Air Force Vet Scott Flansburg | The Recalibrated Podcast | S01E05

Welcome to The Recalibrated. I'm your

host, Meade Kincke, and

I'm here to take us through

the journey of being in the service,

transitioning out, and

what today looks like.

Our guest, Scott Flansburg, served over

six years with the United States Air

Force Office of Special

Investigations working in the

Tech Services Division

supporting high-level investigative

and intelligence operations. Today he is

the founder and CEO of Herkimer Originals

and its foundation, where he preserves

the true origins of

basketball.

The National Counting Bee,

a contest to encourage mental maths

exercises, and Scott is

known worldwide as

The Human Calculator, where he helps people

of all ages see the beauty and

power of numbers with confidence.

Scott holds the Guinness World Record for

fastest human calculator and

he is the best-selling author

of Math Magic and Math Magic for Kids.

He has been featured on

countless talk shows sharing his work

and encouraging a better understanding

and appreciation of mathematics.

Scott, welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me.

I'm glad to have you, good sir.

So, as we always do in the wonderful

tradition, let's start with "The Why".

What drew you to the Air Force?

1988 or 1982, I was getting out of high

school and I was going to go to a college

in upstate New York near my hometown.

I had a personality

conflict with my English teacher.

I took advanced English,

AP English it was called.

He ended up giving me a 69 average.

You have to have a 70 to

get a credit for that class.

In the state of New York, you have to

have an English credit

in order to graduate.

It was my senior year.

I had signed up for delayed enlistment

program for the Air Force.

It was still optional, like I could have

withdrawn, but I had everything done.

As soon as that happened, my scholarships

for math and everything else evaporated.

I was very distraught.

I only found out two

days before graduation.

I had to turn my gown back in.

I didn't get to walk across the stage.

I had to cancel my party.

I didn't go to any other parties.

I was so upset, and just left for the

Air Force like the next day.

I just said, "Hey, let's go." Oh my goodness!

So, that was a... So full blown scorched earth,

just like, "No, I'm

done. We're done now."

I knew I didn't want to stay where I was

in upstate New York in that little town.

I had been there my whole life.

I thought going a couple hours away to

college would be enough.

When that all disappeared, I couldn't

wait to get the service just

to have that option available.

So, I got lucky that I had set up for

that DEP beforehand.

Okay.

Well, that's uncustomary.

I'll say you have a unique tale.

So, tell us about humble beginnings.

You go from day one going,

"I guess high school is over," to

"Bam, in the service."

How did you start out?

I didn't know what was coming.

Honestly, I was so unprepared because I

I really thought I was going to go to

college and take math and play baseball.

That was my whole world.

You're going to get an extremely short

haircut and you're going to have somebody

telling you what to do for the next

several months, if not years.

It was quite an adjustment to go from

one extreme to the other.

Yeah, but, my dad served in the

Air Force for a brief time.

He actually ran a farm when he was put in

the Air Force or went in the Air Force.

A bunch of stuff happened back in upstate

New York where people had to go back to

help with their farm.

So, my dad actually went back.

But he always said he loved the Air Force

and had a great time.

So, it was okay.

I wasn't totally shocked,

but I wasn't mentally prepared.

It sounds like not mentally and probably

not emotionally as well.

You know the joke thing of you break up

with a girl and you

get the breakup beard?

You kind of did the opposite of like,

"Okay, broke up with the high school, had

the head shaved," and then

just went straight into it.

Yeah, it was quite a shock.

It was probably a good way to go in

though because I never could have been

prepared for what

life in the military was like.

I just, you know, I was a sports guy and I was a math

person always thinking about math and

numbers and things like that.

To go into a space where you really need

to be focused when

you go in the military.

You know, they don't accept anything less.

So, yeah, it was quite an adjustment.

Yeah, it very much

Again, we've talked about this a lot.

It's regimented.

We can say it that way.

You know who you're answering to.

You know who you're answering

to you and what time you eat.

You know what time you do things.

So, it's a little bit jarring.

That's hilarious.

So, going from day one just thrown into

the dark, how did you end up

in the tech services division?

Yeah, I got really lucky.

I was down in, let's see, Lackland

Air Force Base doing my basic training.

And, I ended up at

Keesler, Biloxi for my training.

I was 702 is what

they ended up putting me.

I've been to Keesler.

Yeah.

And so, you know,

everything is different.

I mean, not just the job, the

environment, the location.

And I didn't know where I was going.

You know, at Lackland, you just sort of

find out what's going on.

So, yeah, there were a lot of surprises,

a lot of twists and turns.

And it just helped me realise that I was

completely out of control

of what was happening to me.

And so, I was at the base and somehow a

TV station heard about my abilities to do

numbers in my head very quickly.

Oh, that's so funny.

And they asked permission to

come on base to interview me.

And the base commander was like, "What?

Who? What's this guy? What's going on?"

And so, he had me go into his office and

he goes, "Why do these

people want to talk to you?

This is very, you know,

not normal in the service."

And I told him, you know, what I could do

and gave him a

demonstration, him and his staff.

And they said, "Oh, you know what? All

right, we'll let them interview you."

And that moment of having to be in front

of him is what afforded me the

opportunity to get a special duty

assignment to work with the OSI in Japan.

And so, I went from being a... I was

supposed to be a 702 at a church, an Air

Force church up in Northern California.

That's so funny.

I ended up being in Japan working for OSI

District 46 and got into the

counterintelligence division and got to

see all the crazy things that we were

doing, you know, even

back then in the 80s.

That is, to say, a stark difference.

Now, I know you technically already have

the moniker of the,

you know, the human calculator,

but it sounds like it would have been

much more apt to just call you the

human kite because you were just tethered,

like, "Where's the wind blowing? I'm

going to Japan? Is that... sure.

I'm a little tall for Japan,

but fine. That'll be fine."

Yeah, that worked out. Well, I ended up

getting married over there and stuff.

But, the first job that, you know, when

you get your job offers, when you're

going through the training, the first one

was a refrigerator repairman.

And I was like, "Well, I got no

inclination towards that."

Freon not in the future?

Nah. And then the 702 thing came up and

it was very flexible and the assignments

were very cool. Like, you know, 702 opens

up the whole world for you.

And, then this meeting with the base

commander where he just, you know, a week

later, I was told that I was offered a

special duty assignment to

go to Japan for four years.

And I was like, "Yeah,

that sounds fun. I'll go."

I can only imagine, like, again, the

playing back that particular exchange,

we'll call it that way, of, "Hold on a

moment. Why are the news

cameras? Who know we're here?

Who's causing trouble? What's

he called? Scott. Get him in."

Like, it's just one of those kinds of

things of like, "We don't have

celebrities here, sir

What are you doing?"

Yeah. And it came out of right field,

even the interview. You know, I think it

was one of my family members lived nearby

and, you know, knew somebody or something.

