You're listening to Wake Up Call on demand from KFI AM six forty KFI and
KOST HD two Los Angeles, Orange County. It's time for your morning wake
up call. Good morning, and happy Black Friday. This is your wake
up call for Friday, November twenty fourth. It is five a m.
I'm Heatherbrooker in this morning for Amy King. Hello. It is such a
joy to be with you today, even though I got up at two thirty
this morning. Listen. I'm not a morning person, but I'm still happy
to be here. Amy is off today, enjoying a much deserved break and
day off, so I hope she's getting lots of fresh We have a lot
of fun things to talk about today. But first of all, I want
to tell you guys who I am. As I said, my name is
Heather. I am a journalist, a season journalist who has been around for
way too long in the news biz. I used to work here for NBC
in Los Angeles as well as Katila, and I now am here happily at
KFI. I also have a daughter. My daughter is ten years old.
I'm a mom. I also am an actor and comedian. So that's just
a little bit about me not too many jokes in today's show, though,
I promise I won't torture you this early in the morning with my jokes.
But I'm, like I said, I'm happy to be here, happy to
wake up with you guys on this awesome Black Friday. It's almost the weekend,
you guys, yay, looking forward to that. I'll be here all
weekend as well. I enjoy doing the news during the Fork Report on the
weekends and then also Home with Dean Sharp on Sunday morning. So if you
haven't tuned in for those shows, definitely do that. They're a lot of
fun. So yesterday was Thanksgiving. Let's talk about that a little bit.
I hope you guys are well rested and got lots of turkey. I went
to Flemings with my family. That's sort of our tradition. We go to
Flemings every year. We have a nice turkey dinner there, and then I
went home and properly took a nap, which you know, it's kind of
required. It's kind of what you're supposed to do on Thanksgiving. Hope you
guys got lots of turkey as well. Today, though it's Black Friday,
I was going to try to venture out maybe and try to get some deals.
But I don't know. I don't know if I'm going to maybe stick
more to online shopping this year. We'll see how it goes. How I
feel after I after I leave here this morning, I may be too pooped
to go shopping. All right, let's get into it. We have a
lot of fun things to talk about today. Here's what's ahead on wake up
Call. It is Black Friday. As I mentioned, that means we'll be
talking to Joel Larsgard, the host of How the Money, about managing your
money and whenever you go out looking for deals today, we've all seen those
appliances that mus you miracles. Will Dean Sharp, the host of Home with
Dean Sharp, is going to join me to help demystify some of the appliances
that over promise. And we have a very special guest this morning. I
caught up with him at Universal Studios and you are not going to believe what
he has to say about KFI. Then at six p' oh five, it's
handled on the news. Amazon workers went on strike and we're going to talk
about how that could impact Black Friday here in the US. Let's start with
some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. The
cash rewards are being offered to help catch the person who started that fire under
the ten Freeway in downtown La cal Fire says it'll pay one thousand dollars to
anyone with a tip that helps arrest the arsonist. Investigators say they're also trying
to track down and interview the sixteen homeless people who were living near the scene
of the fire but were taken away by first responders. The fire started in
the early morning hours of November eleventh and destroyed everything inside the storage lots where
the fire started and damaged a part of the freeway. Last week, the
state Fire Marshall released photos of a person of interest. You can see those
photos on our website at KFIAM six forty dot com slash Arson Steve Gregory KFI
News. Fewer catalytic converters are being stolen. California State Farm says there were
fifty four hundred claims in the first half of twenty twenty three. Triple a's
Doug Shoop says despite the drop and claims, California still has the highest number
of converter thefts in the country. He says people should check with their insurance
companies for coverage options. Goat converters can cost up to three thousand dollars to
replace, depending on the vehicle. Shoup says that while they can be spendy,
most insurances do offer coverage. State Farm paid out more than seventeen million
dollars for the fifty four hundred claims so far this year. Travelers arriving at
LAX with time to kill can burn off their Thanksgiving meal by walking the terminal
track. A recently completed connection between LAX's Terminal three and the Bradley International Terminal
let's travelers roam all nine terminals without going through TSA several times. It's roughly
a two mile stroll. Wow. Someone who did the one way journey says
they got an extra eighty nine hundred steps in. Dozens of AID trucks have
entered Gaza as a four day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas kicks off. ABC's
Jordana Miller says it's the first time in nearly seven weeks where it's quiet on
the streets and skies of Gaza. Hamas expected to release thirteen Israeli hostages,
all women and children Leader today. They are the first of fifty Israelis to
be released. Miller says an American girl who turns four today is not on
the first list of those who will come home. Israel's government says the hostages
will be taken to five major hospitals and medical centers throughout Israel once they're released.
