I NEED Another Water Bottle Though! (Hour 1)

Good morning, Wes Godson.

Morning world, it's a new day, thanks for kicking it off with us at 975 FM, WFHR.

Your host, James behind the mic, joined by our head of news, our co-host, Melissa K.

Good morning.

And our head of production, our co-host, Seth Habagger.

Good morning.

We're going to have some fun coming up in the next couple of hours and we're going to

kick things off the way we like to with our friend Bertine Merlot talking little mother

nature.

Good morning, Brett.

Good morning.

How's it going?

Good over here.

Yeah.

Blue skies.

Can't complain.

How is it over on your end?

Beautiful, pleasant, another gorgeous day.

I mean, no complaints over here.

Nice today.

Mid 70s.

Isn't that like the perfect California weather we dream about?

Yes.

Yes.

How did you say that?

Okay.

Well, that's today.

So no worries.

We do have a cold front moving through later tonight.

Pretty much overnight.

So maybe some rain, maybe some rumbles of thunder.

We'll be sleeping right through it.

No severe.

Nothing to worry about.

So you don't have to be paying attention to those.

Otherwise, tomorrow, some clouds to start the day will become sunny by the afternoon.

A little bit cooler highs in the low 70s will hang on to that for Friday too.

But then back to those mid to upper 70s.

As we roll into Labor Day weekend, the high pressure system holds off all of the rain.

It keeps it just to the west of the state.

I just think it's great because we have nothing to worry about.

Yeah, we're a little bit cooler.

Yeah.

You know, you can get in the water with upper 70s.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

At least your feet.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You can still, definitely still enjoy it.

And certainly get outside.

We enjoy some of this wonderful mother nature.

Get on out there.

They're really nice to hear.

Oh, that's great, Brittany.

We appreciate it.

Thanks for ordering that up for us, Brittany.

Yeah, it was really nice of you.

Yeah.

You're welcome.

We got delivered on time.

Perfect.

That's right.

Yes.

We expect this for the rest of the year now.

Yeah.

That's a tall order.

Wow.

We're losing that connection here.

Our connections get they'll stay on the sun.

Charge.

Thank you, Brittany.

We appreciate you.

You have a great morning.

You too.

Thanks, Brittany.

It's the best in the business right there.

Pretty below Jordy.

I guess every morning right this time slot.

Nice temperatures.

Look forward to.

Yeah.

And especially with Labor Day.

More on Labor Day in a moment.

We'll talk about that in a little bit.

We also got other fun things to get into.

A new survey has found the perfect seller for the average American.

We will discuss.

Oh.

Sorry.

No, it is laughable.

It is laughable.

It is.

Because I'm guessing it's nothing close to what we make.

Right.

We will see.

Yeah.

And we've also got an interesting one about Google.

You know what, you know, we're going to talk about the top trending.

How to stop buying blank searches.

What?

Yeah.

I'll just stop yourself from buying something.

Yes, okay.

That's, all right.

You have no idea what that's about.

But we got entertainment news coming up for you.

We're going to not only talk about some of the big stories in the headlines,

but local theater.

And we'll also talk about our newsletter coming up.

Got all of that.

And we have the four top 20, 25.

Twenty twenty five trends that are already on the decline.

We will get into those.

We're not even.

They trend up.

They trend down.

That's the way it goes these days, you know.

I mean, we are over halfway through this year or so.

That is fair.

As a programming note, we won't be here on Labor Day.

We will be, we will have our best of programming and stuff.

Hey, we get Monday off.

Yes.

Yes.

We will not be laboring on Labor Day.

No, no.

I will be laboring.

If you needed to remind your soda die, you're not alone.

You're not alone in that.

The whole reason I'm bringing it up is to remind myself.

Hey, I got the whole thing set up.

You guys just sit back and relax.

Chuck already put it in the system.

We're good.

Hey, you know what?

I appreciate you, Seth.

Oh my gosh.

Right?

Red Letter Day.

What is this?

I know.

The 27th day of August 2025.

Even in the same room when I said it.

I know.

That's even more impressive.

Well, thank you.

You read that as a writer.

You want people to be able to bring life to your words.

You read that perfectly.

I sounded sincere in everything.

Really good.

That's really good.

I get my actor card today.

Yep.

You were a SAG member.

Believe it or not, Monday is Labor Day.

And in general, Americans put in more hours at work than people in most other countries.

The average in the US was 1,805 hours last year.

That's more than people in Canada, Australia, Japan, or the UK.

But less than people in Colombia or Korea.

But which states has the hardest workers?

Well, an annual study ranked all 50 states based on things like employment rates,

hours worked, average commute, and how much free time people have in general.

Okay.

