Podcasts about sears tower

Alyssa tells about a chap dubbed "Spider Dan" who, among other things, scaled the Sear Tower using suction cups on Memorial Day in 1981.  Socials:Twitter, BlueSky, Instagram Show Notes:  Chicago Tribune: ‘Spider Dan' wowed Chicagoans with his scaling of skyscrapers WTTW: Spider Dan Climbs Chicago Chicago Fire Department:Chicago Fire Dept. Spider Dan Climbs the Hancock building ABC 7: 'Spider Dan' Goodwin scales Sears Tower, Hancock building - 1981 Dan Goodwin "Spiderman" scaled the outside of the John Hancock Building and the Sears Tower in 1981.Outside: SpiderDan Climbs Again, and Gets Arrested Again Bangor Daily News: 40 years ago, a Mainer dressed as Spider-Man climbed the tallest building in the world CBS: Crime San Francisco Tower Climber, "Spider Dan," Cited for Public Nuisance, Trespassing BBC: Americas French 'Spiderman' scales Sears Tower Sears Tower Time: Going Up, Up, Up NBC 5: Watch: NBC Chicago Docuseries ‘Big Chicago Stories 'The Daily Herald: Wallenda supported, Spider-Dan nearly killed New York Times: Climber Scales Tower in San Francisco New York Times: Swat Team at World Trade Center Foils Would-Be Human FlyWashington Post: Vacuum cleaners, Spider-Man and Trump: A brief history of suction-cupped skyscraper ascents Chicago History Podcast Chicago Tribune: Flashback: When ‘Spider Dan' climbed the Sears Tower, Chicagoans cheered. Hapless authorities shook their heads Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

(2024) National Wine day.  Entertainment from 1967.  SpiderDan climbed Sears Tower, Deadliest aviation disaster in US history, Goofy debuted as Dippy Dawg.  Todays birthdays - Mr. Bogangles, Kitty Kallen, Tom T. Hall, Sir Ian McKellen, Frank Oz, Laus Meine, Connie Sellecca, Mike Myers, Anne Heche, Justin Henry.  CJ Walker died.Intro - Pour some sugar on me - Def Leppard    http://defleppard.com/Hey brother pour the wine - Dean MartinGroovin' - The Young RascalsSam's place - Buck OwensBirthdays - In da club - 50 Cent    http://50cent.com/Just a crazy song - Mr. Bojangles  Bill RobinsonLittle things mean a lot - Kitty KallenI like beer - Tom T. HallRock you like a hurricane - ScorpionsExit - Its not love - Dokken    http://dokken.net/

Skyscrapers were invented in the United States. 摩天大楼是在美国发明的。 Two new technological developments made very tall buildings possible in the late 1800s. One development was the mechanical elevator. It meant that people would not have to climb many steps to reach the upper floors of tall buildings. It saved time and effort. 1800年代后期，两项新的技术发展使建筑物成为可能。 一个发展是机械电梯。 这意味着人们不必爬上许多步骤才能到达高层建筑的上层。 它节省了时间和精力。The second was good quality steel that could carry the heavy load of a tall structure. These two developments helped make the skyscraper possible. 第二个是高质量的钢，可以承受高大的结构的重量。 这两个发展有助于使摩天大楼成为可能。 Many experts consider the Home Insurance Building in Chicago, Illinois to be the first skyscraper. It was completed in 1885 and later increased to a height of 55 meters. Today, this would not be considered tall. But at the time, this height was striking. 许多专家认为伊利诺伊州芝加哥的家庭保险大楼是第一批摩天大楼。 它于1885年完成，后来增加到55米的高度。 今天，这不会被认为是高个子。 但是当时，这个高度令人震惊。 What was different about the Home Insurance Building was its structure. It was built using a steel frame. 房屋保险大楼的不同之处在于它的结构。 它是使用钢架建造的。 This frame carried the weight of the building rather than the walls. The method was known as “skeleton construction” at the time. Before this technology, a tall building required thick stone walls to support its weight. Thick walls are extremely heavy and take up a big area that could be used for floor space or windows. 该框架带有建筑物的重量，而不是墙壁。 该方法当时被称为“骨架构造”。 在这项技术之前，一栋高建筑物需要厚的石墙来支撑其重量。 厚的墙壁非常重，并占用可用于地板或窗户的大区域。 William Jenney was the engineer who helped build the Home Insurance Building. He understood the possibilities that steel frames could offer. Some people consider him the father of the skyscraper. 威廉·詹妮（William Jenney）是帮助建造家庭保险大楼的工程师。 他了解钢架可以提供的可能性。 有人认为他是摩天大楼的父亲。 Soon after the building was finished, builders in Chicago and New York City began copying and improving on the idea of building upwards. Builders in these cities and others would also begin competing for the title of “tallest building.” 建筑物完成后不久，芝加哥和纽约市的建筑商开始复制和改进建造的想法。 这些城市和其他人的建筑商也将开始争夺“最高建筑物”的头衔。The Empire State building in New York City was completed in 1931. It was the tallest building in the world for more than 40 years. It is still one of the most popular. Millions of visitors have seen New York from observation areas in this building. 纽约市的帝国大厦于1931年完成。这是40多年来世界上最高的建筑。 它仍然是最受欢迎的之一。 数以百万计的游客从这座建筑物的观察区看到了纽约。 Chicago became home to the world's tallest building in 1973 when the Sears Tower was completed. It is 442 meters tall. The Sears Tower, which is now called Willis Tower, was the tallest building in the world for 23 years. Then, in 1996, two taller buildings were completed. They are the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. They are about 452 meters tall. 1973年，西尔斯大厦（Sears Tower）完成时，芝加哥成为了世界上最高建筑物的所在地。 它高442米。 西尔斯塔（Sears Tower）现在称为威利斯塔（Willis Tower），是世界上23年来最高的建筑。 然后，在1996年，建造了两座更高的建筑物。 他们是马来西亚吉隆坡的石油塔。 他们高约452米。The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) is a nonprofit organization based in Chicago that studies tall buildings and their place in the design of cities. CTBUH supports tall buildings as a way to create more sustainable cities to live in. The group publishes a list of the world's tallest buildings. Today, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai is considered the tallest building at 828 meters. 高层建筑和城市栖息地理事会（CTBUH）是一个位于芝加哥的非营利组织，研究高建筑物及其在城市设计中的地位。 CTBUH支持高大的建筑物，以创建更可持续的城市来居住。该集团发布了世界上最高的建筑物的清单。 如今，迪拜的Burj Khalifa被认为是828米的最高建筑物。 The tallest building in the United States and North America is One World Trade Center in New York, which replaced the two towers of the World Trade Center destroyed in the terrorist attacks against the United States in 2001. One World Trade Center stands at 541 meters. 美国和北美最高的建筑物是纽约的一个世界贸易中心，该中心取代了2001年在恐怖袭击美国的世界贸易中心的两座塔楼。一个世界贸易中心位于541米处。

Jeff would like to thank everyone for their prayers and support for him and his family during this tough time.  God Bless and thank you.(2024) National Paranormal day.  Entertainment from 2014.  1st US toll bridge, 3rd worst city fire in US history in Jacksonvile FL, Sears Tower now Willis Tower tallest building in the world at that time.  Todays birthdays - Bing Crosby, George Gaynes, Ann B. Davis, Dave Dudley, James Brown, Frankie Valli, Christopher Cross, Eric Church.  Jackie Cooper died.Intro - Pour some sugar on me - Def Leppard    http://defleppard.com/If I were a ghost - Super Simple SongsHappy - Pharrell WilliamsPlay it again - Luke BryanBirthdays - In da club - 50 Cent    http://50cent.com/Pennies fro heaven - Bing CrosbyBrady Bunch TV themeSix days on the road - Dave DudleyPlease Please Please - James BrownMy eyes adored you - Frankie ValliRide like the wind - Christopher CrossDrink in my hand - Eric ChurchExit - Its not love - Dokken   http://dokken.net/

I denne episoden snakker Lars og Alexander om samarbeid, og den svært sentrale posisjonen konstruktørene har i utvikling av en fremtidsrettet og høyteknologisk arkitektur. Det er en slags reise som følger Mies van der Rohe fra Europa til USA, og S.O.M. (Skidmore, Owings, Merrill), sine store prosjekter bl.a. i Chicago, og hvordan alt dette har påvirket oss i dag. Det er en lang liste med prosjekter og personer som nevnes, forsøkvis ramset opp her: Mies van der Rohe Barcelonapaviliongen, med Lilly Reich Villa Tugenhat, med Lilly Reich Lake Shore Drive SR Crown Hall (IIT) S.O.M.  Willis Tower (tidl. Sears Tower), konstruert av Fazlur Khan. John Hancock building, konstruert av Fazlur Khan. Inland Steel, konstruert av Fazlur Khan. Burj Khalifa I tillegg nevnes Johnson Wax building av Frank Lloyd Wright, Ecole de Plen Air av Marcel Lodz, Ricardo Bofill, Oriol Bohigas, og Aqua Tower og St. Regis Chicago av Jeanna Gang og Studio Gang.  Du kan gjerne følge oss på instagram Send oss gjerne en mail til podkast@lpo.no Alles ist architektur! 

Lizzie, Helen et Harold se rendent aux ressources humaines de Datadrive pour trouver leur coupable. N'oubliez pas de suivre Alceste, le conteur, sur : https://www.twitch.tv/monsieuralceste https://www.youtube.com/@MonsieurAlceste/ https://twitter.com/MonsieurAlceste https://twitter.com/Masqueradefr https://discord.gg/aTrbqCkuAx Portions of the materials are the copyrights and trademarks  of Paradox Interactive AB, and are used with permission. All  rights reserved. For more information please visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠worldofdarkness.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. This is NOT official World of Darkness material. Introduction : ‘Bloodsport' by Karl Casey @ White Bat Audio

Cáel deals with wounds, lies and the clash of cultures.In 25 parts, edited from the works of FinalStand.Listen and subscribe to the ► Podcast at Connected..“The words 'I love you' inspires joy, relief and terror.”I missed my entry to the infirmary. I was returned to clarity by the two female attendants. The younger went straight to cutting my left pants leg off while the oldest Amazon I'd seen to date began an excellent rendition of 'beef' inspector while pretending to be a physician. It was almost hilarious when she looked to Sydney, addressing her in Old Kingdom Hittite."Was he being disciplined, or did he do something stupid?""I did something stupid," I griped. "I showed up to work today." Since it was their native tongue, both of the medical attendants' eyes bugged out."He volunteered to help Aya of Epona with her archery lessons by letting her shoot at a fruit out of his hand," Sydney related."This; this isn't a wound caused by a practice arrow," the physician observed."No, that was from Leona of Marda. She attempted to kill him. When Leona threatened his controller, he presented himself for slaughter," Sydney clarified. "Hayden stopped Leona, Leona disobeyed and we need to plan Leona's funerary arrangements now.""How did you come to speak our language?" the junior attendant asked. The tone of her voice and the look in her eyes was chilling and sensual at the same time. It was chilling because of the transformation she went through as I went from a piece of equipment to a close approximation of a human being in her eyes. I was getting tired."Erotic poetry," I humored her. "I had a lover some time ago; a scholar; who wanted to share Old Kingdom Hittite; Amazon love poetry and songs in the voices of their creators. I know multiple languages no longer spoken."#Your eyes are stolen from the waterfalls descending from the highest mountains##Your hair robbed from the threads of the night sky##Your body is shaped by the Mother Rivers##Your beauty is the gift of the Goddess who knows both tears and love#I recited it in the original Chaldean Babylonian. They were all staring at me, so I translated it into Hittite. It didn't flow as smoothly."What language was that in?" the security guard inquired."Chaldean Babylonian. It is a love poem from a prince to his dead wife," I answered."It was nice, even eloquent," Sydney remarked."Wow," I sighed. "It is tragic to think not a single woman in this room has ever been romanced.""I am pretty sure every woman in this room has been with a man before," the security guard countered."After sex, what did the two of you talk about?" I regarded her."That's not what we use men for," the doctor spoke up while she began examining my wound. Pain. "We use artificial insemination and surrogates for procreation. Beyond directing them in our physical stimulation, there is no need to talk to men.""Oh," I mused sadly. "That makes sense and is richly rewarding to know. If I was more like the rest of you, I'd be laughing. Unfortunately, I have a heart and compassion, so I'll pity you all instead." The doctor didn't take my honestly well. "Ow! Good bedside; Ow!; manner there, Doc.""We don't need your pity," the security guard threatened."Sure, but then I've not bred myself into extinction out of fear of cuddling either," I grinned. "Treating men like livestock makes sense; if you are evil. You refused to allow yourselves to get attached to any male so it would be easier to kill us when our time came.""Tread carefully," Sydney cautioned me."Okay Sydney. Since you are the only female present capable of having offspring, I'll be good," I got in my parting shot. By the silence in the room, I had hit the nail on the head. "I apologize for disturbing you ladies. I'll be a good male and keep my mouth shut."That declaration didn't last long. Apparently pain-killers were not part of their medical credo. When I asked, the doctor implied I wasn't hurt nearly enough; in other words, not being amputated or decapitated. I asked if being castrated would earn me a hammer to the head. They smiled. They thought I was a funny guy once more. It was the whole 'laugh at death' mystique again.This tender, motherly moment was punctuated by the doctor's application of the staple gun (instead of stitches) to both entry and exit wounds. Sydney offered to give me something to bite down on. I insisted on sharing my pain as I screamed my lungs out during the torturous procedure."I thought you were a tough guy," the security guard sneered."And not screaming would have made me tough? Bitch, those are some fucked-up priorities. Screaming meant I didn't jolt when she was stapling my wounds shut. I've been stabbed and stitched enough to know that much," I glared.The assistant had been walking her hands over my body during the process."You have been stabbed fourteen times," she muttered."You missed the one on the right foot," I corrected."You've been stabbed fifteen times? What do you do?" Sydney wondered."I date women. You are a surprisingly dangerous breed, even without the extreme training you ladies possess," I confessed. "To be concise, I have the bad habit of dating women and their friends, acquaintances, and even family members; usually without their knowledge. It always ends badly; thus the wounds.""You betray the women you sleep with?" the doctor stared."We could banter terms and expectations about, but essentially 'yes', I do," I sighed."You seemed like such a well-behaved male," the security guard looked confused."Huh? What does my love of sex have to do with my demeanor?" I mused."I've never beat a lover, or forced myself on a woman. If you want to hold my lack of forthrightness against me, please remember you are part of a secret society that embraces kidnapping, rape and slaughter as daily practices," I smiled. "Comparatively, me not telling one woman that I'm dating her neighbor is small potatoes.""We do what we do out of necessity," the doctor insisted."That flimsy excuse is about as useful as 'you wouldn't understand; you aren't a woman/amazon/nutty-nut bar," I shook my head. "I give up. Your society has equaled, if not exceeded, every inhuman deed men have ever committed.""Congratulations; you have become crueler and more depraved than your enemies," I lauded them."Because of your ignorance, I will let that outburst go unpunished," Sydney stated. I wised up and shut up.My shirt was returned and they had to synch a large towel around my waist because my jeans were ruined and they didn't have scrubs in my size. They gave me my bloody dockers too. Sydney walked me to the front entrance. By the looks of the women we passed they knew something had happened, if not the precise nature.Security's opportunity to 'get me' on the way out was stymied by Caitlyn  and  family, Desiree, Tigger, and Buffy hanging around. The moment Aya saw me, she called out my name and came running. The only thing worse than the pain of her impacting me would have been the look on her face if I warded her off. I caught her in my arms and lifted her up."Cáel," she exclaimed. "Does it hurt?" I kept lifting her until I blew loudly on her belly."Does that hurt?" I teased her."No," she giggled."Then I'm fine. Really now, I've been hurt worse by a splinter from a toothpick," I exaggerated for her."You are lying to me," Aya shook her finger in my face."The lesson being 'don't lie to winners'," I sighed."Yep," Aya mimicked me. "Is our date for tonight still going to happen?""Oh; Aya, I can't," I groaned. "I've got three smoking hot babes coming over tonight.""Don't make me punch you," Europa play-threatened. She and Loraine had sneaked up on me while I was entertaining Aya."I don't know," Loraine gave a cautious laugh. "I like being called a smoking hot babe.""Aya, I really like you, but do you always have to drag those two around with you?" I wiggled Aya up in the air. "It's kind of creepy." She giggled."Those are my sisters, Silly," she snickered. "They will be your daughters one day too.""Time for us to go," Caitlyn intervened. As she ushered her children away, she shot me a look over my shoulder that strongly suggested she wanted to play house. Desiree moved to within a meter of me and looked me up and down."You are an idiot," she remarked, turned and left. I looked to Buffy."I'm your ride," Buffy snorted. I hobbled to her."I'm glad you are okay," Tigger waved then followed Desiree out."Thanks for a great time," I looked over my shoulder at the Amazons. "As soon as my blood supply has replenished, I'll be sure to come back and play some more."We were in the car, exiting Doebridge when Buffy finally spoke."Why do you keep thinking you can keep getting away with talking like;” she was glaring at me. "Oh Goddess; you really are laughing at death. You really believe you are going to die, don't you?""Absolutely. The moment they started chanting I realized it was unlikely I'd get out of this experience alive," I admitted."Why are you holding us to the 78 day rule?" she asked."Recall what I said about backbone, Buffy?" I reminded her."I am attached to the lifestyle I've created and I'm not going to change it to scrape out a few more days of existence," I grinned. "I hold Havenstone to that countdown because I would do it if I thought I was going to be okay." A few more minutes passed. I tried to cut the radio on. Buffy kept cutting it off. I was getting sick of it and my annoyance was showing."Did you really tell the whole dome that you would sleep with me first?" she whispered."Of course," I replied. "I said that was my intention at work and I mean to keep to it.""What about Hayden?" she asked."Well, unless you agree to a three-way, I think this is going to be an issue we'll have to work around," I shrugged."I'm not even sure I like you," Buffy mumbled. "I want you. I am not sure I like you, though.""Buffy, that's fine," I murmured. I unbuckled my seatbelt and began twisting around in my seat. My thigh was killing me, but I was a man on a mission. I put my head in Buffy's lap, gazing up at her."What are you doing?" she grinned."Annoying you; taking advantage of you; take your pick," I smiled. We drove for a while.

She can't even find the Sears Tower from Elgin.  Chicago's best morning radio show now has a podcast! Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and remember that the conversation always lives on the Q101 Facebook page.  Brian & Kenzie are live every morning from 6a-10a on Q101.    Subscribe to our channel HERE: https://www.youtube.com/@Q101 Like Q101 on Facebook HERE: https://www.facebook.com/q101chicago Follow Q101 on Twitter HERE: https://twitter.com/Q101Chicago Follow Q101 on Instagram HERE: https://www.instagram.com/q101chicago/?hl=en Follow Q101 on TikTok HERE: https://www.tiktok.com/@q101chicago?lang=enSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

She can't even find the Sears Tower from Elgin.  Chicago's best morning radio show now has a podcast! Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and remember that the conversation always lives on the Q101 Facebook page.  Brian & Kenzie are live every morning from 6a-10a on Q101.    Subscribe to our channel HERE: https://www.youtube.com/@Q101 Like Q101 on Facebook HERE: https://www.facebook.com/q101chicago Follow Q101 on Twitter HERE: https://twitter.com/Q101Chicago Follow Q101 on Instagram HERE: https://www.instagram.com/q101chicago/?hl=en Follow Q101 on TikTok HERE: https://www.tiktok.com/@q101chicago?lang=enSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When I turned twenty-one in 1994, I embarked on a 500 mile solo hike on the Pacific Crest Trail across the state of Washington.  The Tread of My Soul is a memoir-meets-travelogue written from the trail.  Originally self published and shared with only a handful of family and friends, I recently dusted off the manuscript with the intention of sharing it with a new generation, on the 30th anniversary of its completion. Among black bears, ravens and Indian paintbrush, I grappled with the meaning of life while traversing the spine of the Cascade range with a handful of pocket edition classics in tow. Quotes from sacred texts, poets, and naturalists punctuate a coming of age tale contemplated in the wilderness.What follows is Part 1 of the book, squared off into four long Substack posts. For this first post, I'm also exclusively including Pacific Crest Trail Soundwalk, featuring a binaural field recording captured while hiking the first few miles on the Pacific Crest Trail up out of the Columbia Gorge in Washington. (If you haven't already, feel free to tap that play button at the top of the post.) The 26-minute composition cycles a triad of parts inspired by the letters PCT: part one in Phrygian mode (in E), part two in the key of C, and part three with Tritone substitutions. The instrumentation is outlined with Pianet electric piano, and colored in with synthesizer and intriguing pads built with a vaguely Appalachian mood in mind. It's on the quieter side, in terms of wildlife, but all in all, I think it compliments the reading. It concludes with a pretty frog chorus so, like the book, I'm making it unrestricted, in the hope of enticing some readers to stick with it to the end. If you prefer, you can find The Tread of My Soul in ebook format available for free right now on Apple Books or Amazon Kindle Store (free with Kindle Unlimited, points, or $2.99). If you read it and like it, please feel free to leave a review to help others find it. Thank you. So, without further ado, here we go:The Tread of My SoulComing of Age on the Pacific Crest Trailby Chad CrouchACT 1(AT RISE we see TEACHER and STUDENTS in an art studio. It is fall term; the sun is just beginning to set when class begins. Warm light washes the profiles of eight classmates. The wood floors are splashed with technicolor constellations of paint.)TEACHERHello. Welcome to class. I find role taking a tiresome practice so we'll skip over that and get to the assignment. Here I have a two-inch square of paper for you. I would like you to put your soul on it. The assignment is due in five minutes. No further explanations will be given.STUDENT #1(makes eye contact with a STUDENT #4, a young woman. She wears a perplexed smile on her face.)TEACHERHere you go.                                    (hands out squares of paper.)(People begin to work. Restlessness gives way to an almost reverence, except STUDENT #5 is scribbling to no end. The Students' awareness of others fades imperceptibly inward.  Five minutes pass quickly.)TEACHERTeacher: Are you ready? I'm interested to see what you've come up with.                                    (scuffle of some stools; the sound of a classroom reclaiming itself.)TEACHERWhat have you got there?STUDENT #1Well, I used half of the time just thinking. I was looking at my pencil and I thought…                                    (taps pencil on his knee, you see it is a mechanical model)this will never do the trick. The idea of soul seemed too intense to be grasped with only graphite. So 1 poked a pin sized hole in the paper and wrote:                                    (reading voice)“Hold paper up to sun, look into hole for soul.” That's all the further I got.TEACHER                                    (looking at student #2)And you?STUDENT #2                                    (smiles)Um, I didn't know what to do so all I have is a few specks where I was tapping my pen while I was thinking. This one…                                    (she points to a dot)is all, um, all fuzzy because I was ready to draw something and I hesitated so the ink just ran…(Students nod sympathetically. Attention goes to STUDENT #3)STUDENT #3I couldn't deal with just one little blank square.                                    (holds paper up and flaps it around, listlessly)So I started dividing.                                    (steadies and turns paper to reveal a graph.)Now, I have lots of squares in which to put my soul in. I think of a soul as being multifaceted.TEACHEROkay.  Thank you.  Next…                                    (looking at student #4)STUDENT #4                                    (without hesitation)I just stepped on it.(holds paper up to reveal the tread of a shoe sole in a multicolor print.)The tread of my soul.•     •     •            The writing that follows seems to have many of the same attributes as the students' responses to the problem posed in the preceding scene. While I have a lot more paper to work with, the problem remains the same: how do I express myself?  How do I express the intangible and essential part of me that people call a soul?  What is it wrapped up in?  What doctrines, ideologies and memories help give it a shape?            I guess I identify mostly with Student #4. Her shoe-print “Tread of My Soul” alludes to my own process: walking over 500 miles on The Pacific Crest Trail from Oregon To Canada in the Cascade Mountain Range in Washington. In trying to describe my soul I found that useful to be literal. Where my narrative dips into memoir or philosophy I tried not to hesitate or overthink things.  I tried to lay it all out.            Student #1's solution was evident in my own problem solving in how I constantly had to look elsewhere; into nature, into literature, and into symbology to even begin to bring out the depth of what I was thinking and feeling. Often the words of spiritual classics and of poetry are seen through my writing as if looking through a hole. I can only claim originality in where I poke the holes.            As for Student #2, I am afraid that my own problem solving doesn't evoke enough of her charm. For as much as I wanted to be thoughtful, I wanted also to be open and unstudied, tapping my pen. What I see has emerged, however, is at times argumentative. In retrospect I see that I had no recourse, really. My thoughts on God and Jesus were molded in a throng of letters, dialogues, experiences, and personal studies prior to writing this.Finally, in the winter of my twenty-first year, as I set down to transcribe this book, I realize how necessary it was to hike. Student #3 had the same problem. The soul is complex and cannot fit into a box. Hiking gave me a cadence to begin to answer the question what is my soul? The trail made me mindful. There was the unceasing metaphor of the journey: I could only reach my goal incrementally. This tamed my writing sometimes. It wandered sometimes and I was at ease to let it. I had more than five minutes and a scrap of paper. I had each step.•     •     •            The Bridge of the Gods looks like a behemoth Erector set project over the Columbia River spanning the natural border of Washington and Oregon. My question: what sort of Gods use Erector sets?  Its namesake actually descends from an event in space and time; a landslide. The regional natives likely witnessed, in the last millennium, a landslide that temporarily dammed the Columbia effectually creating a bridge—The Bridge of the Gods. I just finished reading about why geologists think landslides are frequent in the gorge. Didn't say anything about Gods. How we name things, as humankind, has something to do with space and time doesn't it? Where once we call something The Bridge of the Gods it has been contemporarily reduced to landslide. We have new Gods now, and they compel us to do the work with erector sets. Or perhaps I mistook the name: It doesn't necessarily mean Gods made it. Perhaps Gods dwell there or frequent it. Or maybe it is a passageway that goes where the Gods go. It seems to me that if the Gods wanted to migrate from, say, Mt. Rainier in Washington to Mt. Hood in Oregon, they would probably follow the Cascade Ridge down to the Bridge of the Gods and cross there.            If so, I think I should like to see one, or maybe a whole herd of them like the caribou I saw in Alaska earlier this summer, strewn across the snow field like mahogany tables. Gods, I tend to think are more likely to be seen in the high places or thereabouts, after all,The patriarchs and prophets of the Old Testament behold the Lord face to face in the high places. For Moses it was Mount Sinai and Mount Nebo; in the New Testament it is the Mount of Olives and Golgotha. I went so far as to discover this ancient symbol of the mountain in the pyramid constructions of Egypt and Chaldea. Turning to the Aryans, I recalled those obscure legends of the Vedas in which the Soma—the 'nectar' that is in the 'seed of immortality' is said to reside in its luminous and subtle form 'within the mountain.' In India the Himalayas are the dwelling place of the Siva, of his spouse 'the Daughter of the Mountain,' and the 'Mothers' of all worlds, just as in Greece the king of the gods held court on Mt Olympus.- Rene Daumal, Mount Analogue            These days Gods don't go around making landslides every time they want to cross a river, much less perform a Jesus walking on the water miracle. That would be far too suspicious. Gods like to conceal themselves. A popular saying is "God helps those who help themselves." I think if Moses were alive today, Jehovah would have him build a bridge rather than part the waters.            Someone said, "Miracles take a lot of hard work." This is true.•     •     •Day 1.Bridge of the Gods.Exhausted, I pitch my tent on the side of the trail in the hot afternoon and crawl into to take a nap to avoid the annoying bugs.My sweat leaves a dead person stamp on the taffeta floor.Heavy pack.  A vertical climb of 3200 ft.Twelve miles. I heaved dry tears and wanted to vomit.Dinner and camp on a saddle.Food hard to stomach.View of Adams and gorge.            Perhaps I am a naive pilgrim as I cross over that bridge embarking on what I suppose will be a forty day and night journey on the Pacific Crest Trail with the terminus in Canada. My mother gave me a box of animal crackers before my departure so I could leave “a trail of crumbs to return by.” The familiar classic Barnum's red, yellow and blue box dangles from a carabineer of my expedition backpack            As I cross over the bridge I feel small, the pack bearing down on my hips, legs, knees, feet. I look past my feet, beyond the steel grid decking of the bridge, at the water below.  Its green surface swirls. I wonder how many gallons are framed in each metal square and how many flow by in the instant I look?How does the sea become the king of all streams?Because it is lower than they!Hence it is the king of all streams.-Lao-tzu, Tao Teh Ching            On the Bridge of the Gods I begin my quest, gazing at my feet superimposed on the Columbia's waters flowing toward the ocean. Our paths are divergent. Why is it that the water knows without a doubt where to go; to its humble Ocean King that embraces our planet in blue? I know no such path of least resistance to and feel at one with humankind. To the contrary, when we follow our paths of least resistance—following our family trees of religion, learning cultural norms—we end up worshipping different Gods. It is much easier for an Indian to revere Brahman than it is for I. It is much easier for me to worship Christ than it is for an Indian. These paths are determined geographically and socially.             It's not without trepidation that I begin my journey. I want to turn from society and turn to what I believe to be impartial: the sweeping landscape.            With me I bring a small collection of pocket books representing different ideas of the soul. (Dhammapada, Duino Elegies, Tao Teh Ching, Song of Myself, Walden, Mount Analogue, and the Bible.) It isn't that I want to renounce my faith.  I turn to the wilderness, to see if I can't make sense of it all.            I hike north. This is a fitting metaphor. The sun rises in the east and arcs over the south to the west. To the north is darkness. To the north my shadow is cast. Instinctively I want to probe this.•     •     •Day 2.Hiked fourteen miles.Three miles on a ridge and five descending brought me to Rock Creek.I bathed in the pool. Shelves of fern on a wet rock wall.Swaths of sunlight penetrating the leafy canopy.Met one person.Read and wrote and slept on a bed of moss.Little appetite.Began another ascent.Fatigued, I cried and cursed out at the forest.I saw a black bear descending through the brushBefore reaching a dark campsite.            I am setting records of fatigue for myself. I am a novice at hiking. Here is the situation: I have 150 miles to walk. Simple arithmetic agrees that if I average 15 miles a day it will take me 10 days to get to the post office in White Pass where I have mailed myself more food. I think I am carrying a sufficient amount of food to sustain my journey, although I'm uncertain because I have never backpacked for more than three consecutive days. The greatest contingency, it seems, is my strength: can I actually walk 15 miles a day with 60 pounds on my back in the mountains? Moreover, can I continue to rise and fall as much as I have? I have climbed a vertical distance of over 6000 feet in the first two days.            I begin to quantify my movement in terms of Sears Towers. I reason that if the Sears Tower is 1000 feet, I walked the stairs of it up and down almost 5 times. I am developing a language of abstract symbols to articulate my pain.            I dwell on my condition. I ask myself, are these thoughts intensified by my weakness or am I feeding my weakness with my thoughts?            I begin to think about God. Many saints believed by impoverishing their physical self, often by fasting, their spiritual self would increase as a result. Will my spirit awake as my body suffers?            I feet the lactic acid burning my muscle tissue. I begin to moan aloud. I do this for some time until, like a thunderclap, I unleash voice in the forest.            I say, "I CAN'T do this,” and "I CAN do this," in turn. I curse and call out "Where are you God? I've come to find you." Then I see the futility of my words. Scanning the forest: all is lush, verdant, solemn, still. My complaint is not registered here.And all things conspire to keep silent about us, half out of shame perhaps, half as unutterable hope.- Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies            I unstrap my pack and collapse into heap on the trail floor, curled up. I want to be still like the forest.            The forest makes a noise: Crack, crack, crack.            I think a deer must be traversing through the brush. I turn slowly to look in the direction of the sound. It's close. Not twenty yards off judging from the noise.            I pick myself up to view the creature, and look breathlessly. It's just below me in the ravine. Its shadowy black body dilates subtly as it breathes. What light falls on it seems to be soaked up, like a hole cut in the forest in the shape of an animal. It turns and looks at me with glassy eyes. It claims all my senses—I see, hear, feel, smell, taste nothing else--as I focus on the bear.And so I hold myself back to swallow the call note of my dark sobbing.Ah, whom can we ever turn to in our need?Not angels, not humans and already the knowing animals are aware that we are really not at home in our interpreted world.- Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies            Remembering what I read to do when encountering a bear, I raise my arms, making myself bigger. "Hello bear," I say, "Go away!"            With the rhythm of cracking branches, it does.•     •     •Day 3.Hiked thirteen miles.Descended to Trout Creek, thirsty.Met a couple en route to Lake Tahoe.Bathed in Panther Creek.Saw the wind brushing the lower canopy of leaves on a hillside.A fly landed on the hairs of my forearm and I,Complacent,Dreamt.            I awake in an unusual bed: a stream bed. A trickle of clear water ran over stones beneath me, down my center, as if to bisect me. And yet I was not wet. What, I wonder, is the significance of this dream?            The August sun had been relentless thus far on my journey. The heat combined with the effort involved in getting from one source of water to the next makes an arrival quite thrilling. If the water is deep enough for my body, even more so:I undress... hurry me out of sight of land, cushion me soft... rock me in billowy drowse Dash me with amorous wet...- Walt Whitman, Song of Myself            There is something electrifying and intensely renewing about swimming naked in a cold creek pool or mountain lake.I got up early and bathed in the pond; that was a religious exercise, and one of the best things I did. They say that characters were engraven on the bathing tub of King Tching-thang to this effect; "renew thyself completely each day; do it again and again and forever again."- Henry David Thoreau, Walden            Is bathing, then, a spiritual exercise?            When I was baptized on June 15, 1985 in the tiled pool of our chapel in the Portland suburbs, I thought surely as I was submerged something extraordinary would happen, such as the face of Jesus would appear to me in the water. And I did do it—I opened my eyes under water— but saw only the blur of my pastor's white torso and the hanging ferns that framed the pool. I wondered: shouldn't a ceremony as significant as this feel more than just wet? I'm guessing that most children with exposure to religion often keep their eyes open for some sort of spectacular encounter with God, be it to punish or affirm them. (As a child, I remember sitting in front of the television thinking God could put a commercial on for heaven if he wanted to.)            Now, only ten years after I was baptized, I still keep my eyes open for God, though not contextually the same, not within a religion, not literally.            And when I swim in a clear creek pool, I feel communion, pure and alive. The small rounded stones are reminders of the ceaseless touch of water. Their blurry shapes embrace me in a way that the symbols and rites of the church fail to.I hear and behold God in every objectYet I understand God not in the least.-Walt Whitman, Song of Myself            And unlike the doctrines and precepts of organized religion, I have never doubted my intrinsic bond to water.And more-For greater than all the joysOf heaven and earthGreater still than dominionOver all worlds,Is the joy of reaching the stream.- Dhammapada, Sayings of the Buddha•     •     •Day 4.Hiked fourteen miles. Climbed to a beautiful ridge.Signs, yellow and black posted every 50 feet: "Experimental Forest"Wound down to a campground where I met three peopleAs I stopped for lunch."Where does this trail go to?" he says. "Mexico," I say."Ha Ha," says he.Camped at small Green Lake.            My body continues to evolve. My hair and fingernails grow and grow, and right now I've got four new teeth trying to find a seat in my mouth.            I turned twenty-one on August sixth. On August sixth, 1945 a bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. The world lost more people than it made that day. When I was born, I suspect we gained a few.            I'm an adult now, and I'm not sure where it happened or why. I wonder if someone had to stamp something somewhere because of it? A big red stamp that says "ADULT".  It was a blind passage for me—just like those persons who evaporated at ground zero on August sixth, 49 years ago.            I do feel like I just evaporated into adulthood. I am aware of the traditional ceremony of turning twenty-one. Drinking. Contemporary society commemorates becoming an adult with this token privilege. Do you have any idea how fast alcohol evaporates? I am suggesting this: One's response to this rite rarely affords any resolution or insight into growth. Our society commemorates the passage from child to adult with a fermented beverage.            I wanted to more deliberate about becoming an adult. Hence the second reason (behind a spiritual search) for this sojourn into the wilderness. I took my lead from the scriptures:And he was in the desert forty days... He was with the wild animal and the angels attended him.- Mark 1:13            Something about those forty days prepared Jesus for what we know of his adult life.I also took my lead from Native Americans. Their rite of passage is called a vision quest, wherein the youth goes alone into the depth of nature for a few days to receive some sort of insight into being.            I look around me. I am alone here in the woods a few days after my birthday. Why? To discover those parts of me that want to be liberated. To draw the fragrant air into my lungs. To feel my place in nature.…beneath each footfall with resolution.I want to own every atom of myself in the present and be able to say:Look I am living. On what? NeitherChildhood nor future grows any smaller....Superabundant being wells up in my heart.- Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies•     •     •Day 5.Hiked to Bear Lake and swam.Saw over a dozen people. Eighteen miles.Watched raven fly from tree and listened.Found frogs as little as my thumbnail.Left Indian Heaven.            Surprise.  My body is becoming acclimated to long distance hiking. I know because when I rest it is a luxury rather than a necessity.            The light is warmer and comes through the forest canopy at an acute angle from the west, illuminating the trunks of this relatively sparse old growth stand. I am laying on my back watching a raven at his common perch aloft in a dead Douglas fir.            It leaps into its court and flap its wings slowly, effortlessly navigating through the old wood pillars. The most spectacular sense of this, however, is the sound: a loud, slow, hollow thrum: Whoosh whoosh, whoosh....  It's as if the interstices between each pulse are too long, too vacant to keep the creature airborne. Unlike its kind, this raven does not speak: there are no loud guttural croaks to be heard.            Northwest coastal tribes such as the Kwakiutl thought the croaks of a raven were prophetic and whoever could interpret them was a seer. Indeed, the mythic perception of ravens to be invested with knowledge and power is somewhat universal.           My raven is silent. And this is apt, for I tend to think the most authentic prophecies are silent, or near to it.Great sound is silent.- Lao Tzu, Tao Teh Ching            The contour of that sound and silence leaves a sublime impression on me.•     •     •Day 6.Hiked twelve miles.Many uphill, but not most.Met several people.One group looked like they were enjoying themselves—two families.I spent the afternoon reading my natural history book on a bridge.Voles (forest mice) relentlessly made efforts to infiltrate my food bag during the night.            I am reading about how to call a tree a “Pacific Silver Fir” or an “Engelmann Spruce” or “Western Larch” and so on. If something arouses my curiosity on my walk, I look in my natural history book to see if it has anything to say.            Jung said, "Sometimes a tree can teach you more than a book can."            Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha was enlightened beneath a fig tree.            I read that a 316-year-old Ponderosa Pine east of Mt. Jefferson bears scars from 18 forest fires. Surely that tree taught us one thing a book couldn't.  All things are clues. Everything is part of a complex tapestry of causality.            The grand design behind these mountains has something to do with plate tectonics. Beneath me the oceanic plate is diving beneath the continental at twenty to sixty degrees putting it well under the coastline to where it partially melts and forms magma. This has been happening for millions of years. Every once and a while this magma channels its way up to the surface, cools and turns into igneous rock. Again and again, this happens. Again and again, and yet again until a mountain is made; a stratovolcano.            Meanwhile, on top, water, glaciers, wind, and sun are trying to carry the mountains away grain by grain. Geologic time is as incomprehensible as it would be to imagine someone's life by looking at his or her gravestone. These mountains are gravestones.            Plants fight to keep the hillsides together. Plants and trees do. But every summer some of those trees, somewhere, are going to burn. Nature will not tolerate too much fuel. New trees will grow to replace those lost. Again and again. Eighteen times over and there we find our tree, a scarred Ponderosa Pine in the tapestry.            And every summer the flowers will bloom. The bees will come to pollinate them and cross-pollinate them: next year a new color will emerge.            And every summer the mammals named homo-sapiens-sapiens will come to the mountains to cut down trees, hike trails, and to put up yellow and black signs that read Boundary Experimental Forest U.S.F.S. placed evenly 100 yards apart so hikers are kept excessively informed about boundaries.            Here I am in the midst of this slow-motion interplay of nature. I walk by thousands of trees daily. Sometimes I see just one, sometimes the blur of thousands. It is not so much that a tree teaches me more than a book; rather it conjures up in me the copious leagues of books unwritten. And, I know somewhere inside that I participate. What more hope could a tree offer?  What more hope could you find in a gravestone?•     •     •Day 7.Hiked twenty miles in Alpine country near Mt Adams.More flowers—fields of them. Saw owl. Saw elk.Wrote near cascading creek.Enjoyed walking. Appetite is robust.Camped at Lave Spring.Saw six to ten folks.Didn't talk too much.            Before I was baptized, during the announcements, there was a tremendous screech culminating in a loud cumbf! This is a sound which can be translated here as metal and glass crumpling and shattering in an instant to absorb the forces of automobiles colliding.            In the subsequent prayer, the pastor made mention of the crash, which happened on the very same corner of the chapel, and prayed to God that He might spare those people of injury.            As it turns the peculiarly memorable sound was that of our family automobile folding into itself, and it was either through prayer or her seat belt that no harm came to my sister who was driving it.            Poor thing. She just was going to get some donuts. Do you know why? Because I missed my appointment with baptism. There is time in most church services when people go to the front to (1.) confess their sin, (2.) confess their faith in Christ as their only personal savior, and (3.) to receive Him. This is what is known as the “Altar Call”. To the embarrassment of my parents (for I recall the plan was for one of them to escort me to the front) the Alter Call cue—a specific prayer and hymn—was missed and I sat expectant till the service end. The solution was to attend the subsequent service and try harder.            I don't recall my entire understanding of God and Jesus then, at age eleven, but I do remember arriving at a version of Pascal's reductive decision tree that there are four possibilities regarding my death and salvation:1. Jesus is truly the savior of mankind and I claim him and I go to heaven, or2. Jesus is truly the savior of mankind and I don't claim him and I end up in hell, or3. Jesus isn't the savior of mankind and I die having lived a somewhat virtuous life in trying to model myself after him, or4. Jesus isn't the savior of mankind and I didn't believe it anyhow.            My sister, fresh with an Oregon drivers license, thought one dose of church was enough for her and, being hungry, went out for donuts and failed to yield.Cumbf!            Someone came into the chapel to inform us. We all went out to the accident. The cars were smashed and askew, and my sister was a bawling, rocking little lump on the side of the street. We attended to her, calmed her, and realized there was yet time for me to get baptized. We went into the church and waited patiently for the hymn we had mentally earmarked and then I was baptized. I look back on the calamities of that day affectionately.Prize calamities as your own body.- Lao Tzu, Tao Teh Ching            Those events that surrounded the ritual decry a ceremony so commonplace one often misses the extraordinariness of it; of humanity; the embarrassment of my parents; the frustration and impetuous flight of my sister; and the sympathy and furrowed brow of our pastor. These events unwind in my head like a black and white silent film of Keystone Cops with a church organ revival hymn for the soundtrack.  There was something almost slapstick about how that morning unfolded, and once the dust had settled and the family was relating the story to my grandmother later that day, we began to find the humor in it. Hitting things and missing things and this is sacred. All of it.Because our body is the very source of our calamities,If we have no body, what calamities can we have?- Lao Tzu, Tao Teh Ching            Most religions see the body as temporal and the soul as eternal. Hence, 13th century monks cloistered themselves up denying their bodies space and interaction that their souls might be enhanced.            I see it this way: No one denies their bodily existence, do they? Look, your own hand holds this book. Why do you exist? You exist right now, inherently, to hold a book, and to feel the manifold sensations of the moment.            If this isn't enough of a reason, adjust.            I've heard it said, "Stop living in the way of the world, live in the way of God."            My reply: "Before I was baptized, I heard a cumbf, and it was in the world and I couldn't ignore it.  I'm not convinced we would have a world if we weren't supposed to live in the way of it."Thanks for reading Soundwalk! This is Part One of my 1994 travelogue-meets-memoir The Tread of My Soul. This post is public so feel free to share it.Read: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4. Or find the eBook at Apple Books or Amazon Kindle Store. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit chadcrouch.substack.com/subscribe

