The Boone Show
The Boone Show
The Boone Show - S4 E1 - Roberta Hamby
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Ever wondered what it takes to transform a town or inspire a community? Today, we're thrilled to have Roberta Hamby, executive director of Envision Williamston, who's made it her life's work to do just that. From humble beginnings in Possum Kingdom to a career in real estate and a passion for community enrichment, Roberta's journey is inspiring.
But don't think we're all work and no play! What's a better breather than a juicy chat about the billionaire cage match between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg? We dive into this spicy topic, speculate on the ultimate outcome, and even take a detour into the intriguing world of Barbie Land. We also take a moment to reflect on the importance of personal inspirations.
The Boone Show is not just about the laughs, though; we also highlight matters close to our hearts. So grab your headphones, and let's embark on this journey together. It's an episode jam-packed with insight, entertainment, and a shared love for our communities. Don't miss out!
Get ready because it's season four. The Boone Show with your host, john Boone.
John:Hello everybody, we are back after a kind of short summer break, but a break nonetheless. It's the Boone Show on my Pulse Radio and here we are to start season number four. Believe it or not, started during COVID and here we are. And can you believe that COVID is that far in the rear view window and rear view mirror, and let's hope it stays there. It's just time flies, that's all I can say. And we're here to start a season number four. Boss lady is not here today. She's in Columbia and Danita is also out. Who is her fill in? But we have plenty of personality in the room. My producer, colt, is here. Hello, colt.
Colt:Yes, sir.
John:It's good to be back and our very special guest tonight is Roberta Hamby from Envision Williamston. I'm going to tell us all the stuff that's going on in Williamston and a little bit about her. Thanks for coming, roberta.
:You're certainly welcome. Thanks for having me.
John:Yeah, it's great to have you because we know a lot's going on. But for people that don't know you yet, tell us a little bit about yourself. How'd you get to where you are now? Where are you from? Are you from this area originally? I'm from Possum Kingdom, oh right somebody's actually from one of those great named towns.
:Yeah, southern end of Greenville County.
John:Yeah, possum Kingdom, so generally from this area, your whole life and tell us how you grew up and how you got into position. You're a realtor now, right?
:I am. I own a real estate company. I've been doing real estate for 31 years, oh wow. And we moved to this area when my children started school because we wanted them in Anderson District on schools. Wow, they both graduated. They went all through school here and they both graduated from school here and now have grad children in school here.
John:How about that? A great District 1 supporter.
:Absolutely.
John:And yeah, it's been a great district for a long time, that's for sure.
:A warm winning.
John:Our kids, our older kids are in their 30s now and they all went to District 1. And so did our middle kids. Now that we've moved to, our other kids are in Oconee County, but through no fault of their own.
Speaker 4:Oconee is not that bad.
John:But we all know from working here that District 1 is great and I'm sure you've had a great experience coming through there. So where do you? Oh yes, colt, I know you're a District 1 kid yourself over there at Palmetto, and well, tell us what brought you to Williamston. How long have you lived? Do you live right here in Williamston?
:I do. I live right here, not even a quarter of a mile right here from the Career Center. So I'm just right there at Hardee's. So I have been here, like I said, since my kids have started school, so that's been over 30 years. I moved here specifically to get them in school here and we've been here the whole time and absolutely love the small town and feel like we belong now.
John:Yeah, yeah. When did you decide in your life that you wanted to be a realtor? Because you said you've done that pretty much your whole life. So when was it that you decided that's what I want to do? And obviously you've stuck with it.
:I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up Me neither.
Colt:That was one of those things.
:I went to church with somebody who worked in real estate. She was my children's Sunday school teacher and she said, hey, I'm going to go get my real estate license and I had never thought about it. And she taught me into going to school with her to get my real estate license. And we did. And I was in banking before that and I love the banking job, but I wanted to be a stay at home mother and so real estate gave me the opportunity that I could set my schedule around my kids field trips and things like that and so that's the reason I stayed in it.
John:Yeah, it's good that you could find a job to do that. It's always nice to have that kid time. I know a lot of people in my business in radio wound up not being so great of family people because they get so involved in the 24-7 media cycle and a lot of them you know, unfortunately, divorces and families breaking up. The majority of the people I knew had that happened to them. So it's that kind of business. So for you to be able to find something that you were able to spend that time, that's time you can't get back, and so I'm sure you're thankful for that. So what brought you up to wanting to do this? Envision Williamston thing?
:Envision Williamston started in 2014 and I became a volunteer in 2014. So I've been with the program since its inception.
John:So it was 10 years now.
