E466 Haunted Toilets and Frozen Jail

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Haunted Toilets and Frozen Jail"

And That's Why We Drink — Episode 466
Hosts: Christine Schiefer & Em Schulz
Release Date: January 18, 2026

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Episode Overview

This week's episode blends personal updates, comedic banter, and the signature mix of true crime and the paranormal. Christine and Em open up about recent personal struggles and household disasters before leaning into a chilling haunted hotel story (the Alaskan Hotel in Juneau, AK) and continuing the saga of the Fort Worth Trio disappearance. The episode seamlessly combines emotional vulnerability, wild storytelling, witty improv, and a touch of occult theorizing— classic And That's Why We Drink.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Personal Catch-Ups and Chaos [02:00–23:44]

Fredericksburg Rivalry & Merch Musings [02:02–06:20]

• Christine buys a t-shirt in Fredericksburg, Texas, sparking a one-sided rivalry with her hometown Fredericksburg, Virginia.
• Both hosts brainstorm tongue-in-cheek merch ideas (river otter mascots, “Fredericksburg, Texas can kick rocks”).

Why Do You Drink? Segment [06:22–23:44]

• Christine opens up about a series of personal hardships including a recent pregnancy loss, household illnesses, and a brutal water leak caused by a haunted toilet ("when it rains, it pours").
  • Notable Quote (Christine, 10:27): “People on the Internet are very sleuthy and very good at reading between lines ... I have to respect them for that.”
  • Christine details how the water catastrophe struck (“saved” by a ghostly presence tucking her in).
• Em shares about her own chaotic household, drinking from a prized Buc-ee’s mug, and the persistent post-pandemic “ick”.

Memorable Mom Quotes About Parenting and Spirits

• Discussion about children’s existential questions (“When are you going to die?”) and navigating grief, Santa, and magic.
  • Notable Quote (Christine, 14:31): “So I was like, does the spirit of Christmas ever die? … Christmas magic is immortal. And she’s like, there’s no such thing as magic.”

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2. Story #1: Paranormal— The Alaskan Hotel Hauntings [26:36–71:09]

Background & Setting the Scene [28:16–31:12]

• Situated in Juneau, opened in 1913 during the gold rush.
• Touted as Alaska’s most haunted hotel—appearing as #5 on USA Today’s “Best Haunted Hotels” list.

History & Haunted Lore [31:16–45:40]

• The hotel was at the “crossroads of future civilization, but in the past of frontier lawlessness.” (30:37)
• Colorful early history: boarding house, speakeasy during Prohibition, and brothel (for “minErs with an E”).
• Noted for rowdy clientele: “Scoundrel, scumbag, legislator, conman, murderer, thief—you name it.” (38:18)

Ghost of Alice (Room 219 and 218) [44:48–51:16]

• Alice’s story: deserted by her miner husband, she worked in the hotel as a sex worker to survive. When her husband returned, he killed her in a fit of rage.
• Paranormal activity: guests see Alice’s apparition, feel her presence, or hear her voice. She is interactive with investigators via spirit boxes and Ovilus devices.
  • Notable Evidence (48:38): During a spirit session, the Ovilus says “July” (matching the psychic’s vision of the death date), then “Alice”, then “Hell”.

Room 315 Incident (2007 Navy Sailor Story) [52:18–59:56]

• A Navy sailor requested the most haunted room (315), then suffered a terrifying episode: screams for help, breaking glass, writing HELP in blood on walls/ceiling, and leaping out the window into a narrow alley. Miraculously, he survived.
  • Notable Quote (Em, 55:22): "The blood wasn’t just on the walls. It was on the ceiling, on the floors, on the bed. It was everywhere.”
• Since the event, guests report hearing residual “help me” screams caught on 12 security cameras.
  • Notable Quote (Em, 62:33): “All 12 security cameras caught 'help me' throughout the hotel.”
• Room 315 is now only rented out by request, usually as a last resort.

Basement Hot Tub Ghost—Charlie & Demonic Activity [63:12–68:24]

• 1988: Young Josh Adams (son of current owners) discovers a guest’s dead body (Charlie) in the (decidedly non-glamorous) basement hot tub.
• The basement is now considered demonic—Josh reports demonic figures and claims exorcisms have failed.
• Josh claims to have participated (willingly and unwillingly) in diabolical occult rituals on the premises.
  • Notable Moment (Em, 68:12): “At the end of the episode, Josh says he both willingly and unwillingly, on separate occasions, was a part of, quote, diabolical rituals in the hotel.”

General Phenomena and Miscellaneous Hauntings [69:27–70:31]

• Techno-loving poltergeists, moving towels/bedding, flickering lights, shadow figures, voices, and time slips reported.
• Notably, a staff member once saw a man walking the basement, only to see his face suddenly right in front of the security camera (71:00).

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3. Story #2: True Crime— The Fort Worth Trio Disappearance, Part 2 [74:25–133:04]

Previously On: Recap [74:25–77:00]

• On December 23, 1974, three girls (Rachel Trelisa, 17; Renee Wilson, 14; Julie Ann Mosley, 9) vanish while shopping before Christmas in Fort Worth, TX. Rachel's locked car is found in the parking lot; a strange letter appears addressed to her husband.
• Immediate chaos: false sightings, prank calls, and a traumatizing phone call ("Mama") possibly from Julie.

The Tommy & Deborah Drama (Distrust Closer to Home) [77:17–83:55]

• Deep dive into Rachel's husband Tommy: multiple quick marriages/divorces, including a whirlwind engagement to Rachel’s older sister Deborah, who lived with the couple.
  • Notable Reaction (Em, 78:47): “So, no, you didn’t mention any of this last week. And I—”
• No hard evidence links Tommy to the disappearance, but suspicion remains; even other families and Rachel’s brother Rusty openly speculate about his possible involvement.

Family Fractures and the Role of Rusty [86:56–91:44]

• Rusty (Rachel’s brother), consumed by the case, becomes obsessed with seeking answers—even at the expense of family relationships (accusing sister Deborah of involvement).
• They eventually reconcile by 2020, but the emotional toll is evident.
  • Notable Quote (Deborah, 89:48): “You have an uncontrollable need for things to be the way you need them to be, not the way they were.”

Theories & Speculation: Witnesses, Security Guards, Serial Killers, and Human Trafficking [91:45–125:36]

• Multiple witness reports: An elderly woman claims to have seen the girls being hustled into a yellow truck with lights (possibly a security vehicle). Another witness claims to see a man forcing a girl into a van, later dismissed as a “family dispute.”
• Police officer says he saw the girls with a security guard on the night of their disappearance (97:31); records are sparse, nothing comes of this lead.
• Context: Rachel and Deborah’s abusive father may have influenced the sisters’ early exits from home (marriage, engagement); not a suspect.
• Serial killer theories abound:
  • Kenneth Granville: Active in Fort Worth at the right time, murders multiple women/children (107:02).
  • Glenn McCurley (Carla Walker case): Parallels in victimology and abductions.
  • Henry Lee Lucas, Otis Toole, Dean Corll (“The Candyman”), and Mike DeBardeleben (“Mall Passer”): All floated as potential suspects due to MO or proximity to malls, but with no hard evidence.
  • Em’s Gut Theory (112:09): The abduction required at least two perpetrators—likely a young man/woman team to appear less threatening or to “lure” the girls.

Modern Theories: Trafficking & Opportunistic Attack [118:14–126:17]

• The possibility of the girls being trafficked or the victims of a coordinated, opportunistic attack is discussed as the likeliest scenario.
  • Em (121:49): “I think these days...the ones that are most successful is when one person in the plot is a woman, because women feel safer with women.”
  • Christine notes: The randomness of the trio’s trip (last-minute guest, time of year) makes a targeted attack unlikely, suggesting opportunism by predators already prowling the mall.
• The case remains a painful mystery—no evidence, no closure.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Christine, 19:02 (On the Haunted Toilet): “To my therapist, I said, ‘Well, when it rains, it pours...get it?’”
• Em, 48:17 (On the Ovilus responses): “He turns it on and the first word he got was ‘July’ ... and then [it says] ‘Alice’. It’s eerie how it immediately went to Alice.”
• Christine, 55:15 (Describing Room 315 aftermath): “He used the blood to write ‘HELP’ on the walls … the blood wasn’t just on the walls, it was on the ceiling, on the floors, on the bed. It was everywhere.”
• Em, 62:33 (Shared EVP): “All twelve security cameras caught ‘help me, help me’ throughout the hotel.”
• Christine, 79:04 (On the family relationships): “She broke up [with Tommy], was already with someone else, but it doesn’t look good.”
• Em, 112:09: “My thought is that it was a two-man job...and maybe not someone they knew personally, but someone their age…”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 02:02–06:20 – Fredericksburg Texas/Virginia rivalry & merch brainstorm
• 06:22–23:44 – Why Do You Drink, Christine’s personal update & haunted toilet story
• 26:36–71:09 – Haunted Alaskan Hotel (Full story)
  • 44:48 – Ghost of Alice begins
  • 52:18 – Room 315 sailor incident
  • 63:12 – Basement hot tub ghost / demonic reports
• 74:25–133:04 – The Fort Worth Trio, Part 2 (Recap, family drama, theories, suspects, speculation)

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Overall Tone

The episode is both witty and emotionally candid—balancing Christine’s very real struggles with humor, and blending the supernatural with grounded, empathetic storytelling. Unsparing when discussing the bizarre and the tragic, Christine and Em keep the tone conversational, irreverent, and sometimes darkly comical.

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Final Thoughts

“Haunted Toilets and Frozen Jail” is classic ATWWD: emotionally open, deeply researched, and never short of hilarious, tangential asides. From spectral tucking-in to the mysteries of the Alaskan Hotel and the enduring pain of a 50-year-old unsolved disappearance, the episode reminds listeners: “The world’s a scary place — and that’s why we drink.”

Transcript

[A]

The new year brings new health goals and wealth goals. Protecting your identity is an important step. Your info is in endless places that could expose you to identity theft leading to lost funds. LifeLock monitors millions of data points per second. If your identity is stolen, our restoration specialists will fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Resolve to make identity, health and wealth part of your new year's goals. With LifeLock, save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com podcast Terms apply Christine I Last night slept on the couch. Wasn't feeling good. Sometimes you just needed to feel, you know, like you're a kid again. But what kept me cozy was my Lola blanket.

[B]

Sometimes I will lay on the couch. I ended up getting one for upstairs too, because I couldn't live without the one downstairs or I would be sleeping on the couch every night. I slept in Leona's room last night on the floor and I slept with my Lola blanket. And I cannot believe how well I slept despite just by sleeping on the floor.

[A]

It's truly a clown.

[B]

Unbelievable.

[A]

It's wildly People come over and they're.

[B]

Like, is that a Lola blanket? And I'm like, you want to try it? Lola is the world's number one blanket, crafted with ultra soft luxury vegan faux fur and a signature four way stretch. That's the thing that like really does it for me. It's machine washable, double hemmed for durability and stays flawless. There's no pilling, no shedding even I've washed mine several times has still feels just the same. It's, it's like miracle product.

[A]

It really is. For a limited time, our listeners can get 40 off select Lola Blankets products with Code Drink at checkout. Just head to lolablankets.com and use code DRINK to get 40 off your order.

[B]

After you purchase, they'll ask where you heard about them. Please support our show and let them know we sent you. Wrap yourself in luxury with Lola blankets.

[A]

Okay?

[B]

Welcome. What's in your shirt? Peach. Life is peachy.

[A]

Life is peachy in Fredericksburg, Texas.

[B]

Fredericksburg, Texas, that's right.

[A]

I, I so desperately needed to. There's always been one other Fredericksburg that I've known of and it was in Texas. And I was, I. The rivalry was completely one sided, but I needed to know for myself what it was all about. And one of the times I went to Texas, I oh yeah, I have a friend who lives in Texas and I made her drive like an hour and a half to take me to.

[B]

Fredericksburg, Texas and all I got was this Lousy T shirt. That's a.

[A]

You know what, though? They kind of. Fredericksburg, Virginia, if you're listening, and I pray someone is, because I'm from there, and I would love some attention, please, if we. Someone who is in charge of the merch of Fredericksburg, Virginia, needs to do some undercover sleuthing in Fredericksburg, Texas, because they know what the they're doing over there, and it's embarrassing.

[B]

Have something to say.

[A]

Is it you?

[B]

Mahatma Gandhi said, be the change you wish to see in the world. Sounds like maybe you are noticing a lack that you feel you have the aesthetic sensibility to solve, and you're kind of outsourcing, you know, like, who can fix this? And I want you to kind of take a moment and think, could it be me? As in you, not me. I don't want to do it. I could.

[A]

I could write a letter to the chamber of commerce today. Actually, I don't know.

[B]

I meant, like, just design the merch, but I guess you could write a letter to the chamber of commerce.

[A]

I will say, okay, actually, what the hell?

[B]

You need to write a letter to the chat. They don't care if you make merch for their town. To differ.

[A]

I beg to differ there. I don't know if it's a chamber of commerce.

[B]

You're gonna be censored.

[A]

In my time thinking about the chamber of commerce, which was all two seconds of my life just now, in the.

[B]

Time that I've worked with the chamber.

[A]

Of commerce, I do know that there is a building in downtown Fredericksburg that they feel like a little too. It looks like I'm in a mayor's office when I go in there. And they're the only people who sell anything Fredericksburg shirt related. And they only have two. And so I have one of them, which I was actually wearing yesterday. It's so funny. I kind of. I need to email them and be like, I'm sitting here in a Fredericksburg, Texas, shirt, and you should be embarrassed.

[B]

What I'm saying is, like, instead of just, like, bullying these people into, like, maybe making even worse merch or, like, similarly quality merch, why don't you just design new merch and say, like, here's some merch for Fredericksburg, Virginia, is what I'm kind of getting at.

[A]

I get what you're getting at. I'm trying to come up with a different tactic where I just.

[B]

Oh, you just want to talk to the chamber of fragment.

[A]

I just want to yell at somebody.

[B]

Oh, okay. Well, then please carry on. My mistake.

[A]

But I Do I do like your idea of just may. Maybe. Maybe it would be a. It would be a. What's the right word? Not so much of a low blow. If I maybe gave them some suggestions along the way, right?

[B]

Like, hey, I saw these kind of things in Texas. Maybe you could get a. Get a clue. You could say, get a clue.

[A]

Fredericksburg, Virginia, if you're watching, I want this.

[B]

Hey, I have an idea. Can I. Are we allowed to brainstorm? Are we allowed to bring some. Okay, how about. How about Fredericksburg? Fredericksburg, Texas can kick rocks. How's that? You can sell it and take a h. Yeah, do the one. Like really lean into the one sided rivalry and like, don't ever tell them and see how long it takes them to figure it out.

[A]

That's a good idea. And if anyone has any suggestions in the comments, I will send them to the chamber of commerce. But I will let you know. Fredericksburg is trying really hard to make otters our mascot.

[B]

Why?

[A]

Because we live across a river and I guess there's a lot of river otters. And then we had a whole baseball team and they didn't know what to give the mascot for that. And they picked George Washington as our fucking baseball. Could have picked an otter. Whatever. Literally.

[B]

It's like when they change the freedoms for Florence Freedom baseball team to the Florence y'. Alls. And people got mad and I was like, really? You prefer Florence Freedom? Get a fucking life, dude.

[A]

Like, a river otter would have been a wonderful little mascot. Now I feel like, so be happy about president.

[B]

You don't have to be happy about it. You can really write a letter to the chamber of commerce.

[A]

I really just might. I'm at least going to hashtag them in something after this.

[B]

You can hashtag them. Oh, no.

[A]

Anyway, if anyone has a river otter T shirt idea, let me know. I'll send it their way.

[B]

Yeah, I ought to be in Fredericksburg. Listen, I could go for days. Let's go.

[A]

I love that. I love that. Or really, if they were all about unity, it should be one rip. One river otter is Fredericksburg, Virginia. One's Fredericksburg, Texas. And they're holding hands because that's what.

