Good morning, Wisconsin.
Morning, world.
It's a new day.
Thanks for kicking it off with us at WFHR.
Got your host, James J. Mayloff, behind the mic.
I am joined by our head of news, our co-host, Melissa K.
Good morning.
I am the best listeners in radio.
Thanks for being here, everybody.
We're going to kick things off the way we like to, the way we've been liking to.
We haven't been able to do it for a while.
We got Bernie Merlow back with us, everybody.
Yeah!
Wait, let me make the...
Yeah!
Yeah!
There we go.
There we go.
Brittany, good to have you back with us.
How you been?
Oh, great to be back.
I've been fantastic.
You know, I went down the Florida, soaked up some heat and dragged it right back up here with
these green eyes.
I wanted to thank you for that.
That was nice.
How much that cost it as an add-on or anything, like a carry-on, anything like that, but that
was really nice of you.
Let me just shove the sun into this suitcase here.
Never mind me.
Could anybody blame you?
Yeah.
I'm surprised you found some sun down there, by the way, absolutely.
It took a minute.
It did take a minute.
I first got down there and I looked like local because I was in my winter jacket still.
High temperatures were only in the fifties, but it's very humid and moist, so it actually
felt just as cold as we do when we're probably like in the teens.
So I wasn't actually freezing for the first few days, but it did warm up, and now those
winds are really going to be surging out of the south.
We're going to see gusts today sustained, a constant wind in the 20s, and then we're going
to be gusting up to about 40 miles per hour throughout this afternoon and evening.
So we can see some power outages throughout tonight, possibly, but that's bringing in the
warmth.
That's going to give us the highs of about 40 degrees today, which is only, I think,
7 degrees away from a record back in the 1900s that we have set.
So extreme warmth in the time that we shouldn't be seeing it, but we'll take it.
And it's kind of an up and down week where we have a warm front today, a cold front tomorrow,
a warm front Thursday, a cold front Friday.
So a little up and down, a taste of something for everyone, but we both see the sunshine
for most of the week, which is good.
Good to hear.
You know, typically when I want hot and cold treatments, I don't need help from other
patients.
No, no.
You know, like this seems like a little bit put upon really really messes with the body,
really messes with the mind and all that too.
Pretty my aunt, Deb is living in Florida now and she sent us my, my folks and I have
a picture of the snow down there and everything and I was telling her and I'm curious if
you were able to help any of our friends in Florida with what to do with this kind of
weather.
They have no idea how to handle this.
We thought we'd give tips.
We've got a handful of listeners down in that area and everything and in some warmer areas
that have been hit by snow.
So we're giving them tips on what to do, like stay indoors, like things like that.
Shovel with your knees, not your back.
You got to shove with the knees, get into the little things.
Find an empty parking lot and practice whipping donuts because that's how you learn how to handle
your vehicle and snow.
Okay, that should be number one, right away, right at the top.
That is number one.
I don't think anything could top that one.
You know if your locals were trying that, but I have not, make sure you know that parking
lot.
So there's not any of those little cement barriers, you know what I'm saying?
Yeah, or like poles.
See, this is why she's the best and it's good to have her back.
Thanks, Brittany.
We're good to have you back.
You have a good morning.
You too.
Thank you.
Thanks, Brittany.
Best in the business right there.
That feels good.
Good to have the team back here.
That's fine.
We appreciate you all joining us.
We got good stuff on the way for you.
The El Café birthday anniversary club right around the corner.
We'll also get into, we got a hotel hack for you for the best place to put your luggage.
Maybe not where you thought.
Okay.
Not where I thought at least.
Got that one coming up.
Starbucks is doing something weird again and nutrition labels may be moved to the front
of food packages.
I've been, I've been itching to get into this one with you Melissa.
So I'm looking forward to diving into that.
Nine o'clock hour.
We're going to feature some entertainment news.
We're going to talk Renee Zellweger, Pamela Anderson.
And we have these bands have the most valuable shirts.
That could be an interesting one, I think.
It might be some monetary value or just sentimentality value.
It looks like they're talking dollar amounts here and everything.
So there might be like somebody who has, you know, a shirt that's worth a lot more than
they realize.
We're also going to talk some local entertainment, some things going on in their area.
And I have one little bit later in the nine o'clock.
People who don't watch TV say they do these 15 things instead.
Huh.
I thought this one might be a good one for us, Melissa, so we'll be on a little bit later.
Often do not watch TV.
Yeah.
But see how many things I do.
But I have to start here.
And actually, I feel like we already started with that a right story, Brittany not having
warm weather in Florida.
I mean, the weather, we kind of started already there, but this one, this is sort of that
a right story.
But this is one where, now, not to it all compare animals and children.
Not to do that, but to do that for a second, if you just, just hear me out.
Because I have, I know I can put my foot down when need be, but I've never been the best
at it.
I'll admit that.
And I am in horrible at it when it comes to children.
And when it comes to my own children, I'm a million times worse.
