dots to be connected with the ones between moral hazard and patients not being able to discern high- and low-value care. There are so many ways and places these dots will show up. Like, here's another moral hazard issue with those maximizers or accumulators, which apparently are on my mind right now—the not good ones I'm talking about now, where patients find themselves on the hook for hundreds or thousands of dollars midyear if they want to pick up the meds that they've been prescribed. If you need more details on how that might happen to understand what I'm saying fully, listen to the show again a couple of weeks ago with Bill Sarraille (EP459). But even if you're a little confused, it doesn't matter because the question is this: Do we justify having programs that make drugs really expensive for patients? Do we put in place one of these pretty darn punitive types of accumulators or maximizers, right? Like, there's different kinds, and I'm talking about the punitive ones of accumulators or maximizers. Do we justify putting one of those into place and figure that if a patient really wants the med, they'll pay a whole lot of money for it? Because if they're willing to pay a whole lot of money for it, then, right? It must be high-value care, so they'll figure out how to pay for it. Keep in mind, as I said earlier, if it's expensive, people don't do it. If it's free or cheap, they will overutilize. And the issue with both of these patient choices is, patients are not good at discerning low-value care or meds from high-value care or meds. So, look, Pharma can be up to all kinds of crap, and list prices are really expensive. No arguments here. That isn't the point. The point is, What is the actual problem that we're trying to solve for, for our plan and our patients and our members? And if that problem is making sure that the right patients get the right high-value meds or care, then not letting members get co-pay assistance such that all drugs—the good ones and the too-expensive ones and the ones that we don't really want our members to take for whatever reason—if we make all of them way too expensive with a maximizer or accumulator designed to make all the drugs really expensive … dots connected. We wind up with the all-in to prevent moral hazard issue we just talked about, where patients could easily be harmed and the plan can easily get into a balloon squeezing situation. All I'm saying is that there's a big-picture view of moral hazard here that we need to be looking at and over-indexing into binary, moral hazard black and white, where we attribute malice to members, some of whom, some of the time, may actually be trying to get high-value care, or the flip side, the plan's paying too much for low-value care and causing financial difficulties and not understanding the root cause. Going black and white or over-indexing to prevent outlier kind of stuff is probably not gonna end well. Not seeking a middle way can easily result in a solution that is possibly worse than the problem. So, look, moral hazard is actually a thing. There are lots of implications to patients not being able to distinguish high-value and low-value care. But if we know this, then, philosophically at least, how do we conceptualize a solve? What should we be doing? If we're not doing black and white, what does the gray in the middle look like? Alright, we don't want to be a solution looking around for a problem. So, let's think about the problems that we want to solve for. I would start with, What's the goal? The goal of plan sponsors providing insurance most of the time is attract and retain talent. Also, I was at the HBCH (Houston Business Coalition on Health) Conference at the beginning of December 2024. And there was a poll question. There was a bunch of employers in the audience, and the poll question asked the audience, “What's your biggest plan goal this year?” Main answer by a mile: Cut costs. Okay … so, we want to attract and retain, and we want to control costs. Obviously, you can go about achieving these three things a bunch of different ways, and they will all be tradeoffs. As Luke Prettol reminded me of the other day, there are no solutions, only tradeoffs. And so, with that, right now, I want to introduce the second concept that I have been ruminating over in my rabbit hole lately, that I've kind of been hinting at for this whole time. But here's a word we've been waiting for to solve all of our problems in a good kind of way, not the bad black-and-white ways that are so often either financially a problem or deploying brute force and harming patients in the name of solving something else: Pareto optimality. Pareto optimality is the state where resources are allocated as efficiently as possible so that improving one criterion will not worsen other criteria. It's essential to consider this, that Pareto optimality is the ideal we should at least be striving for when attempting to overcome any challenge but, in particular, the moral hazard issue, when we know that patients do not know what care is high value and what care is low value. Because if we don't try to at least Pareto optimize (if that's a word), if we try to fix the moral hazard problem and wind up with a new problem or new problems that might be worse than the old problem, that's not optimal. We have improved one criterion and worsened another. So, fixing the members going wild after they meet their deductible by slamming the lid on the fingers of members trying to get high-value care as well as low-value care, well … not sure about this, but I'd assume if not the attract but at least the retain criterion might be compromised by member dissatisfaction. But also, as I've said nine times, we might not actually cut costs. We might be doing a squeeze of the balloon. Especially that could be true when, as we all probably know or suspect, what's driving costs at the plan level is rising hospital prices. There's a show coming up on rising hospital prices as a primary driver of rising plan costs, and it's pretty hard to argue with. So, it's financially pretty advantageous to keep patients from needing to go to the hospital. So, yeah … I'd strongly suggest not squeezing balloons when hospitalizations are where the air goes. I'm not gonna belabor this. My only suggestion is, do the Pareto optimality math. A lot of you already are, I'm sure, and do a great job. But just for any given policy plan change, or decision, keep in mind moral hazard and then really go through the whole cascade of likely impact on other factors based on likely member/patient behavior. It's so easy to get sucked into kind of these philosophical, “those are my enemies” kinds of conversations that are actually philosophically sort of interesting, but they aren't the goal. I mean, there's always unintended consequences; but not all unintended consequences should come as some kind of, like, wild-ass surprise. They were pretty predictable, actually. Let me also mention that when considering Pareto optimal solutions, advanced primary care starts to get really compelling. It's because having a PCP team with data and a relationship to the patient helps patients stay on the high-value care bus. And that can minimize the bad that comes from lowering the barrier to care and inviting in a little bit of moral hazard. Just saying. Okay, so this has been going on a little bit longer than I had originally intended, but I do want to remind you of the so-called theory of second best. It's probably really appropriate here, and one of the reasons why I'm mentioning this and not finishing the show right now is that, in a very synchronistic moment, I was writing up my outline for this inbetweenisode and—how random is this?—Steve Schutzer, MD, wrote an email that included something about the theory of second best. Great minds and all of that. Anyway, the theory of second best is really aligned with Pareto optimality. It's just that sometimes you gotta be really practical. You gotta be a little scrappy. If you cannot achieve the best option, either because you just can't or because the best option for one thing results in too many negative consequences elsewhere, then don't do the best option. Forget it. Do the second best (ie, the theory of second best). There is nothing wrong with that. Don't be a hero. Okay, so in summary, moral hazard is actually a thing and so is the opposite; and it's even more of an impactful thing because most people cannot distinguish high-value from low-value care. And if they meet their deductible that they have paid a lot of money to reach, of course, they are going to want to try to get through their checklist of medical appointments that they have been putting off. This is not a surprise. And it's not all bad, as long as the care that they are trying to go get is high value; and that matters if we're trying to cut costs. Because to cut costs for real and not in a squeezing of the balloon way, we need to direct or limit somehow what gets done to high-value care. And we got to do that without accidentally causing other problems, meaning think through Pareto optimality and possibly consider the theory of second best. I hope this has been helpful at some level. It's helped me. I feel better having vented. Also mentioned in this episode are Nina Lathia, RPh, MSc, PhD; Bill Sarraille; Scott Conard, MD; Wayne Jenkins, MD; Houston Business Coalition on Health (HBCH); Luke Prettol; and Steve Schutzer, MD. Additional studies mentioned: Moral Hazard in Health Insurance: What We Know and How We Know It Do People Choose Wisely After Satisfying Health Plan Deductibles? Evidence From the Use of Low-Value Health Care Services Healthcare and the Moral Hazard Problem Distinguishing Moral Hazard From Access for High-Cost Healthcare Under Insurance   For more information, go to aventriahealth.com.   Each week on Relentless Health Value, Stacey uses her voice and thought leadership to provide insights for healthcare industry decision makers trying to do the right thing. Each show features expert guests who break down the twists and tricks in the medical field to help improve outcomes and lower costs across the care continuum. Relentless Health Value is a top 100 podcast on iTunes in the medicine category and reaches tens of thousands of engaged listeners across the healthcare industry. In addition to hosting Relentless Health Value, Stacey is co-president of QC-Health, a benefit corporation finding cost-effective ways to improve the health of Americans. She is also co-president of Aventria Health Group, a consultancy working with clients who endeavor to form collaborations with payers, providers, Pharma, employer organizations, or patient advocacy groups.   04:05 Where did Stacey's rabbit hole spiral start? 05:40 What is the moral hazard of insurance? 09:31 EP358 with Wayne Jenkins, MD. 12:49 Why isn't moral hazard mitigated in insurance? 18:16 EP459 with Bill Sarraille. 20:51 “How do we conceptualize a solve?” 22:24 Why should we be striving for Pareto optimality? 25:20 What is the theory of second best?   For more information, go to aventriahealth.com.   Our host, Stacey Richter, discusses considerations for #plansponsors and others. #healthcare #podcast #changemanagement #healthcareleadership #healthcaretransformation #healthcareinnovation   Recent past interviews: Click a guest's name for their latest RHV episode! Chris Crawford, Dr Rushika Fernandopulle, Bill Sarraille, Stacey Richter (INBW41), Andreas Mang (Encore! EP419), Dr Komal Bajaj, Cynthia Fisher, Stacey Richter (INBW40), Mark Cuban and Ferrin Williams (Encore! EP418), Rob Andrews (Encore! EP415)  

Welcome to the first episode of 2025 for The Brain Podcast - the official podcast of the journals Brain and Brain Communications.  This episode features a discussion with senior author Dr Frank Porreca of the Brain article entitled: Nociceptors are functionally male or female: from mouse to monkey to man? Dr Porreca discusses important findings into the  sexual dimorphic nature of nociception and how it could and indeed should affect clinical trial participant design, precision medicine and need for more sex specific studies to unravel the regulation of pain nociception in male and female individuals. Check out the full article on the Brain website as part of the December 2024 issue: https://doi.org/10.1093/brain/awae179 This episode was co-hosted by Chaitra Sathyaprakash and Andreas Thermistocleous,  edited and produced by Chaitra and Xin You Tai, co-produced by Antonia Johnston, original music by Ammar Al-Chalabi.

Mike Johnson is betraying us with more spending even before Trump takes office. I explain why we need a fight over the speakership, but that will not happen unless we get Trump to change his legislative focus. Likewise, we are having similar problems in the red states. We're joined today by state Rep. Jordan Pace, chairman of the South Carolina Freedom Caucus, to discuss everything that is wrong with the state party. Under the leadership of Speaker Murrell Smith, Democrats have been given key subcommittee chairs. Pace explains with painstaking detail the subterfuge GOP leaders use to advance the Democrat agenda without transparency. They have a corrupt process of picking judges, which often results in placing liberals on the bench. Moreover, they continue promoting biomedical tyranny, pushing socially liberal policies, and handing over state lands to the green grift. In South Carolina and elsewhere, unless we support the Freedom Caucus members, the GOP will continue promoting Democrat policies without the Democrats owning the consequences.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In todays episode we sat down with one of Australia's top interior designers, known for his sophisticated, contemporary style that blends practicality with elegance, Darren Palmer. You may also recognise Darren from Channel 9's hit TV show, The Block! Within this episode, Darren delves deep into the intersection of design, renovation, and lifestyle, offering invaluable insights for creating spaces that not only function well but resonate emotionally with the people who live in them. We dive deep into: The significance of indoor-outdoor connectivity: Maximizing space and flow. Darren emphasizes that well-designed transitions between interior and exterior areas create a sense of openness, enhance natural light, and improve the overall flow of the home. The critical need to understand the buyer profile before designing, setting this as the Foundation for Design. The importance on how “Lifestyle drives emotion” and how to harness it for your next project Feeling inspired? Drop us a review and help us spread the knowledge! Your feedback keeps us rolling and helps others “Be In The Know Before They Buy.”

University of Canterbury lecturer Mike Grimshaw says students are turning up to university unable to adequately read, write, or think independently.

A university lecturer has fired shots at the education system, claiming the number of tertiary students who are “functionally illiterate” is at crisis level. Associate Professor of Sociology at Canterbury University Mike Grimshaw believes New Zealand is under-educating and over-qualifying. He tells Heather du Plessis-Allanit's a wider societal issue of how we value education, fund it and what we want from the system. New Zealand pumps out around 45,000 tertiary graduates a year. Grimshaw says there is no increase in the societal, cultural and economic outcomes that degrees are said to provide. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

By Walt HickeyWelcome to the Numlock Sunday edition.This week, I spoke to Stephen Follows, author of The Horror Movie Report.Stephen and I go back a ways, he's a pop culture data journalist I really respect and you've seen him in the newsletter lately based on his great work on stuff like Hallmark movies. He's out with a really fun new book diving into horror movies, one of the more exciting genres in the film industry these days. We spoke about the rise of horror as a genre, its unique relationship with audiences, and how certain trends have evolved over time.Follows can be found at his website, and the book can be found at HorrorMovieReport.com.This interview has been condensed and edited. Stephen, thank you so much for coming on.Thanks for inviting me. It's always a joy to have a chat with a fellow nerd who likes to go as deep as we do on this stuff.You have this really interesting new book out called The Horror Movie Report: The Ultimate Data Analysis of Horror Films. This thing's amazing. We're going to get into it. But before we dive in, I'd love to start off by hearing about how you'd describe the work you do. Can you tell folks a little about your history as a writer, blogger and analyst?Definitely. I kind of came to this in a strange way. I always knew I wanted to do film and thinking, but I didn't know what that meant. I was a teenager, and everyone told me to go and study thinking, study science and do film on the side. So I did the opposite, because I'm a contrarian. I went to film school and went down a path of writer/producer, and I set up a production company. It still runs, but is now doing more advertising for the charity sector in the UK.I'm still involved with that, but it meant that as my stuff moved away from film, I missed being connected to the film industry. I started to use my thinking principles and maybe 15 years ago I started studying film through the lens of data. I have no training in data. I stopped studying math at about 15, but I have an aptitude for it, and I enjoy it. Not many people do in film. I thought, oh, this is fun. This is a place for me. I started blogging about that, and some in the film industry like it. Not many people run away to do the accounts for the circus. It's nice to have a place.Then that evolved. I've done stuff within gender and other forms of inequality, and things within business to help filmmakers' profitability — but also crazy things, like looking at which Bond film mentions its own title most frequently in the dialogue. Which I don't think you're going to guess.GoldenEye is my only guess.It's a good guess, and you're on the right path, but it's the wrong answer. The answer is Moonraker. You were right to think object instead of character.But that led me on, and I now work for Guinness World Records as a side gig, finding out movie records. That's the sum total of 20 years of numbers and film fun.I love your work. I've always enjoyed your work quite a bit, and I've done a lot of work myself in the pop culture data space and there's not a lot of folks in here. Particularly back in the day, there weren't many folks at all, so it was always really cool to see your stuff. It definitely always got me thinking and is really one-of-a-kind.That's nice to say. And I agree; I would often think of an idea, or someone would ask me about an idea, and I'd be like, I wonder if anyone's done that. Then I'd Google it and it would either be you, me and I'd forgotten, or no one's done it. That's great. What a privilege to have a space to actually make some progress in.It's good. Again, I admire your stuff so much, and this is why when you hit me up and mentioned you were working on this project, I was so excited. Horror movies have been one of the biggest success stories of the past couple of years, particularly in the postpandemic box office. They tend to overperform; they tend to get good ROI. We've seen a surge in horror film production and we've seen the market share increase.Can you talk a little bit about why this is historically anomalous? We've always had horror movies, since the beginning of the invention of the medium, but why are we now seeing a bit of an uptick?You're absolutely right. It's way more than an uptick. If we were looking at how many horror films were made last year worldwide, it was over 1,500, whereas around 2000, it was 500-something, and in the 1980s it was below 200. It's really transformed. As you said, not only have the raw numbers gone up, but also has the market share. Now about 12 percent of movies are horror films. That's a large percentage.It's a number of factors. Certainly all genres have grown in raw numbers, because it's easier and cheaper to make a film than ever before. Every device I own has some sort of HD camera on it — you can do it on a doorbell. It's possible to do that. You also have the ubiquity of information. I went to film school in 2001 and there was education from tutors, there were a few hardback books, but that was how you learned how to do stuff. Now there's so much content online telling you amazing stuff from awesome people for free. That has an effect.But that's across all films. With horror itself, the market share growth is, as you said, the more interesting part of it. There are a few factors. One, we're more accepting that a film is a horror film. A film that we might think of as horror now, if it had been made in the '80s, it might've been pitched as a psychological thriller. There's more acceptance; there's no shame in it. People are like, yeah, it's a horror film, whereas in the past they might not have done.There's also that generation that grew up with VHS horror films, The Evil Dead generation — and maybe even the generation after that, when it comes to executives — where people have grown up loving horror, but also knowing that it does well. Therefore, if there's no business shame and there's no art shame and there's no personal shame, why not say, yeah, I'm making a horror.There's still a bit of way to go. The awards are pretty poor for horror, and the trade press doesn't cover it properly. It's still not as fully accepted as other genres, but production-wise and audience-wise, it's really evolved and grown and, in the last 20 years, really matured.It's so funny that you mentioned the award stuff. I remember when Jamie Lee Curtis won her Oscar for Everything Everywhere All at Once, I thought it was actually really special that she took a moment and shouted out the horror fans. That's a constituency in movies that does not get a lot of shout-outs from award stages, but nevertheless really did keep her in business for a few years.And it was keeping her in business because it was delivering to audiences. There's no hiding from that. It's the most audience-connected genre, in my opinion.All my stuff is from raw data and from doing my own research, but sometimes I'll do a bit of Googling around to get a context before or after I do the work. With the awards, I found a few blog articles about how horror does at the Oscars, and all the numbers were wrong. They were all different, and they were different from mine. I was like, what is going on?It turns out there is a very, very small number of horror films that do well at the Oscars. Most of them are quite questionable horrors, as in, is it a horror or not? Silence of the Lambs. Jaws. Those are two films that IMDB says are not horror films. You can argue either way, and it doesn't matter what my opinion is, but there are a few like that. Or Black Swan, which is very much a horror film, but because it's female led and about a female perspective, people often go, “Ah, it's a psychological thriller,” in a very misogynistic way.A small number of films that have outperformed have really changed that data. You end up almost immediately talking about existential questions of what horror is. I love that. That's what the data immediately suggests we should chat about.I want to talk a little more about that audience for horror. You had a stat in here that was really interesting to me about how horror is the only genre where the audiences that actually go to the cinema to watch it are direct reflections of the actual national audience. I know you write about the UK in there, but also in general, one really interesting thing about the cinema is that you do have quote-unquote “four quadrants” for movies. For the most part, you're going to see a gender skew or an age skew in terms of who attends a film. But I'd love to hear you speak to how horror is really one of the most universal genres.It really is. It's interesting, because as you've mentioned, there are a few different ways we can cut up the data. The one way that horror is not like the population is age. It has the largest percentage of 18- to 24-year-olds. If you split them into the different buckets, as they often do, horror has the lowest percentage of people under 18 and the lowest percentage of people over 45, which is fascinating. It's really condensed within your 20s. However, it's a good gender split, and also crucially, in the UK, they do just the most British thing ever and do stats around social status.Interesting.It's a rabbit hole. If ever you're looking for a rabbit hole, Google social status. Everyone's classed into different groups, usually based on the job they do or that their parents did, or whether they went to university — things that are sort of falling apart. But it does mean they put people in different brackets. They do that for all the different audiences because it's part of the cinema business' advertising: They want to know whether to sell Rolex watches or lager. And when you compare it to the UK population, every other genre is posher. To a large degree, things like biographies are unbelievably posher than the average population.Horror is the one that just reflects the public. Also, almost every genre has a very strong correlation between what critics think of the movie and whether it makes money or not. In almost all genres, it makes sense; if you can make the film better, according to critics, you'll make more money. Horror has little to no correlation — functionally irrelevant correlation. Critics are irrelevant. Horror always gets poor scores from audiences, even, but I think that's because it delivers something different. It still is a film and it still is in the film genre space, but it's the weird cousin that's there delivering because it doesn't have the snootiness. It doesn't have the credibility. It only has the fact that it delivers, so when it does deliver, it does stunningly well. And the audience has a different criteria for what they'll put up with, whether they'll tolerate junkie effects or a bad idea or bad acting. I love that. It has its own identity.I love it, too. I'm glad that you mentioned that, because when I was doing my book, I was really interested in horror. I'm not good at horror movies; I am very easily scared and I don't have fun during them. I'll see them if I'm dragged to by my husband, but nevertheless, I am a gigantic weenie. There's no personal affection for this genre, but I was obsessed with it because, to your point, the first thing that people start messing around with when a new medium is invented is spooky stuff, right?When the novel was invented, you were very quickly after that getting stuff like Dracula, or Frankenstein. Once the medium has ossified, you start getting people experimenting with scares. Some of the earliest films that we have, whether it's Nosferatu or things like that, are people trying to spook one another. It's almost like the stuff that came before the dinosaurs.You're absolutely right. What's fascinating about it is that as soon as there's a new medium, people use it to scare other people, but then they take a long time to acknowledge that. The idea of a horror film as a nomenclature, as a name for it, didn't emerge until the early '30s, when you started to have universal monsters. We had horror films before that, but they didn't call them that. They might be called Gothic. So, there is a very quick move to scare ourselves, but then there's a very slow realization of acceptance, of publicly going, yeah, I don't mind being scared. Which is fascinating, isn't it?It is. It's so cool, and it's cool seeing it replicate itself. Online, you used to have jump-scare videos as some of the first stuff. Some of the earliest viral videos were that. Even with podcasts, a lot of true crime podcasts are horror podcasts.One hundred percent.There's another thing you write about in here that I genuinely just love, which is that there's no link between a filmmaker's experience and the actual profitability of the horror film. This is one of the things that makes this genre so cool, and I'd love to hear your perspective on it and some of the data from it. It's a really approve-yourself kind of genre. A lot of the time, you can show up with a little bit of money and some corn syrup and red food coloring, and they've been really special.Totally. It is the most accessible genre, partly because it has the lowest cost but also because it doesn't need gatekeepers. It doesn't need stars. It doesn't need visual effects. So it's immediately open to more people, but then on the other end, the audience is also willing to go with something great. They're not going to go, “Well, who made it?” They'll just go, “Ah, that was great.” You're right.I looked at the correlation between the number of films that someone had made before and the profitability of their films. I looked at it for writers, producers, directors, and exec producers. What we found, when we were looking through this, is that with writers, producers and directors, there's little to no correlation. Really. That's staggering when you think about it, because most horror films do nothing — that's what films do — and if you have a lot of microbudget films, that's 1,500 a year and not all of them making money. But the ones that do make money can do staggeringly well. You would imagine that experience is a factor, but it's not.Except for the exec producer. There was a correlation, though it's not the strongest. It's not make-or-break. I don't know which way around that is, whether it's exec producers being very good at spotting the right projects, so they become an identifier, or whether they transform the project and therefore become the transformation.Functionally, it doesn't matter. It's a bit of both: a bit of column A, a bit of column B. The horror producers I've spoken to often say it's a mix of those things, that they're not going to come aboard a bad project. But at the same time, it is about having the right relationships to know how to get distribution or how to retitle it or basically how not to eff up one contract that could ruin everything. Sometimes it is just a steady hand.If you're making a horror film and you've never done it before, I don't see that as any kind of problem, but maybe have at least one voice who's experienced that you can go to — infrequently, so they don't have to do a huge amount. The exec producer is not on set picking up trash.It's almost reminiscent of the Roger Corman film school stuff.Totally. The things that the really experienced person will do are basically, here's the big picture, here are some connections, but the bits the audience is actually going to love if they're given the chance to watch the film — the story, the acting, the moments, the editing, the sound — that's all going to be done by the creatives. And that doesn't matter about your experience.I remember an interview with Wes Craven a long time ago where they said to him, why are there so many bad horror films? And he said, because they're made by people who don't love horror. I've got to say, that's probably true. You can't make it cynically, but if you make it with your passion and heart, you have a good chance. Make a Western or a sports movie with your heart and you're not getting the money back. But if you make a horror film with your heart, there's a chance. I'm not saying there's a big one, but there's a route to success and establishment and franchise and all that.Sam Raimi very notoriously tread that path. Even folks like James Cameron. It's interesting to look at filmmakers who really did make their bones by being very passionate about a horror film and getting it done and learning something very cool.The Terminator might be a horror film. I don't know. It certainly doesn't have the money to be what Terminator 2 is, which is solid action.Absolutely.It's not really sci-fi; there's a bit of sci-fi in it, but it's just a man. It's too cheap to have any of the expensive things you'd expect. It's a torment film, or maybe even a slasher, almost. There is an infamous killer.There's another element on this that I wanted to bring up, which is that you have this really cool stat about horror films and shot length. You were able to compare them to other mediums, and horror films just have so much more room to breathe. Can you speak to that?Before I study something, I tend to have a preconception of what it's going to be, which you can't help because you're around. But what I love is that I'm sometimes completely thrown off-kilter. Then I'm forced to go back and be like, what happened there? Why was I wrong? Is my data wrong? Because, as you know, sometimes when you find that anomalous result, you have to double check or even triple check it.This was one of those things. What I found when I was looking at this was that, unsurprisingly, action and sci-fi films had the shortest shot lengths of about four seconds on average, or something like that. That's short, and that's the whole movie. That was across all films. Drama had the second highest, and it was something like 12, 13, 14 seconds — I can't remember, I don't have it in front of me. But horror was 16 seconds on average per shot.That's a long time. And that's an average. First of all, I thought it was an error and I went through it, but no, this is true. Then I thought about it, and of course it makes perfect sense, because horror is about what you can't see. It's about the lack of control. Action is about sound and fury and it's a firework show. You don't really need to know what's going on; you're just excited to be involved. Whereas horror is like, no, you're going to sit there and you can't see what's behind that thing. Or the reverse, which is that you can see it's approaching whoever's on screen, and they're getting closer. No, you can't look away. No, you can't warn them. It's about the control of the image.It might be one of the quintessential genres for film. You watch some films and go, eh, I should have read the book. But with horror, it's not on the page. You have to have the required elements, but it's made on the screen and it's made in the moment of the interaction between the screen and the audience. That's what shot length does. It's control. It's awesome.It is. You also think about Hitchcock movies, where there's an absolute control of the camera. That got boiled out of a lot of dramatic filmmaking and a lot of action-thriller filmmaking, but it's still there in horror because it still does something to us. That's an amazing stat. I like it a lot.It speaks to the medium. It's not a play that's been filmed, which is what drama can be sometimes. It's used entirely differently than in drama, where the camera's just rolling so you capture it. In horror, and in a good horror especially, it's being used by a craftsperson to paint a picture, to force you to feel. That's the bit that horror fans like: the strapping into the rollercoaster. Make me think I'm going to die, you know? That's it.I want to talk a little about content. You're able to do some really awesome content analysis on this stuff, and there are a couple different angles that you've tackled in the book. Some are about the kinds of monsters we see on screen. There was a cool stat in here about aquatic-based monsters and the rise of water as a medium of fear, which I'd love for you to speak to, but what are some of the monster stats that popped out at you? What are some of the things hunting us now that have evolved over time?Well, let's be clear. They're not actually hunting us; this is movies. It's so funny, because sometimes I have reflected and thought, oh my god, the world is — oh, no, these are the stories we're telling ourselves about ourselves.I did see a parallel between serial killers on screen and serial killers in the real world. That was one of the things I found. I was looking at serial killers in the graph over time, and there's a big peak in the '80s, and then I showed it to one of my colleagues at Guinness World Records. They nerd-sniped me and went, “I wonder if that correlates with the real world.” And I was like, well now I have to go and have a look, don't I? Thanks. I thought I was done with this topic.Going back to your monsters, it's interesting. Monster horror movies are two subgenres: There are horror movies, and then there are ones that have to do with monsters. Within that, I classified the monsters where they were flying, aquatic or land-based mammals. There are other bits around the edges, but this has to do with monsters rather than little creatures. I found that the land-based category is the biggest, but has been declining quite quickly over the last two or three decades. Shooting up almost out of nowhere — well, out of the ocean — are aquatic monsters. It's such a clear trend. It's definitely happening. Because I'm looking at decades, and the whole report looks over 27,000 films — not all monster films, but still, monsters is a big genre. So, this isn't an anomaly of the data of just two films.I've got two theories, but they are only theories. This is what I love about this data stuff: I'll do the data stuff, I'll present it to you objectively, and then we'll all sit around over a drink or some food and disagree about the why. My current two thoughts are, one, that environmentalism has changed what we think of as villains and what's unknown. It's changing our understanding of monsters and nature, and the ocean is more unknown. But two, a more practical answer came from a producer friend of mine. I was talking to her about this and she said it was quite expensive to make an aquatic monster without visual effects.What were the monsters you could have in, say, the 20th century? For most of the 20th century, it was a bloke in a suit, or it was ants on a small model. That's it, right? It looks cool, but it is a certain kind of thing, and water doesn't scale. You can't have a miniature because it just looks different. Water is incredibly complex from a visual effects point of view, as well as the way the beings move. If you put a guy in a suit and put him underwater, he's going to drown, because that suit's heavy. But you're freed up in the 21st century to use more visual effects. More are freely available, so now we can live out our aquatic dreams — and nightmares. And, because we haven't for most of history, there's loads more space. There are plenty of more dangerous fish in the sea.Those are my two working theories, but I have no idea. I would happily talk with people about it for hours, because it doesn't matter. That's what I like about this. This isn't instructive. It's not like we must figure this out because it's going to change what people invest in or anything. No, let's just have some fun and talk about movies.There's that scene in Ed Wood where they're like, all right, Bill, just get in there and flail.Exactly.The tech has got to be a part of it. I also thought it was really fun to dive into some of the stuff you had about clowns, because we are in the week where Terrifier is a box office champion. Unforeseeable, unless you potentially foresaw it.Well, it's at least the third in the series, so there's a certain amount of success that's gone on before. But I don't think anyone expected Terrifier 3 to do the kind of business it's done and Joker 2 not to. Those two coming out a few weeks apart have had such different journeys that it's quite dramatic.Terrifier 3 has done exactly what good horror films do. They've got a very clear idea that's been tested before and gone big on it. They know what they're delivering to their audience, which is shock. They've also got a great advertising campaign. From what I understand, from what I've read around, they did test screenings in some cinemas where they didn't tell the audience what they were going to watch. They were like, “It's a holiday film!” and then showed this grotesque film. Lots of people walked out. Some people threw up, apparently. Then, with the remaining people that stayed, they did the piece to camera afterward. Like, “What did you think of the movie?” But loads of people walked out. The viral marketing is spot-on.Clowns weren't a big feature of horror films until about the 2010s, when we started to see them creep up to 1 percent of films, which is quite a lot. I'm not that bothered either way by clowns. I certainly don't think they're fun, but I'm not terrified of them. In reading around, I found a study — I don't have it in front of me, so I can't quote it exactly — that they did on the fear of clowns. It was across many, many people across multiple countries, and they found that over half of people reported some fear of clowns. So I think clowns are inherently scary, and most people, like me, are ambivalent. Someone will get a clown for a kid's birthday party, and I'll go, oh, okay. Whereas some people are actually like, why?That's also what horror is supposed to do, right? Horror is supposed to take something that you feel is safe and make it unsafe, but then in playing out the unsafe, you'll have exorcised the demon that worried you. Therefore you now feel safe, perhaps, because your body thinks you've played with that demon. You've played with that thought.I don't know. It'll die down, it'll get tired and something else will come along. I can't even think what the next thing is. Probably an IT engineer, or something that doesn't feel scary. Though, mind you, you'd have to call that “IT,” and they've already done that with clowns.The SEO on that is quite bad.We'll work on that together off-pod so we can keep the copyright.Terrifier is great, though. It's not my kind of film, but they've done such a good job. Everything they've done, they've delivered to their audience, and they've also created a franchise and a character, so they will be making a lot of money. They've earned it, as far as I'm concerned. Not mine, though; not my money.I thought some of the stuff you wrote in here about survival as an increasing theme in these films was really interesting, which also goes well with what you had about body horror films and infection as a prominent way we deal with that. When the pandemic hit, a lot of films that saw quite a bit of pop were the ones that pertained to this idea of survival during infection and things like that. You had some really interesting, decade-long data.Before we wrap it up, what are some emerging trends? What are some of the charts that have been going up? As we think about the evolution of this really durable genre, where do you see this stuff going?You're absolutely right. The pinnacle of infection movies wasn't actually postpandemic, though we'll see what it will be for the rest of the current decade. 28 Days Later might be patient zero for that kind of movie. But you're right. What we saw during the lockdown was that we wanted to find meaning and structure to the narrative that was playing out in our lives. It wasn't coming from the media, and it wasn't coming from the scientists, because we didn't know. So there were films like Contagion that did such a great job.It's kind of spooky when someone predicts the future. We forget all the ones where they failed to predict the future, or they did a terrible job. Out of however many it was at that point, 20,000 horror films, one of them nailed the future. Mathematicians are rolling their eyes, but at the same time, we're in this emotional experience saying, oh my god. Gwyneth Paltrow went through that, so I can.But it was interesting, actually. There was a film that was shot before the pandemic called The Pink Cloud, a Brazilian film. It was shot in 2019, but it was then edited and ready just as the pandemic was happening. It was relatively low budget, and it's about a big pink cloud that comes over cities and forces everyone to live in lockdown. It's a film about being in lockdown and it was just coincidence. It's great art, but it was just coincidence. It played at Sundance the year it was not physical — either 2020 or 2021, I can't remember. But it was amazing. The timing was sort of weird, and I think that adds an extra spookiness to it.Speaking to your point, obviously there are loads of films that talk about lockdown and infection, but not nearly as much as you'd think. We're done with it. “I get enough of that at home,” if you see what I mean. What is interesting in the trends is that, you're right, survival has gone up, but one of the biggest things that's gone down — which I think is really interesting. This is over almost 100 years of content — is how people are thinking about the brain or the mind.We're seeing fewer films where the brain is being attacked or madness is the cause of the psycho, and we're seeing far more understanding, like maybe they had a bad childhood. I think it's a strong story of mental health moving on from being the thing that you're scared of. You could read Foucault, you could look at 12 monkeys — there are lots of films that have played with this idea of madness and what sanity is. But largely we've moved away from, “He's mad, run away,” to, “He's mad. Let's listen to what he's got to say and try to understand him as a real human being.” That's really interesting. I don't know where that goes, but that's been a very clear trend over almost 100 years of horror films.That is fascinating. Again, so much of horror is interior-looking. A lot of the things that we're scared of and that are played up are more reflections of our own state of mind and our own fears. If we're not worried about madness being contagious in a Lovecraftian way, that is super interesting.Exactly. Throughout all of literature and all of art, madness has been fascinating. Up until a certain point, maybe 500 years ago, it was seen as a root to the divine or harmless. Then at some point, when you start having authority figures in certain ways, you need to shut down the anti-voices. It started to become something terrifying that you lock away, like it might be infectious and a problem.Then, more recently, we start to think about how actually we're all a bit effed up. There are reasons behind this. We can do something about this. It's not mad to go and see a therapist, or a psychotherapist, or whatever it might be. That then speaks to, well, you can't have the motivation of a slasher be that he's mad. It doesn't work; it's just not credible.You need to have a different origin, and you go one of two ways: You either give a lot more context, like he went through this horrific thing as a kid, or you say it's unknown. It's just unknown. It's a man in a mask. What's terrifying is the lack of knowledge, or it's too much information. Each film takes a different route on that.All right. This book is really good. It's called The Horror Movie Report, and it looks at all those different ways these movies take and the history of this stuff, which I think is one of the most fascinating things. Horror in general is just such a cool genre.Stephen, I would love to hear you pitch where folks can find you and where things are going. Tell folks a little about the book and where they can get ahold of it.Thank you. That's high praise indeed, because you're someone whose work I respect a huge amount. That's really cool. You're someone who actually can find the holes in it.If you go to HorrorMovieReport.com, you can get there. It's all digital at the moment; I'd love to do a coffee-table book of it, but that will take a bit of time. I've put it out in two editions. One is for film fans, and it's much cheaper, like 20 bucks. That'll give you the 400 pages and all the charts and graphs. If you love horror films, that's enough. If you're a filmmaker or a data geek, you'll want the film professional version, which is only a little bit more. That gives you all the data as spreadsheets, as well as some bonus reports.I've got different constituencies. Some people just want a pretty graph and then argue about aquatic monsters; others are like, give me the data. So here you go! And by all means, reach out to me if you've read something you want more detail on. I love this stuff, and if you love it, too, we're going to get on. Grab a report, and if you want to reach out, I'm not hard to get hold of.Terrific. Again, your stuff is always so good. People will know it from the newsletter if they've read it long enough. It's great stuff. Thanks again for coming on, I really appreciate it.My pleasure. I'm always here. And if anyone listening has a question about the film industry, if you think there's some data out there somewhere but can't bother to do it, someone else will do it — contact me. The best stuff I do comes from readers, the 4 o'clock in the morning ideas, the shower thoughts. Reach out, I promise I'll give it a go.Amazing. Stephen, have a spooktacular day.Nice.Edited by Susie Stark.If you have anything you'd like to see in this Sunday special, shoot me an email. Comment below! Thanks for reading, and thanks so much for supporting Numlock.Thank you so much for becoming a paid subscriber! Send links to me on Twitter at @WaltHickey or email me with numbers, tips or feedback at walt@numlock.news.  This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.numlock.com/subscribe