I mean, it was just so random. The whole

thing was that I went from being a

refrigerator repairman in Mississippi to

being a 702 in California at a church.

For an Air Force preacher or not a

preacher, whatever they call them. And... Pastor.

A pastor. And then a special duty

assignment to Tokyo.

So, yeah, all within a couple of weeks.

And so, yeah, it was interesting. And

then I ended up meeting my wife in Japan.

And, you know, that was fantastic. She

was a daughter of a chief master sergeant

who his his wife was full Japanese and

they had lived there forever.

So, I got totally integrated into the

space. You know, I learned Japanese and I

got to do a lot of stuff for the Air

Force, you know, in a role where I could

use my fluency to, you know, just help

out in certain situations like golf

tournaments and softball tournaments.

So I ended up doing all these things

that, you know, I just never saw coming.

Definitely not. Oh, my goodness.

And then go figure that, you know, I got

divorced years and years later, but the

next girl I fell in love with turned

turned out to be from where I was

supposed to be

stationed as the preacher's 702.

So you came back around.

But I never lived there, but but I ended up I ended up

having to go there to visit her family.

So, yeah, it was just very surreal.

Oh, that's so fun. So, yeah, like one way

or another, there's this there's a little

pin in space and time with

with with her name on it.

You go like, no, no, no, no, no. You took

a detour. We got your back.

Yeah, I just and, you know, that's it. It

was interesting because I guess just

because maybe my math brain, my numbers

brain, I love to understand and I don't

want to say control, but, you know, sort

of know what's going on.

You know, it's like math. You just you

know... See through the fog.

Yeah, and, then to get thrown into six weeks of

basic training where I had no control and

didn't know what was coming.

The word "surrender" might come to mind.

I learned quickly. I learned quickly to

surrender. And it just wasn't my it's not

my skill set. I'm just the way my brain

is wired and my, my nature. It was it was

it was awkward with the military.

Even when I was in it full force, you

know, I just I never

felt comfortable completely.

Yeah. Being like the entrepreneurial

mindset, it's not exactly the place where

it it's a bit more

rigid. So that that tracks.

Well, like you said, the regiment, the

regiment, the structure did help me in a

lot of ways because I didn't have any

structure. I wasn't regimented.

We had eight kids in my family. You can

get away with anything. You know, you

disappear for a week. They didn't even

notice. So to go from that to, you know,

here we are. Well, what's the old phrase

that people, it's coming back around. But,

the television advert that was on late

night and it says, you

know, "It's eight o'clock.

Do you know where your children are?"

And, people think today that that's a joke

thing. And it's like, no, that's real.

That's one hundred percent.

You go like just be in by the time the

street lamps turn on, and you go, yeah,

no, that's that's a thing.

That was the rules. Be home when it

when it's dark out, you know.

How do you wrangle up eight kids and feed

them and count them and make sure they

all went to bed and didn't sneak out a

window and, you know,

Not missing body parts.

It was so, yeah. And then to go to basic

training where somebody knew where you were every

second and what you were going to do

next. And so, yeah, it

was it was a wake up call.

But at the same time, I there are certain

things about the military environment

that were very satisfying and very I

liked the predictability

of it once I got situated.

So, yeah, a lot of good lessons for life.

I love that. Okay, let's do this. What's

something in your "kite flying adventures"

We'll say it that way.

That you are ever so glad that

smartphones were not around to record?

Oh, man. Listen, I wish they still weren't around

for the most part. I think it doesn't

help as much as we think. That's fair.

You know, in some ways, I wish there were

smartphones because there are some

moments in your life that

you truly wish you captured.

But who carried around a camera all the

time? Social media, you know, using

social media as your storybook for your

life and stuff like that.

So, but no, I got to travel the world.

You know, when you're overseas in Tokyo

in the Air Force, the one cool thing

about being at Yakota Air Base was

several planes coming and going.

And I was living right on the tarmac,

basically in a dorm. And you can walk

down to the flight ops and for five

dollars jump on a C5 to Hong Kong for the

weekend and stay at a ten dollar hotel

for military guys over in

Hong Kong and go shopping.

You know, a hundred dollars, you couldn't

carry it all back. So, yeah, there was a

lot of cool stuff I

wish I could recapture.

I like it. You flipped it the other way.

We a lot of times have stories on the

show where, let's say, infantry and

shenanigans and things, and you go like,

oh, no, that one really

didn't need to be on film.

Well, I don't know how I got picked as a

basic training. I got picked

as the guide for our watches.

You looked confident. That's what it is.

Worst, worst guy ever to

have in front of

A large group of people trying to look

structured. And I, my whole goal...

No crowdome for you yelling at the crowd?

No, my goal was to make everybody laugh.

So I could get people smirking and Fair.

laughing to the point where we got in

trouble many times, you know, by our

folks. So, yeah, it

was a tough adjustment.

I get it. Okay. Okay. Oh, goodness.

So, nearing the end of your service, what

kind of drove the decision to retire?

Well, I didn't retire. I got out after

six years. I had signed up for four, and

then I re-listed for six, not knowing

what I was getting into because just a

couple months later, my supervisor's son

failed second grade math.

And, I spent some time with him and I

showed him how to do some stuff that I

knew. And I got a call from his teacher

and he said, are you the guy that's

talking to this kid because he's the

worst math student in our class. And now

he's teaching me stuff. What happened?

You're like, this is, I've never seen

this kind of a turnaround. What is, what

magic are you just

like sprinkling on this?

Yeah. And so I got invited to go speak at

a school and, I went to my supervisor, my

other supervisor, and I said, hey, can I

get, you know, an hour or two off in the

afternoon to go speak to these kids down,

you know, like 15 minutes away.

And he goes, no. I was like, oh, okay.

That's what we're at.

How very kind of you.

Yeah. Yeah. Like zero. Yeah. Anyway, I

remember his name just

got, never forget. But yeah.

And so I had to take personal time off to

go visit the school and I never performed

in front of kids or at a school or

anything like that before. I just did

this stuff for myself.

Like no public

speaking, no anything like that, at all?

No, I was 18. I, you know, I didn't even

make it out of high school, you know,

what, what, no college. Fair enough.

And, you know, the last thing on my menu

was, you know, go, go perform in front of

a lot of people and, you know, teach

them. So I do this 30, 40 minute show in

front of the kids and the teacher said,

can you show some of the

things you taught Travis?

So I showed him some shortcuts in mental

math and how to think about numbers. And

I got a call back the next day and they

invited me to speak at every school in the school district.

So now I didn't have enough personal time

to do that. So I had to go back and ask

for time and they said no. And so I

took more personal time and I went and

started visiting the schools.

And, one of the schools invited the

parents, and one of the parents was a

reporter and wrote an article in the

Montgomery newspaper about this guy who's

serving in the Air Force who came to my

kid's school and freaked us

out and beat the calculators.

