My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia HardstarkThis week’s hometowns include a dog named Turbo and an annual Hot Dog Day.
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He welcome to my favorite murder the minisode. Yep, yep, you agree, I think I think so.
Okay, Well think about it and get back to me. Circle back whenever you have after the holidays.
In the meantime, should I read you a story? Okay? Should I go first?
Yeah?
Please do?
Okay. This is called family vacation turned claustrophobic escape mission. Karen, Georgia and co y'all have been my constant companions for years, and I can't believe I'm just now writing in during a recent catch up on minisodes, I heard you ask for disaster vacation stories. So here's mine in the mid zero zerosts oughts.
Yeah, I like mid zero zeros better though, mid zero zeros.
Mid zero zeros. My family went on a trip to Prince Edward Island. My little sister and I in Sufferable preteen book Nerds were hoping to see every place mentioned in Anne of Green Gables. My dad had other plans. His goal was to visit all the lighthouses on the island. There are over fifty. Oh Jesus Christ's a lot of driving around on a vacation.
To get out to a point.
The end of the jetty fucking think yeah to look at a similar thing over exactly.
On a drive to the capital city of Charlottetown or Charlottetown, Charlottetown probably, our dad spontaneously took us to check yet another lighthouse on his list. We were the only people there when we arrived, so we went to take a couple photos. My sister and I had long since clued into the meaning of the phrase if you've seen one, you've seen them all, so we weren't too keen to stay for very long. We were about to ask our parents to leave when they saw two college aided girls trying to climb up from the rocky shore with their bicycles.
Hmm.
My dad asked if they needed help, and boy did they. Turns out they worked for a cruise ship that was docked in the city, and since they had the morning off, they asked a local boat guy and says captain to berry them across the bay so they could bike back into town on the scenic shoreline. When they got halfway across the bay, the boat guy turned off the engine and began pressuring them to drink and take off their clothes since it was so hot.
Oh.
They were stuck for hours with this creep on open water before he finally brought them to the lighthouse. He boasted that they would come crawling back to him because he was their only way back to the city dock before their cruise ship left.
Fucking asshole.
I know.
The lighthouse was so remote. There wasn't a visitor center where they could get help, or any other houses or businesses, and no one had a cell phone. The girls frantically asked us if we could drive them somewhere and call a cab, and it says, and the police to cut get them. My mom and dad took one look at these two young ladies and with two daughters of their own, decided that calling a cab wasn't going to cut it. We had no choice but to drive them back to the city dock ourselves. The only problem are rented two door Minnie Cooper, which was already fit to burst with a family of four. Undeterred, my handyman dad was able to and then it says, dismantle their bicycles to fit in the trunk, while my mom squished the girls and me in the backseat and then shoved my little sister on the floor of the passenger seat between her legs.
She's going to get that momming done.
She is not no girl left behind because of a douchebag man.
Exactly to this day, I'm still not sure how we all fit. We must have broken countless unknown Canadian traffic laws, but we got the girls back to their ship with time to spare and to write a police report. Hopefully. They even bought us T shirts from the cruise gift shop as a thank you. Looking back on the story, it makes my skin crawl to imagine how badly things might have gone for those girls if my family hadn't been in the right place at the right time. Stay sexy and rent an suv, Abigail.
For real, God, Abigail, I love that your parents are the kind of people that like, oh, we are not only just going to get involved, We're going to make this work.
Yeah, because like, who knows what happened if they like left them behind and then the guy came back, you know.
Yeah, like ugh, ugh, gross gross. All right, keep your eyes out for those boat guys. Hey, if you have any positive boat guys stories, we're here. We're here to read and counter this fucking bullshit.
We know, we know there's positive ones out there.
We know there's great boat guys out there. Okay, my first one subject line's the one you've been waiting for. I may have babysat for Witness Protection Program kids question mark that is good, and then it says hello, good people and pets. I've been wanting to write in with this story for a long time, and when I heard the story on episode four fifty four about the nineteen seventy eight Leftanza heist, I knew the time was right. I grew up in a small Appalachian city in the eighties. When I was a teenager, a new family moved in down the block, and as I had a monopoly on the neighborhood babysitting jobs, it wasn't long before they hired me to watch their four kids. About a month after they moved in, and during what turned out to be my last babysitting gig with them, the youngest kid, three or four years old, told me about how they had to leave their old house really fast in the middle of the night and couldn't take anything with them. She ended it with and then we came here.
