#55. Matthew Owen’s Journey: From Eureka’s Roots to LA’s Hustle and Back

Scott Hammond: Ladies and gentlemen, friends and neighbors, it's Scott Hammond with the 100% Humboldt podcast, with my new best friend Matthew Owen.

Scott Hammond: Hi, Matthew.

Matthew Owen: Hi, Scott. How you doing?

Scott Hammond: I'm doing well. Good to see you, man.

Matthew Owen: Nice to see you again.

Scott Hammond: Usually see you at mixers and wave across the street in different places, and this isn't that.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I have to look at you now.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I get to. Tell me about, uh, the Matthew story. H- where were you born? How'd you get here?

Scott Hammond: Um-

Matthew Owen: Uh, my family's been here about 117 years.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: My mother graduated Eureka High School, I graduated Eureka High School, and my daughter graduated Eureka High School.

Scott Hammond: Wow, you are-

Matthew Owen: So born and raised

Scott Hammond: … what you would call 100% Humboldt.

Matthew Owen: Um, for a while there, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Pretty close. Did you leave for a while?

Matthew Owen: After college, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Where'd you go?

Matthew Owen: Went down to LA for 23 years.

Scott Hammond: Oh, sorry to hear that.

Matthew Owen: You know,

Matthew Owen: LA is great-

Scott Hammond: It's great

Matthew Owen: … except for the traffic and the amount of people.

Matthew Owen: But-

Scott Hammond: Other than– And the weather's great

Matthew Owen: … you're not gonna see a Rams game here in Eureka, and you're not gonna see-

Scott Hammond: No

Matthew Owen: … a U2 concert here in Eureka.

Scott Hammond: You're not gonna see The Who at the Hollywood Bowl.

Scott Hammond: The Bowl.

Matthew Owen: Been there many times.

Scott Hammond: The Bowl's cool.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. LA, LA's cool, ex- like you said, except for-

Matthew Owen: It's great weather

Scott Hammond: … except for getting around

Matthew Owen: … beach. It's just traffic, and they have way too many people.

Scott Hammond: You know, there's people pretty much everywhere I turn. You know, it's like, oh my gosh. And you can't wait to get on the plane and get back up here.

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I go down there often.

Scott Hammond: So wh- where'd you go to school?

Matthew Owen: Oh, Eureka High School, then Chico State.

Scott Hammond: Oh, you went to Chico– Oh, the Wildcat. Oh, the party school.

Matthew Owen: Um, allegedly, yes.

Scott Hammond: Allegedly. Let's see. You're probably my age, so you're 39 or

Scott Hammond: 40. Let me do the math on that. Let me see. Chico State, so-

Matthew Owen: I was at Chico State when they had Pioneer Days.

Scott Hammond: Pioneer Days is the red flag for you went, you were a full-on party guy.

Matthew Owen: Just saying that the, the whole campus was, so.

Scott Hammond: So you weren't alone. Okay.

Matthew Owen: For a one-week period, you basically rolled out of bed and started drinking in the morning through the afternoon until the night, and then did it again.

Scott Hammond: And rinse and repeat.

Matthew Owen: For ba- it was basically a long weekend, 'cause you couldn't, your body couldn't do that for a week. Well, most people's bodies couldn't.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, there's some guys that could rally a little. They were more stalwart than ever, uh.

Matthew Owen: Our favorite game at Chico State is they had the, the sororities and the, uh, various sororities and fraternities that would come and drink a pony keg.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Matthew Owen: So it was only seven and a half gallons, but you had to drink a cup, and then the next person in line would have to drink a cup, the next person in line would have to

Matthew Owen: drink a cup, until someone couldn't drink anymore, and either threw up or passed out or they said, "I'm done." Now you're down one less person, and you have to keep drinking a

Matthew Owen: cup-

Scott Hammond: Oh, really

Matthew Owen: … until the next person throws up, passes out, or says, "I'm done," and now you're down to one less person,

Matthew Owen: and whoever-

Scott Hammond: That's a game?

Matthew Owen: … drained the pony keg first won.

Scott Hammond: Wow. You ever done that one?

Scott Hammond: Nope.

Matthew Owen: Thank God.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, thank goodness. So is that a pony keg per team?

Matthew Owen: Yes.

Scott Hammond: That's a lot of beer.

Matthew Owen: It's a lot of beer.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: You may start off with 10 people, but just

Matthew Owen: …

Scott Hammond: It is a process of elimination.

Matthew Owen: That was probably the worst Chico State drinking game I w- witnessed.

Scott Hammond: That's a, that's a tough one. I'm, I was gonna say, the, um, my brother-in-law, Scott Hansen, who's a, a, a remarkable individual investment guy, when he gets up to introduce himself, all the other guys are from Cal or Stanford, and, "Scott Hansen, where'd you go to s- " "Chico State."

Matthew Owen: Yeah, love it.

Scott Hammond: And it's like every- And he, everybody just goes … "Oh, Chico. Oh, hey." And he, he always wears that with as a little badge, I think, of some th- some sort. Anyway. So what brought you to Chico? Where'd you study at Chico, business?

Matthew Owen: Business, yeah.

Scott Hammond: And then came home?

Matthew Owen: Uh, came home, yeah.

Scott Hammond: What'd you do in LA?

Matthew Owen: Uh, worked primarily in, uh, real estate mortgage lending, whether it was PMI, private mortgage insurance, or actual mortgage banking.

Scott Hammond: Gotcha. Is that with-

Matthew Owen: And then-

Scott Hammond: Was that with Wells?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no, Wells wasn't until Eureka.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm. Gotcha. How'd you like it?

Matthew Owen: How'd I like Wells or …

Scott Hammond: Your, your profession.

Matthew Owen: Profession? It's-

Scott Hammond: I hated the traffic and hated the people.

Matthew Owen: Well, yeah. I didn't say I hate the people. I said there's too many people.

Scott Hammond: There's too many people.

Matthew Owen: I love working with people, especially helping a first-time buyer get another home.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: And I love helping people reach their financial goals, 'cause for m- most people, your mortgage payment's your largest piece coming out of your-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … financial family's budget each month.

Scott Hammond: Oh, yeah.

Matthew Owen: Unless you own your house free and clear.

Scott Hammond: So as a good neighbor, I'm just gonna go right to the insurance discussion. So with, with, with the fire, the dumpster fire that is fire insurance in California, one of the stories that I tell myself and tell customers is that because of the craziness of, of, uh, the California Fair Plan, you know, fire insurance-

Matthew Owen: Mm-hmm

Scott Hammond: … is triple, that it does bump first-time buyers, the people that you love and I love, out of the, out of the market. Does, does that kick people out of escrows often, or is it just big and tough?

Matthew Owen: Rarely. Uh, more so if you're in a rural area.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: If you're down in, uh, Mendocino County in the hills or South Humboldt County in the hills-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … it can get– What typically used to be, we used to quote out, mm, 1,200 a year or less for homeowners insurance.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: That was pretty easy.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: Nowadays, depending upon where you live, we say expect 3,000 or 4,000 a year.

Matthew Owen: So.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Easy, yeah.

Matthew Owen: Just depends on where you live.

Scott Hammond: You know, I'm, uh, I'll confess, I get the AARP newsletter. But it's cool. It's in big print, and there's big pictures. And bullet points, and I can look at graphics. And w- the striking, uh, homeowners insurance, uh, they have a name for ads like these. Anyway, it's not an ad. The average price for homeowners in Florida is 5,500 a year.

Matthew Owen: Florida's worse than California.

Scott Hammond: Correct. They're the, they're the top, but the average in America is about 3,600.

Matthew Owen: That's good.

Scott Hammond: And you and I are paying 1,200 or whatever.

Matthew Owen: Well, then we've been lucky for all these years.

Scott Hammond: Called rate repression.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Your f- your friends and mine, Prop 103, I think was the number, they created the watchdog agency that sits at a table in Sacramento, and, um, they're just obstructionist dudes and dudettes that said, "Hey, we're not gonna let you do capitalism." And, and everybody now is wondering what happened, because we had rate repression for two decades. We're not paying what the nation pays. Your home and mine is worth, what, double in, in Mississippi or

Scott Hammond: Michigan, but they pay double what we pay in insurance. They're used to it, and we're just not. So anyway, enough of insurance.I'd like to see State Farm's annual income statement and balance sheet. Did they actually lose money last year?

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I, I, I didn't understand that last question.

Scott Hammond: We're gonna go beyond that question.

Matthew Owen: My, my, my headset… Nick, my headset's messing up. I don't know what he-

Scott Hammond: My, my corporate master maybe made billions, but they said, "We're not making any

Scott Hammond: money."

Matthew Owen: We're going broke in California, bro. It's terrible. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: It's like our local nonprofit hospital that you can look up the numbers that makes 20, 25 million a year, but they claim they're nonprofit.

Matthew Owen: Correct. Yeah. And so, and, and the co- and the corporate says, "When you're an agent, say, 'I, I don't know anything.'" "I, I don't know

Matthew Owen: anything." Pl- Act dumb, and it's not a very big act for some of our dudes.

Scott Hammond: I'm sorry. We need to pay our CEO more tens of millions of dollars a year.

Matthew Owen: A jillion doll- Yeah.

Scott Hammond: He can't get by on 30 million a year.

Matthew Owen: Our… Yeah, I don't know what ours… I, that's a good question.

Scott Hammond: Why don't you find out?

Matthew Owen: I'd say it's probably 30 million a year.

Scott Hammond: Let me Google that right now. Yeah. So, so you went to LA and worked for 23 years. Where'd you live down there?

Matthew Owen: Uh, primarily in the Pasadena area.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: So when you hit a certain age in Pasadena, you get the tap on your shoulder saying you need to join the Rotary Club of Pasadena, and you need to join Tournament of Roses. That's the nonprofit organization that puts on the Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl

Matthew Owen: Game.

Scott Hammond: That's right. We were talking before the show. You're actually on that, uh, commit- one of the committees.

Matthew Owen: I'm at my 23rd parade coming up, and I've probably attended 20 Rose Bowls over the years.

Scott Hammond: That's cool. Huh, who's your team?

Matthew Owen: Um, I don't have a college team per se. I say I- I'm in for a good game.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: Uh, I could tell you I was there at the USC-Texas game in January 2005, which is, I'd argue, is one of the greatest college games ever played.

Scott Hammond: How many… What was the score on that one?

Matthew Owen: Uh, top of my head, 38-35 Texas.

