Transcript
Holding On To Cherished Memories with Ken Szymanski (Hour 2)
The Todd Allbaugh Show · Fri Jul 11, 2025
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Good afternoon, everybody.
Todd Albaugh here live on location for the Northern Wisconsin State Fair in the Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.
It is Friday, TGIF the 11th of July, 2025.
It is a great day to be Wisconsinite, along with our guest cohost, our friend, our colleague, the host of Mornings with Pat Critello every morning from six until nine across most of these stations, the one, the only Pat Critello.
But let's.
Let's be honest.
I'm just I'm just a you know a two day stand for you.
I mean you I am just the beginning of Todd's excellent adventure on the road across Wisconsin along with Jane and Greg.
I will be replaced by Jane.
It takes two of them to replace me.
You're no sweet.
You're no herky
the Hawkeye.
I'll put it that way.
That's inside.
That's inside baseball right there.
But yes, this is
This is the first of our big weeks on the on the road path, and I appreciate you being here for two days and helping us kick that off.
You're right next week.
Jane Mattener and Greg Baca Mattener on air and I are going to go from Oshkosh to Butternut to Hayward Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.
I just imagine the three of you on like the Partridge family bus Trust me.
That's maybe that may be our mode of transportation.
I've told I've told our audience in the morning You're gonna you're gonna want to stick around not just to hear what's happening in these places where they go put the stories of how they get there Exactly.
I'll look at that.
Hang on here.
What were you able to hold on to that with one hand?
That is 25 pounds of funnel cake.
It looks like
now look here our on-site producer the lovely and talented Heather all-balkaloy.
Yes, my sister
has gone out and brought Pat and I some fair food.
Heather, what have you got for us?
Hold it close.
We've got a funnel cake for you, like fresh funnel cake.
It's hot.
It's going to burn your hand and your mouth.
Don't burn your face off.
I'll try not
to.
Thank you.
How about
over here, away from all
the
external electronic equipment.
Right
in front
of me.
Sure.
One of the great things about the
fair though, funnel cake, right?
It is one of
my favorites.
It
is.
Pat, are you a funnel cake
fan?
You know.
I don't get it very often, and I'm looking at all the powdered sugar I'm into realizing
not,
about
things here.
But I mean, it's basically, it's one very long mini donut.
It
is wrapped around and around and around it, and sugar and oil and dough.
What else do you need?
Well, I mean cheese, but other than that.
It's part of the fair.
Yes, yeah.
Nothing wrong with that.
Nothing wrong about it at all.
All right.
Heather, again, all seriousness, thank you for you and Mike and for helping out because we could not have done this this last two days without you guys.
So thank you.
Mopping up my spilled lemonade yesterday.
Just the roadie.
Yes.
You're more
than that.
Very good one.
We appreciate that.
All right.
Thank you very much, Heather.
We appreciate it.
We will check back in with her a little bit later on.
Pat, we've had such a busy show here.
We have more coming up here in just a bit.
Our colleague Mike McKay from our sister station up here at WCFW 105.7 FM is going to be along talking about what happens musically here in the Chippewa Valley.
And we're also going to talk with Ken Samansky, great author.
It's going to be here with a new book talking to him.
Pat, we forgot about, I know you did it this morning on your show, Free Tick
for free ticket
Friday.
I didn't think you forgot.
I thought you were just building up the anticipation.
Oh, we should have covered my missteps.
Yeah, let's go with that.
Alright, time once again for free ticket Friday giveaway.
Let's go.
That's right.
It's time for Free Ticket Friday.
Give away your chance to win four beautiful tickets to the Milwaukee Brewers game in our beautiful club level seats.
It's not just their basic seat.
Pat and I have been there before.
They're beautiful seats, Pat.
Wonderful seats.
In fact, I recently secured tickets to a game in the not too distant future.
Very
good.
And I
will be attending.
you're going to want to be in these seats.
It's the club level.
If it's a hot day, don't worry.
There is a air conditioned concourse right behind you.
Bathrooms just for that club level.
They're beautiful seats and this is for a game this or yes this coming Sunday, July 13th against the Washington Nationals at 2.10 PM.
That's the catch.
You must be able to go to this game on Sunday at 2.10 PM.
You cannot exchange it for the game.
So that's the key to that.
So if we're ready, Mr. Zommer, it's here.
So you download the Civic Media app, folks.
If you don't have it on your Apple or Android device, open it up.
First, 11 stations are the ones that we're on.
Choose the one closest to you.
Click on it on the lower right-hand side.
It'll say text.
Click on that.
And now we're going to give you the word of the hour.
Text the following word on the Civic Media app to be eligible.
