Don't Blame Me! - He Shushed Me

Episode Date: December 8, 2025

In this week's episode, Meghan and Melisa give advice to a listener struggling to get over fear in the workplace . Then, they settle a sticky listener debate about dealing with a manbaby. They also share an update from a listener who is learning to cope and do things alone, following her husband's death. In personal news, Meghan and Melisa discuss their initial thoughts on seeing the movie musical Wicked: For Good (with more detailed discussion coming Thursday on But Am I Watching!). Melisa recounts her experience seeing Jimmy Kimmel Live with her mother and also getting stuck in an elevator! Finally, Meghan saw Home Alone for the very first time. Join our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/dontblameme Subscribe to But Am I Watching? Apple  Spotify Subscribe to Don’t Blame Me! Apple Spotify Call In for DBM - 310-694-0976 (3 minutes or less) Write In for DBM - [e-mail] (300 words or less) DBM Submission Form Buy Our Merch https://crowdmade.com/collections/sister-sign Follow Us! instagram.com/meghanandmelisa @meghanrienks instagram.com/meghanrienks https://twitter.com/meghanrienks @sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/sheisnotmelissa instagram.com/diamondmprint.productions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

welcome everybody we are back from our our short hiatus yes our fall break our fall break exactly did you know that la uh unified school district had the entire thanksgiving week off like those kids didn't go to school from i think it's like the norm now like nationwide i'm sorry those poor parents and the people who are hosting thanksgiving what do you mean all of your kids are home as you're having to do thanksgiving shopping as you're having to make like that is so cruel we saw our neighbor who has four kids and she was walking them in my i didn't know about this thing but matzah brought it up because he had heard because our nephew was off school and he brought the mom when she was with one of her kids and she's like uh-huh yep no they are all off school

right now yep i saw a lot of parents complaining about it online so i figured that this is when i said a national thing now that's all i was basing it on that uh california was off arkansas was off and then i saw other people complaining about it so i think it's the norm now yeah i think it's got to be new it's got to be like they used to have one like depending on what school the kid went to they would be home for like a couple extra days but like now it's like no no every single week every single in the school district yeah because we just got wednesday thursday and friday on yeah but i but also a lot of people would just be out of town so it might be that too where they were like people are gone might as well just cancel it for everybody yeah and

it's easier for the teachers too i think oh if it's easier for the teachers then i subscribe to it whatever makes it easier for the teachers like i were i'm always like oh how are the parents handling it i'm sorry teachers are before parents in this case for me teachers if they like it i love it me too so welcome back teachers let us know do you like it if so we're loving it so um this is don't blame me a call and advice plus current event show where i'm melissa diamond months that's megan rinks we just like to talk and talk and talk and talk and we're really good at it and we haven't talked that much i know this break a lot has happened a lot has a lot has in fact happened i was i was on aunt duty almost the entire time and i was on mom duty yeah like

over my mom how was the trip it was good as it always goes she's like i'm on vacation time and I'm like I have to work and she doesn't quite understand that even though when I go home she's always working she's the busiest woman of all time she doesn't it's not like she's taking off while I'm there so I don't know why maybe because this is like Los Angeles is a vacation city as Fayetteville Arkansas is not but yeah but we we did a lot of fun things like going to jimmy kimmel who she absolutely loves absolutely loves when you get to the reveal of like reading the text message of being like i'm taking my mom to jimmy kimmel i was like oh my god perfect she loves jimmy i was like this is lovely this is gonna be so great and within the same text message

like the excitement to good god whiplash was um i i i did choke on what i was eating at the time and had to sit up because i was like i actually wasn't prepared for this kind of storyline reveal yeah so um my cousin works for the audience that does jimmy kimmel so you know we don't have to get there five hours earlier however early these people other people have to get there we just walk in and um we were sitting next to the head of abc night time whatever it's called she was cool her my mom were chatting up i was like i need you to be a little bit more chatty so i can get to abc daytime but the lady bolted out of there as soon as the show was over damn and as i was looking at the guests for that day enemy of the pod honestly possibly the original enemy of the podcast

enemy of podcasting yeah uh dax shepherd was there which i was looking at our spotify um what the listeners of our show the number one show that they also listen to you guys please tell me it's a hate listen or please tell me you're just there for monica because that to me is is the only is the only way you can stomach through that yeah so he's our number one call our daddy is number five so and i think too hot takes is number two okay so you know what the thing is it is their shows are in the realm of what we without a doubt i could understand how you're entertained by all of them i do hope that you view us with more of like a i could be friends with these people not if the purge is coming these people are very quick like very very high at the

top of my list like i hope you view us in a different you favor us in a different way yes uh So, yeah, it was Dax Shepard and Kristen Bell. And I said, why? Why are they going to discuss that Instagram photo? Because this would have been the perfect time to discuss it. Is this going to be to discuss, you know, that they have that Fox News has stolen work that she did several years ago and now is publishing the Bible miniseries, which is not really a miniseries. They're just reading the Bible. Also, in my mind, tell me if I'm wrong.

I don't, isn't the Bible by nature not many? What do you mean? Like, isn't it like a, isn't it like lengthy? Yes, it's very long. Okay. So I think that's why. A mini series just feels like a bad way to. Yeah, maybe like an epic journey.

