Season 1 Finale_Live from the Rescue Ranch

Amy Castro: 0:00

You're listening to Starlight Pet Talk, a podcast for pet parents who want the best pet care advice from cat experts, dog trainers, veterinarians and other top pet professionals who will help you live your very best life with your pets. We also share inspiring rescue and adoption stories from people who've taken their love of pets to the next level by getting involved in animal welfare. My name is Amy Castro and I'm the founder and president of Starlight Outreach and Rescue and a columnist for PetAge Magazine. I've rescued thousands of animals and helped people just like you find the right pet for their family. My mission is to help pet parents learn all the ways that they can care for, live with and even have fun with their pets so they can live their very best lives and their pets can too. Welcome to our Starlight Pet Talk live episode. We have no idea what we're doing, in case you didn't already notice that and I hope my podcast coach is watching so he can see me make a fool out of myself and second guess his career choices Nope, just kidding Anyway. So yeah, we've got a lot in store for you this evening. From meowing Did you hear that We've got kittens that we're going to bring out for you to see. We're going to talk about your favorite episodes from this past season our very first inaugural season and we're going to get that going here in just a couple more seconds. So, like I said, we're going to give people time to get on because I don't want anybody to miss the highlights of our 2023 inaugural season. So well, like I said, we'll just kind of slowly ease into things. So I'm Amy Castro. You all probably hear my voice every single week If you listen to the podcast every single week, which I hope that you do. And this person over here is my friend Bev. She actually was on the very, very first official episode of the Starlight Pet Talk podcast and has been on. How many episodes have you been on since then? At least two, at least two. At least two other episodes along the way. So I rely on her to share her pet expertise and to keep me in line. And she also always finds the errors that I do in the podcast, like, why did I listen to a podcast and it was supposed to be about apples, but then it was about mushrooms? Okay, that happened. So she does find. She does help me find my errors. So what we're going to be doing this evening we actually have a plan, unlike most of the time. I have notes. I did my homework. I have notes, I have claims, she has notes and did some homework. So we are going to obviously talk about your top favorite episodes. Bev and I are going to share some of our favorite episodes and they may overlap with yours or they may not. We may overlap with each other or we may not along the way, and we'll talk about why we like those episodes and I'm hoping also to guide you if you didn't listen to all of the episodes throughout the season to maybe guide you to some episodes that I think are pretty impactful, maybe life changing, depending upon where you are in your journey with your pets. So we will go over that. We're also going to get into talking about our second season, which will kick off in January. I haven't announced a date yet, but you will. If you keep an eye on our website and on our Facebook page, you will definitely hear about that, and Twitter and Instagram and wherever else you find us along the way. Before we get into revealing any exciting things about the podcast producer Kelsey, can you show us the source of that noise in the background there, because I seem to hear some little visitors. Oh my goodness, yes, give me that one. I like that. So we have some little kittens here, and so for those of you who would know us well and have been following us since the very beginning, you will know. Okay, all right, don't take over my show. She does let me talk sometimes, yeah, so yeah, so these kittens are from Starlight Outreach and Rescue. They are available for adoption along the way and realize that we are actually recording here directly from an animal rescuer. I love you. Okay, all right, and there hasn't been no alcohol this evening. We're waiting until this thing is over before we get all involved in that. These little guys are from Starlight Outreach and Rescue. The whole reason the podcast exists is as an extension of our mission at Star Light Outreach and Rescue to educate people on pets. And I will say and I think you've said the same thing along the way we have educated ourselves. I mean, I have made complete changes in my pets' diets, in some of the things that I've done with the foster animals, based on based on what we've learned on the podcast. We wanted to extend our reach when it comes to education, and so the podcast was a way to do that. We spent a lot of time at the rescue doing one-on-one conversations with people over the phone or back and forth on email and trying to help them with problems that they have with their pets, because the number one reason that people gave up their pets at least in our experience over the last 15 years of being involved in fostering and rescue, is a huge percentage of it is definitely a lack of education or just not knowing how to handle certain problems and situations that show up. So we kind of figured hey, we can have these one-off, one-on-one conversations or we can create a podcast that will allow us to address all of the issues that people have, because the odds are that if one person has them, there's probably 100 people that have them, and we've managed to build this podcast. I think the first episode we had like 40 people listen to it, so we're hoping that this has been helpful to you in helping you learn and grow as a pet parent or a pet owner, however you refer to yourself and the goal obviously for all of us is to help our pets live their very best lives and to not make ourselves crazy in the process, because that's the other thing that has a tendency to happen along the way. So let's go ahead and talk a little bit about favorite episodes. So what we asked people to do basically was to either vote on our survey for all of the episodes that we had throughout the season we put up a survey, so we got a lot of votes on that and then we also went back and we took a look at download numbers to kind of see what were the episodes that people listen to most. And I have to say, before I actually get into revealing the results. I have to say thank you to everybody who has listened to this podcast along the way, because I will speak for my just my own personal experience. If we didn't have good success in the beginning, I wouldn't still be doing this podcast. I went to chickened out a long time ago and said this isn't going to work, people aren't going to like it. But you were there for us, you were encouraging, you gave us great feedback, you downloaded and you listened. You helped us when we made mistakes to fix things. So I really appreciate every single person out there that is listening to this, whether you're listening to it live or whether you listen to it later on when we upload the recording, which we will do so nobody gets to miss out on our bloopers this evening along the way. Also very much want to share a thank you with and I did this on Facebook the other day and tagged a lot of you in it but the people who are guests on the show. Throughout this first season, I did not really well. I didn't realize that it can be a real challenge to get guests to come on a podcast and that you really have to do a lot of planning ahead along the way and you know I was number one grateful to friends and people who have adopted from Starlight Outreach and Rescue, but also my professional speaker friends, that those folks really helped me get off to a great start because not only do I have a lot of professional speaker friends who are animal lovers and are involved in animals in various different ways, but also they're really eloquent and so they don't do things like drop their papers and let their phones chime. They make you look good because they speak well and they know what they're talking about and they're organized. So you know, shout outs to Sandy Weaver. Sandy saved me on a last minute episode where I had somebody bail on me. At the last minute I called her up and I was like, hey, I don't even think I called her, I think I Facebook Messenger and said, hey, can you come and do an episode on something with me? And she's like, okay, what do you want to do? And boom, she was there. But Sandy, alisa Hayes, donna Mack, nora Burns, your name's going to come up, so your ears will be burning this evening along the way. But thank you all for being there for me and for helping to make me look good and the show look good and to share some great information about our animal friends. So let's go ahead and get into some of these episodes. And it was. You know, it was very interesting to me the difference between and I don't know if you were surprised about this as well, beth, but the difference between the download numbers and some of the responses. There was a couple of things in there that were like radically different. So, in addition, you know, we originally said we're going to take the top three favorite episodes and talk about those, but we're going to take actually the top four because there was that disparity between downloads versus what people voted for and we wanted to make sure everybody was represented. So the number one most listened to episode of the Starlight Pet Talk podcast for our first season actually aired on April 11th, so that wasn't too far into the season, and my guest for that episode was Dr Jeff Grognet from Canada and he's a holistic veterinarian and the title of the or the yeah, the title of the episode was are you feeding your pet the right food? So that has been, to date, still the most downloaded episode of the podcast. I attribute part of that to the fact that Dr Jeff has a pretty tremendous following. I hope that guests and I'm sure most podcasts host hope that the people that come on their show will help spread the word about the episode that they're in. And especially when you get a guest that has a much bigger following than what you have, it's like you hope that he can kind of ride that, ride that train and gain more followers. So Dr Jeff said he would share the information about the podcast and I'm not going to quote it exactly, but it was. It was an email that came out and his emails are pretty straightforward and pretty simple and it basically was some somewhere along the lines of I was on a podcast talking about nutrition and feeding your pets. Here's a link and I thought, man, could you, could you like hype it up a little bit more, like give a little more excitement along the way. And I kid you not, I got that email. I went back out to Buzzsprout, which is where I host the podcast, and I could click and refresh the page and it'd be like 10 more downloads, 15 more downloads. It was like so obviously he doesn't have to make it fancy, just like he doesn't think your food has to be fancy for your pets. So it was. It was really great to see that people were listening to that episodes and that episode and I know for me personally. Almost immediately after that I completely changed all my all my pets food.

