The cameras on our phones are so advanced, it's got another point where when you see someone with a regular camera, just a camera, they look so out of place.
Is that kind of part of a civil war reenactment?
The value of a photo is, it's changed too. I get emails from my kids schools. They're like, would you like to order your child's school portrait?
The last thing any parent needs is more photos of their children.
Schools should just offer, hey, we'll come over and delete half of your photos. I pay for that.
Because that's what we use our phones for. For photos, emails, directions, anything but talking. When my phone rings, I'm like, well, that's obviously not for me.
I see all the photos down in the booths. Every night, I watch the light from the house upon the hill.
I love a little girl that lives up there, and I can't always feel. But I don't care not for her, though.
The daddy is my old man, so I'll just have to be convinced to see whenever I can.
708 at WRGN, I'm Don Rosen, thanks for joining us here at Civic Media Station, hometown radio will fresh.
It's gonna be a beautiful day today, sunny with a high-tier 43 right now, a clear sky, 24 degrees, and yes, there's frost on the car this morning.
It's a joke. My wife found out this one of those frost on the car and panicked and said, oh, no.
I thought with all the troubles in the world, frost on the car. Oh, no.
Kelly Cruz is here. Kelly is executive director of the downtown Racine Corporation. And good morning. Welcome.
Good morning. Did you watch the Super Bowl? I did. It was great.
I didn't. I just just give me the final score. Actually, I have to go to bed early because I can't, you know, I get to get up at four.
But I woke up and I saw all the highlights and it looked like an exciting second half to me.
Looks like a lot of fun. And yeah, so that was good.
And if you had a good time watching it, that's all the counts, right?
Absolutely. Yeah, the first half was a little slow-moving, but it's still fun for the commercials and half-touches.
Yeah, I didn't see any of the commercials. So are there any good ones?
Nothing that stood up. I mean, gosh, there are some good ones.
I'm going to have to go back and watch them on YouTube.
I actually got a list here.
Said, oh, you know what? I didn't copy the list, some of the commercials.
There was a list of what the commercials, what the good ones were.
And I didn't do it because I didn't watch them.
So I didn't, uh, okay, no, no, it's not there.
No, I didn't save it, but I got a list of the good ones.
And I didn't save it. So after what they believe me, they'll be all over the Internet.
And watch them. Plus, these commercials are going to be run time and time again.
So how was the halftime show? I saw about 15 seconds of it with Usher.
I enjoyed it. Yeah.
I didn't realize he had as many hit songs as he'd done.
Yeah, it hits on, and he knows how to roller skate.
Yeah, that was pretty cool.
You know what it is? I was sleeping. I got up and I walked through the, my wife was watching it.
She had it on anyway. And I walked through and I just took a look at the TV screen and they stopped for a second.
I think Alicia Keys was playing the piano or something and I recognized Usher.
But yeah, I guess if you had a lot of fun, I'd like to pay $10,000 for a seat to the Super Bowl.
You watch it on your couch. These people pay $10,000 a seat.
That's a lot. Yeah, that's a lot. Okay.
So we're going to have a lot of free events.
You could park partake in downtown Racine. And by the way, I'm going to tell you,
one of the saddest days of the year for me is I pass through downtown every day on the way to work
when you shut off and take down the Christmas tree.
Oh, yeah. Yes.
That's one of the saddest days because it's so exciting leading up to Christmas.
The Christmas tree and it was a really beautiful one this year.
And I look at pass it every time it's all lit up and one day I passed by and it was gone.
Yeah, now the holiday banners are also down.
So this is sort of a transition time of year, I guess.
Yeah, boohoo. Yeah, it was going to come to work coming down 16th street.
All the houses are usually lit up and one by one during January.
They shut the lights off. Now there's only one house left with their lights on.
I think it's time to take them down.
They got a snowman lit up. They've got a Santa Claus lit up and they got another thing lit up.
Oh, leave it up for me. I just I hate when they see the last one gone.
All right. So January is in the books downtown and now we've got February
and we've got something coming up on seven day of five days.
Five days from now. What is that?
Yeah, starting this Saturday.
It's the official kick off to our craft beer week.
So that'll just be running throughout Saturday to Saturday in downtown.
A lot of the businesses are running craft beer specials having different tastings
and then every single craft beer that you buy during the week gets you entered to win a big price pack.
So it's just a fun way to highlight some of the Wisconsin breweries and of course
little park breweries downtown. So just a fun something fun to do in February.
