Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Armchair Anonymous: I Quit
Episode Date: March 14, 2025Dax and Monica talk to Armcherries! In today's episode, Armcherries tell us a crazy "I Quit" story.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new conte...nt on YouTube or listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free by joining Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial by visiting wondery.com/links/armchair-expert-with-dax-shepard/ now.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous.
I'm Dan Rather and I'm joined by Lily Padman.
Hi.
Today's Armchair Anonymous prompt was I quit.
Tell us a crazy I quit story.
Now guess what?
You can finally listen to this one.
Oh, good.
Yeah, you can listen to this one.
There's, let me hold on, Heidi.
Well, yeah.
Yeah, there is some, I guess, light animal cruelty,
but the animal's dead.
Oh yeah, all right.
Yeah, yeah, okay.
So other than that, I think you're free to listen. Please enjoy. I quit. Until April 2nd, sky high elegance at dream prices
during the Air France Rendezvous. It's time to book your rendezvous with Paris starting at $765
or Madrid starting at $885 return from Toronto, tax included. You can enjoy a glass of champagne however you fly,
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Elegance is a journey. Air France.
Travel from March 17th to June 28th
and from August 24th to November 30th, 2025.
See conditions at airfrance.ca.
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What a beautiful, robust set of headphones you're wearing.
And the wall, is it plaster?
No, that's a sheet.
Oh. I'm a labor and delivery nurse.
My supervisor's a huge arm cherry,
and she pulled out like a baby warmer
that's in one of our closets.
And used foam surgical tape
and taped up all these like...
Oh my goodness.
What's your boss's name?
Scotty.
Big props and shout outs
and thank yous to Scotty.
Okay, Kaylee, what did you quit?
I quit a job at a wildlife agency.
So I live in Idaho.
My freshman year of college, I applied for my dream job, which was on a snorkel
crew, so it was for a summer, it was in rivers.
And so we would have like these different sites that we would snorkel to.
And we would count fish to like count different kinds of trout and see if there's juveniles,
adults, and then we would also check up on people fishing and see like if they were catching salmon.
It's what I was going to school for, which was wildlife biology. We camped the whole summer
together. It was just me and one other girl.
The rest were older dudes.
And so of course I'm 19 and have like a huge crush
on one of the like leads of the crew.
Each day we had split into groups of two.
And so of course I volunteer to go
with the guy I have a crush on.
This is hot.
Let's call him Greg.
He needs a name that's kind of like a hot mess.
Trevor.
Oh, Trevor.
Trevor's great.
I volunteer to go with Trevor.
So we're going down like these back roads
and going way too fast.
Trevor. He's wild.
Unfortunately, we're listening to My Dick by Mickey Avalon.
He is driving.
He leans down to grab our radio to call out and he loses control of the vehicle and it hits the gravel.
He overcorrects, hits the guardrail.
Oh boy.
And we're probably going like 60 miles per hour and we're in a brand new Yukon.
Oh no, those are gorgeous.
I know, in a company vehicle. He hits the guardrail and we roll three times.
Oh my God.
Airbags, everything shatters.
We have a ton of equipment.
Everything's going out the windows.
It's wild.
I'm being suspended
because the truck landed where I'm on the top.
So I'm like hanging over and I can't open the door
because it's so heavy above us. Yeah.
He's trapped. He can't get out either. But there was a fish trap like across the road and someone
was there and hurt us. Ran across, got us out and took us to a very, very small hospital there,
if you can call it a hospital, where our crew meets up with us and they're cutting my clothes
off in front of my crew.
And I am like probably 10 years younger than everyone.
Oh, God.
This is not what I was going for.
So luckily he was fine.
I mean, maybe luckily.
Yeah, I wouldn't mind if he had a broken arm or something,
to be honest.
So I just had like a shoulder strain, but they put me in a
sling so I couldn't drive home.
So I had to call my mom.
Oh no, from your first job.
She drives three hours, comes and picks me up, go home and I take 13 days
off to just recover my shoulder.
And so they put me on like muscle relaxers.
This whole time I'm home, I have horrible diarrhea.
Oh. Oh.
All day, every day.
And my mom's like, something is very wrong.
So I went to the doctor and I got Giardia.
Giardia.
What's that?
How'd you get that?
So it's a parasite that you get from dirty water.
Necrotic flesh?
No, no, no different, but bad.
We just had another necrotic flesh.
This isn't necrotic flesh.
