Emileigh Only Bonus 2 War Animals

All right, we're actually going this time. Bless you, I think. That was an adorable little squeak. It was kind of cute. It could be the second glass of wine I'm drinking right now. Okay, let's do the intro. To ill-equipped history. Bonus, bonus, episode, bonus. That was actually a really good impersonation of that sound, and I'm really impressed. You're welcome, you're welcome. Hey. Yeah. And we're coming into this right, because just a fair warning, y'all. I have my hot tea like I normally do, but I'm also a glass and a half deep of red wine, because parenting is hard. So here we are. So if it's a little weirder than normal, I'm blaming the boxed wine. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I'm very excited about this, even if I'm a chaos goblin and finished researching this at 5.30 p.m. Oh, my God. Can we get a shirt that says we're just goblin ladies? I want to be just a goblin lady. Yes. I'm here for you, though, because all I wear is T-shirts and leggings around the house. And then when I go out into town, sometimes I forget that I'm still not at the house and I look like a goblin lady in town. So I'm surprised people talk to me. I don't know. I think, honestly, no shit. I think I have a face or an aura or a vibe. I don't know what I give off, but people will come up to me randomly and just tell me their life story. I don't know them, and I'm really sorry and or glad you're going through that, depending on the situation, but, like, who are you? And why are you telling me this? Once I was trying to get William, I was trying to get my son into the car to take him to swim lessons, and I was – my daughter was a baby at the time. I'm trying to wrestle a toddler nightmare, just a nightmare, right, in the parking lot of a Walmart. And this dude walks up to me because his Jeep is parked next to my car, and he was, like, telling me, oh, yeah, well, they're fun at that age. That's normal parent commentary. Every parent out there has heard all that. That's fine. Until he started telling me about how his daughter is now 16 years old, has run off with her boyfriend, and they haven't talked to her in days, and that if she decides to show her happy ass back at the house, she's going to have to start paying rent and all this stuff. And I'm like, I got to go, sir. Like, he's got swim lessons. I need to leave. I just came here for swim diapers, my dude. Like, dude, I'm sorry about your daughter. I don't know you. Yeah. I had someone at a store, I was returning a shirt for my mom, and they were having issues with the computer. A lady straight up said something to me. I don't really remember what it was. I mean, it was vaguely just, like, fine. But she, like, she was an older lady. She touched my – she tapped my back, like, my upper back, and, like, did, like, a squeeze of the shoulder, and I'm like, ma'am, why are you touching me right now? Why are you touching me right now? Why? Oh, my God. I was so dumbfounded. This is, like, the worst moment I have ever had as a parent because I didn't do shit because I was so dumbfounded by the fact that a stranger just picked up my child out of his high chair at a restaurant. And then she just put him back down and went and got her food, and I was like, um, do you just randomly pick up other people's kids? Look, y'all are lucky that I'm out in public and I'm smiling. Like, listen, I can talk to everybody. I can. Sometimes I don't want to. Like, I get enough talking at home. These kids don't stop. Sometimes I just want to be in public quietly. But I have worn earbuds that you can clearly see. People still talk to me. They watch me pull them out of my ear, and they continue. But I would like to just kind of say that I would rather random people walk up to me and be nice to me and tell me stories and all that than everyone be super hateful. I just felt like bitching for a minute. My butt. Say it. We can always cut it if you don't want to say it, but. Oh, yeah. I used to get weirdos. I attract absolute weirdos. There was one guy that left a lottery ticket on the windshield of my car that just said, can I go home with you? And he was not around. I don't know where he went. He was, like, hiding around the corner of this gas station or whatever. But I just yelled out into the ether just, no, and then got in my car and waited for Lou to get out of the gas station. I was, like, texting her. I was like, we got to go. The worst one was when I got my transmission blew up in my car. A dude pulled over to the side of the road, asked for my number, and I told him, sorry, no, I have a boyfriend. And he was like, well, he's a lucky bastard. And then he left. Like, buddy, it wasn't contingent on the phone number. Yeah. Tasty. Okay. Oh, you showed your ankles, Morgan? Oh, you're scandalous. Scandalous. Yeah, cool. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. The worst, I think the most uncomfortable I ever was, was I was trying to go to school. And at the time, I lived with my boyfriend. Well, he's my husband now. But I lived with Nick's parents because college, and it was closer, and I had to be at school very early in the morning. So instead of waking up the whole family, I would stop in at the truck stop on the way to school and make myself a cup of coffee there and get a little quick breakfast. Well, I was half asleep making my coffee at like 7 a.m., and this trucker guy, and I could tell he was a trucker because he had like the headset on, and he came up to me, looked at me from head to toe, and then back up, and he said, damn, girl, you got some cute feet. And if y'all know me, I have some fucking jacked-off feet. And I was like, my man, I can't move four of them. They're jacked. And in my head, I'm like, he can't be looking at my feet. I was wearing Chacos. You could see the toes, okay? And I'm just staring at him. And then he does the second worst thing in this situation, other than tell me I have cute feet because I know that's a damn lie. He starts talking to whoever's on the other side of the headset about me, in front of me, making eye contact. And I'm like, it's too early. I haven't had coffee. I just got my coffee. I don't think I even said anything to him. I just, like, stared at him. I might have said, thanks, and then left. Yes. Oh, my God, yeah. Oh, I think I know which one you're talking about. Yes, I love this story. Okay. Okay. Okay. Oh, that sucks. She did it, right? Man, you know what? If people like that kind of shit, I am in the wrong business. Yeah. Do they have, like, only fans, but it's, like, only feet, and then no one has to see my face? True. That's true. We should get into our topic today. Ah, 15 minutes. Yeah, it's fine. Yeah. We did just talk about, before we started recording, it was like, let's get a little loosey-goosey with it, and we might have goosed. We goosed too much. Goosed too much. Okay. Do you want to start out? Okay, start out. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Nice. Okay. Yes, he was born somewhere. Just yes. Sorry, I read ahead. Yes. Head and face, normal. Oh, no. Okay. Okay. Genetic urinaries. Sorry, I can't. Okay. Oh, it's a picture. Okay. Again, this is adorable, but also the shit of nightmares. Oh, no. I love him. I love him so much. He's cat-ish. What did it say? His nationality was pussy. He's a Catholic pussy. Oh, my God. I love that. Okay. I have a little more information than that on my first one, and it is Jet of IATA. IATA? It's I-A-D-A. IATA. And he was a black German shepherd. He was born July 21st of 1942, and he passed away October 18th of 1949, which, now looking back at that, that is not a very long life for a pupper. It's a poor thing. But he was born in Liverpool at the IATA kennel of Miss Babcock Cleaver, and at nine months old he was loaned to be trained at the war dog school in Gloucester? I don't know how to say that, guys. Gloucester, where he was trained in anti-sabotage work, and after his training was complete, he spent 18 months working on airfields performing his anti-sabotage duties. He then returned to the school to be trained in search and rescue, and that is when he was paired with Corporal Wardle. And the two of them were then sent to London, where they were the first handler and dog to be used in an official capacity in civil defense rescue duties. And it was during his time in London that he helped rescue 50 people from a blitzed building, from one blitzed building, 50 people. And for that, he was awarded the Dickin Medal, which is basically the animal equivalent of the Victoria Cross, on January the 12th of 1945 for saving those 50 people. In all, he saved about 150 people from blitzed buildings. And the dedication on the Dickin Medal, which I can't. The Dickin Medal. So the dedication read, for being responsible for the rescue of persons trapped under blitzed buildings while serving in the Civil Defense Services of London. And on August the 15th of 1947, an explosion occurred in the William Pit near Whitehaven, Cumbria. Now, at this point, he had gone back to his original owner, because remember, he was just loaned out. So the dogs trained in body recovery work were unavailable. So two dogs were sent from the RAF Police Dog School in Staverton. And Jet was, like, picked up on the way. So they just, like, scooped him and picked him up and took him. And he helped save the rescuers. And he was awarded the RSPCA's Medallion of Valor. And there is a memorial to Jet in the English Flower Garden of Calderstones Park in Liverpool, near where he is buried. And this memorial was cleaned in 2016 by pupils of the Childwell Church of England Primary School and the Reader in celebration of Jet's birthday. And also in attendance was, at 93 years old, his owner. I know. I know. And if you scroll down to the first picture I put, there's his little memorial. Yes. Mmm. Cool. Yeah, go ahead. It doesn't matter. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Wow. That's so sad. Yeah. Wow. Look at him. Aww. Aww. Let them go. That is so... We are the same person. All right, my next one. Are you ready for this? Wojtek the Bear. Have you heard about him before? So he is a brown bear, and he weighed fully grown 5 to 600 pounds, and he served in the 22nd Transport Company's Artillery Division in the Polish Second Corps. Sorry about the slur. That's the wine. So on April 8th of 1942, he was found as a cub in the mountains of Iran by a group of Polish prisoners of war who were being transported from a Siberian gulag through the Middle East to Alexandria, Egypt. So from what I understand, I think the Polish ended up fighting for the – those Polish prisoners of war ended up fighting for the Allies. So from there, they were shipped off to Europe, and Wojtek went with them. They fed him condensed milk out of a vodka bottle, and one of the soldiers who took care of him said, quote, once he got bigger, sorry, once he got bigger, quote, he would accept lit cigarettes, take a puff, and then swallow them. He loved to drink from a beer bottle, and when it was empty, he would look through the opening to see where the rest of the beer was. Especially lit cigarettes that he was going to just swallow. They really were – honestly, I don't condone it, but they definitely had bigger fish to fry, and I don't blame them for having a little fun finding – at least they were nice to him. Yeah. So his time in the – Alex in Egypt, he's a brown bear. He is not made to be in that heat. So it was way too hot for him, and he learned how to break into the communal shower huts and turn on the water on his own. But that was a problem because the water was rationed, and his ingeniousness would sometimes result in water shortages. Yeah. And apparently the men taught him how to pick up new recruits by, like, the boot and hold them upside down and make the rookies think that they were going to get eaten. So during the Battle of Monte Cassino, the bear was seen on the front lines carrying what was thought to be live ammunition to help load the guns. But one of the members of the 22nd Transport Company said that he was really just walking around with, like, empty ammo crates and used shells. But the image stuck, and the regiment changed its insignia to an image of a bear and an ammo shell and boasted that the bear was an enlisted soldier and gave him a rank and a number. So if you look at the pictures I posted, you'll see one of the soldiers and a bear, and then you see the little insignia they put. I didn't, unfortunately. So after the war, they didn't know where the heck he was going to go. So his caretakers were afraid that if he got taken back to Poland, that the Soviets, who controlled Poland at the time, would use them as a symbol for communism, and they didn't want him being used for that because they were not on board with that. So he ended up in Scotland living on a farm with some other former Polish soldiers. And one woman, I think that's probably why. I don't know. Yeah. Huh. I wonder if that's why. So one woman stated that, quote, he was very much a part of the community and attended dances, concerts, local children's parties. He was like a dog. He was almost human. Yep. Yeah. Wojtek. Wojtek. Mm-hmm. I did have to Google that because it is spelled W-O-J-T-E-K. Yeah. Wojtek. Yeah. Yeah. I Googled it. So he died in 1963, partly of damage to his esophagus, probably from swallowing the lit cigarette. Yeah. But a bronze statue of him was unveiled in central Edinburgh in November of 2015. So you must have just missed it. Isn't he? And look, the nose. And the nose is rubbed. It's a bear nose. Isn't it? Yeah. Oh, my God. We're the same person. Did you wash the duck? Oh. Question. Did they say what it meant? Got it. Got it, got it, got it. Got it. Okay. Okay. Oh, my God. No, she didn't. She understood the fucking assignment. No. No, it's not good for them. Well, she's adorable and she's a fighter, okay? Yeah. Yeah. Fucking roosters. Fair. Yeah. All right. Thank you for the duck. I had to fix the header. Not that it would matter, but it matters to me, apparently. Sorry. I took a drink of wine and now my throat is, like, weird, so now I'm going to chase