WEBVTT
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Hello, everyone, I am Jeff and welcome to History and Factory.
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Is about today? Today is March the seventeenth, Now my
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co host today. She's just totally cool. Not only is
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she a Hall of Fame softball player, she's actually one
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of the greatest hitters of all time. Nowadays, she is
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so much more. It's gonna be fun to hear all
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about her. Lea, why don't you introduce yourself?
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Yeah, I'm Leah Amiko. I'm a three time Olympic gold
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medalist with USA Softball, a two time world champion with them,
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and I really got my big start in college at
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the University of Arizona, where I also won three national championships.
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And I am married to my husband Tommy for twenty
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six years, and I'm a mom of three young adult boys.
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You know, we got one wander that I think gets
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underrated pretty much, not just in softball, are you, but
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pretty much along. You were a three time All American
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academic too, weren't you?
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Yes, I was, And I actually loved telling people about
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that because the school did not come as easy for me,
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and I had to work really, really hard. But I
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feel like that same effort and focused allowed me to
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really excel on the field when I was able to
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do something that I was passionate about and I felt
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was a little bit more natural for me.
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So you just went one of those natural kids. You
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had to really work at it in softball, Oh, I.
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Had to work. I think I worked harder than most people.
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And there was just something inside of me that was like,
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I have to do my very best. I really want
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good results, and that just continued to drive me day
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after day.
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Still does too.
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Yes, and everything I do, well, that's great.
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Notes. You know what alse happened on March seventeenth today,
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don't you. It's pretty obvious.
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Yes, I'm.
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The tiniest men that you have seen if you ever
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catch me.
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So it's told how good you might be taught of gold.
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Today is Saint Patrick's Day. Today we celebrate Saint Patrick
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and the arrival of Christianity into Ireland. See today also
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celebrates the high Irish heritage, their culture. You know, in general,
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it's basically the one of the biggest one day festivals
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in the world and pretty much every country celebrates it.
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See you pundering why do we wear green? Well, it
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makes you invisible to leprechauns. See leprechauns. They like to
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pinch people that they can actually see. So yeah, everybody's
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Irish today. The Catholic Church, they started recognizing Saint Patrick's
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Day back in sixteen eighty one, see March seventeenth. It
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usually falls during lint, and you can't drink during lint,
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so they thought just giving everybody a nice break for
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one day and letting them all drink would be a
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good excuse. But the first Saint Patrick's Day, prey, it's
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actually older. The first Saint Patrick's Day Bread yeah, held
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then the Saint Augusta, Florida in sixteen oh one. Now
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Sat Patrick Stakes always being a lot bigger in the
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United States than over in Ireland. Ireland they really didn't
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celebrate it. But then in the nineteen seventies they were
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watching what was going on in the United States with
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all the parades and party and they said, hey, we
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want to partake in that. So now they actually celebrate
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Saint Patrick's Day in Ireland too. So yeah, I wish
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you all the best of the luckily Irish with you
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out today. So you're California girl, what took you down
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to Tucson for the UFA to play softball.
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You know, the opportunity to get a college scholarship. I
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actually had Long Beach State, which was very close down
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the road, that asked me to come and offer me
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a scholarship as well. But I took one visit to
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the University of Arizona in Tucson, and I absolutely fell
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in love with the campus, the athletes, the coaches, and
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I went to a football game and that was it.
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I just thought it was nothing like my southern California
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football games and honestly ended up being the biggest blessing.
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Ended up being really the best place for me. Everything
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in Tucson is surrounded around the university, so for us
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to be able to play and be one of the
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top teams in the country, Long Beach Stay at the
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time was also top in the country. But I feel
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like in Tucson was where you got all the attention
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and it was really a great place to thrive.
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And you guys definitely did thrive, won three titles while
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you were there. Now it's been almost I don't want
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to date you or anything, but it's been almost thirty years.
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Do you still hold the highest batting average in the
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women's college Words series? I do.
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I hit seven to fifty. My sophomore year went nine
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for twelve, had a few walks, sack hits, and you know,
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I think back to like, I don't even know how
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that happened. It was the best experience ever. And the
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fact that it has remained for three decades is really insane.
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Man, you talk about being in the zone, right, that
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might be one of those what he got work that
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Joe Demajio fifty six game hitting streaks, that's almost unattainable. Thenbody,
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don't want air embarrass you there, but you did good?
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Yeah, No, I honestly I think back and actually I
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didn't even know it until many years later when I
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was working at the women College World Series calling radio,
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and I saw records book and it outlined every year,
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and I did not realize that three out of my
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four years there I actually led in batting average at
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the Women's College World Series. So three out of four
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I was hitting over five hundred, and obviously that included
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the seven to fifty mark.
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And that is incredible. All right, let's see happen in
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entertainment on March seventeenth, It's back to your nineteen ninety
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The number one album was Forever Your Girl by Paula Abdell.
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Jennet Jackson had the number one song with Escapade. Raddy
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Travis had the number one country song with hard Rock
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Bottom of My Heart.
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I Keep Waiting you too? Did you keep saying? Kny Star?
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Hell up these logging star.
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To.
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The number one book was The Burn Ultimatum by Robert Lendlham.
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The top movie was The Hunt for the Red October.
