Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982

132 - Jeff Blair - Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982

January 26, 2022 Scott Townsend & Jeff Blair Season 2 Episode 132
Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982
132 - Jeff Blair - Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982
Show Notes Transcript

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As we approach our 40th year, I interview friends from my graduating class of 1982, The College High Wildcats. This class held the distinction of being the last graduating class of College High School before the name was changed to Bartlesville High School.  Sooner High School and College High were combined into one school called Bartlesville High School.

In this episode, I visit with Col-Hi Wildcat, Jeff Blair about his life as a veterinarian, life in France, living in Belgium as a kid, high school memories, cars and what advice he would give his 18-year-old self.

You can contact Jeff Blair at 

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Narrator:

Welcome to the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcasts 1982 podcast, brought to you by Deetsoman Production you know, you go to college and you're on this all star team. So I would tell myself that, really don't listen to that voice inside your head that tells you you're not good enough. And probably the other thing I would tell myself is get more sleep.

Amy Wallen:

Not everyone's gonna like you, but try to make them want to. Stil working on that one.

Kent Hudson:

People say, Well, I'm not going to have kids yet, because it's not the right time or I'm not gonna get married yet. It's not the right time. Well, if you keep moving the goalposts in life, there's never gonna be the right time. So enjoy your life.

John Hensley:

Do what you love for a living. Figure out a way to make that work. Don't Don't do something because that's what you're supposed to do, because it's gonna do something that makes you happy.

Mark Thompson:

Think, going to Landers for lunch... sitting around Jeff Blair's Mustang II and listening to his tape of Pink Floyd's THE WALL.

Scott Townsend:

Hey this is Scott Townsend. Welcome back to the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982 podcast and today all the way from France, is that right?

Jeff Blair:

Yes, that's right.

Scott Townsend:

...is Jeff Blair. Jeff, how's it going?

Jeff Blair:

Great. How are you Scott?

Scott Townsend:

Man, I'm doing pretty good. doing really good. This is so you're like seven hours ahead of me right now. Is

that right? Or it's 11:

12 here?

Jeff Blair: Yeah, it's 6:

12 just got home a little bit late getting home.

Scott Townsend:

You You've been working all day and I'm just now get my day started here. So yeah,

Jeff Blair:

That's why I look so old and tired.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, man. Well, it's great to have you on the show. I'm glad you did this. I know everyone's gonna enjoy catching up with you and hearing what Jeff's been up to.

Jeff Blair:

was certainly great for me to to see everybody else's video. I really enjoyed it. I just I don't know how I even fell into it. I don't I don't do Facebook or anything anymore. So I just something I got and started watching. I think I stayed up till three or four in the morning watching watching all the other videos was so interesting. No Yeah. Since watched. I think I've watched all of them, the ones that are available.

Scott Townsend:

Well, okay, first question softball. What do you have for breakfast this morning?

Jeff Blair:

Had a piece of toast

Scott Townsend:

that's what I had.

Jeff Blair:

piece of toast with some good, some good French Sheep's cheese.

Scott Townsend:

That's awesome. I had some cream cheese, which there's a big shortage of right now here. Oh, yes. Yeah. Everybody's screaming about cream cheese being in short supply. So we'll see. So you're in France. Yes. So let's get started here help me connect the dots between 1982 and now what? You've just graduated and you're off to?

Unknown:

Yeah. So I went to Oklahoma State. I decided like when I was 12 years old that I was going to be a veterinarian and Oklahoma State was the place to go to be a veterinarian. So I I went off to Stillwater and spent seven years in Stillwater through undergrad in vet school. And I graduated vet school in 1989.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, you and I graduated the same year. Okay. Yeah.

Jeff Blair:

So what was your degree? I don't know

Scott Townsend:

Journalism.

Jeff Blair:

Journalism

Scott Townsend:

I took the long route. I kind of fool around with KU and then OSU. Yeah. And got kicked out of OSU and then they'd let me back in.

Jeff Blair:

I didn't know that.

