The Danny and Park Novels Good News Podcast

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. A few weeks ago, I got an email asking if I’d like to interview the CEO of a nonprofit veteran support group called Clear Path for Veterans. I was absolutely interested because A), I’ve done interviews with the All Secure Foundation in the past, and B), I enjoy talking to veterans. So, I got Ryan Woodruff’s number and gave him a call. So sit back, relax, and prepare to be amazed at what Clear Path for Veterans offers to our country’s bravest men and women.

After you listen, let me know your thoughts on Ryan and Clear Path for Veterans. As I mentioned in our conversation, the drill sergeant saying, “Welcome Home” to Ryan at their first meeting really struck a chord with me. So many veterans feel out of place and on their own when they leave the service, giving them a safe place to call home is quite simply, incredible. I’m truly honored that Ryan agreed to come on the podcast and I hope he comes back soon. 

I highly encourage you to check out Clear Path's website here: ⬇️⬇️⬇️

https://www.clearpath4vets.com

Until next time, take care of one another, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. Recently I received an email asking if I’d like to have Forensic psychiatrist and author, Dr. Carole Lieberman on as a guest. I’m always looking for new and intriguing guests and was definitely interested in talking to her, especially after I saw that she’s studied Trump Derangement Syndrome and wants to have it become a recognized mental health disorder. In this episode we discuss that, as well as the assassination of Charlie Kirk, education and the media. We cover a lot in this episode and I'm interested in hearing your opinion after you listen.

 I consider myself neither Democrat nor Republican, liberal nor conservative. I’m firmly independent and like to think that I view the world through a lens of common sense. I’m sure people have differing opinions on whether Trump Derangement Syndrome is real or whether Charlie Kirk spoke the truth. There’s nothing wrong with disagreeing with one another. In fact, healthy debate is good for everyone. What angers me is when people use the words ‘Nazi’ and ‘fascist’ so casually. Especially when the words are used by people who’ve received a higher education and should know better. All that being said, I know that despite the high concentration of hate that pervades social media, in real life, people are kind to each other every, single day. Let’s keep it up.

If you'd like to explore more of Dr. Lieberman's work, check out the link here: ⬇️⬇️⬇️

https://terroristtherapist.com/

Unitl next time, take care of one another, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. I love getting emails from publicists asking if I’d be interested in interviewing an author for an episode. Normally, I see someone who interests me, then I reach out to them. But these email pitches are always a nice surprise, and the streak continues with this episode’s guest, award-winning author Christa Carmen. So without further ado, sit back, relax, and I hope you enjoy our conversation. Then, tell me what you think of Christa. As I mentioned in the interview, I’ve never interviewed a horror writer before, so talking to Christa and listening to her viewpoints was fascinating. Even if the people in Rhode Island try to stake a claim on Richmond’s Edgar Alan Poe.  I hope Christa comes back for future episodes and wish her a long and fruitful writing career.

Check out all of Christa's books here: ⬇️⬇️⬇️

https://www.christacarmen.com/

Until next time, take care of one another, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. For this episode, I’m welcoming back two of my favorite people, Johnnie Calloway Sr, and El-Amin. The wrestler, Hulk Hogan, died about a week before this episode, and El-Amin was a big fan of Hogan. El-Amin posted a photo of Muhammad Ali holding up Hulk Hogan’s arm after a wrestling victory and added a broken heart emoji to the post. To his surprise, around forty people came at El-Amin and told him that he shouldn’t mourn Hogan because of a statement that he made about his daughter dating a black guy. El-Amin pushed back, and that’s where our conversation started. I want to make my listeners aware, these guys are very direct and honest with each other and don’t hold back, which is exactly why I love having them on. The language may offend some listeners, so be prepared, but I’ll never censor my guests, so you’ve been warned. And as always, I hope you enjoy the episode.

And after you listen, what’s your take on what was discussed?  I’m so glad that my podcast is completely independent and I can have on any guests that I want and they can say whatever they’d like. There’s no one sponsoring me and no one to tell me what I can and can’t talk about. If there’s any other podcast out there that’s as honest as mine, I haven’t heard it. And if there are any guests out there like Johnnie and El-Amin, I haven’t heard them. These guys are the best, and I’m honored to have them on as regular guests. I hope you continue to enjoy them as much as I do. I think that honesty and frank conversations are the backbone of positivity, and I plan on having Johnnie and El-Amin on for many episodes to come. So, until next time, take care of one another, be honest and respectful of one another, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. Today’s guest is Hanover County Sheriff’s Office Sergeant Steve Wills. I met Steve when he got promoted to sergeant, and I took his spot as an investigator with the sheriff’s office. Steve looks mild-mannered until he opens his mouth and you realize that this guy is hilarious. I’ve been trying to get Steve on the podcast for months, and we were finally able to coordinate our schedules to make it work. I take him through his career with the sheriff’s office, even though he tried to wrap it up in about six minutes. As a bonus, at the end of the interview, he talks about, well, let’s just say if you saw the picture for the episode, you have a pretty good idea about the final portion of the interview. So sit back, relax, and get ready to laugh. I hope you enjoy the episode.