Yeah, because I'm like, how many, how long, if it's a mini series, how goddamn long are each, is each segment if you're saying it's mini? Because I'm like, guys, I'm thinking it's a long, a long book. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. so you know jimmy kimmel being who he is especially being hated by trump i would think that this would be the op time to discuss these two things but no they're there discussing a movie that they had that came that they did like 12 years ago if there's one thing about that couple and like i don't speak ill on her i have no issue with her i feel i feel bad for her like i I truly do and like he it's the same thing that I felt about like listening to Anna Faris's podcast

like immediately that is what made me hate Chris Pratt it made me be like oh my god like you deserve so much better that's how I felt about as soon as I listened to Dax Shepard's podcast I was like oh my god Chris no no get out of there but like that is like their they I think they I don't even know if they've ever someone has said it like I if I have a memory of it being on record somewhere that like they are the people who like you call if a guest backs out because like they will go on any late night talk show whenever and like versus a lot of other celebrities and actors are like if i something promote i'll go but like i'm not just gonna go to like perf like just to like perform and like be fun because they're not comedians right it's like if you're a stand-up

comedian i get that like being on call because you're constantly pitching a you're like pitching new bits but you're also like trying to get more fans who only need to be fans of you and like your projects are what you create but like for them they are on like the amount of times like she's been on ellen promoting nothing the amount of times that he has like they both just do that kind of stuff but this to me timing wise i would have actually picked maybe if your whole thing is that you always do late night shows whenever they have a guest drop out if you're not going to talk about why you are both like actively in the news right now maybe don't go right and like they had been on the list for at least a week i feel like because it was the day before thanksgiving it was

just that they were here here yeah and they were willing to go on if you care i implore you to go look at it and i'll leave it there wait i'm gonna watch it but um there was a plus so senator mark kelly was there which that actually was good to see yeah because he was there talking about how trump said to execute him and other members of congress um but he was great he's very he's a petite man i didn't think he was that little really yeah he doesn't look petite he doesn't look petite at all he's got the opposite of glenn powell syndrome who looks petite but is not nearly as petite as he looks oh and so he was um great like he was very inspirational you can tell that he's doing what needs to be done he's very charismatic which of course i mean the man

was an astronaut he's a senator like oh yeah i forgot about the astronaut part yeah he was he was in the military i forget which marines i also forget that like you can't actually be an astronaut for that long so it's kind of like a ballerina where like you will have a full career after that or you work in like just the science division and so going up to space yeah but like they don't let you do that i mean all of its science division sorry you were a more office job than actually going to space two feet on the ground you are you are dealing with the gravity we have here on earth yes do you like space movies yeah are you gonna see hail mary no clue what that is wonderful we got it is i'm i'm like looking forward to it more than it's probably like my

second biggest movie i've been looking forward to besides roof man it might even be my number one at this point because you're just saying words now i know what is roof man roof man is it's like based on a true story but it's channing tatum in a little indie flick with uh kirsten kirsten which is my what you're talking about red and goddamn fucking butter give me a three million dollar budget with an indie studio and give me a leading man when you put him in an indie movie i'm like i'm fucking here for it give me a limited wardrobe budget give me one singular set i love it and uh he's it's about a guy who like is living in a um store great yeah i'm excited but hail mary is ryan ryan gosling um do you ever see that lady on tiktok who impersonates her

german mother who's obsessed with ryan gosling no mox is obsessed with this moment like we watch it all the time we just go ryan gosling he's in that where he basically plays i think like a high school science teacher or something and it's like of course the earth and the rest of the galaxy are in peril and like we we must we must explore outer space as like our last option like we have to figure out this thing and we need someone to whatever and i don't know because the trailer you'd actually like the trailer doesn't reveal everything um so i'm not entirely sure why he's the one being picked but all we know is he's also wondering why the fuck are you asking me to do it like but he must have a certain skill set that like they don't have um but he's literally a

teacher and they it's called hail mary because it's like this is our last hope and they like just send him to space and he was like i i can't go to space like what do you mean i have like responsibilities like i've never been to space before but it looks good like it looks like a looks like a ryan like a ryan gosling film like kind of funny but also dark but also just like good i think you'll like it okay um we also saw wicked which we'll talk about in the next episode but when we left we got stuck in the elevator i wonder if i got that notification on citizen because for some reason not because i would have been the person to report it okay well no matter what i don't think anybody in that elevator was reporting things to

citizen no matter the location citizen does send me the push notifications because they do think i would like to know if people are stuck in an elevator yeah we didn't call the cops so probably not how long were you stuck like 10-15 minutes it was scary and it was it we weren't over the weight limit but it was a full elevator so we couldn't even sit down if we wanted to it was seven people in this elevator and westwood all all women one man and the man happened to be the one closest to the call button as soon as it stopped and it wouldn't open i said press the button to get the people to come they go let's go it's that serious the elevator stops between floors we haven't we moved maybe an inch there's no way we can like get out no they won't