So sorry.
She can't stop thinking about
hearing the necrotic flesh story.
This is very similar to necrotic flesh.
I feel like it was.
I was so, so sick.
They also call it, which is so gross,
but they call it beaver fever.
Oh. Ew.
Cause it goes in your vagina?
Oh no.
No, the beavers poop and then you eat it.
Okay, I got it.
So I got it from, I'm assuming,
snorkeling in gross water.
Yes.
We would snorkel little tributaries and stuff.
So sometimes you would get there and just be like,
I can't even see in this murky ass water.
It was sometimes nasty.
So they put me on anti-parasitics and I'm like, cool.
I'll go back to work.
Still into the guy that tried to kill me.
Gotta see Trev.
He's like hitting me up, making sure I'm okay.
I'm like, this guy just heart of gold.
So I go back on day 14.
I can't go hiking because I am literally shitting myself
every five seconds.
They're like, it's cool.
We'll drive down the river to a different site.
And this time it's my actual boss driving.
And Trevor is the passenger and I'm in the back seat.
And we have this new company vehicle
since we totaled the other one. It has like suicide doors.
So you have to open the front door to get the back doors open. My window is down. And then we also
have my boss's puppy in the bed in a kennel. My boss and Trevor had gone on like a night hike.
My boss was super tired and he was like, hey, I need someone else to drive.
Who do you think he chose to drive?
T-Dog? Not me.
Oh, sexism.
Strikes again. After he just crashed,
this is so- He's the reason
you're in a pickup truck.
Two weeks ago, literally, to the day.
So he switches drivers and probably five minutes later,
we are rolling. Stop it. So he switches drivers and probably five minutes later,
we are rolling. Stop it!
No!
Are you serious?
Five minutes later, we are rolling.
I am fucking serious.
Trevor!
Trevor is-
Oh my God, what a putz.
He should never be allowed to drive again.
We're rolling down in Bankman and land in the river.
No! Oh my God! This is how that lady died. of rolling down an embankment and land in the river.
Oh my God. This is how that lady died.
I know, that scarred you.
I'm sorry, Kaylee.
Stop, why do you keep apologizing?
These are normal things I'm saying.
Because she doesn't know what you're talking about.
I know you're referring to Mitch McConnell's sister.
It's Mitch McConnell's sister-in-law.
She drowned in a situation like this.
In a pond, I think.
So we roll down. She drowned in a situation like this.
So we roll down.
I am so lucky because it lands the same exact way
as the first one.
I'm suspended above the water.
I had to undo my seatbelt, stand in the river,
and then my window was open, so I like squeezed through.
I look behind me and the puppy in the kennel
is floating down the river.
Oh!
Oh my God, now it's like a Disney movie
where the puppy gets separated and goes down the river.
Oh, and he has an adventure and then he makes his way back.
Yeah, he makes friends with a cat.
We were lucky because the rest of the crew
was right behind us and so someone like hopped in the river, gets the puppy,
the puppy's okay, everyone.
What about the people?
Fuck them.
I wiggle out, I'm like standing on the top of the truck
and I look and I see my boss and Trevor just chilling fine.
And I just looked at my boss and I was like,
I fucking quit immediately.
Like I was like, okay, you're breathing, you're breathing.
I fucking quit.
Like, I hate you.
Yes.
Yeah, you're trying to kill you twice.
So I called my mom and I'm like, mom.
Oh my God.
My poor parents.
I know.
Was she like, honey, is it the diarrhea?
How's the Giardia holding up?
How's your beaver fever?
I got all my shit.
We went back to base camp.
I got in my car, drove home and never looked back.
I dropped out of the biology program.
Oh wow, this was really life changing.
Yep, and then I went to nursing school.
Okay.
Okay, well we love nurses.
We do.
But super devastating.
I was so excited.
It was like my dream job.
It was so cool.
And then I was like, I'm gonna die if I continue.
Yes, two strikes.
Did Trevor reach out after the second one?
He did.
And he probably for like a year,
he would just be like, hey, you doing okay?
The crazy shit is that they like drug tested him
and everything, obviously. He was just dumb.
Yeah.
But he also changed his career.
He's now a plumber.
So life changing for everybody.
Wow.
I'm glad he's not an Uber driver.
All right.
Or a chauffeur.
Oh my God.
That was a great story.
Two rollovers within two weeks.
I had to like do counseling.
I couldn't go through a car wash for months.
