My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 412

Episode Date: December 2, 2024

This week’s hometowns include a self-reporting trash parent and summer camp memories.  Support this podcast by shopping our latest sponsor deals and promotions at this link: https://bit.ly/3UFCn1g. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is exactly right. Your teen requested a ride, but this time not from you. It's through their Uber Teen account. It's an Uber account that allows your teen to request a ride under your supervision with live trip tracking and highly rated drivers. Add your teen to your Uber account today. Add your team to your Uber account today. Skip. My neighbor's nightly saxophone practices. Er, nope, you're on your own there. Could have skipped it. Should have skipped it.

Skip to the good part and get groceries, meals, and more delivered right to your door on skip. My favorite murder. Hello and welcome to my favorite murder. The mini-sode. Where we read you your stories. You send in emails. We agreed we would read them. What more do you want us to do? Yeah.

And they can be about anything at this point in life. Yeah. I mean, fuck it, you know? Truly. Would you like to go first? Sure. This one's called creating new fears for my child. Hello from Virginia. In a recent hometown, y'all asked for our own trash parenting stories and I am finally in there. Yeah.

I was 21 when I had my first child. So basically a baby raising a baby. And somewhere along the way, I started joking with her about, quote, dropping her off at the fire station. My mom did it similar thing. Because they have the baby drop boxes and I always thought it was a joke. We even joked about how she would have to tuck her knees because she was probably getting too big for the box. One day when she was about five years old when I dropped her off at her on-base daycare,

they informed me that the fire department would be doing an annual walkthrough later in the day. Okay, cool. No big deal. Until her daycare provider called me a few hours later because when my daughter saw the fire truck out front, she ran into a closet screaming, No, don't take me. I'll be good. Oh, that's right. My daughter thought the fire department had come to pick her up and take her away. She was hysterical. Turns

out I had successfully made her terrified of all firefighters. Good news, she's now 15 and no longer scared, but it was super fun explaining to her daycare provider that I was actually a terrible parent and to please not report us. Thank you guys for all that you do and keeping me company on long drives into work, Cicely. And then it says, good luck on the pronunciation. I just go with whatever these days. Looks like Cecily. Cicely or Sicily.

Cecily. I'm going to go Cecily. Cecily's cool. Yeah. I like that name. Yeah. I like a self-report Cicely. I'm going to go Cicely. Cicely's cool. I like that name. I like a self-reporting trash parent. I do, too.

Please, if you've been trashy and you want to talk about it, we're here for you. You all have those stories. We know it. I mean, come on. Also, it's that thing where I think for my trash babysitter story of my own, it was like I only ever related to other adults, so I forgot that children do not relate the same way. And I wonder if it's like that's part of it. It's like you're a young parent and

you're just like, oh wait, okay, that's right. Okay. Here's my first story. The subject line is, an Irish hometown story with a difference. Hi Karen, Georgia, Stephen, Alejandra, and all furry creatures. I love you gals obviously as you brighten up my day. It says brighten up me day. Oh, me day. Because they're hiring. Me day.

I shall brighten up me day. My walks when I'm cooking, etc., etc. I first came across your podcast a few years ago when I heard my colleagues giggling in the office with their earphones in. They were all listening to you while working. Ah. Nice. So, I could tell you about the spooky happenings in the house I grew up in that's over 120 years old, but I'll leave that to another time and tell you about something way better. I wanted to let you know about a fantastic 83-year-old from Ireland who was a crucial behind-the-scenes part of The Banshees

of Vinishirin. Oh, shit. Did you watch that movie? Mm-hmm. I loved that movie. We think it's such a lovely story, and of course, Karen's Irish, so we wanted to share it with you. Yes.

Delia Berry joined the knitting group through Greystone's cancer support when her husband Patty died over 10 years ago. She found friends and comfort from this group and from GCS, so she wanted to give something special back. Something else special about Delia is that she also took in her sister's four children when she lost her sister to cancer many years ago. Delia is Jesus' favorite person. She shot to fame having knit the iconic jumper's sweaters for Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleason, and

Barry Kiyogan in the Oscar nominated movie, The Banshees of Innshield. So that movie is like the sweaters are the third lead. And Delia is the one who made all of them. Amazing. Also, Colin Farrell's sister, who actually won an Oscar for best supporting Carrie something, has an incredible cardigan that I was obsessed with like every I watched it like three times. I wonder if she made it. You can get you can commission one. Oh that's right Delia I need to talk to you. Okay so Brendan Gleason has even asked her to

knit two more for him since. What we didn't know before now was that Delia is no stranger to the celebrity world having knit for Meryl Streep for her role in Dancing at Luganza and having taught Emily Watson how to knit for her role in the movie Little Women. Cute. Delia is an international superstar. Teach me how to knit. She fits knitting in and around her bingo and walks around her town, Greystones, County Wicklow in the Garden of Ireland. In the Garden of Ireland? Is that a saying? You tell me.