Now, I've never had a beer in my life.
I'm one of these people that just for some reason, I've sipped it, I've tasted it, but I've never had a beer.
And it's nothing against it. I just never came up.
So I never had one. So a craft beer.
Is that like a beer that the actual store will make itself or is like a small brewery or what is a craft beer?
Yeah. So they're basically beers are either domestic craft or imports.
And so imports are obviously come from different countries.
And then craft beer is just smaller breweries.
So it's not Miller light or core light. It's crafted in smaller batches.
I mean, you could still, you know, spotted cow is still considered a craft beer.
But that's probably one of the most popular craft beers around, especially in Wisconsin.
So say that again. What was that name of that beer?
Spotted cow.
Spotted cow. Okay. Makes sense.
It's brewed in the new glare is Wisconsin. It's pretty popular.
But there's so many craft beers that have come out in the last years.
It's pretty.
Okay. So yeah.
Now we're talking about beers. Let's talk about the Super Bowl beer.
Because someone scanned social media to find out the most popular Super Bowl beer in all 50 states.
Now the official sponsor of Super Bowl 58 was Bud, I was a Bud Light.
And that didn't rank first anywhere.
So all their money didn't make people drink beer.
All right. Number one in the Midwest was Miller light.
Oh, Miller, of course, is Milwaukee beer.
Yeah.
Then in New England, it was Michelob ultra.
And much of the much of the Northwest, it was a core is light.
I remember when you couldn't get cores on the east side of the Mississippi or the Rockies or whatever it was.
It was only a West Coast West beer.
And they wouldn't sell anywhere else.
That is a beer.
But now that Miller in course combined.
Right there.
Right there.
The same company now.
Yeah.
This one I came to pronounce.
Why UNG, L-I-N-G?
You England?
You ever hear that?
No, I have not.
It's in Pennsylvania.
Number one beer.
And number one, a handful of states around Pennsylvania too.
Budweiser ranked first in Missouri, obviously.
And it was something called Madeleo beer in California and Florida.
Madeleo is in an import Mexican beer.
Oh, see.
I don't know this stuff.
Yeah.
But isn't that funny that the beer sponsor for the Super Bowl 58?
It's a number.
And, you know, they, you know, they spend millions and millions and millions.
Well, maybe the advertising will make a number one next year.
Okay, so the craft beer week is all week.
It's February 17th through the 24th.
And how many breweries, how many beer places you have in downtown that are taking part in this?
We've got about 15 business that are taking part.
So yeah, we've got some good participation.
And, you know, it's craft beer.
Some people love it.
Some people don't.
So it's not for everybody.
But if you do enjoy craft beer, this is really the week.
Oh, good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so showing some support.
Oh, here's a family event.
Take all the family out February 24th through the Chili Ice Walk.
Now, this is renewed to four.
This is the ice sculpture event, right?
Yeah.
So this is a super fun event.
It's grown every year.
So we have ice sculpture actually happening before your eyes.
So this is what makes it a little bit different.
Then say the connoisseur one where they just set the sculptures down and you look at them.
Here, you actually get to see local people crafting and carving and using chainsaws and chisels
and creating something right in front of you.
So it's fun.
And then on top of that, we've got 16 locations that are going to be handing out free chili samples
and trying to vibe for the best chili in downtown.
And that's the name Chili Ice Walk.
I guess it's so like chili, like the food.
That's good.
I like that.
You know, I've seen these before because one year we, our radio station sponsored one of the
ice sculpture people.
So we went down there to watch them do the, and I, I said to them, well, what if you break something off
that shouldn't have been broken off?
Yeah, that does happen.
You know what they do?
They improvise.
I know.
I make it.
They just turn it into something else.
It's a really good plan.
I'll tell you.
But there are some really good ones.
And some of them do holes right in the center where you're like, oh my god, how are they
going to do that?
It's just, I think it's fascinating to watch.
You know, as the day goes on, how they, you know, literally start with the block of ice.
Yeah.
And you know, some of these turn into some of these anxious sculptures.
And you're right.
That's what the guy said to us.
Actually, it was, I think it was a woman who was doing this ice sculpture.
That's what she said.
But if I break something off, it becomes something else then.
It's not what I, it doesn't improvise.
But she doesn't break things off.
She's very careful.
But you're right.
