This week’s Chic Chat episode on the Jeep Talk Show features Wendy interviewing fellow JTS Host Larry. Dive into Larry’s Jeep journey, learning how he got started with his off-roading adventures and what inspired him to explore the country in his Jeep. Plus, meet Larry’s loyal off-road companion, Duke, his 120-pound black lab who never misses a trail. Don’t miss this engaging episode, and subscribe to catch all the exciting stories from Jeep enthusiasts!

 

Don’t miss this Friday’s Jeep Talk Show interview with Noel from the Martin County Police Athletic League. Discover how they’re helping kids in the community with the power of a Jeep. Learn about their initiatives and how off-roading is making a difference in young lives. Tune in to our weekly interview episodes every Friday for inspiring stories from the Jeep community.

 

All right, boys and girls, it’s time for another Jeep Talk Show interview. And today we’re gonna be talking with,

 

was it Noel? It was Noel, wasn’t it?

 

Because I wanna say Noel. I don’t know. I think it’s because of the Christmas thing. I don’t want to, I wanna say Noel. The Christmas song and stuff. Yeah.

 

Anyway, Noel, visionary leader, the executive director of Martin County PAL, a transformative organization dedicated to the empowerment of young lives through mentorship and athletics. Leaving behind a thriving career in landscape. Oh yeah, you can spend a bunch of money on landscaping. And it makes such a big deal to the house. It makes it look so much nicer.

 

Noel recognized he needed to structure, hang on a second.

 

Noel recognized the need for structured mentorship and an athletic program in their community. His journey marked by profound commitment to service and purpose. Noel, thanks a lot for being here. And I had you pronounce your name before we started. And I still screwed it up. But that’s kind of the charm of our show, especially the interviews.

 

Well, Tony, I really appreciate you having me here. And you know what, I’m used to the name thing. Oh, God, yeah. 50 years in the making and I still get it every day. So I just wanna mention the name of your organization really quick. Martin County PAL, like PayPal, but the PAL.org, mortincountypal.org. I mentioned that at the front of the interviews. So people can go and check out the website and see what’s going on there. And I think I found when I was going to it that you gotta put a www in front of it for it to work. So if you guys try going to mortincountypal.org and it doesn’t come up, put the www in the front of it, the old way of getting around the internet. All right, Noel, so now there’s a Jeep component to your organization, correct? There is, there is, yeah. We have, I’ve had a Jeep now for six years.

 

Mojito Green, JL, Ford Door. And I slapped the PAL logo on there and everything else. And it’s definitely well known in the community. And I’m always getting messages and texts. Oh, I just saw the PAL Jeep, PAL Jeep, PAL Jeep. So we are definitely embedded in the community with that PAL Jeep. You love hearing that too, being seen, especially when you’re trying to make people aware of things. It’s nice to get feedback. And I was just mentioning this the other day to a guest in an interview. It’s so important whenever you’re part of an organization and you get people to not only, you know people are seeing it, but for them to take their time to mention it or say, oh, I saw that, it just really feels good. Cause it’s effort and it is an expense as well. Yeah, I mean, everybody always tells me that it’s good and bad cause I can’t hide.

 

And I’m seen all the time, right? Oh, you’d be dead meat if somebody saw you at McDonald’s. Why are you even there? Listen, I’ve had it. Oh my God. I had it the other day cause my son started driving and he was using the Jeep all day. And my phone’s blowing up. What are you doing at McDonald’s? What are you doing at McDonald’s? I’m like, it’s not me, it’s not me, it’s my son. Oh yeah. Yeah. So when your mission statement is to develop healthy, productive leaders of the future and the PAL Jeep sitting in the drive-through at McDonald’s. Oh, it’s my kid. You say it’s my kid, then everybody understands because they don’t do exactly what you’re telling them to do. So what kind of Jeep is it?

 

It’s a JL, soft top JL, Mojito green. It’s lifted. I’ve got the lights on for the night. I mean, you can’t miss this thing. You can’t miss it. So what kind of lift?

 

It’s a rough country, two and a half inch lift.

 

And I’ve got the Oracle lights underneath. Oh nice. Yeah, yeah. And then my team, I just turned 50 last this year in the beginning of this year. My team bought me one of those giant whip LED antennas. And that thing is just, that thing’s the brightest thing on the Jeep. So I’ve got that flashing with a green scrub. And yeah, this thing’s obnoxious when it’s at night. So how are you with the police force there in the town? Because I think that they would be a little questioning of distracted driving. Yeah, I don’t, I try not to draw attention to myself when I’m driving around. We’ve got a great partnership with the Sheriff’s department here. And our Sheriff, William Snyder actually was critical to the start of our program back in 2017. Yeah, so in order to start a PAL program, you have to be either a law enforcement agency or partner with one. So I was real fortunate enough that at that time, the Sheriff, he used to box back in the day down in Miami. Oh my God, you’re gonna say you had to have a death match with him to be able to get approved for this. This is like Rocky. Yeah, I mean, this story,

 

this story of how this PAL started is just absolutely incredible.

 

When I wanted to start this program,

 

I had a boxing fitness, a kicks boxing fitness gym. And I was watching the Olympics and I saw this kid in the Olympics. They did a whole backstory. Oh, the kid was a pain and the trouble in the streets. And one of the PAL coaches pulled him in and says, look, if you’re gonna fight, I’m gonna do something productive with you and got him involved and hooked on boxing. And there was this kid, 17 years old, competing for a medal in the Olympics.

 

And I turned to my wife and I said, hey, how cool would it be to take one of our kids and put them in the Olympics? And she’s like, well, do it. I’m like, I don’t know how to do it. I was like, I’m a landscaper. I’m doing this for extra money at night. So I did some research and I found out, yeah, you can do the PAL, you have to be partnered with an organization. I go, that’s funny because the Sheriff is actually working out at my gym at night doing boxing. Oh. I’m like, hey, Sheriff, I’m like, can we do this? He’s like, yeah, he’s like, I’ll help you any way I can. So we signed an agreement that, you know, a partnership with them. And there’s no financial obligations from him. They were on our own to figure that part out. But I mean, if it wasn’t for him, this would have never started. It would never be where I am today.

 

So I didn’t ask you where are you guys located? And I’m assuming that you handled just for the general area with the kids and the athletic programs and stuff. That’s correct. We’re located in Martin County, Florida. We’re right in Palm City. And we service all of Martin County and we actually go all the way out west to Indian Town, which is a rural town here in Martin County as well.

 

We cover all those areas. We’re serving about 600 kids a year right now and growing. Every year we’re growing at a tremendous clip. And it’s just been a blessing. This is just, you know, this was just my calling. And, you know, I left my 38 years in the landscape industry for this. And this is just what I was put on the earth to do. And that’s what I’m doing. So switching gears here a bit, because I’m just curious, what is the thing about landscaping that was the biggest gotcha, that you just didn’t think it would be a thing? I’m sure people are just really pains in the asses and they ask for unrealistic things that you can’t do or you can, but it would be really expensive to do. But was there a common gotcha about landscaping that you learned about over those 30 years?

 

You know, I was landscaping when I was in eighth grade. I mean, my dad was like, I was born an entrepreneur and a hustler. That’s great. My dad’s like, you know, if you want to go get those shoes, you got to go find money. And so, well, can I use them or is it? Yeah, and I would literally take the push mower, a little tank of gas and like those hand shears, like the old hand shears, that’s how I use the edge of sidewalks and my hands and knees. Wow. And I would just go hustle, like, yeah, I’ll cut your lawn for 20 bucks. And one thing led to another. And I was in college, I did college for about two years and brick and mortar was not my thing. Like I was always looking out the window, I’m like, hey, I want to go do, and I just left college, dropped out of college and started my own company.

 

Actually acquired and purchased the company of the guy that I used to work for during the summers. Wow, nice. And I picked up a partner and we just blew this thing up and I actually went to school for landscape design and just blew it. And I was just so passionate about transforming people’s yards and everything. And then this was up in Pennsylvania. So I quickly got sick of the winters up there. Oh, of course. And my uncle had had a house down here. What do you do? How do you get a paycheck whenever it’s wintertime and there’s snowed? Are you into snow shaping? Come in and put a snowman up in the front yard for people? I mean, there’s not much to do, is there? When we first started the business, my partner and I would have to get part-time jobs in the summer to pay the bills, right? But we got to the point where we were successful enough that we would put money away to hold us through the winter and we would plow snow and everything. But in Pennsylvania where we lived, it wasn’t the moneymaker. That was just icing on the cake, so to speak.

 

So in 2000, I really just got sick of the weather up there. I was getting seasonal depression and everything, especially after coming to Florida in the wintertime. I’m like, sheesh. And it just came to a point. I was young, I was single. I was like, you know what? I’m out. I’m gonna take this leap and just do it. And then I did it. Moved down here, went to school here, learned about landscape here in the schools because it’s a different, we’re going from seasonal to tropical. So I versed myself in here, worked with a landscape company here, switched to another one. And I worked with some of the top 10% people in the entire world. We were doing houses on Jupiter Island, Palm Beach Island, millions and millions of dollars on landscape. And it was just amazing. Meat grain people transformed dirt into beautiful oases for people. It was so satisfying. Yeah, it’s so funny. You were talking about the mower and stuff and I actually mowed grass whenever I was probably 13, 14 years old and bought a 10 speed bicycle, a Swin, 10 speed bicycle. That was like 110 bucks. And I was always, I got into the yard, I got into the yard, I’m gonna be able to get that bike, in another six months, whatever it was. And yeah, so I don’t know, but could I call myself a landscaper because I was mowing grass? I mean, I guess it’s landscaping, right? Yeah, it really is. I mean, I got to the point where I built this makeshift trailer and attached to my bike with a rope. And I was just, you know what I mean? You just had to do it. Even when I started my own landscape company, I had a 78 Chevy Impala two door. And I put a trailer hitch on, I put a trailer and put mowers in there. I was driving around with a car and a trailer. Like that’s how I started. Like, you know. The cool thing is, is that because you did this, you learned that all you have to do is just put forth the effort, put forth the time, make the contacts, get the customers, and you can take care of yourself. And that is a wonderful thing to do. I mean, I’ve worked for multiple companies over the years, and it’s always been a disappointment because corporations don’t give a shit about you. You’re a cog in the wheel. I mean, and we all know that going in, but the relationships that you, and the time that you put into it, you think it’s gonna be worth something. And it’s really not in the big scheme of things. So being able to have, I always look at it like, you can have one customer, which is the corporation, or you can have a lot of customers, which are the people that you’re really working for. And if you lose one, it’s sad, but you still got all these others. Yeah, and it’s funny you say that because that’s a huge component of what’s missing in today’s world with these kids, is that hustle and drive.

 

These kids, they need to learn that hustle. Like, we’re not here to give them stuff. Like, that’s not the way it works. Right.

 

Handouts don’t exist. I mean, they’re great when they’re there, but when they disappear, what are you left with? Right. Like, so we’ve gotta teach these kids the hustle and the passion and the drive. We really work hard here with our kids to find that dream and that goal,

 

because once we know the dream and the goal,

 

we have our support system that helps push and thrive and feed the dream and the goal for these kids. Like, we expose them. Like, we have, of course, we have sports programs and activities here, yeah, big deal. What really at our core makes the difference is the values and the leadership lessons that we teach these kids, because that’s what they need to succeed in life. Because you can have a kid that’s a straight A student, unbelievable in coding AI, but he can’t work with anybody. Oh, yeah. He can’t compete with people. What good is he can do? That’s kind of general IT people anyway.

 

(Laughs) In general, you know. The better you are at IT, the worse you are with people. Yeah, but you have to be able to communicate with people. You have to be able to socialize with people. You have to be able to interact with people, and you have to be able to appreciate, respect, and honor people.

 

I mean, at its core, and that’s really what we do here. We develop these kids. Our mission statement is to develop healthy, productive leaders of the future.

 

The healthy is mental and physical. Like, we’re very, very adamant about being healthy here, physical. We try to always give the kids healthy snacks. You’ll never see soda in here. We’re weaning out chips as we speak. We’re just trying to find healthy options for these kids. And then the mental portion of this is giving them those leadership values, teaching them empathy, respect to adults and to peers. I mean, that’s what we need more of in this world, is these kids that understand that things aren’t for free. It’s up to them to provide for themselves, and it’s up to them to add value to other people. And then once these kids start understanding how important it is to add value to other people’s, the rippling effect is amazing. You see the change within themselves, within their peers, in their families, and all that translates right into the community. And then that’s how we start changing and transforming these communities, one kid at a time. And that’s what we do here at our core. So I would assume you use athletics to help understand there’s a manager, there’s somebody that guides and directs the team, the team has to rely on each other if you wanna be in a winning situation, even if you don’t keep score, it’s nice to know that you’re doing the job that you’re intended to do. So a lot of these things, I believe, translate into what you’re just talking about, life and working with people, communicating the criticality of communication, because you can really screw up stuff in a baseball game if you’re not communicating with the rest of your team.

 

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, everything at its core is important to what you do. And we have very different unique sports here, like we’re not the baseball, soccer, or baseball basketball kind of organization, we have boxing at our core. Oh, nice. That’s good because there’s a lot of aggression in both, definitely in males, but even females these days, and this gives a way to let lose some of that aggression and helps you deal with things in your life if you let loose the aggression. Right, and these kids are all bottled up all day long at school, right? They’re constantly be told, no, you can’t do this, you can’t do that, they’re stressed, something at home is twerking them, and they can’t get this aggression out, and they come over here and beat the hell out of a bag. And you see the pressure just released from these kids, and all of a sudden, this kid’s talking like crazy and having a good time, and it’s therapy at its core. That’s gonna feel so good to see that. Even us, my employees are staffed, I’ll be here during the day, and all of a sudden, the bag is ripping out there, I’m like, uh-oh, somebody’s having a bad day. Well, I guess the meeting didn’t go as well as I thought.

 

Yeah, hopefully I wasn’t the cause of that problem.

 

But yeah, it’s important, and then we have golf, we have a great golf program that’s really starting to blow up, and you know, golf, you know as well as I do, golf is like owning a Jeep, I mean, you talk about empty banking.

 

And these kids, they can’t afford a set of clubs, it’s like 200 bucks to go play golf, 40, 50 bucks, I mean, that’s so expensive, so we’re putting these kids on the golf course, and it costs them nothing. And this is a great skill to learn if they go to college as an opportunity for that, but not only that, you can play golf until you’re dead.

 

I mean, I get beat by old guys on the golf– That’s true, yeah, that’s very true.

 

And you know, you get into the corporate world or whatever it may be, and you wanna have a meeting with somebody, hey, you wanna go play golf? Yeah, sure, I’ve got four hours of their undivided attention one on one. You’re gonna do something in those four hours. Do you ever not play as good as you can just so you have something for them to talk to you about? Well, with my skill level, you don’t have to worry about that. Well, then I would use that as the excuse. Yeah, they’re usually talking about how bad my game is, so that carries the conversation on just fine. You need to help me with your help and support, I can buy lessons. Exactly, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you know, we have boxing, we have golf, we have a drumline program that the kids really love, and our drumline kids perform at one of our big events every single year, so they get to look forward to doing that. And we have soccer, we have a couple of leadership programs, and we’re a really big diversion program for the court system. So once the kids get in trouble with the courts, they’re sanctioned to come to our leadership program for 16 weeks. So that’s where they get those 16 value lessons. That has to be very challenging, because I’m sure there’s some very large chips on shoulders. There really is, and you know, with the vaping and THC right now going around in the schools, like, you know, I would say 80 to 90% of the kids we get are vaping with THC, so they’re, you know, these kids are high all day long. Yeah, they’re mentally not straight, I guess you could say. It’s just hard to learn that like that too, which kind of begs the question, why are they allowed to do that in school? I mean, I know that they’re not allowed, but you know what I mean. You could crack down on those type of things, but then again, lawsuits and people getting upset and parents going, not my kids, so. It’s a challenge. It really is a challenge, and you know, that program, we’ve been running that diversion program for five years now, and we have a zero recidivism rate, so I’m not sure if you’re familiar with it.

 

So that means that none of those kids have been fracked in again.

 

Well, you just tell them you know where they live, and they’re, no, I’m just saying. It’s either, it’s either also the judge, you like, you make your choice, like come here. You know, they work closely with mentors, so we have one mentor for every seven kids, so the kids get to develop a relationship with a mentor that actually cares about them, that wants to help them, and it’s really great, like we have so many mentors that’ll just come to me, it’s like, oh, this kid came in, he’s like all gangster and everything, and like, you know, after a few weeks, you see him start to open up and talk, and like, you know, the persona, the fake persona goes away, and the real person comes back out again, and it’s just so great to see that transformation happen in these kids, because again, they’re going to their peers as a different person now, maybe they’re not hanging out with those peers anymore, and have made a better choice to move to a different group of kids,

 

but at our core, that’s really what matters, I mean, you know as well as I do, the kids nowadays, we need to pour in them as much as I can, they need so much help. Right, and the economy, and it’s been this way off and on for a while, it doesn’t lend itself to a parent being at home, you know, with them, and because this is really, what you’re doing is what the parents should be doing, and they’re either ill-equipped to do that, or they’re just too damn busy,

 

and they have to hope for the best. This is the new parent. Yes.

 

That’s the new parent. And I was going to ask you about that, so especially on the judge related, the judge mandated ones, do you have any kind of rules and regulations about being on social media, or maybe playing video games, because I can see how, especially like Grand Theft Auto, I got that game and I was playing it, and I just felt bad, I had to stop playing it, because I don’t like playing games that I’m doing harm to other people. It’s just the game I know, but it just didn’t appeal to me. Yeah, it’s such a hard part to, first of all, PAL is a no electronic zone. We don’t let the kids, no fight. If I see the phone, it’s gone. They’re scratching their neck and licking themselves, because they don’t know what to do. Right, if we see the phone, it’s gone, but at the same time, our programs are so structured and so disciplined and so in their faces, they really don’t have time to do anything else, but that program. We keep them busy all the time, and all we can do is educate them. The worst that’s gonna happen to a PAL kid when they leave here is they leave with a bunch of tools that are gonna make them survive and be successful. That’s the worst thing. Maybe they’re not listening now, but two years from now, when that aha moment happens, all this stuff that we’ve taught them resonates all of a sudden.

 

Wow, like, oh, I remember when coach told me this or this coach told me that.

 

That’s really what we’re trying to do here is have these kids ready. We’ve placed a lot of kids into jobs already that were PAL kids that came in here for selling drugs, doing drugs.

 

So it’s really incredible to watch these kids just have that full transformation happen. The other thing, the other aha moment I had recently is we’re developing healthy production as leaders of the future, but what we’re doing is we’re handing you a camera-ready person to go to work.

 

They’re camera-ready.

 

They might not have the skills for the job,

 

but as a human being, you want them on your team.

 

Because they’re gonna strive. I think a person that has their mind open can learn anything, and as long as you’re a teacher or a decent person, you can train somebody really to do anything. At least that’s what I’ve found.

 

So let me ask you about this. So you mentioned about the judge, and I say ordered, maybe it is a choice. They can do this program or do something that’s not as pleasant. But how do people get involved in this? I would imagine that you could have quite a waiting list if it’s not a court ordered.

 

So we have a couple of feeder systems here for POW. So the court order thing, so every time a youth gets a civil citation, the middle school kids are sanctioned to come to POW, depending on what they do. So they have to come to our programs. They do the diversion programs, or they choose not to, and they gotta go back to the courts and deal with them.

 

So there’s that portion. But since, like I talked about our unique sports, we have so many unique sports that aren’t offered here in the county. We get a draw of kids that just wanna come here for that reason. Yeah.

 

There’s probably not a places to go boxing. Yeah, so that’s kinda cool by itself. And our head boxing coach is a former two time heavyweight champion in the world. He beat him in the Holyfield, John Ruiz. So that’s got some merit too, right? Sure. Hey, we’ve got a legit boxing system here, but the other piece of it too is I’m really proud and adamant about the fact that we have positive male role models here, which are so needed today. There’s so many single family homes that need that positive male, and we all know that having a positive male role model is gonna keep you out of trouble. Oh yeah. It helps both the boys and it helps the girls. They need that positive strong figure to look up to and understand that that person’s there to help them guide them through life.

