MFM Minisode 299

[0] This is exactly right.

[1] And welcome to my favorite murder.

[2] The minisode.

[3] That's right.

[4] And it's being video in case you want to watch us talk about your letters you sent us.

[5] Are you one of those podcast people that wishes it was visual?

[6] Well, have we got a solution for you?

[7] That's right.

[8] Do you want to go first?

[9] Sure.

[10] To be fair, I did that whole, hey, grandparents.

[11] Do you have a murder story question at that?

[12] Thanksgiving last year and never delivered the goods.

[13] My bad.

[14] So they asked for the story, got a story, and then just didn't tell us about.

[15] Okay.

[16] Well, at least you're doing it now.

[17] Right.

[18] And at least you're taking a responsibility for your part in it.

[19] Okay.

[20] So when I asked this question, my grandma patiently waited for my grandpa to say, no, I got nothing, which if he talks like my dad and everyone in my family, it'd be, I got nothing.

[21] To which my grandma turned to me with a glint in her eye, I do.

[22] Which didn't surprise me. She's a spitfire slash spicy gal.

[23] She went on to tell us that her uncle Cecil was murdered by two men who were hired by her aunt.

[24] With the help of her aunt's stepson, so I guess my grandma's cousin, the three men threw him in the trunk of the car and drove out into the woods of Georgia and then hid the car amongst the trees.

[25] Oh, my God.

[26] Detectives later found the car and her uncle in the trunk, and the newspapers were splashed.

[27] with the headline and the scandal.

[28] When I asked why she got him killed, my grandma just shrugged and said, I guess she didn't like him very much.

[29] Jesus.

[30] So talk about the horrible thing, but not about the what caused it.

[31] The why.

[32] Don't, yeah, don't go into that part.

[33] And grandma closed with, quote, when everyone in school found out it was my aunt, oh, I was so embarrassed.

[34] Oh, my God.

[35] I'm very lucky to still get these wild stories from both my grandparents, they are an endless well of hilarity and sometimes chaos.

[36] Thank you for being my friends since episode 20 -ish.

[37] Stay sexy and stay spicy.

[38] Love Annie.

[39] She heard.

[40] I like the new motto.

[41] Fucking make that shit up.

[42] Do it.

[43] Stay sexy and stay spicy works.

[44] It does work.

[45] Good job.

[46] Okay, my first one, I'm not going to read you the title.

[47] It just starts, Hey, All.

[48] I was just listening to the most recent minisode where you asked for stories about being maced.

[49] Well, have I got a story for you?

[50] One day, many years ago, I was standing in a long line at a Kmart.

[51] Remember those?

[52] Yes.

[53] As I read a magazine, I noticed a woman with an increasingly irate toddler in front of me. This kid was not having it, and the mom was becoming more and more frazzled and doing anything to try and quiet her baby.

[54] Mom was handing her items from their cart, items off the impulse buy display at the register, the grubby plastic item divider thing, anything.

[55] Nope, not having it.

[56] Then mom handed her the car keys.

[57] For a precious moment or two, there was silence, which caused me to look up for my magazine just in time to see the baby with arm outstretched, oscillating back and forth like a sprinkler while spraying liquid from the tiny mace dispenser on mom's keychain.

[58] Baby took three of us out that day.

[59] Me, the man behind the counter, and the cashier with direct shots to the face.

[60] Of course, we couldn't really comprehend what was happening at first, just that we were falling over gasping and choking.

[61] You never suspect the baby.

[62] Thank God, she had pointed it away from her own face, and now it were towards the rest of us.

[63] What a nice person that they're like, at least it's not their own face.

[64] A baby being maced is horrible.

[65] Horrible.

[66] I'm not exactly sure what happened after that.

[67] The store was helpful in attending to us, and the police were called.

[68] I had to give a statement, but beyond that, I'm not sure what happened.

[69] The mother was rightfully hysterical and mortified.

[70] Yes.

[71] I remember the burning of my eyes, but most importantly, the demise or the perfect white blouse I was wearing that day.