:Wow yeah almost yeah, and I thought it was a wonderful program. I thought I loved everything that they were doing for the program and I stayed as a volunteer for many years and then I got on the board and through the COVID and some other things, we lost our funding for a full-time executive director. So I just stepped in to keep the program running because I thought it was such a good program, and that's been a little over two years now that.
John:I'm still sitting here in the that's what happens when you do a good job. Well, thank you very much.
:No one's going to chase you out of there, I ask them all the time if they're ready to fire me and they just laugh and say absolutely not. Yeah, that's the same thing?
John:We had the PBA girls in here last, at the end of last season, and who are they again, caroline? And Melanie Caroline yes, I don't know why I can see their faces, and I'm terrible with names.
:And Melanie.
John:And they do a great job and they've really brought PBA back and again from COVID and they were saying the same thing. They were just going to help out a little bit and no one's saying to leave anytime soon, because they're doing a great job too.
John:So that's great. We're going to talk about coming up all the different things and vision Williamston does and you can kind of explain about what it does do, what it doesn't do, what it's involved in and those kind of things when we come back. So a lot to talk about with Roberta Hamby. We've also got some stuff in the news that we like to joke around about, because there's always some fun we can find in the news amidst all the bad news there is out there. We can find some things to smile and laugh about and of course we'll close out with our food segment. So that's all coming up here on this episode of the Boone Show right here on my Pulse Radio. Welcome back to the Boone Show on my Pulse Radio.
John:I'm John Boone, along with Col Gouge and our special guest Roberta Hamby from Envision Williamston. I'm going to talk a little bit about Envision Williamston right now and let's kick it off with the mission statement which I told Roberta I would not tell her she had to recite it back to me word for word right off the bat. But it is a community-based program designed to enhance the identity and heritage of the Williamston community by working with both the public and private sectors of the town to restore vitality and ensure economic security and ensure economic stability through concentrated efforts in organization, promotion, design and business development. So we'll break that down a little bit, Roberta, and you can tell us what all that means. Let's kick it off with the business development and promotion part of that.
:We help to bring businesses to town. We help locate the properties that may be suitable for the businesses. We reach out to the property owners and we help facilitate a meeting. We help get the business owners with the correct departments there in the town and they handle all their business needs. We perform all the ribbon cuttings in town and the grand openings and we promote them when they have anything going on in their businesses. We promote that as well on our social media.
John:So how is that going? A lot of ribbon cuttings lately. It seems like I see posts about you being out there going through a lot of ribbon these days.
:Absolutely. We've got a lot of new businesses coming to town and we've got some that are even franchise businesses that we love, so that means that growth is coming.
John:We got the Bojangles. Of course was a big one coming to town.
:And T-Mobile.
John:And T-Mobile there yeah. So yeah, it's been Williamston moving up a little bit.
Colt:Yeah, and an Ingles in a couple years.
John:Yeah, everyone keeps talking about that. Boy Board of Rocky gets those emails about that all the time.
Speaker 4:When's the Ingles coming? When's it coming?
John:Gotta get that grocery store. I joke around with him all the time about that. But yeah, it's going to be cool when it does come, because that's an area. If that area of the town gets built up right there on Main Street, that'll really be a capper on the rebirth, I guess, of the town to have that all busy.
:Originally in Vision Williamston was the Main Street program and we were part of the Main Street program throughout the United States. And then we branched off and we kind of separated from just the Main Street corridor to the whole entire town. So we worked throughout but when we first started it was the Main Street program and we only focused right there in the direct center of town.
John:Well, that's a good segue to the next thing that we're talking about. One of the things you do is beautifying the town in many different ways. Talk about that a little bit.
:OK, we've done adopt arrest stop. That's been just throughout town and people were able to adopt those and put their planks on them and they could dedicate them to someone who had passed away or someone who was still here. We did adopt a shelter last year in the park and that was businesses and individuals were allowed to adopt the shelters to help maintain them.
John:I think the Career Center has one right.
:The Career Center was going to have one but a little something happened with that.
Speaker 4:And they weren't.
:Yeah, they had to, but they did. Yeah, they did commit to one, but then something happened with that. We've added wayfinding signs throughout the town. We've got welcome signs at most of the entrances to town, we put up the electronic message board in front of town hall and we have town cleanup days every year and we do those as well.
John:And it seems like you've had good turnout for those as well. People coming out to clean up the town and some of these other projects you've been doing seem to be growing pretty quickly too, especially again coming out of COVID. Everything kind of everything was growing and then COVID came along and everything just totally shut down. It's not a shock to anybody, that's what happened. But to see you guys with Envision Williamston and with PBA and such building all this stuff back up is amazing. And one of those things is the bobbers on Big Creek, which I missed this year because I was out of town, but that's a fun thing.
:That is a very fun event.