And I was telling you off the air, you watch these people who change us, like Bill Murray
and Groundhog Day, when he was doing the ice sculpture, and he's got that chain saw and
he's running all around it.
That's a, that is an art, which I don't know how they do, because you got to do it fast,
and you have an audience.
It's not like you're making a sculpture in an artist loft or something where you're in
a museum, and you've got, and you've got months to do it.
You only have a short time to do this thing, and you get one block of ice.
That's all they give you.
And you're better.
And some of them, they do eagles with the feathers, and it's just amazing how they put
this stuff together.
I don't, you know, I, I don't have any talent like that.
Some amaze when I see people who have that kind of talent to do it.
And that's going to be an all day thing, bring the family down from noon to four.
And I think the kids, you know, love it.
I know I loved it.
And I'm an adult.
So that's it.
And everybody loves chili, right?
Yeah.
So 16 businesses, that's the most we've ever had participate.
So, you know, there'll be a chili score card.
So that you're welcome.
And now the street, you can kind of rate it from one to five stars, and then of course
someone will be the ultimate winner.
Last year, Pablo Scotson won for the best chili.
And so the race is on, you know, we've got Maple Table, Red Onion, I mean, some stiff
competition here.
They really, they really bring out their best and unique chili recipes for this event.
You've got the white chilies, the vegan chilies, the traditional, the spicy, there's something
for, you know, everyone.
Well, I don't say my wife makes veggie chili, she, I don't need it, but she loves it.
I like meat in my chili.
Well, down to say we're talking to Kelly Cruz, executive director of the DRC.
You're at WRJM 719.
I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes, well, love is all around me, I'm so
excited.
Yeah, this is the one that in love actually tries to change the words to the song to get
a number one hit.
See, that's typical.
You think of the love song version of what movie was in, I think of the baseball movie
that was filmed at the old county stadium, Major League, where they played Wild Thing
by the Trunks.
It's totally different song.
All right, Kelly Cruz is here.
We're talking about events going on downtown, Racine, we've got a ton of them, March.
We've got another pub girl, Patty's pub crawl from three until midnight.
Now, that's not on St. Patrick's Day though.
There's another thing coming up on St. Patrick's Day, but this is leading up to St. Patrick's
Day.
Yeah, you know, we actually started this during COVID when we weren't able to have the
parade.
And it was such a big success that we've continued it, but of course, we like to keep
them separate from the actual parade.
So it is the week prior, but this is just a really fun pub crawl.
There's a scavenger hunt where you have to find somebody with, you know, a green hair
or you have to find all this just iris stuff.
We've got a free shuttle driving around the entire time, so you don't have to worry about
the fact that it might be cold out or, and you don't want, obviously, going to be driving,
so if you can just get dropped off in downtown, the shuttle will take you to all of the locations.
And it's nice, too, because if you're just somebody who wants to come at three o'clock
when it's a little less busy and more of the daytime atmosphere, casual, or you can
come late at night when I'm guessing it gets much crazier.
Or you can see somebody who's in brush their teeth, and he's got the green teeth.
No, that's just the color of his teeth, the green.
The, I have a picture on my cell phone when we had our van in the, okay, let's talk about
this first, then I'll take you to the picture story.
St Patrick's Day parade coming up, it's on the 16th, even though St Patrick's Day on
the 17th.
The 16th is what, a Saturday, I don't have my calendar, of course, yes, it is at the Saturday
at noon.
Okay, St Patrick's Day parade, downtown Racine, floats, music, a lot of fun.
We go every year, one year, I actually brought my dog in the parade, we had our station
van and my wife, we had a beagle, and I have it on my phone, and I'll, I'll text to
you, yeah, when we get down here, maybe during the break, how texted to you, you're on
a cell phone now, right?
Yeah.
Okay, so I can text to you, and you'll see the picture, and we put St Patrick's Day hat
on the dog, he had like a little derby, and he was great.
He looked at the window the whole time, I really loved him, he went with the flow on this
one.
He was, we stuck him in all these parades, and he just went with the flow, I mean, he
didn't bite.
He didn't fight.
He did what was asked of him to do.
Last year, it was, I believe, with the wind, she'll probably negative 20 to 30 degrees
out.
It was, by far, absolutely, the coldest parade, including the holiday parade, during the
St Patrick's last year, and this year should look much different given the, the warmer temperatures
we've been having.
It's so interesting that St Patrick can literally be minus 30 degrees or 60 degrees in Wisconsin,
and you just don't know.
