Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty wake Up Call
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Speaker 1: Station. This is Amy King with kfi's wake up call.
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Speaker 3: I can hear you loud and clear. It's time for
Speaker 3: your morning wake up.
Speaker 1: Call Godland, and his name is Amy k.
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Speaker 1: Eight is five o'clock straight up. This is your wake
Speaker 1: up call for Tuesday, June seventeenth. I'm Amy King. We're
Speaker 1: live everywhere on the iHeartRadio apps. Gonna be a big day.
Speaker 1: I hope you got a good night's sleep because we're
Speaker 1: raring to go show.
Speaker 2: Hey.
Speaker 1: Otani of course pitched his first game in a couple
Speaker 1: of years. Just one inning, wasn't great, but he's back
Speaker 1: on the mound and then went right back out and
Speaker 1: hit like immediately came off the mound, put on his
Speaker 1: batting gear and went to went to home plate. Also,
Speaker 1: Sonny and Gizmo both back in the nest this morning.
Speaker 1: Haven't talked about the Eagles for I don't know twenty
Speaker 1: four hours, but I turned on the camera because I
Speaker 1: still turn it on every day and a lot of times.
Speaker 1: The nest is empty now, but they're both back there,
Speaker 1: and if you want to get a glimpse of glimpse
Speaker 1: of them, friends of Big Bear Valley have the link
Speaker 1: on their website. And they don't stick around. They don't
Speaker 1: stick around long. They take off early and leave the
Speaker 1: nest for the day. And today we are being visited
Speaker 1: by an astronaut, Colonel Nick hag Is on his way
Speaker 1: into the KFI studios. We're going to be talking with
Speaker 1: him during wake up call. Find out you know what
Speaker 1: he's been up to since he returned to Earth after
Speaker 1: spending six months floating in waitlessness on the International Space Station.
Speaker 1: Can't wait for that. Lots going on around the world,
Speaker 1: So here's what's ahead on wake up call, saying the
Speaker 1: curfew has been successful. La Mayor Bass has eased curfew hours.
Speaker 1: The curfew last night went into effect at ten pm,
Speaker 1: that's two hours later than the previous day. The Civic Center, Chinatown,
Speaker 1: Little Tokyo and nearby areas remain under curfew until six
Speaker 1: a m. Mayor Baths says the curfew has protected stores, restaurants,
Speaker 1: businesses and communities from bad actors. A doctor in Santa
Speaker 1: Monica has agreed to plead guilty to supplying ketamine to
Speaker 1: friends star Matthew Perry. Prosecutors say doctor Salvador Placentia gave
Speaker 1: the drug to the actor and taught his assistant who injected.
Speaker 1: Of course, Perry suffered a fatal overdose of the drug
Speaker 1: at his home in Pacific Palisades last October, shops have closed.
Speaker 1: Cars are lined up to get gas in Iran's capital
Speaker 1: city following a warning by President Trump that all Iranians
Speaker 1: should leave Tehran. ABC's Jordana Miller joins us in just
Speaker 1: a couple of minutes to give us the latest as
Speaker 1: things continue to heat up in the Middle East. How
Speaker 1: often do you have your phone out? How often do
Speaker 1: you check it? Are you a slave to your phone?
Speaker 1: We're going to be talking with Richard Simon. He wrote
Speaker 1: a book called Unplugged. He joins us next to tell
Speaker 1: us how it might be time to break up with
Speaker 1: your smartphone and how that can make your life a
Speaker 1: whole lot better. And I can tell you, since I
Speaker 1: started reading this book, I notice how much not only
Speaker 1: I am in my smartphone, but how much everybody around
Speaker 1: me is too. And at the bottom of the hour,
Speaker 1: of course, we're throwing a bit of a welcome home party.
Speaker 1: We're going to be joined by our friend, NASA Astronaut
Speaker 1: Space Force Guardian Colonel Nick Haig, who's back on Earth
Speaker 1: after more than six months on the Inner National Space Station.
Speaker 1: He's coming here. He'll be in studio, live with us,
Speaker 1: a couple of little fun things, decorations. It's a party.
Speaker 1: Let's get started with some of the stories coming out
Speaker 1: of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. A federal appeals
Speaker 1: court is set to hold a hearing today on whether
Speaker 1: President Trump can continue to control California National Guard troops.
Speaker 1: Trump federalized the Guard and sent them to LA to
Speaker 1: protect federal buildings and agents doing ice raids. Governor Newsom sued,
Speaker 1: challenging the president's authority to do so. Newsom says Trump
Speaker 1: only sent the troops to instill fear in the community.
Speaker 1: President Trump says he has the right to federalize the
Speaker 1: troops and they were needed to protect law enforcement. LA
Speaker 1: Mayor Bass has adjusted the curfew for downtown LA, pushing
Speaker 1: it back from eight to ten pm.
Speaker 5: The downtown La Residents Association says the ongoing curfew has
Speaker 5: hurt the neighborhood. Group co founder Cassie Horton says, it's
Speaker 5: time for the curfew to come to an end.
Speaker 4: Our businesses cannot afford this. They're already kind of hanging
Speaker 4: on by a shoestring after the fires.
Speaker 2: COVID did the writers.
Speaker 3: Strike all of that.
Speaker 5: A survey put out by the group on Sunday showed
Speaker 5: that a combined eighty percent of hundreds of members either
Speaker 5: want the curfew gone immediately or phased out over the
Speaker 5: coming days. Michael Monks KFI News.
Speaker 1: SpaceX has completed another launch of a Falcon nine rocket
Speaker 1: from the coast of Santa Barbara County.
Speaker 6: The launch from Vendenburg Space Force Base happened just after
Speaker 6: eight thirty Monday night. The rocket took twenty six Starlink
Speaker 6: Internet satellites into low Earth orbit. It was the third
Speaker 6: flight for the first stage rocket booster supporting the mission.