Scott Townsend:

That's another story. But yeah. Yeah, so I sat out for about a year and then came back and always the old joke and you've probably heard it on the other videos is I went through, who else was I telling this to, I went through four terms. The Ford, Reagan, Bush and Clinton terms. But anyway,

Jeff Blair:

okay, well, you finished

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. Yeah. So what did you so you graduated 89

Unknown:

I graduated and then I went back to Bartlesville. And I worked. I worked for John Manley for a year. Okay. As a Vet. Wanted to go back and, and get a doctorate. I had been working with my, one of my professors in vet school and sort of decided at the last minute to not continue into a Ph. D. program. And so I went out to Bartlesville to practice, because I thought I needed to try that. So it wouldn't, it definitely confirmed the, my desire to continue into a more scientific side of veterinary medicine. Okay. And so the next good way for me to go back to school was to join the Army. So I joined the Army as a vet spent several years in the army when all around the world went from San Antonio, to San Francisco to Italy, and then back to San Antonio.

Scott Townsend:

And I wouldn't have thought that the army needed vets. But I guess they do.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah. And so there are there are some military animals still left in military. At least, there were a long time ago, almost 20 years ago. I worked I could I took care of the Marine Corps, mountain warfare training center's, mules. They had, when I was out in San Francisco, they have a training center out in the Sierra Nevadas. And they have a string of about 150 mules. That was only a small part of what I did out there. But, you know, once a quarter, I had to go out and spend three or four days with the with the Marine Corps, helping with their mules.

Scott Townsend:

That's cool.

Jeff Blair:

But there are also the, you know, the working dogs and the drug and bomb detection dogs, the guard dogs that are mostly at Air Force bases. And the Army is the only one with vets. So a lot of times we are the we are the only army person on a ... ike I was at Travis Air Force Base near San Francisco, at a Naval Air Station in Italy.

Scott Townsend:

So the so you say that again? The Army is the only one that has the dogs?

Jeff Blair:

The Army is the only one that has veterinarians.

Scott Townsend:

Veterinarians, okay.

Jeff Blair:

And then there's a big food inspection part of that as well. Okay.

Scott Townsend:

So there was a, I remember the dog when I think of dogs, I think of the dog that attacked, was it Osama bin Laden or in the tunnels or

Jeff Blair:

When they found him? Yeah.

Scott Townsend:

Something like that. Yeah, dog was pretty torn up or something like that. But they got him all fixed up.

Jeff Blair:

I don't know that story. But it doesn't surprise me that a dog found him in that hole. Yeah.

Scott Townsend:

So after the, after the army stint...

Jeff Blair:

Well, after the army, I got with the army and they wanted me to go back overseas and I thought it was time for me to go back and get my PhD. That's why I joined. They didn't agree. So I got out. And I went back into private practice around Texas, and stayed in that for about six years. And then finally got to a point where I could go back to school, and I went back to Stillwater with full intention of going back to work for my old professor and continuing that project. Unfortunately, as soon as I got there, he just been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. Oh, man, he died about six months later. It's not funny, I don't know why I'm chuckling it was a very sad time. But I stayed on OSU and I found another project and was able to get a fellowship there. And I finished that, that PhD, and got an offer from one of the veterinary pharmaceutical companies to start going to work in their R&D. So I got my start in that with that company at a research site in Fulton, Missouri, where Jimmy Webb went to school and someone else sent their child to college there. Yeah, so it's near. It's near Jeff City and not not too far from St. Louis. With that company they offered me a position over in France. So I came to France with them. Somewhere in there, I forgot to tell you I had two children that were born. I have one son who's 29. His name is Garrett. And my daughter is 28 Lexi. Lexi is in San Antonio, and Garret's in New York. So at that period of time when I went back to grad school, I had been divorced. I started seeing my current wife there, but we never really lived together. She was a professor at a vet school down in Mexico. And I got this opportunity to move to France. And we decided to know if we were ever going to create a future together she needed to come with me and for her to come with me she, we needed to be married. So we got married, about three months before we moved to France, we still didn't live together. The first time we lived together, we arrived in France with five suitcases. And so we've been sort of doing the tour of France since then.

Scott Townsend:

How long was that when was that?

Jeff Blair:

That was in 2011. 2011. Okay. And very soon after we got here, we found out she was pregnant. And our little girl was born. Her name is Isabel, who was born in July of 2012. So she's nine now. And so I'm sort of having my second shot at fatherhood.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah, that's great. When you're working as a vet, what is it about being a vet that you like? What, what? What did you always think about when you wanted to be a vet? What was it about that, that?