The word is pitch.
P-I-T-C-H.
The word is pitch.
Really, they gave you that word?
So easily confused.
He
is the P
as
in
pitch.
He is Paul, I-T-C-H.
That is the word.
As a matter of fact, it's not.
Text the word pitch right now, and at the end of this hour, a computer will randomly choose someone, and you will win four tickets for this Sunday's game, July 13th against the Nationals at Amfam Field in Milwaukee at 2-10.
How about that?
Can you do anything before the robot overlords pick one?
Can you help your odds at all?
Can you put like an emoji after the word pitch?
No, don't
don't do that
because the computer do not
do because it will it will you'll have no chance at all Can you attach a dollar bill?
No, nothing.
No, you have to spell it correctly because if it were up to pat 9 we'd say well, that's cute That's interesting and we choose you but we are not in charge Letting the
robots do it.
It's it's completely random.
Yes completely random word and so PITC
Text the word pitch right now on the Civic Media app to be eligible for those free ticket Friday giveaways.
And
you know what?
How about
that?
It's a statewide contest.
Thank you the attorney the attorneys of the 12th floor will come down on me if I don't even on the road They're listening.
So, uh, yes.
Thank you Zommer's it is a statewide contest and Pat and I are statewide here up here in northern Wisconsin talking about the northern Wisconsin State Fair
Great so far, right?
It's been awesome.
Yes.
I mean come on We you brought a live animal to the start of this show.
That's
right
barbershop quartet yesterday We have to kick you out of here.
We don't know what you do next We can't fit a marching band in here, but you could pull it off if you
wanted to do it.
There's there's dancers coming up in hour three.
Oh wait a minute.
We don't have an hour three.
That's right.
It's still just me.
That's right.
As it turns out.
Uh alright.
So now text the word pitch P I T C H to the Civic Media app.
Alright.
We have the business out of the way.
We're going to do two things simultaneously because Todd forgot an hour one about the tickets but uh it is now eleven.
Make it thirteen minutes past the hour of three o'clock.
Time once again for what's worse.
Here we go.
Time once again for what's worse.
No prize money involved here.
Nothing to give away on this part of it.
We could give away a funnel cake, but it is your chance to be heard across all 11 news talk sports stations in the civic media world.
No better place to advertise than the civic media network.
Go to civicmedia.us to find out how you can be a partner, and we would love to have you.
All right, this category today, Pat, timely time indeed.
There's a little overcast, but it's hot up here, hot up here, but not overly hot.
That time of year, if you're gonna be out on Lake Wissoda, you wanna make sure that you have your sun screen on, but in the winter, the Lake Wissoda could get very nippy.
So today's category, what's worse, sunburn.
or frostbite sunburn or frostbite.
Give us a call 855-752-4842-855-752-4842.
You could also text us a response on the old Civic Media app as well if you'd like to do that.
Pat, sunburn, or frostbite.
The
thing about Lake Wissota is you could get both if you're ice fishing on a particularly sunny but cold day.
Right?
It could happen.
People
don't think about that.
Actually, I don't know if that could happen.
I should ask Dr. Kratlow when she gets back in here.
Yes, he's lovely, intelligent life.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
No, I think that's true because people in winter, I've known people that gone downhill skiing in particular, higher, like out west, and they come back sunburn.
You're just in the middle of the winter.
And it's because they don't take care of this.
A skin in the winter.
Yeah,
I mean and I I Accidentally gave myself a severe sunburn a couple years back in
the winter.
No, no But that but even even with that I would still say frostbites worse for me All right,
so so Pat is saying that but I'm also
fearing the unknown.
I've never had frostbite So it just strikes me as something It strikes me as something out of what was that Jack London book to build a fire, you know I don't want to freeze to death just for the purposes of having a good book
No, you don't want that.
We have an author
coming up with a good book in a bit, so we'll talk.
Jack London's here?
Yes, Jack London.
That's right.
855-752-4842.
855-752-4842.
Let's go to Cam listening in Appleton.
Cam, thanks for calling in on a Friday sunburn or frostbite.
What's worse?
Hey guys, thanks for taking my call.
I would say frostbite.
And my reason is that I watched a show a long time ago.
called Love Death Robots and in one of the scenes there's an astronaut that gets stuck out in the middle of space and she doesn't have anything to push her back to her ship so she breaks open her suit and it exposes her arm to get it all frostbitten and frozen and then breaks it off so she can throw it so she can get back to the ship and ever since
then
it's
What?
Cam, what are you watching?
I was gonna say, what's worse?
Love, Death and Robots is a very
mortgage show.
