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How to Become a Guest Teacher at Treehouse, Woodworking, and Bibiliophilia with Elizabeth Kozup
9:49 with Craig DennisIn this episode we talk about guest teaching with project manager and bibliophile, Elizabeth Kozup.
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Hi, I'm Craig.
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Welcome to the Treehouse Show.
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The Treehouse Show is our weekly conversation with the Treehouse Community.
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[SOUND] In this episode, we'll be talking about guest
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teaching with project manager, Elizabeth Kozup.
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Thank you so much for being on the show today, Elizabeth.
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>> Thanks for having me, Craig.
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>> I was wondering if we could talk a bit
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to the students about guest teaching and what that means.
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>> We have nine or ten full-time teachers here at Treehouse.
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But there is a lot of technology out there, and we teach a lot of it.
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And not all of it can be taught by our internal teachers.
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So what I do is when they determine that, we want to teach a course.
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I look for subject matter experts to create that course.
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And then I basically manage the project
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from inception to execution when we launch.
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>> That's awesome.
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>> Yeah. >> How do you go about finding them?
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>> Wow, so there's a lot of different ways.
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First of all, word of mouth is great.
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>> Okay.
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>> The Treehouse team has a lot of, that's a really wide variety of experiences and
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people that work in different areas.
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So I get a lot of recommendations from internal members.
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>> Yeah.
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But I also go and look at who's speaking at conferences, and
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I look at who's speaking at a local meet up.
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I spend a lot of time on Twitter and Stack Overflow.
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>> Okay. >> To see who's answering questions.
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There's a lot of different ways that I look for people.
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>> Awesome, if somebody at home is watching this and like, wow,
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I can do that?
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I can teach in Treehouse.
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How would they go about getting a hold of you?
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>> We have a couple different ways.
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>> Okay.
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>> We have on the Treehouse site, we have a teachers page that really talks all
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about the different teachers that we have here.
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They're all listed out.
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So if you teach with us, you get to be on that page as well.
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>> Nice.
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>> But there's a link there that basically says I wanna teach a course or a workshop.
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And you put in the subject you'd like to teach,
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the content that you'd be interested in teaching, then it comes to me.
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And I go through them all, myself.
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>> Okay. >> And
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I do my best to respond as quickly as possible.
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>> Okay.
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>> Depending on whether or not we're interested in teaching the subjects.
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>> Okay, so are there subjects that we're chasing after right now,
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very specifically?
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>> Yes. >> What's that?
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>> Well, we're really trying to build out our design contents so
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we're trying to really refurbish that and refresh that on the site.
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We are also trying to do security courses.
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>> Mm-hm.
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>> We are doing QA content.
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>> Okay.
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>> We are teaching data analysis, and database information.
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>> Wow, okay. >> So those are some of the areas, and
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as you can tell,
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it's a really wide variety of topics- >> Right.
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>> That we're currently trying to teach.
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>> Right. So then that brings up interesting
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question that I've always had.
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>> [LAUGH] >> You can list that in a couple of these
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meetings with you.
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How did you go about doing that?
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There's this new topic area, here comes somebody to talk about it.
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You have to help scope and plan.
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How does that work?
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>> So first and foremost, I am not a programmer.
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>> Okay. >> I'm not a developer.
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I am a project manager.
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>> Okay.
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>> And part of being a project manager is understanding
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the basics around every component of that.
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So whether it's the actual teaching, the video production,
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the development pieces, I have to know a little bit.
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But I'm not an expert on any of those areas.
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So what I end up doing is just before when I'm looking into a subject,
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I spend a lot of time researching it.
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>> Okay.
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>> So not only am I researching the potential teachers, but
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I'm also looking into the subject itself.
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>> Okay. >> So I'm not an expert when I come into
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any of these meetings.
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And I'm usually pretty good at throwing that out there at the beginning.
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But I do have to be able to at least have a conversation about it.
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So I do look on Stack Overflow.
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I do research into the technology and the subject in advance so
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that I can at least have a basic understanding of what we're trying to get.
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>> Right, yeah.
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>> I also rely really heavily on you.
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>> Right.
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That needs specifically?
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>> Well sometimes.
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>> Okay. Yeah, that's true.
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That's true [INAUDIBLE] yeah.
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>> Depending now if we're working together.
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>> [LAUGH] >> But yeah,
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I rely really heavily on our teachers.
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>> Okay.
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>> Cuz in the end, they understand our curriculum and what our students need.
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>> Right. >> So,
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I really do have our teacher's guide those conversations.
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>> Cool. >> And
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try to keep them within the parameters of the course itself.
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>> Right, and that's next cuz nobody is doing that alone.
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Cuz this is a new thing to a lot of people.
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>> For sure.
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>> Some people might not like being in front of a camera, right?
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That might be a thing.
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>> No, some people really don't like being in front of cameras.
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>> [LAUGH] >> Yeah, so
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we actually have a couple different ways of working with our guests.
