When did being busy become a badge of honor—and sitting down require a defense attorney?

In this Morning Brew, Ted takes a humorous look at overflowing calendars, retirement without rest, and projects that somehow create three more projects.

Beneath the laughter is a question: Are we giving our time to what matters most? From neglected friendships to the struggle to say no, this episode encourages listeners to make room for people, prayer, and simple pleasures.

Drawing on Jesus’ invitation to rest, Ted reminds us that a full calendar doesn’t always mean a full life.

Pour some coffee and pause.

Bootlegging wasn’t just a big-city business. In Part 2, we follow the whiskey trail into North Idaho, where Canadian liquor, border roads, and thirsty customers made Bonners Ferry and Sandpoint busy crossroads of Prohibition.

Discover a cigar store caught with Canadian whiskey, a bootlegger carrying bottles in a blanket, and a sheriff whose whiskey dealings betrayed the public’s trust. We also explore Sandpoint’s hidden underground spaces, separating documented history from colorful local legend.

Then we head for the racetrack, tracing how moonshine runners, skilled mechanics, and daring drivers helped lay the groundwork for NASCAR. Along the way, Smokey and the Bandit provides a familiar connection to our region’s love of loud engines and fast cars.

Beneath the adventure lies a deeper question: What happens when talent serves temptation? This episode considers consequences, compromised trust, and the hope faith offers through repentance, forgiveness, and the courage to choose a better road.

An icy mountain road, a powerful Buick, and a one-armed driver named Ray: welcome to the Whiskey On Wheels.

In Part 1, Ted follows Edmund Fahey, a roadhouse owner in Spokane who discovered that bringing Canadian whiskey across the border could produce handsome profits—and dangerous adventures.

Along the way, we explore why America adopted Prohibition, how bootleggers modified their cars, and the network of ferrymen, helpers, and corrupt officials that kept liquor moving.

Fahey’s recollections include whiskey buried beneath railroad coal, visiting lawmen, and a hazardous crossing over the Kettle River on a railroad trestle.

Connections to Breaking Bad and Smokey and the Bandit bring this history into familiar territory while raising questions about motives, judgment, and consequences.

The episode closes with a glimpse of Part 2: Whiskey In Our Backyard. We look bootlegging through Bonners Ferry and Sandpoint, hidden downtown rooms, and a sheriff whose handling of confiscated whiskey put him on the wrong side of the law.

One misplaced word can turn a harmless text into a family emergency—or make Terry’s latest message nearly impossible to decode.

In this Morning Brew, Ted shares a few memorable text mishaps and wonders how punctuation, abbreviations, and voice dictation complicate everyday conversation.

Should we text, call, or send an email? Each has its place, but something special happens when a handwritten card or letter arrives in the mailbox.

From birthday wishes to thank you notes, taking a little extra time can mean a great deal. Perhaps the best way to reach someone is the one that shows we truly thought of them.

A wandering donkey helped lead Noah Kellogg to one of North Idaho’s great mineral discoveries. But finding a fortune and owning it turned out to be two different things. In Part 2 of Who Owns The Treasure we follow the Bunker Hill claim from the hillside above Milo Creek into an Idaho courtroom.

Kellogg and Phil O’Rourke had a stake in the discovery. So did the two men who supplied Kellogg’s grubstake—and the donkey.

Their disagreement raised a question worth asking even today: What happens to a promise when keeping it becomes expensive?

We hear both sides of the dispute, uncover the court’s surprising decision, and see how a patch of gray rock helped shape the Silver Valley. There’s history, a little courtroom suspense, and a donkey named Bill who may have done the most memorable work of all. My donkey, Solomon, meanwhile, is reviewing his legal options.

In 1885, North Idaho’s Coeur d’Alene mining country was alive with prospectors chasing rumors of gold, silver and sudden wealth. Among them was veteran prospector Noah Kellogg, whose latest grubstaked expedition seemed destined to end like so many others: with dwindling supplies and nothing valuable to show for the effort.

Then his borrowed jackass wandered away.

When Kellogg tracked down the missing animal near Milo Creek, he found it standing beside an outcropping of galena, the silver-bearing lead ore that would help transform the region.

But where history ends and legend begins remains open to debate.

Did the donkey uncover the ore, merely lead Kellogg to it, or receive credit because North Idaho recognized a wonderfully good story?

Part One of this story explores the famous discovery, the birth of a mining fortune and the unlikely four-legged prospector who became part of Silver Valley folklore.

But one troublesome question remains: If the donkey helped find the fortune, who owned it?

That will be explored in Part 2 of our next podcast!

The mystery of Paul Spear continues—and grows even darker. In Part One, we met the hardworking, one-eyed lumberjack who vanished from his Cocolalla farm sometime before World War II. His companion, Bruce Anderson, claimed Paul had taken a train to Oregon, yet Paul left behind his new automobile and was never seen again.

Part Two follows Anderson into Washington, where he was arrested while using another missing man’s identity and attempting to claim his money and property. The resulting murder investigation led authorities from a Spokane-area chicken ranch to the smoldering remains of a hay barn near Athol, Idaho. A burned body, an engraved belt buckle, a revealing diary, and Anderson’s contradictory confession eventually sent him to the gallows.

But did Bruce Anderson also murder Paul Spear?

Years later, the old Cocolalla farm produced still more questions: a message hidden inside a Mason jar beneath concrete, stories of a haunted house, and an alleged human skeleton buried beneath manure in the chicken house.

Some details are documented. Others survive only as recollections, rumors, and folklore. Nearly ninety years later, Paul’s fate remains unknown. We can examine the evidence, consider the possibilities, and remember the man—but all we can finally do is wonder.

Years before World War II, a hardworking, one-eyed lumberjack named Paul Spear lived on a small farm near Cocolalla, Idaho. Neighbors remembered him as pleasant, sober, and dependable—a man who tended his orchard and beehives when he wasn’t working in distant logging camps.

Then Paul disappeared.

His friend and farmhand, Bruce Anderson, claimed Paul had taken a train to Oregon for a new job. Letters bearing Oregon postmarks seemed to support his story. But no one remembered seeing Paul board the train, and troubling questions soon emerged. Why had he left his new automobile behind? Why was Anderson driving it? And what should people make of the disturbing rumors beginning to circulate around the valley?

Then Anderson disappeared too.

In Part 1 of this 2 Part North Idaho mystery, we follow the unanswered questions surrounding Paul Spear—until a familiar face appears in a newspaper and the story takes a chilling turn.