Oh wow.
While she was telling me this, the eldest, maybe ten, got a stricken look on his face and was doing everything good to get her to stop talking. Oh no, that's my sister and I all our lives, but we were not in witness protection.
Just shut up, just shut up.
Being a kid myself, I'm sure I thought it was just some weird toddler nonsense and didn't really give it a second thought until a couple of days later, when I realized they were gone and the house was empty.
It was poor kids, I know, those poor kids.
It was.
Then, in my fourteen year old, budding murdering no brain, I decided that I had probably babysat for a witness protection program family. I was convinced the ten year old told his parents everything that went down, and they high tailed it out of there.
I was so freaked out by this.
Notion that I didn't tell anyone this story until just a few years ago, in case the mob came looking for me. Of course, I don't know that they were really in the witness protection program. Maybe they just woke up one morning and decided my town sucked, and they didn't wait to leave. I guess we'll never know. Stay sexy and don't blow your cover r and then it says name withheld because you know the mob?
Oh my god, are you the ten year old or the two year old listening right now? And was that you? And yes, indeed you were in the mob or no, maybe not in the mom but you know what I mean? Please email us?
Oh can you imagine?
Were you a witness protection family like? Tell us we need to know the details. And I know you're gonna say it's way more boring than you think it is. God, we need to know.
Also untrue, it's boring to you because you already went through and it wasn't. It wasn't all day, every day excitement. But no, compared to walking around in a field full of cows, it's way more exciting.
I'm sure, oh man, that ten year old has chronic anxiety. Now, I guarantee it my mom's third man experience. Hey guys, I just heard Georgia's story about third man syndrome and my hands are shaking as I write this. I haven't even finished the entire episode yet, but I have to tell you about how my mom's life was saved by her deceased father. Years ago, my mom, Joyce, was working at a Target store on the receiving dock in the back corner of the stock room.
Joyce is such a mom name, isn't it such a mom name? From like nineteen eighty seven?
Yeah, it's good. She was literally standing in the corner by herself, counting items on a palette when she felt a massive shove from behind that pushed her away from the corner. She turned around to say, hey, what the hell to realize no one could have been behind her. Her back was up against the wall. Just then, an entire palette full of extra shelving fell from the top shelf in the stock room near the ceiling. Holy shit, it landed right where she had been standing. Turns out there were employees in the next aisle trying to add items to that top shelf and hit the palette of shelving, pushing it off the other side. Guys, come on. The security guard had seen it happen on the screen in her office and came running back to grab my mom and say, we almost lost you. There's no explanation for what pushed mom, and no one else was in that aisle with her on the security camera. Her parents had passed away maybe a year before this, and she says she knows for certain it was her dad that saved her. My papa was an amazing man, and I thank him every day for saving my mom. Thank of your amazing podcast that gives all of us humor and hope. Oh stay sexy, and thank you Guardian Angel Papa. Anastasia.
Oh my god, Anastasia, I love that one.
The like surety that it's her dad is like so like got me choked up.
Yeah, you know where It's just like She's like, my dad shoved me like every other day.
Was a big pusher, a constant.
I love to stand under things like pianos that were dangling out of windows.
I can't tell you how many times he shoved me out of the way of danger.
And in it one more time I knew that familiar feeling. But also I want to know if that security guard that saw it on the on the camera saw the shove where.
It's all sudden, right, she goes.
Like that totally me too, that'd be cool.
Okay anyway.
The subject line of this email is Hell's Angels used to pick up my mom from school. Gals, gals, gals, It's time I've arrived. I can finally tell the story and I know you'll get it. I've been here since twenty sixteen, UK listener. You got me through it all. We're grown.
Let's go. Huh excute.