You know, it's funny, because one year, I'm watching the St Patrick's Day parade, and
this little girl was sitting next to us, and I'm looking for that picture while I'm
talking to her.
I'll find it just a minute.
The little girl was sitting next to us, and the newspaper photography game by took
a picture of her.
She was all a little, you know, decked out and her stuff, and there was my foot in the
picture.
So I cut the picture out, and they said, well, we're looking at it.
I say, looking at my foot, well, there's a little girl in the picture wearing, I know,
forget the little girl, look at my foot, my foot, they said, but the little girl, I said,
I know the little girls in the picture, but so's my foot.
So anyway, so St Patrick's Day parade, they always have nice floats with, with music
playing.
It's not as big as the Christmas parade, not as big as the fourth of July parade, which
is three hours long, but it's a good parade, it's a fun day.
Yeah, it's about 65 floats, which means it's about 45 minutes, and everything moves pretty
fast, which is a good thing, so you can come down and enjoy it regardless of the weather.
And then hopefully you stick around, a lot of the businesses are offering corn beef
in.
Corn beef and other Irish favorite type food, Irish stews, so we'll compile that list and
make sure that we promote it so that you can get down there, of course.
You know, the Ivan Hope hub is, and eatery is a great Irish establishment, so they'll
be having a full Irish menu, and I believe they open at 8 a.m. that day, maybe even
earlier.
You know, and they're cooking up Irish breakfast and just, you know, everybody celebrates
St Patrick's Day a different way, so you can make it your own.
You know, I must be a real party pooper, because every St Patrick's Day around that time,
my wife has corn beef and cabbage, and I don't like it, I don't like it, but she gets
right in that holiday mood, and she gets part of the process, and I don't, I don't know
what, I just am very picky about what I eat, and I don't like anything.
Yeah, but then there's other people that, you know, wait all year to have that, you know,
it's a delicacy, so, and Irish banger, I mean, there's all sorts of food, but definitely,
if you're looking for some very traditional Irish food, stop at the Ivanome.
All right.
So here's my fourth of July, my fourth of July, here's my St Patrick's Day story growing
up.
When I was in grammar school, I probably the third grade or second grade, you had to
get, you had to wear something green, they kind of forced you into it.
And so my mother bought me a plastic tie, but it was, it was a super big tie, but it
was meant to be over big, because it was, you know, for St Patrick's Day, it was meant
to be a little goofy, and I said, I'm not wearing it, so she said, it's got a big sham
rock on it.
It's, but it's huge.
And I said, I'm not wearing it.
She said, what if I cut it down the size?
So she cut it and made it a normal size tie, and I wore it, and all the other boys were
the big tie and everybody loved them, and I had the skinny one that nobody liked.
I told you, I can't get into these holiday things, even when I was about seven or eight
years old, I can, I made my mother cut it down and she said, but this is what it's supposed
to be.
It's supposed to be a big, big tie with a sham rock.
I said, I don't want to wear it, don't make me wear it.
And she cut it down and all the other kids had the big tie and everybody was having fun
with them with their big.
Can I try it on?
Because we only held on by a piece of elastic, but yeah, so I told you I'm a party pooper.
I'm not good on holidays.
Hold on.
Hold on.
We got so much more to talk about.
I'm going to, I'll text you that picture now, my dog in the car with the Derby on the
green Derby.
Can I post it to our socials?
It's an old picture.
Anyway, we'll see.
I'll first take a look at it, then we'll decide.
Kelly Cruz, executive director of the DRC, a WRJ on a civic media station, hometown radio,
we're fresh.
It's 729.
Everybody thinks eating meat is disgusting.
Don't get me wrong, you eat meat, it's delicious, but here's how you can tell everybody thinks
eating meat is gross.
Just watch how you react when somebody asks you to eat an animal, you're not used to
eating.
Hey, buddy, you want a gerbil burger, then somebody asks you to eat a reindeer, then you're all
confused because you can't remember if reindeer's are real or not.
You guys want the Super Bowl, maybe wants the Super Bowl.
Here's the thing I like, is at the end of the Super Bowl, they get hats like New York
Giants, they got the hats, say they win, New York Giants, 2008 Super Bowl champs, but there's
another set of hats, the Patriots don't ever get to see, they just send them immediately
to the third world or something, and I don't know exactly, but I'm willing to bet there's
a lot of kids in Cambodia who think the Patriots won that game, like a whole alternate history
of sports over there, like they never heard of the Yankees or the Bulls, everyone's wearing
Buffalo Bills t-shirts.
