And That's Why We Drink - Listener Stories: Vol. 87

Episode Date: January 1, 2024

It's January and we'd like to welcome everyone to the Schiefer Schulz Manor! Wow, what an intro to the year we have in this batch of stories from you, dear listeners. Not only do we check in on Christine's trash pile du jour, but we hear from a volcano-ologist, a time traveling Toyota owner, and someone who worked on Project Blue Book! We also contemplate the benefits of gender neutral pronouns used for anonymity... and that's why we drink!We're going back on tour so soon! Join us in Philly, DC, Baltimore, Salt Lake City and Denver this January and get your tickets at andthatswhywedrink.com

we made it to 2025 no we didn't 2024 god damn it people listening in order were like shit I accidentally skipped an entire year imagine if we just took the year off okay someone jack can you edit it at all where i just say four instead of five

we made it to 2024 i'm literally so stupid well whatever i'm literally the dumbest person alive can you call me an idiot with a capital t because i love it when you do it idiot it hurts so good it hurts me when i say it it hurts me like viscerally to my core and i'm sorry and i don't mean it feels so bad about myself but i'm like kind of like all right well it's true so i'm like you'll say it again i guess it's like and also like maybe show me your shoulders while you're at it i don't know welcome to 2024 uh we have made it here i hope at least this episode has made it into existence so you know what that's saying something it's the first happy birthday blaze tomorrow um sorry once again that your birthday

is just overshadowed by the holidays and new years and the hangovers that everyone has um but happy birthday i love you and um i hope i did something sort of nice for you today yeah you you do is there you feel like brainstorming anything he really he likes bourbon it's just hard because like christmas is such a big you know obviously to do and then his birthday is exactly a week later and there's new year's in between and we have a wedding to go to out of state so it's like and then he's he's the kind of person who's like it's fine just don't worry about my birthday that's nice but also i feel bad i feel like he was just um brought up to say that like

exactly and he's the oldest so it's like he's just kind of had to just live with that and so i'm like no no no i i don't accept that no do you ever just say like why he didn't have a better birthday and he didn't like that question so stop asking do you ever um oh my god tomorrow's katie that's katie's birthday too i just looked at the calendar. Katie who does a lot of behind the scenes, basically helps steer the ship with Eva behind the scenes, apparently has the same birthday. Sorry, Katie. Why don't you have a better birthday, Katie?

Why do you guys have such shitty birthdays? I feel like could you hold off on Christmas gifts and then just give him double gifts one year or the fun part is i end up over i always overdo it on christmas gifts anyway so then i'm like oh well then i'll just pick half of them to wait a week so it feels like but then the rest of the year it's like well shit you know i don't really have opportunities to gift until our anniversary in

october june people are the luckiest because every six months you get a bunch of presents halfway baby and i still insist every december that it's my half birthday so like i we i just don't let it i don't drop it ever i had a great half birthday this year allison really did it up like oh it was like a week ago our half half birthday. Happy half birthday, Christine. Yeah, we talked about it briefly because you insulted me very deeply. And I said, well, I guess it's the day after my half birthday. So we're not celebrating me anymore. We're just talking about my many compulsions and tics. That was a twist of the knife, wasn't it? Yeah. But happy. Anyway, our so by the way, speaking of january 1st even though we're very excited that it is a new year currently as you hear this we are in full blown fucking panic mode because we are 10 days away

11 days away from going back on tour um if you are in the u.s specifically if you're in the northeast um please go get tickets for our shows this is the last opportunity you will have to see our on the rocks tour before we come out with our new tour this is the end oh oh oh and we're saying and keep saying east coast but there are we got indianapolis we have shows that are not on the east coast so if you're not on the east coast please still look and see if we're coming to your town it's uh it's it's heavily it's heavily northeast and i i really officially like we have denver we have indianapolis we have chicago we have detroit we have like half of them are not on the east coast m has just created a narrative where they're all on the

east coast yep but come to them anyway even if you live in detroit and you're like i don't live in new england that's fine but we are going going to Salem I mean we're this is going to be the biggest like finale hurrah of all time I'm so fucking amped we've sold out a few shows but um some of them we have not quite sold out yet so go check if we have tickets we're also doing Minneapolis and Milwaukee arguably the least east coast states cities that exist so you know check those out too come see us it'll be a blast the end the end anyway okay anyway what are you drinking what is your first drink of 2024 christine oh i mean right now i just have oh my god do you want to see my side table real quick my trash pile du jour here's

the trash pile it's just beverages the trash pile of beverages this is the most christine thing ever it's just it's you have adhd like that's literally and they're all empty and that's adhd go get a diagnosis i can't stand you let's literally stand myself either it's fine i just can't oh my god i also usually have my army of cups that i have i literally have a whole tupperware that I just leave in my room sometimes so that I can just put all my empty cups in. See, but I should have systems like that in place. That's so smart. It's because I've had ADHD officially longer than you.

So I've gamified it a little bit. But if you, you just got to have a doom box for every room. What are your hacks. I'll try, but you might lose the list. I'll have to send it to you through the phone. I will lose the list. Okay. Let's be real.

Anyway. Okay. This is the episode where we read your stories that you sent in. And Eva sent them to us via chat, not chat via text message um and gave us an explanation i think she feels like she has to explain herself every time she sends us stories um which i think we probably make her feel like she has to do that we've instilled fear over the years we have yeah and i'm sorry about that but eva said that these are sort of like tangentially related to different things we've said in different episodes in my mind as soon as she said it i pictured the charlie day like red string web as the theme for this episode like

people said oh you mentioned this and here's my story it's almost like we're just connecting them all in a remote connections to our topics yeah yeah or whatever we've discussed i don't even know yet but um we did not determine who goes first. Who do you want to go first, Em? I will. Okay, go for it. Okay. And for those wondering,

I'm drinking water as our very first. Sorry, I have ADHD. Okay, I don't have time to ask you what you're drinking. Christine is drinking air out of her many empty cans and I am drinking- It's not even good. Like, it's not even helpful to have this many beverages because there's nothing in them except mold and i'm drinking water out of my um flower vase that i've turned into a cup that's beautiful actually thank you i thought so too i was like she'd be a beautiful cup even though she's a vase and then i said i'm gonna just drink out of her and anything's a

glass if you want it to be she even has a little pitcher spout and it's perfect for my mouth do you pour it into your mouth you weirdo also this will be my first time saying it this year since I'm drinking water everybody except Christine

take a drink of water you thirsty little rats I checked my beer but that's empty too nothing it's i appreciate the effort christine and by effort i mean you thinking about it so thereof yeah all right so let i'm starting first this i'm loving the title. I am a lava specialist. Oh, wait. I do recall shouting magma a lot at one point. So at some point I remember asking for a lava specialist to chime in.