I know in episode four fifty you talked about the Hell's Angels and yahs. I can sorry, yass yass, I can finally share my mom's ridiculous connection to them. Back in the seventies, my granddad, my mom's dad, was well known in the northeast of England, first for being a prize fighting Irish boxer whoa yeah right, I kind of want to look that up, but also in his later years as a respected pub landlord. When my mom was around seven or eight, he decided to branch out and purchase a well known wine bar that had fallen on hard times. What he didn't know is that this bar was often frequented by the Hell's Angels.
A wine bar, A wine bar that's so classy, and it was their base for dealing cocaine.
That's why, that's why they're bringing the cocaine. Where the people who buy cocaine are the wine.
Right, the people have money for cocaine. Yeah, the wine bar, oh my god. But also kind of hilarious you're like, do you want to go wine tasting? And then just get insanely wired and talk about plans.
Let's do it.
They end that sentence with and was their base for dealing cocaine terrific. He tried many different ways to churf them out, including installing mirrors on the wall so he could see everything they were doing, but mysteriously, they would always end up smashed. This went on for a while until one day my granddad remembered that if you can't beat them, join them. No, he didn't become a hell's angel. Instead, he freaking employed them. He made a deal with the head of the gang, and then in parentheses it says, is that the right term that if they stopped dealing from his bar, he would give shifts to each of.
Them as doormen. Wow. Right.
They were happy to accept the work, and it kept the bar safe too after that, because the bar was filled with wired lunar ticks with a bunch of money.
I'm drunk, drunk on red shitty red wine probably back then, and shit, oh my gosh, you.
Know that gorgeous vintage of wine that's from Northeast England.
Can just turned your teeth purple yep, and.
Get you swinging.
Okay.
Well, after that, my granddad started to get on well with their gang leader, a terrifying guy called Jungle Jim, who would frequently give my mom a ride on the back of his Harley.
If Jim, I got it, Jim, Jungle Jim. Jungle Jym.
So my Dave Demo, our family friend who was my age, used to call my dad Jungle Jim.
Oh my god.
He thought it was the funniest.
Jungle Jim used to frequently give my mom a ride on the back of his Harley. If you ever saw her walking home from school alone, she said she was never scared of him, and he kind of resembled a goth Santa Claus.
I could see it. That's perfect totally. AnyWho.
I never got to meet either of my mom parents as they died young, but gosh, I wish I had the chance. My mom is an incredible human being despite a chaotic childhood. But I will say that my murderino tendencies are down to her, as she let me read James Patterson since I was about nine. I now work as a life coach, helping people find joy in these dark times, and often listen to the podcast whilst I'm creating slightly more lighter content. Keep going, gowls. We will so thankful for stumbling across you all these years ago. Stay sexy, Meg, Meg, can you coach my life?
Please?
Meg?
Fun?
You sound fun, Meg, You're a fucking legend. You're from first of all. From what I'm gathering, and I could be wrong, it sounds like an Irish prize fighter fell in love with a British lady and moved to her side of town, which is like ultimate Romeo and Juliet.
Come on totally. Oh my god, love it.
It's fun. That's great. That was a great one. My last one is called dog Snitch and it starts howdy. A couple of years ago, after much begging from our kids, we added a beagle mix with a gentle demeanor and fantastic eye makeup. The picture attached to our family named Turbo. This story also involves my son, who has sensory processing disorder and will often put things that are not food into his mouth. His favorites are small objects like buttons and coins, you know, stuff that makes mom freak out when they are in a four year old's mouth. Yeah, we had Turbo for about six months when one night he was scratching and barking at our son's door after bedtime. Usually Turbo is pretty chill, so I assume the most obvious thing. My son has snuck a lego or something into his room to chew on and is now choking to death, and the dog is telling me to get in there and help. Now rush into the room, Turbo at my heels to see my son looking surprised and guilty with half a candy bar in his hand. I stood in the doorway, scolded him for sneaking footage his room, and Turbo took advantage of the moment to run in, snatch what was left at the candy bar and scarf it down as fast as doggily possible. I went in, thinking we had adopted a hero dog, to realize that he was a snitch who would sell you out for half a chocolate bar.