Yeah, that's a lot.
Because of like the sound of the water on the metal.
Yeah, well, if it got you mad enough to go,
I fucking quit, they pushed you to the breaking point.
They did.
Yeah.
Wow.
Well, thank you for sharing that.
Well, thank you so much.
It's so exciting to talk to you guys.
I emailed Emma back, yes, I'm available
before I even looked at my schedule.
And then I was like, shit, I'm at work,
I gotta figure this out.
But Scotty came in for me.
I do have to shout out Emily,
who's also another armcherry.
We talk every week about what's going on.
And then my dad, Tyler, he's been clean
for like 18 years now.
Oh, go Tyler. Congratulations.
So we both listened to armchairs. Oh, I love this. Delighted to have the whole family. Oh, go Tyler. Congratulations. So we both listened to armchair.
Oh, delighted to have the whole family.
Yeah, this is incredible.
And the nurse team, winners.
And Emily.
All right, well we adore you, thank you.
Thank you so much, it was so great meeting you guys.
All right, take care. Have a great day.
You think you've ever had beer with me?
No, I think I would know.
I mean, sometimes I do have diarrhea.
Take your temperature.
I don't, you know why?
I don't go in ponds or lakes or rivers.
You stay very clear of ponds.
Any water.
Good thing I didn't get it when I almost drowned
on the river, on our tubing.
If I got Giardia fever,
I would still be paying for that.
You would be, yeah.
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My hope is that people will finish an episode of Reclaiming and feel like they filled their
tank up.
They connected with the people that I'm talking to and leave with maybe some nuggets that
help them feel a little more hopeful.
Follow Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Plus.
Hello.
Jim.
Hello.
How are you guys doing?
Good.
And are you a doing? Good.
And are you a cyclist or just a fan of like French posters?
I'm a fan of travel posters, but I'm also a cyclist.
That's from Rag Dry, which is a ride across Iowa.
They do it every year from the Missouri river to the Mississippi river.
Tom Arnold did this several times, I believe.
It's a big event, right?
It is.
I did the 50th anniversary and I think it was like 50,000 people. You just camp on people's yards and it's a big event, right? It is. I did the 50th anniversary and I think it was like 50,000 people.
You just camp on people's yards and it's a big old party.
I think the people from Iowa, some of the nicest people in the entire United States,
they take you into their homes, they cook you meals and every small town and every
church is putting out like a bait sale.
It's really neat.
You're like invigorating a dream.
I think I want to put it on my list of things
I want to do to do that bike ride.
That sounds so fun.
I would recommend it.
I love it.
I'm doing it after the great loop.
Okay.
Tell us about a time you quit.
I am talking to you from Richmond, Virginia,
but I grew up in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
The summer of 1995, I had just graduated high school.
My dad actually worked at the school in the business office in this lawn care company,
cut the grass at the school grounds and he got me a job there.
And I was like, Oh, that'll be pretty good.
They mostly did commercial lawn care.
He got me a job and two of my friends.
Were you riding a Dixie chopper?
That's the hope.
I was like, we're going to be riding big riding mowers.
The three of us are going to have a great time together and we'll spend all summer
together just goofing off.
And it was not bad at all.
You do not get to ride the Dixie mower if you are one of only three people that
are there for the summer.
Everybody else is there full time doing the work.
Yeah.
What we expected and what actually happened was a pretty far cry from each other.
So the three of us were split up immediately.
So they had different crews.
You got there at sunrise, loaded up the trucks.
One of my friends only made it two days.
He was on the residential side and he got fired for jumping on somebody's trampoline
and then getting hurt falling off of it.
My other friend was like, this is terrible.
He made it like a month, then he quit.
But I got it out all summer and I was exposed to some pretty cool stuff that I hadn't seen before. Like we one time went,
cut a shopping center lawn and the guy just walked right into the grocery store and came out with
steaks all down his pants that he had just stolen. He's like, I'm going to sell these later. And then
he opened up the water cooler and just threw them all in there. And we're like, all right,
I guess we'll just store your bloody steaks in the water cooler. Sure. Sure. We just had to pile in the back of the truck. We went all over town all
day long and it would rain. You just put a trash bag over you. I mean, it was not safe at all, but
we pulled up next to a car that had a failed inspection sticker and he offered to sell them
a counterfeit one. Oh my. I did not even know it was like state selling and sticker selling as
well. I learned a lot about raunchy humor and drugs.