Jeff Blair:

Well, there's the part of being able to take care of the animals and, and the interaction with their owners. You know, and just sort of providing that service. It's, it's, it's sort of cool. Vet School was a lot of fun. I learned a lot I it was, it was a big challenge. But what really turned me on was, was science and being able to sort of explore solutions on a on a bigger scale, rather than, and I didn't dislike taking care of individual pets or, or horses or even cattle. But now I feel like I'm sort of doing that care, you know, trying to put needed products for for animals out there on the market.

Scott Townsend:

Right, on a much larger scale, much larger scale.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah, not so much in direct contact, but still sort of contributing to the profession.

Scott Townsend:

So, one of the things I wanted, one of the questions I had here was, I remember I took French in high school, with Mrs. Barton, what was it like learning French? I mean, did you know it before you got there? Did you

Jeff Blair:

Oh, yeah. Before I came to Bartlesville, this time, before we graduated when I was in ninth grade, and I moved there from Belgium. So I'd spent five years in Belgium. And that's, that's where I learned to speak French. And our ninth grade year, I walked down to the high school to take the highest level French class they had and I finished that and never took French again in high school because they didn't have anything. You know, honestly, I wasn't really that interested in pursuing, you know, I'm sure they would have created a special program for me, but I was like, No way. I want to play football.

Scott Townsend:

Okay, so start over. So I didn't know that. So maybe this is a good time to go back. So you're not from Bartlesville or you are or your

Jeff Blair:

I don't know where I'm from, but we live but that when we moved to Bartlesville in ninth grade, that was the fourth time we had moved to Bartlesville Oh, since I had been born, wow. So my dad just got transferred a lot. Yeah, we and by that time we had moved probably nine different cities. Wow. Belgium was the longest I had ever lived in one place until I got to Stillwater and Stillwater still the longest I've ever lived in one place. So I had been I was at Limestone for fourth and part of fifth grade and became friends with with Richard Whitmire and all the Limestone kids, you know, Laurie, and Tracy and Chris, all those folks that we sort of, I sort of knew them when I came in ninth grade, but it's sort of an awkward time. Yeah, yeah.

Scott Townsend:

I didn't know that. Well, there you go. That's a that's, that was really interesting. So was he with Phillips or somebody? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Mindy Goodell talked about talking about moving so much. Her dad was with Phillips Yeah. What? What's it like living in France? I mean, what are some of the advantages to living there versus here?

Jeff Blair:

What's it like... they talk funny. But it's nice. It's where I think we're settled here. I think we're more immigrants than expats. Now, our life is here. You know, my daughter's in. She's nine. That would be third grade in the US. I think,

Scott Townsend:

so does she speak. I'm sorry for being ignorant. I just don't know. Does she speak French? Or does she speak English? And she's

Jeff Blair:

French is her first language. Okay. So that's where I was going is this is our life here because our daughter she is very French. Yeah. So French is her first language. She speaks English also, and Spanish, so my wife, so we speak all three around the house. And when when my daughter and I want to exclude my wife, we speak really quick, fast in French, and when they want to exclude me they speak really fast in Spanish.

Scott Townsend:

And I saw were in France,you guys have longer lunches than Americans. Is that right?

Jeff Blair:

Oh, it's it's a it's an overgeneralization. Oh, I had long lunches when I was in the US. So and most people like I worked in Paris for two years. And boy, you know, in that environment, we usually had a sandwich. There's a little cafeteria down, where you could go eat your sandwich. But you know, you take 15-20 minutes, you get right back on the desk.

Scott Townsend:

Right. Oh, wow. So do they have to they have a 35 hour workweek?

Jeff Blair:

Do and that's done by basically giving you more time off. It's not like you work, you know, 35 hours in one week. So a lot of times people that work for me now, they'll work 45 hours one week, and then the next week we'll schedule them so they only work 32. But then they have I don't know what kind of even know what RTT stands for in French. So I don't know how to tell you but there there is a category of basically vacation that you get every every two months. So I get an extra two days off a month. And I can you know, take a half day here half day there. It's pretty convenient. But you know, I got I think I get almost 30 days of vacation plus 13 days of that extra vacation a year. And they make you take it you know I've had to but now I'm old enough that I can I can put the extra time in a savings account so I don't have to take all that time.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. Eating is probably a huge benefit in France. I can imagine you guys have like I looked it up is 27 restaurants with three Michelin stars. I mean, France is certainly known for haute cuisine for the really fancy with little bitty dish. Very pretty. But you know if you go to a cafe here, you get a steak and fries They're apart from the famous sort of haute cuisine. The big stuff. Just a second Excuse me. No, no problem sorry, reminds me that politician on TV when his little kid came in the back door and his wife was trying to corral all the kids back inside the door.