 

Yeah, I told all my children multiple times whenever they were complaining about rules and stuff, I said, look, you can learn from mom and I, or you can learn from life. And I guarantee you life is gonna be a lot harder on you than anything that we’re doing to you. Yeah, absolutely. And as parents, it’s our job to prepare them for life. Yes.

 

And the single family, and not even, not necessarily just a single family, but like you said, with the economy, the way it is in inflation, we have families that are working three or four jobs. Mom and dad are working three or four jobs, so the kids are wherever. Oh, and the kids understand it, but they don’t like it, and they’re left to their own devices, and depending on their age and the people they hang around, yeah, it’s a nightmare. And I’m assuming this is open for both boys and girls. Yes, yeah, we have about 37% population of females and the rest are boys.

 

We have a heavy Hispanic population here at our organization now, due to going out to the rural areas. And so yeah, we cater to them all. We’re here to support them and everything, and we just started developing programs from parents too,

 

because as you know, you can help a kid all they want, but they go home to a toxic environment every single day. That’s gonna be some tough conversations. It is hard. We’re taking baby steps. We partnered with John Roseman last year, who’s a world-renowned parenting expert and psychologist, and we had him come to POW, and we did 12 hours of video series with him on parenting topics. Kids not listening, how do I do discipline, bullying,

 

electronic devices like we both talked about. So we put together a whole entire parenting session

 

for parents video series. So we’re dripping that out right now across our social media platforms as resources for parents for help. And it’s, we’ve got parents, my kid’s not listening. I don’t know what they’re doing, he’s out of control. Well, here’s a parenting series you can check out. It’s on our YouTube video. Some of the teasers are on our YouTube video now, channel now. So there’s a lot of resources that we’re, we’re also trying to help parents too.

 

Yeah, that’s really important. That kind of does the full circle thing because, and actually I was gonna ask you, do you find that any of,

 

could I call them students? Because they’re there to learn stuff. So do any of your students come back because they just find themselves going down the wrong path again, and they need a refresher? To me, it’s almost like an AA meeting, you know? You have to keep going.

 

Right.

 

Yeah, you know, it’s funny you said that, you know, when I was, when I started PAL, I was kind of doing both. I was working at the landscape company and doing PAL part-time.

 

And for the, we had one girl, when we first started our diversion program, the first class, we had one girl come in and she was scary. Like I was intimidated by her. So it was me, one of the captains at the time who was my vice president, he was there. And then we had a lieutenant from the jail. So those were our mentors, me and these two other guys. So she comes in and I’m like, what’s your name? And she told me her name, her name was Sandra. And she’s like, I’m like, well, here’s your workbook. And she says, I don’t need no F in workbook and threw it across the room. Sure. Threw it across the room. And I’m sitting there like, uh-oh. Well, she’s got to set the expectation. Yeah, and I looked at the two cops in the room and I’m like, I’m scared, what am I supposed to do? And I’m like, look at it. And they’re not saying anything. I’m like, you guys help me out. Like, what am I supposed to do here? And I’m like, okay. She’s like, where do I sign in? I’m like, right here. It’s just sat down in a huff. And I’m like, holy crap. I’m like, this is not what I signed up for. I’m saying, I’m thinking working with landscaping is going to be a lot more pleasant.

 

Because I know, I mean, I haven’t ever been in this situation but I feel I know that if a judge has ordered something, it’s, somebody ain’t going to be happy about it. Yeah. And you know, it was crazy though, Tony, because four months later, she’s stuck with me for 16 weeks, right? So two months later, I’m sitting there. She comes in early and sits next to me in the boxing ring. And she’s like, hey coach, how you doing? And I’m like, who the hell are you? Holy crap. Who the hell are you? Why are you talking to me? She’s got to be so gratifying. I was like, what the hell? And she’s like, you want to see what I was doing today? I’m like, yeah, sure. And she was coming up on her quince birthday. So she’s preparing for this big, huge quince party. So we started talking about that. And I’ve never seen, let me tell you, it was like, God just came to me and just dropped his bomb on me. And that very day, I knew that this was what I was supposed to do.

 

It was over. Landscaping was done for me. So I watched this girl completely transform and change her life. She went through the 16 weeks. She stayed on as a mentor. Nice. She came to me with a 3.2 GPA, graduated with a 4.3. She ended up being my first hire at Pal as a part-time employee. And she still works here to this day. Oh, that’s so cool. Do you ever give her a hard time about that first day? Oh, we always talk about it. I tell this story all the time. She’s like, oh, are you going to tell the story today? I’m like, of course I’m going to tell the story today. You made it to a podcast. You’re a great supplier, right? Well, that’s interesting. And I think that God, the universe, I personally think God puts things in our path that helps us make the right decision in our lives. And you were, it sounds like you were tasked with,

 

maybe not the worst, but somebody that was going to be really tough and it was scary for you. You charged at the situation and you were successful. And I’m sure now if somebody comes in, it’s like, oh, you’re not as bad as she was. Well, it’s funny because she’s the one in that program now. She’s like, I’ve been there, done that. You don’t scare me.

 

It’s all about learning. And I think that’s why we’re here, is to learn things that help each other. It’s so great. Yeah, we have a ton of mentors. Like we encourage, like all of our, we have three high school kids that have been on our boxing program for a while. So now they coach our boxing fitness program. They’re here as coaches and mentors and we pay them. And we pay the mentors to come coach. Like why not? They’re here, they’re working. They’re gonna pay you. Here’s a job. That’s a good point. How do you guys make money? How do you guys, is it donations? Is it drives and stuff? How does that work? Yeah, it’s the nonprofit beg, borrow and steal scenario. You know, it’s the way that, you know, I get up every day and have to hustle money. We have a bunch of events throughout the year. We’re down to about four. We have one big signature event called Bahama Mama.

 

And that’s our big premiere event. We always have it in May. And then we have a bunch of other program events that are stuck with there. So we have a Jeep Riddle run. We have– And that was the one that you had back in September, right? About the late latter part of September. Correct, on September, yep. And that’s a fun one. We bring the Jeepers out. You know, it’s very, very specific to them. We have a nutcracker party in November, which is, you know, you can purchase a blank nutcracker. I call them the naked nutcrackers. And you decorate it and you bring it to PAL and we auction them off and all the money goes to PAL. So that’s a fun little holiday party we have. And then we have a big CrossFit competition that we partner with a local CrossFit club here. And that brings in like three or 400 people. So that’s, you know, we’ve got some other ones that trickle in. We do have some grants that we work on. Our Drug and Opioid Awareness Program that’s funded by a grant. So yeah, there’s a lot of– Is that local or federal? That is federal. Yeah, yeah. So our PAL uses no local tax dollars whatsoever. Oh, okay. We’ll have any– Just donations and people that are trying to support you guys on what you do. Corporate, yeah, we have corporate partners and, you know, people that really care about what we’re doing and latch on and want to help support us grow. Now you may have already said this, but I may have missed it. How long have you guys been doing this? I started PAL in 2017.

 

So we’re in our eighth year. Very nice. So if you’re a parent and you have a troubled teen or you’re concerned that maybe you have a troubled, well, I guess it doesn’t have to be a teen. Teens are usually the worst. That was the other question I was gonna ask you. What kind of age range is this program for? We’re eight to 17. Okay. Yeah, so once you turn 18, you turn into a mentor coach. Oh, that’s good. Do you get a lot of those converts?

 

We do. We have about one, two, three, four,

 

probably like seven or eight mentors right now. I think that says a lot about the program. I mean, it’s not, okay, I got done with this crap and I’m out of here. It’s like, I’m done with this crap. Now I want to help out too. That’s wonderful. I mean, absolutely wonderful. You know, and it’s like, we have to teach these kids how to give back. Like, you know, and a lot of them just come to us like, hey, I want to help. I want to help. I’m good at this. Can I do this? And we have an amazing summer camp program. So we have a career exploration summer camp program where we, it’s just middle school only because middle school seems to be the sweet spot for us, but these kids come in and they’re exposed to probably 12 to 14 different career paths. So they do fire department. So everything a fireman would do, and it’s all hands on. Like they’re rolling hoses, putting gear on. Oh nice. That’s a cool profession, especially when your kid is like, I want to be a firefighter, astronaut, so on and so forth. So do that. We put them through construction, automotive and welding. We also put that. So damn it. We’re doing this stuff that schools used to do. Yeah, they’re all bringing them back too. I had drafting and wood shop. Those things were wonderful. I loved, I think we had a mechanics thing, a car mechanics thing, but I didn’t get a part of that. It wasn’t until I got my first car that I went into the mechanics program in my driveway.

 

Yeah. And they’re starting to bring all those back into schools. Oh God, I didn’t know. So my goal for the summer camp is like, let’s try to spark some interest in these kids that may not go to college. So at least in middle school, they can get into those CTE programs and the high schools all offer these programs now too. So I mean, they’re getting into, we do CSI, Bomb Squad. Oh nice. And wildlife comes in, K-9 comes in, they do 911 dispatch. We actually go to the 911 dispatch here at the sheriff’s office. They learn about the corrections facility at the jail, what it’s like to work over there, work with the corrections dogs. They need to understand how the correction facilities work.

 

Scared straight if you remember that program. Oh yeah. So we really expose these kids to so much stuff. And we go to the beach and they do fire rescue, ocean rescue with the lifeguards.

 

They reenact, like they pick a kid and then put them out in the water and they rescue him. So we really get these kids so much exposure. That’s right. You’re not in a classroom all the time. You’re out doing these things. They’re interacting in the environment. That’s gonna be very interesting, especially as a kid with a lot of energy. Yeah, and it’s just, it’s hands on. I mean, I feel like they’re gonna have more of a memory stored from it because they’re actually physically doing the stuff. They’re not bored out of their minds with a pencil and a piece of paper. Yeah, absolutely. I hate having, like I always have people that say they wanna come in and talk to the kids. I’m like, well, it’s gotta be hands on. So you gotta figure out how to make it. Cause if you’re up there talking to the kids, they’re gonna be twitting on their thumbs or kicking each other under the table. Like we’ve gotta get completely- I would be that way as a full season adult. I am that way too right now. It’s just boring. I mean, people can be engaging in stuff. I’m not saying they can’t be, but generally speaking, it’s gonna be more interesting getting out there. Kind of like we do with Jeeps. We can polish a Jeep, we can make modifications to it, but we wanna get it off road and do things with it. That excitement of this. So you were talking about the events. So you have one Jeep related event per year or is it? Okay.

 

But you personally have that Jeep, the Jeep driver round. Do you find any of the kids are curious about Jeeps and why do you have that Jeep and why is it lifted? Why do you do the big tires? Do you do anything? Do you answer any questions about Jeep related things or off-roading? It’s funny, you’ve got 600 kids. Every kid’s got their little niche, right? We have that fishing niche where the kids are just all fish. I’m fishing, I’m talking about fishing. We have the kids that are, we have a couple of kids that are into cars. There’s a few of those here and there. So some of them, like during the summer when we do the automotive portion, I let them change the tire on the Jeep. Look here, go change the tires. What size tires? I think you said, but is it 35, 37? 32’s on mine. Okay, well good. Then they can manage that. Yeah, we had to make it manageable.

 

Well, that’s the other thing because you’ve got a girl in there. Like I’m not changing the tire. I’m like, you better learn. Yeah, absolutely. Right now. Because if you’re on a date with a guy and you get a flat tire and you’re the one changing the tire, you need to get a new date. You cannot guarantee that a boy or a man is gonna be able to change the tire these days. I think if he’s driving a standard, you have a 50-50 chance. Well, I can guarantee you that all 150 of my pal kids can change the tire, guaranteed. Very good. Can’t leave camp unless you change the tire.

 

Let’s see, what else is it gonna, oh yeah. So the thing I was asking earlier about the parents or parents, if they see that there’s an issue with their child or field there is,

 

how would they, can they get them involved in your program and how would they go about that? Yeah, we get a lot of messages through Instagram, like direct messages through Facebook and Instagram with parents, like, hey, I’m having, or they’ll pick up the phone and call. I’ve got a kid, he’s out of control. I don’t know what I’m gonna do about it. Those are the things, and we jump on those responses right away. And we talked to him, like, what do you have in trouble with? And now that we’re dripping this parent series out on social media, we’re really starting to get a lot of parents like, hey, my kid’s not listening.

 

I’ve got a whole hour video on not listening. I’m like, here you go, like here it is.

 

And then we always, with those parents that call that are having trouble with their kids, our first motion is like, you gotta come to our leadership program. They have to come to our leadership program. They get linked up with a mentor, and then we start working on the kid. And then after a few months, it’s like, hey, the kids start finding out about the programs we have. Oh, I wanna go do boxing, or I’m gonna do golf, or I wanna do soccer. And it’s like, okay, yeah, fine, go ahead. I mean, we really are a one-stop shop for these kids. And we have a $45 a year membership for kids. That’s all it is, all year. And they can do all the programs, doesn’t matter.

 

That is really nice. It’s affordable, which is very important. That the kids that need help can get in there. And I think anybody can afford $45 a year. That’s just cheap.

 

Yeah, so we really make it an option where it’s not straining on the family financially, and the kids have resources. And we have an after-school program there for middle school kids. So literally, a middle school kid can come here right after school, stay here till six o’clock, and go right in. Oh, that’s nice. And go right into a– And for $45 a year, you’re not paying after-school babysitting? Oh, that’s a big thing right there. And the after-school program, they’re actually learning skills now. So we just brought in a new program where they’re actually can get Microsoft certified, learn coding, learn about AI, FBI, all that. But when they complete their courses, they get paid.

 

So they’re actually getting paid to learn. Oh, everybody, that kind of makes you pay attention, doesn’t it? Yeah, I mean, I’ve got middle schoolers that are making 40 bucks a month right now. Yeah, I mean, it’s like how much interest would you have going to a job that you didn’t get paid for?

 

So it makes sense, it’s a great idea. Exactly. So let me ask you, you said something about CSI and bomb disposal and stuff, do you get to blow anything up? Because I’m thinking blowing stuff up would be, no, you failed, you cut the wrong wire, it’s always the wrong wire. That would be cool. Now, the bomb squad brings in their automated robot, which is really– Oh, that’s nice.

 

And they literally just hand the remote to the kids and they’ll put a water bottle on the floor and say, all right, go pick up that water bottle and they’ll pick up their water bottle and bring it over. It’s really cool. I mean, it’s like I said, it’s hands-on, these kids are touching it, CSI comes in and they’ll have all the kids touch one of the cop cars and then they’ll pull the fingerprints off the car.

 

So they pull the duster out and they fingerprint the car. It’s really cool, they really do. I mean, it was– I think so many things, and I think it’s portrayed this way on TV and movies, so many things look difficult and complex. And then whenever you see the magic, it’s not difficult and complex. Some things are more difficult and it requires training, like being a surgeon, knowing all the things you need to know, but it’s not anything that anybody can’t do given the time and the desire to do it, I believe. I agree with you 100%. And like I said, these middle school kids, we gotta give them this exposure. I get the feeling that middle school is the sweet spot. Because the teenage years, things can get really bad. Yeah, and I’ve seen it with my own kids. I mean, I had great kids in preschool and as soon as they hit middle school, the wheels came off the tracks. I was like, what happened? And I hear it all the time, I see it all the time. You’ve got these great kids, boys and girls, and they get to middle school and it just, everything inside just gets completely erased and there are different kids all of a sudden that are making bad choices and the influences are bad. And that’s where we really have to hit them. We have to hit them so hard in middle school and just give them the resources. And we just gotta show that we care more about them. That’s really what it comes down to. Like every kid that walks into this building, they meet a coach that absolutely cares and loves them.

 

And kids don’t see that enough. Right.

 

I never saw it in like elementary, junior high, and high school. I remember how freeing it was going to college for the first time because you’re not treated like a child. And when you’re over a year, I was 18 my senior year because I was born in September. So it was so funny if I was late to school and I was always late to school, I could write my own notes because I was an adult. Nice, thanks for leading. I love it. I love it. The lady, Mrs. McCoy, she would always roll her eyes when I would come in late with my note. I love it. It’s so great. So, all right. Well, you know what? I can tell that we’ve only scratched the surface here. So you guys can go over to martincountypal.org to get more information.

 

And hopefully you guys knew about the Jeep Riddle run and we’re a part of that. And do you have it set for next year? Is it gonna be September or? Yeah, it’s always September.

 

So, especially if you’re in the area, tell me the area you’re in again. We’re in Martin County. Martin County, but that’s in Florida.

 

And the nearby city is? Stuart, Florida. Okay, so if you’re in that area or you just wanna travel, you can be a part of that Riddle run coming up next year. Sorry we missed you this year to promote that for the show. And I’ll just put a bug in your ear for next year when you have an event or any event you’d like to come on here and talk to the show about. Get in here about 30 days prior to the event. Of course it depends on our interview schedule, but the sweet spot for podcasts is about 30 days because that’s about the maximum exposure.

 

Cause you know, it’s on demand. So people listen to it all the time. But after 30 days, you’ve gotten about as much listings as you’re gonna get. There’s a few here and there. People will listen to this in the future. I’m hopeful that the first ship going to Mars, the Starship going to Mars, one of the things that people will be listening to or watching cause we’re doing this on YouTube now is the Jeep Talk Show. So I think that’d be really cool. Yeah, for sure. I think that’s amazing. So anyway, you know how the kids love the social media. Where can they find you on social media? Martincountypal.org is the website. What else you got? So Instagram is Martincountypal

 

and Facebook is Martin County Police Athletic League.

 

And we’re also on YouTube, Martincountypal. And people shouldn’t panic about the police at the athletic league. There’s no warrants being issued. There’s no– No, not at all. Did the police come in there and show you how to handcuff people, maybe use zip ties and stuff? Cause that’d be pretty fun too. That would be kind of cool, right? Bring that whole aspect into the realm. But yeah, absolutely. Well, you might as well go about it before it happens to them. And maybe it would deter them from being a part of the bad part of the situation.

 

Tony, when I started a soccer program, I had a guy come to me and said, “Hey, let’s start a soccer program in the Hispanic neighborhood.” I’m like, “Yeah, sure, I’m game.” He’s like, “Really?” I’m like, “Yeah, I was like, you’re gonna coach? I’ll do it.” So I rolled up there and the whole soccer field was full of kids. So I rolled up there in a pal Jeep with the big star logo on it. Get out of the Jeep and the field clears out in five minutes. Then I’m like, “Oh shit.” So me and the other guy, I’m literally chasing this lady down the street. And she was the slowest, oldest lady. I’m like, “I’m gonna catch her.” So I catch her and I speak Spanish and I’m talking there. I’m like, “Oh, I’m not here to arrest you. I’m not even a cop.” I said, “I’m here to give your kid soccer, a soccer program.” He’s like, “Oh, oh, oh.” So she makes a phone call and a couple other relatives come out. And then we start bringing the kids back to the field. And by the end of the summer, we had like a hundred kids in that soccer program. Well, it’s cool because now you know that they can run so they’d be good at soccer. (Both Laughing) But I had to break that stigma that I wasn’t there to arrest them, right? And that was like an eye-opening experience for me. That day when that happened, I was like, “Wow, this is kind of crazy.” Yeah, it really is.

 

All right, Noel. So I really appreciate you being here. It sounds like you’re doing the Lord’s work. And even if you aren’t, it’s helping society just by you doing that. I know you’re aware of this. And I think I’m telling the listeners so that if you can help out, you should go over there and help support mortoncountypal.org. Thank you so much for being with us today. Thanks, Tony. I really appreciate the time.

Hey, thanks again to Noel Devell of Martin County Police Athletic League. See the trick is, is that if you don’t know how to pronounce the last name, just go for it. Act like you know what you’re doing.

 

You could visit them at martincountypal.org. P-A-L martincountypal.org. Sounds like they’re doing a great thing there for the kids in that area. And if you’re in that area or just want to help support them, go over there, find out more, find out how you can help.