This is seminal experience for a young man. I went to work at a race shop at 15 and I
was working with all like 38 year old dudes. Yeah. And the stuff I was hearing and the
jokes they were making to me, I was like terrified half the time I was there.
Yeah. A lot of masturbation jokes. Some of the people were really, really good, but the guys that ran over just
assholes, I mean, they just run you straight rag it from the time you get up.
The sun down, you kind of come back and unload the truck and you never cut
enough, they were like, Hey, we need to cut more, you should be out there.
Go faster.
Stop taking so many breaks.
I was going to go to college and I had about a week up to summer and it was Sunday and I met a bunch of friends on the beach and they had had a completely different
summer experience than I had. Traveling, they're like, oh yeah, the next week we're just going to
hang out on the beach. This is what I should be doing. Tomorrow I'm quitting. And so I took the
zinc sunblock, I was like, I'm going to quit in a blaze of glory too. So I wrote on my chest,
sunblock, I was like, I'm gonna put in a blaze of glory too. So I wrote on my chest,
Mo this with a huge arrow to my crotch.
Oh wow.
Okay, wow.
You really caught up to them.
You took on their personas.
Yeah, I was thinking like, the crew's gonna love this
and all the foremen are gonna be like, oh man.
What was amazing is how well it worked.
It was bone white on the Mo this
and then bright red everywhere else.
The arrow was huge.
I worked all day.
I was super excited about this.
I am a blabberer.
I normally will spill it and I kept it all day.
I'm like, wait until everybody gets a load of this.
We get back and you have to gather around,
talk about what you got done and then where you're going the next day and what he was on what crew.
And I was all right.
So I ripped my shirt off.
Nobody even like looked at me.
And then finally someone looked over
and I remember a guy like just smoking a cigarette
and looking at me like,
what in the world does this guy have?
It was so embarrassing because I had to basically
quit with my shirt off and be like,
today's my last day.
The punchline was so lost and it was so sad.
I was really expecting more of a place of glory
and I got a whimper.
Yeah, when you gotta explain like, oh, did you see so,
it's like, mow this.
Because we mow lawns.
And then the arrow though,
because it's kind of a reference.
This is like, suck my dick.
But it's also, I'm quitting.
And they're like, get out.
No, you're fired.
Actually you're fired for that joke.
No one even laughed.
My expectations and reality was really, really far apart.
But the move this was on there for a while, leaving for your first week of
school with this not realizing it communal showers.
Oh, well it's great to have a job like that.
Cause then you can go like, I really got to figure something out other than this.
It's a great motivator.
I had a lot of manual labor jobs growing up.
I think it instills a good work ethic.
Everything is just easier the rest of your life.
Yeah.
I appreciate the time.
Thanks for chatting with us.
Great meeting you.
And you've really inspired me to do this Iowa trip.
It was really, really hot.
There was one tornado warning, but people just come out of their house and are
like, you can come stay with us as a stranger.
I stayed in someone's basement after biking a hundred miles that day smelling
horrible, but they gave me a clean shower and it was quite an experience to show
how nice the people in Iowa are.
Yeah.
Well, great meeting you, Jim.
Thanks so much for telling us that story.
Thank you guys.
All right.
Take care.
Hello. Can you hear me All right, take care. Bye. Hello.
Hello.
Can you hear me okay?
Beautifully.
What fake name do you want?
People have told me that I look like a Zoe,
so I'll go with that.
Oh, okay.
That's a great name.
I like that.
I have a niece named Zoe.
Do you remember the first Zoe?
I do.
Kravitz.
No.
Uh, uh.
I was gonna say Deschanel.
Oh, that's a good one.
A great one.
I think the first one was Zoe Bowie.
David Bowie's kid.
First one ever.
And wouldn't you leave it to David Bowie to come up with that?
Zoe Bowie.
Are you allowed to tell us where you're at?
Yeah, I'm actually in Ireland at the moment, but from the Pacific Northwest.
So it's where the story takes place.
It's the summer of 2018.
I was 17 at the time and I'm looking for a summer job. So I'm
going to restaurants, shops, cafes, and I end up getting a job at this little cafe and it's owned
by a couple who I'll call Linda and Derek. They're probably in their mid to late 50s and very
well-meaning, but definitely things could get a little awkward because they worked alongside us
and the relationship would kind of get in the way sometimes. Which was kind of awkward
for a teenager and everyone who worked there were young girls. The town that this was in,
a lot of eclectic people. We had a lot of interesting customers. I think a highlight
is a man once brought a full-size dining room table into the store and then took a nap on it. Oh, and that was allowed?
