Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Armchair Anonymous: Party Gone Wrong

Episode Date: January 9, 2026

Dax and Monica talk to Armcherries! In today's episode, Armcherries tell us about a party gone wrong.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new content 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.

Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Dan Rather and I'm joined by Buck Rogers. Hi, it's me. I think when I say Buck Rogers, you should go bo bo bo bo, like you should have a go-to. Oh, a specific.

Okay, well, I need to think about it. Okay, work on it. Workshop it. I will. Today's Anonymous is Party Gone Wrong. Think Triple-Eck. No, what was that movie? X, X.

Think Hangover. Think. Oh, yeah. What's XX? Project X. Oh, I don't know it. It was a Todd Phillips-produced movie about a backyard party that goes insane. Oh, boy.

Okay. These deliver. They're really good. We will definitely have to do a Party Gone Wrong part two. Yeah. Yeah. Please enjoy parties that have gone wrong. All times.

And go. Good times. Take them slow. I had them both. You got to know. I'm going to keep on shining. Is this Sandy? Hi.

Yes, it's Sandy. We were just talking about the unisexuality. How do you say that? Neas-saxiness, unisex nature of Sandy. Could go either way. There's a little bit of a, with this story. So it'll be revealed. Where are you?

I'm in the Pacific Northwest, but my story is in Montana where I grew up. Okay. In a rural area or in one of the cities? In a small town. A mountain town. A small mountain town. Beautiful. What a wonderful setting for a party gone wrong.

Yeah, this happened about 15, 20 years ago, my senior year of high school graduation weekend. So it was a small Montana town where I grew up. And it's really beautiful there. So it tends to attract pretty big, low. kind of blue collar population. And then it attracts a lot of kind of early retirees who are going there to build their like lodge home, finish raising their kids, recreate, that kind of stuff. And then do you have like river raft people and snowboarders and all those too? The granola people who are kind of in and out of college doing the guide life.

I like using recreate as a verb. Yeah. Well, Sandy has a very good vocabulary. I know. I'm going to use that. It feels adjacent to conversate. Yeah, I like it. Okay, so 15 years ago, adorable little town, mostly blue collar, we got some snow, oh, no, they're the opposite of snowbirds, snow seekers. The recreaters. The recreaters, yeah, yeah. High school, it was pretty small, just over 400 people in total. So my graduating class was like maybe 100. So there was definitely some tense socioeconomic undertones at the high school.

My car was like a 77 Volvo, just old kind of feeder. And then there were kids with like brand new SUVs. And there was just a little bit of that going on in the. social dynamics. So it was grad weekend and that we were kind of partying all weekend. And this particular party was a backwood sort of bonfire. So everyone drove a little ways out of town, down like a single lane, little dirt road, a couple miles. And then there's a huge fire just out in the middle of nowhere. So my best friend and I headed to the party and we parked in kind of a clearing a little ways up the road from where the bonfire was happening. And that's where most people were

parked. We were about a five-minute walk away. Get to the fire. There are a few cars there. I'm imagining this predates drop a pin. Like, how the fuck are you finding this two-track? Pretty sure I had a motorol eraser or something. No cell service. So it was just like there's a party out in the woods behind So-and-so's house. And then you'd be like, okay, well, where's so-and-so's house? And someone would know.

And then you'd follow them and you'd kind of just get there eventually. I just want to point out that that's a fun part of the adventure of being a hillbilly. Where I grew up, too, there were field parties. And same thing. It's like, wait, the two-track rode on the end of, middle road or the one behind it? Just when you feel like you're not getting there, you're in the wrong place, you pull around a random corner and there's 50 people you know being dumb and running around.

You start the party with a big reward of accomplishment. It's a good foot to start out. Yeah, you're like, we're here. We did it. We found it. We walked down this road. There are a few cars parked to the side, kind of like get to the fire and just join the crowd.

Night kind of goes on a couple hours in. It's like party climax. Everyone's a little bit drunk. People are going off into the woods to hook up, going into cars to hook up. Yes. Going out to pee, coming and going. And it's just sort of mayhem. And I was walking back to the fire, like, along the road with my own hookup, who I'm going to call Danny for this little grease reference.

And did you guys choose the woods or a car? A car. Starting. Moved to a car. Oh, wow. Exciting. Multiple locations. We'd hooked up a little, a couple times leading up to this and had sealed the deal, I guess, and we're coming back down the road.

We were immature. We were like 18. So it was just that awkward post hookup feeling where you're like, get away from. I don't know how to deal with this. You want to see your girlfriends and tell them what just happened. You don't want to talk to him. The next time we get horny in a few weeks, then we'll talk. Yes, exactly.

It was that vibe, not my boyfriend. As we're walking back, we can see the fire. And all of a sudden, there's a huge explosion. All of the woods are lit up. It's like broad daylight. You can see everyone all of a sudden, and everyone just like, freezes and then it's dark again. And one of the other grads had been gifted a brand new SUV for her graduation.

And it was full of flames. There was just like flames inside of it between me and the fire. Pretty quickly, the car was engulfed in flames and the trees around it were starting to fire. Oh my God. And people are just running around. Chaos. A few people who could reach their cars got in their cars.

But then before anyone could really leave, we could hear sirens. I'm assuming someone at the party or maybe a neighbor or someone heard this and called. I can't make it back to my car, a five-minute walk away and out this road. That's a single-lane dirt road for a few miles. And we're all drunk. So Danny and I, we grab hands, just run away from the road, away from the fire, down this hill until we reach like a marshy area and we can't keep running. We just hunker down under a pine tree kind of like in the bushes. We can still sort of see and hear what's going on on the road, but we're like out of view.