Scott Hammond: I remember that. It was a good game.

Matthew Owen: It was close game. Um, Vince Young scored with like 30 seconds to

Matthew Owen: go.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: And I was sitting there in that end zone section going, "I…" We just saw the whole play break out and go, "Oh, sh-"

Scott Hammond: That's awesome. My friend's going to the Texas-Georgia game here in October. They're number one and two in the nation back in Austin.

Scott Hammond: He's a big-

Matthew Owen: Wow

Scott Hammond: … Horns fan, so. So what, what… Do you actually go down and work on the parade and do stuff?

Matthew Owen: Usually day after Christmas, yep.

Scott Hammond: Wow. That's cool.

Matthew Owen: I found there's another woman just joined our Rotary Club. She actually volunteers to go to… Well, she doesn't volunteer. She's now a paid person. She gets paid to manage a float down there-

Scott Hammond: Oh, wow

Matthew Owen: … from, from Eureka. So someone else does the crazy thing I do.

Scott Hammond: Do you have a name?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Can, can't say her name? I have a name, but you won't hear it. So that's kinda cool. So are you… Which Rotary are you in, Wednesday?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no, Monday, Rotary Club of Eureka.

Scott Hammond: Oh, you're with Lu-

Matthew Owen: The big one

Scott Hammond: … Lucky.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Far really big one.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: The old guys club. Hey.

Matthew Owen: The old guys club. How old's Lucky?

Scott Hammond: How… Lucky's like 29. I, I don't know.

Scott Hammond: It's 40.

Matthew Owen: I was gonna say 35, 40, yeah.

Scott Hammond: So you were a part of it that… So there's five Rotary… Well, there's probably 10 Rotary Clubs in the county, but that was the famous one, Eureka Downtown, right?

Scott Hammond: Or-

Matthew Owen: It used to be Eureka Inn back in the day.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, Ron was, Ron Pelleggi, my good friend r- did the newsletter and, and I remember he said a th- like a quarter or a third of them all died one year. It's like within a year or two, like a whole bunch of the club was like wiped out. 'Cause they're just old dudes.

Matthew Owen: You need to bring in n- new young blood.

Scott Hammond: Yes, you do.

Matthew Owen: Problem is n- n- in my opinion, not enough of the younger people are volunteering.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: It's a big issue from everything from giving blood to whatever charity.

Scott Hammond: Well, yeah, that's… And COVID didn't help any of that. I, I was part of Friday C- Friday Club, pardon me, and I just quit going.

Matthew Owen: Ask your millennial children where do they volunteer? Of course, you can't talk to them. You have to text them 'cause they don't take the calls.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. You can't ask them anything.

Matthew Owen: Unless they need money, they're not taking your calls.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, right. Where do you volunteer? A lot of them grind hard at work 'cause they have to have three jobs to have a

Scott Hammond: mortgage.

Matthew Owen: My daughter pays 4,200 a month for rent.

Scott Hammond: Oh, shoot.

Matthew Owen: In a two bedroom, two bath. It's a beautiful apartment.

Scott Hammond: Where's that?

Matthew Owen: Uh, down in LA.

Scott Hammond: I believe that.

Matthew Owen: But 4,200 a month rent.

Scott Hammond: You're kidding. Rent?

Matthew Owen: You want a nice place in LA-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Matthew Owen: … that's what it costs.

Scott Hammond: I did visit your Rotary Club, uh, several months ago and enjoyed it. It was a lot smaller than I thought. At, Monday at the Eagle House.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And Lucky was, uh, Lucky was there and Brian, and I was a guest of, uh, Phil Nicholas.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. That's a good, that's a good club. You guys do a lot of stuff.

Matthew Owen: I, I, I think it's the individual president each year. If he comes up with goals, ideas, and objectives, gotta explain to the club and say, "This is what we're gonna do. We're gonna get out in the community and do some good."

Scott Hammond: Right. Yeah, the Friday Club was very good about that. It's, it's fun to be part of a Rotary. So what'd you do after you, uh, worked in LA?

Matthew Owen: Uh, came back to Eureka.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Uh, one of my best friends from Eureka High School and my roommate in college died of a suicide.

Scott Hammond: Oh, wow.

Matthew Owen: And at his wake, well, we first had the funeral, which was, um, how do I say this politically correct? Uh, he was gay, and his family never dealt with that and didn't talk about it at all. And as the family's standing up, the only allowed family to

Matthew Owen: talk-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … we're all looking at each other going, "Who the hell are they talking about? That's not the guy we've known for-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Matthew Owen: … 10 years."

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: So then we had a post-wake up at Huckins

Matthew Owen: Bar.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm. Right. And he was a terrific guy, as I understand.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. Great guy.

Scott Hammond: Lovely guy.

Matthew Owen: Just some people are old school.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Well, that's true. So, uh, you came back here and res- did you… Is that what… Before or after you married Virginia?

Matthew Owen: Met her there at our post-wake.

Scott Hammond: Oh, how about that? So there's-

Matthew Owen: We're classmates in high school

Scott Hammond: … there's a connection there.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And then you guys d- decided to be married one day.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. Yeah, got, got to there after a little while.

Scott Hammond: That's good.

Matthew Owen: But yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, she's terrif- she's been on the show, as you know.

Matthew Owen: She told me.

Scott Hammond: She did a great job. I hope you saw that. I hope you looked at her.

Matthew Owen: I did.

Scott Hammond: Don't, don't admit that you didn't.

Matthew Owen: I forwarded it to her.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, no, she's, she did terrific. And then it was funny seeing her at the airport, uh, schlepping luggage.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: County supervisor, United baggage person.

Matthew Owen: She likes to travel.

Scott Hammond: Parity. So she'll travel free, right? Is that correct or something close to?

Matthew Owen: Uh, you travel standby.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: If there's a seat available, you can fly anywhere in the world for free.

Scott Hammond: And you can pretty much find that out with a phone.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: But-

Matthew Owen: Uh, the downside is the last sometimes hour people buy

Matthew Owen: tickets.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: And if they're a revenue passenger, guess what haps- happens to the non-revenue

Matthew Owen: passenger?

Scott Hammond: Oh, bye. Yeah. You're, you're go- you're going to Houston.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I like… I have a funny story. Uh, it reminds me of this story. This is a speaker story. So there's a guy going off and railing at the, uh, the attendant at the, at the gate and just, uh, the ticket gate, just freaking out. And she, "Sir," you know, "calm down." And she- he got together and, and, uh, finally, very disrespectful, and he took off to his gate. And she goes… They go, "How…" And the g- a guy behind him comes up, "How did that go?" She goes, "Well, he's going to Houston, but his bags are going to

Scott Hammond: Taipei."

Scott Hammond: So-

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I wouldn't recommend messing with them.

Scott Hammond: Be nice to people out there, folks. It's not an easy job.

Matthew Owen: When you're in the air, the flight attendant is the law.

Scott Hammond: Excuse me.

Matthew Owen: And they can call the FBI and say, "We've got an unruly passenger. Be waiting for us at the gate."

Scott Hammond: First time I've ever asked this. What are the three big things that have happened in your life that changed you or caused, c- gave you cause for pause or were transitional, transformative?

Matthew Owen: A couple different… Well, first off, I'll start off at a young age. Uh, Boy Scouts.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Matthew Owen: I… One of my true regrets in life is I didn't finish my Eagle Scout.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Matthew Owen: Um, I-

Scott Hammond: That's a big thing

Matthew Owen: … hit 15 years old, started playing football, started working out, figured out what beer was.

Scott Hammond: Ooh.

Matthew Owen: Used to hang out with my buddies, and all of a sudden, um, Eagle Scout, whatever.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Figured out what beer was.

Matthew Owen: And in hindsight, yeah, I didn't want to say the other female thing.

Matthew Owen: But yeah-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … in hindsight, I wish I would've said, "Hey, you're 16 now. Let's finish up this Eagle Scout just to put it on your resume."

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And truly, I was, like, one project away from finishing it up, but-

Scott Hammond: It's a really big deal.

Matthew Owen: It is.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And when you're 16, you just gotta, you need to keep focused.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. I think I played on the bong team early on. I never even got to go to scouting much.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: So feral child, feral hippie child in San Diego.

Matthew Owen: Gave you a lot. We used to, you know, Frank's, Frank Yeager, our former Eureka Mayor and City Council member-

Scott Hammond: Great guy

Matthew Owen: … was my scoutmaster.

Scott Hammond: Big scouter.

Matthew Owen: And we used to do 50-milers up in Trinity Alps, Marble Mountains, 100-mile canoe trips.

Scott Hammond: Second time Frank's come up today.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's funny. Yeah.

Matthew Owen: He's a great man.

Scott Hammond: Oh, he's a, he's a, he's memorable. I mean, s- he really invested in scouting, right?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's super cool.

Matthew Owen: I wanna say for like 50, 60 years.

Scott Hammond: So three things. Scouts-

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: … has had an impact. My son-in-law is one of five Eagle Scouts in their

Scott Hammond: family.

Matthew Owen: Um, right. That's pretty cool.

Scott Hammond: Incredible, yeah.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. I would say the second one was football.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Matthew Owen: At a young age, um, it, it gave you discipline.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: It gave you camaraderie, teammates, and all that great stuff, but it really had you inner focused on what you wanted to do.

Scott Hammond: Mm.

Matthew Owen: And I was not a big guy. I didn't have the DNA.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Typically, the average guy I played against in high school was probably 6'2", 230 pounds.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: And I'm at, like, 5'9", 175, doing my best.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Hitting hard.

Matthew Owen: Just-

Scott Hammond: Try to be quick

Matthew Owen: … you learn how to be quick, and you learn how to take the legs out 'cause-

Scott Hammond: That's funny

Matthew Owen: … you are not gonna push some guy who's got 60 pounds on you around.

Scott Hammond: Probably not, yeah.

Matthew Owen: So.

Scott Hammond: Did you guys w- good team that year?

Matthew Owen: Um-

Scott Hammond: Yours?

Matthew Owen: Yeah. We came a few plays away from beating Fortuna in

Matthew Owen: 1979, but-

Scott Hammond: All right

Matthew Owen: … yeah.

Scott Hammond: Is that your senior year?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Okay. So you are a little younger than me.

Matthew Owen: Well, senior, it was the football year, it was '79.

Scott Hammond: Okay. Gotcha.

Matthew Owen: I graduated '80.

