Suicide Prevention Saturday

Coming to you live from a Great Start Shooting School, just some bunny here today. So anyway, hey everybody, welcome to Suicide Printing Saturday. And no, we're not doing video today. Uh, just got back from the beach. I am sun-kissed and tired, and I'm holding my phone ever so gingerly as to hope that the charging thing actually keeps working because it kind of doesn't want to. So anyway, uh, just little bunny right there is much better than what the Blair Witch Project would probably be should you have video this evening. So, um, my— your lack of seasickness, I'm sure you will appreciate. Anyway, welcome to Suicide Prevention Saturday. Why are we here? For the same reason we're here every Saturday since 2018, because 2 out of every 3 gun deaths we hear about are suicides. And because of that, if we talk about suicide prevention as well as mental health, not only can we help save the lives that are lost by firearm but we can also help reduce violence. And that's why all you lovely fine people pop in here. And welcome for those of you who are here live and in person on this Saturday evening, 9 PM Eastern. And for those catching the replay, thanks for popping in and saying hi. I do appreciate the comments when y'all let me know you do get the replay because, you know, I miss you guys when you're not here live and in person. All right, so we are on the phone, which means I'm gonna do my darndest not to touch the phone because it seems like when I use StreamYard on the phone, I'm very likely to actually drop you guys or close a thing or magically disappear just like the bunnies in our yard, which the picture that's up here right now is actually a bunny that was in our yard at some point in the past that I got a picture of. So Tonight, what are we talking about? Mental health. What does that mean? Holy smokes, that could mean anything and everything. So it is birthday weekend. For those of you who don't know, my daughter and I have the birthday weekend, which is usually birthday week, but we took our vacation earlier this year. So 17th is Nadia's, 18th tomorrow is mine. And so we have at least birthday weekend this week. And today we got to go play in the ocean and fight the waves because some of it was definitely a fight. And we got to spend together time together today as a family, go to Nadia's— one of Nadia's favorite places for noodle soup. And these are hopefully all mental health things that are good for you. I know DJ. Has great, um, I don't know, DJ, what is the correct word? Um, he is jealous, I think, is the word, that since he is landlocked of our ocean-going abilities here in Connecticut.

True, absolutely true. Nebraska definitely is the land of no coast. Yeah, Missouri River doesn't cut it.

Well, you know, water, water, water is a good thing. Rivers, brooks, Ocean, lakes, all those things.

Well, we may have water, water everywhere, but we don't have a drop to surf is the thing.

Oh, oh dude, and the waves were insane. The undertow was like scary, scary, sort of, oh my gosh, take your breath away scary. So I got yelled at by a lifeguard because I went too far out and almost got swept away. It was very distressing. So, but the rest of the beach time was lovely. We had like 5-foot waves here, which normally it's like 1 or 2. So it was good. So the whole family was here. And so my husband, myself, my son, and my daughter, we got to frolic in the waves. And hopefully all of you know how much fun it is to spend time with family that you love. Because we of course all have those family members who maybe we're not wanting to spend lots of time with. But DJ, you're, you're, you're, uh, I know you get to spend time with your mom at least once a week or so, or do you just chat with her on a regular basis?

Well, we do the Tuesday, Thursday evening calls. She always says, I might option into calling you sometime during the weekend, and she sometimes does. And I suppose I see her about about once a week, almost 3 times a month. I'll say cuts it.

Gotcha. So, so family is good, spending time with family. So that is all part of mental health and celebrating stuff like birthdays, right? So I am curious because it is our birthday weekend. I want to ask you guys in the chat, What are some of the cool or fun things that you guys do as a birthday celebration? So DJ, since you're live and you could actually answer me in real time, what's something you like to do for your birthday and/or your mom's birthday?

