And That's Why We Drink - Listener Stories: Vol. 88

Episode Date: February 1, 2024

Happy February, boozers and shakers! Join us for a lovely romp down food poisoning lane. We were hoping to leave potty problems in the past but not before we hear from a listener who may have hallucinated their own toilet exorcism. We also have some sweet and unnerving stories related to Third Man Syndrome and even a creepy Valentine's Day tribute. Oh, and don't forget the debilitating fear of elevators... and that's why we drink!Tickets are selling fast for our last round of On the Rocks live shows! Don't miss out - andthatswhywedrink.com/live

Christine see I did it again all I ever do is just doing that I can't stop it but I did have a thing to announce to you I think that was my way of trying to beat you to the punch. First of all, happy February. It's just a... Why? February. Come on, people. February. Happy Feb.

Also, I need to tell you, we were just recording another episode. And as we were recording it, I heard someone I heard like someone like pounding on the door. What? Not on the troll hole door, but on the apartment door. Oh. I heard someone banging and I was like, I don't know what that is. It's probably like mail or something. But it was a really aggressive bang.

And I would have usually gotten up to open it, but Allison's here. So I didn't hear the banging anymore. So I was like, oh, she must have gotten it. so i i didn't hear the banging anymore so i was like oh she must have gotten it apparently i got a text shortly after that which i only read just now that said uh what did it say it says you missed a visit by the fuzz huh the johnny 50 apparently made an appearance at the schultz fourth manor today and uh apparently it was to ask us if we noticed anything because the other night um allison and i were up until like two or three in the morning um we had taken a very long nap during the day so we ended up pulling a middle of the night situation and we went out until like two in the morning and when

we were coming back i guess someone followed us into our building and we didn't even notice which terrifies me oh my god and apparently he stole like a bunch of packages so just followed you to get inside the building thank god but yeah straight up followed us like on foot and like because we we live in like a gated apartment. And I guess he must have been waiting near the gate for someone to open it up. And we drove in. Oh, my Lord. That's scary.

Yeah. You know, I never knew what to do in those scenarios because it's like, you know, they say like I remember in college they were like, don't let don't like hold the door for people. But it's also like I'm not going to slam it in someone's face and be like prove that you live here like I don't want to be that guy you know so it's like how do you even handle that that's hard wow that's scary though I mean it's scary that I didn't even notice that like someone was like it could have been someone much worse and then yeah thank god it was just the packages well I guess uh Allison said that I couldn't come out and answer anything god it was just the packages well i guess uh allison said that

i couldn't come out and answer anything because i was in the middle of recording my true crime podcast and the cop was like oh well tell them that there is a burbank cold case that we just solved with genetics uh sorry is this like uh fucking the newest like hbo comedy show like comedy it's like are we murders in the building yeah that's the one i'm thinking i'm like am i selena gomez what's happening that is so weird anyway if you wanted to look up solved burbank cold case apparently they just it. And he was very excited for someone to talk about it. So, I mean, I'm, I'm thrilled that he was like, Hey, guess what? I know. I'm wondering if he's the one who solved it and he was like, Oh, someone should report this immediately.

Yeah. Ask Al what his name was. Cause I've, I've already got the, the article up. So, uh, of course, just horribly sad. Uh, okay. Nevermind. Cool. Great. great i mean of course it was going to be for your discretion um yeah just fyi but uh wowza but i mean this happened in the 80s and uh they put them away thank god um wow anyway that's your fun fact your february fun fact wowza well m that was quite who imagine if we knew like imagine you had a ring doorbell and like you just look down and there was like police at the door. You'd be like, I know you're telling a story right now, Christine, but like there's a situation. I would be like, thank God, because I'm like so fearful of all that nonsense. I was like, thank God we're recording right now.

Like, don't go anywhere while I answer this fucking door. I feel like I would have been like, pick up the laptop and walk over there. Yeah, exactly. I've got it recording i want to know held you in front of them and you'd be like i would have been like show me your badge number oh god wow what what a day you're having already m i know i know anyway now my like personal fear is like what if the guy who followed us in now like was dressed as a cop and just knocked on our door? That freaks me out. What if he's the bad guy all along? That's why you asked for his badge number.

I just told you. You are right. Anyway, with that, that's the first story everyone's getting from us this month. How was January for you, Christine? The ultimate listener story. It was great. We kicked off tour. It was fun. We had fun.

We traveled. We had fun. It felt like things were really back to, I don't want to say back to normal, but like, you know, back to the old grind of touring and flying and all that nonsense um how about how about you how about me um it's yeah it feels like uh things are kind of moving and grooving the right way although i will say the tour even though the tour itself the being on stage part was much better than i expected it to go the other parts were much worse than i expected them to go right fair point um and i had just about me and eva had the worst food poisoning we've ever had in our entire lives and honestly i think the reason our first show of the tour went so well like in terms of like my my fear my stage fright i didn't even have time to think about stage fright so so worried about like pooping myself in front of i'm so glad audience of people said that because putting that

bacteria in your food was a really hard decision for me to make but i figured how else can i get m over and you know it was just collateral damage she took a bite of mine by accident you were like i needed it to be realistic, okay? And so when you said a cop showed up at your door, I thought, uh-oh, they're onto me. But thankfully it was not. There she is, officer. Yeah, no, no, no. In all seriousness, they had terrible food poisoning.