Now, I'm going to keep the kid from touching something hot, of course, but really when it
comes right down to, you know, certain things, I'm not really good at it.
And then there's, you know, I never had animals growing up, and I'll suddenly start
having dogs and everything.
And well, dogs are literally like, they have evolved to read our faces.
This is how dogs got domesticated.
It's actually a really cool history, if you look into it, how wolf dogs learn to read
human faces, get some food, get asked to be brought inside.
And then before we know it, you know, we've got, he made societies and all these things.
So dogs are literally scientifically trained to be able to read our faces and look for empathy
and pull it out of us.
Another animal that we don't mind, might not realize this, monkeys, monkeys are pretty
good at this.
Okay.
And I have no doubt that this monkey was able to manipulate these, these people.
A South African security firm said teams were dispatched to a home where a panic alarm
turned out to have been triggered by a thieving monkey.
Oh, dear.
Who didn't get arrested, by the way?
Just spoiler alert.
I'm going to tell you that right now, monkey not arrested, no crime, not charged with
anything.
Security company MI7 national group said on social media that its control room received
multiple panic alarm signals from a home in Northdale on a day right after Christmas.
And they were very worried about this, especially the day after Christmas that can be, you know,
sometimes people are traveling, so they wouldn't be home.
Yeah.
Which was the case for a couple of these homes and people worried people were breaking
in.
It was the monkey, a monkey that fled it with the remote.
It stole the remote and it started hitting the buttons on it and turning on the alarms,
which triggered alarms in other homes, which is weird that that can happen as a side note
here.
I didn't even know that was a thing.
But yeah, so they were able to, you know, fix everything and calm everybody down.
But this South African monkey, I'm telling you, like, that's a pretty good story.
I enjoy that one.
And this one is pretty cool too.
Do you know much about Melissa about growing hot peppers?
Not a lot.
No.
I, when I was living into Cal, I had a good friend of mine, Vince, and a good morning
to him.
He happens to be listening.
He does everyone's in a while.
Vince, just a really laid back cool guy, play guitar, video games.
And I'm over there doing that with him and he's like, hey, I got to go check out my
peppers.
What are you talking about?
He's outside.
And he's got a bunch of peppers just bacon in the sun.
And if you really want to grow hot peppers, this is, this is how you do it.
You just let them bake in the sun and let the sun take up all this heat and everything.
And that's how you make hot peppers.
It's part of how you make it.
I'm simplifying it.
But an environmental group of Mississippi might have done something similar to this.
They have broken a Guinness World Record with a cayenne pepper plant that grew to be nearly
16.5 feet tall.
Henry Pope, the lead grower and plant geniuses of Mississippi Foundation for Renewable Energy,
said he spent seven years cross pollinating specific pepper plants with an aim towards
creating a variety of plant ideal for vertical gardening.
Quote opportunity for creating a world record of any kind was never the goal.
He told the local newspaper.
Side bonus.
Yeah, the goal was the same as it always is for us to produce a natural variety of edible
plant that is beneficial to those who wish to become less reliant on the grocery stores.
The current record was set in 1999 in California by Laura Lingy with 16 feet, so just barely
beat it.
Pope had a team of measurement specialists, plant experts and local officials measuring
the cayenne to bring it to see if it was the rural record.
And it was.
The record keeping organization now review evidence from other measurements from other
people that have done similar things, but nobody is doing it for the reasons that Mr.
Pope is doing it.
And I think it's pretty kind of, there's some really cool things here going on with
this.
And it's so much more about one of the more important things, I think, to people whether
they realize that or not, and options, whether we're talking about going to the doctor and
having options there, or we're talking about in our food and how we get it, how we make
it, how we, how we ingest it, all those things.
Well, and having the ability to grow when you don't have land, when you don't have a lot
of land, and being able to grow vertically takes that out of the equation.
And feels like that's a good idea, feels like that's what we should be on, we should
be definitely getting out of everything.
And stuff like this too, there's no downside, there's no negative to this or anything.
That's pretty cool.
And just a side note, the Mississippi, as long as you like cayenne pepper, this is being
done in the Mississippi Foundation for Renewable Energy.
I don't think we talk about the South, we talk about Mississippi, or we talk about any of
these things, and we talk about renewable energy, or these kind of things very often.
Mississippi is a hotbed for this stuff, no pun intended, and there's a lot more of this
going on in the South than I think we realize.
And I think that is pretty cool and deserves as much attention as this record and as what
this environmental group is working to do.
Yeah, I agree.
I think we all too often, and especially in the mainstream media, focuses on the negatives.
It will be who of us, a whole lot more to start focusing on the positives and put our
energy into that.
Mm-hmm, nicely done.
We will take a time out, we'll come back after hanging out with our partners here.
We'll have the Elcafe birthday anniversary club coming up on the morning show.
It is time for the birthday anniversary club, but one of our favorite parts of the day,
we get to celebrate you and our great friends over at Elcafe.