And I don't know that that's necessarily the best way to do this.

But to take a look at the results, according to them, the 10 hardest working states are

North Dakota, Alaska, South Dakota, Texas, Hawaii, Virginia, New Hampshire,

Wyoming, Maryland, and Nebraska.

Wow.

It's an interesting list.

It is.

It's really interesting.

I don't see.

There's no obvious connection between those.

Except maybe most of them are less populated states.

That's the only other thing I can take out.

They're a little more rural.

Yeah, that's right.

And that definitely requires more travel time, more work like just to make your area where you live livable.

Yeah, like yard care or garden or whatever else you need to do.

I didn't even think about that, but you're right because they did say commute time was one of the things when we lived in North Dakota.

I mean, it took us 25 minutes to get to like a grocery store.

Right.

You know, just to be able to buy stuff, I think my work commute was like 35, 40 minutes long.

Yeah.

And that's often a case when you live in rural areas that you just have a much longer commute time and you have to drive it.

It's not like you can ride a bus.

There's nothing else.

Yeah, there's no public transportation.

Or even in some cases ride with someone else.

Right.

That's not an option.

There was no ride share for me.

Yeah.

For that.

No, not at all.

Maybe not so much Alaska and Hawaii, but it does seem like there's an ag connection with these two.

A lot of ag industry is very big in all of these states.

Well, I mean, I would say in Alaska fishing and then in Hawaii, there is agriculture there too.

I just didn't know as much about those states, but yeah, that's a good point.

Yeah.

And then at the bottom of the list, Michigan ranked last followed by West Virginia, Rhode Island, Nevada, New York, California, Ohio, New Mexico, Illinois, and Oregon.

Again, no weird combination there to the other side of things.

The majority of people working in those states are centered into one the overwhelming majority of like work is done in Detroit, Chicago.

Whereas the rest of the state, there's certainly a lot of work being done.

But they're being done in different industries.

That's the ag industry and some of those.

And the commute time in the city compared to South Dakota or something like that.

It's night and day.

Yeah.

Well, especially if they've got public transportation options.

Yeah, exactly.

And out of our 50 states, where did Wisconsin rank?

Well, right.

Dabstack in the middle.

Oh, wow.

As usual.

25.

Oh, literally the middle.

Literally the middle.

The pickle in the middle.

Wow.

How about that?

Well, the Midwest states didn't do well on this list, which I find laughable.

Because I don't believe that you can you can't move me on this one.

There's nobody working harder in this country than the Midwest.

It's in part because we're part of the oldest part of this country.

So we've had industries here that have been built here for so long.

And they're dependent on trained industries, certain things like that.

Right.

But there's also just the idea of what Melissa was saying before about kind of

making your life work, even you have to work here to make it work.

Right.

I'm not saying you don't have to in other states, but unlike other areas,

the weather component and some other things really do play into.

Right.

I don't know.

I don't know that I haven't met plenty of people who aren't necessarily great workers

or go getters that are Midwesterners.

But I have not met many people that are necessarily lazy

or unwilling to get up off the couch and get to work.

Right.

It's not typically something you find in the Midwest.

Maybe it's something that will, you know, be something one day.

I don't know, but you know, the part of the reason why I back our people so much

is because of that ethic that they have when it comes to work.

Well, and it's looking at the criteria.

I guess it does make a little bit of sense

because most Midwestern states are a mix of urban and rural.

Right.

We have larger metropolitan areas, but like we said,

but it's more populated than Wyoming, right?

Right.

Or Oregon on the other side.

So I think that with the criteria that they used,

I think that has to be taken into account to how these states are made up

in terms of rural and urban.

This could also play into a little bit later that survey

about perfect salaries.

We'll see how that goes with that because it depends where you live, right?

I want people to keep this is almost a two-parter.

Those hardest working states where we get to that.

Think about those things in there.

And as far as the criteria that they use to seem a little difficult,

what is, to me, a hard worker, somebody that works hard,

is somebody who is locked in, somebody who is trying a showing effort.

It's not even about how the quality of their work as much as it is about that effort

and that energy that they're putting into it.

I talk about that with acting all the time.

Right.

I've worked with community theater actors that may not have the skill of certain,

some of the pros I've worked with, but they're heart and their energy.

I'll take that any day.

Absolutely.

Way over talent, absolutely.

Way over that.

I think that there's a lot of that in the workforce.

There's a lot of those things.

To me, it's the job that you were hired to do done.

It shouldn't have to be about time.

It should be about what job you're supposed to do

and have you done it in the time you were allotted to get it done.

For me, that's the important thing.

It's not how many hours you spend putting paper clips together

just because there's nothing to do.

You're just sitting there.

Because you have to be there.