John:And tell people how that works, in case you're not familiar.
:OK, it's a race and it's very similar to the Ducky Derby in Greenville. We partner with the Palmetto Business Association on this event so that the businesses in Williamston and Pelser and West Pelser can all participate. People go into one of the participating businesses the PBA businesses and they receive a bobber and they bring the bobber to our freedom celebration and you race it down the Big Creek for a chance to win some great donated prizes.
John:That sounds like fun. I haven't seen it yet. I've been missing it each time, and this was part of the freedom celebration, right.
Speaker 4:It was For the.
John:Fourth of July and Williamston is becoming known as one of the best places to watch fireworks what I've heard as well.
:They put on a phenomenal show. We had a big storm right before the fireworks and it was kind of iffy if we were going to get to do it this year, but it cleared up just in time and it was off the charts. It was amazing.
John:Yeah, and some of the other things. As far as beautifying goes the park, you now have a fire pit over there. How does that work? Do people have to reserve the fire pit as well or get permission to use that?
:You do. You just go to Town Hall and let them know what day you're going to be there and they just record what day. Now we do ask that you stay with your fire until it's completely out. Occasionally there's wood already there at the fire pit, but you can certainly bring your own. It's a great way for you to be able to take for people who live in apartments and maybe live in a subdivision that don't allow any kind of backyard fire pit. Take your kids, do a fire pit, make some s'mores and just enjoy the evening and there's plenty of places to sit around there.
John:They have that stone kind of seating area.
:And then you've got picnic tables and all that and you can bring your own fold out chairs and sit at my next that was a good idea.
John:Then you've got the Easter Bunny that comes to town each week. Yeah, each week, each year. That would be a little crazy each week, but that's always a big deal with the, not only for that, but they usually have a hunt going on across the park, which those things are just crazy, with kids running all over the place. But you've got the Easter Bunny. Then you've tell us about these hometown hero banners that get hung up on occasion throughout the town.
:We started that a couple of years ago, right after COVID, and we allowed, we got up an order and you could buy a hometown hero banner with your loved one's information on it, and then we hung it up at the 4th of July and left it hanging down Main Street and so anybody who wanted to purchase one, and then we will hang them up at different times as well, throughout the year.
John:Now they go through your website or town website, or how do they get the information to you?
:Usually we always have the applications right outside my office store. My office, invision Williamston, is when you walk in Town Hall. It's the first store on the left. You can't miss it. It says InVision Williamston. It's got the mailbox next to it and we have got a brochure stand right there.
:So anytime we have any kind of event going on, we've got the applications there. But it'll also be on the website and it'll be on our Facebook page. And if you don't have access to any of that, call me and I can get you a copy. We can mail you a copy or you can come by and we'll come by and drop you one off or whatever we need to do. The best place to find out is to follow us on our Facebook page and you see what's going on, or in the journal and they tell anytime we've got a program going on. So when we open this hometown hero banner back up, then it will be in the paper telling you that you can order one and then it will also be on our Facebook and the town of Williamston's Facebook as well.
John:Pretty cool thing. So for all these events that we're talking about, you would have information right there in those places that you said. So we'll, ok, throw that out there. The working on Williamson the wow used to be howdy.
:It did used to be howdy, now it's wow.
John:That's the cleanup day and every year around Earth Day, so that's a cool thing to get involved in. We had talked about doing something with the kids being out of school. It's tough for us to do things around. Well, that is like right at the end of the school year, right? Earth Day is in April, is it?
John:It is and so yeah, that was a busy time, but we'd love to have a team of people go out there and help out. They have a pastor's breakfast twice a year. That'll keep the churches knowing what all's going on, so that's a great idea. We've got a lot of churches around and a lot of active churches that do get involved. They see a lot of the events you're talking about. A lot of churches out there doing things.
:We. We've got a local church that has a food bank right here in town. We've got a local church that has a coat closet here in town so they provide clothing for people in need. We've got one that does a Lazer earth project and so you can fill out an application for them, and if you have a special need of a handicap or amp or something's wrong with your house and there's an immediate need, the Lazer earth project steps in. So we've got some wonderful churches in the area that do amazing things for the community.
John:That's awesome. That's awesome. Here's one for you, colt the bingo with the blue playing bingo with the Williamston Police Department when? When is when? Is that the good question, colt? That was good. Tell me, he's my news director, because he just asked a good question when and where do you have the bingo?
:We only had that one time so far and we've got a great response and we want people to and people want us to do it again. What we have to do is we have to get prizes donated so that we have something to give away at the bingo. The last time we did the bingo game we did it around Valentine's Day and we partnered with the Palmetto Business Association and Piedmont Post Acute and they got donations. So we hope to do it generally in the springtime, All right and we start working on getting prizes and as soon as we get enough prizes to make it, we can't have a bingo game and have two prizes and have the auditorium, but it does happen at Town Hall and the auditorium there at Town Hall, williamston.