It was horrendous because our flight, I got picked up for the airport at 5.45 a.m. Then the Uber went and picked them up at the airport. And Em came down and said, don't speak to me. for the airport at 5 45 a.m then the uber went and picked them up at the airport and um m came down and said don't speak to me um and then eva was nowhere and we thought this can't be good and so then you couldn't even make it down like we were supposed to leave by like 5 40 in the morning and the car came to get us at exactly 5 40 and even didn't even come down until six like she was just she couldn't move that's eva folks like you know that that's that something's wrong so eva texts me and is like can you come up and help me please and i was like oh my god this is really bad so i go up and of course thankfully the guy at the front desk is like i'm not letting

you up to someone's room and i was like you're that's the correct answer thank you but also please call her so he called her and she and then they let me up. And then Eva was like, I can't close my suitcase. And I was like, oh, darling. Oh, it was just like, oh, my God. And just so everyone knows, Eva, on average, travels with three pieces of luggage at least. And so the fact that she couldn't even close one, but she was about to have to drag three of them through an airport. And that's like because of us, not like she's like high maintenance and has like a bag of shoes that she brings with her it's like all our shit like all our bullshit our total we usually travel with

eight to ten pieces of luggage it's insanity and so yeah so we're like i'm like oh my god let's get to the fucking airport and then how are we gonna even get on a plane and eva and i both have really like motion sickness issues so we're on this plane and i'm like between Em and Eva and I'm like kind of glancing back and forth and we hit turbulence and I'm like I'm I'm listen Eva's gone down here I was like one of us is one of you two is going down and I I mean listen I was very fortunate I was not struck down by this food poisoning um one of us needed to like go get the rental car and like you know and this is where i say on this february eve on this eve of this february 1st christine you really you're the winner of january because you really handled it when we needed you

the most you like we were like we're talking about evil a lot that poor girl like the fact that like she still had to work backstage at the first show and like in between like answering tech questions and stuff would just like sprint to the bathroom like i was vomit yeah i i was the opposite where at least i wasn't throwing up but it was hurting in other ways if you catch my drift and it was i i really was prepared i thought about instacarting adult diapers to our first show i was like i mean it was so miserable and it was like it wasn't even like it would just hit you randomly it was like my stomach was i was doubled over like you didn't even get to sleep because of it so on top of it no i never i never went to sleep the first our philly show i hadn't slept that night because

every i had to run to the bathroom like every 10 minutes and my goal i was like trying to space out the intervals intervals i was like just keep it together for 15 minutes just keep it for 15 and i think the best we got was 17 minutes but i was i was sick it was a noble pursuit oh my god it was so bad and then i still felt sick for like through the whole tour i wasn't feeling good but philly was a rough rough day yeah and you really I mean you really did like do the good compartmentalization of Welp got no time to focus on get being nervous let's just exactly knock it out of the park I was like I'm not even nervous about fainting I'm nervous about everyone witnessing a really awful thing that makes me want to scream when my stepdad used to

say like if I'd be like oh my leg hurts he'd like, you want me to hit you on the other leg so you forget about, like, that bullshit? Like, that's what happened to you in real life. That was God being like, want me to make you have explosive situations instead. Want me to punch you in the guts real quick? Yeah, yeah. Oh, it was so foul. Like, I just, I was, so I think that helped with the rest of the leg because I was like, honestly, the fact that I feel better today and I didn't pass out on the worst version of this, like maybe today's better. Maybe tomorrow's better.

I mean, you really pulled through, both of you. And I just didn't even I mean, there was nothing I could do. I was just helpless. But I am so glad that it ended as quickly as it did, because Eva was telling me horror stories of a friend who had some like thing for weeks and months. And I was like, Oh, God, I'm so glad you guys are better. So, you know, if you're still hoping to see us soon live, or you're planning to know that we'll at least be in better, hopefully a better place. I was literally I was so proud of myself for getting through like an hour and a half like sitting on stage and not having to rent the bathroom but i thought for sure that was going to be the day so um yeah if you want to see me in an even better mood

um you can do that only up to our future shows um and uh with that that's my hope for february is that i don't have any tummy problems like i did in january yeah let's leave the let's just say um hmm the uh let's leave it in the past the toilet let's leave say, the toilet in the past. The toilet. Let's leave the potty problems in the past. The potty in the past. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

Well, we've got some stories to tell you guys that are much less grotesque than that. Thank you, Eva, for picking them for us. We have three and three. So do you want to go first or me this time, Christine? Why don't you go first? The first one is written by Stephanie. Here's a she her pronouns. Thank you for normalizing pronouns, Stephanie.

And Stephanie's subject line is third man syndrome and the elevator. And then in parentheses, it says, or I just realized 25 years later what I experienced. So I'm thinking our third man syndrome episode recently gave an awakening to Stephanie. Well, you saw that post, right, on Slack. This is why sometimes you really got to get in there because I tag you in the things that are important. Megan shared a BuzzFeed article. Did you see that? Yes, I did see that. That said it was inspired by your episode. Yeah. And then the writer of the article DM'd me on Insta too. Wow. Okay. So

you're really talking about awakenings, man. That struck a nerve. Apparently so. Yeah. At least to two people. So I'm happy about that. Stephanie says, says hello m eva christine my name is stephanie she her and i just started listening to episode 360 about the third man syndrome and i immediately went oh my god i've experienced that um and as stephanie's writing this stephanie has not finished the episode yet so immediately felt uh the need to say something to us and stephanie says rewind the clock back to 1999 or 2000 i was in college and i was visiting my friend at school since i was on break since this person and i are no longer friends drama um i'll just call them x okay teen shiefer uh-oh i was thinking more like x is like your ex friend but yes of course x and i were heading back up to her dorm room and we decided to take the elevator because she was on the third or fourth

floor the elevator door started to close so x put her hand in it to stop it well it did not stop and the outer door closed on her hand oh my god that's a nightmare already which now my also my fear too is if the door closes on your hand and the elevator thinks like we're all good to go are you gonna get pulled like your hands gonna get ripped off oh my god yeah okay we tried to get uh the elevator to open but it wouldn't someone ran upstairs to try to send it back down while someone else called the police and fire department a few guys tried to pry the door open with no luck and my job was to keep x calm this random guy walked around the corner though and offered to help and with his help they were able to open the door enough to get her hand out we turned to thank

him and he was gone no No one ever saw him. She and I visited the ER with only bruising and coincidentally the second time I've ridden on the back of a police car without being arrested. I love that. Unless the drama that you're leaving out of these stories. I love this. X sounds like trouble in the best way. X sounds like you will always have a story next to X. Like some sort of connection.