[72] It's always so hard to find the perfect white blouse, but I had it, damn it, and the bright orange stains from the pepper spray never came out.

[73] Stay sexy and never give mace to a baby, Jen.

[74] Amazing.

[75] Oh, to be maced by a baby.

[76] You just would not see it coming.

[77] It's the perfect cover.

[78] You wouldn't.

[79] Are you wearing a little neckerchief?

[80] I'm wearing like a, yeah, like a little tie.

[81] I just added a little flare, a little tie.

[82] Fun.

[83] Do you like it?

[84] We need five more pieces of flare.

[85] Shit.

[86] Is pink hair one of them?

[87] No, I'm just saying the line from office space.

[88] I know, I know.

[89] No, it looks really cute.

[90] This is all just a teaser because the people in the fan cult are going to know exactly what we're talking about.

[91] Oh, yeah.

[92] They're going to see my little neck, my little thing.

[93] A little, it's kind of a necktie.

[94] It's like a colonel.

[95] Sanders, but if he was doing it for himself.

[96] He was a hipster.

[97] Right.

[98] Yes.

[99] Accidental pepper spraying gone right.

[100] Oh, shit.

[101] Hey, fam.

[102] Names have been changed to protect me. In 2012, I moved from my small town to a big city where I knew exactly zero people.

[103] I was eager to start my new life and make friends.

[104] One such friend will call Dick.

[105] Dick and I met the first week of school as we were in the same small theater program.

[106] He was convinced.

[107] conceited, charming, and had an air of danger about him, a .k .a. My type.

[108] Yes, I have bad taste.

[109] You have regular taste.

[110] You have all of our taste.

[111] Yeah, sounds right.

[112] Dangerous, conceited, and charming is pretty much every girl's first crush story.

[113] Especially in 2012, way back before we knew about, you know, self -care and shit.

[114] Right.

[115] For real.

[116] We hit it off right away and started spending every second together.

[117] Early in our short -lived friendship, we spent an even...

[118] hanging out in a small study hall lounge in our dorm.

[119] I had a new lanyard which held my keys, my student ID, and of course a bright pink mace.

[120] My mom had purchased them for all my friends as graduation gifts.

[121] Dick had never seen mace before.

[122] He asked me what it was.

[123] I proudly held my mace high.

[124] Little did I know my mace was in the on position.

[125] As I lifted my mace, my hand slipped, applying pressure to the trigger.

[126] A cloud of peppery spray filled the air.

[127] That's right, folks.

[128] I mace dick in the face.

[129] It was mortifying.

[130] He choked.

[131] The choking led to puking.

[132] His eyes were red.

[133] I apologize profusely.

[134] He assured me that it was okay.

[135] I wasn't sure our friendship could move past this.

[136] I felt so guilty.

[137] Our friendship fizzled out a few weeks later, but I continued to look back on this memory with shame.

[138] The following year came to light that Dick was a sexual predator who abused women.

[139] There was solid proof that led to his expulsion from the school.

[140] Wow.

[141] This knowledge was horrifying.

[142] I spent time alone with this man. However, it led me to look at the macing incident in a new light.

[143] Suck it, Dick.

[144] Stay sexy and mace the creepy dude in your class, Anonymous.

[145] Wow.

[146] Yeah.

[147] It was like karma coming in early and hot and being like, let me get this out of the way real quick.

[148] What if it was Anonymous's sixth sense?

[149] Yeah.

[150] Like, as that's dropping, go ahead.

[151] finger.

[152] Do your magic.

[153] Do your thing.

[154] Do your thing.

[155] Karen, you know I'm all about vintage shopping.

[156] Absolutely.

[157] And when you say vintage, you mean when you physically drive to a store and actually purchase something with cash.

[158] Exactly.

[159] And if you're a small business owner, you might know Shopify is great for online sales.

[160] But did you know that they also power in -person sales?

[161] That's right.

[162] Shopify is the sound of selling everywhere.

[163] Online, in store, on social media, and beyond.

[164] Give your point -of -sale system a serious upgrade with Shopify.

