Speaker 1: Hey, hey, hey, we're bad, We're blad, We're but brown ambition, ambition.
Speaker 1: I missed you.
Speaker 2: I missed you too, but not you slowing the beat
Speaker 2: down on me. I was ready with the choreo and
Speaker 2: then I couldn't find it. I'm looking like a fool
Speaker 2: out here on this on the dance floor. Hello, my dear,
Speaker 2: how are you ben? I feel like I need to
Speaker 2: talk to you like this because I was a vacation.
Speaker 1: It wasn't a glamorous as the girls with.
Speaker 2: Well, although I don't know I have a Cockney accent.
Speaker 1: Well, I'll say this first and foremost. I had an
Speaker 1: amazing time. I don't know about Supergirl, but my forty
Speaker 1: three year old heart had an amazing time.
Speaker 2: And the little they are itinerary.
Speaker 1: So first we did London, London Town and it was
Speaker 1: super fun. You know, I went to the London. I
Speaker 1: had big bend Westminster Abbey's weather. Yeah, well actually it
Speaker 1: was really great weather. They didn't rain, not want you know,
Speaker 1: London is not known for its good weather. It was sunny.
Speaker 1: We said, a really cute place. And then too, what
Speaker 1: I liked is that we did high tea, you know, which,
Speaker 1: of course Supergirl was like, I don't drink tea. I
Speaker 1: was like drunk. We took a chocolate making class. It
Speaker 1: was just like she's like, oh, y'all, y'all with teenagers.
Speaker 2: Damn you took a grown and sexy baker.
Speaker 1: Y'all, how you don't punch them in the face.
Speaker 2: She's the kind of teenager that wants to go to
Speaker 2: a foreign country. So she could shop at Ah.
Speaker 1: I mean literally, she was like, can we go shopping?
Speaker 1: She's like, oh, there's the Babe store. I was like,
Speaker 1: so this is why you can't yees. So she loved
Speaker 1: the shopping them and she was like, you know, she
Speaker 1: thought London was pretty cool, you know, but still there
Speaker 1: was definitely times where it's like, can we have Chipotle?
Speaker 1: I'm like.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: And then the second trip, so we did four days London,
Speaker 1: five days Paris, like four nights, five days Paris, and
Speaker 1: Paris was like we did like a dinner cruise on
Speaker 1: the River Seine. I guess it's called but it's really beautiful.
Speaker 1: We got super dressed up. I mean like one day
Speaker 1: I did love is that we like, you know, outfits
Speaker 1: were definitely hitting. I mean, like your girl was. It
Speaker 1: was super cute. She had an okay time there because
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna lie that was kind of adultish, but whatever, child,
Speaker 1: you said.
Speaker 2: You want to have a cocktail on the river?
Speaker 1: Sound yes exactly. So it was like, you know, I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't even have a cocktail, but it
Speaker 1: was I was getting my life. And then we also
Speaker 1: went to She really loved Paris Disney. We went to
Speaker 1: Disney Parish, which that was That's when made me realize, oh,
Speaker 1: she got a kid, kid, but it nicely. We had
Speaker 1: a ton of fun because we got one of those
Speaker 1: like skip the line passes. So yeah, it was a
Speaker 1: really good time and I think that was her favorite day.
Speaker 1: We also did the top of the Eiffel Tower, which
Speaker 1: I wanted to strangle her. When I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: we're at the Affel Tower, she looked so unoppressed, like
Speaker 1: I guess. I was like, oh, because we have one
Speaker 1: of these in Newark. And then she was like, do
Speaker 1: we have to go to.
Speaker 2: The top, like you guys have an Eiffel Tower?
Speaker 1: No we don't, That's what I'm saying, like she's acting
Speaker 1: as it, but she was acting like girl. I guess,
Speaker 1: I'm like, sis, we live in Newark, New Jersey. No
Speaker 1: shade to Newark. I live here, but it's not giving
Speaker 1: Eiffel Tower.
Speaker 2: She okay, yeah.
Speaker 1: So I was like, Alissa, we're not walking were I like,
Speaker 1: some people do take the steps. I could see if
Speaker 1: she said, do we have to go to the top
Speaker 1: because we're taking the steps? We're taking the three minute elevator?
Speaker 1: Is that too much? So we did. We took beautiful pictures. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I'll just say I had a good time. We ated
Speaker 1: our first French cafe and POWDERI I was, this is
Speaker 1: your first Parisian cafe. She was like, okay, when do
Speaker 1: my friends wake up?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: Because that was like her and so I will say this.
Speaker 1: That one the lesson I learned because A listen and
Speaker 1: I we don't. We didn't argue that we don't. We've
Speaker 1: never had an argumentative relationship. We're just listen. And I
Speaker 1: have always had very chill. I know how to give
Speaker 1: her her space. One I underestimated how much she would
Speaker 1: be homesick. So I'm like, oh, poor baby, because she
Speaker 1: and her mam are really really close, and now that
Speaker 1: Jarell's not here, they're even closer, and so I underestimated
Speaker 1: how much she would really just miss her mama, so
Speaker 1: I understood that, you know, because mama is home and
Speaker 1: two and like you know. And then lastly we finished
Speaker 1: up in Italy. We did the on Mafy Coast. We
Speaker 1: stayed at Sorrento. We took like this boat cruise and
Speaker 1: got to see like the coast and like get out
Speaker 1: and shop and eat gelato and like sit on the beach.
Speaker 1: She was like, Italy was my least favorite. I was like,
Speaker 1: really because it was pretty amazing. Literally our hotel was
Speaker 1: on the on the water, and she's like, wow, it's pretty.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh my god, is that a wow? So,
Speaker 1: but what I realized is that one Alyssa has not
Speaker 1: traveled a lot, Like you know, Jerrell and I had
Speaker 1: taken her to Florida in California, but not like extensively.
Speaker 1: So it to go from we've been to Florida twice
Speaker 1: to we're in a ten day vacation with me just
Speaker 1: me and you sharing a room because Alyssa does stay
Speaker 1: of me one to two weeks set of every month
Speaker 1: here like at the house, but you know, she has
Speaker 1: her own room, she moves about. I'm just basically here
Speaker 1: to make sure she eats and does so you know,
Speaker 1: I don't have to check on harm to due to
Speaker 1: her homework. She likes pretty self sufficient, so you know,
Speaker 1: sharing a room, you know, being in close quarters, which
Speaker 1: it wasn't bad, it's just different, you know. So I
Speaker 1: just I didn't anticipate how different that kind of like
Speaker 1: interaction would be for her and how much she's missed
Speaker 1: her mom. I think it would have been easier if
Speaker 1: the time zones weren't so different, because she would have
Speaker 1: to wait six hours before she could call her and
Speaker 1: just be like, hey, mam, see her face you know.
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, So I would have been cuter if
Speaker 2: she could FaceTime the girls at home.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, I think that, you know, and also too that,
Speaker 1: like I mean, if I would have because I used points.
Speaker 1: If I'm being honest, shout out to Amex, Hey girl,
Speaker 1: you need to sponsor us. So I use AMEX largely
Speaker 1: for my business. I have a Gold card, but I
Speaker 1: don't use it as much I typically like, I have
Speaker 1: two businesses that use the AMEX card. And what I
Speaker 1: like about Amex is that my Gold card and my
Speaker 1: two Platinum cards, all the points accumulated accumulate into one
Speaker 1: bucket unless you otherwise ask them to separate the bucket,
Speaker 1: so they accumulated into this one bucket, and that bucket
Speaker 1: had over a million points, so I didn't really have
Speaker 1: to come out of pocket like I, you know, from
Speaker 1: the taxi rides or the rise that we preordained from
Speaker 1: all of the the activities like I used my Chase
Speaker 1: for remember Chase Go get your run, like the Chase
Speaker 1: venture card that we.
Speaker 2: Used to call Nope, Nope, still not still not chase.
Speaker 2: You're conflating the capital one venture with the chase. What
Speaker 2: you call the good the chase good, it's the chase
Speaker 2: that fire results.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So that card had like two hundred something thousand
Speaker 1: points or so. And so a friend of mine, Tory,
Speaker 1: helped because she does like luxury vacation, so she helped
Speaker 1: me book all of the excursions and things like we
Speaker 1: made We made pasta in Italy the best I oh
Speaker 1: my goodness, on like a farm that like picked, like
Speaker 1: the tomatoes fresh it was. And we made tara massou
Speaker 1: there girl, it was the best tasting. So that was amazing.