Scott Hammond: You're class of '80, so yeah. Class of '78.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Um-

Matthew Owen: The other thing, the third thing I would say-

Scott Hammond: Third thing

Matthew Owen: … w- was Marine Corps. I went through Marine Corps Officer Candidate School during

Matthew Owen: college.

Scott Hammond: Okay. Okay.

Matthew Owen: So during your summers-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … they send you back to the East Coast to Quantico, Virginia.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: Shave your head, and wake you up at 4:00 in the morning, start yelling at you, and put you to bed at 10:00 at night.

Scott Hammond: There you go. The yelling never stops.

Matthew Owen: And the yelling never stops. Morning was a garbage can being flown down the barracks bay on the cement floor, bang, bang, bang, bang. And the lights go on, and the yelling starts screaming.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Get up, you, you-

Matthew Owen: And the whole idea was-

Scott Hammond: … you jerks

Matthew Owen: … if you can't handle this stress, there's-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … no way in hell you're gonna handle the stress of bullets being fired at you-

Scott Hammond: Or-

Matthew Owen: … or bombs going off next to you

Scott Hammond: … or war t- wartime in general, yeah.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. So.

Scott Hammond: Huh. So did you actually serve after that?

Matthew Owen: No. One of my other great regrets in life is I graduated college in three and a half years.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: And I was dirt poor, and so I said to the Marine Corps, "I can't wait another six months. I need to get in now."

Scott Hammond: Interesting.

Matthew Owen: So I wrote a hardship letter, and they bumped me back another three months.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Matthew Owen: So I just didn't wanna hang out for actually 10 months. I would've had to hang out for 10 months just twiddling my thumbs, doing some-

Scott Hammond: What are you gonna do?

Matthew Owen: … low-grade job, and-

Scott Hammond: Yeah. You make a good point. I wanna infer your point that a lot of successes have disappointments. I mean, they're cousin. I mean, they can be the s- two different sides of the same

Scott Hammond: coin.

Matthew Owen: I'm, I'm gonna add a fourth thing too.

Scott Hammond: Go for it.

Matthew Owen: In college, I realized, they use this line in the movie Good Will Hunting. You can probably get a better education at a public library than you can at most universities.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: Unless you're really a specialist in a certain field like medical or science or

Matthew Owen: something.

Scott Hammond: Great, great movie, by the way.

Matthew Owen: But yeah, if you just start reading books, and if you read a book a week, I would say you're probably more intelligent than 98% of the people out there.

Scott Hammond: So, uh, hey, three things that you're passionate about now. There's a, there's another… You're, you're like my guinea pig. You're getting all the new- … the new questions. What are you passionate about that you'd like to see, uh, transpire in Humboldt or beyond?

Matthew Owen: Um, I'm, I'm passionate about politics.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Um, I think most people don't get involved in politics unless it, it affects them.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: You know, there, there's a thing of, uh, the Humboldt County supervisors, and I wanna go back to I wanna say 2008-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … decided they're gonna cut off building permits in TPZ, timber,

Matthew Owen: uh, timber productive zones or timber production zones.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And overnight, people just stood in front of the courthouse. People I knew who had said, told me they would never get involved in politics, they're out there yelling and screaming, holding a placard.

Scott Hammond: Flipped out.

Matthew Owen: Just lost their mind because-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Matthew Owen: … they had f- they had land up in rural areas, or their family had lands that they're planning to give back to them so they could build a house somewhere.

Scott Hammond: Not anymore.

Matthew Owen: And overnight, supervisors said, without any input, "We're gonna take away your building rights."And-

Scott Hammond: I remember that

Matthew Owen: … that-

Scott Hammond: People really-

Matthew Owen: Lost peo… But it started with HUM CPR.

Scott Hammond: Huh. That's right. Was-

Matthew Owen: Humane Coalition for Property Rights

Scott Hammond: … was that Estelle Fennell and-

Matthew Owen: Uh, she was one of the executive directors

Scott Hammond: … part of it?

Matthew Owen: But they just got people together to say, "Hey, maybe we should have some input on our local electeds," because they-

Scott Hammond: Oh

Matthew Owen: … did something without checking with anybody.

Scott Hammond: Right. And HUM CPR was a big, big deal, right?

Matthew Owen: They were-

Scott Hammond: Are they still around?

Matthew Owen: No. They, they were effective, very effective for a while.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: They got a lot of people motivated and involved, and that's half the battle. You gotta get someone off their couch.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Uh, so on next month at this time, literally the next month at this time, October 19th, I'll be off to Clark County, Nevada, where I'm planning on spending four to five days out knocking doors.

Scott Hammond: Is that, is that, uh, Burning Man?

Matthew Owen: No.

Scott Hammond: Wait.

Matthew Owen: It-

Scott Hammond: Wait. I'm kidding

Matthew Owen: … it's track homes. Uh, but it's just, it's early voting starts on October 19th.

Scott Hammond: In Nevada.

Matthew Owen: Where you can go to local library or fire station and vote and get it out of the

Matthew Owen: way.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: That's our goal is to get them off their couches and get them to vote.

Scott Hammond: Good.

Matthew Owen: So that way, the, your vote's banked and you don't have to chase them on Election

Matthew Owen: Day.

Scott Hammond: Makes sense.

Matthew Owen: Where, you know, I had a headache, I slept in late, I had to work late on the job, so I'm sorry, I couldn't vote this year.

Scott Hammond: So they could vote earlier in Nevada?

Matthew Owen: Most… Well-

Scott Hammond: Do they have a window of voting? Is it just-

Matthew Owen: Yeah, two we- uh, it's literally, like, two weeks prior to the election it opens up.

Scott Hammond: Okay, gotcha. All right.

Matthew Owen: And most states have something like that.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: In California, I'm gonna get my ballot on October 6th. They're probably gonna mail it on October 5th.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I'll get it in my mail October 6th. I'll fill it out in the first five minutes, sign it, sign the envelope, and it's gonna be back out in my mail in 10 minutes.

Scott Hammond: Forget about it. Send it.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. Done.

Scott Hammond: Hey, listen, we don't talk politics here 'cause-

Scott Hammond: … the most important things are, are, you know, sex, politics, and religion.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And if, if we had to talk about God for a while, this, the, the whole thing is over.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. That's why I always say you don't talk politics, religion, or sex to any people because they've all got their own opinions, and theirs are definitely wrong.

Scott Hammond: And there's and so is yours, for the record. Uh, so three things you're passionate about. We'll come back to politics-

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: … 'cause I wanna hear about your column and-

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: … stuff you write, too, and, uh, w- but religion and sex, we're not doing that today.

Matthew Owen: No.

Scott Hammond: I mean, we're just… We have limits on the show.

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I get that.

Scott Hammond: And, and, you know, and Nick's a little younger than, than, you know, I wanna make sure we take-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … you know what I'm saying? I wanna be cool with Nick.

Matthew Owen: The other one I'm passionate about is NFL football, and sometimes college football.

Scott Hammond: Oh, politics to football. Okay, good.

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I, I love football.

Scott Hammond: I like it.

Matthew Owen: Just n- it's the most popular sport in America.

Scott Hammond: Who's your team?

Matthew Owen: Um, well, this year, um, once again, I don't have a team since Tom Brady

Matthew Owen: retired.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I loved the Patriots when he was there.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I loved him 'cause he had it on a bunch of scrubs. If you can name a wide receiver during their first three Super Bowls, I would be actually impressed. Most people can't.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Um, even the wide receivers they brought in in the last three Super Bowls.

Scott Hammond: The one, the one guy. The tall guy.

Matthew Owen: Uh, they had Randy Moss for two years.

Scott Hammond: Let's go to Moss.

Matthew Owen: But they, they didn't win a Super Bowl with Moss.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Matthew Owen: They lost that one.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Matthew Owen: But they, uh, yeah, if you can name a res- wide receiver during their first three Super Bowls or the next three Super Bowls, I would be truly amazed.

Scott Hammond: That's pretty good.

Matthew Owen: And then also when he went to Tampa Bay in one year, their first year there, they hadn't won the playoffs 13 years, and Brady takes them to the Super Bowl as a wild

Matthew Owen: card team.

Scott Hammond: Crazy.

Matthew Owen: And wins it.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, yeah.

Matthew Owen: So, um, but love football. A matter of fact, this year I bought a three-pack down at, uh, I keep calling the San Diego Chargers. The Los Angeles Chargers now play at SoFi Stadium.

Scott Hammond: My team.

Matthew Owen: They share the stadium with the Rams.

Scott Hammond: Right, they do a rotation.

Matthew Owen: I just did, went to the f- opening game of the season against the Raiders.

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: Heading off to see the Chiefs the end of this month.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: And then Baltimore, uh, the Monday night before Thanksgiving.

Scott Hammond: Ravens have a good team even though they lost already. Well, their quarterback, what's his name? Lamar Jackson.

Matthew Owen: Jackson, yeah.

Scott Hammond: He's great.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. I don't know if, if I like him, but he's great. I respect him.

Matthew Owen: So football is something I'm very passionate about. The other thing is travel.

Scott Hammond: Travel.

Matthew Owen: I love to travel. I'm a travel hack, so people always ask me, "How do you travel so much?" Well, I typically get free airfare, free hotels. That makes it really affordable to travel.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: I use that doing credit card sign-up bonuses.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Well, talk about that. That's a big deal. Do you, where are you traveling to next?

Matthew Owen: Um, uh, I just got back from Vegas where I had three nights comped at Encore, Wynn Encore, and-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Matthew Owen: … $600 of food comped.

Scott Hammond: How'd you do that?

Matthew Owen: I have no idea.

Scott Hammond: Just-

Matthew Owen: They send me saying, "Would you like three nights?" And I, "Yes," with $600 of food.

Scott Hammond: What's it called, Wynn Encore?

Matthew Owen: Wynn Encore.

Scott Hammond: Is that a new-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … new property?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no, it's been around for a while. I wanna say Wynn's been around for 20 years, and I wanna say Encore's been around

Matthew Owen: for 13.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: But it's one of the finest hotels in Las Vegas.

Scott Hammond: So do you fly United down to SFO and over?

Matthew Owen: Yep.

Scott Hammond: Huh. Do you think they'll have the, uh, was it a Velo that flew?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Is that coming back anytime?