I can't. How cool is she, right? If you'd like to read more about our famous and generous Delia, you can read all about her in the New York Times Vogue, the Daily Mail, to name a few. This is the best. Stay sexy and don't get murdered and wrap yourself in a cost knit Erin sweater knit with love, Mary. Wow.

Mary, I love that email. It makes me want to be an old lady. Like I'm excited to be an old lady. Also it's like the thing that brought her to knitting was this painful difficult thing that then knitting actually helped her with and then she kind of kept powering through and then she was like, now everybody that then knitting actually helped her with. And then she kind of kept powering through and then she was like, now everybody loves my knitting. And now she needs her own movie. Yeah, she actually does.

And like all those stars will come and star in it with her. Stop it. I love it. I'm mad. I'm mad I love it so much. Such a good email. Do you have someone on your list who's impossible to shop for? You know, the kind of person who claims they don't want anything.

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BlueNile.com. Goodbye. Look, you've got enough to worry about without adding body odor to the mix. Listen, whether you're hosting, traveling, or spending the day in cozy PJs, Lumi Whole Body Deodorant has your back. Lumi keeps you smelling fresh for up to 72 hours so you can enjoy everything the holidays have to offer without those unwanted odors tagging along.

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That's code MFM at L-U-M-E-D-E-O-D-O-R-A-N-T dot com. Please support our show and tell them we sent you. Smell fresher, stay drier, and boost your confidence from head to toe with Lumi. Goodbye. Okay, just found out my uncle's death was a murder. All the requisite pleasantries and compliments. I'm from a large East Coast Puerto Rican family of murderinos. My abuelos, grandparents, were married for almost 70 years before abuelo became an ancestor. Isn't that a beautiful way of saying he passed on?

And I am the oldest of 16 grandchildren. Several of us kids grew up on a heavy dose of diagnosis murder 2020, CSI, and the list goes on. Diagnosis murder. Yeah. Recently, I think I uncovered our family's murderino origin story. When I was growing up, our relative Rosa, and it says all names changed, would occasionally come visit from Puerto Rico with her two kids, Leti and Roberto.

Rosa's relation to us was unclear, but I assumed that she was a distant aunt. During their visits, they would go to the local cemetery where Rosa's husband, my assumed uncle, was buried. I always wondered why he would be here instead of in Puerto Rico. Cut to a few weeks ago, a handful of the family was at Abuela's house, pouring through old albums and bins of pictures. My sister pulls out an 8x10 portrait of a handsome young man

that looked like it was from the 60s. Who's this? She asked. Oh, that's Javier, Rosa's husband, my abuela said solemnly. You know, she said, turning to me, they killed him. I instantly had about a million questions and went to work trying to get them all answered. So here's the story I was able to get from my abuela, my mom, and a free trial to a newspaper website.

In the mid-'80s, Rosa unfortunately had a miscarriage. Javier, who was my abuelo's cousin, that's how they're related, dropped off a young Letty and Roberto at my abuelo's house so he could go be with Rosa in the hospital. It was the last time any of our family would see him alive. His body was found in a field the next day. He was 38 years old. The police interviewed everyone at my abuelo's house, including my mom, since that was the last place he was seen.

It took months of investigation, but the story came together. Javier dropped off the kids and was carjacked on the way to the hospital. He withdrew $100 from the ATM, and 25 minutes later, his car was found on the way to the hospital. He withdrew $100 from the ATM and 25 minutes later, his car was found on fire in the residential area. They found him the following day. He had been shot execution style. Nearly two years later, three suspects were arrested and one was eventually convicted. He was also convicted of killing a cab driver a few weeks after Javier's murder and is suspected to be involved in a few other murders. After the trial, Rosa took the kids and moved back to Puerto Rico.

So this happened in the U.S.? Yeah. By all accounts, she was never the same. Apparently, the murderer was up for parole in 2019 and my uncle spoke with the hearing on behalf of our family. Everyone kept it quiet because they didn't want Rosa to find out. We're unsure of what the outcome was, but COVID hit shortly thereafter and the murderer died in prison. I found his obituary and it's clear his family loved him very much, just as our family loved Javier." That's like a really beautiful sentiment. Yeah, it is.

I've been musing about what could make a 23-year-old man who was full of potential go on a robbery and murder spree, but this email is long enough. The whole ordeal was traumatizing for my family, and my theory is that it created a generational anxiety that fuels our interest in true crime. Or maybe it's just a horrible story that I feel the need to wrap up nicely. Either way, stay sexy and don't carjack people, Jay, she, her. Wow, Jay.