Speaker 4:Town Hall. Keep that in mind.
John:Now I know, and it's free to the public, there you go, you win from there.
Speaker 4:No losing involved there.
John:You talk about all the ribbon cuttings. They're going on all the time. This summer kids scavenger hunt I hadn't heard about that, but a chance to win hundreds of prizes. How does?
:that work. We just had that. That was the first time we'd ever done that. What we did was we hid rocks throughout the park. They were numbered and lettered and we had a puzzle so the kids would find the rocks, they would flip them over and they would coordinate the letters with the numbers and they would solve the puzzle. And then we had a camp out. We had our first ever camp out in town. We called that Staycation 2023, camping Creekside in Williamston. And so the kids brought their soft scavenger puzzles to the camp out that Friday night and turned them in and we had over a hundred prizes that the kids could win for solving their scavenger hunt. And it kicked off our Camping Creekside event and that was the first time we had that event as well.
John:How did that go? Because that sounded pretty cool.
:That was really good. We had 14 tents and three individual sleeping bag campers. Everybody was really afraid. With it being the end of July, it was going to be extremely hot, but we had the threat of a big storm right before and so it actually believe it or not got cold in the night.
John:So I think I think you're staying out there. I did I was in the big tent.
:I stayed in all my life, and and we definitely everybody who was there have asked us to do it again, and we're probably thinking about maybe in the fall, but if not, certainly in the spring. The whole purpose of us doing it, though, was a lot of kids, a lot of families, specifically with the economy and stuff, weren't able to go on a vacation the summer, and the summer was short, so that's the whole reason we set this up was so that when kids go back to school and the teacher said what did you do during the summer, these kids didn't have anything to write about. So then they had. We had an outdoor movie at the event, we had s'mores at the event, we had hot dogs at the event, so there was a lot to do and camping, and a lot of them.
:It was our first time ever camping. It was right there. We had security there that was patrolling for us. We gave every adult in a tent a whistle, so if anything went on, they could whistle and there would be help there. So it was just a great time. With the park completely closed off. They were safe, secure, and then able to camp out.
John:Now was Rocky out there.
:Rocky did not come. Rocky came for the introduction to it a couple of days before, but he was actually on vacation when it happened. So we're going to give him a pass this year. It had been scheduled for a year.
John:That's the problem with him.
Speaker 4:He's always on vacation. He works hard.
John:And of course, I might as well wrap it up here with the biggest event of the year. Last year was the first one of the winter wonderland right.
:No, that was our second year.
John:That's only our third it was big and we were sort of a part of that too, with the parade and some of the things that were happening afterwards, with Santa Claus and the food and drink that was involved in the park, with the hot chocolate and cookies and all that. But tell us what all this winter wonderland encompasses.
:Okay, we start the evening. Last year we tried to incorporate the parade with it and it was just a lot for the day. So this year we have decided that the parade will actually be the first Saturday of December, that Saturday the second, and that'll be at three o'clock, because it was just so hard for everybody to get to all the places.
:It was for the day and then with kids going back to school the next day and stuff, we just had a lot going on. We did move that to the following Saturday. But what we do on winter wonderland is we have our official Christmas tree lighting in front of Town Hall. Before we light the Christmas tree we have all the local pastors reading the story of the birth of Christ. We have carolers singing Christmas songs there. The mayor gives a little speech. Last year we had all the past mayors that were our special guests there.
:We do the lighting of the park of the Christmas, the mineral springs park. We do the lighting of the deck, the halls. We have a holiday market fair inside where vendors sell their goods and things. We have a live nativity at the Bethlehem Stable in the park. We have carolers throughout the whole entire park. We have horse drawn carriage rides through the park and that's sponsored by the Palmetta Business Association. We have the free cocoa and cookies that you talked about. Last year we added two famous mouses. We can't call them by their first names, but they live at Disney and they joined the festivities.
:And then of course, we have Santa and Mrs Claus and we always have snow, so it is a great event. We said I had told the mayor when we first started it two years ago that we wanted it to feel like a Hallmark movie, and we got that a lot. We got that comment that we got exactly what we wanted. So it's a great event and a great turnout.
John:And that will be the Sunday after Thanksgiving. So the only difference is the parade got moved to the following Saturday, so the Winter Wonderland will still be the Sunday right after Thanksgiving.
:Right.
John:All right, looking forward to that. Roberta, thanks for giving us that update on all the events. A lot going on. Of course, the Spring Water Festival, which isn't technically your event, right, but that's coming up next weekend and, from what we hear, I mean they've had to turn vendors away. It's been so popular this year.
