David Pruitt on Icon Idaho, Digital Marketing, and Balloon Artistry

On this episode of the We Share podcast, Alex and Julie sit down with David Pruitt, the digital director at Sandhill Media and co-owner of Icon Idaho, a board game convention. David shares his journey from working at Disneyland to becoming a software engineer and digital marketer, all while embracing his love for board games and event organizing. He talks about his unconventional upbringing, including learning balloon artistry from his mother—a professional clown—his experience serving a mission, and how those skills ultimately shaped his career.

David dives into the origins of Icon Idaho, a convention dedicated to board games and tabletop RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons, explaining how it grew into a thriving community event held every April and October. He emphasizes the value of taking initiative, encouraging young people to create their own opportunities rather than waiting for success to come to them. Throughout the conversation, he shares humorous and heartfelt stories, reflecting on the role of faith, perseverance, and fun in both business and life.

Transcript

Makeup make a board game convention happen. That was just the goal I set for that year, about three years ago. And then I just followed through. And then I met, my business partner, John Young, who had been running Icom for years before that. But they were very tiny. They maybe had about 200 people showing up. They were, you know, really cramped in their into their small building over in downtown Idaho Falls.

We built it up. We got the website, we got everything kind of built from there. And since then, I mean, we've been growing year after year. We're gonna go from three days this year, compare the two we've been doing.

Today on the We Share podcast, we're joined by David Pruitt, the digital director at Sand Hill Media and co-owner of Icon Idaho convention for board Gamers. Welcome to the We Share podcast. I'm Julie, I'm Alex, we share ourselves and we provide a platform for others to share. We believe everyone has a purpose and a story to tell. And we're back on the We Share podcast.

I'm Julie and I'm Alex and it's coworker we share. Yeah, it's we are so lucky to work with such an amazing group of people. Yeah. With all that talent among us, we have to highlight a few. And so we we tend to rotate and we've had some deejays on, but today we have David Pruitt, our digital marketing director, who hails originally from California.

Dad, balloon artist. I, I'm really interested in the loon artist distress in the corner of our icon game boards by convention. So he's he's got his hands in a lot of different things. Other of three I believe he he might have to correct me on that, but just he's such a hard worker and he's got a team amongst him there that he's brought on with him.

And we've just been growing and it's just fun to watch. So welcome David Pruitt. Yeah, thanks for having me. Hey, David, I always feel like in every work atmosphere, if you work with, you know, a group of people and your peers, there is usually 1 or 2 that you can look at that can do just about everything in the building.

Anything south of the DJ studios. David's got a handle on. Right. He's the guy that can go to and fix everything for us. So. David, welcome. Yeah. Welcome to. We. Sure. Yeah. We're. I'm happy to be here. Hey, guys, tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you end up in Idaho? Yeah. So, I guess the story begins with I was in California, and, it started when I worked at Disneyland because I'm actually from Anaheim.

And, the fun story for me on that would be, Oh, I might get emotional. But what was for me is, I was working at Disneyland. I was 18, 19, 20 years old, and I had a car. I had a girlfriend. Things were going great, if you were to look from just, you know, I look from the, you know, the outside like a snapshot.

Everything in my life is going wonderful. That makes any sense. But I was probably one of the most miserable people on the inside, if that makes any sense. Yeah, I think a lot of people can identify with moments in time like that. I believe it, and I'm yet again, I was young at the time, so it's kind of like, why is this such a miserable thing?

And it's mostly because I discovered in my life I was missing something very important. I didn't have in my feelings the spirit with me, or I didn't have God influencing my life. I didn't have anything like that going on. And, I told God in prayer because I believed in prayer at the time that if he was, willing to work with me, I would work with him.

And I made a deal with him, which was really funny. I told him, just because I had some LDS background in my, my upbringing, I said, I will go on a mission. That's what I made the deal with. I will go on a mission. If you give me a girlfriend, it's just before that. But once he gave me, if that's the word for it, because I met once, he delivered.

Once he delivered good on his. And if that makes any sense. Because literally, I said that prayer on December the 24th, 2008. Yeah. On December the 25th, 2008, I had said that prayer if you get me a girlfriend, I'll go on a mission in one year's time. On the very next weekend, which was New Year's Eve, I met my girlfriend, who I dated for the next year, and then I started my job at Disneyland, and I was miserable as heck.