Speaker 6: Daniel Martindale, KFI News, Let's.
Speaker 1: Say good morning now to ABC's Jordana Miller in Jerusalem. So, Jordana,
Speaker 1: Israel's not letting up continuing to attack Tehran, and of
Speaker 1: course the goal is to take out its nuclear capability.
Speaker 1: What are the latest developments.
Speaker 4: That's right, Israeli air Force, with air superiority, it must
Speaker 4: be said, has a flight path now in over western
Speaker 4: Ran into to the capital Tehran, where they're carrying out
Speaker 4: a series of strikes. Really, the air force has been
Speaker 4: active and carrying out bombings since Israel's opening attack back
Speaker 4: on Friday morning or Thursday night in the United States.
Speaker 4: One target that the Israeli Army says they succeeded in
Speaker 4: hitting was the new Joint chiefs of Staff, the new
Speaker 4: head of Iran's army. This was a close confidante of
Speaker 4: the Supreme Leader, Ayatola Jomene. He was just put in
Speaker 4: the position maybe three days ago, and overnight they targeted
Speaker 4: a place in Tehran where he was with an air
Speaker 4: strike and he was killed. There's also a lot of
Speaker 4: i would say, growing threats against the Supreme Leader coming
Speaker 4: from coming from Israeli leaders, the latest being the Defense
Speaker 4: Minister ystral Katz, who said today that Homiani could turn
Speaker 4: out have the same fate as Sodom Hussein. You know,
Speaker 4: this is a war that is not explicitly to bring
Speaker 4: down the regime. That's what the Israelis have said, but
Speaker 4: you know, on the ground, everything that they're doing seems
Speaker 4: to be pushing the regime to the brink, right, assassinating
Speaker 4: military leaders, scientists, going after their headquarters, political and military headquarters,
Speaker 4: and now yesterday as well hitting one of the national broadcasters,
Speaker 4: the TV that is aligned with the regime. We am
Speaker 4: sure many people saw the clip that was circulating online
Speaker 4: of an Iranian female anchor in the middle of her
Speaker 4: in the middle of her newscast, you know, with an
Speaker 4: explosion in the back and star and leaving the cameras right.
Speaker 4: So we're still seeing a lot of activity on this side.
Speaker 4: I can tell you. The Iranians overnight launched four different
Speaker 4: waves of ballistic missile strikes in total about thirty missiles,
Speaker 4: so a lower number than we saw the previous days,
Speaker 4: but they spread them out, keeping Israelis up all night
Speaker 4: and in their shelters, especially those living in Tel Aviv
Speaker 4: and in central Israel. For me, I'm in Jerusalem. I
Speaker 4: was up twice, but most of the country was up
Speaker 4: four times.
Speaker 1: And when you luckily, when you get to when you
Speaker 1: get awakened, you have to go into the shelters. Is
Speaker 1: that correct that you hear those sirens and then off
Speaker 1: you go into the shelters for how long?
Speaker 4: Right, So, Israel thankfully has developed a very sophisticated early
Speaker 4: warning system. So because these ballistic missiles are so deadly,
Speaker 4: and we've seen that over the last several days, right,
Speaker 4: twenty four Israelis have been killed and they've brought down
Speaker 4: a part sides of entire apartment buildings. The Israelis now
Speaker 4: give their citizens usually about fifteen minutes of lead time,
Speaker 4: sometimes twenty minutes, and they first send out a warning saying,
Speaker 4: we have detected a launch of Iranian missiles coming towards us.
Speaker 4: We you know, everyone now needs to get close to
Speaker 4: their bomb shelter, right, and then you get another warning
Speaker 4: that is a loud beeping sound on your phone in
Speaker 4: case you didn't see the other one. The first message
Speaker 4: that says you now need to go into the bomb shelter.
Speaker 4: And then usually once you're already inside, then you hear
Speaker 4: the sirens there, yeah, which is still frightening. Well yeah, anyway, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: and you hear the interceptions. I mean a lot of
Speaker 4: the you know, there's every time Iran fires on Israel,
Speaker 4: you know, there's always a number of missiles that are
Speaker 4: shot down over Jerusalem because Jerusalem situated in the center
Speaker 4: of the country, a little center east, So anything trying
Speaker 4: to hit the Tel Aviv comes over Jerusalem. When they're
Speaker 4: trying to hit military bases a little bit further south,
Speaker 4: sometimes they go over Jerusalem, right, So the sound of
Speaker 4: the explosions and the booms are often, you know, there's
Speaker 4: often many of them that we can hear from the shelter.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's I just can't even imagine. But thank you
Speaker 1: for sharing kind of the what it's like to get
Speaker 1: those warnings. I wanted to go back real quick before
Speaker 1: we let you go and ask you just a couple
Speaker 1: of questions. One you mentioned Israel says it has air superiority.
Speaker 1: What does that mean. Does that mean that Iran is
Speaker 1: it's little, Not it's little, but its defenses are so
Speaker 1: badly degraded that Israel can just go wherever they want
Speaker 1: and they're not worried about getting shot down exactly.
Speaker 4: It means that when it comes to a corridor from
Speaker 4: western Iran into Tehran, Israel has managed to wipe out
Speaker 4: Iran's ability to shoot down their aircraft by taking out
Speaker 4: air defense systems radar systems, and also by taking out
Speaker 4: missile launchers and weapons depots and the ballistic missiles themselves
Speaker 4: that would be shot at aircraft. So they are operating
Speaker 4: freely in the skies of Tehran, right, They're even carrying
Speaker 4: out air strikes in daylight, which I mean generals behind
Speaker 4: the scenes will tell us, you know that it all
Speaker 4: happened faster than they thought, right.