Learn from Mika Yamamoto, Chief Customer and Marketing Officer at Freshworks, about blending the physical and digital world to create impactful campaigns. Episode Summary: This episode features an interview with Mika Yamamoto, Chief Customer and Marketing Officer at Freshworks, a company that provides powerful, easy to use Customer service, IT, and CRM software.In this episode, Mika discusses surgically blending the physical and digital world, to create a campaign experience that sticks with prospects. She also talks about encouraging innovation from her team, tying marketing victory to sales' success and focusing on customer over function. Key Takeaways:Blending the physical and digital world when creating campaigns can create more lasting impact and better returns.Allowing your team to divide and conquer different markets and functions allows people to specialize and be the best at what they do, an impossibility if they are doing too many things.Incorporating humanity and a recognition of the human on the other side, not only differentiates your marketing in a B2B space, it makes the whole job more enjoyableQuote: ”In terms of signals, what helps is that we have one operations function that works across all functions. There's traditionally been, marketing comes up and celebrates and says, “Woohoo, we did all this work, we're green!” And then sales is saying, “Well, what the heck you can't claim victory because we haven't met our numbers. So how can you declare victory if we haven't met our numbers?” And so again, the construct that we have is we have one operations group in our organization, Freshworks. So, we have one dashboard that essentially ties together and we're still working on making those ties, but that ties together, marketing doesn't declare victory if sales can't. So, it's driving shared metrics in one dashboard versus this view of the world that is a marketing view, then a sales view then a product view. We want to drive one view, which is more customer focused versus functionally focused.”Episode Timestamps: *(08:24) The Trust Tree: Divide and conquer different markets *(24:12) The Playbook: Focus on demand capture *(39:20) The Dust Up: Assumptions about sellers and marketers*(42:49) Quick Hits: Mika's Quick Hits Sponsor:Pipeline Visionaries is brought to you by Qualified.com, the #1 Conversational Marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the secret weapon for pipeline pros. The world's leading enterprise brands trust Qualified to instantly meet with buyers, right on their website, and maximize sales pipeline. Visit Qualified.com to learn more.Links:Connect with Ian on LinkedInConnect with Mika on LinkedInLearn more about FreshworksLearn more about Caspian Studios

Explore the LIFE model of dog training, a force free approach, with David & Josh.

Arkansas Razorbacks' Mike Neighbors is well-known for his "Functionally Fast" offensive. He goes next level, explaining how to teach this face-paced style, how to limit turnovers, and what to practice to make your team faster.A Quick Timeout film breakdown with Coach NeighborsFunctionally Fast CoachTube Course (Free)Actions to Make Any Defense Look Wrong CoachTube CourseThis episode is sponsored by the Dr. Dish Basketball Shooting Machine. Mention "Quick Timeout" and receive $300 off on the Dr. Dish Rebel, All-Star, and CT models.Are you tired of generic workout routines that don't deliver results? If so, then Alpha Progression is your answer. Alpha Progression creates a personalized plan just for you. Download Alpha Progression today and get 20% off your first payment with the code "AQT20".A Quick Timeout is brought to you by Ballogy. A mobile app created by coaches for coaches, the Ballogy mobile app makes it easy for you to effectively evaluate, manage, and track overall skill development for your team. Go to Ballogy.com for more information.

REMIX: Album 5 Track 23 – Functional & Emotional Unison w/Renita BryantWe love an episode with firsts..but how about an episode with multiple first-time answers. Renita Bryant is bringing us jew-els with her compelling answers in our 5-Questions segment that made us stop, listen, and reflect. From a successful author, publisher, and analyst, Renita has forged a path of entrepreneurship while staying authentic and true to herself (and the self she's been since her middle school days). An episode that will hit you to your core and inspire you to think better and be the best YOU there is. Here are a few key takeaways from the episode:Mentee/Mentor relationships can provide value to both partiesHire Slow - Fire Fast - It's a true saying.Authenticity is truly your power (and your personal brand)Functionally & Emotionally When Two-Become-One  NOTES:Show Partner: SpecificityLearn More About Specificity Stay Up-To-Date on All Things Brands, Beats, & Bytes on SocialInstagram | Twitter

When people think of golf apparel they rarely consider anything to be revolutionary. In fact, most people likely look at apparel as another extension of fashion. But what if they could be both? Functionally appropriate and also stylish? That's exactly what the company TRUE Links Wear is doing with their wide toe box shoes with zero drop, and golf apparel which is both unbelievably comfortable and unique. Join host Jeff Hartman as he talks about this, and more, with TRUE representative Jeremy Santana as they discuss how TRUE is changing the golf apparel game, and the story of the company. All on the latest episode of the Fairways & Dreams podcast. This podcast is a part of the Golfer Gang Network of podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As a Functionally and conventionally trained registered nurse, I get questions all the time about the microbiome- both from clients, lay people and family members.   This episode is a breakdown of the microbiome, what it is, why it's important to address it for all of our health concerns and so much more!    In this episode, I answer:  What is the microbiome, and why is it important for overall health? Can you explain how the microbiome influences our mental and behavioral health? What specific aspects of mental health or behavioral issues can be impacted by microbiome imbalances? How does the gut-brain axis work, and what role does the microbiome play in this connection? What are some common signs or symptoms that might indicate a microbiome imbalances    

When stress occurs, sometimes there's no where to run and the survival mechanism signals "freeze," and plays possum. In this follow up episode about being functionally-frozen, I'll explain what you can do to melt this deep freeze. You'll be amazed at the difference a few simple techniques can make when we move from sensory overload and isolation to a sense of safety. Be sure to check out my podcast companion workbook, Why Is My Body Betraying Me? at drskyler.net/store. It's like having a one-on-one session with me. Also, I'm offering two FREE downloads at drskyler.net upon signing up for my weekly newsletter, including "5 Things Every Child Wishes Their Parents Knew" and "Healing Phases: Moving From Victim to Warrior."

Ever catch yourself staring into space, mentally numb or checked-out? Or feel like you're watching yourself in a movie, disconnected from reality and find yourself sitting in your car before going inside to avoid the imminent overload of demands once you walk in the door. Some men will hide-out in the bathroom. This is called being functionally-frozen which is a prolonged sensory shut-down. This functional freeze may be harmless, but it could also be a sign of a more serious issue called a dorsal vagal shut-down which can impact gastrointestinal health. In this first of a two-part series, I'll explain what's behind this sympathetic system response that can lead to mental and physical immobilization. Be sure to check out my podcast companion workbook, Why Is My Body Betraying Me? at drskyler.net/store. It's like having a one-on-one session with me. Also, I'm offering two FREE downloads at drskyler.net upon signing up for my weekly newsletter, including "5 Things Every Child Wishes Their Parents Knew" and "Healing Phases: Moving From Victim to Warrior."

Yep, we have coined the Functionally Integrated Tummy Tuck FITT™! What the heck? After years of listening to clients talk about their struggle to work the “lower abs,” the amount of people we've treated with chronic low back pain, and the post partum or menopausal women who struggle to control their bladder, we decided this strategy MUST be shared with the world. It's not another core workout. It's not going to overwhelm you and add more on your to-do list. It's going to EMPOWER and encourage you to make all your core work more effective and efficient. In addition, it's so simple, we'll share with you how to integrate it into daily life to protect your body to work at it's BEST™. Thanks for joining us today! We would love to connect with you! Find Tracy On Instagram and join our Facebook community Hardwired For Health. You can email us to apply for our custom coaching 3D Fusion Transformation as journeystrong3@gmail.com. Want access to our FREE FITT Technique? Click the link and give you freedom to make core part of your daily mundane tasks as well as change all things you do core (and BEST part is it doesn't even have to require you to take extra time to do it today). It will even improve the belly pooch, low back pain and Diastasis Recti! If you're struggling to figure out how to make eating well a simple, integrated part of your day(especially through life's TWISTS), invest in our monthly HAAC™ membership for your daily BEST™ delivered to your phone every morning and Health Assurance, Accountability Coaching to guarantee you keep moving forward in loving yourself no matter how— messy life is. In there, we build community so you don't feel alone and answer your unique questions for your current season challenges. What are we Loving? Jess & Tracy Are both enjoying some toxin-free scents in their home for spring cleaning from Doterra.

Jimi Olaghere is one of the first patients to have been functionally cured of sickle cell disease with a CRISPR gene-edited cell therapy.

Today I spoke with Dr Sharon Surita, PhD, a Certified Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner and triumphant chronic illness warrior. Her passion for holistic well-being is shaped by her personal four-year journey to overcome challenges with dysautonomia and complications from a hernia mesh implant. Armed with a doctoral degree in Environmental Engineering from Florida International University, Sharon's expertise in air, water quality, and environmental health risks, linked to chemical and mold exposures, enables her to craft personalized strategies using a holistic approach.  She develops bio-individual protocols that have been used successfully to eliminate hidden stressors in the body and remove environmental toxicants, thereby improving the lives of her clients. Owner at Functionally Enlightened Phone 305-766-1312 Web  functionallyenlightened.com Email sharon@functionallyenlightened.com Are you ready to gain a deeper understanding of menopause, breast health, and nutrition? Let's embark on a journey to embrace our new life with renewed energy, vitality, and clarity. I'm Dana, and I am here to guide your transformation from feeling frustrated to being fueled by faith, helping you become the Wise Divine Woman that God has destined you to be! Welcome to the Wise Divine Women Sisterhood! My mission is to provide you with valuable education about your health, strengthen your faith, and help you forge new connections for your Spirit, Mind, Body, and Nutrition. Together, we will delve into captivating interviews and explore a wide range of topics that will empower and inspire you. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://wisedivinewomen.newzenler.com/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Thank you for joining me here today! If you liked my podcast today, leave a review and share it with your friends, that would mean the world to me! Did you know I coach menopausal women? You can visit my website to learn more. It is simple and I do offer coaching appointments ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://danairvine.com/work-with-me/ola/services/soul-session-a-time-of-discovery⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ In your FREE Soul Session 30-minute consultation with me, we will discuss your challenges and goals concerning your health. This will create a unique signature program to meet your needs.  Dana Irvine  Certified Menopause Coaching Specialist Breast Health Educator  Holistic Health Coach Certified Clinical Thermographer Thermography Advisor. ⁠⁠⁠⁠www.danairvine.com⁠⁠⁠ #MenopauseMatters #BreastHealthAwareness #ChristianWomenPodcast #PodcastLife #BrainHealthTips #LibidoBoost #WomenEmpowerment #HealthyLiving #FaithandWellness #MindBodyBalance --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/wisedivinewomen/message

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Identifying Functionally Important Features with End-to-End Sparse Dictionary Learning, published by Dan Braun on May 17, 2024 on The AI Alignment Forum. A short summary of the paper is presented below. This work was produced by Apollo Research in collaboration with Jordan Taylor (MATS + University of Queensland) . TL;DR: We propose end-to-end (e2e) sparse dictionary learning, a method for training SAEs that ensures the features learned are functionally important by minimizing the KL divergence between the output distributions of the original model and the model with SAE activations inserted. Compared to standard SAEs, e2e SAEs offer a Pareto improvement: They explain more network performance, require fewer total features, and require fewer simultaneously active features per datapoint, all with no cost to interpretability. We explore geometric and qualitative differences between e2e SAE features and standard SAE features. Introduction Current SAEs focus on the wrong goal: They are trained to minimize mean squared reconstruction error (MSE) of activations (in addition to minimizing their sparsity penalty). The issue is that the importance of a feature as measured by its effect on MSE may not strongly correlate with how important the feature is for explaining the network's performance. This would not be a problem if the network's activations used a small, finite set of ground truth features -- the SAE would simply identify those features, and thus optimizing MSE would have led the SAE to learn the functionally important features. In practice, however, Bricken et al. observed the phenomenon of feature splitting, where increasing dictionary size while increasing sparsity allows SAEs to split a feature into multiple, more specific features, representing smaller and smaller portions of the dataset. In the limit of large dictionary size, it would be possible to represent each individual datapoint as its own dictionary element. Since minimizing MSE does not explicitly prioritize learning features based on how important they are for explaining the network's performance, an SAE may waste much of its fixed capacity on learning less important features. This is perhaps responsible for the observation that, when measuring the causal effects of some features on network performance, a significant amount is mediated by the reconstruction residual errors (i.e. everything not explained by the SAE) and not mediated by SAE features (Marks et al.). Given these issues, it is therefore natural to ask how we can identify the functionally important features used by the network. We say a feature is functional important if it is important for explaining the network's behavior on the training distribution. If we prioritize learning functionally important features, we should be able to maintain strong performance with fewer features used by the SAE per datapoint as well as fewer overall features. To optimize SAEs for these properties, we introduce a new training method. We still train SAEs using a sparsity penalty on the feature activations (to reduce the number of features used on each datapoint), but we no longer optimize activation reconstruction. Instead, we replace the original activations with the SAE output and optimize the KL divergence between the original output logits and the output logits when passing the SAE output through the rest of the network, thus training the SAE end-to-end (e2e). One risk with this method is that it may be possible for the outputs of SAE_e2e to take a different computational pathway through subsequent layers of the network (compared with the original activations) while nevertheless producing a similar output distribution. For example, it might learn a new feature that exploits a particular transformation in a downstream layer that is unused by the regular netw...

The interplanetary filesystem, or IPFS, is a peer-to-peer network that uses a distributed and decentralized model. Functionally, IPFS allows users to store and share files without having to rely on a single source of truth for those files. Matt Ober is the Co-Founder & CTO of Pinata. He joins the show to talk about IPFS The post Pinata and the Interplanetary File System with Matt Ober appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

The interplanetary filesystem, or IPFS, is a peer-to-peer network that uses a distributed and decentralized model. Functionally, IPFS allows users to store and share files without having to rely on a single source of truth for those files. Matt Ober is the Co-Founder & CTO of Pinata. He joins the show to talk about IPFS The post Pinata and the Interplanetary File System with Matt Ober appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

  We've had more guest mixes than usual the last 6 months and that is a great thing because it means we all get to hear some amazing music and amazing mixes like this one.  This new mix comes from Matthew Ramolo, who records as Khôra. There is a new Khôra album that just dropped in April called "Gestures of Perception" and is described this way - "The album weaves ritualized instrumentals with alien textures and resonant melodies, inviting listeners to transcend into uncommon consciousness." You can find the new album here - https://khora.bandcamp.com/album/gestures-of-perception-3 I was unfamiliar with the music of Khôra, but one listen to the new album and I was all in for a guest set. This mix is so very propulsive, it draws you in and drives you forward with layer upon layer of rhythmic intensity.  Here's what Matthew says about this mix: "This assemblage of material was selected primarily on the basis of substantiating the sonic and conceptual universes that my most recent Khôra release is in lineage with. The vast majority of the pieces presented are percussive or propulsive, but also circular in nature and in one respect I was seeking a fundamental rhythmic presence or energy among my troves of collected music that could be traced across various artists and presented as a single typology or modality that tenders itself in various guises through a cast of contemporary and historical voices. Functionally, the mix pursues a particular genealogy of percussive music across various genres, cultures, histories, technologies, and interpretations which initiates a kind of meditative dancing. Within the outline of this non-linear genealogy, ancient ritualistic and tribal tendencies flower within the unconscious regimes of the body even as the mind and body are provoked to find new appreciations and applications for these emboldening forms of musical intelligence which persist through time but are mutated, conditioned, and understood by the nuances of the listener and their temporal circumstances." Thanks to Matthew for putting together this unique journey. His album is out on the Marionette label and you can find more of their fine releases here - https://marionettelabel.bandcamp.com/   Cheers!   T R A C K L I S T : 00:00 Khôra - Flux and Hieroglyph (Gestures Of Perception 2024) 06:45 Cyclopean - Fingers (Cyclopean 2013) 12:21 The Dwarfs of East Agouza - Resinance (Bes 2019) 15:12 The Comet Is Coming - Journey Through The Asteroid Belt (Channel The Spirits 2016) 20:30 Muslimgauze - Caste the First Stone - (Salaam Alekum, Bastard 2020) 24:44 Love-Songs & Ulf Schütte - Dumpfes hämmerndes Dröhnen (Spannende Musik 2021) 29:29 Various - Radio Delhi #1 (Radio India: The Eternal Dream Of Sound 2004) 32:04 Uwalmassa - Belit (Malar 2022) 36:00 Kilchhofer - Karon ( The Book Room 2018) 39:28 De Leon - A2 (De Leon 2018) 44:44 Khôra - In Petrified Light (Gestures Of Perception 2024) 49:50 Joyfultalk - Kill Scene (Plurality Trip 2018) 53:42 Jon Iverson Meets Prins Emanuel, Golden Ivy & Inre Kretsen Grupp - Drum Steel (Jon Iverson Meets Prins Emanuel, Golden Ivy & Inre Kretsen Grupp 2023) 58:21 D.K. - Going Into Trance (The Goddess Is Dancing 2019) 1:04:15 Antonio Zepeda - Danzando en El Templo Mayor (Templo Mayor 1982) 1:07:30 23 Skidoo - Coup De Grace (Urban Gamelan 1984) 1:09:07 Holden - Blackpool Late 80s (The Inheritors 2013) 1:17:24 Autechre - known (1) (Oversteps 2010) 1:22:00 Stephan Micus - Passing Cloud (The Garden Of Mirrors 1997) 1:27:07 Tomaga - Idioma (Intimate Immensity 2021) 1:31:10 Shabaka - Ital Is Vital (Afrikan Culture 2022) 1:35:35 Roberto Musci - Claudia, Wilhelm R, and Me (The Loa Of Music 1984) 1:38:38 Khôra - Golden Femur (Gestures Of Perception 2024)