Border officials in the US are taking measures to keep pigs in Canada from
migrating South. ABC's Chuck Sieverson says super pigs are no joke. An expert
at the University of Saskatchewan calls these fast breeding super pigs an ecological train wreck,
crossbreeds with survival skills of wild Eurasian boar. He says wild pigs destroy
billions in US crops each year. States like Montana, North Dakota, and
Minnesota are taking steps, and the Federal Agriculture Department is using planes and drones
to watch out for those pigs. Black Friday is here, but some retailers
worry deals may not be enough. The National Retail Federation says US holiday sales
will rise only three to four percent for November through December, compared with five
point four percent a year ago. The Federation blames growing credit card debt and
higher rent. All right, these studios are battling it out at the box
office this weekend. Thanksgiving weekend is traditionally a pretty big for Hollywood and movie
going fans. Lions Gates, the Hunger Games. The ballot of Songbirds and
Snakes is neck and neck with Disney's Wish for the number one spot, but
Wish is expected to eke out that win over the weekend with at least four
five to fifty million dollars. Let's check in right now with Nick Bagliochini and
listen, Nick, are you there? Can you hear me? I am
the other day I tried to say your name, and I don't know why
I decided to know you put every possible into it. That was fantastic.
I was like, there's nothing wrong with that. I don't know what said
olive garden. I don't know why. I don't know why. We can
do better than olive gardens. Okay, fair enough, at least give me
like Magiano's like, come on, yeah, fair enough. Although to be
fair, olive garden is the BA I do have olive garden. I'm a
no, was never any bread sticks, but yeah, I guess here you
go. Have you seen any of these movies lately? Have you been to
the theater? H yeah, So I just sawt Disney Wish and we did
talk about that with Jason, Jason Nathanson and Amy King. But I loved
it. Although if you're looking for something down the Disney path that you're usually
expecting, it's not going to be that. It is going to be a
very unique special conglomeration of the last one hundred years of Walt Disney animation.
So lots of Easter eggs across the board. The music, I walked out,
and this is one thing we all agreed on. I don't remember any
of the lyrics. The musical content. It was great. It was a
bob but I couldn't tell you. It wasn't like walking out of Frozen or
The Lion King or Beating the Beast. I wasn't singing the lyrics, but
I definitely was humming some of the tunes. So that's definitely worth going out
and seeing and make sure to keep an eye out. There's so much going
on, including, just like we've gotten used to with Marble, some post
credit scenes, so that's totally worth checking out and but yeah, that's kind
of it now a Hunger Games. Are you a fan of that or no?
I am. Actually I'm really looking forward to Songbirds and Snakes. I
think that looks like a really interesting prequel. That's definitely on my list.
And Trolls Band Together. That's also my daughter is a huge Trolls fan,
so we're excited for that one. Plus that's kind of that, you know,
if you've been excited about the in Sync reunion. Yeah, that so
all right. Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson recently released a book, Infinity to Infinity
and Beyond, and our Amy King got a chance to talk to him about
the book and some other fun science stuff. Let's say good morning to Neil
deGrasse Tyson. I am absolutely thrilled to say good morning to astrophysicist and best
selling author and well all around smart guy Neil deGrasse Tyson. Good morning,
Neil, Good good morning, good morning. Thank you so much for coming
on early this morning with us. So Neil's on with us because he has
a new book out about the Cosmos and beyond. It's about real science versus
basically what we see in TV in movies and before we jump in, Neil.