And that's when, on December the 24th, I met someone very special in my life. Her name was Deanna Scherrer. And she was working with me as a coworker at Disneyland selling balloons and, you know, glow sticks and that kind of stuff. And it was really fascinating because she happened to be LDS herself. And yet again, two of the day is what how crazy that was.

I said that like at midnight on December the 24th, just before Christmas. That makes any sense. And, we were walking back at about midnight because that's when Disneyland closes back to the thing, and it takes us about 15 minutes to walk that backstage route. And she said, you know, I happen to be LDS. I have a missionary out, that kind of stuff.

I'm like, oh, that's funny. I'm sort of LDS myself. She's like, how come you're not on your mission yet? And I'm like, my, my girlfriend doesn't want me to go. And then I, she's like, well, you should dump your girlfriend. I was like, whoa! And then it all floods back to me. I made a deal, and I wasn't ready to serve a mission at that time.

So I ended up working a little longer. But I started going meeting with the missionaries, preparing, and I then served a mission to Minnesota two years later. Following that, I got back to California after my mission and I wanted to go to school, and so I went to BYU Idaho. I studied software engineering, and, that's where I met the love of my life, my wife, which I'm sure she'll be so grateful I mentioned her on here.

Well, yeah. What's her name? Of? My wife's name is Jamie. Okay. She's from Utah. She, was an elementary school teacher. Lovely. The gal that Diana. Diana. Have. Does she know that she had such an impact on you. Oh 100%. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah. See, she's the one who, helped me pretty much understand. She was the one who brought me to singles awards after that, if that makes any sense.

Because the family award, it's. There's a weird stage in a man's life when he turns 18, and all your friends are about a year or two younger than you in the priest quorum, if that's the way to look at it. And it was just like, I don't want to go to Elder's Quorum, that's going to suck. Oh, yeah, I don't want to.

It's to the old man. You're either too young or to all. Yeah. And then in California, there's a big disparity. There's no one between the ages of like 20 to 40. So, I mean, they've all left and gone to school. And so you're kind of as a man on an island. Pretty much. Yeah. So I got lucky that she was there in my life to, to directly affect my course of how I got to Idaho.

So I love the timing of it being Christmas Eve. It's like almost like, was it God or was it Santa? I sure deliver out whatever the higher being that you believe in. I actually appreciate so much about that story that you had the faith, because sometimes it does take a delay for us to figure out, oh, that was the higher power speaking to me.

And he's like, David, you stinking idiot. So he puts Diana in your life, and then you're like, oh yeah, that's right. Well, you've got the girlfriend right away. But then you had to have the wake up call the girl with a message saying, and you're like, oh yeah, I didn't make up a deal. I think we've all bargained, but God, I don't.

Conspiracy theory. Yeah, I think as a parent, you expected all three of us are parents. You expect your kids to bargain with you. I think God expects that two from us. It's not. Doesn't mean he's going to give in. No, but just wants us to wax our negotiator sessions. Yeah, yeah. Flex those motions a little bit. We're okay.

He knows at the end of the day who's got the the reins, the power. Yeah. Okay. But before we talk about BYU Idaho, we had a hit on the balloon artist at Disneyland. So what? Like why the why that avenue? There's so many positions available at Disneyland. And that's where you landed. Yeah. So I was actually a professional balloon artist, at the age of 12.

Not when I started Disneyland. Really? Yeah. So were you a self-taught balloon artist? No. I actually went to clown school. Funny story for that. You ever go to. This is why we have people like, who knew there was a clown school? He's graduated. Clown school is official clown. Okay, tell us all about clown school. Sure. So it's called the Western Regional Clown Association.

It takes place in left Nevada, usually about the second week of November. And my mom had, it gets complicated, but at the end of the day, she got hit by a bus. She gamed amnesia, she forgot who she was, and then she kind of had a midlife crisis. Kind of happened because she was married to my dad.

They got divorced after that at some point, but she ended up starting clowning because that brought her, I guess, joy, because some people just have that feeling for it. Well, true. Well, you're sharing something, your gift with kids or adults and making them happy. That has to feel great. Yeah. So, she she went down that path, and when I hit about 12, I was living for my dad at the time.