It's more about getting the job done.

That's an interesting take on how we look at work

and the salary position versus an hourly position.

Because so many people work an hour job,

especially those of us who have progressed through our lives

working multiple jobs to just try to make ends meet

and not have necessarily a career.

That's how our society is.

We need people to work in fast food places.

We need people to work in offices.

Important jobs that aren't like why I went to college for this.

Exactly.

They're necessary jobs and they make our society work.

They turn out the wheels of society.

We need them.

But those are hourly positions for the most part.

For me, I have a hard time looking at work going,

well, I accomplished everything I needed to,

but I've only worked 32 hours this week.

Let's do something else.

To be fair, that really doesn't happen.

What you're going to say, there's probably something you could find to do.

For me, I know there's always,

if I'm like, okay, I've got everything done this week.

Oh, no, I'm going to do this thing.

It's longer term project or something like that.

You've come back to something.

It's the difference between salary and hourly.

Anything when I worked hourly jobs.

When I was working at James, you could test to this.

But when you're at a front desk at a hotel overnight,

there's not actually a lot to do once you have,

because you're kind of in a babysitting position.

But can't tell you how many times I rearranged drawers.

And I cleaned the dust out of corners.

And you know, just like, it is.

And then I would bring out my knitting.

Because what else am I supposed to do?

Yeah.

Forensic files.

Forensic files on headline news.

And we would be out in like two in the morning.

And they'd play like eight episodes in a row.

Nice.

I'd have that on the background while I was either taking calls

or filling out the budget.

Not the budget.

The audit.

At the end of the night and doing those things.

Yeah, you find things to keep you busy.

Or wake.

Remember when solitary came out?

Yes, I do remember.

Free solitary on the computer.

Oh my god.

Actually, I think I learned to play something.

Yeah, that's a fun way to play that too.

If for any other reason, I feel like transportation or teleportation

should be a thing for work.

Traveling to work.

Traveling to a job is one of the,

it's something we, you know, have to do with nobody's blinking

and I at that or anything.

But it does say when you think about the whole average commute time.

Right.

And how much time?

And most people are not paid for that time.

And it just kind of throws you a little bit where it's like,

well, I should be being paid as soon as I get in the car.

Like, you feel like.

Yeah, obviously that's not how it works.

And I'm not saying it should be that way.

But the idea of what the hours we work and the actual hours we put in.

I think very few of us that adds up that that's the same thing.

Right.

No, absolutely.

There's no way any day I've ever worked in radio.

They've paid me forever hour or work.

Oh no.

Especially since I've been taking over as a PD and those things.

Right.

And that's not anything against my businesses or a form of business.

No, that speaks to your passion of dedication to the job.

Right.

Which some employers take advantage of.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Many, many employers.

Many do.

Many do.

There's at least three that I can.

I was going to do the sneeze thing and mention that.

No, no, no.

And when it comes to here in Wisconsin.

I think that one of the things that you can hang your hat on too is, you know,

from a young age, people working and building that work ethic.

Whether it is with their family's business or a farm or even anything outside of the

ag industry.

We have a lot of vendors and a lot of people.

Logo where.

Yes.

And I was sowing emblems onto varsity jackets at age 11.

Right up.

Oh wow.

Yeah.

That sounds not fun.

I mean, hard on your fingers too.

Yeah.

Well, I used a sewing machine.

It wasn't.

Oh, that's the true.

But I milked a goat.

That was for fun.

It was not for fun.

It was for fun.

I made 25 bucks off of that.

Oh, how many goats did you milk?

Well, it was one goat and I cut its nails.

But I also swept up here.

Here's a lot.

So I think it was more than just the goats.

Yeah, yeah.

But it was also, this was early 90s or mid 90s or something like that.

But either way, it was.

It was.

What was the goat doing in the hair salon?

She had in the back.

It's.

I think that she closed her shop.

But it was right on the way to Washington school.

And she had this little shop.

And then in the back had all like just a couple of goats.

And in some chicken surgery.

Yeah.

And you would never guessed it was back there either.

But I got to wish her remember her name because she was a sweetheart.

She was so.

There was.

There was the worst lie I have ever told in my life.

The worst acting I've ever done in my life.

So I don't really need you to sweep up hair.

But I have a goat in back.

You want to milk the goat?

Yes, I've done that before.

I can do that.

I saw it on TV.

That probably raised an eyebrow.

Look on her face.

There was no way she bought it.

No, there was no way.

Take a quick time out.

Come back and have some fun with the LCAPA birthday anniversary club.

Welcome back everybody.

Time to do some celebration with our great friends at LCAPA and the birthday anniversary club.

We encourage you to treat yourself.

