Ep.245 Back From The Dead With Steve And Michelle

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Where'll you be going?

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Texas. Damn, son, where'd you find this? Go on, make it happen. And now here's Steve and Michelle.

SPEAKER_02 0:11

Welcome back to Mallet and Michelle on Dripping Springs. I'm Michelle, and sitting right here across from me, which we are very, very thankful, is Steve Mallet. Now, a couple of weeks ago, we all know, we heard the story, Steve underwent open heart surgery for a genetic heart condition. And today we wanted to give everybody a real update on how he's doing, what recovery has actually looked like, and maybe talk about a few things that people really don't understand about having open heart surgery until you're the one going through it. But Steve, welcome.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Well, thank you. You know, before we kind of get into that, I want to say thank you to the people that reached out to me and brought us meals and sent cards and texts and emails. Uh it was more than I could count. It was it was uh I got emotional about it a couple times because you sometimes forget how much of a part you pit play we play in people's lives. Uh people said some of the nicest things to me, and uh it was it was a little it was great. I loved it. It was a little overwhelming, but it was fantastic. I mean, people came to visit me in the hospital and um you know the meal train that you set up, it was it was truly, truly amazing. I heard I actually heard from people I hadn't heard from years uh for years that said, hey, we heard which what's going on, we just want to wish you the best of luck and we love you, we're praying for you. It's uh what a great town we live in. That's that's great. Pretty amazing community. Not everybody thinks Steve Mallet is a jerk face, but the prayers those of the you you that do, uh just so you know, I don't care.

SPEAKER_02 1:51

I don't care. The prayers, the messages, the meals, the check-ins, the encouragement. I know it has meant more to you than you can probably just even put into words.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

I can't. I it was uh it was very sweet. Everybody that that uh said such nice things. It was very, very nice. Uh and if you know somebody that's going through something like this and you know them and you have their contact info, please send them something encouraging. I can tell you, it made a huge, huge difference for me.

SPEAKER_02 2:20

I bet it, I bet it did. And you know, we just want to let you know that today we we missed a week. It's the only time in our entire time of 200. We we gave, well, Steve thought he was actually gonna record a podcast and I canceled it because I was like, no, you're not.

SPEAKER_01 2:38

I was, yeah, there was a uh two-week period where I thought, oh, I'm gonna get back up and running, and my body said, No, you're not.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Yeah, well, Steve being Steve, probably is already wondering when he can go climb a mountain or run like 10 miles or just do something completely unreasonable. But we wanted to let you know that today there's just not a big production, no guest. It's just Steve and myself and the story of what happened on the day they put your heart back together. But we also do not want to um miss the day. Today that we are recording, it is the 25th anniversary of 9-11, and we will talk about that in just a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Very important day. And I know some of our listeners were not alive or were very young when that happened, and I think it's important for us to remember what happened. You know, you you hear that slogan, uh, what's a remember uh remember the day or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

Um never forget.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

But it's it's it's more than that. You you have something you want to read, which I thought was beautiful, but um yeah, we definitely need to talk about that. But yeah, it's been three weeks today.

SPEAKER_02 3:43

Today, uh the day of our recording.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

Three months since I had my surgery.

SPEAKER_02 3:47

Well, we could not do this podcast. We don't have our sassy little commentary, but we could not do our podcast without our sponsors. I don't have the It's okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Hey, Deep Eddie Vodka, we love you. You are fantastic. Thanks for sponsoring the show.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

You're right. And how about South Star Bank?

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Hey, South Star Bank, we love you, and thank you for sponsoring the show.

SPEAKER_02 4:08

And how about black slate construction and black slate roofing?

SPEAKER_01 4:12

Hey, Hunter, you're very sexy, and the world should know that. Thank you for being a sponsor of the show.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

And then, of course, um our entire team stepped in when Steve was not here, Mallet Integrity Team.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

You know what? I uh I've always loved our team, but this team really shined when I wasn't able to do the job that I, you know, that I'm supposed to do. All of you stepped up so big, it made all the difference in the world to me, you know, being in the hospital knowing that you all had it covered and you had it covered and then some. It was uh it made me feel better about just being a bump on a log for a couple weeks and you know, letting my body heal the way it needs to. Because you took care of everything.

SPEAKER_02 4:56

There's uh not a lot of agents out there that have a team like we do that are willing to step up. And so kudos to Carlisle Kennedy, Cedric Mill Mills, and Maury Boyd.

SPEAKER_03 5:08

And Michelle Lewis. Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:10

Um, I I also wanted to let you know while you were gone, and um I got the accolades of of the WOW awards.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Congratulations.

SPEAKER_02 5:21

Lisa Sullivan's um group or award show that she put together. And I really kind of kept it low-key. I number one, I didn't think I was gonna win. I really didn't promote that I was nominated or anything. And I really honestly haven't until I was in the newspaper, I reposted it.

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

Because I kind of wanted wanted to wait for you because quite honestly, I won the Trailblazer Award. Yeah. I am so sorry. I'm still dealing with this this crud, but I won the Trailblazer Award, and I that award never would have come about if it hadn't been for you and Mallet and Michelle. And I just really kind of wait, wanted to wait because I wanted to share this award with you. It's it was about celebrating women, but I wouldn't be have the community standing that I do without you as my partner.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

Do you remember the moment we were sitting at Simply Pho and I said, we're gonna start a podcast, and you like freaked out nuts. Did you ever imagine it would become what it has become? I never, I never would have imagined this. No. What I the the the parameter I would have set for this to be a success is like one one hundredth of what we've attained with it. It's been so great. The the listeners we have, the loyal people that, you know, they quote things to us.