 

All right. So I’ve been teasing this a little bit. Uh, it hadn’t happened until today. Um, uh, Steersmarts was going to send me a bunch of stuff for the Jeep Talk Show 2021 Gladiator, uh, to improve the steering, uh, both on-road and off-road performance of the Gladiator. And, uh, been, uh, been waiting for the, the, the products to show up just because it’s fun to get stuff, uh, even more fun whenever you’re not having to pay, uh, hundreds or thousands of dollars to get something. So, uh, that showed up today. Uh, I was expecting a couple of things from, uh, from Amazon and, uh, was watching those, I heard the, the, the motion detector thing go off and, uh, looked outside and the FedEx guy, uh, pretty sure he was pissed off. I mean, I’m discussing because he kept bringing box after box, big boxes up to the, uh, up to the door. And, uh, it probably took me a good three to four minutes to bring everything in. So, uh, looking forward to that. And, oh, and you know, I think everybody’s this way. Everybody’s got a Jeep or anybody that likes putting stickers on their, on their vehicles, uh, the, uh, they sent me a bunch of stickers. I think it’s a sticker pack because, uh, I was sharing this with, uh, a few of the Jeep Talk Show team members and Natalie from a Chick Chat and stuff. Uh, she showed a picture of the stickers that she got in yesterday and they were the same ones that I’m showing here. Uh, if you’re, uh, if you’re on the YouTube watching this, you’re seeing some of these stickers, they got some really beautiful stickers. And I noticed that they have, uh, my wife thought this was, was a really cool one. Uh, they have a QR code right there that I have yet to scan. I’m going to go check that out and see, uh, I’m thinking it’s going to be some gratuitous pictures of, uh, Sasquatch. Uh, there’s another one of the same one. So, uh, there’s a, I just love stickers and I don’t know which one I’ve already put the book, put a couple of steer sports pick stickers here on the board behind me. Uh, but, uh, I don’t know which one of these I’m going to put on the gladiator. Uh, I like putting the, uh, the parts and stuff that I, uh, put on the gladiator, like putting on the, uh, the back windshield of, uh, the gladiator and to show people behind me and I put it on the driver’s side, so it doesn’t block my view. For anybody out there that was concerned for my safety.

 

All right. And that’s a wrap for today’s episode of the Jeep talk show. I’m going to give a big thank you to our special guests for joining us today and sharing their knowledge and experience with the Jeep community. Oh crap. I forgot to mention we are going to have, uh, Ryan from Gladius off-road. I want to think I can, I think I have a show and tell for that as well. Uh, it’s a good thing. I never clean up my desk. So, uh, Ryan over at Gladius off-road makes these three dimensional emblems and, uh, he made some, uh, for the interview, uh, so he could show them on an interview and I said, Hey, let me buy some of those. And of course, no, he just sends them. So actually, uh, Chris, uh, Jeep talk show Chris and I have these are really nice. I mean, it is, I mean, I think you can see that how this had the quality of the thing. It’s gorgeous and it’s, it’s, you know, it’s six out. It’s 3d. So yeah, anyway, you’ll learn more about that in the interview that we’re doing with Ryan of a gladiator soft road. You can go over there and check out all their products right now. Uh, I highly recommend them and beautiful products. I mean, I can see it directly and that’s going to be going on the 2021 Jeep talk show gladiator as well. So, uh, big shout out to, uh, to Ryan for, uh, for providing those to not John Lee me, but to Chris.

 

All right. So, uh, don’t forget that we have five episodes a week. It’s understandable if you’ve missed past episodes, because there’s, there’s a lot to listen to. The trick, and I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, the trick is we have competitors out there that talk about off road and Jeeps and so on and so forth. Um, my plan was that if we do five episodes a week, you won’t have time to listen to anybody else.

 

No, there’s always plenty of time to listen to other podcasts.

 

You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.

 

In this week’s Jeep Talk Show Flagship II episode, Natalie and Tony dive into the latest news, discussing a Jeep hybrid recall due to fire risks and Stellantis stocks dropping over 30%. Plus, they talk about the Jeep Gladiator’s surprising last-place ranking and, as always, veer off into some fun rabbit trails! Don’t miss this weekly Thursday episode packed with Jeep news, discussions, and plenty of surprises. Make sure to tune in—you won’t want to miss it!

Hidy Ho Jeeper is time for another Jeep talk show flagship episode and this Jeep talk show flagship episode is brought to you by the more you do for your Jeep, the more your Jeep will do for you. Oh, I didn’t know it worked that way. That’s cool. Right. I like it.

 

If you want to update, upgrade and make it ready to take on anything life can throw at you, RealTruck has the parts and accessories to make it to fit your favorite 4×4. We’ll even guide you through the installation process. So whether you’re taking on the next big adventure or your favorite off-road trail, make sure your Jeep is ready at realtruck.com. RealTruck, bring your truck to life. You know, I’ve had Todd from RealTruck, they talk about the videos where you can see how to install stuff. I’ve had, I’ve had Todd on here a couple of times from RealTruck, super guy. And he does some really great installation videos.

 

And I love the installation videos. I mean, I can do something on the Jeep that I’ve done a couple of times, but I’m going to sit my ass right here mainly so I don’t have to sweat that much quicker, but I almost sit my ass right here and watch a video, a YouTube video, because it just, it just makes it go faster. You know, you know exactly where to look. You know exactly what size, uh, oh, I’m going to need this tool. I’m gonna need this tool. And if you’re like me, I never put my tools away. So I have to find a bunch of stuff before I start. You do have to find it. Where’s Waldo tools? Exactly. All right. So on tonight’s episode in our news stories, your hybrid Jeep may kill you. Oh my God. Lord. I mean, you know, it’s, it’s an adventure. It’s kind of a bad adventure, but it’s still an adventure that you’re putting into your life by having a hybrid. And I know I’m not, I’m not beating up on the, the electric vehicles. It’s just, it’s a thing that’s going on right now. It’s just a thing right now. That’s why we keep talking about it. Stay out of the news hybrids. Come on. And this just pisses me off. Gladiator is in last place.

 

I mean, and that’s me too. I’m with you. I I’m going to say this, I just attribute this to the whole thing about some people just don’t understand Jeeps. They don’t. It’s a Jeep thing. It’s definitely a Jeep thing. And I don’t think you’re much of a jeeper if you can be swayed to buy something else. And you’re not much of an off-roader if you can be swayed to buy something else with the possible exception of a Toyota. Cause I know Toyotas can do very good off-road as well. They can. But a Ford Ranger. That’s not what we’re going to talk about though, is it? I think everyone’s going to be surprised. No. Yeah. A Ford Ranger off-road. Sure. I mean, this, make sure you have your, you have your winch and your tow strap ready. Absolutely. And I’m glad to hear Jeep talk show, glad eater update. What’s a sway bar and do I need it?

 

I’m triggering people. Legal disclaimer coming in hot. Oh yeah. Absolutely.

 

And tonight’s must have for your Jeep from Natalie, I need help. I need so much help. That’s the first step. That is knowing admitting that you need help. Yeah.

 

With recovery, that is from Warren’s. We’re going to talk about some things from our friends from Warren and what we’re going to showcase tonight is the Warren Epic accessory kit. I mean, when you throw the word Epic in there, I think you automatically are intrigued. I know I am. Raising the bar. It’s actually complete. Yeah. You know, Warren has always had a bunch of great stuff and, uh, and factor 55 was so great they bought them. So I know, right? Yeah. So it’s a, yeah. Factor 55 stuff is really cool too.

 

Well, hi guys. I’m Natalie from high lift off road where you dream it and we build it and we’re looking forward to tonight. So let’s just jump right in. So your hybrid could kill you. Um, so Jeep right now is urging 194,000 plug in hybrid SUV owners to stop charging and park outdoors due to a fire risk. Is the, their corporate headquarters isn’t in California, is it? Cause that sounds like something California would do. Somebody buy a V EV now stop charging it. I know. Right. And you know, I’m all about citations, right? So it’s actually, this is coming from the associated press guys out of Detroit. So this is not coming from my head. I promise. Um, so Jeep is doing a recall, like I said, of 194,000 plug in hybrid SUVs worldwide because they can catch fire with the ignition turned off. That’s the key. It’s just turned off hanging out in your garage or in your carport. So that’s a little scary for me. Um, in addition, Jeep is urging owners not to charge the SUVs as well and to just park them outdoors away from any structures that, um, could be repaired or until they repair the Jeep as well. So, Well, I mean, it’s good that they’re doing this, but you have to wonder what’s the process, what’s the quality control process whenever they’re building these things and why are they finding it out whenever it’s out in the wild, so to speak. I’ve always thought about that anyway with recalls, um, big or small. And I understand a lot of times it’s a computer system and you just need an update, but this one’s a little bit more than the computer system. So and I understand like with the batteries, I know Tesla has probably gone through it, um, you know, but for, I’m just covering, we’re just covering the Jeep stuff. So I just more in my face, but the recall does cover the Wrangler four by E Tony nice favorite wink, wink. Sorry Jeep. I’m a Jim. If you’re listening from the 2020 through the 2024 model year. So essentially all of them, um, it’s going to cover all those years, um, as well as the grand Cherokee four by E from 2022 through 2024. So most of the recalled SUVs are actually here in North America, which is, um, well, I guess that’s good from a expense standpoint. It is because at least they’re local. Um, and Solanus really needs to watch what they’re doing right now, um, on all fronts, especially with expenses as we know, um, they set, so Solanus did say that they, that the remedy is near, um, and if it has affected the customers, the, I’m sorry, the affected customers will be notified when they can schedule their service. So how do you know if you’ve been affected? Is your car already caught on fire? Like how do you know? So, uh, well they probably have a, I can’t remember if this one, cause I don’t see it here on the show notes. I’m wondering if this is the one where there is a part, uh, that overheats there. But I mean, just sitting there, the plug or something, there’s a problem with the plug and it gets really hot, uh, just because it it’s, I think it’s not supposed to have voltage on it, but some, for some reason it does. It gets really hot, a fire starts and then it causes all these issues. Um, but I, I gotta wonder if you are a, um, a dealership mechanic.

 

Yeah, right. So what do you think? So you’re working, you’re working at a dealership and then you see the news story come over because management never tells you anything. No, never. Never. And they go, holy shit. I got enough to do now. What? 194,000. And the cost was there. Yeah. Well, that’s true too. I wonder if they’ve got a guy standing there with a, with a fire extinguisher. Yes.

 

Oh my gosh. That was our whole sand hollow trip with all the sand and PSC issues. So sorry. Side note. I have, yeah. Well, here we go again. I have this whole mental image of Tony Stark and that robot holding the fire extinguisher. Yes.

 

That is it. This is all very Tony. Tony, Tony. So yes. God, such a funny movie. They do say though, that the risk of fire is reduced when the battery charge is shocking depleted. Oh, I like that shocking thing in there. Thank you for that. Captain obvious. The routine review of customer data led to an investigation that found out 13 fires with two injuries actually have occurred and have been reported. So Salinas estimates that’s about 5% of the SUVs that have the problem, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but 5% is 194,000 of these things. Yes. So that’s even more mind blowing Jeep isn’t doing great in sales, but damn, I mean, that’s a lot of numbers. Here we are again. So I think that’s kind of the downside to being a publicly traded company is that you have to produce. You have to have those, you can’t have those rookie numbers. You got to get those numbers up and, uh, but they’re, they are selling a lot of Jeeps. Obviously if, uh, if only 5% of the affected ones are in 194,000, they sold a bunch of Jeeps, but that ain’t good enough and ain’t good enough for the, for the stockholders. And I, I’ve seen more around here actually, I don’t know if this is because we keep talking about it. So now I’m more aware of the full ride, but it is becoming more and more popular around here. People love that $7,500 off. Um, basically I wonder, and I should get somebody on here to clarify that maybe, you know, uh, but the 7,500 isn’t a check in your pocket. It is now tax credit. Yes, exactly. And if you don’t have $7,500 worth of taxes to be paid, you are not giving a $7,500 tax credit. At least that’s my understanding. And anybody out there feel free to correct me on this. I would love to know because where did that number even come from? Like where, how did they base it? Where, I mean, do they throw 7,500 out? Like I just want to know who I have a lot of questions. So can someone just please write in info at Jeep, talk show.com, please write in.

Well, I guess the good news is, is that a lot of, uh, a lot of people have not been affected by this and it’s good that, uh, and I would assume that, uh, Jeep is being forced by the NTSB M O U S E thing. So, uh, to do this, but it’s good that they’re doing this ahead of time. I would like to know about the 13 fires. I mean, were they full blown? Did they burn to the ground moment? I mean, I do have some questions, but I mean, I guess even if it’s just a spark, that’s a problem. So, so whenever we had this house built, I think it was, uh, I think we moved in in 1997.

 

Um, I, I’m, it was, uh, we were really excited. It was going to be great actually being a new house for the first time ever. And, um, but the thing that concerned me was, is that one of the kids bedrooms on the second floor was right above the garage. And I don’t know that everybody thinks about this or not. Uh, there’s no smart smoke alarms in the garage. You can certainly do that, but the house, when they build, they don’t, they didn’t build the house with smoke alarms. So, so your, your precious child is sitting above batteries and gasoline and everything, because it’s not a detached garage. I mean, and of course a detached garage will just give you a little more time, but it’s, it’s at least a little more time to get your kids out. So, uh, and the, the first, the first thing about, uh, you may, uh, and I’m not knowledgeable on this, but my fear is the first your child would know that there’s a fire in the garage is whenever their bed collapses into the fire. I mean, that, that would be bad timing. Yeah. These are concerns that a parent has and they built, but they build houses like this. Okay. Now multiply that with your hybrid may kill you. It may catch on fire and four trucks were doing this not too long ago, a couple of years ago, and they were telling you not to park it in your garage. Cause you could lose the house that way. Um, so yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s, so I don’t know. I don’t know if you’re aware of this or not, but I have a video cameras all around the house, security cameras. Yeah. It’s not like I’m concerned about anything. I just like being able to see outside, explain the dog bar. Cause I can look up at one of these screens and see what’s going on outside. Well, I got to have one in the garage too. So I like to be able to see what’s going on in there because now I don’t have to go and check it while there’s a fire. So, um, this, this really concerns me. And I think it concerns a lot of people, even if you don’t have kids, but especially so, if you do have children, um, that, uh, you know, should, should you ever park a vehicle in a attached garage? Yeah.

 

My garage is detached and it’s nice.

 

It is detached. It’s a little bit older. Yeah. Yes. I, yes. Yesterday was a little, we have a major downpour yesterday, so I’ll think, Oh, yeah, we wish I didn’t have to go through this. Um, is it full to the gills? Cause ours is full to the gills. We buy too much stuff and we don’t get rid of it now. Uh, because the jeep is back. So the jeep is in there. So I haven’t, I didn’t even think. It did fit. Was there any concerns about that? I bet the tire size and stuff. Yeah. Major. His little twin did not fit really well. Um, I, there’s a nice dent in my garage door from little twin, uh, trying to close the door and it hit the, actually the factor 55 hook. Um, sorry, Mike Bailey, but there was no scratch. I promise. Um, and then, but no, this fit actually, she felt like a glove. So she’s home. Good. Super excited. Good.

 

All right. So, I don’t know about you, Natalie. I was worried about this Ford ranger sales bounce back.

 

Ford ranger. The clean version.

 

Now that means that the Jeep gladiator, uh, is now in last place for sales.

 

Come on. Um, and then we were talking about this at the top of the show. I think that the people that look at a Jeep as just another vehicle. They don’t get it. Um, they don’t get it even with the gladiator. That that’s a special, a special love right there. Exactly. It’s, it’s unusual. It’s not the, the standard Wrangler. I mean, you certainly, it is a lot like a Wrangler, but it’s not just a standard Wrangler that everybody associates the, the Jeep as, I mean, that’s the, the model that everybody thinks about is being the true Jeep. Um, but, uh, I, I would, I just, I mean, I hate to predict the future, but I don’t think I would ever buy a Ford ranger. No, not even for the Epic song that comes with it. No. I mean, I would buy a Ford pickup, a full size Ford pickup. Yes. Well, at least before they went fully aluminum. Now that concerns me, uh, the full aluminum bodies. Well, yeah, because they tear. Uh, I mean, it’s a big Coke can. Uh, it’s so, uh, but I mean, the older, yeah, the older Ford trucks, I had a Ford F 150, uh, with a crew cab, club cab, crew cab, I think is what it was. No club. And it’s a great point place to store all your shit, uh, in a, in a two door, in a two door truck. Uh, I love full size trucks and Ford was great. I don’t know that I would buy a Chevy these days because the design of those things are just screwy. Uh, I had a square, I had a square body. So compare the square body to what you see now. And that’s true. And there’s, there’s a transformer thing.

 

Mine’s a 2021, uh, the 1500 with the crew cab. And I love it. Love the body design, but the new, the new, new ones I can see. I don’t like how it says Chevrolet across the hood or I’m sorry, across the grill. I’m not a fan of that. Bring the logo back. Yeah. Yeah. No. Uh, well, you know, I remember, I’m sure you can still do it. We used to put the, uh, the chrome grills that were just the chrome bars on there and just change the front look and get rid of those logos altogether. Yeah. I had Chevrolet trucks. I had a Ford trucks and, uh, the, the, they were both great. I would say the Ford trucks, uh, was the, the first vehicle I ever had that went over a hundred thousand miles. Wow. And that was, uh, that was, uh, like 89. So, uh, that just shows you this, the way that they were being built back then. 60,000 miles on a vehicle was a lot of miles back then. But anyway, so I can’t see myself buying a Ford ranger. I don’t even like the idea of a mid-sized truck. Now, if it’s a Jeep mid-sized truck, hell yeah. Especially with the towing capacity that the gladiator has. So, I mean, again, I just don’t think people get, if they’re not Jeepers, then they’re considering these other vehicles is the way I’m looking at it. Yes.

 

I mean, that’s not good for Jeep because they need to sell some of these things. Yes, they do.

 

So anyway, the mid-sized and a compact pickup pickup truck segments are doing good in the third quarter of 2024 while Toyota Tacoma and Jeep gladiator sales are down, which I find interesting that the Toyota, the Tona Toyota sales are down, uh, when compared to the previous year, the reasons for this, uh, are likely different. I agree. Uh, the Ford ranger pickup bounces back into third sales place behind GM and Toyota Nissan Frontier Honda Ridgeline. Oh, what a piece of crap that is. And it’s a very unique looking thing, but it’s, uh, it’s actually, it kind of looks more like a, uh, the old seventies Bronco that has the, the top off where it’s, you know, there’s no separation between the bed. That’s so true. I’m just not a fan. Never have been. Um, and, uh, but anyway, the GMC Canyon are all growing in sales. That’s interesting. I do not associate Chevrolet’s as being a well built vehicle. No offense to yours. Uh, but I hear a lot of bad things about it. I mean, I used to love Chevy’s. And, uh, but I don’t think they have the build quality, uh, of the Jeep. So especially after driving a Jeep Cherokee, uh, from what it was brand new for 25 years. And I’m, I mean, I did repairs, water pumps and stuff like that. Right. But, uh, I mean, it got me back and forth to work almost.

 

I mean, God, like 99, uh, 98% of the time I’m very seldom did I have to take another vehicle to get to work. Right. Yeah. Uh, so, I mean, yeah, also too, I was working on it. So that’s true. That means you knew, you knew what you had, you knew everything that was going on with it and every Creek in the knees, you knew what it was. I didn’t, I didn’t take it to the shop and it wasn’t there a week or two weeks or the dealership for a month. Uh, then, then, then I wouldn’t have it for work. So I was repairing it. Um, but that, that included like ordering the parts, uh, off of Amazon and getting them here in a day, fixing it, so on and so forth. So I was able to manage all that so that I could still get back and forth to work. And it really was, it was my daily driver for at least 20, 23 of the 25 years. Um, and I think that’s just amazing. I mean, good Lord, it’s a 98 and, uh, yeah, so it got towed a few times, but, uh, that was like, uh, when, uh, the water pump went out and a couple of the things that happened, but it was, it, this wasn’t safe to drive. It was something that was going to get damaged.