Get on over to LCAPA, 221 Market Avenue, beautiful port Edwards.

Wish them a great day from all of us.

Buy local support, local support, our good friends at LCAPA.

Get some great specials out there.

Still want to try that Mexican French toast.

Yeah, that sounds interesting.

It's like a sweet savory kind of cake on French toast.

If you try, go ahead and enjoy.

And let us know.

We'd love to hear from you.

And love to hear from you about your birthdays and anniversaries, everybody.

You can go ahead and email us info at WFHR.com.

You can direct messages on our Facebook pages and you can call on up.

That's right.

That number is 715-424-2600 or just a touch or two away on the Civic Media app.

Looking forward to talking with you, everybody.

Feel free to join us.

We take a look at our list here.

We've got three possible qualifiers.

Seth, give me a one through three.

Two.

All right.

Got ourselves our qualifier.

First up, we want to wish a happy birthday to Andy Thomas.

Happy birthday, Andy.

Happy birthday, Andy.

Enjoy the day, sir.

Hope it's a good one for you.

Have a great one, Andy.

We also want to wish a happy birthday to Stella Forella.

Oh, I love that name.

Happy birthday, Stella.

Happy birthday.

I'm not going to do it.

Stella.

I'm not going to do it.

I'm not going to do the photo.

I probably heard it before.

I wanted to.

I wanted to.

I didn't call it.

You're right, Melissa.

You're right.

She's probably really intact.

Or I thought she wants to.

I won't do it.

We need to bring that name back.

It's such a great name.

Stella.

It's a great name.

My brother's girlfriend's cat's name is Stella.

Oh, I like it.

That's not bad.

It's a good cat name, too.

Is that how he calls for the cat?

Stella adopts.

I would.

Every time.

Your neighbors would be.

Oh, that's just to be able to do that.

In fact, now I kind of want an animal.

Or actually just tell everybody I have an animal.

But it's always lost.

It's always lost.

My dog is always lost.

Oh.

Happy birthday, Stella.

Enjoy your day.

And thank you for putting up with us.

Yes.

Sorry about that.

Yes.

And a very happy birthday to our qualifier, Suzanne Wilson.

Oh, happy birthday, Suzanne.

Suzanne, congratulations.

Congratulations.

Enjoy the day.

We wish you a great one, Suzanne.

Enjoy.

And thank you so much to everybody getting us these birthdays and anniversaries.

Mm-hmm.

It's one of the Leonard Cohen songs, Suzanne.

It's a great song.

That's a good one, too.

Yeah.

Taking a look who you share your birthdays and anniversaries with Aaron Paul is 46.

Jesse on Breaking Bad.

It's done a lot of voice work, too.

And he had a great spot on the Westworld series as that was wrapping up.

He was in the final two seasons of that.

Very strong good actor.

Very strong good actor.

And one of those guys who the Breaking Bad thing is kind of put on a level where he's probably going to get work.

He's probably going to get work the rest of his career.

Yeah.

It would be surprised.

Sarah Clark is 49.

Dr. Elliot Reed on Scrubs.

She was the second Becky on Rose Ann for the sixth through ninth seasons.

Oh, really?

And then returned for the reboot and everything.

Very cool.

Very cool.

And a nice career.

Yeah.

Let's see here.

Oh, Shonda Wilson is 56.

And Dr. Miranda Bailey on Gregson Anime.

Oh, I like her a lot.

Yeah.

Wait, what did you say?

Gregson Adam.

Gregson Adam.

Oh, Greg, you're an anime.

You think they'd be done by now with Gregson Anime after all these seasons.

There's a horrible spin off that they tried to do.

Did not work out.

Did not work well.

Welcome to Gregson Adam.

Okay.

Turning.

Flip that show wasn't even Greenlit for one episode.

No.

No.

The dog whisperer.

Caesar Milan is 56.

Wow.

He is an interesting one.

I watched a lot of his stuff back in the day when he was first on and everything

because the person I was with watched a lot of it.

And that's just how that works.

And that's how it works.

And there were plenty of things I enjoyed about him.

And then there were things I'm kind of like, oh, no, no.

But definitely seems to know his stuff and has helped a lot of pet owners and pets throughout the years.

Still doing his thing, I imagine.

Right.

Yeah, you can hire him for $50,000 to $75,000.

Is that all?

Yeah.

Wow.

And the lower end is virtual.

If I pay that, my dog better learned to speak English.

You know, walk on its hind legs.

Yes.

I'm on.

I'm not even exaggerating.

No.

Like after Caesar's done.

Like, you're my boy.

All right.

So, what do you think of the option of who you think is going to make it in the play-offs this year and NFL and everything?

I want my dog to be able to have a conversation with me.