SPEAKER_02 6:37

It's been amazing.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

You know, and the people we have met.

SPEAKER_02 6:40

That's that's the thing, is that you know, when we first started, we thought we're really gonna make our mark on dripping springs. And I have to tell you that we were dead flat wrong because the people have dripping of dripping springs have really made a mark on both of our lives.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

And so true.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

You said something to me that really stuck with me when people because they've said it to me, you know, thank you so much for what you do for this community. And you're like, what do we do for this community? And honestly, it's giving them an authentic, fresh platform to promote whatever ideas and the great people of dripping springs in the Texas Hill country.

SPEAKER_01 7:17

You know, it we'll talk about it a little bit more uh uh when we talk about 9-11, but it's we wanted to do this to build a sense of community where people didn't split each other up. Well, that person has that political view, and you said, you know, that person lives in that neighborhood, that person drives a pickup or whatever. We wanted people to to know each other to the point where they could love each other even though they're different. That's what we want to do. That was the main thing we wanted to do, and I think we've done that over and over and over. We've had people come in this studio that we align with perfectly, you know, and we have great conversations, and we've had people that have come in that we don't see much of anything in the world uh uh the same, but we still we still had great conversations with them. And it was respectful. It was it was like we were sitting on our couches, just having a fun dialogue with somebody that came over to visit with us. I think that's it's been really, really cool. That's what we're trying to every minute over.

SPEAKER_02 8:11

That's what we're missing back from the September 12th days, right? And we've tried to really provide a safe space for people. And you know, I've come to learn in my ripe age of 55 years of age that youngster. Yeah, uh we are not for everybody, and that's okay. That's okay. That's okay.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

You know, nothing you do that's impactful in life can be for everybody. And you know, if there's people out there that don't like us and they like to hate us, and I know there are actually people that listen that don't like us that are looking for us to say something uh that they can use against us. You know, if it gives you some purpose in life, good for you. I don't but trust me, you can complain to us, we're gonna keep doing what what we do, the way we do it, and we're not gonna change just to to fit who what you think we should be. This is this is it. If 245 episodes in, you haven't figured out what we're all about, this is it. This is what we do.

SPEAKER_02 9:04

This is who we are, and we've really kind of opened our lives, our personal lives, our professional lives. And um, you know, so I want to start off and say, welcome to our guest, our our guest today, Steve Mallet. Twice. Twice in what I know. How crazy. So, Steve, I want to start off with the question that everybody out there is kind of wanting to know. How are you actually feeling? Because I'm sure you are so sick and tired of that question.

SPEAKER_01 9:30

Oh yeah, it's it is an interesting question. I I think I look pretty good, and that's a little deceiving. Um, because I've I've you know, I've been coming to the office a little bit, I've been getting out and about, I've been going to cardio rehab. Um, I get tired really easily. Uh at the end of the day, my body is worn out, and I can't do like I can't lift anything with my upper body. I can't, uh, you know, they said five pounds. I've been trying to be real careful because apparently, if where they sawed my sternum in half, if that doesn't heal properly, there's nothing they can do about it. I'll live with a sternum that moves every time I do something for the rest of my life. Yeah, I won't be able to do bench pressing, you know, and carry a like you say, carry a backpack. I won't be able to do that. So I'm being very cautious about that. But I think, you know, that's probably the biggest thing. I am feeling better every day, without a doubt. I'm off all the pain meds. I I actually not even taking that much Tylenol anymore. But my body is working really hard to heal itself.

SPEAKER_02 10:35

Well, you you went to hell and back for sure. And before surgery, you and I had a lot of discussions about um about what the surgery was gonna entail. What were you most nervous about, and what actually was the hardest part of the surgery?

SPEAKER_01 10:53

There was a couple parts. Uh one was, and I'm gonna get a little choked up. Um, you know, you go into pre-op and they shave you and they do all the stuff that they do, and Holly was there with me the whole the whole time. And when they said, Okay, we're ready to take you back, um she gave me a kiss and they wheeled me off in the hall, and I held up the sign, I love you. And I was really hard because I didn't know what was gonna come out of that. I didn't know what was gonna be on the other side of when they wheeled me in that big old room, and I was on Valium, you know, I'm in there trying to crack jokes. I think they gave me the the anesthesia early, like, yeah, we gotta shut this guy up. This guy comes over with this great big machine, and I go, I hope you know what that thing does. But you know, it was that was hard. And then the second thing was I was a little nervous about them waking me up with being intubated because they don't they they take you out of sedation before they pull that tube out of your throat and they warn you, but it doesn't prepare you for it, that hey, we're gonna wake you up and you're gonna feel the tube in your throat. Um, but we have to make sure you can breathe on your own before we pull that tube out. So for like five or ten minutes, I was awake with that tube. It turns out it had two tubes. I had uh the trachea, the tube that goes into my lungs, and then I had some kind of camera in there still. Um so when they pulled that out.