[165] From accepting payments to managing inventory, they have everything you need to sell in person.

[166] So give your point -of -sale system a serious upgrade with Shopify.

[167] Their sleek, reliable POS hardware takes every major payment method and looks fabulous at the same time.

[168] With Shopify, we have a powerful partner for managing our sales, and if you're a business owner, you can't too.

[169] Connect with customers inline and online.

[170] Do retail right with Shopify.

[171] Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify .com slash murder.

[172] Important note, that promo code is all lowercase.

[173] Go to Shopify .com slash murder to take your retail business to the next level today.

[174] That's Shopify .com slash murder.

[175] Goodbye.

[176] This is how it starts, and I'm embarrassed to say this.

[177] But I'm going to put my all into it.

[178] Okay.

[179] What's crack -a -lackin, mamacitas?

[180] Literally.

[181] They've made me do that.

[182] I'm mad.

[183] I just immediately envisioned the outdoor space at Edendale.

[184] And if you, obviously, wouldn't be you, but anybody that we knew walked up saying that, I would literally get up and walk away immediately.

[185] Because I wouldn't want people to see me being on the receiving end of that behavior.

[186] What's crackleck and mamacitas?

[187] But now I've said it twice.

[188] Okay.

[189] Now you were going to say it every time you go anywhere.

[190] Every day of my life.

[191] I went to high school in a small, literally nothing happens town in New Jersey called Hopatakong.

[192] And then it says, go ahead, try to pronounce it.

[193] It's Hopat Kong.

[194] Hopat Kong.

[195] Ever since forever, I've shared a room with my sister.

[196] And when we were in high school, our beds were parallel to each other.

[197] One night, I kept tossing and turning, but as a super paranoid kid, I tossed with my eyes closed because the people in the dark freaked me out.

[198] For some reason, I decided to open my eyes and I see a little girl dressed in white kneeling by my sister's pillow looking into her soul.

[199] I only have one sister and she was currently getting her soul sucked to mentor style.

[200] And I wasn't about to make myself a target.

[201] So I carefully turned around and went right back to sleep and hope I wake up the next day.

[202] I did.

[203] I told my sister about it the following morning and she was super upset that I didn't see.

[204] square up with a ghost in the middle of the night for her.

[205] It really put a dent in our relationship.

[206] Yeah.

[207] Fast forward a couple of years and my sister and I are both out of high school and my parents sold the house to some family friends, a couple with two young kids.

[208] In January of this year, I visited my aunt who lives in the same town and she updated me that my old house had been sold to someone else and I casually bring up my sister's encounter with a ghost.

[209] Her jaw drops and she proceeds to tell me that the reason the family friends resold the house was because their young daughter always wake up crying at the same time every night complaining about a strange little girl that wouldn't let her sleep.

[210] The women were too stunned to speak and we kind of just sat there in silence until we got hungry and she made us some food.

[211] I'm a new listener and I stumbled upon your podcast when I got sick and tired of my boyfriend's shitty comedy podcast.

[212] Such an upgrade.

[213] She's like, and my boyfriend is Joe Rogan.

[214] But if she's busting the host of a comedy podcast right now.

[215] That would be pretty great.

[216] Oh, my God.

[217] I currently live alone and listen to you guys.

[218] Every waking moment, keep doing what you do best.

[219] Stay sexy and choose life over fighting a ghost for your sister, AFT.

[220] I don't know, AFT.

[221] Mama Cita.

[222] I don't know.

[223] Here's what's crackleck and Mama Cita.

[224] You let your sister down when the shit went down and then told her about it afterwards.

[225] Reported yourself.

[226] You never had to say a word.

[227] No. But God, that's fucking scary.

[228] Yeah.

[229] What was that ghost doing?

[230] Sucking her breath, like a cat.

[231] Like a fucking cat.

[232] But then she didn't, like, was she diminished in some way the next morning?

[233] But, like, the other little girl couldn't sleep, she kept keeping her awake.

[234] That, like, that's the fucked up.

[235] That is, I kind of really do love.

[236] That was a, FTA, a great example of how ghost stories.

