The Betty Brigade with Sharon McRill

Sometimes our attachment to stuff can be detrimental to our relationships and even our health.  Listen in at Sharon McRill from the Betty Brigade breaks down simple strategies for decluttering our lives.

Transcript

[background music]

Bill Krieger:  Hello, everyone, and welcome to "Me You Us," a well‑being podcast. It's another well‑being Wednesday here at Consumers Energy. I'm your host, Bill Krieger. Today, my guest is Sharon McRill. She is the owner and operator of The Betty Brigade, and also the author of, "Downsizing the Silver Tsunami." Sharon, if you'd introduce yourself, we'll get the conversation started.

Sharon McRill:  Hi, I'm Sharon. I am a 20‑year purveyor of people stuff.

[laughter]

Bill:  Nice synopsis of what you do. [laughs]

Sharon:  The Betty Brigade has been around for 20 years. We help people sort through their things, help them organize it, figure out what they want to keep, figure out what they don't want to keep, help them sell that stuff that they don't want to keep, donate, trash, recycle every layer of stuff.

We send stuff to beneficiaries all over the world. We work with all different kinds of recycling services. Things like that.

Bill:  Great. For the audience, Sharon, I keep wanting to call you Betty. I know people do.

Sharon:  They do.

Bill:  Sharon and I met at the storytelling event for Big Hearts for Seniors. When she told me her story, I was fascinated because I've lived through a couple of house clean outs. Gosh, I wish I'd known about this service at the time.

Let's talk a little bit more about Betty Brigade. What is that? How did it get started? Why did it get started? What kind of services do you provide? Lots of questions in there for you.

Sharon:  As I mentioned, Betty Brigade has been around since 2003. I started Betty Brigade because I got downsized from my corporate job. I used to work at Borders. I worked in their merchandising department as a project manager.

I took my project management skills from my corporate life, and I applied them to a residential model. Lots of lists, lots of figuring out how things work, and that's basically how it got started. The sadder story is, I was laying on my couch watching Oprah feeling sorry for myself.

She was having one of those, "Live Your Best Life" shows. I was like, "Well, I'm at least as smart as those people." I made a list of what I was good at, and a list of what I knew how to do. Those are two different lists. That's how The Betty Brigade was born.

Bill:  That's pretty amazing. I have to say that Oprah Winfrey changes lives all the time. It's funny that you mentioned that.

I remember watching Oprah Winfrey years ago, and one of her books from her book club was "The Secret." I read that book, and it changed my life. I don't know if it changed everybody's life that read it, but it really changed how I view things, and how I did things. It's interesting that there are people out there who can do that through different media.

Sharon:  Absolutely.

Bill:  You made your list, you checked it twice, and came up with The Betty Brigade. What was it like starting out, and how did you offer your services to people?

Sharon:  I started off just reaching out to friends and family. My mom was my first client. She had a room that was just full of stuff that the doors wouldn't even open. She said, "Hey, would you clear out that room?" I said, "Sure." I started clearing it out and a friend of hers came over and said, "What are you doing?" I said, "Hey, I'm clearing out this space."

She said, "Well when you're done with your mom would you come to my house because I haven't had the heart to go through the stuff since my husband died? I need some help." Her friend was my second client.

Then one of my friends who I worked with in corporate life said, "What are you up to? You're not around." I said, "I've been clearing out my mom's house and her friend's house." She said, "Do you think maybe you could run some errands for me, and help me organize my house?" I said, "Sure."

That was kind of how it got started. Then that particular friend, who is still my good friend, she lives in San Francisco now, she and I sat down with a bottle of wine, and basically worked out what it would be like if I started this as a legitimate business. We started mapping it out in a much bigger way.

Bill:  I hear a couple of things in there, and some of the stuff we talked about before coming on air. I hear helping people clean out, helping people organize, and also helping with moves. You offer multiple services, depending on what someone needs.

Sharon:  Correct. We didn't start off with the move piece. The move piece was an evolution of the business.

We started with just organizing and helping people with errands. We don't really do the errand piece so much anymore. What we found is that most people are more interested in having a professional organizer, or having someone who really knows what they're doing with relocation, or clearing a trust, or an estate, and helping make that smooth process.

They might be going through a divorce, grieving the loss of a loved one, or something's going on in their family, and they need to let that piece of property go.