Yeah. We always chalked it up to being her guardian angel. Listening to the podcast today made me remember this. Also, Christine, my friend perforated her eardrum with a Q-tip. I tell Jess. Trouble, trouble, trouble. And I still use them to clean my ear. I'll never learn.

Stay safe. The irony of writing stay safe after that stephanie you too likewise probably more so p.s october scorpios are the best and so um i think you just wanted me to say that out loud but i didn't mean it i just want everyone to know i was saying what stephanie said and was crossing their fingers when they said that yeah yeah yeah wowza okay so we got like a uh a dorm room ra uh ghost or a someone a college guardian angel yeah i don't know what that is that's that's creepy and you know what freaks me out about the third man syndrome too is that like are they coming because if they didn't show up you would actually fucking die die. That's a true. That's a great point. Like, it wasn't really that bad of an emergency that they were like, I need to stop this from happening.

Like, stop fate or stop. Right. Because I've been in some pretty gnarly situations and no one ever fucking showed up. Third man wise for me. And I survived them. So I'm like, if I didn't, is that when I got to be worried? Like, am I am I in the beginnings of crossing into a realm where I can see these people you know yeah yeah yeah who knows what the what the real outcome would have been that's I know horrible

horrible I mean that's a nightmare to get your arm or limb stuck in an elevator door I'd be screaming I mean there there's no way I would have kept calm elevators are one of those things where when people say they have a fear of elevators, like a phobia, I'm like, I get it. Like, I don't, I don't, but I get it. And I'm mad at myself for not having one because it's nature to even be in an elevator. Yeah. Or like a fear of heights. You know, I'm like, these things make a lot of sense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't critique them at all all i mean eva just texted me the other day saying apparently she had forgotten but when she was little she had like a debilitating fear of elevators and she said it was because one time she ran away from her parents i wonder if that's

why she picked that story she said one time she ran away from her parents and like ended up on an elevator or something or that's at least what her sister said uh and that's why she thinks she had that fear for a long time oh that's so sad that is so scary yeah so you know i get it i get it okay so this is another submission oh my god okay wait this one's also called my own third man syndrome story m you're really what're really causing a ruckus here. All right, I guess we've got ourselves a theme, I think. We've got a theme. This is from Maddie Sheher. It says, hello to the whole ATWWD gang.

My name is Maddie Sheher, and I have my own third man syndrome story that still shakes me up when I think about it. When I was 12, I was in a really bad car accident. I wasn't wearing a seat belt please everyone wear a seat belt thank you maddie please folks thank you for normalizing seat belts thank you it's it needs to be needs to be said i had been thrown into the windshield and i broke the windshield with my face oh my god broke my back punctured a lung cut my spleen and had 27 stitches on the bridge of my

nose and forehead i don't know which of those was like in a fuck mary kill situation with all of those injuries all of those sounded i don't there's not one I would prefer over the other all of those are horrible it's all fucking terrifying oh my god she said anyway I was kind of a bloody mess and I blacked out in the wreck I woke up in the just to just to ignore the pain I know that's when that's when our bodies are like let's not remember this part that's when you're that's when the laptop just reboots itself it's like yeah the rainbow spinning wheel comes on and you're like cool we're gonna just freeze overheating it's time to it's time to be done yeah i woke up in the ditch on this secluded country road and i was pacing back and forth crying while blood was pouring from my face

jesus christ What the fuck? As I had turned around to continue my pacing, a man was suddenly standing there and he shoved a washcloth in my face and walked away. What an aggressive guardian angel. Like, put this on your fucking face, you dirty bloody monster. Don't tell anyone I was here.

Clean yourself up. I had to come down from heaven to clean you. You're embarrassing me. They're looking at all my clients today. It's performance review day. You look so bad. Take this washcloth. Get it together, little girl. I didn't think anything of it other than maybe someone had stopped to help. While I was trying to stop the bleeding in my face, I looked down and noticed my knee was also bleeding like crazy. I saw the man sitting in his truck and I walked up to him and for some reason when I got to him, I felt calm and I said, excuse me, sir, do you have another washcloth for my knee? This is wild. This feels like a fever dream because no

one would ever approach a strange man in a truck at all but i guess you're already such a mess well you're in an emergency and he just helped you he didn't say a word and just handed me another washcloth and i walked away to sit on the side of the road and wait for help ambulance arrived and i was put in a stretcher and while the emt was putting my neck brace on and hooking up the oxygen. Wait, but also think about her pacing back and forth. And she has broken her back, by the way. I literally I've already thought I have already thought about it. I'm like the adrenaline is out of control. It must be surging.

Okay. And hooking up the oxygen. She asked me where I got the washcloth. And I told her the man in the truck who stopped to help us. She gave me a weird look like she had no idea what I was talking about. I was admitted to the ER and was there for a few days. When I got out of the hospital, I told my parents about this man and they wanted to thank him for helping me, but I had no idea who he was. I called the people I was in the car accident with and asked if they by chance got his name and they were like, what are you talking about? No one was

there with us. My heart sank to my stomach. I adamantly told them, you have to remember him. He was in a white shirt. It's always a white shirt, Em. Always in white. He was in a white shirt, blue jeans, a cowboy hat, and was driving the white work truck. They both told me no one was at the scene of the accident

other than the paramedics that showed up. Even 15 years later, I've asked them about it and they still do not know what i'm talking about i assume maybe it was some sort of guardian angel but after listening to the episode on third man syndrome i realized that's what it must have been i just wanted to share my story with you all you guys are the best and i look forward to the episodes coming out every week wow well i'm glad you're okay maddie that's fucking terrifying the way i would have saved that washcloth and like sewn it into like a little like yeah i would have i would have kept it as like a tchotchke i would have put it somewhere and like held on to it like i don't know what i would have done with that thing but there's no

throwing that washcloth away but i feel like that has to be there's something eerie about it on either end of the spectrum because either there's a grown-ass man who just watched you fly through a windshield with a broken back a little girl react yeah didn't react more than just give you a washcloth without saying are you okay or it's so like in that way if he's human that's a weird fucking behavior to have and if it's a spirit that's a weird fucking behavior to have. And if it's a spirit, that's also weird. Like neither way, there didn't seem to be like an emotional urgency for you. Yeah, the only thing that I guess like strikes me is that she said she was very calm in his presence.

