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Where the heck have I been? Is the show canceled? And did Jacob finally lose his
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mind? Uh all these questions and more going to be answered on this special edition of the X Homescholars Club.
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What is good my X Homies? It's your boy Jacob Cogan and uh if you hadn't noticed, the show's been
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pretty silent for the last almost 2 months. Um and there's good reason for that.
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But I'm going to tell you why. Um So, this episode a little bit different than usual. Uh
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it's going to be a little life update. We're going to do a show update as well
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as some special announcement type stuff. And so, let's just start with the life stuff um
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because that's really the catalyst for why I haven't been around. So, at the end of March um I got a phone
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call that nobody ever really wants to get. Um and that was that my grandfather uh we call him Poppy
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uh was in the hospital with some heart stuff. And you never want to hear that somebody's
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in the hospital. It's just never great news. But this was not this was really not great news. And um
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things were very complicated. Um and so, for about a week, things would kind of flop between there being hope for his
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recovery to it being very dire. Um he was sick with some other stuff in there as well. And so, it just was this very
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complicated um thing. And uh if you don't know, I don't live near my granddad. Um he lives
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in California. I live in Tennessee. Not the most convenient to just hop in a car um and drive all that way or even
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hop on a plane um because it's expensive and uh time-consuming. And so, anyway, so for
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about a week, I just kind of existed in this very question mark of what is going on in my
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life um and had to somewhat operate as if life was normal even though it very much
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was not and it was not in my head. So, I had decided I'm not going to put the
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show out that week. And cuz it was just too much to handle. And uh, later on that week I got a another
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phone call um, very early in the morning that he passed away. And he went peacefully and leading up to
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him dying he got to spend time with his kids. He got to spend time with uh, his siblings
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and um, us grandkids, we didn't get to go see him, but we got to send him messages
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um, of love and and remembering um, the good the good stuff. And um, and that's why we didn't get to
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go see him either was he didn't want us to see him be sick. He wanted us to remember him
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healthier and just who he was. The normal the normal Poppy. Um, and so anyway, um,
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but like every death uh, it's typically followed by a funeral and so um, so I ended up going out to California
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and was there for most of April. Um, I actually just I flew out on the 1st and I didn't get home until the 20th. And so
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um, just a lot of time spent with family doing funeral stuff uh, helping clean out his house
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dealing with with things um, doing a lot of like remembrance type stuff and just spending time with family honestly
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because even though that those times are like very sad, right? Because you just lost a loved
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one, there's also I think sometimes some joy that can be found in there, right? Remembering their
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life and the funny moments and the stupid moments and the the games and the adventures and the life lessons and all
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those types of things. So, we did a lot of that and um which is good. It's you know, it's healing.
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Um and then came home and it grief really hit. This has been a very interesting um
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experience um with grief. Uh I've lost all four of my grandparents now and I lost my first
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grandparent when I was 17 um and I'm 29 now. Uh each one hits so vastly different um
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from a grief perspective and I can't even like begin to describe uh the emotions
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surrounding it. And if you've lost loved ones, you probably know what I'm talking
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about how it's different uh every single time. This is both the most emotionally
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healthy I felt um losing a grandparent and also like the worst experience because I'm just
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insanely emotional uh around everything now. So, if you can't tell by me describing this, it's a little bit
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touchy still and overwhelming. Um and it's just been tough. And so, the whole month of April
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basically became a wash um and I decided I'm just going to put the show on pause.