Bill:  You bring up something interesting to me, the loss of a loved one. At least in my limited experience, I've noticed that when people lose a loved one, they tend to have difficulty in letting go of things that they associate with that person. It can be as little as a coffee table, but it can be as big as a whole basement full of stuff.

Sharon:  You are not kidding. [laughs]

Bill:  Let's talk about that. What happens? You're not a trained psychologist, I don't think.

Sharon:  Nope.

Bill:  You've seen this enough. What happens when someone suffers that loss, and now they can't let go of that stuff.

Sharon:  That's really the tricky part. Every person puts a different sentimentality on stuff, and some people are not sentimental at all. We have literally pulled up to people's homes, and there is family photos inside trash bags already, and they just say, "I don't want any of these because the people in the photos aren't important to me."

I get that, but then there are other folks who say, "Every single piece of paper, piece of cloth, piece of thread is important because it reminds me of the person who is no longer here."

It's about putting some priority on what really is important because every piece of thread is not important. It's important to clarify that to the client and say, "Let's keep the things that really make your heart light up. Let's keep the things that are really meaningful to the family or meaningful to the historical importance of some history of the family." That's important, too.

It's a lot like archaeology, what we do. It's fascinating work, we get to learn a lot about our clients. Sometimes we know more about our clients than their family does.

Bill:  That's interesting. I guess by sometimes going through stuff and doing the archaeological dig, you do learn a lot about people.

For instance, we always knew my father‑in‑law was in the Navy, but until we went through his things we didn't realize what he had done in the Navy, and how he had served. Through looking at film and all those things, we got to really get insight into his life, stuff we never would have known because the stuff was in boxes in the basement covered in dust.

Do you find that quite frequently, that there's a lot of stuff that does have meaning that just no one ever sees it because it's in this box somewhere?

Sharon:  Yeah. People are saving the stuff they think is important, and they put it away thinking, "Oh, OK. I need to keep this safe and protected," but then it gets forgotten.

We really encourage people to use their good silver, use their good china, use the stuff. Put the pictures out there that are important to you. It doesn't make any difference if the piece of art doesn't match your living room. If it's important to you, and if it lights up your heart, then hang it.

Bill:  Just not all 300 pieces of art maybe.

Sharon:  Unless you have a really huge house. [laughs]

Bill:  I can understand that definitely. What have you gotten out of this? I've had jobs before where it was a job and I did it, and there was not a lot of satisfaction in what I was doing. The job I do today, I love it. Not only I think I'm helping others, but it really helps me on a day‑to‑day basis. Do you find that in this new career?

Sharon:  There are days when my heart is completely full with clients that we help. We get hugs, we get gifts from our clients, they write us beautiful notes, and send us really lovely kudos to our team.

There are days when I think, "Really?" I go through people's stuff for a living, and there are times when people have literally screamed at me and said, "You got rid of my favorite blah, blah, blah," even though they didn't tell me it was their favorite thing. They didn't create any importance around the thing that they were so concerned about.

What do I get out of it? I get a huge sense of satisfaction in truly helping people because stuff is a form of energy. When you fill up your house with things, you're filling up your house with memories and things you use every day, like silverware and plates. You're filling it up with the energy you want around you.

Being able to dissipate some of the energy that is no longer necessary that doesn't need to be in that home or around that family, is a way of moving the universe forward. If that's a...

Bill:  My belief in the universe in positive and negative energy, I'm right on with you. Probably a lot of our listeners will be as well. If I'm hearing you correctly, it sounds sometimes having an attachment to all of those things, all those past memories, can really stifle you from making current memories.

Sharon:  That is absolutely what I think. That's not how I approach the clients. You can't walk in and say, "Let's move some energy today."

[laughter]

Bill:  They are going to think you're crazy, Sharon, I'm just going to say. [laughs]

Sharon:  They absolutely will think I'm crazy. What's interesting is that even after the very first meeting where we haven't done any work, all we've done is walk through somebody's home, we hear all the time, people say, "I feel better already." Just knowing that there is a solution, knowing that there is somebody who can help them create a plan and execute that plan, is so relieving to people.

I like to talk about, and this is a new thing for me, so bear with me. Stuff is like guests in your home. There are the guests in your home that you are excited to see. You see them all the time. You're excited. You're like, "Yay, I'm so glad you're here." Then, there are the guests that show up, and you're like, "OK, I'm glad you're here, and you're useful, but I don't really love you."