The image of the skyscraper is the hallmark of the modern city. Futuristic depictions of urban landscapes nearly always feature towering structures high above the clouds. Today, however, developing countries seem to be putting the greatest effort into building the most impressive skyscrapers, from the Burj Khalifa in the UAE, to the future Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia. Whether you love them or hate them, it's worth asking why we build skyscrapers and what their role will be in future cities. Today on Faster, Please! — The Podcast, I sit down with Jason Barr, author of Cities in the Sky: The Quest to Build the World's Tallest Skyscrapers.Barr is a professor of economics at Rutgers University – Newark, and is a member of the Rutgers Global Urban Systems PhD program. He is also the author of Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers.In This Episode* Demand for the skyscraper (1:35)* The end of the skyscraper (9:00)* Pillars of commerce (14:05)* The sky's the limit (18:36)* Manhattan extension (23:04)* Trends and styles (24:23)Below is a lightly edited transcript of our conversationThe image of the skyscraper is the hallmark of the modern city. Futuristic depictions of urban landscapes nearly always feature towering structures high above the clouds. Today, however, developing countries seem to be putting the greatest effort into building the most impressive skyscrapers, from the Burj Khalifa in the UAE, to the future Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia. Whether you love them or hate them, it's worth asking why we build skyscrapers and what their role will be in future cities. Today on Faster, Please! — The Podcast, I sit down with Jason Barr, author of Cities in the Sky: The Quest to Build the World's Tallest Skyscrapers.Barr is a professor of economics at Rutgers University – Newark, and is a member of the Rutgers Global Urban Systems PhD program. He is also the author of Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers.Demand for the skyscraper (1:35)Pethokoukis: You obviously love skyscrapers, you're fascinated by them. You wrote a whole book on them. So I want to just start the very basic question: Why do skyscrapers fascinate you, and the people who aren't fascinated by them, what are they missing?Barr: Great questions. Well, I grew up on Long Island, and so I was always really fascinated with Manhattan. I grew up in the '70s, and so New York back then was a very dark, mysterious place for a youngster. So when I grew up, actually when I was in college, I started hanging out in the city. So to me, the skyline of Manhattan and New York City, they're just two sides of the same coin. I really developed an interest in tall buildings through my interest and fascination with Manhattan's and New York City's history.So when I came to Rutgers Newark, I just started doing research on tall buildings, especially in New York City: what was driving the heights of these buildings; there's all these interesting height cycles over the last 150 years. So I wrote my first book on the Manhattan skyline, that was called Building the Skyline, and then after that I thought, let's see what's happening around the rest of the world. So to me, the tall building is an interesting thing because it's part and parcel with urbanization, and I just personally don't think you could have one without the other.I think some people might think that skyscrapers are, at least for rich countries, that they're kind of a 20th-century thing that we did as we were growing, and cities were getting bigger, and skyscrapers are a part of that, but now they're for other parts of the world, parts of the world which are still urbanizing, which are still getting richer. Are skyscrapers are still a thing for America?The short answer is yes, but, given how dense cities are, tall buildings are just being added a lot more slowly. In New York, the population's kind of slowly growing, and so tall buildings are either replacing old buildings that are wearing out, or there's always this push by big global corporations to be in the newest and latest tall building. And obviously there's this international demand from people abroad to have an apartment — or national demand — global demand to have some kind of residential presence in New York. But the thing is, people in other countries: cities, planners, residents in other countries, they look to New York, they look to Chicago, and I think, for many of them, they see New York as something they want to emulate, and New York is, on just about almost any metric, it's probably the top global city. And so I think cities today, especially in China, and Asia more broadly, they're trying to kind of replicate that, what you might call “the Manhattan magic,” and I don't really think people in this country realize how much tall building construction is going on in other cities around the world. People in this country are a little bit more cynical about the role of the tall building in urban growth and in housing affordability and stuff like this, but other cities are basically going gangbusters, is a way to put it.Is that driven by fundamental economic forces? Is it kind of a “national greatness” kinds of signaling projects? Are there fundamental reasons, not just to build skyscrapers, but to build very, very tall skyscrapers?“All of the above” is the answer. Fundamentally, if there's many, many people who want to be working, living, playing in the center, the only way to accommodate the demand to be in the center is to make more land in the center, so the skyscraper, at its heart, is what I would say is “land in the sky.” You just go vertical because there's constraints on how much land there is in the center.Having said that, definitely the skyscraper is seen as a kind of way to advertise, a way to increase confidence in the place, and so you boost foreign direct investment. Observatories are huge money makers, there's a big tourism component. A lot of critics will say, “Oh, it's all about spectacle and ego.” But really, for the book, and just more broadly my research, when you drill down on the economics of these super tall buildings, not all of them are profitable or profit-maximizing, but they all have a strong economic rationale.Now, I just also want to say, China has its own thing going on, which sort of compounds the skyscraper construction-building there because of their unique governance structure and land ownership structure, but China is building tall buildings because, at the end of the day, there's a kind of, what I call, a “tall building bling.” There's just something that says, “This city is growing, this city is drawing population.” So we build a tall building and we boost confidence in the city. And it works, really.The pictures don't have to be too old, if you look at a picture of Shanghai, it looks a lot different not too long ago. It's almost as if a whole other city just kind of fell from the sky, a city of skyscrapers, and where there were once goats or something grazing, there's now a bunch of massive skyscrapers.Yeah, absolutely, and there's a few reasons for this. One is, I think Chinese residents more broadly see tall building as a natural way to live. I've talked to many Chinese residents, whether it's Shanghai or other cities, and to them, to own an apartment in the sky is like the greatest thing. It's their equivalent of the single family home in the United States. Living in the clouds is something many people aspire to. The other aspect of it is, Shanghai, and the Pudong neighborhood in Shanghai, was chosen basically to become a financial hub. Basically, the leaders were looking at Hong Kong and they thought it was a, to quote, I forgot the author, but to quote him in the book, the Shanghai officials and the National Party officials saw Hong Kong as that frustratingly free city, and so they wanted to create a kind of a financial hub in Shanghai. And so the Shanghai Tower, for example, is part of that plan to really draw people's attention to Shanghai, itself. So it was part of a master plan.The end of the skyscraper (9:00)I certainly remember that, after 9/11, I heard about “the end of the skyscraper,” and then during the pandemic, I heard about “the end of the city.” Now I'm guessing that cities will continue to exist and we're going to continue to build tall buildings.Absolutely. What 9/11 did was just make sure that we make our building safer with fire protection measures. In many Asian countries, every 20 floors, let's say, are mechanical floors, so you have the electric equipment, and the heating, and the cooling, and water tanks. They can also surround these in concrete, and so if something's on fire, if a floor is on fire, they can go to this hermetically sealed floor, a refuge floor, and stay there and be protected. And the elevator cores, they're made of concrete, and so you wouldn't have something like what happened on 9/11. So it didn't really impact the demand; 9/11 didn't impact the demand for the tall building, it just made us make tall buildings safer. And of course the downside is if you want to go into an office building, you have to have a swipe and you have to have an entry, so the negative of 9/11 was more about heightened security and increasing protections in a way that engenders a little bit more mistrust of us. But the demand didn't go away.Same thing with Covid. For big cities like New York and San Francisco, I'm sure the empty-office problem is going to dissipate. It'll take a while. This may be an overly broad statement, but the truth is, our present and future is in cities. The funny thing about the internet and social media and all that, it was supposed to allow us to suburbanize more, or run away from these big, overcrowded cities, but the truth is, social media and internet technology has just made cities even more important. So, as long as cities are growing, there'll be a demand for tall buildingsOf the tallest, I don't know, half-dozen buildings, have you been to all of them?That's a good question. I've been to the Shanghai Tower, which was the second-tallest building in the world, now is the third-tallest. The one that replaced it, I think it's [Merdeka 118] in Kuala Lumpur, I believe. I didn't go to that one yet because that just opened up recently. I've been to the Burj Khalifa, which is the world's tallest building. I'd have to look at the list. I've been to the Sears Tower, Empire State Building . . . Anyway, so I've been to a handful of them. I can't say I've been to every single one of the super-tall buildings in the worldAnd in any of those super-tall buildings, can you open a window? Why can't you open the windows in these skyscrapers?Well, the wind forces are just tremendous! The biggest problem engineering tall buildings is making sure that the building doesn't sway so that people feel it. The really fascinating thing about engineering tall buildings is this question: How do you allow the building to sway enough so that you don't have to — you don't want to over-engineer a building so that you make it perfectly stiff because that's just completely uneconomic to do that, but you want to make sure the building sways just enough so if you're sitting there reading a newspaper or drinking a cup of coffee on the top floor, you don't feel it. And so the wind forces high, a thousand feet in the air, are just so tremendous. I think if you open the window, everything would just would just blow away.I was thinking about some of those very, super-skinny residential buildings, which I guess seem to be becoming more popular, and do those people really feel the motion?From what I can tell, the short answer is no. There's one lawsuit in Manhattan, in particular, where the engineering wasn't exactly perfectly right, but I think that represents the exception that proves the rule. The building is safe, that's not the problem, it's just that, when you're dealing with these super-skinny buildings — these are kind of a new kind of breed of super-tall buildings, so sometimes the engineering isn't perfectly right, so they will figure out ways to kind of fix those problems. The problems are solvable, but sometimes if you don't get it 100 percent right, people complain, and obviously there's lawsuits and you have to go back in and tweak the engineering. But these things are selling for 70, 80, 100 million dollars for a penthouse on the 90th floor, so people still value them, and if motion sickness was a problem, they'd be worthless.Pillars of commerce (14:05)In the book, you run through a number of myths: tall buildings being only for the rich, that they drive up housing prices in cities, again, that you mentioned a little bit earlier, that they're somehow bad economic deals. All these myths all tend to be very negative.I'm not going to rename your book, but I could call it “Cathedrals in the Sky,” I mean, I think these are beautiful buildings that say a lot about human aspiration and to create a sense of awe. Boy, but some people just do not see it that way.I think there's a few strands; I've been thinking about this. There's a kind of a NIMBY strand, and sort of a NIMBY/gentrification strand. So people in the middle income, let's say, they see their housing prices going up, their rent going up, and then they see these billionaire condos, and so they, in my opinion, or based on my research, there's a confusion of correlation and causation. So the most visible manifestation in people's minds of gentrification and affordability problems are the super-slim buildings, but New York City has something like 3.6 million housing units, and if you look at the outlying areas of Queens and Staten Island, they're just covered in one- and two-family homes. Those neighborhoods have added barely any housing. So all of the housing — I'm exaggerating here when I say the word “all,” but the vast majority of new housing units happens in the center where either the zoning is more permissive, or old industrial sites come online and things like this, so people don't realize that the problem of housing affordability is citywide, it just looks naturally to be in their neighborhood where high rises are going up.Then there's another strand, which I would say is kind of the “Jane Jacobs strand” / the anti-public-housing strand. Jane Jacobs has some great points in her book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities about walkability, about eyes on the street. She wasn't a big fan of tall buildings, and this has kind of given rise to this whole movement of “human scale,” where five-story Greenwich Village buildings, or 10-story Parisian mansard-roof-type buildings are perfect, and any other deviation from that is somehow destroying the city. So there's that part of it, that people see tall buildings as somehow destroying the feel or the perfect fabric of the city. And lastly, obviously, some of the failures with the public housing policy has made people convinced that it's unhealthy to live in these tall buildings. I think that gets at what you're inquiring about. I think there's those different strains.I wonder if part of it stems for a confusion about what are cities for, and I mean cities are, for a large part, are where people to come together for jobs and to conduct commerce. And if you think of them that way, then certain things make sense; but if you think of them as, I don't know, some sort of urban retreat, where it's kind of like a garden or . . . I don't know, but it's a very different view, and perhaps it is not just about bike paths, but it's about what facilitates people to connect.Without jobs, without a labor market, there's no purpose to have a city. Maybe in the 18th or 19th century, you can create a city for the king or the empire, as are many examples, or the Vatican or something like this; so you can have these sort of political capital cities, or even Washington DC, but, fundamentally, 99 percent of the world's cities are places where people go to work, and so, if you don't allow the labor market to function properly, which means having a functioning housing market, then all these ideas about “the good city” and “the perfectly crafted city,” they kind of are irrelevant.So you have to start with: what makes a city grow, what makes people productive, and then how do we accommodate that? To the extent that we can improve design, all the better. There's always a million ways to make things better for people design-wise. I think bike lanes are great, and I think pedestrian-friendly cities are better than car-centric cities, but you can't start with designing the city first and then seeing what happens. You have to start with “let's make an attractive place to live and work” first, and then work on the design feature second.The sky's the limit (18:36)How tall are these buildings going to get?Okay, well, the next world's tallest building is going to be one kilometer: The Jeddah Tower, which had started, I think back in 2013 or 2015, had been stalled, there was some sort of political turmoil in Saudi Arabia, and they've just restarted this Jeddah Tower in the city of Jeddah. And so when that's completed, that's going to be one kilometer. There were some plans floated to have a two-kilometer building in Riyadh. I don't think anyone really thinks that's going to happen.How long does it take to get up to your office in a two-kilometer building?Well, that's the thing. They're coming up with new ways to get people up there faster. The old conventional steel cables could maybe go 500 meters or something like that, which is maybe 80 floors or something. Maybe if you had a really good cable, you can get people to 80 floors and then they'd have to switch. Now they have these composite . . . it's KONE UltraRope, which could go 1000 meters, which could go basically one kilometer continuously. So if you can get people from the ground floor to wherever their destination is within a minute, that's kind of like the golden rule here. People are not willing to wait more than a minute once they get in the elevator. The trick really is the ear pressure, and that's probably the hardest part because you're going up so quickly, the air pressure changes, so you have to figure out ways to make sure the cabin remains pressurized, and then there's the air pressure up on the highest floors. So that, I would argue, is the fundamental issue that's going to be coming next on the horizon is how to efficiently pressurize the highest floors. Let's say you're a mile high; if you're a mile high on the top floor, that's the equivalent of going from New York to Denver in a minute, or two minutes. So you have to figure out a way how to pressurize the entire building so it has a constant air pressure.If I were to look at the skyline of major American cities 50 years from now, would you expect them to be radically different, futuristic looking, maybe not two-kilometer buildings, but a lot of very, very tall buildings? Or is it again, if they're not growing, if population isn't growing, then that won't happen?People are always asking me what I think about the doom loops and all that. Pick New York as one end of the spectrum: It's always going to be adding new buildings, that's just in its DNA, and so you're going to have this kind of collage of different building styles. But other cities, smaller cities, maybe where people are moving now because working from home, they'll add a few tall buildings here, they'll have mini-skylines. Then the other cities, like a St. Louis, that's just going to have to kind of figure out a plan for growth. So I don't see the world as a kind of Jetsons-type world.I mean, you never know what's going to happen with the technology. There's one company, TK or Thyssenkrupp elevators, they're working on Maglev elevators, and this can actually be a game changer because you have these shafts, so the Maglev elevator cars, they can go up or down or they can go horizontal. Part of the goal with that is that everybody has their own — if it's an apartment building, they have their own elevator car, it takes them up to their apartment, it becomes the door. So that could be a real game changer . . . And then you could run these things horizontally. So if you have these Maglev elevators, you can not only run them horizontally within the building, but, in principle, if you could work out property rights or whatever, you could connect these things across buildings. But at the end of the day, it's really about preferences and a kind of cultural perception of the tall building, and I just don't see us in the United States us having a dramatic, country-wide rethinking of where we live. There's always going to be this desire for the single-family home in the suburbs. Now maybe that'll diminish to some degree, but as long as people see their own little house as their own little castle . . .Unlike China, where there seems to be a great desire to live in these kinds of buildings.Manhattan extension (23:04)Have you had any takers about your proposal to make Manhattan bigger?No.You would extend it by about 2000 acres and maybe build some tall buildings on that, I don't know.The idea would be to create a new mini-Manhattan extending Manhattan into New York Harbor. Just briefly, the idea was both to add more housing and add more land, and to protect lower Manhattan against sea level rises and so forth. I proposed this in a New York Times op-ed piece, and, naturally, I would say the majority of commenters and people had this sort of kneejerk reaction against it.I had a kneejerk reaction for it! I loved it!You are part of a small, select core of appreciators, let's say. Having said that, in the 21st century it's just not something I think most people are willing to wrap their heads around. SoTo me, that's an idea with the future, and I think you should not be dejected that it was not initially well-received. I think that kind of idea might actually have some legs.Trends and styles (24:23)Finally, let me ask you, whether it's because of computers or new materials, would we expect skyscrapers in the future to look any differently? I think some people would love to go back to the 1930s style. They love that style of skyscraper, and they don't like the glass-and-steel, very rectangular skyscraper; they want it to look like Gotham City or something.Actually, if you look in Manhattan, in Brooklyn there's one, I think they're calling it something like the “Dark Knight Tower” or the “Gotham Tower.” It's in Brooklyn and it has this almost art deco sort of —It slipped my mind, I was thinking art deco, yes.And there's a high rise apartment near Columbia University, which uses the same color masonry as the surrounding buildings. I think it's the Union Theological Seminary, which sold some of the land to build a high rise. It sort of blends in. So I guess the question is really architecturally speaking, and it's sort of hard to say. I think maybe there'll be some neo-historical buildings coming up here or there, but there's two things: One is that people like glass windows. People love to have light and views, and so that's really just pushing the glass buildings. I think developers like glass too, because it's easy to work with, and architects — if you're a developer and you want a super-tall building, you usually go to a handful of architects and you have some kind of design competition, and, chances are, you're going to get something that looks full of glass and has some funky geometry to it.But they seem more twisty than they used to, so they're not just perfect rectangles.Right, so you're creating a lot of illusion. The interesting thing is, at the end of the day, you can only have certain internal shapes because you need functional spaces, so you have to have illusion with the twisting and these sort of Jenga towers, and a lot of that is due to massive improvements in computer technology; so the rendering software has dramatically improved, the engineering know-how, the engineering technology improved, you can send your designs right to the manufacturer where they can then use the computer programs to design exactly the shapes and sizes.So it's the learning curve of every building that you do adds to the knowledge of how to do something a little bit different, or some version of something before, and also just massive computer power. I think there'll be a lot more of these sort of funky architectural shape. How they hold up, only time tells. In the '80s there was this massive postmodern boom with all kinds of pastiche-type buildings with all kinds of references to old buildings, and funky buildings, and some of those haven't held up as well.Frankly, I'm from Chicago, and I know exactly what you're talking about. Also being from Chicago, I appreciate you calling that building the Sears Tower rather than what other name they try to put on it. Last question: Do you have a favorite skyscraper?I'm from New York and I like the Empire State Building, and it's not just because architecturally a classic building, but it speaks to New York as a city of strivers. And the more research I did into the Empire State Building, the more I appreciate the sheer guts of these guys who built this building. And the thing is, when it was completed in 1931, Great Depression was really starting to kick into high gear, and so the building was unrented, and it kind of gave this whole mythology about how these guys didn't know what they were doing, but when you crunch the numbers, they knew exactly what they were doing. They knew what the landscape looked like for New York, and the costs, and the revenues. Nobody saw the Great Depression coming, and so to say that the Great Depression showed how foolish these were, I just think it's a bad standard to hold them to. And if you look at the revenues and them building value over its 90-whatever, 93-year history, it's been a money-maker for almost a century. After the Great Depression, it recovered and has become an icon and a moneymaker, so what's not to love about that?Faster, Please! is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fasterplease.substack.com/subscribe

Anna Davlantes, WGN Radio's investigative correspondent, joins Bob Sirott to share what happened this week in Chicago history. Stories include the founding for World’s Finest Chocolate, the finalized plans for the Sears Tower, the opening of the Field Museum, and more.

National Wine day.  Entertainment from 1967.  SpiderDan climbed Sears Tower, Deadliest aviation disaster in US history, Goofy debuted as Dippy Dawg.  Todays birthdays - Mr. Bogangles, Kitty Kallen, Tom T. Hall, Sir Ian McKellen, Frank Oz, Laus Meine, Connie Sellecca, Mike Myers, Anne Heche, Justin Henry.  CJ Walker died.Intro - Pour some sugar on me - Def Leppard    http://defleppard.com/Hey brother pour the wine - Dean MartinGroovin' - The Young RascalsSam's place - Buck OwensBirthdays - In da club - 50 Cent    http://50cent.com/Just a crazy song - Mr. Bojangles  Bill RobinsonLittle things mean a lot - Kitty KallenI like beer - Tom T. HallRock you like a hurricane - ScorpionsExit - Its not love - Dokken    http://dokken.net/Follow Jeff Stampka on Facebook

National Paranormal day.  Entertainment from 2014.  1st US toll bridge, 3rd worst city fire in US history in Jacksonvile FL, Sears Tower now Willis Tower tallest building in the world at that time.  Todays birthdays - Bing Crosby, George Gaynes, Ann B. Davis, Dave Dudley, James Brown, Frankie Valli, Christopher Cross, Eric Church.  Jackie Cooper died.Intro - Pour some sugar on me - Def Leppard    http://defleppard.com/If I were a ghost - Super Simple SongsHappy - Pharrell WilliamsPlay it again - Luke BryanBirthdays - In da club - 50 Cent    http://50cent.com/Pennies fro heaven - Bing CrosbyBrady Bunch TV themeSix days on the road - Dave DudleyPlease Please Please - James BrownMy eyes adored you - Frankie ValliRide like the wind - Christopher CrossDrink in my hand - Eric ChurchExit - Its not love - Dokken   http://dokken.net/Follow Jeff Stampka on Facebook or cooolmedia.com 

We often hear about the Tribune Tower, the Chicago Cultural Center and of course the once-called Sears Tower, but do you ever wonder about the buildings that aren't aesthetically pleasing to the eye? Tour guide Mike McMains from Tours with Mike designed the Ugly Buildings Tour to highlight the eyesores that hide behind and between Chicago's famous skyscrapers and structures. Mike tells host Jacoby Cochran what makes a building ugly and his favorites.  Want some more City Cast Chicago news? Then make sure to sign up for our Hey Chicago newsletter.  Follow us @citycastchicago You can also text us or leave a voicemail at: 773 780-0246 Become a member of City Cast Chicago. Interested in advertising with City Cast? Find more info HERE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An engaged workplace is productive, joyful, and most importantly, requires a brave leader. Now when I say brave, I don't mean that you have to go bungee jumping off bridges or step in front of cars to save kittens. Bravery is a set of skills. You can learn the actions of bravery…even when you're not feeling it. In this episode, I share the 5 skills every brave leader needs in order to lead a healthy and joyful team. Hint: one of them has to do with the glass floor at the Sears Tower in Chicago. How do we engage our team in a way that's fun and challenging, but they feel safe while doing so? I'd love to hear what you thought in the comments! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxX2zPXJK0Q Here's what we talked about: 05:45 Why is emotional regulation at work important 08:47 How to welcome questions at a meeting 10:03 What great relationships and teams need 12:45 How to communicate boundaries as a leader 16:19 Tips for making decisions more effectively https://jennwhitmer.com/spark-call

Some people just get stuff done while others get to the end of the day, look back, and wonder what they did all day. On the 386th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, Rob's talk with brand builder, prolific content creator, and fractional CMO Amanda Goetz. Amanda revealed her secrets for getting stuff done, creating fly wheels (instead of funnels) to keep moving readers to other parts of her business, and adding a thousand subscribers to her newsletter every month. She calls it realistic productivity—the kind you can do when you're running your own business and have three kids—and you'll want to hear how she does it. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: Life's a Game (Amanda's course) Hypefury Taplio The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Some people seem to have an other worldly ability to get stuff done. While the rest of us struggle through our daily to-do lists and often fail to check off more than one or two items, they post great, well-thought out content several times a day to social media, they create new products, regular emails, launch and promote courses, and maybe even crank out a few pages for the book they're working on.  Hi, I'm Rob Marsh, one of the founders of The Copywriter Club. And on today's episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I sat down with brand builder, creator and fractional CMO Amanda Goetz. Amanda is one of those people who just gets stuff done. She's running three different content businesses, writing a book, taking on work as a part-time CMO and is launching a course in a couple of days. So how does she get it all done? We talked about the systems she uses to produce her weekly newsletters and daily social media content so that it all gets written in one day a month, plus an hour or two a week to schedule posts. And her system has helped her grow her newsletter by about 1000 new subscribers every month. If you produce content to support or grow your own business, you're definitely going to want to hear what she has to say. But first, I want to tell you about The Copywriter Underground. You've heard about the library of training that will help you build a profitable business. You've heard about the monthly coaching, and the almost weekly copy critiques and the helpful group of members ready with support and even the occasional lead. Last week we recorded an exclusive training for Underground members on the diagnostic scorecard that helps you close just about any prospect or project on a sales call. It's the kind of business secret you don't read about in free facebook groups or even on most email lists. But right now, you can watch that training and get the diagnostic scorecard to help you close more projects when you go to thecopywriterclub.com/tcu and join as a member.  But hurry, that training disappears in a few days. Now, let's jump to my discussion with Amanda. Amanda, let's get started with your story. You've done so many things, vice president marketing, CMO, you're building three businesses. How did you get here? Amanda Goetz: Oh, gosh. So where do I start? I grew up on a farm in Central Illinois. I'm a first generation college grad. And for me, my start was I graduated early from college because my accounting T.A. offered me a job at Ernst and Young. And I was still first semester of my senior year. And I was like, OK, I think I can graduate early if I take 18 hours. So I added a course. I graduated early. But my senior year of college, I took 18 hours of classes Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. I got on a bus every Wednesday night. I went from Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, up to Chicago. I worked at Ernst & Young in the Sears Tower in Chicago, Thursdays and Fridays. I studied all day Saturday, went back to my roommates on Sunday and did it all again.  Rob Marsh: Wow, that's nuts.  Amanda Goetz: I definitely have found that just the way that I'm wired an...

The gang is back in action with a new episode! This time the gang feature one of the most culturally influential movies of all time. Ferris Beuller's Day Off! This was of course during John Hughes time in the the 80s where he was directing and turning out hit movies like no other director! Ferris Bueller's Day Off is a 1986 American teen comedy film written, co-produced, and directed by John Hughes. The film stars Matthew Broderick, Mia Sara, and Alan Ruck, with supporting roles from Jennifer Grey, Jeffrey Jones, Cindy Pickett, Edie McClurg, Lyman Ward, and Charlie Sheen. It tells the story of a high school slacker, Ferris, who skips school with his best friend, Cameron, and his girlfriend, Sloane, for a day in Chicago, and regularly breaks the fourth wall to explain his techniques and inner thoughts. Hughes wrote the screenplay in less than a week. Filming began in September 1985 and finished in November, featuring many Chicago landmarks including the Sears Tower, Wrigley Field, and the Art Institute of Chicago. The film was Hughes's love letter to Chicago: "I really wanted to capture as much of Chicago as I could. Not just in the architecture and landscape, but the spirit." Released by Paramount Pictures on June 11, 1986, the film became the tenth-highest-grossing film of 1986 in the United States, grossing $70 million over a $5 million budget. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and audiences alike, who praised Broderick's performance, and the film's humor and tone. In 2014, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress, being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The film was followed by a television series, starring Charlie Schlatter as the title character. A spin-off film titled Sam & Victor's Day Off, focusing on the two valets who took Cameron's father's Ferrari on a joy ride, is in development for Paramount+.