That was, I'm assuming, to make sure that you don't see any cops when they arrive. Yeah, yeah. Of course, we all hear sirens and none of us were like, hey, let's do something about this fire. We're just running away, trying not to get in trouble. Because now we're 18, and that felt scary, and all of a sudden we're legal adults. So we're just trying to hide. And everyone else just sort of dispersed. Like, people who had gotten in their cars just drove further off into the woods to avoid the whole situation.

The firefighters arrive fairly quickly. They start doing their stuff. And late June in Montana, it's still like in the 40s at night. And I was in my early 2000s, a couple layered tank tops, some skinny jeans, ready to just be hanging out by a fire and then go home. So after a while, Danny and I are sitting there. We're both like full body convulsing. We're so cold. So we end up, we're facing each other and I'm like straddling him so that we can get really close together and just hold on for dear life.

like his chin and head are like on my shoulder and vice versa. And we're just like that for hours. The firefighters were there until after dawn. Oh my God. Whoa, through the whole night. Yeah, they were there putting the car fire out and then also dealing with like a minor forest fire. Oh, this is in a highly flammable, combustible area.

Yeah. One tree connecting to the next. Can I ask a quick question? Was there no talk of trying to make your way through the woods without going under the road, but getting yourself back to your car? Or would that have just been impenetrable? We would have had to cross the road. And for some reason, that seemed, I don't remember what the logic was, but it was like, we had to stay here. And did you guys start kissing again at any point? Yeah, that's my question. Yeah. Especially because you're nuzzling. I mean, it felt like we were

survivors together. The eroticism was pretty low for you. A roaring forest fire behind you is very romantic. I know. I bet for him he was hard. Yeah. maybe at one point because his head was right here and we were trying to be quiet he whispered and he was like I'm so sorry I just can't hold it anymore and he let out like the biggest stinkiest tear fart oh wow okay so no wonder you guys are like this yeah so it dried up any future like what was going to maybe be like a summer fling this took a big turn yeah what a plot point we're just soaking in this fart stink finally finally after dawn the final final after dawn the firefighters left. We pulled an all-nighter in there. Everyone just slowly starts emerging from the woods back to where the fire was. We can like walk back up to our cars. And all of the trees around the fire were just burnt. Everything was smoking. The car, I don't know if the firefighters have taken parts of it with them, but it was literally just two axles and a ball of melted glass laying on the ground. There was nothing else left. And just like, it looked like a crater. It's amazing somebody didn't die or get hurt. Like you know, one was in the car.

car or close enough to it. So we walked back to where my car is parked and his cars in that area. He was like, oh, thanks for that. Oh, no. Walked away. It was very awkward. Have you heard him four like six more times? He had been trying. Yeah, he was trying. Yeah, no, it was just the one big one and then like, silence. And this is 20 years ago and I can tell you still know the smell. You remember it so vividly. Oh my God, yeah, the feeling in my body of just, I'm leaving this place now. Well, so then I got back to my car and my best friend had thought of sneaky through the woods and getting back to the cars. And I just hadn't showed up to drive us back home. So she was curled up on my back seat. And one of her feet was just a bare, bloody stump because she had been wearing flip-flops. One had flown off when she was running through the woods.

And her foot just got mangled because in her panic, she like just kept running. Wow. We drove back home, woke my parents up when we got in because it was basically time to wake up anyway. And they just looked at us and we're like, you're not in a lot of trouble because at least you didn't drive in the middle of the night and you're 18. So we want you to tell us about this kind of stuff. But like, go to bed. Yeah. Now, did we ever find out how the fuck the SUV caught on fire and exploded?

It was just that close to the bonfire or did one of these jealous low-income kids? Oh my god, a Dax type. In Montana, you can just freely buy fireworks, and it was two weeks before Fourth of July. A group of kids had bought a bunch of fireworks and made like a homemade sparkler bomb. And apparently they thought it would sort of like go off, make like a hole in one of the seats.

But they'd gone way overboard and built this like huge bomb and slipped it in through the cracked window. So they just like slipped it in the car, kept on walking by. And then 10 seconds later it exploded. What assholes? Have you ever seen one of those go off? They're crazy. They're scary big, these sparkler bombs. Did they go to jail? Those specific people were never outed. And what about the poor girl? Was she so sad?

She was upset. Did you do the sparkler bomb? Sandy? Was it you? It wasn't me. But you know who it was. I know you know who it was. We know she knows. Yeah. And that's okay. You keep that to your great. Yeah. Or until statute of limitations. I mean, it's been this long. And the car was eventually replaced by insurance. So there was that, luckily. But very dramatic start to adulthood.

Wow. If I were the girl, boy, my feelings would be quite hurt. I would take it so personally. Yeah. You're unable to recognize that there's some financial jealousy happening. Yeah. Or just like, oh, they hate me. They blew up my new car.

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, just the same way that the undertones in the school, this isn't our lack of or amount of, you know, this is our parents. Yeah. Everyone's born in. That vibe was very alive in my town, too. The haves and the have-nobiles. Yeah. The greasers and the soches. Lots of good people all around, just young and dumb and not really having a bigger picture of the world, I think.

I would argue a little bit more Old West justice is happening still in the rural areas. Kids, look, their brains literally are not developed. They don't even have frontal lobes. And yet they're drinking and doing crazy stuff. If I were that guy, I would have said, Sandy, I'm so sorry. I know you're freezing. And I am too. But I do need to go walk over there for five seconds.

You break the huddle. And it's going to be miserable while I'm gone. But you're going to be so happy you don't smell what's coming out. And then when I return, relative to how cold you were, we're going to feel warm again. So could you just grant me this five? It would have been graceful. For some reason, it felt like we had to, like, cling for dear life. Would you have said, no, no, I don't care about the fart.

