My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia HardstarkThis week’s hometowns include trying to enjoy a picnic and hanging out at a mall in the ‘80s.
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Hello, Hello, I'm welcome to my favorite murder, the minisod.
Here it is, I'll que and Minnie.
You want to go first?
Sure, I'm not going to tell you the name of this one, all right, hey, team. My husband and I bought our very first house in the middle of covid Lockdown just over four years ago. Now we had a three year old and a new baby, and despite these amazing milestones in our lives, it was a strange time to be alive. One thing that made life slightly less cabin fevery was the park behind our house. By park, I mean biggish rocky hill, at the top of which is a beautiful gary oak meadow. Gary oaks are gnarly, scraggly tim Burton trees, but the creepy factor is offset by the wildflowers that grow between them, crocuses, daffodils, fawn lily and camas. Pretty spectacular stuff. One day, my husband and I had a rare opportunity to go out alone together. Seizing the moment, we got takeout Vietnamese subs and avoiding the plague, we took them to the summit of our hill. It was a gorgeous spring day. The creepy trees were creeping, and crocuses were in full bloom. We walked past the gathering of fifteen people or so weird to see so many people in one spot in those days, who were perched in a circle at the top of a small cliff overlooking the city. They had a bunch of acoustic guitars, so we veered hard to the left, not thinking much about it except that we wanted some alone time. Unsullied by tragic covers of Imagine and Hallelujah, we headed down to a nice lookout spot nestled under the cliff, sort of semi private. We tucked into our bond Me so delicious and we're really feeling pretty happy. The guitars had started up, but the view is nice, so we didn't mind until black stuff started sprinkling down from the sky all around us.
Uh oh.
We looked up, confused to the cliff above. It took us a second before we realized that the gathering was a COVID friendly funeral.
Oh my god.
And they were shaking someone's crimines onto our picnic. Can you evenly.
Imagine onto our beautiful bond Me sandwiches and like during covidho.
We got up and ran quietly and respectfully and very fucking fast, directly all the way home and into the shower. Worst of all, we had to throw out those delicious subs. And I mean, you know, Vietnamese subs are everything, with that soft white loaf and all that cilantro and mayo and green chilies. Sorry, writing while hungry, needless to say, date night was cut short, yea, but like just this desperate grab for one moment together alone.
And what you get is a dead body sprinkled on top of you.
That's right.
In any case, I first heard your lovely voices around the same time as the Ruined picnic, and binging the episodes in reverse order was another tool I used to keep saying during pandemic times, I am a midwife with a medical degree and not a whiff of patuli about me, And I remember at the time having to attend prenatal clinic visits, berths and home visits in swimming goggles and homemade trash bag gowns as there was a shortage on ppe on our island and nothing left for us to use to protect ourselves. So scary, yeah, says what a fucking time. Yeah, you kept me afloat and have kept me company through so many of life's twists and turns in the years that have followed. I am grateful, take good care, stay sexy, and don't have a picnic at a funeral, Megan. And then it says just Meg and spelled weird. Because it was spelled weird.
She her, Megan, that's a story for the ages.
I mean, that's an anecdote that you're going to be able to pull out at any dinner party when people are like trading great stories back and forth, they're like, okay, well, everybody sit down, because it's my time to shine.
Definitely, this is going to be her grandchildren are going to write in this hometown to whoever is hosting my favorite murderer in fucking twenty five years from now, good lord, and be like, that was my Grandmaden spelled weird was my grandma.
My mom was pregnant with me during that story, which it had cremaine sprinkled on her.
Oh god, oh shit. Okay, amazing kickoff. I think I have a good follow up here.
Okay, I won't read you the subject line and the opening is my favorite people. Oh I'm currently at work listening to Minnesode four oh one, which is listener Catherine's story of being a ten year old bartender. I can't top that, but I remembered my experience as a reception for my school district for one morning at eleven years old. All right, it would have been a totally banal story had I not received to rather unfortunate calls within the same five minutes. So, for some brief background, my middle school and the elementary school where my mom teaches were connected. So when missus West, the receptionist for both schools, was unable to cover the phone lines one morning, the quote unquote logical option was for the eleven year old to do it. As I was already in my mom's classroom waiting for homeroom to start, I was asked to cover the phones until ten am instead of going to my first few classes.
What the fuck?
Yeah, that's a job, that's they have temp agencies so you can call adults in to do that.
It's a professional job where important things happen.
It's schools and children, and like, yeah, I was like training, that's done.
Also, who were the other children that were up for the job that she got it over? Them.
I just can't imagine, like leaving getting a voicemail or leaving a message wouldn't have been more useful than an eleven year old answering the fucking phone.
Right, you know, unless it was one of those sassy kind of quinn commings. Eleven year old so that's kind of like, yeah, calls their parents by their first name, you know, no nonsense. Yeah, okay, yeah, old soul, yeah, big.