Then there are the guests that show up, and you're like, "What are you doing here?" Those might be like, when you get a gift from someone, and you're like, "Why did you give me this? And I have to keep this?"

No, you don't have to keep the gifts that you don't love, but just like a guest that shows up in your home, you have to give it some space in your home for a period of time. Think about stuff like having a party and inviting people over. some of those people you're excited to see and some of the people you're not excited to see.

Bill:  Some of them leave when it's appropriate, and some of them just hang out.

Sharon:  Stay and stay and stay, and you're like, "Oh, man. They really need to go."

[laughter]

Bill:  I've actually had guests like that, not just things, but guests like that as well. Kind of along the lines of guests, but maybe not. I have a philosophy. As a kid, I moved a lot. There was a lot of chaos in our lives. We moved around quite a bit. I don't have an attachment to things, necessarily. I will sell or get rid of stuff once its useful life is done for me.

I don't do that with my friends or guests necessarily, but I do that with stuff. I have this philosophy that if I move and there's something in a box and I don't open that box for two years, I get rid of it. Sometimes I don't even look in the box. I'm like, "Whatever's in here I haven't needed for two years, I'm just getting rid of it." What are your thoughts on that one?

Sharon:  I think that that's an interesting philosophy, and a lot of people don't have that bravery. I would say, "Look in the box because there might be something that's precious to you in the box that you just forgot was there." If there is nothing precious in the box, it's OK to let it go. It's really OK.

I want to tell you about a lady who we were helping. She had a five‑bedroom house that she was using as a storage unit. She didn't live there.

Bill:  Hold out a second, she didn't even live in the house.

Sharon:  She didn't even live in the house.

Bill:  Five bedrooms just storing stuff.

Sharon:  Five bedrooms just storing stuff. She had kept every piece of report cards and papers that her kids wrote from kindergarten all the way through high school. Her children had stopped talking to her. They were estranged from her. This lady could not see her grandchildren because of her hoarding.

Because what happened is every time she would see her grandchildren, she would want to give them things. The hoarding would start creeping into the daughters' homes. We started working with this lady. We helped clear a big chunk of this house. Both daughters started talking to her again during this process, which was really beautiful.

The hoarder got scared at the end and stopped the process. Her daughters went away again. People have a lot of fear around stuff, and they feel sometimes the stuff is a comfort to them because it's what they can control. You can't necessarily control people or control their feelings, but you can control stuff. You can control how much you buy, things like that.

Bill:  That makes perfect sense to me. When we talked about control that makes me think, also, we talked a little bit about this earlier about the customer. As a business owner, many times we have this thought of the customer's always right, and through our conversation prior to the podcast, you had mentioned sometimes the customer is not exactly right.

What do you mean by that? How do you guide someone through that?

Sharon:  We believe that not every client is our client, meaning that if you're not open to organizing, if you're not open to letting go of some stuff, then maybe you're not ready. That's a whole thing. We move people every single day, and I have a team around me. This is what they do all the time.

They know who to call, they know what kind of things to keep, they know based on the size of your new space how to organize it, and how to make it most efficient, and keep the things that you love, and that doesn't mean everything.

We had this lady, she was a very wealthy lady, and she was moving into a senior community. She insisted on bringing three desks with her into a small apartment because she was a business person in her former pre‑retirement life, and so she needed all three desks. We had to tell her, "OK, let's keep two. We'll keep two of your desks." She said, "No, no, no. I need all three."

We moved her. We moved all three. She said, "Wow, I don't have room for three desks." She then paid the movers to move that third desk away. Sometimes, we let the client make that mistake, and see that we're really giving you good advice. If you choose not to follow it, that is up to you.

We are trying really hard to make sure that your move is smooth. We bring peace and ease, and all of the things that you don't really think about when you're moving or when you're organizing. We're trying hard to make that as smooth as possible.

Bill:  I have found it always ‑‑ at least for me ‑‑ has paid to have an expert come in when I'm moving. I don't know why this is but when you are moving, there's always that, like the all the minutia that you start just throwing into boxes because the movers are going to be there.

Do you also offer packing services? Do you handle it from, you walk in the door, pack them up, and move them out? Is that how you do that so that the client is not necessarily doing what I would do, and that's just toss stuff into boxes, and get out of here?