That's a classic hometown. And also just so personal and kind of beautiful. Yeah. Like, because yeah, why would a 23 year old be, not just robbing people, robbing and murdering them. Yeah. Like. This like email makes it clear that Jay has a really big heart. You know what I mean? And not just robbing people, but robbing and murdering them. Like... Yeah.

This, like, email makes it clear that Jay has a really big heart. You know what I mean? Like, I totally got that just from the story being told. Right. Yeah. Thank you for sending that in. Thank you. Okay, we're going to take a little left turn.

Please. And go to subject line, culty Christian camp. Okay. And then it just says, sup. You all have been the voices I fall asleep to for years now, so thank you for your sweet murderous bedtime tales. They've definitely helped me avoid the shame merry-go-round I typically ride

as I'm falling asleep. So thank you. I am very familiar with that ride. I've been on it a time or two myself. Honored to be part of the soundtrack. I mean, actually that kind of just made me think, where it's like, yeah, if it's a shame, Mary, go around. How do you avoid it?

It's like, you have to do a step up of engaging different feelings, stronger feelings. Yeah, to make something louder. Yeah. And we're fucking plenty loud. I was re-listening to Minnesota 278 the other night, and it sparked a memory of summer camp for me that I had to tell you guys.

In the late 90s, I went to a Christian summer camp with my best friend for some God forsaken reason and it was as close to being inducted into a cult as I have ever come. Picture it. Summer in the Rocky Mountains, clean cut Christian teenager camp counselors, horseback riding, mess halls, and coming home with hand foot mouth disease. Oh my God. No. Yeah. I was about to say, I went to a camp like that, but it was Jewish. No, we did not.

That didn't happen. Didn't get that, yeah. All the camp staples, it says, except there are some very weird Christian spice in there. We attended sunrise sermons, lunchtime Bible studies, and midnight campfire sermons. One of the stranger games, quote unquote, they had us play was to go out into the forest after dark in pairs of two and find counselors scattered around acting like they were nonbelievers. And we had to do our best to convert them or convince them to give Christianity a try.

Oh my God. Like a culty scavenger hunt. The whole week culminated into a sunset sermon overlooking the mountains given by the owner of the camp, singing worship songs and everyone becoming very emotional. At one point, he told all the campers to close their eyes and raise their hands if they felt like they accepted Jesus into their heart this week. I was absolutely nosy and peaked and saw my best friend raise her hand, and because I'm a girl's girl and definitely did not want to be left out, I raised my hand too. That's the right answer.

The speaker then asked us to lower our hands and open our eyes and asked who would be brave enough to come stand up front if we had raised our hand. Well, mama didn't raise no pussy, so I got up and went to the front with some reluctant others, expecting my best friend to come up too. She did not. So there I was standing up while the crowd cheered and my best friend got teary-eyed saying how glad she was that I finally accepted Jesus. What the fuck, Chelsea? Oh no. The speaker then asked us to write our name in the Book accepted Jesus. What the fuck, Chelsea? Oh no. The speaker then asked us to write our name

in the book of life, whatever the fuck that was. That's a Jewish thing. Is it? Oh, they just kind of blended a little. Well, they stole on a lot of shit, but yeah, go ahead. Okay, really sorry on behalf of me and Chelsea, sorry. That's really funny. What if they were like ex-Jewish, now they were born again Christian.

But this actually is kind of effective. I like this one. Yeah. Well, I winkled my way out of that step and decided I didn't think summer camp was for me anymore. So they're actually that's right where she stops. Anyway, thank you for all you do. You've been my most reliable best friends through years of postpartum depression. Regular depression and finding a wonderful therapist to help unpack all that shit. Yay! Partly due to listening to you guys talk about the ways you have benefited from therapy.

You're both wonderful. Stay sexy and definitely stay out of the forest. At a Christian summer camp, Kate, she, her. Oh, that's really funny. She winkled her way out of that one. She winkled. So you know how every year someone suggests taking a nice family photo and it ends in chaos? Those are like the best, right? I mean, you can take those chaotic hilarious moments and turn them into the perfect gift

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We just are the number one fans of Aura frames. I feel like we just go on and on every time we do the ads, but it's really real. It's that kind of thing where it's like, if you have the kind of parents that really love pictures and these days, because of phones and technology, they just don't get to see pictures the way they used to. It's like there's no photo albums anymore. You can now basically make a digital photo album for them that just cycles through all day long. It's such a good idea. This is the perfect gift for your Gen X and Boomer parents because yeah they don't have the photo album

anymore. They want it. We all want it. Yeah. For a limited time visit AuraFrames.com and get $45 off Aura's best-selling Carver Matte Frames using promo code MFM at checkout. That's AuraFrames.com promo code MFM. This exclusive Black Friday Cyber Monday deal is their best of the year, so don't miss out. Terms and conditions apply. Goodbye. My last one's called the Anne Frank sandwich story. Hello, I love you all. Let's fucking go. For the past 10 years, I have been the proud stepmom to Ella 20 and Sam 23.