SPEAKER_02 12:18

Oh, I I requested that.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

I requested that. I guess there's a camera that that watches what you're I don't know, I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_02 12:25

But um I also had him put a tracker in you, too.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Oh, great, yeah. That was very painful. I was uh because when they take you off the anesthesia, all the pain was there. Holly said uh that I was I I was still groggy, but that I was kicking my legs and and they actually tie your arms down because they don't want you to pull the tube out. Uh and I was flailing my hands and my feet saying, hurt, hurt, hurt, because it was so much pain.

SPEAKER_02 12:52

Do you remember saying any of that?

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Trying to do it's sort of like a dream, you know? It's like, oh, did that really happen? Um, but you know, they give you they give you opioids like right away as soon as they can. And then I had this four-inch tube sticking out of the side of my throat for a day that was kind of weird, which was I guess where they hooked me up to the blood machine that keeps my blood pumping. Um I'll tell you what though, heart hospital. If you have anything, if you need a heart procedure, heart hospital. Really? They are everybody I met there was fantastic. That's wonderful.

SPEAKER_02 13:29

Um that take that's all that is uh makes all the difference in the world when you are being taken care of, when you were at your most vulnerable.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

I didn't have one person. You know how sometimes you're in a medical situation and you come up to somebody and they're almost like, Why are you bugging me? I'm doing something else. Everybody was so nice, so helpful, friendly, smiled. Um that's the place to go if you need a heart procedure.

SPEAKER_02 13:54

Well, and I know also everybody that knows Steve Mallet knows that you are somebody that is normally very, very active. How hard has it been for you to mentally for your for your mental health to be basically told, um, hey Mallet, you need to slow down a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 14:12

It's been really hard. And uh you know, I started cardio rehab, I've gone to three sessions, and my body's not where it was before. I you know, I got on a not yet. No, I know, I know. It takes time. But I, you know, I got on a spin bike for 20 minutes this morning. I could ride, you know, at a pretty high heart rate for two hours before this, and 20 minutes in, I was freaking dying.

SPEAKER_02 14:36

But what can you do today that you couldn't do the first week? So there's that progression. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

No, I I know I'm going in the right direction. I'm not complaining about that, but it has been I've had to uh to reset what my expectations were. But it is funny, you mentioned it when you were kind of introducing this segment that uh my friend Daniel, Daniel Payne, who's an ultra marathoner, and him and I have done well we don't train as much now because he's 20 or something years younger than me, and uh he's I I can't keep up with him. Yeah, but he go he calls me and we were talking, and I said, you know, I'm thinking about doing maybe a race in January or February. And he goes, Oh, what are you thinking? You know, 5K, 10k? No, I was thinking about a 50 miler.

SPEAKER_02 15:19

Do you have any recommendations? When you told me that, my eyes started to twitch. I know. Like, I'm just I'm gonna break an ankle for you.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

So I'm uh I don't want to just do the memo. I don't want to just get by. I want to see, and actually, I'm excited to see what this now that I'm fixed. I've lived with this my whole life. Why what am I gonna be like now that I'm fixed? I told Daniel, I go, maybe I can keep up with you guys. Maybe I could run with you guys again. He goes, Well, we could slow down. I don't want you to slow down. I want to be able to speed up to keep up with you.

SPEAKER_02 15:50

Well, I told you that um, now granted, he's just in med school, but he witnessed, my son has witnessed or had has been involved in an open heart surgery. And when I told him what you had, he said, You have been living on borrowed time and how incredibly blessed you are that you have been able to be 63 years of age and only just of late have had a couple of issues. You could have just literally dropped dead. I mean, what would the ratings have done if you dropped dead on the air?

SPEAKER_01 16:20

Well, you would have done weekend at Bernie's and just popped me up here and put my hand on the little keyboard. Yeah. I you know uh I I do, I I uh I'm thankful that they discovered it and that I because my cardiologist said if you hadn't, if we hadn't discovered this, the the next thing you knew that you had a problem, you'd have had a heart attack and it would have been severe. And so I'm grateful that the cardiologist, the people that I saw, the tests that they did discovered it. And I feel like I've been given a second lease on life.

SPEAKER_02 16:52

You absolutely have. And so now I kind of want to shift gears a little bit. And one of the things that you complained most about to me wasn't necessarily the pain, wasn't the fogginess, wasn't just kind of like worried about you're gonna get back to exercising, was how flipping bored you were. And you were like, I cannot watch anymore. I was so bored.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

I uh you know, I read magazines, I listened to some audio books, I read some books, I did uh, you know, word searches. I got I um I was so bored, but I there was a part of me I didn't want people to think, oh, he's already back because the pressure, the stress. I'm trying to avoid that a little bit right now. Um so you know, if I if somebody texted me and I responded right away, they might think, oh, well, Steve's, you know, back up. But I'm not. I'm um I'm still got a ways to go. Uh so I'm taking little baby steps every day, but they're all forward steps. There are none of some of them might be backward steps.