I'll be too cold. Just fart. Because you might have said that. Honestly, I wasn't wildly offended by the fire. I was like, I get it. We're here. But also the hotness is gone. You can't come back from that.

Well, Sandy, thank you for telling us that. Thank you so much. All right. Bye-bye. Hello. Can you hear us, Stephen? I can hear you. Can you hear me all right?

I can hear you great. And it's very rare that I get to speak with a Stephen P.H.E.N. And I'm going to make you answer for this. So tell me how we get a V out of P.H. What is the origin of this? I'm commonly called Stefan. I'm commonly spelled with an A. I think since Stefan Curry's become more popular,

that's almost the default now. Yeah. Is that how he spells it? Yeah, how does he spell it? I thought it was with an F. Oh, no. It's definitely pH, but is it A? Oh, is it Stefan or Stefan?

So I can give you the quick. It's my grandpa was Stefano. My uncle is Stefan. I'm Stephen. Oh, love that. Oh, so it did start that way. Yeah. Steph is Ian.

Steph Curry is? Yeah. Oh, okay. And is it enough? It's a pH. It's definitely a P. Okay, so Stefan, Stephen, Stephen, where are you calling from? Right outside New York City.

So just across the river in New Jersey. Oh, okay, wonderful. And do you have a view of New York City? Like, can you see it from your area? Yeah, just not from my exact department. Part of me thinks, and I would have not been privy to this had I not stayed in Brooklyn on one trip, recognizing it's almost more fun to be looking at it than it is to be in it for your living quarters. Totally.

When you're in Brooklyn next, maybe you try Red Hook Taverns Burger instead of Emily Burger. Oh, really? Both really good, but that deserves some love next time. Red Hook. Rob, you write that down? Yeah, I've been there. You've been? Yeah, it's really good.

Oh, and where do you rank it with Emily? Different but equal. Yeah, different but equal. Wow. Is it more conventional, like just burger bun stitch? Burger, bun, cheese, raw onion on the bottom. And it should say on the menus to say, burger, bun, cheese, fuck you. Really go for it.

No caramelized onions. Caramelized. Dang. Okay, so you were at a party gone wrong. And again, I'm going to stereotype, but I have to imagine a lot of Jersey parties go wrong. Did the party take place in Jersey? I think it's just your average drinking. But yeah, a ton of parties.

So it was 2010. So it was my freshman year of college. And it was like a first break back from college. So kind of everyone's still in like that high school party mode. It's unsuccessful if there's not a drinking party every single night of the week. Sure. You've just been training for three months, right? Like you've been drinking completely unsupervised for three months.

So you're almost ready to come back for a big fight. So this one girl from high school is having a party. It's at her mom's house when she's away for work. It's like three towns away. So a lot of small towns in New Jersey, but it's only about three miles or so. We were excited because her mom lived in like this really cool modern house. It had an elevator in it, like a bunch of cool art in different areas. It wasn't like cookie cutter, Jersey, suburbia. So we get to the party and it's kind of taking place over all different parts of the house. People playing drinking games in the kitchen. There's parties upstairs. People are taking the elevator up and down to different areas. We're all drinking, playing a bunch of different games. And then me and my one friend venture off. And we kind of find this door that leads to the roof. And it's like a roof that's like meant to be. at certain point. There's like an Adirondack chair

that looks out over the backyard, but really only space for like three people. So it's just the two of us up there. We're like, oh, it'd be cool if people come up and we could play drinking games up here. Wasn't enough space, obviously. No one's coming up. And then on our way down,

we see that there's this skylight. And we're like, okay, the skylight looks over the kitchen and if people playing beer pong up there, what if we stand on the skylight? And people look up and notice like, whoa, there's this whole area upstairs that someone found. Hold on a second before we get to you getting on the skyline. This is like hard.

Neither of you are like, huh, I wonder if this thing will break if we get on. Obviously not. Our head went there pretty quickly after. Yeah, you know, you think it was an actual glass that you could stand on. Well, by the way, it's not there. There's no such thing. Bulletproof glass, maybe. Or like separating glass in a prisoner.

Not like fragile glass. Well, that's true. I'm sure it has a high temperance. Point of glass. So, as you would expect, It's challenging to get on because it's also pretty bulbous. Oh, no. Oh, it's like a dome one?

Yeah, it's domed on top. Oh. Well, that makes a little more sense, Stephen, because I can imagine where you guys that you were going to kind of lean over and knock on it and have them be excited. Oh, you now see why it would be fun. Well, I just imagine, like, I'm picturing the most modern house in the world with a dead flat roof and a dead flat skylight. It may think they're going to stand on that, whereas this feels more like, yeah, we'll both lean on it. We both take our steps on it.

It takes like a second to get on. And then it's small, so we're kind of holding each other's shoulders. And once we get on, it's pretty quickly understood. Like, it's going to give way. Oh, no. Before we can do anything, my one friend jumps off feeling it. And then as soon as he gets off, the weight redistributes. And my leg just goes shooting through this guy.

I'm like 12 feet above the party. My leg is dangling through. Can you imagine being at that party? And then a leg pops out. So I get my body out of the picture so no one could see that. It's me. My friend's like, pull your leg out and jump off the roof. We'll run.

We'll find a way to get out of here. But you can start hearing the chatter of the party. Like, who is that? Grab his shoe. Make sure he doesn't get out of here. Oh. Because I think I did some damage to this house that they want this person to be accountable for. And you did, you know.

Yeah. Reality sets in. Embarrassment sets in. And then realize I had to pull my leg out of this. So I don't know if it was. cut when it went through or cut when it came out. But it's like a small hole that I made with like shards of glass. I just yank my leg out.

