And That's Why We Drink - E41 Dr. Carrot and the Score of Yore

Episode Date: November 12, 2017

Let’s just say this episode is a little out of control. Don’t say we didn’t warn you. Em talks the Great Amherst Mystery, a terrifying poltergeist story from Nova Scotia, and Christine tells the story of Herb Baumeister, a serial killer with an affinity for mannequins. Oh, there are also flying potatoes, a pool of chardonnay, and a Psychic Called Wanda. Light a cigarette - er, lamp - and listen up.

so what's up not much well you want to know something yeah so listen listen my dad called i bet he did he had something to say he had something to say whatever you're about to tell me every millennial's eyes are just rolling into the back of their head right now because if you're laughing at the fact that your dad said anything at all it's gonna be good he calls i mean i mean i'm not joking like this was very serious nothing about this was comical to him. It was an extreme problem. And he had to call me in the morning. It was very much early my morning because I'm Pacific Standard Time. It was like breakfast time, his time.

And this is what the phone call consisted of. Christina, sometimes I listen to your podcast at breakfast through my Son speakers which are like the the like surround sound through this entire fucking house i'm like well first of all don't do that mistake one mistake number one don't i was eating a muffin with orange marmalade it was from frida's bakery and my appetite was completely ruined so i don't think people who want to enjoy their breakfast will be able to listen to the full episodes of your podcast. This is something you should consider. Our podcast is not called And That's Why We Eat.

So there's that, Bernhard. I love when dads try to be constructive, but like at the same time, like are the complete opposite. He's like, no one will want to listen. I'm like, okay, I'm sure one person will. No one will. Nobody who wants to eat a marmalade muffin will want to listen i'm like he's like okay i'm sure one person will no one will no nobody who wants to eat a marmalade muffin will want to listen to the podcast also let's let's not even get into it don't don't get into it um my dad tried saying yeah my dad tried to give some constructive criticism as well and by the way this is a man who does not know what a podcast is

um i oh i also recently told him that they're the new version of radio like there are generations radio and i was like i would i would go so far as to say that most people our age listen to podcasts more than they listen to radio shows i mean it's it's statistically accurate i think the only like infamous radio shows to date still are like Howard Stern and like the fireside chats. Like I was going to say Ryan Seacrest, but I guess we'll go with fireside. I was trying to give history a chance. I like how you're trying to throw in your like elementary school history. That's all I've got.

But so like my dad doesn't like, Oh, but I was going to tell, I did tell him that like a lot of people our age will definitely listen to a podcast before a radio. And my father made this sound like he was throwing up. He was like, I don't think so. He was trying to tell me I don't know about my own generation. And he doesn't have a credit card.

He shares a cell phone with my stepmom. He knows nothing about technology. He literally spells YouTube with a U. He doesn't know anything about this stuff. And recently about the cloud recently, I tried to, uh, I don't even remember what, how we led into this, but I was trying to tell him something really impressive about the podcast. And his response was post that on the cloud and he was like i don't know how but if i could i would and i was like well if you find out you tell me because i didn't know we could post anything on clouds if i knew how i would post

that on the cloud i was like if you figure it out tell me so i can do it too that's my favorite thing in the whole world actually he also recently just bought his own cell phone so he no longer shares with my stepmom. That's amazing. Because he could not say, okay, Google to the phone anymore. Because I guess now, I'm not kidding you. That's the one reason he now has like a $240 bill every month. Because I guess like the new update, I don't have an Android, but that's an Android, right?

But like apparently now it recognizes the voice of its owner. So only my stepmom can say, okay, Google. But like if my dad says it, it doesn't recognize his voice. So it won't just open up. Yeah. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. But so now my dad can't say, okay, Google, open the map and directions to this place.

And that frustrated him so much, he bought a phone. Okay, Google, open the fireside chat. I don't know what's wrong with that man. I didn't ask because it's too late. He's already paying for it. But I was like, why don't you just open it up with a passcode or something and then just go to Maps? It's not hard.

Insert your dad's vomit sound. If he ever listens to this, let's hope this isn't the only one he ever listens to. It's just funny because my dad's the, like, I feel like our dads are the opposite in some ways because my dad's, like, extremely technologically savvy. Like, the second anything savvy. Like he bought, like the second anything comes out, he buys like all the, like he literally bought that like surround sound Sonos system where you're in any room of the house and you can like change the music. And his favorite song is like that selfie song. Like, let me take a selfie.

Like he it's his favorite song and he thinks it's so funny. And so every time someone comes over, he like thinks it's funny to like play it in different rooms of the house i don't know can't wait to meet him in october next year get ready that's probably what he's gonna do at my fucking wedding so he plays our podcast on that sonos thing so it goes through every room of the house and my stepmom's the opposite where she's like she doesn't know how to like hit space on her phone. So it's just like a bunch of letters in a row. So I feel like our parents are just a wacky group. My mom, the second anything comes out, she buys it. But it's only Apple products.

She doesn't care for anything else. My dad refuses to buy Apple. He's like Android technology. Well, my mom got an Apple iWatch or whatever they're fucking called. Apple Watch. And as soon as she put it on for the first time and bragged to me about it and how cool it was three minutes later in the other room i hear her go shit and it had fallen and shattered all over the marble tile

and it was like three minutes into her putting it on she got another one she's fine anyway so um that's how our parents are doing. So I know you guys wanted to hear about our parents. Because that's all this podcast is about. I also wanted to say another thing that I wrote down in a notebook that I didn't bring with me. So let's see. What was it? Hmm.

That's a fun game to play. It's always fun when you think, oh, I'll be productive so I don't forget. And then you forget the productive aspect of it. You're like, great. I was productive. Let me put this away in a shelf. Let me write a to-do list and then throw it away and try to remember everything I wanted to say. And leave it at work so that tomorrow I can look at it and think, motherfucker, I didn't do any of these things.

We have a listener named Verac. Oh, shit. I'm spilling wine everywhere. Hold on. Is it good? Oh, it's fine. If you think that's the first time I've spilled wine on this computer, look who brought his milkshake. Baby G! Hi, honey!

Sweet baboo. He's so good. I know, it's so nice to have someone give you that. He's like, now what do I get? He's like, what else? We have a listener named Varrock and he sent his company called D&K Monarchy, sent a few pairs of leggings for me to try because I always talk about. And also, I've never not seen you in leggings. Yeah, it's all I wear.

So perfect. So he sent that, and that was just really thoughtful of him. And the leggings are amazing. It's an L.A.-based company. They're all different colors. It's an L.A.-based company. They're all different colors. There's different lengths. And he actually was kind enough to also offer 15% off your entire order on their website, which is D as in dog, N as in Nancy, K, monarchy.com. And if you use the coupon code ATWWD, you get 15% off.

And I personally, this isn't even through our network or anything. I just want to, you know. We're just plugging whatever we want today, apparently. Well, I was just very honored that he sent them. No, it's awesome. And I wore them and I was like, these are really flipping great. Really? So he was like, well, if you want, like, your listeners can get a discount.

So I figured, why not let everyone in on the secret? Why not? Why not? Why not? So why do you drink this week? I'm mainly stressed because my whole world seems to be like a stress climax right now because last week I tried really hard to be productive and somehow it backfired and I have more shit on my plate than usual. I think because I weeded out all the stuff I'm always actively avoiding, but now that

it's gone, I'm realizing all the other stuff that I've been really avoiding, and now I'm like, oh, shit. Or, you know, my roommates are currently both moving out, so I'm very stressed out about having to find multiple roommates. I already found one who is our friend from our Boston program. Other Christine, who we've mentioned on the show before. Christine number one. And I lived with her when we first moved out to LA.

So it's like a reunion. And she's probably one of the best roommates I've ever had. So I'm lucky for that. And she's like a real grown up with like a real job. Oh, she makes us look like we have no idea what we're doing. I mean, we don't. We don't. Also, RJ doesn't listen to this, so I can say it out loud, but I'm also planning a going away party for him.

So, but it's a surprise. I'm sorry. I'm not attending because RJ doesn't listen to this podcast. I think if he does, we'll find out if he does or not based on how surprised he acts at the party. But anyway, that's why I'm stressed. Also, side note, everyone, i've gotten like 300 messages about how to clean my sweatshirt oh and i swear to fucking god if one more person says tell em how to clean her sweatshirt i'm like everyone has been very very kind and very very nice about it and also

i've gotten a lot of um kind words about me mentioning my depression last episode a lot of people have been sending in good wishes and saying you know i suffer from it too so i hear you guys i'm sorry i didn't get to everyone there's just only so many ways i can reply to 300 pieces of advice about cleaning a sweatshirt and by the way i tried everyone's stuff and there's still a giant stain did you iron yes okay i'll i'll tell you later there's a way to get oil i know what it is it's oil it's all gone it's just the oil stain yeah i know how to get it out okay yeah thanks guys uh why do you drink i drink because like speaking speaking of people like i feel like every time okay i'm just gonna say it me. My anxiety is out of control.