Speaker 1: She did enjoy them, and so, you know, so she
Speaker 1: like all those types of like like I said, we
Speaker 1: did chocolate, making high tea. We had all these excursions
Speaker 1: and fun things that we did. So she used my
Speaker 1: Chase points for those things because she said that the
Speaker 1: choices were more robust there, and then she used MX
Speaker 1: for the hotels, and then I had United Points because
Speaker 1: I flied so much with the United that she used
Speaker 1: that for the for the flight, and so it was
Speaker 1: just great because if I'm being honest, that trip was
Speaker 1: probably if I would have paid out of pocket, because
Speaker 1: we did, I wouldn't have paid this out of pocket
Speaker 1: because but because it was points, it probably was at
Speaker 1: least fifteen thousand dollars honestly, I know, like because we
Speaker 1: flew first class, which is business, so you know, but
Speaker 1: I didn't have to, like, you know, normally if we
Speaker 1: were going I'm not gonna lie just because of the cost.
Speaker 1: I probably just if I was paying out of pocket,
Speaker 1: would have paid and said okay, economy, and I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have done maybe three countries, maybe just too because Paris
Speaker 1: and London are closer to each other. But because literally
Speaker 1: it was just what I did pay out of pocket
Speaker 1: was just like the food and things like that, which
Speaker 1: was fairly nominal relatively speaking, because two of the hotels
Speaker 1: had breakfast included. But it's like. Honestly, it took as
Speaker 1: a like for those of y'all who are like parents,
Speaker 1: you know, especially the kids you gave birth to. It
Speaker 1: took me maybe like a day or two to to
Speaker 1: remind myself that I am allowed to have a good
Speaker 1: time even if she is adjusting to the fact that
Speaker 1: she's not home. Do you know what I mean? Because
Speaker 1: at first I felt bad about I am. I am
Speaker 1: I free to have a good time if she's having
Speaker 1: if she's still trying to figure out how she feels
Speaker 1: about where we are, because I'm like, girl.
Speaker 2: Get my life, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so once I was like, Tiffany, it's allowed you
Speaker 1: are here to continue to check in on her, to help,
Speaker 1: you know, expand her like view of the world, to
Speaker 1: show her like we went to the Palace of Versailles,
Speaker 1: which is gorgeous. She didn't like it so much, like
Speaker 1: the because we walked the gardens and she was like,
Speaker 1: he hate that. But one day she'll look back and
Speaker 1: look back at all those pictures and be like, wow,
Speaker 1: I can't believe I was there. So I was like,
Speaker 1: it's your job to expand her knowledge, expand what she's seen.
Speaker 1: She might not love it, in the moment, that's okay,
Speaker 1: and we negotiated. I was like, tomorrow we're supposed to
Speaker 1: do this, but you seem tired. We don't have to
Speaker 1: do that. I can cancel now we get our money
Speaker 1: back and we could just chill, you know. So there
Speaker 1: were two things that we kind of took off the
Speaker 1: because it was a pretty packed itinerary, just.
Speaker 2: Like traveling with my husband, to be honest, ah, and
Speaker 2: I feel like, no matter what the relationship is, travel
Speaker 2: will always present like a different version of the person
Speaker 2: that you never knew, or like you'll find new things
Speaker 2: about them and about yourself and you'll learn for next time.
Speaker 2: And you know, the first year of my relationship with
Speaker 2: my husband at the time, I can't believe. I got
Speaker 2: a group on trip to Turkey and it was like
Speaker 2: thirteen days and it was one of these It was
Speaker 2: one of these like group travel trips, like a tour group,
Speaker 2: and you were on big bus and we went to
Speaker 2: six cities in thirteen days. We were on that bus
Speaker 2: every other day and it was kind of like napping
Speaker 2: on the bus. And I didn't know that he can't
Speaker 2: sleep anywhere but a sort of mattress that costs hundreds
Speaker 2: of thousands, if not dollars. But anyway, a very expensive
Speaker 2: mattress with a pillow with a temperature controlled you know,
Speaker 2: air conditioning in the corner, and like, you know, all
Speaker 2: of his favorite things next time on the nightstand. So
Speaker 2: oh wow, I'm the fact that we survived that trip
Speaker 2: because me, I'm like, I will do any I will sleep,
Speaker 2: I can sleep standing up, I'll sleep on the hard
Speaker 2: dirt floor. I'm gonna I was gonna get up at
Speaker 2: four am for the hot air balloon excursion in Cappadocia,
Speaker 2: because when are you going to be in Cappadocia? And
Speaker 2: I was like, how am I going to do with
Speaker 2: the guy who sleeps through this? He didn't. I dragged
Speaker 2: his ass to the hard hot air balloons. But anyway, yeah,
Speaker 2: so I completely get it. And I don't know, I
Speaker 2: was not as mature as you are in this moment,
Speaker 2: as like back then, I it's like this guy sucks
Speaker 2: and we don't travel the same and he's just like
Speaker 2: not in La da da da da. But cut to
Speaker 2: our last big trip to Portugal or No Costa Rica
Speaker 2: actually Costa Rica a baby moon. That was like I
Speaker 2: was so proud of myself for the restraint that I
Speaker 2: had and the compromises and how we came up with
Speaker 2: the trip where we both could enjoy. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So no, I like that because you start to realize that,
Speaker 1: like it's okay for people to have different because I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna lie. It was really endearing because Girell was
Speaker 1: not a big travel He wanted me like his favorite thing,
Speaker 1: like let's go to this nice place so I could
Speaker 1: stay in the hotel and watch movies like that. And
Speaker 1: so to watch her kind of do that, I was like,
Speaker 1: if that ain't her daddy like, So it was just
Speaker 1: kind of like oh and I told her. And what
Speaker 1: I really really appreciated is like by the time we
Speaker 1: got to Italy and she was like really kind of
Speaker 1: like over it and tired. I was like, I know
Speaker 1: you're having a hard time. She's like, I don't want
Speaker 1: to see him ungrateful because I am really grateful and everybody,
Speaker 1: I guess she was like, you know, sharing her mom
Speaker 1: and everybody tell me I'm so great. It's just that
Speaker 1: I miss home. I missed my mom. I said, O,
Speaker 1: let's say you're allowed. I hope you know that you're
Speaker 1: allowed to not love every single thing we've done. You're
Speaker 1: allowed to, you know, miss your mom, You're allowed to
Speaker 1: miss your friends. You know. I said, honestly, let's discuss
Speaker 1: so we could talk about, like what you'd like to
Speaker 1: do next time? How would this look?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: And she was like you know that. She really aloaded,
Speaker 1: like I like this, and I was like, okay. But
Speaker 1: I was so glad that she felt safe to be
Speaker 1: able to share that, because I was like, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to offer any judgment. If she would have done
Speaker 1: this day two or three, I certainly would have felt defensive,
Speaker 1: but by then I had already remedied and rectified with myself.
Speaker 1: It is okay for her to have her own separate experience.
Speaker 1: You cannot create what you want her to feel, but
Speaker 1: you can just create the experience and have her lean
Speaker 1: into it. And so it was funny like because at
Speaker 1: the end she was like, you know, I know I
Speaker 1: chose because she chose London in past, She's like, I
Speaker 1: know I chose London Paris, but I feel like maybe
Speaker 1: I should have chose Canada.
Speaker 2: Girl, no shade to our Canadian friend, no shade.
Speaker 1: But I said, girl, if you wanted to go to
Speaker 1: Caromel or we could have took the train there and
Speaker 1: back in two days. But I was rolling in my
Speaker 1: head and I thought, okay, Alyssa, because her birthday's coming up.
Speaker 2: The wildfires and all.
Speaker 1: I mean, she just like cause she was like, it's
Speaker 1: the same time zone as mommy. It's not as far
Speaker 1: I know, And I just said, okay, like you know,
Speaker 1: I told her that next time, we're gonna do more
Speaker 1: research on like where we're going and what to expect,
Speaker 1: and we can certainly stay closer like a Mexico or
Speaker 1: Jamaica or Canada until you feel, until you get older,
Speaker 1: you get more and more comfortable. But I said, I'm
Speaker 1: really glad that you she said, But I am honestly
Speaker 1: really glad I got to experience this, and so, like
Speaker 1: you know, that was it was a really like I said,
Speaker 1: once I flipped the switch in my head, I had
Speaker 1: an amazing time. I mean in Italy. The hotel where
Speaker 1: we stay, which is so beautiful, that was on like
Speaker 1: the coast, so you can literally where you had breakfast.