:It is and it's going to be huge. We will be there, we'll have our tent there giving out some, some Envision Williamson swag. But it's not our event, but absolutely it's going to be. It looks like it's going to be standing room only this year for everything that's awesome.
John:Looking forward to seeing everybody out there. We'll be out there too, so we'll continue with Roberta and then we'll switch gears, ask her her opinion on some of the the offbeat news stories we've got going on in the world these days. As we continue, it's the Boon Show on my pulse radio. Welcome back to the Boon Show on my pulse radio, our first show of season four. Okay, so we want to talk with our very special guest, roberta Hamby, about some of the things that are there in the news and some of the things that aren't necessarily being talked about with everybody else, because, you know, we don't want to talk about any of the bad stuff and we don't want to get into politics on this show. So so we won't, as we'll just talk about dumb things like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg Getting in a cage match, have you?
Colt:seen this cult. I have. I already have my bets.
John:You do have your bets. Who do you think so? I win?
Colt:Obviously Elon Musk. Do you think so People?
John:people say that Zuckerberg has been really training.
Colt:They say he's the you know the martial arts master. But I think you know, once you get the Tesla mech suit in there, then it's just a giant Iron man versus the lizard fight.
Speaker 4:And at that point, you are conspiracy theorist.
Colt:Elon Musk will win.
John:Okay, you heard it here first folks Elon Musk will be the winner. But here the latest on the on the match. Have you heard about this for better? I have not. Oh yeah, you're really missing out to. These two billionaires have challenged each other to a cage match, MMA style mixed martial arts. Zuckerberg has been training in that for a while, and then I guess Elon kind of challenged him.
Speaker 4:So I'll take you on a fight.
John:And he supposedly has been training some a little bit here and there, but has been coming up with excuses to put the fight off, and lately the excuse is well the not really an excuse. Well, yeah, he said he needed surgery and then he said he was okay and he wanted to do a practice match in Zuckerberg's backyard. Here we are talking about billionaires.
John:Yeah, he has an octagon in his backyard to you know that he practices in, but Zuckerberg didn't want to do that. If we do it, we do it for real, and Dana White, who's the head of the UFC has, says that he'll get involved and they can do this, you know, wherever they want to do it, but he won't hammer down a date and Zuck is getting.
Colt:He's still. He's building a suit. You got to give him time, he's building his seat.
John:Well, he's. He's stalling and so there's no date set, but I got to admit I would watch. That is as and they'll probably make it a paper view that's like a hundred bucks or something. But I got to tell you I may not watch it, then I'll find it illegally somehow, but that is something that you have to say. You watched.
Colt:Yeah.
John:Two of the richest guys in the world trying to beat the heck out of each other.
:That would be, we'll make a watch party. How about that Watch?
John:party sponsored by Envision Winsons, coming up at Town Hall whenever these guys.
:We'll do it outside, outside in the park. Yes, at the park, so everybody in town can watch it.
John:Yes, and this is it's. It's ridiculous at the same time. It's so ridiculous that you know it's the old train wreck thing. You've got to see it. You've got to see it. So whenever this happens, we'll keep you posted right here. Also, have you seen Barbie yet? I have not seen Barbie. I have not either. Colt, have you?
Colt:I was going to go this weekend, but I did not find the time, so yeah, I mean, I'm not real motivated to see it.
John:And it's not a political thing. I know people get it all involved in the movie too about whether it's politically correct or whatever. But you know I was just never a Barbie fan growing up, neither was. I was not a Ken fan.
John:I had my GI Joe's and that kind of thing and never really bothered with Barbie, and even my sisters, they were into other stuff. They were into sports and stuff like that. They didn't really have dolls and so I was never really around the whole Barbie craze. But I can understand, if it's the biggest selling doll of all time, why making a movie about it would be a big deal and it's made over a billion dollars, which is amazing, and I heard a good explanation about this. Because some people say and again, I haven't seen it, but I've heard a lot about it from a lot of different people and most people have said they like it. If you just take it for what it is, it's just a thing about doll coming into the real world.
John:So what they were saying about the people that think it's down on men? They were saying that it's just kind of the way that Barbie was presented originally Ken was never the star, it was Barbie and Ken was just there. So they just made a movie about it where Barbie's the star and doing all the stuff and Ken's the side guy. So it's not like they were doubting men, it's just that's the way it is with the dolls. So it's like, don't take things so seriously, go have fun with it and sure, if it's a women's empowerment thing, sure, fine, ok, we get it.