She wanted to spend some time with me, so she figured, why not take him to Las Nevada at a casino? I think it's done. Loveland's casino. I can't be 100% sure. I think that's a perfect place for a young boy. Exactly. So I would spend the whole week there, and I would, I would do balloons and magic and juggling and all the other funny stuff on that kind of thing.

And, it was a lot of fun. And I did that for a couple of years in a row, and, they would have contests and competitions, and I would win them, and then I would go home and, during the summers I would spend with my mom, typically, I would go to the fairs and I would do balloon art and that kind of stuff, because I wasn't as interested in the face painting and the, the clowning around.

I didn't really like dressing up as a clown clown. I was an introverted 12 year old, if that makes any sense. But when you put, like, the mask on, if that makes any sense. It was terrifying for me. And so I went the other route with it. I was like, I'll do balloon art, because at least that's something I can do as a craft.

And, I've won awards almost every year, at least from the they call them Junior Joeys because that's what a young clown is. Is that Joey not a clown, but like a kangaroo? Yeah, exactly. Like a kangaroo. Yeah. So I won those competitions, and I just kept the skills up, and I would go and do birthday parties.

When I was at home, I'd make like $100 an hour. It also affected my grades directly because, you know, what do I need school for? If I can make all this money already? Yeah, right. Right. Okay, I got to point out he is not our only guest that was put in positions like this. Do you remember our first guest late in learning?

Yes. Was in his high chair in a bar while his mom played music, like. Yeah, at the at the bar. Just because she needed to. She needed to make money for her family. It wasn't like, Forrest Gump at the bar, right? No no no no no. Yeah, yeah. So I had the same kind of situation. Your mom is trying to make some money, but she's got you with her and she's like, okay, let's combine these two activities and I'll have David with me.

And here we go. How interesting then, clown. Yeah. Does your mom still is she still? My mom is a clown. But she generally speaking, at least for the last decade or so. And she just retired, this year or so. She's been doing face painting before, so she travels all the fairs on the West Coast, which is why I've been to pretty much every fair on the West Coast.

I'm kind of over fairs, not to say anything more about that, but, Yeah, we we went to Tillamook, Oregon. We went to Prescott, Arizona. We went to most of the California ones, Nevada ones, Oregon, Washington and all that. So I've, I've hit the whole West Coast all throughout my childhood, just doing all the fairs, making balloons. My brain is just like, rolling through, like book titles, like, my mom is a clown.

Yeah, I actually have one if you want to hear one. What is it? Yeah. So it's, my dad thinks he's funny, and my mom's a clown. Here I am, yeah, you can write a biography now. Over down, like. Yeah, I mean, it's it's what, makes life interesting, though. Stories like. Yeah, we do. There's a lot of flavor to David because of that.

What's the biggest lesson you learned from being a professional balloon artist? Oh, clowning around? Yeah, sure. Definitely one of the biggest skills I gained, which definitely helped direct me in my life later on, was just, how to talk to people in a general sense. You know, I'm a software engineer by trade, but most people probably wouldn't have guessed that about me.

Mostly because if we were to do stereotypes about software engineers, people they dirty, gross, can't communicate what a technical problem is with someone who doesn't understand technical stuff. And, I mean, having served a mission was also good because it allowed me to be like, I can talk to a big group of people, no big deal. Rather than most people who go and start a mission.

They're terrified to talk to anyone specifically about Jesus or anything like that. So, there's a lot of good skills and just the entrepreneurial ones in there as well. Like, I figured out what my costs were, what it takes to do something. And it's how good money out of business for, I don't know, I, I've been in business for 20 years.

I've had about six of them now. Yeah. This is so awesome. So you serve the mission in Minnesota, you come home, you begin school up at BYU Idaho, you meet your beautiful wife, Jamie. How did you land at Sand Hill Media and start working in the radio version of software engineering? Yeah, sure. So, I got my first internship just out of, out of BYU Idaho.

It was with my father in law's business somewhere in Kansas, but it was a remote, so I just stayed here, and, that was miserable. It was just doing databases and not to make it boring as heck, but, it was boring. I don't even know what databases are. That's how bad it was. So then I ended up finding a second internship.

It was with a man named John Seale. He's up in Rexburg. It was with, at the time, Air Interactive. I think it Snellville. There could be a few other names. I don't know what's happened since then, but, it was a digital company, and I was doing websites because I initially went to school to become a video game designer and developer, because I was very into video games and board games and that kind of stuff.