I'm embarrassed. Okay, go ahead. Real quick, though, let's appreciate the fact that there is actually... I called in the troops. I said, we need a lava specialist. And one of them heard my cries we literally have a lava specialist like that's by the way honestly the biggest compliment ever like how lucky we have a lava specialist who listens okay so she says why that's what i'm saying i'm like you're so much smarter than this okay okay this is from ray

who's a she her pronouns thank you for normal pronouns. Ray says, hello to all of us. And I just listened to your latest podcast episode, episode 356. And I had to chime in as I am in a volcanology, vulcan, volcanology, volcanology PhD student. Volcanology, please tell me that's not right. It's real, vulcanology. Okay, I'm not that stupid no it's volcanology okay but you said volcano ology oh oh oh oh i see that's what made me laugh volcano ology can't be right but volcanology sounds right i had to chime in as i'm a volcanology phd student I've been listening to your podcast since I was an undergrad back in 2017. Wow, you're an OG. Could one say that we inspired you to become a volcanology PhD candidate? You've gotten me through all my studies and still continue to this day. So

thank you for all that you do and for the laughs and the goose cam so oh this is the episode where i covered mirrors okay okay right right right volcanic glass aka obsidian is super quickly cooled lava and got that right i feel like at some point i'm gonna have not gotten something right gold star however you can manufacture clear glass which which we use today, much like we use today, by using quartz. Oh, and also sand has a lot of quartz in it. So if you heat up quartz to a very hot temperature and quickly cool it, it won't recrystallize into quartz and it will instead become glass. That makes sense. It does.

I mean, I don't have a doctoral degree in volcanology, but so far I'm on it. You're only one degree away from it, though. Technically, yes. I am only one degree from my PhD. That's true. Sea glass are broken glass, usually from people littering. Okay, I caught that. Yes.

So Christine got that right. Look at us. Wow. The broken glass is then tumbled by the sea naturally to make them frosty and rounded and you can make your own by using a rock tumbler and any glass shards blue lava remember when we talked about blue lava blue lava isn't per se a thing it is more that it is a fire from lava that is sulfur rich. The sulfur gas burns blue and the sulfur gas is ignited by the lava and boom, blue fire. So you were both on the right track there. Overall, you were both on the right track.

It sounds like there was something that you're kindly disregarding. Thank you. On the right track is the thing that teachers say when they're like, I really don't want to fail you. Please, please step it up. It's what it's you know that the next thing they say after you're on the right track is. But what? Give me something else.

What's more? I need more. But let's keep trying. I have also thought of cute geology baby names. And here are some of my favorites. Oh, we didn't ask for this, but OK. OK. Fucking bring it on.

Well, I'm going to fuck up the first one olivine which is a green volcanic mineral okay another green mineral jade obviously beautiful um an aquamarine it's aquamarine but the mineral group is a crystal structure it's called barrel okay wait why l, wait. B-E-R-Y-L. Do you remember that? One time I talked about someone named Beryl and you were like, stop. Why do you keep saying this person's name is Beryl? And I was like, what do you mean?

And you were like, you're saying Beryl like it's a name. But the disconnect was I was reading it as B-E-R-Y-L. So in my head, it was sort of like Cheryl, but Beryl. But then of course you heard it as like a was sort of like Cheryl, but barrel. But then, of course, you heard it as like a wine barrel or like a bourbon barrel. So you could be like, why do you keep saying barrel so casually as if it's a name? And we had a big, this was like a long time ago, but I remember every time I see the name barrel, I'm like, oh my God. Em thought I was just saying like the word barrel over and over and saying, no, no that's his name that's her name barrel it totally

makes sense now yep but now i understand i didn't know that was actually a geology name so that's fun yeah also onyx is a very badass name oh that's kick-ass black quartz and then there's a coal type mineral which um the baby name would be jet i like the name that's cool that's definitely like a pop a name i feel like that's been more popular and then this is my personal favorite it's a lead mineral but it is galena and galena is a place that we both just heard about in another episode didn't we i was like haven't i been there before no i've only dreamed of it you and i want to go to galena isn't that in illinois i feel like i literally okay after that episode that place after that episode did i send you the zillow link that i found i think i did i think you

must have yes you must it was a beautiful beautiful home um right on the corner right next to like main street oh wait no maybe you didn't send me the zillow i don't think you did oh my god and if you did you got to resend it because she's got to be sold out by now i'm literally scrolling through our our texts um there are multiple pictures of both of our feet trying to find the zillow link and then i'm like here's a picture of my bunion and you said this is a definition of a red light district because i blazed bought these light bulbs that turn red for his melatonin i don't know fucking. Fucking now. And so the picture is like. Sorry, keep going. The picture is just like my feet bathed in red light.