We encourage you to treat yourself.
Get on over to Elcafe, 221 Market Avenue and beautiful port Edwards, taking a look at
their Facebook page, they have got their specials up and boy, they heard you loud and clear
and they have brought back by popular demand, their French onion soup.
Ooh, yum.
Mm-hmm.
And the picture of their sandwich there looks delicious.
It really does.
Looks like they did some high quality checking too and were able to guarantee that the breakfast
trio sandwich is also delicious.
Keep that in mind.
Taste tested it themselves.
Yes, good on them.
Good on them to do that.
But they also have a chili cheese omelette this morning with fruit or pancakes and toast
or fruit or potato and toaster pancakes.
I've never seen dollars, you really can't go get better than that and it includes your
beverage.
No, I'm not kidding, man.
You can't beat that.
Wow, that is a really good price for that.
That's really good.
That took me off.
I'm also thinking about omelettes.
I've never really tried omelettes.
Maybe I should give my try.
Maybe I should give my shot.
I don't know.
I like it, James, because a basic omelette is just eggs and cheese.
Then there you go.
I can really like those too.
That's right.
Yeah, I do like those.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think you'd like it.
Maybe some bacon bits in there.
Don't people put stuff inside them and everything?
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
I like that.
All right.
Well, maybe I'll try it over at El Café for the first time.
Oh, shoot.
I'll meet you over there, everybody.
A 221 Market Avenue and beautiful port.
Edwards.
Wish them a great day from us and buy local support locals.
Support those that support our communities.
Lunch looks good too.
Hot beef sandwich or a roast beef wrap.
Oh, God.
That's good.
I love roast beef.
That's good stuff.
Give us your birthdays and anniversaries, everybody.
We want to celebrate with you.
Send them to info at wfhr.com.
You can email us that way.
You can direct messages on our Facebook pages.
Like our pages, please.
We appreciate you doing that.
And of course, you can call up.
That's right.
715-424-2600.
Look forward to talking with you, everybody.
Remember, you're just to touch your true way on the Civic Media app.
And we greatly thank every one of you for downloading that app.
It's free.
Well, let's say I need one through three.
Ooh, let's go three today.
I didn't mean for us to rhyme there, but that was great.
That was good.
First up, we wish Happy Birthday to Amanda Pritzel.
Happy Birthday, Amanda.
Wishing you a good day, Amanda.
Hope it's a good one for you.
Mm-hmm.
Then we wish a very Happy Birthday to Caroline Bush.
Happy Birthday, Caroline.
It's a great name, Caroline.
It's a great name.
Enjoy your day, Caroline.
Hope it's a good one for you.
And our qualifier today, Colleen Johnson.
Oh, Happy Birthday, Colleen.
And congratulations.
Just great names all around today.
Oh, yeah.
Enjoy your day, Colleen.
And we say, brag to friends, family, strangers, pets.
Everybody, brag to them that you are our qualifier for today.
And brag at El Café because you'll get free pie.
Yes, do that.
Do that, everybody.
Yes, thank you, Melissa.
We need to mention that more.
Yeah.
They spoil us over there.
They're awesome.
Thank you.
And keep in mind, everybody.
We are getting to the end of January here, which is just shocking, which we're going to be
pulling our winner in the beginning of February pretty quick here.
So, Colleen and all the rest of our qualifiers keep on listening.
We take a look at our celebrity list of birthdays.
Ariel Winter is 27.
Most famously known as Alex on Modern Family.
Okay.
I kind of expected to see a lot more from the Modern Family team.
That show was pretty big for a while there.
And I don't feel like Sophia Vagara, of course, is continued to work at O'Neal's area a little bit.
But all the kids on that show, I don't feel like I see that many where.
And I thought for sure that every one of them would probably be doing stuff no more than her.
I thought for sure she would be kind of what Selena Gomez is doing right now.
I kind of thought she was going to be doing a similar thing.
Well, she's only 27.
Yeah.
She has time.
She's got plenty of time.
Yeah.
One of the better Rhymers in the game today, Jake Cole is 40 years old.
Jake Cole, not only one of the better lyricists.
And usually has a message with a lot of what he says, which I appreciate nowadays.
We don't have enough rap that does that.
But one of the best things that Jake Cole has done with his career,
I think this saying something, there was a beef that was beginning between Drake, Kendrick Lamar, and Jake Cole.
Jake Cole got in it and then stepped back.
It was like, you know what?
I don't want any of this.
I'm good.
I want to live a much more calm, zen kind of life.
I'm doing more of that.
I'm into Bohemian stuff and everything.
I'm not messing with this.
And then like two weeks later Kendrick Lamar just dropped the hammer on Drake.
And I don't believe, like I've watched rap beeps my whole life.
And usually it happens and then things move on, except for obviously the LA and New York thing.
But this one, I don't know how Drake can come back.
I don't know how people listen to his music still.
Like Kendrick Lamar has done.