Jeff Blair:

But, you know, the the French cuisine, for average people, it's kind of you see the same stuff on every menu. You know, there's, there's a much wider variety of things to restaurants in the US. There are a lot of them here. But as far as cuisines, you know, I would much rather eat Indian or Mexican or Thai, then, you know, the really fancy French stuff. Yeah.

Scott Townsend:

Well, for one thing, that doesn't seem like there's a lot of it, whenever they bring out those fancy plates, and there's a little dollop of whatever, you know, and like, I should have gotten McDonald's before I came or went to that restaurant.

Jeff Blair:

There in there are some things that that I really liked here. You know, foie gras, the first time I tried it was a little shocking. But then I've since sort of learned that, and that's, that's really good. And now we're coming into the time where everybody eats foie gras. So it's Christmas time, I can eat foie gras.

Scott Townsend:

I have to try that. I want to try that sometime. I've heard a lot about it. But I've never had it. I don't even know where to get it around here.

Jeff Blair:

I don't know. It's, you know, because we have foie gras here, we have really good duck and goose that you can buy in the grocery store. So the other thing that I really like is a duck breast that we cook here. And also some other preparations of duck.

Scott Townsend:

So I think that brings us up to speed as far as what's going in and Jeff Blair's world up to this point. Unless there's something else you can think of that we haven't discussed or how many animals do you have being a vet?

Jeff Blair:

I have two now. For a long time here in France, we didn't have any because we were moving all the time. We lived in a little bitty apartments. Before we came here to Angers, we were in Paris, and we had maybe 100 meter squares, I think 900 square feet. Maybe

Scott Townsend:

In your apartment?

Jeff Blair:

...in the apartment, and it was big. It was big expensive apartment for Paris. Wow. And then we came here and we bought a house. We're just like oh we have all this space we had like four bedrooms

Scott Townsend:

Going to be luxurious compared to the apartment in Paris.

Jeff Blair:

It's not like a luxurious house.just Wow, we got all this floor space. I can get in a separate room from from the girls.

Scott Townsend:

It's awesome.

Narrator:

Thank you for listening to the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcasts 1982 podcast and we'll be right back after this

Scott Townsend:

Pops Daylight Donuts man they've got the best tasting doughnuts, sausage wraps pastries in ne Oklahoma. And also if you'll tell the staff there. Hey Scott Townsend said to give me a large spicy pig. They'll give you a free large spicy sausage rat. But you have to tell him Scott Townsend sent you so tell them Hey, Scott Townsend told me to tell you to give me a large spicy pig. So there's the offer. There's the there's the call to action. So go to Pops Daylight Donuts. Say hi to mark for me. And yeah, go to Pops Daylight Donuts and get you some. If you've enjoyed this podcast in 2021 You have my patrons to thank for that. A bunch of Wildcats got together and created a GoFundMe account to help in the production of this podcast. So with that in mind, I've started a Patreon page so that listeners can help support the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcasts 1982. podcast on a month to month basis. So please check out my Patreon page, patreon dot Calm forward slash Wildcats 1982 And now back to the show What, the let's go back to Bartlesville you know in high school I was looking you still have no you still have your your yearbook?

Jeff Blair:

No, when I when I moved here to France I put every possesion I owned out in the front yard and the auction house came by and sold every except, you know, like my underwear and socks and shirts. Right? Suitcase. And that's how I got here. So I don't unless it's at my mom's house in an attic that

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. So I was looking through there and I saw I don't know about.. maybe I'll flash some pictures up here for people to see but it looks like you were in Hi-Y, you went to northeast Oklahoma State University with Kent Hudson and you remember that for Boys State? Yeah. Yeah. And the girls like, Tammy, no, Trisha, Yeah, that told me to stay the hell away from politics. Heinz, and Margaret. Ogilvy or somebody like that. Did it really?

Jeff Blair:

Yeah.

Scott Townsend:

What was it about that? But

Jeff Blair:

oh, it was we had this sort of mini election. And I don't know exactly what we did. But what I remember is they had an election and it was a popular vote in the way these guys were going around, just making stuff up. I don't want to have anything to do with this.