And then he showed my kid how to do some

mental math. And that little story went

on the wire, and I got a call from a

national television show in New York City

called Regis & Kathie Lee.

It's a small show. You

may have heard of it.

Morning show 9 a.m. ABC. And, uh,

And I was like, oh, this is interesting. And, so that

inspired me to try to get out of the Air

Force because I knew I had found

something where I was

using my gift for good.

So, I went to my supervisor and I said,

"Can I please get out of the service?"

And he said, "No." And I was like, oh, okay. So I

manufactured an exit, and it took a couple

months. You know, it

was a little awkward.

I had to spend 30 days at the dorm during

my during my dismissal to clean all the

bathrooms and the dormitories, you know,

whatever manual labor...

They put you on latrine duty is what

you're trying to say.

For 30 days, in front of all these guys were I

went from OSI to be in, and then I was a

computer programmer at Maxwell Air Force

Base or Gunter Air Force Station. And... Gotcha.

you know, my dorm was near

the cops and all these guys.

And you know, I was having fun. They were

all friends. And then the last 30 days of

my Air Force time, I was doing latrine

duty and it was a very humbling

experience. And I just I remember how

excited I was to to start

this new part of my life.

I cannot get away from you all fast

enough. Yeah. And you know, I could I

could tell, I was like, oh, I'm going to get

invited to travel around the world and

speak and do things and go on

national TV shows and stuff.

And so that distraction kept me sane

through the 30 days of that. Yeah. And I got

out, and I started I started I went on

Regis & Kathie Lee, and at the end of the

interview, Regis says, "Scott, you're like a...

you're like a human calculator."

And that's where I got my name, and

I trademarked it, and within a year I was doing

TV shows around the country and I got a

book deal and did infomercials and on and

on and on. So that was back in late 80s,

even when infomercials are still a new

thing. So it happened quite quickly.

Oh, goodness. Well, first off, you

know, I think we have a giant thank you

to Regis Philbin for for giving you the

moniker, and of all things, you're like,

that does have a ring to it. Thank you,

sir. I'll write that down.

And what's crazy is Regis passed away a

couple of years ago. And before he passed

away, he was a guest host on a TV show in

L.A. that I had been on a couple of times

and they invited me back.

And they informed Regis of the situation

that, you know, here's this guy's the

human calculator. They told my story. And

then they said, by the way, we just went

there. Remember this, but you actually

nicknamed him The Human Calculator.

And he was so awestruck. He was just so

glad and grateful that he had such an

impact in my life and saw what I did with

it. So it was full circle for Regis. You

know, I got a great picture

with Regis and Larry King.

Oh, that's excellent.

That day. And I've been on Larry's show

many times. And for Regis to see that and

I got to thank him face to face. And

yeah, so full circle.

I mean, that that's just that's so

wonderful, you know, because a lot of

times you already know when you deal with

some people, some people, things matter

to some things don't.

And to have it where he's like, that I

did that. Okay, I did good. I did good.

You know, like that kind

of thing. I love that.

Well, it's one thing, like if I ran into him at

a restaurant, and I got to say thank you.

It's another thing when there's a camera on

his face and I got to see the replay and

see his reactions and how much of an

impact it had on him.

So, yeah, it was a great, it was a great

thrill to thank a person that had such an

impact in my life that

didn't even really understand.

I mean, the next day he was he had

another show with five more guests, you

know, so he can't keep track of

everything. So, yeah, it was

really nice to shake his hand.

Oh, that's so that's just so wonderful.

Like he gave you your name with a, with

just with just a conversation and you go,

I don't know how

that's just, it's perfect.

And Reg, Regis is just being Regis,

you know, he is... Just talking, just talking.

That's right. And he for him to just

throw out that nickname, if you will.

Yeah! In retrospect, it's really shocking

because, you know, let's see, 10 years

later, I discovered a pattern in numbers

that I believes help everyone

feel like a human calculator.

And so to go from just Scott to Regis

calling me the human calculator, then 10

years later, having an epiphany about

numbers that is going to revolutionise

the way people learn arithmetic and make

them feel like a human calculator.

I, Regis couldn't

even have ever imagined that.

Like you go, you just you just said

something brilliant and witty, but you

don't realise you gave me an identity.

And I'm like, yeah, that's huge.

And it was my first show. It

was my first national TV show.

Well, you did a bang up job, good sir.

I'll just say. It's crazy statistically.

Well, you already know it only needs one.

That's all that a win

starts with is just one.

Well, and I think that that really gives

me perspective, because when I'm

performing or working with a company or a

group or teacher workshops, whatever.

Yeah. I understand the significance that

one person can have in somebody's life.

And if I have a little kid in front of me

who's afraid of math and I

have a moment to change that.

I respect that opportunity tremendously

because you just never know what's going

to come out of that. Now I've been doing

this human calculator thing for let's

see, twelve, thirty, almost forty years.

And I've met kids of kids of kids that I

visited their parents school when they

were a kid. So I got to see a

full circle many times now.

Yeah, you're just a living legacy of

like, no, no, no, I like there's a film

Doc Hollywood with Michael J. Fox

Yeah, such a good. I feel like I'm the

only one that know about that, but it's

such a good one. And it's the you know,

the old town doctor and it's like, no, I

delivered your father.

And you go, I think Doc has

the keys. I'll just say it.

It's a it's very humbling to realise the

potential you have in a person's life and

to be haphazard about it would be,

excuse me, just terrible.

You know, I'm really grateful to have I

have an attitude of

gratitude towards the impact.

Saying thank you does a lot.

Yeah, it does.

Well, you've sort of, let's say, jumped

the gap a bit. But what was the first

moment, and it may be the exact same one.

But what's the first moment where you

realised, okay, civilian life is going to

be a touch different?

When I knew I was getting out of the Air

Force, I was in Montgomery, Alabama. And

I reached out to a friend of a friend.

His name's Don Davenport.

He was the biggest marketing guy in

Alabama, Montgomery, Alabama. And he was

he had a marketing agency and they were

working with all the biggest clients.

And I asked if I could take him to lunch

and just explain to him what was going on

and see if he saw an angle that might

help me, you know,

acclimate to civilian life.

And, Don, we had a great lunch. We ended

up having several more in

that next 30 to 60 days.

And, he really helped me understood the

opportunity that was available to me and

helped me skip many painful lessons that

I would have gone through

if I hadn't met with him.

So, always grateful to I call him Triple

D, Don Davenport, DDDs or

his initial. So 3D, Triple D.

Triple D. Oh, my goodness. Now, I'll ask

on the other end of it, is there anything

that did not translate well?

In regards to what?

Coming out of the service into civilian

life, is there something you go like,

this didn't make sense to try and keep?

No, I was. I was. I was very content.

