Big Digital Energy

0:00 Why did the Moneywise podcast this morning and what was that about so money wise this Guy named Sam Par and and Harry Morton and what they do is they interview people not about how to get rich but

0:16 what happens after you're rich and you know so shit like what are the economics of a private plane you know what are the struggles raising kids you know that sort of Stuff and Sammut tweeted out you

0:31 know who do I do do I have on the show and I've called and said you Gotta have Yates on Blah Blah Blah so he had me on in the other piece of advice is don't get fired well you Know I think the whole

0:45 reason they wanted to have me on cause you know my net worth theoretically went from one hundred and fifty million bucks at one point to eighty two thousand and you know how do you deal with that and

0:56 it's like I Dunno Justice my Coffee order didn't really change at Joseph's Yeah tacos at larry's of the things that really matter in your daily life don't change and you and You Realize you don't need

1:10 that much Yeah it's you know I'll I'll tell you this and this morning we spent probably forty five minutes at Joseph's with Mr Coleman betting Keith that he couldn't figure out how to turn on the car

1:29 radio in his car somehow MR coleman finds this brand new Genesis he has in the High Tech Board and fraught Yeah Crazy and he has to call the Dealership three times a day to figure it out he said he

1:45 was willing to bet one hundred Bucks and Keith was so Cynical Gone I need proof the radio actually works before I make this bad

1:57 well and the Reason I wanted to tell you that story because you've met all those cast of characters down at at at Joseph's but

2:08 you know what's funny about that is probably two or three years from now we'll be sitting around Joseph's and We'll have that same bat again you know she was scholars Yeah you know and and I think in

2:21 terms of of what that does kind of for me and my Psyche and my mental health to be able to kind of have those those mornings I think's really important particularly coming on the heels of the weekend

2:36 we had and what's going on and and central Texas and so if it's all with umar can we do fuck energy this week and just talk about Texas cause it's been a

2:52 it's been a few days like a you know I've never experienced we were talking on the phone earlier about you know this places is very personally meaningful to both of US not only for US but individually

3:09 but you know our our kids as well and and before that so it's you know just one of those

3:22 incredibly incredibly devastating and almost unimaginable events that

3:31 he at least for me cause a tremendous amount of reflection

3:37 in in a number of ways and Yeah no I you know the the thing that struck me and will will start talking

3:48 and it wouldn't surprise me if I start crying at some point just that area's really special like you said but I mean it really hit home with me when the announced death toll is now higher than

3:60 Hurricane harvey and we all remember how bad Hurricane Harvey was when it hit Houston and how devastating it was and you know more people have died kind of along the Waterloo Bay River over the last

4:17 few days than that and just spent a horrible my My My Mom and Dad moved to retire just down the river and comfort back in nineteen eighty seven and that was the year of another big flood of that where

4:35 I'm sure you remember when the pot of Gold Cap There was a church group for Baptists that was from a Dallas area Sago Ville Baptist Church was trying to evacuate and you know they lost they lost ten

4:54 campers who were in a van and a bus one of whom of the ten was never never recovered and so you know that that part of the world as I say used to that type of event but you know certainly nothing like

5:13 this and we we as a family have along hunt camp experience not at mystic which you know is just devastating I woke up certain saturday morning or Friday morning I'm in I'm still in North Carolina a

5:31 kind of glance at the news and I was thinking about OpeC meeting on Saturday and what That IT may mean talks of ratcheting up the the the volumes that they're going to be bringing back on in in August

5:47 and September and then all of a sudden it you know the the news reports and got really really intense and then you start to look at the magnitude of of what happened in the very early hours of that

6:03 and then the camp Mystic came into the the conversation and it was just it was it was all just so very surreal and and having spent you know a lot of time recreationally in that area over the last

6:20 fifty years of my life My girls went to camp just down the river at the heart of the hills which is just down the river from from Mystic and in the dozen years That either drop them off as campers or

6:37 what we call heart lights pre counselor it's like a counselor in training after you know after you finish your last year as a camper at age sixteen and then returning again as as counselors it's a

6:51 it's just a very very profound part of the lives of girls and families that have you know have been fortunate enough to have that experience in that part of the world at those camps you know mystic

7:07 and heart of the hills there's capital hunter there's Wildomar camp stewart for boys and you know many others that are right there on the north and south fork of Guadalupe that over generations Girls