Speaker 1: And then one last question for you. You mentioned that
Speaker 1: there was a string of missiles that came in. There
Speaker 1: were like thirty of them, and they came in sort
Speaker 1: of at regular intervals to kind of keep everybody on
Speaker 1: their you know, yeah, keep every everybody shared and anxious
Speaker 1: and awake. Is there a reason that there's a lower
Speaker 1: number that we know of. They're not running out of
Speaker 1: missiles or or are they.
Speaker 4: Well, that's a great question. First of all, the Israelis
Speaker 4: say they have taken out one third of Iran's total
Speaker 4: missile launcher pads. No matter how many missiles you have,
Speaker 4: even if you have five thousand, if you don't have
Speaker 4: a means to deploy them, they're useless. So Israel has
Speaker 4: focused in the first days of this attack on taking
Speaker 4: out the launch pads and the Israeli Army does claim
Speaker 4: that it has crippled and reduced Iran's ability to fire
Speaker 4: missiles on Israel. I mean, thirty is not an impressive number,
Speaker 4: quote unquote in a state of war. So you know so,
Speaker 4: but we'll have to wait and see that. No one
Speaker 4: denies that Iran still has they still have capabilities, and
Speaker 4: even the damage that's been done to the nuclear facilities,
Speaker 4: it is significant, but not it is not consequential in
Speaker 4: terms of you know, ending the nuclear threat. As you know,
Speaker 4: again as a general who does background briefings with the
Speaker 4: press here, you know we've been told there's there's still
Speaker 4: a lot of targets in the bank, and there's still
Speaker 4: a lot of work to do. And remember Israel has
Speaker 4: not yet attacked the four Dow nuclear facility, which is
Speaker 4: buried in a mountain near Tehran. That is the most
Speaker 4: difficult nuclear target. But it has to be touched one
Speaker 4: way or the other, or in a sense, this entire
Speaker 4: attack on Iran will be a failure because that facility
Speaker 4: is crude, crucial.
Speaker 1: All right, and that's where we're going to have to
Speaker 1: leave it for today. Jordana Miller in Jerusalem, stay safe,
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for the information. We'll talk soon texting.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get back to some of the stories
Speaker 1: coming out of the KFI twenty Forever newsroom. Federal prosecutors
Speaker 1: say the man in custody for allegedly shooting and killing
Speaker 1: a state lawmaker and her husband in Minnesota stalked his targets,
Speaker 1: like prey ABC's Faith Abu Bay says Vance Bolter also
Speaker 1: allegedly wounded a Democratic state senator and his wife in
Speaker 1: Saturday's attacks.
Speaker 7: Investigators believe this was a complex and chilling plant to
Speaker 7: kill public officials. Forty five lawmakers on that alleged target list,
Speaker 7: mostly or all Democrats.
Speaker 1: Billy say they have found assault style rifles, several rounds
Speaker 1: of ammunition, and a medical kit in Bolter's car. News
Speaker 1: brought to you by Simper Solaris. The Trump family has
Speaker 1: announced its latest business venture.
Speaker 7: Eric Trump, one of President Trump's sons, who will run
Speaker 7: the mobile phone company, says it will build its own
Speaker 7: phones and maintain a call center in the US. The
Speaker 7: new business follows several real estate deals for towers and
Speaker 7: resorts in the Middle East, including a golf development in
Speaker 7: Guitar and a one and a half billion dollar partnership
Speaker 7: to build golf courses, hotels, and real estate projects in Vietnam.
Speaker 1: Deborah Mark kff I News and Tropical Storm Eric is
Speaker 1: formed near southern Mexico. The US National Hurricane Center in
Speaker 1: Miami says it is expected to become a hurricane by tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Hurricane watches have been issued for parts of Mexico. Heavy
Speaker 1: rainfall is in the forecast for parts of the states
Speaker 1: of Oajaca and Guerrero. Well show, Hey did it. He
Speaker 1: was back on the mound, pitched one inning. Wasn't the
Speaker 1: greatest performance, but he was throwing like one hundred mile
Speaker 1: in our fastballs. The Dodgers won the game last night,
Speaker 1: six to three. Tonight, the Dodgers take on the Padres
Speaker 1: at Dodgers Stadium. The first pitch goes out at seven o'clock.
Speaker 1: You can listen to all the Dodger games on AM
Speaker 1: five to seventy LA Sports live from the Gallpin Motors
Speaker 1: Broadcast booth and stream all the Dodgers games in HD,
Speaker 1: just like I did last night listening to show Hay's
Speaker 1: first outing on the iHeartRadio app Keyword AM five seventy
Speaker 1: LA Sports. Anti ice protests have cost the city of
Speaker 1: La nearly twenty million dollars so far. City administrative officer
Speaker 1: stay Bo says most of that is tied to the
Speaker 1: cost of police, about seventeen million dollars of it. Murder
Speaker 1: and stocking charges have been filed against the man in
Speaker 1: Minnesota accused of shooting and killing a Minnesota state senator
Speaker 1: and her husband, and attempting to kill a senator and
Speaker 1: his wife. Official save Vnce Bolter will be charged with
Speaker 1: first degree murder and could face the death penalty if convicted.
Speaker 1: Police are looking for the person who shot a mail
Speaker 1: carrier in South la The LAPD says a shooting happened
Speaker 1: late yesterday morning near Century Boulevard in Central Avenue. The
Speaker 1: mail carrier was hit in the arm. The person who
Speaker 1: shot him was last seen running east on Century Boulevard.