And he's going to do it at the Super Bowl too.
Like at the Super Bowl, he's going to play one of these songs.
And you're going to have the whole entire crowd chanting along with it.
It's insane.
So Jake Cole got away from all that.
He didn't want any of that smoke.
Got out of it.
That's smart.
One of the smarter moves that any any artist has ever made because you do not mess with Kendrick Lamar.
You just just don't.
One of my favorite actors of all time, Elijah Wood is 44.
Wow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Frodo, of course, in the Lord of the Rings movies.
Perfectly cast.
One of the most perfect castings of all time, I think.
I stand very strongly on that.
When I'm a little kid reading those books, that's who I imagine is Frodo.
Not Elijah Wood.
Just that's what he would look like.
And you know, the he ends up doing it.
Elijah Wood, one of the, you hear Daniel Radcliffe and other actors talk about this.
One of the first child actors to kind of show it could be done and you could keep a good brain.
You could do this in a healthy way.
You could do this job in a healthy way.
And Elijah Wood, to his credit, mentions a lot of the time.
He was coming up when McCulley Culkin was.
And McCulley Culkin took a lot more of the shrapnel, if you will, than Elijah Wood would have.
If he was the only child, big name child actor at the time.
Yeah.
I didn't know he was in back to the future, too.
Yeah.
I'm going to have to go back and watch that now.
Yeah.
He was one of the video game boys.
Yeah.
Big, big fan of his.
I just think he's, I mean, I've never seen him do bad work.
He's just a great.
He was only eight years old in that.
It's crazy.
Well, it's crazy.
Joey Fattone is 48 in sync star, dancing with the star star.
But also, like a good actor, decent actor.
He was in the mic, in fact, my big, fat Greek wedding movies.
I only saw the first one.
I believe he was in all of them, but he was good in it.
He did good.
He did a good job in it.
Let's see here.
Rick Ross is 49.
Miami rapper, former prison guard turned rapper, by the way.
Interesting.
You don't hear that story very often.
Yeah.
Maybe probably my, I would say, second or third favorite voice in hip hop.
And I mean, like the tone, like the sound of his voice.
And one of the best rappers of all time, Rock Kim is 57 today.
Rock Kim of Eric B and Rock Kim.
Don't sweat the technique.
Listen to that.
If you're going to listen to any hip hop song in your life,
don't sweat the technique is a good one.
And you will hear Rock Kim's voice and hear exactly what I'm talking about.
And another one of my favorite voices.
Sarah McLaughlin is 57 today.
Oh, I didn't know what was her birthday.
Certainly, I think her voice has become very famous,
being attached to a lot of the Humane Society videos with the dogs.
And you see them hurting and the arms of an angel sings over it and everything.
Two notes on that.
One, she is very proud of that.
It's a huge cause to her, animal rights.
And not in a pita way, but in a humane way.
And also, she has also been very self deprecating about that.
I've seen her make fun of it twice.
It's just like teasing her own.
Which is good, yeah.
Because people make fun of it all the time.
Yeah, yeah.
Because that's what people do on the internet.
Yeah, yeah.
And just one of the most unique voices I think I've ever heard.
I really enjoy her voice.
She's got a lot of great albums, actually.
I have two of her CDs in my car.
I found out on my trip this weekend.
Oh, cool.
Barbara Benton is 75.
A wonderful actor and playboy star from He-Ha.
I remember her.
Yeah, she was great.
Mikhail Brezhnikov is 77.
One of the greatest dancers any of us will ever see.
Legendary ballet dancer lost some years there
with a lot of what was going on.
He came over to this country, you know,
kind of under the lines and everything.
And so we didn't hear from him right away.
But just you can't watch his work, watch his dancing,
watch his ballet, watch his feet.
And it's insane what he's in.
What he was able to do in his prime.
I don't know.
To me, I understand that a lot of people look at ballet
and look at a kind of like a, you know, as a feminine kind of thing.
In my house, you know, I grew up hearing that Lin Swan
took ballet, one of the greatest wide receivers I ever saw.
And my father was so interested in good footwork,
like in figure skating and ballet and dancing and stuff.
And the strength in we put into our feet
and what we can do with them.
We don't think much about being able to flip a coin
in our fingers or something like that.
But what these ballet dancers do with their feet is very similar.
Well, they make it look so effortless and the amount of strength
that it takes to be able to achieve that level of,
of it just looking so like they're not even trying.
And their bodies are like iron.
Like if you felt them, they are true athletes.
There is nothing soft about ballet dancing.
Look at a ballet dancer's feet.
Look, take a look at those feet, man.
And you will see.
If you want the nightmare, that's nightmare feelings.
Yeah, that too.
You really actually don't want to see it because their feet are,
it's a battleground.
And so many people, I'm amazed if he's walking.
Yeah, I have 77.
I don't have any, like, I don't know what he,
well, actually, I've known a couple ballet dancers at my time.
And I don't really know any of this world or anything like that.