Speaker 1: You're like, oh, hey, ocean, you cute. They had a
Speaker 1: cistern hotel that you can go to because they had
Speaker 1: this beautiful private beach that was like a cold that
Speaker 1: you walk into and opened up into this beach that
Speaker 1: looked like out of a movie. And of course I
Speaker 1: asked the listener, you want to go with me? Which
Speaker 1: I was hoping she said no, and she did. I
Speaker 1: was like, yay, cause I don't want to sell it
Speaker 1: selling teenager sitting with me. So I was like, what
Speaker 1: are you gonna do? I told the hotel like, there's
Speaker 1: the like the there's like a you know, the woman
Speaker 1: who was at the front desk. I'm like, she's going
Speaker 1: to be here, you know, by herself. She can't leave
Speaker 1: the hotel. There's no place to really go anywhere because
Speaker 1: it's private. I was like, she can go to the
Speaker 1: They have a little private beach at that one and
Speaker 1: like a pool or sit on your private deck. And
Speaker 1: I said, you know, you could order anything because because
Speaker 1: of MX, we had like one hundred or two hundred
Speaker 1: dollars credit to the room for food. You know. I
Speaker 1: was like, you know, try to keep it under fifty bucks,
Speaker 1: like whatever you order, and so you know, and if
Speaker 1: you do decide to go to the beach at the pool,
Speaker 1: just FaceTime me and you know. So she was like okay,
Speaker 1: So it gave her time to also have time to herself.
Speaker 1: But when I tell you, when I got to that
Speaker 1: private beach called that you had to get to by
Speaker 1: golf cart, I mean gave me a picture to oh
Speaker 1: my goodness, take me there. There was literally so it
Speaker 1: opened up like this rock formation opened up into this
Speaker 1: looks like an oval that you walk through and it's
Speaker 1: just like this crystal blue sea, green water and maybe
Speaker 1: like what's maybe like ten beach chairs and three or
Speaker 1: four people out there, So it's just I mean no kids.
Speaker 1: And first of all, Italians are so like romantic. All
Speaker 1: the couples were making it.
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, I'm liking to South America too.
Speaker 2: They love a park bench and a makeout sesh.
Speaker 1: So I was just like it was so beautiful. And
Speaker 1: then they had a restaurant like built into like the
Speaker 1: side of the cove with the freshest everything. I was like,
Speaker 1: I'll take it out the salad with a not I mean,
Speaker 1: it was so delus. The only thing missing is I
Speaker 1: felt like if I drank wine, I should be drinking wine,
Speaker 1: you know, but it was had a little glass of wine.
Speaker 1: But what I tell you, I spent like five hours
Speaker 1: there just looking at the water, wading into the water,
Speaker 1: like listening to music. It was so I feel like
Speaker 1: I should get back because they're a kid back at
Speaker 1: the hotel. So I would just text her every hour
Speaker 1: you get yes, did you leave their own now? I
Speaker 1: was like okay bye. Yeah, but I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm glad to be back. But I had a really
Speaker 1: great time.
Speaker 2: I think definitely years will pass and she'll look back
Speaker 2: on it, you know, and wish that she had been
Speaker 2: a little older. Yeah, and you know whatever. But I
Speaker 2: do want to say, though, the thing that she's discovering,
Speaker 2: which I think is really important, and I think it's
Speaker 2: I wouldn't want anyone to listen to this and think
Speaker 2: I shouldn't let my teenager or my young kid like
Speaker 2: go out and be homesick, because I think being homesick
Speaker 2: is an important part of the journey into adulthood. It's
Speaker 2: like letting your tether get longer and longer like you've
Speaker 2: always wanted it to be, and then realizing that home
Speaker 2: really is where the heart is. And I'm going to
Speaker 2: sound super cliche and like I don't care, but the
Speaker 2: thing is, like, sometimes I believe that we envision travel
Speaker 2: to be this like destination where where we go, there
Speaker 2: will be a better version of ourselves and our relationships
Speaker 2: will be better and we'll come back and you know,
Speaker 2: things will feel better, and you like vacations are, so
Speaker 2: you know, we'll just if we can just make it
Speaker 2: to summer vacation, then things will be better. But then
Speaker 2: you go and what you find out as you come
Speaker 2: back and the same old bullshit's waiting for you, And
Speaker 2: like a vacation is never going to fix if something's
Speaker 2: not right, and it also is never going to replace
Speaker 2: like where you feel home and where you feel loved
Speaker 2: and safe. So I'm really proud of her too, for
Speaker 2: you know she went. I mean, you made it pretty
Speaker 2: easy for her that she went. But it just reminds
Speaker 2: me of how I felt. I didn't have near as
Speaker 2: many comforts as she did. But when I started to
Speaker 2: travel by myself and get really homesick, and I'd be like,
Speaker 2: why do I feel this way? I should be so lucky.
Speaker 2: This is what I wanted. I bought this one, no
Speaker 2: one sent me here. But then I just realized, like,
Speaker 2: it just means that you've got something good at home,
Speaker 2: and it's okay to miss it at the end, Yeah,
Speaker 2: to miss it and to sometimes not leave it if
Speaker 2: you just are happy, yeah where you are, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. I love that I get it, and
Speaker 2: I hope that you know, we go to Canada next time,
Speaker 2: say some of those points for yourself to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh girl please. We had so many like that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have like after literally as soon as we landed,
Speaker 1: after that, I took my sisters and I we went
Speaker 1: to Chicago because my sister Karen lives in Chicago with
Speaker 1: you know, her husband. Yes, And so literally I landed
Speaker 1: and the next scientist, Yeah, the scientist she's met to
Speaker 1: a doctor, And so we landed and we went and
Speaker 1: it was and said, we had such a great trip.
Speaker 1: It was a really nice wine down trip because we
Speaker 1: weren't going to Chicago to like do Chicago we things.
Speaker 1: We literally just hotel, went to her house all day,
Speaker 1: the kids played. My sister Carol and her two kids
Speaker 1: played with my sister Karen's kid, Lily. They were around
Speaker 1: the same age, the same height, so they just played
Speaker 1: all day and then we went home in the evening.
Speaker 1: So it was really like just like chilling at home,
Speaker 1: but my sister's house. So it was really nice to
Speaker 1: go and have kind of like this wine down and
Speaker 1: sister time before school started for all the kids. She
Speaker 1: was so happy that we came. We are there for
Speaker 1: like four days. And I use points to do that too,
Speaker 1: Like honestly, I never was a big I didn't really
Speaker 1: get like the point thing, but especially because of the
Speaker 1: fact that I have a business, I get to accumulate
Speaker 1: them so much faster. And I make sure that every
Speaker 1: trip I'm on, if someone flies me out or whatever,
Speaker 1: I always put my you know, my number, my United number.
Speaker 1: I insist ideally can I fly United because United has
Speaker 1: a hub in Newark, and so that way I can
Speaker 1: collect you know, these points. So for me personally, I
Speaker 1: get to enjoy the fruits or even like if I'm
Speaker 1: staying in a hotel, I have Hilton and Marriott and
Speaker 1: so like if a brand wants to put me up,
Speaker 1: I try to get put up in a hotel where
Speaker 1: I can collect points. So like now when I go somewhere,
Speaker 1: I can use like I like right now Hilton and Marriot,
Speaker 1: I both have three night free three night stays because
Speaker 1: of the points I've accumulated, so I can use that
Speaker 1: for my own like chilling time, you know. So honestly,
Speaker 1: like the financial lesson in all of this is that, like,
Speaker 1: you know, there are ways to kind of like like
Speaker 1: monetize your choices on the back end, so you can
Speaker 1: use it to enhance, like, you know, your life. If
Speaker 1: you're if your job has you travel a lot, you know,
Speaker 1: and you're flying a lot. Please if you don't have
Speaker 1: you know, an airline loyalty, that's a great way to
Speaker 1: accumulate points, you know, if you're if you're using a card,
Speaker 1: you know, accumulating points that way. And also too, if
Speaker 1: there's a hotel that you stay at, make sure you
Speaker 1: sign up for whatever that loyalty is. And you know,
Speaker 1: although because even though like companies would book me, it
Speaker 1: didn't mean I couldn't put down my loyalty number, you
Speaker 1: know when I got to the hotel and add the
Speaker 1: points to that way. So there's just a really great
Speaker 1: way to be able to to continue the good times,
Speaker 1: you know, like passive.
Speaker 2: I love, Yes, I've been you know. I think the
Speaker 2: reason people get overwhelmed by the whole points game is
Speaker 2: that it is a game, but the gamification people are
Speaker 2: obsessed with this and that and the third and I
Speaker 2: just like the way you're doing it is how I
Speaker 2: feel like it works for me to just get the
Speaker 2: right card yep, maybe one or two yep, and then
Speaker 2: just do what you're going to do anyway, yes, and
Speaker 2: then reap the rewards.