And I discovered that that industry is incredibly toxic. If you like, work 80 hour weeks, and that's just, you know, a baseline and make sure you hit deadlines. It was not something I wanted to go on with my life. I wanted to have my downtime to actually have fun and do something and be a dad. Yeah. Balloon. Yeah.

And board game ballooning. Yeah. I'm boring. Yeah, yeah. So, then I got that job and I had taken the LDS course. How to find a job, how to get a better job. There was a self-reliance course. If you guys are familiar, I actually teach that class up at BYU Idaho. Not that one, but I teach the emotional resilience version because they have different ones.

And so, yeah, yeah, that's really beneficial. But it's all volunteer. So good job at taking it. I better not take that course because I need to stay here for longer. Yeah. So, while I was doing my internship there, there was three other guys who were also doing web development with me there, and it was a digital marketing company.

So they were doing things like Costco and other businesses like that, just even in their local area to even the national area. So he showed me the things I didn't earn my degree, how to make websites faster, how to do, you know, just the things I didn't learn about. And I got really good at it really quickly because it was, in my opinion, really easy for me.

I don't know why, I just felt that way to me. So I was teaching those guys, and then John was basically giving me, all the things I wanted to do to, you know, actually expand up, I think because it was an internship and actually didn't just learn from him. I also grew on what he knew and as well as what I could learn and know as well.

So I then took the self-reliance course and the promise because I don't know what it is about me and God making deals. Anytime I make a deal with him, he usually follows through. It says, if you will take this course, you will find a better job or you will find a job. By the time the end of this is in like four months or something like that.

And I took him up on it and I said, I will do everything you ask of me and I will make it happen. And since then, I and this this is the funny one. I've had 60 some interns here. Now at Sand Hill Media Group, and I talk to them. I teach them all the things I do from the self-reliance class that I learned.

I'm like, you got to communicate. You got to find the secret job market. You got to find people that talk to you, that kind of stuff. And I did that when I did it. And, the way I found this job was it was, I think, on ZipRecruiter or something. And which is, which is one of the worst ways to find a job, by the way.

But that's how I found it. I met Knapper going, which is Jim Burgoyne's son here. And then he offered it was for, a WordPress developer position and then when I met him, he's like, David, you're going to do all this digital stuff. I don't know anything about that. But I was like, I will be willing to learn and I can do all the other stuff that I think you guys need and that kind of led me to the job I have here now, not as a WordPress developer, but they gave me the digital marketing position because they said, you need to build the digital department.

Digital is the way of the future, and you're going to have a lot of opportunity to see, like exponential growth that takes place here. So far, it's been kind of where we have now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sandhill is growing tremendously. And for those who don't understand radio, it is so much more than tuning in in your car.

It is become so much bigger than that. It's one of the unique media outlets that has actually transitioned well into the digital age. Newspaper is dying. They haven't done as well. Transition TV struggles a little bit. They're getting better. I think they were a little slow catching up, but they're really trying. Radio's done a great job of creating, digital products for the terrestrial radio audience, which is you've got to keep up or else you can get out of business.

They just fit so well together. Yes, they do. So when we're seeing digital images, if we have that audio auditory message embedded in our brain and just sticks better. And so and I know both Alex and I appreciate all the work you do. Could you help us out on a regular basis? I know I'm the girl that's like, okay, I just got this email.

Let's run down to David and see if it's going to like break my phone. If it's spam. Yes, like I don't I just don't trust myself. But I know that he'll just look at it immediately like, yeah, I don't know. I'm not scared of. So you, you you love your job. Is it fair for me to say that?

Absolutely. Yeah. You love your job. But that entrepreneurial spirit, was still festering inside of you. You've done it since you were 12, so you got to keep it up. So tell us about your game convention. Yeah. So I, I run with John Young. I come board game convention, which happens every April in October. The way I got into that was actually kind of a funny sandhill story.

After the end of the day there we have, sales. He was the national sales. God, Keith. Yeah. Well, Keith, he set up a career fair because the FCC has rules for us at the end of the day to say, hey, you got to go out there and you got, you know, outreach to the community, give back to the community.

So we set up a job fair, and we did that with, the snake River Event Center. And I just was, I used to go to a place called Salt Con down in Utah. It's exactly what I've implemented here. They they're much bigger than us. But I knew the guys down there, I was like, what would it take for me to just implement that here?

