Don't Blame Me! - DBM: My Friend Thinks I'm Flirting With Her

Episode Date: February 12, 2024

This week Meghan and Melisa are giving advice on: Update: Telling your mom that your dad is cheating Friends think I flirt with everyone Uncle wants to talk about my dad Don't Blame Them: -- Diet talk in the work place -- Not able to pass a test Buy our merch: https://store.dftba.com/collections/don-t-blame-me Follow Us! @meghanrienks instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa https://twitter.com/sheisnotmelissa @meghanandmelisa https://www.instagram.com/meghanandmelisa Affordable Therapy By State (Curated by Crissy Milazzo): tinyurl.com/y64kwdnf Need Advice? dontblameme.show Domestic Listeners Call: [phone] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

hello happy monday oh yeah it's monday and it's time for another episode of don't blame me a wonderful podcast where me megan and melissa give you fantastic amazing life-changing advice is that your full name yeah megan and melissa you said me megan and melissa not us megan and melissa i but i also then detached myself because i did me comma megan comma and melissa okay who's the me there then like there's me and then there's the other version of me it's us there's only two of us did you see the um title i put for cnx tuesday this week or last week probably but let me see it would be current week for us but as far as recording that was beautiful this is us now colon a story of friendship but i just can't explain i'm gonna have to i'm gonna have to like

listen to that one again like i just can't explain how excited i am counting down the days obviously for your birthday but like can't believe that jayla is giving you the greatest gift of all i know later this week on friday you know what mouse came to me and he said can we watch the trailer again and i said of course we can i have now told people and showed people the trailer and everyone is just like what is this and that's the question and i keep telling months i'm like we don't need to watch any other content after this because like you're in the mood for action got it sci-fi she's got it thriller got it comedy got it romance got it steampunk got it it's all there it is and if you don't know what we're talking about go back to listen to see next

tuesday from last week which we also we actually had recorded a couple weeks ago but life happened and i didn't even realize i hadn't even put it up and that's fine and in the note of talking over each other if you are on patreon and there's any sort of uh freezing or glitching obviously the quality we record it in is not it's better when we like export it and you see it um but in the off chance things are a little laggy we are more long distance than normal melissa's in arkansas and so if anyone no uncertainty rumors like oh they're fighting if like we cut each other off or it's like sounds a little clankety or early pandemic vibes the wi-fi connection is just not as strong as it normally is but we make do and it's fine we make do how's how's the rain treat

me wet it is i can't even explain to you that you know we talk about how when it rains in la like last year it rained so fucking much no it didn't not compared to what we've been doing like holy fucking hell this shit is we've just like every couple hours moths goes down to the basement and like wet vacs it to get all the water up so it's been a lot and i went to go we were going to go pick up my meds on tuesday and it's like a drive like it's like a 40 minute drive each way and i was like i don't like i don't know if it's like it's still raining like i just don't think it and monster's like come on like especially if anyone's on adhd meds like you know like you don't you want to be able to go pick it up because if you don't pick it up they're going to give it to somebody

else and then you have the timeline to wait to get it again like it's just a hassle especially with the shortage like when they have my meds in stock like you gotta go get them and i'm like maybe i should just call and ask if they can hold it for a day like this is just i'm worried and we get on mox like it's fine we get on the freeway mox goes yeah give him a call like you're just driving through water and then once it's like not as deep of water it is just like an like a enough water that all you see is the kickback where all of the cars just look like they're surrounded by like flour and white dust because it's just like all this mist of water coming back up and you like can't see anything. And it's just such a shit show that you're like driving so slow and other

people aren't driving slow at all. And you're like, okay. And then we ended up going yesterday and I called and they were like, I was like, it's fine. They're like, it's fine. And I'm like, I'm sure everybody's doing this. And we go. And on yesterday when we went, we turned off like the exit and Matt's like, whoa, what is all this thing? I was like, oh yeah, all these roads were closed because of mudslides. Like they're still closed, like all of this stuff. So it's been pretty pretty wild and i guess it is the most rain we've gotten in a single i forget which day was the record but it was more than we've gotten tuesday maybe and it has like but it broke the record that was set in like 1920 or something so like last year wasn't even as bad yeah i was going