Right.

If I'm paid, it seems to be love.

How have you guys seen the dogs and cats, I think, where they have those buttons and they can push the buttons to talk to?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that would be cool.

I might have to get that set up for Lulu.

Oh, I've got it.

Yes, you definitely do.

Okay.

Yeah.

I think Lulu would swear at me a lot.

It's just a swear button all through the way.

Well, because right now we've progressed into just grunting at me.

If I get too close.

You've been warned.

Just wear them down.

Just wear them down.

You'll win them over.

Alex Lifeson is a 72 from Rush.

Well, what are the better parts of that band?

Well, it's really three parts.

Three bands.

Yeah.

I don't know what I'm saying.

One third of the good part of that band.

There you go.

Right.

What I was thinking of my head is whenever I think of Rush.

I'm not a big Rush guy or anything.

But all three of the members of that band are so respected in the music and just a really good band.

You could be like Mike Nelson.

Mike Nelson, who apparently is not a Rush fan, but he just watches Rush documentaries.

Yeah.

I don't get it.

It's very weird.

It's great.

Let's see here.

Oh.

Yes.

Tuesday Weld is 82.

Wow.

Yeah.

She, a child actor who really kind of like actually survived being a child actor.

Yeah.

She did.

Really.

And her story and sharing of that story has been very integral for a lot of the child actors out there today.

That is correct.

Of all the bad stuff that happened while she was a child actor.

Yeah.

And as far as people no longer with us, making sure to take care of this list.

Okay.

Here it is.

Yeah.

Paul Rubens.

Peewee Herman.

Oh.

It would have been 73 today.

Oh.

Certainly we had a conversation about him the other day.

Yes, we did.

About Peewee and the movie.

Yeah.

The anniversary of the Peewee's big adventure.

Yeah.

Jeff Cook from Alabama born in the state in 1949.

Certainly note him.

Yes.

His great-well skills.

And we do this every year on this one.

Daryl Dragon born in the state in 1942.

The captain of captain and to Neil.

That's right.

Oh, yeah.

How you could not go by dragon.

That's your god-given name.

I know.

And he goes with the captain just because he wore a captain's hat.

It feels like it was a prop.

Yeah, exactly.

I'll be the captain and you'll be your name.

It's because that's your name.

Tony Teneal, that was her name.

Yeah.

So is it because of the genre, the yacht rock kind of thing is dragging to aggressive for yacht

rock?

I don't know.

I don't get it.

But given that last name, as somebody's actual name is Daryl Dragon, what I wouldn't

give for the last name dragon.

I mean, think of what you can do, man, with a band.

Yeah.

Daryl Dragon and the fire breeders.

I mean, just think of that.

Yeah.

Exactly.

There's so many different things you can do with that one.

You wasted on your Daryl.

We had a good career.

You know, let some hits and stuff.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But also his brother, Dennis Dragon.

He actually looks more like a dragon than Daryl is.

You know, with the curly blonde hair.

I see the family went with the whole D thing too.

Dennis and Daryl Dragon.

Oh boy.

We want more birthdays and endaversers.

Everybody, be sure to get them to us.

However, you need to.

And we will celebrate with you more tomorrow.

We encourage you today, though, to get on over to LKFA.

Enjoy some great food over their great specials.

And.

At the Pylist, it's huge.

The wonderful atmosphere.

Say hi to the gang over the front.

Over there for us at 221 Market Avenue in beautiful Port Edwards.

We'll take a break.

Come back and have some more fun on the morning show at WFHR.

Dragon.

Please.

Oh yeah.

It's time, everybody.

We're back.

Hope y'all are having a great one out there.

Thanks for joining us.

James, Seth and Melissa here with you.

Bringing you another great segment of the morning show.

And an interesting one.

So.

Bring up the volume.

And I bring up the energy.

And now for something serious.

House of ears and something interesting here to see.

I just really wanted to play summertime.

I just really wanted to play that song.

These days, getting any job is a win.

But imagine that three companies offered you three different salaries for basically the exact same job.

Ooh, okay.

And we have examples.

They are a 55,000, b 74,000, and c 215,000.

Whoa.

I feel like-

That's a big difference.

I feel like we know which one you'd probably take.

Um, according to a report, the average American says the perfect salary is $74,000 a year.

That'd be nice.

That'd be nice.

I'd like that.

Sure.

Can we do the mean or the median instead of the average?

I think I'm closer to that.

Anyway, it's unclear why the perfect, quote, perfect amount isn't higher, especially with how expensive things can be.

But it's possible that they were just asked for the sweet spot where you'd be able to make ends meet comfortably.

Okay.