It was allowed.
Like, what am I gonna do?
Oh, wow.
That's a weird kink.
Yeah.
Like, I love sleeping in public on a dining room table.
That is really odd. Wow.
Okay.
After about a month of being there, I'm pretty happy
because I'm realizing that I'm making probably six
or $7 an hour in tips on top of my minimum wage pay. I'm like, this is way more money than I thought I was going to be
making here. But then suddenly that goes down to like one to two dollars an hour. I talked
to my coworkers and they're like, yeah, we also noticed that suddenly we've lost all
of our tip money, which didn't make sense because it was the height of summer was way
busier than it had ever been. So we're like, you know what?
Let's talk to Linda and Derek.
We approached him one day and we're like,
hey, like we noticed some of our tip money is missing.
We don't think anyone's stealing it,
but just wanted to alert you to the situation.
Were the tips gathered in like a tip jar on the counter
or left on receipts?
The cash tips, if people gave us change,
we put them in a tip jar and then we'd empty that
into like a big tip jar.
And then if people tipped on card, we would immediately take that cash out of the cash
register and put that also in the big tip jar.
So we had basically this massive bin of coins and either two coworkers would roll those
coins into like coin rolls or Linda would do it.
And then what would happen was Linda would take those coins to the bank and she would bring us big bills.
So we'd get like 50 or $100 bills.
So all these tips are missing.
Linda is immediately very emotional.
She starts crying.
She's like, I'm so sorry.
I don't know what's happening.
But really hysterical.
Oh.
Not the reaction I was expecting.
And Derek is like, I'm going to get to the bottom of this.
I'm going to check the security footage.
Someone is stealing from the store.
This is unacceptable.
This was on a Friday.
So it was my last shift of the week.
I go home like, great,
we're gonna get to the bottom of this
or get our tips back.
I get a text from one of my coworkers the next day
and she's like, Derek found the tips.
They were in a chicken carcass.
What? What a great left turn. They were in a chicken carcass. What?
What a great left turn.
They were in a chicken carcass.
Yeah.
That's not good yummy stuffing.
Just to warn everyone.
In no logical way could I make sense
of why, how did they get there?
I text her back, I make sure she's not joking.
She's like, no, no, no, he's like,
I found them in a chicken carcass.
So I'm like, I'm going down there.
So I show up and Linda looks really scared to see me.
She's like kind of darting around.
Derek and I go and sit outside
and he's also being really evasive
and he's commenting on like birds he's seeing
and not there to have this conversation.
I'm like, what happened with the tips?
He's like, well, I really trust my employees.
I didn't think any of you would steal them.
So I wasn't even gonna mess around
with looking at the security cameras.
I just went straight to the,
I'm gonna go through the dumpster
and I'm gonna find the tips.
These guys are bad at lying.
Really bad.
And the dumpsters are like shared with other businesses.
So I keep pressing him and he's like,
Linda was making some chicken sandwiches.
Oh my God, this is like an episode of Parks and Rec or something. So I keep pressing him and he's like, Linda was making some chicken sandwiches.
Oh my god, this is like an episode of Parks and Rec or something.
Or Orlando, really.
So she's making chicken sandwiches
and she accidentally puts the bills,
these like $100 bills, which is probably over $1,000.
Oh my god.
We're thinking for all of the employees,
accidentally puts them inside of the chicken.
Yeah.
Yeah. Who hasn't?
And then, Easy mistake.
Puts that in the dumpster.
But I am like, no, no, no, I caught you in your lie.
Good for you.
I was really into Nancy Drew as a kid.
Oh.
Yeah, this is your moment.
Not to get hung up on this,
but they're making the chicken sandwiches
from a real chicken, like it's that good?
Well, PNW, small artsy town.
They had a farm.
Dang.
Some good food out there. That sounds yummy.
Yeah.
And if you don't get a stray $100 bill in your sandwich.
Honestly, would appreciate that.
Yeah, it'd be worth it.
It was getting weirder and weirder,
and I was like, no, Derek,
I actually know that she made those earlier on in the week,
and the garbage is collected on a Friday morning.
Wow, Nancy.
Fucking Lance Drew.
There's no way the bills would have been in the dumpster.