 

So, uh, again, Toyota sales are slowly returning to normal, but not without problems, the Tacoma, uh, still hold the overall best seller lead, uh, by huge margin, uh, General Motors is in second place and the Chevy Colorado and GMC Canyon are both growing, but the Canyon is growing way quicker. Uh, the Nissan Frontier, who gives a shit about the Nissan Frontier? I’m kidding. I mean, come on. Fourth place Q3, 2024. The Honda Ridge line is very close behind. What I hear a Honda Ridge line, I often think of the word behind. Um, so the Jeep gladiators now in the last place as it loses negative 35% in Q3 when compared to the same time period last year. Wow. I hate hearing this for Jeep. That’s staggering. Natalie, can you think of anything that Jeep is doing? I mean, especially compared to all these others, we can say that they’re, they’re just way too expensive, but I know these others are way too expensive as well. And I just think people, they still don’t look at it as a functioning truck for themselves and they just go to what they think they know. Um, we’ve been seeing an influx of the Ford Maverick actually coming into the shop for modifications. Yeah. I actually, I mentioned Todd with real truck earlier. He has a Ford Maverick. Yeah. Oh my gosh, really? Yeah. We’ve been doing a lot of modifications with that, uh, adding the caps onto the back and, uh, rails and I mean, I’ve been, I’ve just been shocked because it’s so tiny and I’m like, why not just get a Jeep gladiator and have some fun with it? And you can do multiple things with it. And I think do more with it. Oh, well that’s the thing that kills me is, is that the aftermarket for Jeep is absolutely huge, billions and billions of dollars of parts and stuff that you can slap onto the Jeep and, and that’s just fun. It’s just fun modifying it. Uh, and, and then you see somebody, well, I mean, I don’t, I don’t know if you’re aware of the Mavericks and the Pinto’s and the stuff that was going on in the seventies, but there was people buying those and we knew they were pieces of shit then. So I just don’t know. I mean, the, like the Chevy Vega, uh, was this little, and they may even made a Vega station wagon. Uh, now I do know somebody that dropped a V8 and the, and the, the, the Vega painted the thing completely yellow and, uh, yeah, it was solar yellow. Oh yeah. A very bright yellow. It was, it was a lot of fun. Um, but, uh, a friend of mine did that and it was really cool and it’s really neat when it’s a sleeper that makes it cool.

 

But with that V8 in there, he had some, uh, some, some punch in that thing. But anyway, I digress. Uh, of course you can do that with a Jeep too, especially with dropping some Hema’s in there, which you guys will do that, right? Oh yeah, we do. I’m actually, I’m taking our Hemi gladiator to a show on Sunday, cause we gotta get the gladiators back out, I guess, in front of people. Um, and I guarantee you’ll probably be the only one there. Uh, it’s a, on a golf course too. So let’s get really unique. So you guys have to be helping, uh, Jeep on their sales. Whenever you take, uh, vehicles like that with Hemi’s, you know, because people see that and go, wow. I mean, a lot of people, a lot of people understand that’s a different engine that’s in there, but some people are just not going to know enough about Jeep to understand that it’s a highly modified vehicle.

 

Yes, for sure. I mean, I do think we get asked a lot, you know, do you sell them? Do you have Jeeps on your lot for sale? Um, and you know, that could be coming. You never know. I could see you out there with the leisure suit on, uh, making deals. An electric eye lip blue, you know? Yeah. Oh, we get the really blue, uh, eyeshadow, like they used to wear in the sixties or seventies or something. Uh, just dial it up.

 

All right. Well, I don’t like doing bad news on the show, but it is real. I think that’s all we’re doing tonight. Yeah. It’s realistic. Now there was some, some people that got killed, uh, and, uh, in a Jeep and killed some people and I didn’t do those stories. So just be glad. Um, he always sees some, some negative things. I think the dumb criminal stories are kind of fun. I haven’t seen one of those in a while. The, the dumb criminal stories are often really, really fun. I was listening to a little segment that we did a while back. I think it was actually Josh did the news story where, um, somebody, uh, thankfully it was a Jeep compass, but somebody, uh, got a lot of pizzas. And when to this guy’s house and was throwing, throwing the pizzas on the Jeep compass, and we considered it a crime, not because it was a compass, cause who cares? It was for the pizza. It was the pizzas don’t hurt the pizzas. Right? Like, gosh, well, remember that one story that we did when we reported on, um, sorry, gosh, here we go. But the wagon years that were stolen, uh, by the kids. I mean, that was amazing. We love our criminal stories. Oh yeah. It’s funny. Uh, it’s not funny for the people that lost them, but it’s, uh, it’s amazing. It’s funny for us. The kids, we think the kids aren’t doing anything except playing on their phones and playing on the, uh, the games, the video games online, but dammit. No, they’re still stealing a million dollars of wagon years of grand wagon years. All right. So anyway, uh, still more bad news. Here we go. Yeah. Yeah. Stop. Stantly. Not surprisingly. Stellantis stock plunges as a Jeep maker cuts outlook. So I think that means it’s not the, the email, uh, Microsoft email thing. Don’t we all want to cut out outlook out of our life? Outlook’s kind of a pain in the ass, but anyway, especially whenever you get corruption on the, uh, the PST files or the P D B files, the it people know what I’m talking about. Okay. I was like, now you’re now, now we’re doing this. Oh yeah. No, once you get up to a couple of gig worth of emails, which everybody does eventually, uh, the Microsoft outlook database doesn’t like it too much anyway. Anyway, here we go. Stellantis, Stellantis forward, fast forward, fast forward. Stellantis shares are tumbling a Monday. This is earlier in the week, uh, after Chrysler and Jeep parent issue a profit warning, you know, they got to have to do anything possible not to do this because they know this is going to affect the stock, right? The company said it is cutting excess North America inventory amid a deterioration. I can’t even say that. I’m just going to say detonation. Same thing in this case, I in global industry dynamics, uh, and competition from Chinese rivals. Yikes. So we, I think we talked about this where they were cutting, uh, they were stopping production on the Wrangler and the, the grand Cherokees, the two most popular Jeeps, uh, because the, uh, the, the dealerships were bitchin’ and moaning because they have so much inventory. Yeah.

 

So, uh, the company says it’s fiscal 2024 adjusted operating income margin now is expected to be 5.5 and 7% versus its previous previous projection for double digit levels, uh, which would probably meant, uh, 10. Yeah, right. That’s a close, but it’s like, if you say double digit, it’s like, oh, it could be anything it could have been 99.

 

Yeah. Uh, and about two thirds of the reduction driven by corrective actions in North America, oh, that sounds interesting. Um, yes. Yeah. It goes, stand at the corner, uh, shares of General Motors and Ford, uh, motor are also failing. Yeah. I think the whole industry is a whole, yeah, it is. I’m gonna, this is, this is different for me, but I’m gonna go off on a tangent. Um, so I’ve been listening. I’m a, I’m a Tesla stockholder. I do not have any Tesla vehicles. I think it is a, an amazing, uh, idea. I’m not, I’m not huge on the whole EV thing. Uh, but I think, uh, Elon Musk, it’s like if Elon does it, yeah, I want to, I want to buy into that because he, I agree with you. He makes all that. He’s doing something right. So yeah, he’s doing it the right way. And anyway, so I watch a lot of YouTube videos about Tesla and, uh, there’s, there’s people that I watch repeatedly and their idea about Tesla. EVs is different than mine and probably yours as well. They think that, uh, the reason why the automobile industry is having such hard times is because it’s not an EV. They have not been successful in transitioning into EV. And of course I can understand how they would think this. These are knowledgeable people, but I think they’re wrong from the standpoint of internal combustion engines, uh, are going to be here for, uh, I’m sure long after I’m dead, they will still be here because there’s certain things that you cannot do with an EV. Now, if there’s a big breakthrough in technology, if we don’t go from a battery, that’s a charging system to a electrical generation device, uh, fusion reactor for, or, you know, we, we roll our eyes about stuff like this. But if you could put something in there, uh, that, I mean, uh, a lot of our, our, our carriers anyway, our nuclear powered. And I think, and I think they run for five years. Now, now tell me if you were, uh, uh, able to buy an EV and you didn’t have to refuel it for five years, that would kind of sell me on getting the EV. It would, but then you still have to pay that electric bill. So you’re still paying at the end of the day. It’s just which, which Piper are we going to be paying? Well, I mean, but the, but I’m saying this is, if it had a nuclear, a nuclear reactor or a fusion reactor, it would be generating electricity and it would do so for five years, there would be, you would not be going to any place, any charging or any filling station. You just get it in it and go.

 

But what if that would be huge, it would be huge, but then the fallout, if something happens now we have nuclear issues going on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, tomato, tomato, um, crash. It’s fine. But I’m saying that is a level of technology that it makes sense that somebody made the smartphone thing. I mean, we used to have phones that were, that, you know, you charged once every 30 days and then the smartphone technology came up and you got to charge it daily or every couple of days at least. But, but the, the technology is so fantastic. Everybody, everybody wants a smartphone. Uh, you know, you don’t want an old Nicole, Nicole, Nicole, Nokia phone and do that snake chase. Yeah. So I mean, my point is, is that the technology is sufficiently advanced from what you’re used to, then the public is going to go for that technology. I want it. Yes. And, and, and this is what I’m getting to about the EV and I’ve, I’ve mentioned this before, the, the government is trying to mandate all this electric vehicle crap where the market needs to be mandating it. We need to look at it as consumers and say, this is where I want to go. And I’ll throw this in. I didn’t even think about this. So, uh, again, I’ve been following the Tesla stuff. Uh, full self driving is, is like a near certainty. Oh, it is. Vehicle, Cadillac’s doing it too now, but Jeep is not doing it. I don’t think, are they? No, but the, the point that they were making was, um, if I’m, they were talking about Rivian and they said, yeah, the Rivian is very nice. Uh, so and so forth. Uh, they lose money on every one they sell. But, uh, if I was going to buy a vehicle, it probably wouldn’t be a Rivian. Even though they’re very nice because there is no full self driving.

 

And I thought about it and went, my God, that’s absolutely right. Oh, and by the way, the full self driving is, does not require an electric motor.

 

I don’t think I knew that. I just learned something this week. That’s in the teach, Natalie, something new this week. I mean, but you do have to have a, I didn’t know that. Yeah. You do have to have a system that can control the brakes and the steering and everything, but the Tesla full EV. Yeah. Yeah. It does not have to be an EV to do full self driving. So, uh, and I thought about that. I went, my God, yes. If, if Tesla is selling full self driving vehicles and I’m going to go buy, maybe I’m going to go buy another EV from somebody else, I’m going to say, well, but they don’t have full self driving. Yeah. I would, even if I’m not planning on doing full self driving right away, that’s going to be a consideration because who wants to be driven. I mean, who wants to drive when you can be driven. It’s your choice.

 

It is your choice. I don’t trust it. I don’t know if I could ever do it. I don’t know if I could ever relax enough to do it. It really scares me. All right. One more, one more rabbit trail and I’ll stop. Okay. Okay. This is from years ago. Um, they were doing scientists were doing a study of insects and how they were, how they would fly around and they would miss each other. This tap hazard, they had a collision avoidance.

 

Now imagine a world that has no stop signs or lights to stop traffic flow. Oh my gosh. No, because, because all of the cars with full self driving are intertwined and they know exactly where they are. Everybody is, and they do collision avoidance. And I’m not talking about a 9g maneuver.

 

It just one slows down a little bit. I’m all down the road because they know they’re going to come into and now there’s no stopping.

 

That’s so wild to me. And it’s going to happen. We will get there. Yeah. It’s going to be like insects flying around and you wondered why they don’t collide. That would be the insects. Yeah. Insects do collide, but I mean, generally speaking, they don’t anyway. Yeah. So, uh, I think Jeep’s going to bounce back. Uh, they, uh, they’re going to, they’re going to fire, uh, another 150, uh, executives and it’ll get all better. Not because they fired the executives, just because they got to act like they’re doing something. Um, exactly. Somebody’s going to come in there and figure out what it is. And, and, uh, interest rates are down a half a percent, which I think is going to help sales, uh, it’s going to be fine. Uh, at least things are going down and the election is almost here. I really do think that, I mean, this climate right now is based on that. It just is. Yeah. And I don’t think it matters who wins. It’s is the, um, the attitude of people. So when there’s a federal election, uh, American election, the, the, the, the head of the country, so to speak. Uh, and they do, they don’t do as much as what a lot of people think they do. Uh, and it’s actually designed that way by the, the founding fathers. Um, but, but it changes the attitude of the people and it’s something that they can say, well, I was waiting for this to happen to see what I wanted to do. I’m going to go buy a vehicle now. So it doesn’t initially mean who wins. It’s just that there’s, there’s a final outcome, uh, for the next four years. So yeah, I think we’re going to see some things change. Uh, and I think they’ll probably change for the better. I think so too. I really do.

 

Well, look what COVID did. That was such a big spike with, well, yes, that’s a whole another episode, sorry, everybody.

 

Oh my gosh. All right, guys. Well, the Monterey Motorsports Festival 2024 is quickly, um, upon us. Have you ever been to Monterey?

 

Um, I don’t even know where Monterey is. Is that Mexico or is that New Mexico? It is California. All right. I was going to get there eventually. I just had 49 more guesses to go. There we go. You are in Texas. It’s, it’s not in Texas. What does it, yeah. If it’s not in Texas, what does it matter? Sorry, no offense.

 

So the Monterey car week is held every August and is known for the Pebble Beach Concours de Excellance. So we actually have our own chapter here in Cincinnati, just so everybody knows the Concours de Excellance. So I was really excited to talk about this. Um, we actually, Michael Bailey and his dad have entered their Morgans, uh, with the Concours. So it’s really fun. So it’s kind of close to my heart. Um, among other car centric activities that draw thousands of people to the seaside town in central California. So while sipping champagne and a sport coat and a bow tie is a favorite tradition of some, there’s another side to car week. So one of that is a more accessible to the general public and welcoming the families. So they really are trying to bring together, um, different generations and different gaps that have been in the car community. Um, and I think they’re, they’re onto something. So now in its second year, the Monterey Motor Sports Fest is a one-day celebration held on 22 acres at the Monterey Fairgrounds, which aims to bring everything automotive to a less exclusive audience than what you would see at the quail. So this year’s event near attracted nearly 7,000 people and had everything from trucks to exotics, to heavy machinery. So heavy machinery that I’ll be thinking like John Deere, I like machinery. I’m most like, I’m not like most men’s like, I want to get it.

 

That’s a new one for me, heavy machinery. And then even a helicopter as some of the more, even a helicopter was present. I wonder if, um, someone famous came in on that, um, as some of them more than I hope it was a Bell helicopter. Like the one they had in Magnum PI, that was a cool looking helicopter. That would have been really cool. Um, so they add over more than 250 vehicle entries. So that was pretty cool. We had ours this year at, um, one of our local airports, like where all the private planes are, so everyone parked on the tarmac. And of course we have one of the Jeeps there. The only Jeep that was there. So that made it a little bit interesting. Um, we belong, you know, and so does heavy machinery. Why not? Sure. So with a late, with a late morning kickoff and a show that lasted late into the evening, I wonder if that was because of the champagne that was blowing the Monterey Motorsports Festival was full of great vehicles and a regular scheduled parade that drives off different vehicles throughout the day. So live workshops and demos, along with interesting expert panels on the main stage or complemented with live music. Well, Tony, we need to go to this. I gotta be honest. That sounds really, I’m into it.

 

We were especially interested in the overland outpost that features off-road vehicles and the sprinkling of cool trucks throughout the show. I just hope in the cool trucks weren’t higher on the front than the back and had the rubber band tires. Exactly.

 

And if you guys want to learn more about the Monterey show, you can go head over to realtruck.com forward slash blog. Hang on a second. Just look up modern. You cut out a little bit there and make sure that we, I want to make sure that the audio is right on that one. Sorry about that. That’s all right. No, it’s not your fault. It’s the internet.

 

So do the five second pause and then go ahead and do it again.

 

Just the, this is the real truck part.

 

I’m sorry, just the part where you’re saying go over to

 

realtruck.com forward slash blog. And just search under Monterey Motorsports Festival 2024.

 

Very, very cool.

 

Oh, you know what? I have a, I actually have a little, uh, segment intro, uh, for the gladiator thing and I have a little, a little cheat thing here. Cause I don’t, I never remember. I never remember what it fell off the monitor. Uh, so I had, I had to talk to him about it. I had to talk to him about it. I had to talk to him about it. Uh, so I had to, I had to talk about it. So anyway, uh, it’s a minus sign on the keyboard. So let’s see if it works.

 

Gladiator.

 

Yay.

 

Gladiator’s good.

 

God, that’s a good looking.

 

Well, so pretty

 

Gladiator. You know, uh, Henderson was telling me though, that Greg Henderson unofficially suddenly he said, uh, so you need to do something with that gladiator because people look at that and they go, you know, that’s, that’s like a stock gladiator. You need to get some bigger tires on there. Uh, you need to, you know, get some stuff going with that thing so that it looks like it looks like you’re a jeeper, you know,

 

most capable vehicle right off the lot. That’s right.

 

All right. So anyway, working towards that. Uh, so, uh, my question for you, uh, for you, Natalie and the, the listener out there, do you need a front sway bar?

 

Well, it depends on who’s listening from a high lift off road right now, Tony. Yeah.

 

I mean, since EGS 2024 and perhaps before, cause I can’t quite remember, it’s been off, it’s been disconnected for a long time. I haven’t had the front sway bar connected. I initially, I was concerned because I mean, I’m kind of used to no sway bar. Like, like if I do the XJ, maybe I would take it off road on something. That’s true. I would disconnect it and I was just kind of used to that. And it’s for the XJ, it’s very different. It feels that you’re like steering a boat. Uh, but, but you get used to it and you can think ahead, uh, for the most part. Now, again, talking about Greg Henderson and several other people in the zoom meeting that we were discussing this the other day, um, Greg Henderson lost his fricking mind, of course you have to have the sway bar front sway bar connected. Because if you’re, if little Johnny runs out into the street after his ball and you got to swerve to, to miss him, you’re going to wind up on the top of that Jeep. And it’s just going to flip over. Uh, and I don’t doubt that he’s right. I mean, you know, Greg knows. I’m sure he, I mean, yes, I mean, he is right. Yes. So I got to say this, this is, this is the general, uh, statement, uh, safety statement and release of liability. That’s the only reason liability release. Don’t drive around with your sway bar disconnected on the road. This is an off-road only thing. So don’t be like me.

 

Always reconnect your sway bar before getting back on public roads.

 

Got it. All right. Got it. Now, Tony, I am going to say I will join you. I was, I, I was disconnected for a solid two years in my JK. You know what I’m talking about. And also too, I do. I think the, the glad eater being disconnected is it’s really long. And I think that has a lot to do with it. Uh, I can’t really hardly tell a difference. Now, uh, I, I’ve made my determination that I’m just plowing through Johnny. Uh, he shouldn’t have been out there. I mean, at this point, you have good insurance. I’m not going to roll my Jeep to save Johnny. His kids should have been watching him.

 

But I think you made a good point about the body length. I do think that it plays a positive role and keep roll. Get it. Um, and keeping you a little bit more stable and you do get used to it, but, um, no, I’m not promoting to drive without a sway bar. Just everybody knows from high, the thought road, not, not, not promoting that, but you, it is possible. It is possible. Sometimes you just cannot reconnect. I know for me, like I was, I have a hard time by myself and I just couldn’t get it. And I got really frustrated trying to put the pins back in. I had the JKS. You have to have a damn mallet with you to get the things back on. And sometimes to get them off. And then at one point I had to like lower it on one side. So I’m trying to park it on a curb and that wasn’t working. Thought, well, there’s no one around like to stand on the one side. So I had a 40 pound cat litter thinking that would help. No, it didn’t help. Just so everybody knows I needed a lot more weight. Screw it. I got places to go. Yeah. So I was just like, you know what? I’ll just hold onto these, uh, disconnects and here we are. What, uh, what disconnects do you have?