Sharon:  Correct. Yes. Our motto is, "One Call Does It All." We're helping you pack. We're helping you sort. We're helping you sell the stuff if we can sell it because not everything can be sold. Just because it's old doesn't mean it's valuable.

Bill:  Hold on a second. [laughs] Hold on a second. This is a conversation that happens in my house or has happened in my house quite frequently.

My in‑laws bought very expensive, high‑end everything. You can tell because it lasts, and it looks like it's brand new. The problem is just because I paid X number of dollars for this thing four years ago, it did not appreciate in value. It wasn't handcrafted by some craftsman. This is really nice stuff.

There's always been that discussion around, "No, honey. If you like that plate it's a great plate, but it's not worth probably anywhere near what anyone paid for it."

The other thing I have found is that people give silver...at least in some communities, people will give people silver as wedding gifts, and things like that. What I have found is that 99.9 percent of that is not really silver. It's all silver plate. While it may have some sentimental value, there's no real value when it comes to dollars. That's been difficult conversations as well.

Sharon:  That's exactly right. Sterling silver still has held its value. It says on the back "sterling." That's how you know that it's real silver. If it says "plate" or "SP," that's the stamp on the back, it is plate. What that means is it's just dipped in silver. It is not actual silver, and that plate will wear off.

If you walk into any donation place, any Salvation Army, or Goodwill, or any place, you will find silver plate in every single one of them. It's lovely, but you still have to shine it like regular silver, and the value of it is almost nothing.

I want to go back to what you said about furniture because it's actually something that comes up all the time. Because Michigan was a manufacturing state, we have an enormous amount of big, brown furniture here in Michigan.

If you look around in people's homes, you will see big, brown furniture. If you don't know what big brown furniture is, then come to Michigan because we got it. We got it in spades.

What happens is that that big, brown furniture, people move to climates that are warmer where the furniture is wicker or bamboo, and they take their big brown furniture, and nobody wants it because it's heavy. Yes, it is sturdy, and it is perfectly good furniture. If it doesn't fit in the new climate or in the new apartment where you're moving to, then it doesn't work.

As the baby boomers have aged, there is a glut of big, brown furniture, and just in general a glut of stuff in the marketplace, and so the value of just everyday goods has dropped considerably.

Now, if you shop in second‑hand stores, you will find amazing finds, but selling your stuff, it has become much, much harder.

Bill:  It's kind interesting you say that because I have a relative who is older, and he and his wife over the years have collected Lladro figurines. They're expensive, very beautiful stuff.

He was lamenting to me that he has thousands and thousands of dollars in Lladro, but when you look up the values in the catalogs today they're worth pennies on the dollar. If you like it, and it's beautiful, and you want to keep it, great, but these things don't appreciate.

It reminds me of Hummel figurines and some of the other things that people collected because there was this market and this value. Then when the market fell off, it never came back.

Sharon:  Right. Hummel is an interesting case, because we see Hummels in almost every home, and we also see a good amount of Lladro as well. Hummels...it seems like everyone had them.

What happened is that in the '30s and '40s, the Hummels were not mass‑produced because that's just not what happened, they were handmade, and so those Hummels have held their value.

What happened is in the '50s and early '60s, Hummels began to be mass‑produced, and that's when people started collecting them en masse. That's when the value started really dropping because you could find them anywhere.

Those Hummels that were mass‑produced are worth about five bucks a piece, and they're not as valuable as those original Hummels that are not mass‑produced. Are Hummels still valuable? There's always a caveat, yes, some of them, but you have to know which ones.

Bill:  It will almost benefit someone to go through that stuff, and see exactly what they have before they say it's valuable or not, much like my relative who actually looked up the value of his Lladro. It's beautiful stuff, it really is. They have it displayed, but it's not going to fetch a high price. At least, most of it is not going to.

The other thing I wanted to ask about is, and this is personal to me. Like I said earlier, I really don't get attached to stuff necessarily, and I can let stuff come and go.

My wife is different from me in that respect that she likes to keep things because she does have a sentimental attachment to things that her mother owned, or that her stepmother owned, or that her father owned, which I understand.

We joke that if I lived by myself, I would have a table, a chair and a TV. There'd be not a whole lot of stuff in my house, and if she lived on her own, it would be probably the opposite of that.