to leave last thursday i almost texted you being like i don't think that's a good call yeah and so i was watching of course i i'm afraid of flying so i was looking at the weather anyway and i was like i'm not gonna leave and i saw friday it wasn't gonna rain till much later in the day and i don't think it even ended up raining on friday and it was bright and sunny so beautiful barely anybody on the plane it felt like a pj uh it was great and it was so smooth too oh i slept the whole way i was like great this is beautiful and then it was raining here like after a couple hours it started pouring down for a couple days here but now it's sunny again but then it's supposed to snow on sunday but i got alerts i know like i've been outside the last

couple days no jacket on me and abriel have been playing and frolicking outside with the dogs and then it's supposed to it's still warm right now but it's supposed to be snowing on monday whatever but um i've been getting alerts on my phone from la of my power and internet being on and off all week and i'm like i don't think any of my food's gonna be good because it was no i wasn't gonna say that it's been off for long long periods of time like seven and eight hours so specifically your neighborhood has gotten the most of the power out and i was looking at that and i was like i'm just i'm sure she i don't guess anything to her but also i do think because there's always been a lot of flooding too but your house is up a little bit yeah yeah so you're

fine i've been looking at my ring and stuff it hasn't gotten high enough anyway no the next time we're going over in that area i'll drive by but you i think you're fine yeah it's not it hasn't even got up because you know my porch even is a little higher than the ground you've got like two layers and so it's perfectly fine yeah it has been um a wild a wild ride and i'm just so happy and i've always been thankful of this that even like last year when we had the flooding the reason why it was so bad last year is because we were out of town so like it was all that fucking standing water for a long time before we came back and we had stuff in there so like we didn't have any of the things in there and all that now but i just like i'm always reminded like that could be our

like living room like that could be like the official first floor of our home because it's not technically a basement it's garden level so like it's just like the first level and we've worked on better draining we like MacGyvered a bunch of like pipe like with like these tubes we put over some of the gutters and did all of this stuff and we built more sandbags so Mott's is doing most of it so I give him all of the kudos for that good job Mott's and hopefully it will be done soon yeah i was like yeah but actually i was like glad that i wasn't there because it would have been i would have just been sitting in black and coldness for no hours yeah you would have had like you would have to come here because ours only went off like once overnight

but you would have been not been able to work and i wouldn't have been able to drive my little car either so i don't know i saw someone in your little car driving and i was like get off the road sir like get out of there you're gonna start flowing you're a buoy you're you're a little you're a little boat right now you're a very cute little boat but like you're about to fucking set sail on the 405 jesus christ get out mayor karen bass said get off the roads if you don't need to be here when the mayor says stay at home i feel like people need to be staying at home factually agree and also i don't know why anyone would be out because i can't trust you that like everything's closed like it's open now because like we're done with the rain for it looks like for a while now

but everything was closed like you could go to the grocery store you go to like some of the big like chain fast casual stuff but like the bookstore closed all the other things closed pasadena was like don't come right like all of pasadena was like okay hope everybody's okay and everybody's things are okay wherever they are and if you hear someone in california or los angeles specifically complaining about the rain just understand that it's not that people here can't handle the rain it's our city can't handle the rain we don't have storm drains and we don't have any sort of like drainage on the streets it just pools there and also something about our asphalt is poured differently so it's like reduces tire friction and the heat it absorbs the heat more and so

it specifically then makes it when it's wet or raining so bad and impossible so that's why well what is this show this is a show where we give you wonderful amazing and life-changing advice and we do so by answering your voicemails as well as your voice memos and reading your messages so if you'd like to participate in an upcoming episode you can give us a call at 310-694-0976 or international listeners you can send us an audio message at meganpodcast at gmail.com we have all of this like listed in the show notes too as well if you don't catch what i'm saying so for the voice memo and phone call it is a voicemail so it just has to keep under three minutes. So we do request that you practice, time it out, write everything that you're going to say