Speaker 1: Let's say good morning now to Richard Simon, the author
Speaker 1: of Unplug, How to Break Up with your Phone and
Speaker 1: Reclaim your Life. Good morning, Richard, Good morning Amy. Great
Speaker 1: to be here, Great to have you. Thanks for getting
Speaker 1: up early with this. So you wrote this book, and
Speaker 1: I saw the press release on it and I go,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, I have to read this book. And
Speaker 1: I will tell you that since reading it, I've noticed
Speaker 1: even more how perve our phones are. Like I'll find
Speaker 1: myself sitting on the couch just playing Solitaire and other
Speaker 1: word games four hours at a time, and it's just
Speaker 1: this time suck and then like I'll put the phone
Speaker 1: down and then I'll get this feeling like I need
Speaker 1: to pick it up and play another game. And I
Speaker 1: was like, oh my gosh, why is that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, the core piece of dopamine. Dopamine is the most powerful,
Speaker 2: one of the most powerful molecules in the brain. And
Speaker 2: each time you tap your phone, whether it's with Solitaire
Speaker 2: or whether it's Internet browser or WhatsApp, whatever it might be,
Speaker 2: it releases dopamine. So it just becomes more and more pleasurable.
Speaker 2: And the smartphone is literally a shortcut machine. And that's
Speaker 2: what's going on behind the scenes in your mind.
Speaker 1: Okay, So the premise of the book seems pretty straightforward.
Speaker 1: You know that it may be time to break up
Speaker 1: with your phone. But I want to ask you kind
Speaker 1: of what is the goal of the book, Like what
Speaker 1: gave you the idea to write it?
Speaker 2: Sure, with me, I was thick of my smartphone taking
Speaker 2: up hours of my day. The average American adult spends
Speaker 2: more than five hours a day on their smartphones. We
Speaker 2: don't get that time back. And I was a father
Speaker 2: to young kids in twenty nineteen, I realized this.
Speaker 3: I had enough.
Speaker 2: So in twenty twenty, I turned my smartphone off for
Speaker 2: an entire year and was one of the most transformative
Speaker 2: moments of my life. And what I realized is that
Speaker 2: you look at all the various self help articles and
Speaker 2: books everyone is espousing hacks noble as they might be,
Speaker 2: but deleting social media, putting a rubber band around your phone,
Speaker 2: digital status. All these things are great, but presenting as
Speaker 2: addictive as a phone as you were just talking about
Speaker 2: it doesn't go far enough. So I ended up interviewing
Speaker 2: dozens of people over the course of the last couple
Speaker 2: of years and found that the first step to establishing
Speaker 2: a more effective relationship with your smartphone is to turn
Speaker 2: it off.
Speaker 1: Okay, so turn off completely, So no GPS, no texting,
Speaker 1: no social media, just done.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So therefore to diferent styles that outline the book in
Speaker 2: terms of turning it off. The most popular one I
Speaker 2: think that will resonate for your listeners is to switch
Speaker 2: to a basic phone. And I say basic phone, I
Speaker 2: mean basic like calling and texting. There are some like
Speaker 2: Kosher phones or Wise phones that have more features. For
Speaker 2: the sake of recalibrating the reward pathways in your brain,
Speaker 2: I highly recommend switching over to a basic phone. You
Speaker 2: can have your same phone number, you can switch over
Speaker 2: the simcard at your local AT and T Verizon your
Speaker 2: T Mobile story. And by doing that, by switching over
Speaker 2: to a basic phone, you're going to regain the most
Speaker 2: precious resource source in life, which is time. You're going
Speaker 2: to get hours back because you're not going to want
Speaker 2: to text on this terrible device because it takes forever
Speaker 2: to text and it'll completely reset you. So one of
Speaker 2: the four breakup styles of recommend is switching to a
Speaker 2: basic phone.
Speaker 1: Okay, So then Richard, also tell me, like you said
Speaker 1: that one of the things you noticed when I was
Speaker 1: reading your book, you said you you and your wife
Speaker 1: would come sit down on your couch at night and
Speaker 1: you wouldn't talk to each other because you just stick
Speaker 1: your noses in your phones and you're doing your own thing.
Speaker 1: How did that immediately change when you turned your phone off.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my wife and she's a doctor, she's a physician.
Speaker 2: She's very very busy in terms of her hours and
Speaker 2: what would end up happening is during the day. I'm
Speaker 2: sure many other married couples who are listening go through this.
Speaker 2: You text each other throughout the day, spouses, and there's
Speaker 2: dozens of texts that are happening. You know, this is happening,
Speaker 2: This is happening.
Speaker 3: What do you think of this?
Speaker 2: How about this for dinner? This? And before you know it,
Speaker 2: you get back home and you're already caught up. When
Speaker 2: everything had happened during the day, it's nothing to catch
Speaker 2: up on. And all of a sudden, you know, we
Speaker 2: stopped this texting throughout the day and we actually like
Speaker 2: sit down and have dinner as a family, and like,
Speaker 2: I'm genuinely curious about what happened during the day, and
Speaker 2: same for her in terms of what happened for my day.
Speaker 2: It completely reset our relationship and it grew tremendously since
Speaker 2: I went through this process, and with the dozens of
Speaker 2: people I interviewed in the book in my profile, it
Speaker 2: was the same. Relationships with family just improved so much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we hear a lot about how like kids
Speaker 1: who have grown up, they've had smartphones since, you know,
Speaker 1: since they were very young. That they don't communicate as well.
Speaker 1: They don't have those same communication skills because, like you said,
Speaker 1: they text and do short little blurbs as opposed to
Speaker 1: having full on conversations like we used to when we
Speaker 1: were growing up. So I could I can see that correlation.
Speaker 1: If somebody wants to dip their toe in, is there
Speaker 1: a way to dip their toe in?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I mean for starters, go for a walk. Go for
Speaker 2: a walk around the neighborhood for forty five minutes an hour,
Speaker 2: and don't bring your phone. You're going to be going
Speaker 2: crazy inside the first time you do it, because this
Speaker 2: is how addictive a smartphone is. But go for a
Speaker 2: walk for forty five minutes to an hour and do
Speaker 2: it by yourself for the first time. Don't bring someone
Speaker 2: else and just have to embrace your own thoughts. That's
Speaker 2: way to say a smartphone has done is that we
Speaker 2: are no longer able to embrace solitude, We're no longer able.