SPEAKER_02 17:51

But right now, that's just your physical body. Your mental body is like when I first talked to you the first week versus today, it's like it's the old Steve.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Well, I was on painkillers the first week, and uh not the whole week. I got off those things as fast as I could.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

Yeah, because I actually um I forgot to tell you, I gave myself a raise.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Okay, and I I Well that check will bounce. I did a bunch of stuff while you're gonna the pain pills uh they help, but man, I was so fuzzy in my head, and I and I you know, you trick yourself. You think that you're doing okay when really you're not doing okay.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

And I, you know, I Well, that's why you don't even like to drink alcohol.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

No, I don't. I like to be a hundred percent in the moment at the time that I'm there. Well, yeah. Um that allows me to do that. And so, you know, I got off the painkillers, I started doing Tylenol. I still have to sleep in bed sitting up, which is a pain in the butt. But, you know, it's it at the end of the day, six months from now, this is all gonna be like, you know, hey, way back, you know, I had hearts or open hearts.

SPEAKER_02 19:02

Remember when I know I was like, I wonder, I don't know who it was. I think it was Scotty, uh, my co-host on Coke Radio. I was like, you know, he's coming back to work. I, you know, I was updating our listeners on Coke Radio about what was going on. We have a Coke listener line, and you know, somebody had requested, you know, how's Steve doing? And uh I was like, there was one day I was like, he's coming back in the office this morning, and I'm a little worried. And because when my husband had his heart attack, which was totally different, we joked with him for so long because he would say, You remember I died.

SPEAKER_01 19:37

And so I haven't pulled that one out yet. You haven't pulled it out yet. I almost did the other day. Somebody said something to me, and it was I didn't want to do it. So I almost said, Well, you know, I had open heart surgery two weeks ago.

SPEAKER_02 19:49

You know, well, I just want to tell people out there, that people that know Steve, you're gonna run into Steve in the next couple of weeks. Let's just keep a little hula hoop distance. Let's let's knuckle him, let's five high five him, but let's don't go in for I Steve and I we joke around a lot.

SPEAKER_01 20:05

I am actually worried somebody's gonna come in like too hot for a big little hug. Oh my gosh, round about that. It it's it uh gives me the easy.

SPEAKER_02 20:15

Hey, we're from the south, we're huggers out here, and you and I we tease a lot. So we we slap each other's arms a lot, or like you were like, eh. And I said it the other day. I was like, I gotta, I gotta tie my arms down when I'm around you. But I want to ask you a question also. It's like, what would you tell somebody if they just found out that they're gonna have open heart surgery and is just scared to death?

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Oh boy, that's a good question. Um trust in the doctors and the nurses that they know what they're doing. And uh, you know, I can't remember who said this. Um I think it was Colton, my son, said, you know, they do thousands of these a year. And my first thought was, well, wait a minute, this is the first one I've ever had. But but the point of that is you're in good hands. So trust that they know what they're doing. Try and be aware of uh, you know, the process and do as much research and ask as many questions as you can. Once once you go in there under the knife, you're just sort of along for the ride. So try and you know, try and understand, like, you know, that they're gonna pull that tube out and when they're gonna pull that thing out of your jugular and try and understand the process, but then just trust that they know what they're doing at that point. That if if you do that, um it'll go a lot smoother rather than second guessing and you know being a pain in the ass to the nurses and the doctors, ask questions. They want you to ask questions. Um, but you know, don't don't feel like you have to oversee what they're doing because they know how to do it. The other thing I want to point out to people, uh I I was in the hospital thinking this if you have chest pain, if you have shortness of breath, if something's not right in your chest, Especially you guys out there, geez. Don't sit at home and go, ah, no big deal. It'll pass. Let me just go pop an aspirin and I'll be, you know, back to work in 20 minutes. Go see your damn doctor. Go call, call, go to the emergency room. There's nobody in that emergency room that's gonna go, Well, there's nothing wrong with you. What why are you here wasting our time? If you walk in there and say, look, I have chest pain and shortness of breath, they will get you right in the back and make sure you're not dying of a heart attack. So don't wait. Don't go right then. Go as soon as it happens and you see there's a problem, give them the chance to say, Hey, good news, nothing's wrong, but don't do, don't do the opposite. There are so many people in this country that drop dead of a heart attack every year because they go, ah, it'll pass. They're sitting in their living room on the couch watching TV and they go, it's no big deal. No, call 911. Yeah. Go to the emergency room. That's great advice. One of my big takeaways.

SPEAKER_02 22:56

That's amazing. That's really good advice. And so to piggyback on that, I want to say, not to tell you what your journey was, but the fact that you had an amazing support system, not only in your professional life, also in your personal life. But the fact that you finally accepted help. When I first set up this meal train, you were like, I don't need this. And I was like, I don't care what you say. I'm doing it. I just kind of steamrolled. And Holly was very grateful. She was. She's like, I'm gonna starve.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

She, yeah, we the people brought us meals, people donated money. We were able to get takeout and food delivered and stuff. Um, and that was all really I'm glad that I finally said, okay. Because people love you and they want to do that. It's not like they're saying, hey, you know, we know you need help, and we'll we're willing to step in. It's like we love you, we care about you, and we want to do something for you. What can we do? And then bringing you a meal, it shows that love, it shows that caring.

SPEAKER_02 23:58

And it it does, it absolutely does. And and the fact that you guys have the most oddest and strangest meal restrictions and think think was it Lauren Lauren Lauren, yeah, yes, Lauren Payne.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

She said, uh I wanted to make you I wanted to make them a homemade meal, but they had they eat such weird ways. I can't figure out what they could both eat. So I just donated some money. So thank you, Lauren. Thank you, Lauren. But before we move on to 9-11, I want to give a shout out to my lovely, yes, lovely wife, Holly.