01:30 - mos def says drake isn't hip hop09:00 - is it kanye fault10:00 - what is hiphop?12:40 - why are you not rapping about palestine??14:20 - lil boom minor situation21:00 - alec baldwin indicted for killing someone on accident, who's to blame?27:00 - how long until you go back to work if someone dies on the job?31:00 - casualties of construction 31:40 - cost of living too high or should everybody live in storage units?36:00 - what's the worst place you would live?40:00 - mole people NYC44:30 - juice worlds ex tryna sell their sex tape46:00 - brianne's Tennessee cabin trip with her twitter friends58:50 - aliens invited to kentucky1:07:00 - trump 2024?1:10:00 - mexican for president1:13:00 - better call saul winless at the emmy's again1:16:00 - give 50 cent his flowers ?1:20:00 - true detective is back1:22:00 - why are you living in alaska? 

Sequoia Simone from But Make It Scary is back and is here for what is without a doubt the funniest episode of TNO that has ever been released. We cover an incredibly intense chapter that features the showdown with Kronos and so much more. It's a fun show in front of a packed crowd and you're gonna love it! Topics include: LeakyCon, New Jeans, Carly Rae Jepsen, The Illinois Lottery, Jaritos, untethered Olympus, Kronos LEGO, Inspector Gadget, Homer Simpson, Kronos makeover, efficient villains, The Jonas Brothers, Burnin' Up, “Nick, come on the pod,” E-than, Nakamura's fall, Crash Bandicoot, bad HQ choices, villain merchandising, trying hard, The Sound of Poseidon, the Jersey Shore, Blizzard Beach, Typhon Tartarus Tumble, aprons, Terminator 2, Chekov's melted sword, Luke's death, indoor basketball courts, East High School, Battle Map of Manhattan, Elijah Wood, Lord Of the Rings, The Sears Tower, Annabelle, Taylor Swift Eras, Steve Kerr, Mythomagic cards, The Proclaimers, and more!   Camp Regular Person Shirts: www.thenewestolympian.com/merch   Thanks to our sponsors, G-Adventures: Win $4,999 in travel credits at www.gadventures.com/wishlist AG1: Get a 1 year supply of Vitamin D and 5 free travel packs at drinkAG1.com/NEWESTOLYMPIAN   — Find The Newest Olympian Online — • Website: www.thenewestolympian.com • Patreon: www.thenewestolympian.com/patreon • Twitter: www.twitter.com/newestolympian • Instagram: www.instagram.com/newestolympian • Facebook: www.facebook.com/newestolympian • Reddit: www.reddit.com/r/thenewestolympian • Merch: www.thenewestolympian.com/merch   — Production — • Creator, Host, Producer, Social Media, Web Design: Mike Schubert • Editor: Sherry Guo • Music: Bettina Campomanes and Brandon Grugle • Art: Jessica E. Boyd   — About The Show — Is Percy Jackson the book series we should've been reading all along? Join Mike Schubert as he reads through the books for the first time with the help of longtime PJO fans to cover the plot, take stabs at what happens next, and nerd out over Greek mythology. Whether you're looking for an excuse to finally read these books, or want to re-read an old favorite with a digital book club, grab your blue chocolate chip cookies and listen along. New episodes release on Mondays wherever you get your podcasts!

Guest: From Italy Jay Pridmore We can talk about Sears Tower (photo of book) a little... hope I am still an expert, and about Modern Beyond Style (Photo of book), which is about Larry Booth, who was an important member of the Chicago Seven group of architects in the 1970s. Jay Pridmore Jay Pridmore is the author or coauthor of many books, including Chicago Architecture and Design, University of Chicago: The Campus Guide, Shanghai: The Architecture of China's Great Urban Center, and The American Bicycle. He has worked as a journalist in Chicago and has written extensively about architecture.

Jesus is the cornerstone in the eternal temple of the living God. The sinful men who despise and reject this stone are doomed to be destroyed. - SERMON TRANSCRIPT - "The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes. Today's text, if you look at it in a certain way, is effectively the story of two builders and their differing perspectives on building. Their differences, immeasurably deep and profound, though it manifests itself in a simple controversy over proper building materials or a proper building material, a single stone that one builder hates and rejects, but the other builder delights in, chooses, and establishes. The two builders in this scenario are sinful man on the one side and Almighty God on the other. Their philosophies of architecture are radically opposed to each other. Sinful man builds a building and so does God. Sinful man builds for his own glory and God builds for His own glory. The building projects go on day after day. Both sinful man and Almighty God add daily to their buildings and their architectural glories are in direct contradiction to each other. One of those buildings will sink back down into the dust from which it came and the wind will blow it away like chaff as though it was never there at all. But the other building will shine, will radiate with the glory of God for all eternity. Almighty God in his wisdom has chosen to make his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, despised and rejected, the head of the corner or the chief cornerstone of his entire building project. Day after day, this building rises, built out of other living stones, quarried and shaped to fit the cornerstone. "Almighty God in his wisdom has chosen to make his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, despised and rejected, the head of the corner or the chief cornerstone of his entire building project." When the last living stone is set in its proper place according to the plans of the eternal architect, the chosen stone will also be in some mysterious way, the capstone, the completing stone, as it was also the cornerstone. Every stone in it will glow with his glory. Sinful man having despised and rejected this stone builds every day for his own glory by his own principles, with his own building materials, his thoughts, his preferences, his achievements, his choices, his tastes, his lusts, his styles, his drives, his ambitions, and so the building of sinful man rises. It's outwardly impressive, in some sense, but it is ultimately doomed for it is built on the temporary sand of sinful man's own rebellious wisdom, and the storm will come and it will beat on it and it will fall with a great crash. Habakkuk 2 describes these two building projects in direct contradiction to each other and Habakkuk 2:11-14 says, "The stones of the wall will cry out and the beams of the woodwork will echo it. Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by crime. Has not the Lord Almighty determined that the people's labor is only fuel for the fire that the nation's exhaust themselves for nothing?" As the nations are building their empires out of their own effort, God says they're exhausting themselves for nothing. It's only fuel for the fire, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. That's God's building project. So we have two builders, two approaches to architecture. One destined to stand in glory forever, the other doomed to be destroyed, blown away like chaff in the wind. Now, the question for every individual member of the human race is this, which of these two buildings are you investing your life in? What are you building? I've seen some magnificent buildings in my life. I've had the privilege of traveling various places and seen some stunning displays of human ingenuity and architecture. Architecture is an interesting discipline, a fascinating discipline, a combination of science and art. Science because the building needs to be sound in its construction principles, needs to be built well on a solid foundation, needs to rise by tried and true technologies of engineering with structural members on which everything else is based so that it will stand strong supporting its own weight, surviving wind and weather, erosion and earthquakes, and years of subjection to sunlight and water. It must have wise provision for heat and venting and air conditioning, also plumbing and electricity now and walls and doorways that meet building codes. It needs to be soundly built, but it also needs to be beautiful, I think. I've seen some really ugly buildings that stood behind the Iron Curtain. It seemed like they were designed to suck the life out of anyone that looked at them. Talk about form and function, it was nothing but function and ugly in form. It was intended to be so. You want there to be an art to the architecture, light, color, a space that captures the heart while it supports the body physically. Every great culture has expressed its greatness, at least in part, through its architecture, its great buildings. Five of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World were displays of architecture. The Great Pyramid of Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. They all sought to proclaim the greatness of the cultures that built them, but since all flesh is grass and all its glory is like the flowers of the field, the glories are here today, God blows on them and they wither and the wind blows them away like chaff. God has determined that the glories of man, including the stacking up of stones one on top of the other, will eventually be toppled and sink back down, as Jesus said of the temple, "Not one stone here will be left on another." For me, personally, what are the most impressive buildings I've ever seen? Oh, of course, this one here that we're in, definitely. Well, what are my seven wonders of the modern world? It's objective, of course. I was speaking at a pastor's conference in Chicago last year and they took me on a river tour of the skyline of Chicago, and it was very impressive. Lots of steel and glass and crown jewels, building formerly known as Sears Tower, they still call it Sears Tower though Sears sold it a long time ago. It's impressive, shiny and beautiful. I've seen the Great Wall of China, Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, the United States Capitol Building, Washington D.C., London Bridge, the Louvre Art Museum, the Eiffel Tower. Those are impressive. Four years ago, April 15th, 2019, I was saddened to hear the fire that attacked the cathedral at Notre Dame. I was sad about that. I know that they're refurbishing it, but it's not the same when it gets rebuilt, but it's a reminder to me, again, everything man builds is temporary. The text that we're studying today points, along with other passages, to a work of spiritual architecture that will never be destroyed. This morning, we're going to look at one small passage, but I'm going to use it as a portal, a doorway to go through into something much bigger, and I want to use it to meditate in an extended fashion with you on the greatness of Jesus Christ. That's what I'm about today. "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone. The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes." It is one of the most significant Old Testament prophecies about Christ. It's cited by Jesus here in this debate with his enemies. It's cited again by Peter and John in Acts 4 in their controversy with the exact same men, the exact same enemies as they boldly proclaim the Gospel. It's cited again by Peter in his epistle in 1 Peter 2. And as a matter of fact, I would urge you to turn there. Put your finger here on Mark and turn also to 1 Peter 2 because we're going to be leaning on it to get some of our information today. This passage, "the stone the builders rejected, et cetera", is a magnificent image of a building rising from its perfect beginning, from its perfect foundation, to its perfect consummation, the true temple of God in which God will dwell with his people in glory forever. It is eternal and heavenly architecture, the foundation laid by Christ's perfect life and substitutionary death. The wall's made up of living stones, that's us Christians quarried from Satan's dark kingdom, and positioned in walls of a rising spiritual structure, a true spiritual temple in which God dwells and will dwell by his spirit. Ephesians 2 talks about this, I know you're in 1 Peter 2 and I'll get to that in a moment, but Ephesians 2:19-22 says, "You are no longer foreigners and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him, the whole building is joined together and rises to become a dwelling, to become a holy temple in the Lord, and in him, you two are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his spirit.” So you've got this holy spiritual temple rising, rising now, and it's a place that God dwells and will dwell by his spirit. Again, in the passage in 1 Peter 2:4-5, the same illusion, "As you come to him, the living stone rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him. You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” This is the true and eternal architecture, the eternal temple of the living God, which is rising right now by souls that are being won to Christ through evangelism and missions all over the world. Rising now, though we cannot see it, it's built on the foundation laid by Jesus Christ, but it all starts with him as that first stone, the cornerstone, the foundation of everything. I. Context of the Story The context of this statement in Mark's Gospel, it was the final week of Jesus' life. He has already ridden in triumph into the city to cries of "Hosanna!" and "Blessed is the coming kingdom of our Father, David," and all that. That was the high point emotionally. From then on would come Jesus' final descent down to the cross, his humiliation, the consummation of that infinite downward journey of his humiliation described in Philippians 2, “Jesus, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross.” That downward journey is on display in the final week of Jesus' life and that's where we're at in Mark's Gospel. Central to this downward journey was his increasingly sharp conflict with his human enemies, the chief priests, elders, teachers of the law, the Pharisees. His human enemies are surrounding him. He had already made a mortal enemy of the high priest, the real high priest, Annas, whose business He impinged on twice by cleansing the temple, when He overturned the benches of the money changers and those selling doves and says, "Take these out of here. How dare you turn my father's house into a marketplace? My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations. You've made it a den of thieves." The next day, Jesus continued his teaching ministry right in that location in the temple, taking it over, teaching, healing, ministering. His enemies come back, the priests and Scribes and Pharisees come to challenge him with controversial questions trying to trap him into a fatal error with his mouth. They challenged him with the question of his authority. What authority did He have the right to do these things? By what authority? Cleansing of the temple, his teaching of the people, all of that, "Who are you to do these things?" Jesus challenged them back with a question about John the Baptist's authority. Where did he get his authority to do his baptism? Where did that come from? "You answer me, then I'll answer you." They wouldn't answer him so He didn't answer them. Then He told them, as we studied last week, the Parable of the Tenant Farmers, the wicked tenant farmers, how God expected fruit, and represents, I think, Israel, the people of God. It represents them and He sent messengers, prophets to them, and they just killed them, et cetera. Ultimately, he sent his son. "They'll respect my son," he said. But when they saw the son, they said, "Look, this is the heir. Let's kill him, and the inheritance will be ours,” meaning the vineyard. So they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. Jesus interpreted the parable in light of their imminent rejection and murder of the son of God, himself. He finished with the allusion to this Old Testament prophecy, "Have you never read in the scripture the stone the builders rejected has become the capstone. The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes." So that's where we're at in Mark's Gospel, and that's what we're going to consider today. This one prophecy is so rich I believe it's worthy of our entire attention this morning. It's a direct quotation of Psalm 118 : 22-23, and I desire to unfold it. This is my simple interpretation. The stone is Jesus Christ. The builders are the Jewish leaders. The rejection of Christ shows that they're directly opposing God in their rejection, for the stone that they reject, God makes the chief cornerstone or the head of the corner, a chosen, strategically placed stone. The text says, "The Lord has done this." So the Jewish leaders’ rejection of Jesus is directly in contradiction to God's intentions, God's estimation, God's selection of him to be the head of the corner. The psalmist says, "The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes." Therefore, it is worthy of worship, it is worthy of us marveling over it, and that's what I think we've assembled to do this morning, is to marvel at Jesus. I'm using this one concept, the stone the village rejected as a portal through which to contemplate some of the marvels of Jesus Christ. It's mysterious. How is Jesus like a stone? What does that mean? What does the head of the corner mean? In Hebrew, what does that mean? How is this placement of Jesus celebrated in the Bible? All of these questions and others came into my ever questioning mind, my engineering mind, my verbal mind. I won't deny that it wasn't accidental that I ended up with a bunch of Ps in the outline. If you look at the outline, all right, you'll see the list of where we haven't even begun to start yet this morning. There you've got all of these P’s: a predestined stone, a prophesied stone, a perfect and perfected stone, a rejected stone, there's no P for that one, a precious stone, a position stone, a permanent stone, proclaimed, pattern, praise, and I thought of one more, paradoxical. We'll get to that in due time. But I feel okay with it because in Psalm 119, the psalmist does it with the success of letters of the Hebrew alphabet, eight verses on “aleph”, eight verses on “beth”, eight verses on “gimel”. I don't usually do it. I know it seems a little gimmicky. The other day, I was with a good friend at one of my favorite restaurant coffee shops around here, and the servers brought us a tray with a bunch of samples on it of a new product that they were rolling out. I took it and popped it in my mouth, it was delicious and that was it. That's what this sermon's going to be like, a sampler. So let's walk through. II. A Predestined Stone First, Jesus is a predestined stone, predestined. God planned this whole thing from eternity past. The blueprint was laid in the mind of God before He said, "Let there be light.” This is no new thing for God. God is the architect that made the blueprint. He figured all of this out. He knew that He wanted a spiritual temple in which He would dwell forever with his people in intimate connection with them. He knew that his people would be essential to that dwelling place. They would make it up in effect as themselves living stones. He figured all of this out, that his only begotten son would be the head of the corner or the chief cornerstone, et cetera. Peter tells us he was predestined for this role. Look at verse 4 of 1 Peter 2, "As you come to him, the living stone rejected by men but chosen by God." That's implied in the Psalm 118 quote, the Lord has done this. This is God's plan, God's purpose. Also, two verses later in 1 Peter 2:6, “For in scripture it says, ‘Behold I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone.’" So He is chosen for this role. These verses tell us that Jesus was chosen for the role but doesn't say when. But Peter tells us that in the previous chapter, 1 Peter 1:20, that “He was chosen before the creation of the world."You look at it right there in First Peter 1:20, "chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” That's what I mean by predestined. All of this is consistent with the biblical doctrine of predestination. Ephesians 1:4-5 says, “God chose us in him before the creation of the world, [him being Christ], to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love, he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ in accordance with his pleasure and will.” Also, Second Timothy 1:9 says, "This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.” Before the beginning of time, this whole thing was worked out. He is the predestined stone, predestined cornerstone, part of a blueprint that God worked out in his mind before time began. III. The Prophesied Stone Secondly, he's the prophesied stone. Not only did God choose and predestine and work all this out in his mind, He rolled out his ideas of it ahead of time through the prophets. He told the prophets what would happen and the prophets proclaimed it to the world. They prophesied it, they predicted it. So we get Psalm 118, verse 22-23, "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone. The Lord has done this and is marvelous in our eyes." Jesus quoted it. Jesus thought, “Have you never read like in your synagogues on the Sabbath? Haven't you read this Psalm, Psalm 118? Of course, you have." Who wrote Psalm 118? It's not titled. If you look at it, it's not titled, but, traditionally, logically, in the psalter, in its position in the psalter, it's ascribed to King David. That would've been 1,000 years before Christ, 1,000 years. "The stone the builders rejected, it has become the capstone." David was prophesying. He's a prophet as he wrote the psalm. God prophesied these things about Christ ahead of time so that his chosen people could read the prophecies that predated him by 1,000 and know it was all true. It's a sense it is validation of our faith. He's the prophesied stone. IV. A Perfect and Perfected Stone He's also a perfect and perfected stone, perfect and also perfected. What does that mean? First of all, He's already perfect, flawless, morally pure, but that perfection was not formed or fashioned by man. He is flawless. 1 Peter 2, same chapter verse 22 says, "He committed no sin and there was no deceit in his mouth.” He was a perfect man. Jesus' perfection was not the work of other people. It certainly wasn't the work of Joseph and Mary. They were really great parents and did a really great job raising him, but no, not at all. They were godly people, but his perfection was not because of their great parenting. There is a picture of this, if you know what to look for. As a requirement, the stones used for the altar and for the building of the temple were not to be formed or fashioned by chisel and hammer on the work site. It's very interesting. Exodus 20:25, "If you make an altar of stones for me, do not build it with dress stones for you'll defile it if you use a tool on it." 1 Kings 6:7, Solomon's Temple, "In building the temple, only blocks dressed at the quarry were used and no hammer, chisel, or any other iron tool was heard at the temple site while it was being built." Why this little detail? Because Christ was not formed or fashioned by human ingenuity or power. It's a picture of the work of God in the perfection of Christ. We also have this in Daniel 2 with the image of human history of the statue in Nebuchadnezzar's mind that had feet of clay. The whole thing is destroyed by a stone, we're told, cut out but not by human hands that struck the statue on its feet of clay and destroyed it and turned the whole thing to chaff. Hence, my earlier comments as I introduced this sermon saying, everything man built will turn into chaff and the wind's going to blow it away without leaving a trace. But the stone that struck it became a huge mountain that filled the whole earth representing the kingdom of Christ, and it's called "a stone cut out but not by human hands." His perfection was his own and yet He was perfected by his sufferings, we're told. The author of Hebrew tells us, Hebrews 5:8-9, "Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered and once made perfect became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him." Wow, what a mysterious assertion. Jesus was made perfect by his sufferings to be our mediator, our savior. As I meditate on that, it doesn't mean there was any imperfection in Jesus, but He had to go through the suffering and death on the cross to save us. So I would look at “made perfect” as “qualified by his sufferings." By his suffering He was qualified to save us. By the shedding of his blood, He was made a perfect savior, a mediator for us. That's what I think of as “made perfect.” He was fitted to be the foundation stone by his suffering and death. Therefore, the stone the builders rejected, their rejection of him was essential to him being made perfect to be our savior. So Jesus was both perfect and perfected stone. V. A Rejected Stone He is also a rejected stone, as I just said a moment ago. There is no P for this. Therefore, it really sticks out, doesn't it? How could such a man be rejected? Stunning. But, actually, most people that know and hear about Jesus reject him. It's actually normal, but it's still bizarre. "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone." The Jewish nation officially rejected Jesus. "Led by these builders, he was despised and rejected," it says in Isaiah 53. John 1:11, "He came to his own and his own did not receive him." Officially, on his trial before the high priest, Matthew 26:65-67, "The high priest tore his clothes and said, 'He has spoken blasphemy. Why do we need any more witnesses? Look, now you've heard the blasphemy. What do you think?' 'He's worthy of death,' they all answered. Then they spit in his face and struck him with their fists.” That's them rejecting Jesus, officially rejecting him. How astounding that He would be rejected. This speaks to the perversion of the sinful mind. Jesus was God incarnate. He was love incarnate. He was kindness incarnate, goodness incarnate, mercy incarnate. He did a river of healings for the people. Why did they hate him? The sinful mind steeped in darkness hated him, rejected him. The sinful mind is twisted and perverted by sin and evil. It loves what is hateful and hates what is lovely. It puts darkness for light and light for darkness. It puts bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. It calls wickedness righteousness and righteousness wickedness. It is fundamental. It is essential to sin, this rejection of goodness, this rejection of God. It's at the core of our wickedness. We are commanded to love God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, with all of our mind, all of our strength, and we actually hate him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength until we are converted, steeped in sin. Jesus was the rejected stone. VI. The Precious Stone But Jesus is the precious stone. Rejected by men, but precious. Chosen by God and precious to him, we're told. The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone. The Lord has done this and is marvelous in our eyes. Look at 1 Peter 2:4, "As you come to him, the living stone rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him." What does that mean, “precious"? Precious means “unspeakably valuable.” How can you properly measure the worth and value of Jesus Christ? One way to get at it is Romans 8:32. So you know, God the Father, ”He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all, how will we not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” That puts everything that God had to give in two categories, his own son and all things. That would be everything other than Jesus. The entire universe, physical and spiritual, lays before him because He made it all, He owns it all, and He says, "Of these, what's really precious to me is my only begotten son and I gave him for you. Therefore, how would I not also, along with him, graciously give you everything else?" That means, in God's estimation, Jesus is more precious than everything else in the universe. "That means, in God's estimation, Jesus is more precious than everything else in the universe." And isn't it amazing that now He's precious to us too? Look at 1 Peter 2:7, "Now, to you who believe the stone is precious." How beautiful is that, “precious to God”, in verse 4, 1 Peter 2, precious to us who believe. How did that happen? Is it not because of the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives? Do you not give credit to the Holy Spirit for making Jesus precious to you? How many of you could testify right now that Jesus is precious to you? How many of you be willing to say, be able to say, "Jesus is precious to me,” ? You might've been converted a week ago and you would be able to say, "Jesus is precious to me." You might've been a Christian for 50 years and you'd be able to say, "Jesus is precious to me." Those would say, "Jesus is more precious to me now than when I was first converted." The more I study him, the more precious He becomes to me, and the more you study his preciousness, his value, his worth, the more you feel you've just begun to scratch the surface. Give him the credit and the glory. Thank him for your salvation. You are surrounded every day by people who are familiar with Jesus, who know some things about him, and He's not precious. They're rejecting him. But not you. How did that come about, dear brother and sister? Is it not because the Holy Spirit sovereignly worked grace in your life? Is it not because He took out your heart of stone and gave you a heart of flesh and made Jesus precious to you? What does that word mean, “precious”? Charles Spurgeon, meditating on this, said, "Something is precious because it's rare, and because it has intrinsic value to it, and because of its beneficial qualities.” Jesus is rare. He is utterly unique in the universe. He is the only begotten son of God. We're all adopted children of God. He's the only begotten. He's unique. He's the God-man. He has intrinsic value because in him dwells the fullness of the deity in bodily form. And one of his beneficial qualities, Spurgeon put it this way, "He is eyes to the blind. He is ears to the deaf. He is feet for the lame. He is healing to the sick. He is freedom to the slave. He is joy to the mourner. He is life to the dead. Think of his life and how it gives life to the believer. Think of his death and how it redeems from hell all those who trust in him. Think of his resurrection and how it justifies believers. Think of his second coming and how it delights our hearts. Think of our Lord in all of his offices of prophet, priest, and king. Think of him in all his relationships as husband, brother, and friend. Is he not precious to you?” VII. A Positioned Stone He is also a positioned stone. He is positioned by God as the foundation to the entire building. Everything's based on him. Cornerstones are laid first. Everything else finds its orientation based on the cornerstone. The angles must be perfect. Let's imagine that the architect wants a 90 degree angle. If it's 89 or if it's 91 and you measure out over 200 feet, you're going to be off by three feet or more. It's got to be just right. It's a cornerstone. Everything is based on him. He's positioned as the foundation. As Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:11, "No one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ." Everything's based on him, his death, his resurrection. VIII. A Permanent Stone Therefore, He's a permanent stone. He's laid for all eternity, He cannot be moved. Stones have immense weight and compressive strength. You can stack stone upon stone upon stone and make a big building. There's that sense of permanence with Jesus. He is positioned permanently, and He is more permanent than the universe itself. It's hard to believe, but it is really true. Hebrews 1:10-12 says, "In the beginning, oh Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens of the work of your hand. They will perish, but you remain. They all wear out like a garment. You'll roll them up like a robe. Like a garment, they will be changed, but you remain the same and your years will never end." Speaking to Jesus, He's more permanent than the universe. The finished work of Christ on the cross cannot be undone. He is permanent foundation for the eternal dwelling place of God. "Heaven and earth," Jesus said, "will pass away, but my words will never pass away." Therefore, also, everyone who builds his or her life based on the words and work of Christ, it will last for eternity, the things you are building. At the end of the Sermon of the Mount, Jesus says, "Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and puts the into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. Rains came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, but it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock." Your work will be permanent too if it's based on Christ and on his words. "But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on the sand, and the rains came down and the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house and it fell with a great crash.” [Matthew7:24-27] That's somebody who does not obey the word and builds on sand. IX. A Proclaimed Stone Jesus is also a proclaimed stone. I'm doing it right now. I'm proclaiming the greatness of Christ. I'm preaching him. He is proclaimed throughout the world, proclaimed in scripture, and He's proclaimed by preachers who go and proclaim the greatness of Christ, and in that proclamation, people hear and believe and are saved. 1 Peter 2:6 says, "Behold I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame." So as this proclamation is going out around the world, people are hearing and trusting and they are built on that foundation. Peter and John give a very good example of this in Acts 4. It's one of my favorite parts of the Book of Acts. They heal a lame beggar. He's walking and leaping and praising God and all that, and they come and arrest Peter and John and haul them up in front of the exact same human enemies that had condemned Jesus. Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, spoke to these wicked enemies of Jesus these words, "Rulers and elders of the people, if we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a cripple and are asked how he was healed, then know this, you and all the people of Israel, it is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed." Now listen to this. It's my favorite part, "He is the stone you builders rejected which has become the capstone. Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved." [Acts 4:7-12] Do you see what Peter did to the quote? He changed it a little bit. I've been reading it out of Psalm 118, "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone." Peter said, "The stone you builders rejected..." in case you missed it, filled with the Holy Spirit, he applied it to Jesus's enemies. But he's saying, "Salvation is found in no one else and that's how we get saved. That's how our sins are forgiven, by the proclamation of this cornerstone." X. A Pattern Stone He is also a pattern stone. Jesus is the first of a vast sequence of similar stones. Look at 1 Peter 2:4-7, "As you come to him, the living stone rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him, you also like living stones are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For in scripture it says, 'Behold I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trust in him will never be put to shame now to you who believe the stone is precious.’" So, by believing Jesus becomes precious, you become instantly like him, a living stone. XI. A Paradoxical Stone Now I'm going to insert another P in here, and that is a paradoxical stone. What does that mean? “Paradox” means, it's “internally mysteriously, contradictory”. By dying, we live. By living, we die. This kind of thing. Do you not see the paradox of a living stone? Think about it. Don't we use stones as an example of things that are dead, that are not alive? Dead as a stone or stone dead, something like that? But here Jesus is a living stone. I was on another bike ride and I was thinking about that phrase, living stone. How is a stone living? What does that mean? And I don't know for sure, but let me tell you some guesses. I think stones not just are pictures of deadness, but they're also pictures of permanence and unchanging nature. They just are what they are. If something's engraved in stone, it never changes. If something's rock solid, it has a solid foundation. It doesn't move. So I think it's a sense of Jesus's permanence and immutability, but tied to his life. He's eternally alive. As Romans says, "Since he died, he cannot die again. Death no longer has any mastery over him." He's alive forever. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. What he was yesterday, he will be today and he will be forever. And you can count on him. He never changes. He's rock solid. You can build on him. He's alive and gives you life. The giving of life will keep on happening. He's a living stone. You also become like him, living stones. That's pretty cool too because you are positioned in a wall of the rising spiritual temple in which God will dwell forever. You're positioned there in a place, I believe, through predestination. You're the only one that could have been positioned there. That place was made for you. Imagine, not that anyone would ever do this, a 100,000 piece jigsaw puzzle. Imagine someone with the diligence and discipline to do a 100,000 piece jigsaw puzzle and there's one piece missing. Let's imagine it's a real type-A person. That person's not going to shrug and say, "Oh, well, we got most of it." What are they going to do, friends? They're going to search until they find that missing piece, aren't they, because that piece can't be replaced. It's got a certain contour, certain shape. It's got certain colors on it. It's the only one that can go there. Didn't Jesus tell a story about a woman who lost a coin and she looked everywhere and everywhere until she found that coin? So we also, like Jesus, are positioned in a certain place in the wall that only we could have filled and God will not rest until all of his chosen people, Ephesians 1 says "chosen in him before the foundation of the world", are positioned like him in our proper place in the wall. It's pretty awesome when you think about it. Now, with this, we have a bit of a translation problem. Is Jesus the cornerstone or the capstone? Have you ever wondered about that? Now, which is it? They are different. The one is the beginning stone and the other is the ending stone. One of them starts the whole thing and the other one finishes it or consummate it. The Hebrew is "head of the corner". KJV brings it over to “chief cornerstone”. He's the head of all the corner, that kind of thing. He's the chief. So people have wondered, are we talking the foundation, the cornerstone foundation stone, or the capstone the consummate? Why not both, friends? I'll tell you what, let's go both, because Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. He is the beginning of this whole structure, and He will end it. And every living stone in between is conformed to him in beautiful ways. In Revelation 3:12, it says of believers, "Him who overcomes, I'll make a pillar in the temple of my God. Never again will he leave it." You're going to be positioned and be radiant forever and you're going to glow. In Revelation 21, the holy city Jerusalem is coming down out of heaven from God. It's shown with the glory of God and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. Think about that, clear living stones. You're going to radiate with the glory of Christ. You're going to shine with his glory in that beautiful spiritual temple. XII. A Praise Stone Finally, a praise stone. That's all I've been doing in this sermon. That's the whole point of this sermon, this gimmicky-looking sermon with all of its Ps. I just wanted to praise Jesus. Doesn't it say right in the text, "The Lord has done this and it is," what? "marvelous in our eyes." Do you know you're going to get a chance for all eternity to celebrate how marvelous Jesus is, how marvelous this whole building project really was? It is marvelous. It's more marvelous than you think. We've only scratched the surface. I've given you a sampler sermon today. Each of the Ps you could delve into more, but Jesus is infinitely greater than any meditations you could ever do, and you're going to have heaven. If you repent and believe in Jesus and trust in him, you're going to have heaven forever to think about the greatness of Christ. Close with me in prayer. Father, we thank you for this one text, for its power. We thank you for the concept behind it, of this grand and glorious structure that is rising to become a dwelling in which God lives by his spirit. We thank you. We pray that you would take these meditations, however brief, however imperfect, and use them to fill us with glory. Help us to proclaim Christ to a lost and dying world. Help us to be filled with expectancy that we have so much more to learn about Jesus than we ever thought we did. Fill us with a sense of his greatness, of his preciousness. Thank you for saving us, Lord. I want to thank you for each of my brothers and sisters that are here for whom Jesus is precious. Thank you for working that in them. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Comedian Jeff Allen joins the program to talk about his new book Are We There Yet?--My Journey from a Messed-Up to Meaningful Life. Allen grew up in Chicago (his father troweled the last step of the highest point of the Sears Tower) and was on the Philadelphia Phillies' radar to potentially draft when he was a freshman in college. Alcohol, drugs and other problems derailed Allen's athletic career, and over time his life began to spiral out of control (including narrowly escaping going to jail for 3-5 years for being caught with cocaine in his car...and just two nights later, driving home the wrong way on the expressway). Married with children, his challenges grew--when in his darkest season, Allen discovered the Source of true meaning while reading the book of Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament. Are We There Yet? is Salem (WFIL's parent company)'s September Book of the Month. You can enter to win it on the CONTESTS page at wfil.com :).See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jon and Keith, here in the penthouse suite in the new Flumadiddle Towers in scenic North Alabama!  Bet you didn't know we have just completed our new Superscraper. It just edges out the Burj Khalifa as the tallest building in the world at 2725 ft! Hey, don't forget our new thrift store, mattress store, vape shop and Jack's burger joint is now open on the 100th floor promenade.  What a perfect place and time to announce the renaming of our world famous podcast Flumadiddle... Drumroll please,  we will now be officially called SHAT, by flumadiddle. Science, History, Art and Technology. Listen in on the pod for more info. Today we have a good one for you, folks. It's all about the tallest buildings ever made; that most modern of architectural marvels, the Skyscraper. So listen in as we share about everything from the Flatiron, the Sears Tower, the Empire State Building, the Twin Towers, the Burj Khalifa and more. 