down, read it out loud a couple times, make sure it's under that three-minute mark, include all the relevant information, like if you're aging over, have your parents' permission. But let us know your age, if it's about a relationship, how long you've been together, if there's some backstory drama that involves why we've gotten to this point of this predicament, include all of that stuff so we can give you the best possible advice with the best possible information and then we do ask that it is or we don't ask we require and it will all be anonymous so please use fake names for people and if you want to write in you can send it to our dms on instagram or you could also send it to the same email address meganpodcast.gmail.com and for that

keep it under 300 words but everything else applies just write it all down keep it anonymous let us know your ages and all relevant info and you can also always let us know if you are sensitive we will take that into account and you can also let us know if you're like give me the tough love i can handle it and if you have more time tell us who would play you in a movie and who would play the other people who would play you all right uh shall we get into an update let's do so hi megan and melissa this is an update from the episode titled trainer set me up on set me up with his brother-in-law from January 2023. I was asking for advice on how to tell my mom that my dad was cheating on her. I thought about your advice and really appreciated it, but there was just a part

of me that couldn't flat out say the words, mom, I know dad is cheating on you. Over the summer, while I was home from college, I would tell her things like, you deserve better, or I noticed the love I see my friend's parents have and it's not what you and dad share. I want you to experience that too. She would say thank you and that she felt the same way. Fast forward to the beginning of December when I received a text from my 13-year-old little sister which explained that she knew about the lady my dad was cheating on my mom with because she had seen him texting her too. I felt bad that I just longed to say something and I wish I could have prevented my sister from finding out this way. This was the final push it took me to talk to my mom. I took her advice and

waited for a moment when my sister wasn't around so my mom could react to this news however she needed to. I ended up telling her everything I knew and that both my sister and older brother knew as well. Side note, I asked both my siblings if I could talk about them in this conversation and they both agreed. My mom then told me she had had suspicions that something was going on just this August and that from then on they weren't sleeping in the same bed. She told me she knows she deserves better and that she wanted to have a family meeting with everyone to discuss all of this. She was super sad that we had all known for so long, but that she understood how hard it was to say anything. She said that her therapist was helping her work through all of

and she was confident everything was going to be okay. We had a meeting as a family where my dad sheepishly told us that he had made a huge mistake by cheating and that him and my mom were getting a separation agreement and that he was supposed to move out in a couple of weeks. My brother and I both got pretty upset at the fact that our dad got the easy way out by just telling us this information and basically leaving after we had known everything for so long.

This conversation was on December 28th and he has not tried to have a conversation with any of us about it since. Now that I know my mom and sister are safe, I feel much better and I've decided to go no contact with my dad. Now I am back at school and in therapy and in the process of grieving the dad I once had and the fact that my family won't ever be the same. I want to say thank you for the advice you gave me. It helps so much, even if it took me for a while to go through with it. Thanks again. And I love your podcast so much. I'm so sorry that you're going through this, but I'm glad that everything's out on the table now and that your mom knows that was the most

difficult part. I think at least everyone knows the information and they're doing with it what they need to do with it. Yeah. And I'm glad that despite you being like, I wish I could have prevented X, Y, and Z or whatever, that like everybody from what you're saying, everybody seems like really understanding that no one really knew what to do in this situation, in this circumstance and that you know the issue here lies in your dad and he put you all in a bad he put everyone who knew in a really bad position and how you respond to being in that position i don't think says much i don't think that's like a something that we should be uh or anybody else should be looking at as something that that's the fault that's the issue that's the issue here

like everyone it seems like everyone knows that the crux of this is is him and that you shouldn't feel guilty about how the timeline of it all because there's no like playbook for this but yeah it's difficult and it's hard when um you're the kid and you can acknowledge that like the adult in your life is the one who's like being a coward about that yeah without acknowledging all the shit that they're putting you through in regards to like what they put someone else through so i'm i'm sorry it's there's i i think we all knew like not we all knew but like you caller knew that this wasn't this is going to end at some in some way and it sucks but i'm glad that you're ready to like make the decision to go no contact with your dad and i hope that helps