SPEAKER_02 24:28

She's been amazing.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

My God, I have hit the jackpot, Michelle. I I won the lottery 10 times over when uh when Holly came into my life and we got married. She showed up at the hospital first thing in the morning every day and stayed till I was ready to go to sleep at night. She walked with me in the halls when they would let me do it. She held my hand. She tucks me in at night. She held my hand when I had, you know, first came home and I was not steady and I needed to take a shower. She has been my rock. And uh I there's part of me that thinks I don't deserve that, but I am so thankful. You probably don't.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

So you outkicked your coverage, as they say. Yes, 100%.

SPEAKER_01 25:10

I I I wish everybody that's listening finds that partner in life that loves and you love as much as Holly and I have together. She's so great.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Well, that's wonderful. And you know what? She was a lifeline to me as well because we um early on we decided that you weren't gonna be allowed to have your phone. And so there were times where I had to get her into your phone to get an email or to and there were things that were going on. I was like, we're not gonna tell T about this.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

I'm glad you said that. If you're gonna have open heart surgery or you're gonna have a giant surgery, give your phone to somebody you trust and tell them kind of some basics on how to respond to things and don't touch it for at like a week. I didn't touch my phone for probably almost a week. That was one of the best things I did because if I was sitting in the hospital, drugged out of my mind on opioids and thinking, oh, there's a text, I need to respond to that. I could have messed up so many things. And I just was I just was able to focus on recovery. Yes. You know, how am I doing right now? Can I go for a walk? Do I need to go take a shower? You know, uh, oh look, they're bringing hospital lunch. Great. I just focused on that. I didn't focus on all focus on all the other stuff. Because at the end of the day, while all this stuff is important in our business, what's most important is the relationships you have with the people around you and how you take care of yourself. That that trumps everything.

SPEAKER_02 26:37

I I have made that mistake coming out of anesthesia and have texted Steve or Andor the team. And um, yeah, you know, you don't want to do that. And there was one moment where I don't know if Holly slipped out and Steve stole his phone.

SPEAKER_01 26:51

That's what it was.

SPEAKER_02 26:52

And I texted Holly, it was like, go get his You know what's funny?

SPEAKER_01 26:56

So I I play the Wordle every day, and I had a I have a street going, New York Times Wordle. And I told her every morning, I go, this was like I actually I didn't miss a day. I did it the morning I went in surgery and the day after. But I was at home and I go, hey, I need to do the wordle today. And she gave me my phone. And then a text came in that said, Is it group text? Yes. Just checking in. And I for some reason thought, oh, it's Carlisle. Carlisle's asking me how I'm doing. So I sent this long text about, well, I'm home and I'm feeling good. I got a shower. And then and then I get a text like 30 seconds later from Michelle going, Holly, take Steve's phone away. He's texting. And I went, Oh crap. I just but I thought I was doing right at the time. But those drugs, man, they'll take you, they'll take you down a road you don't want to.

SPEAKER_02 27:42

Hey, I have no excuse. One time I was dead dead ass sober, and I told I called a client an idiot. That's right. You did. I thought it was on the case.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

And he never he will never let us know.

SPEAKER_02 27:52

He will never let me know. I have one last question for you before we move on. So when exactly did the nurses realize that they had the world's worst patient because you wanted to get up and start training.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

I actually, if they did think that, uh, they never let on. They were, you know, they uh I actually think it was the second. So I had surgery on Friday. I think Saturday, they got me with a walker. Uh, and I walked around, I'd probably, you know, it was maybe a hundred yards. It wasn't very far, but God, that was nice. But by the third day, fourth day, Holly and I, we I didn't have a walker anymore. We'd just, she would hold my hand and we'd walk around the halls, and they would let me do that anytime I wanted. Um so yeah, if the nurses had any bad thoughts about me, they sure kept it to themselves. But I I met some of the nicest people there. They were uh one nurse, Nisa, uh, she was young. She came in wearing these cool Converse, and I said, Oh man, I love your kicks. And she's oh, you should see my other ones. They're all sparkly and colorful. And so the next day she wore them. She goes, Oh, I brought my shoes just for you. Check them out. And so it's just it was nice to feel like a human being in the hospital rather than just a chart that they had to check up on. Um, so it, yeah, it was a good experience for me.

SPEAKER_02 29:12

I'm just very grateful. And I, you know, Steve and I, we joke around a lot. I I I love this man, but I did tell him, man, I had the most freaking epic, epic eulogy planned for you. And I was like, I'm saving it. I'm saving it. But uh so it it cannot go without um the the day going by without recognizing that today is September 11th, the day that we are recording. And um, I am also we've we've talked about it before. I'm also on air talent for Coke Radio, and I had this whole thing. I have a segment called Ask Mama Lou where people ask me questions and then I respond to them in a smart elec way. And I thought on today's show, it's like, oh no, I don't want to do that. But I ought also, you'd have said, Hey, do you want to read the one you wrote on Coke?

SPEAKER_03 30:01

I think it's beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

Well, I had actually written one for here because I was hoping.