With LB on a Hero's Journey through the bowels of Hell, John and Niki once again conscript Producer Jordan into the triumvirate of intellect that is If You're Driving, Close Your Eyes. Topics of discussion for this meeting include (but are not limited to) the contents of John's most recent stress dream, carbon monoxide poisoning, ape films, photos of odd occurrences that Jordan has experienced recently, a "real brief" explanation of the complete history of Transformers, and even without trying, somehow even more.Welcome to If You're Driving, Close Your Eyes, a podcast about navigating the cruelty, chaos, and wonder of our terrifying world. Niki, John, LB— and our producer Jordo— try to find meaning and clarity one or twelve subjects at a time: from the menu at Cheesecake Factory to a human man dressed up as Snoopy tucking you into bed.Who are we?: We are Niki Grayson (https://twitter.com/godsewa) (the Buster Keaton of basketball), John Warren (https://twitter.com/FloppyAdult) (business boy and wassail pervert, short), LB Hunktears (https://twitter.com/hunktears) (handsome genius, 5'8", America's Gamer), and producer Jordan Mallory (https://twitter.com/Jordan_Mallory/) (frog with computer). Music by Jordan Mallory and Art by Max Schwartz (https://maxds.itch.io/).Follow the show: https://www.twitter.com/ifyouredriving Support us: https://www.patreon.com/ifyouredriving Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week-in-review, Crystal is joined by Seattle Times City Hall reporter, David Kroman! Crystal and David dig into why Seattle is putting less money into new affordable housing project this year and how this week's launch of a second social housing initiative by House Our Neighbors may be appealing to voters wanting to see progress on the issue. Next, they discuss the pressure on Mayor Bruce Harrell to deliver results now that a City Council friendly to his agenda has taken office and how the new Council's relative inexperience was on display at initial committee meetings. Finally, the show wraps up with a troubling story of the for-profit Tacoma immigration detention center refusing to allow state inspectors access after hundreds of complaints about the facility's poor conditions. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, David Kroman, at @KromanDavid.   Resources Harm Reduction in Rural Washington with Everett Maroon of Blue Mountain Heart to Heart from Hacks & Wonks   “Why Seattle will fund fewer new affordable housing projects this year” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times   I-136 Let's Build Social Housing | House Our Neighbors   “Seattle's social housing developer proposes payroll tax on ‘excess earners'” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times   “New Social Housing Initiative Would Tax Business to Fund Up to 2,500 Over 10 Years” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger   “A council of allies in place, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell feels pressure to deliver” by David Kroman from The Seattle Times   “Watch: New Transportation Committee gets intro from SDOT, CM Kettle puts foot in mouth” by Tom Fucoloro from Seattle Bike Blog   @KromanDavid on Twitter: “Councilmember Rob Saka: "Ideally I'd like to have an across the board auditing of the entire city budget, but I am mindful that that is very costly and a time intensive activity. It's not practicable or feasible this year."”   “State inspectors denied entry to privately-run immigration detention center in Tacoma” by Grace Deng from Washington State Standard   Find stories that Crystal is reading here   Listen on your favorite podcast app to all our episodes here   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Tuesday topical show and our Friday week-in-review delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. If you missed our Tuesday topical show, I welcomed Everett Maroon of Blue Mountain Heart to Heart for a conversation about how the opioid epidemic has impacted rural communities in Washington, the damaging role of stigma, what harm reduction is, and why it's so important. Today, we're continuing our Friday week-in-review shows where we review the news of the week with a co-host. Welcome back to the program, friend of the show, and today's co-host: Seattle Times City Hall reporter, David Kroman. [00:01:22] David Kroman: Hello. Thanks for having me. [00:01:24] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Thanks for being here. Well, there is - been a decent amount of news this week. We will start off talking about news you covered about why Seattle is funding fewer new affordable housing projects this year. What's happening and why are they seeming to step back here? [00:01:45] David Kroman: Yeah, it's interesting, and I would say kind of concerning for the general affordable housing landscape. So back to as far as 2018, Seattle has always made these annual announcements of how much money they're going to be putting towards affordable housing. They pair it with federal tax credits and private donations, but it usually ends up being over $100 million a year. Last year, for example, it was $147 million - I think it was about that the year before. This year, the award is only $53 million for new affordable housing projects - that stands out because voters just passed a new housing levy that's triple the size of the one before it. There is still money - less money, but there's still money - coming in from the Mandatory Housing Affordability program. And there's also the JumpStart payroll tax, which is supposed to go towards housing. So all those things together would suggest there's a lot of money for new affordable housing, but the problem is that a lot of the projects that the city has funded in the past are struggling with their finances. The combination of interest rates and some wonky details about what loans they're on mean that these 70 projects or so that are in the works, or at various stages of development, need something in the order of $90 million to prop them up. So it's a frustrating reality for people in the affordable housing world because they want to be building new housing, they want to be putting new units on the market. But because of just the nature of construction industry and where interest rates are at, a lot of that money is getting sucked up into basically paying for housing that we thought we'd already paid for. [00:03:17] Crystal Fincher: So does this money that is usually allocated annually - does it only go to the construction? Does it ever go to propping up other projects? Did this happen by surprise for the city? It doesn't seem like it was telegraphed that it would be this much of a hit. How did this change come about? [00:03:36] David Kroman: Yeah, the Office of Housing always helps out with operations and maintenance, and they see that they have a certain obligation not to just fund the construction, but to make sure that the buildings that they're helping fund function properly and can actually house people. I don't think it's uncommon that they go back and help out buildings that they'd already funded. As far as I know, though, it has never gotten to this size. It was telegraphed actually a few months ago - their initial announcement of how much money would be available suggested that it was going to be quite a bit smaller. I think people thought there were some more technical explanations for that. But what's really happening - in affordable housing, there's basically two loans that these affordable housing buildings get. There's the construction loan, which is what they get to put up the building. And then there's their final loan that they convert to once they've leased up enough of their units and are bringing in enough rent - because, despite the fact that it's affordable housing, the calculations that the banks make around these still require that they're collecting some level of rent from their tenants. Usually that process takes two or three years for them to convert from their construction loan to their final loan. But for a lot of reasons, they're just having a really hard time doing that. They're having a harder time filling their units - I think that's probably worth following up on why that is exactly. And then they're having a harder time collecting rents - some of that does go back to some of the pandemic era policies that were intended to stabilize people in their rental apartments. So they're not able to get to the point where they can get off of their construction loan. And that is a really bad loan to be on for a long period of time, just because the rates and interest rates on those are way higher. And so I think that reality is just coming to pass this year, that basically every single one of these projects is functioning on a construction loan. But if the Office of Housing didn't go back and help them weather this storm, then we're looking at a much worse problem, which is affordable housing buildings that have already been built and people are living in them - but them just basically going belly up or needing to be sold. And so kind of a rock and a hard place for the Office of Housing - they have a choice of spending on new buildings or helping out the buildings they've already funded. The choice in some ways is fairly obvious because you don't want to lose these buildings you've already built. But it does mean that future projects take a fairly significant hit. [00:05:48] Crystal Fincher: Well, it does look like that and it's important to keep these projects moving and healthy so that they don't go belly up or cause a large amount of destabilization in the market. But looking forward, especially with this hit to new affordable developments in an already-crisis level situation with housing affordability, the need for more units to be added - what kind of long-term impact does this look to have? Are we looking at a similar situation next year where we could be looking at a further hit? Is this a permanent injury to affordable housing funding, at least for the short to midterm? [00:06:28] David Kroman: Yeah, it's a good question. I'm not sure, but I do know that something fairly material would have to change between now and next year to make sure that this isn't a problem anymore. The number of units in a building that have to be leased up and collecting rent is like 90%, so it's really high. It used to never be a problem, but it seems like a lot of these buildings are hovering around 80% occupancy/rent collection. So unless the City has some trick up its sleeve for making sure that these buildings are 90% leased up and the people who are in them are paying that rent, it sets up a situation that is out of the City's hands because these are banks making these calls on whether or not they qualify for these cheaper loans. It's not like the City can pass some law that requires the banks to give them a cheaper loan. And so my guess would be it's not a problem that will go away in a year and probably will come up again this time next year. In the past, this has just never been a problem because, unfortunately, affordable housing is in such high demand that banks have never even thought twice about whether or not an affordable housing development would hit 90% occupancy and payment. The deeper concern here is that as banks see that that assumption is maybe not holding up as well, they might be more hesitant to write these loans in the first place. The only sort of cold comfort, I guess, is that this is not really a specific problem for affordable housing. I used to cover transportation - any transportation project is having these massive cost overruns and problems with construction projects too. And so maybe there's a little more leniency on the part of the financers because they understand that this isn't just some negligence on the affordable housing providers part, it's just the reality of the construction industry right now. But that doesn't mean that it's going to start being cheap anytime soon. [00:08:13] Crystal Fincher: Right - that's almost the takeaway. Everything about building housing right now seems expensive and growing more expensive. Inflation has definitely hit every element of it and interest rates are higher than they used to be, and just everything seems to be contributing to a higher overall cost. And so that's a challenge that we're going to have to figure out how to deal with, especially as it would be one thing if this were 15 years ago - We need to make plans because this is going to become a problem if we don't address it appropriately. But this now is a problem, a major problem, crisis level, where from the legislature to different cities are all acknowledging that we do have to build more residential units - at minimum - in addition to a variety of other policies, in order to prevent rents and housing costs from continuing to skyrocket. So here we are again, but not enough money is currently budgeted to go around. Is this a money issue? I know there's also a big budget deficit that they're in the process of beginning to deal with. Did the money just run out? Is this a matter of priorities? [00:09:21] David Kroman: Yeah, there is one lever I think that the City could pull and is pulling that could actually help this a little bit, which is one of the problems is the permitting timeline - for anything really, but affordable housing included - it used to be a year and a half basically just to get all the permits. There has been some legislation passed recently to exempt some affordable housing projects from design review in an effort to speed things up. That could help because then you're not sitting on a piece of property without actually being able to do anything with it. But yeah, it is a money problem because what it is at the end of the day is just things are costing more. The problem is every time there's a property tax levy in Seattle, the specter of levy fatigue is raised. So far, Seattle voters have never hit that - they have handily passed pretty much every property tax levy put before them. But there is, to an extent, an upper limit on how much in property taxes Seattle officials are going to feel comfortable asking voters to fund affordable housing. And if more than 50% of their money is going towards projects that they already thought had been funded, suddenly the political scenario starts to feel a little more fraught. Meanwhile, the other two funds that the City relies on for affordable housing are also no longer guaranteed solid funds. The Mandatory Housing Affordability pot - that depends on there being a lot of development in the City of Seattle. And of course, we've seen permits for new development plummet, which means there's just not going to be as many contributions from private developers toward affordable housing. And then the JumpStart payroll tax, this new city council is thinking already about this $230 million budget gap that you mentioned, and are not the friendliest to the idea of a business payroll tax. And so shifting the JumpStart tax from pure housing purposes to basically budget relief is very much on the table. And I think nonprofit housing developers understand that. So the problem is that in addition to the housing levy, which is robust and large, not going as far as they had hoped, combined with these other two sources of funds either declining or perhaps being repurposed for political reasons, in general, creates a lot of uncertainty among nonprofit housing developers. [00:11:23] Crystal Fincher: It does. We will continue to follow this. Thank you for covering that so comprehensively. Well, and that leads into news this week that House Our Neighbors launched a new social housing initiative, basically Part 2 of their initiative process that they talked about before. What is House Our Neighbors? What did the first initiative do? And what are they launching with this initiative that they just filed? [00:11:51] David Kroman: House Our Neighbors is the political side of Seattle's new social housing developer. 2023, they ran an initiative that set up this public developer that was theoretically going to take money and then either buy or build buildings. On its surface, it sounds a little bit maybe like Seattle Housing Authority, but their focus was going to be on mixed income or housing for not necessarily the poorest residents - 80% to 120% AMI. The idea being that if you're trying to raise a family in Seattle, it's really difficult because it's very, very hard to find two-, three-, four-bedroom affordable apartments. This would fill that gap that they see is missing between the market and government provided subsidized housing. The complaint or pushback on the last initiative was that there weren't any funds to do any of that work. That was intentional on the part of the people who ran the campaign because there are concerns about violating the state's rules against having multiple subjects in one initiative. So this new initiative that they're running would be that second step. It would provide a funding source via a tax on businesses with employees earning more than a million dollars. Their hope is to raise $50 million a year and buy or build around 2,000 units of social housing. I don't know that their announcement was coordinated with the Office of Housing's affordable housing announcement, but the two things certainly are related to each other. [00:13:11] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely. And with social housing, it's designed to be permanently affordable, government-owned, mixed-income housing that insulates itself, basically, because it's not part of the private market - where we just got done talking about all of the factors causing price increases in the private market. But because this is public, government-owned, it can move forward with a different model that is conceivably more insulated from market forces, in addition to not having profit pressure attached to it - helping to keep it more affordable with mixed incomes where people paying into the pot help fund the affordable housing for everything else. This did pass in the City of Seattle. And as you said, this was a two-part initiative process. The first part was on whether we were going to establish this public developer. And now comes the time to fund it. So when it comes to funding, what is the funding mechanism? And why was this chosen? [00:14:15] David Kroman: Yeah, the funding mechanism is similar to the JumpStart Tax that we were talking about before, which is it focuses on companies that have an employee making a million dollars or more. And I think the thought behind this - if you think back to the contentious Head Tax debate, which was targeting overall revenue of a business and trying to tax that, that became really contentious because you have businesses like grocery stores that have really high revenue, but super thin profits. So when you have Uwajimaya, for example, testifying against this tax as a beloved local business, people get kind of queasy about it - it basically failed because of that. The argument here is we're not really focusing on the overall revenue. We're focusing on whether or not they have employees that they're paying over a million dollars, because that suggests - if you can pay somebody a million dollars or more, you should be paying some tax on that. And it's a marginal tax, so the first million dollars of that person's salary are not taxed - it's everything above that that is taxed. The City's payroll tax exempts grocery stores and healthcare businesses, or at least healthcare businesses have waiver for a few years. This one doesn't do that. This targets any business that's paying people a million dollars or more. The exact number of businesses that that includes is a little murky. They relied on a couple past legislative efforts at the state and city level to come up with their calculations. If it passed, we'd get a little more sense of who would actually have to pay this tax, but that's basically how it works. [00:15:33] Crystal Fincher: So what they're referring to is an 'excess earners' tax, and it'd be a 5% marginal payroll tax. As you said, if they had an employee making $2 million, the tax would not apply to that first million. It would only apply to the one million above that at a rate of 5%. They're estimating with that revenue source, they could acquire or build 2,000 affordable units over 10 years. What is the timeline for this initiative now? What do they have to do in order to qualify and get it on the ballot? [00:16:06] David Kroman: They have set 30,000 signatures as their goal, and they want to get it by June - because if they got it in by June, that would leave the current city council no choice but to put it on the November ballot. And anybody who's trying to do a more left-leaning progressive initiative wants to get their measure on the November ballot because turnout in Seattle is going to be probably 80% - it's a presidential election - and the progressives of Seattle figure that more turnout favors them. So the goal is November '24. But they said that if for whatever reason they didn't get there, they would run it anyway at a later ballot date. I just think politically, that would be a little more challenging for them. [00:16:40] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely. They just filed the initiative. So that process for the initiative to be approved, get to the signature gathering process will be commencing. How does this fit in, in the general overall landscape? Tiffani McCoy, who's the policy and advocacy director with House Our Neighbors, talked a little bit about this happening because there is either not a plan or a deficit in the ability to deliver the amount of housing we need and the type of housing we need at scale. [00:17:11] David Kroman: Yeah, it fits in because the affordable 80% to 120% AMI - there is just not really anybody interested in doing that right now. There have been some one-off projects around the city where a developer, out of the good of their own heart, has said that their building is going to be affordable to a certain level - workforce housing. But you're really relying on individual developers being interested in doing that. Usually those come with time limits, so they guarantee it for 30 years or 40 years or something like that. And then as we talked about before, there's Housing Authority and Office of Housing - it's a small lane, but there is a lane for 0% to probably 60% AMI. But when voters are approving a property tax levy, they're not quite as interested in building housing for people who are making up to $80,000 a year. But when you're looking at how expensive it is to live in Seattle or what the median income is, those people are having a hard time finding places to live and especially raise families in Seattle. And so that is more who this effort is targeted towards, which is fill that gap between 0% to 60% AMI and then 200%+ AMI housing, which there's just not a lot of people out there building that kind of housing right now. [00:18:21] Crystal Fincher: Right. And that matters so much because that is related to a lot of the staffing shortage talk that we hear about, whether it's teachers or bus drivers or healthcare workers or - across the board, we're hearing about workforce shortages, particularly in the City of Seattle and surrounding areas. And a big piece of that puzzle is that people just can't afford to live in the areas where those jobs are. It's way too expensive. So you have people moving further and further out, making it harder to commute in for a job, or just finding a job elsewhere outside of the city. And so housing affordability is an important element in just these conversations about our overall economy, including workforce strength and availability. It is absolutely related to those challenges. So once they made this announcement, the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce immediately make a statement that opposed it. I don't know that this opposition was necessarily surprising, but it was an immediate reaction. How did they respond? [00:19:30] David Kroman: No, not surprising at all - they took the JumpStart Tax to court. They clearly don't like payroll taxes on businesses. Their argument was they supported the Housing Levy and they support some level of voter-agreed-upon property tax to build housing for the poorest people. The Chamber's line, and this has been their line and that of other businesses since at least back to 2017 when the first Head Tax debate came up, is this all comes down to supply. That the real issue is that Seattle is zoned in a way that you just can't add more supply, especially in the 60% or whatever it is of the city that's zoned for single family homes. So their argument is you are asking businesses to try and address a very small part of a much larger illness. And in so doing, you're not going to get us to where the city actually needs to be. And at the same time, you're going to materially hurt these businesses at a time when it has been, at least for some of them, sort of a difficult period. I think the counterargument is it has not actually been that difficult of a period for businesses like Amazon. And if you're paying somebody over a million dollars, something must be going okay for you. But I think the Chamber's position does kind of go to this point, which is - you're talking about a symptom when the real cause is just that we have built a system that doesn't allow for new housing construction. [00:20:42] Crystal Fincher: Yes, and it would be less ironic if they didn't seem to also oppose a lot of the rezoning and necessary new construction for that. But I guess it's a comfortable position to be in when you can just oppose things that seemingly have to do with each other. But I do think that's part of the reason why this passed in the first place. This passed after several years of seeming opposition and defeat of efforts to make things more affordable overall, including housing, especially those that are funded with taxes. And that has been a big point of contention between the Chamber and other folks there. The Chamber traditionally takes a - Hey, just don't tax us approach. A lot of their financial support of candidates in elections seems tied to their willingness or unwillingness to tax business. So this has been a long-standing divide that we have here. But I wonder if they've ever wondered if that long-standing hesitance to do that, in the face of skyrocketing costs borne by the regular residents of Seattle and surrounding areas, might have something to do with the alternatives becoming more popular to the point where they pass this in Seattle. So it'll be interesting to see how formal and robust the opposition to this initiative is. But it does seem like this is an alternative that the residents of Seattle are looking at. And as we look forward, especially if the JumpStart Tax is raided for the general fund, some of the other mechanisms that the legislature is looking at right now don't end up coming to fruition - this may be one of the only avenues where it looks feasible that something can actually happen, that there can be funding for, and that we can start to make up some of the gaps that are reopening here in some of the other areas. How do you see the prognosis for this moving forward? [00:22:42] David Kroman: Yeah, I think you're right that this is a lot of voter response to an intractable problem. I think it is true that the underlying problem is supply - I think that's hard to dispute at this point. It's just there are a lot of people coming into the city and just not enough housing for them. And so then, therefore, even old, run-down housing is being competed for - rich people are outbidding people of lesser means for housing that you would not necessarily associate with rich people. A lot of that is enabled by the fact that most of the city - it's just cast in amber and there cannot be any added density. So at a time when the city's population is growing, you've got certain neighborhoods in Seattle where the population is actually decreasing, and I think that is what is driving a lot of rent increases. I think the reaction, though - the problem is now, the struggles are now - and so it's all well and good to diagnose the deep problem and look back at what the city should or shouldn't have done, or what the city should be doing to help this problem in 10 or 15 years. The city could upzone across the entire city tomorrow, and the construction environment - as we just talked about - means it's pretty unlikely that you're going to see a huge influx immediately of new housing and density because it's just not a great time for building new stuff. And so I think that then causes people to look for alternative options. And this is one of them, which is a more direct taxation to construction that is divorced from - well, not entirely divorced because we talked about the problems facing the nonprofit housing world, but more divorced from market forces that, again, perhaps should have been addressed a long time ago. But even if they were addressed tomorrow, would take years, decades, perhaps, to really show meaningful improvements in the affordability of Seattle. And so I think that is why these solutions that the Chamber doesn't like - because they are not market solutions, they are taxation solutions on their clients and the people that they represent, but that becomes more appealing because people want to make some immediate progress in the next year. [00:24:38] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Well, we will continue to follow that story and the initiative and see how it goes. I also want to talk about a piece that you wrote this week about Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell, titled, "A council of allies in place, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell feels pressure to deliver." I think that pressure is an appropriate response - a number of commitments or what he ran on two years ago still has a lot of areas for improvement. I don't know that anyone feels that the type of progress that was indicated or promised has actually happened. But some of that was in his telling because he didn't have a great working relationship with the council - even though they have very distinct roles and responsibilities. But he's saying now, and part of what he said during the campaign - if we have a better working relationship, we could accomplish more. What did this story uncover, what did you talk about, and where does he stand on what he's accomplished and what he's looking to accomplish? [00:25:37] David Kroman: Yeah, I think it's perhaps not quite exactly like having a one-party President, House and Senate, but it's something like that. Because at least since I have been watching City Hall, I would argue that there has been no mayor who, at least on paper, has come into a more favorable political environment than Bruce Harrell does right now. Because he endorsed five people for city council - which I don't think Durkan or Ed Murray dipped that much of a toe into the political scene, so that alone was a big jump into playing politics - and then all of them won. And then he gets this bonus of another one of his opponents, Teresa Mosqueda, leaving to go to the King County Council. So basically he gets six new friendly people on the council, banishes all but Councilmember Tammy Morales as clear opponents to his agenda. And then more than that, if you've been watching the committee meetings in city council this year, their agenda items are what is the Seattle Department of Transportation and what does it do? They are just getting their feet under them. They are still trying to find where the bathroom is. Meanwhile, Bruce Harrell has been in City Hall for 14 years. So all of that added together means there is nothing in his way to basically do what it is that he has envisioned for City Hall. The question is - can he or will he do that? And also it kind of puts to test some of the narratives that were created around what the previous council was at fault for doing. Some of those I think could end up being true, but also I think some of the problems that we're talking about here - fairly complicated and don't just boil down to who exactly was on the previous city council. For example, police recruitment. The mayor has said he wants to grow the department to 1,400. It's a real question of whether the police department is ever going to be back to 1,400. But there's no longer the boogeyman of "Defund the Police" to fault for those challenges - now the rubber meets the road. Can a council that has explicitly said it wants to hire more police officers actually do that? And then if it doesn't, I will be curious to see how voters respond. Will they give him the same level of scrutiny that they gave the council the last few years? That will be interesting to watch. [00:27:35] Crystal Fincher: That will be interesting to watch. I do also find it interesting, from the perspective of his allies that we heard during the campaign, of stuff like "Defund the Police" and blaming some of the inability to achieve what they said they wanted to achieve on that, as if the council had been hostile. But if we look - particularly over the past two years - the council didn't pass up an opportunity to fund the hiring of more police officers. Functionally - policy-wise, budget-wise - they allocated all of the money that was asked for, they allocated bonuses related to that, yet they still ran as if this council was somehow hostile to that issue. It seemed, to your point, like the creation of a boogeyman that didn't exist, and certainly not since he's taken office here. Did that strike you as genuine reasons or reasons that really would have impeded him taking action on some of his priorities that he seemingly talked about? Well, it was because of the council that I couldn't. But on an issue like police funding, where council did provide the funding for that, where council did provide everything that was asked for to do that, yet there still wasn't progress - does that rest on the council or was that another issue? [00:28:51] David Kroman: Yeah, I think if you ask him and you ask the current council, they acknowledge - Sure, they didn't literally defund the police by 50%. And what they did "defund" was mostly a shuffling of the decks.decks -moved parking enforcement to SDOT for a while and they moved 911 to Community Safety. So the police department's budget shrunk, but those functions just moved to a different department. I think they acknowledge - yes, that they didn't cut them. But policing is an incredibly competitive recruiting environment. And I think their argument is. And I do think - yes, they didn't literally defund, but they were pretty public about some of their comments around the police. And I think that that probably had an effect on certain police officers' willingness to stay at the police department and others' willingness to come to the police department - can have a whole debate about the merit or harms of that, but I do think that probably played a factor. But at the same time, I think that there's a lot else going on around that issue of police recruitment that transcends just conversations around "Defund the Police" and what the previous city council did or didn't do. The mayor's office has had a budget for marketing for a couple years now. As far as we know, the recruitment environment has not improved. And so I think there are a lot of technical details that will slowly come out over Harrell's administration that show that the problems - while I do think that whatever the city council's previous image was, made probably a difference around that - I think there's a more complicated story around the mechanics of what recruitment actually looks like. [00:30:17] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, I tend to think that there's a more complicated story around the mechanics of recruitment, particularly because several surrounding departments, including those with staunch supporters of hiring police, of funding police, are also experiencing challenges with hiring. It's hard to find a department around that isn't saying that they're experiencing staffing problems. So it seems to go deeper, in my view, than just that. Can I absolutely say that their willingness to examine the budget four years ago had nothing to do with this now? No, I can't. Certainly conservative elements in talk radio and Fox News continue to make a lot of that and characterize "defund" as a current dominant thought, which I think is just demonstrably false. On top of that, just on that issue, with the understanding and the knowledge that even if you were to hire an officer today, it's going to be a year plus before they can actually be deployed on the streets because of their need to train and go through their requirements. Is there a plan in the interim? We're two years into Bruce Harrell's term now, and it doesn't seem like - okay, barring that, what are we doing? I don't want to say no plan. They introduced a limited partial trial of a co-response model for behavioral health through his new CARE Department. There is that going on in a limited way - would love to see that expanded so it's at minimum around-the-clock, but certainly more than a handful of officers and responders involved there. Certainly in the area of public safety, I think a lot has been examined there. Were there any other issue areas, whether it's homelessness, the City's environmental plans, economic development within the city, that he talked about wanting to deliver or work on in his next two years? [00:32:10] David Kroman: Harrell - I think he's going to be dripping these out slowly. But the thing that I would say stood out to me the most was his comments about the City's relationship to the county. We had seen some comments of his about, specifically the City's relationship to the King County Regional Homelessness Authority, leak out unintentionally over the last two years. Fairly clear that he took a skeptical eye toward that body. But now I would say the big change now that he has this friendly council and basically full control of the City Hall is he's no longer saying those things in private. He's being fairly public about - he has a skeptical view of the King County Regional Homelessness Authority. And he has a skeptical view of the amount of money that the City of Seattle is giving that body and whether it is doing what he wants it to do. He said basically the same thing about Public Health Seattle King County, which I thought was interesting. I had never heard that relationship come up as one that needed additional scrutiny. But he said that when it comes to the issue of fentanyl, that basically he thinks Public Health Seattle King County should be doing more, and he was wondering why they're not doing more. And so as far as specific policies or legislation he might introduce, I don't have a great read on that just yet. But I do think - and I've heard this from the new council members too - I wouldn't be surprised if we see a fairly dramatic rethinking of how the city and the county work together on some of this stuff. [00:33:25] Crystal Fincher: Interesting. Certainly, it seems like there might be some budget implications attached to that. That might be another reason why we are talking about this now, as the City looks to trim a couple hundred million dollars or make up for a budget deficit of over $200 million that they're facing. Has he been responsive, or did you get a chance to talk about some of the seeming inaction on some of those areas? There certainly seemed to be a number of promises as he walked in and optimism from a lot of people as he took office that - Hey, you're someone with a different vision who's looking to move forward on a variety of things, talking about One Seattle and the vision that he has for that. Has that resulted in or materialized in anything? Is he talking about doing anything specific with that? I think a lot of people are wondering just kind of overall what his plans are. [00:34:17] David Kroman: Yeah, I think so far this has not been the most policy-heavy mayor's office by any stretch. I think back to the Murray administration - before, of course, everything else came out - but that was an office that pushed super hard for the task forces around $15 an hour and housing affordability, the HALA committee, and they would lock people in a room and make them work it out. This is not that office. What we have heard from him is a lot of messaging and, I think, an effort to do perhaps not systemic things, but pushes around certain homeless encampments or priority policing around Third Avenue or 12th and Jackson. And it's kind of these hits and sort of giving a general message about what kind of mayor he is. I think he would perhaps point to some of the rules - tree canopy legislation or things like that. But I don't know that you can point to the first two years of his office and call it a major policy-heavy term. I think there's going to be more pressure on him to be a little more policy-minded in the next two years, because as we just talked about, he's not going to have to do nearly the amount of negotiation with this city council as he would have had to do with the last one. If he comes down to them and says - I think this is really important, we got to pass this. - pretty good chance he's going to get it passed without, there's going to be tweaks and I'm sure there's going to be some nods towards pushback or accountability. But at the end of the day, this is a city council that has kind of adopted the mayor's own One Seattle slogan. When he was on city council, too, I don't know that everyone would have pointed to him, as a city councilmember, as the most policy-driven. He had certain things that he focused a lot on around policing, or he was the one who pushed the hardest for body cameras. And he's pushed hard for some police technologies like ShotSpotter and things like that. But when he was on city council, he wasn't taking the lead on a lot of big, big policy swings. And so far, I would say that's mostly been true for the first half of his term. It's just he's going to have to show some big policy swings, I think, for these next two years - because I do think he's hyper-conscious of his own reelection campaign, is my sense. We didn't talk about that specifically, but I think he's interested in running for reelection. I think it's assumed he will run for reelection. And so he's going to have to build a case for himself to voters in two years from now. [00:36:28] Crystal Fincher: Definitely. I also want to talk about some of the firsts that we saw this week. We saw the Seattle City Council conduct their first committee meeting. The Transportation Committee, chaired by Councilmember Rob Saka, held its first meeting. As you talked about, it was very Intro to or Transpo 101, because these are a lot of new members who are not familiar with the way this functions, who are still just getting their bearings underneath them for how City Hall works, how legislation works, what SDOT does do. They are all very new and are not even coming into this with a policy background in the area that may help. So this is really starting from Step 1 here. What did we hear during this committee and outside of the committee - statements from members of the council this week? [00:37:19] David Kroman: Well, a few things that stood out to me. One, it's starting to hit home a bit that this is just an incredibly green city council. This is two-thirds of people who have not held elected office before - that's not to say that they have zero experience. Maritza Rivera, for example, was a department head, so she has spent some time in City Hall. But at the end of the day, some of the questions they're asking or getting briefed on are things like - What is the Sound Transit Board? Who decides where the West Seattle to Ballard stations go? - things like that. Not to say that they don't know those things, but that's the level that we're at right now in their committee meetings. So that was one thing that really stood out to me, which is - they don't have a lot of time to figure out a lot of these big problems. We're already a month in to the year because they had to spend the first month appointing a new member. Council President Nelson didn't schedule any committee meetings during that time. So it's February and we're doing the briefing meetings. I think that's going to be something to watch. We also heard, I would say - let's call it some acknowledgement of the reality of the situation. On the campaign trail, we heard a lot of talk about "auditing the budget." We really heard it in the applications to fill the vacant council seat, this phrase "audit the budget, audit the budget." It was never super well defined what they actually meant by audit. We heard from Councilmember Saka that a literal audit of the entire budget is something that would take a really long time and be really expensive. And he acknowledged that they're not going to do that, at least not this year. So that raises some questions around what they actually meant when they were saying we were going to audit the budget and how that is materially different from what happens every year with the budget - which is you review what you can, and cut where you think you can cut, and fund what you want to fund. So that was interesting - just there's a certain reality that comes with moving from being on the campaign trail to being in office. [00:39:06] Crystal Fincher: There is a reality about moving from the campaign trail to moving into office. Speaking personally and speaking as someone who is a political consultant, has worked with plenty of candidates. This is something that you hope candidates would have an understanding of while they're running. This is directly related to what their plans are going to be. Certainly, Rob Saka and other councilmembers were asked plenty of times on the campaign trail how they were planning to deal with this looming budget deficit. And part of the background of this is that, "Well, we need to audit the budget" issue - never sound credible or serious to a lot of people because, overall, just a citywide budget audit is not the thing. But as you said, the budget process is what that is. The budget process is continually reviewing, understanding, approving, modifying - what this funding is, how effective the funding has been - that's all part of the standard budget process of the City every year. And so a lot of it seemed like they were trying to avoid talking about what their plans were. They were trying to avoid taking a stance on particularly the progressive revenue that would be needed to close a budget hole like this. And the mayor put together a Progressive Revenue Task Force that came out with options that may seem doable - asked about those, the move from a lot of the candidates, especially the moderate to conservative ones, was to say - I don't know about that progressive revenue, but we really need to audit the budget before we do anything else. We need to take a look at exactly what's being spent where and see if it works and that kind of stuff. But I think we're arriving in another situation where if you actually come in with a plan about what you want to accomplish, that's one thing. If you're coming in trying to avoid talking about what you want to accomplish, that becomes really hairy - trying to contend with and explain once you're actually in office. So now the one thing that people heard you talk about, which seeing response certainly online following these comments, was - Hey, the only thing he talked about was doing audits. And now he's saying that - Well, they can't really do that, we're walking it back, it's not practical or feasible. One, that seemingly could have been something that when people pointed that out on the campaign trail, maybe they should have taken that to heart and come up with a more realistic plan. But also now that we're here, it just seems like maybe there wasn't the kind of understanding related to what they were saying. I hope future candidates look at that and take that under advisement. I hope voters look at that and again, look at the types of answers that you're getting - even though they may sound good in a soundbite, are they actually realistic? Will they actually get done what you want to see happen in the city? Or is it just a line that people are tossing out in order to avoid talking about something else, or because it sounds good as a soundbite? [00:41:57] David Kroman: Yeah, I would say this, though, about the budget. I don't want to sound like I'm defending the City's budget process too much because - it takes you a little while, but it's very easy to see where dollars are allocated, theoretically. It is much, much more difficult to know if those dollars are actually being spent in the way that the city council budgeted them for. We've seen this actually crop up in conflicts between the city council and the mayor's office, which is city council will budget a certain amount of dollars and the mayor's office - not this mayor's office, past mayor's offices - just won't spend it because it wasn't part of their priority. And I think you can look to that conflict and generalize it out a little bit. I don't know that there are great mechanisms to show for sure that when the city council puts money towards a certain thing, it's A) going to the thing that it was supposed to, going out at all - I do think there are probably some amount of dollars that are dedicated and not being spent for whatever reason. I don't think it's corruption or anything like that. It's just staffing and permit timelines or whatever it might be. And then of course, the final question of - So it's gone out the door, is it doing what it was intended to do? I think those are all questions that are probably worth asking. And I'm not sure are always asked in the fullest sense every year during budget. And so I agree that the use of the word "audit" was incredibly fast and loose on the campaign trail. Because when you say "audit," that implies something pretty specific. We have a Washington State Auditor. We have a City of Seattle Auditor. And they do audits, or you can hire people to do an audit. It's clear that audit in the most literal sense of the term is not on the table here because that costs time and money. Close scrutiny of whether the dollars that the City has allocated are being used in the way that people said they were going to - sure, I can buy that a little bit more. I don't know how you bring that more into the process than what's already there. To the new councilmembers' credit, I think there is room there to shed a little bit more light on that end of the budgeting equation than has been done in the past. [00:43:50] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely agree with that. I think you raise a really important point. It's hard to do it comprehensively - doing a deep dive into everything is a challenging thing. I do think that those questions do need to be asked frequently, especially on these high priority items. We definitely have a number of examples in the Durkan administration where they just refused to spend money - if council funded something and it wasn't aligned with the priorities of the mayor's office, the mayor's office just wouldn't spend that money in some instances or would look to divert that money to another area that wasn't one of their policy priorities as they've identified. So certainly just because money is allocated, does not mean at all that it's being spent at all or spent effectively. And I hope council does take seriously their responsibility to make sure that what they intend to happen as they set forth does happen and that money isn't just sitting there - that should be working for the residents of the city. But we'll certainly see what happens there. Last thing I want to talk about today was a story that was really concerning about a for-profit ICE detention center in Tacoma blocking health and labor inspections. What happened here? [00:45:04] David Kroman: Yeah, this was news to me. It looks like the state had tried to pass a law that basically increased access to the ICE facility - a privately run jail, basically - for people who have come into the United States. Because, as we know, there have been a lot of complaints about that facility over the years, but it's always been a little bit of a he-said, she-said situation because there's just such limited access in a way that - not to say that the state or city or county jails are in great shape, but lawmakers have an eye into those places and can see what's going on in there. They just don't with this facility because it's private. And so this bill was supposed to allow that access, but it seems like the GEO group that runs the prison is fighting them super hard on it in court and even barring people from entering. And this is pretty new to me - it seems pretty concerning - something that if you were a lawmaker, you might want to follow up on. [00:45:52] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, these complaints, there were hundreds of complaints - over 200 just between April and November of last year - stuff like insufficient food, misuse of solitary confinement, clothes rarely laundered and returning when they were supposedly laundered wet and dirtier than before, detainees with mental health issues being refused clean clothing. Medical issues, including stroke, paralysis, asthma, internal bleeding. One instance, a detainee with a broken arm was only given ibuprofen and not a cast for days after the incidents. When you talk about the types of violations that can happen when you have people who are 100% under your control, who you control their access to everything - the possibility of denial of that is egregious and atrocious. And so you do have to follow the laws of the state. Representative Lillian Ortiz-Self is trying to work through legislation to ensure that the state can inspect and examine what is happening here so it gets out of the world of he said, she said, and to ensure that they're following the laws of our state. And they've refused. So it is really concerning. A law was passed in 2021 aimed at shutting down the detention center by 2025, but that was ruled unenforceable. It just really is scary to think about - that we have these facilities responsible for people's care, basically, while they're being detained just seemingly unaccountable to anyone, with really catastrophic impacts on people who are jailed or detained here in this situation. And sometimes I'll hear people very flippantly - If they didn't want that to happen, then they shouldn't have done something to land in there in the first place. One, I think it might surprise people, the amount of seemingly innocuous things that can land someone in there. But regardless of how they landed in there, these are still people in the care of the state. And the detainment is what has been called for there, so they're being detained. But that doesn't mean that abuse, neglect, mistreatment is in any way justified. It is never justified. And I just think that we need to look at these things seriously. And when we hear about facilities, with the responsibility on behalf of the state, where they can control people's access to the necessities of life, that we should hold a higher standard than the average private company out there. And it really is just infuriating to me that we seemingly land in these situations where we have people being mistreated and they just seem to not care about the law - it's about the profit - and regardless of how people suffer at their hands in the process of it, I just - these types of stories really get to me. [00:48:54] David Kroman: Yeah, and I think it's why people are so concerned and looking for ways to get more eyes on the private prison industry - just because it is a constitutional right that people, even incarcerated people, have healthcare and food and not inhumane conditions, but just a little harder to make sure that it's not happening when the prison doesn't necessarily need to answer to the voters. [00:49:17] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. Hopefully that is something that will change soon. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, February 9th, 2024 - it's my mom's birthday today, as we're recording this February 8th. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Shannon Cheng. Our insightful co-host today was Seattle Times City Hall reporter David Kroman. You can find David on Twitter at @KromanDavid, that's K-R-O-M-A-N, David. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. You can find me on all platforms at @finchfrii, with two I's at the end. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical shows delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, please leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