Speaker 3: To truly think.
Speaker 2: So that's the first step I would do, And after
Speaker 2: you do it a few times, you're going to realize
Speaker 2: this is really really nice. Start tonight when you go
Speaker 2: out to dinner with friends, leave your phone at home.
Speaker 2: The first time you're in the car, you might be
Speaker 2: completely freaking out. That's the withdrawal, It's completely natural. Then
Speaker 2: you're going to realize how special that is. So before
Speaker 2: you go through any sort of detox, in terms of
Speaker 2: turning your phone off, I have a whole section in
Speaker 2: my book about preparation. I think those were some of
Speaker 2: the initial things you can do to start to realize that, okay,
Speaker 2: I can do this.
Speaker 1: Okay. And another example that you gave Richard that I
Speaker 1: absolutely loved was you said after you turned your phone
Speaker 1: off or you left it behind. I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: it was before you or after you actually turned the
Speaker 1: smartphone off. As you said, you went to the grocery
Speaker 1: store and you were standing in line and you just
Speaker 1: had to stand there because you didn't have a phone
Speaker 1: to check. And how weird that feeling is because we're
Speaker 1: so used to be being connected all the time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so true.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the first day of my of my detox, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was at the grocery store and yeah, even just
Speaker 2: for three four minutes, I could only scan the tabloids
Speaker 2: for so long around me and I'm literally freaking out inside.
Speaker 2: And I'm literally standing in line at a grocery store.
Speaker 2: You figure, Okay, you can deal with it for three
Speaker 2: or four minutes. But I was not comfortable enough being
Speaker 2: in my own skin. Now, looking back, when it's five
Speaker 2: years later, I mean, I don't go to the grocery
Speaker 2: store with a smartphone ever. So now I'm totally comfortable
Speaker 2: with it. So this whole process to talk about in
Speaker 2: the book, it really will recalibrate the low word pathways
Speaker 2: in your brain.
Speaker 1: Okay, Richard Simon, the book is Unplugged, How to Break
Speaker 1: Up with your Phone and Reclaim your Life. I wish
Speaker 1: we had more time to talk because this is so
Speaker 1: interesting and it really opened my eyes to how much
Speaker 1: we spend time on our phones and don't spend our
Speaker 1: time living our lives. Where can we get the book, Richard.
Speaker 2: Unplugged if you found at all major booksellers, Amazon, Targets,
Speaker 2: Barnes and Noble, Walmart, your local independent bookstore wherever books
Speaker 2: are sold.
Speaker 1: All right, Thank you so much, Richard Simon. Again, the
Speaker 1: book is Unplugged, How to Break Up with your Phone
Speaker 1: and Reclaim your Life. It's quick read and it's really
Speaker 1: a good read. Richard. Appreciate and have a great day.
Speaker 4: Thanks so much.
Speaker 1: Amy you too, Okay, it really it's really worth it,
Speaker 1: and I swear. Then we went to a Dodger game
Speaker 1: and we were sitting we went to the speakeasy, which
Speaker 1: we get to do every once in a while, and
Speaker 1: we were looking at the table next to us and
Speaker 1: there were four people sitting there. None of them were
Speaker 1: talking to each other. All of them had their phones
Speaker 1: out and their faces in their phones. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: you're in a cool speak easy at a Dodger game.
Speaker 1: Come on, I mean, it's just crazy anyway. All right,
Speaker 1: we have in studio NASA astronaut and Space Force Guardian
Speaker 1: Colonel Nick Haig, now back on Earth, touring the US
Speaker 1: to talk about life in space, and he's here with
Speaker 1: us in studio. Welcome Colonel Haig.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Amy, it's a pleasure to be here, and
Speaker 3: thank you for the warm welcome.
Speaker 1: Oh well, we had a little welcome home party and
Speaker 1: we have some treats and all of that stuff. And
Speaker 1: you know what, when did you get back? It was
Speaker 1: in March.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so the end of March is when we landed.
Speaker 3: So it's been about three months. Time fly a couple
Speaker 3: of those months. It flies because I'm just heads down
Speaker 3: trying to rehabilitate and figure out how to live in
Speaker 3: gravity again. You spend a while floating around on orbit
Speaker 3: and you forget just how strong gravity is.
Speaker 1: Well, we had talked one other time, and you were
Speaker 1: talking about how you go from completely not knowing which
Speaker 1: direction is up or down and weightlessness, and we talked
Speaker 1: about how you said you got the best sleep of
Speaker 1: your life in space.
Speaker 3: Indeed, indeed, and now I have to suffer an earthing
Speaker 3: Earthlingk's fate and sleep in a bed.
Speaker 1: Is it difficult?
Speaker 3: It's different? You know, you wake up and maybe I
Speaker 3: have a little toss and turn a little bit, or
Speaker 3: my back doesn't feel quite right, or I'm on an
Speaker 3: arm and it just you know, kind of falls asleep
Speaker 3: and I'm like, dang, I wish I was back on
Speaker 3: orbit because that was the best sleep ever.
Speaker 1: Okay, so up in orbit you were up there for it?
Speaker 1: Was it one hundred and seventy days? Right around there?
Speaker 3: One hundred Yeah, a little over one hundred and seventy days.
Speaker 1: Okay. What has to be like one thing that you
Speaker 1: absolutely miss about it?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Or is there just one?
Speaker 3: There isn't just one. The obvious stuff is being able
Speaker 3: to float around and flip and just play in microgravity
Speaker 3: where everything floats, or to float over to the window
Speaker 3: and then be able to see the Earth and the
Speaker 3: universe in front of you in a way that just
Speaker 3: you can't do on the ground. But you know, probably
Speaker 3: the other thing that you might not think about missing
Speaker 3: as my crewmates, I spend six months with six other
Speaker 3: people inside this really confined space, and you get to
Speaker 3: know each other so well, and then when we hit
Speaker 3: the ground, we kind of go all our separate ways
Speaker 3: and we're doing all these different things, and so you
Speaker 3: don't see them as much as you did while you
Speaker 3: were up there, and so you miss those friendships.