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I kept telling myself, you need to like make an announcement. You need to you know, tell people and I just was like I
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couldn't even do that. Um And so, um yeah. So, April was basically a wash um
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for both good and bad reasons. Um But where does that put us today? Is the show canceled? No, absolutely not. Uh
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we're not going anywhere. Um in fact, very much the opposite. The show has been doing incredible things even while
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we've been on break and just seeing uh numbers continue like go up and I know
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not everything is numbers, but it is nice to know that people are listening um to back catalog stuff and um I've
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received messages and people wanting to be on the show and opportunities and the
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and things that I am just very excited for uh the future of where the show is going. So,
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that being said, when is it actually coming back? Well, it's coming back this
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Friday. Um, I've got an interview with RB. If you guys don't remember RB, he
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was on previously. He's back. We're going to talk about some very cool things, but I'll let you find out on
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Friday uh all of those things. So, So, we're back. We're coming back. Um,
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and not only are we coming back, but I'm also going to try to put out an episode
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every week in the month of May and get back on a weekly schedule. Uh because I've got just a nice back
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catalog right now of people and I got a nice plethora of guests coming on. And so,
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there's that. We are headed in a good direction, I guess, is what I'm trying
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to say with the show. So, in addition to the show coming back, I've also got some
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special announcements. The first one being something that's actually happening this week, specifically on
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April 30th. And um that is that April 30th is day of the homeschool kid, the homeschool child. And um
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did you know that? I didn't know that until last month uh sometime, but the Coalition for
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Responsible Home uh Education is putting on a great conversation with um Steven Merrill Block. And if you're not
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familiar with Steven, um he just wrote a book called Homeschooled. If you haven't
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read this, it's a great book. Um I actually would love to reread it with maybe some of you. More on that in a
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minute. Um but yeah, he's going to be talking about his homeschool experience. He's going to
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talk about what the coalition does. It's just going to be a really cool time. So,
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that's happening on Thursday at 2:00 Eastern time. I'm going to put a link
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down in the description um of how you can sign up to attend um or you can just go to crhe.org
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{dot} org uh /dothc day of the homeschooled child. Um again, that's crhe.org
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/dothc. I know, a lot of letters. It's going to be linked down below as well, but go get
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on that list. They'll send you an update. Get on their newsletter list, too. If you're not familiar with the
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Coalition for Responsible Home Education, specifically a lot of what they do is work with homeschool alumni
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to help kind of shape uh some of the direction that uh legislation can can take to to help
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homeschool kids down the line um and protect homeschool kids. So, it's a lot
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about giving homeschool kids rights um and access to things and stuff like that. So, very cool organization. She's
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going to come back on at some point. We've got potentially some other stuff in the works with them, as well. But,
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very cool organization. Again, go sign up. Day of the Homeschool Kid. It's going to be a lot of fun. Um you can ask
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Stephen questions um as well as hear more about his story and hopefully he'll
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come on the show at some point. I would love to have him on. So, here's a little
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plug for that. Um second special announcement, also kind of just like an ask in general, is that
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I want to do a ex-homeschooler happy hour type of thing and I want to hang out with a bunch of
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you guys all at the same time. Play games, be stupid, tell stories, that kind of a thing. And so, I'm going
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to post more about that on Instagram um and get kind of some feedback on potential days we could do it, as well
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as like maybe things you guys would want to do. but I'm thinking play some games, maybe like bingo,
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trivia, I I don't really know. Um but hang out, have some conversation around our home school experiences and
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and how that shaped us maybe. And so, anyway, so if you're interested in that,
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let me know. Um I'm thinking somewhere between May 11th and the 24th. I know
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that's a big wide window, but if you are interested in that and have some feedback or something, you can drop a
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comment down below or shoot me an email [email protected]. And yeah, would love to like hear your
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thoughts on it. But uh I'm also going to be posting more about it, I think, on
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Instagram, trying to pull you guys a little bit and figure out some some good info, hopefully. So, there's that.