FROM THE ARCHIVES from October, 2020:On Memorial Day, May 25th, 1981, a 25-year-old year old sport climber dressed as comic book hero Spider-Man used a system of suction cups and other climbing gear to scale the outside of the 110-story Sears Tower, which at that time was the tallest building in the world. He came back later that year to climb the John Hancock Center. This is the story of Spider-Dan Goodwin, who was kind enough to let me interview him for this episode.Dan Goodwin:www.dangoodwin.cowww.tripleblack.com"Chemo Crazy" the podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/chemo-crazy-lessons-from-a-stage-four-cancer-survivor/id1481134448"Chemo Crazy" the book: https://amzn.to/3XcwLfiChicago History Podcast Clothing, Mugs, Totes, & More (your purchase helps support the podcast):https://www.teepublic.com/user/chicago-history-podcasthttps://teespring.com/stores/chicago-history-podcastChicago History Podcast (chicagohistorypod@gmail.com):https://www.chicagohistorypod.comhttps://www.facebook.com/Chicago-History-Podcast-107482214277883https://twitter.com/chicago_podhttps://www.instagram.com/chicagohistorypod/Chicago History Podcast Art by John K. Schneider (angeleyesartjks AT gmail.com) and on https://www.instagram.com/angeleyesartjks/Music From This Episode Includes:Degenerate Blues by Alexander NakaradaLink: https://filmmusic.io/song/4781-degenerate-bluesLicense: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Slow Burn by Kevin MacLeodLink: https://filmmusic.io/song/4372-slow-burnLicense: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Nile's Blues by Kevin MacLeodLink: https://filmmusic.io/song/4134-nile-s-bluesLicense: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Cold Sober by Kevin MacLeodLink: https://filmmusic.io/song/3523-cold-soberLicense: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Support the show

What was the first skyscraper? Was it a building? Was it a particularly tall horse? Or just a regular-sized horse next to a very small man? Guest Victoria Bruick (Book Club with Julia and Victoria) joins the Buddies to talk about tall buildings, sinking structures, steal, stone, and Chicago... And so much more. Plus, we dive deep into the Mouthgarf Report and I See What You Did There.Check out Victoria's podcast: https://www.bookclubwithjv.com/Have a First for us? Perhaps a tall horse? Just wanna try to convince Kelly to play a video game? Email us at debutbuddies@gmail.comListen to Kelly and Chelsea's awesome horror movie podcast, Never Show the Monster.Get some sci-fi from Spaceboy Books.Get down with Michael J. O'Connor's music!Next time: the First Day of Summer

In this episode, Joel Cavaness expresses his love of the insurance industry, he describes it as cool, exciting, and fun. Sharing stories from insuring the King Tut exhibit, to the Sears Tower, and how insurers have to be creative. He also optimistically shares that there is nothing you can't insure.Support the show

EPISODE #899 9/11 STORIES Richard welcomes a retired American Airlines flight attendant who recounts her harrowing experiences working on 9/11 and reveals that there were more hijackers and more planes involved in the planned terror attack but that this was hidden from the pubic. She later learned that had her flight out of JFK had hijackers aboard and was intended to be flown into the Sears Tower in Chicago. GUEST: Carol Hellermann is a former American Airlines flight attendant who was was on a plane that terrorists were planning to crash into the Sears Tower in Chicago on 9/11, and is speaking out about how there were likely dozens more planes and targets than the FBI or anyone has ever admitted. If You're Interested in Interviewing Carol Hellerman Contact: Jesse Nash Brian Hyland Cricket Public Relations 212-363-0654 CPR@cricketpr.com nashjesse@gmail.com SUPPORT MY SPONSORS!!! COPY MY CRYPTO Discover how over 2,800 people - many of who know nothing about crypto or how to invest - are building rapid wealth the cabal can never steal. "You don't need to know a thing about cryptocurrency if you copy someone who does." Gain Access for just $1 CopyMyCrypto.com/Richard SUBSCRIBE TO STRANGE PLANET PREMIUM https://strangeplanet.supportingcast.fm Use the discount code "Planet" to receive one month off the first subscription. We and our partners use cookies to personalize your experience, to show you ads based on your interests, and for measurement and analytics purposes. By using our website and services, you agree to our use of cookies as described in our Cookie Policy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://strangeplanet.supportingcast.fm/

Carol Hellermann, A flight attendant aboard American Airlines Flight 1 – JFK to LAX, scheduled to depart at 9 am on 9/11. ” Hellermann says. “The government and the FBI know a lot more than they're admitting, and there are a lot of people who have said nothing over the past two decades.” She notes that the 585-page (DOJ/FBI) dossier, which is supposed to tell the whole story about 9/11, doesn't contain anywhere near all of the facts. Carol Hellermann request contact: Cricket Public Relations at CPR@cricketpr.com For example, it omits the fact that the FBI conducted a sting operation - of which she was unknowingly a part of - in the days after 9/11 – announcing three planes were being allowed to fly out of JFK to ports of exit from the country in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Miami. Something else that's never been talked about is how BADLY the flight staff – of all airlines – were treated on 9/11 and the days, months, and years afterward. Hundreds of attendants are affected, but most won't talk because they are still employed or taking a pension. First, in the FBI sting, flight attendants were put in danger without knowledge,” Hellermann recalls. “Then, we were sworn to secrecy under threat of termination if we told anyone what we saw on 9/11 or during the sting. Check out Carl Hellermann on Cricket: https://www.cricketpr.com- | CPR@cricketpr.com⁠ Please support the show. Sponsors: ➔Manscaped: Get 20% Off and Free Shipping with the code MSCSMEDIA at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Manscaped.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ : Hormone levels falling? Use MSCSMEDIA to get 25% off home test: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://trylgc.com/MSCSMEDIA ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Use Code MSCSMEDIA ➔ ZBiotics: 15% off on your first order with code: MSCSMEDIA  Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sponsr.is/zbiotics_mscsmedia  ➔Fiji: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Fijiwater.com/mscs⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ $5 off free shipping Unleash ➔Monster Energy:  ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.monsterenergy.com/us/mscs⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➔Aura: See if any of your passwords have been compromised.    Try 14 days for free: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://au⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ra.com/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠MSCS ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Thank you to Aura Fhp94gVGlEF8ScuRiAMY

It's a another Dolly story from her own An-DOLL-ogy (don't applaude that) with episode Two Doors Down from Heartstrings (2019).  The episode has more stories in it than the Sears Tower. Liz proposes her Dolly themed Lazer Tag, Dolly Proton. While Josh reminces about his fav childhood movie: An American Tail: Digby Goes West. Follow BDN on twitter, instagram or facebook @BloodyDateNight Donate to our patreon https://www.patreon.com/bloodydatenight

Anna Davlantes, WGN Radio's investigative correspondent, joins Bob Sirott to share what happened this week in Chicago history. Stories include the original Jerry Springer Show, the completion of the Sears Tower, and the “official” condemnation of ketchup on hotdogs by then President Obama.

National paranormal day. Pop culture from 1972. Sears Tower, 3rd largest city fire in US history in Jacksonville Florida, 1st Toll Bridge. Todays birthdays - Bing Crosby, George Gaynes, Ann B. Davis, Dave Dudley, James Brown, Frankie Valli, Christopher Cross, Eric Church. Jackie Cooper died.

Our longest episode ever! The boys share tuna steak with the amazing Chris Brown!Chris climbs the Sears Tower, RJ has fond memories of Morocco, Jimmy likes a good docuseries, and Johnny likes a little bit of cream. 

William Strange is a Professor of Economic Analysis and Policy at the Rotman School. William is former Editor of the Journal of Urban Economics (with Stuart Rosenthal), and he served in 2011 as President of the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association. He works in the areas of urban economics and real estate. His research is focused on agglomeration, industry clusters, labor market pooling, skills, private government, real estate development and real estate investment. In this episode we talked about: William's Background and how he got into Real Estate Rotman School Real Estate Program Paper Analysis of Skyscrapers Macroeconomic Outlook Urban Economics Resources Useful links: Book “Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier” by Edward Glaeser Book “The New Geography Of Jobs” by Enrico Moretti https://www.rotman.utoronto.ca/FacultyAndResearch/Faculty/FacultyBios/Strange.aspx Transcription: Jesse (0s): Welcome to the Working Capital Real Estate Podcast. My name's Jessica Galley, and on this show we discuss all things real estate with investors and experts in a variety of industries that impact real estate. Whether you're looking at your first investment or raising your first fund, join me and let's build that portfolio one square foot at a time. Ladies and gentlemen, my name's Jesse for Galley, and you're listening to Working Capital, the Real Estate Podcast. My guest today is William Strange. Will is a professor of economic analysis and policy at the Rotman School that's at the University of Toronto.   He's the former editor of the Journal of Urban Economics, and he served in 2011 as president of the American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association. He works in the area of urban economics and real estate. His research has focused on industry clusters, labor market, pooling skills, private government, real estate development, and real estate investment. Will, thanks for being here. How's it going?   William (58s): Thanks a lot for having me, Jesse. It's going great.   Jesse (1m 1s): Well, I appreciate you coming on. Like we said before the show, I thought there's a couple different areas of research that I thought we could jump into and, and I think the listeners would get a lot out of. But before we do that, why don't we kind of circle back to you in, in your current role at the University of Toronto and kind of what you're working on today, how did that all come to fruition? How did you get into, into this business of real estate?   William (1m 25s): Well, I got into real estate as an urban economist, so when I went to graduate school, my favorite undergraduate econ class was urban. I liked it because there are so many things going on in cities. Cities are just interesting organisms. And so I, I pursued a PhD at Princeton with Ed Mills, who is the father of the feet, modern field of urban economics. That ended up with me at U B C amongst the real estate folks. And I gradually came to understand just how interesting real estate is too, and just how much an urban economist will have to say about real estate, you know, both on the residential and commercial side.   I feel incredibly fortunate that I've lucked into a, a career as satisfying as this one has been.   Jesse (2m 8s): That's great. And the current role that you have at Rotman, so for people that aren't, aren't familiar, that's the, the business school at the University of Toronto. The, the teaching that you do there, is it predominantly undergrad is,   William (2m 21s): It's almost entirely MBA and PhD. I teach some vanilla economics, which I think is important too. Yeah. But, but we also teach a bunch of econ cla a bunch of real estate econ and real estate finance classes. One thing that I would say to your audience is I'm also the director of the Center of Real Estate at Rotman, and we periodically put on public events, we put on one on downtown recovery back in December that was addressing the different pace at which downtowns were repopulating as Covid fingers crossed, recedes.   And, and we were scheduled to do a housing market one with City Post in March, and we'll keep doing them as interesting policy issues emerge. We are, we, we welcome people from outside Rotman. Please come everybody.   Jesse (3m 12s): Yeah, that's great. The, and we want to jump into one of the papers that you did, you did regarding covid. Before we do that though, I'm curious, you know, people in our industry, when we think of schools that have a real estate program at the MBA or or higher level, you know, whether it's economics or finance or real estate, I think of, you know, Rotman, I think of Osgood. A lot of people have gone to Columbia and New York for their Ms. Red program. Has that, how long has that program been the real estate specific aspect of it? How long has that been something that has been at Rotman?   Because I, I feel like you guys were one of the first to actually have the, that specialization.   William (3m 48s): It's nice of you to say, but it was, it started building up when I came in 2001 and we've specifically p positioned ourselves to not duplicate other programs. Like I, I, I like the SCHOOK program very much, but there's no reason that we need to do something that's as specialized as their program is, given that they already have such a program that's, that's a good program. So what we have done is to set up a smaller real estate program. We have three electives of the 10 classes and MBA would take with the idea being that people in real estate benefit from taking things outside of real estate, you know, that a good real estate person needs to know about finance, a good real estate person needs to know about strategy and my various colleagues in Rotman can help in those ways very much.   Jesse (4m 33s): Yeah, no, that makes sense. So before we, we jumped on here, we, we talked about a paper that kind of pid my interest and it was just being in the commercial real estate world and it was a basically a, a paper analysis of skyscrapers. I thought before we jump into this Covid paper, we could talk a little bit about this, this paper that you did regarding skyscrapers.   William (4m 53s): The skyscraper paper is still pretty relevant. I mean, what it's motivated by is that we're living in a new era of skyscrapers that if you look at something online like the skyscraper page, you can see the big buildings that people are planning to build. The Empire State Building was the biggest building in the world for on the order of 40 years before the World Trade Center. It has since been sub topped by Burge Dubai. And there are other buildings that are, are also really large that are either recent or, or that are being planned.   The big question is, are these big buildings being built big because it's economical to do so? Or are they being built big for some other reason? You know, possibly ego reasons, possibly other stuff. And so we have analyzed skys, this is in my paper with Bob Helsley from UBC. In this paper we look at skyscrapers as a contest for who is the biggest, this, this is assuming that people want to be bigger than the other person. Let me give you a couple of historical examples of that.   I mean, people did look at whether h skyscrapers were economical in the 1930s after the big skyscraper wave of the twenties and thirties. That was mo allowed by things like structural steel and elevators. And we see there a lot of stuff that looks game theoretical. So one story is the story of the lower man of the Manhattan Company building, which is now Trump's lower Manhattan building. And, and, and the incredibly beautiful art deco Chrysler building.   And they were each built to be the biggest building in the world at the time. Manhattan Company building finishes first, so it has a ceiling on it, and they are very happy because the ceiling on the sky on the Chrysler Building is, is gonna be lower. So for some reason, the Chrysler building did not build an extra a hundred feet that would've made them bigger than the Manhattan Company building. And, and this has an added issue of personal interest, that the lead people on both of those projects hated each other. They used to be partners. There was a breakup of their partnership and, and not the owners of the buildings, but the architects despised each other.   Unbeknownst to the people who built the Manhattan Company Building with the Chrysler Tower, the most famous thing about it, if, if the readers Google it right now, you'll see it is the spire at the top. It was hidden inside the structure, so people didn't know what happened. And so they waited until the Manhattan Company building had reached its ceiling and then they raised like a giant middle finger, the spire of, of the Chrysler building, which made it an extra 50 feet taller than the Manhattan Company building. It's really hard to argue that there is some economic tenants paying rent sort of argument that would make you do something like that.   That's one example. Another example is the Empire State Building, which I mean we've all seen King Kong bu movies, so we know how the Empire State Building looks, but, but the, you may not know that the spire on top of the Empire State Building, which made it by a couple hundred feet bigger than the Chrysler Building when it was built, that was originally pretended to be a Zeppelin loading dock. So people would be taking international flights by blimp and, and on top of Manhattan where winds are pretty big, they, they would tie the Zeppelin on and then people would get off on on it.   No one ever did that. That was just totally a fiction to allow the building to be as big as it could possibly be. So in, in, in this paper, we look at that as what is called in game theory and all pay auction. That's an auction where you have to pay, even if you don't win in, in this case, you pay to build the building even if you don't win the race of having the very biggest building subsequent to our paper, which was theoretical. Others have looked in various ways for empirical evidence in the data, and there seems to be a lot of it around the moral of the story being some of these big buildings look like they should be built based on economics, or at least you can make a justification of building such a big building on economic grounds.   But there's a lot of evidence that people wanna build a little bit bigger than the other guy, even if it's not economical because of the prestige that seems to go with being the biggest building in a market or in the world or of a particular type. If you look online, you'll see all kinds of lists of, you know, biggest office building, biggest residential building, biggest building in Canada, biggest building in Toronto. It seems to be something that people do care about and not simply just the economics of, of building real estate space for tenants to use.   Jesse (9m 29s): Yeah, that's a fascinating story. I'm almost embarrassed to say I I had never heard of that. So they continued to build with regard to the Manhattan Chrysler, they continued to build hiding the spire within, within the   William (9m 41s): Envelope, within the structure because the seal structure, you know, you can have it own. And then they literally leveled it up. There's a, I forget who wrote it, but there was a book, there's a book on this whole episode, which I think is a fascinating story. Yeah.   Jesse (9m 51s): Oh, that's great. Yeah, that it's, it's interesting too, I'm reading a book right now that New Kings of New York by The Real Deal, and it talks about a lot about kind of the Trump era of New York when it was the, the basically push to build more and more price per square foot condos, high-end condos. And it was really almost a race of who could build the best, the the tallest. And it became a lot of, seemed to be a lot about ego rather than economics.   William (10m 16s): Yeah, I mean, I think ego matters in real estate. Look, I mean, I I'm just a professor, I just write papers. Somebody who actually builds tall buildings can, you know, look at this thing that they've built and I understand why people's personalities are invested in it and why, you know, they wanna build buildings that are deemed to be significant. I mean, for a long time the, the CN Tower was the biggest structure in the world, and people make a distinction between occupied buildings and unoccupied structures. And so, you know, clearly we in Toronto are, are not immune to building buildings for ego-based reasons.   Jesse (10m 51s): And it was there a distinction in your research between commercial skyscrapers as opposed to residential towers? Or, or was it,   William (10m 59s): I mean, the early ones were, were all commercial and, and well, I mean the Eiffel Tower shows people how structural steel lets you build stuff that's big and then the Woolworth building becomes the biggest building in the world. And then as supplanted, as I said a little while ago, briefly by the Manhattan Company building the, whatever the Trump building is in lower Manhattan and, and Chrysler, they were commercial. But now, now we see people building big residential buildings. I mean, it, it can be problematic. The, the, the former Sears Tower, and I'm having a brain cramp now about its current name, Willis Tower.   I believe it, it was renamed a while ago. It had a problem after its initial construction because it was big enough that the building swayed in the wind and, and this made people feel very uncomfortable. And so there was a period of time and it, it could continue. I'm not sure whether it is or the tallest, the, the, the highest suites in that building were used for storage because people didn't wanna be up there because it wiggled around too much. Yeah. And, and, and just made them uncomfortable for residential.   I mean, I don't know what your experience is, but I have a friend who was on the 40th floor of a Toronto building and which, you know, he thought was beautiful, gave him a view of the lake and so on and so forth. But during covid when you don't wanna be in the elevator with a lot of people or worse still, if the elevator is slower is not running, you know, 40 stories is a long ways to walk.   Jesse (12m 24s): Yeah, absolutely. Well the one with the Willis Towers kind of, that'd be Chicago too, so I I'm sure it, it, it'd get pretty windy up there. I think for us, if, if I'm not mistaken today, our first Canadian place, at least in the Toronto area.   William (12m 38s): Yeah. Ever since it's been built, that's been the biggest building in Canada and it's, it's of course commercial. Yeah. There are some things that I believe people are considering that might be bigger but haven't been built yet.   Jesse (12m 48s): So you, you mentioned something that you ask your class at Rotman question that I, right before we got on this call, I would, I would've failed and can pose the question to, to listeners that you normally ask your class at Rotman.   William (13m 2s): Well the, I mean, I I've said that this is an era of skyscraper construction and I've talked about the earlier one. And the question is what is it that it took for us to have skyscrapers? And it turns out there are two things that it took. It took structural steel and it took elevators. And before I ask the question, I can give you the elevator story because that is also one that's worth hearing. Sure. Elevators are old. They're like, they're like, Archimedes figured out how you could use pulleys to lift things. The problem with a, a classical elevator is if the cable was cut, the elevator would fall and whatever was on it, including humans would be destroyed.   And, and, and thus elevators were not used, you know, for large distances for human beings because it was just considered to be too dangerous. The name that most people will associate with elevators is Otis. And, and Otis went to the New York World's Fair in, I believe 1856, give or take two years. And he demonstrated his safety elevator. And the way he did it was he was pulled up in the elevator with a very sharp sword in his hand to about 40 feet with an audience watching him. And then he cut the cable above the, the rope that was on the elevator above himself and the audience went, Ooh, because the, they, they were sure that he was now going to fall to his death.   But the Otis elevator's innovation was, it didn't fall, it was a safety elevator and it had automatic brakes that would arrest it. Before that you wouldn't see apartment buildings that were any bigger than six stories. Cuz you know, six stories is a lot to walk up. You wouldn't wanna walk up 10. But now once you have elevators, vertical distance is not a barrier anymore. And that really changes the ability, the demand for big buildings on the supply side. This is my question, what was the biggest building in the world in 1850 around when the elevator was developed and before skyscrapers were, were started to be built?   So I'll leave leave you a minute to think about it. Look it up on Wikipedia or, or whatever the answer is that the biggest building in the world was the great pyramid from something like 1400 bc. Why is that worth mentioning? Because it's a masonry building and, and the key feature of masonry buildings is that the supporting walls on the lower floors have to get bigger and bigger as the building gets taller in or in order to bear the weight to say, to say nothing of earthquakes and other problems with masonry buildings, structural steel changes that structural steel lets you go up.   I mean it's, it's incredibly robust. We don't always use structural steel. Now the World Trade Center did not to, to its peril. It used much lighter framing. And that was one of the things that meant that the intense heat that the airplanes produced when they hit the building were able to bring it down. That's a worthwhile story to to point out because the Empire State Building was also hit by an airplane during World War ii, which people might not know about because the Empire State Building is still there. Yeah. It was foggy and a, a World War II bomber crashed into it, but because it was structural steel, it basically bounced off.   I mean, it was, was not good for the airplane and not good for the pilots, but it, it survived. But we've learned cheaper ways to build buildings subsequent to that without structural steel. And that seems to be one of the factors that's responsible for the skyscraper wave that we have seen in, in recent years with Birds Dubai. Now the tallest building in the world for a while, Taipei 1 0 1 was, was the biggest building in the world. You have very tall buildings being built in, in many Chinese cities, especially Shanghai.   People are building big buildings, you know, and, and part of it is the strategic thing that we talked about a minute ago in the case of Taiwan. I mean, if you read about that building, it's clear that this was a matter of great national pride. And so the Chinese were building it to make Taipei obvious as an important business city and to make, to make Taiwan an an important place. The same sort of thing in places like Birds Dubai, I mean, what will be the financial center in the Middle East, it's, it's not obvious what it would be having big buildings, you know, they're hoping that if they build it, people will come.   Jesse (17m 10s): Hmm. Yeah. That's fascinating. Well it was good to, good to jump on that cuz that paper I saw that the title and I was like, well it's got economics, it's got skyscrapers. So just being from the commercial real estate side of things, I thought it'd be something listeners get some value out of. Well, I   William (17m 24s): Mean, so for, for your readers who are in the industry, I mean, it's a valid question for folks to ask. Do the economics justify such big buildings? I mean, in, in a lot of cases they do. People were convinced that the, say the Empire State Building did, of course the Great Depression happened begin after the Empire State Building was started and before it was finished. And so the Empire State Building was financially rather a disaster. It was called the Empty State building for about the first 10 years because they had so much trouble tenanting it up.   And so this is something that market participants should ask themselves. Does the market support a big building or is there something else that's going on with the building's size?   Jesse (18m 2s): Yeah, well we're certainly going through a, you know, a different version of that in terms of some of the construction or or over construction in some of our major cities. And just trying to see if the, if the lease ups will, will actually, if the absorption will be able to fill those buildings.   William (18m 18s): Right. I mean, we had buildings that were designed pre covid and that came on the market in 2022 and are partly responsible for the slow absorption that we've seen in recent years. I mean that's a, a very valid point. I mean, a lot of my other research has dealt with the fundamentals of why people want to concentrate spatially. Hmm. So, I mean, in Canada, a huge amount of our population is in the three cities of Vancouver, Montreal and, and Toronto. Yeah. In, in the case of the US when people use satellite data to look at how much of the country is actually occupied.   So you're looking at data that reflects down on the land and the satellite can tell you, is this dirt or is this concrete? The US is a big country, 2% of it is developed. I suspect the number would be even smaller in Canada. But I haven't seen somebody use satellites to do that. So we have this situation when Toronto and Vancouver at least are incredibly expensive when households say that affordability is the biggest issue that they face economically, not just real estate, it's the biggest issue that they face.   And yet everybody keeps piling into Toronto no matter how expensive it is. And thus prices continue to go up and up. I mean, I think one of the silver linings we may see from Covid is, is that through Covid we have learned that remote work is possible, can't do everything remotely that you can do in person, but you can do a lot. And that to the extent that Covid allows people to do things remotely, you know, either at different places in the same city or even in different in in, in different cities completely.   That may make it less essential for everybody to be down at bay in Adelaide, you know, paying the high rents that people pay down there and thus paying the high housing prices that you have to pay to be close to bay in Adelaide for your job as an investment banker, you know, this is a possibility to un unlock value for folks by freeing them from the Toronto housing price death spiral that people have been dealing with for so many years.   Jesse (20m 19s): Yeah. And we're, and we're dealing with, so we have 84 offices predominantly in, in North America, but we are a global company. And it's one thing where you are taking a b class or a suburban office and converting it to industrial or residential. It's, it's another thing to have these massive towers in cities and just trying to figure out how we repurpose the space, whether, you know, and   William (20m 39s): People are sure talking about that and there's, there's certainly fortunes to be made in people who feel how to figure out how to do it. Right. But I mean, what I'm hearing, and I'm, I'm nobody's architect, but what, what I'm hearing is the challenge of the seven and a half foot ceilings that you might see in an office in a residential setting are really problematic. And you can make a lot of internal changes in the building, but dealing with the floors is, is hard.   Jesse (21m 1s): Yeah, absolutely. And I think some of what you just mentioned here touched on, I noticed another paper on, on your, on your link on U F T or on Rotman's website was entrepreneurship in cities. And, and I imagine that kind of ties into what you're, what you're talking about here, it's that question of why do we congregate in these   William (21m 18s): Metropolis that, that there's something in downtown Toronto that people are willing to pay for. The market tells us that this is valuable. Both the housing market and the commercial real estate market say that Toronto's expensive people aren't throwing away the money for no reason they're paying it because it's a good, good value. As expensive as it might be. I mean, I like my job in Toronto, thus I'm willing to pay a whole bunch of money for a house here cuz I have to live here in or in order to be able to teach in, in, in the Rotmans school. So that, and a whole bunch of other things.   But, but ever since the dawn of the internet, some people have been arguing that distance is dead. And and I think that's wrong. Distance isn't dead. Maybe it smells funny, but it isn't dead yet. And in, in thinking about Covid, there was a New York Times op-ed that Jerry Seinfeld wrote titled New York City Is Not Dead. He wrote this in response to a friend of his, a fellow who owned a comedy club arguing that New York City was dead. And in this case, I'm happy to say that I agree with Jerry that that places like New York and Toronto are for sure challenged by, by things that happen associated with C O V D.   You know, two years ago what we were worried about is making each other sick. We are less worried about that as the disease has become less virulent as we and as we become vaccinated. But you know, hopefully, you know, COVID is killing 500 Americans a day. I don't know how many Canadians it's killed killing a day. Are we are much healthier than America is in that particular regard. But in, in addition to that being a challenge for folks, the working from home phenomenon is almost certainly here to stay.   It's just incredibly valuable for people to stay home and write reports for a day instead of fighting traffic to drive 45 that's from North York downtown, and then do the same thing again in the afternoon. So anyway, Jerry's friend wrote an article saying New York was dead. You know, that that that the value of being close to other people was, was really being challenged. Seinfeld said, no, it wasn't. We did some work using contemporaneous data. So the only time in my life I've used absolutely fresh data off the process and I I now have more patience with other professionals who use that, who use that kind of data.   It's just a lot harder to do stuff with that. And we looked at something called the commercial rent gradient. So the commercial rent gradient is telling you how much rents are declining as you, you're moving away from, from the city center. And so, so in Toronto, rents are highest in the city center. They go down as they move away, they rise in suburban sub-centers. We were not able to get good Toronto data to do these calculations here, but we did do it in cities that are like Toronto in the us like New York and Toronto and in and in cities like that, the gradient might be 6%.   So my, my co-authors were American, so they made me do this with miles, but the result was rents are declining by roughly 6% a mile as you move away from the center of activity in the city. If, if the big cities are dead, you know, given the long term nature of commercial leases, we should see people demanding large discounts when they're signing up in the downtown or, or close to the downtown, not paying the premiums they previously paid with the onset of covid and work from home and stuff like that.   What we found was a little of that, but not a lot of it. What we found was that the gradient went down by about a sixth. It went down from about 6% to about 5%, but it's still a gradient. People are still signing leases in 2021 to pay a big premium to be downtown, which is suggesting that, you know, as mu as much fun as Zoom can be and as productive as Zoom can be, it's not the same thing as sitting next to the other person and, and hearing them talk with their clients and realizing there's some synergy with what you're after and what they're after, which is the kind of thing that people are paying big dollars to locate downtown and getting.   So our answer is so far the downtown is less attractive, but is still attractive in, in core dominated cities like Toronto. Now can I tell you that it's gonna be that way five years from now? Of course I can't And and we do promise I'm saying this to someone who will broadcast it. So I guess this promise has some credibility. We promise that once, I mean our intention was once Covid is behind us, do this again. We are realizing that Covid will not be behind us and we'll have to pick another time to do it again and see what the evolution of this is.   But thus far we're still seeing people attracted to large cities. One scenario would be that this is a continuation of a phenomenon that Toronto saw in the late eighties and the nineties when back office stuff got moved out of Toronto to Mississauga and then later to places that are farther away than Mississauga. You know, people thought, oh no, the downtown's going away. No. What we were doing was we were keeping only the people downtown who really need to be there, the people who really need to be there to interact with other folks, you know, that that's what really matters and not the fact that the physical files are located in the building there.   Yeah. So this may be the same kind of thing where downtown Toronto just becomes more and more rarefied. Yeah. You know, that the investment bankers stay there, but maybe not the middle managers now that, that that is a social issue that we have to engage with, you know, if Toronto just becomes a city of investment bankers and Uber drivers. Yeah. You know, which is sort of the story that I'm telling you. Yeah. But at least that evidence and that theory points us in the direction of that being someplace we could end up.   Jesse (27m 4s): Yeah, no, for sure. And I think for the, you know, kind of the anecdotal side of things, what we see on the street is we see leases being signed. We see that there is a bit of a spread between the bid ask, but it, but it's not at the discount, which we, you know, I have clients they call me and Yeah, especially in the middle, at the beginning and in the middle of Covid, they're expecting these 20%, 30% discounts, you know, on pricing and for leasing and they just weren't happening. Landlords were providing inducements, whether it was free rent allowances. But even today, we, we still see these leases being signed and if anything, the trend that I've seen with most of the clients in the downtown areas, whether it's New York, Boston, Toronto, is that there's a, you know, the term flight to quality gets thrown around a lot.   We're seeing a lot more of that. And we're seeing, I agree completely, we're seeing even four years ago where a startup might want to be in a trendy area in, in the periphery of Toronto or of New York, and we're starting to see more of them have transit as a component. Not that it wasn't important before, but it's, we're seeing that almost pretty much at the top of the list for these, for these tenants.   William (28m 5s): Yep. Transit matters and, and the businesses are deciding they wanna be where the accountants and the business lawyers and the, the bankers are, you know, because they need to interact with them all the time. So I mean, the flight quality, I've heard noises in that direction also that what we would see would be, look, people have been talking about the retail apocalypse for years about online shopping, cannibalizing brick and mortar retailing. Now, did that kill the Eaton Center? It didn't because the Eaton center's in a market position where people are still willing to go there, but it's gonna kill someone.   I've got,   Jesse (28m 37s): I've gotta go there today. There's   William (28m 39s): Good for you. I'm glad one of my predictions ends up being true. Yeah. But, but credit old, old, old fashioned malls, they're getting torn down and, and getting replaced with something different. And I think we could imagine that being something that would happen too. I mean, just something that the audience should think about more generally is that the way the downtown has been for the last 10 years is different than it was 30 years ago, you know, when you had back offices there and it's way different than it was a hundred years ago when there was still a lot of manufacturing activity in the downtown, taking advantage of the proximity to the lake and to shipping and stuff like that.   And so the notion that the downtown should be frozen in Amber as of 2000 or something like that is crazy. It's never been that way. It's gonna change as business changes. And that's a good thing. I mean, that's, that's a way that the ability of Toronto to deliver good, good jobs and high value business outcomes is crucial for all of Canada. And, you know, anything that we can do to make Toronto a better competitor to New York, Boston, and San Francisco very much, much serves Canada's interests.   Jesse (29m 42s): Absolutely. So I wanna be mindful of the time here, will, but I do wanna get to your, your paper, your, I I'm not sure if it's your most recent paper, the one on Covid, but maybe you could give us the   William (29m 54s): Covid one was the one I just talked about a second   Jesse (29m 56s): Ago. Okay. So, so in, in, so what, what was the ultimate thesis of that? Was it this, this divide that we're seeing as, I would say even kind of an inequality of a potential outcome of having downtown cores be predominantly bankers? Or was that, was that the, the other paper,   William (30m 13s): The focus was on whether downtown would still be as important as it used to be. And we looked at, I, I left out some of the results. The, in addition to looking at core dominated cities like Toronto, we also looked at much more spread out car oriented cities like LA and Dallas and stuff like that. And the pattern in, in those places was different. In those cases, the gradient was already smaller. It was, you know, two or 2% rather than the 6%. And it didn't change a lot after Covid, you know, because la the downtown is, is different than the rest of the city.   But LA is not a downtown dominated city the way that Toronto is at all. And Covid didn't affect those. We looked at some parallel results that weren't as parametric, if you'll forgive my geekiness, the gradient puts an exponential functional form to get a percentage decline from the downtown. But look, I mean, how, how are we to think about sub-centers in North York and Mississauga and Markham and places like that in, in, in relative to having one downtown at Bay and Adelaide.   So we also looked at the premium that tenants pay to be in a high density environment. So that's a, a more flexible, functional form. We basically got the same results, which is the value of density does get smaller just like the gradient gets smaller. But it by no means goes all the way to zero. Cities aren't dead yet. Now the changes are just starting and things may change a lot. We may finally, eventually end up in a circumstance where distance really is dead the way people have been saying it would be since the early nineties.   But we're certainly not seeing it yet. And, you know, looking at real estate markets is one way to understand that, you know, because people put it, put their, you know, people can talk about distance being dead, but that's just talk, I mean a tenant paying, putting down a guarantee on, on real estate lease that's putting their money where their mouths are and how much money they're willing to pay for the downtown versus someplace extra or for a dense non downtown location like Mississauga Center of Mississauga relative to somewhere more peripheral.   You know, what we're seeing is people are still willing to pay premiums for those things. This could change, but it did not change in the early years of covid. And you're telling me that your sources say that it's not changing right now yet either. So I think that's where we are as of this minute. Will it change, you know, who knows?   Jesse (32m 39s): Yeah, it's a very, it's kind of a fascinating time in the sense that it's, it's hard to get data points when we're, you know, fingers crossed coming out of Covid, but potentially entering a recessionary environment. So it's, you know, we're, we're positive in one, but then we're drawn back in another. And I'd be re remiss if I didn't ask, if I was speaking to economists and didn't ask a little bit about the kind of macroeconomic environment.   William (33m 2s): I'm not a macro economist, so I'll probably avoid, but by all means you can ask.   Jesse (33m 6s): But, but yeah, I mean, how do you see this? Or if you do at all as a, as a comparison to oh eight or oh one or the early nineties and, and, you know, we, we come out of something that was extraordinary, the pandemic, but now we're entering inflation numbers that we haven't seen in, in years.   William (33m 26s): I, I think it, it, it is absolutely to be worried about because inflation, as, as economists who know more about the stuff than I do have always said it, it reduces the information, content and prices reduces the incentives that price systems have. So it just makes capitalism work less well than it would have previously. So it's certainly a risk. I will say that the government's decision to stimulate the economy during covid kept us from having a recession. I, I mean, I don't know if you recall, but in May of 2020, the C M H C who know a lot about housing more, more than I know about housing, they, their projection said that they predicted housing prices would fall.   I think the number was 18% in, in the preferred model that they offered. Now, I didn't have a model, but that was my inclination also, and also my inclination of the colleagues that, you know, housing is a normal good. People buy more of it when they're rich and, and there, there it seemed closing people out of their workplaces is surely recessionary. So I I I told my neighbor who I like and respect, you know, I I think you should, if you're thinking about selling your house the next few years are, are problematic. I, I was wrong.   I mean, the PR prices went up by more than 30% in Toronto. Quality adjusted during that, you know, in, in part because the government tried to keep people from being killed. But now they've spent huge amounts of money and they can't spend like that forever. And economies don't stay in boom, forever, ever either. So there, you know, there there is uncertainty and, and there is risk.   Jesse (34m 60s): Yeah. Well, I guess, we'll nobody has a crystal ball here for this next year.   William (35m 4s): Especially not Microeconomists and, and people who spent a lot of their careers doing theorists doing   Jesse (35m 9s): Theater. No, I, I, I wouldn't I once sell yourself short. I feel like a lot of the insights come from, from the micro and, and get extrapolated. Well,   William (35m 16s): I, I, unlike micro, I just believe in, I mean, economist, I believe in the division of labor and there are other people who know more about macro than I do.   Jesse (35m 23s): Yeah. So Will, we're, we're gonna wrap up here. What I'd like to do is, first of all, for those that want to kind of learn more on, you know, urban, urban economics, urban planning seems to be a, a passion of yours. But just generally speaking, are there books or resources that you've used in the past that you think would be good recommendations for listeners if this is something they're interested   William (35m 43s): In? Yeah, there, there are a couple of them. And, and I'm, I'm giving you civilian friendly books Okay. That you could read to pass the time on an airplane and not, not a boring textbook. The two examples that come to mind immediately are a book called Triumph of the City by a guy at Harvard called Ed Glazer and another book called New Economic Geography by a guy at Berkeley called Enrico Moretti. They are both lucid explanations of the kinds of forces that we've been talking about. Now both of them are a little less real estate than our discussion has been, but they are about forces that feed into real estate markets.   I mean, someone who's a market participant has to be asking themselves why are people paying the premiums for the downtown? Will they continue to pay the premiums from the downtown? And, and if not, how can I trade on that perce perception? I mean, because there are clearly gonna be places where people who get priced out by Toronto go and those real estate markets are gon are, are, are going to be booms. I mean, I don't think people are gonna go to Vancouver to be cheap, although maybe they will go to Vancouver for warmer winter weather.   A question that I think is, is unsettled as of this moment is, do people who get priced out of Toronto go to someplace close to Toronto like Hamilton? You know, so you can drive in for a Wednesday meeting, but it's cheaper than Toronto is, or do you go somewhere or do you go to someplace like Montreal that is farther but is cheap for a big city? Or do you think about somewhere that's even farther still and, and, and cheaper still like Halifax. I mean the Maritimes are wonderful place a whole lot cheaper than Toronto.   And if a huge amount of your work is Zoom meetings, you know, for some people that location is, is gonna be the more economical place to   Jesse (37m 25s): Be. Yeah, that's, that's interesting. So I've, I've read Ed Glazer's book, I've, I have not read the New Economic Geography. So that definitely put on the reading list for those. Just interested in, in kind of your research will or the Rotman program in general, what, what's the best place to send? And we'll put a link in the show notes.   William (37m 46s): I mean, look, people can email me and I will either respond or not, depending on how many thousands of emails that I get. I mean, for admission to the programs, you know, we are recruiting students every year. I think our, our MBA program is fantastic. We have programs that work at the full-time level and get done faster, but we also have part-time programs that get done that, that work better for professionals. And I actually think there's a, the case for the part-time programs have become stronger in recent years because there's gonna be a lot more times when somebody can meet a professor in office hours on Zoom rather than having to schlep up to the Rotman school af after work.   But, but also we, we have these public events and googling Rotman events. I, I don't know what the le the link would be, but Googling Rotman events is gonna put you in touch with real estate things. But a lot of other things would be useful and we, we try to be good citizens. We're physically close to the center of business in Canada. It's what five subway stops or so to get up here. You know, we want people in the building and now that the building is open, I think people would find it a good use of their time to show up for some of the things that happen here.   I would also give a shout out to the New School of Cities that was formed separately of us at the University of Toronto. This attempts to include the stuff from my world on econ and real estate, but also architects and planning and things like that that also relate to cities. It is the first of its kind in the world, has a fantastic director and I think we'll do very cool things in time.   Jesse (39m 21s): My guest today has been Will Strange, will, thanks for being part of Working Capital.   William (39m 25s): Thank you very much.   Jesse (39m 36s): You so much for listening to Working Capital, the Real Estate podcast. I'm your host, Jesse for Galley. If you like the episode, head on to iTunes and leave us a five star review and share on social media. It really helps us out. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me on Instagram. Jesse for galley, F R A G A L E. Have a good one. Take care.