Speaker 1: And if you ever get confused, there's a great like
Speaker 1: the Points guy is a great resource. So there would
Speaker 1: be times when I wasn't really sure about a thing
Speaker 1: and I would just go on and like search to them,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, because that's all he does all day,
Speaker 1: every day, and he'll explain it really clearly, like Okay.
Speaker 1: Then I would call American Express and say, hey, I've
Speaker 1: read somewhere that I can use it in this way.
Speaker 1: How do I do that? You know? So like he's
Speaker 1: like super deep dive into it. But to Mandy's point,
Speaker 1: I don't know how to do all that, just basic
Speaker 1: uses of use of points. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well you mentioned back to school, and can I
Speaker 2: just tell you I became a mother last week. I
Speaker 2: thought I was a mom before, but I wasn't. Actually
Speaker 2: two weeks ago, two three weeks ago, when my mom
Speaker 2: was in town and we went to Target, and we
Speaker 2: went straight to the back to school section and I
Speaker 2: let my three year old he picked out a lunch
Speaker 2: box and a backpack. You know, they still make the
Speaker 2: same little subject like notebooks. They haven't innovated those. They're
Speaker 2: the same, the five the five star five subjects, spiral notebooks,
Speaker 2: the number two pencils, Exo markers, the Elmer's glue. It's
Speaker 2: all the same. And he was and I had my
Speaker 2: little list on my phone and I was like, we
Speaker 2: need this and that and this. One hundred and seventy
Speaker 2: five dollars later, godly what.
Speaker 1: And for a preschooler, for a rod Prie school, or.
Speaker 2: Because you know, they wanted the you know, disinfectantn the
Speaker 2: hand sanitizer, extra supplies for the classroom, and he wanted,
Speaker 2: you know, he had to get brand new backpack, lunch box.
Speaker 2: He never had any of that before. But it was
Speaker 2: so I just kept looking at my mom like what
Speaker 2: it was. It was so bizarre because for me, back
Speaker 2: to school was like a really exciting time. I like
Speaker 2: to get the new Lisa Frank whatever stationary set and
Speaker 2: like my new shiny notebook, and I was like, this
Speaker 2: year's gonna be different. I'm gonna have for friends and
Speaker 2: I'm gonna do good in school. Eventually that happened, but anyway,
Speaker 2: so Rio was getting his back to school supplies because
Speaker 2: he's officially a prekter, and we did, I tell you,
Speaker 2: we got so we had never had a lottery like
Speaker 2: a universal pre K in my town where I live
Speaker 2: in Westchester, which was really lame because basically every other
Speaker 2: town around us has it, or city or I don't know,
Speaker 2: they separate these little areas of Westchester very confusingly. So
Speaker 2: finally we found out like the I think I was
Speaker 2: in labor. I was at the hospital when we got
Speaker 2: the email saying that there's going to be a UPK
Speaker 2: program and you can enter. And I was like, make
Speaker 2: me a reminder on my calendar because I want to
Speaker 2: remember this. And they were only they're only thirty two spots.
Speaker 2: He got in and he started on Thursday, and it's
Speaker 2: really close to where we live, and it's actually on
Speaker 2: the way to his old daycare. So for and I'm
Speaker 2: in this group chat now with a lot of parents,
Speaker 2: and I'm finding a lot of parents whose kids had
Speaker 2: been homeschooled or like just had been home are struggling
Speaker 2: with the you know, going into school for the first
Speaker 2: time and like the anxiety and all that. And I
Speaker 2: feel like, for me, Rio has been doing really well
Speaker 2: and I think just because I had for I think
Speaker 2: the past month or two ever since I found he
Speaker 2: got in were we would drive past it, i'd pull it.
Speaker 2: I'd be like, this is where your door is going
Speaker 2: to be. Let's go see if there's any decorations, let's
Speaker 2: see the playgrounds built yet, because it's all brand new.
Speaker 2: And and just seeing him, you know, get this huge backpack.
Speaker 2: They asked for a full sized backpack. I don't know why.
Speaker 2: It's like two thirds of his body.
Speaker 1: What does he have a like a character or whatever
Speaker 1: on it?
Speaker 2: So he chose the He chose a neon frog like design.
Speaker 2: I think he thinks they're dinosaurs. I didn't want to
Speaker 2: tell him because it was really cute, but they're like
Speaker 2: all the different color different frogs and stuff. And he
Speaker 2: got the matching lunch box, and then he picked out
Speaker 2: a little like Bento box for his food, and in
Speaker 2: true mom of a toddler fashion, what to put in
Speaker 2: it kept me up the night before and I was like,
Speaker 2: if you don't relax about what to put in his lunchbox,
Speaker 2: I just had him decide. And luckily my husband's mother
Speaker 2: has been here the past few days helping and his
Speaker 2: rio requested tostes, and I was like, my little.
Speaker 1: Dominican pace, does he say it with an accent?
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, he's he's just but it's really cute.
Speaker 2: He's starting to finally learn something Spanish. But I was
Speaker 2: just telling my mother in law this morning because she
Speaker 2: was lamenting the fact that, you know, the kids don't
Speaker 2: speak Spanish and her other nieces and nephews kids don't
Speaker 2: speak Spanish. And I was like, listen, Myra, I promise
Speaker 2: you in my own Spanish telo prometto. I'm a Rio
Speaker 2: Francisco Santos. I can't have a son in the world
Speaker 2: whose name is Rio Francisco Santos and he can't speak Spanish,
Speaker 2: Like what am I doing? False advertising? You know, he's
Speaker 2: going to be set up for failure, so he has
Speaker 2: to learn. But yeah, he asked her his toes and
Speaker 2: I made him a girl cheese and he chose that.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: He selected his own strawberries and he put them in
Speaker 2: his little bento box and he had a great He
Speaker 2: had a great first day. And I was like haggard
Speaker 2: by the time to him off. And I only had
Speaker 2: him home for a week in between, so for the
Speaker 2: parents would look like if your camp or your your school,
Speaker 2: like whatever you had your kids in this summer, if
Speaker 2: there was a gap between that in real school. God
Speaker 2: bless you. I toast to you this entire care off
Speaker 2: of French press. This is for us, okay, because we
Speaker 2: did it, no question.
Speaker 1: The financial question as a result of him getting so
Speaker 1: universal pre K is something that's been into it for
Speaker 1: a long time. It means the kids get to go
Speaker 1: to school for free, basically because they consider pre K
Speaker 1: part of public school, which is free. So how much
Speaker 1: are you saving as a result, Like what were you
Speaker 1: paying for daycare? And for how much are you saving?
Speaker 2: Oh? My god, thank you for asking me, because I
Speaker 2: just wanted to. Oh, I feel so good. I was
Speaker 2: paying two thousand and fifty five dollars for yes, a month,
Speaker 2: for five day a week, all day daycare, and what's
Speaker 2: all day time time from I would drop him off
Speaker 2: like nine and I pick him up at four thirty
Speaker 2: or five okay, okay, so like ninety five and yeah,
Speaker 2: so UPK it is free. This is true, but the
Speaker 2: catches they have very limited hours, so it's only from
Speaker 2: nine am to two pm, which is a very short
Speaker 2: day and for most working Americans, like, nah, you can't,
Speaker 2: you can't do that. Not only that, but I live
Speaker 2: in a I live about forty minutes outside of Manhattan
Speaker 2: where a lot of parents who live here work for
Speaker 2: the proximity to the city, but you have to get
Speaker 2: on a train, and so my husband's commutes like an
Speaker 2: hour and fifteen minutes. So nine am drop off, we'll
Speaker 2: get him to the office at ten thirty. Like there's
Speaker 2: just for a lot of parents that is not going
Speaker 2: to work. So for the low, low price of five
Speaker 2: hundred dollars, we can pay for a little bit of time,
Speaker 2: like to drop him off early and pick him up late,
Speaker 2: so at four thirty, so we're still saving significantly.
Speaker 1: So that's five hundred dollars for the month.
Speaker 2: For the month, Oh that's great, fifteen hundred. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: not only that, but I didn't realize what the benefit
Speaker 2: is is one of the biggest things for me that's
Speaker 2: become a benefit is that he's in a class with
Speaker 2: the kids. He's going to go to kindergarten. I love that,
Speaker 2: and then first grade and then second grade. They're all
Speaker 2: a little same school district. Yes for real, though with
Speaker 2: one of the moms made a Facebook group and when
Speaker 2: I looked at it and it said the class of
Speaker 2: twenty thirty.