[B]

And the one from Fredericksburg hex is way uglier though.

[A]

Has a big old butt tooth. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

I thought you say butt and I was like, no, no, that has to be. The Virginia one has a big booty.

[A]

Well, what do you. What do you too, Christine, how's your life?

[B]

Oh, God, I'm trying to survive. Listen, I've Got. I hope you can't hear it. I turned off the fan we. The other day. I'm, I'm short circuiting. I'm sorry. I'm trying to figure out what to address first. H, hey, why don't you tell me why you drink and then I will, I will try and organize my thoughts.

[A]

Excellent. Okay. Love that.

[B]

I want to show you what I brought because I brought vitamin water and then I brought a bottle of wine just in case, and I thought maybe after the break, and now I'm like, I think I might open it right now.

[A]

Open it now.

[B]

It's like two in the afternoon. Barely.

[A]

Yeah. And it's a Friday. It's 2 o' clock on a Friday.

[B]

True. And my daughter is at my mom's all day.

[A]

I have not heard a reason why you shouldn't open that fucking thing.

[B]

Oh, okay. So while I crack into it, I also brought the screw top. Of course. 19 crimes situation.

[A]

Mommy's gonna have fun today.

[B]

Okay. Have at least a little bit of a numbing agent while we discuss whatever we're gonna discuss today. Okay. Why do you drink? While I set this up, I drink.

[A]

Out of Speaking of Texas and all the slander I just gave them. Here's a Buc ee's mug.

[B]

Oh, okay. But now we're getting that. That's hot. I've never said that before about an item, but that literally.

[A]

Is she not the most bisexual cup you've ever seen?

[B]

That's like a hot water cup. It's almost as bisexual as my Starbucks cup that has has like the, the magenta into, you know, my, my sexual as you.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Oh, my God. Well, I wouldn't go that far taking a sip. Oh, my God. But that is a beautiful cup.

[A]

Isn't she? She's a cutie. I am like, I'm drinking.

[B]

I'm like, that's hot. That's a hot cup. Like, I need to get well, I need to get better.

[A]

That makes me feel good, though, that you said that.

[B]

Oh, look at my cup. Actually, now that we're both drinking out of cool cups, I brought this, this baddie up from my dusty cabinet in the dining room because I never something I, I, I'm trying, okay? I can barely wash my own face slash hair. I found this cup. It has bats on it. And I bought it on discount from Crate and Barrel, like four years ago. And I never use them. But then I'm like, it doesn't have to be Halloween to use a bat mug. That's exactly right.

[A]

And you don't have to be bisexual to drink out of a big old pink and blue cup. You know, that's exactly.

[B]

That's exactly right.

[A]

But this is. She's a big girl. This is, I think, the biggest cup I own. And I. I put. Usually I would just do like a mug of tea. This is three mugs and one. And I usually bring this to the dog park when it's chilly out.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

But I needed her today because I don't know what happened. But yesterday I started getting a little tickle on my throat and I woke up today with a very odd cough. It's like there's nothing else ill about me except I'm just feeling kind of like flemmy and gross. No, but I usually. I don't know. This is. Apparently I'm nine days in and I've had two illnesses that my body isn't used to having.

[B]

So at least it's not hand foot in mouth again. Girl.

[A]

My neighbor, my. Not my neighbor, my cousins in Seattle just got that a good thing.

[B]

You already got it.

[A]

Literally the week after I left.

[B]

Good thing. You and I had our chicken pox party, but with hand foot mouth. And we all got it together.

[A]

Yeah. And I was actually alone and I was supposed to go to Iceland or something.

[B]

Correct. And you missed a whole vacation. Yeah.

[A]

It's okay. Talk about a learning experience. That's what that was.

[B]

Yeah, sure. We all learned a lot.

[A]

I learned that I hate it. That's what I learned.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So anyway, I drink just to. It's hot tea. Just to keep my. I was gonna ask Lubricated. So that's it. Why do you drink? Please tell me. I gotta know what this wine's all about.

[B]

Okay. There's a lot happening. I wasn't going to really talk about it. I'm just going to give a brief update because it's just uncomfortable and weird and I don't know. But people on the Internet are very sleuthy and very good at reading between lines and hypothesizing, and I have to respect them for that. So I'm just going to give a brief update of what's been going on. Yes, there has been. Which, by the way, people. My brother sent me a screenshot and was like, man, people are great sleuths. Because people went and like, found little things I've said over the last year and been like, what's going on in Christine's life? And I'm like, damn, people are good. I mean, I do talk about myself a lot. So it's like to Be expected.

[A]

But it's kind of your job.

[B]

Yeah, kind of my job. Yeah. So I don't. I don't fall to anyone for wondering. And I know it's kind of. I've been very vague, but essentially now that I want to give a trigger warning here for. For pregnancy loss. But I. In September, found out I was pregnant. We were very excited. Told Leona. She, like, was so excited to be a big sister. Lost the pregnancy December, mid December, had surgery, like, over Christmas. And my mom and Tim left town and Blaze got the flu, so he didn't even see him for 15, 16 days. So it's. It's. So I feel. I feel like I want to give a little caveat because people are like, is she just, like, bored? I'm like, no, I'm just struggling. Okay. But I'm okay. We're all okay. I do. I did for Christmas. This is, again, a little bit sad. So I apologize. Skip forward if you don't want to hear sad, but it's also sweet. Leona had drawn for school. She. They made. In the fall, they made leaf families. And so she went outside and picked a leaf that she felt like, represented everybody in the family. And she. Her teacher was like, hey, I don't know about this, but she. She picked a, like, a little ginkgo leaf for. For baby. And she's like, are you. Are you having a baby? And I was like, oh, my God. So she, like, added a little, like, leaf for baby with googly eyes. And it was just really sad because then, you know, obviously tell was the hardest part. And then for Christmas, I got blazing me these, like, little. It's a Leona leaf and a. And the baby leaf with the little googly eyes. It's hard to see, but it's like a little charm.

[A]

It's very precious.

[B]

And so I've been wearing that, and it's calmed my. But we told Leon and she's like, I don't care. And I was like, okay, so this is not what the mommy blogs prepared me for. I expected. And then we've processed it a lot. But the reason I drink is because my child keeps asking me, when are you going to die? When am I going to die? And I'm like, okay, we've hit this stage. And so now keep in mind, when I was talking about Santa and stuff, I was like, trying to get through all this and also, like, try to tell her about death. So it's been an extremely long month. I'm okay. We're all good now. A little Bit, But I just. I felt like I needed to give a little bit of clarity because I used to be a lot more open about things. And it's just. I don't know, I guess as I get older, I'm just, like, less blabby about my personal life. Or maybe it's just things are more intense and more serious. And then there is also other stuff that people have picked up on that I'm less shy about. I just don't care to give it the energy it doesn't deserve, which is just family stuff. But M knows about that already, so. Which is just, you know, the typical, like, millennial boomer estrangement situation that you hear so much about on Oprah. Okay, so there's that. That's why I drink. But also the real reason. Well, that's all the real reason that for the last month. But the real reason today is that last night. So I've been thinking, there's a ghost in my house, because.

[A]

Hang on, hang on. Let me just shift gears for a second because why?

[B]

It's all connected.

[A]

No. Oh, it is. Okay. No, it's not. I was gonna say, this does make the Santa conversation ten times harder, and I feel like an asshole for the.

[B]

Advice I was giving. No, you were very helpful. And I feel like you made the point of like, hey, make it magic. Like, it's fun to have it be magical. And it was. And I feel like that was very good guidance. So. No, so that was great. I. And I really was mostly concerned about that at that point because, like I said, Liana didn't care about the other thing.

[A]

You know what? That's. It sounds like you can write a brand new mommy blog of, like, what? You can also expect another.

[B]

If your child is more like your Capricorn partner than it is your Gemini self and can't.

[A]

Really quick to pivot. Yeah.

[B]

Quick to just be like, what is it? I always forget, is it right brain or left brain? That's like the.

[A]

I think right brain. I don't know.

[B]

Left brain is the, like, analytical one. Right. No other way.

[A]

I'm left handed, which means I'm right brained. And I'm more. I'm not as analytical.

[B]

Okay, okay. Okay.

[A]

So I guess that's right.

[B]

Oh, yeah. Okay. So he's. She's more left brained. Like Blaze, where they're just like, well. And then she's like, does Santa die? And I was like, well, now this is getting complicated because how am I supposed to talk about that?

[A]

So I was like, does the spirit of Christmas ever die?

[B]

No, Literally, that was like, Christmas magic is immortal. And she's like, there's no such thing as magic. And I'm like, all right, this is actually becoming really upsetting to me.

[A]

You know what? You really. I'll remember this for myself one day, having to a lot of conversations all at once between magic Santa, the spirit of Christmas, and death.

[B]

And when I tell you it rains, it pours, and when I say that, I mean it literally, because last night, as I'm saying, I'm telling you, I'm laying there, I'm like, I just texted, I forget my brother, somebody. And I was like, wow, I finally feel, like, back to myself a little bit. Slowly starting to, like, get back to normal and get into the swing of things. And I'm falling asleep, and I feel this, like. So I've been feeling this weird, like, touching and it. And I've let it happen because I'm like, what is that? And it feels almost like someone is, like, tapping up the side of my leg, like, as I fall asleep. And I felt this for years living here. The only time I ever felt it was living here. And it never felt, like, malicious. It was just, like, strange. And I was like, is that, like, my nerve? Like, is that. Am I, like, twitching? Like, I couldn't figure out what it was, but it happens so often in different spots. And then I was listening to Jim Harold's campfire, and someone was like, oh, I didn't put it together until I heard this on your show, Jim, but I used to have this poking feeling, and I think that was someone tucking me in. And I went, oh, my God. Because then I went, that's what it is. It's like whenever I have a blanket, it's almost like someone is, like, pushing the blanket up under me. But it doesn't feel, like, threatening, because I. Okay, but it feels like someone's tucking me in. And so last night, or it was actually two nights ago, I was falling asleep, and I thought I felt that. And then all of a sudden, I heard this sound. And I went, oh, my God, what is this? And I was like, it's happening. There's a ghost. And I hear, like, when I was like, what the fuck? And then I'm like, there's a sound coming from the walls. And then all of a sudden, I hear rushing water. And I go, okay. Actually, now I'm worried, Dude. What? It was a toilet on the third floor had completely, like, rotted out, like, the inside did and had literally filled the third floor with Just like this, like, flood of water. And it was pouring down into our hallway, like, stairwell. It was just pouring out of the ceiling, like, hardwood floors.

[A]

And for those who don't know Christine's staircase, who would else would know this? Christine's staircase? It's like. Like. Like in a. In a hotel, the stairs where, like, you can lean over the banister and look straight down several floors.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

Y.

[B]

So.

[A]

So when the water's pouring on your third floor, it's literally as you just, like, raining to the second floor, raining into.

[B]

And now then it's pooling and it's spreading. And thank God I was awake because I felt this ghost. And I was awake at, like, one in the morning, which, like, typically I'm not awake by the. At that point, and I'm awake, and I just. But I heard it start. So thank God, because if I'd fallen asleep and just didn't hear the water running, it would have, like, gone on all night. I mean, we went upstairs at like, 1:30, and the floor of the bathroom was like a pool. Like, I was like, you can't go in there.

[A]

What? Oh, my God. I have so many houses.

[B]

We have emergency flood. People come out.

[A]

Are your floors, like, all three floors rotted?

[B]

No, thank God. So it just went through the ceiling here. It leaked over so that we had tile in the bathroom, thank God. But then it went into the hallway, which is wood flooring, and seeped through through the ceiling. But, like, nothing else really got damaged because we caught it right away. But, like, we. I mean, it is so expensive. And I was like, of course it's expensive. You don't call water emerg emergency services unless, like, you have to.

[A]

So, of course, house is from, like, the 1800s.

[B]

Oh. And so it's a arm and a leg. And then they brought this industrial dehumidifier and fan that's, like, right in the stairwell. And Blaze goes, is that too loud for recording? And I was like, yeah, it's so loud. So we turned it off. But anyway, the. The dehumidifier is running. The industrial fan is not on right now. Blaze turned it off for me. So is it like.

[A]

Like, humid? Huge. Is it humid or anything? I'm trying to think, like, water and trying to get rid of the water.

[B]

So they're basically just trying to dry out the, like. Yeah, the area where it, like, seeped through. So they have a fan going, and they're trying to. I guess. I don't know. We were like, whatever you say, guys. But now we have to undo all. Both toilets, so now we need new toilets on the third floor. I'm like, this is the part of the house I hoped I never had to touch. Because it's like, who the hell wants to go up to the third floor, you know?

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

Been here.

[A]

I. I'm so sorry.

[B]

That's been like. It's just like one of those when. And then I was like. To my therapist, I was like, well, when it rains, it pours. Get it? And she was like, huh?

[A]

It's like, yeah, I get it. And also don't want to laugh because I feel just so bad for you. Oh, my God. What is. And that feels my. At one in the morning, I would have seen that. And I honestly don't know what I would have done. It was like. Like when Hank got skunked at 2 in the morning and I was about to go to bed and I was so exhausted, Part of me was like, is there a world where I can deal?

[B]

I do that tomorrow. I absolutely, in the moment, go, what are the. The risks? You know, how, like. And you learn in stats and, like, microeconomics, like, risk verse. I never learned any of that, but I do it in my head. I'm like, what's the risk of going to bed now pretending I never saw anything?

[A]

Right, Right.

[B]

The risk was too great. I woke blaze up. Part of me thought, I hope he doesn't come upstairs and I can just put a bunch of towels down.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Thank God he came up because he's like. He's like, turn the water off. And I was like, oh, duh. And I'm turning the water off. I'm taking the toilet apart. I mean, it's just a mess. And it was, like, soaking one in toilet water. It was so crazy.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

And the toilet is probably, like, 50 years old. It's this humongous, like, old porcelain thing. All the rubber is, like, rotted out. It was just ridiculous. I was like, this house had you.

[A]

When you got the house, did you. You got an inspection. Like, did they say eventually, by the.

[B]

Way, we got an inspection on paper only. Because we moved in, we realized the rug on the balcony had been covering up huge holes in rotted wood. Gio went straight through one of the holes, and, like, thank God it was just big enough for one paw. But we were like, holy shit. They didn't catch anything. There was styrofoam stuffed into the gutters for God knows what reason. Like, there's stuff in this house. Like, they use paint that like, if you turn on the fireplace that they painted it, like, bubbles, and it's not meant for heat. I mean, just like, things where you're like, what were you thinking?

[A]

So it's literally like over a hundred years of people just making.

[B]

Of people making cheap decision. Yes, exactly. And I'm like, I get it to an extent. Right. Like, you're. If you're renting, this used to be, like, multi. Multi part housing. And, like, somebody owned. I think it was, like, two apartments, and somebody owned the building. So, like, I get it if you're renting. You're like, I don't want to spend money on a nice toilet. But it's like, now I feel like, of course, it's catching up to the house and me. You had a.

[A]

You had a good few years, though, man.

[B]

We had a good run. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So, you know, slowly, but.

[A]

Oh, my God, that's terrible.

[B]

It's just been a doozy of a month.

[A]

And it's. It's one of those problems where it's so annoying. Well, duh. But it's one of those problems where, like, if you just want to have someone, you want to call someone and have it be done by the day, by the end of the day, and it's just gonna be an issue for, like, maybe weeks. Like, it's just gonna be so annoying.

[B]

It doesn't end. And then they were like, do you want us to come back every day to check on the humidif dehumidifier? And we were like, they're like, that'll be 400 more. And I was like, why would we need you to come check on the dehumid? Like, no.

[A]

Yeah, I'll look at the floor and tell you if my feet are wet.

[B]

Like, they're really. Exactly. And Blaze, like, went to. To Lowe's today to, like, get new toilets. And I'm like, this is. This is our life.

[A]

And Blaze has to carry them up three floors.

[B]

You know, I'm trying to remember how we did it last time. Oh, it wasn't on the third floor, so we didn't have to carry it up three floors. Right? Yeah, we'll figure that part out. Certainly not my key.