Scott Townsend:

Was this at College High or was this at the state level? The state thing you went to?

Jeff Blair:

This was at the state thing.

Scott Townsend:

Okay.

Jeff Blair:

This was the the the Boy's State.

Scott Townsend:

All right, okay.

Jeff Blair:

Northeastern.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. So it starts that young, even. Kids learn real quick, how to finagle the vote.

Jeff Blair:

I guess.

Scott Townsend:

And then you were an FHA officer? Looks like you were with...

Jeff Blair:

Troxell?

Scott Townsend:

Let's see here. Let's look it up and see what it says here. Nothing. Nothing incriminating here, but

Jeff Blair:

if me and Troxell were doing it together, I have no memory of it. And I highly doubt we did anything.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, man. Well, let's see here. Oh, come on. I could be wrong. It seems like well, I'll keep going here. And I'll keep looking...all district football team.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah.

Scott Townsend:

And you were pimpin, the McDonald's restaurant ad at the at the back of the

Jeff Blair:

I worked at McDonalds

Scott Townsend:

Oh, did you?

Jeff Blair:

Yeah. I was like the assistant manager for a while.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, wow. So it was you and Chris Zervis and Phil Pasqua in the picture with Laura Eastman.

Jeff Blair:

Okay, yeah.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, okay. So you worked at the McDonald's. What was your... now Mark Thompson, I talked to him. Did you see his...?

Jeff Blair:

Yeah,

Scott Townsend:

He talked about, I asked him what his fondest memories was and he said it was something like sitting in your car listening to Pink Floyd THE WALL.

Jeff Blair:

Surprised he said Pink Floyd. Because what I remember about that car and the music, is I had one tape. It was Stevie Nicks. And it was stuck and I couldn't get it out. So the only thing I could listen to was Stevie Nicks. And you just had to turn the tape over, you know, the tape had one of those did one that automatically versus So you, listen to one side, then you'd listen to the other. Even now, if I hear that song, White Winged Dove, it has a particular guitar intro. And if I hear that I just turn the radio off real quick.

Scott Townsend:

Well, now that was one of my questions, too, was what song takes you back to'82 hen you hear it?

Jeff Blair:

Well, that went in a bad way. No. Good way. Yeah. I enjoyed that. There was a song by Electric Light Orchestra. Yeah, I think when we were sophomores and I just remember walking into the football locker room with all those huge seniors and they were playing that song. I can't remember how it goes now but I remember Electric Light Orchestra and they would play it over and over and over. I was just terrified of those guys. That song brings back shivers as well.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, wow. That's so cool. It's really weird how memory works. What were who were your friends? Who did you hang out with in high school? You mentioned Mark Thompson.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah, I'm working on...

Scott Townsend:

What car was it that you got?

Jeff Blair:

It was a 79 Ford Mustang II hatchback.

Scott Townsend:

Okay,

Jeff Blair:

That was really cool. It was wheels. I didn't care.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. So Mark, Richard Whitmire.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah, Richard and I were really close for a long time until college and I kind of lost track of him. So if you ever have if you can track him down, I'd really love to hear from him.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah, okay. Yeah, you're not. You're like the second person that's mentioned him. I can't remember the first person but yeah, so

Jeff Blair:

There was Jimmy Webb and Steve Cramer. Kent Hudson. Chris Zervas. Yeah. Matt Newman.

Scott Townsend:

Just talked to Matt interviewed him.

Jeff Blair:

Oh, yeah?

Scott Townsend:

Last week or two weeks ago. Those will be coming out in January.

Jeff Blair:

Remember, Todd Meyerdirk?

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. I'm interviewing him next week, I think.

Jeff Blair:

Great. And then Lori List, Tricia Heinz.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. Yeah.

Jeff Blair:

Diane Honts

Scott Townsend:

Lloyd Honts was her dad. He, he was one of the scout guys, Troop 11 I think it was.

Jeff Blair:

Lisa Hutchins and Rhonda Rizzo. And all the First Baptist Church, you know, all the group, people that you know, you saw, so six days a week instead of five.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. That's cool. So when you think back to College High and high school senior year, what's the funniest thing? I mean? Do you have any fond memories of high school? Is there a funny story that you think back on that? Pretty that you can tell?