Christine and I are losing our fucking minds right now. All week. I don't know what's been going on, but telepathy is a real thing. Especially when we are both so in sync with that kind of stuff. And we're so close with each other that now I don't even have to text Christine. I can just kind of feel when she's probably going to reach out to me soon. And in the last couple days, I have been at such a weird state of anxiety. And it felt like it wasn't just my anxiety.

And then for some reason, I couldn't stop thinking about Christine. And I was like, this bitch is going fucking psychotic over there. I do a thing where I just spread my anxiety to other people. And so I tried calling you yesterday and you didn't answer the phone. But I was trying to call you to be like, what the fuck is going on? And then today I show up

at our house and both of us are losing our minds. Geo, the therapy emotional support animal, does not know how to handle both of us stressed out. Em walks in

and I'm listening to fucking Matchbox 20. That's how you know there's something wrong. The teen angst. Man, I swear to God, I... Why are you so stressed?

I don't fucking know. I just have anxiety and it's so out of control. And I will say that my medication, I didn't... Walgreens fucked it up. So I wasn't on it for like three days. So I think that probably has a slight thing to do with it. Even though Blaze likes to come for me by saying,

no, no, no. It doesn't... That won't affect it. And I'm like... Okay, but placebo effect, it does. But also, I had a dream that eight people stabbed me. And I'm like, okay, but placebo effect, it does. But also I had a dream that like eight people stabbed me. So I feel like I had a dream this week that Allison died and it was very bad. Yeah.

So we're basically in a bad place mentally, but you know, it's fine. And that's why we drink it. I am very grateful for the podcast and for my job and for everything that's happening and for wine. Well, I said that for Allison and Gio and that's about it. And well i said thank you for allison and geo and that's about it and geo and allison i guess too um but yeah so that's why i drink i'm just like really anxious to the point where i'm like digging my fingernails into my palms but it's a good feeling it's a good state we're in it's like it's like a learning stage um anyway with all that enjoy all of our stress guys i know you

can feel it from wherever you are in the world do you guys like when you're our therapist because that's what's happening because i like it it's really remember that time i was like let's start a podcast so other people have to deal with our problems it's a good idea listen you want to hear about someone else's issues i only want to hear about someone else's issues? I only want to hear about someone else's issues. So I'm trying to do a lot more stories where people request the story because I want to do things that people care about. And that's why I did Crescent Hotel last week, which a lot of people wrote to me about. You're really charitable, you know. Honestly, I'm a saint.

Yeah, I mean, you should be canonized. We'll talk about it. You are on a candle with Gia. Oh, I love it. And you know what? That candle has not failed me or my sweatshirt. That's right. So there's only one person who requested this story.

However, they took my interest in goats and my interest in Canada and put them together. So thank you to Kate, whose handle is True North Ranger. Well, she sounds like a true North Ranger to me. And she suggested the story of Esther Cox andx and the great amherst mystery which sounds like a wild ride sounds like the guy who wrote polar express it sounds like a video game it sounds like he decided to write a children's book about a murder mystery well here's the even more adventurous part of this story my laptop is at 11 and my phone is at three. So let's see how

fast I can tell this story. So hurry up. Here we go. Um, all right. So the Amherst poltergeist case. Oh no, no, no, no, no. Is the most well-known documented poltergeist case in Canada. My homeland. Okay. Uh,, a lot of people have been reaching out to me wondering why I love Canada so much. And listen, I don't know. It's just I know it in my soul, in my heart and in my gut. And that's all that matters. All I have to say is a lot of people have been reaching out to me to ask why you love Canada so much. I'm just a true patriot. I'm like, if if M doesn't know, then how am i supposed to fucking know look all all we need to know is that america may or may not be the place i end up i will say i mean hell is where i

will end up but in between there is like canada you know canada's like purgatory well yeah i mean if if by purgatory you mean the greatest place on earth, whether or not you've been there. Yeah. In 1878 in Amherst, Nova Scotia. Is that how they say it? I like how you're like, I love Canada. And then you're like, every Canadian. I mean, it just sounded more Midwest than anything to me.

It sounds like Minnesota. Minnesota. And there go all of our Minnesota listeners. I just took a drink for them. Minnesota. And there go all of our Minnesota listeners. I just took a drink for them. Goodbye. In 1878 in Amherst, Nova Scotia, Esther Cox, who was 19 years old, was living with her sister, her brother-in-law, and about 7 million other people. Because in this house, it was like a family of 10. They were all kind of living in one small home.

But they were all siblings or in-laws somehow. Okay. They also rented out the other room to passersby. So they're just like ten people, and then they're like, oh. Yeah, they just all huddle together all the time. And then a rando just gets to come in. And then a demon. So.

Oh, okay. so oh okay so one night esther and her sister jenny um are sleeping in bed and they they share a bed by the way of course and they feel something moving under the covers as they're about to go to sleep all right no um esther thought it was a mouse and they both just went to bed, which first of all, what kind of bear grills? Who just feels a mouse in the bed and is like, oh, nighty night. Honey, don't. Sissy, don't worry. It's just a mouse.

It's just. Go back to sleep. It's just a vermin. One time my aunt went into her bed in Germany. I promise this is worth it. She got into bed in their house and there was a bat hiding under the covers. Shut the fuck up. And she pulled up the and there was a bat hiding under the covers. Shut the fuck up. And she pulled up the covers and it flew

out from under the covers. I swear to god I would never ever go to Germany again. And ever since then she has to like pick up the covers and look. I don't blame her. Can you imagine? Anyway. Oh my god. Let's all take a sip for your hand. Cheers. Uh, so they thought

a mouse was in the bed and they ignored it already the uh they're different people than i am it was stewart little and canada is a strong place he was their little brother apparently um so anyway they ignored it but they kept feeling something crawling in the sheets and when they finally looked finally they found nothing at all um the next night you know because they went to bed and woke up relief okay the next night um they heard strange noises coming from under the bed and they felt their bed moving like something was kind of kicking it from underneath no no they looked under the bed poor choice again don't lie am i just from an area where i was raised like i get i had a helicopter parent raising me but also never look under your fucking bed i think as the 90s kids who watch like

aria monsters and are you afraid of the dark and goosebumps and bunnicula we were like no you don't oh i love bunnicula me too but you don't fuck with that shit. So anyway, they looked under the bed. They saw nothing there but a box full of fabric. Ew. Like fabric strips for sewing, I guess. Okay. And when they pulled it out, the box flew in the air by itself. And then, because the true Canadians they are, got out of bed and walked over to it.

And then... They were like, oh, sorry, box of fabric. Whoops. Oh, sorry. And so then they went over to the box, and when they tried to pick it up, it flew away from them. Then they got scared, told their family. Their family came upstairs, and all of them witnessed the box fly to the other side of the room. All 10 of them.

All 10,000 Canadians. Or 7,000 or whatever. So anyway, the third night, because we're just on a roll. Sure, sure, sure. On the third night, Esther went to bed early by herself. Don't do that. Again, stupid fucking choice. You gotta read a book or something.

Are they even going to talk about what they saw? Or they're just like, that was weird. Are they going to talk about it to who? To anyone. Are they they gonna look at each other and be like did you see that shit like why is there a mouse in my bed why is there a box of fabric flying around so the third night esther goes to bed by herself early because she says she doesn't feel well jenny her sister then goes upstairs later that night after esther's gone to bed presumably but then she opens the door est after Esther has gone to bed, presumably. But then she opens the door. Esther jumps out of the bed and is screaming, what is happening to me?

I'm dying. Jenny lights a lamp. I thought you were going to say lights a cigarette. Jenny's like, I'm too old for this bullshit. Jenny's like, I need a break for this bullshit. Jenny's like, oh fuck. Jenny's like, I need a break. And that's why I smoke. Jenny lights a lamp because there's no electricity yet in their home.

Oh, sure. Okay. And after Esther says, I'm dying, what's happening to me? Lights a lamp to see what's going on and Esther's skin is bright red and seems to be swelling unnaturally. Oh. She was hot to the touch. Her eyes were bulging out of her and she looked like she was

literally going to burst out of her own stretched skin. That's fucking disgusting. That is why Jenny lit the cigarette. It's like that episode where I talked about Carl Tonsler and his corpse that he brought home. And you were like, yeah, of course she smelled.

She's a fucking corpse. The bitchy seventh grader. Bitchy seventh. That's right. So obviously she smelled because she was a dead fucking body. God damn it, Megan. I'm not saying she smelled. I'm just saying she was a dead corpse.