And also how many garbage bags did you go through
and why did you look inside of the chicken carcass?
He can't explain it to me.
So he just switches to, you know what this is about?
You must be on your period.
Oh, Derek, Derek, Derek, Derek,
this is not an acceptable tactic.
My God.
He's trying to period shame you.
He's trying to gaslight you.
And then he brings Linda into it
and he's like, Linda, come on over here.
You're going through menopause, right?
And I think what's happened is your menopause
and Zoe's period has synced up and you're just really
fueling each other's hormonal rage.
Oh, this is not okay. If I was going to get my money back, I'd move on. But I did not
appreciate this. So I went home and I remember talking to my parents and they were like,
be respectful, write a two week letter, give it to them on your next shift,
and then find another job.
So came in on Monday morning, gave Derek the letter,
Linda's also there, she immediately starts crying.
Oh, Linda.
She is in menopause.
She's going through something and Derek is very angry.
He's yelling that I'm ungrateful for my job.
It's just the hormones. You're never gonna find another job.
Oh my God.
What is wrong with these people?
They're gonna poison the town like Ma nods Sheila.
Yeah, a couple steps away.
The way that he was yelling at me, I was a little scared.
So I was like, you know what, I quit.
I took off my apron, I walked out.
I had another job two days later and they shut down.
The health department finds a big wad of money
in the chicken carcass.
They're gonna be like, you guys can't stay.
Which is obviously not what happened.
Did you at least get that tip money that had been missing?
No.
He said that he would give it to us
and maybe if I had stayed, I would have got it
and it was probably like a couple hundred bucks.
Oh.
Yeah, fuck.
I kind of think the guy that was sleeping on the table
inside was Derek's brother.
Or Derek.
In disguise.
In disguise.
What was going on with them?
You know, like you can be really mad at them
as you're entitled to be,
but also some people's lives are so terrible,
you're like, oh, they're already paying the price
for this mania.
There's like no way there's any joy happening
when they get home from work
and he's dealing with Linda
who stole all the tip money.
Well, what's your take?
I think she stole it because she's bawling
the second she heard about it.
I think she was trying to squirrel away some money
to get away from Derek.
Or Derek stole it and she felt so guilty
and she knew he was taking the money
and so she started crying.
Could be and he was gasoline her and you stole it.
They were in cahoots with the money.
Unless she was trying to squirrel it away
to make her escape, like Julia Roberts in that movie.
Oh, Sleeping with the Enemy,
Jess brings that up all the time.
That's a good one.
I definitely think she was the one who took it
based on her reaction.
Now I feel bad if she was trying to leave him.
Okay, well.
Forged at her escape.
Don't feel bad, we do not know the details of any of this.
Maybe the shutdown was she finally got out of there.
And then he's like, I'm not gonna run this thing
by myself.
I think the shutdown is like,
they are not able to conduct a business.
Yeah, or she made her a big escape
and she's got a new healthy lover.
You want that to be.
That's best.
So we'll say that.
Oh boy.
Do you go back to the town? Have you ever bumped into them?
My dad still lives there.
So I am always a little on edge
because everyone knows everyone
when I go back for Christmas,
but never seen them.
Oh, well.
That was funny.
Zoe, that was really bizarre in a great way.
I was nervous.
I was like, I don't know if I have a story good enough.
And I saw this prompt, like, okay, this might be my chance.
Chicken carcass.
That'll get you there.
That'll get you here for sure.
Well, it's lovely meeting you, Zoe.
Yeah, thank you.
Have fun in Ireland.
Are you drinking Guinness and Beamish and all the fun beers?
I am, I also discovered a baby Guinness,
which is like Kahlua and something else.
And it's so cute, it literally is in a shot glass.
Oh, cute.
Well, you know, Guinness in either Bailey's or Kaluah
and a little Jameson is called an Irish Car Bomb
and those are fucking outrageous.
They taste like a milkshake.
Give that a try.
Give that a couple of bangs.
All right, wonderful meeting you, have fun.
You too, thanks, bye.
Weird. What happened? I, bye. Bye. Weird.
What happened? I just got a text from Zoe.
Oh my goodness, which Zoe?
A friend of mine named Zoe who I haven't spoken to
since September 4th, 2023.
Whoa.
Something's collapsing. The sim.
I know.
There's a glitch.
Huh?
Oh, wonderful.
We have a visitor. Oh my gosh, it's a glitch. Oh, wonderful. We have a visitor.