yeah yeah all right well we're going to take a break and when we get back we'll get into the calls and write-ins and we are back it's time for the rest of the calls hey megan and melissa i need some advice for a situation with a very close friend. We both use she her pronouns are 22 and in our last semester of college. About two weeks ago my friend and I got white girl wasted and she let it slip that she thinks I tend to flirt with everyone regardless if she's into them or not. I'm aware that I have a flirty personality but I never have consciously flirted with anyone she's even mentioned she thinks is cute. I do have memory problems due to past trauma so I could be forgetting

certain things. However, the situations she's brought up, I do remember. These are things such as, I'll give them the eyes or I'll stand too close to them. All these situations have occurred at the bar where it's loud and I have an auditory processing disorder, so I do stand a bit close to people in loud situations. As for the eye thing, she even claims I've given her the eyes, which makes me laugh because I honestly don't even know what I'm doing with my eyes. I don't want it to seem like I'm making excuses just to be clear. I'm trying to give her side as well as mine. She says me being nice is just really easily seen as flirting and that I have big eyes and I'm short, so I have to look through my lashes to make eye contact. Regardless of my intentions, my actions are causing her to feel hurt, and her feelings are valid and very important to me.

When we discuss it, I start crying because I hate that I've hurt her, and then I keep crying from anger that I'm crying, which is very counterproductive when we're trying to resolve this. Not sure what to do because in my eyes, I'm just being nice. I've asked other friends their opinions and they all said that I'm fine and I don't act any different. Normally, I'd say go easy on me. However, for this situation, if I need tough love,

please give it to me. This friend is worth hearing uncomfortable things for. Thank you so much. I love the pod. Also, I am in the car, but I'm parked. The car's turned off,

but if you hear cars in the background, that's why. Thank you so much. Bye. You're great at following directions. Thank you for being, yeah, in a car, but I couldn't tell.

I couldn't tell. No, I want to know if you're a neurodivergent or have ADHD because that sounds like you're like, dude, I'm following all of the rules and I'm communicating so that you know that, which is something that I very much do. I need to know the rules. Well, I have to keep in mind that you said

this is a friend that is worth putting this work into for because this is truly the silliest, goofiest thing I have ever heard. And what I think has happened is someone she has a crush on told her that they're not interested in her and they have a crush on you. and she's trying to blame you for the like and that you caused this yeah like you're not the

problem here it's her and i know you said um for us to go easy on you you don't need that because you are didn't do anything wrong um if you hadn't told us that this was a friend that was worth fighting for i would be going hard on them but since you want to maintain this friendship like if other friends are saying it's not a problem if other friends think you're fine it seems like she has a problem with you or she's jealous of you but also she thinks that you're in love with her too yeah so like i would get down to the root of why she feels like that you are flirting with everyone including her when no one else can see that does she secretly have a crush on you and she's fighting back in a different like trying to deflect and you rejected her in

some way and she's like well you just flirt with everybody so it's whatever and you gave me mixed signals no like maybe have the conversation with other friends with her like as a group have a conversation if you want to maintain the friendship because then they can hear then your friend can hear this friend you wrote in can hear how no one else thinks that this is a problem yeah and i also wonder it doesn't sound like she's saying it in the moment it's afterwards and i i don't think that's fair like you if i'm doing something subconsciously you have to call it out in the moment because it is so it's so nothing to me that i'm not going to remember what you're talking about but like if it's this big thing of like oh you did this and this is the issue i would be like

okay, can you let me know in the moment when that happens? And I would make sure that you hang out with her when you're hanging out with other friends as well. So she has to call it out again in front of those other people. But yeah, I would also just ask, I wouldn't ask her, I'm going to ask you to ask yourself, what is your history and track record with dating and crushes and what is hers? Because she might feel that she is in competition with you, that you have no idea you've even participated in this competition, that she feels like she's losing and that you are beating her intentionally out in. So I think like if for her, it feels like maybe you have like had a lot of relationships or had had a couple of serious relationships and

she hasn't, she might view every potential suitor, even if it's not someone that she has a crush on as she has dibs on all of them, because you've already, you've had, you've had the boyfriend, you've had the relationship you've had the girlfriend or whatever it is you've had you've had the relationship there that she doesn't feel like she's had yet and so it feels like oh well just because I don't like them now doesn't mean that like you're you're what if I could like them later like you're issuing claim on everything and that can happen for some people who maybe have not felt like maybe don't have like the most dating experience and thinking that that's how you kind of keep your feelers out when when it's not but i would also ask you like is she nice