[237] can work like when they prove themselves after years where it's like now there's a consensus this house is haunted and with the same kind of goes the same haunting she's leaning down it's sleep based yeah little girl based for sure it's not a weird tall man I'm not gonna reach in the subject line it just starts hey Georgia and Karen I've written in about when my cousin tried to sell me at a yard sale when a guy almost died in my dorm room and when Lori Cabot the Witch of Salem cursed me all to no avail.

[238] Here's hoping this is lucky number four.

[239] Guess what?

[240] Guess what it is?

[241] In a recent minisode, you mentioned that people who work in fraud must have great stories.

[242] When I was in college in the 90s, I worked nights as a fraud analyst at a major credit card company to help pay for school.

[243] I did indeed have some interesting fraud cases.

[244] Here are three brief such tales.

[245] Number one, boob fraud.

[246] A grandson stole his grandfather's credit card from a nursing home and used it to get his girlfriend a boob job.

[247] What?

[248] Uh -huh.

[249] And then it says, try returning that to pay off the dead.

[250] Yeah.

[251] Quack, quack.

[252] Don't try to make us someone's boyfriend's shitty comedy podcast.

[253] We're not having it, Joe Rogan.

[254] Please.

[255] Number two, meat fraud.

[256] Called a customer for a suspiciously large charge for pounds and pounds of meat.

[257] He said, ma 'am, I'm a vegetarian.

[258] It's not me. Please find the bastard who bought meat in my name and take him down.

[259] Such an intense vegetarian.

[260] Number three, naughtiness in the Netherlands.

[261] There are codes that come up for different types of purchases, electronics, gas, etc. I had a weird code come up in my queue I didn't recognize.

[262] I asked a colleague who smiled and very cheerily said, Oh, you got one.

[263] That's the code that sometimes gets used for sex work in countries where it's legal.

[264] Oh, great.

[265] Now it's my job to call the cardholder and ask if the charge is valid.

[266] Oh, no. I'm 20 years old and raised a good Irish Catholic girl and then in parentheses that says, Karen understands.

[267] I call and with every ring, pray no one answers.

[268] Then a woman picks up.

[269] Now, if both spouses are cardholders, I'm supposed to talk to whoever answers.

[270] Oh, my God.

[271] I confirm her identity as a cardholder.

[272] I ask if her husband was also available.

[273] She said, know he was a way on business in the Netherlands.

[274] Oh, fuck.

[275] I chickened out.

[276] I really wanted to out her husband for cheating, but I just couldn't.

[277] I said, okay, well, there's a problem with the charge from the Netherlands.

[278] Can you have him call us?

[279] My 46 -year -old self would totally blow that up.

[280] Either she knows and is cool with it or doesn't and should know.

[281] Either way, the most awkward moment in my short -lived fraud career.

[282] Stay sexy, Erin, she, her.

[283] Oh, I don't think I could go through with it either.

[284] I don't think I could do it.

[285] Because it's not just about, like, the truth of that is she's having the conversation with a person who, if she doesn't know, and isn't cool with it, is the worst impacted.

[286] Her life is ruined if she's not okay with it and doesn't know.

[287] And Aaron's the one there being like, hey, I'd love to sign up to be the messenger.

[288] No, that's the manager.

[289] Get the manager.

[290] That's a higher up right there for sure.

[291] Yeah, if anything that you're about to do is going to make the customer cry, that goes upstairs.

[292] That goes above the line for sure.

[293] Yes.

[294] All right, that was a good one.

[295] My last one's called one hijab and five stitches.

[296] Hey, oh, MFM crew, and of course, all the fuzzy ones.

[297] Just a quick thank you for all your hard work on the podcast, and oh boy, do I have a story for you.

[298] Okay, so the story goes back to fifth grade.

[299] Me and my best friend at the time were hanging out, doing our usual standing at the entrance of the nearby apartments and serenading the passers -by.

[300] Children!

[301] Neither of us actually knew how to play the guitar, but gosh, darn it did we try.

[302] Oh, how annoying.