This week we're exploring the fascinating and controversial topic of flat earth theory....again. This ancient belief, once relegated to the fringes of society, has seen a resurgence in recent years thanks to the power of the internet and social media. On this episode, we'll take a deep dive into the history of the flat earth movement and examine the arguments made by its supporters.  We'll explore the evidence (or lack thereof) supporting the idea that the earth is not a globe, but rather a flat, disc-shaped plane. Whether you're a believer or a skeptic, you won't want to miss this revisit. Join us as we challenge our assumptions about the world around us and explore the flat earth phenomenon. Did we change our minds? *Intro sound clip features comedian Dan Cummins If you have any questions or topics you'd like to see the society cover, please reach out at Contact@hushhushsociety.com   You can find all our audio, blogs and drop sweet ratings at www.hushhushsociety.com Find our Video Content on our Rokfin Leave us a review on Apple, our website, Podchaser or GoodPods You can grab Hush Hush merch and help support the show on Patreon Link up with the society on social media:   Facebook   Instagram   Twitter    Join our Discord and chat with us   TRANSCRIPT Flat Earth 2   [00:01:00]  Dave: Greetings, Hushlings. Welcome back to the Hush Hush Society Conspiracy Hour. Mike: Where we journey into the world of conspiratorial mysteries and dark truths Dave: I'm Declassified Dave Mike: and I'm Mystery Mike and as though is we're joined by our fellow globetard Slick Fronk Sanders. Fronk: The Earth is probably round how you doing? Dave: it's going. Are things going around today? Mike: Quick question flat Earthers. How do boomerangs work on your flat plane? Fronk: Boomerangs are flat.  Dave: that got him. If you didn't notice today, we returned to the great debate in this episode. Is the Earth round? Is the Earth flat? Fronk: Hushling's, uh, in case you weren't [00:02:00] aware, we visited this topic in season three and completely shat all over the flat plane and we believe we should revisit this mother of all modern conspiracies, seeing as though it's such a big part of conspiracy culture. Dave: it's getting even bigger, even though you guys probably most definitely are gonna take a second dumping in this one. Mike: not as bad as the first. Dave: Not  Fronk: Yeah. We'll see. We'll see. Mike: we've discussed how there are different phases to being a flat earther. I'm guess I'm still in stage zero and we were in stage one in May of 2021. let's go up around to stage two But before we search for the horizon and fall off the flat plane and search for God in the sky under the spotlight sun, you can always find us on our social medias, Facebook, [00:03:00] Instagram, and Twitter Dave: You can also find everything hush hush society on our website, www.hushhushsociety.com. From episodes to links to merchandise, and the ability to drop a review or leave us a voicemail. We hope we get some after this episode. Mike: Hmm. Please do. Dave: Yeah. Fronk: And we keep mentioning that we are now also a video podcast. You can not only. To us, but you can watch us, you can see our faces. You can get that expressional action that you might not get from just an audio recording. And to find those episodes, you just gotta go to Rock Fin. It's, it's very simple. Rock fin.com. There's even an app. And in the search bar you just put in Hush Hush Society. You'll find us nice and easy. And there you can find all of our videos. you hit the notification button. You get notifications when our videos come out. Check it out. Mike: And just one last thing before we move on to the flat plane, we just [00:04:00] want to give a quick shout out to our newest patron, Gabrielle May. Thank you so much. We appreciate you. Fronk: Just in case you're new to this, we're gonna do a quick little recap for you on what Flat Earth theory is, and essentially, in a nutshell, the earth is flat rather than round. Pretty self explanatory, although it's made its appearance throughout history. The theory gained popularity around 2009 and has continued to grow ever since. Dave: It is regarded as one of the most controversial conspiracy theories in existence. Why claim that our earth is flat and not a globe easy? That's because it looks flat and feels flat and is surrounded by 200 feet of ice blocking us from traversing across an infinite plane or falling off the edge. Sounds correct, right? Fronk: I mean, yeah, that's what I've been made to believe. That's that's what it seems like Mike: Yeah. Riding on the back of a turtle through the cosmos, but the cosmos [00:05:00] doesn't exist, so where's the turtle going? Anyways,  according to believers, NASA and the ruling elite protect the ice walls from people attempting to climb over and fall from the disc. Can't make it up. They also believe that earth's gravity is an illusion, and that objects are driven up by a mysterious force called dark energy, rather than spinning and being stuck to a surface, Fronk: But on the other hand, there are countless photographs, videos, and images from astronauts and the International Space Station that kind of seem like evidence to show that the Earth is round. But these are not considered real evidence and are allegedly faked by the government or the ruling elites Dave: Now before we move on, flat, earthers already pissed off at our description in the beginning, Fronk: probably. Dave: we wanted to pull you in, but we'll make it as [00:06:00] fair as possible with some of the talking points that we're going to go over.  Now, Hushlings, there is the flat Earth Society as well as thousands of others from around the globe in groups. In addition to independent researchers, even though there is evidence to contradict some of these arguments, they are dismissed as fabrications of around earth conspiracy, along with stars, planets, galaxies, space, and gravity, all being a part of the facade of where we live. Mike: That is my biggest thing when it comes down to a debate between a flat earth and someone who believes that we live on a globe, is that it always results. In a flat earth are saying, well, that's what you've been told. You've been lied to. You're believing a lie that's being told to you, which is the old faithful of all conspiracy theorists, is that you're being lied to. That's all well and good, but at what point do you turn around and say, the [00:07:00] science is being lied to you. Nasa, we know lies to us. We know they fabricate images. We know what they do. But again, that's more of an argument that NASA is filled with bunch of liars. But at what point do you look at it maybe there is evidence that it's a globe or maybe there is evidence that it's a flat plane. There has to be a certain cutoff point where you stop saying, well, you're being lied to. That's what they want you to believe. That's what they're fabricating the science. They're fabricating this. They're fabricating that. How, and this has always been my issue, how do you talk to a flat earth and say, what piece of evidence would it take for you to say that it's a globe Dave: Pictures. Mike: pictures? , but then you show them a picture of this is what our earth looks like. It's a globe. Or you show them video or you show them anything. Well, that's been fabricated. It's always like this deniability to go against what they believe in. Like you, you have to deny [00:08:00] it. You have to deny it because it shakes the entire foundation of what their belief system is, especially when it comes to a flat earth. But then they always revert back to, that's what the Bible says. That's what the Bible says. I'm sorry, we, we've been over the Bible many times. We all know that it's been changed a thousand times and it's a book.  Fronk: not only that, but that's what they're making the Bible say. That's what certain people are interpreting the bible to say, and you can make the Bible say a lot of different things depending on how you decide to interpret it as a person. And if you're interpreting it as, they're telling me about the flat earth and so be it, Dave: This episode is gonna focus a little bit more heavily on some of the things that Mike and Fronk just mentioned, talking about NASA and the why would they lie and why would they fake and indoctrinated us as kids to believe that it's a ball. , and these are major [00:09:00] talking points that I've learned over the last year and a half since we've done this, other than just the physical evidence. We have the physical evidence if you're going to go by the, mainstream. we'll go through a bunch of stuff. I think we'll talk about religion too. So Mike, save those nails, buddy. Mike: We'll look into some of what we just listed and more throughout this episode, and it strongly suggested you listen to our first crack at this crust to understand where some of the historical beliefs come from and a lot of other things about this theory, mainly the science. But let's give this another oscillation, shall we? We're gonna literally hit some of the proposed theories and then firmly spit some facts. be prepared to, uh, confirm or deny your belief. Fronk: Before we completely dive into the flat plane, we're gonna talk about the planet as we've been taught in a traditional sense. Our Native [00:10:00] Earth is a terrestrial rocky planet, correct? Yes or no? I mean, whether it's flat around truth,  It has a dynamic and active surface with mountains, valley, canyons, you name it. All the different geographical structures and a variety of other features. It has water covering 70% of its surface, as well as harboring thousands of life forms, and it has a unique orbiting satellite arm. Dave: it has a circumference. Remember this number Hushlings 24,901 miles. And it shares our solar system with eight, sorry, Pluto, eight other planets and is rotating at around thousand miles an hour while orbiting our home star. Now this is where flat Earthers start to deny our existence on a spinning ball. we're orbiting around our sun at 67,000 miles an hour, all while zipping around the center of the Milky Way, roughly at [00:11:00] around 490,000 miles an hour. And the biggest claim, you can't feel it.   Mike: Well, that's just what we're taught in school. Unfortunately, most of us didn't escape the clutches of the Rockefeller Education System. There's that name again. Yep. He created the General Education Board in 1902 at the cost of 129 million. It's a lot of money back in 1902. It's a lot of money today and provided major funding for schools across the nation and was very influential in shaping the school system. Also, he's quoted as saying, I don't want a nation of thinkers. I want a nation of workers. Sounds like my pause. Fronk: And that speaks some deep truth because school does indoctrinate the nation into the trap of society. Once you hit like 10th grade, you're already filling out college applications, colleges that you're gonna be in debt to for the rest of your life, that you're gonna have to work for the majority of [00:12:00] your life to pay off for that job that you'll be working for the rest of your life. And it's this endless cycle. So that's definitely perpetuated by some global elitist. I get that to an extent, maybe the indoctrination portion of it. Dave: Well, from the beginning. Which classroom have you ever been in that didn't have a globe?    Fronk: In 1928, John D Rockefeller Jr. Financed an expedition to the South Pole as a British secret service. Agent Rockefeller knew perfectly that no South Pole existed, but people were curious about the true shape of the world. From 1956 onward, Antarctica was completely controlled by the Pentagon. Hence the Antarctic Treaty. And anybody visiting this chunk of land without permission was shot on site. Admiral by who we've talked about extensively, died mysteriously in 1957 and perhaps had a timely demise before he could tell the truth about what the South Pole. Mike: When it comes to the[00:13:00] Antarctic treaty and being shot on sight, who is shooting these people on sight? Fronk: Snow snipers. Those drones from Star Wars that landed on Hoth Mike: , that's a lot of land to patrol in order to watch for people.  Dave: remember. Antarctica is 5.2 million square miles as well. Mike: That's what doesn't make sense to me. You're gonna be shot on sight and that's another part of the Antarctic treaty that I also don't understand. Who is physically stopping you from going there? The only thing that's physically stopping you from going to Antarctica is it costs a lot of money. To either charter a boat that would go there. most people don't go there. Most charter boats don't go there. You could do a flyover, but that's only partial. Who is physically stopping you besides your bank account? Dave: I did see a video recently of some guys on a boat that were stopped. I think they were stopped by the New Zealand Navy [00:14:00] or the Australian Navy, and they were turning him around and you can see like. Ice in the distance or something like that. And I don't know if there was just like an iceberg that was out there that they were near, but the allegations on TikTok was got turned around at the bottom of the world, cause I believe it's, there's some degree, and I'm gonna sound uneducated saying this, but I don't know the degree, I think, but there's some degree at the bottom of the world. That you can't go. But the Antarctic treaty, it contradicts itself because the Antarctic treaty was supposed to be a demilitarized zone. No military stuff. No commercial, nothing. It was supposed to be strictly for research. Fronk: So why is the Navy there? Of who? New Zealand? Dave: It was either New Zealand or Australia Fronk: So what is the New Zealand or Australian Navy doing there? Dave: Well, they're close to Antarctica Fronk: Yeah, but isn't a non-military zone. Dave: But there's only military scientists maybe not all military scientists. You got like, Noah [00:15:00] scientists and stuff, and I'm sure NASA is down there, the Nazis, they're all down there. You know, you  got everybody. Antarctica looks like a continent to me, and there's a lot of pictures of it. And are they fake? I am. I'm not on the plane, so I don't know. . Why would it matter and why would they lie? The largest argument of why these elites would lie to us is most likely there's more land, more resources, maybe even unlimited resource. And lands beyond the ice shelf or walls, as well as the suppression of how powerful of beings we are, which can kind of be a different argument that has nothing to do with flat earth as well. thoughts on that? Fronk: I could get behind both of those points to an extent in the shoes of a flat Earth, for example. Yes. If you told me that there was unlimited resources, we're talking oil, we're talking the purest water in the world. We're talking minerals that are used to power the world's [00:16:00] electronics, whatever, energy generating methods that we might have unlimited supply of that which would completely destroy not only the US dollar, but the world economy, which is what the alleged elites thrive off of. And if it's not money that they thrive off of it is leaching our fucking energy. And we've talked about that a lot. And if we were to unlock some sort of crazy. Secret about ourselves or humanity as a whole. That might be incredibly enlightening to a lot of people or disturbing. I could see it going either way, but if, if a bunch of people woke up and they were incredibly enlightened, that could be bad for the reptilian negative energy blood suckers. Dave: I don't think it would go well for anybody. I think we always do ask this question a lot when we talk about this as is, would it change our everyday lives? And we usually say no, but it would, because we [00:17:00] probably have a massive economic shutdown. religions would collapse. There'd probably be some type of total anarchy that would happen and then we'd have our own epiphanies of being like, not really upset that I was wrong, but shit I was lied to as well, part of the Doy group. And that would be a shitty day. would it end everything for me? No, it would change everything for sure. But I think the unlimited resources part, I could see somebody hiding that, , we did talk about Admiral Byrd and Admiral Byrd went through, supposedly into the hollow earth, could he have misinterpreted and gone through a crack and found more land. Who knows? In the writing The Iron Republic, written by EW Barrington and published also in 1902, another one of that year with the education system. It was published in Florida Magazine, and it said that an explorer went through a crack in the ice walls and found an advanced civilization after being lost for over a month at sea. So that [00:18:00] means he went through the ice walls and there was more ocean,  Mike: Have there ever been any, any pictures or video of the ice wall or beyond it? Fronk: Uh, people take pictures of. Ice shelves and try to say that they're the ice walls, but at the same time, those could very well just be ice shelves or very large icebergs Mike: Makes sense. Makes sense.  Dave: I wanna see a flight going around the whole whatever, 76,000 miles it's supposed to actually be. Just banking around the whole rim. But you can't go there because the military will shoot you down in a de militarized. Mike: I still think that there's plenty of ways to get there. And we talked, who do we talk with? That had went to Antarctica? Was it Mark Fronk: on a cruise with like their father. Yeah. Mark O'Connell. Yeah. Dave: Yep. Mike: O'Connell said that , he went to Antarctica with his family. Dave: San Diego Padre's pitcher's there right now.  Fronk: Yeah, but he, he also mentioned that it was like the only [00:19:00] part of Antarctica that they'll let a civilian on and it's like this tiny little peninsula and they've got the little, novelty pole.  Like you could go up and touch it and take a picture with it. Yeah. And they got little stuff, penguins and shit. Dave: could it just be a simple explanation why we don't bring people there? One, you'll die  Fronk: , yes, it's very extreme terrain, there's tons of extreme terrain that we're allowed to go to that you would probably die in if you weren't very well equipped. Mike: Yeah, it makes sense that the only reason that they would be stopping people from going there, besides the massive, endless amounts of resources that they're hoarding from us, would be that they just don't want people going out there and fucking dying.  This brings up another allegation that even the word extraterrestrial means extra terra or more land. Trying to hold some weight to the notion this has been taught to us. We see in the film The Next Level by David Weiss. [00:20:00] He meets with an older woman named Ruth. She's 102, God bless her, from Connecticut, who was in tears claiming that she was taught flat Earth in school, in Hamden, Connecticut, and now feels vindicated and better because of his truths. Dave: she was like, lost it. Mike: like real, real emotional about it. Dave: Yeah. Really emotional about it Mike: Okay. We just mentioned the Rockefeller education system and him saying that he doesn't want a nation of thinkers. He wants a nation of workers. , in the 1920s, if she was taught that the earth was flat, She would've been learning from that education system. Dave: True. Yeah, but I don't think that there's actually, I've looked and looked and looked and couldn't find any definitive evidence that was saying that they actually taught that in schools. Because even in 2022 curriculums across the country are not the same, even across the [00:21:00] same states, depending on the size of your state, they're not the same, especially when you get to advanced levels like college professors are teaching what they want within that curriculum, How in 1920 were they all taught the same thing when there was still tons and tons and tons, tons of schools. , that's the thing that gets me,  she's 102. Could she have just been like, yeah, I saw that once and she saw it on a cartoon in the seventies while she was in her sixties,  Fronk: nonetheless, I do find it difficult to wrap my head around because it was David Weiss who did that interview or whatever, and he brings up a lot of stuff about flat Earth. I listen to a bunch of his talks and shows that he went on to and whatnot, and he brings up all of these points and , he tells people to just, look into it. You gotta look into it yourself. You gotta do your research. , you go to do this research and obviously if you're looking into stuff like this, you're not going to [00:22:00] Google. You're not using Bing, like the go to search engine for anything that you can't find is duck, duck go. And he's been saying that Duck, duck go is starting to censor things of this nature. So, like Dave, I went looking for what the global education was like in the 1910s, the 1920s, and. Again, like you said, no definitive proof. Is it a censorship thing or is it the fact that it was just not taught as flat in the 1920s? Dave: There's also allegations that say that, it was the thirties and even in the sixties through certain education systems. , I almost bought David Weiss's app now. David had contacted us and let us know how he thought about us. I think in the next level, , it almost looks like somebody's trying to sell something and maybe this woman really did feel vindicated Ruth if she's still alive or not. but I don't know, check out the next level. It's an interesting take on flat earth and [00:23:00] there's a bunch of other proponents that I'd never even heard of that have some interesting talking points. Mike: my beef when it comes to David is he did reach out to us. He reached out to us a couple times, especially after our flat Earth episode. And essentially just berated us through email it's the usual argument that I, especially for some odd reason am on the receiving end of arguments with flat earthers is just yelling and anger and just being pissed off consistently. and he was not too happy, as Dave said with how we covered it in our talking points. He said, oh, it's the same talking points. Well, it's the same talking points with flat Earthers too. you talk about the Bible, you talk about nasa, you talk about, it's like, it's, it's the same talking points because we're talking about the same fucking topic.  Of course we're gonna have our sides to it and of, and flat earthers are gonna have their sides to it. It's just the way that it is. That's how you have constructive. [00:24:00] Conversations that go back and forth with conflicting beliefs. Dave: I feel like it's a lot of frustration that , you're just not getting it. Fronk: I feel like he rails Coke and like smashes Globes in his free time, like buys globes from Goodwill and just fucking destroys them in the parking lot and then drives home  Dave: beats them with Louisville slugs. Just smack. Smack.  Mike: I can't wait for our next email correspondence after this one. Fronk: dude. It's not gonna be an email. It's gonna be a voice message and he is gonna be all fucking jacked up out of his mind.    Dave: Before we move on to like the major talking points we gotta talk about what Mike mentioned earlier where a lot of the stuff that is talked about goes back to biblical cosmology and creationism.  Mike: Yeah. And that's always been my biggest talking point with discussions with flat Earthers is explain it to me I will give you my counterpoints and you'll give me your points and we can go [00:25:00] back and forth, but complete your, persuasion of trying to make me see that it's a flat plane. Complete your argument without using the Bible. Every single fucking time. Every single time it ends in, well, it says this in the Bible and it says this, it always ends up being that let's put it this way. I've never met a flat earth that wasn't also at the same time a Bible thumper. Dave: I've met two types. I feel like there are conflicting points to, flat earthers even they step on each other's toes a little bit. They might not, not get along, but I think there are some folks that definitely don't believe in the biblical cosmology and it's just a physical thing. But every time you go back to, if it's a physical thing, that's a structure that's not a planet. It brings me to the question, even a non-religious person. It brings me to the question, well then we're talking about who created it, [00:26:00] not just the science of planets and, gas and particles coming together for, from a accretion. We're talking a whole different thing. Now. We're talking about, well, if it's a structure , and this is not what we think it is and this is not what I think it is, then it had to have been manufactured structure. We build structures. using that type of verbiage, brings even me to being like, , now we're in the religious realm or the faith realm. Fronk: You want me to blow your mind right now? you know what's easier than creating a whole universe writing fucking lines of code. Bam, bam.  Mike: Yeah, there it is. There it is. We should just bring all arguments of flat earth back to simulation theory. Fronk: That's where I, that, yeah. Prove to me that it's even physical and then maybe I'll consider whether, the shape is round or flat. Dave: Let's talk about curves. Fronk: Right. All right. Let's talk about the voluminous crevices and curves that our mother Earth provides. Right. The idea of a flat [00:27:00] earth stems from a number of viewpoints, and the most fundamental is to rely on one's own sense, to determine the true nature of one's surroundings. The world appears flat. Clouds, bottoms look like they're flat. Water looks like it's flat, and the sun moves. The stars are always the same positioned exactly how they always were, and all of these sensory cues indicate that we do, in fact, live on a flat. Dave: I'm not an astrophysicist and I'm not a  Fronk: Are you  sure?  Dave: Maybe, maybe, maybe in my other existence, the 500 of 'em. I'm a failed astrophysicist, but I do have a telescope and I've had it for quite some time and I'm pretty good with it. And it's Fronk: the fuck? Dave: eh, the stars not moving. I know that there's a difference between absolute, uh, motion. A difference between [00:28:00] relative motion, and I'm pretty sure that the way that the stars move, but their whole argument is, is that since everything's spinning at astronomical speeds every night, we would see different stars because we're just whipping around and seeing different things. So why are the stars the same? And it does get you thinking, well, why are the stars the same? Well, I'm not a professional astronomer, so I can't really explain that. But I would say it has something to do with relative motion where everything's moving in conjunction instead of just this vortex of insane speeds..  Fronk: In my peanut globetard brain, I'm more so thinking the speed of light and how long it actually takes for the light from the stars that we're seeing to travel here. I mean, yeah, we've been seeing the same stars for thousands and thousands and thousands of years, but at what point were those stars emitting that light? How long have those stars been dead for, and how long is it gonna take for us to see new stars again? [00:29:00] I can't answer any of those questions for you, but I'm pretty sure that's. Dave: Valid point. Mike: Also in the grand scheme of time, humanity has been around a fucking blink in universal time. again to Fronk's point here, we're seeing the same stars because we're living 80 years and that's it. As opposed to the billions and billions and billions of years that the universe has existed and that that light has traveled and those stars have either been born, exploded, died, and disappeared. , we're seeing nothing, nothing. Dave: Well, that goes back to you being an insignificant being and that being suppressed. There's that argument. We'll have that later. We'll fight about it. Mike: there, there won't be an argument. We are insignificant beings.  Even if you took it back to a creationist argument, we are fucking insignificant. We are insignificant, we're [00:30:00] nothing. If we were something we would still commune with Gods, we would still commune with universal spirits. We would be. Something more than fucking meat sacks traveling through the world going, oh, I wonder what job I'm gonna have next, that I'm gonna work fucking 40 hours a week at and pull in a menial salary and take care of my 5.2 fucking kids, and then eventually retire at the ripe old age of 70 years old. And that's my life. How special am I Dave: Well, that's the system that you're locked in. Mike: system or not? Even if I had no job, even if I was just wandering, enjoying my life, going to these wonderful, exotic places, just doing everything that I wanted to do. At the end of it all 70 to 80 years, that's what I get. That's fucking it. in those 70 to 80 years, when am I seeing God? When am I [00:31:00] seeing a hint of any extraterrestrial, any, any extra dimensional, any religious, fucking spiritual guide? Anything. Anything.  when I'm not, fucked up on drugs, Dave: psychedelics. Fronk: God tier moment. Mike goes, have you ever given an ant food? Throw that bitch in there.  Dave: A lot of people see that as negative, and I don't really see it as negative that we're that insignificant. It's kind of the same argument that I make about the flight paths, which we'll quickly touch on is, well, the, the plane has to keep dipping down to keep going. Have you seen how small a plane is to how big the earth is? Mike: That's one thing that they don't understand is fucking perspective. You don't understand  perspective.  Dave: I'm glad you brought that up because what Frankie said a couple minutes ago about viewpoints perspective, seeing, if the clouds appear flat, water is flat, that's called using an empirical approach or an approach that relies on information [00:32:00] on your senses.  What's your feeble little human garbage eyes can see? And if you can't see the curve, then it doesn't exist. They use mathematics. I am. Stupid with math. The math is if the earth is round, there should be a degree of curvature, eight inches per mile squared. one mile would be eight inches, two miles, 32 inches, three miles, 72 inches, four miles, 128, and so on.  128 inches is about 10 feet of curvature. So that would be, four miles away now? 10 feet. A considerable amount when you're looking at a boat on. Water the water line to the top, say, let's say an aircraft carrier is probably 60 to 90 feet. You'd have to be at least around 20 miles to not just see the flight deck of that ship going over the horizon.  Then you got the whole, you got the bridge, you got everything else. You got all the radar you're probably looking at 120 feet at least to the top of, all of the structures on that ship. How many miles is that? . That's the thing. Another thing with the insignificance is [00:33:00] that we're tiny as fuck. Like how can we see anything? If you're five foot 10 and you're looking at something how far are you actually gonna see Mike: but what about the Zoom, Dave? What about the Zoom? Some of those cameras, they can zoom way, way, way, way in. They take those cameras and they zoom, zoom, zoom, and they go, well, that city is 150 miles away. There's no way that I should see it because of this curvature. And this camera is picking it up perfectly. So how do they work? Dave: I think they use the Chicago skyline for example. And I didn't do the experiment and look on Google Maps , and see the different distances, but you gotta remember the Sears Tower, whatever the fuck it's called now, it's like well over a thousand feet tall. and they're like, well, you can see the whole thing you. In those pictures that are shown as examples, you cannot see the entire Sears Tower. There is hundreds of feet of displacement in Chicago. Like New York has a [00:34:00] very tall fucking skyline. But you could still see those buildings and they're there, and on top of it, you're getting atmospheric disturbance. You're getting a layer of almost a mirage layer.  Mike: Dave was just going over the math of the entire situation, it's 67 feet per 10 miles. Now, before we move on, we have to mention that there are ball earthers or globes or globe tards that do argue that this equation is misused by flat earthers. And is the equation of calculating a parabola, not a full sphere. Dave: The guy who said that this is Misused was something that was found on the Michael Stata podcast and apparently himself and another guy that were on there, one was like an F 18 pilot, and then he's got certain hundreds and hundreds amount of hours as being a pilot. he had mentioned that the equation was misused and used the parabola as an example, that you're talking [00:35:00] about something like this instead of something that's a full circle even if you're talking about it on the curve, , it's still a parabola, even on that surface. Even though the equations are right and the math is right to calculate the curvature of the earth with its circumference that's known.  Might not be accurate. And uh, who did that? Aristophenes did that. And I know Flat Earthers is gonna say that guy didn't even fucking exist. which maybe he did, maybe he didn't. That was 2000 years ago. Who knows? Fronk: just to be fair to the flat earthers, right? We can't nitpick what false history we believe and don't, we do tend to say that history could have been falsified many times. If history has been erased at any point in time there is the possibility that this dude was made. Mike: using this model, a person standing on a spherical surface with eyes five feet, 11 inches above the ground, can [00:36:00] hypothetically see the ground up to about three miles away, but a person at the top of the Eiffel Tower at 896 feet can see the ground up to 36.6 miles away. Dave: Well, they're higher in altitude, Mike: Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm.  Dave: but the argument is that you can't see using the calculation, you wouldn't be able to see because it's dipping. I think the argument is wrong, and I'm not a mathematician and I'm not good at math, but from what my I see is that almost like some of these people are seeing it smaller than what it is. I don't think they're really getting how big this thing is and how small we are. So even at a 900 feet, Yes, you can see almost 10 times as much in distance, but you're also almost a thousand feet in the air,  Mike: Again,  perspective.   Fronk: If the degree of the [00:37:00] curvature is found to be the same everywhere on earth's surface, and the surface is in fact large enough, the constant curvature demonstrates that the earth is a. Now what about water? James Underdown, executive Director for the Center for Inquiry, Los Angeles worked with the Independent Investigations Group, a nonprofit dedicated to investigating exceptional claims using scientific methods. A boat based target with horizontal stripes was used in one of these tests. Dave: He's quoted as saying we sent a boat out on the water, and the farther it goes, the more the stripes disappear. That was supposed to demonstrate the curvature of the planet, but most flat earthers disagreed generating considerable debate. The biggest reason for these arguments with flat earth, obviously it comes from flat Earth, Dave(David Weiss), and it's all about perspective, as we said. The ground would never obscure distant objects on a flat earth. It should be possible to see all the way to the edge of the [00:38:00] world, right? That is the question that we would be asking. The answer we get is the atmosphere is opaque. Now, using the vernacular atmosphere is almost a conundrum in itself, and you ask, well, why did you use that? Well, we don't have another word for it.  Mike: Why not just make up a word like you fucking make up your own beliefs?  Just fucking do it. Just do it. . Make up a new word. It's very easy. It's done every day.   [00:39:00] Ad break [00:40:00]    Mike: Let's move on to another major fight in this, the position of the sun, sunrise and sunset. In case you were wondering, the sun is always above the Earth's surface in both models, Yet in the flat model, it travels in circles around the Earth's north pole, which is also, its. The seasons are caused by the expansion [00:41:00] and contraction of these circles. What about latitude?  Dave: What about latitude? I mean,  that would  Mike: about latitude  Dave: right? Mike: Hmm. Dave: The largest circumference of latitude on this planet would be the equator. Correct?  Mike: Yep. Dave: And then you have the tropic cancer and the tropic of Capricorn. The midpoints. I don't know that seems pretty, easy to explain. Maybe I'm just stupid. Could  be,  Mike: Globetard Dave: yeah. Fronk: Fucking idiot. Do some research Mike: Look into it. Fronk: where, show me where, show me where I could read about this that isn't on the app.  Mike: In the Bible, Fronk: Oh, yeah. Okay. Okay. All right. Here we go with the fucking Bible again. Mike: and books from the  17 hundreds  Fronk: They considered the sun to be much closer than 93 million miles and possibly even as far as 3000 miles or as close as 300 miles and moves in a circle or a helix pattern because the earth is supposedly accelerating upward, obviously toward the sun [00:42:00] at 9.8 meters per second because they don't believe in gravity, and that explains gravity away. with that being said, the sun must also be accelerating in the same direction as this hypothetical earth vortex. Make sense? You guys got that? Dave: instead of us spinning with things spinning around us and us spinning around something else and then that spinning around something else, which is relative there's a really big graphic that's always shown on every documentary, every video, and it's like the sun being shot out of a. With everything else just like around it, it looks like a DNA strand, most globe tards, know that that's not how motion works with celestial bodies. that one got me and always gets me, is every time that's shown. I'm like, oh God.  Fronk: other astronomical bodies moving in such a pattern? We have like really high powered telescopes Mike: Because space is not real.  Fronk: [00:43:00] Oh, shit. I forgot. I'm, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You got me.  Okay. All right. All right. Right. All right. Dave: no space. No space. We have to remember that throughout this whole episode, there's no space. Fronk: Yes. Yes. Mike: if you take space out of the equation, introduce God in the Bible, and just ignore all known fucking science for the past like 300 years, you can be a flat earther. Fronk: wait is it no space or it's just the sun and the moon and the earth, or , is it None of that and it's just plain earth with our spinning moon, sun clock sort of thing happening, Which one is it? Do flat earthers believe either the barrel bore theory or the plate theory? Dave: Everything's contained in a system. Fronk: It's one in the same Dave: and everything above us is, I guess, the abyss, because there's a lot of arguments that, like with this Artemis program, whether it's fake or not, we'll talk about NASA in a little bit, but whether it's fake or not, Rockets [00:44:00] don't work in a vacuum apparently. but they're actually using, their own inertia to move in a vacuum. But I guess things don't work that way according to some. That brings us to sunrise and sunset. I don't want to get too far into this cuz this can take hours and hours and hours to argue about, let's talk about sunrise and sunset real quick.  Fronk: Unlike a bunch of these other points, the day and night cycles are actually kind of easily explained on a flat plane. The sun theoretically would move in circles above the North Pole. Or around the North Pole, and when it's over your head, it's day, and when it's not, it's nighttime. The light of the sun is then confined to a limited area on the earth, right? Because it's right above you. This claim never held any weight for me in particular because it can be debunked with science.  On top of this, all of the planets and stars aren't actually what they appear to be like [00:45:00] big rock balls in space or giant balls of gas, but they're actually luminaries. Yet. We also hear a lot of people say, well, we don't know what they. Dave: Stars and planets are one of the biggest things that cannot be explained yet. We can explain them with telescopes. We've been talking a lot about movement. We have to talk about heliocentric model, which is the one that we supposedly live in and not the geocentric model, which is the one that flat earthers live in. When we are confronted with the question of how the earth is able to orbit the sun, and it's not a sphere it's pretty simple. The earth actually doesn't orbit the sun, as we've been saying. This is so, because instead of the sun being the center of our solar system, our planet is actually the center of our solar system or controlled environment. Mike: In reality, we have Helio Centrism, also known as the Heliocentric Model. It's the astronomical model in which the earth and planets revolve around the sun at the center historically, [00:46:00] Helio Centrism was opposed to geo centrism, which placed the earth at the center. now we've hit the firmament. Fronk: In the cosmology of the flat earth. The disc shaped planet is covered by a dome whose edges stopped just beyond the roughly 145 foot high ice wall of Antarctica. And these stars are fixed on this dome while the sun and moon, which are only about 31 miles in diameter, revolve about a 3,100 miles above the earth. Dave: Now, as we said before in biblical cosmology, the firmament is a vast, solid dome or semi solid dome created by God during his creation in the first six days To divide the primal sea into upper and lower portions so that the dry land could appear, which surrounds the earth or frozen water, I've heard this a lot with the biblical cosmology stuff, is that it's explained during day one, day two, day three, and they even say in the Bible, God created the firmament. I [00:47:00] believe it's on ver bran's headstone, as we've mentioned previously. I think it's a lot of wordplay and interpretation,  Mike: We also mentioned back in Hollow Moon, if you've listened to that episode about the Zulu tribe, where the firmament or atmosphere rained down to earth.  Our flat earthers saying that the sky is liquid possibly. Clearly, we know that the Earth's atmosphere is 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, 0.9% argon and 0.1% of other gases. Dave: Now, quickly, recently, I've heard a lot of arguments in quite a few different shows and videos not just one proponent, but multiple proponents on this theory. And a lot of 'em will say, well, the atmosphere itself is just a different version of water as it is up in space, a whole different version of water. Because they use the example of if you go to the deep oceans or certain lakes, there's different [00:48:00] salinities of water. You'll have heavier water on the bottom, different pockets of water. the atmosphere works the same way and they say, because it has the same elements in it. Now, if our atmosphere is made up of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, yes, there's hydrogen in that, because if we need water, we need H two O, which does happen in the atmosphere, Fronk: shit. That's why they sent U-boats to space it's water. Dave: oh. Fronk: Oh, Dave: That's it.  You got me.  Mike: done. We're done.    Final thoughts, boys? Fronk: Thank you Hushlings. Dave: Yeah, that's it. Mike: Okay, so we're talking about the firmament currently. Now I just want everyone to know the actual definition of a firmament. So the firmament is the vault or arch of the sky. The firmament isn't necessarily something that is physical. It is something that is viewed. the [00:49:00] arch from one horizon to the other is the sky. That is the firmament. So when everybody's saying, oh, firmament, they're talking about the firmament, they're talking about something that's physically there. No, that's a viewpoint. The firmament refers to horizon. To horizon. The arch of the sky as you see it from one end of your viewpoint to the other Dave: Makes sense. There's a lot of that too, where it said that you're, uh, you have a personal viewing bubble and I think that's misinterpreted as what you're actually, what you can see you go up a 1500 foot mountain, you look around, you can see 360 degrees.  Mike: that's your firmament. Dave: that's your firmament. Fronk: One bar from Suicide Boy's last album. One of them goes Dome. So good. I think she think the earth is flat mouth like the fucking firmament. She got my eyes rolling back. There you go.  Mike: it says it all. Fronk: [00:50:00] It says it all, it says it all your, your mouth has a firmament. Mike: Show me what that firmament do. Fronk: land ho. We have hit the ice walls and the absence of the poles along the edge of our local area exists a massive 150 foot ice wall. This ice wall is on the coast of Antarctica, and The wall is absolutely gargantuan, made up of solid water, ice that surrounds our world and holds our world's oceans in.   And the South Pole does not exist, whereas the North Pole is just a giant mountain called a hyperly that you can't visit. Dave: The ice walls were discovered by Sir James Clark, who was a British naval officer and polar explorer who was amongst the first adventure to Antarctica in an attempt to determine the position of the south magnetic pole between 1768 and 1779. [00:51:00] Upon confronting the massive vertical front of ice heat famously remarked. Mike: "It was an obstruction of such character as to leave no doubt in my mind as to our future proceedings for we might as well sail through the Cliffs of Dover as to penetrate such a mass. That's what she said. It would be impossible to conceive a more solid looking mass of ice. Not the smallest appearance of any rent or fisher. Could we discover throughout the whole of its extent and the intensely bright sky beyond it, but too plainly indicated. The great distance to which it wreaths, southward " Dave: apparently it took him three years or so to do one of the journeys and he circumnavigated the globe at 77,000 miles. what if he did it three times and did [00:52:00] 77,000 miles? That's the one thing that I've always thought is that, was it one trip  Fronk: And he just didn't know Mike: But again, in the 18 hundreds, let's say that this guy goes and he encounters an ice shelf, would he not think that was an ice wall? Dave: yeah, Fronk: like, oh shit. Well this is the edge of the world I suppose. Mike: there's no going past this. My ship can't go through that. Dave: I mean, yeah, that would be logical. Mike: I think this is what we said in the first one, a lot of these arguments for a flat earth revert back to like this 18 hundreds knowledge. Let's look at this book from the 18 hundreds. Look, they mentioned the firmament. Let's look at this. they talk about ice stones and blah, blah, blah. Fronk: The future is a lie. . The truth lies in the 18 hundreds. Reject modernity, Now all of this would of course, imply that Antarctica isn't at all what they say. And we've [00:53:00] mentioned this quite a bit about the Antarctic treaty already and the Antarctic bases and all of the secrets that they hide and you can't go there. You're not allowed There. Only scientists. Yeah. That's where they're hiding the edge of the.  Dave: Let's board a plane real quick and try to go to Antarctica. I know we say we can get there by ship, but two major arguments about airplanes with the flat earth theory is one, there's no round trip flights to Antarctica. And I think we covered this briefly in our first one where we had said, Antarctica fucking sucks. And that's probably why there's no round trip flights and how a lot of the Southern Hemisphere flights cannot be explained. And I believe we went over that a lot in our first episode. And I still stick by all of what I thought about that. Now, the other question that comes up with this theory  one, can you see curve in a commercial aircraft? And two, the aircraft always has to be pitching nose down after a [00:54:00] certain amount of time. Those two arguments come up major in this theory. So I wanna get your thoughts on do planes always have to tip downward as you're flying? Cuz you've all been on flights before, Fronk: No, the plane isn't nose diving or it doesn't feel like it anyway. It doesn't seem like it's nose diving by any means. Dave: but you would feel it. You can feel drop in altitude when you're starting to descend and you feel that, whew, almost that weird weightlessness when they drop a couple hundred feet or a thousand feet pretty quickly. You can feel turbulence, obviously. , I don't think that it necessarily pitches downward after a certain distance because I think, like I said earlier, planes are tiny and the earth is huge. So I don't think there's that much effect of a plane having to move when it's floating on top of a surface of air. Fronk: If a plane pitched downwards while at like max [00:55:00] altitude, wouldn't it just start losing altitude? Wouldn't you just be going towards the ground or am I being peanut brained? Dave: If planes were going in the straight path following the Earth's curve, then they would fly off into space. That's what they say. And I think it's simpler than that. Planes fly in a certain area from 35,000 to 50,000 feet, especially commercial aircraft in a certain layer of air that's thinnest. Which is why they can move as fast as they can, but I don't believe that they're pitching because they're so tiny that everything is going to appear flat at 35,000 feet cuz the earth is so big. Mike: , they're maintaining a certain altitude from the ground, so they're not pitching anything. They're just going with the natural atmosphere of the earth. Dave: Gravity.  Mike: Yeah.    Dave: The plane thing never, never made too much sense to me, especially with the flying off into space. If you didn't compensate for curvature, it's because the Plains Center [00:56:00] mass is always perpendicular with the ground and the plane is so insignificantly small. That you will not notice those changes. You notice left and right banks on planes, , you take a direction moving towards another city, you see it, you feel the whole plane go and you're looking towards the ground. If you're ascending, you feel that inertia you're getting pulled up into the air, especially on takeoffs. Or if you're descending, you feel that, oh, the pilot goes, we're gonna be descending in a couple minutes, and all of a sudden you feel that that drop, you feel that motion left, right, and vertical but you don't feel those nudges that they say that they're doing. So I don't think that that happens. I just think the center mass of that plane is fighting against gravity to keep it up. It's a boat in the sky. Mike: even if they did, that's a continuous compensation. So it's not like they're flying a certain distance and then going, oh, well I'm eight inches above where I was before. I need to adjust. Even if that was the truth, they would just make manual [00:57:00] adjustments as they went. So over that period of time, a half inch, a quarter inch, whatever you wouldn't even be able to tell in the first place if that was the case. Fronk: And that would only be if you were flying like across the world. I'm sure it's even less so if you're flying from somewhere on the east coast down to like Minnesota or something, it's gonna be even less noticeable if you're traveling somewhere that local. Dave: You're only traveling a couple hundred miles. Fronk: Yeah, exactly. Mike: I'm sure the figures are out there, but how many flat earthers are from America versus from the rest of the world? Dave: Good question. Mike: just wondering. Dave: I don't know the answer to that. I would say there's a lot in America. America is a very conspiracy driven country at the moment, and flat earth boils down to every other conspiracy. If you believe wholeheartedly in this, you believe everything else, the lies, everything is fake. Your entire [00:58:00] existence is fake. that's from what I get Fronk: That sucks. And then, and then from that point where do they go with that? They yell at other people about it or We're gonna briefly go over the eclipse aspect of flat earth theory. Now, we all obviously know what eclipses are. That's when the moon aligns with the sun and the earth and blocks out the sun. You know the deal. and remember that the moon is 400 times smaller than the sun. It's also about 400 times closer to the earth than the sun is. Is that coincidence that this astronomical phenomenon happens? Uh, Dave: Well, I can tell you from the flat earth side that that is almost impossible.  Mike: It's pretty impossible either way. Like it's pretty coincidental. I will give it to them that when you're talking about the sun and the moon being these like perfect distances and these perfect sizes and these per that's intriguing to say the least. I will give them. Dave: Which we did go over[00:59:00] Hollow moon theory if the moon was placed here, it was placed here on purpose, but then that would give weight to some type of, maybe not creationism, but some type of external control or external observation, which I think all of us are on the fence with that.  That could be, it could not be, Mike: Again, prove to me that any of this is real Dave: So there's two types of eclipses. There's solar and lunar eclipses. Now, the way solar eclipses work is that the moon orbits in between the sun and the earth. And when that occurs, obviously the moon blocks out the sunlight. You see the corona bought a bing. You have a solar eclipse, and the moon also casts a shadow on the earth. Now, a lot of the times it's told that the moon can't cast this little tiny pin prick shadow that goes across the earth. But if the moon is relatively 200,000 miles away, why couldn't it?  Mike: According to flat Earth theorists, this astronomical phenomenon is [01:00:00] actually a glimpse of a mysterious shadow object that orbits the sun and occasionally passes in front of the moon. From our point of view, could it be planet X Nibiru? No. This object is known as the anti moon. That's new Dave: another random object in our solar system. We could go on and on about eclipses, but we have to talk about one of the biggest fallacies of our education system. Gravity, Mike: not real. Dave: not real. Now, one of the most well agreed upon theories is general relativity. And it is the theory of gravitation developed by our boy Albert Einstein, who was apparently a conman according to flat earthers. And between 1907 and 1915, he figured all this out. The theory of general relativity says that an observe gravitational effect between masses results from their warping of space time. Gravity is still just a theory to us. I guess we can all be on the fence [01:01:00] on it cause we really don't get it. And I think scientists have , admitted that they don't get it,  Mike: Well, didn't recently they say that they had to like rework that entire thought process for some discovery that they had found that the theory of relativity had to be, had to be rethought or it was not necessarily wrong entirely, but partially, I guess., it had to do with the way that a black hole was working, where for the first time they saw a star coming out of a black hole. Fronk: Yeah, I saw that it was being regurgitated. They saw light coming out of a black hole. That's right. Mike: Things are happening, man. Whether you believe in space or not, it's. Pretty wild. Fronk: Newton's love gravitation states every point Mass attracts every single other point mass by a force acting along the line intersecting both points. I don't know what that means. The force is proportional to the product of the two [01:02:00] masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Exactly. That's what I've been saying this whole Mike: Sounds about right. Thanks boys. Well, what is gravity? According to this theory, it's stated that the earth isn't pulled into a sphere because the force known as gravity exists in a greatly diminished form compared to what is commonly taught, which is that we're being pulled down to the center of the earth while. The flat Earth is constantly accelerating up at a rate of 32 feet per second squared or 9.8 meters per second squared. As we had previously mentioned, this constant acceleration causes what you think of as gravity, but it's actually caused by a universal accelerator known as dark energy or Etheric wind. Never heard of Etheric wind. That's interesting, Fronk: time's that post Taco Bell shit's my etheric wind. Dave: [01:03:00] Furthermore with this we hear words like density and buoyancy a lot in these theories arguments, which is why things fall to the ground that are heavier and explains rockets, which are thought to actually be filled with helium and have a pyrotechnic show. that proves that all things fall at 9.8 meters squared.   Dave: All right boys, we're getting towards the end of our flat earth expedition here. But we have to go back in the sky. That brings us to rockets and satellites. As we just mentioned. Proponents of flat earth theory believe that satellites totally exist, but cannot be seen from the ground and are actually held in the atmosphere by helium balloons. Hence why NASA is the largest consumer of helium and they sometimes crash into the planet, which we call them weather balloons. And I guess that would explain the weather balloon phenomenon.  Fronk: Satellites in low earth orbit are constantly fighting gravity. According to science, some are geographically fixed and keep their [01:04:00] orbit by balancing two factors, their velocity, which is the speed required to travel in a straight line and their gravitational pull to the earth. To resist the stronger gravitational pole, a satellite orbiting closer to the earth requires more velocity. And of course, we're not going to get out of this debriefing without a little bit of NASA sprinkled in that bitch. Mike: Yes, good old nasa, our friends over there, professional cgi. It's widely assumed that humans have never left the Earth's atmosphere. In fact, we've never left earth and entered space because we lack the ability to do so in the first place unless you're a Nazi and a U-boat. Most of what society has been taught about space is completely made up or greatly exaggerated. By the government and or the elites. There's also the claim that humans have never landed on the moon. I'm with that, and that the infamous moon landings witnessed by the entire world in [01:05:00] 1969 were a sham. Fronk: Okay. I'll give them that. A major claim is that any pictures from the Apollo 11 mission that show that our planet as a sphere in the distance were fabricated by the government and nasa and NASA's mission is not to hide the shape of the earth or trick people into thinking it's round or anything else of the sort. Dave: Well, that's what NASA says, right?  We obviously know that there's some type of space travel conspiracy, whether it's more advanced or it doesn't exist. Possibly Nasa's mission is to create the illusion of space travel in order to, cover for the military, and their dominance in space. One thing we forgot to mention that I thought of real quick when you guys were talking is the quick notion on gravity. There's a lot of flat earthers that will say, well, can you jump, when you jump off the earth, you a hundred, 200 pound person jumping off the earth. Do you come back [01:06:00] down? And was it easy to jump? Then why is gravity so strong? Fronk: that's the whole argument of like, why does Gravity hold our planet's, oceans On  Dave: Yeah. Yeah. If it can  hold all this water and all this mass,  why can you jump off your roof and hit the ground? Mike: Because there is a different pull depending on the mass of the object.  Dave: Mike wins a gold star Fronk: gold sticker for you. Mike: boys, let's get into our final thoughts. Everything that was on Reddit, we've been through, we've done this whole thing. I wanna know the final thoughts as we get into stage two of becoming a flat earth. are we now believing that gravity is not real? The sun is a, lamp and uh, and we live on a flat plain, surrounded by an ice wall. Dave, are you a flat earther? Dave: No. sadly, I am not a flat earther. I think it's an [01:07:00] interesting theory that opens up a lot of more conspiracies and there are some valid questions, but I think a lot of it has to do with our lack of actually being able to see things because we are restricted beings. Uh, the one thing about flat earth theory that I find really fascinating is the suppression of information, the hidden things. And I think that's the conspiratorial part that really pulls me, believing that it is a different shape or an infinite plane or a snow globe, or, flatterers is gonna get so mad at me for saying that because we don't believe it's a snow globe. It doesn't look like a pancake. They all have different theories and a lot of it goes back to religion. A lot of it goes to creationism. A lot of it goes back to every other conspiracy you've ever heard of. So for me, still, I still think we live on a planet. the definition of planet is what we live on. Is it a perfect sphere? I think that's proven that it's not a perfect sphere.[01:08:00] I'm not a scientist, but I've done research and research and research and supposedly it takes up to two weeks or so to become a flat earth. I've been doing this research since like the end of July, and I'm still not convinced. wanted to give it a fair shake. Didn't wanna be a douche bag. Would invite any flat earth to come on and talk to us. We'd love to have you on, but You didn't get me yet. Mike: I will take my final thoughts, a complete left turn here. I don't care. I don't care whether it's a giant paella pan or if we live on a dodge ball. I, I don't care. I don't care. Maybe it's the blue pilled part of my brain that still exists. I don't give a shit. It doesn't change anything. I'm still gonna wake up in the morning and have to go to work, have to pay my taxes, and eventually I'm gonna fucking die. That's just the way that it is. I don't care if we live on a flat plane, I don't care if we live on a globe. It's just the way that [01:09:00] it is. but I don't think that we live on a fly plane. I'm just gonna say that I don't think that I, I do think that there is a lot of cover up of our former history. That much I believe is true. I do believe that NASA is filled with a bunch of liars and they do fabricate things including, setting up these videos where they're watching astronauts float around, but the water stays in a cup. That's an interesting one. , I do think that they do composite images together and they are a bunch of liars that I completely agree with. . I love you whether you're a flat earth or not, but no, it's a no for me. Fran, give us your final thoughts. Did you become a flat earther in this episode?   Fronk: No, I didn't. , I'm not gonna go off on a limb and say that I tried to give flat earth theory, the benefit of [01:10:00] the doubt, but I tried to stay open-ended, especially towards like the beginning of the episode. I was just trying to like see it from both sides and I still do to an extent. And you're right in saying that their best argument is the space shit and nasa, but, that can't be all you're going off of here, because that, lends to so much other shit besides just the shape of the planet.  And not only that, if you're like sold on the shape of the planet, then you've been deceived. You know what, I'm gonna pull a flirter and tell you what you've been taught on. The internet is wrong, and it's all code. You've been tricked into thinking that what we live on is physical and that it has shape. There is no shape. I've never even been out of the country. You can't even convince me that Australia's real, let alone the, the, the fucking shape of the  Mike: you're partial flat earther because they don't believe that Australia is real either. Fronk: [01:11:00] Oh, no. Australia's not real Mike: listen, if you're in Australia and you, uh, you live there full time, reach out to us. Send us an email. Even better a voicemail, because I just want to hear the accent. Send us a voicemail and say, Hey, yeah, I exist. I'm here. This is a real place. Dave: Clearly they exist. They're number three on our Spotify Mike: That's right. Thanks Australia. Fronk: No, I, I never tried to doubt Australia. It was a metaphor, but Dave: Our Hustralians down under, Mike: That's hilarious. Dave: , if we offended you we're sorry. Well, I partially am. Mike: I, I, listen, I tried this episode. I think that I was better than the first episode. I didn't sit there and say anybody was an idiot or any of that stuff. like I said, you believe what you wanna believe, but on, at the end of the day, I don't think that it really matters. Fronk: And if it makes you feel [01:12:00] special, by all means,