John:But the funny thing I saw in the news about it this week was that Neil deGrasse Tyson, the astrophysicist one of the smartest guys supposedly out there and I wouldn't doubt it says that by watching the movie he can figure out where Barbie Land actually is.
John:So he said, by watching the movie and seeing the different things that are in the movie and this is funny because we're talking about an astrophysicist breaking down Barbie so closely that he could tell you where Barbie Land is he says, due to the moon's orientation in the movie, places Barbie world between or Barbie Land, whatever it's called between 20 and 40 degrees north latitude on Earth. But then there's more. He says there are palm trees and there are plenty of palm trees in Barbie Land. It's kind of a tropical type of environment. He says that further constrains the latitude to between 20 and 30 degrees and he says the sun and the moon rose and set over the ocean. So he says if it's in the US which you would kind of assume it was just by the characters and how they played and being in Los Angeles and all that and then going to Barbie Land, he would say it would be somewhere in the Florida Keys.
John:I was going to say so if you were going to look for Barbie Land, you would look in the Florida Keys. Now the other people that are really watching Barbie closely say that can't be, because evidently, see, I didn't know this either because I hadn't seen the movie To get to the real world from Barbie Land, you have to go through space, and you wouldn't really have to go through space to get from California to Los Angeles, which is the real world that they wind up going to from Florida.
:Why, unless you're passing through a mile? Unless you go way up in the air and go way back down again, or Miami Beach is kind of like space, if you can't feel that, and maybe in a little different way yes.
John:I lived in South Florida for 10 years. I can vouch for that Crazy, crazy down there. So they're saying, well, that wouldn't really be traveling through space to go from California to Florida and back. But just interesting to me that an astrophysicist would spend that much time looking at it to figure out exactly where it would be by where the sun and the moon are in the sky, where the ocean is and the palm trees he was able to pinpoint.
Colt:He's done weirder. There's this famous I think it was with Joe Rogan, I believe on the Joe Rogan experience, but he mentioned how he kept fussing at James Cameron, the director of the Titanic movie, because the stars in the sky were not correct historically as what the constellations in the sky would have been. How about that? See, that's a guy, that's just entirely too, smart.
John:When you're smart, it begins to be a burden. After.
:Or has too much time on his hands.
John:Yeah, you just see too much error in the world when you know everything. So it's good not to know everything, because then you don't concentrate on where the stars are. I did want to let you know also that today is World Greatness Day, and there is a professor that established this as a festival to honor all things that are great in life to the individuals who have had a significant impact on our lives, whether it's a parent, friend, cherished pet. This is our moment to honor and thank those people. And he said above all, it's also a day to think about your own brilliance.
John:All brilliant in our own ways, I guess Not as much as Neil deGrasse Tyson, but this professor believes that everyone is capable of greatness. That's critical to build confidence and self-esteem. Share that greatness with the rest of the world. So what I was going to ask you guys, and I'll tell you what let's keep it outside of family, because I think we can all say our family, we have heroes in our families that we look up to, but maybe, whether it be another person or an animal, a pet, maybe someone that has inspired greatness in your own life Colt.
John:I'll go to you right away. Yeah, you got a phone. Because the phone's going to ring, I don't have a good answer for that.
Colt:Definitely not my pet. I got a German shepherd husky mix. Her name's Joey and she definitely has none of the smarts from the German shepherd. I'll tell you that much. But is she loyal to you? I think she'd run away if, given the chance.
John:So is there a person that has inspired greatness in you, Colt?
Colt:I mean, this is going to be cliche. I'm going to say my girlfriend. Oh yeah, wow, so I because she, we have been together since eighth grade.
John:And that's five years. You're senior.
Colt:Yeah, it's crazy, and she has inspired me to do so much that I otherwise wouldn't have done that's good. So yeah, she's who I would think of.
John:I have somebody pushing you. That's always good. You don't want it the other way, where they just sit back and let you be you.
Colt:No yeah.
John:I know I've always had people pushing me. What about you, Roberta? You have a person or thing that has really inspired greatness in your life.
:I just would take this opportunity to say specifically law enforcement, and not for me specifically, but just for us as a society. I don't think that they get the recognition they deserve. It's a thankless job. On many occasions they go above and beyond and I just think it's a great profession to be in. That's not paid near enough. Well, and teachers as well Teachers is another profession that you should make a million dollars a year to be a teacher.
John:Well, that sounds good, yes.
:And I'll go to the district office and tell them I think that that's what should happen. But law enforcement officers I just see. I get to work now at Town Hall side by side with them and I see how much they put in and then I see so much negativity that comes back when they're working as hard as they can and put more in than they have to. So law enforcement's definitely make it a great place for us to live and don't get the recognition that they deserve.