because part of the thing that she said about you is that like you're too nice to everyone like and you're nice to everyone as if that's like a bad thing like is this kind of like the bitchy friend and i don't mean that in a negative way but like is she more i don't know like is she only like nice to the person that she has a crush on like is she kind of more of like someone who like negs people or does she ignore everyone else except the people she has crushes on like what is that vibe because i do think that the calling out that you're being too nice to me sounds like it just comes from a place of insecurity and some people who are really insecure about their experience of dating or their game or any of that kind of stuff um can get really

really angry at other women and think it's other women that that's a fault there but it's other women who are backstabbing her and that's why this isn't working out when in a lot of that can be coming from the place that that person isn't being nice and kind to other people and it doesn't mean that the people that they want to date or whatever but it's like if you're in a group hang out and you're being a bitch to your friends and you're trying to like woo this guy or this girl like it's not really an attractive quality there to kind of just like turn on everybody else so yeah and even the thing about being like well i'm short and i have big eyes like she sounds like she just sounds like really jealous and i i do think my gut instinct is right that i think she

probably has a crush on someone who she told or but maybe didn't even tell them but they they might have confided in her that they like you and it could also be like that's not the first time like it might be that she's had a couple of the people who she's liked who have told who have asked like hey can i get your friend's number hey can i do this or this or this and instead of being like these guys suck she's putting that blame on you and i don't know i i think like i can be like a flirtatious person sometimes but like similar with everybody like i can like i and i don't even want to say like flirtatious like i know how to turn on like the charm if i'm like performing or whatever and like you can kind of do that if you're in a loud bar

you're having fun like if you're if you're an outgoing person you tend to kind of you feed off of the energy of talking to other people and like being social and all of that so that can become more not inauthentic but it can become more of like a heightened performance style of like hanging out with people and if she doesn't like that then you guys like don't have to hang out in these instances but i don't you're not doing anything wrong correct she just sounds like so jealous looking through your eye your eyelashes that's such like a book thing yeah and it's like okay what do you want me to look through instead my titties like how much what am i supposed to look through but i i just think that like at this point i would be like hey i talked to other people and

like no one else is seeing what you're seeing so if you want to like go to the bar and we'll go with all of our friends like you can call it out in the moment um if you're not comfortable doing that like i think that if the location that we're doing this is all these things you've said happen in a bar like maybe we're not friends who go to the bar together but it's not your responsibility to make her less jealous all right the next one is a write-in hi megan and melissa i am 39 she her and have been living abroad for four years now i'm going back home for two weeks to see my boyfriend very soon this is the first time i will introduce him to my dad and his side of the family a few days ago my uncle texted me saying that during my time back home he would like to have

a quote-unquote discreet conversation with me about my dad my dad has been an alcoholic ever since I can remember, and I'm 99% sure that this is what he wants to talk to me about. I've done a lot of work in therapy ever since I left home due to my abandonment issues and constant feelings of guilt for leaving home. My mom divorced my dad years ago, and my brother also left seven years ago and has not seen him again. So I always felt like I was the only one left to take care of him. I grew up feeling like he was my responsibility, but now I know that that was not my role as a daughter and that all the adults around me failed to protect me and my brother back then. Am I wrong for not answering my uncle's text and for not wanting to talk to

him about my dad's drinking problems. I get very emotional about this issue and honestly don't want to get into that during my trip. I just want to enjoy my time back home with my boyfriend. Any advice on how to address this gently with my uncle would be greatly appreciated. Love the podcast. Thank you. I hate those kinds of texts of ominous of those things there. So I'm really sorry you even had to get that because that's a stressful thing. I mean, my instinct reaction is is to respond and just to say, hey, I appreciate you reaching out. I've done a lot of work in therapy.

I'm not interested in having this conversation, whether that's in person or over the phone during, before, or after this trip. I'll let you know if that changes. But I'm really just looking forward to having a nice trip, visiting, showing my boyfriend my hometown and all of that.