[A]

Blaze is strong.

[B]

I know. I'm like, well, not after that flu. I'm like, you better get those biceps back. Carry that damn thing up the stairs.

[A]

It's like, is your chest. Is your respiratory system feeling good? Because it's about to be pumping.

[B]

Yeah. Let's do one of those breath tests to see how strong your lungs are today, because you're going to be carrying porcelain up the stairs.

[A]

Honestly, I think that would be worth the 400. I'd be like, don't come check the floors, but certainly carry the toilets up here, please.

[B]

I would pay. Yes. I would have to pay someone to do that. Anyway, that's that. Sorry for all the talk, for all the yabbering. I just felt like. I felt like by not saying anything, I was just kind of letting people speculate and try to figure out what was up. But, yeah, that's what's up. It's just. It's just a hard time of life. But, you know, 2025 was very hard on a lot of us. So I think. I think a lot of people can commiserate, but I'm really, truly doing okay now, and especially now that I have a glass of wine, so I'm happy.

[A]

Yeah, you need it. I don't know why you had the nerve to be like, I don't know if I should drink that.

[B]

Listen, I live in a perpetual state of.

[A]

Chaos.

[B]

Chaos, fear. No, yeah, you're right. I just needed to kind of put on the act of pretending like I didn't need the wine, you know, or didn't. Yeah, we all knew it.

[A]

You feel like you're making the decision.

[B]

For you, and I needed you to feel like I need to feel validated in my decision. So thank you.

[A]

You wanted me to have the mystery of will she, won't she? Yeah.

[B]

And then encourage me, you know, to do the wrong thing. And why else would I bring a screw top up like we know I'm going to open.

[A]

Well, that's funny that you call it the wrong thing when the wrong thing on a Friday at 2. After all, your problems would be to.

[B]

Not drink the wine would be a vitamin water.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, right.

[B]

Big mistake.

[A]

Stay hydrated. And to all my thirsty rats, if it is the weekend for you, please drink. If you needed permission, please drink. We're warming our instruments to tell you all about what is. Hello, hello, hello.

[B]

Fresh, fresh, fresh. We got enchiladas going on my house tonight.

[A]

We've got pork chops going on at my house.

[B]

I mean, it sounds like we're living in, like, some era where we were, like, where we, like, cook for our families, you know, and hellofresh makes me feel like I am doing that and like I'm a productive, you know, member of my family.

[A]

My favorite thing these days about hellofresh is that they have bigger portions so no one leaves the table hungry, even though I'm the only person at the table. But I'm not leaving hungry.

[B]

I'm not leaving hungry. No. You can choose from 35 high protein weekly recipes including new Mediterranean and GLP1 friendly options. They have so many options now that it takes me like twice as long to pick what I want to eat. But it makes it so much more fun because then I know what is coming and I'm excited. For enchiladas specifically.

[A]

I get it. I get it. They have steak and seafood. They plus they have three times more seafood options now at no extra cost. And you can feast on seasonal produce from stone fruit. My fave to corn on the cob. I mean my other favor go to.

[B]

Hellofresh.Com drink10fm to get 10 free meals plus a free Zwilling knife which is 144.99 value on your third box box.

[A]

Offer valid while supplies last free meals applied as discount on first box. New subscribers only. Varies by plan.

[B]

I know I spend my days talking about disturbing facts in the true crime world, but wouldn't you know it, I also have disturbing thoughts that are all my own and come from my own brain. Yeah, the. There's. That's a. That's a. That's a great winning marker of ocd, which is a serious and highly misunderstood condition that causes people to get stuck in these cycles of repetitive unwanted thoughts and physical behaviors. Intrusive thoughts. You know, that's a big word nowadays, but it really is a very unsettling and debilitating experience that has a lot of misconceptions. And that's why we're so thrilled whenever we have an a no CD reading ad read. Not every therapist understands OCD or is qualified to treat it effectively, which can make it difficult to find the right help. OCD is highly treatable with a specialized type of therapy called ERP or Exposure and Response Prevention, which NOCD offers.

[A]

And with nocd, you can do live virtual ERP therapy with licensed therapists who specialize in ocd. NOCD therapists are highly trained, so they really understand OCD and won't judge you no matter what your thoughts are about. And OCD therapy is covered by insurance for over 155 million Americans.

[B]

It makes me want to cry because I just remember like when I got diagnosed and it was so hard and scary and I was like, how's anyone going to do this? And now they have tools like this which just like makes me so happy. If you think you or someone you know might be struggling with OCD, please don't wait to get help go to nocd.com and book a free call with their team to learn more. That's no CD dot To schedule a free call and learn more.

[A]

Well, I have a story for you. This comes straight out of a stranger I met.

[B]

Straight out of a stranger?

[A]

Yeah. Well, it was a story suggestion from them. I went to one of those like. Like all the.

[B]

All the listeners who have. Who have requested the same thing 400 times are like, really? I just had to be a stranger and just spit it out and then em will cover it.

[A]

I went to one of those, like, go to dinner with strangers things. And What.

[B]

What's that?

[A]

Oh, they're all over la. There's like six or seven different companies now.

[B]

That sounds terrible. I mean, I'm sure it's fun in its own way, but it makes me immediately, like, clench up. What is it?

[A]

You just go to dinner with strangers? They just, they. They send you a time, 24 hours before and say.

[B]

And it's just randomized?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Wow. Okay. Okay. So you went to this thing and I actually signed.

[A]

I got a subscription, by the way, so I'm gonna be doing it quite often.

[B]

Make sure to check rocket money next year when I know.

[A]

No, but I mentioned ghosts, and someone said, oh, I just had a trip in Alaska. You should do this one. And so I just looked it up and.

[B]

Didn't you just do an Alaska one?

[A]

Yeah. So I don't know what's going on. Alaska's been in my. In my scope for a while.

[B]

Wow. Maybe that's my stuff from my house.

[A]

What an outdated, obscure reference I love about it.

[B]

At least once a week, I'd see it from my house, see Russia from my house.

[A]

To me, it was hysterical. But to anyone younger than us, they're like, what the did you just say?

[B]

Get out of here, you little kids.

[A]

So where am I here? Oh. So, yeah, Alaska's been popping up recently, so maybe that's my next big trip. But.

[B]

I.

[A]

It's a hotel in Alaska. I feel like I literally just covered one of these, but it's another one, so I hope everyone's okay with that. I had plans, which I might be doing next week for an alien UFO abduction situation, but that got pushed because of Alaska. So this is the Alaskan hotel. It is also called, or it was called for a moment, the Northlander Hotel, but known as the Alaskan Hotel. So we're in Juneau, and it's in 1913. That's when it was created. And the Alaskan Hotel is Alaska's most haunted hotel. Apparently.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And when I looked it up online, there was not too much information. I really got a lot of my info from TV shows I watched, which. Okay, love when that happens because sometimes I watch and I only get one blurb and I'm like, was that really worth the three hours?

[B]

You know, I mean, it is. When you get to show me a timestamp during the episode, that's always worth it for me.

[A]

I agree.

[B]

But I'm sure it spends hours of your life wasting time.

[A]

Agree. But it's. Yeah, when it's worth it, it's worth it. So anyway, in 1913, we see the beginnings of the Alaskan Hotel. I just kind of went through this history last time, so I'm just going to kind of fly through it. But this was built during the height of the gold rush and there weren't a lot of hotels at the time. It was a lot of, like, boarding houses. And this was also Alaska. It wasn't even officially a territory yet. I think it was just like frontier land. And these two brothers who literally struck gold, then had enough money and they're like, we're going to build one of the first hotels out here for the rest of the miners coming into town. So these two brothers, they were the McCluskey brothers, and then they had a third person helping them named Jules Caro. You don't have to remember any of those people.

[B]

Oh, he sounds like a Knives out character. I've been watching a lot of Knives out, like, murder mystery.

[A]

That's exactly right. And their names were John, James and Jules, which I love. See, it's like the Duggars are running.

[B]

Yeah, it is. They had the idea first.

[A]

So at the time, like I said, there weren't a lot of hotels. So this was one of the first ones. And it opened in 1913. It is now Alaska's oldest continuously operating hotel. It still exists. And it was on the. It became part of the National Register of Historic places in the 70s. It was built one year after Alaska became a territory.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So pretty much for as long as Alaska has been a territory.

[B]

That's pretty cool.

[A]

I liked this one quote that I found. That's to give you an idea of the energy going on in this hotel when it first got built is that it was. This hotel was, quote, placed at the crossroads of the future of emerging civilization, but in the past of frontier lawlessness. Loved.

[B]

I'm, I'm, I, I'm. That's hot. You know, I keep saying, like, the Paris Hilton. I mean, talk about outdated references. Wow.

[A]

You're really cool today.

[B]

I'm like in. I'm like into that. That's cool.

[A]

Sarah Palin, Paris Hilton.

[B]

Yeah, I'm not into that. I mean, who knows anymore, really?

[A]

Well, so the we. I saw this on one source and then nowhere else. And I don't know why, because this is the silliest little thing I've ever seen in my life. But the hotel's grand opening was very over the top and very dramatic. And I think the brothers were like, trying to really symbolically do this up and be like, we're going to be part of Alaska's growth from being kind of the wild west to like this big, fancy luxury area. And so during the opening ceremonies of this hotel, which they had opening ceremonies, they tied the literal front door keys to a balloon and then just let it go and just. It flew into the sky. And what to be symbolic that the hotel would never be closed until it.

[B]

Pops on like a passing piece of trash.

[A]

Until a seagull takes it or something.

[B]

Yeah, really. And swallows it and dies. What are you talking about? Stop it.

[A]

Till the skeleton key comes down and clunks someone on the head.

[B]

Seriously. Or somebody's like, oh, cool, A key to a hotel. Let me just try this.

[A]

How about like, hey, now we don't have a key to the hotel.

[B]

True. Like, did anyone make a copy? Follow that balloon. Did you ever send a balloon into outer space? Not outer space, but no, I'm not.

[A]

Iron man, but I don't know what do you.

[B]

We sent a balloon at one of my birthday parties that we like wrote on and sent it off. You never did that?

[A]

I've done. I mean, if like a Chinese lantern situation.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. Ours were probably way more ecologically disastrous. But I mean, it was one balloon. You're really not supposed to do that. But, you know, back in 2000, whatever, 12. We didn't know that.

[A]

I have seen videos on YouTube, which feels so. I mean, it's interesting, but so reckless with your equipment. People have just tied like their full ass camera on a balloon and like they like tape a tracker onto the camera. So that way when the balloon eventually pops and the camera comes crashing down, then you can go find the camera but watch the footage back of it going up into the atmosphere and falling.

[B]

Isn't that like literally what a drone is for?

[A]

I imagine, yes, but the poor man's way, I suppose.

[B]

Okay, yes, I see the poor man's way. Except then you lose your iPhone forever. Okay. Like it falls in a. It falls in a swamp. Good luck. Some of them are, like.

[A]

I guess the camera is, like, meant to, like, withstand certain atmosphere. So, like, you end up, like, getting up in the sky.

[B]

I thought you meant you just, like, tie your BlackBerry device to it, and I'm like, what a terrible idea. Okay, so you did, like, One of those GoPro things or something?

[A]

Yes, a GoPro. That's exactly right. I thought those were cool, but, no, I've never. Maybe in school once with, like. Was there a letter in the balloon? Like, when you.

[B]

Yeah. So we wrote all the names of our crush. It was my 11th birthday. We wrote all the names of our crushes on a balloon.

[A]

That's sinister. I love it.

[B]

And sent it off.

[A]

It doesn't.

[B]

Didn't seem sinister now that I'm literally 90 of the way through the audiobook of it. It does feel a little sinister, but at the time, it didn't.

[A]

Was it, like, everyone wrote it and got to crumble it up and hide it from everybody and put it in the balloon?

[B]

No. No, it wasn't on the balloon.

[A]

So you just made people for your birthday confess their precious.

[B]

I'm a gemini. I turned 11. What do you think I'm gonna do? We. And then you know what else we did that day after the boom we sent off, we all went around and talked about when we got our periods, and I was like, yeah. I was like, I don't know what a period is. I was 11. I was. I was. I was really out of the. I mean, to be fair, I was not the only girl who was like, what's going on? But I was out of my depth already at this point in middle school. But, yeah, so we all wrote our. I mean, whoever wanted to. Nobody, or you could use a code name.

[A]

Nobody had to, as you had a knife poking them in the ribs if they didn't do.

[B]

I said, you want me to use this on you or the balloon? And so then I. We all wrote our crushes. I don't even remember who mine was. I think I made one up, because I don't think I had a real crush. And then we sent it off into. Into the atmosphere, and we got a phone call from a lady from my crush.

[A]

I saw what you did.

[B]

We all float down here. It was from this lady in West Virginia who was, like, in her 30s and was like, so this landed in my yard. I just want to let you know I found it. And she's like. She actually said I couldn't read it because it had been, like, popped. And I was like, that's good. Don't read it.

[A]

Honestly. This message will self destruct in 30 seconds.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. And so that was my experience with sending off a balloon. Anyways, that's all. When I hear the keys being sent away, I was like, that sounds like something dumb. I would have done and then not made a copy of the keys.

[A]

I that feel that's what a birthday gift to make everyone tell you their crushes.

[B]

Man, Em, that was a really good birthday. Except for that I met my stepdad that day. And by that, I mean my mom met my stepdad stepdad that day. So that was the day that he entered my life. Which, you know, for. About.

[A]

Your mom should have written Tim on that balloon is what.

[B]

My mom should not have, because I would have used that knife right away on that balloon. I would have popped it. I would have been like, I'm not setting this hex into the air.

[A]

You know, I went. When I went to Allison, and Tim.

[B]

Is not the person I'm estranged from. I love my stepdad, but he's such a. Just to be clear. But, man, he is. He showed up with these giant ass glasses. I was like, who's that nerd? And then it turns out he's my new dad.

[A]

He's, you know what a nerd he is.

[B]

But he's a good man.

[A]

He's a good man. At Allison's family reunion, it was. It was me and all the night owls that were left. There was like three or four of us, and we were all just kind of, like, making small talk. And at some point, the conversation kind of died down and, like, trying to make a joke. I was like, all right, well, if no one else has anything else to say, we should just tell each other our deepest, darkest secrets.

[B]

Yes. This is a Vibes out episode.

[A]

I thought it was a joke. They took it serious. I forgot that Allison's family takes everything very literally.

[B]

See the, like, nuance in it? Yeah.

[A]

I was like. I thought we were going to, like, laugh. That I was trying to, like, break the tension of the silence in the room. And they were all like, okay. And I went, no, no, no, no. I don't want to tell you mine. Okay. But I was like, why are you. So it says something about. Yeah, I know, right?

[B]

Can you share those? Hey, write them on this balloon real quick.

[A]

I will say if those are their secrets. That family's got no secrets.

[B]

I know. That's always the people, though, who are like, share. And they're like, I. I can't. I can't say it. And it's Like. Like, I was like, sometimes I eat cookies after bedtime. It's like, what.

[A]

What was that movie that Amy Schumer was in where she ended up at a baby shower full of, like, kind of like just, oh, yeah, I saw that on the plane some. They were like. The people were like. Their secrets were not that incredible. And someone said, like, when my husband goes to bed, I sneak a spoonful of ice cream or something. And she went, oh, my God, you're so brave.

[B]

Like, oh, my God, you're so brave. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Wow. Thanks for sharing.

[A]

Hey, remember Alaska? Okay. So.

[B]

Okay, yeah, let's get back to your thing.

[A]

So again, I've pretty much said this a million times before, so you can kind of guess where I'm heading. But the hotel was in a gold mine area. It was one of the first hotels at the time. A lot of people were coming into town looking for money. And therefore, the hotel, which was also often a public space at the time, became used for nefarious things, including gambling. There was a bar there during the pro. During Prohibition, it became a speakeasy. There was a quote from one of the hotel's owners that said this area was a hub for every scoundrel, scumbag, legislator, con man, murderer, thief, you name it.