I want to just say that when I hear you talk, I realized
how incredibly smart you are and how much you know. But you always talk
to us in a way that my brain can understand, and I appreciate that
because you know, you talk to really smart people sometimes and they talk in
these technical terms you don't get, and you have a way of breaking through
and talking to meppreciate differ between the difference between lecturing and communicating. I think
that's that's that's all it is. So I can face the talkboard and have
you try to meet me ninety percent of the way of where I am,
or I can face you and meet you ninety percent of the way towards you,
and that's that's that's my goal. And if I achieve that, then
that's a good day for me as an educator. Well, I think you
have. So you have this new book called Infinity to Infinity and Beyond,
and again in the meeting me on my side, it's illustrated, so there's
there are some fantastic pictures in here. So I read the pictures last night,
and okay, you have some of stuff from like the Hubble Space telescope
or not from Hubble, from the James Webbs telescope. Thank all the latest
stuff is in there. So the book has attempts to take the reader on
a journey of mind and spirit from the time when we're just standing on Earth
looking up, wondering how would you ever get to the moon? Just imagine
five hundred years ago looking up? Do you just ascend? Does air continue
from Earth already to the moon if you have a balloon? But balloons were
kind of a ladder day thing, right, so you have to learn that
hot air rises, and so it tracks. So for example, the first
aeroonauts was a cheap a duck and a rooster. They were sent up in
a balloon was and they just how high did they get? Well? So,
yeah, so it's not safe if you keep going too high up.
And I feel sorry for the sheep because had that experiment failed, the duck
and the rooster still had a chance of surviving coming down back to Earth.
But you get a sense of are certain dreams you have impossible? They're reel
in your head, but they can't happen until more science and technology and engineering
arrive. And so we also follow the fits and starts and the mistakes and
when we can we analogize that there's scenery that we pass along the way.
And these are movies that have attempted to portray some aspect of the science that
we talk about, and then we'll tell you if the movie got it right
or wrong. And because movies form part of the pop culture dimension of the
communicating there's science humor in pop culture, which is the three DNA strands of
my podcast, which is called Stark Talk, and this is a book in
the in the Stark Talk tradition. Well, I love that you were talking
about that kind of marriage between art and science because I see a lot of
movies and I go, or you see some science that's coming out and you
go, god, I saw that in a movie like twenty years ago.
How did they know? So, like, what's a good example. I
know that you said something about gravity and Sandra Bullock, oh yeah, so
just you know, when we talk about how do you escape gravity? You
know, I referenced the movie the movie Gravity, right, which had Sandra
Bullock and handsome man leading man let's say, George Clooney, thank you,
And so I first I think the movie should have been called zero Gravity because
the whole movie is in zero gravity. Yes, and they did some very
good things all right. You know when you burn a candle, a kale
just keeps burning. You know why the hot air rises and it brings in
new oxygen. They showed correctly in that movie a flame that extinguished itself because
it beats up the oxygen. The warm air doesn't know to rise, and
then the absence of oxygen extinguishes the flame. They got so much right,
but I had to call them out. How is it that sends a bullets?
Bangs always knew which way down was? Geez, her hair wasn't floating
in the zero g Their hair knew okay, So, but it's fun to
point this out because we all have many people had seen the movie. There
are other movies that talk about Back to the Future. Talk about the movie
The Martian, talk about the Hulk. When we talk about the density of
things and air, it's odd that the Hulk could start out just as a
little person and they become a big person. Did he just sort of swallow
up? And if you did, he would have the density of a beach
ball, and August to Win would just blow him around, and right exactly,
I thought of that. So if you If so, if the Hulk
actually has masks, would you get the extra mass from You have to get
it from the energy and the environment. He equals mc squared, and then
he would suck all the energy out of his sector of the world, and
then there's no no one to fight and there's no battles. But the biggest
question is how can his shorts still fit him when he gets big? I
don't never understood that. I got some questions for you, and one of
the big ones that I've always wondered, and you were the perfect person to
ask, this is when we go up into space. Because you have a
whole section on rockets and leaving the atmosphere and that kind of stuff. How
come we can't just go on a plane and just go up to elevation and
break out of the atmosphere. Why do we have to go on a rocket
straight up like that? Oh? Yeah, yeah, Two very important reasons.
First, airplanes work because they're combining the oxygen of the air with the
fuel in their fuel tanks to create some form of combustion. Right, so
they're well, they're air breathing, right, they need the air to run
their engines. When you get to very high in the atmosphere, the air
gets thinner and thinner, there's less and less oxygen. You need a whole
different kind of fuel system in order to get around. So in other words,
you have to bring your own oxygen oxidizers. They're called Okay, so
if we were flying in a plane, So if you were in a plane
and you just kept going higher and higher, eventually it wouldn't work anymore because
you don't have the oxygen. So not only because you don't have the oxygen,
the air stays aloft because of the buoy. And see the points are
because of the there's air pressing up underneath the wings that keeps it flying.