And I would just urge you to reach out to any local services or those things. but I'm moving forward. This is not something that I'm participating in. Yeah, I would make sure that is what your uncle wants to talk to you about first, because you are assuming it probably is what he wants to talk to you about,

but it also might be something else. So I would first talk to your uncle and just see what it's about and then take Megan's advice and do exactly what Megan said with that, because you don't know. It could be anything. It could not be specifically about your dad.

could be about somebody else in the family but um still take the call see what it's about and then once you have the information share what megan just shared yeah and i would just you know make sure you're on the same page with your boyfriend when you go home just so he knows too so if he your uncle tries to make hey can i talk to you for a second like your boyfriend can also act as a buffer there to being like oh do you need something like i'll like i'll come with all let me let me go with you what do you need like in that in that kind of um stuff that you know when you're in a partnership with someone that's a it's a role that you play and like i do that for months mom says that for me like you act as offense for other things that come along and

that is not like a burden or putting a large responsibility on your boyfriend at all so i would make sure that you know he knows he knows that as well and i don't know how much you've told your boyfriend about this. But if you have not told your boyfriend about your dad's drinking issues, I would make sure that you do that as well before. And yeah, that you plan your trip accordingly of what you want to see, what you want to do, who you want to be with. And you don't have an obligation to spend any time or a certain amount of time with any one person there. Because it can be easy to kind of slip back into those roles or have people expect you to slip back into those roles. So standing firm in your boundaries, but I always think it's much, much better to

communicate your boundaries, I think, over text before the event happens. All right. But I hope your trip goes well. All right. We're going to take a break. When we get back, we'll get into two Don't Blame Them's. Your playlist might get you through the workday, but have you ever wondered how your ancestors spent theirs? What work helped them build a life? How did they adapt as the world around them changed. With Ancestry, you can search select historical occupational records for free for a limited time and discover the stories

behind the jobs in your family tree. You've got questions. We've got ancestors. Search free until August 31st. Visit ancestry.ca for details. Terms apply. we're back all right here we go now it's time for don't blame them don't blame them is when y'all write in and share either your experience or your thoughts on a previous call that someone

has wrote in or left a voicemail asking for advice hi megan and melissa i'm a long-time listener first-time caller i'm calling in response to the written message about co-workers having inappropriate conversations regarding weight and dieting on the don't blame me finger licking gross episode as a 23 year old girl also starting her first office job i have experienced this constantly the talk of skipping meals unhealthy dieting and buying a literal back alley ozempic is absurd and just a part of the day-to-day conversations at my office. It doesn't help that I've always been a heavier, curvy girl and I'm the only Gen Z in the office. It's crazy how different the beauty standards are between me

and my coworkers. While I'm all about embracing the female form in all shapes and sizes and health and the body is a vessel to get you through life and it changes as you get older, but it's such a blessing to grow older. These women are stuck in the early 2000s tabloid age of trying outrageous things to lose weight and calling every single woman fat. Literally no one's safe.

The lack of awareness of these women when I'm considerably larger than all of them to be talking about how they wish we didn't have to come to work in person because no one should see them, how fat they are right now, and just all these crazy things. Or sometimes we'll get office catered lunch and everyone will skip it. And meanwhile, I'm over here not getting paid enough. We'll take whatever free meal I can get. And I just don't want to feel guilty about it all the time. Anyways, luckily, I guess it's good that they've mainly internalized

this and stuck to making comments on their own bodies. Sometimes they're friends' bodies, but they stray away from commenting on people in the office. Since people in your office are making comments about others' clothing, like telling you your shirt was slimming, making you uncomfortable, I really wouldn't hesitate to go bring it up with HR. You don't have to say any specific names. You can just talk about the general office culture, how it makes you uncomfortable. And, you know, it can turn into something much different than someone getting in trouble

or like a lecture. hr girlies are here to help you i've learned you spend way too much time at work each week to feel uncomfortable i know like where i'm at being the new hire or being the youngest it's not always an easy conversation to have but whenever they say something that makes you uncomfortable i really hope this situation improves for you and i'm so happy that you grew up in such a good household where you feel confident about your own body but honestly your work environment sounds pretty toxic and I would save somebody else the trouble of coming into that sort of environment. I definitely agree with everything Megan and Melissa said as well.