That was the adrenaline probably. I don't remember feeling the pain at that point. But I stand up and I know I have to go down and face the host of the party. Because you're a good boy. You're going to take responsibility. Yeah, there's the only option at that point. I imagine you jumping off the roof and them just following the trail of blood. I know.

Also jumping off the roof after that injury. I mean, none of this was smart, right? Walk downstairs and just to give you an idea of what this cut looks like, it's probably about like an eight inch gash right in the center of my shin. Oh! It kind of like split pretty considerably. Like I don't know if it was like thin skin or pressure. And Stephen, I've had that injury. It's so close to your shin bone.

You're seeing bone immediately, right? Yeah. And the outsides are pretty cut. Not that it's integral of the story, but when it's healing, it took like three months to heal. It's graphic. It was a cut on my leg and starts to expand. I mean, it looked like there was a vagina. Yes.

An elephant vagina. The different stages of healing reveal different stages of like. Yeah, it was pretty gnarly. So go downstairs. I realize I probably need stitches. But the host of the party greets me. And instead of kicking me out, she's super sweet. She brings me into a room away from the party.

People are annoyed that this happened. There's a hole in the roof. Bandages me up. Says, like, not a problem. I'll take care of it. I'll find a way. Is she your wife now? Because this better be a meat cute.

Exactly. You know, I knew you were going to go there. We're so predictable. I'll save that for the end. Okay. Okay. Don't get too excited about. She bandages me up.

Super nice. I decided to leave the party. It's like a three-mile walk home. So now I have to walk home on this leg. I know I need stitches. I know I can't drive myself there because we've been drinking. So walk three miles, get home. Probably somewhere between 11 and 1, I would say.

It was a while ago. It was later at night. Knock on my parents' door because I know that I need to get taken to the emergency room where you get it stitched up. No answer. Open my parents' door and then immediately met with what no child wants to be. Oh, wow. There's sex.

Oh, my God. Add insults, injury. What a night you're having. She's rustling. I mean, I closed the door. Embarrassed in pain, bleeding. I mean, at this point, there's blood in like my sock and my shoe. It's pretty significant.

Oh, fuck. You're like, I just want to die now. That's the feeling for sure. So she comes out, gives it one look. We both don't want to look at each other. looks at my leg, she's like, it's fine, you're fine, go to bed. Oh, you're fine! She wanted to get back.

Okay, yeah. Round two. So woke up the next morning. Didn't end up getting it stitched. And not too bad now. I got like a four-inch scar on my leg, but it took time. Monica, I knew you would go to, oh my God, maybe a meat cute because she's bandaging you up 10 years ago.

I went on a date with her probably 10 years later, and I was like, great, this is going to be like a perfect segue, bring up something funny that happened 10 years ago. We're both way more mature now. And she paused and she was like, yeah, I'm pretty sure my brother still fucking hates you for that. And that was it. Oh. Okay. Well, she went on the day with you knowing it was you.

But I thought it would be a fun little story. I guess it holds some weight in her brother's eyes for not paying the damage. But it's super nice. Didn't work out. I'm going to try to skin this cat in yet another original way that's going to backfire, but I'm going to give it a shot. In the shin. Skin this shin. I'm going to shin this cat.

So all I'm saying right now is if I were a single girl, I would try to date you in one second. I think you are so fucking cute and funny. That's hard to take in, honestly. Are you married? No, I have a girlfriend. Monica, I did write into Monica and Jeff love boys. You did. Season two?

Oh, I'm very flattered. The show never happened. Huge fans, listen to all the pods, listen to your egg freezing pod, why I need to listen of that. I don't know. Listen to it. Well, it probably makes you better for your girlfriend. She'll be like, oh, you're so sensitive. I'm feeling very upset right now.

I saw. I'm happy for her. Very nice to meet you. Yeah. You too. I'll give one quick shout out to my cherry chat because I have two friends who we listen to the show all the time and we have a group chat that's a cherry. And every Sunday we guess who the guest is going to be.

Sometimes people get it right. I'll give a quick shout out to them. Cherry That's so cute. Well, this was fun. Stephen, you're a dream. I'm so smitten with you. It's nuts. Anytime you want me back, I'll come on.

Okay. I hope we talk again soon. Take care, brother. Bye. Jessa. Jessa. from girls? That's the only other time I've heard that name.

I've never even heard Jessa. Hi. I was just saying to Monica, I'm completely unaware of the name Jessa, but she's familiar because of girls. I know. I was so upset. set when that came out. I was like, I'm not the only just set in the world. This is insane. But it worked

out. If I were you, I would have got me maniacal maniacal and thought somebody knows me in the writer's room and they stole my name. That's the way I should have thought of it. You need a little more arrogance. Are you anywhere near New York City where this could have possibly happened? I'm not. I'm originally from the Bay Area, but I live in Nashville now. And how are you liking the move. I love Nashville. I've been there for four years. It was a big adjustment at first, but I'm loving it now. What were the hurdles at the beginning? So I'm from Northern California, where it's like farm town, wine country. It's not that busy. So I moved to Nashville. I moved to the actual city and it was so busy. So I was shell-shocked a little bit. And then I moved over to Franklin,

and I've really enjoyed Franklin because it's nice and quiet and I can drive into the city. Small town. Okay, so you have a party gone wrong story. I realize now that we have photos, so I'm going to put them between Monica and I so that we'll be prepared when the opportunity presents itself. This is a Batch the Rett trip gone wrong. Originally, we are going to road trip from Nashville, where a majority of the girls lived, down to Alice Beach, Florida.

And if you're unfamiliar with Alice Beach, it's like quiet, quaint, charming little beach town. Is it on A130? That's the zone everyone loves? Yep. I got to flag one ironic hysterical thing is that. That Nashville, of course, is the Bachelorette capital of the world, and you guys are leaving there. Well, you have to. You can't do it in your, I mean, you can. You can do Broadway any night. And we did have a Broadway night before the wedding.