Oh my gosh, it's a little baby.
This is Huxley.
He's almost six weeks.
Oh, Huxley looks perfect.
I wanna hold Huxley.
Huxley.
Look, he's just staring up at his mom.
He knows that she's got all the things he needs.
All right, do you wanna go with daddy while I talk?
Or take a nap.
Oh, he's got a little turtle jammies.
Oh.
He's in the bag of potato phase.
He's so cute. You see,
he looks like a little sack of potatoes
when he moved around.
Rock on.
I'm gonna use my middle name
for legal reasons just in case.
It's Roxanne.
Oh. Roxanne.
You've got a Roxanne vibe.
That's a great name.
Thanks, I like it too.
Are you allowed to tell us where you're at in the country
or would that be too incriminating?
I'm in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania,
which is right in between Harrisburg and Hershey.
So in between the Capitol and Chocolate Town.
I went to Hershey as a kid.
Very fun, have you been there, Monica?
No, I wanted to go.
Yeah, all over the town,
the little street lamps are Hershey Kisses.
That's cute. Did I make this up? I feel like I took a boat ride on chocolate You been there, Monica? No, I wanted to go. Yeah, all over the town, the little street lamps are Hershey Kisses.
That's cute.
Did I make this up?
I feel like I took a boat ride on Chocolate
and there was Chocolate Rollers that you could see.
Yeah, that's Chocolate World.
Oh!
That is a free ride that you can do
in addition to Hershey Park.
We might've just done the free ride, probably.
You got to go there.
You're always acting like you didn't get to do stuff.
And you went to Hershey World.
Hershey, Pennsylvania, you gotta go.
That was another job I had
that I have a different quits story, but not this one.
Oh, you worked at Hershey?
Worked at Hershey Park in games.
Oh, really where people would throw the balls?
Yeah. Oh, wow.
Were you a teen?
That'd be fun to meet boys.
Yeah, I was a teen.
I was dating a boy there
who I was also dating for this other story.
Oh, wonderful. Oh, great.
Yes, he sucks.
It was a weird engaged at 16 situation.
Luckily that didn't go through.
Yeah, thank goodness.
I'd be like to hear that.
The story that I have takes place at Kmart.
Oh.
You're hitting all my erogenous zones right now.
Kmart, Hershey. We love this.
Yes, Blue Light Special.
This was 2002, 2003.
I was 16-ish.
And to preface, I do not condone my actions
of this story or my behavior at all.
Undiagnosed ADHD, heavily angsty teen, anything's possible.
I hated this job.
I applied at Kmart to be a cash register lady.
I wanted to be that since I was a small child.
Yeah, I can relate.
Yeah, it's the best.
The buttons, I mean, a sensory dream.
So they put me on stock straightening the shelves.
It was mind numbing and I hated it.
So I was always trying to like call off and a normal person would just find a different job.
But I had to come up with a grand scheme
to get out of this job.
So one day I arrived for my four hour shift
and I noticed there was a ladder in the aisle.
Like one of those step ladders, like staircase.
So I devised a plan to fall off the ladder.
And in my teenage brain, I was gonna then sue Kmart.
Oh my God, you had big dreams.
And then also sue to never have to work again.
Oh my goodness. Right.
You're gonna retire at 16 basically, yeah.
Correct.
This makes sense.
It was so awful working at Kmart.
Ooh. Yeah. Yeah, it was so awful working at Kmart. So I'm like devising this plan all day, straightening my shelves, I'm walking over, I'm like, how
am I going to do it?
So finally I decide to do a test run and I look around, I don't see anybody nearby.
So I walked to the top of the ladder and I'm just trying to figure out how I'm going to
fake fall.
I've never done that before.
So I kind of kick my leg out in front of me and I go down
and I start falling and I fall on the floor.
My head, I'm like, okay, this went pretty well.
But then all of a sudden I hear this woman
and she's like, I saw the whole thing.
Don't move, I'm a nurse.
Oh. So she's like, I'm gonna stay with you. Don't move, I'm a nurse. Oh.
So she's like, I'm gonna stay with you,
don't move your neck.
I'm like, I think I'm fine.
I can probably just stand up.
She's like, no, no.
So she gets the manager and then they call 911.
Oh.
My God.
At this point I'm just like, I'm gonna go to jail.
They have to tell my parents because I'm a minor,
so my parents are involved.