 

So on when I was doing that, it was a JKS quick disconnects, um, which are fantastic, but you do need a mallet. Yeah. Um, but now with the rock crawler adventure series kit, um, you only have to pull a pin on the bottom and then the, it comes up and there’s a nice little, um, attachment that has a, the great rock crawler logo. Jeremy did a great job and you just connect it with that, um, with just a push and it stays up. So, um, I’m brain farting on the one that’s always connected, but it allows more flex cause it has the torsion bar. Um, the rock jock anti-rock. I think anti-rock. Yeah. Um, I’ve seen those before. I think that’s a great idea. It’s not, it’s not as good as being completely, uh, disconnected, but it’s a good compromise, uh, when you don’t have to mess with it. It is an amazing compromise. The technology behind it. Um, I was just actually, I learned a lot more about them watching flex rocks and rollovers new hell and back and enter series, and they were featuring them on there. Um, and right now guys just so you know, you can enter a contest to win. So check it out. Um, I definitely entered twice, just everybody knows. Um, so I had to do rock jock.com. What are you going to do with it? You can’t put it on your Jeep because you’re, you’re Jeep. Your Jeep is the high lift Jeep now. So you can’t make changes to it. Uh, I know, right. Well, uh, rock shock. If you guys would like, I would love to win the contest. So I don’t want to reconnect. This is going to be the first episode that Mike Bailey listens to. And he’s like, he’s like, Oh hell no. He’s in a Bangkok, Thailand right now. So he has a long flight. So you know what? Maybe we’ll turn on that. You talk to finally. Yes. An episode to catch up on. Um, but we do a lot of installs of them and a lot of our customers. And they have from front and rear, right? So you do. Yeah. Because a lot of people don’t think about the sway bar disconnect for the rear. I mean, people just generally don’t do that. But if you put the anti-rock on there, now you have articulation front and rear, which I think is something you have to do if you’re going to be an off-roader or you can just, I mean, even if you’re at the mall parking lot, you can say, look at that, I got the anti-rock on the rear. I mean, snow is coming. So no mounts. I’m in Southeast Texas. I haven’t seen snow and since 74. Oh my gosh.

 

So anyway, I mean, do you actually need a sway bar? Well, if, if you’re going with what Henderson says, and you know, you need to make a, a panic maneuver out on the street someplace, uh, according to him, you do need that. Um, so, um, I just, I mean, it just, it doesn’t feel that much difference. Oh, and the other thing I was going to say is, is that, um, I was a little concerned about my wife driving it with, without the sway bar connected. She didn’t say a word. I asked her about it. She, she didn’t notice anything. And I was going to say, did she even notice? And if somebody’s going to notice something, it’s going to be a woman. So just, just saying.

 

Very true. So I do have a question for you. Do you still have a steering stabilizer on yours? I do. Uh, it’s a, it’s got a nice big dent in it. Uh, and, and actually I wouldn’t, uh, I’m going to mention this here in a minute. I can mention it now. Um, I’m supposed to be getting a lot of goodies from steer smarts. Um, and, um, it’s, it’s been a long process. Finally found out the, the other day when Jay gave me a call, uh, the, apparently they’ve got a new part numbers and there’s a different part number for the, uh, uh, steel, um, um, steering box and the aluminum one. Yeah. So that’s what held up the shipment. So he was just double checking to make sure which one I had. Thank God I’ve got the steel one and not the aluminum, uh, steering box. So, uh, anyway, I should have a boatload of crap coming from a steer smarts that I’ll be adding to the, uh, the gladiator. Uh, they’re so great when they say they’re going to send something, they do it. I just got it. I actually got my envelope today with all my new stickers in it for my track bar and everything, so that now my logos look better again. Oh God. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And thanks guys, by the way, I did receive it. So thank you. And I love showing that stuff off. Uh, actually we can show it off here on the, uh, on the backboard as well. Yes. I got, and if they steer smarts in one, I can replace it with this high lift sticker. I can put that where that is. Never. I will say I was looking at steer smarts yesterday real quick. Um, and a friend of mine just got back from a cruise and Alaskan cruise and she, it was a Bigfoot themed Alaskan cruise. That’s a story for another day. Um, but she saw the logo and she was, Oh my God, is that big foot? And I was like, close, it’s a Yeti, but close. So their logo is fantastic. So the, so the women were going on this cruise because only men that were size 12 and bigger shoes were, were on the cruise, right? Right. She was a gaggle of girls. So there you go. All right. So the guys got what I was saying there. All right. So, um, anyway, uh, just so you know, I mean, I’m sure people are wondering about the, uh, the sway bar thing. Uh, I have a 2021 Jeep gladiator with max tow. Uh, this means the axles are just a little bit wider. I think it’s a basically an inch or a half inch on either side. I have a two inch hard lift. Yeah, it does. And, uh, 35 by 12 and a half by 17. I know I just triggered you when I said 12 and a half. You did 12 and a half.

 

Because Natalie had the wrong size tires. They were an inch too small on her new build. So I don’t, and I don’t think I’ve got anything else on there. I mean, I was, I was doing this before up at the skid system on there. And I’m sure the skid system helps too with that low weight. Uh, you know, so I’m sure that helps. But I mean, I mean, I, the sway bar, it’s disconnected and, um, uh, I don’t have any plans of connecting back. I do. And I will say this, I do, uh, notice a slight difference. Uh, it’s a little less, a little less comfortable to drive. If that makes any sense to you at all. For sure. Cause do you feel like you have like the hula girl front? It’s like a smooth, it’s like being on the boat, but it’s not as bad as the XJ for sure. Oh, and you know what? I do remember when I disconnected the sway bar. So I was on a, a gone jeeping run, uh, and, uh, Greg and the gone jeep and people were there too. But, uh, Greg Henderson and Chuck from the, from Jeep talk show, uh, we were on this run and we had to go through a really twisty bit and it was good for, um, I thought it was good for the shorter jeeps, but the gladiator. It was, I mean, I had a wheel up in the air and I was a little concerned about, um, I mean, I got through it fine, but I was a little concerned because it was so twisty. So that was our destination. It was like go through that twisty bit and then another hundred feet. We were where we were. Our destination was to see the, the, the, uh, historic stuff, uh, right there. So before we went back, I disconnected the sway bars.

 

I think it’s smart. And I was able to get through that little twisty bit so much easier. Much better. So do you have a sport? Is your gladiator born a sport? Is a sport sport. Yes.

 

Okay. Yeah. But the tow package gives me the Rubicon axles minus the lockers. Oh, gotcha. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, anyway, it was, uh, it was, like I said, it was a lot easier to get through there, uh, being disconnected. And that’s the whole point is to increase the articulation, uh, on that. So yeah, anyway, um, so it’s been disconnected since, uh, March, the last part of March, 2024. So several months. Um, and, uh, I just don’t, I just don’t see what it is. So, uh, we mentioned before I’m supposed to be getting some steer smart stuff, uh, they’re hooking me up with lots of goodies, uh, for the, uh, the gladiator and, uh, so keep checking back to find out what I think of the steer smarts parts. You have to slow down when you’re saying steer smarts parts.

 

And then what difference it makes, uh, and what my wife thinks of the drive, drivability after the install, Jay specifically said he wants to hear from, uh, from her, what she, what he thinks he goes because people rave. Uh, not when you just piecemeal it. Like if you just do the tie rod and then you, you know, you won’t notice an overall change, he goes when you, when you change all three of the components at the same time, that there’s a significant, uh, increase in, uh, drivability of the gladiator and the, uh, the, the LJ I’m sure the JK as well. Um, Oh, it was my, it’s been my favorite upgrade. Like that was the, after I did the initial build, I mean, I kept that stock in the front forever because why not? And, um, then when it was time, I really did, I will no more death wobble. I mean, everything changed. Um, when I did that upgrade and it was, I mean, it was pretty affordable too. It was, it was a great next step. They aren’t real expensive as far as G parts go and especially as beefy and as thick as those gear smarts parts are. Cause I was, I’ve been eyeballing it. I mean, I’m not, I wasn’t going to buy anything soon, but I’ve been eyeballing it because especially since Henderson, that’s everything that, uh, Henderson works on. He puts that stuff on there. Um, so, uh, yeah, so I just got lucky. Uh, I explained to Jay, I don’t do interviews and stuff to get parts, but damn it, I want the steer smart stuff. So go ahead.

 

So breezy, it’s pretty cool. So I’m, I’m kind of obsessed with that build that they did. So I’m wondering too, if I get all the steer smart stuff, driveability improves significantly, should I just remove the sway bar?

 

No. I would say no, because I don’t know what your warranty situation is as your, as your fake legal over here. I’m going to say no. Uh, I’m just triggering people. No, it’s, it’s, I didn’t know. I asked you about your steering stabilizer because I did not have one, um, before when I was running disconnected for two years, we took it off because it was leaking, um, some friends and I did and not high lift off road. Um, and I never put another one back on. Um, and so I don’t know if that made a difference in feeling that boat motion, that’s a good way to put it, the boat motion. Uh, so I thought that was interesting. And do you, I guess that’s another one. I don’t think the steering stabilizer, yeah. I don’t think the steering stabilizer is going to stop that boat motion feeling. I think all it’s, I think all it’s going to do is dampen the wiggle, the tire wiggles, like if you go through a bump or something and, and man, I can, I mean, uh, I’m a jace to be on the show again. I’ll have to ask him, uh, cause I know you technically do not need a steering stabilizer for your steering. Yeah. I mean, that is not a fix for death wobble. That is absolutely not for death. And it doesn’t create it either. Right. Um, so yeah, so I’m, that’s a whole nother episode. I mean, I’m planning on doing the steering stabilizer. I absolutely, I love the idea of that Falcon with a little knob. Yes. Just simply because they’ve got a knob on it. I mean, they, they could probably sell fake knobs for a hundred dollars and you could put it on a cheaper steering stabilizer, but, but I love the idea of, uh, putting that one on there. So, uh, but I think that I’m not going to have to really worry about that with the steer smart stuff. I think I’ll be able to put that on there and because of the thickness and the quality of the, of the stuff, uh, that I probably won’t need one. I’ll get one eventually, but, uh, yeah. So the one I have on there is, is dented pretty bad from, from being off-road.

 

That’s how mine was.

 

And then I removed it. Yep.

 

From the mind of Nikki G.

 

Get ready to laugh. Hey, this is Nikki G. You guys talked about bottle jacks and I carry a high lift jack and a bottle jack and I got to tell you the bottle jacks kind of useless. That doesn’t really do anything. Um, let me show you what I’m talking about. As I tell you this joke, is it okay to call an angry carrot, a steamed vegetable?

 

When the lawyers were at a court, a lawsuit, which did one toilet, the other toilet, you look kind of flush.

 

You’re going to use that suit suit at the airport, man. Those things never get flushed. All right, boys and girls. I think you guys had enough for one day. I’ll shout at you later and have a good one. Bye.

 

Oh, a lawsuit, a lawsuit. It’s like it was meant for me today. That’s right.

 

Thank you, Nikki G. All right. Well, uh, so, uh, oh, this is yours. The must have stuff. I is. Yeah. So, um, and this episodes of must have stuff for your Jeep guys. Um, we are going to talk about the worn Epic accessory kit and I don’t know if, um, hopefully everyone is following worn. Actually, I want to give a huge shout out to them out in, uh, at trail hero. They are making some Epic videos right now. It’s all about warns world as a play on Wayne’s world. And I think we’re just happy to be living in it right now because they are doing some great stuff. So thank you guys. Keep it coming from out at trail hero. It is fantastic. So one thing we carry at the shop and we can actually ship this to you guys, um, nationwide is their Epic accessory kit or recovery kit. And it already comes fully loaded for you. So if you’re new to off-roading or if you’re a seasoned veteran and you know, you don’t want to think about what you need to get or replace. Um, this bag really does. It does at all. It has everything. It does. Um, and so, you know, things I never thought about I needed when I, I piecemealed my kit together. Um, one thing I’ve been missing is gloves. And every time I’ve had to pull something, I’m like, man, I wish I had some gloves with me. Well, don’t worry. This kit comes with that. Um, along with your tree saver, um, and your straps and also your, um, shackles, um, and a snatch block. So it really does give you everything that you need, including a really epic, um, carrying bag, which is also a backpack. Yeah. I was going to say, it looks like a backpack. The backpack makes it so much easier because when you’re trying to recover someone, is it on flat ground normally or somewhere easy? Heck no. No, it’s always somewhere super hard. We have to like climb around like a mountain goat. So, um, this bag is absolutely incredible. We really, we love them at the shop. All of our jeeps have them. Um, and a lot of our customer jeeps have them too. So, um, we are pretty excited to bring this to you guys. So I will tell you that the original prices bag is a little bit hefty at $623 and 56 cents, but we are able to offer it at 20% off with the Jeep talk show for 498 85. So we’ll about $130 saving. It’s warned. So, you know, it’s a really good and I’ll just mention, of course, you can see this, uh, on the, our YouTube video and our show notes for this episode of the Jeep talk show, Jeep talk show.com, uh, and have a look. But anyway, uh, the cool thing about this backpack is there has a handle, a flexible handle that’s on top of the backpack. So if somebody’s going for that last Coke or last beer, you can smack them with this. You can smack them. This is going to be heavy with all this stuff in it and you just smack them and get the sink, all the money you’ll save and beer. And the bag also is all compartments. So there’s all these different compartments in there. So everything has its own home. So you will never, like if it’s, if you open it up and say your tree saver is missing because it’s missing out of that certain compartment. So it’s kind of, it definitely keeps you organized. That’s definitely a problem for me. I know. Um, and you guys can’t find this at highliftoffroad.com under, um, our recovery section, so, and there is a link as well in the show notes. Um, but I can’t say enough good at things about it. And I know the price tag sounds hefty, but when you piecemeal yourself together, you’re going to go way above that anyway. So, yeah, you definitely need it. So I do recommend it, especially like I know I’m going wheeling this weekend. Matt Moss and I were already talking about what do we need from our last experience for that we didn’t have our own stuff. So here we are. Just tell your spouse it’s on sale. I got to get it. I’m saving money. I’m saving money by getting it. It will cost more if I get it later. So I need it now. Absolutely. The only thing I would like to add, that’s not part of this kit. Um, that’s a favorite for me is a soft shackle. I think everyone should have a soft shackle and warm does make those in factor 55 and we sell those on our website too. So please check them out. Why do you say, uh, the soft shackle? Because I don’t think, I think that the, the D rings work just fine. They’re and they don’t do as much damage when they smack you in the head. The D rings don’t do as much damage. The salt. Well, I guess, I guess the soft shackles. Yeah. But anyway, but I don’t see, I mean, soft shackles are nice and everything. They are, but they are, they have a, you got to keep you guys take care of them. You got to put the lotion on them. Got to put the sunblock on them. So, uh, but why, why do you like the soft shackles? Is it a danger thing? I think that there’s a little bit of danger, the danger aspect, but also I like that I can literally put it anywhere I need it to go. Um, and I like that I can, it attaches to any hook I needed to go. Um, my new crawl tech bumper, there’s different point recovery points on the bumper where I can feed that soft shackle through where, you know, with the hard one, um, I might not be able to do that. So I just, I really liked the durability, not well, besides durability, but just the, it can, it’s a chameleon. You can do so many different things with it. It’s flexible. So it makes it flexible. Thank you. How do I, I could knock off with the word flexible, but I came up with chameleon. So here we are. So are you aware of the Jeep talk show million dollar ideas that I come up with occasionally on our interview episodes for people we’re talking about? So I came up with a million dollar, uh, idea for a guy that was, uh, that’s all he has, all he does is sell the soft shackles. I told him, cause it was right around, um, February and something, uh, oh no cat attack. Um, it was again, you got to watch YouTube to see this stuff.

So it was around February. I think it was a past Valentine’s day. And I said, so next year, what you should do with your soft shackles come out with a, a different take on it, where you put the, what is it like the Boa feathers, the pink boa. Oh yeah. That’d be cool. And you could actually use it as kind of a restraint or for Valentine’s day. It’s not, it’s not what you do. It’s how you sell it. It is how you sell it. That’s right. It’s multifunctional. And guys think of it this way. You get the soft shackle, but the girls thinks it’s for them as well. Time. I’ll talk about recovery points on my bumper. Anyway, thank you. All right.

 

It’s always a little sad when we hit the end of the trail, just like the end of the show, but there’s always another trail ride, just down the road. Jeep talk show has five episodes a week, Monday through Friday. And of course, Natalie is a bar part of that chick chat episode that we have on the, on Monday. Uh, and we really appreciate that. You guys are doing really good by the way. People are really enjoying the chick chat episodes. I mean, I mean, not, not to take away from you and Janet and Wendy, but I think what they’re really enjoying is no Tony on that episode. I think so. We do. We call you out every now and then cause we know you’re listening. You’re in the background. That’s right.

 

I’m creeping and keeping things recording. Yeah. So speaking of subscribing, consider, I don’t think I even mentioned that, but anyway, we’ll go with it. Like I meant to do that. Speaking of subscribing, consider the Jeep subscribing to the Jeep talk show and keeping us on the air via Patreon. Uh, you can just go to Jeep talk show.com slash contact to find out all the ways to contact us and how to subscribe to us on Patreon. Natalie, thank you so much. I went out, I was going to make this, uh, make this announcement earlier and I, we just having such a good time talking. So, uh, Natalie and I think you’re, I think you’re aware of this. Natalie is going to be our regular, uh, for a co-host here on our flagship two episodes. So if you’re enjoying Natalie and her cat adventures, uh, we’re going to have more of those in the future. And if you’re, if you’re wondering about the cowboy and the kilt, uh, that is going to continue to continue as well. That will also be a flagship too. And we may have some other guests hosts on here. It may not just be me, uh, and Natalie and who knows it may just be, uh, to other people, uh, with Natalie and not me. You never know. Cause I don’t mind recording and cruising the internet while you guys do the show.

 

That’s right. Anyway, you guys have a great night, Natalie. Thank you so much for being here. And we look forward to hearing, seeing you here every, every week. Me too. Thank you guys. Broadcasting sense. 2010. Oh, you got the cat up there for due to the wave. Like you wanted to do with the chick shot. It worked out.

 

You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.

 

Two Dallas area nonprofits have partnered together to host the Rubber Duck Regatta and Jeep Festival on Saturday, October 12th at the Harbor in Rockwall, Texas. This family friendly celebration will include several fun Jeep events along with a rubber duck race where a lucky winner will receive a new 2024 Jeep Wrangler.

Mary Walker is here to talk to us about the festival and share with us how we can support these great causes, bring the family out to have some fun and how we can adopt our own ducks for a chance to win.

Mary is the Executive Director of The Grace Clinic which is a nonprofit family medical clinic serving patients in Rockwall County and the surrounding areas. They have partnered with the Boys & Girls Club of Northeast Texas to host the Jeep Festival and Rubber Duck Race. All proceeds raised will go to help children access proper medical care and developmental programs.

Are you ready?

It’s the Jeep Dog Show Chick Chat with Wendy and Avana.

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(…) Well, howdy everybody, this is Wendy and I’m just gonna get right into it. We have an awesome episode of Chick Chat this time. So, Chick Chat’s a place where we celebrate the perfect fusion of style and adventure. Jeeps have long been synonymous with ruggedness, freedom, and the spirit of adventure. And who says women can’t embrace all of that and more? Well, let me tell you, I have a wonderful guest I wanna introduce, Mary Walker. And she’s gonna tell us all about the Rubber Duck Regatta and Jeep Festival in Rockwell, Texas. Coming up guys, you don’t wanna miss this, October 12th. Welcome, Mary.

(…) Thank you, I’m so grateful to be here, I appreciate it.

Yeah, so we wanna learn all about this wonderful Jeep event. So tell us a little bit about it. I know that there’s some ducks involved and some Jeeps maybe, so give us some clue, we’re really super excited.