it real quick. That's a little better. Okay. So bats. Freaking bats. I freaking love Halloween. I love her so much. It is. She's my spirit animal, truly. So, after Pearl Harbor, hundreds of Mexican free-tailed bats were recruited into the military. Why? To blow up Japanese cities. Again, we don't condone this, but the dumb assery that happened through this project. Okay. Anyway, the idea was that they would just strap bombs to the bats, let them fly into the houses, and then they're going to blow everything up naturally. And they did at least go for a species of bats that there were millions of at the time. I think there still are. So, no, no, no. They were not going to, you know, do that at least, but still not okay. But there were two tiny little problems with this plan from the get-go. Problem number one is they hadn't invented a bomb small enough that a bat could carry. The smallest they had gotten it to was the size of a can of beans, which was impossible for the bats to carry because these bats are probably the size of a medium-sized mouse. They're not big. Yeah, they're tiny bats. So that was problem number one. Problem number two, can you guess it? Bats aren't trainable. That's problem number two. So Lytle Adams was a Pennsylvania dentist and inventor, and he came up with this idea. Why, buddy? He somehow convinced President Roosevelt to give recommendations of, like, his credibility to the National Research Defense Committee. And Roosevelt said, quote, this man is not a nut. It sounds like a perfectly wild idea, but it's worth looking into. He's not a nut. He just sounds nuts. So even though those are two very big problems, this project was given the green fucking light. So the project was dubbed Top Secret and then given the name Project X-Ray. Why not echolocation, something that makes more sense? Yes, echo sounds cool. These are the people that were trying to get freaking bats to blow up houses. So a team of senior Army types, arsenal experts, engineers, and biologists were assembled, like a fucked up X-Men. And they developed the bomb and captured hundreds of bats. So they have figured out half the problem. They did make a bomb small enough. But they couldn't figure out how to control the bats after they got them, so they put them in refrigerators, which pretty much just forced them into, like, a slightly, like, hibernation mode. Yeah. But the problem with that was that waking them back up was the hard part, because they did test several of them, but the bats woke up too late, which caused them to plummet to the ground once released. Something just occurred to me. They must have been throwing these bats before they were even awake. What did they expect? Yeah. I wonder, actually, now that I'm thinking about it, they did show, like, a canister, and it was like the bat was in the canister and it was, like, strapped to them, so they just, like, let go. And I think maybe they were supposed to, like, come out of the canister, but if they didn't wake up in time as they were falling, it's almost like they were being dropped into the city. I think so. That's kind of what I'm gathering. And so they would either fall to the ground or they would wake up too soon before they could get the bomb strapped to them and they would just escape. Then my next topic or my next title is just oops. So that was with dummy bombs. They were fucking up with dummy bombs, and they were like, you know what's a good fucking idea? Let's test the real bombs. No, let's just test the real bombs. Not, like, do it. Ow, I just squished my finger. I squished it on my desk. So anyway, so they were like, let's test the real bombs. At their own fucking facility. So they tested the real bombs, but quickly concluded the test when the bats blew up not only most of the other materials, but also the barracks, control tower, and several other buildings at the auxiliary field station in Carlsbad, New Mexico. Please refer to the picture. So the fire led from building to building because their need for secrecy prevented them from allowing the local fire department to come in and assist in the fire. Buddy, at this point, just let them come. So a few of the bats got loose, but they had bombs strapped to them, and they flew under a general's car and then blew up the car. The project never recovered and was canceled in 1944. I didn't see that they did. I didn't see anything. But the endeavor cost the U.S. a couple years and a few million dollars. Motherfucker. I think there's a piece of pumpkin in my wine. We carved jack-o'-lanterns tonight, guys, and it was with power tools, because that's how you have to do it when you buy the hardest fucking pumpkins on the face of the planet. I could not get a knife through, a boning knife made for cutting up chickens. I couldn't get it through it. Listen, I am a strong, independent woman until I am not anymore, and I was like, honey, I need you and your man muscles, and he went and got a power tool. All right, Morgan, let's hear yours. Yeah. Got it. Mm-hmm. Oh. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. That's incredible. What the fuck? Oh. That poor bird. Wow. Wow. They stuffed him. Oh, my little leg. I mean, you might as well, I guess. Well, I mean, okay, I don't find it too weird, and it's probably because going through – when I was growing up, the alligator farm in St. Augustine had the biggest – I think these are crocodiles in captivity, like in the world, and I remember when he was alive, this motherfucker's like 30 feet long. He's huge, and his name was Gomek, and when he died, they stuffed him, and they've got like a whole exhibit like around, and they've got – they think he was like over 100 years old or something like that. He was so old, and so I don't know. If he's like – if it's like a really important animal, I mean, people taxidermy just less than that, so I guess it's not too weird. Yeah. Yeah, at what point like do you taxidermy it or do you put a memorial for it? I don't think I've ever seen a memorial for a – yeah, I don't think I've ever seen a memorial for a bird, but there's lots of dog memorials and a statue for the bear. Yeah, so – Oh, my God, you're going to know so – he like – he like hyper-focused on pigeons for a little too long, I think. So speaking of small animals, you ready to get into the last one? Smokey, and if you're a Tennessee fan, I'm not talking about the Blue Tickhound Smokey football mascot. I am talking about a four-pound Yorkie who, in 1943, was found in a foxhole in the New Guinea jungle. Little four-pound. Yeah, I know. It's a girl. It's a girl. Yeah, so she was found in the foxhole in 1944. I think I said 43, but she was born in 43. She was full-grown when they found her, and the soldier that found her thought that maybe she belonged to one of the Japanese, but she didn't respond to either Japanese or English commands, so I guess she was just no one's dog or wasn't trained at all. But she was sold to Corporal William A. Wynne of Cleveland, Ohio, for two Australian pounds, which was equal to $6.44 at the time. So the seller could return to his poker game. Yep. So we're in the middle of war right now. So for the next two years, this dog, little tiny four-pound Yorkie, backpacked with Wynne through the rest of the war for the next two years, accompanying him on combat flights in the Pacific. Huh. So they were in the Air Force. She was getting in planes and shit. So she slept in Wynne's tent on a bed made out of green felt from a card table cover, and she would share his rations and occasionally get a can of Spam. That was her food. And she unfortunately didn't have the access to the veterinary medicines or a balanced diet of, like, the official dogs of the military, so she just kind of lived on whatever he could give her. Thankfully, she was a small dog, so probably didn't need a whole lot. But she also never got sick. She ate coral, and I'm talking actual coral, for four months without developing any of the paw ailments that developed in other dogs. Yeah. So when her and Corporal Wynne went on their mission, Wynne described her, he said, Smokey served in the South Pacific with the 5th Air Force 26th Photo Reconnaissance Squadron and flew 12 air, sea, rescue, and photo reconnaissance missions. So she would literally just spend hours in these flights dangling in a backpack just next to, like, machine guns and all these other things, and she was just chilling. And Smokey was credited with 12 combat missions and awarded eight battle stars. She survived 150 air raids in New Guinea and made it through a typhoon in Okinawa. And Smokey even – I know! And Smokey even parachuted from 30 feet, or 9.1 meters, in the air, out of a tree, using a parachute that was made just for her. I know! I literally – I told you, I was like, I'm going to cry. I was crying reading these because it's just so sweet. And Wynne credited Smokey with saving his life by warning him of incoming shells on an LST or a transport ship, calling her, quote, an angel from a foxhole. Morgan's crying. This is why I saved this one for last. I knew it was going to get you. So the ship deck was apparently loud and, like, vibrating from the anti-aircraft gunnery, and Smokey guided Wynne to duck the fire that hit eight men that was standing next to him. But she was able to, like, push him out of the way, which is – what a good girl. I know. Smokey. So in their downtime, Smokey learned a lot of tricks, and she