Jeff Blair:

I wish I was a good storyteller. It's been a long time. Yeah. Uh, the worst part of senior year was, Zervas's Dad put braces on me in the second half of my junior year. So I had braces until I was a sophomore in college.

Scott Townsend:

Oh, wow.

Jeff Blair:

Which

Scott Townsend:

Hey, you know what? I was just the opposite. I had braces when I was in the third grade. I think it was which was too young. Really. I don't understand why they did that. It was this wasn't Chris Zervas, this was back in Texas. Where I grew up and I got hit in the mouth with the baseball bat, playing catcher and the kid reared back to hit the ball and these were back when the braces were like super metal you know? They were like

Jeff Blair:

And mine were too! When I was senior in high school. Yeah. Chase girls own to go out there with me. Ugly brace face Get away from me.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. So anyway, the kid hit me in the mouth and reared back and hit me in the mouth and my lips were my lips were just like hamburger. They were they were stuck to the braces. And yeah, it was just gross. It was literally had to pull the lips away from the braces and golly what a mess. Anyway. Yeah, so I had braces when I was super little, which is probably just as bad as having braces. I don't know. Well, I don't know, when

Jeff Blair:

Where you trying to get dates when you're in third grade?

Scott Townsend:

No, but I really don't know why they did that. But to tell you the truth. But anyway, it seems like when I was growing up, I was always going to the doctor, always going to the, coarse I was the firstborn. And so, you know, there's a million pictures of me. There's always going to the doctor. And by the time my third brother comes around, there's no pictures. There's no you know, I'm exaggerating, but you know how it goes. Anyway, so where were we? Oh yeah, the funny story. So the worst story was getting braces.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah. And I listened to Donnie talk about that run to the through the basketball championship. I do remember that time that was really I was charged up for those guys they were they just sort of turned on a dime and became this this unbeatable team. Yeah. It was such a letdown when they did lose that game. Man that was fun while it lasted.

Scott Townsend:

Were you part of the prank or any kind of any of the senior pranks that went along with the pigs or the car?

Jeff Blair:

was sort of peripherally involved with the with the car thing. But the night they stuck it in the school I had to I had to I had to close McDonald's. So okay, by the time I got off work, they were they were finished. How did they get it in? One piece at a time. Wow. Not one piece at a time but you know, take thing off of a little MG car frame like that. It's not very heavy. And you get four high school guys around it. Yeah, it's easy to cart across into, into the doors even.

Scott Townsend:

So how did they get in?

Jeff Blair:

Well,

Scott Townsend:

or should do we meed to say that or save that for someone else?

Jeff Blair:

I think the Jimmy Webb had to add a copy of the key.

Scott Townsend:

Okay, we'll just leave it at that. Yeah. Cool. Well,

Jeff Blair:

...all the all the doors being missing from the restrooms? But something you should ask Jimmy about too.

Scott Townsend:

Okay.

Jeff Blair:

Mr. Mallums was really angry about that. Oh, yeah. That one almost got us in. Big Big Trouble Richard and I stole a bunch of sheets of plywood from from a new house being built. Because Because Coach Ripley wanted them for the weight room. He wanted big sheets of thick plywood to go under the the weights and stuff. And I looked back then, we probably stole $1,000 worth of wood in today's money. One of those big 5/8 sheets of plywood. Very expensive.

Scott Townsend:

They're expensive. Yeah. Wow. Looking back on your graduation, I'll try to wrap it up here. What advice would you give your 18 year old self? Knowing what you know now?

Jeff Blair:

Well see, it's not spontaneous for me. I've had time to think about it.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah.

Jeff Blair:

saw your other videos. But I would tell myself that your mistakes won't kill you. But your reaction to them might. You need to learn to forgive yourself.

Scott Townsend:

That's huge. Yeah. I totally agree.

Jeff Blair:

Yeah. I carried a lot of guilt for a long time. Oh, yeah. So

Scott Townsend:

yeah, that forgiving yourself. I'm just thinking about I was just thinking about that last night. You know, you've got it's you should like yourself. Yeah. I was like, you know, you love others. Almost like the commandment. But it's another thing to like somebody it's like your family, you know? Yeah. You love your cousins and whatnot. But it's another thing to actually like them, you know?