Like this looks like if somebody didn't know us and saw these, they were like, these people have a weird, freaky relationship. But I was just trying to show you my bunion. Oh, yes, yes, yes. By the way, I just sent you the link again to the Galena house. Is she not beautiful? Sorry. She's breathtaking um m like it's my house m like it's my house m this is like if you took what i want in a house what you want in a house and then put it in a random town called galena with cobblestone let's not forget it literally like is it not it's everything and like compared to la i could buy like five of her isn't that crazy it's like the price alone

is worth like like that's the schultz fourth manor hey wait what can i have a guest room yes obviously there's like 10 rooms in this can it be the schieffer schultz manor schultz schieffer manor uh you can text allison about that what hey you and i said we were moving here i didn't even include blaze in this conversation oh oh then yes of course it's well hey can it be schultz schieffer because your name is schieffer it's schieffer schultz on our book and i always have to ask anytime i go to a store and i want to buy a copy of a haunted road atlas they ask who the author is i have to say are you serious i can't even say my own name because they look up by the first author so you're the main author you're the main author of alphabetical i know

but so can i have can i have schultz schieffer for this i found the house you said it's schultz fourth so i'm already just sad that i'm not included i thought this was like a you and me Can I have Schultz Schieffer for this? I found the house. You can have whatever you want. You said it's Schultz's fourth. So I'm already just sad that I'm not included. I thought this was like a you and me thing. But I guess I'll visit if you and Allison move there. I mean, it's Schultz's fourth when I was actually for a second thinking about getting it. I was like, that's too good of a deal. I thought when you said I sent you a Zillow link that that meant, you know.

But I get it it it's fine if you want to uproot your family to indiana or illinois or wherever it is let's go oh is that what you're doing i did have there was a 24-hour period where i was like i could just do it like what's the thing you always say you're like nothing matters like let's just matters go let's just do like literally one time i said to blaze actually this was probably a few weeks ago i was like what if we just moved somewhere really random and he's like i think about that a lot i was like whoa well i think i found your house this is the sheifer lampignale manner right there no no for real that schlampignale thank you um

no no every now and then sorry i was just still in my own like fantasy world where you and i had like a retreat where we met and did haunted things together i think i was still in that mindset so i just have to recalibrate my view of galena i don't ever think about you had told allison about it i'll tell blaze we'll all four be excited about it together i don't think about our um our fantasy house as anywhere other than the conjuring house though because remember we were like should we get it that's like a million and a half dollars and everyone's obsessed with it this is like its own retreat away from everything you know the home away from home i see yeah yeah okay i'm down with that let's do that so you're but you're right you found it i'm not i'm not invading your... It's a beautiful home. And maybe I'll find one down the street.

Maybe you'll just move into the attic and I wouldn't allow it. Yeah, maybe I'll live spider-man up in the attic. You'll never know. You'll never know. Actually, that's way more fun. I'll do that. Anyway, I'm not going. Wink! Oh, I'm going, Wink. Let's do it. But I'm not going. Wink! I'll going wink. Let's do it. But I will say. I'm not going wink. I'll be in the attic and you'll never know. Oh, I see.

Yeah. Okay. Okay. I'll be surprised. I'll be surprised. Yeah. Anyway, so that's what we're going to name our baby, right? Galena.

Galena. We would have to. And that's Kremit's little sister, Galena. Kremit and Galena. That's beautiful. Can you imagine if we're walking down the street so it's like what are their names like which would they wonder about more cremate cremate and galena schlamping nally schultzforth schlamping

okay well ray is like never. I just like volcanoes. I don't know how we got here. Ray was like, I listened to this episode through all your wrong facts about volcanoes, but this is too far and I'm done. Anyway, thank you, Ray. That was lovely. You really set us on quite a tangent there. Thank you so much. Okay, let me find mine. Oh, my God.

Wait, sorry. So I just got onto the, I clicked the first one that you just read read and i scroll to the bottom and it says much love and rock on and then there's a volcano emoji i hope that that's like on your dating profile like i hope i hope you don't even need a dating profile because you've already yeah found your soulmate because i mean wow you're on it you're fucking on it so next is mine let's see more green ghost sightings this is from lauren she her and it says hello i was listening to your volume 86 listener episode and knew it was time to write in about a story i've been holding on to for a while during that episode someone wrote in about a lime green entity visiting them in the middle of the night. Remember? I think it was a priest or whatever. Oh, it was. It was something religious. I think

it was a priest. He like climbed into bed. Ugh. Firm pass. You both said you'd never heard of a lime green ghost, but I have. My sister and her family moved into a home where her kids rooms were in the downstairs area her oldest son's room always had a terrible smell and they hired several renovation specialists to come in and see if they could figure out the source of the smell they finally determined that the dozens of mice had been getting trapped in the wall and dying there they took measures to remove the dead mice and repair the wall. Shortly after, my nephew started to claim he would not sleep down there any longer because of the green monkey that continued to appear in his room. Green monkey? First of all, this is like so Family Guy coded because the son is scared to sleep in a room

because of an evil monkey in his room. Oh yeah, does your son watch Family Guy? Does he also watch Ghostbusters? Because the only green ghost I've ever heard of is slimer also does anyone watch family guy anybody i do i used to i'm used to i mean a lot of us used to i just don't know if that's still relevant for children nowadays you know oh oh he would be in such hysterics over it that my sister finally made her upstairs office into his new bedroom. Poor thing.

Fast forward a few years and we were over at their house. My son kept begging me to go downstairs and watch him play. I asked why he needed me down there with him and he replied that, oh my God, sorry. What? So just to clarify, like just a little summation here. The nephew. So Lauren, her nephew is the one who was too scared to sleep in the room because of the green monkey, right? Sure.