Speaker 1: Yeah, do you still communicate with them a lot?
Speaker 3: Yeah, as you know, as much as we can, and
Speaker 3: unfortunately most of it on a on a phone because
Speaker 3: we're not in close proximity together. Uh necessarily, but yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, we'll run into each other and it's a
Speaker 3: it's a big hug, and hey, how you've been, how's
Speaker 3: the how's how's rehab going? Yeah, you know, we're all
Speaker 3: all suffering all the aches and pains and and and
Speaker 3: everything that comes with trying to figure out how to
Speaker 3: walk in gravity again. And uh and you know, we
Speaker 3: finally get to the point where those aches become age
Speaker 3: appropriate and uh, and you're back to normal.
Speaker 1: And you said that you do get it back pretty
Speaker 1: quickly though, that that when you're when you come back
Speaker 1: to Earth, all of a sudden, you got all of
Speaker 1: this weight on you that you didn't have, and your
Speaker 1: muscles are all screwed up because they don't know how
Speaker 1: to work again. But it snaps back, I think, is
Speaker 1: what you said.
Speaker 3: It does. The mind. There's a couple of different layers.
Speaker 3: The mind snaps back and starts to appreciate that you're
Speaker 3: in an environment where everything doesn't float, and and it
Speaker 3: understands what's happening. Your balance comes back fairly quick within
Speaker 3: a couple of days. Uh. But the and you're strong
Speaker 3: because you're while you're on the space station two and
Speaker 3: a half hours a day every day, we're lifting weights
Speaker 3: and working.
Speaker 1: Saw some videos if you work it out.
Speaker 3: And so you come back strong, but you haven't had
Speaker 3: to balance and you know, stabilize your body, and so
Speaker 3: all the little muscles, all the joints take time to
Speaker 3: kind of reacclimate. And that's kind of the long pole.
Speaker 1: So does it feel a little bit like you're drunk
Speaker 1: or something like. You just can't lose your balance.
Speaker 3: So the wobbly goes away. It feels like you went
Speaker 3: and ran a marathon and it's the day after, and
Speaker 3: the joints ache, the muscles.
Speaker 1: Ache, yellow legs a little bit.
Speaker 3: You're a little slow trying to, you know, get up
Speaker 3: from sitting. Feels like you're twenty years older than you
Speaker 3: actually are. But slowly the body responds, and after a
Speaker 3: while it's like somebody flipped a switch and hey, I'm
Speaker 3: back to.
Speaker 1: Normal, and you are you back to one hundred percent?
Speaker 1: You think, yeah, for it'll fall over when you're walking anywhere.
Speaker 3: I have fallen over recently. Now back to as normal
Speaker 3: as I can be. The kind of the thing that
Speaker 3: I'm still waiting is you do lose some bone mass
Speaker 3: while you're up there, some bone density, and so your
Speaker 3: body will slowly accumulate that, and that's about a day
Speaker 3: per day. So at about the six month point, I'll
Speaker 3: truly be back to about one hundred percent.
Speaker 1: Okay, So you mentioned cell phones and how you guys
Speaker 1: text each other because you don't get to see each
Speaker 1: other as much. But we were just talking with the
Speaker 1: author of a book called unplug who We were talking
Speaker 1: about how cell phones just rule your lives and is
Speaker 1: it possible just to turn it off and disconnect for
Speaker 1: a while. You had to do that, you had no choice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no cell phone coverage on the space station.
Speaker 1: So even with all those Starlink satellites.
Speaker 3: Even with all the satellites, you know, we still have email.
Speaker 3: We still have the ability to make phone calls, which
Speaker 3: is crazy, talk to somebody on the phone. And that's
Speaker 3: actually one of the things that I enjoyed doing, you know,
Speaker 3: representing the Space Wars, being a guardian in space. I
Speaker 3: would take the opportunity every week steal some minutes at
Speaker 3: the end of a day and call down to one
Speaker 3: of the ops floors and surprise, one of the Space
Speaker 3: Force guardians is sitting there doing the mission that's helping
Speaker 3: protect me and say, hey, you know, just it's Nick
Speaker 3: on orbit. Just want to say thing I want to
Speaker 3: say and see how things are going down there. And
Speaker 3: so it's the power of talking with somebody and hearing
Speaker 3: their voice and the emotion and the inflections and their voice.
Speaker 3: It's something that you really appreciate. But yeah, you're unplugged
Speaker 3: up there.
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that Okay, we have one
Speaker 1: hundred other things to ask you, and I thought you
Speaker 1: were going to talk about talking to students and STEM
Speaker 1: because I believe you did that while you were up
Speaker 1: there as well. Absolutely, i'd love to ask you that
Speaker 1: when we come back. Plus, we want to find out
Speaker 1: more about life in space and then life back on
Speaker 1: Earth and what's next for Colonel Haig. So if you'll
Speaker 1: hang tight, absolutely all right, this is NASA Astronaut Space
Speaker 1: Force Guardian Colonel Nick Haig live with us in studio
Speaker 1: this morning. Real quick, we're going to get in your
Speaker 1: business with Bloomberg's Courtney Donaho. Good morning, Courtney. I know
Speaker 1: that we are abbreviated today, but we have just a
Speaker 1: couple of things to check in on, and one is
Speaker 1: how are the markets looking today.
Speaker 8: Well, it's looking a little rough out there. Good morning.
Speaker 8: We just got a report on the health of the consumer.