Okay, So that's the weird thing. Like in Apollo eleven that the munder
modules called the Eagle, right, and it shows this egle landing. Well,
an ego on the Moon would fall like a brick because the ego has
wings that need air, right, So you need the air to hold you
up, and you need the oxygen in the air to burn your engines,
and you have neither of that in the very highest altitude, so you need
what you call a rocket and there it is. Okay, all right,
here's another one because you have a section on Mars and terraforming Mars, and
you have these fabulous photos and so it made me think of again a movie
Total Recall where they're on Mars and they're trying to keep the people from getting
the oxygen. So could Mars become habitable with the release of water if they
found it. Yeah, so we think of that's a great question. We
think that there is water on Mars. Well, we have evidence that there
was once liquid running water on the Martian surface if you look at it and
everything's dry, but they're mehandering river beds, river deltas, floodplains, all
the all the telltale evidence that that Mars was once a liquid planet and it's
all gone today. So we should try to figure out how it lost all
of us water in case there's some knob we're turning here on Earth that could
give us the same fate. We think maybe it went down into permafrost.
So, and the Martian atmosphere is very very thin, one percent that of
Earth. So we had to reference the movie The Martian where there's a dust
storm, it's rocking near spaceship and they give up Mark Wotney for dead because
they have to take off because if they don't, they all die. But
what they don't tell you is the adversary is so thin that one hundred miles
an hour winds would be like a gentle bree. It would not have rocked
that, It would not have rocked the ship. So Holley Andy Weardy author,
Yeah, yeah, I told him. He said, well, yeah,
and I'll give him a hall pass on that because you've got so much
other science. Correct. So yeah, if you want to TeleForm it,
you have to put microbes in the soils that can naturally produce some oxygen,
so you have to work that. But if you TeleForm Mars, you can
fly to walk off your spaceship without a space suit, and then we'd have
two planets to live on. That could be cool. Wouldn't that be cool?
Okay? Then my last question, because and I could ask you one
hundreds of them, but you also have this really cool picture. It's a
conceptual picture of a ship that's outfitted with everything you would need to take a
deep trek into space. So is long term space travel actually something that we
could eventually do? Is it realistic? Okay? The image you're referring to
as the one I'm thinking of that's a generational ship, because to get to
the nearest star on our fastest rockets would take fifty thousand years, so you'll
be dead. So what you need to do in a generational ships get a
bunch of very fertile people, put them on, they make babies, they
get old and die, The babies get old and and everybody's making babies are
for a thousand generations and then you arrive at your destination. But I'd rather
wait around for like warp drivers. I know right, this is doing me
okay, so we'll wait until star pre destined. Yeah, I don't want
to predestine the next generation to follow my dreams. When in a free society,
they should be able to choose not to go on a generational ship,
okay. And wouldn't you be mad if you went on a generational ship and
then they discovered warp speeds so you're out in the middle of space somewhere,
and then if a ship goes and passes you. Oh yeah, I would
be so pissed off exactly. Oh my gosh. It's part of what it
is to make the future real. Like you were saying, you see things
in a sci fi movie. It gives you ideas to try to reach for.
They reach for the stars in new and innovative ways, and that's what
the entire book is about. Thank you so much for your time. You
can get to infinity and beyond, I would imagine about everywhere. Well,
you can get the book everywhere, except for space. You have to get
it on Earth. Oh okay, good clarification. Thank you again for your
time this morning. Oh my gosh, thanks for having me. All right,
let's get back to some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty
four hour newsroom. Firefighters in Orange County are searching for a car believed to
have driven into Lake Irvine. Officials say the car may have fallen into a
man made lake last night. The lake is said to be only about six
feet deep. Stores eager for Black Friday shoppers say they're worried about the uptick
in retail theft. ABC's Allison Cossick says even though the number of insore customers
has decreased, stores are still taking extra precautions. In twenty twenty two,
retailers facing more than one hundred and twelve billion dollars in losses due to organized
retail crime, nineteen percent jump from the year before. The news is brought
to you by Ruder Hero. W Amputee Olympic runner Oscar Pistorius has granted been
granted parole ten years after shooting his girlfriend at his home in South Africa.