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People that want to be on camera.
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Absolutely can.
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We just ask for demo videos from them.
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>> Okay.
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>> But we also work with a lot of guest authors.
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And so they will write the content that is then presented by people internally.
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A lot of times if you go on our site.
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And you see two author names there.
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One of those is the content creator and the other is the presenter.
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>> That's excellent.
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>> Yeah.
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>> So you can kinda get a taste of if you want to get up in front of event, right?
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>> Absolutely. >> That's cool.
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>> Absolutely.
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Yeah, we start off with a demo.
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>> Okay. >> And with those demos,
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which is a short little snippet of just teaching something, something little.
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>> Okay.
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>> And that will kinda tell people whether or not they feel comfortable with it.
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>> Whether they like it or not, yeah.
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It's an interesting art.
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>> It is an art.
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>> Yeah.
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>> Yeah.
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>> So if somebody out there right now watching this, is like hey,
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I wanna do that or I know somebody who would be great at that.
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What sort of advice would you give to that person?
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>> Yeah, first of all, I recommend it.
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>> Okay. >> But teaching is not for everybody.
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>> Okay.
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>> Teaching is a very challenging job.
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We really do look for people that have either written books on the subjects or
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have prior teaching experience, or have spoken at conferences or
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even their local technology meetup.
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>> Right. >> So having done presentation or
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put together a presentation in the past is really important, because that way
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you at least have a basic understanding of what you're getting into with this.
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There's a lot of amazing developers out there.
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Not everybody is in a position to teach.
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>> Right. >> So
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it's really about what you're interested in as an individual.
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Some people really love sharing their knowledge.
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If you're the kind of person that loves pair programming,
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if you're the kind of person that is constantly going to meetups and saying,
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I really wanna learn about this next thing.
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And hey, I see you working on it too.
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Let's work on it together.
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That's the kind of person I think that ends up doing really well teaching.
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>> Awesome.
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My favorite question that I get to ask people like one of the show.
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What is something that somebody who went to the teacher's page and
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filled out that form.
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What might they not know about you specifically?
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I am really into wood working.
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>> Mm. Wood working.
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>> Wood working.
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Yeah. >> How so?
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What do you mean by that?
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>> About a little over a year ago now, I was looking for
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something to do in the winter months of Portland.
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>> [LAUGH] >> And
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found a program where I could just kind of learn how to build things out of wood.
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So I've built pantry for my kitchen and I just finished a rocking chair.
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>> How do you build a pantry?
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What do you mean you built a pantry?
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>> I was lacking space in my kitchen.
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>> Okay. >> And I built some cabinetry.
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[LAUGH] >> Okay.
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>> [LAUGH] And made a full-out cabinet for my kitchen.
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>> Awesome.
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>> Yeah. >> That's really cool.
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And then, what was the other thing?
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>> I just finished a rocking chair.
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>> A rocking chair that works?
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>> It does, it rocks.
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>> Wow. >> And it rocks the way it's supposed to.
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Not just because it's uneven.
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>> [LAUGH] >> Yeah, that was a challenge.
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Cuz you're working.
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The big things for me was working with new tools.
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Like different blades and to get the right angle for the rockers was really hard.
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>> Okay.
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>> But yeah.
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>> Awesome.
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Another thing that I have noticed about you.
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I can't seem to think of a time when I haven't seen you
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reading within five minutes.
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You are always reading.
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You're a bibliophile if you will.
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>> I am.
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[LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] You love the Kindle,
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you love the phone.
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If there's ever a hard copy around, you've always got a book in your hand.
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>> I do. I read a lot.
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Some people really like watching television, which is great.
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Some people like watching YouTube videos.
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I like to read.
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I read a lot.
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I like OverDrive.
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The library app is great.
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I love Kindle Unlimited.
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>> Yeah, I think you're the only person that I know personally that reads all
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the time.
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You're like, at the all you can eat buffet,
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you're the people who have taken all those books.
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[LAUGH] >> Yeah.
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No, my parents are both librarians so
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I was- >> Wow, that comes from a long life.
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>> I do, a long life of reading so- >> How many books?
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>> It is okay.
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It's impressive, I bet.
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Do you think monthly that you read?
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>> Monthly? >> Yeah.
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I probably read about 20 books a month.
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>> [LAUGH] Wow.
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>> But that's sometimes I reread books, to be fair.
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>> Okay.
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>> Sometimes I do reread, so if I've got a series and a new book and
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a series comes out.
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>> Might as well do it again.
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>> I might as well just start from the beginning.
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Which is really bad cuz some series of, I've already got 12 or 13 books in them.
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>> [LAUGH] >> So if I wanna get to the next one,
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I've got a lot of reading to do.
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>> [LAUGH] Awesome.
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>> So. [SOUND]
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>> Thanks for watching the Treehouse Show.
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To get in touch with the show, reach out to me on Twitter, or
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hit us up in the Treehouse Community.
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20 books.
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Man, I gotta catch up.
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