Fantastic interview at Garage Logic’s studio…

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Please click on the above video for a shortened version of our Garage Logic interview. See below for the full interview.

5/6 We finally get to meet the traveling Lymans, Tom and Jessica, who were so spellbinding that they became today's episode

Please click on the above bold type to access the audio version of our interview with Joe Soucheray of Garage Logic.

After a difficult night for both of us, coughing and sneezing, we wondered how we got ready to head to St. Paul to the KSTP studio for our interview with Joe Soucheray and his co-hosts Chris Reuvers and Kenny Olson.

The idea of the 30-minute drive in traffic was daunting in itself, let alone being able to sit in the studio and tell our story as questions were posed to us. Once, we were greeted in the lobby by co-host Chris, who walked us down a long hallway to the Garage Logic studio.

Once we entered the studio, we forgot about our lingering coughs, and magic happened. Joe is an exceptional interviewer, and his two co-hosts frequently jumped in with thouhgt provoking comments and questions. Our interview was planned for 15 minutes, and it ended up taking up the entire show. We had so much fun it could easily have gone longer.

We’d both taken 12-hour doses of cough medicine a few hours before the event, hoping we’d make it through. Tom did well, although listening to the podcast later, it was easy to determine he was very stuffed up. I had to hold back a coughing jag on one instance. Also, the sound of my voice was unfamiliar when later listening to the podcast.

Our answers flowed with ease, along with Tom interspersing tidbits of humor, which he often does in general conversation. We all laughed with gusto on many occasions.

Over the past 9½ years of traveling the world, we’ve easily developed a way of sharing morsels of our experiences where we each take turns adding highlights of our experiences. Joe, Chris, and Kenny easily made this familiar banter flow with all the more fluidity than ever.

We couldn’t stop smiling throughout the entire interview. Telling our story only reminds us of how fortunate we are to live this unique lifestyle, be together as this well-matched couple during these experiences, and have developed a financial plan that allows us to continue traveling indefinitely.

Sometimes, it takes a scenario like this to remind us how grateful we are, especially after suffering from Covid-19 since April 20, when we first tested positive aboard the transatlantic cruise from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Southampton, England. Due to our positive diagnosis, we had to cancel our scheduled Queen Mary 2 cruise, sailing on April 24, arriving in New York on May 1, when we’d planned to fly to Minneapolis, Minnesota, to see family.

Not only were we too sick to go on the return cruise, but we continued to test positive until April 28, 29, and 30th, when we felt safe booking the flight from Gatwick Airport in London to Minneapolis for May 1, our original date of arrival after the Queen Mary 2 cruise.

Unfortunately, we purchased dressy clothes for the upscale cruise, which we won’t be able to wear when until we can use the full-fare credit for a future cruise on Cunard. We’ve had to haul those clothes with us this past month.

We couldn’t get a refund based on canceling last minute due to Covid. Hopefully, by the end of 2024, when the future cruise credit expires, we can book another cruise with this cruise line and use the credit. If not, it becomes another loss we’ve incurred due to the worldwide pandemic. Our losses over the past two years are in the $1000s.

Once we said our goodbyes to our hosts and thanked them for inviting us to the show, we headed back to our hotel. In the interim, we had a fantastic break from our current situation to revel in being guests of the Garage Logic show/podcast. We felt temporarily rejuvenated, but the reality remained that we had a way to go to recover from this dreadful virus.

With their over 2,000,000 listeners, we’ve received countless email messages, warm greetings, and hits on our website after the podcast aired yesterday afternoon. Thank you, everyone!  What a boost for us!

Thanks to Joe, Chris, and Kenny for inviting us to this special experience, one we’ll never forget.

Photo from one year ago today, May 7, 2021:

We later named this young male bushbuck, Spikey. For more photos, please click here.

Last night’s worst Covid symptoms yet!…It going in the wrong direction!…For both of us!..

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Today, we’re being interviewed by Garage Logic at their studio in St. Paul. How fun this would be if we were feeling better!

We can’t believe what’s happened. Just when we thought we were beginning to improve from having Omicron, I joined Tom in excessive coughing yesterday. He spent the day in bed sleeping and coughing off and on while I was feeling so well in the morning that I considered restarting my daily walking routine.

But, by 1:00 pm, I started coughing. I’d still had a tickle kind of cough that had diminished over this past week. Then, just like that, I started hacking and hacking and hacking. Immediately, I took a dose of the 12-hour daytime cough medicine we bought in the morning at the pharmacy.

It didn’t seem to help much. I kept coughing, and so did Tom, every time he awoke from his day-long nap. He needed sleep. He’d been awake, coughing all night for the past several days. On top of it, we both were sneezing and suffering from awful congestion. This virus is worse than any cold we ever had!

We tested positive on the ship on April 20. Today it’s been 16 days since that test. Of course, we tested three more times before we left England on May 1, all of which tests were negative. We used the most recent test on April 30 for flying from Gatwick to Minneapolis. At that point, we felt like we were on the mend. We handled the two long flights very well.