She's over now with her own son. And her own son says, can you come with me to go play in that room? And she says, why do you need me to come in to go play with you or watch you play? And he says, the Grinch is down there. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. So that's two children confirming they are saying the same thing a green ghost to my knowledge my son never knew about my nephew seeing a green monkey several

years before this coupled with some other strange happenings at the house such as her bathtub randomly turning the faucet on by itself has got me convinced that the green monkey my nephew saw was more than just a figment of his imagination that is creepy to hear two separate children like oh you're like there's nothing worse similar but describe it slightly differently the double confirmation is from two children who like like they have no reason to say to not they wouldn't even know how to like make up a story and like and have two different ways of describing the same thing sounds so accurate and oh yeah i hate that do you think he walks around like the grinch or do you think he just stands there with his like pot belly out

well i just imagine he's green yeah but he's got to be tall if he's the grinch he's got to be tall a tall monkey maybe i wonder if it was like actually a monkey or if it was like something green that like climbed around or jumped like around the ceiling like a monkey you know which like now i'm imagining the grinch doing like acrobatics or something like parkour um i okay also i've heard some theories on jim harold's campfire and elsewhere that and i think astonishing legends that some people believe that children see things in a way or or spirits or or extraterrestrials can present themselves in a way that they think a child will sort of understand it right so like yes they'll see like a clown or something thinking like

children like clowns you know like totally disregarding like that's fucking terrifying to see a clown in your bedroom but like right it might present itself as something it thinks is like disarming to the child like i'm a monkey like wait no that's not normal you're not tricking the child into thinking you're supposed to be there yeah so maybe it's like presenting differently to different children i don't know well so that gives i feel like this is one of those things where if like we were both high we would have a really good conversation about this right now i don't know you want me to kind of would it be would it be so fast acting that by the end of the sentence you've got something really insightful unfortunately not

i feel like delta eight gummies take about an hour to kick in so because if we're talking about like oh like what if uh this thing was trying to be somewhat comforting or more approachable to a kid i would my first thought would be that this thing can know the inner workings of each individual person and know what's a safe thing for them and it would show up as a different thing for each person but this story makes it sound like i only know green kind of silly moving right he's like he's like i'm i can't change the green thing okay i'm an amateur at this like it's got to be green i'm sorry even if it's a monkey even if it's like a cute little kitty cat it's gonna be green well i imagine like i'm trying to think of the similarities between the grinch and a monkey and like they're both kind of like they're very furry they've got like long limbs they're lanky kind of yeah or and

they move about in like silly ways so like i feel like this thing isn't trying to cater to everybody's needs that like just has i agree you're probably right because i i agree with you because i feel like especially two little kids who don't totally understand. They haven't spoken to each other about it. Right. Right. And like a monkey and a Grinch. I mean, yeah, they're different.

But like two little kids, we don't know how old they are. But say you're like, I mean, I don't know. My daughter's two and she'd probably say something looks like a monkey that doesn't, you know. So, yeah, maybe that's just their understanding as children of like that's the grinch because it's green and furry and that's which also like what the fuck kind of creature is out there supernaturally the fuck is that it's like it's like i'm sorry but i have really gotten myself to think that the most ridiculous thing a ghost could look like is like it has sheets a sheet over it yeah that's like a i'm not prepared like if we were at like the queen mary and a fucking green furry monkey came in well to be honest even the sheet i don't

think of like i just think of like old timey dress lady in white like i'm like yes i see a ghost it'll be an old lady old timey lady or like that's worst case scenario it's a demon and it's like a full dark black cloud or something yeah i am right shadow i i've prepared for many things but i have not prepared for the grinch like i don't know i don't know what to do with that i don't know to be honest i've spent my whole life preparing for the grinch because it is my favorite christmas movie of all time and no not the new ones The original like 30 minute animated. Yeah. Yeah.

Very cool. I like the Jim Carrey one. I think it's one of the only ones where both the original and the reboot are both good separately. I just like can't. I don't I don't like it, but I think it's because I'm so emotionally connected to the first one that I was like, I just can't. Are you a Jim Carrey fan?

I feel like he's a polarizing man. Yeah. I don't dislike him but i'm not like super he had a real era i like him i like i find him funny i just to me i was like it doesn't work for me as a grinch you know like it's a different i i just had a very specific like grinch if it helps if it helps he also really hated the grinch because apparently he like had to like go to like military training to learn how to um like meditate in really stressful situations because he would get so overstimulated by like the eight hour makeup they had to do on his face and he felt suffocated so he had to like go do like some sort of like marine core training for imagine the other marines are like oh why are you doing this he's like well because they're gonna put a lot of makeup on me i guess so but i also know what it's like to feel claustrophobic

in your own skin but yes i i'm sure there's a marine out there who's like, what a Sally or whatever. Jim or like Kim. More like just Carrie. Am I right? Okay. That was good. That was good. We did good.

We can just sign off now. I think let's hang up. I think that's a yes. Goodbye. All right. We got a third story. This is from, let's hang up i think that's a yes goodbye all right we got a third story uh this is from let's see this is from mckenna who uses she her pronouns thank you for normalizing pronouns and the title really gets me cooking my estate sale dressers which already hooks christine oh And a stranger's sex drawer. Shut up. Uh oh. Uh oh.

Okay, here we go. It starts out hot with screaming into the void, hoping that this email is seen. Well done. McKenna says, okay, so hearing Christine's experience with her vintage dressers made me instantly start typing. So in the summer of 2002, my now husband and I bought a house. The same summer, parents got really into estate sales as the middle-aged Midwesterners they are. So one day at a sale, they found a really nice vintage dresser set. It was a good deal, so I told them to make the purchase. They then hauled them to their garage for safekeeping before our big move. keeping before our big move. So I start to clean them up in hopes of getting rid of that antique old smell

that we all know and love. Cleaning them includes removing the retro floral contact paper, picture 70s orange and green florals, from the bottom of the drawers. The contact paper in some of the drawers has actually been adhered to the drawer while others just were laid in with the backing still on.

So I'm taking the ones out that weren't stuck when I find a folded slip of paper underneath them. My dream. What's that? My dream. My dream. Totally. Totally. Secret note.

Again, it's the beginning of a movie. It is. Expecting some kind of religious reading, I was surprised to see the words, coital posture diagrams. Okay. Girl. Girl. Hi, Barbie. reading i was surprised to see the words coital posture diagrams okay girl girl hi barbie okay um my jaw is on the floor of my parents garage now because i'm cleaning this with my mom i awkwardly laugh and say what the fuck my mom looks over and takes it from me and opens it up she looks it over and goes well now i feel weird giving these dressers to you and Kyle as an engagement gift.