So you do the fucking math. So anyway, bullet number four. Are we all done? Okay. While, okay, so anyway, her skin is stretched and all this nonsense. All right. So then she passes out from the pain. Jenny screams and the family comes upstairs, as they do, with the box and everything.

All 7,000. Just in an army line. And they're all trying to wake her up, but instead she begins convulsing on the floor. And during this, four loud claps of thunder rattle around the entire house. Oh, no. And like everything in the house shakes and they think it's an earthquake, but it's four bangs hitting the house from all ends. Then Esther stopped shaking, her skin returned to its regular color, and the swelling stopped, as did the thunder. Four nights later, because we're just going to skip through time one and two, we're just going to ignore the last three nights and just continue on with our week.

I feel like I'm watching, like, Big Brother or some reality series where it's like day one i hope like at least the night after that they were like are you okay do you like need someone to go to bed with you like what's going on but they just they just let her whatever canadians were weird in the 1800s they're just weirdly brave so all these events kept repeating themselves after four days of rest so those those three days happened where they heard some they felt something in the bed then they saw a box fly then she like almost exploded and then four days of nothing and then after that the uh same events began repeating themselves every night where she would like stretch out and

it's like veruca salt or whatever yeah like she was turning into the blueberry girl but like not in a chocolate factory just you know just in her in her weird squatting home her overcrowded um so the family didn't know what to do so they called the local doctor and his name i think someone's gonna yell at me in Canada, but that's fine because you're Canadian. You can say whatever you want to me. His name was Dr. Carrite or Dr. Carrot. I'm going to go with Dr. Carrot.

I'm not sure. Let me see. C-A-R-R-I-T-T-E. C-A-R-R-I-T-T-E. C-A-R-R-I-T-T-E. It means definitely not carrot. I mean, we're going to call him Dr. Carrot. I would say Carrite. Carrite.

Carrite. Carrite. Carrite. Not karate. Doctor. We've gone too far with it. We have to just keep calling him Dr. Carrot now. Carrite.

Carrite. Is that what we're doing? Carrite. I just want to call him Carrot. Okay, call him Carrot. Anyway, we'll just call calling him Dr. Carrot now. I would say, like, Carrotay. Is that what we're doing? Carrotay? I just want to call him Carrot. Okay, call him Carrot. Anyway, we'll just call him the doctor. We're going to get so many fucking emails. When don't we, Christine?

Look, we thought only our moms would listen, and we thought we'd get nothing but compliments. You said to me, but I'm the one who has to respond like, I'm so sorry and pronounce that wrong. Look, everyone, let's just all huddle together, hold hands across the universe, and understand I'm never going to be 100% right. The number of emails I got about Menger Hotel where everyone was like, why did Em say Menger? Okay, for the people out there who are wondering why I said Menger, you all heard me for five minutes wonder if it was Menger or Menger.

At least I was aware that I could be wrong. I said Menger, and then everyone was like, why? And I was like, am I supposed to say oh here's we can't please everyone here's the philosophical reason why m said it a different way because i'm an idiot that's why if you want to call me an idiot you're not wrong i should just respond and say because we're idiots i give you permission if they're like it's not dr carrot be like well m like, well, M's an asshole. Apparently I said Glasgow. Glasgow? Wrong. And there was a whole Facebook thread about it

because apparently I pronounced it like Glasgow and a person who's from there said I butchered it and it's not, I mean, I guess it's just Glasgow. Glasgow? Whatever. Take anyone that's not in America to Massachusetts and have them spell any county. Worcester.

Yeah. Spell Worcester right now. It's not spelled the way you think it is. And also, although that is a British place, so never mind. Okay, everyone but England. And also, if I, you know, try pronouncing Louisville. Try pronouncing it. If you want to fucking say something correctly, record yourself.

Go record yourself. Go record yourself with your own fucking noise. Look, if you don't like how we say things, just don't fucking listen to us. That was an out-of-body experience. I was there for it. You went out and i went in and we like exchanged souls there that's weird magic okay anyway dr carrot showed up fuck you guys if you don't like the way i say it dr c you know what maybe dr carrot can reach out

to us and tell us he doesn't like how i say his fucking name oh wait it was in the 1800s no because then we're going to get fucking haunted. Do not do that shit. Do not tempt fucking ghosts to come haunt us. Also, before anyone else says anything, yes, we have been updated about Dear David, and it's terrifying, but we know what's going on, and it's equally scary for us. We're terrified. Anyway, fun fact, David's last name is Carrot dear david carrot dr david carrot dear dr david

carrot you have to edit some of this oh why but i was drinking no dr c why don't we call him Dr. Macy. Doc. Okay. So the first night that he stayed over to examine Esther's behavior, he wrote down because he decided he was going to keep a journal of everything that he witnessed. The first thing he witnessed was she went to bed and he decided to stay by her bedside and just see if anything happened while she was sleeping. And he saw the pillow that she was sleeping on moving beneath her without any hands pulling it from either side, and her head stayed exactly the same, and her hair wasn't touched. So, like, it was just the pillow itself moving, but no other part was being, like, affected by it. Oh, my God, it was that rat, probably.

Oh, yeah. Right, exactly. And Stuart Little was back in the pillow so then uh other than the pillow he also heard more thunder from beneath the bed only that he cannot explain and he also saw her clothes get thrown around the room by nobody just watching them just like fly up and then hit the ground and fly up and hit the ground that was like the fabric box yeah yeah same kind of thing um so then one night after observing her a couple times he started hearing a scratching noise that sounded like a metal tool scraping into like plaster or something kind of softer

and it was happening above her bed and so he looked up and he saw letters etching themselves into her wall. No. And eventually, when it was done, it spelt out, Esther Cox, you are mine to kill. What the actual fuck? Then a clump of plaster, after it was getting scratched out, a clump of plaster from the ceiling tore off the wall by itself and flew across the room, landing at his feet. Ah! So then, being the courageous Dr. Carrot that he is, he returned the next day and decided that he was going to keep observing.

Okay. I guess because, like, he just didn't get, like, enough of a dramatic fix from that. But, honestly, if I saw that shit in your house, I'd never come back. Just so we all are clear. Me the family that whatever was going on with with esther was something outside of his medical understanding okay fair at least he's honest i was gonna say i feel like most people would at least pretend like they knew it was a good doctor um he could only diagnose her with nervous excitement although wouldn't anyone when you know you've got something like that going on i'd be nervous too i already have that so he gave her a very very powerful sedative oh that's what i need

to but it was a powerful sedative in the 1800s so either it was really good like some coke or it was really bad you know it was just like an illegal drug nowadays it was like methamphetamine they're like let's put it in your body just take all of it so as soon as she took it she fell asleep and the noises around the house were louder than than they have ever been um it sounded apparently according to his journal sounded like a sledge hammer hitting the roof and neighbors claimed that they could hear the sounds from down the street. Oh geez. Um,

and then manifestations slowly began to get worse over time. The first note I have, which makes no sense, but apparently is an important manifestation to mention. Okay. Potatoes hurled themselves across the room. Carrots and potatoes. I'm going to take a note now that I work at Nickelodeon,

because I feel like that's something I could work into an episode. Oh, yeah. Just potatoes just throwing themselves around. Just like lively potatoes. I wonder if it was just the potatoes. Like, why only those? Yeah, like, were there any turnips? Were there more?

Was he just picky about what was going on in the vegetable bowl? It was just the root vegetables. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So anyway, those were just throwing themselves around. Right, sure. Also, spontaneous fires began erupting throughout the house. Knives and forks suddenly flew across the room and would jam themselves into walls.

Good, good. Furniture was being moved and tossed around when no one was actually in the room. People would just come in and see it just laying everywhere. Heavy drawers would slam up against the walls. Witnesses claimed to have heard the sound of a heavy slap, and then they would look at Esther's face and there'd be a giant welt showing up. Poor thing. That's like our early episode where someone got bitch slapped. Yep. Paranormal bitch slaps.

That's what she got pins and needles would materialize out of thin air and then fly into esther's face i'm sorry that sounds like something like first of all i'm not from canada you're not sadly so i don't know if this is like an actual scary story that people think is real or if this is like an urban legend but it sounds like with the pins and needles thing that sounds like something your parents would tell you like like don't cross your eyes or they'll get stuck that way it's like don't do something or pins and needles just gonna show up and slam into your face i guess it sounds like something really sick you would tell kids just to scare them yeah but like what like with what like what behavior would cause that

like i got told if i pick my nose my nose would turn giant like an elephant really i never heard that one that's because my families are i always thought it would be like don't pick your nose your finger will get stuck there no my family are crazy germans and they're like you will turn into an elephant man and i was like okay okay, a bucket of cold water on the kitchen table multiple times began boiling on its own. Why was there a bucket of cold water on the table? Why was it boiling on its own? Also, Esther claimed that the entity was threatening to burn the house down. And for some reason, through all of this, the family decided not to believe her.