No, we don’t have a fever, don’t have body aches, and I am not experiencing exhaustion like Tom. Last night, after Tom turned over to sleep at about 11:00 pm, I thought I’d try to do the same. But the coughing was so bad I could not lay down. I propped up three pillows on the bed and sat up. I’d already taken the cough medicine at 7:00 pm and couldn’t take another dose until morning.

I sucked on sugar-free cough drops, one after another, finding a few minutes of relief in my throat. Finally, at around 2:30 am, I dozed off, awakening several times from coughing. This morning my Fitbit indicated I’d slept for 4 hours and 28 minutes, more than I’d expected to get.

This morning, Tom brought me two decaf coffees and two hard-boiled eggs from the breakfast buffet (mainly a continental breakfast). I chopped up the peeled eggs and added some salt and guacamole I had left over in the fridge. This will hold me until dinner.

Of all things, today is the day we’re scheduled to head to St. Paul at noon for our on-the-air interview for Garage Logic, Tom’s favorite Minnesota-based daily (weekday) podcast. The”boys” have been talking about our arrival in the studio for days. We feel we cannot cancel.

The interview will only last for 15 minutes. We can do this as long as we don’t start coughing while talking. We plan to cover for each other. The drive to the studio will be the most challenging part, but it’s only 25 minutes from our current location. After a quick stop to pick up something for dinner, we will be back at the hotel by 1:30 or 2:00 pm, so we won’t have to go back out again.

We’d hoped to spend Mother’s Day with our kids, but that’s not happening. We have canceled all plans we had made previously, telling everyone that we must play it by ear. We can’t imagine it makes sense to be around family when we’re coughing so much.

It’s hard to believe we came to the US to see family, have been here for five days, and haven’t seen anyone yet. This darned virus continues to impact our lives, one way or another. Tomorrow, we’ll share details of today’s interview and post the video once it’s available online.

Again, thank you for all the well-wishes we’ve received from many of our readers worldwide. It means so much to us!

Be well.

Photo from one year ago today, May 6, 2021:

Egyptian geese on the bank of the Crocodile River. For more photos, please click here.

Tom’s unique podcast story…Check out this video!…

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Listen to the above video with a mention of Tom and his daily participation on the most popular podcast in the Midwest, Garage Logic.

Tom has been listening to a radio show, Garage Logic, directly from Minneapolis/St in the US. Paul, Minnesota, his birthplace. In the early 90s, he started listening to the shows when, at that time, radio broadcasts couldn’t necessarily be streamed hours after a live broadcast. If he were working during the broadcast, he’d missed out entirely. Episodes may be found here.

A few years ago, Garage Logic was no longer associated with KSTP 1500 radio and began to conduct their podcasts, available on several podcast apps. A few years later, as the internet became enhanced, he could stream the past broadcasts, listening at his leisure to the two to three-hour broadcasts. There was no charge to listen to the shows.

During our years of world travel, Tom rarely missed an episode. It was easy to catch up once we were settled in our following location if we were on a cruise or during travel days. In most cases, the WiFi signal was sufficient to be able to stream the shows. Over the years, I started listening to it in the background while I was preparing a post. You know, we girls can multitask! But, as Joe says, about wives, girlfriends, and significant others, the CP, the Chief Procurer.

Also, over the years, I found the show to be quite entertaining, often leaving us both laughing out loud over the host’s unfiltered opinions and attitudes. Although we don’t always agree with their viewpoint, it’s entertaining listening, as with many podcasts. It’s those differences that often add to the entertainment factor.

Joe Soucheray is the show’s host, accompanied by his sidekicks who cover social media, news, traffic, and production, including Chris Reuvers,  Matt Michalski, John Heidt, Kenny Olson, and more. The show is newsworthy, funny, and ultimately entertaining. They can present information that doesn’t offend anyone and yet is rich in content and views.

Over the years, Tom would email them tidbits from “On This Date in Minnesota History,” which they often read on the show mentioning Tom’s name. However, while we were in lockdown in Mumbai, India, Tom began sending Joe Soucheray an email with daily updates from the site for ten months.

Instead of Joe using the site himself directly, he chose to mention Tom’s name every day when Tom sent in the information, rarely missing a day. When Joe mentioned this in each podcast, he always said, “Only because they come from Mumbai, India, from our friend Tom Lyman, it was on this day… And then, Joe reads the information Tom sent in, “On This Date in Minnesota History.”

Now that we’re in South Africa, as Tom continues to send Joe the newest updates, “On this Date in Minnesota History,” Joe says, “Only because they come from Marloth Park, Mpumalanga, South Africa, from our friend Tom Lyman, it was on this day…And then Joe continues with the story.

If you were to click on the February 23rd podcast here and scroll forward to precisely one hour, 18 minutes, 39 seconds, you’d hear Joe’s mention of Tom. We must admit, we get a massive kick out of this. In addition, they have invited both of us to their studio to record a podcast with them the next time we are in Minnesota, which will be May 2022. It will be our pleasure. No doubt, we don’t mind a little “press” from time to time.

Have a fantastic day, and continue to stay safe.

Photo from one year ago today, February 24, 2020:

There was no post on this date one year ago, based on the poor WiFi signal we experienced while on safari in Kanha National Park in India.