performed for the entertainment, of course she did, of troops with special forces and in hospitals from Australia to Korea. And in 1944, Yank Down Under magazine named Smokey the, quote, champion mascot in the southwest Pacific area. I know. Smokey's tricks enabled her to become a hero in her own right by helping engineers to build an air base in Langevin Gulf, Luzon. I don't know. I'm so sorry, guys. Which was a crucial airfield for the Allied war plans. So apparently, during this time, the signal cord needed to run a telegraph wire through a 70-foot-long pipe that was about eight inches in diameter. But dirt and soil had sifted through the corrugated sections of the pipe joinings, filling in as much as half of the pipe in areas. So that would only give Smokey about four inches in some areas. So they tied, okay, I'll just tell the, Wynn has a quote that he said. So, quote, I tied a string, tied to the wire, tied a string to the wire, to Smokey's collar and ran to the other end of the culvert. Smokey made a few steps in and then ran back. Come, Smokey, I said sharply, and she started through again. When she was about ten feet in, the string caught up, and she looked over her shoulder as much as to say, What's holding us up here? The string loosened from the snag, and she came on again. By now the dust was rising from the shuffle of her paws, and she crawled through the dirt and mold, and I could no longer see her. I called and pleaded, not knowing for certain whether she was coming or not. At last, about 20 feet away, I saw two little amber eyes and heard a faint whimpering sound. At 15 feet away, she broke into a run. We were so happy at Smokey's success that we patted and praised her for a full five minutes. She does, because not only was that very helpful, it was so helpful because this act saved 250 ground crewmen from having to move around and keep Operational 40 United States Fighters and Reconnaissance Planes because it was kind of dangerous to have them out. So it prevented them from days' worth of work trying to dig this up, to lay this down, to put it back in. What would have taken them days took her minutes. Yeah. So after the war, when they arrived home from the war, Wynne and Smokey were featured in a page one story with photographs in the Cleveland Press on December 7th of 1945. Smokey soon became a national sensation. Over the next ten years, Smokey and Wynne traveled to Hollywood and all over the world to perform demonstrations of her remarkable skills, which included walking a tightrope while blindfolded. She appeared with Wynne on some of the earliest TV shows in the Cleveland area, including a show of their own on Cleveland's WKYC Channel 3 called Castles in the Air featuring some of Smokey's unbelievable tricks. Smokey performed 42 live television shows without ever repeating a trick. I know. So Smokey and Wynne were also very popular entertainers at veterans hospitals. According to Wynne, quote, after the war Smokey entertained millions during the late 1940s and early 1950s. And on February 21st, 1957, Corporal Smokey died unexpectedly at the approximate age of 14 when Wynne and his family buried Smokey in a World War II .30 caliber ammo box in the Cleveland Metro Parks Rocky River Reservation in Lakewood, Ohio, which seems fitting. And nearly 50 years later, on Veterans Day, November 11th, 2005, a bronze life-size sculpture by Susan Bari of Smokey sitting. Yeah. So the sculpture was of Smokey sitting in the GI helmet, sitting on the base. And it is on top of the very spot where she is laid. And this monument is dedicated, quote, to, sorry, to, quote, Smokey. The Yorkie Doodle Dandy and the Dogs of All Wars. Is that not the sweetest little baby? What? Look at her. She is so sweet. Oh, Jesus Christ. I was like, man, if I'm tearing up reading a Wikipedia page, I feel like Morgan's going to cry. I know, but what really got me was, like, her saving her owner by, like, pushing him out of the way. And her just, like, chilling with all this stressful stuff going around. Yeah. So I'm sure we told this story on the pod before, but I'm telling it again. Once we were in Florida, and Morgan saw a golden retriever wearing a hat and cried on the beach. Because its ears were sticking through the hat. It was so cute. It was so cute. It had sand all over you. They are literally the best. It kind of reminds me of when Lou and I went camping with River, my dog who has passed, unfortunately. She was a Samusky, and that is a Husky Samoyed mix for all that don't know. So she was a big 65-pound fluff ball, full of fucking attitude. Bless her. I love her so much. God, I miss her. But we went camping, and I was like, hey, Lou, I'm going to go run to the shower