So I wonder if it was more just like that his energy was calming and that was all he needed to do. Maybe he was like, match my energy. Don't overreact. Which is, I mean, that happened when I saw my grandpa. Like I had a really weird calming effect that I can still, it felt so different than just being calm. It felt like it was forced upon me. Because it was like, oh, you're seeing a ghost. forced upon me because it was like oh you're seeing a ghost well naturally you'd freak out but people report feeling very calmed as if somebody had like washed them with calmness

to like yeah prevent them from freaking out but i also wonder like you know third man wise like you were in this terrible accident stuff but like i mean i know he handed you a washcloth but like was he just there to watch? Like, what was he doing? Right, like, what was the vibe? I mean, I guess maybe to comfort you, maybe like he somehow saved your life before the washcloth and you just didn't know. Or, I don't know. It's just, that's a really creepy one, though.

He was like on alert just in case you needed him, but. Yeah. Anyway. on alert just in case you needed him but yeah anyway do you have another washcloth for my knee sir as your broken back 12 year old girl comes up do you happen since you have a mary poppins bag of heaven sent items do you have a an ambulance you could spot me do you have a wee bandage give a wee bandage in there for my so you have um morphine and dilaudid and all this other shit please this poor girl man 12 is so little oh god maddie i'm glad you're okay that's all but also like how cool is it that like maybe he if that also i

wonder is the third man your guardian angel like or is it just like a random one who like spotted you and like he was there to pay attention to someone else but personal or is it like which i feel like you talked about in the third man episode like is it like a group of beings that are just ready or is it like you're assigned to one person like it's almost like are you like in guardian angel worlds is there like a department that are just like part of er trauma or whatever right like car crashes or whatever yeah like they're not yours but they're just like new on the job and they're like we'll give you the washcloth task and he's like what that's it yeah and you're not allowed to speak you have no speaking role yeah i wonder like if he if he was yours in which case how cool

is it that you know what your guardian angel looks like yeah or was he just like a random person on the clock as a guardian angel and like happened to be and now whenever you think about like being safe you think about that guy but he was like just an intern he was unpaid you know like he was like he's just a random guy and you're not actually thinking about your real guardian angels wow anyway we do have ourselves a an official uh theme here because the third story I have for you is called Third Man Syndrome Experience, Not Clickbait. You realize, person who sent that, that immediately makes me think it's actually clickbait. I know. I don't know why you would write that. I feel like it's like my mom brand new to the Internet who's like, this is something you do want to see 100 don't question

it sure sure sure this is from monica who's a she her pronouns thank you for normalizing pronouns and monica says howdy i was listening to m's 101 class on third man syndrome and i think my family might have had an experience similar to it the twist is though that we actually know who it was whoa so this answers my question right away back in 2015 my brother uh there is another car accident coming up my brother swerved to dodge a car that didn't look before turning left on the road he was on and his car ended up sideways in a drainage ditch with the passenger side to the ground and him stuck seated at an angle in his chair by the seatbelts jesus christ in parentheses wear your seatbelts yeah thank you for normalizing seatbelts oh they put that too yeah okay this is making me nervous now folks i don't like when things like

this keep repeating so please put your fucking seatbelt on okay there's a and if there's a third one that happens in this episode put your fucking seat Everyone just don't get in a car today. I don't need a third one. Do it now. Just buy a seatbelt and click it onto your office chair. According to him, he felt arms around the seat and someone holding him close when he jerked the wheel and until the car came to a complete stop. So as soon as the accident was beginning, he felt someone hold him. Like almost holding, like restraining him.

Like cradling him before the actual rest of the accident happened. Wow. His only injury was his knee due to his long ass legs hitting the interior of the door. Someone else ended up calling emergency services. And my brother, ironically, had just started volunteering as an EMT. Oh, no. So he ended up calling. He's like, hey, Rob.

EMT Brad. It's us again. EMT Brad. So he ended up calling our mom, who weirdly already had the phone in her hand about to call him herself despite it being six in the morning weird moms always know they know you see she had just woken up in a panic because of a dream she had uh of our dad or our late grandpa coming to her and telling her don't worry i've got him of her dad of her dad their late grandpa so she had just dreamt her dad at six in the morning saying don't worry i've got him and then seconds later he called to say i'm

in a car accident holy shit while she's holding the phone oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god i literally like the goose cam is out of control today um i'm i'm i'm camming that was that one's super imagine like i'd be like dad what the fuck got him from what saved him from what like the panic of like don't worry i got him you're like from what i'd be like but how powerful are you because could you have just prevented this altogether, why did we have to do this? Maybe not. I don't know, man. I guess not. I guess not. I like how even like guardian angels who I consider like nearly God level in terms of power.

Right. Like how can you only get an alarm after the fact? Like you aren't even told something's about to happen. I don't know how it works. I don't know. At least that time it was clear what the fuck he was talking about. you aren't even told something's about to happen i don't know how it works i don't know um at least that time it was clear what the fuck he was talking about a similar thing happened again in 2019 where he appeared to my mom again and dropped she's okay before disappearing this guy is really

just loves to fucking leave people hanging he loves a cliffhanger you know he this is literally me as a ghost where i'm still desperate to like be in the lim loves a cliffhanger you know he this is literally me as a ghost where i'm still desperate to like be in the limelight for a second you just want the drama yeah i know you yeah uh i was traveling so in context i was traveling in the new orleans at the time and got a call from my mom saying are you okay and turns out i was third on the list of people mom called frantically trying to figure out who the hell he meant with uh she's okay i like how your own kid is third on the list true uh my theory and the one we stuck with was he met my cousin's grandma on their dad's side who had died three days before so he only came back to say she's doing okay.