Most Christians worship a binity: Father and Son, and that's when their binity isn't merely Jesus and the Bible! The Holy Spirit routinely gets boxed up, put away, and ignored. Functionally, He is the Cinderella of the Trinity: only brought out on special occasions, like a baptismal service: "In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." But the Scriptures, Old and New, have much to teach us about the third person of the Trinity. I expore how the New Testament builds upon but then expands what the Old Testament revealed about the Spirit. I also work through 5 different ways the Church (and culture) box up the Holy Spirit, keep him on the back shelf. Let's prayerfully welcome the dynamic, creative, and beautiful work of God's Holy Spirit into our lives!

Fraudology is presented by Sardine. Learn more about how their one platform covers you for fraud, compliance, and payments, and watch the replay of our demo here.In this episode of Fraudology, host Karisse Hendrick invites return guest & listener favorite, Gil Rosenthal, a fraud prevention strategy expert & a Fintech Advisor, to discuss the importance of storytelling and strategic thinking in protecting companies and users from fraudulent activities.They delve into the methodology of storytelling in fraud prevention (used by fraud departments in top companies, such as PayPal), and emphasize the need for a proactive approach to anticipate fraudsters' tactics. From analyzing unique patterns and dollar values to identifying band-aid & long-term prevention solutions to understanding the impact of different strategies and actions, they explore key strategies for staying ahead in the ever-evolving world of fraud.Tune in to gain valuable insights and learn about the fascinating world of fraud prevention.Links:As mentioned in the intro, the 2023 Fraudology Benchmarking Survey (Sponsored by Forter) can be viewed here; with no e-mail or contact information required!:https://resources.forter.com/fraud-fighter/2023-benchmark-reportTo connect with Gil on LinkedIn or to inquire about receiving the full training course as overviewed in today's episode:https://www.linkedin.com/in/gil-rosenthal/Fraudology is hosted by Karisse Hendrick, a fraud fighter with decades of experience advising hundreds of the biggest ecommerce companies in the world on fraud, chargebacks, and other forms of abuse impacting a company's bottom line. Connect with her on LinkedIn She brings her experience, expertise, and extensive network of experts to this podcast semi weekly, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

A single crown being fit in a Class I, canine guided occlusion is a piece of cake when it comes to the occlusion, but that same crown in a Class II Div 1 or AOB patient can result in occlusal errors. This episode is all about sharing a classic technique to prevent occlusal issues in ‘funky occlusions'. Join us on this special episode as we delve into a game-changing technique – the functionally generated path technique – with the experienced and generous Dr. Tom Bereznicki. Having recently stepped into clinical retirement, Dr. Bereznicki remains a powerhouse in the education scene. https://youtu.be/xHiLAxXUZ08 Watch PDP168 on Youtube Protrusive Dental Pearl: Ensure you have an excellent relationship with your dental technician. - Working with a ‘big lab' can sometimes have its issues. Try to visit your lab and become a familiar face so you have your specific technician that you can ask for whenever you send any indirect work. In that way, you can grow together  - with that level of communication, the level of work you get back is so much better. Need to Read it? Check out the Full Episode Transcript below! Highlights of the episode: 00:00 Intro 2:06 Protrusive Dental Pearl: 4:06 Dr. Tom Bereznicki 10:16 Functionally Generated Path Technique 16:42 Lab Processes that might be beneficial using Functionally Generated Path Technique 19:47 Protocol for using the Functionally Generated Path Technique 32:48 Functionally Generated Path Technique VS Custom Incisal Guidance Table 34:31 Functionally Generated Path Technique on a single unit restoration  38:07 Final remarks 41:11 Outro Did you know? You can get CPD from the Web App or Phone App and watch premium clinical videos, for less than a tax-deductible Nando's per month? If you liked this episode, you will also like Philosophy of Functional Occlusion with Riaz Yar – PDP066 Check out Dr Tom Bereznicki's website! Click below for full episode transcript: Jaz's Introduction: Have you ever got a crown or an onlay back from the lab and tried it in the mouth and thought, whoa, the occlusion is just way off. Jaz's Introduction:Either it's in infra occlusion, it's not even in the bite at all, or it's in supra occlusion. It's going to need a lot of time to adjust to get it happy, both in the static, the tap, tap, tap, and in the dynamic. i.e. the lateral excursions. And sometimes it's a painstaking process where we try and get this crown perfect and happy in the patient's bite and then the patient's perception comes into it and there's other protocols that we talk about in other YouTube videos and episodes that I've done about checking the occlusion. But this episode is about how can we prevent this scenario from happening. Well, you have to first think about when does this scenario often happen? Well, it's more likely to happen in funky occlusions. And guess what? Loads of our patients have funky occlusions. That's AOBs, cross bites, class 2 division 1s, and super, super deep bites, right? These are classified as funky occlusions, but they're actually very common in the real world. And it's because these occlusions are not your standard class one, that the articulators that we have, whether analog or digital, they struggle to recreate the patient's jaw movement. So this is why the problem exists, and it's more often in these funny occlusions. Well, Protruserati, my name is Jaz Gulati, and in this episode, we're going to talk about the Functionally Generated Path Technique, whereby we can use this little simple trick to get our indirect work happy in the occlusion even in the funkiest of occlusions. I'm joined by a really giving dentist who's recently clinically retired but so involved in the education scene. His name is Dr. Tom Bereznicki. Those who go to King's Uni will know him very well. He's absolutely brilliant. I love everything he's about and I want to promote everything he's doing in education.

“Right Now is When You Can Make 5x-10x Your Money Just Catching the Cycle” says Fury Gold CEO Tim Clark. “The problem here is the market. The problem is the lack of liquidity in the junior space. But that will change. And I think my message to investors now is: I'm not asking you to go out and buy a huge chunk of $FURY. But I think you'd be prudent to buy some. Because once this market moves, because of a lack of liquidity, you'll have a hard time getting in at a reasonable price and you'll be sitting there doubting yourself as it is up 50% wondering if it is going to go up 100%. And if it goes up 100% you are going to be killing yourself that you did not get in.” Currently $FURY has a C$78m market cap with a $61m treasury in $DV.v shares ($53m) and cash ($8m). So unlike most gold explorers now, the company does not have financing risk. Functionally, $FURY is currently a call option on Dolly Varden Silver ($DV.v). SVP Exploration Bryan Atkinson reviews the just-released positive infill drill results from the Hinge Target at the high-grade Eau Claire gold project located in the Eeyou Istchee Territory in the James Bay region of Quebec. The Hinge Target infill program has increased confidence in the geological model and potential for expansion of the Eau Claire resource to the west. Drilling continues to intercept multiple zones of gold mineralization including 5.5 metres (m) of 4.52g/t gold and 3.0m of 3.34g/t gold from 23EC-069; 1.0m of 20.20g/t gold and 3.5m of 3.51g/t gold from 23EC-070; 1.0m of 19.55g/t gold from 23EC-066; and 3.5m of 3.82g/t gold from 23EC-067. 0:00 Introduction 1:11 Positive infill drill results 2:15 Accomplished 19,000m drilling in 2023 4:25 Drill program 2024 6:21 Committee Bay project 8:14 Juniors and Producers need to work together 11:12 Robust treasury with apprx $59mm in $DV shares and cash 13:28 Tim's personal investment in $FURY is at significantly higher cost-basis 15:55 Now is the opportunity to position to make 5x-10x in junior gold stocks https://furygoldmines.com/ Ticker: FURY Presentation: https://furygoldmines.com/investors/presentations/ Press Release discussed: https://furygoldmines.com/site/assets/files/6555/2023-11-28-nr-fury-skop89026.pdf Sign up for our free newsletter and receive interview transcripts, stock profiles and investment ideas: http://eepurl.com/cHxJ39 Fury Gold Mines is a Mining Stock Education sponsor/advertiser. The forward-looking statement found in Fury Gold's most-recent presentation found at www.FuryGoldMines.com applies to everything discussed in this interview. The content found on MiningStockEducation.com is for informational purposes only and is not to be considered personal legal or investment advice.

Welcome back to a new episode of Her HypeSquad with Bosstrack! This week I sat down with Randi Deckard, a Senior VP of Client Engagement, to talk about advocating for yourself, the danger of assumptions, the many benefits of working cross-functionally, breaking down silos, and helping others shine. We cover so much ground in this conversation - we've got something for everyone! About Randi: Randi Deckard has over twenty years of commercial healthcare industry experience with a focus on driving revenue growth with a customer-obsessed approach. She has experience driving revenue and profitability in the Life Sciences, Technology, and Financial Services sectors of Healthcare. Randi has transformed her clinical scientist data-driven experiments into GTM playbooks that drive profitable sustainable growth. She's a Master of Revenue Architecture, a serial learner, and proud mama of two fur babies, Appollo and Luna. Contact Randi: LinkedIn: @randisuedeckard

Mark Clifton is joined by Dan Hurst and Mark Hallock to discuss 7 issues surrounding “The Billy Graham Rule.” Is it misogynist? Overkill or absolutely necessary? Functionally how can you make it work in the real world of ministry? How does this work in a church with one pastor and a secretary? What about email/texting/social medai Your spouse and your passwords When in doubt, leave it out