The Department of Corrections says Pistorius will be released January fifth. The thirteenth annual
AFI Ko or excuse afi, Oh my goodness, The thirteenth annual KFI Pastathon
is here. Jef Bruno's charity, Katerina's Club, provides more than twenty five
thousand meals every week to kids in need in Southern California, and your generosity
is what helped makes that happen. There's three ways to donate. Donate at
pastathon dot com, shop at any Smart and Final store, and you can
donate at your checkout, or go to any Wendy's restaurant in Southern California.
Visit pastathon dot com. One hundred percent of your donations go right to Katerina's
Club. A four day truce between Israel Head and Hamas has begun as part
of an agreement organized by Qatar. Wander appliances. Are they fabulous or fad?
We're going to talk to Dean Sharp and find out and we have a
very special guest dropping by KFI and he guesses who that might be. Well,
we're going to find out in just a minute. At six five.
It's Handle on the news Doctors and Dennis Nelly County could be going on strike.
All right. I am very excited because joining me this morning is the
host of Home on KFI, Dean Sharp. Good morning, Dean, Hey,
Heather, how you doing. I'm good. Did you get lots of
turkey yesterday? No? Zero turkey yesterday? Are you anti turkey? Well,
I'm not anti turkey, but we did prime rib instead. Oh well
that sounds very luxurious. Actually, I think that sounds really good. I
just got tired of, you know, putting like three or four days of
effort into making a brilliant turkey. And the very best thing that anybody says
that the dinner table is oh it's moist. It's like they're surprised. But
you lay out a slab of prime rib, which takes virtually no effort whatsoever,
and you are the hero of somebody's life. They're like, oh,
so there you go. So you know what, I'm just catering to the
applause. That's it, all right, me too. That's the story of
my life, to be honest. Okay, I'm very excited about this.
Let's talk about, first of all, what is a wonder appliance. Wonder
appliances are not real, they're things. They're the kinds of things that these
days, you know, used to be Back in the day, we would
call them an as seen on TV ad right, one of those things like
a Ginsu knife or something. Nowadays it's clickbait and TikTok videos that are trying
to push this new amazing whatever the thing may be. And I get this
question all the time from people like, wow, are these really as amazing
as people say they are? They seem like they're selling like hotcakes. Should
I get one of these for my loved one for Christmas as a Christmas gift?
How do we even know if this is a real thing? And so
that's what I thought we could talk about today. Absolutely. Okay, So
let's talk about falling into those wonder appliance traps because they do look too good
to be true. How can we avoid buying these things? Well, probably
the most important thing that you can do to stay out of that trap is
don't buy anything on a subject matter which you know very little. If you're
not the cook, for instance, in the kitchen, if you're like,
I don't really cook, I don't really know anything about cooking, but my
wife does or my husband does, so I thought i'd get them a George
Foreman grill or something like that. Then you know, don't buy anything you
know in a subject area that you have not seriously done the research in.
Because here's the thing that nobody, nobody who knows, for instance, anything
about cooking, is going to be believe that there is a knife out there
that is a miracle knife that never needs to be sharpened, only last knife
you'll ever need to buy. You know, that kind of stuff. You're
like, no, that's not true at all. You know, you go
to a culinary shop and you can ask the people buying the counter like,
wow, you guys sell a lot of knives, why don't you just sell
the miracle knife? And you'll get a really quick explanation of why, because
it's not a miracle knife. And so that's the big tip. Don't buy
anything in a subject area where you know very very little. If you're curious,
do the research. All right, So, what are some of the
fads that you notice when it comes to these types of appliances. Oh,
you know, I mean the same things we've all seen that we've seen food
dehydrators, which and then this is you know, it's tricky because these aren't
necessarily there's nothing wrong with any of these categories, right. There are some
really nice food dehydrators out there, but not the kinds that you've seen on
TV or you know, in TikTok or in clickbait. They would not be
selling themselves in that way. Rotisserie overans nothing wrong with the retisserie, but
an oven that sits on the countertop and promises you'll never see chickens seared this
way. Ever. You know, a lot of it is just the fact
that if you put a heating element in a really really tiny space, like
you can fit one and a half chickens in this thing, then sure,
sure it gets super hot in there, but still not worth the time of
day. I've already gotten so much grief for saying that the George Foreman grill
is not a serious piece of cooking equipment, because if they stay I know
they do, I know they do, and they're like, Dean, come
on, this is revolutionary. And all I'm saying is, you know what,
Ask any major appliance manufacturer if they've ever been tempted to put a nonstick
surface on the bottom of their grill and slant it so that the juices run
off into a little cup, and they will say, no, you don't
need to do that. So I you know, hey, if if that's
what you know, rows your boat, go for it. I'm just saying
it is not that there are as many George Foreman grills in thrift stores right
now as there are being sold online. All right, So give us the
good news. What are some fabulous products, because I have to say I
love my air fryer exactly. Airfryers are one of those things that came and
we were all, you know, well, those of us in the industry,
we all step back and we're like, all right, let's see what
happens with this h But airfrying is legit. And air fryer, by the
way, is just a convection of It's a it's a smaller space with a
bigger fan, but it's a heating element with a fan that moves the air
around really fast, and therefore it crisps up the outside. It's technically it's
not frying, but it's but its crists up the outside of the food.