I just wanted to bring this alternative up in case you do feel uncomfortable talking to them directly. You should just know that the second I heard this voice to the person who called in, I immediately was like, I know this voice. Who was? I know this voice immediately. I could hear your smile and you have such a beautiful smile and i was like i can hear it in my ears wow well great i thank you for that that i think that is i think that's great and i mean i don't work in a company um so the hr thing is like such a foreign concept to me and i i do hope that like we've heard so many horror stories that like hr is not your friend and there are like ways to like you know things that you should not say to hr and things to go about and like you know do all of

your own things there but if and i hope that's changing and it sounds like that's not how your workplace environment is and so i hope more people there are certain things that hr should be able to take a a handle on yeah yeah because this isn't something against the company um this is something against individuals so i think that this is something that hr can handle without it being a company thing where they have to tiptoe around other feelings and money oh yeah well and i also think that like specifically with this commenting on other people's bodies in a workplace environment is not only like inappropriate in like social etiquette or body shame whatever that is but it is like incredibly close to being like workplace sexual harassment because commenting

on someone's body when it's looking very good what does good mean in that sense there and then even if people are saying things and there's not a sexual connotation there if that's okay other people might feel more comfortable to say the same things about someone's body but the the root cause of why they're saying it is a of a sexual nature and in general commenting on people's bodies in the workplace is an abuse of power and it's just not appropriate so i do think that hr would put a squash to that not that you need anything to lead into workplace harassment because it does it already fucking exists but that that is something that would be they put a stop to uh expeditiously right so very good call thank you for giving that insight thank you very

much oh no we have a second one hi i'm calling for a don't blame them for the episode leaking fingers gross in regards to the girl who can't pass her test in italy first i agree with megan melissa and you need to talk with your professors second she mentioned she wasn't able to learn italian and spanish at the same time and i would love to know how long she tried learning italian before giving up for context i'm a polyglot as a kid i learned italian and portuguese alongside English because those are my parents' native languages. And later on, I went to a really strict and extra hard level with international school. And at one point, I learned French alongside Spanish. In my personal experience, the first moments of learning a language with

the same base as one you already know can be quite difficult. I remember that when I first started learning French, my brain would automatically switch to Italian because a word sounded or was written similarly to the Italian counterpart. And because I had a higher proficiency in Italian, my brain would switch. And sometimes it would be difficult to go back and concentrate on the French. As I got better at French, this switch stopped happening. And in the grand scheme of things, I found that knowing other Latin-based languages really helped me with the French and Spanish because I was already acquainted to a lot of the sounds and rules of this language. You already live in Italy and when you are immersed in the culture,

it is a lot easier to learn and get good at it. That's always one of my number one tips, actually. When I started with learning a new language, I immersed myself in it. I watched TV shows, I listen to a lot of music in the language. I read a lot of articles in the language. I really try to immerse myself. I also find helpful to have an easy-to-reach goal. I usually would pick one song and set a goal to be able to understand the lyrics

without the help of Google Translate. Hope this helps and you pass your exam. And please go talk to your professor. Wishing you all the best. I love this person because they speak at a speed and in a cadence that it tickles my brain. i don't even have to take notes it was too fast for me and the caller also took a long break in between i was like thank you for pausing for a second uh but yeah great advice i i think i said

something similarly about how because i knew spanish it was easier for me to pick up on it on italian while i was in italy yeah so immerse yourself in the language but also i know that taking a test is different than speaking the actual language because you need to know certain rules and conjugations and stuff like that so the biggest thing that i said was to talk to your professor so agree yeah i think it's also helpful even selfishly to hear that that switch that you do to like automatically go to the other language eventually passes because i have like restarted duolingo so many times and my issue is is like i i can understand spanish better than i can speak it but anytime i was like oh let me like look into like i've had to do auditions where i've had to

like just say a couple of words in french like i went to france i went to paris and i like was trying to like come up like figure out a couple of like phrases and like easy things to do and my brain would just make it in spanish like i would i would read the words and they would and i would say them and they would come out with a spanish accent and it would come out the sounds the vowels and the constants were making were how you would do it in spanish not french and so it wasn't even like you could understand it in french even though it was technically french so to know that like eventually that switch stops happening and it like creates another pocket in your brain for no that's this other language makes me think that maybe i'll maybe i'll restart my babble experience