Cáel deals with wounds, lies and the clash of cultures.By FinalStand. Listen and subscribe to the podcast at Steamy Stories.The words ‘I love you’ inspires joy, relief and terror.I missed my entry to the infirmary. I was returned to clarity by the two female attendants. The younger went straight to cutting my left pants leg off while the oldest Amazon I’d seen to date began an excellent rendition of 'beef’ inspector while pretending to be a physician. It was almost hilarious when she looked to Sydney, addressing her in Old Kingdom Hittite.“Was he being disciplined, or did he do something stupid?”“I did something stupid,” I griped. “I showed up to work today.” Since it was their native tongue, both of the medical attendants’ eyes bugged out.“He volunteered to help Aya of Epona with her archery lessons by letting her shoot at a fruit out of his hand,” Sydney related.“This…this isn’t a wound caused by a practice arrow,” the physician observed.“No, that was from Leona of Marda. She attempted to kill him. When Leona threatened his controller, he presented himself for slaughter,” Sydney clarified. “Hayden stopped Leona, Leona disobeyed and we need to plan Leona’s funerary arrangements now.”“How did you come to speak our language?” the junior attendant asked. The tone of her voice and the look in her eyes was chilling and sensual at the same time. It was chilling because of the transformation she went through as I went from a piece of equipment to a close approximation of a human being in her eyes. I was getting tired.“Erotic poetry,” I humored her. “I had a lover some time ago - a scholar - who wanted to share Old King…Amazon love poetry and songs in the voices of their creators. I know multiple languages no longer spoken.”#Your eyes are stolen from the waterfalls descending from the highest mountains##Your hair robbed from the threads of the night sky##Your body is shaped by the Mother Rivers##Your beauty is the gift of the Goddess who knows both tears and love#I recited it in the original Chaldean Babylonian. They were all staring at me, so I translated it into Hittite. It didn’t flow as smoothly.“What language was that in?” the security guard inquired.“Chaldean Babylonian. It is a love poem from a prince to his dead wife,” I answered.“It was nice, even eloquent,” Sydney remarked.“Wow,” I sighed. “It is tragic to think not a single woman in this room has ever been romanced.”“I am pretty sure every woman in this room has been with a man before,” the security guard countered.“After sex, what did the two of you talk about?” I regarded her.“That’s not what we use men for,” the doctor spoke up while she began examining my wound. Pain. “We use artificial insemination and surrogates for procreation. Beyond directing them in our physical stimulation, there is no need to talk to men.”“Oh,” I mused sadly. “That makes sense and is richly rewarding to know. If I was more like the rest of you, I’d be laughing. Unfortunately, I have a heart and compassion, so I’ll pity you all instead.” The doctor didn’t take my honestly well. “Ow! Good bedside - Ow! - manner there, Doc.”“We don’t need your pity,” the security guard threatened.“Sure, but then I’ve not bred myself into extinction out of fear of cuddling either,” I grinned. “Treating men like livestock makes sense - if you are evil. You refused to allow yourselves to get attached to any male so it would be easier to kill us when our time came.”“Tread carefully,” Sydney cautioned me.“Okay Sydney. Since you are the only female present capable of having offspring, I’ll be good,” I got in my parting shot. By the silence in the room, I had hit the nail on the head. “I apologize for disturbing you ladies. I’ll be a good male and keep my mouth shut.”That declaration didn’t last long. Apparently pain-killers were not part of their medical credo. When I asked, the doctor implied I wasn’t hurt nearly enough - in other words, not being amputated or decapitated. I asked if being castrated would earn me a hammer to the head. They smiled. They thought I was a funny guy once more. It was the whole 'laugh at death’ mystique again.This tender, motherly moment was punctuated by the doctor’s application of the staple gun (instead of stitches) to both entry and exit wounds. Sydney offered to give me something to bite down on. I insisted on sharing my pain as I screamed my lungs out during the torturous procedure.“I thought you were a tough guy,” the security guard sneered.“And not screaming would have made me tough? Bitch, those are some fucked-up priorities. Screaming meant I didn’t jolt when she was stapling my wounds shut. I’ve been stabbed and stitched enough to know that much,” I glared.The assistant had been walking her hands over my body during the process.“You have been stabbed fourteen times,” she muttered.“You missed the one on the right foot,” I corrected.“You’ve been stabbed fifteen times? What do you do?” Sydney wondered.“I date women. You are a surprisingly dangerous breed, even without the extreme training you ladies possess,” I confessed. “To be concise, I have the bad habit of dating women and their friends, acquaintances, and even family members - usually without their knowledge. It always ends badly - thus the wounds.”“You betray the women you sleep with?” the doctor stared.“We could banter terms and expectations about, but essentially 'yes’, I do,” I sighed.“You seemed like such a well-behaved male,” the security guard looked confused.“Huh? What does my love of sex have to do with my demeanor?” I mused.“I’ve never beat a lover, or forced myself on a woman. If you want to hold my lack of forthrightness against me, please remember you are part of a secret society that embraces kidnapping, rape and slaughter as daily practices,” I smiled. “Comparatively, me not telling one woman that I’m dating her neighbor is small potatoes.”“We do what we do out of necessity,” the doctor insisted.“That flimsy excuse is about as useful as 'you wouldn’t understand; you aren’t a woman/amazon/nutty-nut bar,” I shook my head. “I give up. Your society has equaled, if not exceeded, every inhuman deed men have ever committed.”“Congratulations; you have become crueler and more depraved than your enemies,” I lauded them.“Because of your ignorance, I will let that outburst go unpunished,” Sydney stated. I wised up and shut up.My shirt was returned and they had to synch a large towel around my waist because my jeans were ruined and they didn’t have scrubs in my size. They gave me my bloody dockers too. Sydney walked me to the front entrance. By the looks of the women we passed they knew something had happened, if not the precise nature.Security’s opportunity to 'get me’ on the way out was stymied by Caitlyn & family, Desiree, Tigger, and Buffy hanging around. The moment Aya saw me, she called out my name and came running. The only thing worse than the pain of her impacting me would have been the look on her face if I warded her off. I caught her in my arms and lifted her up.“Cáel,” she exclaimed. “Does it hurt?” I kept lifting her until I blew loudly on her belly.“Does that hurt?” I teased her.“No,” she giggled.“Then I’m fine. Really now, I’ve been hurt worse by a splinter from a toothpick,” I exaggerated for her.“You are lying to me,” Aya shook her finger in my face.“The lesson being 'don’t lie to winners’,” I sighed.“Yep,” Aya mimicked me. “Is our date for tonight still going to happen?”“Oh…Aya, I can’t,” I groaned. “I’ve got three smoking hot babes coming over tonight.”“Don’t make me punch you,” Europa play-threatened. She and Loraine had sneaked up on me while I was entertaining Aya.“I don’t know,” Loraine gave a cautious laugh. “I like being called a smoking hot babe.”“Aya, I really like you, but do you always have to drag those two around with you?” I wiggled Aya up in the air. “It’s kind of creepy.” She giggled.“Those are my sisters, Silly,” she snickered. “They will be your daughters one day too.”“Time for us to go,” Caitlyn intervened. As she ushered her children away, she shot me a look over my shoulder that strongly suggested she wanted to play house. Desiree moved to within a meter of me and looked me up and down.“You are an idiot,” she remarked, turned and left. I looked to Buffy.“I’m your ride,” Buffy snorted. I hobbled to her.“I’m glad you are okay,” Tigger waved then followed Desiree out.“Thanks for a great time,” I looked over my shoulder at the Amazons. “As soon as my blood supply has replenished, I’ll be sure to come back and play some more.”We were in the car, exiting Doebridge when Buffy finally spoke.“Why do you keep thinking you can keep getting away with talking like…” she was glaring at me. “Oh Goddess…you really are laughing at death. You really believe you are going to die, don’t you?”“Absolutely. The moment they started chanting I realized it was unlikely I’d get out of this experience alive,” I admitted.“Why are you holding us to the 78 day rule?” she asked.“Recall what I said about backbone, Buffy?” I reminded her.“I am attached to the lifestyle I’ve created and I’m not going to change it to scrape out a few more days of existence,” I grinned. “I hold Havenstone to that countdown because I would do it if I thought I was going to be okay.” A few more minutes passed. I tried to cut the radio on. Buffy kept cutting it off. I was getting sick of it and my annoyance was showing.“Did you really tell the whole dome that you would sleep with me first?” she whispered.“Of course,” I replied. “I said that was my intention at work and I mean to keep to it.”“What about Hayden?” she asked.“Well, unless you agree to a three-way, I think this is going to be an issue we’ll have to work around,” I shrugged.“I’m not even sure I like you,” Buffy mumbled. “I want you. I am not sure I like you, though.”“Buffy, that’s fine,” I murmured. I unbuckled my seatbelt and began twisting around in my seat. My thigh was killing me, but I was a man on a mission. I put my head in Buffy’s lap, gazing up at her.“What are you doing?” she grinned.“Annoying you - taking advantage of you - take your pick,” I smiled. We drove for a while.“What are you thinking about?” Buffy gazed upon me warmly.“Picturing you in different colors and cuts of panties,” I told her. Buffy frowned then returned her focus to the road.“What is your favorite?” she inquired a few seconds later.“I’m torn,” I confessed. “I never seen you semi-nude so I have to do some imagining. How do black hipster lace panties sound?”“Not a thong?” I had her attention again.“Nah. You are like a chocolate covered cherry, Buffy,” I explained. “Those panties would be like the sweet sugar before you bite into the cherry. It tantalizes with the promise of something even better.” Silence for over ten minutes.“I hate you,” she gulped. She expressed that by tenderly stroking my face and hair.I drifted off to sleep shortly afterwards. It was the combination of lack of movement and the city’s static that brought me back. We were parked somewhere, Buffy gazing down at me with something that might have been confused with affection.“We are home,” she whispered. “Your home. I need to take you to your apartment.”On the third landing we took a breather. Being wrapped up by Buffy, I took a moment to whisper in her hear.#Your eyes are a molten river of gold, promising riches and a fiery death# I sang to her softly in Old Kingdom Hittite. It was original poetry.“What was that?” she smiled.“I’m not sure I can tell you,” I stifled a yawn. “This whole translation thing wasn’t explained to me. I can tell you it was a line of a love poem I created only for you.”“Oh…could you repeat it?” So I repeated it, quietly - this was still a secret language - on each landing until Buffy felt she got it right.Odette answered the door - oh joy. Buffy turned brittle angry while Odette drank in the whole scene.“Who is this?” Buffy snapped.“This is Odette. Odette, this if Buffy, one of my bosses.”“Buffy, Odette is the woman who brings solace to my nights, drives off the pains of the day and comforts me in the first lights of the morning with a smile and a word,” I said by way of introductions. I didn’t call her my girlfriend and still kept her happy.“Oh God, Cáel, what happened to you?” Odette worried.“An important life lesson,” I frowned. “Lawn darts and jello shots don’t mix.” I knew this to be true as I had something similar to this happen to a good friend. Since he was hit by a woman neither one of us 'was sleeping/had been sleeping’ with, we assumed she was intoxicated. We took him to the hospital then I fucked her in the parking lot.Later she, me and the victim had a three-way to ease her regrets. The next four three-ways were just because. Unfortunately, his girlfriend wasn’t as forgiving. Back in the hospital parking lot, once we knew he’d be okay, I fucked his girlfriend too. Yes, I am morally irreprehensible.“What really happened?” Odette fretted as she helped Buffy get me to the sofa.“He cheated on me so I marked him as my territory,” Buffy snarled.“But he’s your employee,” Odette gasped. “Isn’t that immoral?”“Immoral? Child, men exist solely to pleasure women and carry heavy things,” Buffy grumbled.“Carry heavy things…” Odette mused. “He’s carrying something heavy all the time,” she snickered.“I hate you,” Buffy snapped. I wasn’t sure who that was aimed at.“Why - wait, he’s not having sex with you, is he?” Odette sounded surprised. “Wow, you are really missing out.” Buffy gave off her nearly subsonic jaguar growl. “I haven’t had too much experience,” Odette blithely continued on, “but - Wow - I’m having orgasmic tremors up to eight hours after every nightlong sex session with Cáel. It’s wild.”Buffy grabbed my hair and twisted things until I was looking into her blazing hate/lust-filled eyes.“Monday morning - seven o'clock - you’re mine,” she growled. She turned to leave.“What? No good-bye hug?” I pleaded hopefully. I received a deep animalistic noise and a door slammed in our faces.“Odette, is there any way I could convince you for some 'intensive care’ sex?” I gave her puppy-dog eyes. Odette responded by helping me off the sofa and aiming us toward the bedroom. There was a loud pounding on the door.“Odette, stay here. She’s violently unstable,” I cautioned my buddy. I hobbled to the portal.“I want my hug,” Buffy glared as I opened the door.“Fine. Remember, this is purely platonic,” I kept it cool. “Now put your hands behind your back.”“What? No, I won’t,” she snarled.“Buffy, I’m sort of fragile right now and you are a big bully,” I cautioned her. Buffy’s whole body trembled. Had she spontaneously developed heat ray vision, my brain would have been incinerated on the spot. Buffy finally linked her hand behind her back. I gently pressed my body against hers, brushing her hair behind her shoulders then tilting her jaw up.“I don’t like making you unhappy, or disappointing you, Buffy,” I whispered. “I apologize.” I didn’t kiss her. That was technically against the rules. Slow, persistent puffs of breath played along her shoulder, neck ears, cheeks and forehead in lieu of my forbidden kiss. Buffy’s vexation at the lack of oral contact faded as the hot, moist sensations of my exhalations upon her flesh played out.She quickly caught on that she could tilt her neck around to offer up places she found especially enticing, eventually leading me to her cleavage.“Have a nice weekend,” I told her when I was done.“78 days…Cáel. 78 days,” Buffy’s eyes shone like solar flares of lust. She left.The door shut, I turned around and Odette gave me a horny, beseeching lament. She’d been masturbating while I had been not-kissing Buffy.“I need you,” she moaned. I limped her way.“I’m not sure…” I got out before she overwhelmed me.“I’ll help,” she squealed. She dragged me across the room before tossing me on my new bed. Hmmm…new sheets…and the room looked really clean…sex. Odette would hurt me, make amends then try even harder to make me happy. It wasn’t my best experience with sex, but far from my worst.For example: don’t let yourself get tied down when you suspect your bedmate is unhappy with you because she’s found out you’ve also been doing her friend. At least make sure her friend isn’t at home and in on the revenge too. Don’t apologize, beg for mercy, or say you love them. No, take your lumps like a man, admit you are lower than low, and that you deserve whatever they deem appropriate.A terrifying first night. The next two were among the best I ever had…until the next weekend.Odette helped me clean up and changed the sheets all by herself. She was a wonderful girl and I hoped she’d meet somebody who appreciated her and wasn’t like me. Odette informed me that Timothy and Nikita would be showing up around 4 pm.Timothy had also told her he and I had a double date tomorrow night so she promised to call me Monday to see how I was doing…and whatever. With a wink, Odette also passed along that Timothy claimed all the toys in my room were his, except for the bondage suspension gear - which was untried - hint, hint.Wait a second - wasn’t this the same girl who thought a lone dildo was pressing the sexual envelope on Thursday? I kissed Odette and sent her on her way. I noticed the Nerf gun. I contemplated hiding the damn annoyance then I realized he’d only shoot/throw something harder. I decided to wear my Havenstone t-shirt (one size too small) that came with my recruitment packet and some gym shorts because jeans and the wrapping on my thigh didn’t mesh.Nikita showed up first and a bit early. Maybe she was trying to catch me shooing another girl out the door. I didn’t ask.“Hey Nikita,” I greeted her with a kiss.“Hey Cáel - what happened!” she gasped, taking in my bandaging. I had thought about my response.“I was at an archery range this morning and was shot,” I related.“Did you report this?” she began her interrogation.“My insurance will cover this and 'no’, there is no police incident report,” I answered.“Why not?” she glared.“I work for the Amish Mafia, Nikita. If I talk to the cops, you are going to be looking for me under the next barn raising,” I joked. Nikita was not amused in the slightest.“We need to take care of this,” she demanded.“How about this - someone tried to murder me this morning. Not a single person I was with raised a finger to save me,” I exhaled.“I didn’t die for a few reasons. One is the three girls coming over here tonight. Another is that a few women find me charming enough to keep me around. Lastly, they know that I know I’m a corpse if I make a break for it,” I explained. “Now, I’d truly prefer you think I’m making this shit up to sound insane, or trying to impress you.”“You are not…insane, or making that shit up,” she muttered. “I still can’t date a criminal.”“Barring carrying an unauthorized firearm loaded with blanks, I’ve been good,” I grinned.“That’s a crime,” Nikita groaned then pressed into me. “Why do I put up with you?”“You are most likely the best woman I’ll ever meet?” I offered. She hugged me.“I’d say that you are only saying that to get into my pants except you’re desperately trying to not get into my pants,” she sighed. “How do I fix this?”“Fix? I’m not sure this can be fixed. If you want to help, remind me love is stronger than hate, no one is irredeemable, and people can change for the better,” I murmured.“I’ll try,” she gently and repeatedly kissed my shirt-covered chest. “I think you joke too much yet you’re terribly honest. When you said you had a 'plethora of bizarre knowledge, I laugh at danger and have an incessant desire to learn’ you weren’t kidding. I should have run out the door right then.”“I agree. I know you are normally smarter than this - staying with me,” I nodded.“You are not getting rid of me that easily,” Nikita went to her tippy-toes and kissed me on the lips. That’s right. I was not a stoner who liked to toke on the weekends. No, I was part of a massive criminal conspiracy that was involved in various malfeasances more often associated with The Hague than the FBI, or Interpol.Basically I was the opposite kind of man Nikita thought she wanted. I was verbally evasive, romantically unreliable, unethical and criminally involved. She wasn’t blind to my flaws, she was reevaluating her desires. Beyond the sex, which promised to be epic, she felt I was brave and compassionate, honest and caring; a lover who laughed at death.In her distant future, sitting on the sofa, watching TV, while her socially acceptable, ethical and reliable husband was on the computer and her children were asleep in bed, I was the type of man she would recall with a sensual curve to her lips and the fondest of erotic memories. She might even wonder if they’d ever find all my body parts, or the person, or persons, who finally did me in.In the short term that meant more sex for me. I knew I was trying to not have sex spoil my relations with Nikita. I was going to move mountains to keep this love affair on track. If I wasn’t nailing her by next Saturday, a good bet would be that the world had ended. This lack of sex was killing me. With my stress level skyrocketing, my libido was threatening to slip its leash.I’d already scoped out three dozen spots at Havenstone for some quick nookie. It wasn’t intentional. My perception automatically cataloged every place I went to on how safely, quietly, and comfortable having sex there would be. I don’t think most people appreciate how much restraint I showed by not screwing Katrina in her bathroom, Buffy on that bed, and Buffy and Helena in any number of places.The elevators…oh God, the elevators. I’d had sex with a total stranger riding an elevator in the Sears Tower. Every few seconds, we kept punching buttons for higher floors. Watching her greet her husband and two young daughters getting out of the lift was enchanting. I never considered the wife to be cheating though.She wasn’t leaving her family; she was indulging in a fantasy. That helped me through lunch. After all, I was there to catch up with a high school buddy and his sister…and her husband…and two daughters - whoops. In retrospect, I was probably drawn to her because she looked like her/his mother. Mom was kind of hot and freaky too.The lesson there was never go upstairs to take a shower and change, leaving me alone with your mother unless you want her to have a secret smile when you return. She was divorced so there was no moral quandary. Further rumination was forestalled by Timothy’s keys jingling in the door and coming in.“Brother, she’s still got her clothes on,” Timothy mocked me. “You are losing your touch.”“We are not having sex,” I protested.“We are not…this weekend,” Nikita blushed slightly. “Next week though…”“I’m holding out for next Saturday,” I informed them. Nikita hip-nudged me and I winced.“Oh, I’m sorry, Cáel,” Nikita steadied me.“Cáel, what the hell happened to you?” Timothy tilted over to see past Nikita and look over my bandaged thigh, which was now bleeding. Oh, come on. Don’t tell me 'girl on top’ sex voids the 'don’t engage in any strenuous activity for 48 hours’ warning?“Someone tried to murder him,” Nikita spoke for me.“Any lady I’ve met, a jealous lover, or some totally unrelated woman I haven’t encountered yet?” Timothy was less than sympathetic.“Why do you assume I was shot by a woman, or that it was even my fault?” I groaned.“In Atlantic City, the odds of you being mauled by a woman you’ve pissed off is considered a sure thing,” Timothy chuckled.“Crazy woman, you’ve never met her and I seriously doubt you ever will,” I told him. “She’d have shot my nuts off but she had these ridiculously large double-D breasts that got in…Ow!” I yelped as Nikita finger-stabbed one of my nerve clusters.“Come on, Nikita,” Timothy teased. “If Cáel doesn’t notice a woman’s breast size, check him for a pulse, or a concussion.”“Eyes front, Mister,” Nikita demanded. “If you’re looking anywhere it had better be at me.”“Wait a second,” I protested. “You are supposed to be my love slave.” Nikita smirked.“Who is the boss?” she patted my swelling cock through my shorts and talked to it. “Who’s the boss?” pat, pat, “That’s good boy,” she cooed. “He knows who the boss is,” Nikita smiled at me. What could I say? My cock was the Lying Son of a Bitch of all Lying Sons of Bitches. It lied to everybody, me included.The only thing it didn’t lie about was being horny, which was more like a continuous state of being for the damned thing anyway. I could have grappled her breasts, petted her kitty, and/or groaped her ass. It pays to know your date/target/victim (depending on how polite you want to be).My hands cupped her jaw with my fingers tickling her ears.“Are these lips mine?” I whispered before kissing her with only a tantalizing tip of the tongue. “Are these my lips,” I continued on and on.“Yes,” Nikita sighed happily, finally submitting.“Nikita, I’m about to shoot our boy,” Timothy muttered. “Let’s avoid a friendly fire episode.” Timothy went for his Nerf gun, I went for the kitchenette, or would have if Nikita hadn’t stopped me.“Oh, come on,” I pleaded.“No,” Nikita smiled, “I don’t know what you did, but I’m sure you deserve it.” Wack - Nerf hit.“Fine,” I muttered. “Since I’m clearly not getting any sympathy, why don’t we go get the car now?”“I’ll go get the girls, Cáel,” Nikita suggested. “You should stay off your feet.”“Trust me, that will not work,” I said. Thankfully, no one contested me on that. They took one look at the blood soaking through my bandages and cut me some slack.Getting the rental car was interesting. I had to convince Nikita her personal vehicle wouldn’t cut it in our destination neighborhood. Halfway to the pick-up, something dangerous occurred to me.“Desiree, I need to warn Caitlyn I’m bringing over a lady with a gun,” I made a panicky call to the boss most likely know Caitlyn’s number.“Who?” she snapped.“NYPD Patrolwoman Nikita Kutuzov,” I supplied the name.“You are an idiot,” Desiree stated then hung up.“What was that all about?” Nikita stared suspiciously…again.“The family we are going to is security conscious to the level they will want to verify you are who you say you are,” I explained. They weren’t likely to kill her, or us. Caitlyn simply wouldn’t let me in, or let the girls out, which would be a sucky thing to explain if the opportunity to even see the girls ever arose again.“Do I need to inform my precinct that I’m stopping by this house?” Nikita questioned me.“I wouldn’t think so,” I said. “I also wouldn’t have thought I’d be shot with an arrow this morning either. Do what you think is best.” Nikita called in her itinerary. Once we made it to the children’s place, she insisted helping me to the door. Caitlyn answered with the kids closely behind her, luggage in hand.“Ladies, this is Officer Nikita Kutuzov of the NYPD. She will be our chaperone for the night,” I introduced my companion.“Cáel,” Caitlyn asked after she pulled me into a side room, “who is this woman?”“She is the daughter of the desk sergeant I met at the police station last Monday night/early Tuesday morning when Desiree and I showed up to get Marilyn,” I informed her.“I’ve dated her two times - no sex - and we are getting along okay,” I added.“No sex?” Caitlyn purred. “Saving yourself up for something?” I looked over my shoulder and saw three faces peaking in.“Please stop taunting me, Caitlyn,” I murmured. “The children are watching and I have to get going.” She pressed up against me, gave me a wink then returned me to the hallway.“Children, behave and I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon,” Caitlyn smiled. “Cáel - Daddy, have a good time.” Aya was as happy as a clam, Europa was amused, Loraine was a bit sullen and Nikita was stiff as a board. The presence of Nikita, the outsider, kept conversation to a minimum on the ride over. Europa broke the silence as we entered my building.“Gosh Cáel, you are poor,” she noted.“That’s rude,” was Nikita’s rebuttal.“What do you know about Cáel,” Loraine boiled over with anger. Nikita turned on her.“I know you are the reason I’m here, Loraine,” Nikita locked eyes with her. “You are pretty so I’m here to make sure he behaves.”“She doesn’t want him to behave,” Europa teased. Loraine shot Europa an evil look.“I want Cáel to be our Daddy,” Aya piped up. “So does Mommy.”“I had that impression too,” Nikita’s smile to me was frosty.“Well, I plan to be single for at least three more years,” I declared.“Great!” Loraine exulted.“Good luck with that,” Europa mocked me.“I can wait that long,” Aya added.“It will be a miracle if you live that long,” muttered Nikita.“Cáel was shot saving my life today - me and my family,” Aya got out.“Aya - no!” snapped Loraine. “We are not to talk about it.”“I’m a police officer, you can tell me,” Nikita tried to corner Aya.“She is a, (then she used a dead word,” Loraine stated.It was Old Kingdom Hittite for 'masked ghost’. 'Ghost’ could also mean 'evil spirit’. I postulated that was the Amazon term for non-Amazonian women.“What does that mean?” Nikita scanned the group.“It means we are not going to talk about it, concentrating on having a good night instead. Okay?” I stressed.Nikita backed off, we made it to my place and made the introductions with Timothy. Once they got past the fact that he was gay - their problem was not with homosexuality; it was with males wasting their sexual potential not making babies - they thought he was wonderful. My roommate caught me flat-footed when he reminded the girls that they should wear their pj’s on a sleep over.Off they raced into the bedroom, dragging a reluctant Nikita along, to get changed.“Dude,” I said in a hushed voice. “What have I ever done to you?”“Nothing,” he snickered, “I’m being petty.” He went off to change as well. I was already in a t-shirt and shorts. I really didn’t need to change.Nikita’s countenance was one of fury etched in stone. It appeared that Amazonian sleepwear consisted of a beige half-vest, panties and a short, short skirt. It was somewhat endearing on Aya. I wasn’t going to go there with Europa. My brain was having none of that avoidance with Loraine though. God, she was scrumptious…and so very out of bounds.Nikita was in a plaid sleeping shirt than came down to her knees. I was trying to keep it together when Timothy came out in black boy-shorts.“Wow, Nikita. I had a shirt like that…when I was ten. You make it look…” he ended up laughing. The look Nikita gave Timothy was blistering.Aya came up to one side, knelt on the sofa where I was sitting, and hugged my head to her bosom. Europa plopped down on the other side. Loraine hopped into my lap.“Oh…is that your…?” Loraine gasped.“That’s his nothing!” Nikita yanked Loraine off my lap, “that you need to know about at your tender age.”“What is wrong with you people?” Nikita complained.“Don’t look at me. I’ve been sitting on the sofa the entire time,” I waved off responsibility.“We are not ashamed of our bodies,” Loraine shot back. “Don’t take out the fact that you aren’t pretty as me, my sisters, or our Cáel.”“Cáel, don’t tell me you find this manner of dress acceptable?” Nikita glared.“If they are comfortable with it, who am I to complain?” I shrugged.“She’s nine!” Nikita pointed at Aya who smiled back.“Damn Nikita, trust me a bit, why don’t ya? I am well aware of women’s ages,” I sighed.“Do you want me to dress like they do?” she stared accusingly.“That would be pretty nice,” I smiled letting my lust sneak through.“Hold on,” Timothy grinned. I was in trouble. “When I helped Cáel move in I saw he had a huge box full of women’s clothes - not in his size. He’s not a cross dresser.”Gee - thanks Timothy, you right bastard.“What is a cross dresser?” Aya piped up. I groaned.“A cross dresser is a man who dresses up like a woman,” Nikita provided. “A Drag Queen is a man who dresses up like a famous woman/actress/singer. A transvestite is a man who dresses like a woman because they want to be a woman.”“Have you ever dressed like a woman, Cáel?” Europe inquired.“Yeah,” I grinned. “I did a burlesque review one year and dressed up like a pole dancer at a friend’s bachelorette party.”“Really?” Loraine and Nikita both perked up.“What’s are pole dancers and what’s burlesque?” Aya mused.“Hmmm…I was in a burlesque troupe for a South Sudan relief charity event,” I recited. “Burlesque dancers were really racy clothing - kind of like what you have on right now, Aya. I was a pole dancer at my friend’s bachelorette party because I owed her for some past mistakes.”“Aya, pole dancers where bikini style clothing and do erotic acrobatics with a ceiling to floor pole, thus pole dancing,” I explained.“Can we see you do that?” Loraine and Europa closed in. “Sometime soon?”“Past mistakes?” Nikita glared.“Yes, past mistakes,” I sighed. “I slept with her, her best friend, her mother and her younger sister. She stabbed me here,” I pointed to a faded scar on my left triceps. “We hooked up again later, but things didn’t work out that time either,” I pointed to the scar on my foot.“You didn’t have her arrested? Worse, you took her back so she could stab you again?” Nikita shook her head negatively.“I was the one who made her angry,” I shrugged, “plus the sex was passionate.”“Those are scars of sexual animus,” Loraine purred. “You must be tremendously delectable to incite such a reaction.” She gave off her own predatory rumblings.“Loraine, the man cheated on these women. This is not what you look for in a sex partner,” Nikita lectured.“What do you mean?” Europa looked Nikita’s way. “I want a man that other women desire. It makes the conflict and resulting conquest all the more praiseworthy.”“You are thirteen,” the policewoman reminded Europa. “You don’t need to be thinking about men, especially treating men like conquests.”Timothy came out of my room with a large cardboard packing box - full of clothes - women’s clothes.“What the?” Nikita blanched. Europa and Loraine swarmed the goodies while Aya snuggled in tighter to my side.“I’ve never heard my Mother, or Aunts, talk about a male the way they talk about you,” Aya whispered into my ear in Old Kingdom Hittite. “They really like you - as a person.”“You referred to Desiree as your Aunt today,” I quietly spoke. “Is that the first time you’ve acknowledged her as family."No; I did it once before when I was six and Momma was very angry. Grandmother Sylvia was the Heir to House Epona when she ran away,” Aya informed me. “All of this happened before I was born. Great-grandmother was very angry with her sisters and Momma. When they brought Aunt Desiree back, they were all wanted to kill Desiree except Aunt Katrina.”“Katrina fought and killed Great-grandmother so Desiree was allowed to live. The other women still won’t call Desiree 'aunt’ or 'sister’ though,” Aya finished.“You did,” I reminded Aya.“I’m not going to make it, am I Cáel?” Aya suddenly looked so small and vulnerable. “I know you will honest with me.”I wasn’t sure where the honest part came from.“Why do you think you won’t make your trial in three years?” I inquired. I wanted to know where she stood mentally.“I’m small and weak. My mind gets excited and confused too easily. It took a man risking his life for me to make me concentrate hard enough to hit the target this morning. I’m not going to make it,” she moaped.“You do realize you are asking for sympathy from the only male inside Havenstone who speaks your lingo and everyone will know by Monday,” I tweaked her nose. “I’ve been beaten up, shot with an arrow, faced numerous death threats as well as enslavement plus being stun-gunned half to death and given a truth serum that set my body on fire - figuratively speaking - all in my first week.”“Your life expectancy is under three years, Aya, but mine is at 77 days and counting down,” I gave her a weak grin. “I’m not going to feel sorry for you. Aya has a dozen people who love and support her - me included. She’s a winner. Me? All I’ve got is a whiny munchkin with delusions of self-pity. That would be you, in case you missed it.” Aya hugged me.“That’s why I love you,” she whispered into my ear. “You are really my friend. You turn my mistakes into victories, Cáel. You treat me like you would any other nine-year old girl.”“Cáel Nyilas, what is all this?” Nikita glared at me. She was holding up a bundle of women’s undergarments.“Clean underwear of the female variety,” I grinned broadly.“Wow,” Loraine exclaimed. “There is not much to this one at all,” she held up a lacy white thong. “Do you want to see me wearing this…and a smile?” she invited me with her eyes.“Actually Loraine, those are Timothy’s,” I lied. She looked poleaxed.“Bro, those wouldn’t hide my balls, much less my dick,” Timothy laughed.“Guys!” snapped Nikita. “Try to remember this is a teenage girl sleep-over, not a frat party.”“Nikita, calm down,” Europa tapped the cop’s shoulder. “I think we’ve all seen a naked man before, unless you haven’t. Why don’t you try some of these on? Some are in your size.”“Women don’t put on other women’s underwear,” Nikita stated. “It is unsanitary.”“But he washed them,” Europa countered.“That’s not the point,” Nikita groaned.“Well, I’m going to try some on and see how Cael likes them,” Loraine proclaimed.“Me too!” Europa stood up.“Me three!” Aya tried to jump up but I held her at my side.“No you don’t,” I tickled her. “You need to stay here with me on the sofa to make sure I behave and Officer Nikita doesn’t have to shoot me.”Aya stayed with me; Loraine and Europa grabbed up some of the clothes and fled to my bedroom, pursued hotly by Nikita. Timothy settled in on the other side of Aya.“Hey there,” he rumbled. “You are as cute as Cáel said you were.”“Thank you,” Aya gave her warmest smile to him. “You have really big muscles.”“I work out a lot and eat children for breakfast to stay in shape,” he teased.“Bad children taste better with ketchup,” Aya chirped without missing a beat.“Do you have any eighteen year old, or older, brothers as cute as you?” Timothy rustled Aya’s hair.“We don’t have brothers,” Aya informed him. Timothy shot me an inquisitive look. My visual response indicated he should wait for an explanation later. We opted to tickle Aya instead then Timothy followed that with airplane spins and we ended up doing Aya-tosses. Yes, we tossed the future of House Epona, squealing, across the length of our living room, caught her then threw her back.The ladies came out of my room. Loraine was flabbergasted, Europa was jealous and Nikita was livid. They were also all wearing various pieces of flimsy female attire. You see, when a woman dumps you in a screaming fit, they take their coats, pants and shoes - it gets cold in New Hampshire.The often forget shorts, pajamas, panties, bras and light shirts. This resulted in my 'collection’ of women’s things to be biased toward bedroom/house casual attire.“Me next!” Europa begged.“Put her down right now!” Nikita demanded.“Cáel, I’m scared,” Loraine faux-sniffled. “Hold me.” That would have been bad in all kinds of ways. Loraine had picked up a cotton candy colored bra and panty set - from a nice girl - liked to walk around my room in just that and the matching pair of 6 inch heels…which were also in the box.“No!” Nikita grabbed Loraine’s bra strap to impede her progress. Europa slipped past Nikita right as Timothy was putting the exhilarated Aya down. For a child handled like glass most of her life, I could tell the thrill of our roughhousing was reaching deep into Aya’s heart. She didn’t know that she was still being treated differently than other nine year-olds because being something new was good enough.From my point of view, I was a good boy. I stopped and gawked at Nikita. Sure, she was wearing forest green boy shorts and matching sports bra, but this was as naked as I’d ever seen her. Her body was pale white unlike Loraine’s, which had a faint tan. This did two thing; disappointed Loraine and caused Nikita a terrible conflict of emotions.Oh, I was still a pig who mostly thought of women as sex objects - but she was the current subject of my porcine desires so I was suddenly more acceptable, or at least, forgivable. My reaction had an unexpected benefit. Nikita remembered that she was here to be a chaperone, not a den mother.“Loraine, if he drooled at you like that, he knows I would shoot him,” she tapped the younger woman.“But I’m wearing less,” Loraine turned around to face Nikita. Now Nikita was the 'worldly’ woman lecturing the one blossoming into womanhood - Thank God!Women ganging up on you isn’t always a bad thing and them fighting over you isn’t always a good thing. If they fight over you, the winner may still hold you responsible for what happened = no sex. When they settle those issues internally, they are more likely to ignore your flaws to get what they want, namely your attention and body.Anybody who thinks girls don’t want sex as much as a guy has never been shoved into a dark closet with a female total stranger. If you aren’t quick, she’ll have your cock in her mouth before you can get under her bra - just saying.“Sometimes you get more out of teasing a man than showing him too much,” Nikita taught Loraine.“What do you think?” Loraine turned back to me.“What? Huh? I think you two are two too many,” I gulped. “I’m going to stand in front of the freezer for a bit.” Loraine grinned then turned and shared a special look with Nikita - metamorphosis complete. They were now women, neither Amazon nor outsider.“No you don’t,” Europa insisted. “I want to take an 'Aya’ flight,” she referred to Timothy and me tossing Aya across the admittedly small living room. Timothy easily hefted a giggling Europa up in an arm curl.“We can do this,” Timothy grinned at me. “She’s light enough.”Timothy knew how much weight he regularly lifted and how that rated against my slightly lesser bench press. I took his word for it that I could catch a thrown Europa with only one good leg. The doorbell rang and a stillness seized the room.“Timothy, take Europa to the kitchen,” I hissed. “Loraine, Aya - to the bedroom. Nikita - gun.” People scrambled. Once they were done, I began to stump to the door. The bell rang again because I was taking a while and the person at the door was impatient. I looked out the peephole and what I saw chilled me. Not opening the door wasn’t an option - double negative - ugh.“Hello Elsa,” I glared. She had two buddies, all from the Security Detail. “What can I do for you?”“This is a spot inspection on the Ruger girls,” she informed me.“I didn’t receive any notification of this,” I narrowed my gaze.“That’s why it’s called a spot inspection, you idiot,” Elsa sneered.“Well, that’s not going to happen,” I took a deep breath. “Anything else I can 'not’ do for you?”“Don’t you recall what I said when we met the first time at Katrina’s office?” Elsa smirked.“Since my death will be rapidly followed by yours, I’ll accept the trade,” I grinned.Elsa tried to look past me.“The woman has a gun?” Elsa wondered.“She’s a police officer with a submitted itinerary,” I smiled. “Is there anything else you need to know?”“I will see the girls,” Elsa insisted.“Elsa, here are your options. You can storm the room and you and your team will most likely die. You can leave. Or, you can strip down under my watchful eye. If I am satisfied you have no weapons, you, and you alone, can come in and see the girls. How’s that?”“You don’t dictate conditions to me,” Elsa hissed.“You do what you like. This door closes in ten seconds,” I shrugged.“Girls! Present yourself,” Elsa commanded in Old Kingdom Hittite.“No!” Aya shouted back a second later in the same tongue. “And leave my Daddy alone.”I heard a drawer open in the kitchen.“The knives are in the bloc on the counter,” I heard Timothy give Europa directions. It must have been her looking for a weapon.“Loraine,” Elsa snapped, “stop this madness.”“Elsa, Officer Nikita and me are arguing if I can use her back up-piece, or not,” Loraine responded. “Elsa, I have known and respected you all of my life. If you kill Officer Nikita, I will pick up her weapon and shoot you. Cáel is only doing what a Father would do for his offspring - defending us.”“How about this?” Europa, out of sight in the kitchenette, showed Timothy something.“Utility knife - good choice,” Timothy remarked.“What have you done to these girls?” Elsa seethed.“I…I can’t say anything that would make a damn bit of difference to you, Elsa. You are willfully blind and I’m too hurt and tired to give a damn anymore.”“3…2…1…” I counted down.“Fine, I’ll submit to a search,” Elsa grumbled. Oh, this was going to be fun. This wasn’t what I had purposed. It didn’t matter. She was here to see me, not the kids. I knew that look. I didn’t even ask to take off her clothes. I started, she looked absolutely outraged and she was also juicy enough to slake any man’s, or lesbian’s, thirst.The two other security types started out angry then slowly evolved into a guarded curiosity.“Is this really necessary?” Elsa groused as I took off her belt. I showed her the garrote I found in the folds of the leather accessory. She refused to be apologetic in the least. Beyond the obvious weapons, she had the garrote, 8 small knives and a back-up pistol holstered at the small of her back.Feeling inside Elsa’s bra earned me three dirty looks. I wasn’t actually looking for weapons. Her tits looked nice, so I copped a free feel. I’m a pig. Running my hands around inside her panties earned me a death warrant, no doubt. I kept Elsa’s arousal to myself. Sticking a finger inside her didn’t count as a violation of my 77 day deadline because…I’d make up something later.“Come on,” I beckoned Elsa to follow me. She reached down to pick up her clothes. “No you don’t,’ I insisted. "I can’t be sure I missed something sown into the fabric so you come as you are.” This wasn’t done out of concern for the girls’ safety. This was done because Elsa looked even hotter in her aqua French cut panties and matching sports bra. Oink.Only when I pushed the door open did Elsa and company realize I’d never closed the portal fully. Contrary to the evidence, I wasn’t suicidal. If something had gone bad in the hallway, I was planning to throw my body inside and pray for Nikita to provide me cover fire so I could crawl to the kitchenette.Once we were inside, I shut and deadbolt-locked the door. Nikita and Timothy peeked out first.“You go Bro,” Timothy chuckled. “She’s not here five minutes and you have her out of her clothes. My faith in you is renewed.” Nikita’s reaction was a bit different.“Did you search inside her bra and panties too?” was her icy insinuation of my pig-atude.“Yes he did,” Elsa snarled at Nikita. Oh, this would be a real bitch-fest. I was 'saved’ by the appearance of the three girls. Elsa’s gaze wandered from Loraine to Europa to me. “What is the meaning of this?” That had to be about the lingerie.“Yeah,” Nikita glared at me too. “That’s what I asked him.”“These are his trophies from some of his female conquests,” Lo