Speaker 8: Retail sales felled by the most since the start of
Speaker 8: the year since May, suggesting that the new tariffs are
Speaker 8: holding back consumers from spending. So this is continuing to
Speaker 8: weigh on stocks, which were already under pressure from the
Speaker 8: conflict between Israel and Iran. Dow futures right now down
Speaker 8: one hundred and ninety five points. It was a different
Speaker 8: story yesterday because stocks saw solid gains on a report
Speaker 8: that Iron wanted to rest our talks over its nuclear program.
Speaker 8: That Dow rose three hundred and seventeen points to wrap
Speaker 8: up the session.
Speaker 1: It's amazing how much what's going on in the world
Speaker 1: affects these markets like this, and then wanted to take
Speaker 1: a quick look at Red Lobster. It's cooking up a comeback.
Speaker 8: Yes, they're looking to attract a new generation of fans
Speaker 8: with some old favorites. The chain has brought back fried
Speaker 8: hush puppies and the crispy crunchy popcorn shrimp.
Speaker 1: That was always my favorite.
Speaker 8: But Red Lobster also has refreshed its menu with some
Speaker 8: new items to try to track people, including lobster pauper
Speaker 8: deli pasta, and bacon wrapped scalps. All right, Yeah, there's
Speaker 8: also they fought for bankruptcy, you have to remember last
Speaker 8: year for a number of reasons, including their unprofitable unlimited
Speaker 8: shrimp deal. So they're trying to do some things to
Speaker 8: try to correct all of that.
Speaker 1: But delicious unlimited shrimp deal. Yes, getting in your business
Speaker 1: with Bloomberg's Courtney, donaho, let's do it again tomorrow, shall
Speaker 1: we definitely see you later? All right, thanks Courtney. We
Speaker 1: are talking to a true rocket man. It's NASA astronaut
Speaker 1: and Spaceforce Guardian Colonel Nick Haig, fresh off a trip
Speaker 1: to the International Space Station. And Colonel Haig, this was
Speaker 1: your second time up there. Oops, I got to turn
Speaker 1: your mica on.
Speaker 3: There we go. Yeah, second time to the space station.
Speaker 3: I first, My first time up there was for seven
Speaker 3: months in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: Okay, and we got to go back just a little
Speaker 1: bit because it was it was his second attempt when
Speaker 1: he got to the space station for the first time.
Speaker 1: What happened for the first attempt?
Speaker 3: You know, if at first you don't succeed, try again.
Speaker 3: In fall of twenty eighteen, I was launching to the
Speaker 3: space station for a six month mission with a Lexey
Speaker 3: of chennin on a soy Use rocket and we had
Speaker 3: a failure in the middle of the launch that caused
Speaker 3: us to you know, a board to safely eject and
Speaker 3: the capsule came back down. So what was supposed to
Speaker 3: be a six month mission was a twenty minute flight. Wow.
Speaker 1: So you launched, everything looked good, and then how far in.
Speaker 1: Did you know something was.
Speaker 3: We were two minutes in. Everything was going fine. The
Speaker 3: first stage was separating and there was a problem where
Speaker 3: it didn't separate cleanly and it impacted the rocket that
Speaker 3: was continuing to burn, and it rapidly disassembled.
Speaker 1: And so I love how you guys did it rapidly disassembled.
Speaker 1: I think that when SpaceX did their what's the name
Speaker 1: of the big rocket starship? Yeah, the starship, they said
Speaker 1: it went for like thirty minutes and then it rapidly disassembled.
Speaker 3: Like yeah. So, so it all happened so fast. We
Speaker 3: were thirty miles up, going four thousand miles an hour
Speaker 3: in you know, the snap of a finger, The alarm
Speaker 3: goes off, the injection system fires some rockets and pulls
Speaker 3: us away and and there's some side to side shaking,
Speaker 3: and then we're just kind of coasting. We were going
Speaker 3: so fast. We continued to coast uphill until we got
Speaker 3: right to the edge of space.
Speaker 1: Wow. Okay, So then when you eject, you don't eject
Speaker 1: like a fighter pilot ejectory, and you're still in the capsule.
Speaker 3: So the rockets pulled the capsule away and then we
Speaker 3: landed in the capsule with parachutes just like we normally
Speaker 3: would actually really close to where we were going to
Speaker 3: land six months later, just a little bit earlier than
Speaker 3: we were expecting.
Speaker 1: Okay, And this time when you came back after your
Speaker 1: six months, you brought Sonny and Butch back with you.
Speaker 1: You had to make some changes. And if you've been
Speaker 1: listening to Wake Up Call, we talked. We got to
Speaker 1: talk about some of those changes as it progressed, where
Speaker 1: it went from a four person crew to a two
Speaker 1: person crew. That made you the commander of the crew
Speaker 1: nine mission. And then you went up with two you
Speaker 1: came back with four. Yeah, And I have to ask
Speaker 1: you when you came back, it was the coolest thing
Speaker 1: that we saw. Because several people that I've talked to,
Speaker 1: and of course I was watching when you splash down
Speaker 1: back on Earth and all of a sudden, a pod
Speaker 1: of dolphins shows up in the water like twenty feet
Speaker 1: from the capsule. Did you guys get to see that?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Inside the capsule, we couldn't see it. The windows
Speaker 3: at that point had been charred over from re entry.
Speaker 3: And then they pull us all the way to the
Speaker 3: boat and then take us out. And it wasn't until
Speaker 3: I got back to Houston, and somebody showed me, you know,
Speaker 3: pulled put a phone in front of me and said,
Speaker 3: did you see this video? And I was like, dolphins.
Speaker 1: It was the most amazing, surreal thing.
Speaker 3: Lead it to nature. It's amazing all the technological feats
Speaker 3: of sending people to space and then and then having
Speaker 3: them splash down, the challenges of integrating crew members that
Speaker 3: hadn't trained on a vehicle to be part of a
Speaker 3: crew and lands, you know, safely, and then and then
Speaker 3: nature steals the show absolutely.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you're back and right now we know that
Speaker 1: you're touring around and meeting with different groups and talking.