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Additionally, I kind of had mentioned book club. I know in the past I had brought up doing a book club and reading
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a different book, and then I just totally dropped the ball. It's something I would like to do again, and I would
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like to read Homeschooled, um Stuff and Stuff's book. And I have read this already, um but I would I would like to
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reread it and maybe do some discussion on it. And so, if that's something you're interested in, also
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leave a comment down below, send me an email [email protected]. I'm thinking start it sometime in May,
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mid-May, maybe around the 15th-ish, maybe just call it right there, smack dab in the middle. Um and so, I'm
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currently working on figuring out what that would look like and then do some discussion around
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that as well. And so, anyway, so if you're interested in that and haven't
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picked up this book, gives you about 2 weeks to like grab a copy, and gives me 2 weeks to figure out
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how we split that up. Um so yeah. If that's something you're interested in, shoot me an email, a DM, comment
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down below, any of that kind of stuff. Um next up, I've gotten a lot of requests um for
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guesting on the show. And so, if you want to be a guest, I want to talk about it. Uh
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you can shoot me an email, [email protected]. Uh how many times can I say that in this
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in this uh episode? Um but, shoot me an email. Let me know a little bit about yourself, like just like a paragraph or
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two about your homeschool experience. Um And maybe some topics you would be interested in. If there's something
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specific you've either heard on the show that you want to expand on, something
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you haven't heard on the show that you would like to talk about. Um specifically things that like I've been
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very interested in lately, um aside from just like hearing your experiences, is talking about the role that religion has
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played in homeschooling. Um I'm interested in obviously talk about if you have something like ADHD, if you're
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autistic, um and maybe you got diagnosed later in life, or if you got diagnosed when you were a homeschool kid, or just
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as a kid in general, um how that's kind of shaped into your homeschool experience, or you know, made you think
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about those things. Um Obviously, we talk about big homeschool family versus small homeschool family.
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I'm one of two kids. Um so, small homeschool family over here. Um I very much I'm interested in that dynamic
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along the religion aspect, like purity culture played a huge role for me. Um and just like unpacking the good, the
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bad, and the ugly. Um right? We don't necessarily want to just do If your experience was bad, like that's okay. Um
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I still believe that there's always good things that can be pulled out of those
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experiences. And so, hopefully, if you want to come on the show and you want to have a conversation, like I hope that
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you can like view it the same way of just like there are good things that we can talk about mixed in with the bad and
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the ugly. Um it's about providing commentary around homeschooling and what the experience really was like,
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right? And so, if it's all bad, it's all bad. That's okay. Um if it's all good,
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it's all good. That's okay. So, if you've got a story and you want to share it, shoot me an email. Again,
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[email protected]. I think that's the sixth time I've said it now. Um, but yeah, what you can kind of expect
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like following that email would be a request to do like pre-interview call with me. Typically, they're 30 minutes.
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Sometimes they go up to an hour long if we really hit it off. Um, and it's just a chance
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to like for me to kind of like further vet you, get to know you a little bit, um, and figure out
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kind of what a show would look like. Um, and also ease your mind if you're at all
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nervous about coming on the show. Um, you know, I can answer questions around those types of things. Um, what is kind
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of like required of you? One, the ability to share your story. Um, but secondly, you need to be able to
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record audio and video. Um, if you've got a microphone, awesome. If not, that's okay. We can work around
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that. Um, and typically, it's best to be able to record on a computer if you've
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got it. Um, I have done stuff on phones and iPads and things like that, but it does change the dynamic. So,
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you know, um, keep that in mind as well if you want to do this. Like, it's best
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if you've got like a laptop or a computer with a webcam and some kind of audio device, even just
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headphones. Um, is is helpful. And so, um, yeah. And then, last thing I want to touch on
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is the newsletter, right? Um, I'm going to put a link on the screen, also down
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in the description below if you want to get on the email newsletter. I send it out basically whenever an
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episode comes out. Um, I know I was kind of doing every 2 weeks uh, an episode comes out and then kind
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of fill in the gaps with some other stuff. We'll see. The newsletter might be shifting a little bit, but it
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typically comes out between one one time a week to uh, every 2 weeks. And it's
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just kind of updates like episodes that came out, resources I found, books I'm reading.
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Who knows? There's been other stuff that feeds in there as well. Um, in addition to that, I'm also like
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trying very hard to build a website on the back of it uh where all of those posts as well as like
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stuff about books I read, resources, that kind of thing is going to live as well. And so, all that going to be
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linked down below. Um, and I would love for you to like get on there. That's going to be ultimately
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the best way to like stay connected with the show would be through through email
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um the email newsletter itself. So, all that being said, I'm okay. Life sucks sometimes.
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Uh, the show is coming back, which is a great thing and um I'm looking forward to seeing you guys
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on Friday. Okay. I'm going to go. I'll see you later. Peace.