John:That's a good answer, and I'll say my dog, dog, dog, ha ha ha. I've had a lot of people, though, that inspire greatness in my life. I'm certainly thankful for them, because I can think of several bosses that well, a couple, not too many. I've had some good bosses, but I've had ones that I really didn't like at the time that wound up being the ones that taught me the most, that shaped me for the future. But I really like coming home to my dog, because I have a nice golden retriever and after a day of dealing with teenagers it's nice to go home and spend some time with the dog and relax a little bit. So that dog is also very important to me on this world greatness day. So think of somebody in your life that inspires you to greatness and give yourself some credit for where you are in life and where you can go All right, when we come back. It's the Boon Show on my Pulse radio. Welcome back to the Boon Show on my Pulse radio.
John:One of the things that today is that I noticed and caught my eye was its chant at the moon day. What is that? That sounds like some cultish kind of thing, but it's really not. I don't think I couldn't find anything that showed that it was cultish, because I did look around, but evidently this is something on every August the 15th, thousands of people around the country. They say chant, but they just kind of yell things into the heavens as part of chant at the moon day. Where did it come from? This is why I think it's not a cultish thing.
John:It came from a Wenatchee, washington based fruit grower, stemilts. They grow all kinds of fruit and, according to local legend, harvesting their cherries around the full moon makes them sweeter. The moon's gravitational pull enhances the tree roots where the cherries are grown. That's what they say, and so they decided to have a celebration. This is late in the season for cherries and they say to gather your friends together, let loose your best lunar cheer, whatever that is. But what they're saying about this whole thing is that cherries, the higher they're grown in elevation, the better they are, and they say there's their cherries, which are called moon cherries.
John:Are harvested very late in the summer and very high up in the Washington mountains, and they actually have to be harvested at sunrise in order to maintain their luster. 62% of the sweet cherries in America are grown in Washington state. California and Oregon combining to make up with those three states 94% of the cherries that we get Cherries, of course, very good for you less than 90 calories in a cup of cherries. And I tell you I could go to the store, buy a bag of cherries and eat the whole thing, unless somebody stops me. Cherries are awesome, but yeah, I don't know about the whole chain at the moon thing, but I thought it was interesting the whole thing about how they grow better at higher elevations and such, so I wanted to share that with you. And, of course, being cherries, my question would be what is your favorite cherry dessert?
Colt:Any cherry without the pit in it.
John:I agree. Well, I will eat the cherries with the pit if I'm just eating them out of the bag, but I don't like the maraschino cherries. Do you like those?
:Yes, I do you like?
John:those, the ones they put on ice cream.
:Yeah, I need to Cherry limates. That's what they use for cherry limates too.
John:No, that's not bad. I've had that in the tessari, but I just don't, I don't know, and banana splits OK, and fruit salad. Yeah, so there's a lot. I mean, I like the traditional cherry pie, one of my favorites cherry cobbler. You know those kind of things, old people food, thanks, thanks a lot.
:That's a little cherry for me, little cherry Cherry, just like a taste of cherry, maybe not too much.
John:OK, and it is also coming up this weekend a chance for you to celebrate, because it is National Soft Ice Cream Day and we all like soft ice cream, right? I like any kind of ice cream, it doesn't matter how soft or hard it is. So it's interesting. The history of soft serve, so to speak. Ice cream is thought to have been around since about 2200 BC, but one of the earliest tales of it is between 50 and 80 AD, when Emperor Nero of Rome sent runners to the mountains for snow, which then he would eat flavored. He would put flavor into the snow, and that was the first kind of report of ice cream. Ok, now people will do that now when it snows, so I'll take it in and make the snow cream right In 1934, get this Tom Carvel ice cream.
John:You know they make the ice cream cakes and all that.
John:Well, yeah, that guy suffered a flat tire in his truck. He had to sell all the melting ice cream in a parking lot and it went over big. The soft ice cream went over very big. Late 1940s. Margaret Thatcher, former UK prime minister, works for a company dedicated developing a soft serve recipe compatible with American machines, so she actually helped bring it to America in the late 1940s.
John:In the 1960s, better soft serve machines were made, evidently not at McDonald's, but mechanized air pumps are added to the soft serve machines, allowing better aeration and boosting sales for ice cream machine manufacturers. And then in the 1950s, illegal soft serve. Yes, whether it's a prohibition or something, yes, the Minnesota legislature actually prohibits the sale of ice milk from trucks, specifying that the dessert has to be sold pre-packaged. So, yeah, you couldn't sell it out of the machines. I guess it had to be packaged up before you sold it. So that was weird and they got over that. And now we have soft serve and it's called different things around all the different countries around the world. And, by the way, it contains 35% air. It's actually fluffy compared to regular ice cream. 70% of people will choose soft serve over hard ice cream. It's actually healthier than ice cream because it has less fat in it, if you're just measuring by fat. If you want a soft cone, in Greece or Romania it's called machine ice cream. Well, that doesn't sound near as good, does it?