Bev Brooks: 11:05

I just want to say I hit home too, because it not only did I learn a lot from that episode, but it's nice also that he backed up what I had learned anyway, Like he was backing up things that I was doing right, but I also learned a lot from that too and forced me to continue doing the right thing, like the water. Water and the food is the first thing that comes to mind. The moisture content is key and that really stuck with me quite a bit and continued on doing that, yeah.

Amy Castro: 11:33

I know that's definitely. I mean, I basically moved all of my cats for sure off of dry food because they've been eating dry food. Right, it's the easy thing and you know just the discussion that we had in that episode and several people had commented about you know, I literally changed my pet foods because of this. I didn't realize cats constantly were dehydrated and neither did I. I mean, they've got massive amounts of water. Why aren't they drinking it? But they apparently they just don't drink enough. So, moving to the canned food, adding water to the canned food, I think it has really really helped my, help, my personal pets, and it seemed to be reflected by the, by the folks that downloaded it, because a lot of people listen to that particular episode. That was a good one. Yeah that was a good one, all right. So the number two episode I hesitated to do this one, but I went ahead and did it anyway, because I always feel like having a guest adds a little extra expertise or a little balance to have a conversation, versus me just running my mouth, which I have no problem doing, versus me just running my mouth for an entire episode. But the number two favorite favorite episode was it aired on Halloween and the episode was top favorite pet products Every pet parent must have and we've gotten a really great response from that. I'm glad about that one because I truly I mean we truly started looking around the rescue ranch and looking at you know what is that favorite bowl that I have, or what are the toys that last the longest, or whatever it might be, and it really gave me a chance to help share that information with other people, because I see people making mistakes. So products that were included in that particular episode were things like obviously Kong Kong's a really good friend of ours. They've donated lots of toys and things like that to the rescue. And then also pet mate is another one that's a personal favorite of mine. I remember I actually did. I was standing in the kitchen one day and was I don't know what I was doing. I was shooting a video, I think, about feeding kittens and I said something about oh, this is like my favorite bowl to use for these kittens and I thought, well, let me see what kind it is. And sure enough, it was pet mate and you know, if you want to see that episode, it kind of outlines all of the other products. But the comments that we received on that particular episode were things like you know, these are legit products. Like you know, it's not just not just talking about things and then they're really garbage when you get them. Somebody said life saving. I don't remember. They didn't say specifically what product it was. It was probably it had to have been either the Forda Flora, the Purina Forda Flora, because that has been a lifesaver for us, or, if it was a rescue person, maybe it was the Snuggle, safe, pet warmer bed thing, because that one is. I mean, you got to keep those baby kittens warm. And then I had another comment that where somebody said you know, thanks for sharing this. People, you know, people need to know what works. So that was our number two episode. What did you?

Bev Brooks: 14:21

think about that one the same thing Also, that I trust what you are going to purchase. So when you say XYZ is good, I'm like I'm going to let her do all the. Yeah, let me make the mistakes, the trial and error and like that's good, and all my friends back home on Cape Cod will are probably sick of seeing pictures of my cat in the furry bed. I think we've all seen it. It's like a gray kind of really.

Amy Castro: 14:44

I call it a donut bed.

Bev Brooks: 14:45

It's like a donut thing and that was Midwest Homes and my cat. He loves it. There's a heating pad under it too, so that helps, but he just absolutely loves it and he's never loved something that much Like he just curls up into a tight little donut, does not want to get out, and that I wouldn't have bought it. I totally never. I'm like it's a gimmick, I'm going to spend the money and he's never going to like it.

Amy Castro: 15:23

Yeah. Yeah, it's nice to have somebody test that stuff out for you, because some of the Especially when you're getting into quality products they're not cheap and you don't want to spend money and then have something not work. So yeah, let somebody. It's kind of like restaurants. I don't like to go to a restaurant randomly. I like to know that a bunch of other people have gone and that's good before we tested out. So that was the number two most downloaded episode. So I appreciate that Hopefully you all have purchased some of those products and seen how well they work for you as well. And then the number three episodes. So the number three episode was kind of funny because I thought that episode was going to explode from the get go and maybe I just I'm biased on some of these topics because I think the subject matter is so incredibly important. But it was a slow burner. I mean it kind of started off slow because I'm a psycho about numbers and I don't know if all podcasters do this, but if that podcast is going to air at 5 am, I'm going to be like at 5.15. I'm looking at my phone. What are the downloads? It's like people aren't even up yet. But I don't care and it just lagged for a little while but then all of a sudden it took off. I'm not really sure why, but it was with Dr Matt Getz and he is with Merck Animal Health and the episode was called the Life-Saving Importance of Microchipping your Pets. And we just did that one in November, november 28th. We kind of did that. I wanted to kind of end the year on a holiday series, because holidays are challenging, right. I mean it's stressful, there's so much going on and there's things that can go on with our pets or special challenges that we have with our pets. So kind of came up with this idea of doing a month-long series in November of holiday-related episodes and that was the one that was kind of the wrap-up about getting your pet home again if they were to get lost. So not only was Dr Matt obviously very professional and works for the company, so he knows about product and the product is. There are a lot of microchip companies out there. One that we use here at Starlight Outreach and Rescue is Home Again, which is made by Merck. He was not only knowledgeable about that but had sheltering experience and knows from personal experience the life-saving impact of having your pets microchip. So really really appreciate him and the company coordinating and making sure that episode happened, because sometimes, especially when you're just a baby podcaster even though I'm old, you're a baby podcaster you feel like I can't call this giant company and ask you want to come on my podcast from my guest room at the Rescue Ranch. Now, this is a real studio, this is not a guest room, I promise you. But then they do. They're like, hey, they want people microchip in their pets too, so that they can get their pets home.