I was, you know, you do 30 days latrine

duty or ready to exit.

That's fair. That's fair.

I'm out.

So were there any kind of with the,

at this point, like four times reborn, were

there any identity struggles like when

you got out of the not

so figurative latrine?

Well, you realise that there's not a

cheque coming on the first or 15 from the

government that you know is coming and

it's going to be good.

You're all of a sudden, you're responsible

for generating revenue. And, you know,

that's quite a wake up call to go from,

you know, being an

employee to being an entrepreneur.

So, one of the things I've learned, Meade, is that

having a gift for numbers and being

The Human Calculator is one thing.

Being a business manager or an

entrepreneur or running companies, things

like that, that's a whole different skillset

that doesn't matter if you're

The Human Calculator when

it comes to that stuff.

And so, I've tried all combinations of

managers and different ways to manage

those parts of my life without being that

guy, because as I've learned, it's really

difficult to represent

yourself in any negotiation.

It's always better to have somebody else.

So I got lucky with a great attorney

early on, Mark Wright,

which helped me out a lot.

And, I tried a few different avenues and,

you know, nothing stays the same. You

always have to be evolving. And now I

have AI managers and agents

that do most of this stuff for me.

So yeah, it's a whole brand new one. Whether you want to or not.

Yeah, it's really exciting. I mean, where

we're at with this transition right now,

not to get too far ahead, but it is that

this environment really makes you rethink

how you do what you do and why you do

what you do and makes

it easier to package.

And having a professional always there

ready to talk to you or give you feedback

with no fear of making you angry or

upset. Just, hey, you asked, here's the situation.

No more yes, man, that kind of thing of

like, well, how about this boss?

And you go, yeah, we had a phrase we used

to call those brown noses, like not to be

crude about it, but it's real. And you

go, listen, if I wanted someone to say

yes to me, I'd get a machine that just,

you know, bash the yes button.

If I'm making a mistake, call me on it

because I'm about to go and perform.

There's nowhere to hide now. You know, so

yeah, I went through all that. So very

exciting, very exciting times. And, you

know, I'm called The Human Calculator.

There's the human. And then you got the

calculator, you know, the physical object

that people use the human, which is me.

And so I became the, I got in the

Guinness Book of World Records as the

fastest human calculator and knew that I

was probably the fastest

person on the planet Earth.

And that's quite a, quite a claim, quite

a honour. And...

Well, when you live up to it, though, so it's like, well,

there it is. But my I have some really good

friends. And they're very straightforward

with me. And the show

started being too much about me.

I was like, look at me. Look what I can

do. Look at me, me, me, me. They helped

me transform the show into, okay, show

who you are, but then how can you help

them? And that simple strategy or

approach just changed my entire

presentation, the delivery, everything,

because I was going somewhere with it

instead of just look at me,

which was very refreshing.

Yeah, well, it flips it on the head of

you're no longer peacocking,

you're teaching, you know, and... It's so great.

You can be great. You can be shiny. Yeah.

Well, that's the thing. And that's the

guy that no one invite to drink. You go

like, oh, let's go out and party not with

him. Like, oh, but he's famous. And you

go, yeah, he's also boring and rude.

You'll find out. I promise.

Yeah. And so that was my whole goal ever

since I guess it was 94/95. I just I just

decided to try to become a better human

instead of a faster calculator. And that

really created a situation where the

students reactions to my shows was so

much more genuine and authentic and

inspiring that I just, you know, to me,

it's a dream come true to have a gift,

that I can use for good to help others.

So, yeah, that's that's

really been satisfying.

That's just wonderful. And like, all I

can think of, like, really just

absolutely wonderful shows and, you know,

in the realm of science, like shows that

I absolutely adore, like Mr. Wizard's

World and and watch Mr.

Wizard and all of that.

I actually we have for my children, like

hand signed magazines from, you know,

that family and all of that. This is

stuff that yeah, stuff. It means

something. Those are things that you can

look at Mr. Wizard and like it was there

at the birth of like laserdisc

and really amazing technology.

And you're doing the same thing where you

go, well, what if we broke down the

walls? What if we taught someone

something like you go? Yeah, I like, and I

think that's the human aspect. You know,

there's there's the man that can be the

peacock and can be on the totem pole and

like, look how high I am.

Do you know what's really fun, though?

Drinks in the parlour and playing, you

know, fun tunes and sharing stories and

all of that, like being unobtainable,

I mean, that's that's neat for about a half

a second, I think is about the timeframe

where you go. That's cool.

But, people want to hear you, smell, share

the same air, and the fact that you're

doing that shows, you know, humility and

humanity. And I applaud you for it.

Well, I had an interesting moment. I was

I journal a lot. And I don't know if you remember Oh, okay.

the big pens that used to have,

well, they still do. They have four colours.

You could click blue. Oh, yeah. The ones you

could, yeah. And so... I always used to try and push

them all down at once at one time.

Oh, well, I would use different colours

for different things. You know,

obviously, green is money. Red is stress.

You know, like I just had a colour coded

journal. And when you flip through, you

can be like, oh, man, look how stressed I

was during this little run. Yeah.

Look how look how excited I was here. So

it really does add a whole other level of

understanding your journals. You know, so

I had a had a moment where I caught

myself writing and I started

a sentence with the word I.

And when you write a capital I, there's a

one. And then there's a bar on the bottom

of the bar on the top. That's how we

write a capital I. Right. And for some

reason, I noticed that if I'm that one in

the middle of that I, there's a bar above

me and a bar below me.

And it's just me bouncing back and forth.

Me, me, me, me, me, me. It's like my ego.

And so I decided to rewrite the letter I

and I made it a small I. And when you do

a small I, you've got the one. But then

you got a little zero, a little halo on

top. And I said a prayer. I just said,

help me understand how to be a better

human. And that was the portal. That was

the difference. That

silly little symbology.

Of allowing things in instead of me just

talking about me. And I went through this

transformation because of one letter and

just writing it differently. So I share

that when I speak at events and it really

resonates with a lot of people because.

And I can understand why.

Yeah, you know, we all get stuck in our

own way. And it really

helped me get out of my way.

I love that. Well, to those of you listening at home,

if you're loving what you're hearing as

much as we're loving what we're doing,

smash that subscribe button. And we've

touched only just a little bit. But what

if you needed to wrap it up in a little

parcel? What is your mission now?

Well, I didn't know this when I started.

I really just thought I was going to be

an entertainer and became an "edutainer",

educational entertainer. And, the late

90s, we were all going to die from Y2K.

And, I was really nervous about that.

That was true. Oh, my goodness. The

computers with the

stickers of like, are you Y2K compliant?

Yeah. And, I was I was a programmer for

the last two years I was in the Air Force,

so I knew a little bit about

understanding what was

going on with Y2K. But... Sure.