What cams watching I can't take care, but I appreciate the in-depth research there Thank you cam very much.
What words Sun bite or Sun bite Sun burn or frost bite 8
5 5 sorry I got that
visual just I
know it's like a big old Barbie doll you rip the arm off You're beating somebody over the head with it.
It's This wouldn't a different
direction entirely entirely
8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2.
8-5-5-7-5-2-4-8-4-2.
What's worse, sunburn or frostbite, you could also text us on the old Civic Media app.
Download it for free, your Apple or Android device.
You ever get frostbite?
Not where I had to like have medical I've had to get really really red and I've never gotten like the gray stuff like where where you get really dangerous is like the frost bite your skin turns gray and you can't feel it at all But I've gotten it where you had to like kind of soak hands or toes put it in You don't want to put it in warm water like cool water and you hit that tingly so I have had that have you had
that?
No, and that's not the thing I would not would not like to do that although I can't imagine why I would end up with any exposed skin out there.
I'm you know
I'm not like Bud Grant.
We're not like playing shirtless out there, you know, with Fran Tarkington as your quarterback.
I actually need a jacket on.
Right, right.
Pat's idea of being outside in the winter is, you know, just getting wood to bring in and to burn, right?
Absolutely.
I
don't
know, what's mom missing?
Oh, very good.
We have a lot to come over and say hi.
We have this a great part about this show.
How are you?
I'm fine.
Thank you.
Absolutely.
Tell folks your name.
What are you doing here?
Oh, well, I'm Linda Norton, and I'm with the Eau Claire County Dems, and we were just singing over here.
I don't know if you know.
You were the
ones who were singing.
The singing
was from the Democratic booth.
On the other side of the building
here?
Yeah, we started our own after the raging grannies in Madison.
We started our own group.
We're called the sassy grannies.
The
sassy grannies.
All right, I
love that.
This is
incredible.
New group and I listen to you every day.
Oh, thank you very much.
Civic media.
Well, how cool is that?
And you listen to Pat too, I assume.
Yes, I know.
And when we go to our rallies downtown, I wear my civic media shirt and I wear a carry a sign that says 93.5.
Oh my God.
That's fantastic.
Well, thank you very much for stopping by.
We appreciate
it.
Nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you as well.
Have a wonderful day.
Thank
you.
All right.
Thank you very much.
Look
at that,
folks.
You never know who you're going to run to in the northern Wisconsin State Fair.
Come on back and talk to more friends here, including Mike McKay WCFW.
Don't go anywhere.
You're listening to the title ball show live from the northern Wisconsin State Fair in Chippewa Falls on the Civic Media radio network.
You're listening to Civic Media.
Stay up to date on the latest news and information for your local community and Wisconsin by signing up for our free email newsletter.
Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get
started.
In truth, wherever it may lead and having fun doing it, welcome back to the title of all show on the Civic Media Radio, where we're live on location at the Northern Wisconsin State Fair in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.
Pat has taken a little hike around the, there's a loop here.
He's going to get more food right now.
We're enjoying one of these wonderful funnel cakes right here.
Gonna get to our next guest though in just a minute, but first of all, I'll do a little clean up and aisle two on our What's Worst Today, Sunburn or Frostbite, a couple of collars, Zomers, who do we have next?
First up, we have Jack from Merrimack.
All right, Jack and Merrimack, thanks for calling in, and WMDX in Madison.
Jack, sunburn or frostbite, what's worse?
Well, first of all, you can get sunburn, regardless of the temperature, because it's ultraviolet from the sun.
And I've climbed mountains all over the world.
You wear sunblock when you're doing the glacier climbing, because that will reflect right off the ice.
and give you a nasty sunburn if you're not careful.
My personal opinion, after having life guarded for six years professionally, his sunburn is the worst.
I'm not having any problem other than in cold weather, my nose, which has been frosted in the mountains.
That does give me some discomfort in the cold.
But I've actually had to have certain things in removed because of the sunburn.
Oh my gosh.
Well, Jack, that's terrible.
Well, take
it.
I appreciate
the call, Jack.
I'm up against the clock here today.
Always appreciate your call there.
Thanks, Jack.
Let's go quickly to Angie and Monroe in beautiful Green County.
Angie, thanks for calling in sunburner frostbite.
What's worse?
I'm seeing frostbite because frostbite can last forever.
Um, just like December and apparently, um, like the other guy was
but a few years ago, it was like 60 below.
I had to feed a horse out in the barn that was old, took forever, three pairs of socks and, and, uh, winter boots.
And I'm telling you, my toes are still cold and it was painful, just painful.
So I
just, I,
I faced
frostbite because of the pain.