She hands me the paper and it's covered in some of the, dare I say, most vanilla sex positions known to women. And the kicker for me, however, is that on the front, it says to be dispensed at discretion of doctor. Gross. Okay. Okay. So it's basically a woman who's like getting married and

they're like hey you don't know what sex is because we live in a really fucked up world because purity culture is suffocating yeah so here this is all you need to know a prescription pamphlet like Like doctor's orders. Finally, you can know what sex looks like. That's so fucked up. Okay. Besides looking at sex diagrams with my mom, nothing awful, right? Wrong.

My mom opens another drawer and finds a professional headshot of the lovely couple themselves. So not only did I have to think of sex life of the old couple i i just got these dispensers or these dressers from but now i know that they looked like this and there's an attached photo oh it's like don't be shy don't be shy uh don't worry it's folded in the picture but if you look hard enough you can uh imagine what i was seeing i love the show so much every time i listen i feel like world friends catching up but not in a creepy lonely way thank you for for telling us uh there is a picture attached um is it in the email like it is in the email they look like a lovely couple

oh my god wait okay i was picturing like victorian era like my black and white photos this is like a modern not modern day but like maybe 90s maybe 90s but also they're an older couple so maybe this was in the 30s or 40s that they so not 30s like 40s or 50s that they were totally like pamphlet by a doctor yeah yeah they must have gotten that like when they first got married they're definitely an older couple in this but i mean it looks like your friendly like retired florida couple you know like she makes a she makes a killer cookie you know oh my god they're really cute older couple they look like your average grandparents so it is weird to see coital posture diagram supplement

for use by physicians in marriage counseling oh my god this is crazy wow this is crazy what i hope over the years they got freakier i hope like they earned that you know they earned that they started off hot they're like first of all doc give it to us straight how do we do the basics then we'll figure it out from there by the by the end of the honeymoon we will have it nailed down we will be on our way and i'm so sorry to whomever sent this uh what's their name again mckenna sorry that i just we keep making it worse by talking about how freaky they got um but you know what you know what they've lived a long life and i think that pamphlet probably was old news by like week one so i'm happy for them you know yeah they look happy they look content they look like they figured it out so they're having a good marriage they're having

a good life together yeah okay wow that's crazy because that really is like a direct parallel to me and my weird haunted old drawer with well to be fair i just put a bunch of nipple cream in it that arrived at my house unprompted so oh right i forgot about the nipple cream by the way oh as again as someone who is um not i probably would have stuck with the pamphlet let's just say that um yeah that's the extent you're like this is a little extreme it's like whoa um so as as you said the nipple cream we a while ago we both got you know um a care package from a company that was a little more x-rayed than i'm personally used to i have friends at home like in a bidding war with each other for the stuff that i got so

it's great uh it's it's great good for you good to know well okay I won't go any further but they they really sent like such an array of stuff where it was like man like there's something for everyone yeah for any type of interest and I've got friends hand them out to multiple different partners relationships you know and I've got friends with expansive interests and uh they you sure do they are itching for for the leftovers so um anyway thank you for i'm glad glad we got a seal of approval from christine and probably her shoulders so no listen i'm just trying to give them i just was so like i don't know i just the company is called fun love and they sent us this beautiful gift basket even though i didn't quite

know what what i was getting into when i first opened it with Leona. But even the even got a kick out of the little they sent little disco balls that we hung up on the tree as ornaments. Oh, my gosh. Anyway, just a little shout out. But yeah, so listen, some of us have sex tours. Some are intentional. Some like mine are not intentional. But here we are. I to um the museum of sex with my mother because that's the relationship we have and uh and not only that i mean we i went there where i learned a little bit but there's also somewhere someone's gonna shout it out at some point but somewhere is um the museum of like vibrators or something and it's their vibe the vibrators from the 1800s girl oh crazy like it was like they were taking like the mechanism of a pencil sharpener and like putting

a corn cob on it like it was like they were doing whatever they could my they were they made it work i'll tell you um so we'll find a way humans find a way you know they sure do we've all been you know at least most of us i don't want to going i know where you're going we're all into something yes we're all into something we're all on a journey okay and all the asexual people are like nope we're not i'm like they're into something too they're into nothing no they're into they're into of looking at us and going okay you guys i like to think i like to think the asexual people are at least into listening to us talk about it i don't know i hope so because otherwise they're like what the fuck okay so i

have a story here this is from gabby she her and it's called the campus stalker oh dear good great hello to all of the wonderful folks in your crew i started listening to the podcast at a random point a while back but i've recently gone way back to the beginning and i'm now re-listening to the chunk of episodes i had started out with i've caught back up to episode 305 where christine covers the case of stalking laura black and it reminded me of the stalker i had in college and how dismissive the campus and law enforcement were stalker I had in college and how dismissive the campus and law enforcement were. I began, as some people might know, stalking stories are one of my most frightening to me. I began my freshman year of college in 2017. I lived in on-campus apartments and this will be relevant

later. These were a short walk away from our rec center slash gym and student union building. So this whole story begins in January of 2018 2018 i just returned back to campus after christmas break with a new class schedule and two of those classes were across the campus from my apartment i had a large break in between the two so after my first one i would sit in that building and catch up on school work one day i was studying away when this guy came up to me he stood there for a moment before i even noticed him because i had my earbuds in i took them out and he said hi you are really pretty he was not uh he was not my type whatsoever so i just said thanks he then asked what my name was and what class i was studying for i told him i was studying for my speech class and i put my earbuds back in to hint to him that i wasn't

interested in talking he tried to continue asking who the professor was no means no and also putting your earbuds in means no just saying if it's not an enthusiastic yes it's a no that's it that's it nailed it i told him who it was and then said that i needed to get to work because my next class was starting in an hour he finally got the hint to stop talking to me but proceeded to sit about five feet away and just stare at me and this is when sometimes men will say like, well, then why don't you just come out and say it? And it's like, you know what? Because sometimes you come out and say it and then- And they kill you. They get mad. Yeah, exactly. Like, okay. Anyway, you know, it's a story for another day.