Hell yeah.
Fortunately Turbo suffered no ill effects and the only stitches he got was from a hernia surgery a year later. And it snitches getting stitches. Oh yeah, stay sexy and hydro chocolate megs? She her Oh another meg?
Yeah, two megs in a row.
That's good.
Oh, here's the here's all one hundred with the photo. We'll put it up on Instagram and everywhere. Oh, let me see it's a gorgeous dog.
Oh my god, that eye langage is simply incredible.
Truly, the tattooed on, I mean, that's just bring that to like the tattoo the permanent makeup person and be like, yeah, my eyes like this.
Can you give me one of the kind of a permanent quoll cajol I believe they call it. Frank has a really good eyeliner. Two Yeah, Okay, here's my last one.
Okay.
The subject of line of this email is hot Dog Day, and it starts one of the best I've ever seen.
Enough, grab ass, let's get to it.
Good one.
You say you like hot dogs, then you need to come to my town's annual Hot Dog Day celebration. My little college town of Alfred, New York, located about eighty miles south of Rochester, has an annual hot dog centered festival that you should totally attend.
Yeah yeah.
Each year on a Saturday in April, our tiny main street is closed to traffic and turned into a street festival devoted to all things hot dog.
If I were a mayor of the town, that would be every day.
That would be your first political move, Yeah, the first bill you'd sign into law. There are, of course hot dog vendors, as well as kosher dog and not dogs for vegetarians like me. There's a parade with people dressed as hot dogs, packets of mustard and ketchup, et cetera, as well as fire trucks, adorable little kids from the karate studio dressed in their tiny geese, and all the usual small town stuff. There are games, rides, and of course the wiener dog races, in which confused docs ins run around, sniffing each other's butts and eventually meandering toward the finish line. This is this sounds like the best day of all time.
Yeah.
Why did our tiny town of eight hundred souls decide to celebrate all things hot dog? Great question, I don't know. Wikipedia says our hot Dog Day started in the nineteen seventies, and hot dogs were chosen as the theme because they were cheap and therefore popular with our college students and also for those of us who lived through the seventies. It was the recession and times were tough. It was that was like the gas crisis.
Money were tight.
Yeah yeah, there was a here. At least there was a drought, right.
Yeah, yeah, that's right, all kinds of shitty stuff. Yeah, nothing like today. Whatever its origin, hot Dog Day is a chaotic fun event, with all proceeds from the food vendors and games going to local charities. Oh my god, So if you'd like to cheer on some bewildered wiener dogs while stuffing your faces with everyone's favorite snack, come on over to Little Alfred, New York and hang with me and the probably two other murderinos who live here.
Oh my god, I'm picturing us like at the Rose Parade. The we're like commentating on it as it below us. Yes, live, We're live from the hot Dog Day festival and Georgia.
If you look right down here, the children and geese are storming up the street to protect us from all the hot dog attacks.
That float took eight thousand hot dogs to create. Thank you for the donation from Nathan's.
Whatever, stay sexy and don't mock the hot dogs. Juliana, and then in parentheses it says rhymes with banana, like we don't I can't pronounce Juliana without that album. Thanks, Juliana rhymes with banana, rhymes with banana. That's the best. I mean, these festivals like truly warm my heart.
Yeah, what's your festival? What's your town festival? We need to know about it. We need to know what goes on in it.
Do you think it's any better than the Pedlama butter and eggs?
Dape raaid, I doubt it, man, Yeah, that's cool, it is.
It's real fun.
All right. Well that was a quick one. Thanks so much for listening and tuning in and all of the things.
And if you have a story you'd like to tell us that's interesting and funny and fun that you think we'd like at horrifying or horrifying or a true hometown yeah, or kind of anything in between. Yeah, head on over to my Favorite Murder Gmail, which is literally my favorite murder at gmail dot com and.
Send it in.
Please participate if you'd like, we'll give you a trophy, a participation trophy.
Get in here.
Yeah, stay sexy and don't get murdered. Get the by 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 Leona Squalacci.
Email your hometowns to My Favorite Murder at gmail dot com and.
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Goodbye,