That said, 19% of people say that they need to make at least 100 K and about half of employed Americans say that they should be making more to support their lifestyle.

24% of people say that they are, quote, unhappy with their current salary.

Only 24.

That's actually a little low to that.

That is interesting, actually.

69% of Americans are looking for ways to make extra money and 32% of people are interested in starting a side hustle.

And 29% of those in the survey already have a side hustle.

Okay.

This is, you know, certainly they're going to change from household to household.

That's important to know what I think.

And it's going to change even more when you look at states and how much it cost of living is and some of those things.

But I think that the overall consistency of this is there, no matter where you are age, state, whatever.

We aren't paid enough.

It does not match with the, when cost of living goes up on a can of soda, on a can of soup, let alone with everything else it does.

Gas and insurance and childcare and all these other things.

Yet pay stays the same.

Right.

That does not take, you know, Warren Buffett to figure that out.

It's a pay cut.

Yeah, yeah.

You are getting a pay cut because of that.

Now, I bring this up from time to time and I try not to push this in too much.

But as we have some, you know, quote, I guess that's their job title representatives coming to the area pretty soon here and everything.

I, these people are not going to talk to their constituents.

They're talking to the people in their pocket.

But if they did talk to people, I'd love to be able to ask them, how are you living?

Yeah.

How comfortable are you living?

Name me one politician at any level that is living like we are.

And I'm not talking about your, that's not fair.

I'm not talking about our local local representatives.

Right.

Yeah, some of that.

That, that wasn't fair of me and I want to make sure to correct that right away.

Most of our local representatives are working day jobs along with being politicians.

Yes.

That's a completely different story.

I, I did that in my brain because I don't look at them as politicians.

I look at them.

They're community members.

Yeah.

Yes.

So bring him up as an example because I can, I know what I'm talking about with Representative

Krug and he is a realtor along with being a politician.

And, and, you know, there's certain days I bet Scott's more for realtor.

Right.

Because he's got to be, you know, with that job.

Right.

So here, this is, I just looked this up, the pay for a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

So you take the $74,000 that you were talking about, add another 100,000 to that.

174,000 dollars is how much a U.S. Representative makes in a year.

How are they supposed to relate to us?

How are they supposed to know what it's like to struggle to make ends meet?

And on top of that, represent us, like fight for us.

Right.

Fight for what we're trying.

You wonder why minimum wage has not changed in this state.

You wonder why it's not just Wisconsin.

It's plenty of other states too that have done this.

But why it's gotten so out of hand, it's, it would be laughable if we didn't have to

live it of how ridiculous this is.

If this was a movie, it would be, well, that's going to happen in 2021, 2021, 25 or something

like that.

Wait, wait, wait, wait in the future.

And we're already living it right now.

And while this continues to happen, the only pushback I've seen is people leaving the

workforce and trying to employ themselves, trying to make a living on their own.

And with that, barely making ends meet, but it's the very least they're happier.

And they're probably getting paid better self-employed than they are working a 40 hour

a week job.

Yeah.

Because there are some things that you don't have to do then.

You don't have to commute.

You don't have to dress for the office.

You don't have to bring a lunch or pay for food with you and you're out and about.

And I mean, there are a lot of factors that play into that as well that brings in savings.

Right.

But I was real quick.

I also want to say, you're right about that.

But there's also a lot of scam artists out there that will pray on people who want that what we're

talking about, self-employed, multi-level marketing groups, which are everywhere now and are basically

there are pyramid scheme people.

Yes.

There are pyramid scheme to every politician that says that has an argument to fight me on minimum wage

or these kind of things are cost of living some of that.

I ask them, you do it.

You do it.

I don't think that they're from your local representatives straight up to the president.

They should be making minimum wage.

I don't understand why they're not.

It's ridiculous in my realistic brain.

I cannot understand why they are paid so much.

If your argument is, well, then who's going to want to do those jobs if they're minimum wage?

Let me introduce you to the workforce.

Let me introduce you to everyone else.

Take a look at this blue collar I've got on right now.

Go ahead and take a look at that or go ahead and try maybe doing that.

Maybe they might actually represent us better.

Maybe they might know what it's like to live our life a little bit more because I see these

politicians again from the president on down.

I see no suffering.

I see no struggle.

I see not just in life but in anything.

Most of these people have been handed this, born with a whole set of silver spoons in their mouths.

How can they relate to us?

How can they truly represent us if they don't know what it's like to get dirt under their nails?

To actually have to struggle to know what it's like to, you know what?

My dad's gone out of the house.

It's my mom, my sister and I and I got a little brother here.

So at 10, 11 years old, I'm going off trying to milk goats to make a couple bucks.

Tell me one politician has done that kind of thing.