Speaker 1: Sevens Oh my god, my heart dropped, Oh my god.
Speaker 2: But I never had the benefit. And I don't know
Speaker 2: where where our lives will take us. Who knows if
Speaker 2: he'll graduate from the school district. But and I was
Speaker 2: talking to my mom about this, because my mom was
Speaker 2: a single mom of four kids for a long time,
Speaker 2: and you know, one of her biggest regrets, she said,
Speaker 2: is that she wasn't able to be as involved with
Speaker 2: our school lives because she was surviving. And I don't
Speaker 2: remember ever missing that. Like I would see the other
Speaker 2: moms who are more involved and just be like, Okay,
Speaker 2: nice cupcakes, thank you, miss Jones. But she's like, because
Speaker 2: I was starting to kind of, you know, think, oh,
Speaker 2: all these like back to school things and like the parents'
Speaker 2: nights and the mom group on Facebook, and she says, Mandy,
Speaker 2: you're gonna regret it if you don't invest and get
Speaker 2: to know. And I'm so glad that she and get
Speaker 2: to know the parents and the teachers and stuff and
Speaker 2: be really involved because you have the privilege of being
Speaker 2: more involved than I did. And it's really true, it's
Speaker 2: really true. So I feel not only are we saving
Speaker 2: the money, but it just it feels good and it
Speaker 2: feels like this shouldn't be special in twenty twenty three
Speaker 2: to have your kids in public preschool, Like it just
Speaker 2: makes so much sense, Like why don't we and why
Speaker 2: do we still have so many places where UPK is
Speaker 2: a special you know, announcement, a special treat or doesn't
Speaker 2: even exist. So we're just very grateful and any parents
Speaker 2: who sent their kids off to school last week or
Speaker 2: the week before or whenever, just bless we survived this summer.
Speaker 1: You should seeing Carol, you know, she got Roman and
Speaker 1: Mimi she was clicking her heels, honey because she was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, and like they're in the school. I
Speaker 1: think the last year. That was the first time they
Speaker 1: were in the same school, which.
Speaker 2: Is Mimi's a what kindergarten?
Speaker 1: Now no, she's going to first grade? No no, wait, yeah,
Speaker 1: she's going to first grade. She was in kindergarten last year.
Speaker 1: Now a million is really smart, Like you know, roma
Speaker 1: be teaching her all the things she needs to know.
Speaker 1: Forget her mama, that's his baby. And so Carol said,
Speaker 1: like you know, if I mean y'all heard me talking
Speaker 1: about Roman and that a million a Millia is pretty
Speaker 1: like girl, I got I got it together. I'm smart,
Speaker 1: but and Roman can be a little bit timid, although
Speaker 1: he's obviously super smart. She said that like one time
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night, she like woke her up.
Speaker 1: It's like mommy, and like right before school, She's like what.
Speaker 1: She's like, I'm scared about school. She's like, it's the
Speaker 1: same school you always go to. She said, yeah, but
Speaker 1: I'm going to first grade and it's going to be
Speaker 1: really hard. Oh I know, not dared devil. Amelia not
Speaker 1: let me give you my If you tell a million,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna spank your booty. She towed it up, like
Speaker 1: do it as a side of a kid that never
Speaker 1: gets spanked, Like not that Amelia not mem talk to
Speaker 1: adults like she's grown and some. But I love what
Speaker 1: Carol told her. She said, Amelia, who won the spelling
Speaker 1: bee in your school? In your class? She's like I did.
Speaker 1: She's said, who's the best reader in your Custo Mills
Speaker 1: are really good reader. She's been reading since she was three.
Speaker 1: Because Roman, she's like I am, And she was like,
Speaker 1: don't you know everything that Roman knows? She said, I do.
Speaker 1: And he's like, She's like, he's in third grade. Do
Speaker 1: you think third grade is harder than first grade? She's
Speaker 1: like no, She's like, so if you know everything that
Speaker 1: Roman knows and you're going to be in first grade,
Speaker 1: then you're going to do just fine. And I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: look at you, a good parodo. She was like, now
Speaker 1: go back to sleep. But I just thought that that
Speaker 1: was like, oh, well, all your kiddo's going off to school,
Speaker 1: you know, like, don't forget to give them a little encouragement,
Speaker 1: because even the little tough ones like maybe sometimes need
Speaker 1: a little encouragement. But that's a teacher. Honestly, I loved
Speaker 1: back to school even though so I was like, oh God,
Speaker 1: back to school. But then I see all love my
Speaker 1: little babies trucking on in and what I do love,
Speaker 1: which I'm glad they're doing more of. It seems like
Speaker 1: in school. Is that the same thing happens at their
Speaker 1: school is that you're in the same class and their
Speaker 1: school goes up to eighth grade, so they get to
Speaker 1: stay in their cohort from pre k all the way
Speaker 1: up to eighth grade. To imagine. Yeah, so like that's
Speaker 1: great for a kid like Roman. Who doesn't make friends
Speaker 1: easily because he's so shy. He wasn't scared this year
Speaker 1: because he's like this. Kids from last year, the same
Speaker 1: ones I didn't talk to, they're back, you know, and
Speaker 1: so like I love that. Like I think cohort learning
Speaker 1: is is great because it allows kids who need a
Speaker 1: little more time to like navigate socially. It gives them
Speaker 1: that opportunity. So I love that.
Speaker 2: As a fellow Roman. As a child, that's great. Because
Speaker 2: I moved school so much. It was it was, it
Speaker 2: was not happening for me. So oh well that was
Speaker 2: I'm glad that you had a good trip. We back
Speaker 2: to school, We back to Brown ambition. We are celebrating
Speaker 2: eight years.
Speaker 1: Go to girl, Yes we are you taking me? I
Speaker 1: know we have to plan something.
Speaker 2: I think we had something on the calendar for Friday.
Speaker 1: I saw that.
Speaker 2: I actually do I do hold.
Speaker 1: For I know we have a whole I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to a range track on that.
Speaker 2: So every year has the last eight years meant.
Speaker 1: Not to beside? I feel like when we do, let's
Speaker 1: let's have given let's do the sushi like what I
Speaker 1: give just kidding, Let's do a sushi class has like
Speaker 1: a fun like, yeah, let's make that.
Speaker 2: I would love that, love it. But eight years oh
Speaker 2: my goodness, I.
Speaker 1: Know we have a middle schooler. We have a broad
Speaker 1: and missing middle schooler, Cydebar. Before we jump into break Girl,
Speaker 1: I heard you had Drake on or whatever.
Speaker 2: Listen when my little she told my little my little
Speaker 2: brother Alex was a guest on the show. And I
Speaker 2: actually listened back to that episode and I enjoyed it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was during it because I had to listen to
Speaker 2: him a lot, and I had to like, it was
Speaker 2: very strange interviewing my brother, But once I got through
Speaker 2: the weirdness of it, it was actually great. I think
Speaker 2: he's just a fantastic person, you know, independent of being
Speaker 2: my flesh and blood. But yes, see for yourself if
Speaker 2: you think he looks like me me.
Speaker 1: Literally, I mean he doesn't like you, I be but literally, Like,
Speaker 1: it was so funny to read the comments on our ig.
Speaker 1: People were like girl for I mean, I was like,
Speaker 1: they got break because you know, I been calling Hi
Speaker 1: drink for the longest and y'all are like, Tiffany, you
Speaker 1: I told you grow out a totally Listen.
Speaker 2: She wasn't lying, Okay, she wasn't lying, and like Drake,
Speaker 2: he has a lot going on and he is creative
Speaker 2: and fantastic. I was thinking about him and I when
Speaker 2: you were talking about Roman and me. I can't say
Speaker 2: I was as sweet to my little brother as Romans
Speaker 2: seems to be to me me. But however, that sibling,
Speaker 2: that sibling bond and competitiveness and is just amazing. So
Speaker 2: definitely check out that episode. But let's take a quick break,
Speaker 2: take a little deep breath of woosa. Check on your
Speaker 2: Uber Eats order, make sure they got your order right
Speaker 2: and right back ba.
Speaker 1: And we're bad and we're black and brown and all
Speaker 1: the things we have not done brown break, brown, Bruce
Speaker 1: in a such a long.
Speaker 2: Time, such a long time time.
Speaker 1: I'm ready though, right I can't eat, I can't barely
Speaker 1: remember a song. And now it's time to boost up
Speaker 1: break or boost up, break up, boost up break? Are
Speaker 1: you gonna boost? Are you gonna break? What you're gonna do?