But we had to go live our classy little life in Florida of all things. Yes, yes. This was all told to me when I spent the summer there. I had never heard of it. But this whole A-130, do you know about this? But it's a little zone on the Gulf in Florida that's super boogeying. I can't believe I've never heard of it. It's like the Hamptons of the South. Everybody from Nashville vacations there. I had never heard of it either until I moved there. I'm like, I need to go here. Everyone loves it. I feel poor because I grew up in the South and I've never heard of it. But I think it really took off in the last decade. Mostly new builds and stuff, no?

From what I am aware of, yes, we didn't end up there exactly. Oh, oh. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I still have not gone. Okay. Great. So the plan was that we were going to road trip from Nashville down to Alice Beach. So when it came time for the planning period, the maid of honor is sending a bunch of Airbnb listings to all of the girls so we can choose the house to rent. She comes across one and it looks perfect. It is huge. It's beautiful and it is significantly cheaper than every other house.

So that should have been a red flag. But for us, we're like, book it. This is perfect. Yeah, the oldest century. A Bachelor miracle. It really was. It felt like all the stars aligned. So we go and we go to book the Airbnb and there's one tiny little caveat. They don't allow large groups and they don't allow parties. So we're like, we're screwed. We can't book it. Except one of the girls happens to see the Airbnb hosts their profile and sees that they're from Utah. And she gets this genius idea to tell a tiny little white lie. Say that we are all from Utah and that we are a bunch of BYU students. and one of the girls is getting married and that we are going to just have a tiny,

you know, quiet little beach trip, no party, no harm, no foul, I swear. Yeah. And it works. They really value honesty. I know. That's why it's just so bad. That's why they were susceptible, yeah.

Honestly, I don't tell lies, so I felt so terrible. And no one was worried you guys were going to get, like, struck down by what's his name? Joseph Smith? Joseph Smith. We should have thought about that, honestly, but now I won't do it again. Okay.

We book it. We are so happy. Everything's good to go. We are on the road a couple weeks later. Everything's going great until about 15 minutes out from the house. We realize we are not in Alice Beach. We are in the heart of Panama City. Oh, shit.

I've been there. Okay. That is a place I've been. Whatever I said about 813, you just do the opposite of that. Listen, some of my best times. I went too. Those spring breaks were hot. So now we are driving down the road and on one side of the street it is dollar jello shots.

The other side of the street, it is wet t-shirt contest. And we are going, this is not the vibe. Like this is not what we planned for nor what we packed for. Like we are packed for brunch and mimosas. We are not packed for jello shots and wet t-shirt contests. But nonetheless, we continue on. We go, there's still like another five minutes in this drive somehow ahead. has to turn into Alice speech.

So we turn into the neighborhood, and it is immediately, lock your doors. This is sketchy. Oh, no. The neighborhood is wrong. And I'm saying, we have to have the wrong address until we hear your destination's on the right. So we look to our right, and there it is. The beautiful house that we booked, it looks exactly the same, except it is in the wrong

city. So we go, okay, this is on us. This is our fault. We're going to make the best out of it. Okay. This is where I'm different. This is where I'm pulling up Airbnb immediately. Nope.

We're going to Alice Beach right now. We just talked about this. We did. It's people's nature. It is. Either like, look, it is what it is or it's not what it is. It's the one time you get to have this bachelor at party and you're going to do it. Right.

I wish you were on the bachelorette with us. It would have worked out way better. Oh, no. Okay. So we go in, we decorate. and we have our forbidden party that night. Everything goes great. We're having a ton of fun.

How many are there of you? I think it ended up being like 12 girls. Enough to have a party. Our party, call it like church party gone crazy. It's not that wild. The next day comes around. We spend the day at the beach. Everything's going great.

We're having fun. And we go, let's get ready for dinner. We Google the best restaurants in Panama City. Because, again, we're not prepared for Panama. It was supposed to be a fine dining steakhouse. Awesome. Let's book the reservation. We get in the Uber, we get over there, we open up the door and what do we see? It is like an rundown aquarium.

Yes. With a random elderly man in his karaoke machine doing karaoke throughout the restaurant going up to all the tables, singing to the tables. And at this point, we are so embracing Panama City. We are drinking the juice. We are just going with the vibe. Sure. Sure. That's good.

We have our dinner on our show. We go, okay, let's go back to the Airbnb. We're going to get into our comfy clothes, and we are going to pour some champagne, and it's time to shower the bride with all of the lingerie that we brought her. We go out to the fire pit, and she's starting to unwrap all of her lingerie. Now, when I say lingerie, I don't want you to think like dirty, sexy lingerie. That's not the bride. The bride is very beautiful, classy, silly, and that's the kind of vibe we wanted to embrace. So all of the girls chose a different theme, all of her favorite things.

So for example, her favorite show is Outlanders. So one of the girls bought a kilt and had her fiancee dress up in the quilt and take a bunch of pictures. Oh, that's cute. I chose Harry Potter where she had like a sexy little top and the bottoms say like you can park your wand here or why don't Slytherin on in. A lot of wordplay, creative. You guys are good girls.

Good girls with just a little twist. Slytherin right in doesn't sound that good girl. of me. Well, that's true. Sounds hot. So she's holding up this little nighty, and all of a sudden, about 20 FBI agents and police officers come storming in our backyard. No. Down, down, down, get on.

And they are hopping the fence. No. It's a raid. Yes. So they go into the neighbor's yard, and flash bombs start going off like crazy. It's huge bings, lots of smoke, canines running like crazy. It is literally chaos. During the lingerie party.