And they were like, you're being dramatic. Like, pins are just showing up in your face. But no, the thing doesn't want to burn the place down. this the family decided not to believe her and they were like you're being dramatic like pins are just showing up in your face but no the thing doesn't want to burn the place down putting needles in your own eyeballs so they didn't believe her until not only were pins and needles materializing out of thin air but so were lit matches and they were dropping from the ceiling onto their home no all over the place no so like they were landing on people's beds, on the carpet. One of them landed in a bucket of cedar shavings and almost caught the entire basement on fire. Oh, my God.

So, years later, Dr. Carrot would, he wrote, I know that's not his fucking name, guys. He would be quoted later talking to a colleague saying, there was no fraud or deception in this case. Were I to publish the case in a medical journal, as you suggest, I doubt it would be believed by physicians. I am certain I could not have believed such apparent miracles had I not witnessed them. So he is on board. Yeah. Um, also this was around the time where people were really getting into like spirituality and thought they could connect with the dead and tarot cards and all that good stuff. And automatic writing was one of the big things.

So the family had psychics and automatic writers come through and they just to find out what was going on. And in one session, a spirit came through named Maggie Fisher, who apparently had attended the same school as Esther, but Esther didn't remember her. Other spirits were somehow related to the family. The main one to come forward, his name was Bob Nickel. And there's a lot of coincidences that kind of cast doubt about the validity of this. Okay. doubt about the validity of this okay because every name that she came up with sounded eerily like people that are like that are actually in their real life that are still alive that's like nickel and carrot yeah just inanimate objects um no like one of the spirits so bob nickel um sounded a lot like some their family friend bob mcneil um and a lot of people because later on i'll describe it but um bob mcneil actually was a guy it was a family

friend that tried to sexually assault her oh my god and so a lot of people a lot of skeptics have made the argument that these spirits were just projections of her emotional trauma. So, like, she said she was being haunted by someone that sounded a lot like Bob McNeil. I mean, that's a fair point. For sure. So anyway, the violent, demonic episodes continued for several weeks, and feeling guilty, Esther decided to move out. Feeling guilty? Because, like, her family had to deal with this. Oh, my God. I know, right? weeks and feeling guilty esther decided to move out um when she feeling guilty because like her family had to deal with this oh my god i know right it's like don't feel bad for us like you're

the one that has literally this thing inside of you talk about canadian man talk about canadian man so while she was gone um there were no strange phenomena that happened in the house so it was believed that like whatever was attached to her stayed with her when she moved out after feeling that everything was okay in the house and back to normal esther returned back to be with her family but then the activity came started getting pretty wild again by this time she had received widespread coverage in local tabloids and regional newspapers. So she was well known because, again, this was a time where people were really getting into spirituality.

And she was the first case in their town that someone might have a strong connection with spirits. Right. So everyone was really fascinated by her, especially an actor at the time named Walter Hubble. Uh-huh. Hubble. Hubel. Uh-huh. Hubble. Hubel. Fuck. Walter.

How do you say it? Spell it. H-U-B-B-E-L-L. Hubble. I would think Hubble. Like the telescope. Definitely Hubble. We're going to call him Walter.

All right. So anyway, he was an actor during the time, and he was so fascinated by this story that he decided that he wanted to take that room for rent in the house so he could live in the house with her and witness this shit happening. I think that's kind of fucked up. Like if I was being possessed and then like Ashton Kutcher showed up and was like, I'm definitely not going to help you. I just want front row tickets to this fucking show. I don't know how I'd feel. Oh, I'd be like yes

please take a seat like sit on down i'll make the popcorn for you ashton me and bob nickel i'll make the popcorn dr carrot and i will give you a show so after convincing her that she should try to make some money off of her experience, her and Walter went on tour to share her paranormal experiences. But after being heckled off stage for not being interesting enough because she couldn't do anything on command. First of all, how in tune with spirituality are you if you're like, do something and then nothing happens and you're mad? But so a lot of people were heckling them saying that just being lectured wasn't interesting enough. And one of the groups of hecklers actually kind of turned into a pretty violent mob. And so they got ran off the stage and that's when they gave up and went back home.

Oh, shit. So she went home again. So then Esther wanted to try to make the stop. So she tried going to church. That's a good bet. Yeah, I mean, it can't hurt, I guess. While sitting in church, she sat in the back of the pews and tried her best to just be quiet. But I guess that knocking and the thunder clapping that was going on under her bed seems to follow her wherever she stays for too long.

So while she was sitting in the pews, all of a sudden all these knocks were happening around the entire church until the church, until the, I guess the knocking started next to her by the pew that she was sitting on and it spread out and eventually was only on the other side of the church. So it was muffling out what the priest was saying. Oh my God. And so feeling bad, she just like up and left in the middle of the sermon. Esther just can't get a win. She can't get a win. One night she fell into a trance,

um, during, I guess another psychic came and tried to like hypnotize her or talk to something through her. She went into a trance and finally came out about the story with bob mcneil and how he asked her to go on a buggy ride romantic and while out he pulled over to the side and by gunpoint tried to force her into the woods with him but another couple heard the commotion so they he got back into the buggy and drove her home i'm gonna kill him yep and so anyway she apparently

had no recollection of it until it like came out like she had repressed it um and that was when people were like wait didn't you say that the thing that was following you around his name was bob who happens to be the same age and had the same occupation as this guy that assaulted you poor thing so a lot of skeptics use that as the okay well maybe this wasn't a ghost maybe this was just her freaking out but then how do you explain shit catching on fire and cold water boiling on tables maybe it was a combination of she was so traumatized and the negativity the energy combined the energy combined with i don't know it's a good point that's just always how i look at things but

that's how i would do that's why we have this podcast that's why we're probably wrong and that's why i drink so anyway and so she was still staying at the house she has now come to terms or is coming to terms with some past trauma and she was like okay well maybe like things will calm down now that i'm getting more answers about myself. A neighbor stops by to hang out, and he's playing with a pocket knife that he brought with him. Casual. And it suddenly rips out of his hands and flies straight into Esther's back.

Um... Like, deep into her back. And that was... Everyone watched it just fly out of his hands. Not in, like, a he-threw-it way, but, like, just flew out, like. Listen. Like some hocus-pocus stuff. Don't play with a fucking knife around Esther.

I'm saying. And so that was her last straw, and she was like, fuck it, I'm leaving, I'm moving out. There's a knife in my back, I'm leaving. Especially because the landlord wanted to evict the family because of all the shit that was going on, but they didn't have any real... Because they were like, proof? The whole house is catching on fire all the time. It's like, we're not trying to be dick landlords, but also stop it. But like, matches are falling from the ceiling.

So taking responsibility, she moved to a nearby farm. Oh God, Esther, I'm so sorry. But then the farm's barn, within a month of her living there, burnt down to the ground while she was sleeping in it. Sure it did. And the farmer arrested her for arson. I'm sorry, she was sleeping inside the barn. She was living on

someone else's farm, living in the barn. And did she... And then a month later it caught on fire while she was in it. So the farmer thought that she was an arsonist and lit his own barn on fire and called the cops obviously survived but she was arrested she survived and was arrested and she was convicted for four months but because she was known around town for this story and there was a lot of public sympathy the town demanded that she get taken out

of jail early and so she only served 30 days can you imagine one having a town that supportive of like oh you poor thing you were just haunted let's get you out of jail oh my god it was definitely the ghost that set your barn on fire the world would be a very different place if we all just helped each other out when it came to ghosts or if everyone just assumed that crimes were made by ghosts right so anyway she only served 30 days and after she was freed from jail the poltergeist activity just totally went away no one knows what happened or if if it wasn't real if she just like gave up on that whole act or maybe it got tired and bored of her and it went away on its own. No one really knows. The only epilogue to the story is that she, later in life, Esther got married twice and

died in 1912 at age 53. That's that. Oh, that's the epilogue? That's the epilogue. Walter, the actor that went on a fake tour with her. Oh, sure, Walter. He published a book about his experiences in there, and he was also writing everything down, just like the doctor. And he wrote a book called, well, he wrote the same book twice.

He has two different editions of it. But the first edition was written in 1879. It's called The Haunted House, A True Ghost Story. And it includes an affidavit signed by 16 witnesses who swear that they saw all of this stuff like an official like they're swearing that this happened um and then the second edition which was in 1888 is called the great amherst mystery a the Supernatural. Oh, he just like amped that title up. Well, so that's the thing.