Matthew Owen: No, 'cause it was flying in late on a Friday night. No one getting on again at 10:00 on a Friday night, so by the time you get your luggage and get a cab, you're-

Scott Hammond: Forget about it

Matthew Owen: … it's 11:00 or midnight, and it's like-

Scott Hammond: It's, it's Saturday.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And the day's gone.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: So-

Scott Hammond: You're not gonna go out and gamble at, when you… Yeah, no way. So maybe some of the Chico guys would.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Back in the pony keg days.

Matthew Owen: Mainly I love, love the food there. I read all the food blogs, uh, the Las Vegas Journal-Review.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Uh, all, any w- website that talks about food in there, and it just-

Scott Hammond: Right

Matthew Owen: … go for the food is, oh my God.

Scott Hammond: Really? So you're a food guy there.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Huh. Yeah.

Matthew Owen: It helps out when you get comped for a lot of food, though.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. So State Farm has their conference there every four years.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: So last time we were there we got to see… I met Jake with State Farm.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Kevin.

Matthew Owen: There you go.

Scott Hammond: Kevin's cool. He's a really nice man, and you get 30 seconds at the photo booth. You hand your phone off, and they shoot you, and you get to talk, shake his hand and whatever, and-

Matthew Owen: And next

Scott Hammond: … he was so, yeah, so personal, though. I mean, he was so personable to me. But so they, the rumor was he was in the conference center, so you just had to find him, and so that was cool. He was a nice guy. And then we got to go see Garth Brooks, and, and I love the

Scott Hammond: shows there.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And the, uh, the Allegiant, Allegiant Stadium's kinda cool.

Matthew Owen: Earlier this year I was there at Wynn Encore and walked up to the concierge saying, "Uh, you got any concerts going on?" They go, "Yeah, Duran Duran."

Scott Hammond: Sweet.

Matthew Owen: I'm like, "Okay, tell me about this." "And tickets are only 475." I go, "Yeah, I'm not interested, but my daughter and her girlfriend and my best friend and his girlfriend don't get in till tomorrow, so it's just a single person. Do you have any," what do they call them? "We'll call last-minute tickets." They go, "We have a ticket here for $121." I go, "Sold."

Scott Hammond: My price

Matthew Owen: Yes And I was, I was, you know-

Scott Hammond: Were they good?

Matthew Owen: Um, y- yeah. Uh-

Scott Hammond: They're older, right? They're in their 80s

Matthew Owen: … Simon Le Bon, the Sexiest Man Alive in the early '80s, he's become a dad. He put on 30 pounds and has to dye his hair.

Scott Hammond: He's disgusting and bald. Yeah.

Matthew Owen: No, no, he's still got his hair.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: He just dyes his hair and put on some weight, and, you know, he's a

Matthew Owen: dad.

Scott Hammond: That's funny. We saw Keanu Reeves and, uh, Dogstar, his band, up in Oregon.

Matthew Owen: Okay. And then earlier, a couple months before that, my buddy calls up and says, "Hey, we had a friend of ours can't make it. Would you like to go see U2 at the Sphere?"

Scott Hammond: Oh, dude.

Matthew Owen: Uh, yeah, okay.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: I'll, I'll get there.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: So-

Scott Hammond: So you just traveled on account of that?

Matthew Owen: You know, tell you-

Scott Hammond: Not that, not that hard to get to Vegas from here.

Matthew Owen: Eh.

Scott Hammond: To go to the Sphere, it would be amazing.

Matthew Owen: You find a way to make it work.

Scott Hammond: Was that pretty cool?

Matthew Owen: The Sphere is, it's, it's literally a bucket list thing if you haven't been there.

Scott Hammond: Okay. I've heard, everybody says it's great.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And U2 would be just great to see anywhere.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: They do a good show?

Matthew Owen: Oh, phenomenal. I mean-

Scott Hammond: Really?

Matthew Owen: And, and I, I'm looking at the math going, God, these guys are approaching… Well, they're not, they're s- 60s, mid-60s.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: But still in great shape, and they work it.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Well, they're, they're, they're good guys. You know, I just wanna go back for a minute, and I'm just so delighted that you mentioned the Raiders getting beat by the LA Chargers. It, there's just a, a little warm place in my heart when I heard that. I just wanted to-

Matthew Owen: You're a Chargers fan?

Scott Hammond: I just wanted to go back. I was a San Diego Chargers fan.

Matthew Owen: Okay. So in January 1981, I was at the Murph for the AFC Championship game.

Scott Hammond: With, uh, um, was it Fouts?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Dan Fouts, whatever-

Matthew Owen: Fouts, John Jefferson, Charlie Joiner, Kellen Winslow, Chuck Muncie.

Scott Hammond: Dude, you, you're horrible, yeah.

Matthew Owen: Ed White as a guard.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Who was the, who was the middle linebacker, the Samoan?

Matthew Owen: Oh, Junior Seau didn't come till later.

Scott Hammond: Oh, Junior was later. You're right.

Matthew Owen: Right. He didn't come, he wasn't there in '81.

Scott Hammond: That would've been earlier than Junior.

Matthew Owen: So my uncle lived down in Point Loma.

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh.

Matthew Owen: And he had a friend who was a Charger fan, and says-

Scott Hammond: Beautiful place

Matthew Owen: … "Listen, I need to get my nephew," or not my nephew, yeah, "my nephew a, uh, ticket for the game." So all week long in San Diego, if you live there, the Village People wrote a song, "San Diego Super

Matthew Owen: Chargers."

Scott Hammond: Oh, yeah.

Matthew Owen: "San Diego Super Chargers."

Scott Hammond: It was a big deal.

Matthew Owen: For an entire week, you could not hit a radio station without hearing that stupid song for an entire week.

Scott Hammond: I remember that.

Matthew Owen: Out of the 65,000 people that went to the Murph, 500 of us were wearing black

Matthew Owen: jerseys.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Matthew Owen: Got pelted with beer, popcorn, hot dogs, everything, all game

Matthew Owen: long.

Scott Hammond: It would've been worse in, uh, in Oakland.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Or it would've been LA at that time.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. But just-

Scott Hammond: Were they the LA Raiders then?

Matthew Owen: … an incredible game, and the Raiders won, and-

Scott Hammond: Oh, man

Matthew Owen: … San Diego just went… And they saw one more championship game against Cincinnati in minus 14 degree weather, and-

Scott Hammond: They beat them, right?

Matthew Owen: No.

Scott Hammond: I thought they did, and they went and played the Niners.

Matthew Owen: Cincy lost. They lost to Cincy the next year, and Cincy went on to play the Niners

Matthew Owen: next year.

Scott Hammond: Okay. Was, what year was, did San Diego lose to the Niners? That was in the '90s.

Matthew Owen: Uh, '94.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Then they won, they finally m- got to a Super Bowl.

Scott Hammond: Hey, man.

Matthew Owen: And then you ran into the great '94 49ers team.

Scott Hammond: Oh my gosh. How do you beat those guys? Wasn't even much of a game. Just sa- I was really bummed, actually.

Matthew Owen: It, it, it was ugly.

Scott Hammond: It was not, not a pretty game.

Matthew Owen: I wanna say 49-19 or something.

Scott Hammond: Hey, they're 2 and 0 this year. Chargers actually have some-

Matthew Owen: And they got a new coach.

Scott Hammond: He's the difference.

Matthew Owen: Jim Harbaugh.

Scott Hammond: Oh, man. They tell me he's got some talent to work with in there in development. I don't know what the hell that means.

Matthew Owen: It means they got a lot of young guys, but-

Scott Hammond: That means we'll see

Matthew Owen: … right now the Charger running back's leading the league in rushing.

Scott Hammond: Is that, is he the rookie or is that the receiver?

Matthew Owen: Uh, he's been around for a while. Dobkins, Dobbins.

Scott Hammond: He's good.

Matthew Owen: I wanna say J.K. Dobbins. Uh, they've got, uh, you got a guy there from Georgia, a rookie, named Ladd.

Scott Hammond: Is he the running back or the receiver?

Matthew Owen: Wide receiver.

Scott Hammond: He's the receiver I'm thinking about. Let's talk about destinations for a minute.

Scott Hammond: So-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … we've talked about football.

Scott Hammond: Uh, w- where do you like to travel, um, top, top five destinations and why?

Matthew Owen: Uh, probably Ko Olina, Hawaii is number one.

Scott Hammond: That's, that's the, that's on Oahu, right?

Matthew Owen: On, on Oahu, 20 miles northwest of Honolulu Airport.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: It's an area they started developing about 25 years ago.

Scott Hammond: NFL would stay there during Pro Bowl, right?

Matthew Owen: Uh, the Pro Bowl hotel was right down the beach from where we stay, and then they play at the-

Scott Hammond: Okay

Matthew Owen: … Aloha Stadium.

Scott Hammond: Yep. Took, took my dad one year. It was great.

Matthew Owen: That was a Pro Bowl game, yeah, and the old players used to be there for all that

Matthew Owen: and-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … love going there just 'cause it's quiet. I don't, I'm not a big fan of Waikiki.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I call it San Francisco with a beach.

Scott Hammond: Yep.

Matthew Owen: You know, it's 500,000 people and a bunch of high-rise hotels and traffic and, uh-

Scott Hammond: Crazy. Some people like that.

Matthew Owen: Not on vaca- I, I go there to get away from that.

Scott Hammond: Somebody said it's a combination of Vegas, Tijuana, and Hawaii.

Matthew Owen: It's, it's like a, it's like a trifecta of all three.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: I like going to a beach where there's like 20, 30 people, not 2 or 3,000

Matthew Owen: people.

Scott Hammond: Right. They used to, the NFL did the Pro Bowl pre-games, the tug of, tug-of-war and all that fun stuff at, uh, in Waikiki. My dad and I got to watch all those guys. Flew home with Irving Fryar, the r- uh, receiver from… Was he a receiver from Dolphins?

Matthew Owen: No, New England.

Scott Hammond: Was he New England? Okay. He, I think he did play the, for the Dolphins at one

Scott Hammond: point.

Matthew Owen: Look that up.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, I think so. Nice guy, had his whole family.

Scott Hammond: Whatever. Yeah, the, the, all, those guys are yoked, and some of them are, are not, they're not seven foot. They're, they're 6'2" but they're about that wide. They're just, when you're 6'2", 300 pounds, that's a big boy. That's, that's a big guy, man, and you're gonna just take some people out and… So, uh, so Ko Olina.