[B]

Hell yeah, brother.

[A]

Rock and roll.

[B]

Rock and roll, brother.

[A]

So in. During the prohibition era, when it was a speakeasy, they called themselves a soda cafe. And I love that because I would have actually, genuinely gone there for a.

[B]

Soda or m. Would have wandered in. Like, when you see those fronts that are like, Italian restaurants, and they're like, do we have a frozen lasagna? We can offer this person, because they don't realize they're in a front.

[A]

We have a front in. In our neighborhood. And it's. It looks like an Italian deli restaurant. And Allison went in there one time, and they were like. They weren't selling sandwiches. They were, like, selling buckets. And she was like. She was like, I think I'm just gonna leave.

[B]

Yeah, I think maybe I'm not. No, not for me today. Thank you.

[A]

Well, so the hotel was also a brothel. Twice. Because, of course, it was once. It was an actual, like, I think legal. Everyone knew about it. Brothel for minors. And then it became Minors with an.

[B]

E. Again, just minors with an E. Because this time I heard the other one went, what? Really depends on what mood I'm in.

[A]

If I ever say that with a smile on my face, please know I'm talking about minors like grown adults. Right. The other time was A brothel was in the 60s or 70s when it was known as the Northlander. I think that's at least what one source told me. But I don't really know much about this Northlander history. There's not a lot to find there. And then the last thing I'm gonna say about the history is that. Fun fact. This was. This hotel was on Hotel Impossible. Like Bar Impossible or whatever that show is. Yeah, Bar Rescue, but Hotel Impossible, I think they're essentially the same.

[B]

Is that the same guy? Tafford? Whatever the.

[A]

I think so. I tried to watch it.

[B]

Isn't he, like, a terrible man, or am I making that up? Sometimes my brother says, you can't just say everyone is terrible until you Google them and say, never mind. Because I get. I get people's names. Not Jude Law. I know who he is. But everyone else I get mixed up on.

[A]

No, you don't know who he is. I had a Christine moment recently on TikTok where there was a little child actor and I was like, he looks like Jude Law. And it ends up being an old interview of Jude Law, so.

[B]

Well, first of all, fuck you. I thought you were gonna say, like. And it happened to me.

[A]

No. So it was on Hotel Impossible. I can't not tell you if they. If it is produced by the same people who did Bar Rescue, but the concept's the same. I don't know who was in charge of that show, but I tried to watch it. My computer also. Please write in the comments what the fuck's going on with my computer. But half of the YouTube shows I try to watch now. I literally bought this episode to watch it.

[B]

Do you have.

[A]

It's just a black screen.

[B]

Like, it won't have a vpn.

[A]

I don't know what that means.

[B]

Oh, never mind. You should. Especially if you don't know what that means. Never mind. We'll talk about it another time.

[A]

Okay. Yeah, no, I'll just try to press play on things and then, like, I can hear it, but it's just a black screen.

[B]

Is it, like, are you screen recording? Because that happens if you try to screenshot, it turns black.

[A]

No, but it looks. It looks like one big screen. It's just black. Like, I've tried to watch it. Also, I try to use YouTube for, like, my Duggar content because I don't want to, like, buy anything, so I try to watch clips of it. And even just clips of it are just black.

[B]

Does it happen, like, on your computer or on your phone, too?

[A]

Just my computer.

[B]

Weird. I don't know what that's about?

[A]

Neither. Okay, so let me know, everybody. But anyway, it was on Hotel Impossible. I tried to watch it for you because I thought that'd be funny, and it ended up. All I. All I found online about Hotel Impossible with this episode is that there ended up being a lawsuit threat later because I guess on the episode can't confirm or deny, I didn't see it. But on the episode, I guess one of the people that worked there got fired. And then the guy came out later saying the producers made us do a fake firing. Very. That's Michael Scott and Stan.

[B]

It is. I was gonna say, seriously, what the hell?

[A]

And so he tried to, like, for defamation, threaten a lawsuit.

[B]

Well, yeah. Now on tv, you're being fired and it was fake. And like.

[A]

Yeah. Even if you weren't really fired, now anytime you go in, people, I think you're a bad employee.

[B]

Exactly. Now you're that guy who's, like, targeted on the show.

[A]

Yeah. So fun fact there. If anyone else gets a chance to watch it, please do. And now, just for the ghosts, I want to say one of the reasons that stranger at dinner. I don't even remember their name.

[B]

Okay. I was like, are we purposefully not giving them the. Okay, okay.

[A]

No, they were very nice.

[B]

Some. Some people enter your life for a footprint in a moment. Or what's that quote? You know, for just a moment. And I'm just reciting for good from.

[A]

Wicked in my head now.

[B]

Okay, well, sure. Do that instead. But yeah, it feels like maybe they were just meant to. To bring you this story and then move on.

[A]

Yes. Maybe the ghosts embodied this person and.

[B]

Wow, that must be it.

[A]

You're right. So. But the reason that they mention is because they saw that in USA Today, this was ranked one of, like, the best haunted hotels.

[B]

Oh, that's a fun thing.

[A]

Yeah. And then I looked it up, and it is. In fact, it was number.

[B]

They weren't lying. Yeah.

[A]

Is the number five best haunted hotel on. On a listicle of, like, top 10 best hotels.

[B]

So is it best haunted hotel or most haunted?

[A]

Best haunted.

[B]

Okay. I like this. This is fun.

[A]

I don't know what that means. If it's like the. The best hotel to stay at. That also happens to be.

[B]

That's what I'm guessing. Because I feel like most haunted could be like a run. Like the. The. What's the one in la? The.

[A]

Oh, like Cecil Hotel.

[B]

Cecil Hotel. Don't actually go there. Right. But like. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel like that this is a nice, like, little twist A little spin on that.

[A]

Yes, I agree. Okay, so that's where we're standing.

[B]

Perfect.

[A]

So the current owner, her name is Betty Adams, although I don't know if her son Josh has officially taken over, but he also works there. But it's been in their family for.

[B]

Over 40 years until he was fired in that one bar rescue. Well, so she's like, the heir to the hotel. They're like, fire that guy.

[A]

That would have actually been hysterical.

[B]

I would have watched that.

[A]

No. So Josh said that he's been. I think. I don't know about living in the hotel. Or at least the family has worked there since he was 2 years old.

[B]

Oh, wow.

[A]

In my mind, if you run a hotel, you also live there because, I.

[B]

Mean, my parents ran. Yeah, exactly. My parents ran a restaurant, and we lived, like, above it, like out of a Disney Channel movie. And it was like I was working there, like, even at 3, I was. I mean, working. I was, like, folding silver. But it was like, oh, the. The. The kitchen staff is going to watch you for a few hours. Like, so it literally, I feel like, turns into that if you're living where.

[A]

Your parents are working, I imagine so at least Josh has been there since he was 2, and now he seemed to be, like, in his, like, 40s. And so even the. As far as I know, Betty is still the current owner, but she acknowledges that the building has a lot of ghosts. I mean, they were interviewed in all the TV shows I watched on this. Her son Josh also helps run it. He is very adamant. He's probably, like, the ghost spokesman.

[B]

Oh, okay. Well, he's seen him since he was two.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the main ghost here that people know of is Alice. So the story goes that she was a hotel guest here during the gold rush with her husband, who was a minor. Guess what happened? He never showed up and, like, left her there. But a different twist on her being a lady in insert color. Usually it's that she's like a jilted bride. They were already married. He said he was only going to be gone for three weeks in the mines, but then he never came back. And so she had to stay at the hotel because she couldn't afford.

[B]

How are you gonna leave?

[A]

How are you gonna pay to get out of here? And so, because it was a seedy kind of situation downstairs all the time, the lobby was full of nefarious folks. The way that she decided to survive financially was just take up a job as a sex.

[B]

Wow. Can you imagine, though, like, oh, my. At what point do you think to yourself, my part. My husband's never coming back. This is the only way out. Like, that's.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Terrible.

[A]

So she ended up, you know, doing what she had to do, and eventually her husband came back.

[B]

Oh, I was gonna say. But at least that didn't happen.

[A]

Nope, nope, nope. Apparently, the husband came back, and there seemed to be a big old fight, because the story goes, he found out what she was up and then, in a jealous rage, decided to kill her in. In the room.

[B]

She's a. Who disappeared. What are you. Where were you? She's trying to survive.

[A]

Where were you?

[B]

She was doing what she needed to sound like fun. It sounds like she was having a riotous old time.

[A]

It sounds like she did not want to be doing these things, but she had no money, so what else is she to do? So anyway, that happened in room 219, and I think the room next door to 18 is also haunted by her. They both seem to have similar activity going on. There have been people who will flee in the middle of the night, and they will tell the staff quote, she's in my room.

[B]

Oh, no. Send her to the other room through the. There's one next door.

[A]

Yeah. Custody between the two guests, at least split your time. Guests would see her sitting on their bed. They would see her in mirrors. They would see her walk past and then vanish. They would feel her touching them. People have also seen her coming down the stairs to the bar car. Everyone's got to do that every now and then. And some people have even woken up in the middle of the night to her floating above them.

[B]

Gasp.

[A]

I know I've said that in similar stories, but it's never not horrible, you know?

[B]

And it happens enough that I'm like, okay, this is clearly a thing. Like, one I don't want to experience, but, like, clearly it's a thing. Like, whether it's a sleep paralysis thing or whatever, it's like, no, no, no, no, no.

[A]

Part of me feels like it has to be sleep paralysis, because why are so many ghosts signing up to just float over people?

[B]

It's like, repeated like that. The people sitting on your chest, the hat man in the doorway. I'm not saying they're not real things. I'm just saying I think they happen a lot during sleep paralysis. And it's like, why people say that.

[A]

She is in a translucent gown. People have also just heard her voice speaking to them. And she's very active with ghost hunting equipment, especially spirit boxes and ovilis. Anywhere where she can.

[B]

Oh, she's like tech savvy. I love it.

[A]

I love it too. Women in stem. So many teams have come in and have been able to talk to Alice specifically. And in one show called Alaska Triangle, where they only cover Alaska. Creepy stuff. They had a sensitive. I'm a sensitive. I don't know what the right word is, a sensitive.

[B]

I mean, I think it that they can probably decide if they're psychic medium or some people just say they're a sensitive.

[A]

Yeah, that's what I heard on the show. So that's.

[B]

Oh, yeah, it would just do that.

[A]

Then his name was Jeff and he came in and kind of just cold read the hotel and he got. He had this like flash in his head of a date, July 12, 1921. And then he decided to turn on the ovulus. And he. The first word he got was July.

[B]

Gasp.

[A]

Horrific.

[B]

So she's like screaming in his ear. He's like, yeah, July, July, July, July. And then he turns on. Wow.

[A]

So he asked to the spirits. He was like, is that the day that you died? The person I'm speaking to? And then the ovulus said, alice, I.

[B]

Like that this ghost is like, I'm cutting straight to the chase. I'm not gonna say yes. I'm not gonna give you my name.

[A]

I'm giving you as much info with as little words as possible.

[B]

Exactly. Smart. Smart.

[A]

And as someone who is using ovulus, you know you can't control those things.

[B]

Like, there's no. In fact, I don't even know how they work.

[A]

No, there. I don't. There's no manipulating it to say the words you want.

[B]

So no, unfortunately.

[A]

And it's eerie how it just immediately went to Alice.

[B]

And it'll say some weird things. By the way, Apple.

[A]

He said, why are you here? And the ovulus said, hell. Hell.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

And then he said. He asked, are you in hell? And then the obvious just kept saying Alice.

[B]

I don't like that at all. No.

[A]

Later on he asked, did you die in the room 219? And then the ovulus was saying poltergeists. And then it just kept saying Alice. Again, very horrible.

[B]

This is weird. Okay.

[A]

In the show Portals to Hell starring Jack Osborne.

[B]

Classic.

[A]

This was actually their pilot episode was going to this.

[B]

Oh, I think I've seen this then. I mean, years ago, but.

[A]

Well, so he uses spirit box or I guess. Hang on. Can you hear Hank?

[B]

A little bit, but I like it.

[A]

He's a firsty rat. He. When he drinks, he drinks the whole bowl. It's very Embarrassing.

[B]

A gulp. Gulper.

[A]

He's like. He's like me.

[B]

Hang on, I'll take this time to refill. Unfortunately, though, when I do take a break, I have to go downstairs to pee because my toilet is. Oh, right, Busted.

[A]

I'm almost done, though. Is he almost done? Okay. Yes. So in the episode Portals to Hell, Jack, I don't. I don't remember the name of his partner in crime over here, but I don't either. She decided to stay in Alice's room. She turned on the spirit box and multiple times, got atlas. Ew. Multiple times. And then the only other word that she seemed to get it at least multiple times, was the word rape.

[B]

Oh, oh, oh.

[A]

Which led them to theorize that maybe Alice was never a sex.

[B]

Right. I was at wondering that even in.

[A]

The beginning, but was at the hotel, still waiting for her husband. And then something non consensual was happening to her, but she had nowhere else to go because she couldn't afford to leave.

[B]

And what are you gonna do? I mean, really, like, you're stuck.

[A]

And then her husband came in and decided.

[B]

Right, exactly. Yeah. Because tail is old as time, Tail is old as a lady in white. You know what I'm saying?

[A]

I do, actually. Almost 500 episodes, and I think 499 have a lady in white in them. So in the year 2007, which does not feel that long ago in my mind, there's no such thing as ghosts that came from the 2000s.

[B]

It is hard to believe.

[A]

Well, in 2007, when the. The Adam's family. Oh, I didn't realize that they run this place.

[B]

In the ad. Okay, go on.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

I was like, they're called the Osbornes. And then I went, wait a minute. I literally was thinking about the Osbornes. And you said, the Adams family. And I went, you mean the Osborne family? And now I'm like, wait a minute. I'm all mixed up.

[A]

Okay, Josh Adams.

[B]

Gotcha. The Adams.

[A]

Hysterical. I don't know why they don't that play on words. Hasn't happened before.

[B]

Oh, man.

[A]

So in 2007, while the Adams family happened to own this place, there was a Navy sailor who came off his ship and decided to stay the night here. And he asked for the most haunted hotel room that they had.

[B]

Okay. And this is 07, 2007. Okay. So. And. And this is like the era when we per. Presumably could have gone somewhere and been like, oh, let's stay in the most haunted room. Like, this is making it a little too.

[A]

You were super.

[B]

Yeah. Okay.

[A]

Is that. Right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Seven. Yeah. Yes. And so he wanted to be in the most haunted room, and so they gave him a room I have not discussed yet, which is room 315.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Now, his story seems to have overshadowed what was going on before 2007 in that room, because nobody anymore talks about what that room was like and why it was so haunted.

[B]

So it. Oh, but. So they gave him. Right. Okay. So. But it was haunted, presumably because they gave him this room, saying it's the most haunted. Okay. Oh, no.

[A]

All we know is that this room was apparently the most haunted room, and yet there's no information online before his story that helps us understand why it was so haunted. Because his story is so wild.

[B]

Right. I mean, who would have thought, like, oh, I asked for the most haunted room. Now I'm gonna become the story. That's horrible.

[A]

It's exactly right. So in 315, apparently, it was already haunted. We don't know any more than that. But this guy decided to stay there, there. And a lot of people attribute it to the fact that he had just been on a ship for a very long time. And that does a lot, mental health wise. Or it could have been because the place was so haunted that he was seeing something. We'll never know. But shortly after checking in, people started hearing screaming in his room as if there was somebody else there. In fact, people report saying they thought two people were in the room.

[B]

My God. Okay.

[A]

The screaming he was doing was pretty much him just repetitively saying, help. Let me out of here and stop.

[B]

What the.