Bev Brooks: 18:07

He's excited about it too. Yeah, he was really excited. I like the fact that he was very down to earth and no question was too simple. It's like the GPS part of it. I didn't know people even question if there was GPS in it, like, oh yeah, that's a great question. He was very good about it and he had a lot of suggestions about why it's important to do microchipping. Oh, I never thought of that. That's why I should have microchipped. You're giving your dog a bath and he runs away. I'm a good owner. I always keep my collar on my pet, but if you give him a bath and he slips out, there you go. There's your instance where you need the microchip. It was good. It was good. I liked listening to him. He was very good yeah.

Amy Castro: 18:42

Did you have any particular? I was thinking about the, the pet products ones. I didn't. I've been dominating the conversation other than the.

Bev Brooks: 18:52

Donut.

Amy Castro: 18:53

Sorry, I'm a professional talker. I got my glasses on my grandma in my real-time job, beyond doing this podcast, I think everyone should listen to.

Bev Brooks: 19:02

It was February 14th on navigating pet loss with Nancy Gordon. I think it's something, whether you're a pet owner or not, that everyone can relate to about losing your pet. And then also I thought of this as we're listening to Yamer on.

Amy Castro: 19:19

I really wasn't done yet. I was going to ask you about your other favorite product but, that's okay.

Bev Brooks: 19:23

Y'all gonna have to wait.

Amy Castro: 19:25

No, that's okay, you go ahead.

Bev Brooks: 19:28

You need to listen to that podcast with Nancy Gordon, because everybody who has a pet goes through this BS of having to lose an older pet. This is what they do to us. They kill us. It kind of gave you. That's all I was gonna say. It gives you permission to not feel bad about your pet being a family member. You know, you can hear the eyes rolling already Like, oh, it's just a cat, oh it's just a guinea pig or whatever. But she gives you permission to have that pet be a family member, and it was. It's. Oh, it's got goosebumps. You need to. You need to listen to it. It's good.

Amy Castro: 19:59

Well, and that's actually you know, since we're not going to talk about our favorite episodes that was mine too. I had that on my list, you know it's funny because that was the first Nancy Gordon, who's a licensed clinical social worker, and I know she's got another another like a life coach, certified life coach. She was my first real guest that I got lined up to be on the show and I didn't know her, she didn't know me, but she was willing to willing to come on the show and I remember recording that episode and you talking about getting goosebumps, like thinking, oh my gosh, like it's really happening this show is not only is it's really happening, but this show is going to be so good. And then I remember being and I had never did tell Nancy this because you don't want to tell somebody oh, yours is the lowest listen to show and it's not, it's not anymore. But I, you know, I thought people would be just clamoring to listen to that, to just get some perspective on it, and it was so. I mean, it was in like the two digits for a long time and it just kind of lingered forever. And then I think it kind of dawned on me that people don't want to talk to Kelsey about it too, people don't want to think about it, yeah, but you know, if you did not listen to that episode, I highly, highly recommend that you go back and listen to it, because even as somebody who has not only had to and she doesn't use the word put to sleep or euthanize or whatever the phrase that she used was lift her pets up instead of putting them down, lifting them up we're all going to be in that position to have to do it. You know, it might be a spontaneous thing, that happens quickly, or you might have time to plan, but she will change your entire, absolutely viewpoint on that whole process and how you could you know, if you do have time or even if it's just a short 24 hour period, how you can change that experience for you and for your pet. That was to me like that was a life changing life changing episode for people if they listen to it, and I highly encourage you, you know, listen to it now, when your pets are young and healthy and you're not thinking about it, because you'll be harmed for that information when the time comes. So, yeah, it's funny that you picked that one too, because I like that one as well. All right, so what was your other? Oh, are you done with your? Well, no, I'll let you you, since you started. I'll let you do your top three. We happen to have the same one on that one.

Bev Brooks: 22:21

Well, miss Nora Burns we mentioned you earlier, nora Burns. Nora Burns, april 4th she did a podcast about fostering and how it saves lives. Very interesting, very digestible. If you're thinking about doing it, it's not so overwhelming, and it she talks every talks about everything from soup to nuts about fostering, but the one key thing that she had said during that episode was having a heartbeat in the house. That's a great phrase. Yeah, it just and that was back in April I heard. I still think about that when she said it like really resonates Every, every heartbeat is important yeah.

Amy Castro: 22:57

Well and I think there was so much tied into that, into that concept, on that episode is every heartbeat is important, having some other being in your home if you're lonely or if you know, even if you're, if you're a stay at home person or you work from home and you're, you've got a family, but they're all at work all day.

Bev Brooks: 23:15

Just having somebody else around can really have a really good effect and you're doing that, or the heartbeat a good deed, because you're going to make that animal adoptable. Yeah, you know you're going to have to say goodbye, but look at the good that you've done. Give me another one, I'll make this one good and like flip, it's like flipping houses. It's exactly like flipping houses.

Amy Castro: 23:34

Yeah, you probably don't follow one of those houses. You're flipping as quickly, you know. I will say it doesn't become a bit assembly line after. I don't know, I saw it.

Bev Brooks: 23:43

And it really doesn't. I mean, you go through a lot but it's still like, oh my God, they're adorable or they you feel for them because they need medical attention or whatever. You do get attached to a certain way, but you know, you're doing, you're being a, you're a stepping stone for this animal to get adopted out into a forever home. Yeah, fostering, and it's the commitment. Are you going to cry before me? No, I'm not going to cry.

Amy Castro: 24:05

But what I was going to say was it's like after a while it's that you, it does become a bit of an assembly line and you're like, thank goodness that thing is going Right. Have you done about five, I think? Stop counting at three thousand and I think that was like five years.

Bev Brooks: 24:17

It's crazy, it's just insane.

Amy Castro: 24:18

That's crazy Insane. But yeah, there are.