I just kind of thought about it. And like, I have every resource I need right now. I know pretty much most of the local community, at least the people who own businesses. I, I already know the person at the events center who I probably, you know, got me a deal or something like that. I also know that if I worked away that I can make a win win win situation with Sand Hill and the snake River events are an icon.

I can make it happen. So I just put that down as a goal because I'm in the young men's program right now and they have us do physical, intellectual, emotional and, when there's one more spiritual goal. That's right. Yeah. So I did it with them. I set it up. I'm like, make a make a board game convention happen.

That was just the goal I set for that year. About three years ago. And then I just followed through. And then I met, my business partner, John DeYoung, who had been running Icom for years before that. But they were very tiny. They maybe had, I don't know, 200 people showing up on a semiannual basis. And then they were, you know, really cramped in their into their small building over in downtown Idaho Falls.

So we, we built it up. We got the website to we got everything kind of built from there. And since then, I mean, we've been growing year after year. We're gonna actually go from three days this year compared to the two we've been doing, in the past. And it's coming up. What's the membership? Yeah, it's the number.

You're out now. So we're doing I think it's $25 if you buy before April this month, and then it's 35 for the three day event, for the icon convention. Oh, sorry. Am I a Christian investor? I was that wrong, like, you were about 200 members before, and it was icon. What were hanging out in the five hundreds now.

So we more than doubled. Great. Great job. Okay. For somebody who's never been to a gaming convention, explain it. Because I think they might just be thinking video games, but that's not it. Oh, there's actually no video games there okay. Yep, it is board games. It's also role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons. If you're a super nerd like me, you'll probably end up, oh, like some people we see an office with with cardboard swords.

No no no no, that's that's that's LARPing. That's LARPing. Yeah I know, yeah. Dungeons and Dragons is a very popular board game that, big groups play all the time. You will see them at the library, though. Groups get together and play at the library, or they'll play at a gaming store or, you know, in an apartment up at BYU, Idaho or whatever.

So. So it's board games, Dungeons and Dragons. What is the most popular? Oh, I don't know. I mean, the main attraction for it is, is that we have over a thousand board games to try. So if if monopoly is your kind of game or, you know, maybe some there's like a tan anything like that. If you know board games you might want your family.

Did you say Settlers of Catan? Oh my gosh I never heard of it. Oh, super popular too. That's even like, Settlers of Catan. Yeah. I need to get out more. My, my favorite thing about so there's a good ten is just something I make fun of in the church is if you are Mormon and roughly young are interested in board games, which most of them typically are with that culture, it's like you have to have faith in Jesus.

You have to repent. You have to get baptized, receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Then you got to play Settlers of Catan. Yeah, it's the next step in like Mormon families for this. And then they don't know they hate each other at the end. They're like, they gotta settle a like, okay, we argued, we still love each other.

But man, like, that's what Settlers of Catan. So I grew up playing sorry. Trivial Pursuit. Those will be their monopoly. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So those are some of the the classics is what I would call that. But we have a lot of board game conventions, exhibitors, those kinds of guys and games from that, the histories that were really great games that this were maybe too expensive to buy or anything like that.

That I have games that cost like $500 that that makes sense just for one game. And it's in a box like, you know, like a suitcase. Like a suitcase, essentially. And so, I mean, there's some really interesting games to play there that you can do socially. And then additionally, a lot of people, specifically me, whenever I try to play board games with my family or my in-laws, they look at me and they're like, I don't want to play with you.

You're going to win. I'm like, just because I play good doesn't mean I don't want to play with you. You're more than welcome to beat me, but I'm not going to make it easy for you. Yeah. So it's been nice because I can find other people who are hot headed and strong. Hit it like me on that, that we can, you know, actually have a lot of competition there, if that makes.

Yeah. You found your battle egos. Yeah, yeah, I can imagine. What's the most unique game you have? Oh, jeez. Most unique game that that's that's hard. So I guess as far as for me personally, it's probably the modules I've made for Dungeons and Dragons. I have one called Better Than Life. And what it is, it's, it's a medieval France kind of era where there's been a murderer going on with like, a Jack the Ripper kind of character.