 I have no idea how to follow not one, but two stories about chimps on the loose. I’d like to thank Steve for coming on the show and highly encourage my listeners to check out the Hanover County Sheriff’s Office Facebook page. I truly enjoy working for this agency, and the people that I work with are the best in the business. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. If you love where you were and love where you are, you are extremely lucky. And I consider myself lucky. So until next time, take care of one another and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. This episode’s guest is Mindy Applewhite. Mindy’s daughter, Dr. Lindsey Grizzard Braun was killed in an automobile accident in July, 2023. Since that horrible day, Mindy and her family have tried to cope with Lindsey’s loss, and as you’ll hear in our conversation, she’s still trying to figure out how to go forward with her life. This episode isn’t going to be easy to listen to, especially for parents, but Mindy is her daughter’s biggest advocate and I’m honored to have her as a guest.

 I hope that none of us will ever have to suffer through the loss of a child. To me, and I imagine to most parents, that loss would be unimaginable. To even think about it is just not real. But Mindy and her family have been living with this for nearly two years. I want to thank Mindy for talking about Lindsey’s life and death, and I hope that listening to her will help anyone living through similar grief, get through each day, one step at a time.

Until next time, take care of one another, tell your kids you love them, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I’m Jamie Baynes. A few weeks ago, I interviewed Richmond Police Sergeant Michael Lewandoski about his firsthand experience with the riots in Richmond during the 2020 Summer of Love. After the interview, I noticed that his wife, Kelly, mentioned him in a few of her social media posts, so I got an idea and asked Ski if he thought Kelly would be interested in doing an episode about how she felt during that Spring and Summer. He said that he’d ask her and mentioned that in addition to her being a police officer’s spouse and having to watch all of the invective thrown at cops during the riots, she was a nurse and was dealing with being a health care worker during COVID as well. There was no way that I could pass up a chance to interview her, so here she is. As a programming note, in the interest of time, I stopped the interview at about the 45-minute mark, but don’t worry: a part two will be coming soon. After you listen, let me know what you think.

 It angers me that some peple in the health care field actually post signs like, ‘The only good cop is a dead cop’ on their wall. I mean, really, really makes me mad. As I’m typing this, people in Texas are having to come to grips with a flash flood that killed dozens of people, including children at a summer camp. One of the news outlets reported that a pediatrician in Texas was fired because she posted on a social media page that the people who died got what they deserved because of how the majority of the state voted in the 2024 election. The audacity, ignorance, stupidity, and wickedness of people still astound me. But don’t worry, I have faith that part two will bring some much-needed positivity to the world. 

So, until next time, take care of one another, and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I'm Jamie Baynes. Johnnie and El-Amin are back to discuss their views on men's mental health. June is Men's Mental Health Awareness Month and since the discussions that I have with Johnnie and El-Amin focus on men's issues, we all thought that this topic would be great for discussion and, as usual with Johnnie and El-Amin, it was. We really had a great time discussing mental health and I hope you enjoy the conversation as well.

What are your views on mental health in general and on men's mental health in particular? Do you think that there's a difference between men's mental health and women's mental health? Should there be different strategies between the genders or is there a one-size-fits all for everyone? Do you think that people from different generations handle mental health differently? There are always going to be  a ton of questions about mental health and I'm always in favor of talking about them. If any listeners out there would like to do an episode about mental health, reach out to me and we'll make it happen. 

Until next time, take care of one another and take care of yourself. And as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I'm Jamie Baynes. For this fantastic episode, I'm talking to two more of my favorite people: Nikki Bailey, who's been a guest a couple times before, and a brand new guest, but someone that I've known for years, Trisha Venable. My initial plan was to have them act as a type of counterbalance to the episode with Johnnie and El-Amin that focused on men, but Nikki and Trisha immediately threw me for a loop when they started talking about men, bears and Tik Tok! I think these two women are great and I bet you will too. I hope you enjoy the episode. 

After you listen, let me know what you think of Nikki and Trisha. They're both fun to talk to individually, but talking to them both together is a blast. As we were all texting back and forth, figuring out the logistics for the episode, Trisha sent a text that said, "This will be the only time Jamie can say that he's had a three way with two black women...." Does it get any better than that? I think not. I'd like to thank Nikki and Trisha for coming on the episode and I hope to have them back on soon. So until next time, take care of one another and as always, thanks for listening.

Welcome back to the podcast, I'm Jamie Baynes. This episode's guest is Richmond police sergeant Michael Lewandowski, also affectionately known as Ski. Ski and I worked Patrol in 1st Precinct back in the late 90's. Recently I posted about how people compare the day-long riot on January 6th with the months long riots in the Spring and Summer of 2020. Ski posted his account of being at ground zero when the Richmond riots kicked off, then added more to his experiences on the recent anniversary of those riots. Since the aftermath of that Spring and Summer still linger with me, I reached out to Ski to see if he'd be willing to talk to me about his experiences. He agreed and here he is. I hope you enjoy the episode. And as you're listening, make note of Ski's voice when he mentions how members of the Chesterfield Police Department came in on that first night to help out. It's very telling, then let me know what you think about the episode.

 I know some don't agree with me and probably will never agree with me about my views on January 6th and the riots in 2020. But to be honest, I could care less. My experiences were my own and I wasn't exposed to anywhere near the danger that Ski and the rest of the brave men and women of the Richmond Police Department, the Henrico Police Department, the Virginia Commonwealth University Police Department, the Chesterfield Police Department and the Virginia State Police faced. I obviously can't speak for all the officers who were subjected to the physical and verbal abuse from multiple sources, but it still affects me to this day and probably always will. I want to thank Ski for coming on the podcast and reliving such a horrible time in Richmond's history. Thanks for listening.

The photos in this episode were provided by Ski.