Bev Brooks: 24:20

there are ones that definitely grab you, but there's also, like we were saying in the the other episodes, there's, there's, there's so little you can do and so a lot you can choose what you can do, you know, as when fostering comes along, it doesn't have to be a huge, huge, huge commitment, but it is a commitment. When you do have that animal in your home, it's your responsibility. Right Stepping stone, that's the. You got to keep that in mind, that it's the animals got to go. Yeah.

Amy Castro: 24:41

And I think she, I think it was Nora that had stressed the knowing, the organization and we've brought that up Multiple times along the way is that you know, knowing what you're getting yourself into, what is the level of commitment Because that's where I think sometimes fosters get burned is they'll agree to foster something and then you know, I didn't think this was going to be a six month commitment, or I didn't think I was going to have to run to 15 vet appointments, or I didn't think that this animal wasn't potty trained, I mean you really want to ask a lot of questions, because I do remember and I don't know if she said it in the episode, but she probably did her first Foray into fostering turned out to be puppies that had parvo, oh God, and I pretty sure they were diagnosed after they were already in her home and if you. Yes, she did yes that's right. And so if you've ever had a puppy with parvo in your house, your house is pretty well contaminated for a really long time. I mean, it's just an insidious disease. And so I would have thought, ok, this boy went and I remember seeing her Facebook post and I was like this woman's never going to do this again. And she's still doing it, you know, and she's still involved. And actually she's funny too, nora, because she some of the ones, like Cindy Lou, who is one of the one of the dogs that she fostered, she and her dog color, whiskey girl they still do play dates. That's great. That's like a level of commitment way beyond my. That's awesome. I'm like bye, bye, send me some pictures, send me some updates from wherever you live, at your house, not at my house, because I got another 15 behind the original ones. So yeah, that was, that was a fun, that was a good one. Ok, do you have a third one?

Bev Brooks: 26:16

Did you actually? Yeah, I do To Miss Mason Zimmerman, mason, on your episode on Kaiser. That was what I say September 26th. You have to go to the Starlight website and look at the before and after pictures of Kaiser, because totally different dog.

Amy Castro: 26:35

It doesn't even look like.

Bev Brooks: 26:36

Oh, my God, and just listening to her commitment of getting this dog, for whatever reason, tugged at her heartstrings and it's cute. On the podcast she said you know, somebody got that dog and coat.

Amy Castro: 26:46

Yeah, you had clothes.

Bev Brooks: 26:48

It's like because he looks like and that was her, that was, that was, that was Miss Zimmerman Mason, you know, taking a shine to this sweet little dog. That was that one, for whatever reason, really tugged at me. That was the commitment that you put into that. Mason was was awesome. I really enjoyed that one because you knew her too, so that that was a nice connection from the, from the rescue, and I had a heck of time tracking her down.

Amy Castro: 27:10

She's so busy and she's always running and gunning between working in school and all of her activities and it's like it took me I was I finally caught up. caught up with her, but it took me a couple of months just to pin her down to come on the show. It's funny you mentioned as far as the before and after, because I mean, I think everybody's always fascinated by before and after photos. It's like whether it's oh, look, look how much this person lost 300 pounds. There's a before and after. Look at this skinny dog, look now he's now he's not fat, but, you know, healthy. But sometimes these before and after this, especially dogs like Kaiser, he was in such bad condition and missing such a weird I mean it's pretty significant amount of hair that he didn't even like. If I had seen him on the street I would never have said that could have possibly been the same dog. I mean, it would be like it was just incredible how different he was.

Bev Brooks: 28:00

And it's not only visually, but all the work that she put into it behind the scenes. You know training and whatnot. I was very impressed, yeah, yeah.

Amy Castro: 28:09

Yeah, because sometimes these dogs that come in sick, they seem calm and mild mannered and good nature, and it's just because they don't feel good and then they start feeling good and they can become a handful. Yeah, and I know she went through a lot, you know a lot as far as working with him and training him, and so more power to you, girl. Yeah, that was nice. Yeah, all right. So any other ones that you want to highlight? Are we on time? Okay, because I can go on.

Bev Brooks: 28:31

I got pages and notes. The other one that I wanted to mention was the girl from Politics, liz Whittaker. Whittaker, I can't remember your name on hand, I'm sorry, whittaker, your enthusiasm behind doing computer work is amazing because it just turns me off completely. But you, the computer, computer work, computer work like you. You saw a need and you filled it easy peasy, and that's part of the volunteering. Like if you're looking for a way to help a shelter, a way to help an organization, you don't even have to touch an animal. If you don't want to, you can do computer side of it. Your enthusiasm comes through and Politics does a great job. It's a really great program that she developed. Yeah, she rock on yeah. That was really good.

Amy Castro: 29:18

Well, they're constantly innovating and thinking and they're very I mean they do. Kelsey, our producer here is, does like regular focus groups with that and giving feedback on the software.

Bev Brooks: 29:28

Your enthusiasm comes through and it obviously has helped Starlight quite a bit and it was really enjoyable listening to you Talk about it. Yes, mad props, very good. Yeah, that's it for me.

Amy Castro: 29:40

Okay, so I had top three listed as well. So we already talked about the navigating, pet loss and grief with Nancy Gordon, again one of my favorites. The two other ones that kind of jumped out at me I already gave the shout outs to my speaker friends, but one of them was one that aired on March 21st and I really was kind of torn about doing this episode, because sometimes in rescue, in the rescue world, people get very, very what's the word Like? Very adamant that the world should be in a certain way and only this is the right thing and anybody who doesn't do this is the wrong thing. And you know, I've always been a believer that there is a place in this world for purebred dogs. I don't want to get into the whole conversation again because we had that conversation, but the episode was myths and truths about mutts versus purebred dogs, and Sandy Weaver was the guest on that one, and Sandy is not only a professional speaker, she works with veterinarians, but she's, you know, has raised purebred dogs, she judges show dogs in a variety of categories, and it opened my eyes to a couple of things along the way that I wasn't aware of and I thought I kind of knew everything about the difference between purebred dogs and not purebred dogs, but I think she just provided a balanced view you know that purebred dogs have a place and a space and kind of goes back to something that I think that we have said a lot on the show at least I know I heard it and said it over and over again is that it's all about the right fit. You have a certain kind of lifestyle, you have a certain kind of activity that you're looking for, then, yeah, you might be best suited to get a purebred dog to do that. But one of the things that she stressed was you know, not all purebred dogs are created the same. You know the person who says they've got purebred. You know, german Shepherds in the back of their truck at the Walmart parking lot is not what we're talking about here. You know she was talking about preservation, which I believe she's the term. Preservation breeders that really put in a lot of time, effort, money, testing to make sure that they are giving you a healthy animal, not just looking to make money off of my dog's pretty, your dog's pretty. Let's breed them and, yeah, and make puppies that have all kind of problems, which is you know where breeders can get a bad rat. So that one was a favorite for me personally. And then and this is purely about personal pet peeves, but on March 28th we did an episode. We aired an episode called the Truth About Service Dogs and how Fake Ones Hurt Everybody. I mean, I think we've seen the service peacock or the emotional support peacock or whatever, but I think that episode really it helped me. I had to do quite a bit of research to define the difference between what is a service dog, what is a guide dog, what is an emotional support animal, and then digging into the legalities of you know, where are these allowed to go? How do these impact housing versus those? And Alisa Hayes and Donna Mack are both also professional speaker friends of mine and both have Donna's got a guide dog named Wella and Alisa has a service dog as well. I really liked that episode because it gave two different perspectives from two different kinds of service animals and also personal experience from human beings who have been negatively impacted by fake service dogs. I know Alisa told a story about you know somebody not wanting to sit next to her dog and having to get up and she's you know she has mobility issues and having to get up and move her seat on a plane, and I think you know part of it. I sometimes think it's not so much that that dog was bothering her, because her dog is very well behaved, it's a service dog as opposed to a fake service dog that usually you're not well behaved, but I think people are kind of tired of it. Well, that's a good point. You know, the dogs that are not really service dogs, and so now it's just people want to call something a service dog, or you can go online and get a fake service dog certificate, which you don't need anyway to have a service dog, and so people just don't want dogs everywhere, especially ill-behaved ones that are jumping or like napkin at you, bark at you, whatever. So I got some great personal satisfaction in doing that episode and getting out that difference, and I hope the fakers out there learn.