A lot of people, it's like, which book do you believe? Because apparently in the first book, he was much more dramatic and very descriptive, but like very flowery descriptive. But then in the second one, he like tried to be really clinical about it. So like, basically, because his account of it within ten years of each other is so different, the perception of, like, your perception of the story, like, really matters based on which version of the book you believe in. Right, right, right, right.

Like, in the first one, he was, like, kind of a dick about Esther. Like, he described the sister as like really beautiful and thin and fair and then with esther was like she's a queer girl i'm sorry can i just like kind of like it was like she's lazy and sulking in she's a queer girl with like pins and needles in her face she's had enough there's like a knife in her back and there's pins in her face like she's not really that pretty well also he went from the first book where he was saying that devils were possessing her to in the second book saying that there was just an evil ghost in the house and like basically no matter what in both books he says that there was no trickery

like this was all absolutely supernatural but depending on which book you believe in shows like like how how much drama you're really falling for you know walter walter you you made your money yeah congratulations like just and that's why he drinks just relax walter tell me a tale tell me a tall tale do you maybe want to hear about a guy named Herb? Well, depending on if you are from America or the UK, wouldn't it be Herb? No, Herb is the food. The food. All right.

Herb for like Herbert. Yes. Okay. Like Herbie fully loaded yes i got you now we've got the american slash canadian on board i'm blushing let's talk about herb let's talk about her baby but let's talk about you and me let's talk about her baumeister german's talk about Herb Baumeister. German names just never work in those kind of songs.

You really love the German names. R&B and German names don't go together. Herb Baumeister. You want to know about him? All right. All right. Lay it on thick. He was born in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1947 and was the oldest of four kids.

His childhood was reportedly pretty normal until he was a teenager. Then he started showing antisocial behavior such as... Oh no. What's one thing that you think maybe he did as a fucking antisocial potential murderer? I'm going to go with wanting to hurt people. Do you just want to hurt people? Animals. Animals.

That's sociopathy, though. Yeah. Whatever. It's also very antisocial. I mean, he wants to kill things and get them out of his way. Yes. Let's call it that. All right.

So he started... I just wanted to go with the broad umbrella term, so I wouldn't be wrong. I mean... Usually, that's how I got through high school, so... I consider Gio a people, so... Oh, baby G's so sweet. He's such a good boy. So he started showing antisocial behavior, such as playing with dead animals and urinating

on his teacher's desk. I did that. No, I didn't. I paused for a moment. I watched you wonder. It kind of hurt. I didn't want to judge. Okay, I feel better.

One of his childhood friends later reported that Herb would fall into these strange reveries where he would ponder horrific things. One of them was like, I wonder what it would taste like to drink human urine. Like he would just come up with these like crazy hypothesis or like these crazy thoughts and have these reveries and tell his friends about them. Um,

one morning on the way to school, he picked up a dead crow, put it in his pocket. And when he got to school, he put it on his teacher's desk. I obviously he hated that teacher you know i i did wonder if it was the same teacher because it's like giving an apple to a teacher that you like you just give a dead crow to one you don't like yeah my like oh it's finals week here's a dead fucking crow professor my english teacher um someone put a dead bird in his drawer. Oh my.

And is that, was it her Bob Meister? And it said, you're dead, but it was spelled Y O U R. So he was like, isn't that hilarious? And we were like,

no, someone put a dead bird in your desk. Oh, with a death threat. Yeah. And it wasn't even grammatically correct. That's such an extra fuck you. If someone's going to write me a death note, at least be right about it.

No, he thought it was so funny. We were like, we need extra security. Anyway, so, okay. He basically put a dead bird in his teacher's desk. Ba-ba-ba. His dad was like, oh my God, something's wrong with him. So he was diagnosed with schizophrenia but did not receive any psychiatric treatment so his dad was like here go to this hospital and they were like he

has schizophrenia and that was kind of and they were like oh well we have our answer let's do nothing about it they're like good here's another crow um okay so he attended a couple semesters at different colleges but would drop out and then like back a little bit and then drop out. He also drifted through a variety of jobs. Apparently he had a strong work ethic, so he would like, he was able to keep jobs for a long time, but his behavior was

becoming increasingly bizarre. So here's an example. His dad was a respectable member of the community and was able to get Herb a job as a copy boy at the Indianapolis Star, which was like the local newspaper. An advertising executive named Gary Donna said he remembered one incident where Herb offered to drive Gary and his friends to the Indiana University football game. And when they agreed and they were going to bring their significant like their you know wives or girlfriends or whatever they all met up to get picked up and um uh

her and then a door creaked i forgot his name herb it's just such a weird fucking name yeah and then herb showed up in a hearse nobody nobody knows where he got it uh he just showed up in a hearse um he was wearing a chauffeur's cap and he raced to the game with the lights on and like made traffic pull aside and uh all the people were like who is this weirdo? And that was it. You know, speaking of Canada, you know I love a good episode of Degrassi. Don't we all? And there was one, there was a few seasons, like he became a regular eventually over time on the show. But his name was Eli and he drove a hearse.

I always remembered that. So now for the rest of this story, I'm going to envision that character. Please don't, because it will ruin him for you forever. I never liked him anyway. Oh, good. Okay, then. Keep it up. Here we go. So, basically, he started working at the DMV. And he would rant and rave at people, which apparently was, like, a weird thing.

DMV and he would rant and rave at people which apparently was like a weird thing but I'm like people at the DMV have ranted and raved at me for many years so I don't think it's that unreasonable I mean yeah I mean I don't we don't even have to talk about the DMV

every single person hurts when they think about it okay good I'm just glad I'm like I don't understand why we could do an episode of and that's why we drink at a dmv and people will really feel our pain it should be the next halloween horror episode oh perfect okay so also while he worked at the dmv he sent his co-workers a christmas card with a photo of him and a strange man both dressed in drag. Why? Fuck, give me a card like that. Everyone was like, okay.

Like, no one knew. I feel like in LA, though, that's a pretty common holiday card to get. Oh, yeah. In LA in 2017, maybe. Yeah. But not at the DMV in, you know, the fucking 70s or 80s. So, da-da-da. The DMV thought he had potential, so they made him program director.

If only jobs came that easy. Let me just show you a holiday card of me in drag. Oh, I'm promoted. I'm like, oh, that's all it takes. I'll go to Vistaprint and get some really raunchy photos. And you can give me a raise. So, hello, Nickelodeon. Have you ever heard of Drag Race?

Hello. Here I am. Anyway. I wanted to see how long that pause lasted. I wanted to make it longer, but I also just... Knock it out of the park. I like to make it longer, but I also just... Knock it out of the park. I like to just keep talking. So instead of toning his antics down, he essentially just kept going haywire.

He peed on his boss's desk at one point. Talked about that. Which also is something, if you remember, that Robert Durst did. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that was like number three it was very early on but anyway yeah robert durst also pissed on his boss's desk which right on i feel like maybe that's like a it's like a territorial yeah dominance thing yeah exactly um but he wasn't fired for it why not um listen again i don't fucking know uh he didn't actually get fired until he

urinated on do you want to get i feel like a dead crow i feel like i always make you guess and i'm like i don't know why i do that but it's like fun you hate when i make you guess no i love guessing you're just always wrong you're always wrong too oh yeah that's the fun of it no you hate the numbers game and i'm like guess how much and you're like oh brother because i'm always going to be a thousand off i hate the numbers game because you know i hate numbers and math what did he pee on numbers he peed on negative eight he peed on a letter addressed to the governor of Indiana. Ooh.

You don't do that to the governor of Indiana. Why would, like, you're obviously doing that on purpose. Like, there's letters to all sorts of people. And then you take the letter to the governor of Indiana. Who's writing the letter? I don't know. Also, like, I don't know what's going on in the 70s when it comes to the thinness of paper, but if you're peeing on that, is it just dissolving in your own hands?

Is there even a letter to read later? Yeah, you're peeing all over yourself, too. So basically, this entire DMV smelled like piss. There it is. That's really the moral of the story. Anyway. He married a woman named Julie. There. there okay most normal thing you've said tonight just gotta ground us in reality you know he married a woman named julie seder in november

1971 and the two had three kids around this time he and his wife founded the save a lot thrift store chain not to be confused with the Save-A-Lot grocery store chain, which I did confuse them. I see why you would have done that. Yes. And the Save-A-Lot thrift store chain was actually extremely successful. So he became, he and his wife, Julie, became pretty affluent, pretty well-respected members of their community. But again, they only had two locations. It was not the Save-A-Lot grocery store, which I believe still exists to this day.