7:20 girls and boys have spent summers there just just an incredible growth and development and adventure it's it's it's something that's you know quite unique and very close to us IT was a family because

7:38 our our girls all had that that experience and in fact my My wife was a camper in the mid seventies at heart and the camp director James Ragsdale who

7:52 owned and and directed the camp since eighty eight she was a program director starting in nineteen seventy eight and she was one of the first at least identified victims and fortunately heart was

8:05 between month long sessions so the the second session was actually set to begin on Sunday the sixth which you know and and that that camp received quite a bit of damage and destruction as well so I'm

8:24 kind of rambling here but

8:27 it's enough for one of my good friends from rice lived in Lakey Texas and every year for the fourth of July before we had kids after we had kids we'd go out to lakey they are they always had a parade

8:46 through downtown Lakey if you and we do that and we always stopped and hot at the General store on the way back through not that part of the guadalupe but you know used to go tubing down the Guadalupe

9:04 River you know all the time floated the Frio a whole bunch and in that area and so that that area is always just at a really special place in My heart cause you're right I mean so many of our my girls

9:20 wound up really liking the camp at the Museum of Natural Science in Houston so they did that during the summer instead of going away but so many of their friends went at camps all throughout that area

9:34 and come back and you know I mean I'm sure your wife still talks about meeting some of her best friends at that camp in the summer in fact my youngest daughter My My Girls I have three girls they're

9:48 all you know at or are over thirty and my youngest daughter who lives in Austin was at

10:00 in hunt on Memorial Day weekend there were a group of heart the lums that were celebrating at one of her camp friends family's house which is actually on the riverside of Thirty Nine Pretty close to

10:17 town and unfortunately and her younger brother is a college student this this camp friend's younger brother Aidan Hartfield is a college student In San Antonio he and his girlfriend and two of their

10:34 friends were in the house on Friday and they've they found the three girls but ADN is still missing I looked at the latest update so I

10:48 you know just just

10:52 I you know I have flashback to drop offs and you you mean you're dropping the girls off for a month and that can be as young as six years old and we started pretty early and because I I I knew about

11:08 that area from spending a Lotta time there as a kid just like you I started back in kind of the mid seventies a buddy of mine had a family place on the west fork of Frio about mile outside of central

11:19 Lakey and I've been to all those parades we do the long float from their place all the way to Utopia River bridge where there was when we're old enough there was a big kind of blow out party and but

11:33 you also know that in there we're on a few occasions and there was there was times when the rain hit the the headwaters and in the watershed and we'd see we'd see water up over the the outdoor patio

11:49 where the bunkhouses weren't my Buddy's place so you kind of knew that stuff happens really quickly but again going back to dropping my girls off and it's you know it's it's a big deal when when it's

12:04 certainly when it's their first time and you're you're you're leaving them leaving them in the care of someone else with a large group on the River I told my wife the other Day I Said Look I always

12:19 kind of kept an eye on the on the weather when they were when they were gone because I I knew how quickly things could could change but I never imagined anything like this for sure and So I I Can't I

12:34 can't fully put myself in the place of one of the speaking at it from a dad girl Perspective I can't put myself in the place of one of those one of those dads and moms who have lost their you know

12:49 their baby girls it's it's just it's it's it's so Profound I think that's why I'd sent me so hard is just sitting there that literally could have been a Yates Girl I mean it would not have been weird

13:04 for kelly to be over there as a counselor and the the other thing that's really getting to me is just the stories of heroism that are coming out of this I mean you've got the story of the counselor

13:18 that woke up the kids and waist deep water and got the kids up into the rafters and there was a clothesline up there that they would drive things on and she told the kids hang on to the clothesline Do

13:31 not let go of the clothesline no matter what and she got down because she was going to go look to see if there was a path to safety got swept down the river a mile fortunately she grabbed a tree

13:45 survived got a rescue to get back to the to the girls and all the little girls made it they were all clinging to that clothesline there were supposedly within two feet of water but they all made it

13:58 and you know Harry Broach who's working for Us the summer has a friend that was a counsellor and got all the kids up to the rafters and figured out at some point that the rafters were going to be

14:15 underwater so he was grabbing the kids swam down out a window got him up on the roof and he sat there and went back and forth and eventually got all the kids out the last kid had about six inches of