Bev Brooks: 34:13

I'm a JDB. You're warned. You've been warned.

Amy Castro: 34:15

You're fakers Aggravating. So that was my third. So I had mentioned we didn't bring this one up, but I had mentioned that we had kind of a bonus episode and you know, I can't even necessarily say it was the fourth most downloaded, but when it came to the survey it was the like 50% of the people who completed the online survey of what's your favorite episode. It was 48%. But whatever picked this episode and it was kind of funny because it wasn't necessarily in the top. You know, whatever percentage of downloaded episodes and that one was wait, I just lost it. Oh here, wrong paper. It aired on August 15th and I changed the title a couple of times on that one so. I hope that doesn't mess people up like did I listen to this or not? But the final title that I sat on was Strategies and Insights for Finding your Lost Cat with Kim.

Bev Brooks: 35:13

Freed, so you were talking about that one earlier today.

Amy Castro: 35:16

So I'm gonna name that as number four or the honorable mention or whatever, because we got a lot of really good feedback on that one. Yeah, so I know you're a cat lover. What were your thoughts about that episode?

Bev Brooks: 35:27

I learned everything that I was doing wrong. I learned everything that I have been doing wrong and actually just recently was doing wrong. The cat, the cozy, the super cat got out twice and the first thing you do is you go back in the house and you grab a bag of treats and start chasing them down the street Not the right thing to do. So I've all been educated now. Yeah, proper things to do and the lengths that this woman will go to smartly. She doesn't waste her energy. This woman, she does everything very smartly and it's another good podcast to listen to. You're gonna learn stuff that you've done wrong and you can learn what you can do if your cat runs away or gets out, gets loose yeah, unexpectedly yeah.

Amy Castro: 36:11

Yeah, and it was interesting when I was planning for that episode what my thought was she's gonna come on the show and she's gonna say if you lose your cat, do A, b, c, d, e, f, g, boom your cat's back. And she was kind of hesitant about doing that. And then I realized as we did the episode, and she was talking about the I can't think of the word.

Bev Brooks: 36:37

Customization.

Amy Castro: 36:38

Yeah, basically customizing it, because there's not a one right way to find your cat. If you're living in an apartment building in Manhattan, your strategies are gonna be different than if you're living like I think I said this on the show I'm on a dead end dirt road with acreage between my house and the next door neighbors, and so the train is different. Each cat is different. Whether the cat's normally outdoors or normally indoors is gonna be different, and that's why I think it's so cool that she makes these resources available, whether you I mean, if you want to hire her and fly her, you know, and you've got that kind of bank, you can do that, or if you want to download videos and learn what you need to do but it's, all customized to you and your cat. And I think probably one of the most satisfying things has been because I've shared links to her resources. When I see people posting on because you know how it is you get on Facebook every community page, neighborhood page or whatever somebody's gonna be posting their cats lost and everybody and their brother is a freaking cat expert and has all kind of. Actually in the beginning I just think they're stupid. Now because now I've been educated. But originally it made sense to me. Yeah, put his litter box outside and she's like no, why would you want to go and smell us on poo? And oh, by the way, you're attracting every neighborhood coyote because guess what they poo? Yeah.

Bev Brooks: 38:00

Or they know there's a cat around, or they know there's a cat around and I was like, okay, where's the cat?

Amy Castro: 38:03

They made that poo, I'm gonna make him my snack. So yeah it.

Bev Brooks: 38:08

Yeah, I learned a lot on that one.