Not the same. Anyway, so he and his wife had enough money at this point to move to a more affluent part of Indiana. So they moved to the westfield district which was about 20 miles out of indianapolis they bought a home called fox hollow farms which sounds like the most like bougie indiana house of all time um and it had four bedrooms an indoor swimming pool, and a riding stable. Hmm. It was 18 and a half acres. One less than mine. Okay.

You're Pasadena. I'm just saying they think they're better than me, but let's be real. I have two indoor pools. It's like... Just pour your wine. It's like, just because your 18 acres smell like chlorine. We know if you

had a pool, it would just be Shiraz and you'd just dive in. It wouldn't be indoor. It's like, I want to get some sun while I'm in there, you know? No, but that would heat it up faster. It'd be warm Shiraz. Wait, I don't want Shiraz. Oh. I don't know.

Listen. You could do it in white wine. You could have a pool of white wine, and that way if you peed in it, no one would know. No, it's got... Yeah, well, that's a good point. I gotta write that down. Okay, so a Chardonnay pool.

At least make it like a white wine kiddie pool because you know that's where the pee's going. That is. But here's the problem. The Chardonnay or the white wine is supposed to stay cold. And the red wine is supposed to stay not as cold. So it's like, which one do you put where, you know? Yeah. Yeah.

I see. Well, then you could do a Shiraz Jacuzzi. Yeah. Shiraz Jacuzzi and like a Chardonnay Latte Pool. Okay. Okay. That's where we are. All right.

Good. Write that down. I mean, mine's going to be the coldest of all because it's fucking ice cream. Yours is just like, people will like get like weirdly like do that tiptoe dance walk without the towel into your like Shiraz jacuzzi and they'll like warm up. Oh, that's so fun though. Oh, interesting. Oh, good times. We'll put it on our vision board.

Wait, wait, can we, can we can we actually yeah like i'm not fucking around yeah okay all right so anyway their marriage sucked sorry everybody herb called the shots and pretty much everything um they actually had these brief periods where they would split up and then get back together it was just a big mess. Um, Julie later admitted that she and Herb had engaged in sex. So they were married 25 years. Guess how many times they had sex? Zero.

Well, that's fucking stupid. They have three kids. Three. No. Okay. You know what? You failed this game. You don't like the numbers game either.

I don't like them. How many times did they have sex? This is why I don't like the numbers game because it ruins the game. Okay. You know what? You failed this game. You don't like the numbers game either. I don't like them. How many times did they have sex? This is why I don't like the numbers game, because it ruins the game. Okay. How many times did they have sex? Six. Oh. Okay.

Okay. Six times in 25 years. So a failed and successful attempt for each kid. Yeah. Got it. So they were 50% success rate. There it is. Yeah.

Not many married couples can say that. I mean, you know. So they had sex six times in their 25 years. Yowza. Time to sleep. Fuck you, Fippet. My Fippet just said time to sleep. That's like when my phone says it doesn't tell you that you've used up all your data.

It just says you can change your data services on settings and it's like oh can i thanks mom what the fuck mine doesn't say that mine says you used up all your fucking data oh my phone's just way passive aggressive oh my god mine's just fucking aggressive anyway so anyway herb and his wife never had sex they just like didn't have sex um and then there was this guy who did have sex with Herb's wife. No. Okay. There's this guy.

Mm-hmm. Okay, hold on. I just fucked this up. Nice. You're welcome. So, according to Julie, she never saw her husband nude. So he's, like, a never nude. Like, like Tobias Fianke.

Wonderful. I just blew myself. Oh, that was so good. You guys... If you don't watch Arrested Development, please go do it. You gotta do it. Okay. So basically, she said she never saw her husband nude.

Apparently, he would, like, change in the bathroom, and then when he would come to bed, he would put his pajamas on, or he would, like, go between the sheets because he was too ashamed of his skinny body. Hmm. So, you know. How skinny you got to be to be ashamed? Who knows? All right.

So, you know. How skinny you got to be to be ashamed? Who knows? All right. So, anyway. One day in 1994, their son Eric was playing in the woods outside when he found a complete human skeleton. Just one whole complete one. Nothing missing.

The whole deck. An entire skeleton. The whole deck. It was partially buried, and he showed his mother, who waited until her husband got home to ask, Hi, where did this skeleton come from? You know, as you do. Right. So Herb got home, and when he saw the skeleton, he was like,

Oh, it was one of my father's dissecting skeletons. Because his father was an anesthesiologist. So he's like, Oh, it was one of my dad's. Was he just hanging out in the woods, or what? So he said it was one of his dissecting, like, um. Was he just hanging out in the woods or what? So he said it was one of his, like, uh, you know, dissecting skeletons and it had been stored in the garage. And then Herb was like, I gotta clean the garage out. And he decided he was just gonna bury the skeleton in the backyard. Right, yeah. You know, like, as if he were to cover something up, but he's not.

Isn't that funny? Ha ha ha. It's like, I'm just gonna, like, bury, like, you know like you know some like power tools and a john deere and a full body skeleton backyard like when you clean out the fucking garage yeah so she was like okay sounds a lot like esther cox's family she's being like whatever i mean she did have a lot of needles directly in her face. Right in her face. That's weird. This is where our friend comes in.

I'll tell you what. His name's Virgil Vandegrift. Of course it is. Yeah. Or should I say, Virgil Vandegrift, P.I. Hmm. My favorite. Right?

Oh, yeah. Let's write a show about that Hmm. My favorite. Right? Oh, yeah. Let's write a show about that guy. Tell me. Where were you on the night of... Yesteryear. Where were you on the night of yesteryear? The day of yore. Two fortnights from the day of yore and yesteryear. A score.

Where were you a score ago? Oh, that's idiotic. A score and a yore. Where were you a score and a yore ago? I'll tell you what, that sounds like a band name. A score of, the score of yore. And it sounds like a, it sounds like a band that's like like an irish like uh it sounds like flogging molly yes the score of your m literally and

they're like oh we're so badass and it's like i mean you're good for like for like a festival but that's it looks like we found the title of this episode what is it again the score of your sure okay write that down i will i do this thing where i tell myself to write things down out loud through the podcast so that you'll listen to it later but always like i do it all the time like yesterday i was in the car and i went write that down but i was telling myself that i was driving my car so i was like well no one's gonna but i tell me it doesn him it doesn't make sense. It's fine. Just write that down. All right. So anyway, Vandegrift, uh, had a private investigation

firm in Indianapolis and he specialized in missing persons cases. A woman came to him and said her 28 year old son, Alan Broussard had gone missing. Vandegrift assumed that, uh, Alan Broussard was just a runaway because a lot of times, you know, he would get cases where people would come and say, oh, my, you know, someone's missing. A lot of times it turns out to be a runaway or a miscommunication, so on and so forth. So he did a little research. He found out that Alan Broussard, who the guy who had gone missing was a heavy drinker he was gay um and again this was in a bible belt town it was in you know indiana

and he was last seen leaving a gay bar named brothers so he kind of like kept that information and then pretty soon after that he found out that an indianapolis police detective named mary wilson was working on the cases of other gay men who had disappeared in the area and he noticed parallels between them including their ages obviously their sexual orientation and their physical appearance so he was like it's a little fishy then he saw a small article in a gay lifestyle magazine called the indiana about a man named Jeff Jones who had disappeared the year before, who had essentially just vanished. He was like, these are really similar to the other men who have gone missing. So at this point, he knew something was up, but it wasn't until another man, 34-year-old Roger Allen Goodlett,

vanished after visiting a gay bar that he suspected a serial killer. Oh, my. So when Roger disappeared, he was like, okay, something's up. This is not normal for, like, a small Indiana town. You know, it's just not normal. So the police seemed disinterested in his findings. Surprise, surprise.

But he decided to investigate anyway as a private investigator. A few weeks later, a man named Tony Harris, which, by the way, is a fake name because he did not want to be named for fear of his life. Who knew Roger Goodlett, the last man to go missing.

Oh, no. From the gay bar scene, approached Vandegrift with some new information. So he told him that the police had ignored his story and thought he was crazy. He told the FBI who thought he was on drugs. And then he called Roger's mother. So his friend's mother and his Roger's mother put him in touch with Vandegrift, the private investigator. OK. And his Roger's mother put him in touch with Vandegrift, the private investigator.

So he said to Vandegrift that his story sounds crazy, but it's 100% true. And he said, I met a man and I know he was a serial killer. Oh, crazy. So Tony was terrified for his life telling the story. But over the course of a few weeks, he kind of like gained, or they kind of gained his trust and he was able to reveal pretty much the whole story. Let me tell you Tony's fucking story.

Tell me Tony's fucking story. It's bananas. I want to know. It's bananas. We all want to know. All right. Take a drink, y'all. Tony was at a local gay bar in town called the 501 Club when he noticed a tall, lanky man.