So we naturally go booking it inside. And this is where the group fully divides. Half the group is fetal position, crying hysterically. Get the keys, we're getting in the car, and we're leaving. My side of the group, I like to call us the defenders. We are going to protect us. We are going to lock the doors, the windows. We're going to call the police.

We are not going outside until we know what is going on. Like, this is not normal. We call the police and the 911 operator goes, yeah, so there is active police activity going on outside right now. You are to shelter in place. We will let you know when it's safe. By the way, no, they won't. They're not calling back. I know.

Yeah, yeah. Where is the safest place in this house? The stairwell. We think there's no windows. there's no doors. We go like total tornado prep. We are good to go. Can I ask, is the fear a stray bullet might come through the house?

Oh, there's the fear of everything. It sounds like guns are going off. I think it's probably rubber bullets. And then all the flash bombs. You think that you're in the middle of a war zone. Yeah. We are arm and arm on the stairs crying hysterically. Just as shit is going down next door,

shit's going down in this house. Our little deserted aquarium karaoke dinner, Oh, no. Seven at that point girls are violently ill. Oh, my God. This is like the hangover. This is such a disaster. Oh, no.

It's literally insane. Jess, are you one of the victims? Not until the next day, thankfully. Okay, took a minute. How many bathrooms are there in this house? I think there are like four. So we had a decent amount, but it was really, bad. Both ends really sick. Also, let's add generally when I have that, I'm the only one that

has that. So I'm not entering a bathroom where that already happened. I mean, that is savage. Four bathrooms for seven people dealing with this is not up. Dibolical. Oh, it was not pleasant to be in that house. This is going on for hours. At this point, it is like 2.30 in the morning. It seems to end. And we're like, okay, we're going to get in bed. We are going to go. We are going to go to sleep, we're going to wake up when the sun comes up, and we are getting out of dodge. We are going back home to Nashville. About an hour later, like, we're just hitting REM sleep. And all of a sudden, you hear, boom, it starts right back up again.

You are in the thick of it. It's like a standoff next door. We all hit the ground and we are like crawling back to the staircase and we're going, what the hell is going on? Because this entire time, we're thinking it's a drug grade. Like how drugs can one have in a house. And at this point, we are stone cold sober. Between the sickness and the hours that have gone by, there is no liquid courage.

It is fully 100% sober scleries. We are freaking out. It continues on until 5 in the morning. And then at 5 in the morning, it ends. We feel brave enough to leave the house. So we pack up the Airbnb and we get out. We go back to Nashville and a couple days later, the news articles start coming out. Panama City sex trafficking ring, 21 men arrested.

Holy shit. 21 men. So this all happened next door. It's like a clown car of perverts next door. Oh, my God. What's even crazier, though, is that the whole reason that this even happened was that a girl was kidnapped out of Utah at a Utah jazz game. Remember, the Airbnb host is from Utah. Yes.

So she's kidnapped there by a Panama City man who lives in the sex trafficking house. Wait, what? So then when we got to the Airbnb, you know, you go and you look around, you're looking everywhere, wherever you're staying, you're seeing all the nooks and crannies. There's an outdoor shower. We're like, oh, that's kind of cool. That might be convenient after the beach. And we look in there and there's a camera in the shower. And we're like, what in the world?

This is so creepy. But upon our investigation, it wasn't aimed at the shower. It was aimed at the front door of the sex trafficking house. And it was the only camera on property. And that same day before any of this happened, the Airbnb host emails us. And she's like, hey girls, hope you're having the best time. Feel free to stay an extra night for free on us. What?

Isn't that crazy? Thank God we didn't do it. Wait, so are we thinking that... The FBI put that up so they could record what was a? going on or the owner of the house? Or the sex traffickers owned the house. I still don't know for sure if they had anything to do with it. But all the roads led back to tiny little Utah. It made no sense. It was so crazy. So luckily, we survived. The girl was rescued. The evil 21 men were arrested. And the wedding went on to be beautiful. The marriage is great. But then married for years.

So everything has worked out. But oh my gosh, it was insane. So we got some photos. Oh, this is the news article. PCB police arrest 21 men for human trafficking, internet crimes involving children. Oh, God. Oh, but look at the gang. Looks so cute and happy. Yeah, that's on our deserted aquarium dinner.

I'm glad your friend's not superstitious because I got to say, it might start crossing my mind, right? Oh, this is an almond that I shouldn't. Not supposed to get married. Yeah, I'm not supposed to get married. Like, how many more signs do I need? They had been together for many, many years. She felt secure, but I've told her that she got all of her chaos out in marriage before the marriage even happened. Do you think maybe the water you guys were drinking at the restaurant was from the aquarium?

Have you had that thought? I didn't think about that until now, Monica. Maybe. Maybe we got some, like, crazy immune system boosts after it, though. Do you want a bottle of flat water or filtered water and you say filtered? They just take a ladle out of the aquarium? Right. We thought it tasted a little funny. Well, here's the thing. We're railing on these restaurants a little bit and then I'm feeling snobby.

But then everyone gets fucking ghastly ill and you're like, no, I'm not being snobby. Exactly. That was exactly our mentality. Like, we're not going to be snobby. We're embracing Panama City. It's fine. In fact, it was not fine. All I have to say, children, do not tell little white lies if we didn't lie about being Mormon. None of this would have happened. We would have been safely in Ellis Beach having a great old time. I think maybe you did get struck down by Joseph Smith, if I'm being honest. Also, there's a lot of morals, too. There's also the old tried and trude.

You get what you pay for. It's very rare you actually get a deal. Yeah, but we did. Yeah, you sure did. I only have a single follow-up question, and it does require some vulnerability. You did mention that it did hit you the next day, and you were on a road trip the next day. So how did we deal with that? Not well.