And, it's your job to solve the mystery, which is really fun. I've made a whole book about solving the mystery. It's a D&D campaign that we play. And then the, as as far as icon goes, I think the big game right now that people have been enjoying is called heat. It's this little race card game where people will, you know, you're basically in like, Formula One cars, if that makes any sense.

And you roll the dice. It's not even a dice game. It's actually a card game where you're trying to to win the race. But if you get too much heat, what ends up happening is your car overruns and you'll spin out, and then you have to, you know, slow down and go back. So it's, it's a lot about taking risks, but so is it, like Uno, you draw the card.

I don't know. Or, like, sorry, but more extreme. Okay. Do you do the traditional card games like Pinnacle Bridge? So, my, family is specifically my dad's side. The family started me with cribbage when I was about. Oh, let's see. Cribbage? Yeah. Yeah. We would also play poker and blackjack and 21 and hearts and, so, I mean, I've played all those.

I played all those, too, but that's who was not allowed to play cards. So you got. I learned to play solitaire in my at college though. She hit it. Yeah. She's like hiding solitaire in her bedroom. I hit a blackjack table in Vegas just as someone else puts money down. Yeah, I'm good with numbers. I, I find it funny because there's, like, cultural things.

I find in the LDS church I didn't know about. For example, I think there was a movie in 1980 with, I think, Tom Hanks, and it was about him going crazy, playing Dungeons Dragons and killing his friends in a cave or something like that. And so like when I started playing D and D, when I was about 18, my dad was like, you can't be playing that.

You're gonna be doing double worshiping. I'm like, double worship? Not really. I just think it sounds scary. It kind of like, I don't I'm not a fan of dragons or dungeons. It's be the hero of your own adventure, like I. I'm thinking of The Count of Monte Cristo. I was going to come down in the dungeon and like, people are going to be shackled and know now scenario.

Yeah, right. Well, maybe you should. Yeah, you're right, I do. But I don't even understand. Right. In this scenario, the, Count of Monte Cristo is a board game there. Oh. Really? See themes like that? There's even like John Carter, if, you know, the Mars, the Mars one. That that makes any sense in the in the bad.

No. Okay. Yeah. It's a I think it came out in the 40s or something like that. I could be wrong on that. But I do know that predates me. Yeah. You're kidding me, too. Just slightly. I know it's very popular. A lot of people though, but. Yeah. So you mentioned $25 if you buy before April, $35 if you buy after and it's on the 28th, you said, it is the 26, 27 and 28.

Okay. How do people get a ticket? So if they go to Icon gaming.us, they'll find how to buy a badge there. And then that's what they need to do. Or they can do it at the door and they can just show up at the snake River Event Center on the Thursday, Friday or Saturday. It starts at noon on Thursday and it's all day for the next two days, starting at 9 a.m..

Yeah, it's as easy as that. All ages. Yeah, that's the cool thing. This is a very kid friendly event. That's the best for we have games for kids and that kind of stuff, too. We let anyone under the age of 12 in for free. That's just something that we do for fun. And then teenagers, we have a discounted rate for.

And than adults have a, the cost that I mentioned. So Easter baskets get your tickets. So you could do that. That would be fun. And you could because I'm all about experience gifts. You know, that's my favorite. And this would be an experience gift. This would be going with your family members and doing that to, set myself up, like build up my ego.

Before I went because I guess you're going to get I will lose a lot. Yeah, I, I'm actually the David of my family. Oh, my, my kids are always like, you're always winning, right? And, so we choose games that I'm not as good at. Like anything that that's cards and counting cards. Yeah, I like, I don't like charades, Scattergories, Pictionary, that kind of stuff.

There's some social games there too. I like a game called werewolf. If the figure out who's killing everybody. Oh, I played werewolf. There you go. Yeah, okay. I don't like killing things like I. That's fair. I did in the tennis court. I like to kill my opponent. There is no tennis. But maybe there's a, like, a smaller version of tennis than a in a board game.

Okay. Did we miss out on anything on icon games? Anything more you wanted to cover about that? If if you guys do consider to come, like I said, we do this every six months in October and April, I would highly recommend if it's your first time ever. Like, if it was something that you guys did for the first time, you would probably want to go with a friend.

It's much better if he has something to play with. Go with a friend. Yeah, it's, it's less scary. That's the first part, I'd say on that because I think. Yeah, just not as intimidating. I don't know about this, but if you can go there, you can go and check out a game together. And then if you guys look around, you might say, that looks like fun.