We're back at it! Episode three, I get to chop it up with my childhood homie Juan Luis. We talk about the Skyrise Chicago fundraiser for Shirley Ryan ability lab. We dive into Juan Luis's unfortunate spinal cord injury due to gun violence that left him paralyzed from the neck down. Although he was down, he never gave up and regained his ability to walk thanks to the amazing staff at Shirley Ryan. The fundraiser will be on November 6th, where we will be climbing the stairs of the SEARS TOWER (it will NEVER be the Willis Tower to me!!!) from the 1st floor all the way to the top of the 105th floor!Anyone is welcomed to join our team, but if you're not the participating type we are also accepting donations. The link to participate or donate can be found on both of our instagrams at @oatw_podcast_ or @Juan_luis_92. I hope y'all enjoy this one as much as I did. So sit back, crack open a cold one, light one up, and enjoy the show!

Hey hey y'all, I'm back from a short hiatus for episode 100!! 100 episodes in 100 weeks! Missed a couple weeks, doubled up on a few weeks and here we are! 100 in the bank, looking forward to the next 100! We took a trip to Chicago – caught a Cubs game, ate tons of deep dish pizza, caught the amazing Kayla Drescher at the really cool, speakeasy magic club The Magic Lounge! Paige Thompson was the headliner and it was a blast! Check out Kayla's Podcast Shezam! Hit her up on her website magicinheels.com and tell her to go on Tony on the Mic! Enough pandering… We also took a river cruise and acted like tourists at the Bean! We also took in Niagara Falls and thought we were in the famous Toronto space needle… spoiler alert, we weren't. 

Are you willing to be his tour guide? Chicago's best morning radio show now has a podcast! Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and remember that the conversation always lives on the Q101 Facebook page.  Brian, Ali, & Justin are live every morning from 6a-10a on Q101.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We're off for the holiday, but we wanted to share this bonus episode from the Chicago History Podcast. We had host Tommy Henry on awhile aback to talk about the history of Bally's in the city, and today he's going to tell you about another iconic Chicago company. The Sears tower (now Willis Tower) was once the tallest building in the world and is easily the most recognizable building in Chicago, but that building was not the first Sears Tower. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In pursuit of fame, fortune, or just staying out of trouble, Kenan Rockmore has cooked up a cacophony of plans or plots over the year to make it to the top of the Sears Tower and beyond. In this episode we discuss our favorite of his doomed enterprises. Now c'mon, butterfingers, we've got Kel to pay. Email us at: kenankelpodcast@gmail.com Check out our T-Shirts: https://www.teepublic.com/user/kenan-kel-podcast And our Website: https://www.podpage.com/kenankelpodcast/ Twitter/Instagram/TikTok: @kenankelpodcast --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/kenankelpodcast/message

Anna Davlantes, WGN Radio's investigative correspondent, joined Bob Sirott to share what happened this week in Chicago history. Stories include Mickey Mouse’s debut, the grand opening of Marriott’s Great America, the man who scaled up the Sears Tower, and Chicago’s first Blues Festival.

On this day in 1981, a 25-year-old acrobat named Dan Goodwin completed the first external climb of the Sears Tower, the tallest building in the world at the time. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Shane Pearce is the Director of Urologic Oncology at Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane, WA. He talks with us about advances in robotic surgery, immunotherapy, and why the Sears Tower isn't a reliable unit of measurement!

Today Ben Beard interviews David Rosen David Rosen has over 30 years of experience in financial, operational and strategic planning positions with public and private companies. His investment experience is extensive and includes participation in the restructuring of over $1 Billion dollars in unsecured debt on the Sears Tower and the strategic repositioning of Sears that led to the sale of Coldwell Banker and Allstate. In 2007 David founded Long Grove Capital to help homebuilders navigate the complex world of mergers and acquisitions. You can contact David Rosen at the Long Grove Captial website. https://www.longgrovecapital.com/ Follow Red Cliff Homes Website Facebook Instagram Twitter LinkedIn Youtube

Yes, the Human Spider -French man Alain Robert came to Town to complete his mission to reach the summit of the Petronas Twin Towers, after 2 unsuccessful 2 attempts - 1997 & 2007. The Petronas Twin Towers upon completion in 1996 was awarded the Tallest Tower in the World then, overtaking the Sears Tower in Chicago with the height of the spires also taken into consideration. Nevertheless that was a big surprise win for Malaysia as the initial plan was not to aspire to take the position as the tallest tower in the World ! The Twin Towers, belong to our National :Petroleum Company comprises of 2 identical Twin Towers were built by 2 different companies- Tower 1- Japanese Hazama Corporation- Tower 2 - Samsung C& T. Each tower is 88 stories high, connected in the middle at level 41&42 by the skybridge which was installed by Samsung. Designed by the late Cesar Pelli - and Argentine-American architect, it reflects the Islamic Geometric Design of the 8 pointed star. The TwinTowers is part of the mix development area of the KLCC (Kuala Lumpur City Centre) and comprises other buildings like the Mandarain Oriental Hote, the Convention Centre , the Traders Hotel , the KLCC part, A mosque and also the Suria KLCC Shopping Mall. So when you are in Kuala Lumpur- don't miss the opportunity to see Malaysian's icon with your own eyes !! Malaysia Welcomes You !!

On May 25, 1981, Chicagoans looked toward the sky to spot a man in a Spider Man costume clinging to the side of the Sears Tower, at the time the world's tallest building. It's the day Dan Goodwin became "Spider Dan."Learn more about Dan Goodwin at www.tripleblack.com, and keep an eye out for his forthcoming book, tentatively titled, "Untethered: When Success Is Your Only Option." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Obertubbesing was at the Sears Tower on September 11, 2001. She said she remembers every detail of that day.