And when I got out of the service in 88,

I, I ended up in Los Angeles for a month

because I had been asked to go on

The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. And it

took a lot longer than I

thought to get out there.

And I didn't have any resources. I just

got out of the service. I had no paycheque

coming in. I mean, you know, I was

whole new thing. And I ended up in

Florida. A buddy of mine flew me down

there to help him with his new company.

And, I was like, yeah, I'll do anything,

you know, because I wasn't monetising

this human calculator thing. I was just getting

started. And he had invented

a glow in the dark doorknob.

That he was selling to hotels as a safety Wildly specific.

device for people in a room that don't

know where it is. So if the alarm goes

off at night, you can at least find the

door. And, I was like, all

right. Well, he's paying me.

And I got to go try to sell these things.

So I got a he gave me a rental car and a

hotel room for 30 days down in Florida

and said, Okay, here you go.

Go sell some light bulbs.

Glow in the dark doorknobs. And after 30

days, I had sold exactly

zero glow in the dark doorknobs.

To be fair, this does sound like a weird

bar wager, like a pub wager where you

go, like, hold on, I have an invisible

fire extinguisher. You go.

It was, you know, I was in I was in a

tough spot. So it seemed like it made

sense. And, so after 30 days, I lost the

car, I lost the hotel room,

and I wasn't sure what to do.

And my sister bought me an airplane

ticket to fly out to Phoenix, Arizona,

where I ended up living for over 30

years. So, you know, I flew in and like

and it was it was beautiful

weather during the winter.

I said, okay, what is this? Never left. But,

the day before I left Florida, I was

waiting for my plane, and I walked into

the West Palm Beach Public Library, and I

was just, you know, I go to the math

section, which is not very crowded.

And it's always in the back. And,

I found a book, and this guy said, hey, there's a

pattern in our calendar. And if you're

good at crunching numbers, you can figure

out what day of the week a date falls on.

So I wrote this formula down on a little

three and a half by five index card with

a little pencil at the library. And I got

on the plane the next day, and I was

wiring this equation,

this algorithm into my head.

And I could do it. You could tell me a

date and I could figure out what day of

the week it was on. And I landed in

Phoenix. My sister picked me up at the

airport and I said, what's your birthday?

Tell me, tell me a date like your

birthday, whatever you want.

I'll tell you what day of the week it

was. And she tells me her birthday, and I

said, oh, that was a Saturday. And she

goes, who cares? I was like, oh, man,

I just did a lot of work there.

Thank you for deflating my

feel good. I appreciate that.

I was on cloud nine. I went to cloud zero

and that's how I landed in Phoenix. And I

borrowed her boyfriend's bike and went,

rode a bike from school to school, asking

them to let me come in and talk.

So whenever I went, you know, it's just I

go back to those days and I think, holy

cow, you know, I was sleeping on the

couch, riding a bike to schools

unsolicited, hoping they would book me

days, weeks, or months later.

And so it was it was a rough start.

And that was back in 88/89.

But things picked up very quickly after

that. So yeah, it was very humbling. That

was a tough year getting out of the

service and starting something that, you

know, I had no idea what I was doing, basically.

So, what was the turning point? When did,

when did the as people were lovingly say,

when did the overnight success hit?

My first business partner, JB,

he said, hey, let's sit down. Let's let's

make a book. Let's sell something so you

don't have to be there all the time and

just tell me materialise this business.

And, we started a company and we moved to

Washington, D.C. We thought we had to be

near the National Education Association

and all these big organisations to have

an impact with education.

And, I started, we hired a big PR firm

and they were supposed to help me get on all these shows.

And, after two weeks of sitting in their

office, watching them try to book me on

every show around, in D.C., they booked me

on exactly zero shows. Ouch.

And I had been sitting there for two

weeks, watching them, listening to them.

How do they do it? What are they doing?

How do they approach it?

Then I said, you know, give me an office

for a day. Let me try to book myself. And,

less than a month later,

I was booked on CNN, and I'll never forget

the date. It was April 4th, 1990. It was

a Wednesday. And, I went on CNN.

Bobbie Battista was the host and it was,

you know, they were giving me like 15

minutes on CNN. And, you know, couldn't

believe it. I don't know

how I talked him into that.

But, so J.B. and his business, his

brother, Dennis, is another partner. They

decided to set up a 1-800 number so I

could say that 1-800

number and sell our books.

And, we got it all set up like to the day.

We were checking the numbers. We were

driving into CNN. Denny had one of the

new mobile phones in his car, and we were

driving to CNN... Oh, big Motorola.

Oh, the car phone. Gotcha. Oh, man. It was a big

deal. We were mobile, and... That was space age.

At the time, he was cutting edge. And,

we pulled into CNN. We're all excited. The

800 number is going to this big place in

Nebraska where there's thousands of

people ready to answer the

phone and take our orders.

And, we pull in and I get to the green

room, and J.B. and Denny are with me. And,

the producer comes in and says, Scott,

you know, this is a remote. You're going

to go in this room. There's a camera.

Bobbie's in New York. She's going to

interview you from New York.

And, all we ask is you can't say any 800

numbers. We don't allow advertising like

that on CNN from our guests. And all of

us were just so bummed out. And, Denny

says... How do I decodify this?

Yeah. So Denny says to me and J.B., I

think he goes, he goes, hey, if you get

out the 800 number, we'll go buy you a

new car. And I needed a car. So I was

like, all right, I'm motivated. So, I get

on CNN and I'm killing it. And Bobbie

Battista says, hey, do we have any do we

have any people who want to

calling in and ask Scott a question?

People were calling in. And the first

person that calls in says, Scott, how do

we get a hold of you to book you to come

to our school? And, do you have any books

that I can get for my kids? I said, well,

I do. And I do visit

schools. My office is in D.C.

And we have a, and Bobbie breaks in and

says, Scott has a 1-800 number. It's

1-800, you know, tri-math, whatever it

was. And. when she said it, I was just so

freaked out. And I said, that's right,

Bobbie. It's 1-800-879-6284. She did the

letters. I did the numbers just to double

it up. And I could hear J.B. and Denny in

the green room

yelling and screaming. Yeah.

Just losing it.

And so, and that ended up going 20 minutes

live on CNN. And at the end of the

interview, I said, Bobbie, if you could

just give out that number one more time

for the people that missed it during the

interview. And she said it again. And I

repeated it numerically again. I walked

out. We all did a group hug and went out,

bought me a car that next day.

So, and then, you know, we did a quarter

million dollars in sales that day off of

CNN. And I was like, okay, we found our

niche of how we need to do this. Yeah, definitely that.

So, I went from trying to book one school at a

time to one show at a time. And we fired

the PR firm that we had hired

to book me on all these shows.

I can't imagine why.

And so, yeah, it was. But but again, I

wouldn't have understood or respected

what it takes to get people on national

television unless I had to do it myself.