Mom's already been mentioned now, that's twice. So I'll include what I do with my mom for my birthday. My birthday rests in between Christmas and New Year's. And that's a busy time of year. Yeah, well, everybody's probably heard me complain about it, and I try not to complain too loudly, but one of the things that gets done every year is a birthday lunch celebration with my mom. One of the traditions is that she bakes me a chocolate cake that is her mother-in-law's recipe. And my grandma's been gone for a long time. I don't know if I ever really had chocolate cake from her, but I have the recipe that I've seen on the counter laid out in my grandmother's handwriting, and mom produces one of those cakes. And it doesn't matter where we go, and we were almost always dining out, she'll call the restaurant to make sure that she may bring in a birthday cake and wants to know if she can do the slicing at the table. And so that's what we do. Let's see, this last year we went to Red Lobster. That was like a concession. She knows that I like seafood, and like seafood, she knows that Red Lobster exists. So that's where we went. Now, one of the things that's kind of a tradition that I really like to do on those specific occasions is I like to cut up parts of that cake. Slice, here you go to the server. Slice, here you go to another server. This year happened to be there was another birthday party that was celebrating a birthday, and there were like 20+ people at those, that gathering of tables. And I divided every, the rest of the cake after my slice mom's slice and a slice that goes home with her for later. I cut up the rest of the cake and gave it to somebody else celebrating their birthday. I get to give out that cake and people have to suffer through, it's usually a pretty brief explanation, it's certainly briefer than the one I just gave you about the tradition of this birthday cake, where it comes from, and that my grandmother's name was Elnora Brown. So that little piece of me and a piece of that cake comes from my family and goes somewhere else. And I really like that. I really like that way that we celebrate. Otherwise, I don't really have anything specific that I do for my birthday. I like it when I get calls or messages of some sort. Almost nobody sends USPS first-class mail. You know, the greeting cards come hand-delivered from my mom, and I think she's the only one I've gotten one from in some time.

Gotcha.

So more of a— the adult versions of this, at least, are a lot more spare than the kind of things I used to try to have when I was a kid. But I do hope that someday before this walk is over, that I get to celebrate an honest-to-God birthday party in between that Christmas and that New Year's. And I'd love to have everybody over. So that's what I got for my traditions.

Gotcha. Gotcha.

And because I was sitting back with my arms crossed thinking about these things, I wasn't even looking at the text chat. So I'm going to look for examples that others may have shared out there. And I can also give you a roll call, so that's where I'm going to go now. Crabby Turtle was the first one in the room. Sorry, a fan. 93 saying what's up. Jason Ghost saying hello. Garage Guy 879, hey man. Pat in the Bunker just coming hot off his own live. Hillbilly Up, he's got a live coming up after this one. Let's see who else came in here. Gunpowder Beauty, been such a long time since I have seen her, and I'm so glad to see her. She says, uh, I'm on the wrong screen. She says, hey, you all, uh, hope everyone is having a great weekend. I am. See who else we get as I scroll down.

Gun Websites is out there, and, and I do love Gunpowder Beauty's builds lately. I just love things that she does that are sparkly and pretty. I should do that for my birthday, is go get a sparkly gun.

And I'm gonna bring this up from— well, I'm gonna bring this up from Gunpowder Beauty. Um, she says, I want to start a tradition where I disappear the day before my birthday and come home on my birthday and the laundry is done, dishes are clean, and no one is fighting, or she gets an actual unicorn. I think all those things done in that way is a unicorn event for for sure, especially for a busy mom.

Yeah, it is true. It is true. Yes, I do have my fantasies. It's like, uh, this past year, actually not for my birthday but for Mother's Day, I did leave very heavy hints. I'm like, I just want y'all to clean the kitchen and get the laundry done. That was for sure what I was looking for for birthday— and I mean birthday, Mother's Day— and I kind of did get that one. As for birthday, the other thing we used to do on a regular basis was my my grandfather loved betting on the ponies. And so Saratoga Springs is not that far away from us, and also Burlington. There's a— there was a place, uh, Great Barrington in, uh, Massachusetts, and we would go to the fair, and the fair would have horse racing. And so every August we'd go to the Burlington Fair as— what, Great Barrington, not Burlington, Great Barrington. And then in the August time frame when our birthdays all were, because there's many, many birthdays in the month of August. Um, we would always go to Saratoga Springs and watch 9 horse races, and then on the way home we would have a big, uh, fancy dinner. And so that was sort of a tradition in our household. My grandfather died in like 1984, maybe '85, somewhere in there. And we did keep up the tradition of going to the horse races for a fair amount of time, and, you know, into the 2000s at least. But that was one of our traditions. Now it's like, tomorrow I'm looking forward to having Fudgy the Whale. And for those of you who don't have Carvel, it's just basically if you could make a hot fudge sundae into a cake, that is essentially what that is. So that is what I get to look forward to tomorrow.