know that we're stuck that there are people stuck in the elevator unless you tell them the people on the other side did know because it didn't go all the way down and i guess it made like a chime noise but i was still like the people that work for the elevator company need to know then the woman that was with him starts to try to pry the doors open hold the fuck up this is at the point where i go citizens i need to start carrying zip ties with me citizens zip tying you right now so this is what went through my mind my uncle vietnam vet taught me how to put people in a sleep hold so i was already picking out what order i was going in damn my dad never taught me that so she's and i'm like stop you can jam the door please don't do

that finally after a few minutes of even the people on the other side of the door are trying to open it from their side which that's actually fine i'm like okay fine they can't get it open they can't it's thanksgiving so they can't there's not a lot there's not people in the building and the thing is the building is not attached to where the movie theater is because they're two different sections where the um parking garage is so the people in the movie theater can't do anything about it and the people that are in the office there's nobody there so i'm again i say call and they're like fine fine excuse me we have no other alternative right so he finally hits the button the lady's like can you hold down like if you hold down the button it still should be able

to like open it and move if not then like hold tight i have to get emergency it wouldn't do that that lady's still trying to pry the doors open and she goes ma'am please don't do that you can jam what did i already say what did i already say so then she the lady on the operator she was able to notify the people in the building and then they were able to do something because there's like a key thing that should have been in the elevator that was not there so he was able to do it and he like as soon as it opened he was like get off like hurry up get off and then we hear him as were walking away saying we no longer have a contract with you why are you the one that's answering so who was your contract with and why is it not connected to the emergency people

well good samaritan who was like hey not even getting paid for this but let me help these people out but i think there's obviously some paperwork messed up so they must have still been under somebody's contract what yeah how old are these people who are futzing with this like late 40s oh oh i would get because also you have no leverage and like my i don't think i'm making this up but my dad got his his hand like stuck in an elevator and like broke his finger or something like that like and like that was i mean that was he's old so probably an old school elevator like in general the whole thing is is that like you have leverage when you are on the when you're not within the elevator on you're on the outside you actually you have the leverage to pull from

the inside you do not you are at the mercy of like the the technology and like the mechanics of it not like the sheer manpower of something like that like you can't override that i would have gotten i would have snapped i would have snapped i had to keep my composure because it was such a small place oh yeah that's seven people that's insane yeah yeah and also like i have i would have to sit down i can't stand in one place at that point yeah and there's no room oh my god was this before or after you saw this after you saw it was after oh my god yeah yeah yeah but before we were going to dinner so it would still would have been fine but um also while we were eating all they were playing was music from wicked i said this is not dinner music no and

it's also just not music you just play the whole time no they usually play christmas music but also like i was we had a dance party with my niece and nephew and i went to go put on wicked um and tell me why there is no version of dancing through life that is not nine and a half minutes long because it has all the dialogue included you're like this is not no that's what people were saying that i think it was defined gravity the number one listened version of it is from glee because it doesn't have the dialogue in it yeah like that's not something you put on as like ambience because you're like who's talking right you're like oh sorry that's a whole scene that they just have in the middle of this of this song and you know when they recorded the audio they weren't

just talking they added it later we don't want that i think if i want to see it i will watch the movie well i want two versions like i want like i like the i like the version with like the the staged version where you you know you have like the scene in it i like that's a great option you should the point of the movie is that you're making a soundtrack that's not a cast recording so it can remove the talking but um did you see lisa rena i did not and i was thinking about that how i didn't see my usual thanksgiving buddy damn hope she had a good one i hope she did too maybe she went we went a little bit later than we did last year so maybe she went to the earlier one do you think that's what she saw i feel like she has to because she saw it last year

i can't wait to talk about it me too i saw it last night yeah and i'm debating if i should join one of those movie clubs where you pay like an annual fee i think it sounds it's amc stubs i thought they were amca list you're correct amc stubs is the one where you just get like discounts off the food yeah so they have one for amc they have one for regal they have one for landmark they have one for a couple of other ones but i would have to pick a theater or a theater franchise that has more reclined seats because i can't i have to do a reclined but i'm like maybe this is worth it because the one we went to last night they're advertising it was on sale for a hundred dollars a month a year and i was like a hundred dollars what what's the

catch because to me that's like too that pays for itself too quickly huh well part of the reason is that we wouldn't order food there uh because they do have rats so and here's the thing everywhere has rats but if i know that they have rats yeah i'm not eating okay um i've seen a lot of restaurants recently get shut down for vermin like more than usual yeah and that's i do wonder if it's more than usual that are experiencing the the rat or if it's more than usual that are getting shut down for it because i was like this because i was like this doesn't feel like there our city is overrun by rats it feels like someone may have um gotten a promotion who's got a keener eye and i'm glad yeah i'm glad but now i am second guessing a lot of other things yeah

um ipic does they redid the seats and now they're like little pods more like two person yeah and you can't like see you really can't see anybody else and they're even more comfortable and like the headrest goes up and down too oh and you have individual yeah you have individual i mean you're not going to be paying you're not going to be paying the price that you want to pay No, but if I don't have to watch, I had to watch last night, someone put their phone. It was only like, what? There's two, two people in front of us, Mats and I, and then three people behind us. That was it in the whole theater.