Amy Castro: 38:09

That one was really good and it's been satisfying that I'm not the only one that's sharing that episode. I've seen other people say that they've shared that episode and I had. We actually had somebody from the rescue who lost a cat and has done a consultation with Kim to try to find that she hasn't gotten the cat back yet. But the cat has been seen and so they've been looking and I think the great message in that particular episode because one of the things that's kind of just chaps my butt, to be honest but people that will call to adopt a new cat because their cat went missing and you say, well, how long has your cat been missing? And I mean literally there was one this week, it was five days Like really Disposable kitty cats will just get another one. It's like how hard did you look or how much time are you going to give this? And we have had. I remember being at animal control and these people came to replace their cat and it had been a pretty significant amount of time and a couple months later their cat came into animal control and now it's like okay, well, now I've already replaced you. So they made it work. I mean, they took it home, but it was oh good for them. They did the right thing. Yeah, it's not always easy to reintegrate into now a completely changed situation, but yeah, I thought that one was a good one and if you did not listen to that episode, go back and listen to that episode, and there's links to her resources in those show notes, so check those out. So, yeah, I think that's it as far as the top episodes. I mean, there were so many that were close. You know, as a matter of fact, a lot of the episodes, especially as time has gone on and the show has grown, and maybe it's just me wanting to feel good about myself, but you know somebody, people will listen to a certain episode, or every time a new episode airs, the other ones start clicking up and it's like, oh, that's good, so maybe they like what they heard and now they're going back and listening to other episodes. So I'm very appreciative of people listening and sharing etc along the way. So, on that note, I wanted to see if we have any, if you've seen any Q&A or does anybody have any questions? If you have any questions, go ahead and put those in the comments on Facebook. I also had asked people to if they wanted to submit questions in advance. So we're not sitting here like idiots. So we're like so, do you have any questions, kelsey, do you see anything on the screen? And she's like nope, nobody has any questions. So we did ask people to submit through our website if they had a question or a comment that they wanted to put out there. So, kelsey, do you have another? At least a couple, another one, a ton, and that's okay. But and I won't say who asked him so if you feel silly about the question, we won't make you feel silly. What's coming up on the podcast? Well, that kind of transitions me into my preview of next season, but I'm still playing around with what we're doing for the next season. Actually, this is a good point to give a shout out to my podcast coach, ozeal of Ozeal Media. He has really helped me with the strategizing, because I've just been kind of flying by the seat of my pants and he's a professional. He knows what he's doing, a professional podcaster. I believe that he said I was watching an interview with him recently and some people call him the pod father of Houston. Oh, very clever, very clever, yeah, but he's a mover and a shaker. But he's also really pro-podcaster. I mean, he does Pod Houston, which is a Facebook group and a live get together, you know, with other podcasters and I've never interacted in the world of people that podcast, but a lot of really interesting people with a wide variety of topics. But so we're still kind of tossing around. What are the plans for 2024. But I've kind of been playing with this idea of having a theme of prevention, because why fix a problem when you could have prevented it? So I think you probably can be pretty safe to be on the lookout for this next season, which is going to kick off in January, for the theme to be prevention, and it could be a variety of things. I don't want to throw any names out yet, but we will have a veterinarian that is coming on. That is kind of a celebrity vet, has written a lot of books and we're going to be talking about prevention from the standpoint of choosing a healthy puppy or a healthy kitten. Like how do you make those choices? What are you going to be looking for? Because you know it's hard enough to find something that might be a good fit. You know we get people to call well, how big do you think they're going to be, or how old are they? Or what breed do you think they are? And you know, a lot of times those questions are up in the air. But we've also talked about, right, the difference between backyard breeders and the guy that sells the German Shepherd in the parking lot versus a preservation breeder, and so we're going to look at it from that perspective. But it's not just physical health, it'll be. You know, mental health is part of that as well. You know a well-balanced animal. So we're going to talk about that and we're going to talk a lot about health prevention and preventing behavioral issues, because that's something that you know. Again, the whole point of it is, you know, the whole point of this podcast is a spin-off of the education mission of Starlight, Outreach and Rescue, and so if we can prevent people from having the problems that lead them to the point where they say I can't do anything else, I got to get rid of this animal tomorrow, okay, I mean literally like they wait till the end of their rope, and then we've done our job, because it would be nice to be out of a job as a rescue. I think along the way. So those you know, I think prevention is definitely going to be a theme for the next season. We're also really open to your ideas. You want to be a guest. If you know somebody that you've heard on another podcast or you've read their book or whatever it might be that you think would be a great guest, we would love to have them. I also would really like to roll in some more tough topics, like kind of back to the issue of Nancy Gordon's episode. You know, like maybe get a little edgier from that perspective of you know, maybe you don't want to admit this, maybe you don't want to think about this, maybe you don't want to deal with it, but rolling some of those things in. We're also playing with the idea and probably going to do it as of adding a very short second episode every week. That's going to be some type of highlight from a previous episode and a real deep dive on something just with me, just my kind of like, my personal like. We didn't discuss this in the podcast, but I want to make sure everybody got this message, kind of thing. So we're playing with that, that as an idea as well. So more information on all of that to come? That was a long answer to that very short question. So, yeah, what else you got Kelsey? Any other questions? How do you stay up to date on the latest trends in the pet care industry or other content that's relevant to your listeners? Okay, so the question I don't know if everyone can hear Kelsey from across the room, but the question was how do we stay up to date? How do you stay up to date? Beth, I listen to you as you should. I don't know. I don't know. I mean I will say which is kind of funny that people sometimes, when we get people that call, you know and the conversation is are you taking in kittens, are you taking in cats? I've said this many times. It would be real easy to say nope, we're full. Here's a link to other rescues. Go figure it out. And I generally try to ask what's going on with your cat, what's the issue? And not always, but sometimes the issue is something where I think to myself could you not just Google that? Like? There's so much information out there and obviously, well, sometimes it's confusing too if there's too much. Yeah, maybe that's what it is.

Bev Brooks: 45:38

They might come to you to like I can't sift through this. What's the best way to get through this?

Amy Castro: 45:42

Yeah, and I think the source of the information is important too. Yeah, you know you don't necessarily. Again, you know asking. It's amazing the people that will ask questions like my dog is not walking on one of his legs and one of his eyes is shut and whatever it's like, why are you asking the knuckleheads in your neighborhood that don't know anything? But they're free to put the advice out there, right? Everybody's got an opinion. So being able to provide that information obviously is important. But as far as me, staying up to date I mean, I think my job writing for pet age- I would say pet age or just talking to your vet all the time.

Bev Brooks: 46:16

They're up to date on everything yeah.

Amy Castro: 46:18

Exactly. I mean, yeah, writing for pet age has basically put me into the position of interviewing experts and people that are working with animals every single day. That's part of it. Like you said, that's a good point. I didn't even think about working with my personal vets, but I've got vets that are clients too, but, you know, get a lot of information from that interaction. I also done some certifications in animal behavior through the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants, iabc. So those are some of the things that I do and just having sometimes it's trial and error, you know, with all the animals that we have here and that kind of thing Consulting with trainers, things like that.

Bev Brooks: 46:55

I don't know that wasn't a great answer, but that's the best I could do.

Amy Castro: 46:58

For me it's the best I can do On the podcast. That's a good idea. Thank you whoever gave that idea. Yeah, you know, the whole feral cat thing is such a.

Bev Brooks: 47:14

That's one of your edgy topics. Everyone feels. It seems to me everyone's like over here or over here and there's no one in between. I mean, I think even Jackson Galaxy did a whole episode on helping this one community handle a out of control feral cat community. It worked very well, but everyone has to be on board, it seems to work out well.

Amy Castro: 47:33

Yeah, you're right.

Bev Brooks: 47:34

But that's a hot topic.

Amy Castro: 47:36

Okay, we can do it. Oh, it's going to be, that's where.

Bev Brooks: 47:39

You might have to split it into two or three episodes, you know yeah.