“We are pieces of an important puzzle and there are a lot of pieces. Working together, we can effect a lot of change.”Joining Meagan on the podcast today is Dr. Elliot Berlin, a renowned prenatal chiropractor based out of Los Angeles who is making a huge impact on the birth community. Dr. Berlin is extremely knowledgeable and experienced in holistic birth preparation and advocacy. He is a birth doula, hosts the Informed Pregnancy Podcast, and his most recent project is the Informed Pregnancy Plus streaming service where birth documentaries and other educational videos can be found on one online platform. Dr. Berlin and Meagan discuss TONS of topics that come from your questions! Topics include: What happens during an adjustmentWhen to start prenatal chiropractic careBodyworkAdjustments during laborCPDBreech PresentationPubic SymphysisSupport at homeBreastfeedingAdditional LinksDr. Berlin's WebsiteInformed Pregnancy PlusPediatric Chiropractic Search WebsiteNeeded WebsiteHow to VBAC: The Ultimate Prep Course for ParentsFull Transcript under Episode Details Meagan: Hello, hello everybody. You guys, we have a very special episode for you today. We have Dr. Elliot Berlin with us today and he's actually live with me so that's pretty cool that I actually get to see his face live via Zoom. Dr. Berlin: It feels like we are in the same room. I'll be honest. Meagan: Right? As live as you can get through a computer. I feel like this is our new norm these days. This is how live works. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. And you know, we got used to it. Meagan: Yeah, we did. We got used to it pretty dang fast actually. We're so excited to have you on today and we have so many amazing questions that our listeners and followers have asked. But I first want to just talk a little bit about you and who you are so if anyone doesn't know who Dr. Elliot Berlin is, you need to know and you need to go follow his page right now. Push pause unless you are driving. You can do that later and go follow @doctorberlin on Instagram because he's amazing and has so many incredible things and has done—I mean, for years—so many incredible things in the birthing community. Dr. Berlin is an award-winning pregnancy-focused chiropractor. If you don't know yet, on this podcast, we love chiropractic care. He's a certified birth doula and host of the Informed Pregnancy Podcast. So again, if you haven't followed his page or his podcast, press pause. Go follow along and go—what's the word? Subscribe to his podcast— Informed Pregnancy Podcast. He combines his passion for entertainment with his desire to educate and spread awareness about important issues in the birth industry. We know that in the birth industry, we have a lot of issues that need to be talked about. His latest project is the brand new streaming channel on Informed Pregnancy Plus dedicated to all things fertility, pregnancy, labor, and parenting. Informed Pregnancy Plus So, Dr. Berlin, I would love to actually start right there before we get into these questions. Will you tell us more about this new project that you've got going on? Dr. Berlin: Thank you for having me and for the incredible work that you do. I was just telling you recently that I feel like we are pieces of an important puzzle and there are a lot of pieces. Working together, we can effect a lot of change. The Informed Pregnancy Plus is a streaming platform. Everything grew organically from me really being a very medical-minded person wanting to go to medical school. Sometimes little arrows pop up. I see my son play video games and he's not sure where to go, then a big arrow pops up and says, “Go this way.” I get those arrows sometimes and it led me on a more holistic path. I fell in love with chiropractic and massage. I smooshed them together to make chirossage. I ended up with my wife and I having a fertility struggle. We ended up overcoming that with natural means when medical options ran out— and she is a psychologist. We started this mind/body program together, wellness care, with an eye on helping people boost fertility. Over time, that turned into babies and pregnancy. Again, coming from a much more medical background—I used to work in ambulances and emergency rooms—everything was brand new to me on the more natural front. Meagan: Mhmm, yeah. Dr. Berlin: I had never heard of doula. So I would get questions a lot that I didn't know answers to. It still happens regularly. I would go on to research. I'd talk to experts, read, and try to prepare an answer that was not, “This is what you should do or not do,” but “These are the facts as we know them. What do you want to do?” As I'd get the same questions over and over again, I started to write that as a blog. It became a magazine for a minute when people still printed stuff and then before I knew anything about podcasts, I was doing a podcast. Then I made a couple of documentaries, one of them about VBAC, Trial of Labor. It's a beautiful film and when we finished it, I realized that the only thing I know less about making a documentary is what to do with it once you have one. How do people get to see it? Right when it came out, there was this big flash of excitement about it. There were screenings and all sorts of people were buying it in lots of different ways and showing it in lots of different ways, but then that excitement fizzled out. It was out there in the blogosphere and the webosphere but people weren't finding it. I was getting these crushing emails saying, “Hey. I saw your movie, Trial of Labor, and I really loved it. I just wished I would have seen it before I had my baby.” I was like, “No, I made it so you could see it before you had your baby.” Meagan: Right. Dr. Berlin: So after talking to some of the other filmmakers in the space, I realized that I'm not the only one having this problem. There's not an easy place where people can go and get iconic films like The Business of Being Born, Orgasmic Birth, The Mama Sherpas, Breastmilk, so on and so forth. So I just decided, “Why not make it easy for anybody to access from anywhere without having to pay $25 for each film?” and just boom. You can have it on your phone or your TV. That's how Informed Pregnancy Plus was born. Every day, we are working on acquiring licensing for more great content. It's expanded from film to also web series, also mind and body like yoga and meditations and workshops. My wife has a workshop on there on relationships how to still like your partner after you have a baby together. We have one on birth plans. We have one on sleep. It's just growing all the time. Anybody can try it absolutely free at informedpregnancy.tv. It also has apps for Apple, Android, and Roku. After that, it's very affordable. It's $7 a month. Meagan: That's what I was going to say. It's $6.99 a month or $59 a year. That's pretty dang affordable. Dr. Berlin: That was our goal. If you have an internet connection, a device, and $60 for the year, you have access to all of this great content. That's what we were hoping to achieve. I don't know how I'm going to survive. It's like each element of this is a full-time job. Meagan: A full-time plus. Dr. Berlin: Full-time plus like Informed Pregnancy Plus but thankfully we have a small crew here but very dedicated to the project and very hardworking, very savvy. It's growing both in terms of content and in terms of viewership. The films are finally having an avenue where they can make a greater impact. Meagan: Absolutely. I love that so much. I wish I had something like this back when I was in my childbearing years or having babies, I should say because even the time. In my opinion, how much time I spent researching VBAC and all of the things during pregnancy, even those courses like yoga classes and all of these things, I spent way more time than I would have money. It would have been so much more worth it to just buy a subscription like this and have it all in one great platform. Dr. Berlin: I mean, that's the goal. Especially for people who live in areas where there aren't prenatal yoga classes. We don't have a ton yet, but we are always adding more. We have Baby by Simone on there for people who can't go to a prenatal workout class. She's got great workouts. The whole idea is that no matter where you are, these tools should be accessible to everybody. Thankfully, they are trickling their way through the internet and people are finding them. I'm getting fewer messages about, “I wish I had seen your film before I had my baby,” so that's very rewarding in the way that finances can't reward. Review of the Week Meagan: Okay, so we do have a Review of the Week so we are going to get into that before we jump into all of the amazing information that Dr. Berlin has. This is from 471046246me and it says, “My Labor and Delivery Nurse Told Me About The VBAC Link.” Oh my gosh, that makes me so excited. If you're a labor and delivery nurse, thank you, thank you, thank you for the love and we would love for you to continue sharing with your patients. It says, “I had an emergency C-section six months ago with my first baby. I planned and prepared my entire pregnancy for a non-medicated, vaginal birth with midwives in a hospital. I had an amazing team. Labor was going great. Hard, but I felt strong. But my son had other plans that involved wrapping himself in his umbilical cord so the sunroof exit he went. Ha ha,” she says. “In my recovery room, my nurse told me that she had an HBAC and told me to listen to The VBAC Link. I am so thankful that she recommended y'all to me because I already am stoked for my VBAC and I'm not even pregnant yet. Thank you for the work you do. I can't wait for y'all to come back from your break.” This was back in 2022. It says, “These stories fill my day with so much joy when I take my son for my daily walks.” Oh, thank you so much for your review. You guys, we do love these reviews. We appreciate them so much. We always welcome them in wherever you leave them. You can Google “The VBAC Link” and leave us a review. You can do it on Apple Podcasts. You can message us. You know it. Wherever, we love your reviews so bring them over and maybe they will be read on the next podcast. Q&A Meagan: If you guys are wondering, we will make sure to have all of his links for his platforms in the show notes so make sure to check out the show notes. Dr. Berlin: Thank you.What Happens During an Adjustment?Meagan: Without further ado, I mean there are so many questions. I don't know if we'll get to all of them today, but I was shocked, but then I thought, “Oh well, from someone that had never gone to an adjustment before during pregnancy, I didn't know either.” One of the questions is, “What happens during an adjustment? What does that look like?” Dr. Berlin: These, I'm sure, are going to be amazing questions because they come from real people who are very curious. This is a great question. The answer is it's different from chiropractor to chiropractor. Generally, the one thing we all have in common is that we're all looking for restriction in the bones—so where two bones come together, they form a joint. There should be good movement between those two bones, a certain amount of good movement. If they become restricted or totally locked up, they can create problems for you. It may be a problem like you feel like a loss of range of motion or swelling around that restricted joint that starts to become an issue that presses on nearby things like nerves or other tissue. Or it may be a problem that you don't feel. It might just be restriction where you should have fluid movement. If you're talking about your low back, hips, and pelvis, those kind of restrictions, that's the baby's studio apartment. So where the baby should be able to move freely, your body may not be able to accommodate that. So what we all have in common, really, is that we look for those restrictions and we try to release them. We try to restore motion between those restricted bones around the joint. There are a lot of different ways to find them diagnostically, a lot of different ways to restore movement therapeutically so if you go to a bunch of different chiropractors, you might have very different experiences. Then sometimes, chiropractors also add on top of that other modalities that they do whether it's a physiological therapeutic thing like electric stim or heat or ultrasound or other types of body work like massage. We tend to combine those two together in our practice. What the adjustment is a restoration of movement where it was previously restricted where two bones come together. Any two bones in the body can pretty much be adjusted but many chiropractors primarily focus on the spine and pelvis and maybe the major extremities. Meagan: Yeah. Like you said, it's the baby's apartment. I remember my chiropractor telling me how my pelvis shifted. My right side would shift forward, so it would kind of be off. She was like, “You need to have it aligned for the baby to come out of the apartment.” Dr. Berlin: Yeah. Meagan: I actually wasn't having a ton of pain. I couldn't have told you that my pelvis was wonky like that, but she was like, “It's so easy. You can do it getting in and out of a car or walking up stairs or putting a laundry basket on your hip.” There is so much that happens during pregnancy. Dr. Berlin: That's before the baby gets there sitting on your hip. Meagan: Right. Your body can get out of alignment through pregnancy. Dr. Berlin: That's one of the interesting things though. If you come in even if you do have pain but there's nothing restricted, then on the pure chiropractic front, there's really nothing for us to do. Sometimes it's the opposite. You can have hypermobility where things are moving too much. There are ways we can treat that as well, but the adjustment wouldn't be one of them in that direct area. But on the other hand, you could have restrictions that you don't feel. We would still want to address them if that's what you want to do.Bodywork Meagan: Yeah. You touched a little bit on bodywork. That was kind of a question that was answered a little bit farther down on our list, but what all does bodywork look like with that? You talked about massage and things like that. Is there more to it or is it just more like prenatal massage and then a chiropractor? Dr. Berlin: Bodywork is a vague term, even more vague than chiropractic. There are a lot of different kinds. In our office, what we do is massage therapy. It's more of a clinical massage therapy so it's focused. It's usually 25 minutes long. It's targeted in a specific area. When it comes to musculoskeletal health in general, I see myself as WD-40. I look for things that are stiff, tight, and restricted, and try to get more motion in there. The other side of that coin is duct tape where things are too weak or unstable, somebody's got to help bring that back together again. That's more like a personal trainer or a physical therapist. When we are working together, we can get really good balance and function and strength around the muscles and bones of the body. You can really feel wonderful even through all of the different stages of pregnancy, sometimes even with multiples all the way until the end. When things are out of whack, sometimes not even a month into pregnancy, you start to feel weird things happening to your body. Bodywork can be a lot of different things. For us, it's that more clinical medium to deep tissue, finding muscles, tendons, and fascia that are too stiff, tight, and rigid and trying to use massage strokes to elongate them, lengthen them, and restore normal tone. Other things that we infuse are trigger-point therapy. Sometimes you have a tendon coming to a bone or the center of a muscle where there's an accumulation of all of the tension in one area so we use trigger-points to release that. Back when I was doing birth work, we would also do a lot of reflexology, cranial massage, craniosacral therapy, jaw releases, and anything that's going to release the mind and the body through the process. Not so much in the office, we do craniosacral therapy a lot. We have two pediatric chiropractors that work from newborn through adolescence and they do a lot of craniosacral. Meagan: Yeah, my daughter had torticollis from my C-section actually. Dr. Berlin: Oh, interesting. Meagan: It was literally after birth when she was little. Then it just kept getting worse and all of a sudden, her ear was touching her shoulder but her shoulder wasn't going up. Her ear was going down. Dr. Berlin: Right. Taco neck, they call it. Meagan: Yeah. It was pretty dang bad. We went to PT and that was great, but ended up finding a craniosacral one. Anyway, it was amazing. They did this adjustment and suddenly she was back up. She wasn't fussy and having acid reflux and all of these amazing things. It is really cool. Dr. Berlin: It is so gentle yet powerful at the same time. Meagan: Right! PT was actually hard on us. It was a lot of forcing her to get in these positions and things then just a few chiropractor adjustments of craniosacral work was a game changer for us. Dr. Berlin: That's amazing. Meagan: And a lot more sleep for this mama, right? Dr. Berlin: Yeah. It's not just great for the baby. It's great for the parents. When to Start Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy Meagan: Yeah. Well, awesome. So when should someone start chiropractic care during pregnancy? Is it something like, “Hey, I'm thinking about conceiving. I should start now.” Should we always be seeing? What does it look like? Dr. Berlin: A lot of that depends on your goals. If you want to optimize your body for pregnancy, it would be great to know ahead of time when you're definitely not pregnant because there's a lot of stuff that we can work on that we can't get to once you're pregnant like all of the core muscles, psoas, hip flexors, and the ones that go behind the baby. Loosening that stuff up if it's tight before you get pregnant is ideal. That happens in my case more frequently either if people are on a fertility journey or they had a pregnancy that was either difficult or birth that was difficult and now they're thinking about getting pregnant again. They'll come in for some pre-pregnancy bodywork. Once you're pregnant, it really depends on the goals. If you're coming for maintenance, in my view, there's not really a time that is too early. We do make modifications in the first trimester then we make modifications again at different times as you get bigger and your body changes, but there are always ways that we can, almost always, get you comfortable, situated on a massage table and/or a chiropractic table and find those restrictions and release them.I would say our typical patient comes in the second trimester so maybe somewhere around 20 weeks unless they are coming for something specific like sciatic pain or positioning issues or just getting ready for birth and they come later. They tend to come maybe twice a month during that middle part of the pregnancy then at the end in the last month or two, they'll come once a week to get ready for birth. We don't prescribe a hard and fast number of visits or frequency of visits. It really depends on your goals, how you're feeling, and what your life looks like—what kind of resources you have or want to put into it. Meagan: Yeah. That's what I did at the end of my pregnancy. I did every other week so twice a month then in the very last few weeks, like my 39th to almost 41st, I ended up going a couple of times because I started getting some discomfort and feeling some sciatica pain and things like that. My baby proved his point. He was hanging out in my back. Dr. Berlin: Ouch. Meagan: Yeah. In labor, he did that for 42 hours. Dr. Berlin: Oh my goodness. Ouch. Ouch. I'm sorry. Meagan: It was fine. I was adjusted twice during my labor. Dr. Berlin: Wow. Meagan: I full-on believe—I mean, I believe that my team and everything and that space I had created was an impact, but I swear that my chiropractor really did impact my VBAC. Dr. Berlin: Some people swear by us and some people swear at us. Meagan: I know. Dr. Berlin: I'm really grateful that you were able to have the VBAC. Structure and function are important when you're trying to get a baby through.Can We Get Adjusted During Labor? Meagan: Yeah. I mean, I saw switches in my labors with both adjustments. It's so awesome. That was one of the questions. Can we get adjusted during labor? As a doula, I've been to a few births where we're seeing this lag in this labor and the same thing. We're working through all of the positions, but something is not quite working. We say, “Hey, let's go get an adjustment.” We'll go to the chiropractor with them and things big-time shift and we've got a baby. But yeah, are there signs that someone could use an adjustment? Maybe we've got people in a rural area where they can't have access to a chiropractor or maybe they're already in the hospital and sometimes chiropractors can't come in. Dr. Berlin: Yeah, nowadays they don't let too many people in. Always, ideally, that's why we switch to once a week as you're getting closer to the end so that ideally, you go into as a labor freely moving ball with enough WD-40 to carry you through. But yeah, there's no problem generally doing adjustments during labor. Some people just schedule it and say, “Hey, will you come check on me when I'm in labor?” Other times, we get called when there are some signs that labor slows if there is no progression like things don't progress in a “reasonable time frame”, if the baby's not in a great position, and if there's back labor like what you were talking about. Those are all signs that it's worth checking. Are there restrictions here in the pelvic bones? Your pelvis is not a solid bone. It is a bunch of bones connected by soft tissue. It has the ability to expand and contract and accommodate or even facilitate the baby's movements but if everything is just in a vice grip, then it may not be able to do that the same way. It can be more resistant to the movements. So we don't do anything to the baby. We're musculoskeletal specialists. We do things to your muscles and bones and make them more functional. That could make you a lot more comfortable. It could provide an environment in which the baby is better able to line up with the runway and things like that. Yeah. So you know, it's never a guarantee. Sometimes I'll get to a birth and there's really nothing to adjust. In my case, I also do body work so at the very least, I can do some body work. There are a lot of reflexology points that are just calming. There are those famous hip squeezes or counterpressure on the sacrum and lots of different massage stuff we can do to open up muscles. A lot of what I do in the office I've learned from birth. When someone is in labor and they're having these weird muscle spasms during contractions, you realize, “Oh, that is so tight.” I never would have guessed ahead of time that it was going to be so then as part of labor prep, I'll explain to somebody, “Do you want to release these muscles because they can play a role?” Sometimes you can't see what looks like the direct effect. It's all anecdotal. No one studies on this but all of a sudden, things start to loosen up where those spasms are occurring during labor and they loosen up, then all of a sudden, you start to see a healthy progression. The other thing you see a lot with bodywork is somebody, especially in unmedicated birth—I don't think there is anything like unmedicated birth. Either you get medications or you make your own. The ones that you make look pretty cool. But if there's someone who's not medicated medically, there's this major transition that you can see when a surge comes through and she doesn't feel totally safe or relaxed and she'll start to tighten up and sort of not consciously but fight the surge and fight herself, really. That can look pretty violent sometimes. With bodywork, you can sort of help the nervous system relax to a point where it doesn't feel like it's in danger. It doesn't feel like it has to fight even when intensity comes. That's the most rewarding thing to me from being at a birth. When I see that shift is when it's like, “Wait a second. This is more tolerable, much more tolerable if I don't fight it.” They get the confidence to relax into it and they realize, “Okay. I've got this.” So it's not always, in my case at least, the adjustments and bodywork. Things that people can do on their own, there are all of the doula tricks if the baby is not wanting to come down with the peanut ball but sometimes you can actually roll different parts of the low back, glutes, and piriformis if they're acting up. There is some stretching you can do. Some of the Spinning Babies exercises come in really handy. There is other stuff that you can do even if you can't get a chiropractor over there. Meagan: One of the clients that I went to, her chiropractor went during labor. He showed me this-- I don't even know what it was—tight ligament or something right down next to the bone. Dr. Berlin: Yeah, above it? Meagan: Kind of on the side. It was honestly by the butt crack. That's where it was, this tight thing. He was like, “Do you feel that?” I would feel it and it was so tense. Dr. Berlin: A spasm, mhmm. Meagan: He said, “During a contraction, press on that.” I would press and eventually, it just released and all of a sudden, we had transition coming. It was really interesting. I don't even know what that is. He said, “Press right here.” I could feel it. It was tight. It was really interesting. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. You'll find little things like that in labor. With permission, a little trial and error, you can sometimes really find a gem that is helpful for birth or that you can do ahead of time or that you can train a partner or doula to do. It can make a huge difference.CPD Meagan: Yeah. Absolutely. So we were just talking about our pelvis and how it moves and shifts and all of these things. CPD, cephalopelvic disproportion is a common, as you probably know, diagnosis in C-sections and people wanting to have a VBAC. It's given a lot. In my opinion, too often. I was given it myself. I was told I would never get a baby out of my pelvis. Dr. Berlin: Oh wow. Meagan: So that's a big question. How can someone tell the shape of their pelvis? Does it matter? How can we make our pelvis “bigger” during birth and what can we do to help these babies navigate through this pelvis without getting this diagnosis of, “Your pelvis is too small”? Dr. Berlin: Well, I think the first and most important thing always with a VBAC is to line yourself up with a provider who is really VBAC supportive, not just tolerant. If you feel really trusting that your provider is like that, then they are only going to tell you things. They know your goal and they are supportive of your goal. They are only going to tell you things that are well thought out or that aren't just fear-based. There are a few things coming together here. Number one, there is the pelvic paradox. You see someone with really tiny hips give birth to a 9 or 10-pound baby with no hiccups really smoothly. Then you see somebody who has big hips. Maybe they've been told their whole life, “Wow. You're going to have great hips for birthing,” and a 6-pound baby gets stuck and doesn't come out. How do you explain the pelvic paradox? One of the explanations is that there is a big difference between structure and function. Structure is your pelvis, the bones themselves, the soft tissues themselves, and how big they are. It is measurable to a degree and your baby and how big they are is measurable to a degree. But if you're just looking at structure without function, you're going to see what looks like cephalopelvic disproportion a lot partially because we don't have great measurements on these things. We have approximate measurements and partially because you're not taking into account function. The baby's head is not a solid bone. It's a bunch of bones meant to smoosh through a smaller passageway than it is at its full size and the pelvis is not a solid bone. It's a bunch of bones meant to expand and transmit something bigger than itself through while you're in labor. If those functions are working, then for sure, a larger baby can get through a smaller space even though on paper structurally, you have what looks like a baby that is too big to come through a pelvis that's too small. Sometimes they are too big and that's the issue. That's why it's really important, I think, to be with a provider who really gets you and supports you and is on board with you because if that provider is saying, “Wait a second. You have a head that is like this or the entryway to your pelvis is a concern,” then you're really going to not be second-guessing them in the moment which is really important, I think, for safety. That's the number-one thing is if you want to have a VBAC or even a vaginal birth the first time, is to have a provider that is really supportive. Number two—this is again really anecdotal. I see a lot of pregnant people every single day. What I did was a little poll on social media like, “How many people told you that your baby was going to be 9 pounds and it was substantially smaller?” A huge number of people came up. I don't think it's nefarious at all. I think that doctors in general and obstetricians in particular are trained to look or what might become a problem at some point which is sort of good. We want them to predict those things. But then it could get carried a little too far away because it's like, how likely is that to become a problem and what are the interventions that we take to prevent that and what are the side effects of those interventions? That's a much more complex equation where there's not always a clear answer. It is sometimes presented as a clear answer rather than, “These are the pros and cons, the risks and benefits as we know them. What would you like to do?” I think that's something all practitioners can learn over time. I'm certainly still a student every day 25 years later learning how I can do things better and more comfortably and more effectively. I think towards the beginning of practice for me too is that you know what you know and you want to be so helpful, but sometimes, the person on the receiving end of that doesn't want that and that's okay. That's your choice. It's 100% your choice. Even if it's not the choice that I would make, at the end of the day, I'm supposed to support whatever choice you want to make. That's a lesson that at least for me, took time as both a chiropractor and a massage therapist and as a doula especially. Meagan: Yeah. That's what I was going to say. It's taken a lot of time for me as a doula. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. Meagan: It can be really hard. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. It's really hard. And very well-intentioned practitioners who want the best for you, who would do the same exact thing for their wife or their daughter are trying to help you, but at the end of the day, it's an informed consent situation. What happens with the measurement is that there's no scale for the baby before it's born. It's a computer doing calculations. The calculations have a margin of error. Let's say that margin of error is a pound or a pound and a half. If I tell you that your baby is going to be 7.5 pounds at birth, based on those calculations, that means it could be anywhere between 6 and 9 pounds if the margin of error is a pound and a half. A) I could have probably told you that without the ultrasound. B) The problem with that is if it's ticking upwards if the baby is measuring 8 pounds in there, now all of a sudden I'm thinking, “What if it's 9.5? That could be too big. It might get stuck. We might have problems. We don't want an injured baby.” Nobody wants an injured baby, so maybe we should just induce you or do a C-section or whatever to prevent that. How many of those babies are actually going to come out at 9.5 pounds? That's the end of the margin of error on that side. On the other side, you have the same issue. If a baby is measuring 6.5 pounds, you start to think, “What if it's 5?” because of the margin of error. Maybe the baby's not getting enough nutrition. These are all logical things to think about and important things to talk about, but we can't forget that there is this margin of error and that there is a person who really should be the one at least involved if not making the decision. So that, I think is what happens and anecdotally what I see in the office happens with cephalopelvic disproportion. Either we're doing measurements and we're guestimating that the baby is a certain size but they may not really be that size and we're not really looking at function. There's a great episode of our podcast called “Labor Day Surprises” where there are two women who have both had surprises at the very end of their pregnancies and they are sisters-in-law. One of them had a breech baby and had quite a very interesting story there and the other one had a surprise 11-pound baby. Meagan: Whoa. Dr. Berlin: Now she is 5'8” or so. She is tall but very petite with tiny, small hips. She gave birth to the baby vaginally, unmedicated and are you sitting down? She didn't even tear. Meagan: Oh my gosh. See? That's amazing. Dr. Berlin: It was the most incredible thing to watch and it's one of the few where you saw a very ecstatic birth almost orgasmic birth at the hospital. She really talks about how she got into that mind frame. Her doctor knew the baby was going to be on the larger side and said, “What do you want to do with this?” She said, “I want to try.” He goes, “Well, if you don't try, we won't know.” Meagan: Oh, that just gave me the chills. If you don't try, we won't know. Dr. Berlin: We won't know. Meagan: Like you were saying, it's informed consent. It should be up to that mama to decide if she feels that it's a good thing to try, but we also have to respect that if we have a provider who is not comfortable with it, we have to respect them too. Maybe that's finding a new provider or working with their partner or something but yeah. It's interesting. Dr. Berlin: I mean, I know that I'm not a good match for everybody out there who is looking for a pregnancy chiropractor. I'm not a good doula for people who are looking for a doula. What's really important is that you find providers that you feel are on the same page and that they are a good match. This happens with dating all of the time. It's like, “You're not for me but I have a friend and they would love you.” I don't think– I'm never insulted if I meet somebody and they're like, “I don't want this type of care.” Great. Let me find someone you would love to see. It's the same with obstetricians. There are some obstetricians who are very paternalistic. They make all of the decisions for you and there are people who love that who don't want to make the decisions and who don't want that responsibility. You guys are a great match together, but you're not going to be a great match for my Prius-driving, vegan, hippie mom, who wants to have her baby hanging from a chandelier over a tub. You know? She's not going to be a match for them. Meagan: Not so good of a match. Dr. Berlin: It's not an insult. Neither one of you wants to be with someone who's not a great match. I always encourage people that if you're not with a provider that you feel comfortable with, if they're not on the same page or your interests are conflicting, then try to find a provider who is on the same page. It makes a huge difference and you don't get to do this very often. Meagan: I know and it's worth finding that provider. Just like it's worth dating and dating and dating until you find the one, it's worth going out and continuing to find that provider because like you said, my best friend went to a provider that may not be the best for me. I'm happy that she found him, but I might need to find someone else and that's okay to take that time and find that provider. Dr. Berlin: Totally and if you're going a more natural route, even psychologically if you end up having a Cesarean, which I don't think is the worst thing on the planet. I think it's a great thing. I've been known to say that I think one thing worse than a Cesarean being forced on someone who doesn't want one and doesn't need one is not having one available to somebody who does need one. A Cesarean is a great medical marvel of our time. The doctors who learn how to do them perfect them and do them with very little risk and a lot of skill. They're heroes to me. But you know, if you want a more natural birth and you end up with a Cesarean and you're not with somebody who you felt like you are on the same page with, you're very likely to leave that birth feeling like, “Did I really need that?” It leads to a lot of not-good mental thoughts at a time that you are already going through a tough– for most people, a big transition. Meagan: Yeah. Dr. Berlin: I can't say it enough. Having a provider that is good for you and that is a match for you is so important on all fronts. Breech BirthMeagan: Beautiful. I love that. I couldn't agree more. Finding that provider is so important. We were just talking about these two cute sister-in-laws. They had a surprise breech and that is a question. If the baby is breech, what things could someone do on their own to help their baby turn? How soon should they start to worry? How could chiropractic care truly help that baby turn? We know that there's not a lot. Breech is kind of dwindling away. It's unfortunate and it's really unfortunate that we're not having as much support in the breech world, but we're not.  A lot of people get put in a corner that if they have a breech baby, they feel like they have to have a Cesarean whether they want one or not, but they want options. How can we work with these breech babies? Dr. Berlin: It's truly interesting. I think if there were more options for safe, vaginal breech delivery– not everybody's a good candidate for that– but if there was more of an option, primary Cesareans would be down. Meagan: I wonder too. Dr. Berlin: Substantially and as a result, secondary Cesareans would be down because all of those people who had C-sections are told, “Once a Cesarean, always a Cesarean.” They don't even get a chance. I think it would bring down the Cesarean rate greatly as a whole. The question is, what is a safe breech birth? There is a lot of debate around that but one thing is for sure. There are some people who are much better off seemingly having a Cesarean birth but they're breech and other people who are much better off with the option to try and deliver vaginally but they're breech. Meagan: You have an episode on your podcast talking about that specific topic with Dr. Brock and some other providers talking about what that looks like. Dr. Berlin: Yeah, we have a 3-part series called Breech 101. It's two midwives and two obstetricians just talking everything breech from all angles. With Dr. Brock, we have another episode called “Vaginal Breech After Cesarean Breech” with a mutual patient, Dr. Donna Lou who had a breech with her first and ended up in a Cesarean because her doctor didn't. She went into labor and didn't have the chance to meet Dr. Brock. At the hospital, her doctor just doesn't have the confidence or the comfort to deliver breech babies. He was very apologetic but she had a C-section. One of the few people I have seen over 20 years who was breech again with no known reason, with her second, Dr. Brock also equally baffled said that she is a great candidate for VBAC and a great candidate for breech birth. The two, the risks that come along with those, don't compound each other. It's just two different sets of risks. What would you like to do? She opted for the vaginal breech birth after a Cesarean breech birth. I have them both on and they talk about the decision-making that went into it and what the process was actually like. When it comes to breech, I have a premise which is that– let's talk about a singleton baby in a first pregnancy. That's where we have the most data. I have a premise that at the end of pregnancy, babies generally want to be head-down. The reason I have that premise is because according to Williams Obstetrics, these numbers are a little bit old, but still seemingly relevant. At 28 weeks into a singleton first pregnancy, about 50% of babies are not head-down yet. Meagan: 50%. Dr. Berlin: 50% at 28 weeks. Now, at 32 weeks, about 10% are not head-down yet. You go from 50 out of 100 babies that are not head-down to only 10 out of 100 babies in a 4-week period of time. Meagan: That's a lot of babies that turn in a very short period of time. Dr. Berlin: It's a big migration and it's seemingly because they run out of space. When they have space to move around, they can move all over the womb. It doesn't really matter. Nobody really cares. They are exploring so no big deal. As they start to run out of space, they have to pick a position that is most accommodating in the space that they have and generally in a typically-shaped uterus for a typically-shaped baby, that is head down. That is where they try to go. At birth, at 37 weeks and beyond in that first pregnancy, the breech rate is 3-4%. So it goes all the way down to 3-4 out of 100 from 50. That's where the premise comes from at the end of pregnancy, babies generally want to be head-down. If they don't go there, there must be a reason for it. There's usually a reason. It could be something structural. It could be something functional. Sometimes when we have no idea why, like in the case of Dr. Donna Lew. Why would babies structurally? Well, there's a lot to consider. Maybe the cord is wrapped around them funny. Maybe the placenta is in the way especially when it's on the front wall, it seems to pose more of a getting-in-the-way factor. None of these, by the way, are absolute factors. I have a lot of people that come in with a placenta in the front and the baby does turn. But it seems like of the ones that don't turn, more of them have the anterior placenta. Amniotic fluid seems to play a role. So if the amniotic fluid index normal is somewhere between 8 and 24, with all of those being normal is a big range. 8, 9, and 10 are healthy but not so much fluid volume for baby to move around. 18, 19, and 20 are also healthy but so much fluid volume that even after 32, 33, and 34 weeks, your baby may have a lot more room to move around than other babies and not have a trigger to pick a position and get head-down. If you add other things to that like it's your third pregnancy so there's more room in the uterus anyway and if you're tall and if the baby's measuring small, you can take all of those things into account. Not all breeches are exactly the same. The shape of the uterus is a big deal too. Sometimes if the shape is different, it seems not conducive for the baby to get head-down or for the baby to be able to. Functionally, it's your body. Your lower back, hips, and pelvis are supposed to be pretty loose, relaxed, and open at the end of pregnancy. Your body is doing that hormonally in several different ways but if everything is stiff, tight, and rigid for various different reasons– injuries or excessive workouts or other things like that without enough stretching, then especially if you're strong, you can have a pelvis that is strong, tight, and rigid. As the baby's running out of space, maybe down there is not where they are being invited to go. Maybe the end of the rib cage is a lot more inviting or if they're trying to move as we said before, the body may not be able to accommodate the movements the same way. When I work on breech, I'm not doing anything for the baby itself. I'm not doing anything to the baby. I'm not trying to turn a baby or move a baby. I'm working on the musculoskeletal structures of the baby's surroundings which is the mom and if they're stiff, tight, and rigid, we're creating more functional space using massage to loosen up the soft tissues and chiropractic adjustments to open up those restricted joints and maybe gravity. We have tables that invert so maybe a little bit of gravity if something is really stuck trying to give the baby an opportunity to move naturally with gravity. We also in our office have acupuncture so we also do moxibustion which seems to stimulate more natural movement so it's synergistic. I can create more functional space and they can create more movement in that space. It gives those babies a chance to turn more naturally. When do we start? Usually around 32 weeks but I always tell people, “Look. At this point in that first pregnancy, 10 out of 100 babies roughly statistically are breech, and in birth, it's only going to be about 3.” If I was a betting person, I would still bet that your baby's going to turn. The stuff that I'm doing is really insurance. It's going to be helpful for birth anyway but I tell them not to panic at that point. And then of course, you have to look at all of those factors that we mentioned to see who is more or less likely to turn and you can tell based on the fluid, the uterine shape, the placenta location, and so on. Meagan: My VBAC baby kept going breech. At 32 weeks, he was going breech. She would motion him and he would flip then the next visit, I was like, “His hiccups are up here again.” He would be breech. He did that until 36 weeks. I think it was 34.5 or 35 and she was like, “We have to trust this baby. We have to trust that this baby needs to be head-up for whatever reason” and I was kind of grouchy because I was like, “I don't want to have another C-section just because I had another breech baby.” I really wanted this VBAC, but yeah. At 36 weeks, I went in and he was head-down and he stayed head-down. Dr. Berlin: Do you remember if your fluid was toward the more generous side, middle side, or lower side?Meagan: It wasn't super high, but it was on the higher of the normal. He did have a shorter cord when he came out, so I don't know if maybe something was bugging him there, but yeah. He flipped head-down. It was great, but it was hard. It was hard not to get panicky. Dr. Berlin: Sure, yeah. That's the thing. A lot more people have to think about breech than actually have breech at the end. Meagan: Yeah. Yeah. Dr. Berlin: So if there are 4 million births in the United States every year and 10% of them are breech at 32 weeks, that's 400,000 people every year thinking about breech but only about 3-4% are breech at the end like 160,000. Meagan: Yeah, I even had a client. I'm going to jump off of the breech topic, but I had a client who was breech and was scheduled for a version the next morning but went into spontaneous labor that night. We went in at 1:00 AM and baby was head-down. She was 9 centimeters when we got there. Her body just needed contractions to finish rotating the baby. I have no idea but sometimes it can happen. Okay, so let's see. Post C-section. This is in regards to cupping fasical release and stuff like that that you guys do in your office as well. Is that something that you would suggest? This is another type of bodywork essentially. Dr. Berlin: New mama TLC. I think whether you have a Cesarean or a vaginal birth, it's a lot on the mind and body, and nervous system, so I try to do a longer session soon after usually by two weeks regardless of the mode of delivery unless there is some kind of injury then you are good. We can do most things. The goals are to– sometimes there are smaller injuries from birth like injury to a tailbone or pubic bone or something like that. We can address those right away. I've had people pop a rib out pushing so hard so we obviously can pop that back in after a vaginal birth right after birth. Meagan: Wow. Dr. Berlin: The goal is if there are any injuries, we deal with them right away. After that, it's sort of like the sports massage when you've run a marathon. Just wear and tear on the body and trying to move that excess fluid around and have it be reabsorbed so we do some lymphatic work and finding those overworked muscles and to relax those muscles and at the same time, if we can work it in, a little sensual nervous system relaxation work to help reboot the system. Meagan: Yeah. Dr. Berlin: And to come back online with calm and quiet. So either a little meditation and/or some cranial work. While our normal visits are 25 minutes at that point, we do an hour-long session to try and get all of that in during the first one or two postpartum visits. There's also a great opportunity at that point, especially for people with more chronic things that they deal with pain-wise. You still have the pregnancy relaxation hormone for a bit. You don't have the baby inside there pushing on you 24/7. You're kind of more moldable clay. I've had several instances of somebody who had a lifelong chronic thing from an injury and during that period, we have a better shot at making a lifelong correction there. Meagan: I've never even thought of that. I've got this long-term back issue. I've got this relaxin and great stuff in my body. Let's work with that. Dr. Berlin: Yes. Let's use that advantage. I had a patient who was really eager to do that and then she got COVID and she couldn't come back. It created a whole bunch of problems for her and she's like, “Damn. I'm going to have to have another baby.” Meagan: I was going to say. That's what I would say. Now I have to have another baby. That is really awesome. Like you said, it doesn't matter. C-section or vaginal, our bodies go through quite an event and take a lot of shifts and changes so chiropractic care can be beneficial after as well. We've talked about it with babies as well. They go through a lot and that can be impactful. My little boy didn't poop forever. It was 9 or 10 days. We got him adjusted and he had the biggest poop in the world. Dr. Berlin: We see that all the time. Meagan: He passed out and slept all night. I woke up all engorged and I was like, “Oh my gosh.”Dr. Berlin: I know. It's the number-one feedback. “My baby slept so well after the adjustment.” Meagan: I know. We need it. Babies need it. It's so impactful. Back in the day, way, way, a long time ago, I didn't love the idea. Chiropractic care scared me. It can be scary because you can hear some people talk about it. Like you say, someone is yelling at you. It can be scary sometimes how people talk about it but it doesn't have to be scary and if you find that really good, skilled chiropractor, they're going to take care of you. They're going to help you through this process. Pubic SymphysisThey're going to help you with pubic symphysis which is another question. I know we're running out of time but if you have anything you'd like to share on pubic symphysis, that is a really big one. The more babies we have, sometimes it starts earlier. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. And then it's weird also. Sometimes it doesn't happen at all. It'll plague somebody in the first pregnancy and then not be there. Just a comment on the scared about chiropractic bit, certainly chiropractic isn't for everyone, but it comes back to finding a good match. As I said at the beginning, there are a lot of different ways to find and release those restrictions. Some of them are very, very gentle. It doesn't have to be that cracking noise that a lot of people are off-put by or violent-looking maneuvers. If you want the benefits of chiropractic but that's what's holding you back, find someone who does a low-impact technique or network or activator. Meagan: Drop table. Dr. Berlin: Drop table. Meagan: Yes, I was going to say the activator. Dr. Berlin: Sacro-occipital technique. There are so many that are gentle. The neuro-emotional technique. Okay, so in terms of the pubic bone, there is a right and a left side to the pubic bone. They are separated by pubic cartilage. I've learned over time that there are different types of pubic pain and they present differently. It's still definitely a work in progress. I'm learning new things all of the time. The most common one that presents during pregnancy is pain on sort of the lower pubic bone, the underside of the pubic bone where the fine meets the bone. It's usually only on one side or substantially worse on one side and it's like when you separate your knees. When you bring that pubic bone apart, that right and left side apart, so if you get out of bed one leg at a time or if you get out of the car one leg at a time or when you engage it to roll over in bed if you haven't been moving for a while. A very common one is to lean over to put on pants and lift one leg then ouch, it's very painful. What seems to be happening there in most cases is that you have an imbalance in the right and left side of your pubic bone. Let's say that you have the muscle coming up your thigh attaching to the underside of that pubic bone and pulling harder on one side than the other side. When you're totally stable, your body can accommodate that. But as the relaxation hormones kick in and they kick in pretty early, the pubic cartilage that is holding it together maybe can't compensate for that imbalance so the right and left sides end up not lined up with each other anymore but they torque so every time you engage it and pull them apart, it's very painful. If you could get them to line up again, then it would be either not painful at all or less painful. The combination that I use in that case that tends to work pretty well but not always is either massaging out the upper adductor like a deep massage to lengthen that adductor so it's not pulling so hard and then a trigger point right where that adductor inserts to the underside of the pubic bone. It's sort of an act of release trigger point as I'm pressing into it. They engage the muscle and then release the muscle. Engage and release a couple of times and then there's a little test that I do for it also which is if you're laying on your back or in a semi-reclined position and your knees are bent, feet on the massage table, or a yoga mat, or anything like that, I'll try to gently pull the knees apart against resistance from the mom. If that is weak, first of all, it doesn't really have a lot of strength. It elicits that sharpness in the place where the pain has been bothering them. That's a pretty good sign that this is the mechanism and that doing that combination of massage and trigger point and then adjusting the pubic bone with a drop table will give significant relief. Meagan: Wow. Okay, so that could be a test to say, “Okay. This could be impactful if you do this technique.” Dr. Berlin: Right. Then if it's not, I wouldn't do it necessarily because it's not the most comfortable thing. It's always up to them. I could still offer it and see if they want to do it even if it's a long shot or not do it even if it's a sure bet. But other types of pubic pain that I have identified are definitely the pubic symphysis cartilage itself sometimes gets inflamed. It's not one side or the other. It's right in the middle and it's higher up on the pubic bone. Oh, that's you. Meagan: That was me. It was ow. Dr. Berlin: I find acupuncture and I'll tell you something else in a second. Acupuncture, icing, and a support belt that lifts the belly up off of the pubic bone are some of the things that are more relieving there. The third type is the round ligament. They attach to the soft tissue right near the pubic bone on sort of the top ledge of it towards the outside, the upper corners of it. If you have a round ligament that is tight and pulling all of the time, then that becomes very sensitive. In those cases, we try to massage out or gently stretch the round ligament until it relaxes. That usually takes the pressure off there. One thing I would also say if you're feeling it there in the pubic symphysis cartilage and especially if you're also feeling it in the back by the sacrum or tailbone is to look for hyperactive pelvic floor muscles, a hypertonic pelvic floor. The pelvic floor runs from the back of the pelvic floor to the front of the tailbone. When it gets really tight, it will pull on both of those areas. Especially athletic women but not only– sometimes you have a hypertonic pelvic floor from all of the activities to strengthen and tighten. You might also be doing that to your pelvic floor. Up until not that long ago, all we knew about pelvic floor was that it can get weak so everybody is instructed to do these kegels and strengthen them but if it's already hypertonic and you strengthen it, you might be making it worse. So thankfully, we have these pelvic healthy physical therapists as a specialty now. People are just training on that and how to strengthen the weaker ones and loosen the tight ones, making pregnancy and birth more comfortable, more functional, and postpartum wellness. Postpartum sometimes can be treated. Meagan: Yeah. So as you are saying this, I have a weird question. I had all of that during labor and then since, I am really active. I am a road cyclist and I like to lift and all of these things. I get adductor pain now where it's not as tight and burning right in that pubic symphysis but right in that adductor. Do you think something could still be connected through that pelvic floor?Dr. Berlin: It's always worth checking if you haven't had it checked. The adductor by itself could just be the adductor. Sometimes just from the workouts that you're doing– lifting especially could make it really tight and it just needs to be rolled out or dug out and you might benefit from those trigger points too on the ends or the inserts on the top and the bottom. Pelvic floor could be a factor. There sometimes are other factors too. Even a little drop incontinence when you get the urge, it's like, “I've got to go right now.” Meagan: Yeah. Dr. Berlin: Or pain during intercourse or things like that or if you jump on a trampoline or you sneeze and you pee, those are signs that something is up with the pelvic floor. It's not functioning quite right and worth investigating with a specialist. Meagan: Yeah. I think a lot of people don't even remember that even C-sections can impact that pelvic floor and our whole body and create that tension and restrict us from having good mobility. Dr. Berlin: That is an amazing point because it is absolutely true. The end of pregnancy puts a lot of strain on the pelvic floor no matter how you deliver. Body Support at HomeMeagan: Yeah, so again, definitely check out the chiropractors in your area. So for those who maybe can't have chiropractors or can't have access, are there any tips or maybe places on the Informed Pregnancy Plus channel where people can learn not to adjust themselves but do stretches and do those things that can help create that mobility and help them have these vaginal births that they're wanting? Dr. Berlin: Yeah, there are tons. Spinning Babies has a whole bunch of great exercises that you can do. It's a good idea. We have a course that we do called Labor Kneads. We only do it live right now, but it's where we're teaching partners and doulas and other support people to do bodywork before, during, and after birth. That's a great idea for us to shoot that and put it up on the streaming service. I can't promise it for one, but I will certainly try to do that. The other thing is that there is a great listing of chiropractors with separate post-graduate training. You should know that anybody who is a licensed chiropractor can work on pregnant people. It doesn't have to be a specialty. Meagan: Or Webster-trained. Dr. Berlin: Yeah, it doesn't have to be Webster-trained or it doesn't have to be somebody who is a prenatal chiropractor. There are some chiropractors who don't feel comfortable working on pregnancies. Some don't have all that much experience, but there are a lot who are not prenatal. They are just family chiropractors and as a result, they see a lot of pregnancies. You don't have to have a specialty to do it. So unless there's no chiropractic in your neighborhood, then there might be people who can work on you even if it's not a specialty clinic like in our case, we call it pregnancy-focused chiropractic. The other thing is that there's a great website by the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association that does a lot of postgraduate training in pediatric and prenatal chiropractic care. They have a listing by zipcode and their website is icpa4kids.com. You can search by zip code in the United States and Canada and maybe some other international options. Meagan: We'll make sure to also put that in the show notes for everyone listening. Last but not least, the big question is does anybody not qualify to receive chiropractic care? Dr. Berlin: Yeah, I mean, I would almost say that there are some conditions during pregnancy that come up that are delicate. During those very delicate conditions, I love to work together with the obstetric provider. At that point, it's usually going to be an OB/GYN or a maternal-fetal medical specialist and just access their comfort level with the things that we do. Almost always, it's going to be modifications. It's not that we can't adjust them at all or do any bodywork with them, it's going to be modifications. Sometimes we'll just wait a couple of weeks and then do the treatments but for the most part, you can do something for everyone who has things that are stiff, tight, and rigid and are either uncomfortable or want to improve their function. Meagan: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking this time out of your day with all of your projects. You've got so many hands in buckets. You wear so many hats these days so it's really been such an honor to have you on the show and answer all of these amazing questions. I full-on believe in chiropractic care. Like I said, a long time ago, I was like, “Ah!” and then I started getting into chiropractic and I'm like, “No, this is really impactful on so many levels.” Dr. Berlin: It is. Meagan: I mean, I'm not even pregnant or planning on conceiving but I still go to the chiropractor because it really does impact my life in a better way. Dr. Berlin: We have moms come in here and they make an appointment. They say, “I want to make a postnatal appointment with Dr. Berlin.” The reception team will say, “Oh, how old is your baby?” They'll say, “13 years old.” I'm like, “Yeah.” You don't have to only be pregnant or postnatal to come here. Meagan: A postnatal visit. How old? 13. Okay. That's just called a chiropractic visit. That's all that you have to say. Dr. Berlin: It is, but once you have the baby, you have all of the bending, lifting, holding, feeding, emotional stress, and things like that. The maintenance during that active phase of life is important. BreastfeedingMeagan: Yeah. Oh my gosh. I just said I'm going to end. I feel like I could talk to you all day. Dr. Berlin: Same. Meagan: But something I feel that impacted me and I know a lot of our doula clients is breastfeeding. When we're breastfeeding, we're hunched and curled. Our neck is down and we're in wonky positions then we're out and we're stretching then we're like, “Oh, this is painful” or all of a sudden, my milk supply is not that great, and weirdly enough, chiropractic adjustments can help your body and you nurse better and help your production because your baby is going to nurse easier. You're going to nurse easier. Everyone's going to be better. Dr. Berlin: When you're in a lot of pain, the stress hormones put you more in emergency mode, and making milk is not an emergency function. There's that and there's literally just the– here's one tip I would say that seems to help a lot of people. If you have a nursing station, especially in those early couple of months, you can put a full-length mirror in front of you so you can see what's happening without looking straight down. That seems to be helpful for a lot of people. Meagan: Absolutely. Yeah. To just be able to see and not be curled over. I mean, you are looking at your baby, but you can look down at your baby versus– Dr. Berlin: Across. Meagan: Yeah. Dr. Berlin: Yeah. One thing that gets a lot of people is that you're trying to get some sleep and the baby is in a comfortable position and it's not comfortable for you but you don't want to move because you don't want to wake them up. That's gold for the chiropractors. Meagan: It is. It is. Oh, well thank you so much again. It's such an honor. We're going to make sure to have all of the links to your channel, to your page, and to your website. This chiropractic search forum and everything. Everything will be in the show notes so everybody will be able to find you. Dr. Berlin: Thank you. Meagan: Like I said, if you're listening and you haven't been able to yet, hopefully now you're not driving if you were driving. Stop and go follow Dr. Berlin. Dr. Berlin: Than