But I do get a little, like, there's nothing,
to me, I push back on that.
There's nothing soft about ballet to me.
It's a very, it's a very cutthroat business, too.
Oh, yes.
Watch Black Swan.
Especially Russian ballet.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah.
Where the gymnasts and the ballet dancers and rush,
like at that age, yeah, it's like hockey in Canada.
You're five?
Okay, you're standing upright.
Here's some skates.
Yeah.
And one of the greatest to ever do it.
Ellen Alde is 89 today.
Hawkeye Pierce on Mash.
He was in the West Wing.
I just, I really like Ellen Alde.
Great actor.
Great interview, too.
Really good interview.
You watch some of his interviews.
Get some great ones.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I know who that is.
Yeah, he's good.
Took me a minute.
I had to see his picture.
Yes.
I loved him in Mash.
It's funny.
Ellen Alde, a household name, a household face.
Yes.
But I don't know if he's a household name.
That's interesting.
No, and I do love his work in the West Wing, too.
That was a really good show.
Yeah, yeah.
And just in case you're curious in everything,
he's got a clear and vivid podcast that he does.
And I've heard a little bit of it.
It's pretty good.
It's pretty good.
Like everything he's ever did.
That man never did a bad scene.
Like he just incredible actor.
Happy birthday.
Everybody out there celebrating.
We're wishing you good ones out there.
Thank you so much for getting the ones that you did to us.
Absolutely.
We want more.
Yeah.
More and more and more.
We're going to get some more here.
We're going to get some more news.
Some more sports.
We're going to take care of our partners.
Melissa and I will come back.
And we're going to talk.
Oh, we got this hotel hack for you coming up.
On the morning show at WFHR.
Welcome back, everybody.
Morning show at WFHR.
Melissa and James hanging out with you.
Thanks so much for joining us.
Everyone hope you're having a good Tuesday out there.
We got an interesting hell hotel hack about the best place to put your luggage.
But this is kind of a two-parter.
Because first, do you fully unpack when you're staying in a hotel?
Or you just live out that suitcase?
I'm a little bit, it depends on how long I'm staying.
But I normally live out of the suitcase.
Right, same.
Yeah, okay.
I've never stayed in a hotel for more than like one or two nights.
And the thought of putting my stuff in a hotel drawer?
I don't know, it seems kind of achy.
Yeah.
We both have worked in the industry and understand it on both sides.
That those workers there, the cleaners, they work their tails off.
They're hard workers.
Some of the harder workers you're going to meet.
And they do a good job.
But when Melissa drawer is dirty, you're not going to wipe it out.
No, no.
That's a cleaner.
Just as myself.
Yeah, no, I'm with you on this other person.
No, yeah, me, same.
100%.
Unless there's something in the drawer, I'm not going to...
I don't have time.
Now, if I'm staying at like a relative's house for a couple of days or something like that,
they don't normally leave a drawer open for you.
They do.
I will use the drawer because I feel rude not using the effort.
They may be effort.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Otherwise, though, I'm living out the suitcase like you.
I think a lot of people out there.
Well, if you're not into doing that when you're staying at a hotel,
where's the best place to keep your luggage?
They give stands and they have some spots.
But there really isn't a great place in mind.
Because it's like a chair.
Yeah.
Well, think about keeping your bag in the bathroom.
Huh?
That seems counterintuitive.
It does feel like it doesn't.
But it helps you avoid bedbugs and it's the best place for it is on the bathroom counter.
Oh, wow.
An exterminator who's been with Terminex for 27 years says it's the safest spot because
bedbugs probably aren't going in there.
Oh, man.
There's a misconception that they're attracted to dirty or dingy spots, but they're really
just...they're just like fabric.
The warmth and smell of our bodies and carbon dioxide we exhale.
This is all just, you know, mana for them.
That means they could be hiding in and around the mattress or under the cloth straps or a
luggage stands, even in nice hotels.
He says the best thing to do is just unpack your essentials, then zip your bag up and put
it in the bathroom or on a coffee table or a desk.
Sorry.
This is the creepy crawlies you're giving me here this morning, James.
I don't mean to, but I do think that it's a good one to go over.
Yes.
And I will say I've never thought about needing to wear a hazmat suit in a hotel.
Well, I think we don't talk about bedbugs a whole lot because it's not as big of a problem
hearing Wisconsin, I would say.
We have had to deal with them on military bases, like when I worked on Fort McCoy, the
military base, we had some bedbug infestations in a couple of rooms because soldiers are
out in the field and then they come back in rooms, that's a different environment than
your typical traveler staying at a hotel here in Wisconsin.
But if you travel around the world, you do need to be aware of this.
This is a really good information.
They were having a really bad problem in France not too long ago.
And you can bring these little bedbugs home with you.
Yeah.
And I've never been outside of the country or anything so I don't know much about this
but from what I've heard and talking to people who have and work in the hotel industry,
this seems to be a little bit more of a problem overseas in Europe.