Thanks, Angie.
I really appreciate the call.
We'll finish up what's worse a little bit later.
But first of all, our colleague here at WCFW 105.7 in the beautiful Chippewa Valley, a legend up here in this area.
And we're so happy to have you at the table.
Mike McKay joins us.
Mike, we'll ask you what's worse, Frostbite or Sunburn?
I've got to go with Frostbite.
Yeah.
It's got to be.
Because Sunburn is.
You got to use sunscreen.
I mean, that's all there is to it.
But frostbite, I had a cousin of mine actually that had problems with frostbite.
Really?
And it does last forever.
Yeah, you don't want to mess with that at
all.
Oh, absolutely.
Well, thanks for playing our little stupid, stupid things here on the show.
It's great to be here, Todd.
It's really, really great.
It's nice to have
you
here at the Northern Wisconsin State Fair.
Well, it's my second year.
I came up here last year because, uh, quite low, so you got it up here.
Yeah.
And my sister and brother-in-law live in Eau Claire, but I've never been here until last year.
so many things to do.
Yeah, what year is this more or less for you for the northern
Wisconsin?
Let me see.
I've been in the Chippewa Valley for 30 years, so.
30 yeah,
yeah
every year
and lots of we talked with the rusty bulk yesterday So many changes in upgrades here to make this a real quality event
You know, that's the thing when you if I go back 30 years ago when I first got here the stage was a fourth of the size that it is now You know all the buildings with the farm animals and things were all old and small and they have done some amazing things in rusty
is just an incredible guy.
What a vision he's had over the years.
He's going to be missed.
He's got big.
shoes to fill, but you know, good for him.
He gets to retire and enjoy himself.
So
he's absolutely a great guy.
Tell us a little bit, Mike McKay, about our sister station up here at WCFW 105.7, the FM side, the music side.
We're on the talk side, but WCFW is speaking to legends.
That's a station that people know and appear for generations.
Yeah, the call letters actually the station itself 105.7.
Has been on the air.
I think it's almost 50 years Yeah, the original radio station was put on and it was just until a couple of years ago was owned by the original owner He ran it himself out of his home And it was just a it's iconic call letters iconic radio station and to be a part of it
It's been really fun the last year and a half for me and to be part of Civic Media in this format and 80s and 90s music.
It's really a lot of fun and the stuff that I play is stuff that I actually played when I first got into radio back in the early 80s.
And I was doing top 40 radio, so it's full circle for me.
So I love it.
Yeah, it's
really great.
We're so fortunate to have someone who truly is.
I don't use this lightly a legend in this area, but on radio for so long, people know your voice, they know your name, they trust you.
To me, that's what Civic is so much about is having people locally in these communities that folks and listeners can trust.
Yeah, and I think that's what it is.
That's what it's all about.
And that's what I try to be on the air.
Who I am on the air is who I am off the air.
And I know so many people in businesses and business owners and people in the Chippewa Valley.
And so it's great when, you know, a few years ago when my other radio job ended and I was looking around, I had a lot of offers to go to other places.
But this is.
has been home for us for a long time.
So it was just, you know, let's just stay here and see what happens.
And this opportunity came along and I couldn't be happier.
Really.
We're really pleased to have you.
I'm really honored.
And the great thing is now with the Civic Media app, even if you
don't
live in the Chippewa Valley
area,
you can hear via the Civic Media app, just go to 107.4, 5.7 WCFW.
You can listen to you every day.
Yeah, it's great.
And we invite people to check out all the stations on Civic Media.
They're all on that app.
the the little microphone button that's on there and it's talk back so you can talk to us if people can send us a voicemail so it's it's great and just
Connecting with the listeners is what it's all about.
It's still fun.
About 30 seconds left.
Anything I haven't asked you, I want to say.
No, I think other than I did not get the memo that I was supposed to have the big elephant ears here.
I got plenty of you want to bite.
Look at that.
That's enough for a family.
I mean, that's what that's what it's all about.
So no, it's been great.
I appreciate the time to stop on in here.
And I know people were we're happy and excited to see you here to doing your show.
You're
here tonight at the booth.
I'm hanging out here for a little while.
So if you want to stop by today and meet Mike Backe, you can do that.
And we're giving away a great trip to Chula Vista Resort.
You can sign up for that.
All kinds of fun.
Mike Backe, thank you so much for being here.
Great to be here, Todd.
Thanks.
Our pleasure.
You can listen to them every day at 105.7 FM and on the Civic Media app.
Mike Backe, everybody.
Come on back.
Pat's going to come back with even more food.
I'm going to have to go on white watchers at some point.
