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One. Good morning, good morning, good morning, and welcome, welcome,

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welcome, he said, time now
for our community connection right here on

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K one, the one that you
trust. And we're talking to our friends

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here from Samaritan Counseling and Growth Center
and Larry Thrashes here are the board president.

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You brought friends, because well you
always come in here with friends,

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don't you. Absolutely, I can't
do it by myself. So what are

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you going on, Lawrence? Well, we got an awful lot, you

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know. One of the things that
I'd like to do this morning is to

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introduce our new executive director. We
stole him from Ray of Hope Advocacy Center

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and his name is Ben Ames,
and he's been with us a little over

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two months, and we kind of
had him on a ninety day probation pier,

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but we let that go real early
because he's doing a fabulous job or

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so we're excited to have him.
Well, men, welcome aboard. Yeah,

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thank you. Well you also got
some friends out here with Keith Sheffield.

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Keith, you've been around the man
a little bit over there, haven't

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you. Yeah. I started my
relationship to Samaritan in nineteen ninety five yo

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yo. And still hanging around having
a good time. That I am man.

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You know, when you believe in
something, it's hard to take yourself

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away from that incident. That's exactly
true, my goodness. As Yeah,

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I served with you as the executive
director from two thousand and five to twenty

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seventeen. H my goodness, and
still put it in where needed. Huh.

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Yeah, I'm do training and I'm
on the board of directors. Very

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good. Then letting grass grow under
his fee does absolutely not. We're tickled

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to death to have him and he's
in the position and the experience that he

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board real blessing, absolutely so,
Ben, was it like you did?

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They show you around you don't get
lost around the opposite yet I haven't gotten

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lost just quite yet. Well that's
good, Yeah I have. I've been

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truly, truly blessed by many in
many different ways, but more so just

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through having fantastic mentors with Keith Sharing
and then of course Kristen was with Kristen

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Kurd was the interim executive director for
about eighteen eighteen twenty months. Yeah,

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and she did a fantastic job keeping
things going and just keeping the program running.

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And I know she was ready to
edit and take step back and get

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back into her and to her her
fitness routine and just being mom. But

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you know the amount of support that
I've had from within the organization and then

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also from within the nonprofit community and
self here and borble Spelle, No,

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this is a wonderful opportunity, not
only for you three gentlemen, because you

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get to work at a great place
that helps a lot of people, but

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it's also a wonderful opportunity for people
to work with great professionals to get the

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help that they need and sometimes don't
even realize that they need. Precisely true

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or sisely true. Smaritan was originated
in this community in nineteen seventy fourth.

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So we're coming up on our fiftieth
anniversary and we serve nine hundred, close

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to four thousand hours of sessions every
year. So yeah, we hope we

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set the goal for four eight hundred
this year. And our goal is to

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be of service to the community.
Our mission is is to provide affordable,

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quality counseling, regardless of ability to
pay. And so our goal is to

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reach out and provide quality services to
this community. And then the other part

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of the equation is we raise a
little bit of money in order to offset

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those costs, and what cards are
you holding their pal Well The Iconic Samaritan

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Sports Spectacular August twenty fourth this year
at the Hilton Garden End. It's gonna

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be We've already got a speaker lined
up and so we're really excited again.

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We sell out every year. We
have some great sponsors that have provided money

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for us for several years that just
continue to sponsor. We're always looking for

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new sponsors. It's a great opportunity
to get your name out. It's a

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casual where your sports attire. It's
a lot different than some of the other

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events in town. And that's one
of our differentiators is that you know,

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you can wear shorts, you can
wear jeans, you can wear t shirts,

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whatever it is that makes you comfortable, because when we watch you,

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when you're reaching for your wallet,
that there's no restrictions. Yeah, you've

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got to become absolutely watch him.
I'm telling you now, you know,

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Ben, this is going to be
just a cool opportunity for you to walk

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into something like this and be a
part of this great story. This coincides

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with a lot of other work that
you've done in the past by making sure

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that resources are available to people.
You kind of got big history of that.

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Yeah, I am this is I
believe year twenty and the nonprofit feel

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for myself, you're not old enough
to be around twenty years anywhere. It

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was a surprise to me as well
whenever I realized that. But yeah,

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just being able to have those connections
and just being able to connect people to

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the different resources within our communities.
You know, Bartlesville is a great community.

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We are have a plethora of services
and opportunities available for individuals regardless of

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where they're at, and they're walk
with life and I want to get to

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Keith here. Keith. You know, one of the things that was so

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cool about Samaritan it was during COVID
you guys did some cutting edge things.

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You were not going to let people
to be grasping for help and not being

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able to connect with them. You
guys did the tele health thing long before

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a lot of others did, and
in fact a lot quicker than most people

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around the country did. Our goal
was not to buy experience an interruption of

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services, and plus we really saw
that during that period of time there were

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real stresses on mental health and so
it was more critical that we be available

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maybe than any other time. So
the steps were taken to make sure we

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were available. What kind of help
do we offer, you know, the

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whole gamut, or is there some
specialties that do we kind of rise the

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service. What we would say is
that Marton's a general practice, okay,

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and you know, we we've had
up to six therapists that work on staff,

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both licensed, all licensed, both
as clinical social workers and licensed professionals.

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We have a couple of individuals with
specialties. We provide neural linguistics.

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Plus we also have dance therapy,
movement therapy with at least of roles.