Speaker 1: What you gonna take? I know, with my limited memory,
Speaker 1: you know, sidebarb, I think I might have ADHD.
Speaker 2: That was very in now, yeah it is.
Speaker 1: But I was thinking to myself like I was like
Speaker 1: reading you know some symptoms because you know WebMD, but
Speaker 1: honestly because someone had asked me that I was talking to,
Speaker 1: like the psychologist whatever. She was one of my mentees
Speaker 1: at my mentor Tiffany like my dot on my business mentorship,
Speaker 1: and she had come out to see me and I
Speaker 1: was talking, you know me, I'd be talking and then
Speaker 1: my brain goes this way, and then I would be like,
Speaker 1: right cause I'm Friday. I'm like, oh, that's right. You
Speaker 1: weren't in my head think what I was thinking. And
Speaker 1: she was like, have you ever been diagnosed for ADAH?
Speaker 1: She's like, I'm not diagnosed you, but there are some
Speaker 1: things here And I was like, no, but you know what,
Speaker 1: that wouldn't be too crazy. And she was like, I said,
Speaker 1: you know, if it is, it's that good ADHD because
Speaker 1: it got me. She was like, truthfully, Tiffany, in women,
Speaker 1: especially Black women, it presents you know, like, you know,
Speaker 1: not in this way that drags you down, you know,
Speaker 1: like to your point you know you've been able to
Speaker 1: be creative and motivated and all this other stuff. But
Speaker 1: I told her, my memory is like I can either
Speaker 1: remember like the most minute random detail or like what
Speaker 1: was her name that she just told me like five
Speaker 1: minutes ago, and so anyway, I had asked doctor Green
Speaker 1: if I should get tested for ADHD. I mean, she
Speaker 1: was like, I mean, certainly you can, you know. She's like,
Speaker 1: as long as you're not gonna use it as a
Speaker 1: thing to make yourself feel bad about. I'm like, nah,
Speaker 1: but it might be helpful to say, oh, if I
Speaker 1: find out I do have ADHD, here are some tools
Speaker 1: to help you remember certain things or when I'm having
Speaker 1: a hard time pushing through it. I think it just
Speaker 1: might help. So as an adult, it's harder to get
Speaker 1: like classified or whatever. So but I'm gonna work with
Speaker 1: my therapists to like learn like what are the how
Speaker 1: do I go about figuring out if I do? And
Speaker 1: then if I am, what are some tools and things
Speaker 1: I can use to help me with the parts that
Speaker 1: I do struggle with?
Speaker 2: You know? So yeah, I just want to say you're yeah,
Speaker 2: your therapist wouldn't diagnose you, though it has to be
Speaker 2: a psychologist.
Speaker 1: I believe so. But doctor Green was like, I can
Speaker 1: give you know, I can connect you if you She's like,
Speaker 1: if you really want to know, certainly, you know, I
Speaker 1: can connect you. Her concern was like, are you trying
Speaker 1: to find out because you're feeling bad about something. I'm like, no, honestly,
Speaker 1: I don't, like I would want to know because it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: so the fact that I have a hard time remembering
Speaker 1: stuff is that and that here's a tool that people
Speaker 1: use to do so or whatever. I'm not looking to
Speaker 1: take any medication or anything like that. I'm like, girl,
Speaker 1: we're good, but I'm just curious because that would be helpful. Like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's why, because my.
Speaker 2: Lot to be flippant about it, ADHD is like really,
Speaker 2: you know, like gaining like more awareness. And you're maybe
Speaker 2: the third adult friend I've had who I had two
Speaker 2: that have been diagnosed, and you're the third to like
Speaker 2: bring it up.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, but I know for some people, I mean,
Speaker 1: I know that there are components that are really hard.
Speaker 1: Some people can't navigate, some people can't day to day
Speaker 1: life is too hard. But she said that it presents
Speaker 1: very differently in girls and women. She said, which is
Speaker 1: likely why you might not have ever been because you
Speaker 1: were so high functioning, you know, And so yeah, like
Speaker 1: if I do, then I'm like, oh, okay, you know,
Speaker 1: like what are you know, what are the things I
Speaker 1: can do to to help me with the parts because
Speaker 1: I remember distinctly. I remember I can literally see myself
Speaker 1: sitting in like it was like my math class. I
Speaker 1: think I was like either middle school or high school.
Speaker 1: And I forgot something. And I remember thinking to myself
Speaker 1: because we had just found out that our math teacher
Speaker 1: was diagnosed with dementia, even though she was very young.
Speaker 1: I mean I didn't at the time. I didn't think
Speaker 1: she was only forty. But at the time, you know,
Speaker 1: forty in high school is like girl, you hold e
Speaker 1: the way. So when the people, the girls said that
Speaker 1: she I was like, Okay, well she forty ain't got
Speaker 1: about right. They're like, no, girl, no. And I remember thinking, well,
Speaker 1: one of the reasons is because she was very forgetful.
Speaker 1: She would take attendance like three or four times doing
Speaker 1: out the class. We thought it was silly. She would
Speaker 1: forget names even though you know, so I just and
Speaker 1: I remember thinking, well, that's I forget those things. But
Speaker 1: I don't have dementia because I'm young. But I remember thinking, Tiffany,
Speaker 1: I need you to remember that when you get old
Speaker 1: and you still have a bad memory, it's not dementia.
Speaker 1: It's just you. Like I remember this distinctly, like trying
Speaker 1: to burn that into my brain. So I wasn't like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, it's like so yeah. When I'm eighty
Speaker 1: years old and I'm like, what's he saying? Like you
Speaker 1: know she's old, I'm like, now I've been forgot stop anyway,
Speaker 1: go ahead.
Speaker 2: I used to watch Oprah way too young. I'd be
Speaker 2: like looking at forty year old fifty year old women's
Speaker 2: problems and thinking, I have oh, okay, brown, boots, Brown, is.
Speaker 1: You gonna boost? You're gonna break mandra.
Speaker 2: I am going to do a huge boost because I
Speaker 2: am just so damn proud of one of my oldest friends.
Speaker 2: Her name is Julie Lone, and she is a children's
Speaker 2: book author. On top of being you get it's so
Speaker 2: good So Julie, she works nine to five for Disney
Speaker 2: actually in their books division, and she's been publishing for
Speaker 2: a long time. She and I went to journalism school
Speaker 2: together and used to work on the newspaper together. And
Speaker 2: she just published a children's book that's so so damn
Speaker 2: special and adorable and beautiful. It's called The Truth about
Speaker 2: Dragons and it's the perfect red I would say for
Speaker 2: like Toddler's An Above and the beautiful thing about it
Speaker 2: is Julia is Chinese, her husband is white American. Well,
Speaker 2: she's Chinese American. Her husban's white, and he's not a
Speaker 2: cheese he's white. He's white and white Americans like what
Speaker 2: I ordered from Beach for her. I don't know. He's
Speaker 2: Caucasian anyway. And they have a three year old and
Speaker 2: an eight month old. And it was during the pandemic
Speaker 2: when she was, you know, like a new mom, just
Speaker 2: like I was. And her son, Kieran is yeah, he
Speaker 2: has dual heritages, and so she wrote the book The
Speaker 2: Truth about Dragons and the stories about two different versions
Speaker 2: of what a dragon is told through the points of
Speaker 2: view of his grandmother's So the grandmother from the Chinese
Speaker 2: side and the grandmother from the white American cheese side.
Speaker 1: And where could the girls get it?
Speaker 2: Everywhere? I think it's published with Macmillan. So yeah, any
Speaker 2: bookstore online we can post a link to, like a
Speaker 2: good a good bookstore for y'all to buy from. But
Speaker 2: Truth about Dragons is the book. And I'm just so
Speaker 2: proud of Julie because, like me, you know, she's just
Speaker 2: one of those friends who've gotten so much closer since
Speaker 2: having kids. And also I got to see this book
Speaker 2: when it was you know, she just got the pages
Speaker 2: back from the illustrator. And she's just always been really
Speaker 2: focused on her art, even as she was working nine
Speaker 2: to five. So oh does she know the writing? Okay, yeah, no,
Speaker 2: she didn't draw it, but the writing. And I was
Speaker 2: at her book launch it's really adorable book launch in
Speaker 2: her where she lives in Connecticut, this past weekend. And
Speaker 2: there's just something really special about being in this age
Speaker 2: that we're at, like with my friends and friends that
Speaker 2: I knew, you know, almost two decades ago in college,
Speaker 2: but getting to see us reap what we've sown, you know,
Speaker 2: like to sit in the audience and see one of
Speaker 2: my beloved friends who twenty years ago is just you know,
Speaker 2: dreaming about being an author, and getting her to like
Speaker 2: release her children's book and it's not even her first,
Speaker 2: but it just made me so warm and fuzzy inside.