I've seen pictures, I've seen pictures of the fudge cake. Yep, absolutely. I didn't know what it was you were even saying the first time I heard it. It's like kind of mashing together in my ears. It finally got straightened out. It does look— not only does it look delightful, but it looks delicious as well. And I'm not a dessert guy, so that's attractive.

Yeah, if you like, if you like hot fudge sundaes, you will like this. So, all right, mental health, birthdays, celebrations, family, all of these things.

Um, what—

everything is small, vintage.

Oh, you're suffering from— you're suffering from DJ— I— DJ something. I don't know how I want to say DJ-itis-ology or whatever. You're working on a phone now. You know my pain. Pat in the book are saying he gets to ride vintage ATCs, so he does dig his three-wheelers. There's content about those if you're into them as well on his channel. He'll do the— up, he's throwing some humor our way, says, I wear my birthday suit every year on my birthday. I hope he doesn't go out and walk around kind of deal, like go to the grocery store, it's my birthday, you know. And we did hear from, uh, about a beauty out there.

Go ahead, Mrs. Hillbilly might want to watch him walk around in his birthday suit, one never knows.

Now, Chasing Ghosts, I can relate to some of the things here, and I hope by the time I'm done with this, or at least by the end of this cast, that we can get that frown turned the right way around. She says, I don't even get a call from my mother, and my wife always forgets. Except for a few happy birthdays online, it's just another work day and no one cares. I've had that feeling, and I've, you know, mine is more a time of year kind of thing, so I get to lay it off on people being busy for the holidays. But there's something that I can relate to in what she says there. It's It's important to almost everybody to have at least their birthday honored or remembered or reminded that somebody else knows what it is that's important about that day. And so I'm going to have to ask her, uh, Chasing Ghosts, when her birthday is and try to increase the contact she gets on that day. And I hope that maybe, um, perhaps your wife will begin to remember. Do you put Post-it notes anywhere that she likes to go? Bathroom door, refrigerator, uh, window of her car, steering wheel.

So, so here's the other solution to that though too, is like here in this family we've always believed in like birthday week or birthday month because having just a single day is too specific. And like you said, DJ, people can be just too busy and that sort of thing. So we definitely prefer birthday week. We think that is also a great way to not worry about, oh, they forgot this day, but wait, no, there's something else that happens later on that day, or earlier that week or something along those lines, because my sister-in-law had her birthday on Tuesday, I think it was, and we sent her flowers today. So, um, you know, it's also to have that grace and realize that yes, people get busy, and time is such a crazy, um, phenomenon that changes all the time. As far as how busy we are, how quickly it goes, how bored we are, how slow it goes. Um, I'm sure you've experienced time dilation before. I know I'm not the only one. So yes, we definitely believe in birthday week. So DJ, in other words, you could have it from Christmas to New Year's is your birthday, and it's not just a day. So there's that.