So I'm grateful for the opportunity to

play most of the roles that I had to have

in order to get where I am.

Well, I think I'm required for everyone

listening. What was the secret trick to

get you on on CNN? What was the angle?

How did you just ring up and say, oh,

yes, I work in the in the mail room.

Also, I'm really good at maths.

Yeah, it was, the best part was listening

to other people try to sell me for two

weeks, and seeing the gaps they had.

You just got to see what not to do. Yeah.

And then I, you know, the first few shows

I hit up didn't get any response or any

reaction sometimes. But I was working out

my pitch. And I'm telling you, people

take that as frustrating.

And, I looked at it as, holy cow, I'm really

figuring this out. I'm learning

everything not to say and what they need

to hear. And boy, that really helped me

sell myself and sell my products. So I'm

grateful for that experience of going

through that tough time.

I love it. And, that's, you know, it's a

honest thing to say where you go, well,

who can who can talk about you better

than you? Roughly no one. So, I know what

you've wrestled with. And the whole thing

of like feeling like you're braggadocious

or otherwise, and you go,

no, I'm just a businessman.

And, it can sound flat or it can sound

however you'd like it. But the thing

about it is, I think where it really

breaks is you see that the you have value

just in you and you go,

well, how do I take care of me?

Like I've talked about, you know, being a

pilot. And what's the rule on on a

jetliner? Put on your oxygen mask first.

You take care of you, you get to take

care of everyone else. And, I think a lot

of people unfortunately have the...

I don't matter because, you know, I need to feel

altruistic or otherwise, and you go,

well, you can't help if you're dead.

So, you should probably figure out a way

to make sure that you're taking care of.

And it does come back to your point about

the I. And, there is that in the crisis,

there is that in the moments where you

go, where's the food coming from? And, as

long as you get out of that moment, I

think everything's okay.

It's priceless because as I meet all

these people in my life now, you know,

I'm the chairman of world championships

and meet most of the top kids from around

the world that are going to be record

breakers and all these things.

My experience is priceless to them just

because I can relate to their situation

and help identify what they're missing,

what gaps they have and how to help fill

them. So yeah, I'm grateful to not just

be The Human Calculator.

You know, but to understand all the

things that happen around

me to allow that to happen.

I love it. So, I'll ask this. How did you

get involved in the great story of

basketball? What's

the story with Herkimer?

The small thing.

So, yeah, COVID hit in 2020. 2019, my dad had some

health issues. So I was back home in

upstate New York from Phoenix. And, I was

introduced to a book from 1952 that

claimed that basketball was invented in

my little hometown of Herkimer, New York.

And, I read that book and I called BS.

I said, listen, I would have heard about

this when I was a kid growing up,

if it was real. I read the book and I

said, if this book is real, then Herkimer

deserves to be on the map.

So, I went to the Historical Society at

Herkimer, and decided I was going to snuff

out this story in a couple of days. Just

go look at the old newspapers and say,

look, this book is full of it.

There's no way this happened.

You're like, where's your microfilm and

microfiche? I need to dig this up.

And newspapers from the 1800s, you know,

this happened in 1891. So microfiche, you

know, that's all I had

for a lot of this stuff.

Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed.

After about a week, I found more evidence

to support the story of origin.

You went the other way.

I did. I was very surprised. And after

after a few months, I had created quite a

trove of evidence to show that there's

more to the story and Herkimer. And then

I ran into these two guys in my research,

George Fosty and Darril Fosty.

They had written a book called, "Black Ice",

where they rewrote the history of ice

hockey. They showed that coloured leagues

were the major origin point of ice hockey

and rewrote ice hockey.

And they got destroyed for a decade by

everybody in hockey. And now they're

honoured at hockey tournaments across

Canada. They dropped the puck to start

the game. And so they

went through heck with that.

Well, when they finished their hockey

story, they decided to try this Herkimer

story. And I found an article they

published in 2010 saying, hey, we're

going to start looking into this Herkimer

basketball origin story.

Okay.

So I reached out to them and said, hey,

you know, I'm from Herkimer, born in

Herkimer. I'm a best selling author. I've

got a TV show on the History Channel. You

know, I have access to some stuff.

What evidence do you guys have that we

can put together? So, for the next year

and a half, we worked on all this

together and we put out a book in 2022

called, "Nais-Myth", M-Y-T-H, and put our

evidence together to show not only all

the evidence in Herkimer that proves

something happened there before

Springfield ever heard of basketball,

but also, all the nefarious activities

that Springfield and the Naismith family

had done to hold this story back. And,

How about that? And now I got to tell you, it

has been the most contentious five years

of my life, you know, trying

to rewrite basketball history.

Springfield doesn't like you.

Naismith family is not going to like you.

Kansas University, they're not happy with my

efforts. Sotheby's on and on.

135 year old story that, you know, isn't

complete. And so to go from The Human

Calculator where you walk into a school

or a corporate event and everybody loves

you and wants to meet you afterwards and

do your birthday and have fun. And that

was my life. Play golf every

day and just have a good time.

To being hated by everybody I was up

against, including half the people in my

hometown. They thought I was crazy and

what am I doing? Are we going to

embarrass the village? And the village is

going to heck anyway. Main Street looks

like crap. All 7,200 of them.

That's right. And we got nothing to lose.

Why not go for this? Because Cooperstown,

where Baseball Hall of Fame is, is 28

miles away from us on Route 28. We're

literally that close to the Baseball Hall

of Fame. And if it's true that basketball

was invented right there.

Like maybe there should be a small

monument, a little

round thing or something.

Well, actually the big basketball is what

I brought in. I'm still ridiculed for that,

but, it's very symbolic, you know,

the big basketball. When I decided to go

all in on this story, it was 2020, 2021.

COVID was still going on. And I drove

across the country to go

back to Phoenix

because upstate New York is

just too cold in the winter for me after

living in Phoenix for all these years.

And, the surface of the sun does a little bit

to you. Just a little right.

A whole different mindset. And, I was driving to a

place in Illinois called Casey, Illinois.

Never heard of it. Never seen it before.

And the exit sign was huge. And it had

like a dozen things on it that you could

go and see, and I'm like,

how? In the middle of nowhere?

Is this little town got a dozen things that

you have to go see. Well, this well off

couple had purchased all the bad

buildings on Main Street in Casey,

Illinois, tore them down and then

commissioned artists to build the largest

things in the world.

Well, that's like public works projects,

you know, in the United States, like

places where you go, this place has

nothing. We should probably have the

world's biggest beehive. And you go, why?

We don't even have flowers. And you go,

make a beehive. I promise

people will come to see it.

Well, in this place, Casey, Illinois went

from nothing to I had the big thing on

Main Street is they have the largest

rocking chair in the world. It's three

stories high. And this is during COVID.

Remember, I had to wait in line.