And someone in front of us put like their phone in their purse and it was like hidden, except it was like, I could kind of see it. And it had the alarm that was going off. That's just a light or like, not, not the alarm, the text message notification. That's like the light that shows or whatever. and they like reached over a couple times like when their bag shifted and they were able to see it going off but no matter what i kept seeing the light flash and i thought i was crazy for a while and i thought it was like a reflection of like the screen on like one of the tables or whatever

and i was like no this is what's happening but if i was in a pod i wouldn't see it yeah you're in a pod they also have a little lamp thing just for you too so like if you need to see something you can click it on you have your own end of it because it used to be you shared the little desk with the person next to you now you have your own little individual one so it's great 30 ticket it's like 25 if you go during the week though it's 19 oh that's honestly not that bad except we go to this one we've gone to this one regal location that we got a ticket for like 11 one day and i was like a like a recline seat and it was it looked like a stadium seating we were the only people there and i was like i i worry that we are we are we can't ever stop seeing

movies in theaters because like they are counting on us yeah people need to start going to theaters again i agree i love going to the theater to the cinema i need to get back into the habit of when i would just go and watch movies all day long yeah when you catch up you would like there would all be like four movies come out and then you'd be like oh i haven't seen any of them and then you'd come back and be like i saw them all and it was a great day especially because they serve breakfast lunch and dinner so it sounds like a good fun a good fun time yeah and then sometimes like somebody would come meet me just for this one movie i think i did that for um photograph didn't you see something before that yeah yeah you're right you're right and i was like how was

it you're like man and then we saw photograph which you know it was fine it was fine i don't remember the plot i just remember like it's like two hot people like being hot yeah there was a photograph involved yeah and like a museum or a bookstore i think it was like a photograph of like her grandfather or something because we got a flashback of a grandfather and we were like actually they have more chemistry yeah that's the issue is when you have two hot people you go of course they're gonna have chemistry and i'm like yeah individually i'm loving what i'm looking at together i'm not seeing the spice yeah i'm not seeing it yeah so shall we take a break and then give some advice let's do it we are back and we're going to give you some advice if you want to call

in you can leave us a voicemail 310-694-0976 international listeners you can send us a voice memo to meganpodcast at gmail.com you can also just write an email to that email address you can fill out the form that we have listed in the show notes, or you can send us a DM over on Instagram for our podcast account. And for the voice recording and the voice mail, you have to keep it under three minutes. For the others, under 300 words. And for all of them, we need to know how old you are because you, A, have to be over 18, and B, have to tell us what age you are that is in fact over 18 because it determines the advice that we give you. Give us as many details as possible and we will do our best to help you out in your situation because we can only go off

of the information you give us great job i wasn't even a little bit rusty all right we'll get into the first one this person said they are uh 22 she her i worked at a place for two years directly under the owner she 54 was very comfortable essentially making me run the business while paying me the least she could. I think I called in for advice probably a year ago when she said I was taking advantage of her when I asked for instructional time while being sick instead of decorating the space like she asked. I did everything I could to feel better to go in since she was never interested in teaching me and then she wanted me to decorate instead. It was an ongoing thing that I had to fight for her to teach me, but she constantly was adding more business and daily responsibilities to my plate.

Our personalities also clashed, but I wanted to learn from her, so I did not stand up for myself in a lot of instances and let her walk all over me. I was in a terrible mental state while I worked with her, and I left the job in a traumatic way as well. I guess i'm asking for advice on how to continue working in this career while healing from the trauma of working for her I second guess everything I do because her voice is so ingrained in my head I can't trust the people at my new space because I feel like They're all gonna be like her and I feel like i'm not growing into my own because i'm still stuck there in a way I hope this makes sense. I'm sure any advice you guys give me will be helpful also yes i'm in therapy for this but i'm thinking i need to find a new therapist soon

i'm not sure this is the right one for me so this person is in the uh writer is in a specialized field of hair treatment so um it's not like they can just up and go to a different salon this salon has to be specialized in that treatment so she left that salon and now she's assisting under somebody else at a different school okay um so without revealing where like the specific sect of uh uh i guess it's still kind of cosmetology that you work under this is so common this is so common like this you work in a like client facing position and as someone who has been in a client in these situations this is something i have heard so many times like so many so many so many times that like it is kind of i don't know it's kind of like hazing like it is like for some people

well i'm saying for some people they view it as like it's the people who are who are doing the the acts like they also know that it's hazing and that's how they were brought up through the industry and so that's what they think you need to kind of like prove that you can tough it out like prove all of this kind of stuff and like it's antiquated and it's very dated but it's not uh i would be shocked if there were other people who you work alongside who didn't also have experiences like this with the people that they were assisting but i think that like i don't know maybe the the mindset i would try to work on shifting is like as opposed to be worrying about um other people behaving like her i think like focus on like what you said which was like you

did you let something slide because you were like worried about her focus on like think about this as being like the confrontation moment when you're in the shower afterwards thinking of all the things that you wish you would have said like this is your chance to just be to to not get to to not react the same way if those things happened again so like on the off chance that like you have another boss who does something like that you know what you're not going to do to respond again you know how you're going to stand up for yourself so as opposed to being worried about other people acting the way she did focus on the what for you and being like how can i act and how can i carry myself and present and show up to work that is in a way that i look back on that i wish i