Amy Castro: 47:42

Because there's the whole With the feral cats, there's the. So it's interesting too is that people have no problem just leaving a cat outside. But if your neighborhood was running and although I shouldn't, Houston's a bad example, because some neighborhoods are running with stray dogs but if your neighborhood was running with stray dogs, in most communities animal control would be picking those up. But it doesn't really work the same way with cats. You can't just go over to a feral cat and throw a leash on it, pick it up and take it to animal control. And obviously not all animal controls treat feral cats in the same way Some of them have. Some communities have TNR programs, other communities it's actually illegal. So that's such a it's a big challenge. And what ends up happening as far as managing these colonies is, like you said, it's got to be all neighbors on board working the program, whatever the program might be, and then somebody still has to be responsible for it. I mean it'd be great if your local animal control would spay a neuterim and return them for you, but a lot of times it ends up being individuals that have to trap, go, stand in a line at a vet with two cats at a time for the 50 cats they got in their neighborhood and it turns into a huge project.

Bev Brooks: 48:49

So, and the only other who does it would reach out to Starlight Outreach and Rescue and be on a podcast. There we go, enlighten us.

Amy Castro: 48:57

Yeah, and we do have some good resources. I mean Alley Cat Allies knows a lot about the whole TNR thing and also how to get communities to buy into changing their laws and regulations.

Bev Brooks: 49:08

Perfect Even better.

Amy Castro: 49:09

Yeah, Because it becomes. The city of Alvin just recently passed an ordinance that basically requires a little bit off subject, but I'll bring it back around. But it requires people unless you are a certified breeder and you have to get a license to do it that your animal needs to be spayed. Neuter, oh, awesome Period and a story and it's like who would have thought this town in the country, here in Texas, would have passed something like that? But that's kind of what it's going to take, yeah, and it's like who worked really hard, I know. It's like who would have thought this town would have passed something like that? The folks that work for animal control out of Miller, one of my little heroes over there she's not, hopefully, she's listening she's been working for a couple of years to get that to go through and, yeah, there's challenges again. I'm sure they're gonna face challenges with enforcing it, but it's like a step in the right direction.

Bev Brooks: 49:58

And that's the way to do it.

Amy Castro: 49:59

But it takes somebody to care to push it through, and it takes community support, whether it's you and your neighbors or you and your council people. But it's a lot. So it'd be the same thing with feral cats. It's, you know, it's it's getting everybody on the same page about the benefits of Returning those feral cats, versus what really happens now is, if you trap them, if you take them to animal control, a huge percentage of the time they're just gonna get euthanized because they're not really easily adoptable. Other questions Kelsey, do you have a favorite, either one that you own or one that you've rescued or fostered? I don't like any of my pets. They're also annoying. I'm just a favorite pet. I don't do you? Do you have a?

Bev Brooks: 50:42

All that you start my neighbors are sick of hearing about him but we all know cuz he my favorite pet ever. But I can't imagine what yours would be. I just, I can't. I just can't. Worst puppy, worst puppy in.

Amy Castro: 50:54

America. Yeah, yeah, gun, you know, here's the problem with Amy Castro. Yeah right, I have a favorite pet and then another one comes along, you know, into the house and then suddenly that becomes my attention. So for the longest time it was Guinevere worst puppy aka. The worst puppy in America. She's kind of a mascot for Starlight outreach and rescue. She's been on our she's not on this Christmas shirt, but she's on our Halloween shirt and our dogtoberfest shirt in cartoon form. Actually she's probably on some of my bio pictures somewhere I'm sitting on a dock with any. She was my favorite. She was a mangy Well, you know, yeah, because this is what happens, right. So she was my favorite and I, and I do love her, but she's a very good dog. For the most part, she'd listens to me. For the most part, no, she does, she comes on, I call her Anyway. So she was my favorite dog for a long time and then came Monkey aka, what's her real name? Her real name is Victoria, and nobody around here goes by their real name. So Victoria was a kitten that came in, and I kid you not like she came in with her siblings for those who are watching on video, like this big little tiny kitten. They're okay. So there were four weeks all they shouldn't. It should not have even been anywhere, not with their mom. I mean, they shouldn't have been picked up. But they all had the most messed up eyes, but she had she had the worst eyes of the entire crew and After a lot of medication and seeing ophthalmologist, we, you know, and we were torn about like, do we want to have a cat with no eyes? What kind of life is that gonna be? So we did end up removing her. They had to be removed. They were, they were, I'm sure they were horribly painful, and so she still lives with me. So then she became my favorite and she's pretty amazing. We've got videos of her on our. We have her on the YouTube. I know we have her on Facebook. But the stuff that this cat can do and the mischief she can get into without being able to see, and it's not even like you can say, well, you sure she can't see, the cat has no eyes, she can't see I still question it.

Bev Brooks: 52:56

I was just playing with her yesterday. With it it was just a string.

Amy Castro: 52:59

Yes.

Bev Brooks: 53:01

No noise and she's following it as it's exact.

Amy Castro: 53:03

Yeah, I mean sure, hey sure, yeah, sometimes you'll see her, you'll see her looking it's up. You know, looking it's just. You see her, you'll see her looking up, yeah, and then you realize there's a fly flying.

Bev Brooks: 53:16

It's the same.

Amy Castro: 53:16

It's really really. Yeah, it's a little disconcerting, but, um, she's, she's pretty amazing, but she is kind of a pain in the butt because she likes to knock things. Knock things, she loves to tear a paper and she likes to knock things off of counters. Um, I don't know how she knows they're there, because she'll get up on her hind legs and just reach up and start just feeling around for things and then throw them on the floor. So she was my, she was my favorite for a very long time and then my, my current favorite. Oh, no, is what's her real name? Stella? Okay, so Stella, aka grummy grumpkin, grummy grumpkin aka grummy, um, is this crazy little french bulldog that is the most, um, genetically Mild, deficient, malformed, whatever. She's a hot mess. Okay, this dog is a hot mess and she came in with mange and this Enormous scar on her back and she's pretty tiny. She's only about 10 pounds. So that's my latest project, um, and my current favorite. Except when she's eating her own poop. That is not attractive, not at all. And but thank god she doesn't like to lick, that's the one. She won't lick your face. So, yeah, but if her for breath smells like poop, it's time to put her down, not physically put her down, I mean put her down, take her out of your arms and put her on the floor, just in case. Yeah, no, she will not be put down. So now she's my favorite. Oh, come on. She's got some exp시에. It's not great focus. I just think, like any F, don't waste. That's it. Cheering Ti Look up at the. I know this is really amazing. Who considers fostering is that you don't get so attached that you can't make room for somebody else in your home or in your heart because it's, there's always another one. You think you've got like the ultimate, like I couldn't love anything more than this, and then the next thing, this comes along and it's like, oh yeah, I love that one too. It's a tough world. Did I answer that question? What was the question? A favorite pet? Yeah, I don't have one. Okay, good answer.

Bev Brooks: 55:34

Next question.