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Yes, so the Rubber Duck Regatta and Jeep Festival is held at the harbor in Rockwell on Saturday, October 12th. And it is a fundraiser for two nonprofits in the area. One is the Boys and Girls Club of Northeast Texas and the other is Grace Clinic. And they- And there’s both about those. Yeah, so both of these nonprofits help families in the community with both healthcare and educational type programs. And it’s a great way, this is our fundraiser that allows us to raise funds to continue that mission of both of these nonprofits. So it’s a really great fundraiser.(…) And we initially, it began in 2012, and it was just a rubber duck race, a rubber duck regatta. Yeah. And in 2022, we made the decision to take Jeeps and pair it with the rubber ducks, which seemed to be a really popular thing. Absolutely. And so we said, well, why don’t we go ahead and make our rubber duck regatta also a Jeep Festival.(…) And the giveaway back years ago was like a trip to Disney or something like that. And in 2022, we switched it and now it is a Jeep Wrangler.

No, wait a minute. You’re saying you can actually win the Jeep Wrangler? You can- Just for entering the duck race?

Just for entering the duck race. You can win the Jeep Wrangler, a 2024 four-door Jeep Wrangler.

And it’s beautiful.

That’s beautiful.

Now, do the people who are participating have to be there? I mean, could somebody listening from like myself from California be able to buy a duck or two and put it in the race and still win if I’m not there?

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Absolutely. So anyone is eligible in the United States to win.(…) And all you need to do is find your way to Texas and you can pick up your Jeep.

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I love it. That seems like a great deal, honestly. Yes. In fact, in 2022, when we rolled out this first concept with pairing with the Jeep Festival piece of it, one of the Jeep Talk Show listeners that lived in Midland was actually the winner. I remember that. Yeah. He flew in and we picked him up at Love Field and we drove him straight to the dealership and he drove home in his Jeep.

I mean, can you just imagine that story when you tell your kids how you got this Jeep? Hey, I bought this rubber duck. Maybe he bought 10. I don’t know. Maybe he bought one. You could buy as many as you want, right? There’s no limit.(…) There’s no limit. And then he wins. So, rubber ducks would definitely be on his dash all the way across, right?

Yes. He actually sent, I talked to him this week and he said he wanted to send a video just kind of telling us everything about his Jeep that he still has. And he said, it’s very dirty right now. And I said, well, that’s good. It’s supposed to be dirty.

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You’re living it.

Oh my God.(…) So tell me, because I’m really curious, so how does this race actually work? It’s the day of the event.

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You’ve got, I don’t know how many ducks do you have? Do you still have room for people to buy ducks?

Oh yes. So it depends. Every year we have a duck is $10 to enter the race. That’s it? To win a Jeep $10? Yes. In fact, the gentleman who won last year only bought one duck. And that one takes. It only takes one duck. It only takes one.

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So the way that we work is the festival begins at 10 a.m. And it’s a full day of fun. We have two stages. We have live music. We have food trucks. We have this huge kid zone with all types of games and inflatables. And then we have a Jeep zone. And in the Jeep zone, we have obstacles. We have a show and shine. We have an RTI ramp. And we have vendors.(…) And it’s tons of fun. It’s a lot of fun. And then right around 4.30 or 4.45, we make an announcement to start working your way over to the race location, which in Rockwall, where this festival is held, is on the banks of Lake Ray Hubbard in what’s called the Harbor District. And there’s a big movie theater. And in front of that movie theater are these huge fountains. And there are multiple levels that go all the way down to the lake itself.(…) And so at the top of the fountains, we dump the thousands of ducks that people have purchased.

And then just, you know, just the logistics of getting all those ducks. It is interesting. I’d like to see that part. Like how many truckloads do you need to bring to dump these ducks in there?

We rent large trucks.

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Well, and it depends.

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You know, some people, we did this thing on our Facebook page where we said, can you guess how many, you know, what did you check,(…) basically? And one person had guessed over 300,000. And we said, well, we wish because that would be raising quite a bit of money for our organizations. But I will tell you this. In 2022, it was right under 10,000 ducks.(…) And then in 2023, it was actually even a little bit less than that. Wait, that’s not right. Come on now. So the chance is pretty

good for $10. So you’re saying that you don’t have that whole capacity filled with, there’s probably no capacity, right? As many ducks. Now, I also saw that you don’t have to be an individual. You could be a corporation or a company or a business. And you could sponsor probably multiple ducks. And then they could take that Jeep and do something within their own company and raffle it off or donate it back to you guys for next year. That’d be kind of cool too. Not really. That’s the option. And I don’t think so. If you win a Jeep, I think you’re keeping it. At least I think I probably would. Yes. As much as I’d want to donate and help a charity event. Yeah, maybe I’m going to keep the Jeep.

Just keep the Jeep. It’s okay. Just keep the Jeep and then send us lots of pictures because they help.

So once you load them into that top, I’m assuming like a pool, some sort of an area.

The huge fountain. Okay. A really big fountain. And then it pours into another fountain, which then pours into another fountain. And then it just goes all the way down. And then we create this tubing type of finish line. And so they all kind of start working their way into like a triangle, you know, a triangular shape to get into this tube. And then the first one out wins the new Jeep. And then we also have a second prize. Second place gets $1,000.

Wow.

A Visa card, $1,000 Visa card. And then our third place gets a $500 Visa card.

That is amazing. So I’m also curious, how do you, so if I buy a duck,(…) how do you put my name on it? Or how do you know it’s my duck? Am I giving a number? Am I giving a code? How does that work exactly?

Yes. So all ducks have a number on the bottom of them. And your number is not assigned until right before the event, because we don’t want to throw one through 100 in first. And then, you know, so we do, we close off the duck sales.

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And then we do a randomizer and we randomly assign the numbers to all of the purchasers. And then at that point, we take the ducks that are up till that number. Because we have 25,000 that are sitting there waiting to go in, but we never know until the very end. How many do we have?

Well, I think we need to push for that. This would be awesome for 2024. I don’t care what’s going on in the world right now. It’s $10 people. We’re going for 25,000. So spread the word, let everybody know. You got to participate. I mean, no one would win a Jeep for crying out loud.

Yeah.

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And so we have you, you would end up being assigned a number that coincides with the number on the bottom of that duck. And so once the, once the ducks go through the finish line, we grab them and it’s all videoed. Uh, we’re, we’re streaming live. So even if you are in California, you’ll be able to participate as if you were here with us. And, and we’ll see who the, who the winner is in live, live on streaming.

Yeah. Well, that’s gotta be super exciting to be there in person. If you happen to win too. I mean, can you imagine the screams? I would be yelling so loud that everybody would know that I want it. So I had this vision when I, when I kind of looked at this, your website and kind of saw what you guys were doing and all the different events, which are fabulous. I’ll talk about that in a moment, but I was kind of a visual like, how do you make the ducks move with somebody back there blowing on them to move them? Are you guys splashing water on them to move them? Or is it like you said, a fountain and then the water’s just sort of making it happen?

Yes. So the fountains features themselves push that water. They propel that water over each level. And so the ducks just go for a ride.

Yeah. They’re just hanging there.

They’re just hanging there. And we call it a race, but that’s being friendly to the duck.

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I mean, they’re not racing. They are floating for sure.

(…) They’re just kind of hanging out. Hey, let’s go for a little, oh, look, I’m going on another level. This is so much fun.

Yeah, they kind of tumble, tumble, tumble and, and, and it’s fun to watch because you know, it’s, it’s, it’s lots of fun to see thousands of ducks go tumbling over the different levels of

the fountain. I bet. So how many levels are there?(…) I want to say there’s four.

Okay.

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If I’m, I believe, yes, there’s four. That we use one more at the very bottom, but that goes into the lake and so we don’t, we cut it off.

Yeah. And then you collect all the ducks and all the paraphernalia and make sure that the water is clean and all that so people can rest assure.(…) And then are you, you’re reusing those ducks then I guess, right? If you have them already numbered. So that’s kind of cool.

Every year we, we clean up and we leave it better than we found it. And you repurpose. I love it. Yes. And we dry them out for a couple of days and then we put them back in storage for the next year.

That’s amazing. So this is on October 12th. You do you need to pay to come to see this? It’s a free event. Free event. They come and check out the Jeeps. Come and it sounds like you have a, is an obstacle course where they can drive their own Jeep on. Yes.

Or is it okay?(…) So we have, we have three different obstacles that they can try. And so they aren’t really all part of a course. So you aren’t, if you get on and you don’t want to try one, you don’t have to. You can just drive past it.(…) But it’s, it’s three small different, you know, just it should be what we’ve been told is that any Jeep can do it if they’re, if they’re comfortable with doing it. And so yes, we have that and the show and shine are all in one big parking lot that we call our Jeep zone. And then the edges of it are covered in Jeeps that are stacked on top of each other and

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the live music and vendors and, and food trucks. It’s lots of fun.

Well, that’s amazing. It sounds like a really good event and family oriented because I noticed too, on your site, you had things for the kids to do. So tell us a little bit about what you can do if you’re bringing kids to this event.

(…) So because it’s close to Halloween, we have incorporated some fun new things this year.

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Those part of our part of our show and shine, one of our categories categories is called booty fall. And so it’s an opportunity for the Jeepers to decorate their vehicles in the Halloween styles. And so the kids love that because I

can only imagine how crazy some of these Jeepers are going to be.

These Jeep owners are creative. We are. We definitely are. Oh my gosh. It is so impressive to watch and see, you know, these huge, just, I mean, there’s liquid smoke. There’s really 50 foot skeletons. There’s just, it’s so great. It’s insane.(…) So we have that, but we also have a trunk or treat. So those that are participating will also be given candy so that they can give that out to the kids that are coming around. And then we also have the live music and the kids tend to like to dance and play and have all of that. But then the best part is what we call our kids zone. And in our kids zone, we have huge inflatables. We have lots of games, things they can compete. We have a mechanical bull.

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We have a face.

Find me up right there. I’m ready.

We have a face painter. And then we also have many Jeep races.

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So we have five mini Jeeps and children with a helmet are allowed to kind of race around a track that we have created. So it just gives kids of all ages something really fun to do.

That sounds exciting. I think you need to make that for adults next time.

I insist on the mechanical bull because I said people like that.

That’s a lot of fun. But I could just imagine getting in a little sort of mini Jeep and going at it like little go carts kind of a deal. I don’t know. You could maybe start another section called the adult that wants to be a kid zone. Yes. Yeah. So fun. So now you’ve been doing this since you said when you guys started 2012, you said.

So the boys and girls clubs of Northeast Texas, this they began this event in 2012. Okay. And then we partnered with them in 2022 and incorporated the Jeep event at that point. So when I say we I’m the executive director of Grace Clinic. Okay.(…) When we partnered in 2022, we just added to an event that they were already doing for the last several years. It was their 10 year and we added the Jeep festival. So it was it was quite a party.

Yeah, but that’s quite an undertaking too. When you merge two organizations, plus you’re already doing an event. I mean, I’ve been involved in some different types of events and it’s a lot of work. So I applaud you. You must have a great team and you know, people that help you. And I’m sure you have, which is typical of any corporation in any kind of a setting of somebody wants something one way and someone else wants it the other. And then you got to come to the middle. It turns out to be an awesome event. But that like you said, the stress level of getting into it and you’re coming down to the wire here. You’ve only got a couple of weeks before this event. So it’s a minute. Get it going.

So it is where we’re game time now. And we’ve been blessed to work with each other. We get along fantastic. It’s just been it’s bringing two different skill sets as far as our team, the Grace Clinic team and then their team. And so it just works really well. And we kind of all have we kind of are a well oiled machine at this point. Yeah. But I will tell you this, we could not do this without the volunteers. So we have people that are in the Jeep groups that volunteer with us and they run different parts of the event itself. And so we just we wouldn’t be where we are without without the amazing Jeep groups and the other organizations that are in our town that help out.

So I can I can kind of understand that I belong to a smaller, much smaller four by four club out here in Big Bear. And we did an event to try to raise funds because we donate obviously like you guys do not on that same scale, but we still did. And it was all hands on deck. And it was you just need all the people that are in the club. And then you realize, wow, we need like a bigger amount of people for this club because you need people in all different spots. And when you’re doing a run, we did like a poker run. So you had to go to different locations stuff. So yes.

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Anyway, it was it was amazing because you saw how the volunteers come together. You saw how everybody works together for that common goal. So I love hearing that people are helping you. And obviously, was the Jeep donated by dealership or something?

(…) No. Oh, that’s our goal. So if anyone knows anybody, that’s our goal. But at this point, our our title sponsor is Rockwall Dodge.(…) And they have given us a fantastic deal on our Jeep. And they’ve also they’re also a sponsor. They’re our title sponsor of this event. And then our Jeep this year is a little different than it’s been in years past. OK.(…) We have one of our other sponsors is Platinum Offroad.

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And it is run by Mike Etherington. And he has partnered with TerraFlex and Nitto tires and Falcon Shocks and Rockwall Dodge. And they have modified this Jeep. And here we go. She began pretty and now she’s even prettier. Yeah.

Now she’s got some possibilities. And yes, I think she can do off road.

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She has 35 inch wheels and tires now.(…) And then she lifted. She has Falcon Shocks. I call her a she.

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That’s OK. You can do that.

(…)

So this Jeep is beautiful. And it’s a it’s a four door and the color is granite crystal. And it’s got pretty gray. Mm hmm. Black interior.(…) And now it’s lifted with a nice suspension and shocks. Can you tell I don’t really know a lot. You know what?

Because we want to send people to your site. Do you have a website or do you have a place where they can go to first off to buy ducks? I’m going to encourage everybody listening at least by one duck. You got nothing to lose. It’s ten dollars people. Come on. Yes.

Where do they need to go?

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Go to Rockwall Duck Race dot org.

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Rockwall is the town that we are in, which is the east of Dallas. So Rockwall Duck Race dot org. And you can adopt your ducks there. And we actually created a discount code for Chick Chat.

Yeah. I love that. We love discount codes. OK. All right, people. Listen up. Here you go.

So you can get 10 percent off of any number of ducks. So we have we have Quack Pack, which would be a five pack or an anniversary pack, which would be a 10 pack. And you can get 10 percent off of all duck purchases by putting in the promo code J.T.S. as in Jeep Talk Show. J.T.S.(…) Chick Chat. So that’s J.T.S. Chick. C-H-I-C and chat. C-H-A-T.

J.T.S. Chick Chat. Well, that’s such a great offer that you’ve done for us. So all of our listeners, we need to do it. I mean, let’s be supportive. We’re going to support both of these organizations. Let’s show them our support from the Jeep Talk Show. I love this. I can’t wait. Gosh, I wish I live closer. I would love to come watch this because now I’m so excited how those ducks make it all the way down. That’s just so interesting to me.

So it’s great. It’s a lot of fun. And the edges of the fountain become quite full. That are there. And then our Facebook and Instagram page becomes quite full of people that are ready for the streaming of what we’re doing. And so it’s a fun day. And the weather is beautiful.

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And it’s, knock on wood, the weather will be beautiful.

I was like, wow, you can predict that right now? I am all going. I mean, come on.

I put it out there.

Well, it’s cooler in Texas by October, isn’t it? Yeah, you don’t have the humidity either, right?

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Right. And Dallas, it will be a really, I mean, last year, if we were to base it on last year, it was October 14th last year and it was a perfect, perfect Saturday. So this year is October 12th and I’m putting it out there. It will be a perfect, perfect Saturday.

I think it’s going to be and we’re going to send that images. So let’s talk a little bit about what you do for fun when you’re not involved in this race. Do you have a Jeep yourself? Do you off-road a little bit? I know.

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I wish that I did. I really, really do. In fact, I’ve got a 14 year old who we’re in the conversations now about his first car. Yeah. And I thought, I would really like to get him a Jeep. Yeah. And then I thought, or I could just give him my car and I get the Jeep.

I like that idea better.

I did too. I did too. So, but at this point I do not, but I am in all of the Jeep clubs and I know lots and lots of Jeepers and it’s just such an amazing group of, of just giving and kindhearted people. Yeah.

It’s amazing what the community does. I mean, from helping people to these kinds of organizations, like you said, you have people coming from all over to help you.(…) Do you get to go on any of the Jeep runs with these clubs that you belong to? Have you been in someone else’s Jeep and rode some of those trails?

I have been in other people’s Jeeps, but I have not been on any of the trails at this point.

Well, I think it’s time to up your game. I think you need to connect with somebody and say, I was told by this other girl from California who said, Hey, I need to go out on a trail run. I think I need to go on a trail and go experience it because once you do, I think that’ll make your decision that your son’s getting your old car and you’re going to get the new Jeep.

I think you’re right. I think you are right. And I’m not opposed to it. I’m very willing to do it. It’s unfortunately right here in our area. You have to drive at least about an hour and a half to get to anywhere that has some substantial. But that’s

pretty typical, believe it or not. Yeah. Most people even here in Southern California, I mean, we’ve got some great, great trails that we wheel to. I happen to live about five minutes from Gold Mountain, which always gets Tony because he loves that area.(…) Yeah. But most people are driving a good hour, hour and a half to get up to our trails. OK. And if we want to get off the mountain and go to the desert or some other trails, it’s a good hour, hour and a half. So I don’t think that can be an excuse anymore, Mary. I’m sorry. I’m just going to let you have an excuse.(…) That’s fair. That’s fair. I know. I just you pack a lunch. If you listen to the Jeep talk show, I do whole segments and newbie nuggets on when you’re brand new and what to take. So you’ll be prepared. So you can check that out. But for the most part, you’re just going to go and have fun. And if someone else is wheeling, you’re going to get out and watch them do so. And you’re talking major obstacles. You’re just talking about getting on and seeing some beautiful scenery.(…) You have a chance to go through water sometimes. You can trees. Maybe there’s mud in that area. I’m not sure. But you’re just going to have an opportunity to do and see things that you can’t see from the regular car. If that kind of makes sense.

I love it. I love it. I would love to try it. I’ll if anybody, anybody in this listening area is willing to let me ride along. I’m happy to well,

be careful what you ask for because it’ll happen. I know it will. And then I’m going to say, I’m sorry. I know I pushed you to try and you’re going to be like, I want my own Jeep now. I have to buy my own Jeep. Exactly. Well, especially if you bring your son along, he’s going to go, Mom, what are you waiting for? He will think about it, too. You know, you have the opportunity to go anywhere for the most part in those vehicles. Why not? Check it out. Why not? Very cool. So what else do you do for fun other than organizing this this event?

Oh, gosh. Well, I have three kids.(…) So I’m busy. Yes, I have identical twin girls that are nine. I like my kids. Yes. And then I have my 14 year old son. OK. And I play tennis whenever I can.

Good.

And, you know, I’m trying to talk my husband into joining me in a pickleball league.

So it’s fun and it’s very active, by the way.

It is.(…) I typically play tennis mostly, but I thought it would be a good way for he and I to kind of bridge the gap in the skill sets from from tennis to pickleball.

So it’s either that or you’re going to really love each other or not. What?

Right.

(…)

Right.

But I go either way with sports. You know how that goes.

It definitely can.

It’s especially if you’re beating him, it could go a whole other way.

It in the past, it has.(…) So I think your pickleball would be an easier option for us. Cool. But that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s good. And then we do a lot. I work a lot with the with Grace Clinic and we do this event and we do a couple of other events. And so it’s a it’s a very fulfilling, fulfilling role for me. And so I tend to spend more time here than I probably should.

Well, if somebody wanted to get involved, the Grace Clinic, how would they reach out to you for that?

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They can visit our website at RockwallGraceClinic.org or they can go on our Facebook page or reach out to me directly, which I can provide all of my direct information

(…)

now or or later.(…) You let me know.

Very cool.

(…)

I love that. I just think it’s really nice that you guys are putting on this event. I’m recommending everybody that’s listening to please participate. Even if you live as far as I do in California, I can still buy a duck. And it sounds like I might have a really good chance this year.

So yes, yes, we have

(…)

this year, our duck sales are trending a bit lower,(…) you know, and that just tends to happen in an election year. And, you know, in the economy, I don’t you know, it’s a it’s a challenging time. And we understand that completely. And so things are trending a little lower this year. And so if you are interested, you have a very good chance. You have a very good chance.

I was just going to say, so you’re going to say we have a chance.

Yes, you do. I love your odds are great. Your odds are great at this point. And and with your discount code, you can get 10 bucks for 90 bucks. I love that. Yeah. And and it’s, you know, that’s 10 chances that you’ll have to get the brand new Jeep. I like it.