SPEAKER_03 30:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 30:06

And so here is my monologue that I had kind of written for here. Excuse me. Um, where were you when you heard a plane hit the World Trade Center? I remember, Steve remembers, most people our age remember. We remember where we were, we remember who we called, we remember watching television, and we remember the second plane. We remember watching those towers fall, but I also remember what happened afterwards. The flags, the churches, the neighbors checking on each other, crying with complete strangers in the grocery store. For a brief period, nobody seemed to care whether the person standing next to them was Republican or Democrat. We were Americans. Period. Full stop. So, yes, today's world looks almost nothing like the world did on September 11th, 2001. Technology has changed, our country has changed, we have changed. But 25 years later, there are two things I hope we never lose. The memory of what happened on September 11th and the memory of who we became on September 12th. Never forget. So true. With that, I thought, you know, we weren't uh really doing like any kind of stories of back and forth, and I thought I'd I'd give you a little break, and I have something since today is 25 years. You and I could kind of go back and forth of things that didn't necessarily exist on September 11, 2001. And in these 25 years, things that have kind of popped up, and I think you're gonna be shocked and go, What the heck? You know, you kind of 25 years for somebody as our age, it it happened in a blink of an eye.

SPEAKER_01 31:45

Yeah, I know. I um before you start, I saw it was watching TV when I was bored out of my mind, and this one woman said, uh, cell phone or landline? And this young kid, like six years old, said, What's a landline? That's I mean, that's how long it's been, you know.

SPEAKER_02 32:03

Where were you living? Were you in California?

SPEAKER_01 32:04

I was in Southern California. Uh I was a sales rep in the outdoor industry. It was early in the morning, I think it was uh eight, eight o'clock ish. And uh I was I always put the TV on and watch the news, and I was getting ready to go, and and uh the first plane hit the towers. And I I had gotten my pilot's license uh when I was a few years younger. So I knew a little bit about aviation, and I was like, oh my God, how is that guy so far off course? What did he not did he just put on auto? What went wrong there? I was kind of thinking about it from a pilot standpoint. And then the second plane hit, and I I thought, I need to protect my family. What the hell is going on? And then the Pentagon plane hit, and I thought, you know, we had an RV out in the in the driveway. I thought, do I need to go pack my family up in this RV and drive out in the desert? What's going on? You know, it's are we uh is are the paratroopers gonna come? Remember that we had red dawn out. There was so much uncertainty that nobody knew what was really going on for days, really. That's what I think brought about that that unity was we were we knew that everybody was scared, everybody was concerned, and so I don't care you you mentioned it, you know, politics, blah, blah, blah. I don't care about all that. That person's hurting, I'm hurting. Let's let's just love on each other. Yeah. And that went on for it, went on for a month or two, and then it started to go back to the old ways. But that period right there, a terrible thing happened, and out of that became or showed how great this nation is. Absolutely. There was a period of time right after that where this nation shined so bright, the whole world said, Oh my gosh, look at how these people responded to this attack, this personal attack, bodies on the streets, people jumping out of windows. Look how they responded.

SPEAKER_02 34:01

Holding up signs, posters, desperately looking for their loved ones. Yes, yeah. And then I remember months later the stories that started coming out, and people that were disappearing. And I use air quotes that weren't really there, or story. You know, I had a friend, you know her, Deirdre.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

She was there in New York City when it happened, and she actually had to walk to Long Island because everything thousands of people walked across those bridges because there wasn't there was no public transport. The trains stopped. Yeah. And then I don't I think people forgot. Remember, there was no eight there was no flights.

SPEAKER_02 34:36

No, there was everything was shut down. There were no flights for three for three full days, I believe. The uh airspace was totally shut down, but it was taken out and like when it started opening again, obviously.

SPEAKER_01 34:49

There were people that were overseas and uh people that you know were stuck and they were trying to rent cars, but everybody was renting cars, so there wasn't any. And how is, you know, you you were in Florida for a convention and you lived in California. It could take you a week to get home.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

We were talking about Scotty had mentioned about in Newfoundland in Canada when all of those flights had to land there and that little town uh had to absorb 7,000 passengers and pharmacies and food and clothes and everything that they really kind of embraced. So even the Canadians still liked us. Our mutual friend Dana, Dana Mahaley, her husband at the time, I don't even know if you know this story. Her husband used to be a United Airlines pilot. Oh, I didn't know that. The day before September 10th, he flew United Airlines Flight 93. Oh my gosh. So, I mean, it touches, you just don't even know how much everybody you knew people, everybody from every walks of life, and somehow it was even closer than the six degrees of separation, seven degrees of separation. It's like you knew somebody that knew somebody that was affected by this because it happened all over all over the country. So one of the things that did not exist that exists now was an iPod. iPod Apple introduced the first iPod April, I'm sorry, October 23rd, 2001, only six weeks after 9-11. Oh my god. Can you believe that? I wonder if they had they were releasing it beforehand. Oh, I'm sure they were and everything kind of got pushed out.

SPEAKER_01 36:23

That changed the world.

SPEAKER_02 36:24

Do you did you have um before before music was so readily available, did you have like one of those visors where you had like little CDs? Yeah, of course I did. Do you remember before like a book where you would have all the C.

SPEAKER_01 36:36

And then you'd have one that you you made yourself and you wrote on their Genesis or my mixtape.