house and take a shower. I'm going to leave River here. I'll be back. She was so smart. She busted through whatever I had tied her with, maybe just, like, a rope. I guess she was able to get the knot undone. Lou thought she lost my dog because River was gone. And I was minding my own business taking a shower, and I turned around, and there was a dog nose. I was like, oh, God, River. She came and found me. Yeah. They're so loyal. Yeah. Yeah, he is. Yeah. Yeah. River was ‑‑ she had such separation anxiety when she was a pup that I legitimately remember one time she would sit outside the shower with me, and I don't know what was going on, but she also had storm anxiety. So this might have been why. I was literally taking a shower, and I turned around, and she had climbed into my shower at the house and sat on the seat and was just chilling in the corner, just like, you done yet? You are too big to be in here, ma'am. And she ate all of my underwear. Yeah. All of them. She was like, I'm going to eat your pants and your underwear because you left me at the house. Rude. Oh, the kids also still ‑‑ Izzy did it today. She looked at a painting of River. Because apparently I am one of those dog owners that has a hand painted portrait of my dog. And she said, dad, do you miss River? And he was like, yeah, I do. And she went, yeah, she's dead. Don't remind me. I will be minding my own business, driving down the road, no one saying a word. And the next thing I know, William is reminding me of the dog I hit three years ago when they were in the car with me. Like it wasn't traumatic enough. Yeah. Yeah. I just want you to remember all the bad things you ever did in life. Oh, my God, you're right. Isn't that just what firstborns are? They just remind you? Did you do that to your parents? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think ‑‑ you've said about ‑‑ you've said it a few times that I was about the only person that your mom would let go. Like if I was driving, like I ‑‑ you could go. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because you're the oldest out of the three of us. Oh. My dad was like, hey, I taught you how to drive a long time ago. Here's a Jeep with no airbags. See you later. I could move the steering wheel up and down the whole column. But honestly, though, that Jeep taught me a lot. I know how to change my own oil. At one point I did know how to change the spark plugs. I can change a tire. Learned about radiators. That ran out a few times. I never had to change the oil per se in that Jeep. I would just put a new filter on it. And then I put about a quart of oil in it, I don't know, every week or two. So I just kept it. It was self‑changing, okay? I was bougie. And I did put it in a ditch a few times. And if it had airbags, that thing would have been totaled. But, no, my ass just put it in reverse, backed it out, and took my happy ass on home. I nearly flipped it once, and it landed back on all fours, and I was like ‑‑ I got out, I looked around, and I was like, well, everything seems to be fine. I just drove home. No, no, thankfully you weren't with me on any of them. I was not a good driver at 16. I got better. I am probably too ‑‑ no one is a good driver at 16. You're right. I shouldn't feel bad about that. I am a great driver now. I'm slower than my grandmother. My mom was driving, and she said, oh, there's a cop. I need to slow down. And I was like, mom, how fast are you ‑‑ I was on the phone with her. I was like, mom, how fast are you going? And she's like, oh, I'm only going 10 over. And I was like, oh, only 10 this time? Like, only 10? She's like, I'm trying to be better. That's the beginning of the worst of it. Sorry. Just Georgia. Yes. Well, the cop doesn't give a damn. The cop doesn't give a shit. I don't know how ‑‑ okay. Thank God. Thank God. I somehow ‑‑ I got out of a ticket once, and I'm going to jinx myself by telling this story. But I was driving my red Jeep. And for y'all that don't know, my Jeep has, I think, 32, 34‑inch tires on it. It's got a little lift. I mean, it's nothing crazy. Just a little higher lift, a little bigger tire, bumper with the winch and all that. It's a nice‑looking Cherokee. And bigger tires make your speedometer off. And I knew that. I know that. At the time, I could tell you what the speedometer said, and I could give you to a mile per hour give or take of what I'm actually driving. So I'm going down this road that is a 45, and my ass gets pulled over doing probably 65 at the time. This is pre‑children, okay? I was a little more wild back then. And so I get pulled over and, again, pre‑children, so I'm young and cute and skinny. And I get pulled over and the cop's like, ma'am, do you know how