In line to get a selfie at the rocking

chair. That's how busy Casey was during

COVID. And so, that's when it hit me is

like, okay, the biggest basketball for

the home of basketball, the birthplace of

basketball. We got to put the biggest

basketball in the world. So I put that in

our development plan. And to this day,

I'm still ridiculed

about the big basketball.

But when it does get put up, when we're

officially, like right now, we're down to

days to tomorrow, you know, within a

couple of days here, CBS is airing a huge

special about our efforts from the past

five years, but three days later, the

Hall of Fame announces who the finalists

are for the class of 26.

And I have the two guys from Herkimer

are on the ballot, our foundation, the

Herkimer 9 Foundation got both of

these guys on the ballot in Springfield,

which was extremely contentious, you can

imagine. So... As you've mentioned. So, now,

I think you're just a bit of a prima

donna. Like, it sounds like you you whine

about favouritism a lot,

Scott, are you aware of this?

But, here's my problem. I've identified it

very clearly. I learned, I learned

arithmetic in third grade, and I figured

out an easy way to get it. So by the end

of third grade, I was doing it my head

faster than my teachers. And I rewrote

how we do arithmetic.

In 1999, I invented a new calendar to

save us from Y2K, because I thought we

were going to die from the Gregorian

calendar we use. And then try to rewrite

basketball history. You know, like my

friend said, I don't take on anything

easy, I go for the big ones.

So there's, there's my three.

I absolutely love that. So, you know,

you've mentioned golf, you've mentioned

basketball, and I know you keep

particularly boring company.

People probably haven't heard of them. But like,

you know, guys like I think he's called

Charles, Charles, Charles Barkley, how

did how did you get involved with these

extremely boring people?

So, my first tour as The Human Calculator

was in 1990. And we picked Philadelphia

as the first city to tour. Okay. Symbolic

because you know, Philadelphia,

brotherly love and all that. And, I had

been stationed down in Alabama. And I

watched Charles Barkley go through Auburn

University and how divided the state of

Alabama was about Charles.

And, so I knew quite a bit about him. And,

I show up at my first radio interview

ever, as The Human Calculator on tour.

And I walked in the green room. And

there's Charles Barkley, he had just been

picked by the Philadelphia 76ers to be on

their team. And so Charles Barkley and I

sit in the green room, I've got 30

minutes with him. And, it was just an

amazing moment because I

knew so much about him anyway.

And, then a few years later, he got with

the Phoenix Suns. So he's been out in

Phoenix for 30 years, you know, so it's

just a dream come true. And Charles is

such a genuine guy, and doesn't BS you

about anything. He's like, dude, here's

what you need to do. Here's, you know, I

mean, he had, he was fantastic. So, I just

ran into him on a golf course a couple

months ago. You know, we see, you know,

just a, it's really an honor to,

to have Charles play a role like that in

your life, you know, to

be there and at that right

moment.

Well, it's also, I would say, it's very

kind of the Phoenix

Suns to, to bring on such

a short gentleman. You know, it's, a lot

of times it's, it's

the very overly tall men

that get placed in basketball and it's,

it's kind of them to

choose someone short.

Well, and you know, you can remember

Charles Charles took the

Chicago Bulls to game six

for, I mean, we were right there.

It was very exciting and

Charles was playing amazing.

I mean, he really was an amazing player.

So, he's become a better announcer, I

think, than a player,

but he was an amazing player.

So a great person to have

play a role in your life.

Too fun.

So going back a little bit to service,

what would you say to veterans

that are currently in transition?

What's something that they need to hear?

Well, thank you for your service.

First off, I never take that for granted.

I'm a big fan of the military

and realise the role

they play and the sacrifices

that these people accept when they go in.

And, to be on call 24 hours a day,

your brain constantly

being put into that situation

where you don't know and you just gotta

be ready at all times

is such a demand and a sacrifice to their

families and things.

So, I would just

remind them to be grateful

for everything they

got out of the military

and not treat it as a

disadvantage or a waste of time,

but as a blessing, an

opportunity to continue on

in our communities, serving our

communities as a veteran

who served in the military.

Still stands out to

this day, as you can see,

I was just at the Phoenix Open this week

and they had Wednesday was service day

and they had to fly over, big celebration

for all the veterans and they deserve

every ounce of energy

that these things happened.

So, don't be shy about being

a veteran, let people know,

put it on your license plate.

It's better than a college.

You see a bumper sticker

that they went to this college

or that college, that's great,

but man, you served in the

Marines for 20 years, holy cow.

I wanna hang out with you,

I wanna hear some stories.

So don't be shy.

Oh, there are stories to be had.

There are stories to be had.

Say it.

Unlike anything else,

you know, there's nothing that

compares to the corporate world.

So, I would just be proud and be grateful

to have an opportunity

to continue to contribute

to our society with that on your resume

because the more we have out

there, the better off we are.

Even now, you can see a lot of companies

are always searching

for veterans to employ.

The VA has an incredible program

that helps place

military folks getting out

into the corporate world.

And, you can see how their desires so.

Companies appreciate and understand

that these folks have sacrificed

and have been under a

system that is manageable

that can translate into

being more user-friendly

in the commercial spaces out there,

you know, in the commercial world.

Yeah, that's one of the things

that I love being able to help with

because I see both sides of it,

where I know what it

looks like on the in,

I know what it looks like on the out.

And you go, well, how

does that translate?

And you go, it works well,

you just need to know

how to reshape the lens

because the skills are transferable,

but the verbiage is

not, I'll say it that way.

So, you know, a lot of

people, they're in and they're like,

I don't know how this translate,

you know, you brought up corporate.

It does, but figuring

out how to tell your story

in a way that is, the

way I explain it is,

and it's like a good joke.

You know, if you need to explain the

joke, it's not funny.

And that's kind of the same thing.

If you can give someone

something that they get it

and it's like a little ball and you can

just pass it to them

and they go, great, I

can hold this in the hand,

then it makes sense.

And it's not easy, but it is rewarding.

I'll say it that way.

Yeah, I'm very grateful I got to serve

and I wouldn't have done it

if I'd have known what

I was gonna go through.

That's fair.

You know, so, how are you

for people that stick it

out for 20, 25, 30 years?

God bless you.

I mean, you really, you have to conform.

You're not gonna fit in

if you don't conform.

So, those people have that ability.

And I think companies are looking for

people that have that.

Sure.

Definitely.

So on the flip side,

what, as far as the world,

not military, like civilian,

if you could drop a thought, you know,

some realisation into

their minds instantly,

what's something they need to know?

Help me understand your question.

Like in reference to veterans,

those in the service, those

that have transitioned out,

what's something that

maybe they don't know

or misunderstand or like

they've got it all wrong?

What's something like

that you want them to know?

Oh, that's interesting.