would have done at that other job because that's the only thing unfortunately that you can control and knowing that in general i think like hazing in any workplace is it's unsustainable like you you are not going to be able to once you make it to the level that like you are now the hazer not the hazy most people have burned out by then like it's not it's not like something that it's like if i endure this and i get through this i'll be fine it's not and so i think knowing that for you tolerating it and dealing with it is not something that you need you need to do if it happens again and you know i don't work in the hair industry but i do work in entertainment and the exact same thing happens um and i feel like like as an assistant anywhere you go it's kind of the same

thing where the person that you're working under where you're there you you're not your focus is not to be an assistant forever and the person that you work for should know that because these are entry-level jobs and so they will take advantage of you you end up running things even though that's not essentially at that time your job but they're still getting the glory and the praise for doing those that job even though you are the one that's actually doing it um they don't take you under their wing like they're supposed to and teach you the necessary things so that you can move on because they want you stuck in that assistant position forever so that they don't have to go train somebody else. And so it is a way to make you small. And I know firsthand,

I completely understand this because I was in a very similar situation where they would say things like they want me to be the quiet person doing the things behind the scenes and they try to make it sound like this is like a glorified thing when it's not it's just so that they can be in the spotlight so that you can be small so the way that i got over this was knowing that i was better than them like they they can't do the job that they're supposed to do and they rely on me so much to do their job. And so because of that, I knew that I had the skills to actually do their job. I did not need to be in this assistant position forever. You knew you left working for her. So now you're somewhere else where hopefully you'll be able to learn from them.

I don't know when, if you were like interviewing for the position or if you're still, you didn't really specify if you're still an assistant or what position you're in now. But I would just be constantly asking questions, taking in what's happening, asking questions, but also know that you have a backpack full of skills that you're taking into this job that you didn't have before you started. So you're not going to be in the same situation that you were previously now you know how to deal with somebody like that you know how to run a business you know that you have a skill set that's better than the person that was training you before so now take that into this new job and i promise you that it will be okay and i think something that like our

generation is normalizing to the dismay of our elders is job hopping of being like if this doesn't serve me i'm not going to pay my dues and then hope that like shit gets better and like i'm going to be rewarded for all of these years of like unpaid labor and like hard fucking work because you're just not going to like it's just you're not going to do that and so it's like i'm i'm going to jump ship and you might think that that looks bad but like eventually those people are going to age out of the workforce and it's our peers and that is becoming the new normal and it's like if you have let yourself if you feel like you have let people treat you a certain way or you've accepted certain treatment

and that's become the new normal, really one of the only ways to change that and fix that is to go to a new job where they never know that that happened before and you make sure that you never do that again. Like there's just so much that we gain and we learn and standing up for yourself in the workplace is like so fucking hard.

And if it does not go in the way that you want it to go, like moving your, like switching jobs and going to a different like place, different location, working with different people is not like quitting or being like cowardly or whatever it is also setting yourself up for having confidence in yourself and like what you do your journey and like what your career is going to look like versus being like yeah i deserve and i can accept this level of treatment because also how the fuck are you supposed to trust someone who treats you so poorly to be like i will stop

treating you poorly one day once you reach this ambiguous level of something and then you will be rewarded in in in a grand reward and it's like but that that's not gonna happen like it's never going to happen and you like you said like you keep leading people on and in reality exactly like you said you don't do that for the people who like make your job easier you don't do that for the people who are not very skilled you don't do the people who don't have a future you do that for the people who make your life easier so you can sit on your fucking ass and make the money Yeah. And so I would say, you know, and the great thing about working in the hair industry is that you can eventually be your own boss. And it's a pretty fast trajectory for that. Like you can go rent a booth at, you know, a bigger salon and you're still your own boss. So I'd say absorb as much information as you can now without being annoying, which I don't think you are, but like absorb, because I say that because sometimes people get a little too eager and they become a nuisance instead of absorbing information from other people that are more skilled.

and so you absorb as much as you can and then once you know that you have the confidence and the skill set and the training go do your own thing and then when you're bringing up the next person you know how to treat them because you've been there before yeah and i think there's something that like is underrated about uh yes you have to impress your boss and like yes you are assisting but when you are you feel confident around clients as well those clients will also remember you and like that becomes something that like you know people ask where you are people ask about that like there is something about that aspect of it too that i think um doing good work in most in most in most jobs most professions confidence is like 90 of it and i think if you're

actively seeing that something is tanking your confidence instead of focusing on how can I be a better employee it's like how can I feel more confident in this like it can be something as simple as like having a work outfit that you love that like makes you feel really good listening to your pump up music or even like asking about like what the day looks like being prepared for the day in a way that's like getting a schedule ahead of time and doing all of this kind of stuff that like gets you to be more mentally ready and like more excited just like anything that like sets you up to feel confident in what you're doing and that could even be what you're not doing what you're doing not at work like you're doing stuff on the weekends that makes you feel like you're honing