So here's one of those things. If major manufacturers begin to adopt into their
manufacturing lines, which takes them a lot to retool to do that, then
you know you onto something. And right now, Heather, you cannot buy
a brand new oven out there from any manufacturer, from Viking and Wolf,
ge, Sam, you name it. They all have air fryer functions now.
And that's simply because they've taken their existing convection ovens, given them a
turbo charge and guess what there they are, So airfrying is legit. It's
one of the victories that has come out as a relatively new innovation. You
can still buy a really good countertop model, or you can buy it built
into your brand new double oven that you're putting in your new kitchen. I
love that. Always, such great information, Dean, Thank you so much,
and I'm looking forward to talking with you again on Sunday during your show.
Sounds great. We're so glad you're a bored Heather. Thank you,
have a wonderful weekend. We'll talk soon you too. All right, let's
move on. You guys, we have to get into what's coming up next
weekend. We're going to geek out together a little bit. La Comic Con
is coming back next weekend. My family and I go every year, always
such a good time, and I sat down with Christa Mulin from the La
Comic Con to get all the details. It is such a thrill to be
here talking with Christa Mullin, who is all about Los Angeles Comic Con.
He does many things with La Comic Con, and truly this is one of
my favorite events every year that my family and I go to. And Chris,
You've always been so gracious to talk to me and tell me more about
Comic Con. So let's just dive right in. Absolutely, that is what
is Los Angeles Comic Con all about? Well, I think first and foremost,
we are a show that is all about the fans. So we start
every year by asking the fans what they thought of the show that we just
did, what they'd like to see next year, and then we our team
spends the whole year trying to get those guests and expand into those areas.
So we very much the core of everything we do is that we're all of
us here are fans, and we run the show for the fans, so
it's by fans and for fans. And so when you see us expand into
you know, video games and anime, as we did a couple of years
ago, and by opening up into the West Hall, that was all because
the fans said, we love that stuff, we'd like to see more of
that, and in order to have the room to do it properly, we
needed more space than we expanded. So I think our goal is, you
know, La is such a unique, such unique culture as a city.
It's the center of the creative universe for so many industries, not just movies
and television, but music and video games and anime and streaming, and so
we want to have this really eclectic show that's the ultimate mashup of all of
that. You know. So often when people hear about like a comic con
or a con, they think of San Diego comic Con. But La Comic
Con is its own unique event. I think part of what makes it unique
is, you know, ironically, and we love San Diego. San Diego
is the og con, but this con was actually started by a sister and
a couple of brothers, two friends of theirs, who got frustrated the second
year in a row that they couldn't get tickets to go to San Diego,
and so they're like, well, let's, you know, let's let's put
on a show in the backyard. Let's do our own shows. And they
were super fortunate to get stan Lee to come the first year, and he
loved it and he became a partner in the company. More and more we've
tried to bring in sort of big name guests. So this year we have
a you know, Lord of the Rings panel with all four of the Hobbits,
and thankfully, now that the strike is settled, we can call them
Hobbits and say a Lord of the Rings. It's been a very interesting marketing
challenge this year to talk about who we had coming but not be able to
talk about the properties they were in, or a Matt Smith who was doctor
who in his House of the Dragon, and a Soca panel and the boys.