Men's biggest fear is being laughed at. Women's biggest fear is being killed. So sorry we don't feel like rejecting someone who is going to men's biggest fear is being laughed at men's women's biggest fear is being killed so yeah uh sorry we don't feel like rejecting someone who is going to who already has the size power over me and who already has not gotten any social cues that you're not interested and has the privilege of most likely getting away with it compared to our story so yeah precisely I then realized I probably shouldn't have said my class my next class was in an hour and it's like sucks because it's like now you know he's gonna follow you and well now she thinks it's her fault like oh shit I shouldn't have said that and it's like now it's all the problem on you but like of course it's not your

fault I realized I probably shouldn't have said my next class was in an hour because I felt like if I left right then he would know it was because of him and not because I actually had a class to go to, which really shouldn't matter looking back on it. But I still felt the pressure of being polite for some reason. Yeah. Because everyone in this situation does. I ended up texting one of my friends and told her to call me and asked me to come over for an emergency. She did and I got out of there. Fast forward to about a week later and I was walking to my apartment after class. It was a little bit late in the day so there weren't very many people

around. I saw this same dude standing outside of our student union building. I made eye contact with him and he promptly began following me. I sped up my pace and he did the same. I called my boyfriend and told him what was going on and to stay on the phone with me until I could get somewhere I felt safe. I didn't want to walk up to my apartment because then he'd know where I lived. So I walked straight to my car and began driving away from campus. It was weird though, because the guy followed me all the way up to the stop sign in front of my apartment building, but not any further. Ew. Like he's so quickly escalating. Yeah. What the fuck? Like chill. Fast forward again, a few days after after this i was walking from my apartment to the

rec center i saw this guy again walking on the same sidewalk the opposite direction i turned and hid behind a bush walking him walk in the direction toward my apartment i texted my roommates who knew about the situation and told them to look outside they texted me back saying that he was standing at that same stop sign staring up at our building. I knew at that point that this matter should probably be taken to the police. That night, I drove to the campus police station to file a report. I said to the officer, I just need to file a report about a stalker. He said, is his name Paul?

Whoever Paul is, even if that isn't his name, I it's not paul yes i'd be like yeah let's get a restraining order on paul just in case let's handle paul also while we're at it whoever the fuck paul is i responded yes okay so she didn't know his name was okay i responded yes how did you know he showed me a photo of the guy and said I was the eighth person to report him and the second person to report him that day. Oh, my God. OK. I asked why in the world is he still walking around on campus with this many reports against him? And the officer said there wasn't much they could do about stalking, but they've banned him from every building he doesn't have a class in and any on campus housing. So that's why he stopped at the stop sign outside of my own housing oh my god okay well at least he's listening to the

rules i was like right he's following the rules technically he just said they'd add my report to the file i am lucky enough to have a father that works in law enforcement so he knows the ins and outs of the system i called him and told him everything and he was livid. He called the campus police, city police, and told them he would escalate even further. He further called a few other people too but I have no clue how the system works. He told me to contact a local news station so I did. I talked to a news reporter about what was going on and she said she was going to investigate. Another week or two later, campus officials contacted me with a list of the buildings that paul was banned from and advised me to avoid any others that i didn't have a class in they also referred me to speak with the counselors on campus

i forwarded everything to the journalist lol i also posted on our school facebook page that if any other victims wanted to speak to the journalist to let me know and I'd send over the information. Yes. Good girl. Yes. I had 10 plus women reach out to me that they had been harassed by this guy as well. Finally, the nudist article was published. I got an email within a few hours that Paul was banned from campus and would have a hearing that would determine whether he could be a student there or not. In the meantime, my dad has been using his law enforcement access to records and found out that this guy has been kicked out of multiple other schools, had a domestic violence charge, and his parents had donated a lot of money to our school. Before the hearing, I had to meet with another campus team and recount everything as well as provide any sort of proof i had luckily i still had my phone records that showed the calls to my friend parents and

boyfriend as well as all the texts i'd sent about him the hearing happens and he was finally fully banned he was no longer a student at this school and had to leave immediately my dad found out that as he was walking away from the campus they had an unmarked police car following him to make sure he actually left. Apparently, he went up to a girl walking her dog, asked for her number, and she declined. Good. As she continued to walk, he began chasing her down the sidewalk. Thank God this police car is following him. Yes.

sidewalk oh thank god this police car is following him yes and also like now that he doesn't have to follow school rules technically i'd be terrified that he would leave he would go past the stop sign and follow you into your house now right now he's like well fuck it now i can do what i want okay so he's chasing her down the sidewalk yes um the police car lit him up and he was arrested i can't find any other info about where he is at now and the original news report has been taken down from the website plus after the hearing i remember a few other articles getting published about him even searching his name comes up empty so i have a feeling his rich parents got it all taken down but i was able to find one of the news reports with another victim on the wayback machine website i was about to say girl you got to get on the way back machine obviously you have. Smart girl.

I will drop it below. Anyways, apologies for this being so long, but I think it is important for more people to see the reality of stalking cases. Eight reports had been filed against this guy when I went to the police, and who knows how many went unreported or were reported after my own. It is astounding how few consequences this guy had until it went to the news and gave the campus bad publicity. It terrifies me to think of the cases where there isn't an institution to publicly shame thank you for your time and patience and for everything you all do and then there's a link to the article that i will be checking out later wow's out of applause too if we all yeah gabby and your dad like yeah kick ass you know if we've learned anything today it's that if you are at school and dealing with a stalker, you go not to the police, maybe to the police, but you go to a female

journalist. That's what you do. Well, you report it, first of all, to everybody to say I reported it. If nothing happens, because a lot of schools are getting better, I will say not as maybe as well as they should be. But at least, you know, there might be a recourse available at least get it on the record that you've reported this shit right report it if nothing happens then fucking bring out the big guns call us i don't know we'll we'll fucking call a woman call a woman

a woman will fix it don't worry a woman will handle it um okay thank you so much the next story is from another. Or call your dad. I feel like a lot of times a dad is like, fuck no. You know? Because like they're men and they're like, no, I'll handle it. I can get shit done. And it's like, okay, well, fine.