Jeff Blair:

Yeah. You'd want to hang out with them.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. So you know the same thing for myself. Literally, I was thinking about this last night. You should love yourself. Okay, but you should also like yourself. Yeah. And to like yourself, I guess there's a lot of if you don't, if you don't give yourself a break and forgive yourself for things that have done then it's hard to like yourself.

Jeff Blair:

That's very true. It's a it's a great coupling of my thought

Scott Townsend:

You, so you like yourself now?

Jeff Blair:

I do. Yeah,

Scott Townsend:

good.

Jeff Blair:

I like my life. I like my family. We're well situated. We got no worries. Yeah, the universal health care here. So Oh, yeah.

Scott Townsend:

I read about that toolo you guys have like, yeah, health care for everybody there. So I guess that's cool, huh?

Jeff Blair:

Oh, yeah. You know, I don't know about you, but when I had a business and I was trying to provide health insurance for my employees, you know, I'd, I'd really worried about making that payment. Because, you know, if someone got hurt or had got sick, and they didn't have insurance because I hadn't paid the premiums. But here we don't have that worry. You know we just... my daughter Isabel was born three months early. She spent three months in the in the neonatal ICU, you know, 24 hour care. You can imagine how much that would cost in the US. Yeah, We walked out of there, we didn't pay a dime. They said " thank you very much." And they were just like, "Take care of her." It was....that was my introduction to the French health care, and the the quality of care. It would, it would be if I was in the US, I wouldn't be saying, Wow, that's really good care. So quality is equal to or better than what you get in the US. That's interesting. You know, US Healthcare. There's my soapbox. US healthcare is a for profit industry. And here, it's not. Yeah. So if you have a for profit industry, people are making money. It's gonna be really expensive. And here, you know, you can go and get a little medication, some Tylenol or something at the pharmacy may cost a few, a few cents. But that's, that's one of the big benefits plus all the time off, you know, getting paid. And I feel like I'm semi retired sometimes with all the, the, the working the working from home that we do now. And all the time I have to take for vacation.

Scott Townsend:

Well, how was COVID? For you guys? I guess the same as it was here?

Jeff Blair:

Same? Yeah. You know, we've except, I think the response over the long term may prove it was it was a little different. Instead of laying people off. The French government allowed companies to put people on unemployment. But they still kept all of their rights as an employee, there was a temporary unemployment. So the government started taking over their salary. So people here if they got sent home, for the most, there are some jobs just they they got fired, you know, some restaurants closed or, but but for the most part, people got sent home, they continue collecting a check, it was a little bit smaller than what they were used to. But as soon as things got a little better, the government ended the program, you went back to work. I wasn't I didn't get on, on unemployment. I run a site here and I just, there was no way I could, I could not be there every day. I continue to go to work. I have a team of about 15 or 20 people now. We we run a research site. And we have animals out there we have cows that are milking cows and you have to milk them twice a day, we have pigs up there, we have dogs and cats. So you know, you got to be out there feeding them and take care of them, even if you're not actually doing any research because there's no researchers around. So I stripped down to a skeleton crew about six or seven people. But I had to keep going in support them and provide veterinary support for them.

Scott Townsend:

You know what I'm thinking about? You and animals. And we're talking about COVID, and the virus and the shutdown and all that stuff. I think about the bats. I'm thinking about bats and they are, they are saying that it came from bats, you know, and so what, what are your What are your thoughts? What do you guys know about that's,

Jeff Blair:

That's true. Those people that figured that out are So a bat way on the other side of the world. And then people on really smart. And bats are a known reservoir of all kinds of viruses, something about their, their lifestyle and their immune system. They are a huge reservoir of all kinds of nasty viruses. So the way that they genotype that virus there's no doubt to the smartest people in this field that that's a bad virus. Yeah, it's a bad virus. the total opposite side of the world are having to deal with something the bats messed up. Yeah, and as a veterinarian, that's one thing I worry about we we are continually coming into contact more and more with wild species and those kinds of diseases that jump from animals into people. Those are the kind that become pandemics or epidemics. So no, we have no immunity to them. So we we worry about that as a profession. The whole health care system worries about it people who do that kind of disease surveillance for the WHO and stuff. They're very worried about something coming from an animal and getting into people.

Scott Townsend:

But as we go into 2022, what, what are you looking forward to and what concerns you?