It's 736 at WRTN, hometown radio refreshed a civic media station at Fort
400 AM, 99.9 FM, and 98.1 FM.
Thanks for joining us this morning, going to be a beautiful, sun-shining day today with
a hundred forty-three, part of the clotting lows around 28 tonight, sun-shining tomorrow
with a hundred thirty-seven right now, a clear sky and twenty-four degrees, crossed on the
car this morning, cleaned it off before you drive, bucked against the nuggets in Milwaukee
tonight, 630 PM game time here at WRJN, and right now, Kelly Cruz, executive director of
the downtown Racine Corporation is here so much events, so much stuff going on downtown
Racine.
But the Christmas tree is not up anymore, and I know it's not good to leave that stuff
up year round, and I know that, but when you finally take it down, it's like, Christmas
is over.
You know, it's too bad our lights couldn't change for like red for Valentine's Day and
then green for, you know what they say, Patrick, yeah, ours don't do that, but it would
have been cool.
And then maybe we could have kept, you know, you can't leave Christmas stuff up year
round, and I'll tell you why, because if it did, it wouldn't be special.
That is true.
That is very true.
And it doesn't, I mean, that stuff, it takes its toll in the, in the element, yeah.
But you need to make sure that the reason we love it so much around Christmas time is
because it comes out once a year at Christmas time.
If we ate turkey every day for dinner, we wouldn't think saying thanksgiving was special.
If they had parades every single day, we wouldn't think parades are special.
It's that they do them at special times and that's what, and I know that, but I still feel
bad when I, you know, don't see the Christmas stuff up.
That's just me.
All right.
So we do have, we do all the things to make us happy.
We talked about what's coming up in February and March and April.
This is interesting.
The candy hop, April 6th from noon to two, the candy hop, tells me, yes, this is definitely
a kid, a kid-friendly event and it's just around Easter and we probably get 30, 40 businesses
that participate and it's, I think of it like trick-or-treating for Easter because the
kids get to walk around and get candy from all of the different stores.
There's a fun scavenger hunt that they can do along the way and it's just a, you know,
just something fun to do this time of year.
So it's outside.
So Halloween in April.
I guess so, but the Easter theme.
Oh, the, oh, it's right.
Oh, you Easter.
I forgot.
What an idiot.
What an idiot.
That's right.
Easter candy.
I didn't think about that.
Yes.
All right.
All right.
I should have known that.
You know, we used to have it Easter time in our house in our neighborhood.
Our next door neighbor, Bill Richard, was a chicken and egg man.
That's what he did.
He delivered chicken and eggs and that's what he did.
At Easter time, he used to boil all these eggs and make hard boiled eggs and they used
to color them the day before Easter and then when we woke up, there were eggs all over
the neighborhood on the lawns, all colored hard boiled eggs.
Yeah.
And I knew he did it because it was my next door neighbor and I helped color the eggs some
years, you know, I was over there coloring them and then they used to get up at like
three in the morning and put them on everybody's lawns.
So when you woke up in the morning, that's fun.
Yeah.
We grew up at the age where we actually picked up actual hard boiled eggs.
You know, more than you respect eating, I remember it being eating eggs salad for the next
week straight for every meal.
Yeah.
Because that's that you actually used eggs, you know.
Yeah.
And I think that Bill Richard just turned 101 recently, he lives in Florida with his son
and he's 101 years old.
Yeah.
It's funny that the things you remember growing up when you were a little kid and that's
when I was like in kindergarten, maybe before kindergarten, waking up and say, oh, they're
on the lawn and I should have known that because I helped color them.
But it was still a fun thing.
So the candy hop for Easter, I couldn't, I couldn't believe I forget it was Easter.
Yeah.
Because Easter is very early this year, you know, which is I would be remiss to say that,
you know, with lent coming up this week, there are so many restaurants downtown that are
offering specialent and menus and we have some of the best fish fry in our downtown with
some of these locations.
So.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
My wife and I had some of the fish fries.
Very good.
Excellent.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yard arm.
Sharp room.
Yard arm.
Oh, my goodness.
So this goes on.
Joey's Yard arm.
I can't even say it.
My New York ease is coming out.
Joey's yard arm.
I dropped the yard.