SPEAKER_02 36:43

Well, we all know it's kind of we kind of have a love-hate relationship with them. The TSA obviously did not exist right after 9-11. Those of you that were not alive yet, the National Guard was there. And actually uh good friend of ours, Alan Trevino, he um started Century Security and he was one of the first um actual before TSA, he was monitoring all of the Austin airports and they were screening people. But that happened, TSA was created November 19th, right after September 11th. Um so yeah, I think kids, you know, I I also saw a story, Steve, that some airports are allowing families now to go past the security lines.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

You have to get pre-check. I hear I read about that the other day. You have to get pre-check, but you can go meet people at the gate. How great is that again? Remember the old days where you know, some your grandma was coming to visit or something. You could meet the wave goodbye. Yeah, yeah. You'd wave goodbye, or or she would get off the plane, you're grandma. You know, you didn't have to wait out in the corner.

SPEAKER_02 37:41

You didn't have to take your shoes off. You didn't have to have a rectal exam before you got on. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 37:47

Those are good days.

SPEAKER_02 37:48

Now you would you'd you'd love this. And now you and I both did not have MySpace, but Facebook didn't even exist. Oh, that's right. That came about until 2004. Yeah, who knows? But YouTube didn't exist either. Oh, yeah. That was 2005. Neither did Twitter. And the iPhone. That didn't come about till 2007. So, folks of you that were either too young or didn't know what was happening, you know how we found out what was going on? We had to go to the news cycle that was just playing over and just go on to the good old boobtube.

SPEAKER_01 38:20

You could get on at like AOL. Remember AOL dial-up? I think that came out Beeper, beep. Yeah, yeah. It came up a a few years before September 11th. Um Well, you could go to the internet.

SPEAKER_02 38:31

You could yeah, you could definitely go to the internet.

SPEAKER_01 38:34

Yeah, but you had to be at a computer. You couldn't do it, you know, you couldn't be sitting in a parking lot somewhere doing it. There wasn't uh any way to do that.

SPEAKER_02 38:40

Well, and it was also like not like anybody was going to the movies or watching TV or anything else other than what was going on in September of the aftermath of September, but Netflix, you couldn't stream anything.

SPEAKER_01 38:51

Oh, that's you still had good old DVDs, the DVDs in the mail. I kind of used to like that.

SPEAKER_02 38:56

So um there was also no Uber. We still were taking taxi cabs and everything. Here's something there was no Airbnb or Verbo. That stuff that's wild. The thought that you would rent a house out to somebody for a weekend sounded absurd, insane.

SPEAKER_01 39:14

It's very creative. I mean, thousands and thousands of people every year do that now.

SPEAKER_02 39:18

Well, remember when it first started, it literally was like you're renting a room.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

Rent a room, yeah. You had they come in your house and use your bathroom, and yeah, that's that that's weird to me, but uh you know I'm glad that they made it. It's been helpful for us for sure.

SPEAKER_02 39:31

Well, you used this while you were um recovering. There was no door dash, so you had to get your ass up and go get your McDonald's all by yourself for sure.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

And McDonald's, you could get a whole meal for three bucks or something.

SPEAKER_02 39:45

Yeah, true. Well, um, I don't have one of these, but we have them on I actually have a camera right outside my door, but there weren't ring doorbells. It was really kind of unheard of for people to have any type of surveillance camera.

SPEAKER_01 39:55

The early ones, the early surveillance cameras, all grainy footage, it was all black and white and green. Yeah, now geez, you could see it, it's all in uh it looks almost like a movie.

SPEAKER_02 40:05

And I don't know what I would do without this today, but how about Google Maps? Because what did we do?

SPEAKER_01 40:10

Oh, you had map you had uh MapQuest, where you printed out the directions, or you had a road atlas.

SPEAKER_02 40:16

You had what what was the um a big old map and you the uh oh um the ran uh Randall uh oh gosh, what was it called?

SPEAKER_01 40:24

Ran McNally was the road atlas. But I remember we used to have to go up to the uh Austin Board of Realtors and buy this uh spiral bound map book of Austin and it was updated every year. God, I can't remember what that was called. But it's funny because I can't remember. Might be Mapco, but uh in our MLS, there's still a field for the page and block where of the street that you're that you're gonna go look at to go look at a house. Nobody uses it anymore.

SPEAKER_02 40:53

It's very antiquated for sure. But like I would use it now on my new car. I have it on my big screen. Yeah and my kids make fun of me because I will just even say home, even though where I know I'm going, even though I know how to go home.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

Holly does it. Every place she goes is in the map. She just wants to see what time she's gonna get.

SPEAKER_02 41:11

That's exactly what I do. Okay, so here people maybe love or hate her. Taylor Swift hadn't even re released an album yet. And Tom Brady had zero Super Bowl rings, people. Um, and since then, America elect elected its first black president. Um Barack Obama was elected in 2008 and inaugurated in 2009, so we came a long way. But then we also found Osama bin Laden, um, for those of you that don't know. And then this one stings a little bit. How about the global pandemic since 9-11? Um it's weird.

SPEAKER_01 41:44

People are already forgetting about that too. Yeah. All the stuff that we put up with. I hope that never happens again.

SPEAKER_02 41:50

Yeah, well, now we have AI.

SPEAKER_01 41:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:53

And so um I printed, okay, so my granddaughter, Navy, they like um her uncles like to say she's shaped like an ant. Because she has she has a little belly and she's got long legs and long arms. And she does. When you look at her, she kind of looks like a tall, probably. Yes, she looks like a little ant. And so I created an AI picture of her like an ant.