Matthew Owen: Probably number one. Uh, number two is Las Vegas.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: Just, I go to Las Vegas-

Scott Hammond: You're a Vegas dude

Matthew Owen: … once a month.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Matthew Owen: I get rooms either free or for $12, $13 a night.

Scott Hammond: That, we gotta talk after the show about that. You're my new best friend.

Matthew Owen: It's part of the travel hack. Actually wrote-

Scott Hammond: I got some schwag for you here somewhere

Matthew Owen: … actually wrote an article now for one of my Matthew in the Middle articles in the Times-Standard.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: It's like you, it's not me. Anybody can do it. You just have to know how to play the game.

Scott Hammond: Right. Right.

Matthew Owen: So, uh, Las Vegas-

Scott Hammond: So Vegas

Matthew Owen: … number two. Uh, LA number three.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: I love going to LA to visit.

Matthew Owen: Uh-

Scott Hammond: Where do you stay when you go down? Do you go down-

Matthew Owen: Um, I got my bro friend down there who I'm with Tournament of the Roses with.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: Uh, I usually just stay at… He's got a two-bedroom condo, so-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … it works out well.

Scott Hammond: Pasadena or?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no, Arcadia, right next to Pasadena.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: Um, this last weekend, he drove- dropped me off at the Metro, took the Metro downtown LA and met my daughter and her girlfriend there and another friend of

Matthew Owen: theirs, and-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … I love going to the Grand Central Market. That's just my thing.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I'll travel a half hour to go get a burrito.

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: It's that good.

Scott Hammond: I've heard they're great.

Matthew Owen: Just, oh my God. So we had burritos there. Uh, then we go to the Arts District, and Arts District's where they got a lot of

Matthew Owen: clubs and-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … breweries, and we end up finding a brewery there and playing air hockey, which I had not played in decades.

Scott Hammond: Oh, that's cool.

Matthew Owen: And played Partners Pool. So we pl- probably played pool for about an hour

Matthew Owen: plus.

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: So-

Scott Hammond: And that's all in the downtown area?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Very cool. There's a big Disney theater down there, too, right?

Matthew Owen: Yeah. Huge one.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. So they've done a lot of, lot of renovation.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And isn't that the… Is the, the market the same one I'm thinking about? It's like a giant farmers market that's-

Matthew Owen: Except it's all thing… jobbers of food.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: Well, this one's doing Mexican, this one's doing Filipino-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … this one's doing Italian, this one's doing sandwiches and fish. You pick what you want.

Matthew Owen: They've-

Scott Hammond: Is it me or does Mexican food taste better south of LA? I mean, w- I just got back from San Diego for my re- high school reunion. 25th reunion.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Just kidding. Anyway, um, the food's awesome. We ate tacos every day.

Matthew Owen: Yep.

Scott Hammond: I mean, we, we found the most lowlife-

Matthew Owen: Yep

Scott Hammond: … like, doesn't look very nice, it's in Barrio Logan and-

Matthew Owen: Dives

Scott Hammond: … right across the street from the great food police, and i- the food was

Scott Hammond: outstanding.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: You know, and, and dollar tacos are now two and a quarter.

Scott Hammond: Just-

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: It's like-

Matthew Owen: I was gonna say th- probably $4 in Las Vegas.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Still delicious. So, okay, so we have, uh, LA.

Matthew Owen: Hawaii.

Scott Hammond: Vegas. Ko Olina. And what else?

Matthew Owen: Um, those are my big places I go to.

Scott Hammond: That's close enough.

Matthew Owen: Yeah, it… That's the main reason I go there.

Scott Hammond: Do you go to Europe ever?

Matthew Owen: Uh, have not been. That's one of my goals.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: One of my goals is to go to France, and I wanna do the route from Patton to

Matthew Owen: Berlin.

Scott Hammond: Oh, that'd be cool.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Wow. I like that one. S- General Patton.

Matthew Owen: Yes.

Scott Hammond: Does he-

Matthew Owen: Follow what the Third Army did.

Scott Hammond: Where did he come from? D- Northern Italy?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no, he broke out at Normandy.

Matthew Owen: Um-

Scott Hammond: And then went all the way to Berlin.

Matthew Owen: Yeah, he did so- if you read history, did something called Operation Cobra.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: Um, basically when the, six weeks after Norm- people don't understand that the Allies were basically got in a few miles and that was it, and they called, what they called the, uh, hedgerows.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Basically these giant mulberry-type trees that the roots go d- way down in the ground. They're big and thick.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And the Americans could not get beyond it, 'cause they'd finally get beyond one and the Germans would set up machine guns there, and then they'd get beyond that one-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Matthew Owen: … Germans set up machine guns there, and it was just, it was a, it was a ugly slaughter for a while.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: And two things happened. One, some, uh, farm guys figured out you could put basically big metal spikes or big metal things at the bottom of a

Matthew Owen: tank.

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh.

Matthew Owen: And it would scoop up the whole hedgerows. They would, had enough weight to them, they can move and rip up the roots.

Scott Hammond: As they drive.

Matthew Owen: So now they've got these, they cleared out lanes, and the second thing, they took about 1,000 airplanes and carpet bombed the area.

Scott Hammond: Just the whole thing.

Matthew Owen: Just carpet bombed the crap out of the Nazis.

Scott Hammond: Wiped it out, yeah.

Matthew Owen: And at that point they told Patton, "Go. You, you've got the opening here."

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: "We've opened up these hedgerows. Go."

Scott Hammond: That's cool.

Matthew Owen: And once he did that, he didn't stop till he got to the edge of

Matthew Owen: Berlin.

Scott Hammond: George was a badass.

Matthew Owen: He was.

Scott Hammond: He was a great guy.

Matthew Owen: And that's when we got into the whole world politics war. They let the Russians go into Berlin.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: They stopped the Americans outside and said, "Let them do the dirty work."

Scott Hammond: Yeah, let them go in. My dad was a P-51 pilot in-

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: … the Asian theater, so he was a big fan. Um, we just watched Dunkirk, uh, because I saw it on a map 'cause we were in Amsterdam a couple months ago. We have a son there, and, um,

Scott Hammond: there, there is a, uh, a remembrance of the Americans, how they-

Matthew Owen: Good

Scott Hammond: … free- freed the whole darn thing.

Matthew Owen: They did.

Scott Hammond: And Dunkirk was a really interesting story, how they, how the boats and the, the Englishmen came over and rescued-

Matthew Owen: Thank you, Churchill.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: The other members of Churchill's cabinet wanted to surrender.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Uh, 64,000 troops or something crazy.

Scott Hammond: 30-

Matthew Owen: I was gonna say 100,000 troops surrendered there.

Scott Hammond: There was a lot.

Matthew Owen: But anything that floated, it went across Channel.

Scott Hammond: And they went and got people. Good movie. That's-

Matthew Owen: Live, live soldiers live to fight another day. Dead soldiers you bury.

Scott Hammond: What do you see for Humboldt, Humboldt County? What, what are your concerns? What are your, what do you think are the opportunities? Um, and then we'll go into the column. We'll talk about that.

Matthew Owen: Okay.

Scott Hammond: And then I'll talk about what your legacy-

Matthew Owen: Well, I'm involved in a government group with the Chamber of Commerce, and the big thing they're trying to do is prom- you know, what are the issues facing Humboldt County and what can we do to help move these things forward?

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And I call it the three Hs, housing, healthcare, and homeless.

Scott Hammond: Good.

Matthew Owen: Seems to the biggest three thing in Humboldt County, but in a lot of towns, especially on the West Coast-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … uh, they run into the same problem.

Scott Hammond: Same thing. Same issues.

Matthew Owen: We, we don't have enough h- we don't have enough housing. The Fed just came out today and said, "Hey, we can lower rates more, more, and

Matthew Owen: more."

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: That's not gonna change the issue that housing prices are high 'cause there's a huge demand for housing and not enough housing being built.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: They do amazing thing and they find in certain cities when you build a lot more housing, real estate prices stabilize.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Matthew Owen: But if you don't build housing and you have a demand for it, it's just a supply and

Matthew Owen: demand sh-

Scott Hammond: Supply

Matthew Owen: … supply and demand issue.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: I think they mentioned nationwide we're four million homes short that we need to

Matthew Owen: build now.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: But we're running into the problem in California where lot costs are too damn high, and the cost to build is approximately $300 a square foot.

Scott Hammond: Crazy. Yeah.

Matthew Owen: I just talked to one of the guys at Schaefer's who bids this stuff out for contracts, and he looks at me and goes, "I, I quote them $300 a square foot to build a house out."

Scott Hammond: That's a, that's kind of an average house.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Not fancy.

Matthew Owen: No, he says that's a nice house, but you know, cheap houses you could probably do for about 250 a square foot, but-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … do the math. You know, you want a 2,000 square foot house at, let's say you do it at 250 a square foot, that's $500,000.

Scott Hammond: Mm.

Matthew Owen: And the lot's gonna cost you at least 150 minimum.

Scott Hammond: Minimum.

Matthew Owen: Now you're into it for 650 to get an average house. Not a nice house, just an average house. And you want a nice lot, that's gonna be 150 to 200,000 if you want a little acreage, a little privacy.

Scott Hammond: Mm.