your craft that you don't have the ability to do at work or taking extra classes whatever that is like something that makes you feel confident because that will that is like the vast majority of this and that's what you want to you know out of spite prove to your old boss that like they can't take that away from you right spite is like a great motivator as well completely yeah a great motivator spite and pettiness yeah we're not therapists and that's why you love us all right we're gonna take a break and we're back hi uh how was your thanksgiving my thanksgiving was lovely i had i had a great old time um i did a lot of cooking i like did realize that i in fact cook an entire thanksgiving

and then we don't host thanksgiving i just bring it and i was like oh that's so funny but it is nice because we could i can like leave the kitchen trashed and then come back um but it's it was really good and we played with my niece and my nephew and did a fort my my niece did in fact stay up way too late past her bedtime and so she decided to stack all of her stuffed animals on top of me and then climb on top of me to take a fake nap and i was like girl you're exhausted but she's doing anything to make i am not tired but all of my stuffed animals are tired they're gonna take a nap and they asked me to lay down with them and i'm like okay for sure um but it was really it was fun it was really nice um just like hanging out all together and then we had like talked about

how uh one of our favorite weekend activities is like this thing called street food cinema i've talked about it before but it's outdoor movies in the park and they start in the summer and then they also have like a like a halloween themed one that is like more immersive over obviously halloween and then they do a christmas one which i think we've been to twice now and not too cold what do you mean it's not cold oh it's cold and my nephew who runs hot who insists that he is never cold i was like telling his dad i was like when i tell you that you have to bring him a jacket it's not even that you're gonna have to fight him to get it on he will be asking for another jacket to wear because he will be so fucking cold um and so but they do a christmas

one and we were talking about it and we were planning for it and unfortunately uh we leave the same day that my i was so excited because they're doing the santa claus one and the santa claus two which has my favorite christmas song santa claus lane by hillary huff and i was like no i was so sad because it's happening the day we leave for colorado but so we were like okay let's like do some of the early ones and home alone is one of them and my nephew has never seen home alone his mom was like i think he'd really like it and i also famously no famously i've never seen home alone and so he and i were both like oh it's our first time and so he and i were like cool but all of the adults were like hold up you've never seen like i was like him and

i were just vibing being like fun our first time and everybody's like no we can't let that what the fuck do you mean you have not seen this movie and i was like never seen that couldn't even tell like all i know burglars kevin moira from schitt's creek that's all i know so we went and i was like looking i was like do you guys have blanket he brought an extra jacket and i was like no you needed a jacket and a blanket and we watched the movie and i wasn't sure what he was going to think because he doesn't like he doesn't like movies where people don't follow the rules this kid in rules also the amount of times that we me and mods have to be like hey when we're taking care of you and it's just mods and i our job as aunt and uncle is we're allowed to we're

able to like let you do things that your parents will not let you do and he's like no i'm not allowed to do that i'm like oh my god like have a gatorade having a gatorade we went to a soccer game when we were the ones who took him no parents were there and everybody's having a gatorade and they're having breaks and i was like do you want a gatorade he's like no you can't have a gatorade until after the game's over and i was like literally that's not a rule no one has ever made that rule like you can have a gatorade right now you should have a gatorade and he was like no no i can't and he's looking at he's siding everybody who has a gatorade and i said first of all that's not a rule so stop give stop giving them this look the second the game ends he goes i

can have a gatorade now and i was like and yeah okay okay so he's really about like the rules and so um i think that like the the the the disobeying and the being a bad kid being bad kids like the beginning of it i was like oh my god he's gonna and they were being so mean to him i was like he's gonna get so stressed out and i was so worried um but he seemed to like be fine his dad like talked to him like with like a couple scenes or whatever but then we get to like the hijinks and like the funny stuff happening or even just like when he's like dancing through the house alone and i don't think i realized this might have been the one i've gone to there that had the most kids because oh my if you could bottle this it felt like monster zinc

the laughter of like like dozens and dozens of like kids around five years old like laughing hysterically at this movie out loud every time like i was like oh my god this is like so fucking precious and he would just like look over at us to see if we're laughing too and i was like oh but um i also didn't realize how much like his facial expressions remind me of kevin like i was like oh my god like this is this is him um and it he loved it so like i really liked it we were we were gonna say stay for the second one but we only took one car so we did ended up not which was fine um but i do want to watch the second one now though you know the cheetos got a cameo i've heard yeah but to be fair if they filmed it at trump hotel he that's in the requirement for any

movie that they film trump hotel i'm not everyone's like you'll be shocked and i was like i've seen movies that he's also had cameos in because he requires it to have the filming permit there so not shocking but yeah he loved it and apparently he just wants to watch it over and over and over again and then the next day was his birthday party which of course he was turning six so it started at 10 a.m 10 a.m and so we we were there we went to the the park had a birthday party and that was that was really fun it was pokemon themed gotta catch them all yeah he's obsessed with pokemon and i did humor him and like play with him he doesn't totally understand how to play but somehow he does understand when he's winning he doesn't understand how to play when i'm winning and he