And what I was thinking just now, pardon me, is, is it the celebration or is it the day? Like, which is more important? I'm asking myself that question, which is more important, the celebration or the day? It's the celebration, at least for me it is. And I didn't include this detail, but that visit out to Red Lobster with my mom, the cake cut up and all that jazz, that happened in February on the date, the date of my birthday kind of thing. So sometimes we'll stretch it, you know, we never go early, but January, February, March, we've gotten to the middle of the year one year at least, where it is about the celebration. I look forward to it all the time leading up to it sort of thing. But we're independent adults. We have our own worlds, our own lives, our own distractions and peculiarities. And so we like to ride loose on what day those things actually come. Now, I'm not saying that my mom disrespects me by doing that because it's mutually assented, but I make sure that I give her the call on her birthday. And I was one of those kids that didn't always remember my mom's birthday. But I also didn't have a dad who made sure that we went to a store and bought her something. So I have some years that, of course, she's forgiven me, but I have memories of some really severe embarrassment and not honoring my mom on that day. So I doubled down on Mother's Day, always remember to get something going for her birthday, and try to make sure that other people that I bump into, if I know their birthdays, I'll let them know that I'm thinking of them. And Chasing Ghosts, you're next. I see I'm out there looking for more stuff, and I need to welcome Michael Dunn has joined the conversation out there. And Michael, he adds this, he says, shh, I'm hunting rabbit, laugh out loud. You say it, everybody.

Yes, no, no hunting my rabbit. I mean, you know, we want the bunny to live through the evening because, you know, we're not done yet. But, um, yeah, so birthday week is great. Also, just like you just talked about, we actually did just have my mom's 75th birthday. Celebration on July 24th. Her birthday is January 5th. So yeah, the celebration could definitely mean more and, you know, be when you get to actually, actually celebrate things. So in talking about celebrations, let's talk about what was the last thing you gave yourself a pat on the back for? Since Pat in the bunker is here, we should make Pat tell us when he gave himself a pat on the back since he is Pat. But I just couldn't resist. Sorry, DJ, I apologize. But I don't apologize to Pat though, because I think that's fun. So, but anyway, celebrations with family, whether it is for Mother's Day, Father's Day, Friend Day— because, you know, if y'all look up any calendar anywhere, there are like 5 million national days of things. Because my marketing guy actually just told me that in September— I don't know without messing with my phone, which I don't want to do because I'll lose you guys— is that, um, I think it's like September 10th is National Firearm Suicide Awareness Day or something along those lines. So there's always something to celebrate, and even if it is something as simple as doing your, your live, um, broadcast such as this one I know that Pat in the Bunker was doing his just before we got on, like DJ said at the beginning. I know Hillbilly's got a bunch of folks coming on at the top of the next hour, and goodness knows what they're gonna do tonight because it's gonna be hard following up from last, last weekend and all of the hard seltzer drinking and the Milk Duds and the giveaways and everything else. But I have faith it's still going to be an awesome show. And, uh, yeah, it was lovely watching poor Bubba drink hard seltzer with malted milk balls. So there's that. All right, DJ, what else you got? Anything else? I mean, I know we got Tactical Fudd in here.

I added him to the list. And Justin Grimm now hitting the room, so Jay Grimm also in the room. Um, You know, I mean, not much to add to that. I don't have other people's birthdays that I try to honor any more than any other. So if I do remember them and pats on the back, I think a lot of us have difficulty in accepting compliments from others, let alone issuing them to us, to ourselves. And almost everyone has that ego voice in them that's just like, you're doing a good job, or Sometimes with me, it's they're not recognizing that I'm doing a good job. But then as soon as I'm complimented for the self-same thing, I don't want to hear it, or I shy away from it sort of thing. Yeah, I don't, I don't dig on compliments that much. And people tend not to dig me when, when I think that I'm doing a great job. It's humility is humility and I are constantly at odds, let's say.

Well, it's hard, right? Because I mean, I was always afraid of being confident in myself because I did not want to come off as cocky or anything along those lines, but there is a difference of confidence and pride of what you've accomplished versus cockiness. So there is that. And just because we're happy with something that we did, we can just do a good job, look at it and say, huh, good job, and continue on. And I think that we make it so much harder than that, or I know I do. So, um, it sounds like you do as well. So I'm just looking. I, I did. I went through the comments like you said I wouldn't, or you, you told me that I would. Then I'm like, oh, Chasing Ghosts is only 45 minutes from the ocean— or sorry, the Gulf. I don't know that it's still an ocean even if it's a Gulf.