And I myself have a pretty rad stepmom. This story took place when Ella was around seven. My husband and I had been struggling to get Ella to eat the lunches we packed her for school. The excuses were rampant, ran out of time, didn't have a fork, an alien invaded the lunch room, etc. It was a temporarily frustrating time in our lives to be sure, and many grapes were sacrificed. One day after school, Ella was telling me about her day and what she learned. As she did so, her excitement grew.

She wrote a book. She's famous. as if the subject were a pop culture celebrity. As I listened, it did not seem as if said historical figure's whole story had been told. And I started to wonder what the fuck to say to help her understand the horror and atrocity Anne Frank endured without crushing my sweet child's innocence. I asked her a few follow-ups as she unpacked her things and we delicately made our way around the topic until it seemed she started to grasp the tiny bits of reality being sprinkled in

and her fan girl tone became a little more balanced. How do you? She wrote a book. She was a fan. She wrote a book. She was a fan. Well, also it is exciting that you're that age and you would get a book published.

Like, it's like, I'm sure she was like, could I do that? Yeah. Yeah. Deciding not to totally ruin her afternoon, I suggested she go outside and play. As I unpacked her lunch box, I was once again greeted by an uneaten sandwich. Taking a breath, I went out back and simply asked why she hadn't eaten it that day. The usual response ensued, but this time it broke me and exasperation won. Skipping the reminder about her health and being able to focus in

class, not bothering to mention food waste for the millionth time, I simply held up the rejected sandwich and said, all caps, do you know who would have eaten this? Anne Frank. Oh. Her little face crumpled, and thus one of my worst slash best parenting stories was born. She's in college now, and we both laugh whenever I humbly tell this story. I'm fortunate to have built great relationships with both kids, thus continuing to dismantle the wicked stepmother trope, but I do still hate wasting food. Winky emoji. Thanks for everything, R.

Oh, wow. I bet it worked. I'm sure it worked. And also that was very, yet again, another example of like you're being very vulnerable with your own fuck up. Yeah, we want to hear your fucked up stories because we've told you all of ours.

Yeah, seriously. You've seen every fuck up, you've heard every fuck up, we've done it. We've done it, we've done it. We've done it. We've given it to you. It's your turn at My Favorite Murder at Gmail. If you want to watch this video, is that it? No. Oh.

What was it? We got one last one and it's Asshole Older Sister Stories. Yay. Hi ladies, on Minisode, Episode 406, you asked for older sister stories and I'm here to deliver. My sister is five years younger than me and has always been very gullible Here are a few of my favorite older sister moments when she was about three or four I told her that our mom did not carry or give birth to her instead She found a giant egg in a dollar general dumpster and hatched her from it. I

Told her that she could never tell our parents. she knew this information because it was a huge family secret She cried for days and believed this for years, but oh my god But eventually told our parents that she knew where she came from It's now a running joke in our family and I still can't believe she thought this was true for so many years She was a child. You lied to her and you're her older sister She trusted you. You hold the reality of the world in your hands. I would also tell her that the ginger served with sushi

was ham, and she would eat the weird ham every time we ate sushi. I also told her wasabi was pistachio ice cream, and she ate the whole chunk of it at once when she was 10. You're mean. Love you and everything you do. Stay sexy and keep lying to your younger sister's Lindsey. No, that's trauma.

That is just trauma. The first time I ate wasabi, I was just looking at my friend like, what's going to happen? It scared the shit out of me. That like, sinus clearing feeling. That's insane. Yeah, but like, when you don't know, like I had no context of what it was. It's radish. So it's like, oh yeah, radish. It has that. But like, when you don't know, like, I had no context of what it was.

It's radish. So it's like, oh yeah, radish. It has that. But like, when you just put it in your mouth and you don't know, I thought the back of my head was going to like blow out. It was crazy. All right. Okay, now please, my favorite murder in Gmail.

This is all on video that we're going to put up in the fan cult if you want to watch it. Oh yeah, you want to like just intently stare at each other while we also read? Yeah. It's fun. Do it. Come on. Stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye.

Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an Exactly Right production. Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Liana Scolacci. Email your hometowns to MyFavoriteMurder at gmail.com. And follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at MyFavoriteMurder and on Twitter at MyFaveMurder. Goodbye!