We've found harmony, but it has caused some ‑‑ I won't say arguments because Greeks don't argue, they always talk loud ‑‑ it has caused some heated discussions around, "Why are we keeping this?" or "Why did you get rid of that?" What advice would you give to people who are in that situation where you're kind of opposite when it comes to stuff?

Sharon:  I understand this intimately, my husband is a saver of things, and I am not a saver of things. Although I do have my own collections. I collect mid‑century modern stuff, so our house has got very funky lamps and weird‑shaped tables, and I have an addiction to chairs. Unusually‑shaped chairs is my thing.

My husband is a saver of all things, tools, wood, paper, whatever, he just saves it.

We have come up with a solution, and this is something that we worked out before we got married. I got married in my early 40s. I was never going to get married, and now I'm married to somebody who's a saver, which is interesting.

What we did was we came up with a solution of we're running this business, we're busy, we have busy lives, and so we have a lot going on during the week.

During the week, our space can get cluttery. Our space, we can leave shoes or jacket, or we can leave paper around. The things that get cleared up every day are the kitchen, the dishes, the bathrooms get cleared, things like that, but the rest of the house can have stuff around.

Then once a week at the end of the week, either Friday afternoon or Saturday, we take an hour or an hour‑and‑a‑half to put away our stuff so that we can start the week fresh. Not only does it make me calmer inside, he knows that it makes me happy and a happy wife, happy life, right?

The thing is that we have come to this of, it can be messy during the week, and I'm not going to freak out about that as long as I know that at the end of the week we've got this time to put everything back where it goes.

That's the balance that we walk, and occasionally I have to say, "Hey, this area is getting a bit out of control." He will then bring it back into some sort of alignment, but he is very much a saver of stuff.

Bill:  I feel like we're kindred spirits here. It begs the question, this is the question that will settle that. Does having stuff out on your counters give you anxiety?

Sharon:  Yes.

Bill:  OK. I thought maybe it was just me, but having stuff on my counters gives me anxiety. It's the strangest thing, everything has to be put away.

Sharon:  That is a self‑imposed anxiety. I've actually been through coaching classes around this, and my coach actually said, "So who told you that it needed to be put away?" Then I'm thinking back in my head of my mother going, "Put your stuff away."

It's a self‑imposed thing. There's nobody that says you need to put this away, it's just in your own head. Who says that your house has to look a certain way? Who says that you have to operate your life a certain way? This is all self‑imposed stuff.

Bill:  That's a great way to put it. I know that people like myself who sometimes are a little overweight grew up cleaning their plates. "You asked for that, you eat it, you don't leave the table until it's all gone."

That's a learned behavior, and then it just carries on into adult life where you're cleaning your plate off. Regardless of what you put on it, even if you don't like it, you're going to eat it.

Looking back, you're right. No one said that my house has to be a certain way. Although I'm still going to clean my cabinets often, put stuff away, that's just me.

Sharon:  That's one that again, it goes back to a control thing. Some people feel most comfortable having stuff around them, almost like a nest. That's where we get into that hoarding situation, or that compulsive shopping situation where people keep buying and buying because they feel a need to buy.

It's not that they need the stuff, it's just that they need to keep shopping, and that's what gives them some control and/or it makes them comfortable because that's how they grew up.

Bill:  That actually begs the question on the opposite side of that. Having stuff around causes me anxiety, so I put stuff away, but I think sometimes getting rid of stuff can cause others anxiety. How do we overcome that when it's a situation where clearly they need to get rid of stuff somehow, how do you overcome that anxiety?

Sharon:  There are some anxieties that cannot be overcome. I will let you know that like some people, sometimes their family just says, "No, we have to wait until this person passes away until we clear out this house because we don't want to go down that road." That's OK, that's their decision.

Normally how it works with most families is that there is a change of residence, or a change of situation, and so some of that stuff needs to go.

It's about prioritizing. It's about saying, "What do I need? I need a bed, I need a dining room table, I need some plates, I need some silverware, and some glasses. What do I need, and then what do I want? What are the things that make my heart light up?" Those are the things that we really target.

I want to tell you about a lady who I walked down in her basement. We walk down there, and there's one of those old treadle sewing machines, those really, really old ones.

Bill:  Yes. We had one of those when we were cleaning out my father‑in‑law's house, so I'll be interested in this conversation.

Sharon:  I pointed at it, and it had cobwebs all over it, and it had a bunch of empty potting soil plant‑type pots on it. I said to the lady, "What are you doing with that sewing machine?" She said, "That was my mother's, I have to keep it."