goes i think we're missing a rule and i go i think i'm just winning now and i think you don't love that um but it's crazy to think that like pokemon's like still such a big thing and he asked he goes remember how you came over to my house on my birthday and we watched lilo and stitch and i was like yeah he's like two weeks ago he was like well what about for your birthday if i come over and we watch poke and we watch and then he goes wait do you have hbo max and i was like yes and he goes i come over for your birthday and we watch pokemon and i was like hold up hey i don't want to do that um is it a tv show or a movie and verbatim he goes well um here's the thing we don't have hbo max so i don't exactly know what it is then how does he know that it's on i was talking to

a parent at a birthday party and they were like it's on hulu and i was like oh so his parents are just lying to him so they don't have to watch pokemon i was like wait what but i love when he's like do you know pokemon and i'm like i don't think you understand that like yeah i know what pokemon is that was much bigger when i was a kid than you now but hey the kids are i guess they're going back to that kind of stuff it is what it is it is what it is exactly yeah i don't know if i'm gonna make it to my niece who also six i don't know if i'm gonna make it to her birthday party because it's on what's next the 13th and i just that's early well i mean that's where i know i usually go but um i just like i'm still not settled in this place yet and then with

my mom being here it threw stuff off so like no you have to reset after having a guest and you haven't even fully settled in yeah and then having to leaving is not like you have to like prep a place to leave too right right so i don't know if i'm going yet but i forgot what the theme is for her so let me see i don't feel like power rangers no paw patrol no what are their kids into i feel like their paw patrol was like i know he went to a wicked themed birthday party and like two kids like the the they're like a sibling set and they like love wicked and i was like really have you seen what version did you see i've seen videos of the kids going to universal and they're like freaking out when they say when they see glinda so i think they are into wicked

i wonder if they're seeing part two no i mean these this was before the movie came out so part one i understand totally yeah part one i understand part two it's for adults yeah that's an adult movie that is an adult film and like it's still not as not an adult film oh you're right it is a cinema for people over the age of 18 yeah we'll talk about that on thursday should we read it i was gonna say it's a proposition it's about a debate yeah let's do it Hi, Eminem. I need help settling a debate. Crack snuggles. My colleague, male 30, and I automatically, you're correct, and I, female 28, often have heated debates. Today, I was arguing with him about an unimportant debate regarding the number of fast food in France versus Quebec.

Okay. And while I was talking, he shushed me and started talking over me. Do you agree that a grown man shushing a woman and speaking over her is infantilizing and disrespectful? i want to tell him that i feel disrespected and he would never act that way with a man but i'm afraid to be gaslighted into thinking it's not that bad and i'm overreacting you know how we're going to respond to this of course he was being a child but also he will try to gaslight you yeah that's what's going to happen because he is a man he's the man who shushed you do we think he's going to gaslight you yes 100 like that is going into it knowing that that's what's going to happen uh but to me i think this is like never not worth it to like say something because like i also would

never want like another woman in the workplace to observe me letting a man do that to me and then thinking that that is like the expectation like there are certain ways that like you know you can like treat your friends if your friends outside of work but like at work i'm like no there's a there's a level of like we're setting a precedent for like other people here so like i mean that's without a doubt something i'm i would have bought a knife we've been like did you just shush me right why are you shushing me huh also what side was he on quebec france they both have a lot of fast food restaurants yeah and the only through line is the french the french part so i'm just like what what was this discussion i have to assume that you're in quebec right yeah like

are one of you one place i don't i don't frivolous discussion we all have them but odd i think he did debates with men in general it's like not something that i participate in yeah because men are not respectful last night i was at a christmas party and me and another guy were having a discussion about why men need to be in therapy and one of the men was like no i'm not there but i but he was open to it and then another one is like studying therapy and the one man that's not in therapy was like i heard that therapy isn't something that men are particularly susceptible to and then we broke it down as to why it's because like the other gal she was like i have a theory for that and i said i have a theory as well i'm sure

it's the same theory go ahead since she was the one that spoke first and she was like it's because men don't like to be told what to do and they don't do it like when they are given women if they're given advice they take it in that's why i think like calling advice shows what we're doing is nothing new they've existed forever but they're usually hosted by women and most of the people calling it are women and she was like yeah men just don't listen when they are given advice they simply just don't listen yep and so the guy that's in school for therapy is he's like it goes back to the whole thing of like pulling over to ask for directions men won't do that no men have this idea that like uh skills are acquired not learned like you're you're like pre-programmed to have these

things and like that's why they're also like fucking obsessed with like uh um what's that word optimizing like optimizing your biology optimizing all that and that's why men really slip into eugenics really fucking quickly because like they have this idea that like and then if they're not immediately good at something and a woman is it is because she's good because she's a woman not because she tries not because she researched not because she's asked not because she's like done the work at this they're not used to having to do work to acquire like accolades and so for them they think that that is like a just a skill that they have and it's like you know that is just how the patriarchy works you've been rewarded for not putting in that you've been rewarded for just like

aging up into new qualifications like aging into the ability to get a job aging in the ability to like do all of these kinds of things and therefore like you grow up to be a fully grown adult who like doesn't actually know how to better yourself because you've never you've just existed yeah and then she used the analogy she was like y'all go to golf lessons so that you can get better why wouldn't you go to therapy so that you could get better mentally yep yep yep that's why i think male therapists are great for men because they do not listen to women who are their therapists yeah yeah and this the guy that's in therapy school i've known him for years and he like is one he's a also like a writer and doing what a lot of people in the entertainment industry are