Yard arm.
Great fish, great atmosphere, been to Ivan O's great, some of the restaurants all around
632.
Just do great work.
Very good.
Oh, amazing.
Yeah.
The Celter Stroll is coming up April 20th from 1 to 6 p.m.
Now I like Celter, but I like plain Celter, and that's not this is this is hard Celter.
Okay.
Yes.
I should call it the hard Celter Stroll, but it's just called the Celter Stroll.
I mean, there are so many new Celters, hard Celters coming out into the market every
year.
And people who do like them, it's similar to craft beer, if you drink Celter beers,
then you're going to want to try all of the newest flavors because there are so many
that are coming out right now.
So every year, we've started doing this.
I believe this will be our fourth or fifth year doing it.
And it's just a really fun day where you walk around downtown and you guys kind of get
to see which ones you like.
So you're not committed to buying a whole six pack of something, maybe you bring home
and you think, oh boy, I don't like that.
You know, and while we're talking here, what do you think I'm doing, I'm drinking lemon
Celter.
Oh, I love it.
Yeah.
I am a big Le Croix person myself.
Well, this is this is actually called sparkling ice, do you ever get that the big tall skinny
bottles?
No.
I drink Le Croix as well.
Yeah.
It's called sparkling ice.
It's lemonade flavored sparkling water.
It's, you know, Celter.
No sugar, but added vitamins and antioxidants, so that's supposed to make you feel good
about drinking it.
But it doesn't any sugar in it.
That's why I'm drinking it this morning.
Hold on.
I got to take a sip.
Now that we're talking about it.
Mmm.
Wakes me up in the morning, that in five hour energy, wake me up every morning.
Okay.
So that's an April.
Now as we get into May, the weather turns a little nicer and we're getting to more
events and we kick it off with first Fridays, 41st Friday coming up.
The first one is May 3rd, 4pm till 9pm.
First Fridays is now legendary in downtown Racine, used to be a new event.
Now it's just legendary.
Yeah.
We have amazing first Friday in downtown Racine.
We averaged in the summertime around nearly 7,000 people per event coming to downtown.
And just last year, we started giving every Friday, 1st Friday a theme, just to make it
more fun and interesting so that didn't feel like you were constantly going down town
for the same, you know, a groundhog day type of thing, so speaking of that.
But yeah, so we're having a lot of fun with the themes.
People are really liking them and in May, we're going to be doing a foodie first Fridays.
And during the first Fridays, we're kicking off a brand new event, which let me tell you
that feedback has been stellar on and we're calling it Feast on the Streets.
And we have 10 restaurants participating and it's a ticketed portion so you can still
come down to our foodie first Fridays and we're going to be doing a lot of fun things
around that theme.
But if you also purchase a ticket for the Feast on the Streets, you'll get to stop at
10 different locations and sample small bites of different foods.
So everything from Vero International cuisine to the red onion to Davino Gelato for a dessert,
a chit chat, I mean, we've got pretty much, we've got Irish food from Ivan.
We have every type of food under the sun and this thing.
So people are really excited about this, getting to try some new items that maybe you don't
want to, maybe you've never been to Chit chat and you're not sure if you like Pakistan.
This is a great way to try it, right?
If you haven't been to Vero yet, this is a great way, they're going to give you a plate
full of things.
So it's just, it's really exciting and all of our ticketed events, like the Feast on
the Streets and the Celter Stroll and our Wine Walks.
You can find all of those on eventright.com and just search downtown Christine.
So those tickets you can purchase now or you can, you know, wait, hopefully the Feast
on the Streets doesn't sell out, but if you are interested, that is a really new, exciting
event that we're looking forward to.
Now when I say Pakistani restaurant, what do you think of, do you think a sign, Phil?
Oh, no, I didn't.
Do you remember that?
He goes into a restaurant and the guy is serving, he's from Pakistan and he's serving
regular American iced food, you know, hamburgers and hot dogs and stuff.
And Jerry says, why don't you turn it to a Pakistani restaurant and the guy loses his shirt
and everything and is sent back to Pakistan?
You don't remember that episode?
I don't remember that one.
Remember the, I remember the no soup for you.
No, that was the soup Nazi.
Yeah.
And he said, Jenny Seinfeld, you're a very bad man, Jenny Seinfeld, very bad.
He said, you know, we go Pakistani, nobody come in.
It was a very funny episode.
I will tell you that chit chat is so popular.