Skeptical Inquirer, March 2023, by Rob Palmer:Iranian Schoolgirl Gas Attacks and Havana Syndrome: A Conversation with Robert BartholomewThe Non-Prophets, Episode 22.33.2 featuring Helen Greene, The Well-Known Skeptic, Aaron Jensen and"Jimmy Jr"Today we are discussing Havana syndrome and Iranian school girls' Mass poisoning reports. An article in the Skeptical Inquirer which is called Iranian School girl cast attacks and Havana Syndrome a conversation with Robert Bartholomew.What do these two situations have in common? One began in late 2016 when the US government claimed there were ongoing attacks against its Embassy Personnel in Cuba by unknown forces using unknown weapons. In subsequent years the scope of these claimed attacks include intelligence agents other government officials and even family members stationed in a very long list of countries. Eventually, it was even claimed to have happened on the White House grounds.The symptoms of these attacks were eventually called Havana syndrome. They included everything from brain fatigue to brain damage. The mysterious unidentified Weaponry speculated for these attacks included ultrasound, infrasound, pulsed electromagnetic energy microwaves, and many other things.The second involves Iranian girls. This started in November 2022. Reports surfaced about a poison gas attack at a girl's school in Iran affecting 200 students. Reports of gas attacks then happened all across the country of Iran.As of early this year, the count of victims stood at nearly 7,000 young girls. The victims are mostly girls, there were some teachers and extraneous victims, but mostly school girls. It has been reported at over 100 schools in nearly that many cities.Speculation ranged on who caused this. The usual suspects range from either the Iranian government seeking revenge for the recent and ongoing hijab protests, to the government saying it was a false flag operation by people who wanted it to look like it was the government doing it.Functionally the diplomats have this close-knit tie to one another. They perform the same job, they're going through the same things, and they're separated from their natural environment.On the other hand, the girls in these schools have a close-knit relationship in proximity. Unfortunately, throughout recent history you can go back decades and in different countries, very often if not exclusively in Muslim majority rule countries you will find similar events. and it's always schoolgirls.There's something about being in an environment as part of a population that has no control. When you feel that you can't control things, and you're under other people's thumbs this can happen. The people in Cuba were in hostile territory always under surveillance by the Cuban government.This reeks of mass hysteria, when you have a group of diplomats that are feeling something it's likely to encourage other diplomats to say well maybe that's what I'm feeling too. Maybe we actually are under attack. When in reality it's something else completely.

Colorado teachers' union sues school district over gag policy | Arizona's state Democratic Party has raised 7x more money than AZ Republicans this year | Cecelia Espinoza, Rochelle Galindo, and Tim Hernandez seek vacant Colorado House seat representing Denver-based 4th district | Power shutoffs could prove deadly as Nevadans brace for continued extreme heatSong playsIntro by hostWelcome to High Country - politics in the American West. My name is Sean Diller; regular listeners might know me from Heartland Pod's Talking Politics, every Monday.Support this show and all the work in the Heartland POD universe by going to heartlandpod.com and clicking the link for Patreon, or go to Patreon.com/HeartlandPod to sign up. Membership starts at $1/month, with even more extra shows and special access at the higher levels. No matter the level you choose, your membership helps us create these independent shows as we work together to change the conversation.Alright! Let's get into it: COLORADO NEWSLINE:A Colorado teachers union filed a federal lawsuit against the Woodland Park School District and its board of education over a policy that they say prevents teachers from publicly speaking about school concerns.The Woodland Park Education Association and its president, Nate Owen, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Denver this week. The school board and district in Woodland Park, outside Colorado Springs in Teller County, has become increasingly conservative in recent years and the schools have become a frequent flashpoint of controversy over a number of issues including curriculum, personnel, transparency, etc.The lawsuit alleges that a district policy known as KDDA, is an unconstitutional prior restraint on speech that goes against the First Amendment.That policy, revised twice this year, states that the superintendent is the official spokesperson for the district and employees cannot talk to the media or even post on social media about district decisions without approval. Violation of the policy is considered insubordination.The lawsuit says “Prior restraints on speech are the most serious and least tolerable infringement of an individual's First Amendment rights. The Supreme Court has routinely held that prior restraints on protected speech are presumed to be constitutionally invalid,”There are examples of courts striking down policies that prevent public employees, like teachers, from speaking to the media without prior approval. attorney Steve Zansberg, who works on cases pertaining to media and the First Amendment said “It is my understanding that policies like this have previously been challenged in other school districts and have been found by courts to be unconstitutional restrictions on free speech rights of school employees.” Because of Owen's standing as president of the local teachers union, he often makes public comments to the school board about working conditions and matters of public concern, as well as comments to the media. The district's policy, however, puts his teaching job in jeopardy if he speaks out.The lawsuit also alleges that the way the policy was revised in February and March violates Colorado's Open Meetings Law. There are no posted minutes or agendas that show the school board publicly discussing the issue.Woodland Park School District Superintendent Ken Witt called the lawsuit a “coordinated political attack” by groups seeking to intimidate him, but of course offered no support for that claim. ARIZONA MIRROR:Arizona Republican Party's fundraising abysmal in run up to pivotal 2024 electionBY: CAITLIN SIEVERS - AUGUST 11, 2023 7:00 AMThe Arizona Republican Party's fundraising efforts so far this year are embarrassing, with Democrats outpacing them seven to one, leaving political operatives wondering if the party's new chairman can right the ship in time to mount any sort of meaningful campaign in 2024. The party took in only $165,000 in contributions so far in 2023, as compared to the Arizona Democratic Party's more than $1,150,000. And the state Republican Party's federal account, which is vital to fund operations during a presidential election year, was in a sad state as of the end of June, with less than $24,000 in cash on hand, compared to the state Democratic Party's nearly $714,000.Because of campaign finance laws, the parties must operate separate accounts for money spent to help elect federal candidates and funds used to bolster state and local hopefuls. Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman from 2013-2017, told the Arizona Mirror, “If this were me, I would be sweating a little bit.” He went on to say that the last party chairman Kelli Ward's extravagant spending and far-right fringe politics have left some big donors hesitant to give.Ward, who chaired the state GOP for four years beginning in January 2019, was part of the group of fake electors from Arizona that hoped to overturn former President Donald Trump's loss to President Joe Biden in 2020. She bought into election conspiracy theories and spent more than $500,000 on an election night party and statewide bus tour in 2022, angering fellow Republicans who would have rather seen that money used to help GOP candidates who lost extremely tight statewide races.In that election, Arizona Republicans suffered losses in the race for governor, secretary of state and attorney general and the U.S. Senate.One former AZ Democratic Party executive director said“Functionally, they're running an operation right now that wouldn't be capable of running one Dairy Queen franchise, much less a state operation to hopefully elect a senator or a president,” “I would be shocked, I think, just given where they are right now, if this time next year they're running any sort of impactful campaign or effort out of the state Republican Party.”DENVER WESTWORD:Firebrand Teacher Tim Hernández seeks seat in Colorado HouseHouse District 4 had been represented by Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez, who won an at-large seat on Denver City Council.By Michael RobertsAugust 9, 2023Tim Hernández is a teacher best known for fighting on behalf of diversity, equity and inclusion related to both students and educators. Now he hopes to bring his passion to the Colorado Legislature as a representative for House District 4.Hernandez has been a controversial figure, making headlines last year when students at North High School protested the decision not to keep him on the staff.Colorado's House District 4 stretches roughly from Regis University south to Morrison Road, and from Sheridan Boulevard east to Zuni Street. However, the District's voters as a whole won't be making the selection — at least not yet. On August 26 "appointed leadership of the Democratic Party within the House district, an estimated 69 individuals, will decide who fills out the rest of the term.  Two other hopefuls with significant Democratic connections are also vying for the spot. Cecelia Espenoza previously worked as a counsel for the U.S. Department of Justice and an appellate immigration judge. She is also a former professor at the University of Denver and St. Mary's University School of Law, and a former chair of the board at the National Hispana Leadership Institute in Washington, D.C., as well.Also in the race is Rochelle Galindo, who in 2015 became the first openly gay person to be elected to the Greeley, Colorado City Council. She followed this win by besting Republican rival Michael Thuener to become the state representative for Weld County's District 50 in 2018. She resigned the next year after being accused of sexual assault and providing alcohol to a minor and was cleared of the charges in 2021. Since she left the legislature, Galindo has worked in various roles at advocacy organizations Colorado People's Alliance, Colorado People's Action, and Emerge.NEVADA CURRENT:NV households struggle to pay summer power bills, and it's getting worseBY: JENIFFER SOLIS - AUGUST 15, 2023 5:34 AMRecord heat in Southern Nevada throughout July drove scores of residents to take refuge in air-conditioned homes, but the cost of fighting off summer temperatures will likely leave an alarming number of Nevadans unable to pay their bills. Last month was the hottest July ever recorded in Las Vegas, with a daily average high of 109 degrees. The last two weeks of July were the hottest 14-day stretch on ever record, with an average high of 112 degrees. Nevada residents living in a single-family home saw an average 22% increase — from about $337 per month fo $407 per month - in their energy bills.Electricity rates in July were set to be even higher before NV Energy agreed to temporarily reduce costs for customers.For many Nevada households, an extra $60 to $70 dollars won't completely break the bank, but for low-income households or those on a fixed income, higher utility bills mean choosing between keeping the A/C running or addressing other essential needs like food and medication. In the worst-case scenario, lack of payment may lead to a power shut-off, leaving families scrambling to find enough money to restore service, often only to face disconnection again.Further, Nevada does not require utilities to disclose the number of customers they disconnect, leaving little transparency of the magnitude of the problem. NV Energy, a monopoly with more than a million captive customers, has shown little interest in publicly sharing the number of disconnected customers. An NV Energy spokesperson said in an email that “NV Energy does not share this type of data publicly, though the company works diligently with customers and makes every effort to avoid disconnecting power.”Data that is public reveals that more and more households are struggling to pay utility bills in Nevada. Applications for state utility assistance over the last three months of available data reveal a sharp 37% increase compared to the same period last year. Public health officials anticipate the high demand will continue as temperatures remain high throughout August. The state program, called the Energy Assistance Program, provides a supplement for qualifying low-income Nevadans with the cost of home energy. Eligible households receive an annual, one-time per year benefit paid directly to their energy provider.But the cost of that assistance ultimately falls on NV Energy customers. Part of the program's funding is subsidized by ratepayers through NV Energy's Universal Energy Charge, which adds 46 cents a month to the typical residential power bill.Unpaid bills that can't be recovered by NV Energy are eventually paid by customers too. Nevada law does protect utility customers from power shut-offs during periods of extreme heat, when a lack of air conditioning can result in waves of hospitalizations or even death. According to state statute, a utility company can't terminate service for a non-paying customer if the National Weather Service has forecast a period of extreme heat within the next 24 hours within the customer's geographical area. For most residents in Southern Nevada, extreme heat is defined as 105 degrees. So if it won't be 105 in the course of the next day, service can be terminated. NV Energy must also notify elderly customers at least 48 hours before termination of power.For all other residents in Southern Nevada, a forecast of 105 degrees or higher within a 24 hour period is considered extreme heat. Utilities also can't terminate service to a customer for nonpayment if the outstanding amount owed is $50 or less. But more than $50, it could be lights out. COLORADO SUN:Colorado's Copper Mountain resort starts seeding to spark a huge biodiversity effortJason Blevins3:50 AM MDT on Aug 15, 2023This story first appeared in The Outsider, the premium outdoor newsletter by Jason Blevins.In it, he covers the industry from the inside out, plus the fun side of being outdoors in our beautiful state.SUBSCRIBECopper Mountain has identified 558 acres on the front side of its ski area where soil work can help restore ecosystems and improve biodiversity to help lessen the impacts of climate change. Last year the resort announced a 10-year carbon sequestration plan to plant carbon-storing plants and grasses on its ski slopes. The resort has tapped researchers at Southwestern University in Texas in the effort, with student scientists staking out test plots on five ski runs where they can monitor vegetation growth using native seeds, compost and biochar.The ski area hosted several resort leaders at its second-annual conservation summit earlier this month in an effort to share their research, strategies and projects. A large focus was restoring biological vibrancy on ski slopes, which too often are simply treated pretty much like lawns instead of critical components of mountain ecosystems. Last year sustainability workers at Copper Mountain started collecting seeds from 27 native species and replanting them across the resort's north-facing ski runs.Jeff Grasser, head of sustainability at Copper Mountain said “We are experimenting. We are trying to figure out how to make all this work at a landscape level,” as he sifted through charred wood chips in a 50-gallon drum that he will carefully spread across plots of ski slopes to see how the porous, lightweight biochar might help native grasses thrive. The aptly named Grasser has big plans. What if he could create “tons and tons” of biochar in massive kilns, not just little drums? What if Copper Mountain's corporate owner deploys its fleet of helicopters for heli-skiing in Utah to spread biochar across all the ski slopes at the company's 10 mountain resorts?“We want to do this in ways that can be done on a very large scale and we can't wait to share these results with you,” Grasser told a group of sustainability leaders at a recent conservation summit.The program included a presentation from folks from another Colorado ski area, Arapahoe Basin, detailing how crews replaced vegetation by hand and preserved topsoil when installing new chairlift towers. The crew from Eldora Mountain Resort offered details of a project with the Town of Nederland to build a wetland to replace a trailhead parking lot. Sunlight ski area took a page from Copper Mountain's biodiversity playbook and began collecting native seeds for replanting on ski runs. The Copper Mountain project will build a dataset of more than 100 locations across the ski area, with 10 years of science showing how native grasses, compost and biochar can help resort operators regain a more diverse, balanced ecosystem on ski slopes.“We want to have the data to be able to say,‘Hey this works really well. Don't just take my word for it. We have scientific evidence that supports these methods. These are the first steps in delivering resilience so bio-diversity can grow.'”And your unsolicited concert pick of the week, Ha Ha TonkaThu., Aug. 24, 9 p.m. at the Skylark Lounge in Denver (Bobcat Club) $12-$15An indie / southern rock band originally formed in West Plains, MO, Ha Ha Tonka's "dark view of the realities of socio-economic hardship, backwoods prejudices and drug abuse is leavened by wry humor and a deep appreciation for regional storytelling traditions. New album Blood Red Moon will be released on October 23.After Denver, Ha Ha Tonka will play a slate of shows throughout California, then Columbia, Missouri on November 2nd, West Plains on November 3rd, and Springfield, Missouri on November 4th. hahatonkamusic.comWelp, that's it for me! From Denver I'm Sean Diller. Original reporting for the stories in today's show comes from Colorado Sun, The Outsider, Colorado Newsline, Arizona Mirror, and Denver's Westword.Thank you for listening! See you next time.