John:I would like a machine ice cream, please. In Ireland you ask for a soft whip, soft whip. But I know Ireland loves some soft serve and it seems like it always tastes better in the summertime, that's the time to get soft served. So I mean, what do you like, soft serve-wise?
Colt:Chocolate and vanilla.
John:I mean, do you just eat a regular cone or something?
Colt:Yeah, it has to be on a cone, unless you do a hot fudge Sunday, and then at that point it's, it's acceptable. Yeah but uh yeah, I'm just a regular tone guy.
John:Yeah, I went for a long time thinking that you couldn't have a good sundae with soft serve. It had to be the hard ice cream and then you know, but now I like some of the sun. He's like you go to freddy's or something and get some of their sundaes and their their Soft serves really good.
Speaker 4:Um, where's a good?
John:where's a good soft serve place? Oh.
Colt:Put you on the spot, not McDonald's not McDonald's.
John:Yeah, no, that's though if you have to go kind of place, yeah.
:I'm not a huge ice cream eater, so that's tough for me. Yeah, um, the doghouse right there, right right down the road, they've got ice cream. Yeah, they've got the hard. Do they do that, sir? No, that's just the hard.
Speaker 4:and it's good, they've got a lot of different flavors there, yeah, um, all right.
John:So now it's time for robberto Hamby recommends Dented and dent, and we've got to come up with some sound yeah, we need some music.
John:That that was not it because what what we've done on the show is we always have our guests recommend something food related, whether it's a recipe that they have or a place that they go or a specific place to get something, you know, like a breakfast meal or a lunch or dinner or a dessert or whatever. So, uh, I kind of sprung this on her birdie, right, you, right before the show, and and I'm curious to hear what she has to recommend to us tonight.
:Okay, I've got a couple of things. If you have not tried the pot roast at Reigns and Williamston, I have and that's, somebody recommended that to me and that is great. Oh, wow.
John:Yes.
:If you have it, you need to do it. You owe it to yourself. That and Fried Okra are off the chain. That's right there at Reigns and Williamston. Maple Bakery and Coffee House has some of the best desserts you will ever put in your mouth. They change them up and then their coffees. They can serve them any way you want Hot, cold, any flavor. They're amazing. But personally, something, one of my favorite things to eat is something that nobody's probably ever heard of and it's called tomato gravy and you serve it over cornbread and it's a basic gravy that you make up, just your regular roux and you pour can of tomatoes in it, or you can crush your fresh tomatoes and you salt and pepper and it's tomato gravy. And you crumple up your cornbread and put your tomato gravy over top and it's phenomenal.
John:And where do you get that?
:You make that at home.
John:I just make it at home.
:I grew up on that.
John:So it's kind of like crushed tomatoes or whatever it is.
:Yes, diced tomatoes and you can get real fancy and you can bake in the sausage and things like that in it. But it is great. If you like tomatoes, it's great, just the tomatoes with the basic gravy roux over cornbread.
John:All right, yeah, that sounds like one of those rainy day things.
:It is.
John:Yeah.
:It's a comfort food, yeah, exactly. Going home and comfort food.
John:But I did want to wrap things up by first of all thanking you, roberta, for coming in and spending an hour with us.
John:Thank you for having me, and thanks for everything you're doing with Envision Williamston. It's really taken off and so many different ways as we went through that list for people to get involved, everybody to get involved, whether you're family, kids, older people, you get something for everybody. So again we'd like to thank Roberta Hamby for being with us today. Our next live show is in two weeks, that's August 29th, when Angie Springer will be here for her annual visit from the Cancer Association of Anderson, talking about all the balloon launches and everything that's going to go on Labor Day Not in Williamston this year down in Anderson. That'll be at four o'clock. Of course, you can catch the podcast at any time on Apple, google, spotify, wherever you get the podcast. So thanks again for listening. We'll talk to you next time on the Boone Show on my Pulse Radio.
Colt:Next time on the Boone Show.
Speaker 4:So we've got to only raise two million dollars. That's it now, just two million. As you know, I mean, cancer used to be a death sentence and now it's more of a chronic disease. I will tap, dance or sing. Do you pay me to shut up to make money for cancer patients? So we had to turn a couple of balloons away because we didn't have any lodging for them, you know.
John:Get this. Scientists recorded a Pink Floyd song from patients' brainwaves, it's amazing Holly's been everywhere it's like, no matter what anybody brings up, she's been there.