Tony took note of him because of the way he was scrutinizing and staring at the missing person's poster behind the bar. The poster was a picture of Roger Goodlett, who was Tony's friend, who had gone missing. And Tony said he could simply tell by the way that this guy was captivated by the poster and staring at it that he had something to do with his friend's disappearance.

So he did something questionable. What? He went up and introduced himself. The man introduced himself as Brian Smart and said he knew nothing about Roger because Tony asked. He did, however, invite Tony out for the night and Tony agreed. So Brian Smart said he was a landscape artist from Ohio currently living in an empty house outside town and that he was landscaping the property for its new owners who are going to be coming soon, but who weren't living there yet. So he invited Tony to his empty house for a cocktail and a swim. Oh, my red flag.

Number one. So this is where shit gets weird. Brian drives Tony out into the suburbs in his Buick. They arrive in a neighborhood of large houses and horse stables. They arrive at a dark, unlit mansion, enter through a side entrance. Tony follows Brian through a number of rooms, then down into the basement, where they arrive in an indoor pool. Hmm. Of Shiraz. No, that's the jacuzzi. Right, right, right. Sorry, the rosé.

Actually, rosé would be a good fit for an indoor pool. The outdoor pool. Alright, we'll talk about this later. So, they arrive in an indoor pool, and in the darkness, Tony sees a number of mannequins staged in various poses around the pool. And then Tony got the fuck out.

Oh, no. Tony's an idiot. Tony had quite a night. Brian explained, I get lonely down here. They give me company the second you meet someone who says that you turn around the second you see a mannequin you turn your body the other way and you go as far in that direction the second you meet someone who isn't also creeped out by mannequins just just go you might might die really, really, really soon.

Like, if you see a mannequin, I don't care if you're in Nordstrom or, like, where you are, but just, like, I know I'm going against my own people here, but mannequins and clowns, I swear to God, if someone is like, look at all of my clown dolls, they keep me company. It's like, well, I'm certainly not gonna. Bye. It's like, you should go drown in a pool of Shiraz. What? I don't know. I don't know what else to say. I'm just really worked up about this.

Tony? The fucking pool is surrounded by mannequins. Let's just remember. Wait, what? The whole pool? Yes. Oh, I thought we were in a little shed next to the pool. I didn't know we were.

No, my friend. I just said. I think you did, and I just ignored it. I know. I didn't want it in my head. In the darkness, Tony sees a number of mannequins staged in various poses around the indoor pool. Yeah, never mind. Okay, so you were right.

You just forced the knowledge into me. Yeah, okay. I didn't want it. But here we are. That's what I do. So he's surrounded by mannequins, right? Okay. So Brian's like, hey, do you want a drink?

And Tony's like, no, thank you. Good boy. But then he notices that Brian kind of darkens at this rejection. Right? Ooh. But then Brian's like, it's time to party. But then excuses himself briefly. And when he gets back, he apparently has a completely different attitude.

Was looser, was chattier. And Tony later said he believed he had gone back and taken drugs. Probably coke. So Brian then convinces Tony to go for a swim. And Tony obliges. So Tony gets into the pool naked. The two of them chat about a number

of topics, and then all of a sudden Brian's expression changes, and he says, I just learned this really neat trick. Okay. Let's just remember that they're surrounded by fucking men. I haven't forgotten. Let's just remember.

He picks up a hose and says, If you choke someone while you're having sex, it feels really great. You get a great rush. He explains which two veins you have to pinch to get the right buzz and says you can tell it's working when you see the person's lips change color fuck not so tony is like just like i don't know in the pool like doggy paddling at this point real sexy he's also in case we any of us thought oh maybe you know if they're in the pool having a good time chatting and you think like oh this could be romantic remember that what they're looking at like you could think that this guy maybe isn't crazy and then look over his shoulder

and see five mannequins watching you get choked out as you doggy paddle and they're posed mannequins gnarly and this guy's holding a hose. Talking about pinching your... No thanks. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. So. So I guess they try it. So he's like... So Tony's in the pool. He's listening to Brian explain, like, which nerves to... whatever, which veins to press.

Then he says he is suddenly convinced that Brian is the one who killed his friend Roger. Good boy. Get out. So Brian goes, do it to me. Oh. And lays down on a couch in the corner of the room. So Tony puts the hose around Brian's throat,

and Brian starts to masturbate. Okay. While he's choking him. So guess what Tony does next? Does he try to snap his neck? Does he hurt him or run away or call the police? No. He lets Brian tie the hose around his own neck.

Tony. Tony. I thought... Tony! I thought we had an understanding. Tony, look at the mannequins. They're all... If I... Okay.

I don't even know how to put this in. Basically, if I knew someone... If something in me told me, oh, they killed your friend, I wouldn't then be like, oh, choke me. Well, yeah, but you're not Tony. Apparently not. Apparently I'm smarter. So Tony did not heed the wisdom of the mannequins and was like, okay, sure. But this is what he did.

All right. He let Brian choke him, but when it became too intense, he pretended to be unconscious, which I feel like is probably pretty hard if you're, like, being choked to death. Yeah, like, you're already literally going unconscious. Yeah.

Not voluntarily. So to also act and get the same effect it's pretty impressive you'd think your like intuition would be to like fight back so like to make your body pretend to be unconscious seems like pretty difficult but that's what he did um so when he pretended to be unconscious brian got off of him and started to whisper his name. Then he started to shake him violently. And then Tony opened his eyes and grinned at him. And Brian freaked the fuck out and started yelling about how much Brian had scared him and said, you know, you can die doing this.

There have been accidents. And then Tony has the fucking balls to say, is that what happened to Roger Goodlett? Oh, Tony is a bold, bold man. Was he one of your accidents? Oh, shit. It's like a fucking movie. Like, whoa, stop. Very, very dramatic.

Was he one of your accidents? Okay. Reaching. I feel like one of your accidents? Okay. Reaching. I feel like one of his mother. I feel like his mother. I'm like, Tony, this isn't some sort of movie. Come over here. Tony.

Get away from that. Shut your mouth. What did I tell you? Brian apparently just stares at him and doesn't answer, but just grins at him. The worst. Yes. Still high on whatever drugs he's taken. So Tony basically just waits until Brian's asleep, then starts scouting out the rest of the house to see what's up.

Oh, so wait. Oh, he doesn't leave. He just like wanders around the house. He literally scathed death. Yeah. All right. What the fuck ever Tony wants to do do i guess is what tony's gonna do tony is just like strong-headed let's leave it there like let's talk about die hard

but like the tony version right like tony just won't succumb to this it's like tony good okay what happens this tom foolery so tony's walking around he's like oh here are children's toys and women's clothing clearly brian has been lying he's not the landscaper of this empty house like someone lives here and it's him then he goes oh brian smart is probably not his real name why don't i go find out his real name so he goes all the way back down to the basement pool and finds brian's fucking pants that are on the ground yeah gets his wallet gets his wallet but while he's shaking the wallet out brian wakes up jesus christ tony it's like a fucking movie right so somehow um brian wakes up and tony like, oh, hi, good morning, whatever. Somehow, Tony convinces Brian to drive him back into town unscathed.

Brian congratulates Tony and says, you really know how to play. Yuck. And then drops him off. So, let's get back to our friend Vandegrift,

the PI. Vandegrift hears the story he goes to detective mary wilson who had been investigating missing missing persons cases around this time i think i mentioned her she was like an indianapolis uh police detective super sleuth super sleuth um so mary takes tony on a prowl throughout the suburbs uh they stopped at different estates to see if anything seemed familiar she also had several men stop um troll gay bars around town to talk to like patrons and owners to see if anyone knew who this guy might be um at this point vandergrift secretary connie Pierce, aka M and Christine, decides to call a friend of hers

a psychic named Wanda, which, like, also... Did they do that on purpose? Like, a fish named Wanda? Oh. Like, a psychic named Wanda. Yeah, maybe. Whatever.

So, Connie calls a psychic named wanda um and plays wanda the tapes of the interviews with tony here's what wanda said i see a man tied to a bed handcuffed spread eagled i see pictures being taken while he is being strangled the tongue is swollen quite long Oh. Dun, dun, dun. Wanda fucking knows. Fucking fish named Wanda knows all... Also, you realize why they called her Wanda, right? No.

Because of Fairly Oddparent? Yeah. Wait, because why they called this psychic Wanda? Oh, no. I think I know why they called the fish slash fairy godparent in the Fairly Oddparents why they called her Wanda. I did not know that until this very second. What are you talking about? I don't know.