It is so well loved.
They've got great vegan food items, also regular meat items, but some people are scared
to try it for the first time.
And this is really what this event will do is it's going to allow people to try some
different places that, you know, they haven't had yet.
I've had Pakistan.
It's delicious, but you got to try it.
Yeah.
And also on this is also going to be Margarit and Eve both at the hotel verdict.
So for those of you who have not tried their food yet, this again will be a great way
to get a little sampling of those, of both of those locations.
Now, could you go into the hotel verdict and can you go in there and have dinner or
eat without having to stay overnight?
Of course.
Okay.
Yeah.
Because I live only a few blocks away and it wouldn't pay for me to stay overnight.
What?
No, no.
Both restaurants are open to the public.
Margarit is a fabulous Italian restaurant.
And then Eve, a lot of people think it's not open this time of year because it is a
rooftop.
But it's enclosed, but yet it has the wall, the floor to ceiling windows.
So they have fabulous small bites to eat a great bar, beautiful views, and they're open
year round as well.
And so if you haven't been down there to the hotel verdict yet, just walk right into
the lobby and then you can either choose to go to Margarit or you can go upstairs to
Eve and you will not be disappointed.
A friend of mine eats a chitchat all the time and he posts it on Facebook every time he
goes in there.
And I see the outside, but you know what's not good when you post pictures of food?
It doesn't turn out right for some reason.
It looks delicious in person.
Now when you post a picture of it, it never turns out that it always looks a little off.
But yeah, he always goes to chitchat.
He loves that.
And this is I love Pakistani food.
I got to go in there and try the I got to try a lot of these places and you know, I'm
lazy.
That would be great for you.
Right?
So sampling each.
Yeah.
Yes.
Exactly.
That's what I need.
All right.
Stay with us.
Kelly Cruz is here executive director of the downtown Racine Corporation.
It's up a few more events to talk about before the half mark, halfway marked in this
year.
And we'll do a quick review of what's coming up in February.
Okay.
That's coming up straight ahead.
It's going to be a beautiful sun shining day today with a high near 43 degrees partly
cloudy.
Lose around 28 tonight.
Sunday tomorrow with a high near 37 tomorrow.
Right now it's clear.
In the mid 20s around Racine, don't forget tonight the buck to the nuggets play live 6.30
p.m. on W R J N radio hometown radio refreshed a civic media station 1400 a.m. 99.9 FM and 98.1 FM
749.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Rock your body.
Yeah.
Everybody.
Yeah.
Rock your body right.
Back.
Straight.
Back.
All right.
Oh.
Oh my god.
We're back again.
Brothers sisters everybody say.
When I ring the flame I'll show you how.
Got a question for you better answer now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yup.
Yeah.
I want to see you all.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Damn.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kelly Cruz, executive director of the DRC, as he would be downtown for scene cooperation.
I sent her the picture of my dog in the St. Patrick's Day parade wearing that little derby
on his lap.
It's kind of cute picture.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It was kind of cute.
And he's one of those dogs that just let you do anything to him.
He didn't care.
He went with the flow.
We used to hang stuff on his head all the time during all these different parades
and everything.
I'm trying to think one parade we were in on the on the St. Patrick's Day when we made
it.
It wasn't this one, but we had a big boat.
You know, green bow tie.
He was wearing.
He just went with the flow.
Okay.
Let's talk about some of the other events leading up to the halfway mark of 2024.
I can't believe we're talking about that.
We talked about the first Friday, the food eat on first Friday and the feast on the
street the same day, four to seven PM.
You know, you talk about this food stuff and I'm starving now.
Yeah.
Then the next day, we've got a wine walk and the following week two wine walks two weeks
in a row there, one to six PM.
So after you load up on the food, you go to the wine walk the next day.
Where's that being there?
Yeah.
These these wine marks have really become so popular.
That's why we have them two weekends in a row because we we do sell out.
And it is just a fun day to it's not just for the ladies either.
We have a lot of men that do it and people like to shop and take their time.
Well, they stop it over 20 locations.
There's snacks along the way.
But the really the fun part is, you know, you can make it your own.
If you want to stop the dimples and shop for a while and skip another location, then you can do that.
Or if you prefer, you know, going into a bar and sit down for a while.
And, you know, everyone makes it their own adventure.
Plus, it falls near Mother's Day, which it's a great bonding.
So usually the fourth is usually the Kentucky Derby.