Uh, it's related, right?

Yeah, it's water. It's salty.

I never did understand, except that the, you know, Gulf was the actual physical feature, what its name was kind of thing. I didn't get it when I was a little kid. Why is this not called the Atlantic? Isn't it the Atlantic? Like, imagine some, you know, some arbitrary border somewhere where the water changes temperature or something.

Yeah, well, let's see, can I do this without hanging up? I did it! I did it! I'm so excited! All right, well, Hillbilly's gonna just sing Kumbaya tonight on his show, so if anything else, you should just You know, I can't imagine listening to all you guys sing, but that might be entertaining.

And, um, Miss Cheney?

Yes, sir?

Did I not in the pre-show in the green room say, oh yeah, so you say you're going to do that, I'm not touching any buttons, and I think I said to you, yeah, your pattern is to say you're not gonna do it, try not to do it, read a few, and then you do it. So I'm glad you didn't hang up, go away, or, uh, end stream kind of thing with that one. And yes, you did it from your phone. It's like, there you go, give yourself a pat on the back. You just did a manipulation on the phone and you didn't need to be quite as worried as you might have been. So good job.

Baby steps, baby steps, because I know I have you to catch me and you would still be here even if I did leave. So that's always good. So, um, but yeah, I see Abigail's out there as well, um, and she had some mad, uh, builds done lately. Um, so anyway, one year for my birthday, I got Rent and Fire. What?

No, a 240 and an M60? Sorry, fan. Can I— can we celebrate together next year? Where'd you do this? Oh man, I want the details. That would be a great way to do it. I would love to do that. Coming into the room, uh, right now, Misty, Mrs. Wayne. How's she doing?

Well, you know, I have to see since Michael did Dunn said it, I have to say yes, I'm getting tech savvy, almost, but not really. I can, I can sort of hit things without hanging up on the phone, but I'm not about to make any comments other than out loud. Oh, and towards the end, GT3 decides to join us. Nice of you to join us. GT3 still has one of my favorite, um, stories just because You know, if you didn't watch the interview, go back and watch it because I think it's pretty crazy. Um, not that G23 is crazy, although all of us feel as though we're crazy in some way, shape, or form. But with that, we are getting down to the half— bottom of the half hour, and y'all know I don't like being here crazy long. So to sum up, celebrate stuff. It doesn't have to just be a birthday. Oh yeah, Gigi3 says we can have the party now. Um, celebrate your family, your friends, take the trips to the beach if you can, regardless of whether it's the beach of a lake, a river, or an ocean. Water is always fun to play in. And, um, that is, uh, That's what I got for tonight, and I'm losing my voice, DJ. So with that, I'm going to let you do the normal thing that you do as far as saying goodnight to everybody. This time, as planned, not let me go on and on as if we're still live and we're not. By the way, for those of you who were not here last week, if it seems like last weekend ended weird, it did, because DJ hit the button and I was still talking and I didn't even know that we were done. So anyway, this time, DJ, you can let us out and let us go, and now I will be quiet.

Right on. Well, I'm— I was glad to see a bustling, uh, text chat out there. I hope that everybody comes back next week and every week after that. Saturday evenings, bookmark it for us, won't you please? Tonight we were joined by the Crabby Turtle, sorry if I had 93. Chasing Ghost was out there, so was Garage Guy 879. Pat checking in from his bunker. Hillbilly Up Got a show coming up after this one. Mike Ballinger is out there. So is Gunpowder Beauty, Gun Websites, Michael Dunn, Buck the Tactical Foot. How you doing, man? Jay Grimm, Justin Grimm checking in from the state next to mine. Abigail Sorcha Finnegan was out there. So was Misty, Mrs. Wayne. G23, he came in the door last, so I think we're going to be the first ones to leave. Let's close down this party. Everybody come back again next week. Be safe, have fun, take care of your crew, and rock.