What are you talking about? Why did they call the Fairly Oddparent Wanda? It's literally just hitting me right now the fish named wanda uh-huh right why did they call her wanda because like like i don't i don't know what's the answer i don't know because like she has a wand oh yeah that's it but it's not like based on a fish named wanna because aren't they fish oh i see what's happening that's why i'm confused now i feel like there's multiple layers to this i feel like you knew what i meant and i knew what you meant but we both thought there was another thing that we were both missing yes all right let's just erase all that we complete each

other uh a fish named it but i was gonna say that. I was going to say, oh, a wand, but then I was like, maybe it's something deeper. Okay. Hi, Nickelodeon. You should work for them someday. You think, though? I think you'd be good at it. But obviously not, because I don't really get how their shows work. I guess not.

No. Well, seriously, I mean, there's no show about Gio yet, so. Yeah, there's not yet. He could be the new Blue's Clues. Oh, my God. He could be the new Blue's Clues. Oh, my God. He could be the new Face. Oh, he could be the new Face. Oh, my God.

Face loved peanut butter and banana sandwiches. So did I. Me too. I learned it from Face. Me too. Stop it. Okay, let's just keep going. Oh, God.

This is beautiful. me too stop it okay let's just keep going oh god this is beautiful so anyway wanda's like listen tony don't go there anymore and the search continued so at this point let's go back to remember herb oh who could forget herb's marriage is unraveling. Steady decline. Just down, down, down, down, down. His and his wife's company, the Save-A-Lot thrift store, is going down the drain. So are their finances. It's been about a year at this point after the search for Brian Smart has begun. Tony, our friend Tony, is at a bar called the varsity lounge uh when who does he see walk in the front door but brian smart himself oh my he

being fucking tony so nonchalant doesn Doesn't act, you know, surprised or whatever. Just has a conversation with him. Spends the whole night talking to him. Then, when Brian leaves, he writes down his license plate number and immediately calls the police. That's a smart Tony. Tony is a badass. That's smart Tony. This whole time we thought he was an idiot.

No, he's been, like, luring this dude along, you know? Yeah. And surprise, surprise, the license plate did not belong to a Brian Smart, but to a Herbert R. Baumeister. This is slowly moving from any old movie to, like, a Lifetime movie. It's a thousand percent. But a more progressive progressive where it's like gay men instead of just like heterosexual people i see what's happening um the detective mary wilson if you remember confronted herb at his store but he refused to let her search his property and then

so she went to julie his wife who was equally as stubborn but mary gave julie her card and said it was basically like one of those law and order moments where they were like if you change your mind give us a call and then left with like putting doubts in her mind you know nice so lo and behold six months later herb was out of town and uh julie his wife had her lawyer call mary wilson the detective she told mary about the time her son found those bones in the backyard the fucking skeleton that was you know not a halloween what do you call dissection skeleton yeah not a halloween decoration no no no no no so mary wilson took the police to their house and she took these two guys who were like who literally called it bullshit

and said they're this is like you're wasting our time basically um the yard at first glance looked normal but when the men began to kick through low grass and patches of dirt, um, they found a bone about a foot long charred from having been burned. Um, they weren't sure at first if it was human. And then they kind of started to look at the area around them and realize that the pebbles and rocks that were around them were actually fragments of bone. Oh, no. They weren't actually rocks. They were just pieces of bone.

Gross. So the lawyer, Bill Wendling, was watching the police scoop up one chipped bone after another, and he looked down at his own feet and he said it's so obvious it's unclear like they were just standing among like pieces of bone basically oh wow um he realized that he was also standing in what resembled bone chips and it was in the middle of the backyard where the Baumeister kids would play every day. At one point, he even picked up something off the ground, and it was a human tooth. Oh, my. There were basically pieces of bone everywhere.

So, Mary delivered these bags of evidence to a forensic anthropologist named Stephen Narocki at the University of Indiana, to a forensic anthropologist named Stephen Narocki at the University of Indiana, and his answer immediately came back as, quote, they're human, they're recent, and they've been burned. The next day, the police returned to the scene, and it was one of the worst crimes Indiana has ever encountered. It basically turned out that Herb Baumeister's homemade graveyard contained the remains of many young homosexuals who over the years had vanished from the streets of Indianapolis. Oh, it was just a gay graveyard?

Yeah. Fuck. So they started getting more and more officials to join the search party and to join the kind of dig on the premises. to join the search party and to join the kind of dig on the premises. The dig continued until the late hours. Other policemen came in and checked out the inside of the home, and they found the mannequins, the wet bar, the pool, everything that Tony had described.

But they did find something that Tony had not seen on the evening of his encounter, which was a video camera that had been used to tape all the strangulations. Oh, no. Yeah. So the number of people digging had swelled to about 60 volunteers,

which were mostly off-duty policemen and firemen. After a couple days, they found 5,500 bones, teeth, and bone fragments. Oh my God. And they were able to make up about four bodies. Shit. To identify just off those first couple of days. Then neighbors from a farm, uh, across the way came to inform police that they had found evidence of more bones.

They led investigators to an area that was like a drainage ditch, basically. And there were human ribs, vertebrae, and spines. Shit. Apparently one official murmured, Jesus Christ, they're everywhere. There were so

many bones that they actually stuck up from the mud so you could see them oh god they're jagged yeah like coming out of the dirt oh no so shovels you know dug up the bones but also cans of miller genuine draft beer which wasb's favorite drink, as well as handcuffs that were presumed to be on the victims when they had died. And by the time the dig had actually ended,

they had determined that probably 11 men had been buried among this backyard. Could they identify most of them? They were able to positively identify only four of the victims. Ugh. That sucks.

I know. So it was Roger Allen Goodlett, Stephen Hale, Richard Hamilton, and Manuel Resendez. To this day, the remains of the others wait to be identified. Yeah. Very sad. So where was Her herb at this point so he had he was visiting his mom when uh his wife had called the police and said you can come check out my place um when he kind of got a hint that something was going on uh he peaced the fuck out he basically faded away the only clue the police had came from brad

baumeister who was herb's brother and he called and said that um his older brother had called him from a town in michigan and said he was on a business trip and needed money very quickly. After Brad sent him the money, he had heard about what was going on at his home and immediately called the authorities. Good job, Brad. Good job, Brad. Good boy. Yep. Good boy.

Basically, what they can determine now is that Herb had headed north and entered Canada. Herb had headed north and entered Canada. He basically spent several days there, then drove east along the Lake Huron shoreline to Grand Bend, Ontario. And there, on the evening of July 3rd, he took his.357 Magnum revolver barrel to his forehead and pulled the trigger. Yikes. He took his own life, and the note he left behind said that he blamed his failing business and an irreparable marriage, but there was no mention of the bodies that he had left

behind in Westfield. Instead, his final words on the three-page suicide note explained that he would now eat a peanut butter sandwich, his favorite snack, and then go to sleep. Wow. The evening before he died, a Canadian trooper had stopped him because he was sleeping in his car under a bridge, and he explained that he was merely a tourist passing through.

She noted at the time some luggage in his car and what looked like a pile of videotapes. Oh, crap. In his backseat. The videotapes, Virgil Vandegrift believes they might be the videotapes of the strangulations that he had committed. But when they found his body after he had killed himself there was no sign of the tapes on him vandergriff basically said he must have tossed them in a lake before he shot himself and then added perhaps it's for the best perhaps interestingly enough baumeister's photo actually matches the police sketches drawn from witnesses who thought they'd seen the I-70 Strangler because he had a lot of business trips to Ohio.

And one eyewitness actually came forward to identify Herb's picture as that of the same man who had driven his friend home from a bar one evening in 1988. And his friend had actually been found dead the next morning. And his friend had actually been found dead the next morning. So not long after, representatives from Ohio and Indiana held a press conference to link Baumeister with the I-70 slings. And people aren't sure whether he's actually the same guy who had committed the stranglings, the I-70 stranglings are not, but everything does seem to point to him, especially because the roadside killings on I-70 ended the same time he bought his house and now had a place to bury bodies and hide the bones. That's like a prequel slash one and a half again. Exactly. So all in all, he was linked to about about 18 but assumed to be more victims wow that's the story of herb that's wild right yeah nuts nutso so

ta-da i need a drink i'll tell you what um is that all you got that's all i got we got our our uh thing today we got a thing yeah what thing our um facebook live oh is that today? Sunday, right? Yeah. Today at three. Hey. We will be here for your, whatever questions you have. And I finally have an iPad tripod holder. So we're not going to be just like fucking around with the noise again. Perfect. Can't wait. I promise. I promise.

Anyway, we love you guys. Thank you for listening. Thank you. We love you guys. Thank you for listening. Thank you. We love you guys. And that's why we drink. And that's why we drink. Here, clink it. That's Em's middle finger on my wine glass. That's probably the best description

of our podcast. Your middle finger on my wine glass. And that's why we drink. And that's why we drink. Bye!