Okay. I think he was coming down to let us all know she made it over all right in the most unhelpfully helpful way that he could. Right? Like you're just causing some drama at this point. So yes, that's the story of a possible third man syndrome experience

and a mini bonus grandpa story. I have others to write in that I have personally experienced some backed by my mom years later but that's all for now folks can't wait to see what y'all have cooked up for 2024 monica wow wow it's like grandpa just can you add two or three more clarifying words like just say like the name give me a name betty's okay you know yeah like why the why the vagueness of it uh also like if if you're able to do it for betty you better be doing it for every other person who dies also that i wonder yeah what if you can't do it for like the person you're really

worried about on the other side but you can do it for betty who like never even brought good food to thanksgiving it like makes you wonder like what, how, what their scope is. Like how far can they reach? It's like, I feel like they're all kind of standing in front of like a Monsters, Inc. door. And only when the light turns red above the door can they enter to give you some random news. And they're just picking whatever's relevant at the time. They're like, okay, I have five seconds. Yeah.

I had five seconds on this exact day. So what could I possibly have to tell you? I guess so-and-so's cousin died. I guess I'll update them on seconds. Yeah. I had five seconds on this exact day. So what could I possibly have to tell you? I guess so-and-so's cousin died. I guess I'll update them on that. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, thank you, Monica. Okay.

So this one is called, oh my Lord. Well, we are taking quite a 180. And this one is called, my first martini was bought by a hired hitman. Okay. Was the hitman the third man? I don't understand we had a theme and now eva said how about actually fuck it classic eva she said oh you found a theme well how's this i totally absolutely let's see this is from leah It says, hello, my favorite babies.

Hello. And Eva. My name is Leah. You recently asked for true crime stories, so I figured I would finally contribute considering I feel like y'all are my friends. Also, I wrote this draft up in what had to be 2019 or 2020, so leave it to me to finally get the guts to send this in 2024. Wow.

That is a long... That's like four or five years. A while. I moved to Texas from North Carolina in 2011, the year of my 21st birthday. That's the year of your 21st birthday. That's the truth. I think.

Yeah. That was my 19th. Oh, that's the year of Lays' 21st birthday. Okay. I'm not good at math. I like how I went, that's the truth. You were like, yes.

And everyone was like, wait, what? Oh, God. No, I turned 19 that year. Okay. Well. Good year, by the way. Great year. 2011, I had a terrible time.

Okay. 19 was one of my favorite years. Congratulations. I moved to Texas from North Carolina in 2011, the year of my 21st birthday. So naturally, that entire year consisted of me trying every bar in town. One of the bars in town was a martini bar. I love a martini bar. And of course, 21-year-old Leah needed to try this out. While I was sitting at the bar with my friend, an older man sitting a seat or so down overheard us discussing that it was our first time there.

He introduced himself, small talk, suggested some martinis, and then bought our first martini. No big deal. In the following summer, oh my God, so literally that's the extent of their interaction. This is just crazy. Oh, okay, you just bought them a martini. Just then said like, have a nice night, you know.

In the following summer of 2012, there was a doctor murdered in a neighboring city. Long story short, there's a whole ABC 2020 episode about this particular story. It's called A Last Dance in Texas and aired in 2016. I also just found out there was a Dateline episode as well. He was a victim of a love triangle gone wrong. His girlfriend's former boyfriend, also a doctor, was jealous of her moving on. I'm actually quite sure I remember this.

Really? I don't know. There's a lot of love triangles. I might be confusing it with a different one. At some point, the triangles become like big ass rhombuses. Yeah, just big rhombuses floating around. I don't know anymore. They just web into a big geometric something.

A beautiful, yeah, piece of art. So his girlfriend's former boyfriend also doctor was jealous of her moving on and actually hired someone to kill the new boyfriend the hired hitman was paid three silver bars and given a box of expensive cuban cigars in return for killing her new boyfriend pawn shop records show that he had cashed silver bars the day after the murder not very smooth it totaled out to not even be eight grand of course being in the city that the jealous ex had hired and hired hitman were from mug shots were all over the news and i recognized the dumb hitman as none other than the man who had bought me my first martini wow that is so crazy that is crazy that's also the fact that

um killing someone does like i the idea of paying someone eight thousand dollars for that kind of crime is like not fucking worth it to me like i'm yeah i'm i don't know what the price would be but certainly if i found out i was getting killed for only less than eight grand, I'd be pissed. It wasn't even eight grand. It was fucking silver bars. And like, what are you going to do with that? What are you going to do with silver bars except go to a pawn shop and then you're caught immediately? Like, the idea, if I found out that was the price that someone paid to kill me, I'd be like, I thought I was fucking worth more than that.

That's embarrassing. Yeah, that's rough. Also, I wonder if the guy said like, like oh these silver bars are worth like 200 grand you know like we don't know if he like fucking talked it up or but also like i this experience at the martini bar must have been one hell of an experience because i would never remember the face of somebody i had a two-second interaction with a year ago if i saw them on tv today well i mean it said that they talked for a bit i don't think it was like a two-second thing i mean let's see they did the small talk thing yeah an older man um he introduced himself we small talked he suggested some martinis and then he bought us our first martini okay so maybe yeah

yeah i imagine i was about to be really impressed with her memory maybe he was just had that kind of a face where you're like man i know that guy this fucking guy looks like a hit man yeah yeah this guy looks like a martini man that's this guy looks like he smokes cuban cigars uh in this martini bar it actually does kind of match um so it turns out that in the 2020 episode they said that the martini bar was where they would meet up and discuss their murder plans. Oh, shut up. Oh, literally frequented this place as a hitman. Holy shit. She said, I already knew it was him.