Speaker 1: And I know one of the things that you did
Speaker 1: while you're in space is you talked to STEM kids. Yes,
Speaker 1: And why is that so important for you and for
Speaker 1: Space Force?
Speaker 3: And Vanessa, Well, you know, STEM is that found STEM science,
Speaker 3: technology education math or engineering math education is such a
Speaker 3: foundational necessity in our society and and it really is
Speaker 3: the fuel behind the things that that NASA does or
Speaker 3: the things that the Space Force does. And so it's
Speaker 3: important and to reach out to students and let them
Speaker 3: understand the importance of their education and and just and
Speaker 3: just what the opportunities that that education is going to
Speaker 3: open up for them. So every chance I get, you know,
Speaker 3: try to get out and uh and and you know,
Speaker 3: inspire the next generation. I look at the you know,
Speaker 3: I go to go to K twelve's schools and and
Speaker 3: look at them, and I'm like, wanted to you do
Speaker 3: you want to be an Do you want to walk
Speaker 3: on Mars? Why not? Okay? And and try to inspire
Speaker 3: them a little bit.
Speaker 1: I love that. What what was your first uh like
Speaker 1: aha moment? Hey, I want to be an astronaut.
Speaker 3: I can distinctly remember when I was in elementary school
Speaker 3: and there was an astronaut that visited our our high school,
Speaker 3: and we brought the entire school together. It's Kansas, so
Speaker 3: a small school system. We brought everybody together and and
Speaker 3: you listen to them talk and and you realize, you know,
Speaker 3: that's just a person. They came from somewhere. You know,
Speaker 3: I come from somewhere. So why couldn't I do that?
Speaker 3: If that's something that interests me.
Speaker 1: That So, if you had the opportunity, or maybe you
Speaker 1: already know about it, would you go back up?
Speaker 3: Absolutely? The spaceflight? Is this on a personal level a challenge?
Speaker 3: Challenges everything you know about the Earth and yourself and
Speaker 3: the universe that we live in. And then just from
Speaker 3: being able to serve and do what we're doing for
Speaker 3: the country as well as for the world. You know,
Speaker 3: the space station. We're up there doing scientific research and
Speaker 3: we're learning about ourselves and the universe around us, and
Speaker 3: that knowledge is for the benefit of humanity, and so
Speaker 3: how could you not want to be part of that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, And you said, we're learning about ourselves. And I
Speaker 1: think that when we talked when you first got back,
Speaker 1: you were saying, you're kind of a science experiment for
Speaker 1: NASA right now.
Speaker 3: You know, you raise your hand and you can be
Speaker 3: a guinea pig. And quite a few different experiments, and
Speaker 3: so there was about a dozen this last time around
Speaker 3: where I was the test subject and they were looking
Speaker 3: and prodding and then sometimes shocking, and yes they were shocking. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we were doing some muscle stimulation, trying to see if
Speaker 3: that might be an effective way to avoid having to
Speaker 3: bring all of that heavy equipment that we have to
Speaker 3: use in order to do weight training. As we go
Speaker 3: to the Moon and on to Mars, mass and volume
Speaker 3: become really precious, and so we're trying to figure out alternatives.
Speaker 1: Oh that's so fun. Okay, So in the short term,
Speaker 1: you've got something that I am so jealous of, and
Speaker 1: any Dodger fan, any baseball fan, has got to be
Speaker 1: so jealous of. Tell us what you're doing this evening.
Speaker 3: Well, I get to go to I get to go
Speaker 3: to the Dodgers game tonight. Yes, and and get out
Speaker 3: on the mound and throw out a first pitch.
Speaker 1: Can you believe that? Are you excited?
Speaker 3: I am excited. Have you been practicing? I've if you
Speaker 3: may have caught me throwing a ball with my son.
Speaker 1: Your son is looking at you right now because he's
Speaker 1: here in studio with Is he practiced enough? No?
Speaker 3: That was a resounding no.
Speaker 1: Okay, So we'll be watching you. And as I mentioned,
Speaker 1: you can channel your inner show hey, because he pitched
Speaker 1: for the first time last All right, all right, Colonel
Speaker 1: hag NASA Astronaut, Space Force Guardian. It has been such
Speaker 1: a pleasure to have you. I wish we had you
Speaker 1: all day because I have like pages and pages of
Speaker 1: things that I questions that I would love to ask you.
Speaker 1: But hopefully we'll get to talk again soon, because I
Speaker 1: think that your journey is not over yet. Thank you Amy,
Speaker 1: all right, Colonel Haig, thank you, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: That's been Colonel Nick Haig in studio with us here
Speaker 1: exclusively at KFI. What a treat, that's been so much fun. Okay,
Speaker 1: this is KFI and kost HD two Los Angeles, Orange County,
Speaker 1: live from the KFI twenty four hour Newsroom. I'm Amy King.
Speaker 1: This has been your wake up Call. And if you
Speaker 1: missed any of wake Up Call, you can listen anytime
Speaker 1: on the iHeartRadio app. Go back and find out how
Speaker 1: you can break up with your phone. And if you
Speaker 1: missed any of our interview with NASA astronaut and Space
Speaker 1: Force Guardian Colonel Nick Hag, you can listen to that
Speaker 1: anytime on the iHeartRadio app. Also, I believe we're going
Speaker 1: to put this up on our website where you can
Speaker 1: go back and listen to all of the interviews that
Speaker 1: we've had with Colonel Haig over the past what year,
Speaker 1: year and a half, including video of when we got
Speaker 1: to talk to Colonel Haig when he was up on
Speaker 1: the International Space Station. That was just one of the
Speaker 1: coolest things ever. If you haven't seen it yet, you've
Speaker 1: been listening to Wake Up Call with me Amy King.
Speaker 1: You can always hear wake Up Call five to six
Speaker 1: am Monday through Friday on KFI AM six forty and
Speaker 1: anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app