[A]

At some point, something happened where you could hear glass breaking, which this is all also on a police recorder. I'm not gonna say police cam. It was like an. Like a tape recorder. It was just. But it. The cops that ended up showing up have it on recording, and I did hear some of it, but you can hear him screaming, help. And then you hear glass cracking. And by the time the cops were able to get in, because he had locked himself in there, by the time they got in, he had jumped out of the window. But before the. We're assuming the glass was him breaking the window first before him, like, throwing himself out. Because after we heard glass cracking, he had had maybe intentionally cut himself or maybe accidentally cut himself. But whatever happened, there was a lot of blood. And he used the blood to write help on the walls.

[B]

Holy. Isaac. And Whoa. Holy.

[A]

And then jumped out the window.

[B]

What the.

[A]

And by the time the cops got there, he had already jumped out of the window. But the blood wasn't just on the walls. It was on the ceiling, on the floors, on the bed. It was everywhere. And we don't know if that was something he wanted or didn't want, but the fact that he now has written it on the walls makes. Is a whole element to it.

[B]

This is so sad.

[A]

When he jumped out the window, usually you would think, like, into an alley or something, but the building right next to this hotel is literally, like, this far apart. Like, you can touch the other wall when you're standing in the room. You can touch the other wall to the other building.

[B]

Oh, no.

[A]

So the. The quote alley was so thin that he could barely successfully even fall. And so he kind of, in chunks, slid down.

[B]

He was, like, wedged in there.

[A]

Yes. And so as he did, as gravity slowly dropped him down, he also broke all the windows on the floors below him. So then what the. A lot of the quotes that I saw were people remembering. Like, we thought we heard screaming upstairs, and then our window busted open and we saw a person.

[B]

Well, I mean, this is nightmare. Nightmare fuel.

[A]

Yeah. So obviously that has taken over what the hauntings beforehand and.

[B]

But I mean, it's presumably. I mean, I don't know if it's related, but he asked for a haunted room, so it seems like at least it was on his mind, you know, that something was haunted. Whether or not this was.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And they. And also people are like, oh, well, with mental health, maybe he. There could have been a reason, like he thought he could be closer to voices or.

[B]

Yeah, who knows? Yeah, exactly.

[A]

A part of another realm. I don't know. It could have been something like that. That maybe he just was fine, went into a haunted room, got possessed. I mean, it could be any theory you want, but it sounds like there was a mental health crisis going on personally.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So anyway, some of that audio was played on the Portals to Hell episode, and a lot of articles didn't say this, so I'm gonna say it. I only saw it in one article because everybody kind of just ends the story there. It's like he fell and hit every window on the way down. He was covered in blood. The room was covered in blood. You. Then you must. One would assume he's done somehow. This guy survived and was medevaced and. And I think ended up surviving.

[B]

I mean, I think the only reason he survived is that he didn't fall straight down.

[A]

Yeah, I agree. I think he kind of just scooted down.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But nobody talks about whether he survived or not. They just, like, tell you the bloody part. Part. And I think for like, dramatic effect. Leave out that he actually survived it. So he did survive it. We don't know what happened.

[B]

He's in this alley to this day. Like, oh, my God. Let me know what happened, people.

[A]

Well, in that article I saw, the cops were like, we can't even get in there, too, because it was so thin. No one could scoot in sideways.

[B]

Like, so narrow between buildings. Which also, like, that's alarming because who knows what people have thrown down there and what's. Yeah. Early on.

[A]

Animals that are in there. Animals.

[B]

Animals and dead things.

[A]

But apparently, I guess he was a thinner guy and somehow was able to crawl himself out. And then they medevacked him once he got out between the buildings.

[B]

Did he. Is there any update? Like, did he ever say what the hell?

[A]

Nope.

[B]

Happened.

[A]

Nope.

[B]

Jesus.

[A]

Which, like, imagine surviving it and then finding out that you're the story of that hotel.

[B]

I know. And you're like, oh, dude, I hope he's okay.

[A]

Yeah, he might have just been, like, having a.

[B]

A bad day, an episode or something. Yeah, well, he was having a bad day. I think we could all. Yeah, he was having a very bad day. I think.

[A]

I think. And before he even got to the hotel, it sounds like he was forming.

[B]

Yeah, right, right, right.

[A]

So.

[B]

Jesus.

[A]

But yeah, he survived. At least that's what this one article said. And no one else. No one said anything about him dying, so.

[B]

And they probably would have if it's a ghost story. So just to say that.

[A]

That. Right.

[B]

Usually they do emphasize that part when they're telling a ghost story at these places. Yeah.

[A]

And so I think what I think they were letting people believe, like, for the flare of it all, that he died. But still the energy is something to discuss, like, something really insane.

[B]

I don't want to stay in that room. Whether he lived or died. I don't think I want to stay in that room because it just upset.

[A]

Look at the wall in the window and to know what happened up there.

[B]

Yeah, it's upsetting.

[A]

When you're sleeping and look at the ceiling. I know. There was blood dripping from it.

[B]

And, like, the window. You're like, oh, imagine throwing yourself out the window. Like, I don't think mentally I'd be fit to stay in. In that. Or, like, would want to stay in.

[A]

That room to even open the window to look down there if you were feeling, like, in a creepy mood. Like, I wouldn't even want to touch the window. It's really that. That thing of, like, would you wear a murderer's shirt or something? Yeah.

[B]

You're that thing that we invented that you invented so many years ago. You know, I still think about it. I know it's. And it's a great metaphor. I don't know why it hasn't caught on, because I feel like. I mean, the answer, again, is no, I don't. I would not. And I would not go in.

[A]

It's just a shirt, but it's the energy. I'm not into it. Nope. Anyway, so although he did not die, the energy has stayed in the house. We're now super creepy. People have heard a man screaming for help. Even though.

[B]

See, I've heard that. That. That. That's a thing that can happen. What. What was that somewhere we went?

[A]

I don't know.

[B]

I can't remember if it was somewhere we went or somewhere in Cincinnati. Check your subscription to. No, that was an ad. M accidentally subscribed to Cincinnati.com. cincinnati.com. And we talked about it. A rocket money ad. But I'm like. Was literally reading me, like, the little black news blast. I was like, oh, you get to know all the updates? No, but I can't remember if it was from a ghost tour I did hear or if I was with you. But it was, like, the story. Or maybe it was in Salem when we did that ghost hunt. But it was like, the story of this person who was attacked literally might be a Jim Harold story, but the person who was attacked and then, like, that re. That scene replays even though the person is in prison and is, like, alive. But, like, people witness it all the time, so it's, like, so eerie that you residual.

[A]

Yeah, that falls into my, like, belief about, like, how, like, time isn't real and all that. Because time's a loop. Because the fact that you can be alive and haunting something already.

[B]

Totally. Like, you can be residually in two places because you've already been there. Are you? Yeah. It's freaky. It's so weird.

[A]

That's the question. Begs the question, what if this guy.

[B]

Would you matter? Where'd you wear a murderer shirt?

[A]

Is if that guy decided to come back and say, in 3:15, what the would happen?

[B]

I don't think they'd let him. You're not welcome.

[A]

Well, supervised while heavily Kidding.

[B]

No, I'm just kidding. But yeah. Like, what does it end?

[A]

The haunting? Like, do they need to find each other in some weird way? Or, like, would it. Would the haunting be even stronger because he was there and he's attached to it?

[B]

Right. So would it, like, amplify it? Right. Or would it Null it out. Like, negate it. Yeah, it's really freaky because it is. It is. Then it becomes like timelines and energy and. Oh my God. Yeah. Then your head starts to hurt.

[A]

Then it's like spiritual calculus. All of a sudden I'm like, oh, man.

[B]

I mean, I stop at microeconomics.

[A]

So, okay, the people hear someone saying, help me. But the really creepy one was that one time this woman who works at the front desk, her heard, help me. And then check the security cameras. And all 12 security cameras caught. Help me, me. Like, throughout the hotel. All 12.

[B]

Oh, ew.

[A]

So it's like resonating through the hall.

[B]

Yeah, it's like in the air.

[A]

So now the room 315, they don't even rent it out to people unless it's requested. And I saw someone say, like, they'll give it to you if it's the only available room left, which I love. They're like fake, the scraps.

[B]

I actually hate it because I'm like, honestly, I'd rather you just say no. Well, you don't have a room.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

If I didn't know about it, it.

[A]

Well. So another ghost that's here. This is the last ghost I think I'm going to talk about is that in 1988, up until this point, the hotel used to rent out hop hot tub access in what year? In the 80s.

[B]

That's hilarious. I love this for them. And 80s luxury.

[A]

Even weirder is that they. It was in the basement. And like, it looks like a basement. Like, it doesn't look like you're in a hotel on the bottom floor. It looks like you're in someone's like your grandpa's storage unit basement.

[B]

Oh, no.

[A]

And there's just a hot tub sitting there. And like when. Look to your left and right, you're just in a cellar. Like, it's very eerie.

[B]

Okay. Cuz like, I've stayed in places when I was a kid that like, where we would go like, skiing and then like the hot tubs would be like outside looking at the mountain or whatever the. But this is like in the basement. Literally Alaska. I imagine you have beautiful views and like, wow. Okay.

[A]

You're like your basement.

[B]

Like the one. We don't want a hot tub down there. No, no, no, no, you don't.

[A]

The only difference between your basement and this basement was that this one had cement on the floor. But the. That was it.

[B]

And a hot tub, which you're already like winning. But like, yeah, you don't need to put. You don't need to even sit in a chair in my basement, let alone.

[A]

You don't need to be alive in your basement.

[B]

You don't want to be half naked down there. Really, you don't.

[A]

But. So I guess at the time they were like, well, we've got a hot tub. Do you want it or not?

[B]

I mean, I GUESS in the 80s you got to find hot tubs somewhere. Sure.

[A]

So there was this guy named Charlie who rented out a hot tub, and we don't know what happened. Maybe he drowned or something. But. But tiny little Josh who lived there, I think, or at least his mom worked there, found him floating in the hot tub. Yikes.

[B]

Okay. Thank God that's not something like, that's scary. Like, your parents are like, go check on that one guest who's using the hot tub and tell him it's time to go. And it's like, you don't know what you're accidentally putting this kid through.

[A]

Yeah. So Josh did say, and maybe it has something to do with like, his own trauma and seeing that so early and.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Thinking about death. Well, Josh said that the basement is now demonic and has heavy poltergeist activity. And we don't know if that's because of his experience on there or because he. I mean, he really saw. He literally saw a dead body down there.

[B]

Right. So like, it's. It's already troubling to him no matter what. But he claiming that there's like something even darker. Okay.

[A]

I mean, he also says whatever is down there does not like women and will try to hurt them, which I guess would fit into the category of nefarious. No, no good doers, rapists, etc, and he said there's another ghost down there that will aggressively let people know he doesn't want them there. And he made it sound like ever since this guy Charlie died down there, that's when it all started. So then he's kind of implying that Charlie is the demon, but in the same breath he said, oh, no, Charlie's the only any human spirits down there. Everyone else is a demon.

[B]

Oh, good. He just activated everything. And now. Okay, cool.

[A]

Josh even said that they have had recent exorcists down there to try to help, but nothing has helped. And then he even said that he has seen horned figures and silhouettes down there.

[B]

What? Stop going down there, Josh. I don't want you down there anymore. If I were your parent, I'd be like, you're never allowed to go down there. Which probably would make you go down there more. But what is a this is probably irrelevant. I really want to know, is a hot tub still down there?

[A]

I don't think so. I didn't see it down there because.

[B]

That feels, like, so ominous to still have, like, a dusty old hot tub down there, you know, that had a.

[A]

Dead body in it.

[B]

Okay, it did have a dead body. They probably got rid of it.

[A]

They probably got rid of it. I don't know. I also. I imagine having to lift that out from the basement is like Blaze lifting a toilet upstairs.

[B]

Oh, I. Funny you say that, because real quick, I got a message a little while ago that said, says, 20 minutes ago, I made a huge mistake.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

Which, by the way, I don't. Blaze is the only one when I have do not disturb on that, like, goes through. So I just see, I made a huge mistake, and I'm like, what? And then it says, I didn't check how much the toilets weighed. I assume they would be 30 to 40 pounds or something. They are 104 pounds each.

[A]

They're solid porcelain. Blaze.

[B]

I don't even know how I got them into this car.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

Good luck. I love that. He. He was like, well, I'm not going to return them. I'm just going to bring them. This is. He and I are, like, terrible and great together because we're like, okay, just bring them home, and we'll just figure it out.

[A]

I feel like he's gonna carry the whole thing up, and you're just gonna follow behind, holding the lid, and you're like, this is really hard.

[B]

I believe in you. No, go to the left. No, no, pivot, Pivot.

[A]

So, basically, during the show Portals to Hell, Josh was saying that there's, like, a lot of bad stuff in this basement. He was saying that there had been ritual activity that happened down there at some point. Point. And that he even admitted to also having conjured spirits in this hotel during the investigation.

[B]

Conjured spirits? Don't do that. I mean, I wanted to talk. Okay. Oh. But during the. Okay, fair. Yeah.

[A]

Well, during them, he. The. The investigators asked if Josh had accidentally invited something in that was negative due to his ritual activity.

[B]

Oh. Machines all went off, and he was like, oopsie daisy.

[A]

That's not me.

[B]

Oh, sorry. I found a dead body. I'm allowed to cope however I want.

[A]

I look at the end of the episode, Josh also then tells them that he both willingly and unwillingly, in separate occasions, was a part of, quote, diabolical rituals in the hotel.

[B]

Diabolical? What the is that supposed to mean?

[A]

I didn't think they were dark or like, diablo means devil.

[B]

Hello. Welcome to the club.

[A]

He said, not evil, but diabolical.

[B]

Basically, like, evil times two.

[A]

He told this story of, like, how one of his ex's moms practiced, like, dark witchcraft and like, somehow used. Used him in a ritual and he didn't know about it. It was like a crazy story. And I was like, you should have led with this. Why is this.

[B]

You should have written this a minute before the show. That's why we [e-mail], because that seems like a good listener story. Well, so, yeah, at the last minute, he's like, I was used to a ritual.

[A]

Like, 60 seconds later was the credits. I was like, why are we only.

[B]

They were probably like, we don't really want to lead with that. It makes you look a little bit like, wackadoo. You know what I mean?

[A]

The girl at the end, the. The investigator who was not Jack Osborne when he was telling this to them, she was. Was like, well, that's the last piece of the puzzle we were missing.

[B]

Okay. No, like, okay, got it. Checks out.

[A]

Well, so other than that, people say that the dishes in the bar move by themselves. The stereo system turns on by itself and plays techno music, of all things.

[B]

Hey.

[A]

The towels and the bedding will move and crumple themselves up even though they've just been hung and cleaned. People experience flickering lights, footsteps, orbs, objects moving, shadow figures walking through the building. They'll hear growling. People will wake up at odd hours in Portal to Hell. Both people Woke up at 4am in different rooms to, like, different activity going on. Super creepy. People get palpitations. They feel hands crawling up their legs. At night, one woman walked into the bathroom, and when she came back out, she was in a totally different time period and building. It was like she totally warped.

[B]

I have that, like, I dream of that happening. Like, a split second of like. Like, please, when Eva.

[A]

When the. When the. The car ran out of gas and I could hear Eva going, it's happening. It's happening.

[B]

It's happening. Exactly like, it's happening. It's happening. I mean, oh, my God, I would just kill for that.

[A]

I. I could see you going, it's happening. It's. If we went into a haunted house together and you walked out and you looked like you were in a trance and you're just chanting, it's happening, I would know exactly what's happening.

[B]

You'd be like, film this, Eva.

[A]

Right? I'd be like, we're not even. I'm not even going. To stop it from happening. I need you to tell me what Later.

[B]

Actually, you'd be like, it's happening, Eva. It's happening.

[A]

Every just say get together like a ritual.

[B]

And he was like, we ran out of gas again.

[A]

So the last thing I'm going to say is a quote of what I think is the creepiest thing that's happened here. On one article, I saw someone say a former employee who worked in the basement once saw a man walking around down there alone. And she turned to look at the monitor, and his face was suddenly right in front of the security camera.

[B]

Like a horror movie.