But after watching that episode, it definitely confirmed it. Yeah. So there's like no doubt anymore. Get this. The hitman confessed to killing him for the silver bars to the cops on video however once put on the stand denied he was hired and claimed it was all his decision what what so he was threatened into like he was threatened into silence about someone else wanted him to do it he just decided to do it hired and claimed it was all say who was denied he was hired and claimed it was all his

like all his own decision i feel like he got threatened like the guy who hired him was like i know people in jail who will hurt you you have to make it like get me off of their note off their trail and just say that you did it and i'll make sure you're safe in jail when you go wow okay i see what you're saying So he claimed this was all my idea. Don't worry. I wasn't hired by anybody. And then this is what Leah says next. So said dumb dumb who bought my drink and killed the innocent doctor is in prison for

life now with no chance of parole. And then she says, so there's that. I really never was scared of the hitman i just find it crazy that i've actually met a murderer he is a dumb murderer but hey it's something thanks for being my friends to listen to at work as well as during the 24-hour trip i take back and forth from texas to north carolina i've been listening since 2017 our birth year beautiful and i feel like i've watched your friendship blossom give geo judy moonshine and lemon some love from me wow god wow that's very sweet i that and also like it's one thing to like

know a murderer but to know someone theoretically before they'd ever murdered is even its own weirdness of like oh i knew you before i needed to be worried. Or like, if I looked back, I should have, maybe I should have noticed something. I don't know. That's true because it happened, she said the year after. But it makes you wonder like maybe he's been doing, if he was a hired hit man,

I wonder if this is just. Right, right, right, right, right. I wonder if it's his first time. I don't know. Maybe. Yeah, it makes you wonder like, how many did you get away with? And like, did you,

were you at that martini bar discussing a hit as you ordered my drink for me? Oh, yeah. What was he doing there? Yeah. Yikes. All right. Our next one. You could not be more right, Christine. We have fully shifted things. Oh, this this subject line is toilet exorcism. I thought we were leaving potty problems in the past. No. So this is Patty, who uses she, her pronouns. Thank you for normalizing pronouns. And Patty says, ahoy, hoy, Eva and crew.

Okay, that's a new one. Ahoy, hoy? Ahoy, hoy. That's what it says? Wow. It says it. Ahoy, hoy. Ahoyoy hoy ahoy hoy uh you know what 10 out of 10 for originality because we've done this quite a long time and that's a new one yeah my name is patty and i have a pseudo spooky story for you last week my best friend's mom gave me

three weed brownies that she had baked herself friday night i decided to have some but wasn't thinking and i ate the whole fucking brownie no is there not come on i was feeling pretty good for a little bit and then my vision started to get dark and i realized i needed to throw up i ran to the bathroom threw the seat up puked my guts out at this point it's hitting me hard i had been texting a friend and i couldn't even focus on the screen when I tried to message her back. I'm continuing to vomit and I just shut my eyes for a minute. And this is where it gets very scary for me. When I open them, I'm looking at my puke and I see a small pentagram rotating slowly in the toilet.

Girl, you're tripping. You are tripping balls. Eva's like, that sounds like what happened to me at the Radisson last week. I know. I thought I said that we were done with the gruesome stories, but never mind. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so you see a pentagram rotating slowly in the toilet. Made out of vomit.

Oh, my God. I'm frozen with fear, and the only thing I can think to do is close my eyes and hope that it goes away i eventually muster the courage to open my eyes and there's a fucking goat head swirling around the world obviously the best course of action was to close my eyes and open and hope his demonic ass would be gone when i open them again while i'm resting over the bowl with my eyes squeezed shut i start thinking that maybe i was possessed and I vomited up a demon and that's why he's in my toilet bowl. Oh, girlfriend. Oh, my God.

Then my paranoid ass starts to worry that having just had my toilet exorcism, I'm now more susceptible to an alien abduction. What fucking brownie recipe is this? Also, like, I'm going to call your mother-in-law or whoever this is and be like, she's on the blacklist. There's no more brownies for her. I feel like you, you know what? She made some potent, she made sure you were going to have a good time and you took it too fucking far. I was going to say, a good time or just a time, a time indeed. So I can't imagine tripping that hard.

I'm now susceptible to an alien abduction. I'm in full panic mode that I'm going to open my eyes and there will be a little group of greys standing in my bathroom. There is now because you're literally creating it. It's horrible. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy. You're like, I hope I don't see that. Well, of course, now you're going to see it.

Oh, God. I'm in full panic mode that I'm going to open my eyes and there will be a little group of greys standing in my bathroom watching me violently toss my cookies. One more time, I summon the mental strength to open my eyes, absolutely bracing for the worst. And to my pleasant surprise, I'm alone in the bathroom and I have a brilliant idea. If I just flush the puke, the demon will be gone. I get that. Like all the energy from this experience is out of reach.

Sure. that like all the energy from this experience is out of out of reach sure i reach up and flush and then lean back against the wall with vomit on my face absolutely cackling at my own genius like she this is a mad scientist i've done it this is your villain origin story girl anyway i threw up for another hour or so before i started to feel human again and i finally showered and then ate three quarters of a loaf of jalapeno cheddar focaccia bread and fell asleep. Oh, that sounds good. Please feel free to forward this to the Vatican's Department of Exorcisms for further evaluation. Thank you.