Sister kind of a thing. Yeah, I'm in charge. Okay.
So about seven thirty am I got a call from a substitute teacher who had just gotten in a car accident and wouldn't be able to make it in. I remember floundering immediately, there being no protocol for how to do any components of the job, let alone handle.
A fairly serious issue.
I ascertained the man was not hurt, and I let him know that I'd pass along as message to someone literally, anyone else.
They handled it. Yeah, that's handling. I will let an older person know.
Yeah, what more do you want me to do? Literally, we can't turn back the hands of time.
Do you have insurance?
Let's all, well, then you've done your part right, Nurse a buzz and getting sweaty. I tried to calm myself down in preparation for the next couple hours. Then the phone rang again. This time the man on the other end immediately launched into a tirade about being underpaid. I'm a teacher there and I need more money. What are you going to do about it?
He demanded. Nearly in tears, I blurted out, I'm just Alyssa. I don't even work here. I'm just Alyssa.
Had I not been in such a state of anxiety, I might have recognized the voice of my math teacher calling to play a prank on me.
Fuck you a belt. Oh.
Within a few more seconds, he realized I was not recognizing the joke and said, Alyssa, it's mister Bridger. Friends, I think I hung up on him. To this day, I don't remember. Thankfully, nothing bad actually happened, and I returned to my normal sixth grade scholarly pursuits. I have to say I very clearly remember being in sixth grade, because that was when I realized, like, oh, I love to read aloud in class.
Oh yeah, here's what I like. Here's what I like.
So like if somebody came down, I was like you answered the phone for the day I would have been seventh Heaven.
You're like, here, I am, and I'm going to get the job too. Yeah, this is your new job I got. I was also thinking about prankster teachers and what they were like too. Oh yeah, that was that was a type.
That was a type that no one questioned at the time. Exactly, I don't think you can do that anymore.
I don't either. I don't think they want adults pranking children anymore.
I think mister Bridger would have been sued to high Heaven fucking rightfully. So, Alyssa goes on to say, but I learned a few lessons that day, not the least of witches. That I'm riddled with anxiety, and that you should be wary of adults, even the ones that are underpaid to teach and mentor you more so probably. Yeah, anyway, thanks for being the source of many laughs and my companions through some tears. Oh and what am I even doing right now reconciling spreadsheets as a compensation analyst trying to determine equitable pay rates for new hires at my local university. Oh maybe mister Bridger's mild harangue was more impactful than I thought, I says DGM Melissa, how awesome is that?
Wow? Yeah, that is a good little button.
Everything that happens to us affects us somehow.
Yeah. The butterfly effect by Alissa.
Oh my god, committing felonies for the sake of Lesbian's sext one just starts. When I was in high school in the late nineties, I had a girlfriend who was a couple years.
Older than me. So fucking cool, right.
We looked similar enough that I could pass using her ID and then it says queer. In case the math ain't mathing, please state it.
Loud and proud. We'd like to know.
She ended up giving me a non driver ID so I could buy cigarettes. We broke up shortly after I graduated, and I held onto that ID, awaiting her upcoming twenty first birthday. Unfortunately for me, it expired on that very day, and with it, so did my dream of getting into Tutsie's the lesbian bar.
Such a good name.
Well, unless there was another way. Ah, Yes, yet another brilliant idea formulated in my underdeveloped prefrontal cortex. What if I just renewed the expired ID? It says before I continue, I do want to acknowledge that identity theft is a serious and devastating crime. However, stealing her identity was never my intent. My ex also knew about my plan and was fine with it. In today's world, that sounds crazy, but this was just at a time that most people didn't think about protecting their identity.
Disclaimer quarterback member FDIC.
Clearly, identity protection was not a top priority for the DMV either.
At that time.
In my state, they didn't require you to bring a birth certificate, provide your Social Security number, or proof of residency, which is hilarious because I'm trying to get like my new driver's license and I can't bring enough paperwork to prove who I am in even though I already have a legit driver's license. Yeah, Like, they do not believe me because my middle name is in some stuff and not in others.
Right, what the fuck? They're like?
Can you bring in three gas bills? And it's like, no, I think, what are you talking about. I don't get paper gas bills anymore.
Right? Can you bring people that you knew in elementary school?
No?
I'm not friends with them anymore?
Like, can you bring in your own soul in a jar, right, prove that you're human, being.
Your inner child, please, and it says a vague resemblance to the expired ID was literally the only identification I needed to renew it. What a contrast from today's DMB experience. Within amount of twenty minutes, I had my photo taken, paid ten dollars, and was handed back the expired ID along with a brand new non driver identification card with my photo. It says, yes, gen Z they used to print them on location, and yes, I went to tutsis a lot.