So is there anything else you want to say about your event?

(…) I forgot you mentioned a poker run and I forgot we have a poker run as well at the event. And so we we have vendors and sponsors. And so the event is in this big area. OK. We thought, OK, how about we do a poker run that is, you know, confined to the event itself and access the cards that you need for your hand, you just visit with other vendors that are on that.

And your vendors must have loved it too, because that’s what they want. They’re spending money to be there. Yeah. I want you to come by and check out their products. I like that idea.

That’s a great idea.

So we’ve got and we have prizes for all of the things that we do, the five categories of the show and shine, the biggest flex on the RTI ramp. Then we have, you know, the prize for the poker run. And so it’s it’s not just a Jeep that we’re giving away. We’re giving away hundreds and hundreds of dollars in prizes for people participating in the fun. So we’ve got some great vendors and some great sponsors out there. So it’s really if you’re in the, you know, the well, if you’re anywhere in Texas, it’s you know, what I’ve learned a lot about the Jeep Group is that they don’t mind driving. They will drive anywhere.

(…)

So we’ve got hotel discounts that are set up and we have it’s just tons of fun. And Saturday, October 12th, come and see us. Then why

don’t you give us the the link again so they can check that out.

OK, so to get to our website, you can go to rockwallduckrace.org and then you’ll adopt your deck there and be sure to put your promo code J.T.S. Chick Chat and you will get 10 percent off of your deck purchases. And you might be driving home in that 20 24 Jeep Wrangler.

That would be awesome. So well, thank you so much for coming on. I love having you. We love hearing about this event. We always want to promote any time we can do that to benefit other organizations. So thank you so much. Thank you. And you guys, thanks for this episode of Chick Chat. I hope you guys have been inspired. Please reach out.(…) Get a duck for ten dollars. You might win a Jeep. I mean, you can’t lose, right? And not you’re benefiting other people. So remember, there’s no limits to what you can achieve when you embrace your passion and fearlessly chase those dreams. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to the Jeep Talk Show so you’ll never miss an episode. Remember to embrace the thrill of the off road, embody your own unique style and always keep pushing the boundaries of what you thought possible because anything is possible.

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You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.

In this Jeep Talk Show flagship episode, hosts Tony, Natalie, and Janet dive into the fun and unique world of “Jeep thangs!” Discover what makes the Jeep community so special, and learn about the infamous death wobble—what it is and how to handle it. Don’t miss this exciting episode packed with Jeep insights, laughs, and much more! Tune in to stay connected with everything Jeep.

 

I get so oily, I’ve actually kind of gotten out of it, but in the past I would have to wash my hair every day because it would just get so damn oily. Of course I don’t get as sweaty as I used to being in the house all the time. So not going outside, I recommend. Fat boys don’t go outside, it’s hot out there.

 

Well I’m on day five of no wash, but can you tell? Can you see it? No, I can’t tell at all.

Jana, that’s a very good episode. We’re gonna talk about dry shampoo.

Yeah we are.

And the brands that work so well. You know I’m surrounded by women here at the Studio A with my two daughters and my wife, and I found out about this dry shampoo thing and I was really surprised. I’ve not tried it and I don’t paint my nails. So there’s a reason for that.

It’s a time saver for sure.

 

Can you tell, and people are going, it’s a Jeep show. Can you tell, does it feel better whenever you put the dry shampoo on it or is it still nasty?

 

No, I mean it’s so kind of nasty, but at least it doesn’t look greasy.

So the feel doesn’t change.

Right, it’s the look. So before I sprayed it on, the grease was like down to here, but you can’t tell, I mean it looks pretty good.

I’m just saying such a turn. I know.

 

Let’s move on. Two women and a guy, we gotta talk about women stuff.

 

And I’m curious about everything.

In Studio B you’re surrounded by women too, Tony, because we’re on each side of you right now. So here we are.

Well you know I have two boys.

Your regular Barbies are here.

I have two boys, but they’re older and they don’t live here. They’re a real pain in the ass. Girls are a lot easier to deal with.

 

(Laughing)

 

I have one of each, I don’t know. The Jerry’s still out on that one.

 

All right, so in our news stories, it’s a Jeep thing. What does it mean?

 

Did you guys find out about this stuff when you first got into Jeeps? Natalie, did you know about the Jeep thing when you got your, what was it, 2001 TJ?

2000 Canary Yellow.

Yep.

 

You know I didn’t, but the first time I took it out by myself, we lived on a lane. So the long lane, I’m going down and I get on the main road and here comes the Jeep at me and they’re waving and I’m like, okay.

Oh no, I’ve got a flash.

I keep driving and I was like, all right. And I remember I had on, oh my gosh, Natasha Beddingfield Unwritten. That was the first thing I listened to. Am I Jeep, yes. After I turned 16 and, wow, I sound like Major Wrangler Barbie right now, but I kept getting all these waves. I’m like, why are people waving at me? And then I finally found out it’s a Jeep thing and you’re supposed to wave. So now I’m like, holy cow, I have the best family in the world.

 

So how about you, Janet, whenever you first got into a Jeep or repossessed your husband’s Jeep, ex-husband’s Jeep. Ex-husband’s Jeep. Yeah, I had to correct that, I know.

 

I’m been divorced too and I want everybody to know that I’m no longer with her. So did you hear the Jeep thing and was it confusing to you? It was like,

 

yeah, she, both guys have heard the, I think I have the Jeep thing because it burns when I pee.

 

You haven’t heard that one. You haven’t heard that one. That’s a good one.

No, I’m not having it.

(Laughing)

I love the reaction on these things that you guys don’t know about because you lead sheltered lives.

We do. Well, I mean, maybe people need to wash better.

(Laughing)

 

Maybe that dry shampoo, okay.

Yes, and wipes on the trail. Maybe we need to talk about that.

 

Yeah, when I first got the Jeep, they told me about the Jeep wave. So that was the first thing. No, I get so excited. Oh, they waved at me. And then I would get so mad when somebody didn’t wave back. Then it was the ducks, right? Cause COVID happened right after that. And now it’s like when you go to these Jeep meets and talking about, oh, what upgrades do you have and where have you been? So yeah, it’s definitely a learning curve when you get on these Jeep forums and the Facebook pages and what to say and what’s gonna trigger some people about what you talk about. Angry grills trigger people severely.

 

Oh my gosh, Mr. Carnage, he’s all about smashing them in his videos. So yeah, it’s a trigger for sure.

Yeah, it’s all good. Do you guys sell angry grills at Tylift off-road, Natalie?

We do. Oh my God. We do. The grumpers, the grumpers. I like that.

(Mumbles)

 

How about eyelashes? You sell the eyelashes for the headlights?

No eyelashes.

How about the lens cover or the headlight covers to have the eyes on them? Oh yeah, the snake eyes.

 

But you know, I don’t really see them leave the shop. They have some dust on them in the showroom. So I think we’re safe in the Cincinnati region.

Well, you know, we have a lot of new listeners every episode. And that’s one of the reasons why I was bringing up this Jeep thing, because it’s like, Jeep thing, I haven’t heard of that. What is that? I’m curious. And it’s a way of,

 

it’s a way of getting around answering questions, I think. So I don’t know, did you guys ever listen to, I don’t wanna bring for it on the name, black comedian that’s since left us, really, really good black comedian. And he,

 

in one of his comedy routines, he was married to a white woman and she was questioning him about some of his activities and things that he did. And he used the excuse that he was a black man. You don’t understand, I’m a black guy. This is a black thing.

 

And I thought that was so funny. He simply didn’t want to explain, he didn’t wanna be held accountable for what he was doing. So he used that as an excuse. Well, Jeepers will use the Jeep thing as an excuse. For example, and anybody just raise your hand here if you don’t know about these. So rollovers, that’s a Jeep thing.

 

The CJ. The Jeep thing.

I haven’t done it yet.

Yeah, the CJ when it came out, there was a lot of issues. And I think one of the, I don’t know, one of the people that watch card, self-appointed watch card of the citizens,

 

followed a lawsuit or made a big stink about it. And they were, and Jeep was having really hard time with selling the CJ because it was a little narrow and it had some issues as far as rolling over. Not a lot, but somebody could say to you, if you had a CJ, but aren’t you afraid that’s gonna roll over on you? Nah, that’s a Jeep thing. It’s just something you deal with. I mean, it’s– It’s just you deal with it. Yeah, I like saying it’s part of being in one of the cool kids. It’s a price that you have to pay, not with your life, because it’s probably not gonna roll over. But that was one of those things you could say it was just a Jeep thing.

 

Gas mileage.

 

I’m battling that right now, because I’ve been driving a Jeep every day and not my spark and I’m filling up every other day. But it’s a Jeep thing.

Yeah, I mean Corvettes, I’m sure they use a lot of fuel, especially if you drive it with fun. The old Vipers.

 

Oh yeah.

It goes with what you consider important in your life. And it may not be your primary vehicle, maybe you have a saver, a gas saver. I know Natalie, I know you do. And I would be, I just, I love being in the Jeep. I love being up high where I can see around, especially in traffic, see what the hell is going on, instead of reading the back bumper, the license plate of the vehicle in front of me, every 2.5 seconds. And I just, it’s just more fun. So having to spend a little bit more money on gas is worth it to me.

 

Same, I agree. And if somebody asks like, well, what’s the MPGs on the Jeep? That’s not why you’re buying it. You’re gonna be sad if you look, just change that display on the dash. You don’t have to worry about it. But the fun thing is you can watch that.

 

Move if you look close enough.

Oh you can, that’s scary, isn’t it? Natalie, yours is really gonna do that now with all the modifications that have been made.

I know, I’ve been driving the JL equivalent this week, little twin, so she’s on 38s and so very similar build. And I’m like, oh, this is what it’s gonna be like. Okay.

I hope you told Bailey you need a company gas card if you’re gonna be driving that.

I used it a couple of times, he knows. He knows.

 

(Laughing)

So I’m like a moving billboard for you going from the street.

That’s right, exactly. It’s advertising, you’re paying for advertising.

 

So here’s one, I don’t know that everybody’s experienced this. I’ve never experienced it in my, any of the Jeeps I’ve owned. My wife experienced it in her TJ shortly after we got it. Probably I’m gonna say within a year after we got it, we got it used and it’s a death wobble.

Oh boy.

 

I’ve had it. Me too. Isn’t it fun?

(Laughing)

It’s so fun.

(Laughing)

I’m gonna die.

Because you survived.

 

Yes. Yes.

I’m a death wobble survivor.

Oh yeah, we need to get a little pin or something with a wobbly tire or something.

Yes.

I’m a death wobble survivor.

Yes. I just always wondered like, what did I look like to people on the road when it was happening? Like, could they see the death wobble? Could they see me moving around?

Oh my God, those tears just go in the nuts.

 

Yeah, well, I mean,

 

fortunately they didn’t see you have to pry the cushion off your butt once you got home.

 

(Laughing)

You feel like yelling out the window, just let me slow down, it’ll be okay. Just let me slow down.

So it’s a harmonic vibration. And I’m sorry, there’s some people out there that don’t know what death wobble is. Basically your front tires. They will. Go back and forth very rapidly. So from like from side to side, very rapidly. And it’s a harmonic vibration that gets built up, usually because of worn steering parts in the front end. And the cool thing about it is, is that it’ll happen around the same speed. That vibration, whatever it is, it has a certain speed. So 40 miles an hour, 30 miles an hour, whatever it is. And it doesn’t happen all the time. And quite often it’ll happen, like if you hit a bump or something.

I was gonna say the bump. Yeah. The good old railroad tracks, for me it was the railroad tracks.

Yeah, it does.

The bump, the 155.

It gets that vibration started and it amplifies as it goes on further. So did you guys know that you can speed up and it will stop the vibration?

 

No, that, no. Not when that’s happening.

I just wanna stop. Yeah, I just wanna be like pull over.

Nobody wants to, nobody’s brave enough to try it.

Never thought in my mind, like you need to go faster when this is happening. No.

No, of course, no. It’s counterintuitive. But yes, I mean, you’re changing the harmonics. So you can do it by going faster or slower. And of course the slower is the one everybody wants to do very quickly. So I had it in my 1983 Chevrolet Silverado, short wheelbase 37s. And I mean, I was in my twenties and I didn’t know, have any idea that such a thing existed. There was no internet.

 

So it was just one of those things that happened. I never did anything to fix it. But mine was all pretty new front end. But who knows? It may have been not very good front end parts. I’ve learned a lot about off-road vehicles since then.

 

Well, and it happens to people that have trucks too. So it’s not just a Jeep thing, but it’s not a matter of, if it’s a matter of what.

Yeah, any vehicle with a front axle can get depth wobble. Yeah, no kidding. So for example, the Bronco is IFS, which is not a solid front axle up front. It uses something that’s getting more common in the market.

 

And it breaks really easy because it’s not as strong as a solid axle up front. But that is one of the downsides to having the solid axle is the depth wobble. And like I said, I have not experienced it in my XJ or in the Gladiator. One of the reasons why I think I’d never had a problem with it in the XJ was I upgraded my front end parts multiple times. So through these upgrades–

You never got it to that point.

It never got worn enough where it was gonna cause an issue. So yeah, it’s easily fixed. It doesn’t cost that much money if you can do your own work. And if you can’t do your own work, it probably doesn’t still do, it doesn’t cost that much money, probably around $1,000 or something. But it’s not anything I’d wanna spend $1,000 for because it really is pretty simple.

 

So I got a list here. Do you guys, anything come to mind about the Jeep thing where you just say, oh, that’s just part of owning the Jeep?

I mean, Janet, when we did our first chit chat, our chick chats, say that sometimes fast. I know we were talking about like the normal things about Jeeps and that, I was talking about my ball joints pointing out and it goes in my ball joints because it was just squeaking and I just kept saying, it’s a Jeep thing. It just, it’s supposed to squeak. So, you know, that’s something I was always like, it’s not just a Jeep thing.

It’s not. So like the crackles and the rattles and the whining is not normal.

It’s not normal.

People may tell you it is. Yeah, it’s a Jeep thing. It’s a Jeep thing. It’s just like, oh, there’s a new squeak or there’s a new, something needs to be tightened or something needs to be adjusted somewhere, but yeah.

I also think parking, like parking on a curb or as a big snow plow mound, like in the parking lots in the winter, every time it’s a Jeep thing.

Yeah, if there’s a rock, I’m gonna flex on it.

All right, so winches.

 

You see a lot of Jeeps with winches.

 

Do you guys have winches on your Jeep?

I do. Yes, sir.

How many times have you used it?

 

Oh gosh. Three.

 

Oh, that’s good. Three cents.

Off road.

But mine’s new. Yeah, off road recovery.

 

I bought a winch for the XJ. That was the first winch I ever got, put it on the XJ. And I’ve had no reason to use it except to pull out a old rose bush for my wife.

 

(Laughing)

There we go. Hey, it’s a lot easier than trying to dig it out, that’s for sure.

Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It pulled out really good. It didn’t even drag the XJ forward.

 

Oh gosh, perfect. I have used it since then, but I was like, hey, I got a winch, I wanna try out type situations. So it wasn’t like it was actual absolute need for it, but it’s like any tool that you have. It’s better to have the tool and not need it than to need it and not have it.

Absolutely. I’ve used mine over five times. So, I was doing trails I shouldn’t have been doing in my old setup.

Oh good, so you used it for self recovery.

I did, yeah, yeah. That’s how I was able to do trail 16 in Windrock actually, because I had to winch myself out.

So, and for the new listeners, the people that are new to Jeeps and stuff, the winch is very handy, great thing to have, but are potentially very dangerous.

Yes. Very.

Like removal of fingers, dangerous.

Or head, or if the winch, if it loses its traction, its grip comes apart, yeah. You have to be very careful. There’s a lot of safety precautions to take when you’re using it.

So, it’s absolutely very easy to get a winch, and winches are pretty cheap these days.

 

And it’s really easy to install one. Maybe the electrical isn’t as easy, but just bolt it onto your winch bumper. And yes, you need a bumper that’s specifically designed for that, or a plate, depending on the bumper.

 

Like the Jeep steel bumpers. I don’t know that they come with winch plates, but you can get a winch plate for it. And by the way, the Jeep front steel bumpers are very nice. I was very surprised how nice they are. I mean, Jeep really built a very nice thing there. So, but yeah, you can get a winch, but I would recommend that you go to a class, a 101 or 102 off-roading class, and learn about winches and the safety and using the gloves if you’re using a steel cable winch. And yeah, there’s several things, and there’s great places out there that you can find out more about it. And there’s always YouTube. I think you actually need to go in person, but at least watch some YouTube about how to winch.

 

Absolutely. And we do sell a warm winch at How the Fuff Road, guys.

 

Warm is very nice. Do you guys do a super winch as well?

We do. The super winch, oh my gosh.

Yeah, I said it wrong. It’s not super winch, is it? It’s super something though.

 

We only carry the warm brand, so.

Oh, you only carry the warm?

We’re also, we are a warm service center now, so you can actually bring your winch in, and we will service that for you, so you don’t have to ship it out anymore.

What kind of issues do you see as far as service goes? Is it just not the people not taking care of it, or?

It’s definitely the not taking care, like not cleaning the line, like unspooling, re-spooling. But I’ve seen a lot of the bolt damage, so they’re stripping the bolts out because you’re letting too much line out, so it’s not able to get that spool properly for when you’re trying to winch back in. So it’s definitely more of a bolt issue lately.

 

Yeah, I’m sorry, I just looked it up. It is super winch. I was thinking it was super something else, but super winch.

We do not carry that one. But I think we could order it for you, but in stock we have a Mount Winchmore in the shop, so it’s kind of fun.

 

Mount Winchmore, that’s funny.

Yeah, that’s a good one. Janet, what winch brand do you have? I have a Smittybilt. I bought one of those for my wife’s TJ. It actually does very well off-road. I’ve known several people with them.

 

I don’t know which one you have, but it was an 8,000 pound winch. And I’m saying this and people go, oh my God, that’s heavy. So it’s capable of pulling 8,000 pounds.

Yes, I believe mine is 12. Right, like doing bicep lifts with it.

 

lights on my Jeep of in

oh you need lights it’s my favorite it’s a Jeep thing.

It’s a Jeep thing. It’s a Jeep thing.

Like before lockers that’s what we all do here.

Exactly lights before lockers. I did it backwards.

People are probably sick of me mentioning this but it really depends on the area that you live in and I think disasters can happen anywhere in California is going to be earthquakes in southeast Texas and even up into central Texas when a tropical or or hurricane comes through you may be in a situation where there’s down parallines down telephone poles tornadoes for example Oklahoma so if you’re out you know you should be at home but if you’re out driving or maybe you’re crying to go help a loved one or or you know get get them back home those lights are going to be more important than lockers.

Absolutely.

It’s great to have both but yeah it just really depends on what you’re doing and those those lights are great and something I didn’t really think about and maybe you guys have already experienced this the lights the bright lights are great for you to see probably not so great if you’re behind people in the trail run.

It’s so bad I get I get told often about my lights and I thought people were just being like waving at me. No they’re not waving.

 

Well and we went to hot springs earlier this year and there was a guy behind us that had the yellow you know amber lights and turn them and I’ll say I feel like the sun is behind us trying to catch us.

 

The lights out there are so great I’ve got the Tyree lights thanks to Ken at Tyree lights and they are just wonderful. I have a problem with lights. I’ve always loved lights and watches and Ken kept bugging me. He goes you need to you need to get rid of those Amazon and he didn’t say it this way but you need to get rid of those cheap Amazon lights and put the Tyree lights on there. I said okay damn it Ken that’s fine.

Okay fine. Oh my god

they are just so amazing and the way they’re built I mean these are commercial lights that I have on the on the Gladiator and they’re wonderful. But I’ve got two sets I’ve got a set that’s down low on the bumper and then I’ve got two seven inch duels up on the the hoop of the bumper. So I would say one of the things that maybe is a good thing to keep in mind is if you go with lights that are lower it allows you at night to see the terrain better because it shines shadows and gives definition to what’s coming up. So it’s almost like making something 3D and when you just wash it out with very bright white lights it’s cool but it’s really not helping you choose your path.