I said, "Well, obviously, it's not really important to you because it's covered in cobwebs and old pots, and it's not in a place of value. If you felt like it was important, you would put it in your living room, and you would display plants on it, or you would use it, or you would do something with it."

She said, "Yeah, you're right, but I still want to keep it." I said, "OK, so let's talk about this for a minute. Your mom is not that sewing machine, your mom is in your heart, that sewing machine is a piece of furniture.

"If looking at the sewing machine reminds you of your mother, then take a picture of the sewing machine, but you don't need to keep a piece of furniture that's covered in cobwebs in your basement, just because it reminds you of your mother. If it really reminded you of your mother would be in a place of honor."

Bill:  Wow. What was the outcome of that conversation?

Sharon:  She said, "Let's get rid of the sewing machine."

Bill:  That's pretty amazing. I like the idea of taking a picture of because today with cell phones, it's not like you're going to have boxes and boxes and boxes of photographs, which is a whole different conversation.

Yeah, take a picture of it, you've got it on your cell phone or you've got it in your computer or wherever. It's not taking up space, and you can honor that item, and honor that person that you think of. I'm thinking that if it was on my cell phone, I might see it a little bit more than if it was sitting in my basement.

Sharon:  Pretty much, yeah. [laughs]

Bill:  I didn't want to forget this. You had alluded to baby boomers and people who are getting up there in that age, and they're retiring, and I believe that you've written a book called The Silver Tsunami.

Sharon:  Yep. It's called Downsizing the Silver Tsunami ‑‑ Who to Call and Where Does the Stuff Go?

Bill:  Let's talk about that for a minute. That's interesting. A lot of people talk about writing books, a few of my friends have, but I've always found it interesting to talk to someone who has written a book. Let's talk about what was the purpose of that, and who's that marketed to?

Sharon:  Writing a book, it was to get all of the stuff that's in my head onto a page so that people could use it as a reference tool. That was really the intentional outcome of the book, was to say, "Let's allow people to access this anywhere. They don't have to call me, they don't have to hire Betty Brigade. They can just read it."

That has been what has happened there. Then, we were about to do some updates to that probably next year, some post‑COVID updates, because a lot has changed with donation services, and folks that will come into your home, and what donation services accept because it's changing every year as more and more stuff comes on the market.

Bill:  I have found that too when trying to donate things. That's tightened up a little bit as well, and sometimes we just have to throw it away, which would be difficult if you think someone else could use it.

Sharon:  I really want to caution you, and yes, some things do actually belong in the trash. If it's still usable item, there are lots of places where things can go.

Finding places that resettle homeless folks or resettle refugees is a great place for those items where maybe there's a missing drawer pull, or maybe there's water spots on the top of the table. People would rather have a table with water spots than have no table at all. Think about it from that perspective is is there a place.

We work with several organizations. United Way is actually good one that helps distribute things to families that are in dire need. When we have those items that can't be donated, we are looking for places for it to find a home.

Bill:  I found if you have the patience, certain social media outlets do have marketplaces, and I've been very successful in getting rid of things through that. It does take a little bit of patience and caution when you're doing that.

If I or someone in the audience wanted to read Downsizing Silver Tsunami by Sharon McRill, where would we find that?

Sharon:  You can find it on our website bettybrigade.com, or you can find it on Amazon. We have it in three different versions. It's, of course, in a print version, but we also have a Kindle version, and if you prefer to listen to your books, it is also on Audible.

Bill:  Great, because I'm a big fan of listening to books when I'm traveling, although I listen to podcasts, which I urge anyone who hears this, it's a great place to get information. We are coming up close to time. Before we go, I'd like to give you the opportunity just to leave the audience with a message. What would you like them to take away from our conversation today?

Sharon:  That stuff is not your life. It's stuff. The thing that is most important are the relationships in your life and the people. Go be with people, go spend time, go visit places, stuff is not that important.

Bill:  All right. Well, thank you for that. Thank you for coming on, Sharon. I'm really glad that you grabbed me by the arm when I came walking out of that auditorium. It's great to meet you, and learn about what you do. Again, that's Betty Brigade and the book is Downsizing the Silver Tsunami. Thanks again for being here.

Sharon:  Thanks so much for having me. This was awesome.