We have that stuff, but we also have sort of the you know,
the still the voice actors from from cartoon shows and TV shows that maybe
you know me as a dad, grew up with my kids and and and
so we tried to do it at all of those levels. The big stuff
on the main stage, the expansion into game Now we have a couple of
video game tournaments this year, a Street Fighter tournament and a Mortal Kombat tournament
where player people are fans are coming in and actually playing in a tournament for
prizes on site. But to mix that up with a huge artist alle hundreds
of local artists that you won't see anywhere else, six hundred exhibitors who are
really here, you know, for the pre Christmas shopping of it all.
And we think of it as nerd Black Friday. Right, if you have
a nerd anywhere in your life that loves this stuff, come here. You
will find all the gifts for them you'll you'll ever need to find. When
I go with my family every year, we always find some kind of piece
of art that we love. We find like some clothes. My daughter is
now ten, so she's really getting into her own fandom and her own you
know, things that she's looking for and likes. This feels so inviting to
everybody. Is that intentional on your part? Is that something you guys really
want to do? Yeah, one hundred percent. And I think that's why.
You know, on Saturday every year we have the Cosplay National Championship.
But every year on Sunday, we sort of think of that as family Day
and we do a kid's costume contest, and you know, that kind of
started originally because we were around Halloween and so it's like, hey, this
is one more opportunity to use your costume. But even when we moved to
December a couple of years ago post COVID, the fans said, no,
no, keep that because my kids, they love to come, They love
to dress up, they love to get up on the stage and see themselves
on the JumboTron. And between thirty and thirty five percent of our attendees bring
their kids with them, and we love that. We want to make sure
that that's accessible. Kids six and under are free, kids seven to twelve
are only twenty dollars. So for a couple of parents to bring a couple
of kids and their friends and really turn it into it a fun day.
We really we feel like in a way we don't compete with other cons.
We're competing with a day at knots Berry Farm or Disneyland, and you can,
as a parent, you can bring your kids here and have an experience
over the course of the day that will create memories for a lifetime. I
love that. I love and also shout out to you guys for having more
food options. I know last year we loved all the food trucks. The
food trucks are awesome. It's not like the other cons that we've been to
where you're sitting on the floor eating like, you know, chicken fingers and
French fries. Like there was like delicious local LA food trucks there and it's
honestly just so much fun. It's nice that we have this here in LA.
It makes sense that we have something like this here in LA. Like
you said, with you know, entertainment being in our DNA, and we
look forward to it every year. So tell people really quickly, are their
tickets still available? How can they get passed? Absolutely, there are tickets
available. There's tickets for Friday, for Saturday, for Sunday, there are
weekend tickets. So I look forward to seeing you on site and hopefully you'll
have a good time and discover some fun new things. Absolutely. Los Angeles
Comic Con coming to the LA Convention Center December first, second third. December
first, second third. It's comic ONLA dot com. Sounds like it's going
to be a lot of fun. We're looking forward to it, all right.
The Clippers are taking on the Pelicans in New Orleans with tip off at
seven thirty. You can listen to the game on AM five to seventy LA
Sports. Right now, Amy King wanted to talk to Joel Larsgard, the
host of How To Money, because it's going to be important to manage our
money today on Black Friday. Let's talk Black Friday and what people are going
to expect to see today. This is the coming on the aftermath of the
day in which we are grateful. We are thankful for what we have.
Now it's time to buy as much crap as we can right and hopefully for
hopefully for as little money possible. And so I will say the deals are
pretty good this year. There are a lot of good deals out there.
You just have to be careful. You've had to parse pars through to see
what actually is a deal versus what's not. There was a reason to that
something. So some like twelve or thirteen percent of items on Black Friday that
are purported to be a deal or actually more expensive than they were with in
the last week or so. So you've got to know. Okay, cool,
what is what the retailer is saying here is the big fifty percent off
red numbers? Is that marketing or is that actually a better deal than it
normally is? So do your due diligence. Look at the price history on
a site like be a site like Honey or Cambel, Camel Camell that'll help
you see, Oh wait a second, this was cheaper like just six weeks
ago. I thought this was an actual deal, but maybe it's not.
But that being said, there are a lot of great deals and if you've
budgeted appropriately, this is a great time to be buying those presents for Christmas.
Okay, And can you do the same kind of research on whether you're
getting a deal for brick and mortar stores, Yeah, it can be difficult.