Matthew Owen: And then your cost of building's 300 a square foot.And just start doing the math there, and you're going, "Well, that's $850,000 to build something custom." I need eight jobs to do that. Well, th- you can go out- And my wife is poor … and find a nice house out there. Yeah. Nice house. We have a lot of people moving up the Bay Area in LA. Wow. And they sold their crappy 1942 bedroom, one bath home and got, you know, 900,000 for it. Or two million. Yeah. Yeah. And th- now they s- come up here and they go, "Well, I got, you know, 700,000, $600,000 in the bank for a down payment." I'll go buy Trinidad. With a ocean view. Yeah, a little more expensive there, but compared to Malibu- Sure. Yeah, way cheaper … you can buy something beautiful in Trinidad from mil, mil and a half that's up on the, uh, o- on the, the bluff overlooking the ocean. On the scenic drive, yeah. Ocean front, and you're paying a million and a half. Yeah. But compared to Malibu, you're paying five, six million. Crazy money. What's, what committee are you on with the chamber? What do you guys do? It's called the Government Affairs Committee. Uh-huh. So one of the other things talked about is healthcare is a big issue for a lot of people, especially as they age here. Sure. Uh, now with Fortuna shutting down the, um, um, maternity one. Mm-hmm. And now Arcata's Mad River's talking about shutting down their maternity h- They did … hospital, so. Or it's, it's scheduled. If you're a woman and you're in your eight months- Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … and three weeks of pregnancy, and you're having some sort of- Mm-hmm … issue where your body just doesn't feel right- Mm-hmm … now you gotta drive to get into St. Joe's Hospital. Gotta go to Eureka, yeah. So depending upon where you live, that's gonna be… You know, it used to be if you lived in Garberville, you can go to Fortuna. Mm-hmm. If you lived in Orick or McKinleyville, you can go in Arcata. Now you gotta go into Eureka. Gotta go all the way into town. Th- these things like that's an issue, and I hear from a lot of elderly people who need- Mm … specialists. We don't have enough specialists here. Right. Yeah. Uh, and part of the problem there is the spouses. Right. The spouses come up and go, "Oh my God, this is beautiful. Did you see Trinidad and the, the s- the state parks?" Amazing. "It's beautiful." Where's the mall? Where's Nordstrom's? And where do the 49ers play? And he goes, "Six and a half hour south." Yeah. What? Yeah. So- Well, buy you a plane. Yeah, it's the… You, there's some adjustments there. They're still making… You know, we try to tell them, "You're making great money. You're a physician, you're making great money. And for your money, you're living a good lifestyle up- Mm … and you don't have to deal with traffic." Yeah. And you don't have to deal with 20 people in each line at the Costco on a Saturday morning. You go to a Costco in LA, and there's a crowd of 100 to 200 at 9:55 waiting to run in the store. Crazy. Yeah. And during the day, it gets worse. This Costco's getting worse, but whatever. Ah, it's nothing. Piece of cake. Piece of cake. You know, my traf- my traffic is the last light on the way to McKinleyville. Yeah, the lights. It's nothing. It's so nothing. And I go to the cheat… Joni calls it, Hi Joni, calls it the cheater lane. So you can go, it's… And, and somebody goes, "That's not, it's not cheating, man. That lane is designed to go on the, outside- There you go … and create more room for everybody." So I try to honor- And, and the other problem we have- … my cheating … with homeless up here is inclement weather. Yeah. That's the number one thing that gets us. Right. And people say, "Well, you have drugs." We have drugs in every city in America. Mm-hmm. I'm sorry, but that's just a fact. The issue we have is we have inclement weather. Which makes people sick? No, it, the, it's, you wanna go to Palm Springs or Redding where it's 150 and 120, you just s- I mean, see them in Vegas, and they just sit there and sweat. They gotta find shade and a little bottle of water, and all they do is sweat. Yeah. Not fun. Yeah. So, but you know, when we talk about our summers, God, it hit 72 today. It was a scorcher. I was really sweating out there. Yeah, their typical summer day in Eureka is what? 68? Maybe. It's nice. Maybe, yeah. So that, and the other thing we have is we have woods. Yeah. We have woods everywhere in Humboldt County. Mm-hmm. So they can just kinda blend in there with their tent, and that's that. Yeah. And they, yeah, I've seen that in McKinleyville a lot, yeah. We're, we're not a cement city where it's harder to hide. Right. See, uh, San Diego by Balboa Park and right downtown there, it's a tent city. They're everywhere. Hardcore. And Portland's even wor- even worse, yeah. Portland's worse, Seattle's worse. I wish we had answers for that one. That's a tough one. It's, uh, it's… Yeah, we're dealing with issues of alcohol and drugs, mental health issues, and rising rental. It's not just real estate prices for people buying- Rentals, right

Matthew Owen: … it's rental prices. Yeah. Yeah. Now, that's come up a, a number of times. I'm on the board at Destination Humboldt. So, okay. We're trying to pay some doctor, uh, doctors to come, and we'll pay- Right

Matthew Owen: … their medical bills. A- and I think- Seems like a, a good spot … one thing we need to do is think about more of what can we do to tell them about all the things Humboldt County has to offer.

Matthew Owen: Right. Set them up with a realtor and/or someone, a property manager, depending on the rent or buyers. Let's go look at these different places. Mm-hmm. Here's what your money buys you here in, in Eureka, Humboldt County area. Right. It's a pretty nice lifestyle. And then show them, we do have restaurants, we do have some social- Sure … things going on. There's, we have a lot of music up here. Mm-hmm. We have one of the largest per capita of artists up here in Humboldt County. The arts com- community is huge. It's great. Yeah. It's wonderful. I think it's great. There's, it's got a lot of selling points in that sense. It does. If somebody could, uh, uh, concierge that correctly. Yes, and that's a great word to say is concierge. Yeah, yeah. Just try to tell them, "Hey, we've got a doctor coming in. We wanna show him around." Sure. We'd like to give him a little thing of what is available out there, and have someone take five minutes to tell them about, "Hey, here's some places you may wanna rent." Or take it, take them out and go sh- go show them stuff. Go look at them. Here's some places. I like that. Let's look at Diamond Drive in Arcata. Yeah. It's a nice little area. Hey, man, uh- 800,000 buys you a monster house with a view. Are you a golfer? How about- … there's good golf courses. So let's talk about Matthew in the Middle. Uh, your, your day job is, uh, is mortgage broker. Yep. Your- Mortgage banker, yeah … banker, sorry. Uh, your, your night job is, uh, or whatever other job, is you write. You're a writer. You've done this for how many years? Uh, I wanna say about 12 years now. So you've got thousands of columns. Hundreds of columns, yes. Okay. You might be s- you might be four figures someday. Yeah. So, uh- Coming up … start, started off with the Lost Coast Outpost back in the day. Okay. Hank S- I used to write Letters to the Editor. Uh-huh. And Hank Sims calls me up from the Lost Coast Outpost, says, "How would you like to write a column for us?" And I go- Nice … "Well, what column?" He goes, "You tell me." So- "What do you wanna call this?" Hank says, "How about Matthew in the Middle?" I'm like, "Okay, cool." He came up with that. Yeah. And, uh- Shout out to Hank Sims, man. Good job, Hank … for about, uh, it worked well for a couple years, and then I had, we had to call it creative differences. One of the people there didn't, he wanted to edit a lot of my stuff 'cause- Huh … and writers don't like to being edited a lot. Why would they? Yeah, yeah. We like to, our words getting out. I mean, I could see for size, but edit for size or for content? Content. Oh, that's not cool. Yeah. Yeah. So we went to the Times-Standard and said-Uh, this is right at the time where Times-Standard had a pr- they used to have a guy writing a weekly column, and he had some sort of plagiarism issue, and they got rid of him, and they had-

Scott Hammond: How did that-

Matthew Owen: … they had a hole. And they-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … met with the former, uh, uh, editor, and he says, "Yeah, love to have you come on board here."

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: So.

Scott Hammond: Is that weekly?

Matthew Owen: Weekly every Sunday, and I, I have to turn a column in, otherwise the people get

Matthew Owen: angry.

Scott Hammond: Oh, boy.

Matthew Owen: If for whatever reason we-

Scott Hammond: We can't have that

Matthew Owen: … we're traveling and I don't make the deadline or something and they don't print

Matthew Owen: me-

Scott Hammond: Everyone in the bucket

Matthew Owen: … they get a lot of people calling in angry.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Scott Q. Marcus, our friend, uh-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … writes, writes as well. So what are you, uh, what are you proud of there? What, what have you written about that has hit, um, hit a nerve or got you excited-

Matthew Owen: Oh

Scott Hammond: … or what, what do you-

Matthew Owen: There, there's a-

Scott Hammond: What's going on in the middle-

Matthew Owen: There's a rumor-

Scott Hammond: … over there, Matthew

Matthew Owen: … we're doing a presidential election this year.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm. Is that happening?

Matthew Owen: That's happening. And, um, one side was getting real cocky because it turns out the Democrats may have been hiding Joe Biden's mental acumen.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Matthew Owen: And, you know, nothing against Joe. He did a great job in 2020.

Scott Hammond: He's a, he's a good American.

Matthew Owen: Took out the orange monster, but he's getting old, and he's having senior moments, which were apparent during the first debate.

Scott Hammond: Clearly.

Matthew Owen: Where it was just like every Democrat I talked to just went, "Oh my God."

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And they go, "What do we do?" And I go, "Reset." And they go, "What?" "We need to

Matthew Owen: reset."

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh.

Matthew Owen: Go, "What do you mean?" He goes, "Joe needs to say, 'I'm stepping down, not running for election.'" And there's, I wanna say five, six presidents that have done

Matthew Owen: that-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … during they, did their first term. The last one was Johnson.

Scott Hammond: Really? Okay.

Matthew Owen: LBJ just between-

Scott Hammond: He got old? Yeah

Matthew Owen: … Vietnam and the protest in this country, '68 was a rough year in our country's history.

Scott Hammond: What a g- what a grueling job anyway.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Plus, he took over after the JFK assassination.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: So he basically got in there a year early, won a huge election, uh, and then, um, just it took a toll on him.

Scott Hammond: And he, he left office.

Matthew Owen: All, all the great thoughts he had that he was gonna do with the Great Society,

Matthew Owen: which-

Scott Hammond: Right

Matthew Owen: … I'll give Johnson credit for that.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: But it's hard when you're spending billions of dollars on Great Society to make poor people's lives better and spending billions of dollars on a war.

Scott Hammond: On a war that was tough-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … tough to win.

Matthew Owen: There's, there's an old saying in economics, uh, guns are bullets.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Excuse me, not, uh, bullets are butter.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: You can feed people, or you can shoot a bullet, but once you shoot a bullet, it's

Matthew Owen: gone.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: That expense is done.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And that's that.

Scott Hammond: Good one, yeah. So d- in your opinion, did he step down a little on the late side?

Matthew Owen: B- Biden?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Nah, I thought it was perfect.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: Um, I've never seen a party get behind a candidate like they did with Kamala Harris.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: Um, they just, you know, we all thought, "Okay, is this gonna be an open convention?" You know, "Which one do you like? Are you gonna go for Bernie? Are you gonna go for Pete Buttigieg? You going for Kamala? Who's it gonna be?"

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: And it would've been a free-for-all.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: I mean, it just would've been everyone set on the guy.

Scott Hammond: Right. Right.

Matthew Owen: But instead, somehow the power brokers got together and said-

Scott Hammond: They rallied

Matthew Owen: … "We're getting behind Kamala, and-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … everyone is gonna do it."

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And I loved her choice of v- vice president for Tim Walz.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Uh, turns out he's an everyday guy.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, Jo and my wife li- really likes him, says he's pretty solid.