Hell yeah.
But just a few months later, I was leaving a liquor store vodka in hand, and an undercover officer approached me. He said I looked young and wanted to scan my ID. No problem, right, after all, it was valid and it was my photo. Except there was a problem. Apparently my ex had a warrant for her arrest and shit, it was something trivial like unpaid parking tickets. I momentary contemplated going to jail as her. I was like, how bad she wanted to keep that fucking idea?
Yeah? Really?
Thankfully I came my senses and informed the officer that it wasn't my ID and handed over mine. He stood there looking at both IDs, obviously confused at how much we quote looked alike. In the end, I received a couple tickets and he confiscated the ID. Tutsu was so short lived. Unless I'm not even fucking joking, I went and renewed the original expired ID again.
Fucking diabolical teenager. I love it.
Cannot be kept away from Totsi's in any way, shape or form.
Tutsis must have been epic, but I mean like.
Any bar when you're that age, it's like any bar, of course, But then if you live in a town, if you're a queer person, you live in a town where it's like, oh no, we'll all be meeting here, right and on the.
Nineties, Yeah, yes, fucking you must. Yes.
I only had one other incidant using it. I was unknowingly carded at a liquor store by my ex's ex.
She took one look at the name.
Which wasn't common, and birth date and immediately knew something was weird. Her coworker got involved, and since the photo was actually me, he handed it back and let me leave. I was so confused, but soon after I got a call from my ex explaining that it was her ex that had just carded in. In my late teens and early twenties, I was wild and impulsive, which quickly became reckless and dangerous. Thankfully, my friends and family never gave up on me and carried me to the other side. I am now eighteen years sober.
Wow.
Wow, congratulations.
This podcast reminds me that while my struggles and trauma may be unique to me, they are not unique to the human experience. That sentiment helps me find gratitude, have more compassion, and be accountable. Wowuck, that's a lot to get from.
These two gals, from this bullshit, I'll take it. Yeah.
Really, MTHM is a safe place for so many. Thank you for its creation. Keep sharing stories and their truth and as always, stay sexy and don't grow up too fast. Also, don't commit felonies.
Bridget she bridget brilliant, beautiful, right on target for what we're looking for for a story of any kind exactly.
Oh damn, it's so funny. Yeah that was great. Okay this one.
The subject line is Glory Days the Mall and it says, Hi, there. I just listened to episode four forty seven up until Karen got to the utter tragedy that occurred at the sun Volley Mall.
It made me very.
Nostalgic for my mall rat days. Picture it des Moines, Iowa, nineteen eighty five. I'm eleven years old and frequently skulk around the mall in my parachute pants, striped, untucked Oxford and knit tie that keenly accentuated my amazing mullet and feathered banks.
Ooh, I have in.
Place top tier. For some reason, they decided to open a water slide in the mall called the hydro Tube.
Indoor, a water slide in the middle of a mall in Des Moines.
In Des Moines, it says I personally never went on the water slide, and then in parentheses, I had far more pressing things to spend my money on, such as cigarettes, French fries, and shitty earrings from Claires that always caused infections in my delicate lobes. It says the hydro Tube didn't last long. It closed only six months after opening. There remained rumors and urban legends that somebody died in the slide, but I think it really closed because one a water slide in a mall in Iowa is a dumb idea, and two the maintenance was unwieldy.
Oh the black mold, my god.
And also like if it was nineteen eighty five, there's a chance that it's like action park style water slide where maybe the dip was too steep.
You know what I mean, like you just go crashing into like precious, the Precious Moment store.
Something I went on to work at Things remembered, that's right, the kiosk in the mall between tom the Canshoes and pet World, famous for engraved id bracelets and door knockers. And that was in the nineties, by then having ditched my mullet for massive aquanetted bangs and replaced my parachute pants with Rayon hammer pants. And then it just says, the kids today will.
Just never know. No, I had hammer pants.
You did, absolutely had ham like straight up, you know, like elastic waste hammer pants.
And could you do the town. I tried real hard out on the playground. That's right.
It's as the kids today, we'll just never know. Leoni Wow, Yes, Simon Place. Oh sorry, there's a ps PS. I grew up with a dog named Cookie. In fact, most of our pets were named after snacks.
I love that. I know that was names for animals is great?
Yeah and necessary, so necessary, noodle, What else is there?
Our first dog was named Pepsi. Pepsi's perfect, Pepsi's perfect, Pepsi's perfect.
And that's why I picked Blossom when I was looking on the dog rescue website, because she looked she had the same vibe as Pepsi. She had like a white wire hair terry or mutt, and we brought her back.
Sweet, I know, Blossom.
Oh blassom an angel. My last one's called children violence against Mascots. Hello, gals and pals. Once again attempting to share a story I think would be worthy of a minisode.