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The Soviet's best submarine captain. He heads for the United
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States and an undetectable submarine. Now the United States has
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to figure out if he's detected, defecting, or he wants
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to start a war. Stars Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin and
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James Earl Jones twenty fifteen at a St. Patrick's Date
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concert over in Brussels, Belgium, the band The Script. They
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bought all eight thousand people at the concert to drink
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so according to the Guinness Book of World's Records, that
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is the largest round ever paid for. So do you
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do any coaching and clinics and that kind of stuff?
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I for so long had done clinics around the entire country.
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I do a full here and there now actually coach internationally.
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I coach team Israel, the junior national team. So this
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summer I'll be in Spain with them and as well
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as in Vancouver, so a lot of opportunities to continue
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to share the game. And actually I'm also taking a
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cruise in August. I'm out of New York with softball
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players that want to come and cruise and play some softball.
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Well that sounds fun, So I'm betting is the biggest
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question you get for Well, I guess it transfers to
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the boys too. How do you keep the kids from
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being afraid of the ball?
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Oh?
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Gosh, you know what I tell them? Because I actually
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had an athlete a long time ago I worked with
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and the main thing that I did was I got
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her thinking all the things she was trying to do.
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And if she's thinking about what she's trying to do,
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she's not as worried about what she doesn't want to happen.
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And so all of a sudden, she went from this
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athlete who was jumping away on every single pitch to
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becoming the best hitter on her team.
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Well, that have really good advice there. All right, let's
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see what happened in March seventeen h There is more
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to Saint Patrick's day than from March seventeenth and White
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Air say, it just so happens that you have the Catholics.
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They use it to drink. But a sixteen year old
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boy who'd become Saint Patrick, he was captured by Irish pirates. Yeah,
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he was in his hometown in Great Britain. They'd throw
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him on a boat and took him over to Ireland.
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So he was sold as a slave. When he got there,
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he worked six years before he was able to escape.
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When he went home, he became a priest and then
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a bishop. Then he returned to Ireland. He wanted to
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teach that pagan country all about Christianity. Then Saint Patrick
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he died on March seventeenth and for sixty one. You
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know anything else that happened in England in like eighteen
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forty five, I.
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Thought you were going to do a clip fork. In
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eighteen forty five in London, England, Stephen Perry invented the
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rubber band. That is something that's helped us a lot.
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That's a bigger invention than you might have got. In
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eighteen ninety eight, off the coast of Staten Island, John
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Philip Hollands successfully tested the world's first modern submarine. It
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stayed submerged for one hour and forty minutes. And then
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in nineteen fifty, scientists at the University of California announced
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they had discovered the elephant. Elephant, no sorry. And then
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in nineteen fifty, scientists at the University of California announced
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they had discovered the element California. It's number ninety eight
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on your periodic table. It's radioactive and man made, the
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second heaviest of all the elements and the most expensive.
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It costs twenty seven million a gram. They only can
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make half a gram a year.
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What can it be used for?
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Detecting oil and water levels in oil wells and detecting
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metal fatigueing airplanes, So basically nothing you can't do manually
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for a lot less.
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Yeah, that's a lot of money for a rock. I guess.
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Nineteen fifty eight, the United States they lunch. Their second
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satellite in this space was the Vanguard one. It was
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to measure the shape of the Earth. Now, get this,
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that's it was only six inches across, but it was
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the first satellite that was powered by the Sun. Now
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it went silent in nineteen sixty four, but still up
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there just circling around us, waiting to fall the earth.
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I think they think it'll be about tw hundred and
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fifty years before it comes down. Now, this story, it
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just cracks me up. For some reason, I just think
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it sounds so funny. In twenty twenty in Africa, over
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one thousand cows arrived on the Angola border. See, they
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came from the country of Chad. Chad decided they were
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going to start paying Angola back the one hundred million
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dollars that they owed them.
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Bop dop doped.
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Dop shog thish shive birth day were gonna tar he
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left this shiverbfday. We don't simple targe he like this
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shive birthday and you know we don't give birthday.
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Yeah, we'll get I hit that button a little early
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before we talk about birthdays. You got something really cool
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called the gold Standard. You want to tell us about that? Yeah.
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I've been speaking for a lot of years and really
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just would answer the call when people say, hey, can
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you come speak to our team, our organization, our company,
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our league, And I really would just say, what's my audience?
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Who I want to talk to? But more recently, as
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I've continued to have more and more engagements and opportunities.
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I realized that what is my branding, what is the
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main message? Then, no matter where I go, I want
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to make sure to include and I've titled that the
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gold Standard. I wrote a book on it called the
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Gold Standard Fourteen Ways to Live a Life of Excellence.
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And really the key behind it is that every single
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one of us has the opportunity every single day to
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make an impact, especially when we show up as our best.
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And I realized that I had talent in my sport.
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I would not have become an Olympian without it, but
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more than that, especially at the higher levels, I was
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outmatched in talent many times with speed, power, but never
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with heart, passion, hard work, attitude. And so I talk
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a lot about the choices that we make to lead
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to excellence, and you know, it's really about the journey,
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really focusing on what you are doing and allowing the
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results to take care of themselves. And so for me,
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the Gold Standards all about excellence, but it's about choice
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based and how we can give our best.
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That is really cool. So what do you do with
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your three gold medals? Are they in a display case
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or something?
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They are not? I keep them tucked away safely, and
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then when I'm on the road and i'm speaking, I
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allow everyone to see them and hold them and wear them.
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Many times, I think my medals have been around more
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next then I don't know most people, they have been
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all over the country, they've been all over the world.