Matthew Owen: He's just an every… I mean, a former coach.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: He's not a wealthy guy.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: By the way, the Republicans, two people are from Ivy League schools.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: People don't know that, Wharton and Yale.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And our two people are n-

Scott Hammond: Good job

Matthew Owen: … I don't think Tim Walz got his… Well, he probably did, got a master's in teaching.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: But Kamala graduated, uh, UCSF.

Scott Hammond: Is he a-

Matthew Owen: He's, he's got law school

Scott Hammond: … was he a teacher and a coach?

Matthew Owen: Yes.

Scott Hammond: Walz?

Matthew Owen: High sch- high school assistant coach.

Scott Hammond: Assistant coach.

Matthew Owen: And a teacher for 20-plus years.

Scott Hammond: And she's a-

Matthew Owen: But he's just a down to earth guy.

Scott Hammond: And she's USC Law School.

Matthew Owen: Uh, y- uh, US- UCSF, San Francisco.

Scott Hammond: Oh, San Francisco.

Matthew Owen: Hastings.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: So.

Scott Hammond: Gotcha.

Matthew Owen: But the main thing is now is, uh, I like to say we have a candidate that's Don Old,

Matthew Owen: as in O-L-D.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Used to be that Biden was the old candidate.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Guess who we're left with as the old candidate?

Scott Hammond: Uh, Barbara Boxer.

Matthew Owen: And-

Scott Hammond: Wait, uh-

Matthew Owen: Diane Feinstein, yeah.

Scott Hammond: What? She's di- she's dead.

Matthew Owen: She died, but, uh, yeah.

Scott Hammond: What about Pelosi? Is she still in office?

Matthew Owen: She's still strong as ever and feisty as ever.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And she may be one of the main reasons that Biden stepped down.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Matthew Owen: She came out and said, "I hope Biden does what's best for the country."

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: And now all of a sudden the Democrats say, "We can speak out against the president?"

Scott Hammond: Well, she has, yeah. So tell me about the columns. What, what do you write about?

Matthew Owen: Uh, y- typically someone asks me, "Where do you get your inspiration?" I, I say to them, "I wait till Friday morning and say, what the heck happened this week in this

Matthew Owen: country-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … or locally, that something happened here?"

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: So-

Scott Hammond: So are you gonna write about-

Matthew Owen: … I gotta get inspiration for that

Scott Hammond: … um, some of the, the bomb, bomb things that the, the pagers,

Scott Hammond: the s-

Matthew Owen: In the, in the Middle East?

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Do you write, do you touch that, or do you stay lo-

Matthew Owen: N- I-

Scott Hammond: … stay local?

Matthew Owen: Try to stay off the Middle East. I did write about the Cal Poly incident.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Which I'll say to anyone who is protesting, "What has changed?"

Scott Hammond: Yeah, right.

Matthew Owen: You guys locked yourself in a building for how many days? What changed?

Scott Hammond: And did $2 million of damage.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Officer Packerd-

Matthew Owen: Get destroyed on that

Scott Hammond: … retired UPD, he, he said everybody played ex- played it perfectly wrong.

Matthew Owen: Yep.

Scott Hammond: Everybody just did, like, let's do the opposite. And they did, and there we go.

Scott Hammond: Um-

Matthew Owen: But at the end of the day, what did they accomplish?

Scott Hammond: Good point.

Matthew Owen: Absolutely. It's like the people who did Occupy Wall Street.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: They had a leaderless group that didn't go out and lobby Congress, and they didn't talk about what's happening in the United States Supreme Court, and all they did was protest in a park, and at the end of the day, what'd they accomplish? They brought up some points, but okay, I kind of already knew that.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: There's income inequality in this country. Yes, the billionaires run this country 'cause they run the tax code-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … and regulations from Congress.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Tough truth.

Matthew Owen: Most billionaires pay less taxes than you and I do.

Scott Hammond: Super tough truth.

Matthew Owen: The morning-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … the more money you make, the less taxes they wanna pay.

Scott Hammond: Right. Right. Go figure.

Matthew Owen: How am I gonna get by on 4.2 million a year? I just don't know how I'm gonna, you know-

Scott Hammond: I don't know how

Matthew Owen: … feed the family.

Scott Hammond: You know? The need rises with your budget.

Matthew Owen: I think the need rises with your ego.

Scott Hammond: With your, with your income and your ego, yeah. So, so tell me more in terms of feedback on, on the, uh, the column. What do you, what have you… Any death threats? Anything- … super, super crazy, uh-

Matthew Owen: Um, I-

Scott Hammond: Do you get fr- do you get free things like Vegas, or?

Matthew Owen: Uh, no. I, I- What I do get, depending on the people there, I get a lot of nasty emails.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Matthew Owen: Uh, I gotta tell you, after I wrote the thing about the Cal Poly h- protest over, uh, uh, Israel and Hamas there in Palestine, I got just a flood of emails saying, "I, you know, I, I read your column every week. I don't always agree with you, but you kinda hit the nail on the head here."

Scott Hammond: Oh, nice.

Matthew Owen: So which is nice.

Scott Hammond: You get positive feedback.

Matthew Owen: Some- yeah, sometimes I get, I get positive feedback.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: Usually I get feedback from the Trumpers who are just angry 'cause I t- tell the

Matthew Owen: truth.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Something their candidate never does.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: And they do not like to hear that.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. That's verboten.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: It's

Scott Hammond: j- so-

Matthew Owen: Especially after the, his debate with Kamala Harris when he talked about they're eating the pets, they're eating the cats, they're eating the dogs, and we're going, "What the hell?"

Scott Hammond: It's, it's so hard to, to debate how, how that went.

Matthew Owen: He just, uh, I saw it on the internet, so it's gotta be true.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, yeah.

Matthew Owen: If you believe half the things you see on Facebook.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Wait, that's not true?

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Instagram, TikTok, that's not real? What? Nick, why do you-

Matthew Owen: Oh, it's real, but that's the main reason a, a lot of people on the far right push their p- propaganda because other people don't fact check it.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, yeah. My wife has a supply of socks when, when, when, when Don comes on.

Matthew Owen: Don?

Scott Hammond: Don Trump.

Matthew Owen: Donald Trump. Don-

Scott Hammond: What do you call him? Do you call him Don, Don Old?

Matthew Owen: I was gonna say Don Jr.

Scott Hammond: Don-

Matthew Owen: I was thinking Don.

Scott Hammond: No, she actually throws-

Matthew Owen: Don Old.

Scott Hammond: So we have a nice TV, and she throws socks at it. I'm going, "You can't do this, man."

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: "You can't, you can't be-"

Matthew Owen: I, I was yelling a lot during the debate.

Scott Hammond: Oh, it was, it was interesting. It's so… No wonder you like football. It's, it's kind of a sport.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: On- only it's different.

Matthew Owen: During the Raiders game at the Chargers in SoFi, it was fourth quarter, the Raiders-

Scott Hammond: You ac- wait, you wore, you wore black to that game?

Matthew Owen: Yes, of course.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Matthew Owen: And, and the Raiders go down. The Charger 43, they're down by six, fourth quarter, six minutes to go.

Scott Hammond: It was that close?

Matthew Owen: Fourth and one, and they punt. And I got out of my s- I was literally yelling and screaming.

Scott Hammond: They punted on the 43?

Matthew Owen: On the 43 on fourth and one. You're in the opponent's territory, you gotta go for it.

Scott Hammond: Who made that-

Matthew Owen: And I was standing up. My buddy actually had to grab my arm. He- "You need to calm down." I'm like-

Scott Hammond: You're lose-

Matthew Owen: … "The coach is playing to lose, not to win."

Scott Hammond: You're losing your mind.

Matthew Owen: Yeah. Just…

Scott Hammond: Well, fan is short for fanatic.

Matthew Owen: You know, that's what you said. Do you have passion in your life? Yeah. Get me at a football game and I'll show you some passion.

Scott Hammond: That's some passion. I like it.

Matthew Owen: A- and that's one of the reasons NFL's the most popular sport out there is you go to a game or watch a game on TV, people are passionate. Go to a sports bar and watch your team have a bad day.

Scott Hammond: Oh, they go nuts.

Matthew Owen: They just go nuts.

Scott Hammond: Especially in Vegas. It's very… It, I've noticed it there.

Matthew Owen: I was just at Vegas this last week at a sports bar where you could not get

Matthew Owen: a seat.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: It's just, it's packed and standing two, three deep at the bar 'cause they have, you know, just a m- 20, 30 TVs, wide s- giant wide screen

Matthew Owen: TVs.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Matthew Owen: The size of your side of your house type thing.

Scott Hammond: Oh, they're crazy, yeah.

Matthew Owen: And they got, you know, in the morning six games going on at once. In the afternoon, three games going at once. And depending upon who your team is, you hear people just yell and scream. "Zay!" or "Ugh!" for hours and hours and hours.

Scott Hammond: On end.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: No wonder there's beer. That, that makes sense now.

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: So tell us, w- where do you want to… What do you wanna be known for when, when you leave, whatever that looks like, when you check out, your gravestone, your-

Matthew Owen: That's easy

Scott Hammond: … your, your… What are your, what are your top three things you'd like to be remembered for?

Matthew Owen: I would say he… Well, one, I raised a great child.

Scott Hammond: Oh, nice.

Matthew Owen: That's, you know. When my daughter was growing up, I said, "I'm not here to be your best friend. I'm here to be your father."

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: "Which means my job is to make sure you get through high school not pregnant, not a drug addict, and not an alcoholic, and you're going to college."

Scott Hammond: Cool.

Matthew Owen: "And by the way, w- after you graduate, you got a choice. You can go to a convent, you can go to the barracks, or you go to a dormitory, but you ain't hanging around my house sitting on the couch smoking pot and playing video games like a lot of my friends' adult children do."

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: "As they try to find themselves in the next six to 12 years."

Scott Hammond: Right.

Matthew Owen: So she did a year abroad in Bangkok, Thailand as a-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Matthew Owen: … rotary exchange student.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: Came back, went to junior college two years, and got accepted to UCLA, graduated there two years later.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Matthew Owen: That's probably my, my most pride f- accomplished.

Scott Hammond: Proud, proud of that girl.

Matthew Owen: Proud of the children. And she's doing great in life.

Matthew Owen: Uh, second-

Scott Hammond: Is she married?

Matthew Owen: No.