Jeff Blair:

I'm looking forward to being able to travel. You know, that's one of the big reasons we wanted to come to Europe was just be able to, to travel easily. And to travel back to the US. It's kept us from visiting our families. So we had plans to go back at Christmas this year. We planned it last year, so Okay. Surely by Christmas, everything will be settled down. There won't be a problem but we cancelled those plans a while back. Yeah. Hopefully we can come next summer.

Scott Townsend:

Do you plan on coming back for the reunion?

Jeff Blair:

If I happen to be in the area.

Scott Townsend:

in the States? Yeah. What's your biggest concern with 2022?

Jeff Blair:

Well, there's COVID. But I don't have a lot of worries. You know, we can sit and worry all we want about politics and about viruses. I don't have any acute worries that I lay awake at night about.

Scott Townsend:

That's good. Yeah. It would be bad if you did have if you kept up at night worried about stuff. And so, you know, any last parting words to the Wildcats listening watching out there?

Jeff Blair:

Oh, gosh, I just really appreciate what you've done here. And I appreciate everyone who's participated. Please participate. I'd especially like to hear what's happened to Billy Winter. You know, she's a veterinarian, also.

Scott Townsend:

Billie Winter. Oh, okay. Yeah. I didn't know she was a veterinarian. I

Jeff Blair:

I think I saw it somewhere. But she didn't go to OSU with me anyway. So I'd like to hear her story. Harter Ryan, Steven Shifflett. Steven Riddlebarger. Harter Ryan, yeah. Charles Pendley and Philip Pasqua, Margaret Ogilvie. Just all these names keep coming back after seeing those videos. Yeah,

Scott Townsend:

he's in town right now. Oh, he is? I think so. Yeah.

Jeff Blair:

Get your lasso...go get him.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah, he's in town. So I usually do these interviews via Zoom, you know, because everybody is so far away. But yeah, might find out what he's doing while he's in town and try to get him and James James Jones and some other

Jeff Blair:

Oh, yeah. James Jones. Mike Teague. Mike Teague. I haven't heard, I haven't heard about him in a long time. Jack Trotter

Scott Townsend:

Jack's in town I think yeah.

Jeff Blair:

Oh, and Joe Wallace. Joe Wallace is in St. Louis. Oh, yeah. And I may have an old contact for him, or a contact that I had when I was near St. Louis. I'll try to send you the email.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. And that's usually how this thing works. Like some who was it was talking to Scott Crawley. And then I went to another person that person recommended Keith Richards and then Keith Richards, Todd Meyerdirk, and Todd Meyerdirk, you know, so it's kind of funny. It's really, you know, people might wonder how do these people get selected? They don't get selected. It's just whoever's, you know, just like what you did, you know, so then I go through and start trying to

Jeff Blair:

In so many that that I've looked at, you know, I didn't know many of the people that are I didn't know, well, the people you've interviewed, man, it'd be so much cooler to go back and get to know people. You know, if I can do high school again.

Scott Townsend:

Exactly. Yeah, that's exactly the way I feel.

Jeff Blair:

Instead of staying in my little narrow lane.

Scott Townsend:

Yeah. That's one of the things I I've probably said this in the last three, four videos podcasts that I wish Yeah, just like what you said, I wish. I feel like I've wasted 39 years not being friends with everybody and all of a sudden, I'm, you know, everybody, of course we're in a different place these days. You know, when you're in high school, you're, you're all you're scared to death and at the same time we think you're cool or trying to be cool and you're trying to fit in and all that mumbo jumbo. Now guys, like you and I and everybody else... school of hard knocks, life happens and you realize that you're just glad to be alive. It's kind of the big, life is the big equalizer. Jeff, I really appreciate anything else you want to talk about before we

Jeff Blair:

Thank you Scott. No, I think we've gone a lot longer than I thought we would.

Scott Townsend:

Well, no, that's good. It was good. So yeah, it's

Jeff Blair:

I have some French people coming over for dinner so I've got to go clean the kitchen.

Scott Townsend:

So for Jeff Blair, this is Scott Townsend. Thanks for watching, listening, to the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982 podcast. Have a great day. And we'll talk to you later.

Jeff Blair:

Thanks. Bye everybody. Hope to hear from you. See you on the video.

Narrator:

Last of the Col-Hi Wildcats 1982 podcast is a Deetsoman Production. Visit the Last of the Col-Hi Wildcasts 1982 YouTube channel. Listen on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.