Again, I'm not talking about those little examples that they bring up when they're trying to, you know, in their commercials.

I know what it's like to be you.

I grew up on a farm and all these different things.

Look, what you did as a kid and what you've done as an adult are two very different things.

Right.

None of us are what we were when we were young.

No, and they do, they do form our help to build out our lives and give us lived experience.

But they've shown how, that they've forgotten what that is.

Yeah.

The Van Orton's, the Tiffany's, these people, and I am going to call them out on their name because they're cowards.

And I don't say that lightly.

I've done my homework on this one.

I'm not somebody that throws these words around.

I mean when I say that.

And I know I've done the homework on it.

And you are a coward if you're not representing your community and you won't face your community.

And we've only touched on wages. What about health care?

They got pretty great health care.

They do.

Some of the best in the country.

Yeah. I think they should have the health care that the rest of us have.

And they have to pay for it.

And they don't have to pay for it.

They don't have to pay for it.

What? Yeah.

We have good, pretty decent health care.

But I still have a pretty big bill that I got to pay off, that I got to decide.

Okay, do I go to this appointment?

That's going to cost me more money.

Or do I try to save up for the new bed that I need?

Because I still haven't bought a mattress.

Guys, I'm still sleeping on the mattress that I saw in half with a bread knife.

I'm so sorry.

So, you know, let's just put that on it.

Mental image of Melissa doing that.

I was like, whoa, hey, that's it.

It was pretty funny.

Very entertaining.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Put a note in that one.

Put a note in that one.

I am in desperate need of dental care.

I have good dental insurance.

I still can't do it.

I still can't do it.

Because it still costs money.

Even with the insurance, you still have a deductible that you have to pay.

Yeah.

I want to know what that's like.

If you want my vote, if you want me to actually go out and vote for you or fight for you,

I want you to fight for me.

Fight for us?

Yes.

Yes.

I want you to fight for me.

And I want you to prove that you are.

I am so sick and tired of these people getting away with this, this hustle.

Man, I come from the other side of the tracks.

You think I don't know a hustle when I see one?

That's what the majority of the politicians, especially in this state, are doing.

It is a hustle.

They are hustling you.

They pitch this idea to you that this is who they are.

And this is what they're going to represent.

And they're going to fight for you.

And then as soon as you elect them, what do they do?

They just answer that to people in their pocket.

They won't even face their constituents.

And they use these excuses like, oh, people are unruly or whatever.

I thought you were a tough guy.

I thought you could handle this job.

If you can't handle this job, they get out of there.

And let somebody else do it that can actually face their constituents.

And would do it from minimum wage.

Because that's where you show what you really care about.

What I was talking about before about that work ethic and that hustle and everything.

The willingness because you have to.

There is no other option.

If you don't, you're homeless or your family ain't getting paid or anything.

Or you ain't getting fed or anything like that.

Know what that's like.

I want my politician like that.

And remembers it after they've been elected.

And that's another mission we sometimes see.

So way too many of these people doing these jobs, living comfortably.

Which I have nothing against.

You make a good living.

You worked hard for that money.

More power to you.

Enjoy your life.

I'm talking about people that did not work for it.

Right.

And that is darn near a good way to high of a portion of our politicians in this state.

Along with people in higher positions that are earning while they continue to get bonuses.

There are people see no where they get that way.

Here's a watch for Christmas.

Here's something like that for Christmas.

It'll shut them up.

Here we'll get my little tiny bonus or something.

That'll shut them up.

Instead of something that they can actually build on.

Like a substantial.

And keep in mind everybody.

Whether this is every business or every politician or not.

There is a majority of them where this is about keeping us where we are.

Keeping us in our place.

I was about to say the middle class but that doesn't even exist anymore.

It's gotten a lot smaller.

For sure.

It's about keeping us in line and them keeping their power.

Because God you notice how scared they are of losing that power.

And you know who I'm talking about when I say that.

There is a desperation there that is so clear.

And a lot of it has to do with what they're paying us.

And the fact that they're not taking care of our health care.

Or our child care industry or some of these things.

Or the infrastructure in our country.

They put a little...

I'm not even a band-aid.

They put on one of those little thumb band-aids.

The ones that don't stick very well and fall off after 10 minutes.

Who uses those?

How did they sell that?

Like the band-aid industry is very good.

It does a great job and everything.

It's some using one right now.

But it feels like sometimes if you're in that meeting.

We had to come up with new band-aids.

We had to come up with new ones.

I don't know.

We'll put cartoon characters on them.

Oh great, great.

We should have skin-toned ones.

Oh really good.

How about a tiny one?

Because it was the guy in back who didn't have an idea.

And he had to have an idea.

But a really, really little one for those paper cuts.