[A]

Like a horror movie. No, that's the last thing of it. So sorry that was so long, but that is the Alaskan hotel and bar, slash slash Northlander hotel.

[B]

Okay, so is this place fancy? Like, I feel like if USA Today is calling it, like, the best hotel to stay in. Is it like. It's not fancy? It's not like, super fancy. I mean, the hot tub in the basement didn't scream fancy to me, but no, it's not.

[A]

I think that's the vibe you should run with when you think about the rest of the hotel.

[B]

Got it.

[A]

Oh, you froze.

[B]

Yeah, you froze too.

[A]

Can you see me? Am I moving?

[B]

Oh, you're good now, but it's like five seconds late. Hey, it says ad lib how much you like to talk about your pet and how much you love them.

[A]

Okay, well, who wants to go first? You have three, I have one. Together we make four. With Eva, it's about a thousand. And we are big old animal fans over here, which is why we would like to let you know. Know that we have a quick message from today's sponsor, the ASPCA Pet Health Insurance Program.

[B]

Yes, of course. All our pets are part of the family. You do pretty much any for anything for them. But the vet bills. Yowza. Okay, they hurt. We're going on Monday. Not looking forward to that bill. That is why it's worth checking out ASPCA Pet health insurance. Pet insurance can help manage the vet bills so you can focus on what really matters, making sure your pet gets the care they need when they need it.

[A]

And the program offers customizable accident and illness plans, making it easier to get your pet the care that they may need. It's been around for almost 20 years of has covered nearly a million pets in that time. To Explore coverage, visit aspcapetinsurance.com Drink that's aspcapetinsurance.Com Drink Eligibility restrictions apply.

[B]

Visit aspca pet insurance.com Amazon terms for more info. This is a paid advertisement. Insurance is underwritten by either Independence American Insurance Company or United States Fire Insurance Company and produced by PTZ Insurance Agency Ltd. The ASPCA is not an insurer and is not engaged in the business of insurance insurance. Hey, have you ever had any issues with your finances?

[A]

Literally? Don't look at me. I one time for a story I was covering about your hometown, Christine, I accidentally subscribed to the Cincinnati like Inquirer or something. And for years I was paying for a Cincinnati magazine that I've never touched.

[B]

Oh, okay. You should have put my address. I would have used that. So, okay, we have to say the the sponsor is Rocket Money and they have helped us so much because really, this. These are true stories. This is a real thing that happens. I know this insanity. I've had that issue before. But I actually live here, so at least I got some use out of it. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings.

[A]

You can talk about it all day. And we might, and we might. So I'm just going to keep it sweet for you. But Rocket Money has really saved me and saved my wallet. It saved my. I mean, on top of all of it, I like to spend my money doing other things except not reading the Cincinnati Bulletin or whatever.

[B]

Cincinnati. The Bulletin. Now it's what? Now it's a on the corner.

[A]

Now I finally have money to spend on like magazines in my hometown. You know what I'm saying?

[B]

The next ad, the terms and condition, they'd be like, do not mention the Cincinnati Inquirer by name. Please let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join@rocket money.com drink that's rocket money.com drink.

[A]

Rocket money.com drink.

[B]

I am covering part two of the Fort Worth trio today and I do have a previously on for everybody except M because M actually remember numbers I barely remember. The world probably barely remembers. So I'm going to read you like a little previously on and then we'll get back to the case. So previously on and that's my drink last week, by the way. You should probably go listen to it because it probably still won't make sense if you're starting here. On December 23, 1974, just two days before Christmas, Rachel Trelisa, 17, Renee Wilson, 14, and Julianne Mosley, 9, went to Seminary South Shopping center in in Fort Worth, Texas for what was supposed to be just a Quick shopping TR for last minute Christmas gifts. But they were never seen again. That night Rachel's car was found locked and seemingly untouched in the Sears parking lot which is a top level of the garage. Police initially assumed the girls were runaways despite the fact that this was an impromptu trip. They'd left behind the car and new clothing and there was this random 9 year old that wasn't supposed to be even on the mall shopping trip. The next morning a handwritten letter appeared in Rachel's mailbox addressed to her husband. Husband in what seemed to be Rachel's handwriting. It claimed the girls had gone to Houston. And the letter raised immediate questions. First of all, it came the morning after, it was Christmas Eve morning and they disappeared the evening before. So it was already like how did that happen? It appeared in Rachel's handwriting but the zip code was blurred and the three was backwards which was strange, right? It formally addressed her husband Tommy as Thomas A. Trelisa, which she almost never used used. The envelope was written in pencil and the note inside was written in pen. And the spot where she wrote her name, Rachel, somebody had gone back over and, and fixed the last letter which had been written as an E and was fixed to an L. So it originally had two E's and then somebody kind of wrote over it and wrote now. So just some like strange things. In the days that followed, the families endured all sorts of of bullying and pranks, false sightings, cruel prank calls. One moment that still haunts the case which was January 7th. Julie's mother, the nine year old's mother answered the phone and heard a little girl say mama. And she has always believed that was her daughter.

[A]

Sorry about that.

[B]

It's horrible. With no physical evidence and no clear suspects, a fort with trio vanished and was never seen again. And to this day people are like pulling their hair out trying to figure out what is going on on here. So for part two I'm going to start with dynamics a little closer to home. Let's talk about Rachel's husband Tommy. Because of course people immediately side eye the husband in every case let alone when a 17 year old girl is married to a 22 year old and.

[A]

Who has already been divorced with a kid.

[B]

Right? Correct. Divorced with a kid. And we'll get to it. But there is even more drama. Yes, so, so I don't know, maybe I didn't mention it last week. Tommy who was 22, Rachel 17, they'd been married only six months when she disappeared. He had put in a thousand dollars of reward money when Rachel disappeared. But then retracted it a few months later. Then in April of the following year, so 15 months after her disappearance, he filed for divorce from Rachel, which struck many as a little bit jarring given that she was still missing and not declared dead. That decision prompted people to take a closer look at Tommy's personal history. And people found a pattern that some have like kind of clung on to as proof. And others have said it's just like bad judgment from a young guy. Okay, but I'll give you the timeline. So in 1971, three years before Rachel vanished, when he was 19, Tommy married Shawna Ford and like you said, had a son, Sean. In April of 1974, Tommy filed for divorce from Shauna. And just 43 days later, he married our girl Rachel. But what complicates the timeline is that during that 43 day period where he divorced his first wife and married Rachel, he was engaged to another woman. Woman who, but not just any woman. He had been engaged to Rachel's older sister, Deborah, who.

[A]

That's not funny.

[B]

Lived with them at the time of Rachel's disappearance. Like you.

[A]

So, no, you didn't mention any of this last week. And I.

[B]

Okay, so clearly I didn't because you would have remembered.

[A]

Yeah, I know I would. I remember you specifically saying at the.

[B]

End, I think I'm.

[A]

I'm going to, to next week discuss Tommy and maybe how Deborah's involved.

[B]

Yes. Okay. So I made sure not to bring it up because it is a storytelling.

[A]

Christine.

[B]

But like, what the. But. So, okay, so when you talk to Deborah about it, she basically has said and claimed, and I want to give her all the credit and independence she deserves saying this, but she said it was just like a, like a little casual thing. Like we were together, we got engaged, but not really. Like it was sort of like the 70s. Like maybe he just wanted to sleep with these girls. I don't know. People have thrown out different reasonings why he's engaged to all these girls. But it is a little bit troubling that like she lived with her sister and her sister's new husband when her sister's new husband was her ex fiance.

[A]

Yeah. When did this.

[B]

Only 40 days ago or whatever this begin?

[A]

Like, was he sleeping with both of them at the same time? Time was any.

[B]

There's been jealous. So much speculation and like we don't know. Which of course sucks. But like people have their opinions, right? And they're going to have their opinions. But yeah, we don't know. We have. I. We have heard that Rachel and her sister were in some company that may have been, like, more dangerous than the company the other girls kept. So maybe Rachel was the target of this. We don't really, really know. But we do know that Tommy had kind of, like, at best, an unstable kind of history with relationships. So he married Rachel 43 days after filing from the mother of his child, Shauna. But in between that, was engaged to Rachel's older sister.

[A]

But that's like, it's not. It's not just hooking up with Deborah and then hooking up with Rachel. Like, like, that's already.

[B]

But it might be because it's the 70s, you know? So, like, maybe in their heads, they were like, we're engaged. That's why we can do it. And then, like, maybe it was like, okay, we don't really actually want to get married. We just wanted to have, you know, like, some people have posited that. And I'm like, I could see that. But still, it's still weird to, like, live with your sister's new husband. I mean, it's a lot.

[A]

No matter how chill these sisters are with each other and each other's sex lives, there has to be at least one moment of a lick of insecurity from Deborah when he has seen the other sister going down the hall and all of a sudden now wants to hook up with that one.

[B]

Now they're getting married, and now they're getting married.

[A]

So, like, was worth it and not you. That would be like, the first obvious thing. That's like.

[B]

She claims they had no hard feelings. They broke up. She was in a different relationship at this point. So, like, okay, you know, but, like, it. It. On the surface, only a month ago.

[A]

I would still think about it. Maybe I'm just putting.

[B]

On the surface, though, it doesn't look good. Because on the surface, all of us are like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. And, like, yeah, maybe they're the two sisters in the world who don't have any beef over this, and they just would never. But, like, sure. Most people, I think, think would have at least passing thoughts or insecurities or pat. Whatever. It might be some sort of emotional reaction to this. I don't know, but I don't want to. Like, everyone claims no. Right? But like, some people. A lot of people are like, well, this is still a little strange.

[A]

100.

[B]

So, anyway, on that note, he had not just been engaged to any woman. He had been engaged to Rachel's older sister, Deborah. And at the time of Rachel's disappearance, three of them were roommates. They lived Together. I know. It's messy. It's messy.

[A]

It's not good. It's not a good look.

[B]

I.

[A]

You did such an excellent job of not telling us this last week because.

[B]

I sort of feel like I should have though, because I feel like now this is kind of a. Like I should have like given it as the climax.

[A]

My judgment would have been totally skewed last week, so.

[B]

Interesting. Okay, so some people point to Tommy's relationship timeline. About 15 months after Rachel Van vanished. Now we're going forward in time. Tommy finalized his divorce from her, which seemed like relatively soon to some people, especially because he filed his divorce in April and then that December. So about two years after his wife disappeared, he married another 17 year old. This time her name is Josephine Beck.

[A]

This guy won't quit.

[B]

I know. And they also got divorced by June of 1978.

[A]

So imagine being 25 and having three divorces. I know. Like stop. Just stop having.

[B]

He's lucky. Only has one kid out of all those marriages. Like this is messy, really. And like if your second wife disappear, I'm not blaming him at all. I actually don't think he's involved, but like to have like this many. I mean, it's messy.

[A]

Dude, just date them. Like just stop marrying them.

[B]

I mean, I don't know. I don't know if that wasn't. I know, I know, I know. So I know. It's hard to say because like it's the 70s, it's Texas. I don't fucking know. I have no. I don't really have cultural.

[A]

Understandings of it.

[B]

Yeah. Of this. So whatever. People argue on it about it online. People like, I swear to God, I found arguments for everything. It was like it was the 70s, the post office delivered everything by the same night. And then like I saw, I was like, no. In the 70s, the post office was slow as hell, especially during Christmas and like things would arrive three weeks late. So like, like the letter that got delivered to their mailbox couldn't have been. But it's like then somebody says, I lived in Texas in the 70s and like stuff was delivered overnight all the time. And it's like, who the am I supposed to believe anymore? You know? Like it just feels like everybody has a differing opinion on how things were. Yeah. And what was normal. So it's just very confusing. So he married 17 year old Josephine Beck about two years after Rachel's disappearance. Then by June of 1978, that marriage also ended. And then less than three months after that, he married 23, three year old Ruby Fox, whom he also later divorced before eventually marrying his current wife Linda, with whom he has now been with for roughly 40 years.

[A]

So you know what? He finally found one.

[B]

Linda is the one, I suppose.

[A]

Linda, I, I don't know how you didn't have cold feet about that, but I'm so glad that you.

[B]

Good for you.

[A]

Good for you.

[B]

So for some folks, of course this raised questions and probably eyebrows, but to others it was just poor judgment. Like whatever, he's just a young guy. Still, it means that Tommy remains like a focal point when people discuss this case. Over the years, theories emerged suggesting that Tommy may have had some involvement in Rachel's disappearance, but nothing's ever been proven. There's really not much evidence to suggest this. Law enforcement has never charged him in connection with the case or anything even close. But of course the theories persist, especially because we really just don't know what happened to the girls. So it's like the theories can go off in any tangent. Abduction, serial killer, the husband did it, you could go. The sister at some, I mean you could go in every direction and just go, go, go. Because there no verifiable proof of anything.

[A]

Got it.

[B]

So even the girls families, the other, the other girls families have made statements kind of side eyeing Tommy. So Renee Wilson's Renee is the 14 year old who went along, who's Rachel's friend and went along for the shopping trip. Renee Wilson's father at one point said, I got it in my head that him, Tommy and Deborah were involved. And until the police find someone who stands up and tells me to make my face they did it, then I'm going to have that on my mind. Quite a few parents died with that thought. So a lot of people wonder till their dying day essentially whether Tommy had something to do with it. And okay, I will say, and I know I did hint at this in the last episode. The brother, Rusty, now Rusty, okay, y He's the 11. He was 11 years old when his sister Rachel decided disappeared. Deborah, the sister who had been engaged to Tommy was 19. Rachel was 17 and Rusty was 11.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And he remembers going to the mall and like going store to store asking if anybody had seen his sister. He over the years got really.

[A]

I.

[B]

Don'T even want to say invested in the case. Like it really took over his life.

[A]

I don't blame him. I would also be losing my mind.

[B]

And especially like at age 11, you feel so helpless, right? And then like you get older and you want to bring closure to your parents or to yourself or to The. I mean, it's got to be just a nightmare. Like a nightmarish draw. Yeah. So he connected with this PI who had kind of taken on the case pro bono. Wasn't really asked to. I don't think he just kind of like, decided to. To pursue it. His name was Dan James. And remember I talked about a PI from last year, last week in last week's episode, who passed away from a ruled suicide, and his entire library of evidence had been burned. Just. Yes, all his research had been.

[A]

Totally forgot about that.

[B]

So we have a different PI Here. This is Dan James. And Dan, according to Rusty's sister Deborah, Dan James kind of infiltrated Rusty's head with all these ideas that were, according to her, patently ridiculous. Ridiculous. He basically. Or she basically, accuses PI of putting all these ideas in Rusty's head. And you know, that Rusty's vulnerable, and he fell for all these ideas. The ideas being not only that Tommy may have had something to do with it, but that Deborah herself may have been involved as well, or at least known more than she let on. And as you can imagine, this created, like, a huge rift in the family, especially the mother. Just felt like already she lost her daughter. Now. Now her son and daughter are, like, you know, at odds. And he thinks she had something to do with it. I mean, it was just a lot of heartache. Rusty's fixation shaped most of his adult life. In one Fort Worth Weekly profile, which was, like, very extensive, very well done, his sister's disappearance is described as something that has consumed him entirely. He even wrote a song for Rachel titled in memory of you. And I'm going to read you two lines from this song. The lyrics read, you weren't just my sister. You are my best friend. You taught me my first guitar chords with your guiding hands. Now, Deborah stood up for herself in a written rebuttal. Also, in the same piece that rejected his entire version of events and insisted his obsession with the case had torn the family apart, she said, quote, rachel didn't teach you to play guitar. I did. She didn't even know how to play guitar. You have an uncontrollable need for things to be the way you need them to be, not the way are they. They were. End quote. So she is, like, off. You're putting me in the center of this. I know you're hurting, but, like, I didn't have anything to do with it. I'm hurting, too. You're tearing the family apart, blaming me for this, like, just a mess. And I want to also Clarify. Like, Tommy and Deborah never got back together. Like, it's not like they. Okay, after this, got married and ran away together. Like, they. They never got back together or anything like that. Because people do want wonder, but. Yeah. So for years, these disputes kind of fractured the family. And Rusty was so, like, often trying to get the word out that this became his side of the story, became really well known because he's going on local news and he's trying to keep the case alive, but he's also saying, like, I think my sister had something to do with it. So he's really propagating this idea that, like, things were closer to home, you.