And we're also going to visit with our friend Ken Samansky, a local author of the Northern Wisconsin State Fair.
It's the all balls show across Wisconsin.
Welcome back to the town of...
show on the Civic Media Radio Network.
We're alive on location.
Beautiful Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin at the northern Wisconsin State Fair.
We're going to talk about reading in just a moment.
Zommer's back.
The old world world headquarters down in Madison, Wisconsin, spending the tunes.
We are here at Chippewa Falls along with my co-host last couple of days.
You can hear him every morning on mornings with a conveniently named Pat Crite low.
Pat Crite low every morning from six until I say that because for a long time his show is called something else and I go on.
He was he was kind enough.
He was desperate.
he had to kill a couple of minutes.
He said, well, you would you come on and then he introduces me as the top of the conveniently named top all balls show.
And now the his name is in his show.
I just like to address him.
I'm trying to decide if we were really that desperate that we needed this all the time.
Not actually that desperate.
Okay, all right.
Not racing.
I disagree with that, by the way.
Reading rainbows.
That's what we play when we have author Laura Bernard.
Oh, do
you
really?
We'll be on our morning show later this month on the 28th, talking about books for the outdoors lovers.
books
about
the outdoors.
That's this fantastic.
I mean, again, one of the things I love when you meet different people is talented folks and authors.
I'm a big believer in books.
I think I've learned not just school books, but reading other books.
It takes you places sometimes, Pat.
You can't always afford to go to when you're younger.
Yes, exactly.
Although I did see a funny video on Instagram about kind of an older person mocking the younger folks who have all these
Fluffy TV shows and everything is not non-conflict saying when we grew up with the books we had where the red fern grows red badge of courage old Yeller We didn't we didn't have reading class.
We survived reading class.
I'm
just
saying there was nothing but death and
doom and gloom and all these you ever read The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck.
I have not one of my favorite all-time books We died in that one.
I don't want to give it away.
Okay
Don't sell the land.
That's the story.
the lesson there.
All right, let's get to our next guest here.
Speaking of authors, he has been on this program.
In fact, last time we did the show up here last summer when we did it with our friend, Jane McNair, Mr. Ken Samansky, who is an author here.
He is also an educator.
Ken, welcome back to the program and welcome to the Northern Wisconsin State Fair.
Hey, thanks.
Great to be back.
It's really, really a pleasure for those that might not have heard the show last year.
Tell folks a little bit about yourself, your background and how you came to be a published author.
All right, I've been a teacher for 30 years.
I teach English, eighth grade English at DeLong Middle School.
I've been writing ever since I was 13.
I sat down with a spiral notebook in my parents kitchen table and wrote a choose your own adventure book.
I was naive enough to think that I could do that.
And that's what I found that I love about middle schoolers is they have that naive confidence.
And you can accomplish a lot as an artist when you've got that naive confidence.
So I've tried to hold on to that.
And I've kept writing my whole life.
And in 2020, I was named the Eau Claire writer-in-residence, which means I'm an ambassador for writer writing and an ambassador for Eau Claire through the act of writing.
So I've published three books.
I've got one coming out next week.
It's called Summertime Souvenirs.
And you talked about the gloom and doom in the books you read.
This is the opposite of that.
This is a feel good
book.
Great.
Yeah.
That's great.
What made you choose or the name or the subject matter of summertime souvenirs?
All these books have a summer theme to them.
And why do you buy a souvenir?
It's because you want to remember something about that vacation, but every souvenir has a story behind it.
And so these stories are things that I want to remember.
So it's like souvenirs in the form of stories.
Well, I love it.
The books coming out next week.
Where can they find it?
That'll be at volume one local store.
and maybe a couple other locations around town.
I try to avoid the Amazon and the national sites and really just keep everything with this book local.
Well, I think that's fantastic.
Right now it's in proof form.
Just a whole bunch of loose pages with one paper clip.
Yup, that is the only copy that exists.
Really?
Well, here it
is, ladies and gentlemen, right here at the Old North of Wisconsin State Fair.
Can I want to leave you enough time because you've been so kind as to give us a sample here live on the air of this new book called Summertime Souvenir.
give Ken Samansky a little time here.
He's going to read a portion of this and we'll come back and talk about it.
Here is Mr. Ken Samansky.
Alright, this story is called Stop the Ride.
Before the Tilt-A-Whirl unleashes its madness, the announcer offers this reassurance.
If at any time you want to exit the ride, give the two thumbs down signal and the operator will bring the ride to a stop.
Though the ride hasn't even begun, I'm already woozy.
Here at Como Town in St.