fast you were driving? And I said, well, officer, the speedometer said 50. I knew I was going about five over. And he said, ma'am, you've got bigger tires on this thing. Did you not know that the speedometer makes it bigger? I said, no, my daddy never told me that. And he said, all right, this is what I'm going to do. Instead of giving you a ticket, I'm going to give you ‑‑ I'm going to let you go. You spend that money on getting your speedometer calibrated, because you were going about 65. I said, oh, my gosh, I am so sorry. I am heading home right now, and I will tell my daddy as soon as I walk through the door so he can fix this for me. And I got out of it. Thank you. Thank you. Have you ever gotten pulled over for anything else? Oh, okay, yeah. Oh. Uh, yeah. I've been pulled over twice, and I am not proud of this. This is, again, a long time ago. I've been pulled over on two separate occasions for not having my headlights on in the dark. I've been pulled over on two separate occasions for not having my headlights on in the dark. I've been pulled over on two separate occasions for not having my headlights on in the dark. We were leaving Mufflehead in my mom's car, and in my defense, it was my mom's car. I was turning the wrong knob, and I accidentally turned the lights off, but then we were in a well‑lit area of town, and a cop just happened to be there. But the first time I was in Knoxville, and I was driving home, it was back when I lived in Knoxville, and I was on the interstate, but a very, very well‑lit part of the interstate, right there at a Cedar, not Cedar, is it Cedar Bluff? Yeah, right there at that first exit, Cedar Bluff. And so I'm driving, and a cop gets, like, beside me, so I think I'm going too fast, so I slow down. So he slows down, so I slow down, so he slows down. And then he just gets behind me, because he probably thinks I'm drunk, but I really just don't want to be going faster than a cop. And he pulls me over. He asks if I have, like, weapons in the car and all this other shit, and I was like, no, I just got off work, and I'm really tired. I don't know. I don't feel like I'm a threatening person at all. It's the thunder thighs. I've got area to hide it. I don't know, but it was kind of scary. I was like, man, this is it. I'm going to jail for not having my lights on and being a stupid driver. Yeah. Just a little bit. I hope you like it, because it gets out of the bag now. Yeah. Yeah, tell us what you think. Give us some comments on here if you have any topic ideas or anything special. We had, you know, bounced off a couple ideas. Morgan, do you want to mention the movie idea or something like that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. And I have kids and, like, four part-time jobs, and some of them don't even pay. So I just do this to myself, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. And if you hate that idea, tell us. I mean, we really want your feedback. We want to know what y'all want from us. Like, what would you want to see? We've been winging it since day one. So, yeah. Yeah. We were like, okay, we want to do a podcast. We're going to do a podcast. What the fuck? And then one day one of us was like, I don't even remember which one. And it was like, was it me? Because I know. Okay. So then I guess I was like, the mentality was we watch this anyway. It's an unlimited resource. Like, everything is history, so we're not going to run out of topics. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Expedition unknown. It is the best. Did we even catch up from last season? Oh, shit, we need to catch up. It is really hard. It is really hard. We should go, probably. Yeah. Yes, thank you. Yeah. Because we do. Yeah. We are not exaggerating. When Morgan comes into town or when I go to her house, it's almost a reprieve when the other leaves, because it's like my face hurts from smiling, my lungs hurt from breathing, my throat hurts from talking. We need a couple days of recoup. Yeah. Just, yeah. Y'all should just be lucky that you're not stuck in a car with us on the way to Florida, because that's eight hours of the radio is not on. We're all talking. It doesn't matter who's in the car. Morgan and I are talking, and you're not going to get to listen to music. No, we're not sorry. And also you're going to need a lot of pee breaks and a lot of snack breaks. Okay. I guess we don't need to sign off. They know where to find us. I mean, yeah. And this is our first one. So I don't know how exactly logistically I'm going to do it, but I will be sending you stickers. So, yay, stickers. We're recording this in late October. Yes. So bear with us. It might take a couple weeks to get you out there. Yes. Yay. Okay. Bye.