To your point about not just here in the Midwest, but when this happens here, almost every
place I've worked at, nice, really, really retsy hotels, I've worked at, you know, kind
of just, you know, pass by hotels.
All of these have just a strict protocol and what to do when these things happen and
they work on it quick.
They get it done.
Oh, you have to.
You have to because it's really, really difficult to get rid of bedbugs and you're using chemical
warfare.
Yeah.
You don't mess around because they spread quickly.
So I will say that the next time I do travel, I'm just, I'm not bringing anything.
I'm just, I'm just, I'm just, I'm going to wear multiple layers and just take things
off out of Saturday.
Okay.
This is my Saturday clothes.
I just have a lot of them.
James is down in Cancun.
Yeah.
Dude, why are you wearing three layers?
Like, man, this is all I brought.
Sorry.
It's very hot.
It's very uncomfortable, but I don't have any bedbugs.
More ice, please, more ice.
Please God, more ice.
Speaking of ice sort of, Starbucks is where we go next and if you're someone who thinks
Starbucks has lost its cozy, welcoming coffee house vibe, well, Starbucks would like to
agree with you.
Starbucks is actually a little bit self-aware with in recent stories that I have seen.
And at the same time, they couldn't be more unaware and more, you know, kind of entitling
with some of the things they've done.
It's been very confusing, I think, if you're, I watch a lot of this from the outside.
I don't really go to Starbucks.
It's not really my thing.
But I do understand how big they are, how much popular they are, and how much people
like their coffee.
Well, Starbucks is making some changes to turn back the clock and make the experience
cool and fun again and less corporate.
By that, they're lowering prices, no, no, no, no, they're not doing that at all.
No, no, no, they're not lowering prices at all.
It still will cost you a mortgage to get two cups of coffee.
They'll be going back to handwriting customers' names on the cups with sharpies.
Good.
They stopped doing that?
I guess.
And probably misspelling them, which could lead to a lot of fun with a lot of people in
the coffee shop.
You know, A.A. Ron is, A.A. Ron here, that's Aaron Sir, that's Aaron.
Thank you, Keith Peel.
They're also bringing back the milk and sugar stations, which were removed during the
height of the pandemic.
That makes sense, because they wanted common areas where germs could be, you know, easily
transferred to not be there, that was smart.
They previously said that they wanted to hang out inside Starbucks again.
They wanted people to do this again, start hanging out there again.
So they were going to be more strict about booting people who were not paying customers.
To go along with that, they're going to use ceramic cups inside the store again and offer
everyone free refills on some four-year orders.
Previously this was a perk that was reserved for members of their loyalty program.
The idea that any Starbucks, McDonald's, any of these companies that are bigger than
any other company really in their market, in their field, there isn't just me rambling
or anything like that.
Not only have I done my homework, but I've talked to people in marketing for over 30 years.
I've worked with people in sales.
I understand this industry pretty darn well.
In one universal thing, when you are so high up and you can't get much bigger, it don't
hurt to look at the people that got you there and to maybe, you know, pay a little respect
to that.
Share some goodwill.
Yeah.
Netflix ruined this completely.
Now Netflix is doing well right now.
They'll tell you that they've got more subscribers than they've ever had and all these things.
They don't show you the numbers of these things.
They just want you to take...
They just hike prices again?
Yes.
And this chicken's come home to roost.
I like many other people out there.
Once my Netflix subscription is over, it's over.
I am not going back to that.
They're ain't worth it.
They're not worth it.
And it's a matter.
It's not just a matter of principle or standing on a little tiny hill that nobody in the
world even sees.
I think it's a matter of also self-worth.
The idea of these companies, we make them so big, you know, we make them...
I'm not taking anything from the workers and the people that work so hard at these companies.
They do a good job.
They're, you know, first and foremost, but nobody gets anywhere without, you know, people
buying their product and using their product.
There should be a respect to that.
We see it sometimes, not always, but we see it sometimes in sports.
Nobody's going to see a team.
The fans are going to see teams.
Fans are obsessed with these teams.
So oftentimes, teams will do something for fans.
You know, the Green Bay Packers famously do a lot of things for their fans and, you know,
have for decades and everything.
This is paying it forward.
This is paying it back and thanking the people that help make you what you are.
Netflix is horrible at this.
They're though, one of the worst businesses I've ever seen in the world at this.
And I don't want to reward that.
Between you and I, Melissa, the program, they ain't really that good.
I mean, like, stranger things, like, I don't know, I mean, there's a couple of shows
here and there, but I feel like I'm only enjoying them because I'm paying for this
and I want to get something out of it.
Well, and as we've also often discussed that when the fans do like something, they cancel
it after two seasons, so there's that too.
But also, you have to choose where to spend your limited dollars that you have.
And they're limited, you know, we are not rich.
We are not the millionaires and billionaires out there who can afford all of this stuff.
You've got to make a choice.
And as far as streaming services go, as we've often talked, there are so many options.