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So in addition to general talk therapy
and cognitive behavioral, we branched out to

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do other things with kids. We
provide service support services to other agencies.

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We tried to collaborate to make sure
that we're involved with and support other nonprofits

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as well. You know, getting
help this way is it's been a long

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time coming for folks. I remember
growing up in the nineteen sixties that was

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something that you didn't I'm up in
conversation and you know sometimes you had a

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friend that would miss a class part
of school and they just said, well,

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you know, I had to go
talk to somebody. And then you

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know, later in life we realized
that, you know, they were actually

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getting counseling. And the first thing
I asked, was it help? He

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said, yeah, I'm here,
and it's like, oh okay. So

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why was it such a big deal? He said, you know the folks,

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And I guess it's been kind of
a thing in America where this was

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something that was not really talked about. Now it's very much in the open.

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People openly discussed the fact that sometimes
you need an ear, you need

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a professional, you need someone to
be a sounding board. May is mental

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health awareness is to make us aware
that these services are there, and one

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doesn't need to be embarrassed. No, you just got to be bold enough

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to take that step right. You
know. A long time ago, my

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mentor said, if you have one
person to talk to, you make it.

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And I think that's true. Wow, And I think the stigma that

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you mentioned is disappearing. People are
understanding that they need help and it's not

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something to be embarrassed about. So
I think I think that has helped a

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lot for our general mental help for
our community. But as Keith mentioned,

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we partner with a lot of local
agencies like Hopestone is a great example.

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You know, Hopstone, everything they
do is free, all of their services,

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so it's easy for us to partner
with them and for them with us

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to send those cancer patients to cancer
families that need some support. Boy don't

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they. And this is this is
your strong suit man. It makes you

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making sure that all the lanes are
open, all all the thoroughfares of exchanging

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of ideas and services happen. Absolutely. You know. It's about building this

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collaborative relationships and we're grateful for the
ones that we have. We're always looking

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for new ones. The one of
the things that the gentlemen didn't really talk

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about is we are one of the
larger EAP providers for communities. Here are

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our companies here and here in Barbosville
EAPs employee assistance programs. So if a

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person is having some difficulties in that
company offers that they can then send a

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referral directly to us and we will
make make a time and space for that

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individual to come in and be seen. We work with Conical, Phillips,

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Phillips sixty six, a couple of
other agencies, and I'm also working on

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working on kind of building off of
that and working with some of our nonprofits

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to be able to offer that as
well. Well. Yeah, because some

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of the folks in the nonprofits,
they get a lot of sleepless nights,

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a lot of endless weekends, and
you know it'll add up and you need

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somebody, Like you said, it's
got one person, you're gonna go.

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You gotta be okay, Larry,
you've been associated with for how many years

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now? Well, I'm on about
sixth year being on the board. My

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wife was on the board before I
was for six years, so we kind

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of have a family addition. You've
been around about ten to twelve years,

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so it's been it's been good.
You know. One of the things that

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Ben had mentioned was the value that
Kristen Kurt has brought to our organization,

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oh the last couple of years.
The things that she has done, stepped

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in when things needed running, still
running the American Counseling and Growth Center Sports

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Spectacular, So she has been instrumental
in kind of keeping this thing during our

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our search for the right executive director. So he was right down the street

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the whole time, just right down
the street. Sorry about that, man,

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I didn't mean to make it this
is the most uncomfortable time I've ever

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had here. But it's glad to
have all three of you guys here and

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talking about the I think everybody should
talk about United Way. We do.

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Let's do it. Yes, one
of the things, we're a Night Way

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agency and therefore they're one of our
primary supporters both financially through the community.

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Plus their leadership is supportive, so
we need to make sure people are aware

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of the United Way is an important
part of our support fly. Every dollar

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that is given to the United Way
is turned right back around and given right

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back to nonprofits and those partner agencies
and other organizations within the community that just

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ask for our do an application.
There's grand dollars available through the United Way

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for pretty much any organization, right. That's good to know. We highly

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encourage folks to, you know,
if you want to give, you know,

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yes, we would love to love
for you to give directly to us,

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but also give give to the United
Way because they are they're one of

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the largest supporters in our community.
So, Ben, where can we I

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need your brand new office? All
right? Well, we are located at

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two forty five Southeast Madison here in
Bartlesville, and we have appointments that start

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from nine o'clock and run until late
in the evening. In fact, Kevin

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was there until about eight o'clock last
night. So our telephone nuber is nine

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one eight three three six fourteen sixty
three and they can find us on the

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web at Samaritan Bartlesville dot org.
Very good and reminder folks that they don't

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have any down trees out there,
so if you're thinking about making your visit

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today or calling the head, don't
worry. You won't be obstructed. Everything's

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in one piece. Absolutely made the
walk through this morning, didn't you.

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We definitely did it was it was
a wild hair this morning, just making

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sure we were good. Oh my
goodness sakes. And again when it was

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the Sports protecting or coming up twenty
four Hilton Garden and are they much available

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there? Tickets are not available yet. They'll be available probably next month.

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And yeah, we're still looking for
additional sponsors or people to buy complete tables.

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Just be prepared, guys. You
want to see things get interesting,

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Wait till there's only three tickets left. Huh, okay okay, and then

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and the boom they're gone. All
we have to do is say we've got

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three. Oh well, no,
no more. They're gone, you know.

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So that's a quick ticket. Thanks
guys for being with us today.

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Thanks's Plumbing now serving Coffeeville and