 

And also found that because we see better in amber or yellow colors that making those lights down low amber really enhances the your ability to see the the upcoming terrain.

Oh yeah a buddy mine has really tiny they’re about the little bit bigger like a silver dollar amber lights on his knuckles. So when he’s moving and on the rocks and everything it is amazing how those lights enhance like it’s I that’s my favorite thing I love it. Yeah that’s really cool. Yeah.

Yeah I saw that a couple of years back and I’m thinking to myself not oh this this would enhance my my off-road performance. I went oh wow I can put more lights on my Jeep. That’s cool.

 

I do like the rigid right now we can be featured on our gladiator but it has a backlight so like we have a lot of the blue ones but they come in red too and the amber and it looks really cool and it’s like real dim but it’s still backlit so you can use it. It makes it kind of fun.

 

Yeah it’s a Jeep thing. Lights before lockers. Jeep thing. But also Baja designs can’t speak good enough about that too.

Baja designs are very good. We actually need to get them on the on the show and have a little conversation on them. Do you guys know about oh I’m forgetting the name now. The owner is big into nachos. I think it’s nacho lights and he loves any place he travels he finds the best nacho place to go eat and have nachos. We had him on and those are those are nice. Oh in fact now that I think about it he was the guy that owned the rigid industry company and then he sold it whoever has it now and then a couple of years after after selling it he and a couple of buddies started up this nacho lights company and they have some really nice lights but it’s it’s really interesting. I loved interviewing these folks because you find out things that are going on that I just had no idea I think most people don’t.

I stopped listening after you mentioned nachos. I love nachos. I’m hungry right now.

 

Yeah okay so all these things can all these things you can reply to what it’s a Jeep thing. If you would if you wouldn’t understand so if you don’t understand what a Jeep thing is let us know tell us what or maybe there’s some things here that we’ve missed that what a Jeep thing is you know whenever you just tell somebody when they they question you about why do you have a Jeep you have a midlife crisis. Why you got those those lights up there all that stuff you get to say it’s a Jeep thing you wouldn’t understand.

Yeah the

wife’s not buying it I guarantee you.

No.

 

All right so I think we we probably suspect this and this actually could go under the heading of it’s a Jeep thing Jeeps with the highest maintenance and repair. Oh boy does anybody care.

 

I mean it’s not why we own them for our wallet.

That’s the point and I think that the people that are reporting on these things don’t understand that it’s not a car. It’s not something that you drive back and forth to work. It’s not something it’s not a Subaru that maybe you take on minor trails. This is something that because it’s modifiable extremely modifiable that it just is something you have to consider when you’re driving it.

It’s our life. Do we dare call it a lifestyle. Oh okay. This is going to I’m going to do a sidebar here just for a second. Natalie have you noticed a lot of our mannerisms have been the same. Oh my gosh.

We’re doing the hand like this at one point and I was like yeah boy I didn’t realize it’s after I was already in it and I was like what now I got to stay in it.

Now you know you have to commit. So the fact that we said the same thing at the same time. I love it. That’s why we get along so well on the episode. You’re in trouble.

I agree.

 

No it’s fine. So the Jeep is much more expensive to maintain than other brands. So they say Jeep is significantly higher as a brand that industry average which I don’t know. It’s kind of like I think it’s like having dating a supermodel. There’s certain things that you got to do.

 

Yes there is.

To be with something to be with something that you know to spend your time with somebody there’s a certain amount of things you get up with.

 

Well you can compare that to dating or marrying a Jeep girl. We don’t want flowers we want Jeep parts.

Absolutely. That’s a good point. Do you guys consider the the the the person’s interest or disinterest in Jeeps whenever you’re dating somebody. Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

I don’t date but. But I don’t either but the last one I tried.

You don’t need that negativity in your life is what I’m saying.

Exactly. I just want to be a fan of what I want to.

 

That’s why we have cats. They don’t complain about the Jeep. They don’t.

 

So over the course of 10 years Jeep models average $10,930 in maintenance and repair costs compared to the industry average of $8,419. I think these are people that are having other people work on their vehicles. I can’t believe that it’s $10,000 over 10 years.

 

Well I mean that’s about $1,000 a year. Does that include oil changes and everything else?

I don’t know. I think it would have to.

I mean I don’t know. I’m sorry.

You’re right. It does say maintenance maintenance and repair costs. So yeah it would be oil changes and all the things that have to do with the maintenance of it. I guess tires would be included in that as well.

That sounds I mean that sounds about right. It doesn’t sound too far off. I don’t know. I mean my Ultima is giving me I mean my Ultima is probably doing the same thing. She from 2016.

She’s gonna.

 

vehicle that so many people can’t do. I mean, you’re talking about that. Absolutely. You’re not going to take that thing off road. I mean, you could.

I mean, I could.

 

She already has enough stuff hanging off underneath. I just need that ripped off.

I’m totally good. I drove my spark through the grass at my list. I felt like I was off-roading. So I was like, oh my gosh.

Yeah. It’d be a good cleaning. It’d be like getting the barnacles off of her. Yes. So damn it, we’re having such a good time talking here. We’re going over a lot of time for the news stories. So I’ve got to get this, this news story in before we go.

 

So Natalie had some issues pulling into her driveway. I’m sorry. No, this is somebody. Poor little twin. This is somebody in Cincinnati that got stuck in their driveway. They couldn’t get out of their blue. And I think this is a probably a JLU. And they’re at quite an off-camber angle. And the only thing is you’re from Cincinnati. I don’t know if you know about these driveways, but this driveway is weird. It’s like a chute. So there’s walls on either side. Is this something that you see common in Cincinnati?

It is. It’s like it’s the River Rock. And so all these old River homes, they’re built with the garage going deep, like down into your basement. So you kind of go down a little hill because the yard is built up on each side. So it does look like a chute, but that’s all River Rock that people use to create those retaining walls. And they are strong, very, very strong. I mean, I have my own thought about what happened this week on this story. I’m just going to be honest. It to me, it looked like they were trying to flex and they didn’t disconnect the sway bar in the front.

 

That’s what I think happened.

Well, look, I just realized in this note, this picture is in our show notes for this episode. Look at the underneath. There is nothing dirty. This looks like it’s either brand new or very new.

So clean. Like, oh my gosh, it actually kind of looks like Mike’s 392. I’m not going to lie. I was like, what’s happening?

What happened to it? Horrible.

I mean, my Jeep is my Jeep is clean underneath, but it ain’t that clean.

I mean, it is spotless.

I mean, from my understanding, I heard. I’m hoping they changed the oil while it was up. If they can get out.

Right. That’s a great way to do it.

Right.

 

This story did spread like wildfire all through Cincinnati. All the clubs were posting about it. I mean, we get what posted about it. I know, I know.

 

But my understanding, the throttle control could have been an issue. The foot getting stuck with the pedal.

Yeah, it was an issue with the foot is what it was.

The JL does sometimes have a turbo in it. Maybe that happened. You never know. So, but it looked to me like they’re trying to flex on the wall and be cool and get all flexy. And it didn’t work.

You never know what actually happened, but apparently what they told the police or whoever was that they got, they started accelerating, put their foot on the pedal that they weren’t intending. And it, they went up, I guess, on the retaining wall and went down. Yeah, sure. And now they couldn’t get out.

 

I was thinking about this. I forget who I was talking to about this about. Maybe it was you, Natalie.

 

But I was thinking to myself, how does a tow truck get that out without scratching the hell out of the driver’s side? It’s just not going to happen. I mean, and I doubt that you’re going to have people come out there with two tow trucks and try to pull the thing over a little bit. And by the way, this is one of the reasons why you want rock sliders on your Jeep. Because now you have a tow point that isn’t the pretend roll bar that’s inside the one use roll bar that the Jeep includes with the Jeeps. So, yeah, I mean, like I said, this looks like it’s a brand new Jeep. I feel bad for them. And how embarrassing anytime you get stuck with a Jeep, especially if you’re on road or in your front yard, it’s, it’s very embarrassing.

I’m going to try to find them, Tony, and we can have them on the show.

It would be wonderful. I promise not to drive them nuts. And I’m hoping it’s not a woman.

 

That would be bad.

Be real bad. Especially on tonight’s episode.

 

Watch it, Tony.

 

All right. So yeah, I mean, thank God the other wall was there because this definitely would have been a rollover.

Oh, yeah.

And what did we learn about rollovers?

It’s a Jeep thing. It’s a Jeep thing. It’s, again, it’s one of those, it’s not if it’s when.

 

All right.

One out of three hosts it’s happened to. So here we are.

It doesn’t happen that often. You guys don’t need to worry about it. All right. So with, with Wendy and Larry out tonight, and by the way, I do really appreciate you guys coming in last moment to join me here on the flagship episode. And by the way, doing a wonderful job. And I’m sure that our listeners are going to comment on this, because you guys just do a wonderful thing. And I’m trying not to talk so much because you guys do so well at this. So with that in mind, Natalie, you’re going to be heading out to four Fest on in January, was it that you said?

 

January with an asterisk. We’ll just say that. But yeah, so next Friday, September 6, and also Saturday, September 7, Detroit four Fest is going on at Holly Oaks, which is actually a badge of honor as well, guys. So if you are in the area of come check it out, it’s going to be a lot of fun. Also, Chris is going to be there from the Jeep talk show. He is going to be doing some hosting, and I’m going to join him on the main stage for a little while, the Cooper tire main stage. We’re going to talk about Bill Stein shocks for a tiny, and then he’s going to come join me in the Maxis booth as well. So the red Jeep’s making another a trip. So she’ll be up there and I’ll get to see our other our old friend Julianne too. So it’ll be a lot of fun. A lot of Jeep talk show going on up there.

You know, this is why it’s wonderful having you guys be part of the show, because you’re in the areas of the country that are difficult for me to get to. I mean, I would like to go in my Jeep and be at the same time. But it’s gosh, that would probably be I think that’s further than going to Moab.

It is it is.

Yeah.

And this one, I mean, I would love for you to come Tony would be really cool. Jeep brings a bunch of concept vehicles and you can actually go off road for the first time. You don’t have to come in a Jeep to be able to experience Hollyoaks itself. That’s kind of that’s what the beauty of four fest is all about the celebration of going in for low.

And Natalie, I think we were talking about this earlier, Tom Zelinski, four fest event, the guy that’s behind four fest events. He does a wonderful job of getting vendors out there. So when you can go to a four fest event, it’s it’s really worth your while to do that. And and from what Natalie was saying, you guys need to slow down so that you can see the vendor.

Stop it and see me because the vendor midway, guys, you guys are actually in your Jeeps and rolling through. That’s how a majority go through it. So then you kind of hop out and it gets it’s very different. It’s a very unique experience. So I highly recommend it. Come see us also be with the Brent Hensley and his demon gladiator as well. We’ve talked about him. So I’m gonna get a little possessed. Maybe you never know.

And it’s great having you up there in the Dallas area because Dallas is Janet, the Dallas area because Dallas is four hour driving time from Houston. A lot of people don’t understand how big.

Oh my gosh.

Yes.

Yes. Wow. I realize that.

So so yeah, I haven’t been to Dallas a lot of times in my life. It’s just too far to go.

I think it’s also a four hour drive for me to get from my suburban city to the center of Dallas in downtown. Oh yeah. The traffic here is terrible. I work, luckily I work from home. My business is here at the house. So I really don’t have to go many places unless I’m doing an install in a Jeep, or any other vehicle.

 

But yeah, the drive is to get out of Texas. Like when we went to Colorado a few months ago, the majority of the drive is getting out of Texas and it’s flat.

 

And when you hit those wind turbines, you’re like, okay, I’m almost there. Almost there.

It’s wind turbines. Oh, it’s a cool thing to look at. I mean, those, so many of those wind turbines.

So the wind turbines, when you’re driving towards, you know, Amarillo and all that, one cool thing, if you ever noticed when you’re driving at night is the little red lights at the top are synchronized. I want to know the story behind it. Was it like one? Yes.

 

And the ones on the left of the highway or, you know, whatever, each side of the highway has their own synchronization and there’s always like one or two that are off. Oh, I didn’t notice that. That guy that says the last day on the job, they’re firing him and he’s like, you know what, screw you guys. I’m going to make this one different. So every time I drive out towards the Amarillo and West Texas area and I see the synchronization of all the lights, it’s, it’s really cool to see that.

You know, somebody out there listening knows how that’s done,

 

works out the way you want it to work out. It’s really, really good. And I really appreciate you being on. Both of you are very fun. I hate Wendy and Larry not being with us this week, but it’s really fun to have you guys here to talk to you. Because it’s not me talking 24 seven.

 

And Natalie and I just have a conversation. That’s what it really comes down to. We just, you’re just, you get to peek in on us just having a conversation. Absolutely. Fulfill your voyeurism fetish there.

(Laughing)

Oh, speaking of voyeurism.

(Laughing)

 

We got to check in with Nikki G.

Yeah.

 

From the mind

of Nikki G.

 

(Cheering)

 

Hey, this is Nikki G. Now that I’m putting my segment in video form, it’s kind of difficult for me to edit. When I did my audio, I can just pick out all the times I go and have nothing, trying to think of what to say.

 

So yeah, when I do it in video, I got to do it in one take without editing. So here we go. Let’s give it a try. My doctor told me I was going deaf. Yeah, that was hard for me to hear.

(Drumming)

Read a horror story in Braille. Something terrible about that. And I got a bad feeling.

(Drumming)

Essentially, go to brothers decided it was possible to fly. As you can see, they were right.

(Drumming)

 

That was horrible, horrible. Hi boys and girls, I’ll catch you later. And have a good one, bye.

 

(Upbeat Music)

So you guys can’t see what he did.

 

He had costume changes in that weekly, or biweekly, Nikki G.

 

Go to YouTube to see it. That’s right. It’s entertaining.

And what is it? Smash that subscribe and like button. Smash that like and subscribe button. Smash it.

 

All right, so coming up this Friday in our interview episode, every Friday is an interview episode, Kim Swartz traveling to all 30 MLB stadiums in her Jeep and working remotely. Janet, she’s also IT. And she’s been working from her Jeep, or just outside her Jeep, where she’ll set up and do what she needs to do. And the interesting thing was, is that when I interviewed her, she was someplace, somewhere in the world, somewhere in the United States, and she was flying– At a ballpark? Yeah, near one anyway. And she was flying back for a meeting. So she was parking her Jeep at the airport, covered, a covered area. And she was gonna fly to do the meeting that she needed to go to for IT. And then she was gonna fly back and get her Jeep and continue on on her trip. So, I mean, it’s really, really neat.

 

And I’ve got it, I don’t think Bob cares. So I think both of you guys know F.U. Bob. And that’s a loving thing that we say.

 

He found her on Tinder.

 

Oh. He’s the one that scheduled to get her to do the interview.

Oh my gosh, I love it.

Yeah, and he contacted her because he saw the Jeep.

 

(Laughing)

Oh my gosh. So if you’re on Tinder and you’re maybe not getting the views or the whatever it’s called, well, there’s a cat.

 

He’s got a little Hitler thing going on there.

 

(Laughing)

 

So if you’re on Tinder and you’re not getting the views or the interactions that you want, maybe you should add a Jeep to it, right? They have nothing else. Bob may be talking to you.

 

I thought it was so funny because when she filled out the form to come on the show, she actually sent an email telling me that she had met Bob on Tinder and he set up the interview and stuff. I figured she was just cracking wise. I figured she was just being a smart ass. And then when we got on the interview, I found out literally that was what was going on.

Oh my gosh, that’s so funny.

That is hilarious. It is almost as interesting as her story about going to the 30 baseball parks around the country. And what a cool thing to do, especially you’re working, you’re continuing to work, but you’re also driving your Jeep around either sleeping in your Jeep or outside the Jeep in a hammock. It was a fun story and a different type of story, which we love. I can’t wait to hear it. All right, so in our must have stuff for your Jeep, I don’t know, neither one of you guys have dogs, right? You have all, you just have cats?

I have a dog. Oh, okay. Oh, you do have a dog. I have Lily, the German Shepherd.

 

Oh, that’s right.

You talked about, yes.

I do. You talked about Lily. So do you find a situation where you want to take, I mean, I hate putting the dogs like in the back. I don’t like the dogs being outside or any of that stuff. I like them, they’re fun. They’re fun being there, but I can see situations where you might want to isolate them, especially if somebody’s traveling with you that really isn’t a dog person.

Or if you have your doors off.

Oh yeah, absolutely. Or even if they are a dog person, even if they are a dog person, they may be scared of a larger dog.

Yes.

So you can get one of these nets from RTTCZ,

 

that’s almost as bad as Chick-Cha.

 

Car, rear, trunk, organizer, isolation, cargo net. So it’s basically a mesh, you know, the, you guys have seen it before, and I’ve never talked about this, but it’s a mesh dog barrier divider, and it’s good for your Jeep Wrangler, JKU, JLU, four door 2007 through 2023, and it’s $46.99, and you also could use this as a way to keep things that are in the back, in the back, and not rocking towards you in the front, they’re in a rollover.

Yes, you want to cage those kids in the back. Yeah. I mean, I haven’t done it, but I imagine that’s what it’s for.

 

(Laughing)

I would never do that, but what a great idea. I would never.

 

So yeah, check this out, we have a link to the Amazon, where you can get this and enjoy that isolationism, but I don’t think the dogs are always gonna find a way through there, and the cats, no, they don’t care.

 

Cats will definitely find a way, those won’t climb it, so.

Absolutely. Speaking of dogs, two dogs just came in here to the studio, and the little dog is under my desk, sniffing around, she’s looking for dust bunnies, and I think she’s training the Cane Corso. Did I tell you guys this already?

 

I love the dogs, I wish they would just come up here and lay down at the office while I’m doing this stuff. Anyway, I saw the little dog come in, and it stuck my hand down to the side of me, so that if she wanted me to pet her, I could just pet her while I’m doing the show. And I didn’t realize the Cane Corso was right behind her, because she follows Buffy everywhere. And the next thing I know, my hand’s being bitten.

Oh, Buffy bite.

Yeah, from the Cane Corso, I was like, oh crap, that’s not Buffy.

 

You have to pick up one of the dogs in the view, so we can see it, like we did with our cats.

Even the small dog doesn’t like being picked up. Oh goodness. Yeah, and she’s not that small, and she’s fat. And I think the fat thing is what gets her.

She’s self-conscious.

And the other one’s 50 pounds. She’s just big boned.

 

Leave her alone.

You know those fat skeletons, you know?

 

All right guys, well it’s been so much fun being here with you, we ran a little long, but damn, I think it was worth it. Actually, we’re a lot shorter in time than I thought we were gonna be. 40 minutes for the news stuff. I think she’s working if you want me to. That was so much fun. And you know the funny thing is, we’ve heard this repeatedly, that people like the longer episodes. And it’s only me that tries to keep it around an hour. So yeah, the good thing about it is, is that if you want the show to last longer, there’s a lot of shows you can listen to. There’s a lot of episodes out there. Yeah. So I just wanna thank Natalie and Janet, you guys being here, we tried to do it last night, but you guys were both busy. Said, “Hey, how about Friday?” You said, “Sure, that sounds great. Sorry for the short notice.” But I certainly appreciate you coming in here because nobody wants to hear an episode of me doing it by myself.

 

We love it, Tony, thank you. It’s not as fun. We do love it.

Yeah, and really enjoyed it. All right, well thanks for listening to this episode of the Jeep Talk Show. If you’ve enjoyed the show, please leave us a rating and review. Oh, leave us a comment on YouTube.

 

Give us a like, you know, if you like this stuff.

 

I’m really enjoying doing the editing of all the YouTube videos, trying to make it interesting, trying to make it a little better. Go on there and tell me what you think. So anyway, your feedback helps us improve the show and reach more Jeep enthusiasts like yourself. Also don’t forget about our social media. Instagram, I would say, is probably the best way to follow us and get the latest content that we put out there. And we’re on many of the platforms, but yeah, go to Instagram.

 

You’re my friend, you’re my new friend.