Colorado teachers' union sues school district over gag policy | Arizona's state Democratic Party has raised 7x more money than AZ Republicans this year | Cecelia Espinoza, Rochelle Galindo, and Tim Hernandez seek vacant Colorado House seat representing Denver-based 4th district | Power shutoffs could prove deadly as Nevadans brace for continued extreme heatSong playsIntro by hostWelcome to High Country - politics in the American West. My name is Sean Diller; regular listeners might know me from Heartland Pod's Talking Politics, every Monday.Support this show and all the work in the Heartland POD universe by going to heartlandpod.com and clicking the link for Patreon, or go to Patreon.com/HeartlandPod to sign up. Membership starts at $1/month, with even more extra shows and special access at the higher levels. No matter the level you choose, your membership helps us create these independent shows as we work together to change the conversation.Alright! Let's get into it: COLORADO NEWSLINE:A Colorado teachers union filed a federal lawsuit against the Woodland Park School District and its board of education over a policy that they say prevents teachers from publicly speaking about school concerns.The Woodland Park Education Association and its president, Nate Owen, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Denver this week. The school board and district in Woodland Park, outside Colorado Springs in Teller County, has become increasingly conservative in recent years and the schools have become a frequent flashpoint of controversy over a number of issues including curriculum, personnel, transparency, etc.The lawsuit alleges that a district policy known as KDDA, is an unconstitutional prior restraint on speech that goes against the First Amendment.That policy, revised twice this year, states that the superintendent is the official spokesperson for the district and employees cannot talk to the media or even post on social media about district decisions without approval. Violation of the policy is considered insubordination.The lawsuit says “Prior restraints on speech are the most serious and least tolerable infringement of an individual's First Amendment rights. The Supreme Court has routinely held that prior restraints on protected speech are presumed to be constitutionally invalid,”There are examples of courts striking down policies that prevent public employees, like teachers, from speaking to the media without prior approval. attorney Steve Zansberg, who works on cases pertaining to media and the First Amendment said “It is my understanding that policies like this have previously been challenged in other school districts and have been found by courts to be unconstitutional restrictions on free speech rights of school employees.” Because of Owen's standing as president of the local teachers union, he often makes public comments to the school board about working conditions and matters of public concern, as well as comments to the media. The district's policy, however, puts his teaching job in jeopardy if he speaks out.The lawsuit also alleges that the way the policy was revised in February and March violates Colorado's Open Meetings Law. There are no posted minutes or agendas that show the school board publicly discussing the issue.Woodland Park School District Superintendent Ken Witt called the lawsuit a “coordinated political attack” by groups seeking to intimidate him, but of course offered no support for that claim. ARIZONA MIRROR:Arizona Republican Party's fundraising abysmal in run up to pivotal 2024 electionBY: CAITLIN SIEVERS - AUGUST 11, 2023 7:00 AMThe Arizona Republican Party's fundraising efforts so far this year are embarrassing, with Democrats outpacing them seven to one, leaving political operatives wondering if the party's new chairman can right the ship in time to mount any sort of meaningful campaign in 2024. The party took in only $165,000 in contributions so far in 2023, as compared to the Arizona Democratic Party's more than $1,150,000. And the state Republican Party's federal account, which is vital to fund operations during a presidential election year, was in a sad state as of the end of June, with less than $24,000 in cash on hand, compared to the state Democratic Party's nearly $714,000.Because of campaign finance laws, the parties must operate separate accounts for money spent to help elect federal candidates and funds used to bolster state and local hopefuls. Robert Graham, a former Arizona Republican Party chairman from 2013-2017, told the Arizona Mirror, “If this were me, I would be sweating a little bit.” He went on to say that the last party chairman Kelli Ward's extravagant spending and far-right fringe politics have left some big donors hesitant to give.Ward, who chaired the state GOP for four years beginning in January 2019, was part of the group of fake electors from Arizona that hoped to overturn former President Donald Trump's loss to President Joe Biden in 2020. She bought into election conspiracy theories and spent more than $500,000 on an election night party and statewide bus tour in 2022, angering fellow Republicans who would have rather seen that money used to help GOP candidates who lost extremely tight statewide races.In that election, Arizona Republicans suffered losses in the race for governor, secretary of state and attorney general and the U.S. Senate.One former AZ Democratic Party executive director said“Functionally, they're running an operation right now that wouldn't be capable of running one Dairy Queen franchise, much less a state operation to hopefully elect a senator or a president,” “I would be shocked, I think, just given where they are right now, if this time next year they're running any sort of impactful campaign or effort out of the state Republican Party.”DENVER WESTWORD:Firebrand Teacher Tim Hernández seeks seat in Colorado HouseHouse District 4 had been represented by Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez, who won an at-large seat on Denver City Council.By Michael RobertsAugust 9, 2023Tim Hernández is a teacher best known for fighting on behalf of diversity, equity and inclusion related to both students and educators. Now he hopes to bring his passion to the Colorado Legislature as a representative for House District 4.Hernandez has been a controversial figure, making headlines last year when students at North High School protested the decision not to keep him on the staff.Colorado's House District 4 stretches roughly from Regis University south to Morrison Road, and from Sheridan Boulevard east to Zuni Street. However, the District's voters as a whole won't be making the selection — at least not yet. On August 26 "appointed leadership of the Democratic Party within the House district, an estimated 69 individuals, will decide who fills out the rest of the term.  Two other hopefuls with significant Democratic connections are also vying for the spot. Cecelia Espenoza previously worked as a counsel for the U.S. Department of Justice and an appellate immigration judge. She is also a former professor at the University of Denver and St. Mary's University School of Law, and a former chair of the board at the National Hispana Leadership Institute in Washington, D.C., as well.Also in the race is Rochelle Galindo, who in 2015 became the first openly gay person to be elected to the Greeley, Colorado City Council. She followed this win by besting Republican rival Michael Thuener to become the state representative for Weld County's District 50 in 2018. She resigned the next year after being accused of sexual assault and providing alcohol to a minor and was cleared of the charges in 2021. Since she left the legislature, Galindo has worked in various roles at advocacy organizations Colorado People's Alliance, Colorado People's Action, and Emerge.NEVADA CURRENT:NV households struggle to pay summer power bills, and it's getting worseBY: JENIFFER SOLIS - AUGUST 15, 2023 5:34 AMRecord heat in Southern Nevada throughout July drove scores of residents to take refuge in air-conditioned homes, but the cost of fighting off summer temperatures will likely leave an alarming number of Nevadans unable to pay their bills. Last month was the hottest July ever recorded in Las Vegas, with a daily average high of 109 degrees. The last two weeks of July were the hottest 14-day stretch on ever record, with an average high of 112 degrees. Nevada residents living in a single-family home saw an average 22% increase — from about $337 per month fo $407 per month - in their energy bills.Electricity rates in July were set to be even higher before NV Energy agreed to temporarily reduce costs for customers.For many Nevada households, an extra $60 to $70 dollars won't completely break the bank, but for low-income households or those on a fixed income, higher utility bills mean choosing between keeping the A/C running or addressing other essential needs like food and medication. In the worst-case scenario, lack of payment may lead to a power shut-off, leaving families scrambling to find enough money to restore service, often only to face disconnection again.Further, Nevada does not require utilities to disclose the number of customers they disconnect, leaving little transparency of the magnitude of the problem. NV Energy, a monopoly with more than a million captive customers, has shown little interest in publicly sharing the number of disconnected customers. An NV Energy spokesperson said in an email that “NV Energy does not share this type of data publicly, though the company works diligently with customers and makes every effort to avoid disconnecting power.”Data that is public reveals that more and more households are struggling to pay utility bills in Nevada. Applications for state utility assistance over the last three months of available data reveal a sharp 37% increase compared to the same period last year. Public health officials anticipate the high demand will continue as temperatures remain high throughout August. The state program, called the Energy Assistance Program, provides a supplement for qualifying low-income Nevadans with the cost of home energy. Eligible households receive an annual, one-time per year benefit paid directly to their energy provider.But the cost of that assistance ultimately falls on NV Energy customers. Part of the program's funding is subsidized by ratepayers through NV Energy's Universal Energy Charge, which adds 46 cents a month to the typical residential power bill.Unpaid bills that can't be recovered by NV Energy are eventually paid by customers too. Nevada law does protect utility customers from power shut-offs during periods of extreme heat, when a lack of air conditioning can result in waves of hospitalizations or even death. According to state statute, a utility company can't terminate service for a non-paying customer if the National Weather Service has forecast a period of extreme heat within the next 24 hours within the customer's geographical area. For most residents in Southern Nevada, extreme heat is defined as 105 degrees. So if it won't be 105 in the course of the next day, service can be terminated. NV Energy must also notify elderly customers at least 48 hours before termination of power.For all other residents in Southern Nevada, a forecast of 105 degrees or higher within a 24 hour period is considered extreme heat. Utilities also can't terminate service to a customer for nonpayment if the outstanding amount owed is $50 or less. But more than $50, it could be lights out. COLORADO SUN:Colorado's Copper Mountain resort starts seeding to spark a huge biodiversity effortJason Blevins3:50 AM MDT on Aug 15, 2023This story first appeared in The Outsider, the premium outdoor newsletter by Jason Blevins.In it, he covers the industry from the inside out, plus the fun side of being outdoors in our beautiful state.SUBSCRIBECopper Mountain has identified 558 acres on the front side of its ski area where soil work can help restore ecosystems and improve biodiversity to help lessen the impacts of climate change. Last year the resort announced a 10-year carbon sequestration plan to plant carbon-storing plants and grasses on its ski slopes. The resort has tapped researchers at Southwestern University in Texas in the effort, with student scientists staking out test plots on five ski runs where they can monitor vegetation growth using native seeds, compost and biochar.The ski area hosted several resort leaders at its second-annual conservation summit earlier this month in an effort to share their research, strategies and projects. A large focus was restoring biological vibrancy on ski slopes, which too often are simply treated pretty much like lawns instead of critical components of mountain ecosystems. Last year sustainability workers at Copper Mountain started collecting seeds from 27 native species and replanting them across the resort's north-facing ski runs.Jeff Grasser, head of sustainability at Copper Mountain said “We are experimenting. We are trying to figure out how to make all this work at a landscape level,” as he sifted through charred wood chips in a 50-gallon drum that he will carefully spread across plots of ski slopes to see how the porous, lightweight biochar might help native grasses thrive. The aptly named Grasser has big plans. What if he could create “tons and tons” of biochar in massive kilns, not just little drums? What if Copper Mountain's corporate owner deploys its fleet of helicopters for heli-skiing in Utah to spread biochar across all the ski slopes at the company's 10 mountain resorts?“We want to do this in ways that can be done on a very large scale and we can't wait to share these results with you,” Grasser told a group of sustainability leaders at a recent conservation summit.The program included a presentation from folks from another Colorado ski area, Arapahoe Basin, detailing how crews replaced vegetation by hand and preserved topsoil when installing new chairlift towers. The crew from Eldora Mountain Resort offered details of a project with the Town of Nederland to build a wetland to replace a trailhead parking lot. Sunlight ski area took a page from Copper Mountain's biodiversity playbook and began collecting native seeds for replanting on ski runs. The Copper Mountain project will build a dataset of more than 100 locations across the ski area, with 10 years of science showing how native grasses, compost and biochar can help resort operators regain a more diverse, balanced ecosystem on ski slopes.“We want to have the data to be able to say,‘Hey this works really well. Don't just take my word for it. We have scientific evidence that supports these methods. These are the first steps in delivering resilience so bio-diversity can grow.'”And your unsolicited concert pick of the week, Ha Ha TonkaThu., Aug. 24, 9 p.m. at the Skylark Lounge in Denver (Bobcat Club) $12-$15An indie / southern rock band originally formed in West Plains, MO, Ha Ha Tonka's "dark view of the realities of socio-economic hardship, backwoods prejudices and drug abuse is leavened by wry humor and a deep appreciation for regional storytelling traditions. New album Blood Red Moon will be released on October 23.After Denver, Ha Ha Tonka will play a slate of shows throughout California, then Columbia, Missouri on November 2nd, West Plains on November 3rd, and Springfield, Missouri on November 4th. hahatonkamusic.comWelp, that's it for me! From Denver I'm Sean Diller. Original reporting for the stories in today's show comes from Colorado Sun, The Outsider, Colorado Newsline, Arizona Mirror, and Denver's Westword.Thank you for listening! See you next time.

You ever wonder why the current healthcare system is so expensive and seemingly broken? Get ready to explore the potential of innovative healthcare plan designs that seek to reduce out-of-pocket costs and increase access to care with our special guest, Kevin Kickhaefar, President and Chief Growth Officer at Gravy.  We'll learn about Kevin's fascinating journey from the Midwest to leading a healthcare startup and his vision of a redesigned healthcare system that works for everyone. We'll investigate the integration of direct primary care with plan design, and the challenges that brokers and advisors face in the current climate.Thinking about level-funded and self-funded plans? Our insightful discussion with Kevin also covers their impact on employers and traditional health insurance carriers. We'll explore how these plans provide employers with more control over their healthcare costs, leading to a more sustainable model for the future. Learn about how direct primary care can bridge the healthcare gap in underserved communities, and how innovative partnerships like the Gravy Pay card and Teladot are simplifying the payment process and virtual visits for patients and providers alike. If you're curious about the future of health insurance, this is one episode you won't want to miss.

Watch the movie - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7pylW1Q86Q Bonus Episodes - https://www.patreon.com/whosright  

Fraudology is presented by Spec. Check out their no-code platform you can implement to start fighting fraud today!In this episode of Fraudology, host Karisse Hendrick invites return guest & listener favorite, Gil Rosenthal, a fraud prevention strategy expert & a Fintech Advisor, to discuss the importance of storytelling and strategic thinking in protecting companies and users from fraudulent activities.They delve into the methodology of storytelling in fraud prevention (used by fraud departments in top companies, such as PayPal), and emphasize the need for a proactive approach to anticipate fraudsters' tactics. From analyzing unique patterns and dollar values to identifying band-aid & long-term prevention solutions to understanding the impact of different strategies and actions, they explore key strategies for staying ahead in the ever-evolving world of fraud.Tune in to gain valuable insights and learn about the fascinating world of fraud prevention.Links:As mentioned in the intro, the 2023 Fraudology Benchmarking Survey (Sponsored by Forter) can be viewed here; with no e-mail or contact information required!:https://resources.forter.com/fraud-fighter/2023-benchmark-reportTo connect with Gil on LinkedIn or to inquire about receiving the full training course as overviewed in today's episode:https://www.linkedin.com/in/gil-rosenthal/Fraudology is hosted by Karisse Hendrick, a fraud fighter with decades of experience advising hundreds of the biggest ecommerce companies in the world on fraud, chargebacks, and other forms of abuse impacting a company's bottom line. Connect with her on LinkedIn She brings her experience, expertise, and extensive network of experts to this podcast semi weekly, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

A few months ago, kidney specialist Dr. Stanley Goldfarb was fired from UpToDate, a digital research tool for physicians. Last year, the president of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, where Dr. Goldfarb served as an associate dean, wrote a public letter accusing him of racism while students and colleagues circulated a petition calling for his title as professor emeritus to be stripped.  Dr. Goldfarb's purported crimes had nothing to do with medicine and everything to do with his public opposition to DEI (“Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion”) in medicine. For example, last year, he wrote,   The campaign for diversity is long running and has some value, yet the ideological extremism of the past two years has led medical schools to adopt dangerous strategies. To fight supposed “systemic racism,” at least 40 institutions have dropped the requirement that all applicants take the MCAT, the gold-standard test that measures students' grasp of this life-saving profession.   More recently, he added this observation,  It quickly became apparent that my beloved medical profession, to which I had devoted more than 50 years, was spiraling downward even faster than I had realized. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the decline, as did the death of George Floyd in 2020. Suddenly, medical schools were loudly proclaiming that health care is “systemically racist,” that “medical reparations” are urgently needed, and that medical education and practice must fundamentally change. Whereas DEI and social justice were frequently discussed in 2018, by the end of 2020 they were the central facets of medical education, where they remain to this day.  Other examples of Dr. Goldfarb's concerns include the supposed  systemic racism of being seen by a physician of a different race and pledges made by medical students to fight the gender binary and “honor all indigenous ways of healing that have been historically marginalized by western medicine.”   Near the end of the 20th century, it was common to dismiss and deny the possibility of objective truth claims in the liberal arts and social sciences, such as literature, art, and politics. But the “hard” sciences remained untouched until recently. It is now common for the same kind of deconstructions to be applied in math, medicine, or the other biological sciences. As it turns out, the first chapter of Romans accurately describes the very real potential of fallen humanity to deny what is observably true in the world God made.  Contemporary ideas of DEI prove a maxim of G.K. Chesterton, that “(t)he modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad.” The impulse for justice and equality, birthed within the Western world from Christian ideas about morality and the human condition, draws more from the philosophy of Michel Foucault than the Bible. Built instead on a standpoint epistemology rather than eternal categories of right and wrong and human dignity, an individual who belongs to what is understood as a traditionally marginalized group is granted moral status and authority over and above those from groups not assumed to be marginalized. Functionally, objective reality is denied.  As Shane Morris and I recently described, students taught that successfully solving algebra problems will depend more on the color of their skin than knowing algebra, or that their calculus professors are oppressors if they are white, will not only not unlock the mysteries of the universe, they will believe lies about who they are. Even worse, lowering standards for certain students only dehumanizes them, suggesting they cannot reach the standards in the first place.   In the 1990s, renowned economist Thomas Sowell wrote the following about lowering SAT scores:   The Educational Testing Service is adopting minority students as mascots by turning the SAT exams into race-normed instruments to circumvent the growing number of prohibitions against group preferences. The primary purpose of mascots is to symbolize something that makes others feel good. The well-being of the mascot himself is seldom a major consideration.   Sowell understood–even firsthand–racial injustice and the uphill climb that minority students can face to reach success. Yet for Sowell, ditching objective measurements was not the answer:   People of every race and background are fully capable of becoming world-class physicians. Medical schools should seek out the best candidates who are most likely to provide the best care for patients, regardless of what they look like or where they come from. Anything less jeopardizes the very purpose of these institutions.   Critical Theory in all of its forms only critiques, never constructs. Applied, it will only tear down, never build up. Advocates of this ideology should consider that their proposed solutions may be fueling the problems they claim to address.  This Breakpoint was co-authored by Kasey Leander. For more resources to live like a Christian in this cultural moment, go to breakpoint.org. 

Episode 80 In this episode, I spoke with Melanie Barrett, we spoke about her self-love journey... sharing her transformative experiences from the depths of addiction with food and drugs to the empowering practice of functionally nourishing both her body and mind. Through personal and profound insights, she unveils those shifts from neglecting self-care to becoming a shining example for her kids. Discover how she has navigated through challenges, embraced growth, and ultimately has been finding harmony within herself. There are also exciting plans coming up with her company, Plant Ahead, promising incredible opportunities for all who are ready to embark on their own self-love journey with functional nutrition. Don't miss out on the chance to stay informed and inspired by signing up for her insightful newsletters, brimming with invaluable nutrition-related information. Tune in to this episode for the inspiring journey of self-love, resilience, and the transformative power of embracing a holistic approach to nourishing your body and your mind. Check out her website at https://www.plantahead.co/ Instagram: @plantahead.co Tik Tok: plantahead.co Want to Attend the Modern NLP Summit? Check out the details HERE → https://modernnlpsummit.com/ Learn more about the upcoming Events! Metafit Metamind Academy Fall Cohort (October 21-25th) → https://metafitmetamind.com/certified YOUR QUANTUM WORLD : Hypnosis & QTT Certification Training (December 8-10th) → https://www.metafitmetamind.com/hypqtt-certification Give us 5⭐ & Review! Follow @metafitmetamindpodcast @coachkarlita CONNECT with Me! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. April Dominick // #ICEPelvic // www.ptonice.com  In today's episode of the PT on ICE Daily Show, #ICEPelvic faculty member April Dominick discusses when and how the tailbone/coccyx may be a contributor to a patient's symptom behavior, as well as how to begin to assess & treat the region if appropriate. Take a listen to learn how to better serve this population of patients & athletes. If you're looking to learn more about our live pregnancy and postpartum physical therapy courses or our online physical therapy courses, check our entire list of continuing education courses for physical therapy including our physical therapy certifications by checking out our website. Don't forget about all of our FREE eBooks, prebuilt workshops, free CEUs, and other physical therapy continuing education on our Resources tab. EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION 00:00 INTRO What's up everybody? We are back with another episode of the PT on Ice Daily Show. Before we jump in, let's chat about Jane for a moment as they are our sure sponsor and they make this thing possible. The team at Jane understands that payment processing can be complex, so they built in an integrated payment solution called Jane Payments to help make things as simple as possible so you can get paid. If you're looking for an easy way to navigate payments, here's what we recommend. Head over to jane.app slash payments, book a one-on-one demo with a member of Jane's support team. This can give you a better sense of how Jane Payments can integrate with your practice several other popular features that Jane Payments supports, like memberships with the option to automatically invoice and process your membership payments online. If you know you're ready to get started, you can sign up for Jane and make sure when you do, you use the code ICEPT1MO as that gives you a one-month grace period while you settle in. Once you're in your new Jane account, you can flip the switch for Jane Payments at any time. Let the Jane team know if you need a hand with anything. They offer unlimited support and are always happy to jump in. Thanks everybody. Enjoy today's PT on ICE Daily Show. 01:27 DR. APRIL DOMINICK, PT, DPTWhat is up PT on ICE fam? Dr. April Dominic here. Today we are starting our two-part series on pain in the butt. And today you will learn how you as a clinician can screen for tailbone pain, some general assessment and treatment strategies, as well as in part two, next in two weeks we'll cover soft tissue structures that may contribute to pain in the butt. Before we dive into tailbone pain today, let's talk about some course offerings from the ICE Pelvic Division. So we have our eight-week online cohort that starts July 10th and we still have some spots left. So please hop on in and join us for all of that fun. And then we have our live course and this course is going to give folks the ability to learn pelvic floor basics and about the pregnancy and postpartum changes of the body. We'll definitely dive into the internal exam in supine and standing with an option to learn another way if an internal exam is not for you. Then in day two, we are in the gym and we're applying what we learned day one into all activity types such as impact work, rig work, barbell and more. And we learn how to coach and come alongside and offer modifications for this population and keep them in the gym during pregnancy if that's what they desire, as well as help them feel confident returning back to the gym during postpartum. So our next course is actually going to be with myself and Dr. Alexis Morgan. It'll be here in Denver, Colorado. That's going to be July 29th and 30th. And then you can hop into our next course offering, which is in September 23rd and 24th, I believe, and that's going to be in Scottsdale, Arizona. So tailbone pain. We've got people with pain in the butt and we're thinking, hey, it may be coming from the tailbone. So what do we know about tailbone pain right now? Well, true to the pelvic health research world form, we are still learning and growing. We don't know a lot about incidence rates for tailbone pain. It is under reported. It is multifactorial in nature. There are a lot of psychological and physiologic factors that are involved in tailbone pain. So with that, it is just a trickier diagnosis to treat. But I wanted to share about all of the things that you can do from a general assessment and treatment strategy today. So one study did find that comparing female to males, females tend to be affected by tailbone pain about five times more than male counterparts. We also know that typically speaking, tailbone pain can resolve within weeks or months with time. However, we do know that conservative treatment strategies are welcome and definitely help reduce that duration for some. So what is the tailbone? Or I'll sometimes call it the coccyx. The word coccyx actually originates from the Greek word for the beak of a cuckoo bird. So like a tailbone, the beak and the tailbone have a triangular shape. The tailbone is three to five fused bones that articulate to the bottom of the sacrum. So everyone listening right now, let's go ahead and orient ourselves to where the tailbone actually is. With your fingertips, I want you to try right now, locate the edges of your sacrum, which is going to be that bone that kind of sits inside of the center of the buttock. And I want you to head inferiorly or towards the toes and towards midline. You're going to follow that bone until it ends. You'll bump into a small bone and that is the coccyx. You might be like, whoa, April, I'm like right near the anus. Well, then you're in the right spot because the coccyx is just superior to that anal opening. So the coccyx may be tiny, but it is mighty and it is not insignificant. I like to think about the coccyx as a leg of a tripod. And that tripod is going to consist of a sit bone on one side, a sit bone on the other, and then the tailbone in the center. It is the anchor for the posterior pelvic floor muscles. So there are all kinds of muscles that attach to the coccyx itself all around. Specifically, the coccygeus muscle is going to attach on either side of the coccyx. But wait, there are more. So what is really important and why I wanted to come on here today to talk about tailbone is that there are other structures that are not actually pelvic floor specific that are attaching directly to the tailbone. Those are the glute max. So we have hip insertions as well as the sacro tuberous and sacrospina ligaments. So if you've got someone coming in for tailbone pain, it is important to assess above the joint and below, of course, but assessing above the joint, like at the hip and the low back due to these attachments. Functionally speaking, the tailbone is dynamic. It's going to move as we move throughout our day doing our activities of daily living. So when the pelvic floor contracts, the tailbone is going to draw in and come forward or come anteriorly. So let's chat about actual functions that the coccyx is involved in. More specifically, the coccyx is involved in sitting, bowel health, so it helps to keep poop in or get out of the way to get poop out. It is involved in childbirth, sexual play, and transfers such as sit to stands. So let's put ourselves in the subjective exam. You've got someone that came in and they've got some kind of hip pain or tailbone pain. So what are we going to hear from a traumatic mechanism of injury or a non-traumatic mechanism of injury? I'm also going to talk about aggravating factors here. So what are some things that you might hear during your subjective or things that you might want to dive deeper into in order to maybe put coccidemia or tailbone pain onto your hypothesis list? So from a traumatic mechanism of injury standpoint, we most commonly hear of tailbone injuries during labor and delivery. The tailbone should move out of the way to allow for the fetus to slide on down the birth canal as if it was that easy, right? And simple. But sometimes that birth doesn't go according to plan and someone may need to have an instrument assisted delivery with the use of forceps or a vacuum. And that is going to put someone at a higher risk for a tailbone injury. Another traumatic mechanism of injury would be a fall. And that can be a fall during your sport, during an activity, or from a horse, which we hear often. So now I'm going to dive into eight common non-traumatic aggravating factors or contributors to tailbone pain. We have pregnancy. So during pregnancy, things are a-growing and that's going to put a lot more force down into the sacrum, onto the tailbone. So some of those folks may start to say, hey, I've actually got a lot more pain when I sit during pregnancy. But you don't have to be pregnant to have pain with sitting. So one of the biggest, biggest complaints of, or aggravating factors for tailbone pain is going to be pain with sitting. So especially for a prolonged time. The tailbone assists with weight-bearing support, especially in sitting. So let's bring it to real life. In real life, we're thinking truck drivers or maybe people who have jobs who you are sitting without any brakes or with minimal brakes. So just constant pressure and force down onto that tailbone. And then I also want us to take a minute and think about the social implications of someone who has pain, severe pain with sitting. So what is that going to prevent us from doing? Hey, maybe going on a dinner date, right? Or comfortably going to a movie with your grandkids or any sort of event at work or your job duties itself. So people who have tailbone pain and it is severe, just have some grace for them because we do a lot of sitting in our daily lives. Think about like even transportation, we're sitting in a car, right? Not everybody has subways in their region of the United States. So just extend some grace to these folks because they, this is definitely interrupting their life quite a bit. Other reasons, or contributors to tailbone pain, rapid weight loss, increased stress might increase some overactivity of the pelvic floor muscles that surround the coccyx. We also have some sometimes tailbone pain after spinal injury. If someone has hypermobility, that is going to play into the mechanics of ligaments and of the tailbone, as well as oftentimes people will complain of pain in the tailbone with sexual play due to certain positions causing a little bit more force down into the tailbone. And then finally, exercise. You know, you've got those folks who are like, oh, it's summertime, I'm going to get my hot girl summer on or whatever kind of summer they're wanting. And they are recently starting some sort of exercise routine, whether that is doing a lot of orange theory or 45 where they have or CrossFit where they have a lot of biking or cycling or rowing that they didn't used to have. And that's a little bit more pressure on the tailbone or maybe the Pilates person who is doing like a hundred boat poses, right? So exercise can play a big role in a new onset of tailbone pain. And then from a medical perspective, bone spurs, infections and cysts can also contribute. So what are some easing factors? What are these people are going to say that may lead you to be like, oh, maybe if this is what's relieving their pain, maybe I should be considering tailbone pain. They are going to say, you know, if I change positions or they might report being on their belly or standing or sideline, those are the positions of comfort. And that's because we are not weight bearing onto the tailbone. So from an objective standpoint, let's run through what are some bony structures we should be looking at. So hip and low back. Hopefully I've made that clear to you that those need to be screened out. Pelvic specific structures. We're looking at the sacroiliac joint as well as the tailbone itself. And in our live courses for our pelvic class, we dive deep into assessment and treatment and help you just dial in those skills. So hop on into our live course for that. I'll walk us through verbally how we would palpate the tailbone itself. So first, first, first, first, make sure it is actually the tailbone. I had a patient one time who is a health care provider and they were all through other subjective exam. They're saying, yeah, you know, tailbone this, tailbone that, blah, blah, blah. I get to the objective exam. I'm doing my P.A. mobs on the spine. I get down to L3 through five. Boom. That is their pain. Tenderness. Ah, that's it. That's it. And so I'm like, OK, noting for later. And then we continue on into some tailbone palpation and nothing. Any sort of tailbone pressing or mobilizations does not reproduce the pain that they came in for. So just make sure that we're all on the same page about what the tailbone is. Now, let's just call it what it is. Palpating the tailbone is awkward. It can be uncomfortable for the client, but to quote Finding Nemo, just touch the butt. OK, touch the tailbone. You wouldn't avoid palpation or assessment of the hip if someone came in with hip pain. Right. So we shouldn't think any different about externally palpating the tailbone. So let me give you some options for how to do that. When we are palpating the tailbone, we are looking for reproduction of pain. And sometimes after you get a feel for a few tailbones, you can appreciate that some positions, some tailbone positions are a little more flexed or some are a little more vertical. And that usually comes with a little time after palpating a bunch of them. But the tailbone palpation, we've got three recommendations. So number one is externally, you can palpate as a clinician, you can palpate the client's tailbone in prone, side lying or sitting. And in prone or side lying, it's going to be the same way that I just walked us through how to palpate your own tailbone, except you'll have as a clinician, a pincers grasp on that tailbone and you'll be able to do some mobilizations and manipulations there. So these do make it difficult for getting a solid grasp on the bone. And then in sitting, I love this because this is a little more functional for the person. So you can have your fingertips on their tailbone in sitting and ask them to sit upright and then also slump. And that's going to give you a good appreciation of the movement of the coccyx itself. And then another way to palpate the tailbone is they may be like, uh-uh, you are not getting anywhere near my tailbone. That is my tailbone. So that is okay. You can come alongside them and you can just walk them through how to palpate their own tailbone again in sitting or side lying. And you can ask them some subjective questions about what it is that they're feeling and make sure they're in the right spot. And then the final way to palpate the tailbone would be internally or interactively. And those with pelvic floor specialty, especially trained in inter rectal examinations, will be able to do that. So from a general conservative treatment strategy standpoint, let's talk through some of those things. You've got someone that came in, you're like, yes, they definitely have tailbone pain. Now what do you do? We'll talk through manual therapy, exercise and education. So from a manual therapy side of things, you can do some direct coccyx mobilizations, whether that's externally or interactively. So you've got your pins or grass and you are applying some mobilizations to that structure. You can also do it indirectly where your pins or grass stays on that tailbone. And then you ask them, maybe they're in side lying, hey, can you do some posterior pelvic tilts, anterior pelvic tilts of the hips or can you move your hips while we are stabilizing the tailbone? That is obviously a more active way to get some manual mobilizations in there. We can also supplement with dry needling, cupping, e-stim. We definitely want to hit the glute max, the lumbar spine. And if you're trained in it, the pelvic floor as well, especially those coccidius muscles that attach nearby, that touch directly to the coccyx. And then from an exercise standpoint, I'll talk through some stretches, strengthening and aerobic activity. So my three favorite stretches for promoting down regulation of the nervous system for the tailbone pain is going to be throwing some diaphragmatic breathing in with these three exercises. So the first, I like my clients to be on hands and knees doing some rock backs. The second is happy baby. You can be in happy baby, maybe do some lateral movement side to side, but I love a good modified happy baby where the feet are actually on the wall that frees the client's hands to actually spread the cheeks. It is okay to touch your butt. It's your own butt, right? So spreading those cheeks is actually going to put a stretch onto the tailbone itself and for some people relieve some of that pain. And then a deep supported squat against the wall is going to be wonderful for those pelvic floor muscles that may be, again, a little overactive and pulling on that coccyx bone. Of course, in the long term, we'll want to do some general loading, whatever that patient can tolerate and especially if hyper mobility is on board, loading of the hips and back and pelvic floor can be wonderful for these humans. And then finally, let's blast them with some high intensity interval training of whatever they can tolerate. So bike and rower are probably going to be out the window, but they may be able to do some standing, arm bike intervals, brisk walking, treadmill incline, pull walking, anything to really hit the system to address that increased inflammatory state and promote some blood flow and healing. And then finally, education. Education is huge for these humans. So we're going to talk about positioning, positioning in sitting. Let's encourage a neutral or anterior pelvic tilt because that's going to put a lot less pressure down onto the sacrum and the tailbone. Let's identify the threshold that the patient is able to tolerate in sitting. So if they're like during the subjective, they say, yeah, you know, around 30 minutes is when I start to feel my tailbone pain. Great. We've identified a threshold. below that and say, if you wouldn't mind, let's do some, some standing breaks or movement snacks around 20, 25 minutes of sitting just so that we don't keep hitting that threshold of pain and continuing that ripping the bandaid off cycle of I sit for hours and hours and I have pain and then it starts all over again. So let's do something about it. And then cushions. I love recommending a lumbar support cushion like a half McKinsey slimline roll. They can tuck that below the low back and that's going to give them a little more anterior pelvic tilt and then also tailbone for the cushions for the tailbone itself. So some of my favorite models are the cushion your assets, tailbone support, the kabootie or a donut. And then during intimacy. So using pillows for support or maybe opting for positions with decreased tailbone compression like hands and knees or legs up or side laying. Those may feel better for that human. And then it wouldn't be an ice podcast without talking about lifestyle factors. We want you to be talking with them about nutrition, reducing processed sugar intake, and especially for this population, stress management, increased stress with job, family, whatever can be a huge factor for keeping this tailbone pain around. So we want to make sure that we get them hooked up with someone or using some sort of stress management techniques to address that part of this diagnosis. And then finally, remind these people that it takes time. Tailbone bruises, tailbone pain, all of that. It just takes a really long time. And so it will get better, especially if they can implement some of these strategies. But unfortunately, they are going to have to be a little patient. So let's review what it is that we talked about. Tailbone pain is tricky. It's tricky to treat. It's understudied and it's underreported. But it is involved in so many life functions, including weight bearing support, especially pain sitting, bowel sexual function, labor and delivery. Due to the attachment sites to the tailbone, it should be part of your hypothesis list for folks coming in with back and hip pain. Actually touch the butt, but really touch the tailbone. Make sure that it is the tailbone that is possibly a structure that is involved. If you feel that the tailbone is involved, give it some manual therapy with some mobilizations, soft tissue love, and then supplement that with whatever kind of modalities you prefer. Cupping, dry needling, some supportive stretches like happy baby, quadruped rocking, getting some gentle loading in, and then offering some cushions for solutions for positioning. And finally, refer to a pelvic floor PT in your area or get yourself to one of our live courses because we dive deep into pelvic pain assessment and dialing in those skills so that you feel confident when you have someone like this in front of you. So happy Monday, everyone. Happy Fourth of July. And I will see you all in two weeks to discuss the soft tissue structures that may contribute 24:37 SPEAKER_02 to some pains in the butt. Hey, thanks for tuning in to the PT on Ice Daily Show. If you enjoyed this content, head on over to iTunes and leave us a review and be sure to check us out on Facebook and Instagram at the Institute of Clinical Excellence. If you're interested in getting plugged into more ice content on a weekly basis while earning CUs from home, check out our virtual ice online mentorship program at PT on ice.com. While you're there, sign up for our hump day hustling newsletter for a free email every Wednesday morning with our top five research articles and social media posts that we think are worth reading. Head over to PT on Ice dot com and scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up.