I guess, I mean, the

first thing that jumped out

of my brain there is that

I think it might be hard

for veterans to

understand how respected they are.

I think they take it for

granted because they made money,

they have retirement, they

have a lot of these things.

I just don't think they

understand how important it is

for people to know that they did serve

and that they are veterans.

A lot of guys just

sort of go below the radar

and maybe not talk about it.

And I think veterans need

to realise that, you know,

it's a calming sense for a lot of people.

I still to this day

have many, many friends

that are veterans and

can still, you know,

just feel the difference.

You know, there's some

camaraderie that is unmatched

in the regular world.

Love it.

So what is something on a

completely different note?

What's a, say a telly show or a film

or something that is

either so ridiculous or bad

that you can't stop but laugh at it

or something where, you

know, like they go, wow,

they really nailed it on the

head as far as military life.

What's a favourite of yours?

A favourite show that's personified.

Film, movie, anything.

What's something that you end up watching

more than you realise it?

Well, I mean, I hate to say

I mean, this goes way back.

Some people probably don't

even remember this movie,

but the silly Officer And A Gentleman

Oh my goodness. To see,

How crazy that can... For those that don't

know, watch the scene

where he carries the woman out.

You'll get the joke.

Yeah, and the idea that

there's a person in charge of you

that can just control

your life, you know?

I mean, it completely, like you said,

right at the beginning of our interview,

the word surrender comes up.

I mean, you don't have an option.

So, that movie really

made it crystal clear

that I only feel like doing 20 pushups.

Well, we don't care what you think.

That's adorable, Snowflake, get going.

Yeah, exactly.

So I needed that.

You know, I had a pretty loose life going

and it was good to have that regimen.

Fair enough.

Oh goodness.

Well, Scott, thank

you so much for coming.

And I'll ask for everyone,

what's the best way

for everyone to contact

to get in connection with you?

HumanCalculator.com.

That's it, and on social media,

I'm @HumanCalculator.

And, I'm still performing at schools,

doing teacher

workshops, corporate events.

And, now I'm launching

The National Counting Bee.

But I also do corporate counting bees.

Companies have me come in and

do my human calculator show.

And then at the end, we

do a little counting bee

to find who their fastest math lead is.

And it's hilarious.

The last one I did was here in Phoenix

for an aviation company.

And, they got all these

sales people and CEOs

and smart executives and

we're doing the counting bee.

Very type A personalities.

And the winner was the

guy who runs the warehouse.

Not even, nothing to do with sales.

The man who does logistics every time.

It was amazing.

And everybody was in shock.

And he just stepped up

and destroyed everybody.

So it really humanises the numbers

because I'm not trying to

make everybody a math whiz.

I'm just trying to help

people feel more comfortable

and confident with numbers.

And there is one thing

I wanna share with you.

The pattern and numbers that I discovered

that I think is gonna change the way

people learn arithmetic.

So, I discovered this

right before Y2K on 9-9-99.

I was playing golf with Alice Cooper

who has been one of my best

friends for over 30 years.

Also really boring

company, might I say.

Amazing guy.

He turned 78 the other day

and he's still doing 200 shows a year.

I mean, he runs our Bible studies.

Brilliant, he's a wordsmith, on and on.

Anyway, on 9-9-99, I had

invented a new calendar

to save us from Y2K.

And, it was supposed to come out that day

in a big article in Phoenix.

And, I got a note the night before

saying they were gonna

hold it off for another week.

And I reached out to them,

it was too late at night.

I was like, next week is at 9-9-99.

The reason I had you do this article

was to capture the 9-9-99 for Y2K.

And I showed up at golf the next day

and Alice and I were playing and he goes,

"Hey Scott, don't worry.

Everything happens for a reason.

It wasn't supposed to happen today."

And I go, all right.

I don't know if I

agree with that, but okay.

And, we got to the 18th hole and he said,

hey, I wrote a song called 18.

One plus eight is nine.

Today's nine, nine, nine.

How come 18 adds up to nine?

And I said, Alice, that's easy.

Any number, times nine, that

answer will add up to nine.

Like three times nine is

27, two is seven is nine.

Six times nine is 54,

five and four is nine.

I gave him a couple

more examples and he goes,

"Okay, I don't care."

And I'm driving home thinking about this.

And, I had invented a new calendar.

It's a 13 month calendar

and I looked at the number 13

and for some reason my brain

went one plus three is four.

13 take away four is nine.

And it was nine, nine, nine, nine, nine,

nine o'clock in the morning and I'm like,

"What the heck is this?"

So I tried with the number 11.

One and one is two.

11 minus two is nine.

And I started trying it

with more and more numbers

and it kept working.

You're coming over onto my side now

because the magic is in prime, good sir.

13, 7, those are magic numbers.

Well, and my book, my best-selling book

is called "Math Magic" and I felt like,

what did I miss here?

What's going on?

And to be honest with

you, I kept doing it.

It kept working like I tried it with 22.

Two and two is four.

22 minus four is 18.

And that answer, one,

eight adds up to nine.

I was freaking out.

I called my old math teacher and I said,

"Hey, what is this called?"

Because I thought I had

missed one day in third grade

when they taught this.

It was so simple.

And I'm like, here I am

in the Guinness Book... Well, the obvious answer.

Well, and I'm in the

Guinness Book of Records

as The Human Calculator and I didn't know

this little pattern

that everything goes back

to the number nine.

And so, come to find

out, I didn't miss it.

Nobody really cared about it.

And it took me a

couple years to figure out,

but try this now.

All of your viewers and listeners,

think of your age, and now

add those two digits together

and take that total and

subtract it from your age.

And the answer you get will be a number

that adds up to nine.

And this simple exercise

is what I believe exercises

the calculator in our brain

because it's a natural pattern.

It's not

memorisation, which is over here.

So that's my mission that

you asked about earlier.

This is my mission as

The Human Calculator

is to reach every kid on the planet Earth

before they're nine

years old about this pattern

so that when they are

nine, every number they see,

every day for a whole year,

will go back to their age,

the number nine, and help

them learn all their math facts

and feel like numbers of their friends.

And now they can go learn higher math.

But right now the kids are just

memorising their math facts.

They don't understand the

logic or the patterns of numbers

and it all falls apart by algebra.

So I call it chapter zero,

it's the missing chapter.

It's gonna change the

way kids learn math.

That's my mission now.

And my calendar, I'm

still working on that.

Okay.

It's all brilliant.

And thank you so much for sharing.

Well, thank you for having me.

God bless veterans.

I'm grateful to be considered

one, but man, I'll tell you,

especially now,

everybody knows everything

with social media and for

you to sign up to serve now,

you know, you gotta have a good mindset.

You're not going in there by accident.

And so God bless the military.

Indeed that.

Well, we have more

brilliant stories coming soon

and to support the channel directly,

be sure to join The Tribe on Patreon.

Cheers all.