SPEAKER_01 42:14

I'll have to show it to you. And it's so great. Technology is so great. We can make pictures of us looking like ants.

SPEAKER_02 42:20

Well, Tate said, there goes mom slowly draining one lake at a time just so she can create it.

SPEAKER_01 42:28

You know, that uh before we finish with the 9-11 thing, I want to mention this. I thought a little bit about this as this day approached. Um, and you know, in the in the age of social media, and now we have people down on Saturday morning with protests and all that, and it's their right to do that. I'd like people to remember the a filter. Is the activity that you're engaged in, engaging in, is it dividing us as a community or is it uniting us as a community? So if you're on there and you're a keyboard warrior on Facebook and you're saying something nasty to somebody, right before you yeah, right before you hit post, think, does this bring us together or does this divide us? And if you decide that that divides us as a community, because this is a freaking great community, don't send it, don't post it. Do things that bring us all together. That's what you and I have decided to do here, and I encourage everybody listening, go do that today. Run that filter on everything you do.

SPEAKER_02 43:28

Well, you guys, thank you so much for joining us today. Steve, again, I'm gonna say uh I am so grateful that uh they caught this surgery, that you had the surgery, because even like two days before, he's like, I'm not even convinced I need this thing.

SPEAKER_01 43:44

I I the day I went in to see the cardiac surgeon, I thought, you know, I'm gonna go sit in there. He's gonna tell me I don't even need this. And then when he said, No, you really need to get Dr. Malik. And he said, This is not an emergency, like I don't need to take you there right now, but it is very Very urgent. I went, oh, okay. And 11 days later, there I was on the table.

SPEAKER_02 44:05

Well, for our listeners out there and people watching live on our best of page right now. Um thank you for being patient with us. Thank you for giving us grace. Thank you for letting us miss one single episode because somebody had to have open heart surgery.

SPEAKER_01 44:21

Yeah, what a slacker. Wow, slacker.

SPEAKER_02 44:25

But uh, thank you so much for joining us on Maladin Michelle and Dripping Springs, and we are here to stay.

SPEAKER_01 44:30

Yeah, thank you everybody that reached out during uh the time uh and supported Holly during uh during all of that. It it really meant a lot to me. And some of them I was not able to respond to, but know that I received them and it made a big difference in in uh how I felt and how my recovery's going. And uh I it's really made me appreciate and love this community even more than I already did. So thank you everybody that's out there. Even Mayor Bill. Even Mayor Bill. Mayor Bill reached out to me a couple times. Yeah, great guy.

SPEAKER_02 45:00

Everybody out there, take this as um Steve's and Holly's verbal thank you card because right now is not the time to worry about whether or not you get a thank you card. So this is Steve's verbal thank you card.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

Yeah, well, we we will try and send some thank you cards, but I'm sure Holly will I started to get overwhelmed. I'm like, oh my God, how many cards do I gotta send? And so, but so if you don't get one, know that our our hearts are filled with love and appreciation for everything that everybody did for us. So thanks everyone.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

From rodeo clowns, teachers or doctors, and everyone in between, Texans have one thing in common: hard work deserves smart banking. At South Star Bank, whether you're buying your first home, building a dream ranch, or just managing daily finances, our 16 branches across Central Texas are here for you. Southstar Bank, trusted by professionals, backed by tradition, and built for Texas. Southstarbank.com, member FDIC, an equal housing lender. NMLS 410624.

SPEAKER_01 46:01

The Deep Eddie Vodka tasting room may be closed, but don't get it twisted. Deep Eddie Vodka isn't going anywhere.

SPEAKER_02 46:08

It's still made right here in Texas, and you can still enjoy every flavor, including the new espresso vodka.

SPEAKER_01 46:15

Pour it over ice, mix up your favorite cocktail, or keep it simple with soda and a lime. The tasting room chapter may be over, but the good times are still being poured.

SPEAKER_02 46:25

Deep Eddie vodka. Find your favorite flavor near you.

SPEAKER_01 46:28

Enjoy responsibly available nationwide.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

This show is brought to you in part by the Mallet Integrity Team, serving Dripping Springs, Austin, and the surrounding areas of Central Texas since 2004. When you need the best real estate advice and service, give them a call at 512-829-2062. Or email them at malletintegrity team.com.

SPEAKER_02 46:57

Ever had a contractor disappear halfway through a job?

SPEAKER_01 47:00

Or leave you with work that just isn't right?

SPEAKER_02 47:03

That's where Black Slate Construction steps in.

SPEAKER_01 47:06

They fix bad work and actually finish the job. And here's the difference they're also master electrician licensed. So whether it's cleaning up a remodel or installing an EV charger or upgrading your panel, they do it right.

SPEAKER_02 47:19

Start to finish.

SPEAKER_01 47:20

No shortcuts, no second guesses. Call Black Slate Construction or visit Blackslate Construction.com. Even we're surprised by what we say sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 47:34

Big mouth, small town.

SPEAKER_01 47:36

Follow us on Apple, Spotify, and YouTube.

SPEAKER_02 47:39

Leave us a review or email us at Maladamichelle at gmail.com. I'm surprised we haven't been canceled yet.