doing he is the fourth person that i know is going to therapy school so like he is you know he's always just been very kind and genuine and someone like that wants like it's not like how are you doing just to ask how you're doing he's somebody that like genuinely wants to know how you're doing and so like i think he will be a great therapist and i think that this guy needs to go see him eventually there is something about like people who work in the arts and specifically creative industries like it is like a craft that you're honing you're not like studying it and you're learning it you're not just like studying it but then with other job aspects of it like it is like climbing the ladder versus like carving out spaces for yourself and like getting creative

with it and thinking in different ways as opposed to like this is just xyz this is how you get this this is the equation you pass a test you get a certification there you go yep that would drive me crazy all right we're gonna take a break and we get back we'll get into an update before we round this out we're back give us the update i didn't know this was happening i i i didn't know this was happening it's on the list no in the words of cynthia arriva oh oh i i didn't know this was happening um so this person said hi i doubt you'll see this well we're seeing this hope you're okay with us seeing it yeah they sent it in a uh instagram dm um i doubt you'll see this

but i still want to try i was the write-in for a september 4th episode of don't blame me who was asking for advice about doing things alone after losing my husband i'm behind on listening so i just heard it yesterday i just wanted to thank you both so much for your advice i will definitely be starting with being on the phone while i'm out or going to the movies like melissa suggested i knew i could trust reaching out to the two of you and i know you were never wrong i'm so glad that that was like helpful actionable things and i think about you a lot not to be weird but like yeah i was thinking about this call uh or this right the this conversation we had and you your story the other day um and yeah i think that this is

we i think we'd love if you are would be open to like giving us updates on how this kind of stuff is going and what you found like helpful and I think once you start implementing certain things you'll find things that like we haven't thought of that you found like helpful to do by yourself I'm really glad that you asked about that because we've gotten like so many calls about different things and this was like a very unique one that I think a lot of people relate to in different aspects or different parts of their life and for different reasons and yeah I hope that you find some comfort in being able to do things by yourself and it's not just not scary and not like lonely anymore but you find some like benefits and like relaxation something that

you see the good sides of it yeah me too me too so thanks for giving us an update i've got an update on me are you finally gonna talk about your hair i am gonna talk oh thank god so i was cooking watch the video version everybody i was cooking on the stove and um i smelt something i said no no smells like the 90s when we used to when we would get braids we would burn the ends of it off what's going on i look down my hair is sent across the break these braids right here hold up can you scoot back which ones well i cut them they're now cut because they were like well i was wondering when i told you to give me a wide shot i was like yeah if i'm not mistaken these look shorter than you normally go for yeah so they were singed and

then i was like i don't one i don't feel like taking them down right now because it happened like sunday and then two since we're doing the wicked episode i said i need to keep it in place when you know what's gonna happen on thursday and so i was like i'm just gonna cut them off and then unravel because then they were just like blunt and ugly at the end and i'll unravel them and i think they gave them a new look they're cute i think they're really cute but i was a it's not what you usually go for and as soon as i like started seeing that like they looked a little shorter i was like there's got to be something to this story wow wow yeah so i cut like five inches of it off and then did it singe both sides or just one just one but i had to

because at first i was just gonna cut the ones that were singed and then it looked weird so i'm that only really works if it's your like two front pieces and then you cut both but if it's anything further back it's disconnected wow how many days after was that you got your hair done well it's been like two months now i thought you were getting your hair no these are the same braids i haven't got them redone i do you i feel like you give a new life like like to me i'm like this is it's an it's so much of a different look that i wasn't even looking at the top of your head that i was like these have to be different braids that you got wow i also like the difference the color difference when you can see them unbraided at the bottom it's cute it's like

it's cute that it it got you there and i'm so glad it was human hair not synthetic because i would be the fumes yeah i mean the fumes smell bad but i think like the the safety of a synthetic and then it gets sticky yeah wow yeah it just touched it didn't actually like catch on fire it just touched the side of the pot yeah so it wasn't over the open flame what were you making soup i can't believe when you were saying that you i was like oh show me your hair it looks different this is cute and you're like i've got a story did not expect that this is where the story was going like did not expect that whatsoever but i'm glad you're okay thanks wow i'm glad i didn't catch actually catch on fire no me too well we hope you all enjoyed this episode so happy to

be back back again and um hope you all had a lovely fall break and we'll see you on thursday for wicked for good oh she learned it wicked that's all folks wicked the sequel wicked one more time

wicked run it back wicked er see ya too wicked too fast Montez automatic anytime there's a sequel

for anything he always says um oh my god how am i forgetting it he's it literally says like five times a day oh uh wicked two electric boogaloo every every time there's a sequel and he keeps talking about the now you see me sequel he's like now you see me two electric boogaloo and i go no it's now you see me three so at least like give me a break from this fucking joke all right bye this is a sister sign production hosted by me megan rinks and me melissa d montz plus diamond imprint productions post-production by coco lorenz production assistance by melanie d watson and music by ryan hunter and giacomo picasso