So we get women wearing a lot of the hats.
And then on May 11, we get a lot of mother and daughters that do it together for Mother's Day.
So it's just and they have just exploded in popularity.
People love them and all the wine comes from uncorked.
Yes.
Yes.
So we support.
So it's really just we're supporting small businesses from start to finish on it.
The uncorked was started by our former general manager of WRJN and his wife.
Tim Edis is here.
Yes.
And Edis and Terry Edis, they started uncorked.
They live in Madison now.
But he started.
They started uncorked together.
And it's one of the best one stores I've ever been in before.
I mean, they've started on six street.
Yes.
They started on six street, which is now a restaurant.
And they moved it over to Main Street.
Right.
Absolutely.
I forgot about that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Both great people.
Yeah.
It's been a fabulous addition to our downtown sense of sense.
It started with Tim and Sherry and Tony continues to do a phenomenal job running it.
So it was great.
And one of my one of my best friends is wife works there as well.
Victoria.
Oh, nice.
Victoria works there.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Victoria and her sister.
Yep.
They worked there.
And Kurt Vollman used to work here.
He just was on the air with me not too long ago.
Talking about this day's year at WRJN.
So we got the whole WRJN people involved in uncorked one way or another.
Yeah.
You mentioned the hats that the women wear on Kentucky Derby Day.
Always reminds me like we just walked out of my fair lady or something.
You know, they have those big hats they had in my fair lady walking around with them.
It's so fun though.
Yeah.
They just, you know, they're bonding.
And they're, you know, it's one of those days where especially by May you're ready to get out of the house.
You're ready to start doing things and start making plans.
It doesn't matter if it's 80 degrees out, 50 degrees out or the women are going to come and enjoy it.
And the men too.
I'm telling you there's a lot of men that do the wine walk.
Yeah.
During the wine walk too, there are also beer stops.
So if you want to come with a group that maybe you're not into wine, have no fear.
There's also 10 beer stops along the way.
So it's a combination.
And our final one to talk about today is the Racine Harbor Market because why why found the guy who sells local honey at the harbor market?
And so now we buy from him year round.
He's located in Caledon.
I think in Caledon.
You're right there on the three mile road.
And we go to his house and he shows up at the Racine Harbor Market to sell local honey.
And I just buy it from.
I bought it from my wife for Christmas.
She wants to get me a £1 jar of honey.
I did.
It's like a drug deal.
I go to his driveway, hand on the cash.
He hands me this jar.
That's what it looked like.
Yeah.
I have one of those one time things of the money from him too, I believe.
And it's great because it lasts so long and you have it for everything that you might need.
And you don't even have to worry about it.
But yeah, the harbor market is coming back this summer.
We're going to have seven dates again.
And once again, it's a collaboration with the Kenosha Harbor Market, the downtown nursing corporation,
and the Racine Parks and Rec department.
And so the three departments all work together here and make this a reality.
And it is just, it's really a fantastic event.
It's got live music, acoustic live music every time.
There's prepared food, there's prepackaged food.
Produced as the season goes on, obviously.
The May one might not have as much produce just because it's Wisconsin.
But as the summer goes on, there'll be more and more produce than theirs as well.
As well as just artisan goods.
Okay, so Rob, quickly here in February coming up the 17th through the 24th,
will be the craft beer week.
That's the 17th through the 24th.
And on the 24th of this month, the chili ice walk, it's going to be chilly.
You're going to have ice sculptures out there, but also not just chili.
You're going to have chili real chili, meat chili, veggie chili.
You can actually have food chili.
We have to make that clear.
The chili refers to 16 locations.
So you'll be full by the time you leave.
And, you know, I like hot chili, like really spicy chili.
The older I get, the less spicy I want it.
But I'm sure there's something there for everybody.
And I can't wait for that. That's kind of the 24th.
I will be there, the chili walk.
Oh, good.
Hey, I thank you very much for, well, you said to get up early anyway.
But thank you for joining us early in the morning.
Kelly Cruz, the executive director of the downtown Racine Corporation.
We give the website, by the way.
We are RacineDowntown.com.
RacineDowntown.com.
Hold on the line a second, Kelly.
Don't go anywhere.
It's 758 at WRJ, an early room coming up next year.
I'm Don Rose, and I'll catch you tomorrow morning bright and early.
6 a.m.
Here at the Civic Media Station, WRJN, the hometown radio refreshed.