There are site called brick seek dot com that can help you kind of
see the best deals that are available in stores. And so it's all about
like, hey, these deals are actually we've seen them, the users have
spotted them on store shelves. But you've got to go in and actually make
the purchase in order to get the deal. Because like specific retailers will mark
things down individually, a whole lot more than maybe an online retailer might.
But it can be spotty. It can be stored a store, Okay,
And if you are venturing out on Black Friday, because I know it's still
a lot of people shop online because that's super easy, but it's still fun
sometimes to go and fight the crowds and go and do your shopping. Is
it a good idea to take your phone with you because you could check on
your phone and do price comparisons that way, Oh for sure, Yeah,
most definitely. And the thing is, there is a lot of competition if
you're one of the major electronics retailers or at one of like if you're a
Walmart, Target, Best Buy, those kinds of places, they're typically going
to be in the same ballpark as each other, and so it's important to
note like where you shop matters. But then yeah, it's a good idea.
You can pull up and you can look at a site like deal News
or slick Deals and you can kind of say, wait a second, this
Apple watch is two hundred and eighty nine dollars. Is that a good deal
or not? And you can compare that exact model to other deals that might
be happening to other retailers, and it's a good idea to know that.
It's also a good idea to know where you're shopping what the return policy is.
So if you buy that Apple Watch at Costco, you've got ninety days
to return it, and you might not have the same abilities to return,
especially electronics items, or there might be a restocking fee or something like that.
Is that coming up more and more? Joel, Like, I've seen
that a couple of times. It used to be free to make returns and
now it's not. Yeah, No, that's definitely kind of over the last
two years creeping in and it's gotten significantly worse this year. So there's a
stat that said that's forty percent of retailers are charging for returns this year.
All Right, it's officially Grinch Miss Universal Studios, Hollywood today. You're a
mean one, mister Grinch you all right? And I couldn't let this moment
pass without tracking down the Green Mimi himself to get the scoop on Grinch Miss,
and he had some very strong opinions out KFI. I hate hate,
hate, hate hate double hete entirely. I'm just sading. I love KFI.
That's right. They pay me an onion. That's up vibration. No,
that's that's not that's just a treat right to reach. Don't count.
All right, let's talk about Listen, we are here right now with the
one who stole Christmas, the Grinch himself. Let's talk about what does Christmas
mean to you this year? What does Christmas I mean this year? I've
learned a valuable lesson to do and feel for this time review and also to
get lots of onions from heaven. That's right, we are gonna give you
lots of onions? Are we gonna if we come here to universal form?
What are we going to get to see? See? All right? Well,
to get to see me number one, and then you can go home.
I'm just kidding. We got me, We have mac she you get
to see my girlfriend Moth and me. Whoier, let's see you can Also
there's a tree lot over there. Oh, there's lots of goodies. Get
over with my face on it. Don't get the regular donut, Get the
donut with my face. All right, it's face so much better, and
lots of singing and damn shaking. What are you going to be doing the
day after Christmas? Does the Grinch go Black Friday shopping. I go Black
Friday five a discount. I'm I'm just kidding. What do I do on
Friday? Lots of sleeping. I have Maxico on the other side of the
cave of the cave. You know, he likes to cuddle all the time,
and I just like to meantime a bit of a little cluche introvert.
You know, are you going to be doing anything special with the Who's this
year? Are we on good terms with the Who's? Yet? Are we
bad terms with the Who's? We've settled a peace treaty. Yeah, lots
of onions and then we're gonna get along a little bit. But you know,
don't have so this time of year, a lot of people come to
Universal Studios Hollywood to visit you. How does that make you feel? It
makes me feel sheen and important? But I don't care. No, I
don't get it at all, not at all. So what do you want
people to know when they come to see you Universal? Do you want them
to come right to see you first? What should they do me the whole
time? Just look at me the whole time. There's nothing else you should
do here. I'm just kidding. You will go see the shows, go
on some ride and have just a title time on me the Great Green Fish
to me Mary Grinchmiss Indeed. That means you can head out to also see
the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios and interact with who's in Whoville
Now through January First, we lead local life from the KFI twenty four hour
newsroom. I'm Heather Brooker. This has been your wake up Call. If
you missed any of wake Up Call, you can listen anytime on the iHeartRadio
app. You've been listening to wake Up Call with me Amy King. You
can always hear wake Up Call five to six am Monday through Friday on KFI
AM six forty and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.