Paul, my seven-year-old son Keegan is not afraid to ride the rides, but he is scared to ride them alone.
I'm his only companion, so if I don't ride the rides with him, he won't ride at all.
This will be my fifth ride of the day.
I have a wobbly history with Carnival rides.
Even decades later, I can recall the trauma scenes, the octopus at Thorpe's June Dairy Days, the tempest at the northern Wisconsin State Fair, and the zipper at Spooner Rodeo Days, where I was trapped for an extra cycle due to an unloading oversight.
Simply put, I don't like spinning violently in circles and neither does my stomach.
So far on this day, there were chinks in my armor.
The circular swings, rising and dropping made my legs weak, especially the second time.
The T-Cups, believe it or not, were worse.
Put me on a big budget roller coaster, send me ziplining, bungee jumping or skydiving, all pale in comparison to the spinning brutality of the T-Cups.
We take a break for some cotton candy, which helps get the motion sickness aftertaste out of my mouth, but I tell Keegan, no, to many donuts.
In this land of excess, I must draw the line somewhere.
That's when we walk past the tilt of the world.
Dad, I want to go on that, he says.
Fearing another June Dairy Day's incident, I ask, can you go on this one by yourself?
He shakes his head.
Thinking back, my own father didn't go on carnival rides with me.
I have a hard time picturing him at an amusement park, actually, unless he's standing there, completely unamused, maybe smoking a cigarette, not gruff, just ready to leave.
Any time now, former farmer, factory worker, and Korean War veteran, this wasn't really his scene.
Dad died eight months after Keegan was born, but for those eight months, he showed his goofier side.
Despite the dementia brought on by Alzheimer's disease, Dad would transform with his new grandson on his lap.
Bring the baby in for a good 15 minutes or sometimes longer.
Dad emerged from the fog, fully alert, engaging, and comical.
We called it the surge.
Dad would carry on with ridiculous facial expressions and hilarious one-way banter, anything for a laugh from his new grandson.
Now seven years later Keegan and I are buckled into the Tilt-A-Whirl and the announcer is giving the two thumbs down speech.
As we get up to speed the ride stays true to its name and we tilt and whirl and whirl and whirl.
I feel awful.
I want to give the sign but I can't do that in front of my son.
He'd never forget the day I stopped the Carnival ride and we walked off in humiliation.
I try to focus on one fixed point for the illusion of stability, but it's impossible when whirling around like this.
I'm in trouble.
Slamming from side to side, I want to give the sign.
Would the operator even see me?
Just a blur inside this spinning dome of doom.
I must give the sign.
I'm going to lose my lunch.
I try to give the sign, but I can no longer lift my arms.
My stomach slogs around like a washing machine, and now the operator cranks it up to the whiplash cycle.
Meanwhile, Keegan howls with joy.
Finally, the ride slows down.
The ride stops.
It feels inevitable.
I'm going to throw up.
I lift the safety bar.
Don't puke on the ride, I tell myself.
Get away from the ride.
I zigzag down the stairs.
Behind me, Keegan yells, let's do that again.
I search for privacy, stagger next to the mini donut stand and drop to my hands and knees.
I worry about what Keegan is thinking, 90 miles from home and the only person he knows is half collapsed on the black top.
I pull a $5 bill from my wallet and hand it to him.
Faking call, I ask, you want some mini donuts?
Here, go get some mini donuts.
He shakes his head, confused and scared.
A young couple walks past, points at me and laughs.
Then I hear a voice Perhaps it is just my pride or paternal instincts or maybe it is my late father The voice says get up Don't let him see you like this Like a knockdown boxer trying to prevent the fight from being called off.
I lurched my feet down but not out After a few minutes we sit on a bench and eat mini donuts together
Each bite is a temporary relief from the seasick aftertaste.
On the drive home, I nurse a strawberry smoothie.
We're buckled in, my stomach is still not amused, but we're on cruise control now.
The road curves, dips, and rises again.
I stay focused on the horizon, something far off to keep us steady on the good ride home.
Mr. Ken Samanski from his forthcoming book,
Summertime souvenirs.
Incredible.
Thank you, Ken.
Thank you
story.
Thank you.
I just think that's a so well written and great to hear it read by by the author.
But isn't that the story that could be retold Pat from from million parents or grandparents or or aunts or uncles other kids, whether it was a northern Wisconsin State Fair or or Minnesota
and you don't expect to have a tale of generational differences until you've crossed that line and you're there and you see that it's your kids and now my grandkids and we we didn't do that for our kids.
Yeah
with it.
Those parents have to do it for their kids, and you realize you have a story that the next generation can't tell.