And there are better ones than Netflix.
Well, and they keep raising prices these companies.
And pretty soon, the only people that can watch them are people from other ones, like
the people from Amazon Prime are watching Netflix and the people from Netflix are watching
Apple Plus.
That's the only, it's only people from their own companies that are able to afford it
maybe.
I don't know how this can continue, this model, especially when minimum wage and so many
other things across the country are staying stat.
Like, you know, where's the middle class?
And I thought this new regime was going to make things better for them.
I thought that was supposed to be.
Have you seen egg prices recently, James?
Yeah, yeah.
I thought that was going to be better.
What the what?
What's going on?
Right away.
I'm not seeing that.
And I'm not, you know, like, I want to just keep calling attention to that because those
were promises.
Those are promises that we're made that we're going to have in day one.
What was run on first week, first week, that was going to change, yeah, we need to hold
them to account.
That is, that is our job.
All we've heard the last four years is holding the Democratic regime accountable as
somebody who walks down the line.
I'm not Democrat or a public and I don't see why we're not doing the same thing with
this regime.
I don't see why people are so, you should never be afraid of a president.
Like think of that.
Think of that.
You should never be.
And I'm not just talking about air everyday American citizen.
I'm talking about these billionaires bending the knee and falling down and, you know, here's
my belly.
Here's my soft belly.
Don't don't hurt me.
And the billion dollars.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like, what is going on?
Well, how are we all okay with this?
Like, it would be hilarious if it wasn't actually happening to us.
If it was a movie, I wouldn't stop laughing.
I'd be recommending it to everybody.
As it is, we just ask to pay attention and hold these people accountable because you would
keep asking.
Keep asking about when our price is going to come down.
Yeah.
Ask your local politicians who, you know, if you can't reach the top, reach your local
constituents.
That's what they're there for.
That's who you should be reaching out to, honestly.
Yeah.
I mean, it doesn't hurt to also try to retire, but talk to the people who actually represent
you.
Remember who is in charge, we, the people, we, the people, that's who's in charge.
We are the ones, and we are also the watchmen.
We are the ones who are supposed to be keeping everybody held accountable and, you know, doing
what they said they were going to do.
And the only way that we can do that with corporations like Netflix is with our dollars.
Yeah.
I mean, we can, we can say, oh, we want to them, I don't know, but that's going to make
a difference.
Yeah.
And purchasing their product is a, a better way, I think.
Boy, but they pay attention to that dollar.
They hear that.
They hear that leaving.
And then I encourage it, I do.
We will take a quick time out, check in with our partners.
We're going to come back and we're talking nutrition labels and maybe them moving.
Ooh.
That's coming up on the morning show at, coming up on the morning show.
Welcome back, everybody.
Coming up on the morning show at WFHR, locally grown radio.
Melissa and James here with you.
You hope you're having a good one out there.
And these bumpers are too soft for me.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
They really are.
They're throwing me.
They're throwing me.
Oh, Seth gets a ding today.
He set the bar.
He set a high bar.
It's on it.
He set a high bar.
I want to talk about this one with you, Melissa.
And this, this is an interesting article came across a couple of weeks ago.
It's been two weeks since our New Year's Resolution, or more than that now, about a month,
three weeks, four weeks, since New Year's Resolutions, and a lot of that had to do with
dieting.
And we've, some have done well, some have not, of course.
That's not talk about the half asleep Oreos I ate yesterday, James, or in actuality, the
fudgy chocolate cake.
My brother got me for my birthday.
In my defense, I froze most of it.
I should mention just for journalistic integrity that I did eat eat sleeve of Oreos just about.
In my defense, they were chocolate covered Oreos.
Thank you, Beth.
Oh.
Yeah, there you go.
Chocolate cups.
It's my favorite cookie.
It's my favorite cookie.
I can't, I can't.
And then covered in chocolate.
It is humanly impossible for me not to eat one of those.
I could just get done with Thanksgiving dinner and be full as it gets.
And if there's a chocolate covered Oreo right there, I'm going to make room.
They're making room on our labels now.
The FDA is now proposing that nutrition info be placed on the front of packaged foods.
Not the whole nutrition info box with all the ingredients and chemicals you can't pronounce.
But, you know, the basics, I believe, or the ones that, you know, there are headlines,
if you will.
The ones you really should be paying attention to.
Yeah.
This would be a smaller box with a snapshot of just three things, saturated fat, sodium,
and added sugars.
We'll also be a rating for each classifying them as low, medium, or high.
The idea is that this will help consumers make quicker and more accurate assessments of
products, possibly without even having to pick them up.
This is just a proposal for now.
And even if it does get approved later this year, food companies would be expected to
comply and to end the next three to four years after the new policy is adapted, of course.
Mm-hmm.
What do you think of this one?
What do you think out there of this one?
2715-424-2600, we'd love to hear from you.
So it's interesting to me that this is what they're pushing, as opposed to saying, let's
get the chemicals that are actually causing people health problems out of our food.