Okay. It was a lot of stops. Gastation bathroom. Oh, yeah. It was truly, truly disgusting. Such a nightmare. But we made it. Well, Jess, this was a delight.

Great story. Yeah, phenomenal. Thank you so much for having me. And I just wanted to say a huge congratulations on the Golden Globes nomination. That is incredible and so well-deserved. Oh, thank you. It's because of you guys, the arm cherries. It is.

Send our love to the bride. Thank her for that terrible experience. She's a huge arm cherry, Savannah. She definitely wanted me to say hi to you guys. Great names. Jessus, Savannah. These are great. All right.

Take care. Bye. Bye. Sex trafficking. Diary. Puking. Sex trafficking. Mormon lies.

Launderee party. Langeret Slitherin. Slitherin. Or whatever it was. I'm trying to think what I would say. Tell me the names are Dumbleddorf or Dumbled Dumbled. Dumbledore. Dumbledore.

Dumbledore. We got Huffer. You got Hufflepuff. I would say back dumbled door access. Or back Gryffindore access. Yeah, both work nice. Door and back door we want to use somehow. You got Hufflepuff.

Huff and puff on this with an arrow. God. What was the other one? Ravenclaw. Ravenclaw these are. You should go into Harry Potter merge. Oh, Harry Potter. It ain't Harry, but it's a Potter.

Hi, Maddie. Hey, guys. How are you? Good. We just heard a story about people putting Terrence Posner quotes on lingerie. And there's were clever, but we wanted to be dirtier. So that's what you heard the tail end of. I see, I see. Maddie, where are you? I am in New York City.

Ooh, jealous. What part? We have five boroughs to choose from. I'm in Manhattan. Now I'm really jealous. Is it so cozy there right now? It's pretty frigid. I have not left my apartment today. Congrats.

Thank you. And are you a New York native or did you relocate to there? No, I'm originally from Florida. I've been living here since August of 2023. So you really reversed the flow because it's definitely New York to Florida is the move. I did it opposite and I don't regret it. Fun. So you have a party gone wrong.

I do. Oh, wonderful. And of course, Florida is a great place for it. In fact, the last party gone wrong we just heard was in Jackson or Panama City. Yeah. Maybe so, but this does take place in New York. Oh, fantastic. This is a story about my housewarming, the first housewarming party that I've ever hosted.

And when I moved, I was subletting, just kind of hopping around from different apartments. But I knew that I wanted to move with my two friends, Katie and Marcus. Those are my roommates. We met doing a show, but we were all kind of spread out. Marcus was already living in New York at the time. And then Katie was moving from the south. So we all got together in October of 2023, moved in. We found this gorgeous, huge hidden gem apartment in Manhattan.

So we were very excited to decorate and find furniture and finally host a party. So December was our housewarming. It actually happened two years ago yesterday. Oh. Happy anniversary. So we had a huge group of people that we invited. I invited people that I knew that had moved from high school, a lot of theater people. And then I made the bold decision of inviting my coworkers who I had just,

met. I work for a major fitness company in New York, and my roommate, Marcus, had worked for them for the past five years. So it was a lot of people that I had never really spoken to, but seen around the office. Marcus had vetted them. Yes. So everyone comes. It's going well. The drinks are flowing very quickly. And a few people keep coming up to me and asking, like, who is this guy that just walked in? He's saying really weird stuff. Uh-oh. My roommate went up to him and said, like, who are you here for? Who do you know? And he said, McKenzie.

And I feel like he was just, like, thinking of the first, like, white girl name. Yeah. Yeah. Madison. He would have not been far off. But we were like, there's no McKenzie here. So I walked up to him and I said, what's your name? And he was like, my name is Jillio.

I was like, okay, Jillio, you need to either leave or you can come back, but you need to bring more alcohol because you've drank in all the alcohol. So he makes a swift exit. We do another alcohol run. fine until my friend comes over and tells me that there is a major leak happening in my kitchen. It was a huge crack in the ceiling and it was very close to a light fixture. So we were nervous about the building potentially catching on fire. So my roommate, Marcus and my friend go upstairs and talk to our upstairs neighbors.

We had seen them before but never really spoken to them. It was an older woman and her two adult children probably in their mid-40s. My roommate goes up there, knocks on the door, and when they open the door, there is water everywhere. Oh, boy. There are quilts, sheets, blankets, anything that they could find. And so they were like, yes, we're aware there's an issue. We're handling it and slams the door. Everyone comes back down, keeps drinking, having fun.

It's getting worse. So they go back upstairs, and the neighbors are progressively more irritated and rude and start kind of yelling at us and slamming the door once again. At that point, we decided to call the fire department because it was that bad. Yeah. The fire department comes in. They bring like this huge pole with like a little tiny tip and they put it in the crack. They say nothing else except, okay, we're going to go upstairs and talk to the neighbors. And did they route that pull to your sink or something so that it was draining? All they did was touch the crack. They didn't explain what that was doing. Okay, okay. Everything's fine for a moment. Someone gave me Zen and I had never done that before and I had drank a lot of alcohol. I'm sorry. Sorry to my family listening to this.

But immediately I get really sick, and so I'm throwing up in my bathroom. Oh, no. I'm just doing my business, and I hear a huge commotion at the door. I hear my roommate, who is the sweetest, kindest little guy, say, hit me then. Hit me. I finish throwing up, and I walk out, and I see all the men are sitting on the couch. Very quiet, nervous. And I look over, and it's Marcus, Katie, my roommates, and all the women.

in just like ready to go to battle. I managed to get my way to the front and the upstairs neighbors have come down and they're screaming at us, getting in our face, asking why we would call the fire department and we've ruined everything and why would we move here? They were also definitely under the influence of something. Well, when you say mom and two 40-year-old children, there's a story there for sure. All of my coworkers are native New Yorkers. They're not afraid to get in the fight, defend us.