And now you've put them on paper to share them.
Yeah, and my hope is, is when people hear these, it reminds them of stories that they had with their parents, or things that they've forgotten about.
And then my stories trigger those moments in them, and they're thinking about things they hadn't thought about in a long time, and realizing that they have a lot of valuable memories too, and it doesn't have to be monumental.
moments in life to be important.
It can just be little things.
I mean, to this day, I still know the difference.
I've never smoked a day in my life, but I know the difference between Benson and Hedges and Salem because one grandparent smoked one brand and the other did the other.
And that's something that will never leave my head.
Yeah.
Even though I haven't smelled you, they're one of them, thank God, in many, many years.
But again, those are the moments from...
your childhood that you can build a story around?
Yeah, I mean, Ken, you know, my sister and brother-in-law, you know, well, and Heather and I are dealing with our dads going through an era of dementia now.
And a lot of these stories, when you realize that, oh, that's not available anymore to be retold, because sometimes you hear your parents and grandparents say these things, 100, it's like, oh, geez.
But then when you can't hear them again, it just puts a different vibe on it.
Yeah, and part of the souvenir, you want to preserve it, you want to hold on to it.
Summer is fleeting and it always goes too fast and life is the same way and this is just an attempt to hold on to some of those best moments and Something that you can look back on and feel good and the reader can feel good too
Yeah,
absolutely.
I know there's another story about the Northern Wisconsin State Fair is a little longer than what we have time for today, but there is a story in there specifically about this event, right?
Right.
It took place four years ago today.
It just popped up in my Facebook memories.
Yes, when my wife and kids accidentally snuck into the Blue Oyster Cold Concert and I was stuck in traffic and chip when I was missing it.
They were in there just for one song and it was don't fear the reaper.
Of course it was.
And is it true that the cover of the book has a photo of the Northern Wisconsin State Fair?
Yes, on my sticker you can barely see it.
But we were looking for pictures for the cover and we ended up using one that I took here on my phone.
I just snapped a photo and ended up being the perfect cover for the photo.
I really
think Pat that again, what Ken is doing here, this embolizes what a lot of people
what the north of Wisconsin State Fair is for a lot of people, you create memories here.
Yeah, and it's not static.
It changes as we learned yesterday, you know, from Rusty Vulcan and little drips and drabs.
But over time, you go, wow, there's been so much that's different, but the memories remain.
and and that's the part that's it's great to capture and it's great to share.
Yeah, absolutely.
We're going to come back and talk a little bit more.
Ken's going to share one of his great stories.
Morning announcements make you feel good to end the show and Pat and I are going to wrap it up another year here at the North of Wisconsin State Fair.
Don't go anywhere.
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a pitch.
Oh,
look at how smooth.
That's an award winning broadcaster right there.
Never won an award.
No, you haven't on television.
No, no.
Well, you should.
I will nominate him next year.
All right.
Thank you very appreciate it.
The the word of the hour as Pat alluded to there is pitch P I T C H for those four Milwaukee Brewer's tickets.
You can be eligible for the next seven minutes by texting P I T C H on the Civic Media app for Brewer's tickets up for grabs.
is our free ticket Friday.
Pee.
I TCH pitch text the word right now coming up the top of the hour ABC CBS and James Kelly news would it be great if James Kelly to the news here at the I had no
idea that you were referring
to it as the James Kelly news at the top of the hour for some of our listeners here at the Chippewa Valley and then it is our weather forecast with Brittany Merleau and her team are great sports reporter Mike Clemens talking about those red hot Milwaukee Brewers against the Nationals and then the Maggie Dawn show every afternoon between four and six followed by
Shwaba and Nightlight.
Right now, Pat Crite Lodi are joined at the desk by author and teacher as well.
Here, Ken Samanski has a brand new book coming out called Summertime Souvenirs coming out this Wednesday.
Well, more on that.
Always glad to have you here, Ken.
What are the other great things that you do here?
You're an administrator or just an English teacher?
English teacher.
And you did morning announcements and you put together these inspirational things you've read it to us before.
Tell us just quickly about
this.
with the morning announcements, the first bell rings and you get the lunch menu and the Pledge of Allegiance and any other announcements.
And I just tried to add in these one minute stories and they all have to end with the phrase make it a great day and they've got to be about a minute long.
But just things I've noticed about certain staff members that might teach the kids a lesson.
All right, here's a morning announcement for the afternoon by Ken Samanski.
All right, during a hot September practice, DeLong soccer players were running sprints across the field, but a few of the boys weren't giving it their all.
Maybe it was the heat and the humidity.
Perhaps it had been a long week.