Dr. Laura Gallaher is a keynote speaker, a leadership coach and Organizational Psychologist. She is also the CEO at GALLAHER EDGE. In this super interesting conversation, you can learn about: How she leads culture change using a blend of org' psychology and industrial engineering. Learn about the “inside out” model and that is all starts with self. Why changing culture, you can influence positive outcomes and performance. How to recognise if you have imposter syndrome, how you can go about dealing with that.   Join our Tribe at https://leadership-hacker.com Music: " Upbeat Party " by Scott Holmes courtesy of the Free Music Archive FMA Transcript: Thanks to Jermaine Pinto at JRP Transcribing for being our Partner. Contact Jermaine via LinkedIn or via his site JRP Transcribing Services Find out more about Laura below: Laura on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-gallaher-phd/ Gallaher Edge Website: https://www.gallaheredge.com Laura on Twitter: https://twitter.com/drlauragallaher Laura on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drlauragallaher/ You can get Laura's new book here   Full Transcript Below: ----more----  Steve Rush: Some call me Steve, dad, husband or friend. Others might call me boss, coach or mentor. Today you can call me The Leadership Hacker.   Thanks for listening in. I really appreciate it. My job as the leadership hacker is to hack into the minds, experiences, habits and learning of great leaders, C-Suite executives, authors and development experts so that I can assist you developing your understanding and awareness of leadership. I am Steve Rush and I am your host today. I am the author of Leadership Cake. I am a transformation consultant and leadership coach. I cannot wait to start sharing all things leadership with you   Our special guest on today's show is Dr. Laura Gallaher. She's an Organizational Psychologist. Who's worked with Walt Disney and NASA to help transform culture. She's now a speaker and the CEO of GALLAHER EDGE, but before we get a chance to speak with Laura, it's The Leadership Hacker News. The Leadership Hacker News Steve Rush: If you're a regular listener of the show, you will know that we love diversity and difference on this show. One the news today we explore what leaders can learn about mindfulness and entrepreneurship from Bhutan of all places. So where is Bhutan? Well, it's a small kingdom located deep in the Himalayas and native of Bhutan Dr. Karma Phuntsho who's an Oxford educated founder of the Loden Foundation believes that leadership lessons from Bhutan can lead anyone to success in life and in business. Dr. Phuntsho first discovered the benefits of mindful leadership after studying as a Buddhist monk for over 10 years, he then obtained his PhD at Oxford, completed some research at Cambridge and was the first Bhutanese Oxbridge fellow. As self-described go-between linking Western business philosophies with Buddhist traditions, Dr. Phuntsho contains fascinating insights on humanity, culture, business, and how leadership ties it all together. Perhaps nothing demonstrates this more than the Loden Foundation. His non-for-profit organization for aspiring Bhutanese entrepreneurs built on mindfulness, innovation and tradition. At the Lowden Foundation, Dr. Phuntsho, whose mission isn't only to create a thriving network of Bhutanese businesses, but it's also to shape tomorrow's entrepreneurs as a force of good within their communities throughout the world. In 2008, Dr. Phuntsho, along with a small group of colleagues launched the Lowden Foundation to face the growing challenge of high unemployment in Bhutan, along with a lack of entrepreneurial spirit, largely caused by the tradition of hand-me-down farming, the non-for-profits supports entrepreneurship in Bhutan through education, inspiration, and outreach. They also offer interest free collateral free loans through the Lowden Entrepreneurship Program, which ties the repayment plans to the businesses strategy and structure. To date they've supported over 5,000 aspiring entrepreneurs and funded over 200 businesses in Bhutan, 72 which are run by women, the Lowden Foundations dedicated to preservation of Bhutan's culture and deeply rooted in its Buddha beliefs. And with this comes the intrinsic tie to being mindful, compassionate business leaders. And of course, demonstrating those mindful and compassionate leadership practices, cornerstones of course of the Buddhist philosophy. What Dr Phuntsho believes should be the cornerstones of every leader's philosophy, no matter where they live on the planet, he says it's important for us to bring prosperity, to improve people's ordinary standard of living, but we have to seek that without losing the overall meaning of life. And one wonderful way to never forget the joys of life is, been remembered that every human, every organization is somehow interconnected. And there's a great leadership lesson here. Of course, mindfulness and compassion are given these days, but the role that habits, rituals and mindsets play in communities is still rife and it sometimes takes a bold leader to disrupt that status quo. So, the next time you notice rituals or habits that may be holding your community or team back, will you be that disruptor? That's been The Leadership Hacker News. We'd love to hear your stories, insights from wherever you are in the world. Bring difference to our difference. So please get in touch with us. Start of Podcast Steve Rush: Our special guest on today's show is Dr. Laura Gallaher. She is a keynote speaker, a leadership coach and Organizational Psychologist, is also the CEO at GALLAHER EDGE. Laura, welcome to the leadership hacker podcast. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Thank you so much for having me, Steve. Steve Rush: So, I'm really keen to find out how you ended up leading GALLAHER EDGE and what happened beforehand. So just give us a bit of a potted history of your kind of early career and some of the passions that led you to do what you do? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely, I started looking at psychology in college and thought I would go the route of being a therapist, something kind of, you know, traditional psychology starter type. And then I realized how interested I was in social psychology. What happens when we get groups of people together? And what are the ways that we form impressions and how does that affect the way we treat each other? And then I realized there's this whole field called Industrial Organizational Psychology, where we can look at those kinds of dynamics in the context of the workplace. So, I came from Phoenix, Arizona over to Orlando, Florida, and I studied Organizational Psychology for another five or six years after undergrad and got the chance to work for NASA. So, I was working for NASA while I was finishing up my PhD. And after about seven years there, I started this business GALLAHER EDGE on the side of the NASA job. And after about 10 months of that, I was like, you know what? Let me try this full time. And after about six months of that, I was like, Ooh, I don't know about this. And I went back to a nine to five role with Disney and 10 months later, I was like, you know what, I'm going to try this again. And so ever since 2015, I have been running GALLAHER EDGE as my full-time role. Steve Rush: Excellent, and it was really interesting from the notes I made when we spoke first, you joined NASA at a real kind of pivotal moment in their history, and it was not long after the Space Shuttle Columbia tragedy back in 2003. And you were called in to help transform and enhance the culture at the space center in Kennedy Space Center. What was it you noticed about what was happening at NASA at the time and what did you learn from that time? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, so it was a really somber way to get things started my in my career, you know, and I obviously believed in the importance of psychology and organizational psychology, but to have the chance to come in and work for NASA. When they did the investigation about the accident, the investigation board report said that NASA's culture was as much to blame for the accident is the actual piece of foam that struck the orbiter during the launch. Steve Rush: Wow. Dr. Laura Gallaher: So, yeah, it was a pretty strong indictment of the culture and what I find so incredibly remarkable about this. And you know, I worked very closely with my now business partner, Dr. Phillip Meade. He had been out at the Space Center. He was working there for many years before the accident occurred. Was that just months before the accident happened, NASA was rated the number one place in the Federal Government by its employees. So, when they surveyed all of the employees and every agency of the Federal Government about their workplace and how engaged they were and how motivated they were and how much they had job satisfaction, NASA was number one. So, I don't know about you use Steve, but when I hear like, oh, culture was to blame for this tragedy, I'm like, Ooh, man, that must've been a, what a mess, you know. Steve Rush: That's right, not aligned is it? Dr. Laura Gallaher: It must've been just awful, people not getting along, like overbearing managers. Like this must be a terrible place to work and that wasn't the case. And so, what evolved in the work? I mean, I learned so much in my time there was understanding that there's a difference between having a quote, good culture and a quote, effective culture. So, it's really important to be able to say, what is it that we're actually wanting to achieve and accomplish in terms of results and how we truly designed the culture in a way that we will get those results versus just, hey, do people like working here? Steve Rush: That's a really interesting dichotomy, isn't it? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah. Steve Rush: As you're saying it, I'm trying to kind of frame it almost as in so much as good cultures don't necessarily give you great performance. So, what was the gap if you like between the two? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Of course, as you can imagine, you know, culture. So, we described cultures as emergent property. It's based on the interactions of the common behaviors and beliefs with the employees and organizations are complex adaptive systems. So, I definitely won't have time during our conversation today to get into all of the details about it, right. And the reason I qualify it so much is because I think it's really easy for anybody to be outside of a situation and look in and go, how could they be so stupid? So, some of what I want to describe an point out, it's easy for somebody to fall into altruism and go, oh, well, I would never do that, right? Or that would never happen here. And when you do that, that's a deep form of defensiveness that stops us from learning from the mistakes of other people. Steve Rush: It does, yeah. Dr. Laura Gallaher: So, my invitation to everybody listening is, you know, see how you can actually take some lessons away from some of what I can share about NASA history and find out when might that also be true for me, right. Rather than going like, man, how did they miss that or whatever. So, there's really three levels that I can talk about when I explain what was happening in NASA culture, leading up to the accident. This is based on our inside out model. We have self at the core, everything comes back to self, and then we have team as the middle layer. And then we have the organizational level at the broadest layer. So, these like three concentric circles. So, at the organizational layer, one of the biggest challenges is they had the program manager for shuttle in charge of everything from safety and technical concerns, but also programmatic concerns like budget and schedule. So, when it comes down to it, you're looking to one person to try to effectively balance all of those things at the same time, that's just an organizational design flaw. You don't have people sitting around the table with an equal level of leadership, voicing their opinions when it comes to, well, what does technical say? What does safety say? Okay, what does the program say? It was all falling on one person. And so, they were essentially unknowingly creating a virtually impossible situation for this person to actually make good decisions, right? So, a big piece of what we looked at was how can we design the organization differently so that we're not asking people to fight against the system and ask an engineer who's two or three or four or five levels down from the program manager and say, yeah, stand up in a meeting and say, hey, I don't have a lot of data, but I'm really worried about the shuttle. Even though y'all have made a bunch of decisions in the past to say that we don't need to worry about this during flight, like, wow, like that's really challenging. So, at the org level, work design matters a ton, you really want to pay attention to how the design of the organization affects the culture. Steve Rush: My experience, having worked in lots of different organizations is often they try to fit org design to fit the team and the individual into the organization and not the other way around. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, we work with our clients and organizational design, it's so funny because I'm a psychologist and more so human centric. And when we go into that process, we're like, okay, we really want you to not think about people. Like don't think about human beings. Don't think about who you have right now. We really want you to think about the organization as a system, the organization as a machine. And we want to design it optimally to get the results you want to get and not design it around the specific humans, right. Because then you kind of end up like duct taping things together. Like, oh, well this person, I don't know if we have right now a right person to play a chief revenue officer role. So, let's not do that. Let's just go ahead and, you know, keep this kind of biz-dev over here and this kind of sales here, or like, oh, you know what? I don't know if these two people really get along very well. So even though it makes sense for them to be in the same department, let's just break those up. They're doing the best they can, and sometimes they make very flawed decisions for org design because they're trying to base it around those specific people. Steve Rush: Yeah, I can see that. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, so that was the org design, one of the biggest org design pieces. And that was one of the biggest initiatives that I supported when I first started my work there. At the team level, there were some things happening with communication. So, one of the findings that just, it actually got a lot of attention at the time was the phone strike. And so, for anybody who doesn't know, just briefly during the final launch of Columbia, a piece of foam fell off of the external tank, which is the large orange structure on the shuttle system. And it struck the orbiter, which is the part that looks like the plane. And they didn't know exactly where it hit. They could see that it hit, they could see it and make contact. They could estimate the general size of the foam, but they just weren't sure. And foam had been hitting the orbiter. Unfortunately, it happened numerous times before and it had never been dangerous. It was always something that they had to deal with when they check the orbiter back and processed it to get ready for the next flight. They would need to change out some of the tiles for the heat shield, you know, so they previously made a decision like, hey, when foam strikes happen, we don't have to worry about it in flight. It's something that we'll deal with during processing. So, this was something that they thought they decide and the foam strike, and because they didn't know exactly where it hit. And it looked quite large. It was some conversation, but it was like a third sub bullet, on a PowerPoint slide or something like that. And, you know, a presentation to the decision makers. And so that was one of the things that got a lot of attention was, hey, like what's happening with our team communication here and are we over-relying on trying to make things really brief and succinct and not giving things enough airtime to really understand what it is that we're deciding. So that's one of the things that I really invite leaders to do is, we're all so busy, right? And we all feel so stretched for time. And it's so tempting to just want to push through decisions really quickly and not give them enough airtime. But, in some cases, unfortunately in this case potentially catastrophic. Steve Rush: Yeah, sometimes you just got to go slow to go fast, haven't you? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely, I slow down to speed up is one of our favorite mantras. We're always inviting our clients to do it. And do you know what? We work on it too. It's something that we feel is vital, so I can understand the difficulty. And the other piece that I want to share, it just always stood out the most to me as a psychologist, was that the self-level. So, at the self-level, when it comes to culture, there were numerous people, numerous little groups, little teams, actually around NASA that were looking deeply into this issue of the foam hitting the orbiter, and they were really concerned. They were really concerned, but they didn't have a lot of data. And NASA is very data-driven. And so, like I was starting to allude to earlier, it's really difficult. It was difficult to NASA culture at the time to say, hey, I know we've made a decision in the past. That foam is not something to worry about in flight, but let's just pretend that's not true. And also, I don't have any data to actually tell me that this is going to be a catastrophe, but it might be. So can we talk about it and spend some more money to get some imagery so we can just determine better. That was a request that actually was made, but it was being made in all of these indirect ways, all these indirect channels and because of the interrupt, personal fear to like really stand up and say, you know, hey, I'm actually terrified about this. And I don't have data to back me up. Every time the request to get more imagery, was shut down. It wasn't well understood. And at a certain point, people stopped fighting for it because they just didn't know. Steve Rush: Yeah, and as a result, a catastrophic event happened, it could have been prevented. Had somebody been a bit more forthright or had communicated more effectively? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, I mean, there's probably numerous conversations, right? That could have gone differently. Steve Rush: Yeah. Dr. Laura Gallaher: And one of the additional challenges is, if they did in fact get the imagery and discover, oh no, this is quite a large hole that the foam has created in the orbiters wing. They actually didn't know what they would do about it. There was no clear path or plan to fix that problem. And so, part of what we believe is that, if I don't think that I know how to solve a problem, or if I don't think that there's anything that I can do about it, then subconsciously I might actually convince myself that it's not really a problem. And then not even allow myself to be fully aware of it. And that's a big part of what we think was happening when it came to the decision making of the shuttle program manager at the time, just, you know what, it's not an issue. There's nothing we can do about it, so it's not an issue. There's actually a quote in the Columbia accident, investigation board, almost exactly to that effect. Steve Rush: That's really fascinating. We could spend loads more time on that, I'm sure. But culturally, that kind of three layers that inside out model you just described, all played out here, you can still have a good culture, but that's where performance problems can happen. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah. Steve Rush: Yeah. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, it's, you know, there are so many things that unfortunately ended up working against the intention. Like one of the key things that was also happening for the agency was there was a lot of pressure, mean the shuttle program at this point was over 20 years old, it was constantly considered to be on the chopping block in terms of budget. Maybe they were afraid the program could be canceled. Everything that they were doing to build a space station would potentially be canceled. They had huge schedule pressure to get the international space station finished by a certain date. So, this whole like save the program mentality, led people to subconsciously make much more risky decisions than they would have otherwise. And we equate it to, you know, if there's a large beam, just going 50 feet off of, you know, the Sears Tower and I put a hundred-dollar bill at the end, are you going to walk out and get it? Most people would say, no, I'm going to pass. But if I put your child out at the end of that beam, are you going to go and get your child? Steve Rush: Yeah, it changes the dynamic somewhat, doesn't it? Yeah. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely, so when it's like save the program, saves the baby. Because that's how the program, the shuttle program felt for a lot of people, they would subconsciously start making riskier and riskier decisions to save the program. So riskier decisions to try to maintain schedule, riskier decisions to say, oh, we don't have to worry about that right now because we need to keep moving forward. And so those were a lot of the things that we helped leaders pay attention to and take a look into. Steve Rush: Some great lessons too. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely. Steve Rush: So, you were then hired by Walt Disney to help with their brand. And this is another interesting dynamic in so much as that when people think of Walt Disney they think of this high energy, positive culture. Tell us a little bit about what your experience was like with Walt Disney and then how that might have changed their perspectives around what culture meant for them? Dr. Laura Gallaher: When, I was working for Disney. I was really excited about what they were focusing on because the big culture change, they were wanting to bring was around changing how I did performance management. And if you think about performance management in any organization, if you ask people like, hey, how do you like it your performance management process and system? It tends to just get met with groans, right? Leaders start to look at those conversations as like performance rating, justification conversations, employees tend to feel, you know, demoralized and frustrated and judged. They feel like they ended up trying to defend their own performance. Like almost nobody likes them. And the worst part is they don't actually tend to improve performance, which is the whole point. They're supposed to help improve performance. And so, what I loved about what they were doing was they wanted to get away from this whole idea of, you know, judging the people and saying, here's your rating, right? We're going to grade you now to say, no, we want to train leaders how to coach. It's a totally different part of the brain. It's a different way to show up, it requires growth mindset, right? And not just for oneself, but a belief that this person I'm talking to can and absolutely will grow. And we're in it together kind of thing. And so, I thought that was a really exciting project that they were doing and huge because it changes so much of what people are comfortable with. This idea of like, it's so much, we just kind of give people a grade and then move forward. And so, I was working with them primarily on that project. And it was actually still an ongoing project when I made the decision to leave and focus full-time with GALLAHER EDGE. Steve Rush: It's a massive mindset shift though, isn't it? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes. Steve Rush: Moving away from self-justification of here's what I've done versus here's how I'm helping the future evolve, which is what that coaching culture will create, right? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, part of what I took from that, and I have continued to build on with the clients I work with now is a paradigm chapter, I mention model chapter around, what does it mean to look at your employee's performance? Stop thinking about your employee's performance as a result of, you know, your employee's competence, right? It's their performance is actually a result of their performance and your performance and the relationship the two of you have together. And when you start to think about your employee's performance in that way, then it really makes it feel in these conversations like this is you and me on the same side, working toward a solution together versus that you versus me thing that happens with those performance justification conversations, right? Of the more traditional style. Steve Rush: Exactly, and the other really strange notion I've found is that you actually can't manage performance when it's done, it's done. When you have achieved a result, it's done, it's locked in time and history from that point onwards and therefore spending time over analyzing that is almost counter-intuitive, isn't it? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, it can take people backwards. You may remember where this came from Steve. I can't remember the attribution, but feed forward instead of feedback. Steve Rush: Yeah, it's something I deployed all the time, Dr. Laura Gallaher: Love it. It's such a powerful concept and it starts to become like we use this communication framework. It's an acronym, Fric. It's FRIC. And so, you know, useful, especially when you think about this whole paradigm is shifting performance management away from rating and judging and more into just regular coaching conversations. We want it to be regular. We want it to be timely. We want it to happen in the moment. And so sometimes that it's hard. People are like, Ooh, these are hard conversations. So go ahead and start with the fear of the feeling. Get that out of the way, acknowledge if there is any emotion that you're noticing within yourself as your parts of the conversation, just lead with vulnerability. The R is for request, what do you want? And this is an example of feed forward. So, I'm not harping on somebody for something that like you've said, Steve is done. It's in the past, it's over, it cannot be managed, but I can make a request of what I would like from you in the future. And it's not a demand, it's a request. And then the, I is for inquiry, which is essentially, you know, what can I do to make it easier for you to honor my request? And this is recognizing that whole co-creation idea, this recognizes like, hey, whatever's happening with us, whatever's happening with the performance. We're both creating it. We're both contributing to it. And I think I see something that I'd like from you, that's my request. What do you see within me? What would you like for me? How can I also participate and move together with you towards a solution? And then you want to get to at least one commitment, maybe two. And sometimes it's more, sometimes people have some communication debt and they don't really talk openly for a while. And so, they actually want to go back and forth to make multiple requests. And what they're doing is they're designing how they want to work together. And it's very, very effective at getting people past some of these conversations that they normally avoid, whether it comes to improving performance or improving team dynamics or anything like that. Steve Rush: I love the simplicity of that little model and you can actually help just frame the conversation as well if you use that simple process as well. And one of the other things I also noticed that kind of is aligned to that almost is the principle. When people talk about performance, I get people to talk about the performer rather than performance, because the performer drags their performance, between better and different. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes, very true. Yeah, I keep the focus on the person. Steve Rush: Love it. What are the things that you're working on with GALLAHER EDGE and blending that psychology and industrial psychology together? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, so this is really fun. So, I mentioned Dr. Phillip Meade is my business partner and he and I worked at a closely at NASA following the Space Shuttle Columbia accident. So, we've worked together now for, I guess, about maybe 15, 16 years, something like that. And so, he's got this industrial engineering background and I've got this industrial organizational psychology background. And so, when we bring that together, it's been for me at least, it's been really cool because I get to stay really focused on the psychological elements. I get to stay deep within the human issues that are going on because humans within ourselves, we are these complex adaptive systems, right. But then at the organizational level, there's this whole macro, you know, systems, theory, systems thinking, and how can we really make sure that we're fully designing everything, so we use metaphors of like, you know, designing a car, like, what are the design requirements of a vehicle? Are you trying to create like a dump truck that can carry heavy loads? Are you trying to design a race car that can turn really quickly around a corner? Like there's no good or bad, but let's just be really intentional. So, he's brought so much of that macro, like organizational level thinking and allowing me to stay really focused on the human side. And we've built this model that really connects all of that, where we focus on these cultural traits, these things that emerge, you know, maturity, diversity, community, and unity, but we tie it deep into human motivation, like fundamental human motivation. We cause that there are four key drivers within us. And this gets you away from carrots and sticks, right? This is just human staff. We are all driven for growth, for belonging, for connection and for identity. And so, you know, these are like the missing links. We talk about linking the human beings together in a way that we can tap into these drivers, these fundamental motivations, and then what we get are these emergent traits. And so that's been a really exciting process. We've writing a book about that and tying in all the work that we did with NASA's culture, following the accident, what we've learned and how we've continued to apply that throughout working with different clients throughout different industries over the years. Steve Rush: It'd be great to get you and Phillip back on a later show when the books out and really get into some of that together. Dr. Laura Gallaher: That will be fantastic. Steve Rush: So, from the last time we met, which is you present as a really confident, successful individual, who's got a huge track record of success and cultural shifting and changing behind you, but it hasn't always been that way for you. And I remember from the last time we met; you had this real problem with imposter syndrome for some time until you had this aha moment. And I wonder if he might be able to tell us a little bit about that. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah absolutely. Gosh, imposter syndrome. Well, I mean the first time, the first time that I really felt imposter syndrome was certainly when I began my work with NASA, I was actually 24 years old when I was hired. And I was asked to consult directly with the senior executive service director of engineering, which was this new organization that was being formed, right. As we were reorganizing the space center. I'm like, okay. Now what is it you're going to be able to share with him that he's going to look at me as this 24-year-old kid and go, okay, great, thanks so much. Steve Rush: Right. Dr. Laura Gallaher: So, I really struggled with that when I very first started and I noticed that in this technique, this took me many years to figure out. That it really came down to a lack of genuine self-acceptance, right. Which means being fully okay with myself. Exactly as I was in the moment, all my flaws, all my imperfections, all the things I didn't know, and also being okay with my talents and my strengths. So, in the beginning, the imposter syndrome hit me super hard and it would result in a lot of like, I would end up being rigid sometimes, right. So instead of being more flexible and co-creating with the people that I was working with, I was really just wanting to be right. And what that meant is I was focusing too much of my energy on trying to prove that I was right, rather than focusing on getting it right. And, you know, working with them and where I really saw that affect my performance was actually with my peers. So, the crazy irony about my early career, you know, I was brought in to NASA to really help them focus on psychological safety. How can we help leaders create psychological safety so that people are no longer afraid to say, hey, I don't have any data, but I'm really afraid about this. Can we please have an open conversation or whatever it is, raise a dissenting opinion, champion a dissenting opinion. And so that's what I was working on with my internal customers and that was working out reasonably well. But I went through this experience. It was a five-day workshop called the Human Element just a couple of years into my career. Threw out that week, I got all kinds of feedback just as we were going through. And it was a lot of stuff that felt really weird at the time. But the short version is, I found out that I was actually engaging in a lot of the same exact behaviors with my team, that I was asking the leaders in my personal organizations to not do. So, I wasn't creating psychological safety within my team. I was shutting people down without realizing it. And that realization like shook me to my core. I mean, I didn't even realize up to that point that I had low self-acceptance or lower self-acceptance. I mean, it's not dichotomous obviously, but it really made me take a much deeper look at things. And so, it took me still a couple more years to really figure it out and recognize that, you know, being competent isn't about knowing stuff. That's a very, you know, like grade school kind of mentality that children are taught, you know, learn this stuff, memorize it, take a test and then it's right or wrong. It's very binary, very black and white, but competence isn't knowing stuff. Competence is the ability to learn, grow, adapt, figure things out. Steve Rush: Yeah. Dr. Laura Gallaher: And I can do that with other people and I don't have to be right. And so, I understood my own defense mechanisms to a much greater degree. And once I got there, I realized that this idea of imposter syndrome, Steve, it's actually very like arrogant and judgmental because if I have imposter syndrome, part of what I'm saying is, oh my gosh, these people around me are so stupid. I have fooled all of them into thinking that I actually know what I'm doing. And I was like, whoa, like I thought imposter syndrome was kind of this like internally, like, oh, you know, I'm just, I'm insecure. And yes, it is. And insecurity leads us to not only judge ourselves, but judge other people. And so, it just started to completely shift my whole lens as I looked at what this meant. It's like, you know what, do I know everything? Not even close, right. The more I learned, the more I realized, I don't know, but my value isn't just in knowing stuff. My value is in being able to work with other people and continue to learn and grow and adapt and even whatever it is that I think, I know, I don't know anything, like were all wrong all the time. And so, if we can just shift the lens and get away from binary thinking, I think a lot of imposter syndrome will start to fall away from people. Steve Rush: Yeah, and by asking more questions and learning more things, not only do we get richer, but we actually create more aha moments in other people as well. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely, yeah. Asking questions and really listening are two of the most powerful and sometimes underutilized behaviors and skills. Steve Rush: Yeah, so I if our listeners are listening to us talk about imposter syndrome and they have a perception that that could be them. What would be your counsel to them to maybe go about dealing with that? Dr. Laura Gallaher: So anytime we can develop a practice of self-acceptance, it's going to significantly reduce this feeling of imposter syndrome. And so, I define self-acceptance as being fully okay with yourself. Exactly as you are right now, that includes your flaws and imperfections as well as your talents and strengths. So, I'll give you a couple really tangible things that listeners can do to develop a practice of self-acceptance. And it's a practice you can think about it, like something you want to do on a daily basis, brushing your teeth, for example, or, you know, moving your body, some kind of physical exercise. It's not a light switch you just get to flip on and off. Okay, I've accepted myself. It's a practice, it's a rewiring of your brain. So, one way to practice higher self-acceptance is, we call it taking credit. Another way to frame it is like, what am I proud of myself for? So, let's say for example, I want to start running. And I'm like, I'm going to run three miles and I get all my gear on and I go out there and I run and maybe I'm like not quite a mile in, and I'm starting to cram and I can hardly breathe and my legs are on fire. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I don't think I can do this. And so, I might have this raging imposter syndrome in the moment and I'm like, oh my God, like, I want to be a runner. Who am I kidding? I can't possibly be a runner. So, taking credit would be, instead of focusing on the gap of, oh my gosh, I wanted to run three miles. I only ran one. What is wrong with me? So, embarrassing. Like I'm an idiot, why did I think I could do that? Right. All that really negative self-talk the inner critic. Taking credit is saying, you know what? I am proud of myself for getting out there and running a mile because that was a mile more than I ran yesterday, or I'm proud of myself for getting out there and giving it a shot because that was a kind of a tough step for me. And I want to allow myself to feel good about that as an incremental step. So, taking credit or being proud of yourself for things that represent courage, represent progress, doing that regularly will actually accelerate your whole journey of growth and make it much easier for you to get over this whole idea of like, oh my gosh, I'm a phony and they're all going to figure me out. Steve Rush: I love that. Dr. Laura Gallaher: So that's one tip. And then I'll give one more tip too, which is around forgiving yourself. So, we're really trying to quiet the inner critic with a lot of these and like give more volume to the champion voice. So, forgiving yourself, it's so easy for us to fall into a pattern of beating ourselves up. Most people actually, at some point in their lives, they believed that they have to beat themselves up or they won't learn, grow, improve. They think that they need that really mean voice in order to actually get their button gear. And until you can truly experiment with quieting that voice and leaning just in the champion voice, you'll never learn that there are so many other things that still motivate you to move forward because it's something that we're just fundamentally wired to do is grow as humans. So, find the things that you want to forgive yourself for and forgive yourself as quickly as you can, even if it doesn't feel totally real, like let's say that I miss a meeting with a client, you know, something happened with my schedule or just, I don't know, I dropped the ball and I missed a meeting with a client. I could beat myself up. I could get all mired down in all of the ways that you know, oh my gosh, who are thinking, I'm kidding. Trying to, run this business, trying to be a consultant. I can't even show up to a meeting on time. That's my inner critic, right? And she can be really brutal or I can say, okay, you know what? You actually did have a lot going on. And you know, that you would never intentionally miss a meeting. So, let's make sure that we learned from this and, you know, whatever it was that caused me to miss the meeting, I'm going to make sure that I always have a reminder set for myself. So that doesn't happen again. And it's okay. And so, it's this combination of having self-compassion while also recognizing that, you know, I'm not living up to my current standard. And so, when you can bring in that balance of holding a boundary for yourself while also having self-compassion, when you fail to meet it, that's you forgiving yourself. And these are practices that when you do them every day, your self-acceptance will get higher and higher and higher. And not only will you end up defeating these imposter syndrome moments, but you'll just be able to work so much better with other people. You'll be able to laugh at yourself. You'll be more attentive to other people, and you'll be able to emphasize more easily. You're going to basically have a deeper trust in your underlying ability to cope with whatever the world throws at you, because it's always going to throw things at you. Steve Rush: Exactly, right. And what you've just described is almost a rewiring of that neurological pathways that we've created those previously bad habits. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes. Steve Rush: With replacing them with positive rituals and positive behaviors. And I love the fact that you call it self-acceptance practice because exactly that's what it is. You'll continually have the practice at it until it becomes second nature, right? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes, absolutely. It's a practice and it gets really metta to Steve because if I find myself falling away from my self-acceptance practice, I can actually practice self-acceptance around that. Steve Rush: Yeah, your right. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yeah, so, you know what, I have actually been really hard on myself lately and I haven't been using some of these tools and that's okay. It's a lot of wiring I'm working against and I am committed to bringing in that practice back. Steve Rush: Excellent, brilliant. Okay, so this part show, we close out on three things, and the first thing we're going to close out on is to tap into the leadership aspects of your work in your career. And I'll ask you to narrow down some of those things that you've been working on, but to call that, perhaps your top three leadership hacks or your top tips or ideas, what would the top three be? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Top three, okay. The first one we've alluded to a little bit when we talked about slow down to speed up, so, pause. The power of pause, you know, I think that when leaders are really struggling, it's usually because things are moving so fast and in the moment their energy is not leaving enough space, for other people to truly be who they are and sort of this angsty energy can spread throughout. And it ends up stifling conversation and decreasing the effectiveness of decision making. So, taking more moments of pause in conversation, I think significantly improves the quality of those conversations. And that's another practice that leaders can bring into their daily lives. I invite my clients to do like an eight second pause between every meeting, between sending an email, literally just eight seconds of breath in and out, and then onto the next task. And it just sort of brings a calmer energy to the whole thing, which I believe is much needed. Steve Rush: Yeah, it's almost a little bit of a reboot, isn't it? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes, oh, I love that framing of it. Yeah, that's really good. Another one is listening, listening, listening, listening, and I know that Steve, you do a lot of working in change and I'm sure you've heard this too. I work with so many leaders who, when they're wanting to bring about a change and they're feeling resistance, either passive or active, but the people just aren't, they're not doing it. They're not stepping in line. They tend to focus on, I guess I have to tell them again, I guess I have to tell them differently. I guess I have to tell them louder, right. And what I want them to do instead is, like you were saying, ask questions and listen, listen, they may not even know themselves. Why they're resisting the change or whatever it is that you're asking them to do. They may not be self-aware enough, but when you can ask those questions and really hold space and truly listen, not only to what they're saying, but listen for how they're feeling. Listened to the things they're not actually saying out loud, you will increase their self-awareness as well as your own. And then you're going to actually know, oh, okay, this is the true problem for us to solve here so that we can get back on the same page. So, listening, very powerful. And then the third one I would say is openness, which another way you can talk about that is vulnerability, I think. I think this is becoming something that leaders are understanding more and more, but too many leaders I think still believe that they're supposed to know, or they're supposed to be able to figure things out. And their lack of vulnerability in conversation leads them to actually show up with more rigidity, which again, stifles communication, it can shut down conversation and it can harm trust actually. So, when leaders can go first with vulnerability, go first with being open about what they're really thinking and feeling, being open about you know, what they'd liked. We use that Fric acronym again, here to invite leaders to be more open, then others tend to also be more open. And that's where we get more information flowing back and forth. Trust increases, collaboration increases and performance, super Steve Rush: Super lessons. Thank you. Next part of the show we call it Hack to Attack. So, this is typically where something in your work or your life hasn't worked out. Could even screwed up, but as a result of the experience you've learned from it, and it's now serving you well, what would your Hack to Attack be? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Hmm, well, I think, you know, the biggest one for me for sure, was what I had described earlier with, you know, my experience finding out that I was actually stifling the people that I worked with without even realizing it. But I'll go a little bit deeper into that whole recovery process because once I became more self-aware and I realized that I was not actually creating psychological safety within my team, my immediate go-to response was to try to imitate other people who seemed like they were doing it well. And it seemed, you know, I think I was still like mid-twenties at that point. So, I was like, oh, this is great, you know, I can just watch behavior and I can model that behavior. I even had like acting experience as a kid. I was like, oh, I can totally nailed this. I can behave like this. I can act this way. And I came to learn, unfortunately in the first several months of trying this approach, that trying to only shift my behavior only shift how I was showing up on the outside without actually believing anything differently about the world, or really just sort of being in a lot of inner turmoil. I was actually still hurting trust. So, people were noticing that I was showing up differently, so totally know how to be around me because they could feel that I wasn't being myself. And so, you know, I think the Hack to Attack would be to don't think that you can just focus on shifting behavior and think that all the rest will follow, really see what the belief is underneath. How can you rewire your brain? That's driving the behavior. So, the behavior changes is a more natural, more emergent reality. So, focus on what is it that I believe about myself and the people around me, because that's, what's driving my behavior. How can I shift those beliefs around? Because you know that at least some of those beliefs are wrong, right? So much of what we believe is wrong. So, if I can shift my beliefs and allow the behavior change to follow, that's going to be a much more genuine way to approach growth. Steve Rush: And ironically, you know, from a psychology perspective, you know, this more than most being an organizational psychologist, we have as human beings in innate BS monitor through our neuro transmitters. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes. Steve Rush: Whereas we listing and smelling it and sussing this out straight away that it's not congruent. And then straight away we can recognize that it doesn't feel right. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Absolutely. Even if we're not totally sure what it is, we're like that conversation did not feel good. Steve Rush: Exactly, exactly. And the last thing we're going to do is ask you to do a bit of time travel bump into Laura at 21. And you now get to give us some advice, what would it be? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Oh, I would want her to recognize as early as possible that she does have very strong perfectionist tendencies and that this drive with perfectionist tendencies is actually working against her. So, I would want her to lean into being messy and recognize that, you know, you go forward even five or six years in your life and nobody gives a crap about your grades. So, like there were so many things that I was so focused on that just didn't matter. And of course, you know, getting good grades in college helped me get into grad school and that's great, but I literally will tell students now, especially those who are in grad school and like, you know what, just learn, focus on learning. I'm like, I don't know if I would've listened to this advice myself, but I was so focused on the evaluative component of it. And any advice that I could have given to Laura at 21 to encourage her to instead focus on the journey and focus on the learning and growth that's occurring rather than this sort of, how do I look to other people? Steve Rush: Fantastic advice, really good stuff. So, we're going to have to find some way of working together, you and I, because we've got lots of parallels and lots of commonalities in terms of the work that we do. Dr. Laura Gallaher: I would love that. Steve Rush: We have to do that. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Yes. Steve Rush: But outside of today, our listeners are probably wanting to learn how they can get to know a bit more about you, GALLAHER EDGE, when the book comes out, how can they find him? Where's the best place for us to send them? Dr. Laura Gallaher: Best place to find me is at gallaheredge.com. I know a lot of people think it's Gallagher, because that's way more common, but it's actually GALLAHER. So, gallaheredge.com and there you can you can email me and you can see our phone number there, or you can just see the different ways that we work with people. Steve Rush: We will make also, they're in our show notes so that people can go straight away from listening to this and connect with you. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Thank you. Steve Rush: Laura, I love talking with you. It's been a few months since we met last and every time, I do speak with you, I get this real sense of desire for more learning. You spark things in me. So that's been great and I hope our listeners have got that out of our show today. And I just want to say thank you for coming on and being part of our community and wish you every success with the book launch. And we'll have to get you back on the show in the future. Dr. Laura Gallaher: Thank you so much, Steve. Steve Rush: Thank you, Laura.   Closing   Steve Rush: I genuinely want to say heartfelt thanks for taking time out of your day to listen in too. We do this in the service of helping others, and spreading the word of leadership. Without you listening in, there would be no show. So please subscribe now if you have not done so already. Share this podcast with your communities, network, and help us develop a community and a tribe of leadership hackers.   Finally, if you would like me to work with your senior team, your leadership community, keynote an event, or you would like to sponsor an episode. Please connect with us, by our social media. And you can do that by following and liking our pages on Twitter and Facebook our handler there @leadershiphacker. Instagram you can find us there @the_leadership_hacker and at YouTube, we are just Leadership Hacker, so that is me signing off. I am Steve Rush and I have been the leadership hacker.