Amy Castro: 55:35

Can you share? Funny or real? Yes, okay, so I have two, actually, and because I was said I was going to share bloopers in my uh and it's going to happen again when I tell this story so one of the very first episodes you'll see, hold on hold this thought. So one of the very first episode that and I think everybody needs to go out and listen to this one too. I know it's easy to say it was it was with Kat Donatello of Austin and Kat. So this, this lady was living in Maine and wanted to do better by her dogs, and so she educated herself about nutrition and she did an episode with us because she she created a company around supplements for pets. But she also gave some really great advice on the episode about just like, throw some blueberries, you know, throw the extra little scraps of broccoli. You can do things without spending a boatload of money or having a bottles of pills all over your counter like we do to enhance your pets diet and give them give them a better life. And so I don't know how I'd have to go back and listen. I should, unlike you, biff, I did not go back and listen to all the episodes to prepare for this for this show. But she had said something that prompted me to say, oh yeah, I have to do that too. But what I do is and here's, get ready, it's gonna happen is I say Alexa sent me a reminder for blah, blah, blah, and then well, she's not in here, is she? you want plunger, we put her down, okay, kelsey. Kelsey ruined the episode, so I was okay, you can. You can stuff Christmas is ruined just stick to your computer. So what happened? One the actual recording of the episode is I said Alexa, blah, blah, blah blah, and I had an Alexa plugged in across the room and she started answering me and I started laughing. But then cats, alexa started talking. So both of our Alexis heard me say Alexa, and that was a funny blooper. Actually, I think that video is out there on YouTube. We put that one up too, so that was a good one. And then the second good blooper I mean there been a lot of close calls, don't get me wrong. But the second really good blooper and I don't think Kelsey even knows this story but I had a gentleman, a trainer, really nice guy by the name of Ricky Bedeant, and if you look at him on, I think his on Instagram is probably the place that I see him the most, but he's also on TikTok, that dog guy, okay. So he was kind enough to come on to this show early on. I think I wrote down what episode that was. Where is that? Was it the bloopers? I'll find it in a second. But he came on and we talked about I didn't write it down, bev, you can find it anyway you talked about picking the right shelter dog for you. You know, and that's, I think that's super important is that people, when they're looking for shelter dogs, that they don't get swayed by sad videos, with sad songs, or just you know what something appears to be for that split second as you go by its cage did you write it now?

Bev Brooks: 58:38

I didn't write the date, but it looks like it's after, like it's the end of April, beginning of and then April, beginning of May, we can put this in the show notes for this, for this show.

Amy Castro: 58:45

Anyway, you'll see, you'll see it choosing the right shelter dog for you, april 25th Kelsey says thank you, kelsey and you saw us struggling with with this in the beginning of this recording. So both Bev and I are looking at the laptop like a couple of knuckleheads, because it's really hard not to talk to the face, despite the fact that my camera has eyeballs on it. Well, there's only got one eye left, but it's got eyes which I put on there in the hopes that I would remember to look at the camera like I'm doing now. So what I used to do is I would put my script up, you know, kind of like set it up in front of the laptop so that I could still glance at my script, but I'm not looking at his face while he's doing the video. And so we talked probably an hour or recording for an hour and he's talking and we're talking. He was very nice and all kind of great information. And then I think probably one of the best tips was, if you need help picking a shelter dog, find a good local dog trainer and ask him if they'll go with you. I mean how? that's smart is that you know, and he said most of them would probably do it for free. But even if they don't, you know it's like. Would you buy a $50,000 used car without having a mechanic look at it? Probably not. So why would you bring a lifelong companion into your house without having an expert? You know, maybe give you a little input on? Anyway, so nice this can be. We get to the end of the episode. I shut the recording down and he's like we were just talking and he's like oh man, did you see what happened? Did you? Did it show on my face? I said what are you talking about? Because I didn't see his face. So about 10 minutes into the episode and he's got big, big dogs, people, big dogs that eat lots of food and have lots of food in their belly. His big dog came over and barfed an entire meal into the man's lap and he didn't move. And I don't have to go back and look at the video really closely to see there's a slight flinch. Kelsey says that there was a slight flinch on the video, but of course I couldn't see it because I had papers in front of his face, so he couldn't see and I'm just moseying on my mirror and he didn't say anything. And it's like I said to Ravner was I was like, dude, we were recording, like we could have stopped, you could have changed your clothes. He's like now that's okay. So, yeah, he's a professional. He's a professional, yeah. So thank you, ricky for being a professional. Oh, my goodness, yeah, that was, that was funny. That was a funny one, other than that. Those. Those were two blooper ones. Obviously, the ones that I do with Bev are always funny.

Bev Brooks: 1:01:09

What yeah, I didn't cry almost. I almost did in the beginning with Nancy, yeah, yeah.

Amy Castro: 1:01:15

I think the only yeah, the only blooper we had was that one where we did two episodes recorded at your house and the second one, about halfway through the recording, was messed up and we had to redo the whole thing that was that was more of a bummer than a blooper. Yeah, but anyway, okay. So any other question what are we getting on on time you?

Bev Brooks: 1:01:33

know I got a question seven an hour is it time?

Amy Castro: 1:01:36

to we start, okay, so we need to wrap this up.

Bev Brooks: 1:01:38

Is it time to drink?

Amy Castro: 1:01:40

yeah, well, let's wait till afterwards. Okay, let's, let's start wrapping up. Did you have one last question you wanted to ask, or is it time to drink? Oh, it's time to drink, not yet. You've got to wait about two more minutes. All right, so we're going to go ahead and wrap this up. I this went longer than I thought it was going to go, so if you're still listening to us after an hour of this episode, then thank you so much for being here and listening. I'm sure some of our loyal listeners we've got some really good loyal listeners out there, so we really appreciate you. You can help us out even further in a couple of different ways if you would think about it, especially going into the new year. Let other like-minded pet lovers like yourself know about the show. Don't keep it your best kept secret, because there's plenty of us to share. As you can see and and you know it's not like you know it's not a limited resource. You can download as many times as many times as you want. So I encourage you again share if you want to stay up to date. Go to our website and subscribe and you'll get your weekly updates about episodes. Stay connected. If you have ideas for episodes you want to see in 2024, send it to us on the website and stay tuned for more exciting things from Starlight Pet Talk coming in 2024. Thanks for listening to Starlight Pet Talk. Be sure to visit our website at wwwstarlightpettalkcom for more resources and be sure to follow this podcast on your favorite podcast app, so you'll never miss a show. If you enjoyed and found value in today's episode, we'd appreciate a rating on Apple, or if you'd simply tell a friend about the show, that would be great too. Don't forget to tune in next week and every week for a brand new episode of Starlight Pet Talk. And if you don't do anything else this week, give your pets a big hug from us.