Speaker 2: It's really fun to get to see your friends live
Speaker 2: their dreams in real time.
Speaker 1: So I'm looking at this now, like I see I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, look all these amazing reviews. The illustrations
Speaker 1: are just they're stunning, stunning, Oh my goodness, ah, this
Speaker 1: is just like and honestly, yeah, this is this is
Speaker 1: just great. Okay, So I love this, you know, you
Speaker 1: know I love me illustration. So this is and it's
Speaker 1: an editor's pick book for best book ages six to eight.
Speaker 1: It got to be an editor's pick on the Zong,
Speaker 1: so that's awesome.
Speaker 2: It's doing really well. She's just brilliant and way too humble.
Speaker 2: So I love to shout her out. And obviously, Cocoa
Speaker 2: golf like girl, he won the US Open, congratulations a
Speaker 2: tennis but I know it was fat.
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, I guess I like to thank my haters.
Speaker 1: I'll say, Coco, yes, gen Z.
Speaker 2: Baby Snoop dogg. Girl like to save myself, think myself,
Speaker 2: me myself and I.
Speaker 1: She said, you thought this ain't Serena, Like, okay, no,
Speaker 1: this arena, but you know Serena, y'all, y'all drag her
Speaker 1: through the money. She tried her best to rise a buve.
Speaker 1: Coco said, oh, we don't do that here. These young kids.
Speaker 1: Is like, now, yo, you're gonna get your licked back
Speaker 1: right back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, okay, what are you gonna do? Booster break.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be be because I've been feeling really like,
Speaker 1: you know, ever since year old passed away, I just
Speaker 1: said to myself that there's a big transition that I've
Speaker 1: been wanting to have, and I just didn't. I've just
Speaker 1: been in a weird space of like, I know that
Speaker 1: I don't want to do what I've done before, but
Speaker 1: I don't want to not do what some of the
Speaker 1: things I've done. I'm talking about professionally, especially, so I've
Speaker 1: made some adjustments to like, you know, like I y'all know,
Speaker 1: I walk every day, take my naps, spend more time
Speaker 1: with family and friends. But professionally, I felt like I
Speaker 1: haven't gotten to the place where I want to be,
Speaker 1: meaning like how I want life to go. I want
Speaker 1: my professional life to line up more aligned with my
Speaker 1: personal life. And so recently I just kind of reached
Speaker 1: a fever pitch where I was like, I don't want
Speaker 1: to do the budgetista in the same way anymore. I
Speaker 1: had to admit that I said it in therapy. I
Speaker 1: told doctor Green. She's like, this is the first time,
Speaker 1: and she's like, I've known this, but I've been waiting
Speaker 1: for you to say the words, And I said, I've
Speaker 1: been afraid to say the words because does that mean
Speaker 1: I want to walk away from this business. She said,
Speaker 1: that's not what you said. But it's okay to admit
Speaker 1: the way you've been doing it, you don't want to
Speaker 1: do it because it's very face front, it's very dancing
Speaker 1: for a dollar, it's very busy, busy busy, and although
Speaker 1: I've definitely reduced it, it's not enough, you know, like
Speaker 1: it's been like a low key version of what I
Speaker 1: was doing before, and it's not enough. And admitting that
Speaker 1: kind of like it opened up the floodgates because what
Speaker 1: I was most afraid about was telling the team, which
Speaker 1: I have because I wouldn't tell y'all first. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: what does that mean, you know, because there are people
Speaker 1: who depend on the business and everything else. But I
Speaker 1: shared kind of like the fact that like, I don't
Speaker 1: I don't want to not do the budgetista, but not
Speaker 1: like this, and I'm not sure what this looks like,
Speaker 1: you know. And I was like, you know, I want
Speaker 1: us to figure it out together. I want us to navigate,
Speaker 1: but you have the space and the freedom to say,
Speaker 1: you know what, maybe I want something that's a little
Speaker 1: more stable. I mean not that I mean I pay
Speaker 1: you know, you know, y'all know I pay. I never
Speaker 1: not paid a meaning Like, I don't know what the
Speaker 1: ups and downs to come are and I don't know
Speaker 1: you know where the company is going to land. I
Speaker 1: just wanted to give you the grace to know that.
Speaker 1: Like if you're like I have to move on or whatever,
Speaker 1: you could do so without judgment for me. But I'm
Speaker 1: just sharing that there's a transition coming and I'm not
Speaker 1: sure how it's going to land. And they were really think,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for being so transparent and honest, Tiffany,
Speaker 1: And we want to stay. We want to figure out
Speaker 1: what the new iteration of this is, which honestly, as
Speaker 1: a result of that, like we have come up with
Speaker 1: a really good idea. And I'm just like, I wish
Speaker 1: I would have tell you something, Sola, and so what
Speaker 1: I would really love to be in the business stuff.
Speaker 1: So the part of the budget theese I like the
Speaker 1: most is the teaching part. Like I love showing up,
Speaker 1: I love teaching. I love I hate having to sell something.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my god, I hate this. I hate
Speaker 1: having to have a product or whatever. It's just exhausting.
Speaker 1: I don't like that part. And I said, if it
Speaker 1: was up to me when I first started the budgetist
Speaker 1: to I did everything for free, you know, But then
Speaker 1: as you have a business, it's hard to do. It's
Speaker 1: how do you do everything for free but still have
Speaker 1: a business that pays your employees because they have to
Speaker 1: be paid, you know. And so I thought, well, what
Speaker 1: if one of the things that we're really good at
Speaker 1: at Budganista is gathering insights about like the thoughts, hopes,
Speaker 1: dreams of the women that I serve, largely black women.
Speaker 1: I said, there has to be company. Well, I know
Speaker 1: for a fact because I see companies roll out products
Speaker 1: or services that they hope are going to land in
Speaker 1: our community. And I'm like, girl, nobody cares about that.
Speaker 1: That's not aligned, that's not moral, that's not fair. And
Speaker 1: I said, well, what if I could give away, which
Speaker 1: is what I want to do all the things I'm
Speaker 1: doing with the budgetiessta for free and on the back end,
Speaker 1: because I already gather insights. Y'all give me insights all
Speaker 1: the time. We have surveys upwards of two hundred thousand respondents,
Speaker 1: and I use those insights to create, like I use
Speaker 1: the insight to create geting with money. I use those
Speaker 1: insights to create the next literature challenge or whatever it is.
Speaker 1: But I was like, I know they're companies who also
Speaker 1: want to create good products and services that are aligned
Speaker 1: with this audience. So what if I use those insights
Speaker 1: to say I can consult, I can help for you
Speaker 1: to be like, this is how you're articas misaligned. Here's
Speaker 1: how you get align based upon the insights that I've gathered.
Speaker 1: And so that's what I'd like to be in the
Speaker 1: business of ethical insights, you know, And so I don't
Speaker 1: know what that looks like. I'm not gonna lie. We
Speaker 1: just came up with this a week ago, so you know,
Speaker 1: I'm just over here chatting. But I'm excited about it
Speaker 1: because one of the things I'm sharing it because one
Speaker 1: of the things I've learned in business is that like
Speaker 1: to share the thing. And so since I started to
Speaker 1: share it in the last week, I've reached out to
Speaker 1: like friends and corporate spaces. The response has been amazing.
Speaker 1: I was sharing, like, for example, like, we did a
Speaker 1: Liverature Challenge in twenty twenty three, which is our twenty
Speaker 1: one day free course that I do typically every January,
Speaker 1: give or take, and three hundred thousand people signed up,
Speaker 1: and we took surveys from everyone, and like I said,
Speaker 1: we usually use those insights just internally, like they want this,
Speaker 1: they hate that, they love this. And so we have
Speaker 1: our next challenge that'll be launching in twenty twenty four January,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, are there organization's companies brands that are like, uh,
Speaker 1: I'd love to know what tens of thousands of women,
Speaker 1: specifically Black women. It's not all black women, because I
Speaker 1: know exactly who we're like seventy five percent women, and
Speaker 1: like eighty percent of them are black, but still the
Speaker 1: majority of Black women what they think and feel about
Speaker 1: a thing. It doesn't just have to be a financial thing.