Scott Hammond: Kids?

Matthew Owen: No, not yet. Um-

Scott Hammond: What'd she study, by the way?

Matthew Owen: Uh, anthropology.

Scott Hammond: Perfect.

Matthew Owen: But yeah. But you know who their speaker was? Do you know the actor Dex who's married to-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … Kristen Bell?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Matthew Owen: He graduated UCLA in anthropology and was their commencement speaker.

Scott Hammond: Oh, that's cool.

Matthew Owen: And he says, "You know what I've done with my degree since I graduated? Not a damn thing."

Scott Hammond: Thing.

Matthew Owen: "But I got a piece of paper on the wall that says UCLA graduate."

Scott Hammond: That's right.

Matthew Owen: And he's probably made more money there of anyone who's graduated the-

Scott Hammond: And the skill s-

Matthew Owen: … at Cal State School

Scott Hammond: … all the skillsets that came-

Matthew Owen: Yeah, but he says-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: … "You, you bore down, you, you, you completed your assignments, you showed up every day, and that's n- number one thing employers wanna see."

Scott Hammond: Oh, yeah.

Matthew Owen: "You're not a flake."

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Hey, recreation… Whoa, recreation administration major, Humboldt State.

Matthew Owen: There you, there you go.

Scott Hammond: You know, not Cal Poly.

Matthew Owen: Not, not… Did a lot with that, huh?

Scott Hammond: Yeah, I really, uh, have excelled in that. Uh, my kids go, "You majored in recess?

Scott Hammond: What does-"

Matthew Owen: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: "What's that mean?"

Matthew Owen: I would say the other thing I'd be proud of is on a tombstone I could say, "He told

Matthew Owen: the truth."

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: So I, there's just so much… Everyone has propaganda-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … where they try to tilt the, the news one way or the other, but one side

Matthew Owen: just-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: … it's just a fire hose of lies.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Matthew Owen: And that really bothers me about our country.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: I mean, m- most Republicans don't know that Fox News settled a lawsuit for

Matthew Owen: $778,500,000 just 'cause they didn't want it to go on because it was looking so bad for them. They said, "Yep, we screwed up. We lied to you. Here's the money.

Matthew Owen: Go away."

Scott Hammond: Wow. When was that?

Matthew Owen: Uh, the, the lawsuit against Smart, Smart Medical, uh-Well, no, the Domin- Dominion Voting Systems. Smartmatic's next

Scott Hammond: Hmm

Matthew Owen: But Smartmatic was only in one county in the entire nation, that was LA County

Scott Hammond: Huh

Matthew Owen: So when Fox News is out there saying-

Scott Hammond: That's-

Matthew Owen: … Dominion changed votes and overnight

Scott Hammond: Not, not-

Matthew Owen: They, they lied to you

Scott Hammond: … starter, yeah

Matthew Owen: Flat out lied to you

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: But they told the people what they wanted to hear

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Funny, funny how we're like that. I don- I don't think that's only on the right, but okay

Matthew Owen: Yeah, I got a problem with a lot of progressives too

Scott Hammond: Truth be known

Matthew Owen: They want free stuff, but they don't tell me how they're gonna pay for it

Scott Hammond: Yeah, we like to get it paid for. Yeah, no, that's interesting. It's fun going to Boise, Idaho, 'cause everybody's really great and friendly. It feels conservative-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … and they're great. And then you get them on the streets, and they're fricking crazy drivers. Like, rude doesn't c- cover it. Jody's on a walk and she almost gets hit-

Matthew Owen: Right

Scott Hammond: … like on the regular. It's, it's like people-

Matthew Owen: I know that. They're armed

Scott Hammond: Yeah. It's… Driving is, you know, the rules are just suggestions, I guess, in some places, but maybe LA's like that too, so. So you told the truth. I like that.

Matthew Owen: I think more people need to

Scott Hammond: I, you know, I'll go out on a limb here. S- Miles Slattery sat here a few weeks ago-

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … and I don't know him from Adam. I don't know his politics. I haven't watched a lot of anything. He seemed like he's a pretty straight shooter

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: Yeah, he's a pretty honest guy. Would you concur with that?

Matthew Owen: I would say Miles Slattery's driving the city

Scott Hammond: Okay

Matthew Owen: City managers have more influence because we don't have a strong mayor that can hire and fire people and control the budget.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Matthew Owen: The city manager does it.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: The question is, the city, your city council's supposed to direct the city manager what-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … you want him to do.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: Or does Miles, the city manager, direct the city council what he wants done?

Scott Hammond: Right

Matthew Owen: There's a lot of-

Scott Hammond: Play in that?

Matthew Owen: Yeah

Scott Hammond: And you got Prop F coming up and-

Matthew Owen: Yeah, a lot of people weren't happy about that

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: And Miles says, the State says, "We gotta build things. This is where we own land. We can't go out and buy land"

Scott Hammond: Right

Matthew Owen: "And developers won't do it because it's too damn expensive"

Scott Hammond: There's only a little bit

Matthew Owen: Especially with interest rates being at eight and a half for construction loans. They're just saying, "I can't. It doesn't make sense"

Scott Hammond: Before you go, let's get you started on cannabis again. So that's d- that's dying in the last five years, right? It's kinda been tough in SoHum and elsewhere?

Matthew Owen: I, I wanna say it was-

Scott Hammond: You're in the middle and you tell the truth

Matthew Owen: … seven years ago I wrote an article, Beware of Legalization.

Scott Hammond: Ah.

Matthew Owen: It's coming, but you know what that means? Rules, regulations, and taxes

Scott Hammond: Lots of tax

Matthew Owen: So they, they kept screaming, "We wanna be legal," and, and I w- I wish the industry well. I'm not a cannabis guy. Um, but if you look around Humboldt County, especially if you talk to people under

Matthew Owen: 40, one fr- I said to one guy, "Uh, of your friends, how many would you say use cannabis?" And he goes, "Uh, 80%." Uh, no, that number's low. Probably 90%.

Scott Hammond: Wow

Matthew Owen: A lot of them just 'cause they don't wanna do the pills-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … 'cause it can hurt your internal organs. A lot of them, they used to do alcohol, but it made you fuzzy.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: And a lot of younger people drank way too much, and they goes-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … "Eh, it didn't work for me"

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Matthew Owen: So a lot of them get into cannabis. And, you know, whatever works for you. I, I'm a, a libertarian at heart. What you do in the privacy-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Matthew Owen: … of your own home is your own business. Don't beat your co-inhabitant, don't beat your kids or animals. Outside of that, you know.

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: There's a lot of people that sit around and watch TV all day. That, that's what you wanna do for life, okay.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, State of Jefferson. But that's different.

Matthew Owen: I think Rex Bohn said it best, "A bunch of broke-ass counties wanna form a new

Matthew Owen: state"

Scott Hammond: That's… Good one, Rex. Uh

Matthew Owen: But I, I talked to them when they came here and I said, "How are you gonna pay for any social services?" Guy looks at me and goes, "Easy." And I go, "What's that?" "We're not gonna provide it"

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Matthew Owen: I-

Scott Hammond: What, so what do you do with that?

Matthew Owen: What if you're poor in the state of Jefferson? Uh, you're kinda screwed. Hopefully you move out. You think, well, you know, right now if you look at the Humboldt County's budget, I

Matthew Owen: wanna say 65% of it's Department of Health and Human Services

Scott Hammond: That much?

Matthew Owen: Yeah. In the state of Jefferson, just get rid of it.

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: Gone

Scott Hammond: You know, I'd be cheating you if I didn't give you this. The, the last-minute quiz

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: You already gave us the legacy.

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: You wanna… You told the truth. What's your favorite restaurant? You get, you get to take Virginia anywhere you want tonight, where do you go?

Matthew Owen: SW Steakhouse in Las Vegas

Scott Hammond: Okay. How about- That's a good one

Matthew Owen: It's my favorite by far

Scott Hammond: How about somewhere in Humboldt?

Matthew Owen: Local?

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Matthew Owen: Uh, Larrupin's

Scott Hammond: Larrupin. Okay, that comes up a lot. Question two, best cup of coffee in town?

Matthew Owen: Ramon's

Scott Hammond: Ramon's, good one. Yeah, they used to have a mochaccino that was good. Question three,

Scott Hammond: favorite… You get the day off, what do you get to do? What are you gonna go do? Whatever you want. You get paid, sick leave, whatever. Uh, what do you, what do you, what, what does your day look

Scott Hammond: like?

Matthew Owen: Landscaping. I'm taking care of three to four different properties for family and friends now

Scott Hammond: And that's therapy and fun?

Matthew Owen: Yeah, it relaxes me.

Scott Hammond: Wow

Matthew Owen: I put on my little, uh, Apple iPod, not iPod, it's the Apple Shuffle, the thing that's a little bit bigger than your thumb.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, the little one. Yeah

Matthew Owen: You just clip it to your thing and go

Scott Hammond: It's pretty old school, by the way

Matthew Owen: Yeah, it's old school. I love it.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. I-

Matthew Owen: 'Cause otherwise you gotta hold a big phone in your hand

Scott Hammond: I've got a little one that's a Shuffle that's about that big, and so it's, it's great. So yeah, love it. Still has tons of songs from my son who put it all together in, uh, college

Matthew Owen: Gave you a playlist

Scott Hammond: It's a cool playlist, man. Jesse. Jesse's got a great pl- it's all Limewire

Matthew Owen: Okay

Scott Hammond: What's Limewire, people ask me

Matthew Owen: Yeah, it's an old school

Scott Hammond: Anyway, hey, Matthew, thanks for coming, man

Matthew Owen: Thanks for being here. Yeah

Scott Hammond: Appreciate it. Lots of fun and, uh, I wish you all the best, and we'll definitely have to get together on that travel stuff. I wanna quiz you and, uh, find out, uh-

Matthew Owen: Call me up. We'll go have lunch one day and I'll walk you through how you can travel for free and get free hotels

Scott Hammond: You too can travel. And if we wanted to reach you, how do we reach Matthew in the

Scott Hammond: Middle?

Matthew Owen: Uh, it's at the bottom-

Scott Hammond: Show

Matthew Owen: … of my column every week. My email's there

Scott Hammond: What's that?

Matthew Owen: Uh, mon707@gmail.com

Scott Hammond: Matt, thanks for coming

Matthew Owen: Thank you, Scott

Scott Hammond: Have a great day

Matthew Owen: All right, thank you