Use your powers for good. You know? See something, say something. If you have the power of a man, an adult man, you might as well use it for good. Or a woman. Well, a woman is probably going to use it for good. But I'm saying if you have a man with power and he's on your side, then fucking rope them in too. All right.

The next story comes from another M who uses she her pronouns thank you for normalizing pronouns and the subject line is an odd small town to grow up in as long as it's not galena i am excited um the story says uh hi to everybody and then says i've been listening to you guys since about 2019 and expanded to listening beach to sandy this year too and you guys are helping me get through oh covid lockdown and more recently my hour plus commute to work now to why i'm writing to you i was listening to episode 355 and after hearing christine's portion which was the defao family, I felt like now was the time for my first write-in. Like Christine, I'm also a former Catholic school kid, and I went to the local Catholic elementary school in Amityville, New York.

No. From kindergarten to eighth grade. One thing to know about Amityville is that it's the type of small town that no one ever leaves, and everyone knows everyone else's business. Growing up, many of my classmates and friends' parents had also grown up there and had been around the same ages as the DeFeo children. So we all were told about the tragedy that had happened at an early-ish age. But we also learned that the story that the Lutz family gave was something to not joke around about as it was disrespectful to the memory of the DeFeo family. I was in eighth grade when the 2005 movie came out and I remember the teachers at school sitting us all down to talk about the murders versus what

would be in the movie. How wild is that that your teachers can like give you their own personal lecture on like. It's like so close to home yeah. It was fairly common to be walking around or riding bikes with friends on the weekends or during the summer and then suddenly have a car pull up to you and ask for directions to the house oh because you live in a famous town now yeah most people would give nonsense directions i was gonna say i would try to give nonsense directions and then people would be like christine you led them straight there like my sense of direction is so bad i'd be like it's that way i fooled them and it would be exactly that way most people would give nonsense directions hoping the people in the car would get

hopelessly lost though some people would see how much money they could make taking them directly to the house someone i know made close to 500 one summer oh my god you know what the fuck it's a side hustle baby if you can't beat him join him so i guess so but you also got people who well i'll be nice and say they weren't in the best state of mind which that makes so much sense i've never even considered that the like yeah okay uh a guy in his 30s almost beat up a younger sibling of mine when that sibling was about 12 because the house wasn't the one he thought it was it was a regular private residence versus an attraction like he thought

so basically he thought he he thought he could go like on a tour of this place he didn't know he could only just stand outside and look at the house oh but why did the sibling get beaten up because i think the sibling took him there to see the to see the house. And the guy felt misled, thinking like, oh, it's going to be an attraction. Oh, I see. Oh, shit. Which I never even considered that there would be like fucking unstable people going to houses like this. Sure. Like wanting to see it and acting out.

Yeah. acting out yeah i also even wonder if it's like uh there's got to be someone out there who is mentally unwell in a violent way or like in a they are hearing things seeing things kind of way and like wants to do something at this house like maybe there's someone who's like i don't know into like their own they've got something planned and they want to do it at a landmark you know like yeah you don't know what people's intentions are that's true yeah like it's for people we just covered um uh btk and like he not that we know any like mental diagnoses but he was very into like patterns and signs and like what if someone was like oh it's a sign i have to do it at the ambival house you know who knows what draws people to something like a dark place like that

yeah yeah um it was a weird experience looking back on it but at the time it was just normal for me uh i do have one other connection when one of my uncles was a kid his dad worked as a caretaker maintenance man for a wealthy family that purchased the home sometime after the lutz family my uncle was in the house all the time and has always said it was just a regular house. Due to all this, I have some pretty strong feelings about the haunting part of it. And my friends now all know this as one of my soapbox topics that I will always rant about at the slightest mention. But that isn't to say I don't have my own paranormal stories. Those are for another time. So thank

you for covering it. Oh, you're welcome. Wow. I feel like that kind of is where I've landed as well after all this time of like, you know, some really gruesome, horrible things happened. And I feel like it got overshadowed by all the like demonic lore that probably was overblown and uh the warrens were hyping it up and hollywood you know um so i i think m uh this m and probably um are probably on the same page about that one i think so um yeah so let's see is this the last one no second to last one. Let's see. This one is called. What'd you say? I said the penultimate. Oh, penultimate. Oh, that's a great word.

Okay. So this one is called, uh-oh, time travel. Help, please. I'm going to help a time traveler. Oh my God. Okay. Okay. I wouldn't get ahead of yourself.

You're going to try to help a time traveler. Let's put it that way. Okay. I mean, maybe you will. Maybe you will. No, you know what? I'm not giving you enough credit. You're going to fucking knock this a time traveler. Let's put it that way. Okay. I mean, maybe you will. Maybe you will. No, you know what? I'm not giving you enough credit. You're going to fucking knock this out of the park.

I know. This is from Lily Sheher. And again, the subject is alarming. It's time travel with three question marks. Help, please. I'm so excited. It goes. All righty, motherfuckers.

Settle in. It's going to be a doozy love you guys love the podcast okay so I live in Hobart Tasmania Australia in Hobart there is a massive river that runs straight down the middle of the city connecting the suburbs on either side is the Tasman bridge

so my story starts when I was a kid like 10 or 11 years old and my class went on a little excursion to walk across the bridge yay what fun for a grade 5 kid anyways when we walked across this bridge we would signal to all the cars that drove past to beep their horns okay actually i think this would be really fun for me it'd be so fun right i'm like i'm actually way into that but whatever um i remember very clearly that no cars were falling for our meticulous manipulation to get people to honk their horns to entertain a group of 11 year olds, except for one. It was a beat up white Toyota.