But after a couple of reminders to hustle, a frustrated coach Chang blew the whistle and gathered the team.
The boys knew what was coming.
We're not running these sprints to punish you, coach Chang said.
It is to condition you for the game.
If we are tied in the fourth quarter, the team that can still run will win.
He let that sink in and continued.
Now if you guys play your hardest and come up short your coaches have no problem with that But if you know you could have tried harder then you let your team down So you can't be practicing how we have to say it half donkey Because what do we always say happens in the game when you practice half donkey the players grinned and responded in unison you play half donkey
So whether it's sports practice or schoolwork, don't be a donkey.
Instead, be a stallion.
Gallop at full speed and make it a great day.
Ken Samansky,
morning announcements.
I love it, Ken.
It just makes you feel better, right?
Positivity.
You always bring positivity to the show.
Thanks for being one of our great educators at our public schools here in the Eau Claire school system.
You guys just do Yulman's work.
Appreciate everything you're doing, Ken.
All right, thank you.
Appreciate being here.
Well, your new book coming out summer times, Souvenirs.
We'll keep plugging that and talking about that.
Welcome back on the show anytime.
Thanks, Ken.
All right,
thank
you.
I really appreciate it.
man ski everybody glad to have him here.
And of course, glad to have our friend and colleague, Pat Crite.
What a couple of days, Pat.
It's been fantastic.
Before we run out of time, many thanks to Kaley High, who brought in her chicken soup.
So thanks to Kaley and Sue for coming in.
And her boyfriend, Rudy, as well, was here.
We forgot to call him out.
I feel like you were trying to top pigeon quest.
I know, right?
Yeah, I know.
Pigeons every Wednesday.
You come up with a live chicken.
Well, it's just it's one chicken.
Many thanks also to Josh Showman, the Washington County executive.
and candidate for governor for stopping by BJ Hollars and Steve Dayton from Fireside Productions on their new documentary on Kube.
Of course, Ken Samansky, our own James Kelly was here as well.
Thanks to him and our own Mike McKay from WCFW and of course, Heather and Mike and Mama Linda for for helping out in the show.
Still here and and has just been going to town on the cookies.
She
loves a good cookie.
I know.
Is she a good cookie baker?
She's a fantastic.
Cookies.
She makes really good chocolate chip cookies.
Her favorite thing I think they had there.
I like the the homemade apple pie in the fall.
Homemade apple pie.
That's great.
Oh yeah.
It's really, really good.
Good.
Okay.
Absolutely.
right.
Pat, any final reflections here on the northern Wisconsin state fairs?
We wrap it up for another
year.
I never had if I could, I would shout this this fair from the rooftops to everybody.
Like I said yesterday, it's it's it's the Goldilocks affairs.
Not too big, not too small.
It is just the perfect thing that you'd
cover in a full day or come out a couple of days in a row.
Like you heard Rusty Volk say yesterday, one of the first things he noticed was that people were only coming for one day and he wanted people to come back.
And so over the 17 years that he's been running the fair, they've added different attractions, changed things around.
And you got to love that because we've all been to things where they get comfortable.
They get complacent and they don't update things.
And here they do, but not in such a large way that they lose their character.
And it just makes us such a wonderful community.
It's one of the best parts about being in Wisconsin is when you have people that want to come together, make a fair or an event like that happen.
I mean, when we can even attract high priced major market radio talent like Todd Alba to come to our little fair.
I'm telling you, we're doing something right here.
But none of
that's true, especially the high priced.
But it's just a lot of fun.
Look at all the lights and you cost us a lot.
You are a
high
dollar.
You men pay.
L. A. D. You answer your L. A. D. Patrick.
But thank you all seriously.
It was great hanging out with you and your lovely wife, Sherry, Dr. Krightlow, to me.
It's great to have her along.
Thanks to the family here for doing this, to Rusty Vogue, for our entire team at WCFW, and also on 93-5, the tap up here for helping do all of this.
We really appreciate it.
And the Northern Wisconsin State Fair is definitely some of my book, Pat, that makes Wisconsin great.
Oh, without a doubt.
And hey, safe travels next week.
That's been a lot of fun.
Thanks.
with you next week on Monday.
You can hear Pat starting at 6 a.m.
from 6 until 9 across the network.
And then Jane Mattener, Greg Bach and I back on the road Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.
We'll see you back at the home world headquarters on Monday.
Whatever you're fighting for, whatever you believe in, keep paying, paying your drum.
Time for a funnel cake, Todd.
Thank you, Pat.
Welcome.
Maggie Dawn is next.
We'll see you on Monday.
Bye-bye.
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