Thank you for taking the time to read this and for making such a wonderful show. Much love, Patty. P.S. Weed is legal where I live. If that's important for y'all not to get in trouble well it's very nice of you to think of but it sounds like you're still a little paranoid from the trip yeah don't worry i appreciate it yeah i appreciate it as well what the fuck okay but you need like a hot compress cold compress therapy a hug and a

trophy like hey maybe that cowboy this should be the third man cowboy with a washcloth for you also i feel like it was patty's third man maybe not to make you more paranoid that like now your guardian angel is literally flushed down the toilet baphomet baphomet or whatever um i well you know you know the story right of my, of my brother's weed overdose or whatever. It's like really similar. Patty, you need to listen to, I forget, I think it was a, it's a Beach Juice Andy episode. I think we, it was the one where we got high and read reviews and it was a crazy episode. But he, at one time, I'll just briefly sum it up i think patty you and alexander have a lot to

discuss he on his birthday took an edible and then was like oh i don't i barely feel it you know and then took another one of course which is how these things happen and um he came downstairs and he's like there's something wrong with me and i was like oh no oh no and so it turns out he was tripping so hard he thought he was in purgatory like he literally believed he was trapped in purgatory and so he's like and he was in his bed and he's like i couldn't move i couldn't feel my arms i couldn't move my body i thought i was in purgatory like you know we went to catholic school you can see why why this would have come up but uh yeah i want to i want to do a little study here pat I like, you know, we went to Catholic school. You can see why, why this would have come up, but, uh, I want to, I want to do a little study here, Patty. Like, did you also grow up in the Catholic church? Cause it sounds like there's a lot of similarity here.

You definitely have a lot of shame around the occult in some way. There's something happening subconsciously. Um, but yeah, so he thought he was in purgatory. It was a whole thing. And then eventually he finally made his way to me and I was like, oh no. And like at that point I had never smoked weed in my life really. So I didn't have any clue what I was doing. So I started Googling like how to come down off of a high, you know, like a bad high. And so the first link I found was Willie Nelson's advice. And I was like, well, he must know, you know, so I'm like, obviously, obviously. So I'm like, Billiam, help me. Okay. So I clicked the link for Willie Nelson's page or what a quote. And it says, oh, you need to eat black pepper. And I'm like, okay. So I'm like, Alexander, lay in my bed. I put him in my bed. Blaze was at work, of course.

And I'm like, lay in my bed. Don't move move i'm going to go get pepper and he's like okay and he thought okay he tells it now and he's like christine went downstairs and he's like and to me she was gone for hours he was like she just never came back and then like hours later she appeared and i'm like i literally ran as fast as i could, whipped open the kitchen cabinet, grabbed the pepper of like a Trader Joe's like pepper grinder and ran upstairs. And then I had a bowl and I started like cracking pepper into it. And I was like, eat this. So stupid. Anyway, it was like a terrible birthday for him.

And it was really scary because I was like,lexander i don't know how to help you like i literally ran out downstairs for like a minute and a half and he thought i was gone for hours i was like oh god this is so scary um which is another reason it took me many years to even try weed again i was like i don't think so um but in the end uh he i ended up getting him back to bed and like he went to bed and i was like whoa that, that was dramatic. And then that night I went to brush my teeth and my bathroom is just covered in vomit. Like when I had gone downstairs, I guess, for that like two minutes, he just like puked all over the place. And then he went back and laid down and he to this day is like, I have no memory of that. Like it must have been me, obviously.

But he's like, I don't i don't remember puking but like i just went to brush my teeth and i was like what the fuck like he vomited everywhere anyway i'm sorry that this is such a body fluid heavy episode but uh i just i couldn't get away from the similarities of like seeing a pentagram thinking you're in you know uh purgatory and only willie willie nelson can save you. Only Willie Nelson can help you. God. Anyway, sorry. That was such a long rant, but wowza.

No, you're good. We've got one last one and it's... Is it? Okay. Is it my one? It's yours. Okay. Here it is.

It's called In the Spirit of Valentine's Day. Oh, that's... Oh, right. This is probably our most romantic episode ever. That's why we talked about conception at some point oh wait that was that was not in this episode oh that was not even let's talk about it a lot about puke just vomit that's all a lot of puke very very i'm sorry for the folks who have like a phobia of that i clearly it's too late now i really thought that all my talking about me was all

we were gonna get i didn't know how it really wasn't i want to say i did not say it m said it when m said oh this is the worst you'll hear i thought i thought that was true i didn't know it was going to be challenged so intensely i almost said i like so you think or something but i was like well obviously that's just a joke but apparently it was not um okay sorry let's read this this is the last one in the spirit of valentine's day hi i'm christine and crew i've been listening to the podcast for close to four years as i made my way through college and on in my first job as i caught up on recent episodes i was surprised to hear you mention galena oh my god we just talked about galena in our last episode where we talked about conception. Where we talked about our most romantic episode. Galena, Illinois, considering it is less than an hour from my childhood home where my story today originates.

A truly beautiful area if you ever consider moving. I mean, I am considering. I've looked at that Zillow. Galena does have my heart. I'm ready. It was around 7 p.m. at night and my brother and I were home alone at the farmhouse after my parents left for a Valentine's Day date. We have a noisy home that creaks and groans with the changing weather, so most of the

time we don't associate the sounds with ghosts. With the freedom of an empty house, my brother and I decided to blast rock band on the Wii. Oh, yeah. Love it. Remember those days? Some of the best days of my life. I was really going to say, yeah, the Wii. Oh yeah. Love it. Remember those days? Some of the best days of my life. I'm really going to say, yeah, that's a good memory. I was always on drums and he played the guitar. I love that clarity. Thank you. Oh, by the way, sorry, this is from Miranda Sheher.

I haven't even said that yet. Okay. As we rocked out to Don't Stop Believin', we both heard a loud clang in the kitchen. We looked at each other with wide eyes, confirming we both had heard this sound. We promptly paused the game, listening for more, when the sound of banging pans and dragging chairs sounded again. Oh my god. That's not good. The TV room was two rooms away from the kitchen, and since run-ins with ghosts weren't unheard of with my siblings, we jumped up and ran to the kitchen to see what caused the commotion. Ew!

Okay. What? The chairs were pushed perfectly up to the table, making me think the chairs had been pulled out and then pushed back in, and the cabinet doors to the pots and pans were all wide open. Poltergeist. Absolutely not. A Galena poltergeist.