And I remember feeling very excited because the same car had J, L and O in the number plate. And that meant I could sing Jenny from the block. We would have been great friends i was gonna say i thought they were about to say i thought she was about to say it's the same car j-lo had and i was like are you sure she had a beat-up white toyota and then i read the rest like talking about patterns yeah j-lo definitely was my first thought as well uh and that meant i could sing jenny from the block obnoxiously loudly for the rest of the day. Okay, so fast forward to a few days ago. I'm on my drive to work, going over the bridge, that bridge.

And I see a group of kids wearing my old school uniform on an excursion walking across the bridge. So I beat my horn at them. Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. What? So I beeped my horn at them. Then it hit me. I currently drive an old white beat-up Toyota with J, L, and O on the number plate. Oh my god.

Oh my god. I quickly had a look in my rearview mirror and I shit you not. Little Lily was walking along all happy that someone had just beeped their horn what i have no way of explaining it or rationalizing it so if you have any idea let me know anyways thank you for reading so much love lily what what that's fucking mind-blowing i've never had a goose cam look quite like that. That, that, that. What the fuck? Whoa.

You time-slipped yourself twice. So that was our first call-in, I think, from a glitch in the Matrix that involves some time travel. Like a doppelganger time travel, multi-dimensional. I mean, what the fuck? My entire body created new goosebumps to go on top of the other goosebumps.

You are a one big goose cam. Oh my God. That's the coolest story. That's the coolest story. Wow. That is. Well, wrap it up, Eva. Crazy.

Let's go. Nope, we have one more unfortunately and i hope this person doesn't feel uh oh my god we haven't read the next one but um i'm sure it'll be just as good i don't know man this is pretty good because this is from anonymous not the not the group but a person whoa whoa can you imagine? Heavy hitters. Can you imagine if the next one was, we know about the glitch in the matrix. We know about J-Lo. We know about Lily.

Okay. We've already deleted it from your recording. This will fuck you up, Christine. Don't read along. I know you like to read along. Don't read along. No, I don't read along. I don't.

Because you yelled at me in 2017. I've never done it again. Okay. Dead serious. You're going gonna get a kick out of this because this is from anonymous he uses they them pronouns i love that gender neutral also means discreet i love it yes it does it means mystery mystery subject government listener the fact that okay we have a lava specialist and someone from the government who listen in

are we supposed to be asking for their attention more often? Like, go read a book. You don't, we're beneath you for sure. Okay. Go read a book like you do every other second you're not listening to this podcast. Go work for the government and learn about volcanology. Okay. Here we go, Christine.

You're going to love it. I'm ready. I'm ready. I'm ready. I'm listening to episode 349 while cleaning my house and I can see my partner on the couch. They keep widening their eyes and pursing their lips like they want to interject.

They are an intel analyst subject matter expert. An SME said like SME. They're a SME. An intel analyst subject matter expert. Do we know what the topic was? I don't remember that episode. Or does it matter? I think we're about to figure it out.

Oh, okay. Okay. With 20 years experience in the Air Force Space Command. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. They have contributed to Project Blue Book. Oh my God. They have a lot to say about aliens,

including that they can't say whether we do or don't have evidence of them at Area 51. Yes, they worked on a project at Area 51. Unfortunately for me and you, they can't talk about really anything to do with their job or past. Sorry for the super vague message. I just don't know what is okay to say online.

My partner and I love the podcast and they especially love when you cover government conspiracies. They say it's very endearing to hear people talk about and interpret the declassified info when they don't have the actual complete answers. Okay. We are someone who has worked in area 51 and on Project Blue Book listens to this fucking show. What?

All right, Eva, pack it up. We're done. It's a little scary. It's a little scary. I also love that like note at the end, like they find it really endearing when you are an idiot and don't know anything about the government conspiracy. That's us. They just find it.

They find it really endearing when you try to interpret declassified info and don't actually know any of the answers oh god we can be cute i i i do i mean i'm fine to be told i'm endearing and that's it but like this also does terrify me a little bit because if we were ever on to something they would have to like report us to the government like we are not that far away from a report at some no i mean i don't think i don't think we're on to anything but you know if we act if if we were to come like stumble onto something it would be a stumble we would we fully it would be a stumble but it would probably be a joke like we would probably joke about it that's the free exactly someone we would probably joke about it

and say haha imagine if this were the case and then somebody out there would go oh shit but also the fact that it was the project blue book episode it was like a 101 let's be clear like i don't think i did any outrageous research here no no but the fact that someone who worked on project blue book was making facial expressions that they had opinions about it it means i was either really good or i fucking sucked no no i yeah i really wonder um the the the way can i go into the email now just to read the the verbiage okay so like they said let's see widening their eyes and pursing their lips like they want to interject that makes me feel like uh-oh they're on to something uh-huh that makes me feel i'm not trying to say i'm a genius over

here i'm just saying maybe my research is um is okay it's clearly worth talking about it's worth discussion a person who works at area 51 i mean i was reporting on project blue book and he and this person i don't know if it was a he or she or they but they worked on project blue book and they're listening to my episode oh my god no no no but listen a person who worked at area 51 thoroughly enjoys our show overall which is already like do you know what i mean like that's the accomplishment it's like not even just that episode like they clearly like it enough to listen whether we say things that are

correct or incorrect it's so nice I was gonna go full I love the podcast I was gonna go full panic spiral you really caught me down there no no I mean it says my partner and I love the podcast they especially love when you cover government conspiracies so you know that is such

a good uh a compliment and an encouragement to keep going oh well hey talk about a great way to start 2025 i mean for i mean for what for 2024 and 2024 what an intro to the year we've just had holy shit and by the end of the year maybe've just had. Holy shit. And by the end of the year, maybe the government's coming after us. But so far, they like us. So like, whatever, you know? Yeah, maybe this will be the first and last episode of 2024. But you know what?

We've made it here. So we're happy. All right. Well, everybody have a great year. Have a great January. We'll see you in 30-ish days for another round of listeners episodes. Yay! Send your stories in and that's why we drink