[A]

Know, I mean, I. I can see both sides, because if she really didn't do anything, and he's just constantly, constantly implying that she's a bad person, you know, and she.

[B]

And, like, again, like, it sucks to say this, but, like, he was 11, like.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And she and her sister were 17, 19, were very close. And it's like, how that must be so painful to be, like, you think I did this? You weren't even.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You didn't even know who taught you guitar. You know, Like, I imagine it's just such a frustrating experience. And I will say that. That supposedly in 2020, they reconnected and, like, have. Have kind of. I was about, say, split the difference. That's not right. They've kind of.

[A]

They're at a neutral. At a neutral.

[B]

Yeah. Okay, what do you say? They blank their differences.

[A]

They. Now I've lost my brain.

[B]

Welcome to my brain. They've reconciled. They've settled their differences. They've set aside their differences. Okay, so apparently there's 16 things I could have said that would have worked.

[A]

So we couldn't think of any of them between us.

[B]

Fantastic for us. Yes. Okay. So they've apparently set aside their differences and have, like, reconnected, which we don't have many details on that, but we can only hope.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

So now I want to get into kind of the theories of what could have possibly happened to these girls, because as we were of kind recall, the car was found, no sign of the girls ever discovered, which is pretty abnormal for an abduction in broad daylight at a shopping mall two days before Christmas. I mean, it's just ridiculous. But so we have a couple theories here that are kind of related to witness sightings, that kind of thing. So one theory, which I did mention, a store clerk came forward around the time of the girl's disappearance and said that a woman, an elderly woman, had told her that she had Seen the girls at the mall that day. The woman reported that she. The elderly woman reported that she saw three girls being, quote, hustled into a yellow pickup truck near Buddy's grocery store at the mall. The truck was described to have lights on top of it. So perhaps like a security. Security pickup truck, something like that. So not only did that store clerk say it, but I think either one or two additional store clerks said, oh, this elderly woman came up and told me this story. Like they independently said. Said that.

[A]

Wasn't there another woman who said something about how they. She saw a random person also hanging out with them? Or.

[B]

So there are two other sightings. So it could be. It could be the same woman. She did say that it was a man. Like, basically. Oh, oh, the one you're talking about was Rachel's friend who said he saw them hanging out with a fourth person, but he wasn't. But we never got cl. That's. Yeah, good point. That was in a newspaper article. We never got clarity on, like, was this person, like, hovering around? Was this person, like, a friend of theirs? Was it a girl? Was it a guy? We have no clue.

[A]

And that. And that's. That report was different than what this woman is saying.

[B]

Exactly. That's totally different. So this happened when the family walked around the mall that day and asked, like, with Rusty. And the parents asked all these store clerks, like, two or three of them said, oh, this elderly woman came to us and said, hey, I need you to know I saw this horrible thing. And like, yeah, nobody really did anything but, like, what are they supposed to do? I suppose. I don't know. It's a hard thing to argue, but they put out these statements in the newspaper, like, hey, if you're this woman who saw this and told these clerks, can you reach out? And she never did. So we still don't know who that was. Which is so frustrating because, like, if two or three clerk store clerks were like, oh, she came up to me, it's like, clearly she wanted to share her story, but then she never saw the news posting or whatever know, like.

[A]

She went around telling people too. Like, I saw this thing and nobody ever reached out to me.

[B]

And she just.

[A]

TV on the right news station.

[B]

Exactly. And it's like, how do you know? I wish. I wish at that time they would have been like, leave your name and phone number and we'll like something, you know, but, like, it's just really hard to hear. So that was one of the first theories that it's like a security van, something like that another sighting was this man who reached out to police in 1981, which was. Was like six years, seven years after the disappearance. He said he had been in the parking lot that day and he had seen a man forcing a girl into a van. He said when he said something or started to approach that this man in the van told him, this is a family dispute and you have to stay out of it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so he backed off. And it's like SC again, just so scary because it's, it's, you know, the 70s, like you could kind of just like hit your children. It was normal. Like, so if you're screaming at your kids and like, you're like, it's a family thing, get away, like, what are you gonna do? Yeah, I don't know. Now when they reached out to this man, eventually he was like, he was like, I don't. I just didn't. I just left it. I just left it alone, you know? And like, that's gotta feel bad too, right? Like years later being like, oh, I saw something and I didn't say it, but. But like it's a hard in the moment. It's so hard in the moment to know what to do.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, I understand.

[B]

Especially like a nine year old girl, you're like, well, maybe it's his kid and he's just a shitty dad. I don't know. Like you, you talk yourself out of things.

[A]

I feel like in the 70s, so many people were. Corporal punishment was normal in a house that probably didn't even originally phase him the way that it. I'm sure it faced him a little bit, but not in the way that we're probably thinking, like how we would feel. So I.

[B]

Right.

[A]

I think you're just like, okay, like, that's weird. That guy's just like being a dick.

[B]

But that's how you handle family life, right? Exactly. I think that's just not that abnormal at the time. So another angle, of course, is like they left with someone they knew or they trusted. This is kind of like the secure mall security SL authority angle. Law enforcement seems to lean on this theory the most. I think to me it makes them most sense that at least one of the girls knew their abductor or at least they trusted him. Like, maybe it was a mall security, maybe it was a fake mall security, maybe it was fake police, who knows? But like, especially if this woman told two or three people that she saw a truck with lights on it and like girls being pushed into the car, it's sort of like, well, yeah, Maybe it was somebody saying, like, hey, we think you shoplifted. Get in the. Get in the car. We got to talk. Take you to the mall security office. Who knows? You know? But, like, these are young girls, and maybe one of them either knew this employee at the mall or trusted someone in uniform. Who knows? As far as evidence of this theory goes, In April of 2001, Bill Hutchins, a former Fort Worth police officer and a security guard, former security guard at the Seminary South Sears outlet, said he had seen the three girls with a security guard. And this is a police officer, officer slash, security guard at this exact mall at the Sears. He said he had seen the three girls with a security guard on the night they disappeared.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And when he said this, he was like, no one ever reached out to me. And so then years later, he's like, hey, I sent this report in. I called this in, and nobody touched base. So this is not like, oh, I just remembered I saw this. He was like, I said something, and you guys are still asking for tips. Like, I told you. Told you this.

[A]

Now that we have that information, did anyone go back and, like, the employee records and see who was working that day? I mean, I feel like this is a pretty easy situation to unpack if we wanted to.

[B]

I think they just didn't have that kind of information from, like, they didn't.

[A]

They didn't write it down anywhere. That's so insane.

[B]

That's why I know.

[A]

I mean, I keep track of.

[B]

I mean, nowadays, everything's, like, computerized. Like, even today, I feel like you could botch, like, a worksheet, like a timesheet or something, you know?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And this was like, the days of, like, you pencil it in or whatever, you know? I don't know.

[A]

Yeah, and only if you were in the mood, and who's gonna know?

[B]

And, like, you're a bunch of teenagers working at the mall and whatever. I mean, and for all we know.

[A]

He didn't even actually work there. He just dressed up like a security.

[B]

He could have put on a vest and been like, hey, I have lights on my car. Which, by the way, some serial killers have done, and I'm gonna bring one up in a little while.

[A]

I mean, he could literally just have. He could just said, I'm a security guard and have a gun and. And just.

[B]

Correct. It's Texas. Yeah. So now another uncomfortable avenue of speculation that I want to bring up involves Rachel and Deborah's father. Because he. His name was Cotton, and he was very abusive. According to Rusty, the little brother, the Girls were afraid of him. And Rusty has alleged, quote, he was very abusive to the girls, his sisters. I'd seen him whip Deborah so hard that she had blood running down her legs. So, like, this is a very abusive man.

[A]

Holy.

[B]

Yes. Rachel and Deborah were very afraid of him. Their mother says the same thing, even though their mother has protected this man her whole life. But essentially, the girls were terrified of him, which does. Like, even though. I'm not saying this guy had anything to do with the disappearance, but I do want to add it as context to, like, why Rachel and Deborah may have lived together and why?

[A]

Why?

[B]

Like, why? Maybe they got married so young to get out of the house and leave their father's house. Do you know what I mean? So, like, maybe the context is just like, oh, Rachel and Deborah both just wanted to get out of the house. So they got engaged, got married, moved out to get away. And, you know, so that. That's just important context. I think he died of cancer pretty shortly after the disappearance. So he was already sick by the time she disappeared. And nobody was really thinks he, like, had anything to do with it, but it just gives good context to, like, why they might be running away from something, you know?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So now we got to go to the serial killer angle, because it's the 1970s. It's Texas.

[A]

It's the 70s. It's the 70s. It's like, well, yeah, so there's serial killers. They're a very valid theory.

[B]

Jesus. I mean, these people. It's like, what was going on?

[A]

Have you ever done the psychology of why the 70s was such a heightened time?

[B]

I have thought about it, and I've heard a few theories, and I don't know because I haven't done my own research into it, but I have heard either you or somebody. Maybe it was my brother. It was somebody who is full of fun facts. So it's either you or my brother. But one of you said, that's nice to say. Okay, that, like, it could have been the lead paint.

[A]

It could have been. Oh, I.

[B]

There was a period. I think you might have told me, there was a period where, like, lead paint was so common that it, like, potentially influenced an entire generation of young, young men.

[A]

Could have been him. I usually use that as a reason why boomers piss me off, and I'm.

[B]

Like, oh, okay, maybe that was it. Maybe I. Maybe I just invented it. Like, I was like, okay, also, serial killers.

[A]

That's a much more reasonable thing. No, usually if. If all of a sudden I'm saying something, and it's not clicking with like an adult in my life. I'm like, it's just like the lead paint.

[B]

The lead paint talking. Yeah.

[A]

I'm sorry, I know that's like so mean to say, but also there was a lot of lead paint going on and I can't say, I can't sit here and pretend like it probably, probably didn't affect them.

[B]

Listen, I just learned about like some sort of toxicity to some metal and I'm like, I don't, I don't know anymore. Okay.

[A]

I mean, well, one day the kids younger than us, they're gonna blame us. Like having a microplastic stare. Like for real.

[B]

They're all psychopaths because they ate so many Lunchables. Yeah, probably.

[A]

I. Okay, so. Well, my thought was originally my guess or what I was thinking you might say is because so many parents of them were like insane in like just a war. Just gonna put that as a blanket statement. There was, I feel like they all were somehow affiliated with the military and maybe all had some sort of like PTSD because it was less addressed back then.

[B]

I mean it was, it was a big time especially for young men. Like their dads being like having shell shock, having World War II.

[A]

Yeah. So I feel like maybe they were just the collateral damage when men came home and had.

[B]

That's another very big theory. And so I feel like, I think the lead paint one is more of like kind of a joke. Not maybe not a jokey thing, but.

[A]

Almost like sad reality that.

[B]

Yeah. Other things. Yes. Sort of like, let's just throw that on top, you know. But I think, I think you're right about, you know, they say like each generation has their own like, like we are like the bright eyed optimists who are just like running into walls over and over. And like the Gen Z is like all of you, you're all wrong and stupid and like, you know, it just feels like every generation has like this reaction understandably to their previous predecessors. And so. Yeah, it could be. I bet you there are plenty of dissertations and things I would love to cover that though I might look into that because it's fascinating.

[A]

I feel like 1% of the problem at least. I mean.

[B]

Right, exactly. Like maybe it just like cherry on top, you know, like just a little sprinkle of lead on top.

[A]

If you ever come up with the, the official like professional medical diagnosis reasoning for why there are so many serial killers, I would love to hear. Hear the. What other people think because I don't.

[B]

Know the answer, but I'm curious. And also, like, you hear about this triad, right? You hear like, bedwetting, which I think a lot of that has to do with like. I mean, I don't know. I'm, again, I'm no psychiatrist, I'm no doctor of anything, but, like, you hear bedwetting, you hear like, harming animals. You hear there's a lot of shame. Often fire setting. There's a lot of shame about, like, especially if it's like, oh, I like, some boys wanted to look at their mom's underwear and, like, wear them or high heels. And like, there was just so much shame around that. There's a lot of that when I read on these guys. And then the other thing, bedwetting. Oh, the head injuries. Like, the head injuries where it was like, oh, he just fell off, cracked his head open and they just like laid him down and said, and then he was never the same again. And I'm like, oh, my God. Like, not that I'm saying, like, I mean, maybe head injuries. I haven't, like, looked at the statistics, but I feel like the head injuries back then, they just like swing off a cliff, hit their head and be like, just go to bed.

[A]

I feel like there's. If there's a Venn diagram between head injuries and serial killers, there's at least a little.

[B]

It's got to be a crossover. And it's like, here, here, just sniff this lead. It'll make you feel better. You know, it's like, what are you doing?

[A]

I. Interesting. Yeah. And I. This is me again, absolutely. Just guessing here, here. But I feel like a lot of the early signs seem to also be like, children with some sort of, like, sexual interest early on, which makes me. Correct. Wonder if they were abused.

[B]

There's a lot of shame and a lot in that. Yes. That can go hand in hand with abuse. That can go hand in hand with, like, interests that aren't, like, the norm, quote, unquote, or like, getting caught with, like, interests that are not the norm and getting like, beaten for it or ashamed for it, for sure.

[A]

But I feel like a lot of kids who were abusive, abused. I'm, in this case, I mean, physically or sexually or whatever. I. I feel like it just was easier to get away with back then because. Oh, yeah, it wasn't really cps. I think culturally there was a lot more religious shame or at least a lot. It was more of a blanket across the. The community.

[B]

Shame, more everything. Yeah.

[A]

Purity and all this stuff. And, you know, we hadn't known about, like, a lot of Ways that children are going to.

[B]

Well, and then you have like, boys trying, like, you want your boys to be boys. But then it's like, oh, well, but their father was in the war and has this horrible shell shock. It has this like, CPTSD or whatever. Whatever.

[A]

Like, the social expectations were totally kept them from being able to. Possible to investigate themselves. And.

[B]

And exactly. There's just so many things. I think it's probably like the most complex, like, situation. But it's true. There's a serial killer angle, but because it's the 70s, it's Texas, and here are some of the people. Because, of course, there are multiple people that people point to and say, this could be the person involved. And they could be. Any of these could be. So some of the serial killer, repeat offender names that tend to come up on places like Reddit and websleuth. We've got Kenneth Granville, who was active in the 70s from 1974 to 1975. And to give you an idea, like, this took place in 1974. So this would have been right in the time frame. He was an American serial killer who was responsible for sexually motivated murders of seven people in Fort Worth from 1974 to 1975, most notably the mass murder of three women and two children. He was executed in 1996. But that's all we know. Like, it's not like we have any clue that it could have been this guy. Right. Like, it's just like, oh, he happened to be. Be there during this time.

[A]

I mean, that's a good theory.

[B]

Yeah. But guess what? I've got like three more. And it's like, oh, all of them could easily be the match, you know?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which is like, holy. I'm not bringing all of them, but here's another one. Glenn Samuel McCurley Jr. This is the man responsible for Carla Walker's murder. And I have not covered this one, but I do want to at some point. Also very sad. Carla Walker was kidnapped from a Fort Worth parking lot in February of 1974. And remember, this occurred in December of 1974. So just a few months later in Fort Worth, she was murdered. The method, like a teenager being taken from a public parking lot, a blonde young teenager, is the kind of parallel that people see here between the Fort Worth trio and Carla Walker's case. McCurley was ultimately identified decades later via DNA and arrested and charged. But, like, again, this is just somebody who had done something in the area at that time.

[A]

Yeah. And it could. It's anyone's guess.