Yeah.
I mean, we've talked recently more about the fact that food companies here in the United
States make different products to export to other countries because other countries
won't import the products that they make here for American consumers because they contain
poison.
Yeah.
If that isn't an eye opener.
Right there.
I mean, so great.
So they're going to put saturated fat, sodium, and added sugars on the front of a box.
Okay.
Mm-hmm.
It's another dumbing down of our food system for the American people, but not in a way
that is helpful.
If they really wanted to be helpful, they should also put on the front in a box, may cause
cancer.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not against this.
In fact, I think it's a really good idea, and not just because they used to stock shelves
and have to face things all the time, and you know, people are always picking up items
to look at the back of them and stuff.
But in all seriousness, I think it's a good idea.
I like it.
I just think that they need to take it a couple of steps farther and see what Melissa was
just saying.
You know, how about you make the ingredients that you're putting on these labels better?
How about you make these products better?
That feels like a pretty good start.
Because this is a requirement that is going to cost companies money to change their packaging,
to have to add this, that's actually adding a lot of cost.
Yeah.
As opposed to addressing the problems.
And when companies need to cut costs, where do they start?
They start.
So we got a price, they got a, or the quality of the ingredients that they're putting in
the products.
Yeah.
Well, we got to add, you know, this is going to cost us X amount of dollars.
Well, where can we find those X amount of dollars?
Well, let's get this lower quality flower.
Now you would think that maybe the CEO or the person at the very top of these companies
that is making more money than Solomon, they would maybe take a pay cut or something
like that.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, they don't do that.
They will, in fact, take more money and they will make you pay for it.
And that's the bottom line.
Well, it's an addiction, James.
These people are addicted to being wealthy, they have far more money than anyone could
ever spend in multiple lifetimes, and yet they need more.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, you know, the accountability needs to be brought up more and more when it comes to
any of this stuff.
Not just politicians, but companies, especially considering most of these companies, every
big Fortune 500 company is putting into some, you know, a campaign party or some party
one way or another.
It's very rare to hear of one that isn't.
So even more so that they need to be held accountable and not just, you know, take what's
given to us, we could grow our own food.
We could be doing a lot of these things ourselves.
We don't need them.
There's so many things that we could be doing on our own that we don't need these companies
for and we need to remind them of that.
Yeah.
Yes, that is true to an extent, but also growing your own food takes time, effort, money,
land.
I mean, so it's not a, it's not a simple ask, it's doable.
I would say that our community garden in Wisconsin Rapids is a great place to start.
You know, we have a, we have a collaborative effort to grow things that can be, you know,
replace food on our grocery bills.
Very few things in life worth having are simple.
Correct.
And, you know, I mean, I am thinking about how hard it would be for me to make my own
Oreos.
I will say that.
That does so.
I mean, we know your thinking skills need it.
Yeah.
And you know, many, many, many different countries, you know, they don't think it.
We'll get you an Oreo Bush for you.
Oreo Bush.
That, right.
That sounds really good.
It also sounds really good.
That, you know, that not only, just ideas.
I like that they're talking about their thinking stuff.
Hopefully this leads to better stuff.
Well, like we talked at the beginning of the, of the show with vertical plants growing
up instead of out, so they take up less space, all of those things are helpful and good.
There's just needs, just like we're asking these companies to take the next step, not
just stop here.
We as consumers need to do the same thing.
You know, we can, we can give credit where it's due.
We can also hold accountability to these companies, to these people, to each other.
And to ourselves, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
To each other.
That's, that's certainly, you know, has to start somewhere, let's start with you.
I wanted to remind the audience that our great friends over at the Arts Council have a fantastic
show coming up, Jeff Allen coming to town, everybody this Friday.
He is going to be here.
You've seen him on a dry bar comedy, Comedy Central, VH1, America's Got Talent.
He has been doing this for a long time and Jeff is doing something different with this
show where he is really opening people's eyes to addiction and that.
That's why $3 from every tick will go to opportunity for hope and help our local, uh, locals
around here.
A big, a big shout out to Sally, to Anne, to all the people who helped make this happen
and certainly to Jeff, uh, really, really spearheading this, really being a big part of this
and everything.
So I appreciate the work that everybody is doing on this one.
You can get your tickets at saverthearts.com, saverthearts.com.
Be sure to get those and make sure you have a real good Friday night.
We're going to help you do that because we got two tickets right here to give away.
Awesome.
Call up 715-424-2600.
Give me your favorite comedian.
Who is your favorite comedian?
That's an easy one.
Yeah.
Come on.
Give me your favorite comics.
I want that.
And you give me that.
Just to see Mr. Jeff Allen this Friday right at the performing arts center.
Nice.
We'll come back with a winner.
Melon, I'll be back with more.
This is locally grown radio WFHR 1320 AM W24 A.D.E. Wisconsin Rapids and always streaming
of the Civic Media App.