14:30 air but he eventually got them they all made it and just you know the the various owners of the camps out there trying to save kids it's it's it just breaks your heart a dick Eastland who was you know

14:47 dick and twenties who I never actually met but was quite familiar with them because at that camp community and hart is such a tight knit group they've been there literally for fifty years just

14:59 dedicating to those camps and when you think about the fact that mystic had seven hundred campers on site in that session the just the amount of work and love and passion that goes in to creating that

15:16 experience and how much over generations that that it's been such a valuable thing in in the growth of a young girl and a young boy's life Jane Ragsdale HS husband and the cowl passed Away A few years

15:31 ago but he was very involved in directing camp stewart for boys you'd always see him at heart but he was you know running up and down the roads and the river just taking care of of making sure that

15:49 the full camp experience was the best it could possibly be and you you just get an appreciation when you go for closing ceremony like we used to go to pick them up and they have a big closing ceremony

16:03 and you you're you're amazed at how well run things are how everyone is extremely cared for and as the years passed and we would have successive summers I got more and more comfortable with the fact

16:20 because there was a lot of anxiety going into your first experience but then you know after you got past that as a little girl you Couldn't wait to go back and see your friends that you know may have

16:34 been from other towns and schools and some from out of state and I think some from out of the country I know the the the counselor staff and at least our experts from heart there girls from all over

16:47 the world working at those camps and so they they they all

16:53 they all got to

16:57 discover the magic of that place which is

17:01 which is really what it is and it's in and it's and it's definitely hit close to home I don't I Dunno where we are on

17:11 the the ethics or the quote unquote rightness of mentioning names but we we've definitely had people in the energy business who have Ser suffered direct losses I know a prominent oil and gas CEOS who

17:28 nice Unfortunately he was a victim a CEO of a prominent energy company whose daughter lost and so it's a it's it's definitely hit US hard and and kind of want one other thing I just want to say is we

17:48 do need avid deep dive here to figure out what happens and can we do better so it doesn't nap again but just anybody out there listening now is not the fucking time to do now is on time and then you

18:02 you saw my

18:05 outburst on Saturday I was extremely disappointed to see barely twenty four hours after disaster struck there was not to be named member of he have to since deleted the post you know immediately

18:21 politicising it about the national weather service retirees are excellent and in ws people had no head warned of the needless loss you know something's going to happen at some point resulting in a

18:37 needless loss of life and then the middle kind of part of that was it didn't take long it's not it's not the time for that in in in the notion that the NWS is responsible for any kind of response I I

18:56 that you you know the people in that part of Texas pretty well the natives and the people who who live and make a living in that part of the world they are some of the most self reliant tough

19:09 individuals

19:12 in the state I mean each region of the state has it's own character and profile but the the success stories that you were alluding to in the rest in the in their early earliest stages of their

19:27 response tell you that that there's a lot of courage and a lot of selflessness that that is just part of the character of the people in that part of the world and I and I would just I would just go on

19:44 to say that I it it it's a long road back but I you know I hope and pray that you know we we get that area those camps in that community back on their feet and I it is just such a

20:03 it's it's it's such a magical place that has such a profound impact on you know literally it's been over the at least in our affiliation thousands of young girls who are who are way better now as

20:22 women because of it and I I

20:30 What One Thing I did want to mention and we can share it I saw a story Yesterday in USA Today Jonathan Macomb is working with one of the the private search and rescue organizations he was the father

20:45 and husband who lost his entire family in the Blanco Blanco River flood of twenty fifteen there were in the house that ended up breaking up up against the bridge and in his last moments before he

21:02 decided that he was going to live you know he he knew his wife and two children were washed away and probably gone forever

21:12 and PS you know he asked God what he wanted from him and okay I'll do it and very shortly after that tragedy he dedicated himself to working on search rescue and recovery and he's he's down there now

21:28 and so if there's anyone who can you know provide counsel and comfort to those that are still waiting or those who who have realized to the worst kind of loss that you can imagine he does know what

21:47 you're going through and he's one of the few so none none of US can say

21:53 even as as parents have of

21:59 young girls and young women I I just I I I Can't Imagine I Can't I can't get to that level of of understanding it it just it hits me when I you know at the count the oddest times I'll say one of the