They bring out the stretcher, they put me in the neck brace.
So now at this point I have to play along.
So I'm like, oh, you know, my neck.
So they get me to the ambulance,
they take me to the hospital, which is nearby.
Oh my God, how embarrassing.
They check me out, they didn't admit me, obviously,
because I had no injuries.
Yeah, yeah, you're just fine.
Sure.
So they checked me out, sent me home,
and I don't know, I was asking my mom earlier
if they went through their insurance
or if it ended up being a worker's comp claim.
She said she thinks it ended up
being a worker's comp claim,
but anyway, I promptly quit.
Sure.
Well, you were too hurt.
Every time you walked by that aisle, you probably shuttered.
I know, the health and beauty aisle. Ugh.
So they never found out.
What'd you get out of it?
I got the rest of the day off.
But were they worried about getting sued?
They didn't really say anything, and I did not go through with that part of my plan, obviously.
Sure, I'm glad they did.
They didn't mention it, we just parted ways
and everybody was like, you're good, you're not injured,
so we're good and you're not gonna work here,
so that's fine.
I would imagine it covered the ambulance, right?
Yeah, those are pricey.
That is hilarious.
I love that you threw yourself down one of the,
I mean, what a preposterous plan.
Yeah, now being medicated for ADHD
and understanding that brain, it makes a lot more sense.
It explains a lot with my work history.
Now I have my own place,
so that works well for me to do my own thing.
Yeah.
I'm just an inattentive type,
so I could skip class to watch ER
and lay on the couch all day.
I gotta finish this episode.
Yeah.
I moved to Florida after high school,
randomly one night.
I just drove down with a pizza.
Oh.
Lived there for a few months.
Wow.
And then came back.
Very impulsive.
Did it hurt?
I don't think it hurt.
If anything, I might've bruised up my thigh.
That was my plan to tell them that I was hurt
and that I needed to go home.
Once I brought myself down from the suing,
I was just gonna try to get the rest of the day off.
Oh, those nurses, they're so sweet.
They're just so on top of it.
You gotta make sure you don't have a spinal injury.
She was so kind and I was such a dick.
That's okay, she went home, she felt good.
She told her husband, this poor young teen.
Broke her neck at Kmart today.
They should not have them up on those ladders.
That should be something for adults.
Yeah, maybe that was the hill that she chose.
Now she's an advocate.
Well, Roxanne, delightful meeting you and your little baby.
Thank you so much for the podcast.
I'm also in recovery.
I'm eight years sober.
That's so funny.
When you said you moved to Florida,
I was like, do we have any addiction?
I'm smelling some addiction, but that's great.
I didn't ask you, but I felt like I saw you at sea.
Yes, for sure.
Congrats on eight years.
Congrats, yeah.
Thank you.
Congrats to you too.
Thank you.
I love everything that you guys do.
I'm not ready to diagnose myself with ADHD,
but I do wonder, I certainly enjoyed cocaine
more than everyone else.
I never tried it because I knew I would love it
and I was terrified I would die.
Yeah, that was probably a good choice for you.
Yeah, true.
Well, congrats, that's great news.
And now you got a little baby,
so all the promises are coming true.
Yes, I have a seven-year-old daughter and then Huxley.
Oh, I love it.
All right, well, wonderful meeting you. Yes, wonderful meeting you, thank you love it. All right, well wonderful meeting you. Have a great day.
Yes, wonderful meeting you.
Thank you so much.
All right, take care.
Well, that was sweet.
I wanted to hold that little baby.
Me too.
The way she passed him on, his shape was a ball.
If you lift an adult up, they straighten out.
They rolly polly.
Yes, he stayed snuggled.
Alison Roman just had a baby.
She did?
Yes, and she sent me a picture and he's so cute.
I hope she doesn't cook them.
Whew.
Ha ha ha.
Ha ha ha.
If it doesn't accidentally cook them.
Ha ha ha.
She gets going, she'll just throw anything in her recipe.
I kind of understand what you mean
because they're so tasty.
Yeah, they do look delicious.
All right.
All right, love you.
Love you.
Do you want to sing a tune or something?
We know a theme song.
Oh, okay, great.
We don't have a theme song for this new show,
so here I go, go, go.
We're gonna ask some random questions
and with the help of our cherries,
we'll get some suggestions.
On the flyer, rhyme dish. On the flyer-rhyme dish, on the flyer-rhyme dish, enjoy
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