Hey, you were right.
As this story does me, it hopefully will make you giggle at the misfortune of my brother as a teenager. He obtained and lost many jobs in ways only a stoner teenager could. But there was one job he actually quit. He was a bear mascot at an indoor water park at a resort another indoor water park right in a row psychic click.
In why an indoor a water park needs a bear mascot? Beyond me?
But a perfect job for a seventeen year old to just get high before work and walk around with no one knowing the.
Better except its fucking summertime. But you're indoors, oh oh thank you? Okay, great, but also claustrophobian being high. Don't those things go hand in hand? I mean, and by hand in hand you mean stabbing you in the neck with one hand and poking in the eyes with another.
Exactly one day when headed out.
One day, when headed on break, he got in the elevator only to be joined by five roughly ten year old boys. As soon as the door shut, the boys all turned in unison to face him. Already fucking terrifying, then clearly premeditated, they all pounced, taking him down in his fucking barrier work. They all seemed to be practicing as many WWE moves as possible before the doors opened again, then proceeded to get off the floor, running away, laughing evil.
They fucking beat up a mascot. Of course, of course.
The insult to injury arrived when he realized, due to the mascot head, he couldn't find the leverage to get off of the ground. So there you lay until a kind family boarded the elevator a short time later and helped him up. He promptly walked his fluffy, bare ass into the employee locker room, changed into his clothes, and walked out, only to return for his last check. Yeah, apparently being jumped by a bunch of children wasn't something he was willing to risk for eight fifty an hour. Fuck no, go to hell, big fan of the show, Stay sexy and don't get beat up by children.
Page page, You're so right about all of that.
I love sibling horror stories because it's just so much more gleeful than your own, where you're just like, yes, they deserved it.
And also I feel like Paige, like you can tell that story and tell us you can paint the full picture, like sometimes when something happens to you, you're just like, yes, goddamn kids. But yeah, Paige was like, let me set the same about this indoor.
Water park in the job my brotherhod and what my brother was like, because her brother's not going to be like I was a braddy stoner who fucking just had a lot of.
Jobs, exactly. He's only going to play the victim exactly. He always fucking does. Do you have one more I do.
Okay, oh yeah, and it's a goody Okay, I'm not going to read you the subject line, Oh okay, you seem gleeful.
Hi. Everyone.
Hearing Megan's money booth story, he made me want to write in about my own son's experience in the booth at Chuck E Cheese. It's a money booth story. Hell yeah, we love it, We need them. My child has always been a little different in his motivations. For his sixth or seventh birthday, we went to Chuck E Cheese and part of being the birthday boy is a two minute run in the wind tunnel full of tickets. His quote twin and then it says in parentheses, my sister and I had our babies two days apart, went first and got like thirty tickets. So essentially, I guess at Chuck E Cheese. Then there's a money booth for children, which is instead of money, tickets to get those prizes.
Sounds like mean I could do it as an adult Like that sounds amazing.
Hell yes.
Also, there's some sort of art installation right now in La where there's a ballpit for adults.
Okay, I'm in and you know I've never been in a ballpit. Remember that's right, you have to go. I know.
Okay, So the cousin got like thirty tickets. We had time to think up some strategies, so my partner and I were giving him very goods.
He was ready and excited as he entered the booth.
The wind tunnel starts a little slowly, so my son puts his hands out and down to the floor like he was going to free hand grab the tickets.
He didn't.
He very very slowly raised his hands. Then he started making wind noises with his mouth. Then he concentrated hard. It was one minute and forty five seconds in that I realized he wasn't trying to get a single ticket. He was controlling the elements around him. The time ended and he didn't get a single ticket. I'd never seen him more fulfilled. Sometimes it's just more fun to do what you want and not what the directions say. My son is now fifteen and still very easily pleased. I don't know how I got so lucky. Thanks for all of the things, Katie.
Oh. I know, like if I could.
Be promised one like that, then maybe I would have had kids.
You know, yes, exactly, I don't. I wonder though, if those ones it's just their personality comes out as is.
There's kind of not right.
It's not like I don't think people can control that.
No, it's not like the wind. Yeah, he's a visionary.
You can't be magneto and control your child's personality like the gravity.
Stand by and cheer them on.
Yeah, oh love you tell us your stories about your unique child's funny moments or something.
Or an actual money booth if you were in one. I don't know if you've heard that. We're obsessed and we really need those stories.
We do.
Someday we'll have one someday. Until then, stay sexy and don't get murdered.
A come buy Elvis, Do you want a cookie?
This has been an exactly right production.
Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck. Our editor is Aristotle Osceveda. This episode was mixed by le on a school.
Life emailing her hometowns to My Favorite Murder at gmail dot com.
And follow a show on Instagram and Facebook at My Favorite Murder.
Goodbye