Get out of here. I love that. Terrified, my brother and I ran out of the house and took cover in the woods nearby yeah if the woods are are less scary than your house that's you've got a problem you're saying something yeah terrified my brother and i ran out of the house and took cover in the woods nearby certain that anything that lurked in the woods was less frightening than what was in the house after about 30 minutes of shivering we thought that our only alternative was to go back inside grab a lighter and start a fire outside i feel like you're you're turning into a boxcar child you're like well i was gonna say like what survival show do you think you're on all of a sudden it's like the time my mom lost

me and my brother in the grocery store and like i told him we were orphans now because i was like this is our life and like you bet if you told him that while he was in the middle of thinking he was in purgatory. I literally scarred him for life as a four year old. I think that would have just put him over the edge. Yeah. So I love this. They're like, we live out here now. You know, it's just such catastrophic thinking.

I love it. OK, but we decided to go grab a lighter and start a fire outside until our parents came back. We made our way back to the house and went to the front door that led into the kitchen where we had exited after the commotion. I tried to open the door, but to my surprise, it was locked. Uh-oh. Considering it was a deadbolt, the only way to lock the door was with a key or by locking it from the inside. And the key was with a key or by locking it from the inside and the key was nowhere to be found even though we were still scared we needed that lighter so we walked around the house

until we found a single unlocked window we crawled through grabbed a lighter and fled we waited by our fire okay so you actually know how to make a fire i would have been like yeah it sounds like you're on top of it yeah i would have like set the woods on fire by mistake. So I'm glad you knew what you were doing. I'm like, I'll do it. And then a goat head starts floating around you. Yeah, it could get really bad really quick. Here we go again. We waited by the fire until my parents came home and told them the story. I wasn't sure if they believed it at the time, but today I'm certain they did. They just didn't want to frighten us by confirming it. This house has been in my family since the 1800s, so I'd like to believe it was just my ancestors trying to get us to turn off the loud rock and roll music.

I love that. You're like singing Journey and they're like, enough. Okay. Or maybe just tidying up the kitchen. Who knows? I've had plenty of supernatural occurrences in the house from footsteps behind me, figures in the windows, a ghost kitten and more but i never felt threatened and over the years they've bothered me less i think a protective supernatural energy clings to the house thank you so much for everything you do on and that's why we drink you spread awareness about a lot of hard issues with understanding and comedy i hope you have a great valentine's day sincerely miranda wow that's really kind miranda i am interested in this ghost I hope you have a great Valentine's Day. Sincerely, Miranda. Wow. That's really kind, Miranda.

I am interested in this ghost kitten, but none of the others. I know. I know. You know, what would you do if one day you and Blaze are gone, knowing what your house is capable of, and Leona says that, like, she locked herself out of the house willingly because of some creepy ghost stuff? Do you confirm it or be like, oh, that's silly and just try to hide it from her? No, no. I mean, I would never like dismiss it. I'd probably just be like, tell me exactly in detail what happened. Like, I don't know.

I don't even know. I mean, I think I would try to get to the bottom of it and hopefully find something that explains it you know like i feel like it's moments like that where you you have to teach her like to say out loud like no thank you yeah right like to set personal boundaries which i would teach anyway like for for for the true crime side yeah so yeah yeah i i don't know em Em. I mean, I'll find out, I guess. I have a feeling you will at some point. Knowing what the house is capable of, as you say. Well, thank you, Miranda, for our Valentine's Day wish. That's very lovely.

Are you doing anything for Valentine's Day, Christine? Yeah, I think Blaise and I are just going out for a romantic dinner on a new rooftop restaurant that opened near us. Nice. What are you up to? I don't know. I already asked Allison to be my valentine. That's so sweet. What did she say?

I was wondering what she'd come up with, because I thought she'd have some real asshole wit about her. I thought something slick was going to come out. But she just said yes. That was very nice. Oh, hooray. So I don't know what we're going to do, but I feel like i've now put pressure on myself by asking at all so well now i feel like i'm like the asshole who didn't ask blaze to be my valentine i just kind of took it for granted i found this card that was um it was i'll have to take a picture and send it to you but it was

all the it was like the code that teenagers would use back in the old and victorian days and it was like based on how the stamp is on the your card on your envelope are you serious it was like flirting code i guess and that's real apparently and so that was um i found a card that actually just listed what all the code words meant and so i made her a card and put the stamp in the right spot. That's so sweet. I've never heard of that. That sounds like a deep dive for tonight.

I tell you what. Yeah. I love that shit. Anyway, so that was my, that's how I asked her. Victorian stamp placement romance. Flirtation guide. Yeah. Wow.

Okay. Bye, cruel world. I have plans. Bye, cruel world. I have plans. Hello, rabbit hole. Hello, dark black hole that I will fall into tonight. So I made the card. I put the stamp the right place and asked her, but then I didn't get any further than that. So now I'm going to have to go make a reservation somewhere, I think.

Yeah. You know what? I said, oh, we're going to this nice rooftop bar. And then I was like, wait a second. I tried to get a reservation and they were like 9.30 p.m. OK. And I was like, oh, no, I'm tired by then. So I should probably look for another nice rooftop. He's going to hear this. What rooftop? And we're like, no, I meant this Arby's is what I meant. It's actually your rooftop on your house. It's my rooftop, Blaze. It's your rooftop. Get up there and clean the gutters. You could do a little candlelit thing on your roof on your on your top balcony thing oh the balcony i was like how do i

get up there yeah okay balcony let's be nice yeah yeah okay well happy valentine's day everyone i hope you have a sweetheart if you want one and if you don't whatever be your own i'm here i'm here for the taken no yeah oh you're that i thought you were offering us up so i was like all right we'll be your valentine and then we'll be your sweethearts and also christine apparently needs a reservation to a rooftop bar so if you've got one she's in help me and i guess we'll see with the more listeners stories that you can submit to our website and that's how we get access to them. You can come to our live shows. We're back on tour.

And otherwise, you'll catch another listeners episode from us on March 1st. What are we celebrating then? St. Paddy's Day? St. Paddy's, I guess. And that's why we drink. It's going to be. Green beer. All right.

Something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. And. That's. Why. We. Drink.