Sure, throw it in there.

And then you get to the end of the box.

And you've used all the good band-aids.

And all you have left are those little tiny.

And they're like what?

An inch long.

Like a pad of the band-aid is maybe a quarter inch.

And you're like, okay, I've got this six-inch long cut.

What am I going to...

All right, 27 little band-aids.

Yeah, I don't know any smurfs.

Who else could use this?

I mean, babies can't use this.

I mean, they do fit around like a five or six-year-old child's finger pretty well.

And if they stick to themselves, they stay on decent for an hour.

Right.

We will take a quick time out when we come back.

We're going to get into these things that Americans cannot stop buying apparently.

Which is just another tie-in to all these stories there.

I'm Martin Show at WFHR.

Welcome back, everyone.

Morning Show at WFHR.

And the spring out if she comes back.

Hope you all are having a great Wednesday out there.

Happy Humpty, everybody.

Melissa, Seth, James, hanging out with you.

We're going to get into a bunch of fun in the 10 o'clock hour.

We got some entertainment news for you lined up.

We're also going to dive into a couple of other ones.

We have the top four 2025 trends that are already in decline.

Already.

I'm probably doing at least one of them.

I'm probably doing at least one of them.

Yeah, I usually only jump on at the end or after it's over.

It's always how it goes for me.

If you've bought a dud power ball ticket,

38 drawings in a row,

the 39th time, is that going to be the charm?

Is that it?

Is that what you're telling yourself?

Google looked at the top trending, quote,

how to stop buying blank searches.

We've been googling this year.

And unless you're a kid,

number one on the list is one of the nerdier addictions you can have.

Now, before we dive into these, though,

I wouldn't, I've asked a lot of questions to our search engines.

Most of them in incognito mode.

And I love it.

I will not lie.

I like search engine.

I like the idea of a search engine, I should say.

I love the idea of as somebody who loves to learn and loves information,

loves the answer today.

That we have about our fingertips.

Yes.

Do I like Google or half of these search engines know for various reasons

that we've covered plenty of times?

But as an overthinker,

of all the questions I've asked,

I've never thought about asking a computer how to stop doing something

necessarily.

Not even when I was quitting smoking.

I didn't even think about it then.

I don't know why, but my brain didn't really think of that.

So the question alone just seemed wild to me.

Let alone what it's about with stopping yourself from buying something.

They're not talking about necessarily alcohol.

Like, what can I replace something with?

Like, that seems like a more,

like, I do substitution stuff all the time.

Well, I don't have this type of,

of whatever ingredient, what can I replace it with?

Right.

So here are the five things Americans just can't stop buying.

Quote, how to stop buying Pokemon cards.

It's become a real problem with full-grown adults fighting each other

for boxes of them at Walmart and Costco.

What?

Cheese.

One woman recently turned a Reddit for a device after her husband racked up

over $100,000 in debt.

What?

To buy Pokemon cards?

Okay, that's just like a deduction.

Wow, that is an addiction.

Yes, that is pretty much an addiction.

You could insert anything and it would be, they would do that.

They'd spend that money.

They'd spend $100,000 on something.

Yeah, I agree.

100%.

I will say, so this, my dad is the one that turned me on the desk

and told me about it when I was right around the pandemic.

During the pandemic, I should say during the pandemic and right after.

There's not a lot of places to get baseball, football cards or anything.

Walmart's one of the few places.

Hargates, few other, yeah.

My dad is usually up really early in the morning and my mom and him will run errands.

So six, seven in the morning or something like that, they'll be out doing that.

So he's there pretty early.

Yeah.

And if he gets there early enough, he can get some of those cards.

But there are plenty of times where by six, thirty, seven o'clock, they're all gone.

People just come in there and buy them all up and then they'll sell them on eBay and all this.

Yeah, that's it.

It's a, it's a thing.

So you got people like my dad and other card collectors out there.

You actually just want to collect?

No, I don't have to.

It's just one of them.

And my dad looks up the prices, but it's more so distinctive brag to us already.

Look what I got.

You know, whatever.

This one's worth $15.

Yeah.

It's fun.

It's nostalgic for him and everything.

But you have that going on with that industry.

Let alone heard.

I imagine with the Pokemon industry might even be worse because you're involving more and more younger people too.

How to stop buying water bottles?

It seems like everyone has ten of them now.

You'd think one water bottle would be enough just one.

What?

This is a serious issue in my family.

Well, serious issue in my family.

I can see that when you have kids that, that water bottle is good.

Oh, it's not the kids.

Okay.

Well, from other lived experience, I can see where this would happen, where you have multiples because it gets left somewhere.

And you need a replacement.

With special kids.

That's true.