Maybe you can join in. And that seems not as scary to people. Going by yourself is kind of, I would say maybe more intimidating. It's just my personal thoughts on it. What about food? Is there food available? Yep. You can buy foods there. They usually have. Not those pizza, pulled pork sandwiches, that kind of stuff.

Lovely. Lovely. Okay. If. Yeah. Where do we want to go. Yeah. Well I was going to say we could ask him about his life advice we've learned all about. Oh yes. Yeah. So we ask everybody on we share too because it's about sharing to give us something about their life. Maybe the life lesson you live by, maybe a motto, maybe a silly story that taught you something.

You have three children, I can't remember. Are they all girls? Oh, I have a girl and two boys. Okay, a girl and two boys. Okay. So I mean, would it be life advice you would want them to leave for them? I don't know if I'm the best parents. I don't know if I'll give parental advice. Do you teach them balloon art.

You have. Yes. They're a little too little still. They have seen it. And they beg me for it all the time. Oh, I'm sure they're like. My dad is amazing. Yeah, I'm sure they. I would think if my dad was like, yeah, yeah, I would think that too. But yeah, as far as life advice, if I was to give any, probably be career advice, it's probably something I've helped because I've helped more than 60 interns actually find jobs they want to be in.

It's have initiative. Honestly, a lot of people today wait for something good to happen to them. Why don't you just do the good or become the good? You want to see? A lot of people. Like, it's the same thing with me starting at the board game convention. It's because I wanted it here. I didn't want to travel down to Utah anymore.

But yet again, having initiative is probably the biggest lacking skill that I see with most of the youth and younger people this generation. It's why don't you just do something about it today specifically if you're like 16? I'm like, you have no bills, no taxes, really. You have no really big worries. You're fed every night. You have a bed.

Probably go do something with your life. Don't just play video games all day. Do something that's, you know, kind of get you to where you want to be or be the change you want to be and just have initiative. Great advice. I like that. I mean, yeah, yeah. Don't wait. I live with in town. You did, share multiple stories with that where you wrote something down and then you made it happen and that's where it starts, right?

Just take action, start moving. Well, that leads me to ask, you've completed the goal of icon. Oh, yeah. Have you written down a new goal? And do you want to share it with us? He's going to write the book. Like my mom was a clown, right? Oh, gosh. Yeah. I guess for me, the thing that I would do, so, so every year I do my, my eight goals that that makes any sense with, two spiritual, two physical, two, intellectual and two emotional ones.

I have not been doing so good with my physical ones. That's actually the one on the weakest that I don't like working out, and a bunch of other funny things. It's not fun to me. So I've been trying to gamify lately. So I've been playing Beat Saber at night. If you don't know what that is, it's a VR headset game where you have two lightsabers and you're just basically like attacking.

So it's actual physical activity. Yes, but it's not boring. Just do a thousand reps of this. Yeah. So you're combining one passion with something you don't really like. It's called habit stacking. Yes. Yes, totally is habit stacking. So that's that's my big one I'm trying to do because I'm, getting a little softer in the center. I notice he's got a great dad by.

That happens after three kids or three kids, especially with dear, the girl that my husband used to say to me, why do we why do I gain weight with you with every pregnancy? But you lose it. And I don't like it. I don't equate it to bowls of ice cream. I get a lot of ice cream. While I was pregnant.

Yeah, I ate a lot of peanut butter. That was my thing. And Chinese food I like. I think I like the salt. Yeah, I think you do need extra salt. Something about growing a baby. Yeah, well, David, thank you so much. I knew there was so many layers. And when Alex said she had asked you to come, I'm like, well, that's perfect.

Yeah, I know we can. I know a few little stories. I do think I remembered you were a balloon artist or something about Disneyland. And I'm like, I just always follow my promptings when I invite guests on or I meet people. I'm like, yeah, I had David on. He he needs to be on, and he didn't know exactly why.

But now I do. Now, after spending time with you, we've probably only tapped the surface there for more. All right, David, thank you. And, from both me and Alex and a special thank you for always helping us and being such a great coworker. Work life smooth. Yeah, we appreciate it. Thanks for having me. Thanks for joining us today on the We Share podcast.

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