Speaker 1: The good thing is I'm able to ask any question,
Speaker 1: do you have natural hair? How long do you sleep
Speaker 1: at night? Like my audience, we've built like such an
Speaker 1: amazing space of trust and so yeah, and so like
Speaker 1: I've kind of shared that that and I've gotten such
Speaker 1: great responses to people who wanted to partner to see
Speaker 1: like what I would like to know. So as I
Speaker 1: twist and turn into this new space, it won't really
Speaker 1: look that different to the audience because what it just
Speaker 1: looks like is more stuff is free from tivity. Yay,
Speaker 1: you know, but on the back end it feels less stressful.
Speaker 1: The onnus of me showing up and having a dance
Speaker 1: for a dollar is like not there as much. It
Speaker 1: allows the team to take on a bigger role, you know,
Speaker 1: and like me to just do the part that I like,
Speaker 1: which is just sir y'all. And so I'm just really
Speaker 1: like like it. That's the boost. It's like, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes you're so afraid of making the change that you
Speaker 1: don't realize there's actually more opportunity, more money, more whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, if you have the courage to pivot and
Speaker 1: make the change.
Speaker 2: So, you know, for those of you who say that
Speaker 2: again for the girls in the back, girl, because it's
Speaker 2: just it's it is scary though, because I'm not gonna lie.
Speaker 1: This is almost since the beginning of Budgetiesta. This is
Speaker 1: one of our worst financial years that we've had, you know.
Speaker 2: Just before the budgets.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for the budget Lisa, financially you.
Speaker 2: Know, if you haven't wanted to, yes, you haven't been
Speaker 2: around as much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, because I you know, like because if I
Speaker 1: dance for a dollar, you know, we're gonna make millions
Speaker 1: of me. We just barely will clear a million if
Speaker 1: we're lucky, which is like what for the Budgetissa, That's
Speaker 1: like unheard of. But it made me realize how much
Speaker 1: of the business relied upon me dancing for a dollar.
Speaker 1: And I think the team was scared because it's like,
Speaker 1: if Tiffany doesn't dance, what will we eat? And that's
Speaker 1: what I thought too. But I'm like, there has to
Speaker 1: be a business where I don't got to dance. Oh
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And so I was, but
Speaker 1: I was afraid to make the transition, and so now
Speaker 1: I'm just like I have to because, like I told
Speaker 1: the team, I'm not completely out of steam, but I'm
Speaker 1: just about So if we don't pivot, there will be nothing.
Speaker 1: So if we can pivot and make money in a
Speaker 1: way that doesn't require that, then I could just do
Speaker 1: the thing I really like so much. And like I said,
Speaker 1: it's already like the the partnerships are already starting to
Speaker 1: tentatively form where I feel really good, like, wait, we
Speaker 1: don't have to work nearly as hard. I can just
Speaker 1: do this thing for free. I don't have to close
Speaker 1: a deal and have to be like by this like whoo,
Speaker 1: So to me, I just there's a lift and a light.
Speaker 1: And so I hope for those of you who are listening,
Speaker 1: who are you know, thinking about making a pivot, that
Speaker 1: there's definitely like this space between where you are where
Speaker 1: you want to be, and you do as much work
Speaker 1: to get the space as close as possible, but there
Speaker 1: is a moment where it's not gonna get any closer,
Speaker 1: where you actually have to leap. And that's the scary
Speaker 1: part where you're like, Okay, maybe I could reach It's
Speaker 1: like no, no, You're gonna have to let go the
Speaker 1: safety here and leap across this last little bridge. And
Speaker 1: so I've left, we haven't quite landed yet. We go see,
Speaker 1: but it's looking pretty good on this side.
Speaker 2: So and you're not leaping alone. And to actually tell
Speaker 2: your team, you know, Roseen Logan and I can care
Speaker 2: like yeah, and Tracy assuming everybody knows yeah, tell everybody no, yes,
Speaker 2: and then realizing that you know, you can reimagine what
Speaker 2: your business looks like for you with these other with
Speaker 2: everyone's input, and because at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: you've got such a good team who wants you to
Speaker 2: thrive and survive, or you're not just doing it of course,
Speaker 2: you're doing it for the for their income because we
Speaker 2: all got to eat right. But there's like a genuine
Speaker 2: loyalty and trust the same that you've built with your community,
Speaker 2: also with people who's who work for you and they
Speaker 2: want to see and I think that is you know,
Speaker 2: it speaks volumes of you as a leader and as
Speaker 2: a person and all of that. And I'm I'm excited
Speaker 2: for the new the newest, new chapter. You can heep
Speaker 2: have a new chapters every damn year if you want to,
Speaker 2: like you have permission, I'll do. And I think it's
Speaker 2: great that you're yeah, sharing that.
Speaker 1: I'm just really excited. My biggest thing is like I
Speaker 1: was really worried that the team would feel betrayed. That's
Speaker 1: what kept me here for so long. If I'm being honest,
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, I don't want They've worked so hard,
Speaker 1: and what I'm saying is that we're making a transition
Speaker 1: where it might not work and maybe I should just
Speaker 1: suffer through it. So everybody and I'm like Tiffany, and
Speaker 1: it's so crazy because you have that in your mind.
Speaker 1: But when I told the team, they're like, girl, we
Speaker 1: could tell you tire. We're like, what could we do
Speaker 1: to alleviate Tiffany, we're so worried and so yeah, building
Speaker 1: a really great team and yeah, so I'm honestly, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just really, really really excited about the pivoty because
Speaker 1: one thing about me is like, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: I know how to put in work for us to
Speaker 1: be successful. I just want to, like, like I said,
Speaker 1: navigate differently. So yay, it's like boosteple, you know, for
Speaker 1: the pivot.
Speaker 2: It's almost like you're one of the you know how
Speaker 2: they say, like jay Z and Nas, these are the
Speaker 2: first retiring hip hop artists or because hip hop's really young, they'
Speaker 2: just celebrated fifty years Happy birthday hip hop. And it's
Speaker 2: almost like you're one of the OG influencers and you're
Speaker 2: sort of like paving. What does it look like to
Speaker 2: age well as an influencer? Es like, because you can't
Speaker 2: be doing to go and trying to chase the next
Speaker 2: social media trying forever, right, So I think that it's yeah,
Speaker 2: so I think that fly fly bird so the rest
Speaker 2: of us can watch.
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, I never thought about that. You're right doing
Speaker 1: this because there are people there, like in the music
Speaker 1: industry that like unfortunately never pivoted so they are sixty
Speaker 1: still on tour, which no shade or whatever. But I
Speaker 1: want to be like a nas or jay Z, who
Speaker 1: before that happened pivoted and twisted in a way that
Speaker 1: they're like, Okay, Like you know jay Z every once
Speaker 1: in a while for fun, He's like, I do a
Speaker 1: little rat for fun, But he doesn't. He's not doing
Speaker 1: it for money. It's for the love of making music.
Speaker 1: But he has built this underlying business that sees him through.
Speaker 1: But you're absolutely right. I want to you know, like
Speaker 1: I told people, remember before, I was like, I want
Speaker 1: to be less Sean Carter more, more, less jay Z
Speaker 1: more Sean Carter, Yes, you know, so less than the performer.
Speaker 2: As Diddy Moore Shankolm.
Speaker 1: Yes, Like I want to be like like the the
Speaker 1: you know, I'm a businessman and I'm a business man,
Speaker 1: you know, Like yeah, so I'm excited. I'm excited just
Speaker 1: to kind of share the ups and downs and the
Speaker 1: transparency of like what it all looks like. So as
Speaker 1: if you're going through something similar, whether it's in corporate
Speaker 1: or your own business or whatever, you know, maybe there's
Speaker 1: some takeaways you can take away.
Speaker 2: So take them, get them for free. While you can't. Well,
Speaker 2: so happy to be back in the stew with you,
Speaker 2: beautiful eight years. I know I can't wait first TOHI date. Yes,
Speaker 2: I'm really I'm the wifey in this relationship, So I'll
Speaker 2: plan it. Don't worry, I won't. I won't think ill
Speaker 2: things about it. Plan. I got to plant my own night.
Speaker 1: Yo. We will see you on Friday, riding for b
Speaker 1: a q A.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: If you have questions, we have some answers and send
Speaker 1: it to us. By the Bitch and Podcasts at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com. The BA podcast on Twitter can tweet us
Speaker 1: Brown and Pitch and podcasts on ig signed to the
Speaker 1: d MS and Brandy Bitch and Podcast dot com to
Speaker 1: and contact us or ask us anything and we'll see
Speaker 1: you on Friday.
Speaker 2: Bye and thank y'all for eight years. I forgot to
Speaker 2: thank you guys the listener. B A fam would not
Speaker 2: be here without you and one one walk love forever.
Speaker 1: Bye y'all.
Speaker 2: Ma I excuse us, who's listening