The Democrat's strange, new respect for ethics is actually a plan to functionally dissolve the Supreme Court. Rush Limbaugh, (God rest him), discovered and named the “strange, new respect phenomena.” This was when the Mockingbird Media found new respect for a Republican after the Republican “evolved” on an issue. Think of Mitt Romney, whom the Mockingbirds once considered a psychopath who went around giving people cancer; now, Mitt is an elder statesman, a sober, caring public servant. The Democrats now have a strange, new respect for ethics . . . but only related to the Supreme Court and only as regards the so-called conservatives. While I think we all agree the justices should report when people who have given them a lot of money or employ their spouses have a case before the Court, the specter of the Democrat Party pretending to revere ethics is brutally and offensively hilarious. So, what's their end-game? It's about delegitimizing the Court so they can run on the issue of packing it with as many communists and satanists as they can find and get approved should the people who run Joe Biden get four more years.What does God say? When we forgive people, we do not and cannot absolve them. In fact, if we forgive them in prayer to God, we aren't doing anything for them. Matthew 18: 21-22 Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven timesOur forgiveness does not change what will happen to these people who allow such evil to be done through them. Jesus will return as judge. Christ Will Come to JudgeEpisode 799 Links'If You Want Forgiveness and Amnesty, Emily Oster, Here's Your Program': By Karen KwiatkowskiCNN: Republicans "seizing" on reporters asking Biden scripted questionWhistleblower documents show that Chief Justice John Roberts's wife Jane Roberts made over $10 million as a legal recruiter. A staggering amount. The problem? The couple never disclosed that firms paying Jane had matters before John. Corruption.Supreme Court Justices release unanimous 9-0 letter slamming Democrat Senators over fake Clarence Thomas “ethics” scandal…FBI DIRECTOR WRAY: "There are no political appointees in the FBI. Everybody in the FBI is a career civil servant."Merrick Garland's DOJ never told the Judge who signed off on the search warrant on Mar-a-Lago raid that President Trump had given FBI full consent to search Mar-a-Lago.DOJ Inspector General ADMITS that the FBI has done 3.4 million warrantless “backdoor searches!” Over a MILLION of which were in errorAt the Revere Hotel in Boston, FBI agents and Army Special Ops units were about to conduct a "training exercise". In the "exercise", they would go into a room and interrogate a "role player". Instead, they went to the wrong room, where an unsuspecting airline pilot answered the door. They handcuffed him, threw him into the shower, and interrogated him for about an hour, before he was able to convince them he wasn't the "role player". They then told him that he could never speak about what had happened, and left. When it became public, the government's response was basically "oops"Man calls out Corporate Media Elites to their FACES:“Is there ANYTHING you've gotten right in the last 20 years?! Iraq— WRONG! Syria— WRONG! Russiagate— REALLY WRONG!” Alan's Soapshttps://alanssoaps.com/TODDUse coupon code ‘TODD' to save an additional 10% off the bundle price.BiOptimizershttps://magbreakthrough.com/toddUse promo code TODD for 10% off your order.Bonefroghttps://bonefrog.usEnter promo code TODD at checkout to receive 10% off your subscription. Bulwark Capitalbulwarkcapitalmgmt.comAct now and get Bulwark Capital's “Common Cents Investing” guide FREE. My Pillowhttps://mypillow.comUse code TODD for Closeout pricing on all All Season Slippers.Patriot Mobilehttps://patriotmobile.com/hermanGet free activation today with offer code HERMAN. Visit or call 878-PATRIOT. GreenHaven Interactivehttps://greenhaveninteractive.comGet seen on Google more with your worldclass website! RuffGreenshttps://ruffgreens.com/toddGet your FREE Jumpstart Trial Bag of Ruff Greens, simply cover shipping. Visit or call 877-MYDOG-64. SOTA Weight Losshttps://sotaweightloss.comSOTA Weight Loss is, say it with me now, STATE OF THE ART!Texas SuperFoodhttps://texassuperfood.comTexas SuperFood is whole food nutrition at its best.

Everybody wants to be healthy and fit, but what does that really look like and how do we get there? On episode 585 of the 40+ Fitness Podcast, we discuss how to get functionally fit so you can live the life you love. You can find the full show notes for this episode at 40plusfitnesspodcast.com/585.

This episode carries content warnings for distorted and layered vocals (00:30 - 01:10), discussion of workplace injuries, discussion of medical debt, and discussion of slavery and indentured servitude. For three years, the Bilateral Intercession has held Palisade under blockade. The Pact of Free States holds just beyond Nideo space, waiting in the dark for an opportunity to strike. The Qui'Err Coalition's fleet hovers at the edge of the Mirage, a flock around the Brink. Millennium Break's strike force hides in the shadow of Palisade's moon, Travertine.  Something must give. Someone must move.  And that is when Perennial whispers into an ear she's taken as her own, giving the Witch in Glass a new task and reminding her of an old law: Everything that has happened before will happen again.  And so she moves. The Witch in Glass is fearless, and after all, she has two Divines on her side. The revivified corpse of Past and, of course, the Adversary herself. So she leads the Reflecting Pool (and its many attack wings) crashing through the blockade and driving Crystal Palace once more into the ground--albeit in a much more controlled way this time. It is only hours days after making landfall that the Witch departs the city, joined by Emmeline, her attache, but leaving behind her most loyal supporters. She leaves behind two orders: First, that they must turn their wider landing zone into a city worthy of her rule before she returns. Second, that the city must carry the name which came to her as she browsed Past's ruined archives one night, taken from a kingdom that once ruled vast expanses of the Quire desert: the Crown of Glass. And with no further words, she wanders out into the wilderness–everything that has happened before will happen again–leaving behind only a group of the ship's de facto leaders to see to the new city's repairs and re-establishment. This week on the Road to PALISADE: City Planning Department Records Recovered from the Divine, Arbitrage Factions The Bilateral Intercession: This faction, made up primarily from Stel Nideo and Kesh assets, was formerly known as the Curtain. The rebranding comes as part of a “civil coup” performed by Cynosure Whitestar-Kesh. In a move that surprised no group more than the Curtain themselves, Cynosure spent years growing in confidence and power, until that intelligence organization could be once again reduced to a tool. Still defined by their traditionalism, they wield their control on culture, religion, and history as a weapon—and the extensive spy network for which they are named when those come up short. The Pact of Free States: While the Bilateral Intercession's name change reflects a shift in leadership and posture for the Curtain, the shift from “The Pact of Necessary Venture” to “The Pact of Free States” is simply the public acceptance of what was already widely understood to be true. Led in name by Dahlia, the Glorious Princept, and in day-to-day operation by senior members of Stels Apostolos and Columnar, the Pact paint themselves as liberal reformists whose aim is to increase the degree of autonomy in each of the Stels, such that they become in reality five separate nations. Hypha & Ashen: The former were a culture of galactic nomads, guided by a paranatural force called the Strand which they could commune with using technological devices built into their antlers. The latter are their descendants, their routes broken by the Principality's expansions and occupations, their culture ripped from them.  The Branched: A post-human culture from the Golden Branch star sector who have transformed their bodies into spectacular forms, but who are now weighed down by an endless war with the Principality. Persons Apparatus Aperitif (they/them), Shunley Pernard (they/them), Antonina Juris (she/her), Plum Tort (he/him), and Kojack Variety (he/him): The leading council members of the Crown in Glass, the city built from the fallen ship the Reflecting Pool. The Witch in Glass (she/her): A former scion of Kesh who, after knitting a bond with the adversary Perennial, came into control of the body of the Divine Past. Now scours the galaxy for the lost, injured, and unsure, recruiting them into her growing city-state. A shaky ally of Millennium Break. “Haunted” by an old foe. Exanceaster March (he/him): Head of the vast Columnar multi-system conglomerate called the Frontier Syndicate, which is older than the Stel itself. While the Syndicate has its hands in many enterprises, the heart of it all is corralling and instrumentalizing data. One such effort, Exanceaster's pet project the March Anecdatist Foundation, set its sights on Palisade as a testing ground. Locations The Bontive Valley: When the fledgling Divine Principality left Palisade—for reasons unknown by most—those few who refused to leave (unwilling to see themselves become part of a new empire) remained in quiet isolation, blessed by the gifts of the Divine Bounty. Where that Divine is now remains a mystery. Miscellany The Perennial Wave: Perennial is something like a god, or at least I think she imagines she is. Her wave is her arrogant whim, made manifest. Functionally infinite nano-particles, spread throughout the galaxy, hampering all technology except (curiously) Divines.  Kalmeria Particle: A so-called miracle of modern science, providing those that master it power akin to what was wielded before the Perennial Wave. Like most miracles, there is an explanation, but most people have neither the knowledge of nor interest in what it really is or where it came from. Some know that it is named for the rogue engineer Kal'Mera Broun, but few know that it is the result not only of their research into the divine Asepsis, but also the particular consequences of Millennium Break's battle with Motion and her siphoning of so-called “Autonomy Itself.”  Hosted by Austin Walker (@austin_walker)  Featuring Ali Acampora (@ali_west), Janine Hawkins (@bleatingheart), Keith J Carberry (@keithjcarberry), and Andrew Lee Swan (@swandre3000) Produced by Ali Acampora and Austin Walker Music by Jack de Quidt (available on bandcamp) Text by Austin Walker Cover Art by Craig Sheldon (@shoddyrobot) You can buy City Planning Department right here: https://kaelandm.itch.io/city-plannin...

This episode carries content warnings for cults, depiction of a missing child, assassination, description of a wounded corpse, and non-gory but uncanny body horror. Despite the best (and worst) efforts of those aboard, matters on the Brink have remained frayed and taut—but no pulled rope stays unbroken forever. Some, like Paris France, busy recruiting more members to Brink Proxy, prepare for what is to come. Others, like Mustard Red and Pushy Cheal—diving deeper into their cult investigations—hope to cut off the worst of it before it arrives. And for a rare few—like 3T and the undercover assassin named Lament—the chaos to come is not an obstacle at all. It's the first step. This week on the Road to Palisade: Orbital Pt. 3 Records Recovered from the Divine, Arbitrage Factions The Curtain of Divinity: Largely aligned to Stels Kesh and Nideo, the Curtain of Divinity is made uup of those loyal to Cynosure Whitestar-Kesh, the Peaceful Princept, and who desire the Divine Principality to continue on as it has for millenia. Defined by their traditionalism, they wield their control on culture, religion, and history as a weapon—and the extensive spy network for which they are named when those come up short. The Pact of Necessary Venture: Led in name by Dahlia, the Glorious Princept, and in day-to-day operation by senior members of Stels Apostolos and Columnar, the Pact paint themselves as liberal reformists who hope to increase the degree of autonomy in each of the Stels. Some even claim that they would see the Principality utterly destroyed and replaced by a loose affiliation of free states.  Brink Proxy: The volunteers who function as mechanics, operators, janitors, and engineers for the Brink. Bureaucratic, but some tasks require such things. Orchard Syndicate: A group of gardeners, farmers, and their delivery unit. Specialize in oranges and hidden motivations. The Devotees (aka the Friends of Devotion): A cultish organization that some suspect is responsible for those who have gone missing recently. Seems to worship something called either Devotion or Fervor. Qui Err Coalition: Comprised of the descendents (literal, metaphorical, and mystical) of the planet Quire's original people, the Qui Err Coalition is the de facto government of the Twilight Mirage.  Persons Cheal Pushy (he/him): While his single biggest influence on the Brink was the founding of the ever spreading Community Gardens, he's mostly known as the heart of the station, operating everyone's favorite dive bar and venue, Pushy's.  Mustard Red (she/her): A cyborg member of the Brink Proxy. A little paranoid, but perfectly tuned for a role in surveillance. Oh, and quite eager. A useful trait. Paris France (he/him): The Brink is a hub, with countless things moving through its halls and ports. Paris France is the person you go to when you want access to those things, even when you shouldn't have it. Deutsch Synchro a.k.a. Lament (they/she): A simple bartender at Pushy's. That's all. Certainly not an asset in play. Teleos Triton Tanager a.k.a. 3T (he/him): A idealist, a fool, and a musician with a following of “Troublemakers.” Saint Decario Dicario (he/him): Chief Troublemaker, 3T's lover, and a bellicose whisper in the ear. Sly Dente (they/them): Space trucker and memebr of the Orchard Syndicate. General Mourning (she/her): Military commander from the Qui Err Coalition. False Fruit (he/they): An Orchard Guildsman, Paris' rival fruit trader, and father of a missing child. Toaster Wroaster (any): Member of the Devotees who went missing. Coracin Seventine (he/him): Head of security in Brink Proxy. Suspicious of 3T. C.T.H. Pasodoble (he/him): Member of the Friends of Devotion Joe de Vivre (he/him): The charming rogue that Mustard can't stop loving. Locations The Brink: A space station and central transport hub that orbits through the Shore, the very edge of the Twilight Mirage. Founded during the crisis on Quire. Articles The “Divine” Arbit: A machine that twists and spins and twirls in impossible to predict ways—making it a poison to prediction engines. To call it a Divine though. What a joke. Miscellany The Perennial Wave: Perennial is something like a god, or at least I think she imagines she is. Her wave is her arrogant whim, made manifest. Functionally infinite nano-particles, spread throughout the galaxy, hampering all technology except (curiously) Divines.  Hosted by Austin Walker (@austin_walker)  Featuring Ali Acampora (@ali_west), Keith J Carberry (@keithjcarberry), Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal), and Sylvi Bullet (@GODSNEXTMARTYR) Produced by Ali Acampora (@ali_west) Music by Jack de Quidt (available on bandcamp) Text by Austin Walker Cover Art by Craig Sheldon (@shoddyrobot) You can purchase Orbital at  https://mouseholepress.itch.io/orbital   

This episode carries content warnings for assassination, colonial violence, death from visual stimulus, kidnapping, and missing people. The Brink continues to spin towards crisis. Even as individuals continue to vanish mysteriously, the increase in visitors to the station have led the halls to be more cramped and supplies to run ever thinner. Pushy holds an assembly to address the apparent cult. Paris hunts for a rare and dangerous magazine, while Mustard flirts with accepting an offer from a riskier supplier. Deutsch Syncrho--aka the assassin Lament--tracks down a target. And 3T prepares for the largest concert of his career. This week on the Road to Palisade: Orbital Pt. 2 Records Recovered from the Divine, Arbitrage The Divine, Arbitrage At last, I take the stage. Factions The Curtain of Divinity: Largely aligned to Stels Kesh and Nideo, the Curtain of Divinity is made uup of those loyal to Cynosure Whitestar-Kesh, the Peaceful Princept, and who desire the Divine Principality to continue on as it has for millenia. Defined by their traditionalism, they wield their control on culture, religion, and history as a weapon—and the extensive spy network for which they are named when those come up short. The Pact of Necessary Venture: Led in name by Dahlia, the Glorious Princept, and in day-to-day operation by senior members of Stels Apostolos and Columnar, the Pact paint themselves as liberal reformists who hope to increase the degree of autonomy in each of the Stels. Some even claim that they would see the Principality utterly destroyed and replaced by a loose affiliation of free states.  Brink Proxy: The volunteers who function as mechanics, operators, janitors, and engineers for the Brink. Bureaucratic, but some tasks require such things. Orchard Syndicate: A group of gardeners, farmers, and their delivery unit. Specialize in oranges and hidden motivations. The Devotees (aka the Friends of Devotion): A cultish organization that some suspect is responsible for those who have gone missing recently. Seems to worship something called either Devotion or Fervor. Persons Cheal Pushy (he/him): While his single biggest influence on the Brink was the founding of the ever spreading Community Gardens, he's mostly known as the heart of the station, operating everyone's favorite dive bar and venue, Pushy's.  Mustard Red (she/her): A cyborg member of the Brink Proxy. A little paranoid, but perfectly tuned for a role in surveillance. Oh, and quite eager. A useful trait. Paris France (he/him): The Brink is a hub, with countless things moving through its halls and ports. Paris France is the person you go to when you want access to those things, even when you shouldn't have it. Deutsch Synchro a.k.a. Lament (she/her): A simple bartender at Pushy's. That's all. Certainly not an asset in play. Teleos Triton Tanager a.k.a. 3T (he/him): A idealist, a fool, and a musician with a following of “Troublemakers.” Toaster Wroaster (any): Member of the Devotees who went missing.. Knighton Reach (they/them): Knighton Reach, Pact defector from the Columnar 42nd Stellar Unit. Presumed spy. Coracin Seventine (he/him): Head of security in Brink Proxy. Suspicious of 3T. C.T.H. Pasodoble (he/him): Member of the Friends of Devotion Morning's Observation (he/him): A soldier turned cook turned “hero.”  Gimme Gimme (they/them): Yet another Pact spy. Joe de Vivre (he/him): The charming rogue that Mustard can't stop loving. Locations The Brink: A space station and central transport hub that orbits through the Shore, the very edge of the Twilight Mirage. Founded during the crisis on Quire. Articles The “Divine” Arbit: A machine that twists and spins and twirls in impossible to predict ways—making it a poison to prediction engines. To call it a Divine though. What a joke. Miscellany The Perennial Wave: Perennial is something like a god, or at least I think she imagines she is. Her wave is her arrogant whim, made manifest. Functionally infinite nano-particles, spread throughout the galaxy, hampering all technology except (curiously) Divines.    Hosted by Austin Walker (@austin_walker)  Featuring Ali Acampora (@ali_west), Keith J Carberry (@keithjcarberry), Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal), and Sylvi Bullet (@GODSNEXTMARTYR) Produced by Ali Acampora (@ali_west) Music by Jack de Quidt (available on bandcamp) Text by Austin Walker Cover Art by Craig Sheldon (@shoddyrobot) You can purchase Orbital at  https://mouseholepress.itch.io/orbital 

This episode carries content warnings for the discussion of colonial violence, discussion of death from visual stimulus, and the discussion of industrial and workplace industries. For the last five millennia, the Divine Principality has expanded its reach across the stars. But in the Twilight Mirage, those 5,000 years were only felt as 500. For those in the Mirage, led by the Qui Err Coalition, life has been stable and if not utopian, then at least a type of living that is aspirational in only the best ways. But today, as the space station known as the Brink orbits towards the edge of the false nebula, those 5000 years come rushing in.  This week on the Road to Palisade: Orbital Pt. 1 Records Recovered from the Divine, Arbitrage Factions The Curtain of Divinity: For generations, the Curtain of Divinity operated in the shadows of the Principality, partly as intelligence agency, partly as shadow government. Now they have been dragged into the daylight, and serve as one of the two ruling factions of the whole Principality. Though there are some divisions along questions of secularity, humanism, and cultural taste, in general, leaders of the Curtain are conservative, traditionalist, and nationalistic. They seek the reunification of all five Stels and the permanence of the Divine Principality. Led, in public at least, by Cynosure Whitestar-Kesh, the Peaceful Princept. In fact, the Curtain has five divisions, each led by a ruthless individual known only by a codename: Silk (diplomacy), Damask (research & inquisition), Lace (military), Linen (economics), and Gabardine (espionage and collaboration). The Pact of Necessary Venture: As their (current) name suggests, the Pact began as a cooperative exploratory committee founded in the late 14th Century of the Perfect Millennium. They sought new territory to conquer, breaking an old taboo in the process, and inviting destruction and fracture. Which is appropriate, as their vision for the future is one where each Stel is granted more autonomy and independence—some even claim that they would see the Principality utterly destroyed and replaced by a loose affiliation of free states.  Despite this, the Pact are no radicals: While they want more independence from the Principality, they have little interest in shaking up the internal power structures of the Stels themselves. After all, their founders were all Elects, and though only two remain (Gallica, elect of the Divine Present, and Rye, elect of the divine Space), they are led by Dahlia, who serves as both Apokine and Glorious Princept. Qui Err Coalition: Comprised of the descendents (literal, metaphorical, and mystical) of the planet Quire's original people, the Qui Err Coalition is the de facto government of the Twilight Mirage.  Brink Proxy: The volunteers who function as mechanics, operators, janitors, and engineers for the Brink. Bureaucratic, but some tasks require such things. Orchard Syndicate: A group of gardeners, farmers, and their delivery unit. Specialize in oranges and hidden motivations. Devotion: A cultish organization that some suspect is responsible for those who have gone missing recently. Persons Cheal Pushy (he/him): While his single biggest influence on the Brink was the founding of the ever spreading Community Gardens, he's mostly known as the heart of the station, operating everyone's favorite dive bar and venue, Pushy's.  Mustard Red (she/her): A cyborg member of the Brink Proxy. A little paranoid, but perfectly tuned for a role in surveillance. Oh, and quite eager. A useful trait. Paris France (he/him): The Brink is a hub, with countless things moving through its halls and ports. Paris France is the person you go to when you want access to those things, even when you shouldn't have it. Deutsch Synchro a.k.a. Lament (she/her): A simple bartender at Pushy's. That's all. Certainly not an asset in play. Teleos Triton Tanager a.k.a. 3T (he/him): A idealist, a fool, and a musician with a following of “Troublemakers.” Grey Gloaming (she/her) and Demani Dusk (she/er): Most know these long past wives as the founders of the Brink. But from my perspective, they were interlopers in history. Grand Magnificent (he/him): An “artist” (read: weapons manufacturer) from five centuries ago. The picture of arrogance. He was at his best when he was honest about what he was. Locations Saboria: A world controlled by the Columnar which they “gifted” to a group of Ashen refugees fleeing the Curtain. A fiction, of course. The city of Harborview where the Ashen live is under constant surveillance. I do wonder, however, whether the Columnar know the irony of the trap they think they've laid. Articles The “Divine” Arbit: A machine that twists and spins and twirls in impossible to predict ways—making it a poison to prediction engines. To call it a Divine though. What a joke. Miscellany The Perennial Wave: Perennial is something like a god, or at least I think she imagines she is. Her wave is her arrogant whim, made manifest. Functionally infinite nano-particles, spread throughout the galaxy, hampering all technology except (curiously) Divines.  Hosted by Austin Walker (@austin_walker)  Featuring Ali Acampora (@ali_west), Keith J Carberry (@keithjcarberry), Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal), and Sylvi Bullet (@GODSNEXTMARTYR) Produced by Ali Acampora (@ali_west) Music by Jack de Quidt (available on bandcamp) Text by Austin Walker Cover Art by Craig Sheldon (@shoddyrobot) You can purchase Orbital at  https://mouseholepress.itch.io/orbital