[303] After an hour or so, we were walking back to her house when I had the grand idea that I wanted to make myself a wand.

[304] So, determined as ever, I veered off to a tree and started pulling.

[305] After a wrestle with a very much alive tree that didn't want to snap a branch.

[306] I got it, the perfect piece of wood to start whittling.

[307] But where would I get my tool?

[308] At that moment, my friend emerges from the side of her house with an old rusty, serrated knife that her father used for fishing.

[309] Perfect.

[310] We sat on her hammock and I began chopping away.

[311] Never use a knife in a hammock, first of all.

[312] I feel like that's just like number one here.

[313] That combination only leads to...

[314] To what's about to happen.

[315] Yeah, what's about to happen.

[316] I start chopping away at this poor branch.

[317] We were talking boys in life, and funnily enough, how my parents would never let me do something like this.

[318] I went on about how they would scold me for how dangerous it was, and at that moment, the knife caught a knot in the branch as I was whittling towards me. I looked down because something dropped on my foot.

[319] I screamed that my friend was bleeding.

[320] Nope, it was me. The knife went straight into my right index knuckle and deep.

[321] My friend ran inside to get her mom, who at the time, spoke very little English.

[322] This woman, bless her soul, takes off her hijab and wraps it around my hand as a makeshift tourniquet.

[323] My friend frantically calls my parents to have her mom speak to them.

[324] All she could say was Ellie, bleeding, hospital.

[325] My parents arrive and drive me to the nearest urgent care.

[326] Needless to say, one bloody hijab, one tetanus shot, and five stitches later, I was back home as my mom frantically attempted to de -stain that beautiful hijab.

[327] Of course, we returned it as well as a few dollars in case she would rather buy a new one.

[328] I mean.

[329] To this day, my little siblings, take away my steak knife at restaurants and refuse to let me cut my own damn steak.

[330] Now I have permanent nerve damage on my index finger.

[331] And if I hit that knuckle just right, I can make half of my hand go numb.

[332] Fun, right?

[333] Stay sexy and maybe don't whittle a wand with a rusty knife.

[334] Lots of love, Ellie, she, her.

[335] Ellie, no whittling at all.

[336] There's no need.

[337] Pick up a stick.

[338] If you can't break it into a perfect wand shape, find another stick.

[339] There's so many.

[340] Yeah, you're a child.

[341] Use your imagination, that damn thing.

[342] But whittling, also, I do it so often where, don't you do that thing?

[343] We're like, you're cutting.

[344] And then you're like, oh, I just want to pick this up and basically slice it toward myself.

[345] Yeah.

[346] Or slice it in my hand.

[347] In my hand, a bagel toward myself.

[348] But in my hand, a bagel toward myself, toward your body.

[349] All the stabbing positions to this day.

[350] So it's like, grown adults can't handle knives.

[351] No. No kid should ever be casually handling a knife.

[352] No rusty.

[353] No rusty.

[354] No serrated, which means it was long.

[355] It was like one of those crazy bread knives.

[356] Tell us a story about something stupid you did as a kid.

[357] We always love those stories.

[358] When Blood's involved, great.

[359] Yes.

[360] My Favorite Murder at Gmail.

[361] And thank you guys so much for listening.

[362] And thank you fan cult for watching.

[363] Hi.

[364] And stay sexy.

[365] And don't get murdered.

[366] Goodbye.

[367] Goodbye.

[368] Elvis, do you want a cookie?

[369] This has been an exactly right production.

[370] Our senior producer is Hannah Kyle Crichton.

[371] Our producer is Alejandra Keck.

[372] This episode was engineered and mixed by Stephen Ray Morris.

[373] Our researchers are Marin McLaughan and Gemma Harris.

[374] Email your hometowns and fucking hoorays to My Favorite Murder at Gmail .com.

[375] Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at My Favorite Murder and Twitter.

[376] at my fave murder.

[377] Goodbye.

[378] Follow my favorite murder on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen so you don't miss an episode.

[379] If you like what you hear, rate and review the show.

[380] Visit exactly right store .com to purchase my favorite murder merch.