22:14 little Girls Pictures and really really

22:18 just really takes your breath away in you know in the saddest kind of way so

22:26 I I you Know I I hope the tribute to these to these Girls and young women in the camp directors that lost their lives that they can go on

22:38 after we've taken the time and corrected things if there are things that need to be corrected I know it would be an incredibly difficult thing to carry on to

22:54 their parents trust because what happen because just so the the scope and scale are so unimaginable and the just the extreme impact of of this disaster but I I think ultimately years down the road if

23:14 if it can be restored and carry on I think I think that would be an incredible tribute to those that that dedicated their lives and those that lost their lives in this in this tragedy no doubt well

23:30 Definitely our hearts and thoughts and prayers go out to to everybody affected by this and quite frankly everybody in Texas because at the end of the day we are thugs can say all they want about Us

23:44 but we are a really big family and I know this affects every texan to some degree or another and I had a former colleague reach out to me just put a

23:58 kind of a public service announcement the community fond of the hill country you could look it up and that is the most direct destination for donations that will go in and have the impact where those

24:15 things are needed as it is a locally administered fun that existed before this but my friends at Oregon Auto I don't want to go through the Red Cross I don't want to go through neither the other

24:27 national organizations and so the community funded the whole country is is really I think the the best place for those that are that are looking to to help monetarily

24:41 then so are are my

24:48 Chair Chair St Mark's in Houston is actually directing people towards the Episcopal Church and Carvel and as it as it happens the rector at the Kerrville Episcopal Church used to be my parents rector

25:06 in Richmond Texas so I can I can definitely vouch for him he's a good guy but anyway well appreciate you talking about those mark and it's a it's just been Brutal Yeah Brutus doesn't begin to describe

25:25 it in Yup

25:29 Pray for God's comfort for all of those those that have lost friends family children it's it's it is a it's just an unimaginable thing

25:45 there are there are no magic words and for this time the the the the one thing all kind of clothes on cause I think this is some of the best advice I've gotten from priest Patrick who we both know

25:59 very well and I was one time talking with Patrick and I said Oh My Gosh that's Gotta be the worst thing you do in your job is you know going to the deathbed are going to comfort a family when a

26:17 tragedies occurred and patrick in not a snarky or or Joking Way said it's actually the easiest thing I do and I go you Gotta be kidding why what what are you talking about he goes in those times of

26:34 tragedy people don't remember what you said they only remember the fewer there are not so Patrick's advices show up so hopefully all of US Texans can find a way for somebody that was affected by this

26:49 tragedy to just show up

26:54 for sure

26:57 well thank you for jumping on and doing this it

27:04 is just you know part of the part of the process that Yeah

27:10 absolutely I think I think presence and being there

27:15 in the immediate aftermath but that that there's there's going to be in need for that for weeks months or years to come for many of these people and Let's let's not forget those who have been out on

27:28 the river doing the Grim work of search and recovery in going through that every day I mean we still have what I saw the latest update over one hundred and seventy people still missing with one

27:41 hundred and thirty fatalities so and the and the numbers going to be higher than that I mean you just like it does RV parks you check and you pay cash there's not a record that you are certainly there

27:56 and so Yeah so what they're doing is you know all the law enforcement is receiving inbounds and there they are cross -checking lust and and and unfortunately I told I told my wife this weekend I said

28:11 because of that you know there there was rightfully so focus on mystic because it was so hard hit but you knew who was there and

28:26 you know the identifications of who was there who survived and that was a you know big concentration of people but there are people scattered all over the scattered all over that area just weakening

28:37 and you know I I couldn't think of

28:42 kind of a confluence that was more disastrous than

28:46 the certainly the the burst of rain from that

28:53 Pacific and gulf tropical system the stationary aspect of it it being deep into the night early in the morning and fourth of July weekend now I mean that very easily could have been me heading over to

29:09 Carville to go see Robert Earl keen cause I've done that before and my and my Life and I'm not you know Laura would have known that that I was gone if she didn't come with me but there are a lot of

29:23 people potentially like that that or it's Gonna take a while to figure out that Yeah they'd they had headed over so anyway will mark My I love you did love you too man well I guess we'll get back on

29:37 energy next week Nah and anyway thoughts and prayers to everybody out there