i mean not babble maybe i'll restart my duolingo experience but i'll say babble if babble wants to sponsor us either one duolingo i have beef with duolingo did you see duolingo's recent do you comment to someone they're always commenting so you're gonna need to be a bit more specific the uk commented on something like a uk united kingdom tiktok account blue check mark said i deleted duolingo and duolingo responded learning languages is good for you colonizer damn i was like is this on your personal phone like i'm like is this on the company phone or your personal phone because i just have to say that like if it was on my personal phone the temptation that i would have to respond to everything as duolingo because being shamed

by duolingo like you're gonna make headlines facts this is my beef that i have and i think i might have mentioned it before on this podcast but for some reason it recently i i made this comment months ago they made a thread i don't know what you say a three a thread post oh threads i was listening to trixie and katya and katya was like what's that new thing spool and they were like no not spools so duolingo had uh posted a picture of big bird and it said smash your pass and this was 30 weeks ago and i said big bird is a child and then posted a picture of olivia benson from svu and for some reason right and for some reason uh it's this was weeks ago and now

more people have been liking it this week so i don't know if dueling goes back in the in the mainstream after that colonizer comment went viral that's disgusting yes big birds are literally like six but also the creature the the there are certain characters animated animal or not that are sexual beings yes you know the robin hood fox uh uh and specifically sesame street is not they're not a single one of them are not a single one of them are are sexual creatures get out of here you nasty right ew okay duolingo we've got beef again leave big bird alone as someone who's been called big bird leave me alone huh all right well we hope you all enjoyed this episode and if you did you can always leave us

a review on the podcast app as well as spotify tell us how much you appreciate the podcast and if you do appreciate the podcast you join our patreon we would love to have you do you want to play monopoly go with us join the patreon you can play monopoly go with us right now melissa is off limits in terms of shutting down landmarks unfortunately we cannot prevent a bank heist but you know we've got a set of rules we're trading stickers i've hit a wall with some of my stickers that i'm trying to get um so join yeah but you know if you hold on to them for a while then you can like trade them in with the with monopoly and they'll give you some and honestly so i've done that twice and the 100 the one i did for the 100 stickers i got one that i needed or i think maybe

only one that i needed and the next one i did for 250 didn't get a single fucking one i need i've gotten like a lot that i've needed the two that i've done that's odd did you do it with which one's the 200 yeah the second not the fifth the third okay well keep saving so join us we have a great time there it's very fun and you can also participate in our live streams we do twice a month and it's a jolly grand old good time there are always new people in there so don't feel weird if you are brand new and you can make lots of friends everybody's friends with each other they're everyone's great everyone's fun we got to meet nicole as a roommate recently and i was like i recognize you from the screenshots when nicole's like does anyone

have these stickers and that's who you're facetiming in the background i'm like i know this face so get to know people it's a great way to make friends especially we had someone who recently joined who is like in a new city and is you know trying to like meet new people but was like i need to get settled and socialize so it's a great way to do all of that and we love everybody everyone's great it's the only socialization i get all right well there won't be a noob but am i wrong because i'm dealing with family stuff here but there'll be a see you next tuesday so listen tomorrow if anybody has any witch powers or any other kinds of powers to ensure that melissa either a wins the lottery so if that legal ways which ways are legal and or

everything good happens in her life it's not like i'm not like having like money issues but money would solve a lot of problems well and also like it would just be like the the chance of winning the lottery is like so slim that i think at certain points when you've been dealt like hand after hand that you go seriously this like what are the what are the odds i think at that point you deserve to win you need good odds then you deserve to win the lottery so help help her out okay everybody so positive vibes money witch spells charms all of those things and uh we'll see you next time bye Don't Blame Me is a production by me, Megan Rinks.

And me, Melissa D. Montz, plus Diamond Imprint Productions. Post-production sound and editing by Coco Lorenz. Production assistance by Melanie D. Watson. And music by Giacomo Picasso and Ryan Hunter.