And next thing you know, the daughter comes forward and puts forward and punches my friend's co-worker square in the face. Oh, wow. Oh, my God. Okay, now we're cracking. We're cooking. I think they were cooking. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

My coworker who is 4-11, she's so tiny. She starts defending her friend, and so then the brother comes over and starts choking my co-worker. What? She is pinned up against the wall, being choked. So now everyone's screaming, pulling each other, and my sweet, sweet roommate, Katie, who is from the south. is like, I've got this on video.

And so he turns and takes her phone and walks outside and throws it so far that it hits the other building across the street. And, you know, the streets are wide in New York. So we were out looking for that. She's in shambles. The cops eventually come. By the way, they were mad you called the fire department. And then they forced you to call the police.

I know. We still to this day don't know what made them so angry unless there was something they were hiding. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that these people were already on the last straw with the landlord. Some hijinks happen, which caused this big flood. And then this was going to be them going, you know what, get the fuck out. Now we have enough ammo to get you out of here. Well, it didn't. They're still there.

Oh, my God. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So when the police came up, a lot of questions. Did you find the phone? Was the video intact? What did the police do when they got there? What happened? We could not recover anything on her phone, but we did find her phone.

We came back and the cops weren't super helpful because. Everyone was so intoxicated that they were like, I don't want to deal with this. But they split us all up. They were holding the mother back from us. And they pointed at me and my roommates and they said, you guys are going to jail. The police did? Or the mom. No, the police.

What the hell's happening? What is happening? I had to ask a lot of people because, again, there were different levels of being drug and sober. But they pointed at us and we all responded. We were like, for what? They eventually asked the girls who were assaulted at the party if they wanted to press charges. and they were like, no, we just want to leave. So we kind of turned to everybody and said like, okay, the party's over.

Please leave. Thank you so much for coming. And as everyone was leaving, the neighbors were upstairs in their window, like screaming at everyone. And the next morning I called my mom expecting her to be like, okay, you're moving. She was like, that's crazy. And my uncle actually attended the party. He's lived here for like 26 years. He dipped out before everything happened.

But his response was like, welcome to New York. New York, baby. You wanted it? You got it. I was so petrified to go to work. I was mortified that this girl came to my party and was choked, you know. But I walked into work and everyone who didn't come was like, oh, my God, I heard you through the best party. Oh, great.

I gained a lot of friends from that. My coworker, that was choked, you could see bruises on her neck. I asked the other neighbors about Jillio if they knew anything about him. Forgot about Jillio. He was a red herring. They were like, I can't believe you let that guy in your apartment. You should have never done that. And we haven't seen him since.

So don't know what happened to Jillio. Some lessons learned. Yeah. But that was my first housewarming party in New York City. Wow. Brought me back. Is this your apartment still? No.

We have since moved. Well, Maddie, that was tasty. I really wish I was at that party. Although I would, of course, been in a real dust up with all the whole family. Also, a little girl getting choked. In my mind, I would have prevented that. That's why I want to be there. Yeah.

I would probably have been thrown up in the bathroom. room. And then I'm going to come out and said what I would have done. If I have a second, if I could give some shoutouts. Let's hear some shoutouts. First of all, I just want to thank both of you. I'm in New York and I'm acting and pursuing all the things. And it's so reaffirming to hear everyone that you talk to and hear about their journeys and hear about the really good parts and the really bad parts. It keeps me going. And I want to shout out my sister, Caroline. She is who got me into this podcast. She just had her second baby, so she's killing it. But we call every week about Armchair Anonymous. I also want to shout out my roommates

because without them, this would not have occurred. We have plenty of stories, I'm sure, as you can imagine. And lastly, I want to shout out Anna and Juan Chos. Oh! Oh my God! She texted me today and she said one of Juan Chos' best friends is going to be on Armchair Anonymous. So you're from Orlando. Yes, sir. Juan and I did theater together. He's truly the best.

His family is the best. We love Juan Cho. Jounhow Wancho and Anna. Two of the cutest human beings on planet Earth. I love that your best friends with him. It makes sense because you're so cool. And he's so cool. I call him all the time.

I'm like, did you hear about what they said this week? And he's like, I don't listen to it. Mandy, delightful meeting you. And we will give Juancho. your love. Yes. Thank you so much. All right. Take your hair. God, I love one world's collide. Me too. So fun.

Parties are fun. They are. Even when they go wrong, you're like, I would have been glad to have been any one of those. Most parties, at least something goes a teeny tiny bit wrong. Even when you're old, I went to a party this weekend. A very adult, nice, small gathering, a couple friends of the pod were there. There was a whole entire wine spill incident that was hilarious, but was scary. Because it ran the risk of ruining a very expensive large rug. Yes. The hosts were gone. Then we looked on chat about how to fix it and it said poor baking soda. And then we did that. And then it also, we put sparkling water on it. And then later we

read, you're not supposed to saturate. And then we were all like, you know what? It's going to be okay by morning. and then I did check in in the morning. She said it looked exactly the same. Sure. You forgot the salt. Remember I was telling you? I learned from curb your enthusiasm. You're supposed to dump salt on it.

Hope it's not too late. It's the only thing I hope. Yeah, so parties are great. Yeah. Love you. Love you. Do you want to sing a tune or something? I know a theme song.

Oh. Okay, great. We don't have a thing song for this new show. So here I go, go. go. We're going to ask some random questions and with the help of armcherry's book and some suggestions, I'm a flyer rhyme dish, enjoy. Follow armchair expert on the Wondry app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcast. You can listen to every episode of Armchair expert early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple

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