[B]

Yeah, it could Be anybody. And some other Texas serial killers active during this time. Henry Lou Lucas and Otis Tool. And they mostly. They whatever. They're prolific. I covered them at some point. Dean Coral, the candy man, who is known for the Houston mass murders. But he. His crimes allegedly ended in 1973, and he typically targeted young boys and men. Men. But, like, you just hear all these things, and you're like, it could be anybody who's targeting, like, young people or people in broad daylight. And this is happening all over the place.

[A]

Yeah, Anyone who's got a problem with women or children or, like, Yes, A problem with themselves. And they want to project it on women and children.

[B]

Correct. Yeah. Yeah. And it just seems, like, to be rife with this stuff. So the last person I want to bring up as a potential person who basically just gets brought up is Mike DeBartleben, and he is known as the Mall Pack Passer. The Mall Passer. Not like the catchiest serial killer name, but the Mall Passer.

[A]

Not that I want him to have a cool name, but if I were a serial killer, I would certainly want something other than Mall Passer.

[B]

Correct. I Googled that, and it was like, passing through a mall. And I was like, no, no. Okay, let me get his name, which is so long. Mike, the bottle bin.

[A]

He was like, actually, Mall Passer's fine.

[B]

Mall Passer is good. Just call me that. Yeah, honestly, it fits better. So this is one of the theories, and it gets brought up a lot in conversations about the fort with Trio, basically because he's known as a mall passer. The alias refers to Mike debarlman, otherwise known as James Mitchell Mike debarlebin, who became notorious for later criminal activity. That has drawn, like, speculation he was an American counterfeiter, rapist, kidnapper, and suspected serial killer who earned his nickname because he passed counterfeit 20 bills in shopping malls across the US and that is how they. They caught. That caught him. It was like a nationwide Secret Service investigation. Of course they caught him for, like, fraudulent money, not, like, potentially serial killing people, but okay. Although he was not arrested for murder, evidence found after his capture in the early 80s, including sexual assault paraphernalia, tapes, photographs, and materials suggesting abductions, led investigators to conclude he likely committed additional violent crimes beyond uncoun counterfeiting. But he was only convicted on multiple counts of kidnapping, rape, fraud, and related offenses. But he was sentenced to nearly 400 years in prison. So they were like, we're just gonna leave it there, but it's possible.

[A]

Do you have a feeling about any of these People or like not even a serial killer. Do you think it could be somebody that's not a serial killer?

[B]

My gut is like, it was just somebody who said, but okay. My gut is like, oh, somebody that one of them knew. Maybe, like, maybe somebody was targeting Rachel because she's the oldest. She had the most like, biggest social circle. But then I'm like, but who would pursue three? Like, if she was a target, why would you pursue her if she's there with a 14 year old and a 9 year old, like, it just seems like so much extra.

[A]

My first work, my first thought. Sorry, go ahead.

[B]

I totally, I was just gonna say the last thing is like, and like, it's not like they all plan to be there. It's not like somebody said, oh, they're coming together. It's like some people say, oh, Tommy must have suggested that Rachel go shopping because like his son was coming for Christmas. Maybe he like pushed her to go shopping because he wanted her to get attacked. And it's like, but like he had no idea she was going to invite the random nine year old that like she didn't know. You know, it's, it's like it just doesn't add up.

[A]

I agree that I think it's somebody that either they knew or it was someone their age. Well, know you. Here's what I think this is. You have not even given the suggestion. So I'm, I feel stupid being like, here's my thought.

[B]

Don't feel stupid. Look at Reddit and Websle and then get back to me and you'll feel very smart. Because sometimes people, I'm like, like, read the draft before you hit send, you know.

[A]

Well, my thought is that it was a two man job. I feel like it was.

[B]

A lot of people do believe it had to be multiple people.

[A]

I feel like it had to be. That's maybe not someone that they knew personally, but someone their age because that, that one person who was walking around with them that didn't seem out of place enough for anybody to really comment on it except for one person.

[B]

And when they said, oh, they seemed like they were with someone, it's not like they were with this creepy old man with a knife. It's like, oh, they were just with a friend or somebody in their group.

[A]

They would have noticed if it was a person who didn't look their age or looked different than them in some way. So I have to imagine it was a high schooler or a younger person playing a high school schooler to like, oh, let's all be Friends and shop together. Or maybe it was a guy who was pretending to hit on one of them from another school.

[B]

I want to throw this in there. There was an employee at the mall who was known for collecting applications. He worked at the mall and he was known for collecting applications from young women, young girls, teenage girls who were applying. And he would call and leave them, like, sexually explicit.

[A]

I mean, come on.

[B]

Voicemails, like that kind of thing. But then they look into him and they're like, well, we don't know. We don't have any proof telling it.

[A]

Like, they're like, hm, nothing to arrest here.

[B]

Let's move on. Nothing wrong here. Keep working at Spencer's Gifts.

[A]

Maybe that's why there were so many serial killers, because we weren't arresting people for smaller charges.

[B]

But that's what I'm saying. I feel like there's like a million reasons why this, like, just went bountiful in the 70s. Like, you can't. You can't even pin it down to one thing.

[A]

Lawless. It feels like lawless land. Oh, you could treat girls however you want. And then it's like, there's so many sexual predators.

[B]

Yes. And why don't they killers. And why don't these girls lose more weight and take. Take a aerobics class real quick? Y know, like, Jesus, leave him alone.

[A]

I feel like it's got to be. I mean, I immediately. My gut is that guy. Then immediately. But I. If not, then I would say it's still someone young enough that he could.

[B]

Hit on them and it wasn't weird. He went like, from that a. From that level of just like, leaving prank calls to like, abducting three girls and never finding a trace of them. Like, it's like, how do you. Which I'm not saying is impossible. I'm just saying, like, it's shocking to think like, somebody can just. Just escalate to a point where like, there's never been a clue. And I will tell you, Rusty has combed the city. She has. He has gotten. He has collected money to. To. To. To take cars out of the river. And like, look in the cars. I mean, he's divers all ten grand to pull them out.

[A]

I know Rusty and Deborah had. Have like, their own very reasonable headbutting. Very, very legitimate reason to be mad at your brother for accusing you of something for real. However, that aside, Rusty is the brother of the year. Like, to. To Rachel to be like, I will not rest until I figure out what the happened to you. And I will. I will consider everybody including our other sister.

[B]

Like, well, it's really sad. Yeah, it's really sad because he's, like, basically devoted his whole life to it. And he said, like, until my last dying breath, like, I will not stop looking. And it's, like, just really, really sad because I'm not saying it's sad because, like, he cares about his sister and wants to solve the murder, but he has even said, like, I wish I had time to work. Like, I wish I had time to even. Like, he. It has consumed him.

[A]

Eating him alive.

[B]

Yeah, it is eating him alive. 100. And, you know, I can only hope that this leads to an answer, but if it doesn't, it's like, just how much hardship, you know, they've gone through at the expense of this. And I'm not saying, like, oh, leave it alone. Like, I don't think I could ever leave it alone, frankly. But, like, it's what's easier said than done. But, yeah, it is. It is like, brother of the year. Like, he has on his guitar, he has Rachel's signature, like, etched into it and stuff, you know, like, he's really devoted to solving this. Yeah, it's obsessive. And he's devoted to finding her, but, you know, at what cost, right? Like, he's kind of isolated himself from a lot of the family, and he's. He has clung on to a lot of theories that. That, like, they don't believe.

[A]

And he's sacrificed the relationship with the sister he does still have.

[B]

Correct. Oh, and I want to add, I meant to mention this earlier. I cannot believe I forgot to mention this. He and this PI believe that she's still alive. Oh, I forgot to mention this because it's so jarring every time I hear it. But maybe not anymore. But at the time, in, like, the late. In, like, the 2000s era, he believed that Rachel was still alive. He believed she visited Fort Worth every Christian Christmas, but he believed someone was holding her captive and, like, allowing her to visit every Christmas. But, like, I just started to think, like, that seems a little bit much like a stretch to me. That feels like it does to me, too.

[A]

I understand, like, desperately holding up the.

[B]

Wanting of it, of course, but it does sound like it's happened, right? Like, we've had Elizabeth Smart. We've had people where it's like, oh, crazier things have happened for sure. But it's like he. You know, he thinks that. So what they believe is that or what they believed, at least at the time of reading this reporting, is that Julianne Mosley who was nine and was killed in some sort of tragic, like, violent situation that had to do with this abduction. They believe that Renee has been killed since then, but they believe that Rachel is still alive and that she visits every Christmas. And so. But. And then he still has claimed, like, with that, that Tommy and perhaps Deborah have had something to do with it. And Deborah's like, what the fudge? No, I don't. So it's a very hard thing to kind of parse because you're like, yeah, there's.

[A]

There's a fine line between, like, wanting to still believe, but also.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[A]

Well, I mean, my. My thought is that some younger guy lured them away, and then someone. Maybe a security guard who. Maybe someone who got a job there just to work at the mall to scout out people. I think. I think they're. I think they work.

[B]

Clearly, it's a thing if this one guy's, like, just calling applicants to harass them sexually.

[A]

Maybe the security guard knew about that guy and then they decided to work together. And so that way the guy only had to lure them out and then someone who is okay with being more violent and aggressive.

[B]

And I believe Renee had applied to a job there, or it was one of the girls had applied to a job at that store where this guy, this creepy dude, was working. So it's like, yeah, I feel like.

[A]

They could have teamed up. I mean, if they. There's. Let's pretend there's a security guard, you know, who's not afraid to drag people out, which people did. See, there's a creepy guy who's working there. You know, the two of them are going to find each other and at least talk about creepy things and what they would. How far they're willing to go, and, oh, we could work together. I think it was a traffic.

[B]

Who's your favorite? Okay. The trafficking is a big theory, and the sister Deborah has called it white slavery. And people have talked about, like, what's white slavery? And I'm like, I feel like I studied that in high school. Like, it was called white slavery. Even when I. I was like, in high school, this was a thing. Human trafficking had an unfortunate name of white slavery back in the day, because people, I think, were trying to say, like, oh, you thought it could just happen to people? Black folks? No, there's white slavery. Isn't that shocking? But, like, the term, at least I remember it being used as, like, a term for trafficking. And so one of the theories that Deborah has is, like, perhaps it was a trafficking scheme or something. Like that. But then you just wonder, like, what bothers me is that it's three girls at the mall, but they weren't planning to be there. It's like.

[A]

Well, that's why I think it's like. I mean, there's. Sorry, sorry, I keep interrupting.

[B]

No, no, I want you to say what you want to say because I feel like I need someone to, like, explain that to me.

[A]

I know that there's a lot of trafficking scams or attempts at, like, grocery stores or things like that. And a lot of time one of the two people that are working together is someone who makes you feel safer. So a lot of times it's a woman or someone your age, and she'll say, like, can I. Oh, I. I forgot my phone and I'm trying to call my boyfriend and. Or, oh, you. Even if it's just like a Converse, like, they could hand you something. Maybe there's a tracker in it. I don't know. Or they'll follow you in your car.

[B]

And you feel 70s. They were like, I'm a photographer. I mean, if men could be like, I'm a photographer, come model for me. Yeah, like a woman could probably convince you of anything.

[A]

I think these days, I don't. I'm not a trafficking expert. The stories I've heard, at least the ones that are most successful, is that when one person in the. In the plot is a woman, because women feel safer with women, so. And usually they're someone who's also been trafficked and now they've been trusted enough to now help with the new recruiting of whatever it. Or whatever.

[B]

Right, right.

[A]

And then they could say, like, I don't know, insert anything where you would feel much safer if a woman asked and not a man, and then just like, disarm you. Yeah, transfer happens. We're now.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Or like, oh, can there have been ones that have been around here where it was like two years ago now, where a girl was going up to people in like, Walmart and saying, there's a guy that's really creepy and he's. He's really freaking me out. Can you walk with me to my car? And then they're tricking you and they're like, dude, so unfortunately, you can't fucking trust anybody. But, yeah, not good.

[B]

But it's the 70s. I mean, not to say it again.

[A]

Like, if there was a guy who was kind of creepy and maybe he was for what these girls saw, my thought is that maybe he approached them and said, oh, one of you applied to the store, right? Oh, well, I'm off right now. But we can all like hang out and get to know each other and like, let's go to the food court.

[B]

They had this like. So my, my, Then my question is like, then what happened? Because all three girls were never found. And I'm like, that suggests like some sort of like, we got them out of here. We either hid them so well that like they were never found or we got them like trafficked out of the country. Like, I don't know. I just wonder like, how did they do that?

[A]

I mean, again, this is, I'm fully guessing here.

[B]

No, no, I though really, I would.

[A]

Imagine they were kidnapped to be assaulted by the two of them and then when they were done with them, killed them or maybe even knew somebody else and sent them somewhere else. And then it actually did become a trafficking situation versus, like, let's plot together to get, you know, those are some cute girls. Let's go get them.

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

I have no idea.

[B]

It's just so wild to me that like two days before Christmas you're just like at the mall and you're like, oh, perfect. Three blonde girls that I can like erase off the planet immediately. And like, it's crazy. Obviously it happens because it happened. But like, I think that's why this case is just so like shocking because as police said, we cannot get out of this parking lot. Like, we have this parking lot. We have the car in the parking lot. We cannot get past the parking lot. We don't know, we don't know what happened.

[A]

Yeah, I, I, I all I know, well, I don't know anything. But my, my gut would be that the, it was a two man job that got them in the car. I'm sure both of them at least first before other people did or I like or was just for them.

[B]

100 agree. I believe it was at least a two man job. I, I also agree. My gut would say two man job. My gut would say it's somebody who either had a mall security job or feigned a mall security job. And the one guy I brought up, let me find his name. Oh, Mike DeBartleben. He was known to fake being a cop. Like, he would just go, are you kidding me? Come on, serious. Like, he would research how to like pull people over and stuff. So it's like, but this happened all the time. I mean, I hate to say all the time, but like it's the 70s. Like it happened all the time. Like people. Because there is no, it's like that perfect Sweet spot. Sweet spot of like no, like no stranger danger yet like no security cameras. Like you women are more independent so they're going to the mall by themselves or what have you. Like, it was that perfect sweet spot.

[A]

I'm sorry, go ahead.

[B]

That's all I have to say.

[A]

I feel, I feel like it also had to be someone that they don't know or like it had to be like an impulsive decision by these people because two days before Christmas, if anyone was planning this for a while, they, they would have been like, this is such an obvious time where people are going to be wondering where they are.

[B]

Well, and also like it was only supposed to be like Rachel came up with the idea that morning to go to the shopping mall and then called around a bunch of people and everyone said no. So it's like it could have been another girl, but like she called this girl and then this girl happened to be with her boyfriend whose little sister was there who asked to come. Like it was originally just supposed to.

[A]

Be nobody and then her.

[B]

Yeah, exactly.

[A]

So it has to be an impulse graph.

[B]

It has to be impulsive or at least it has to be something thing that somebody planned and said. I don't care that there are suddenly two more girls involved, will still go through with it. Which seems unlikely to me.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But who knows, you know, which is.

[A]

That'S also why I think it had to be a two person job because they had to assume that based on numbers they could take all three of them.

[B]

That at least a girl would like, the little girl would be like, what the, you know, like I don't want to go with these guys or, or the oldest. Who knows? But yeah, I just.

[A]

That also makes you think that they certainly, I mean people already saw the security guard. I know with full confidence that he used the gun as a weapon because how else do you wrangle three people and none of them ran away or screamed if you didn't threaten somebody that.

[B]

You'D heard and witnesses said like, oh, they were being quote, hustled into a car. And I'm like, yeah, you don't get hustled into a car unless three girls don't get hustled into a stranger's car unless like there is something going on. Like they've either convinced you of a storyline line like you're going to the police station because you shoplifted or I have a gun and you can't fight me. Who knows?

[A]

Or even the little one, like she could have ran away, but it's like I'll shoot your sister. Like, it could be.

[B]

Yeah. Who knows? Exactly. And I wonder, like, if that woman, that older woman who saw this, like, if they had found her. I just really wish. I really wish that they had. And I. Obviously, it's too late now. I assume she's older, like, past, but, man, that would have been a good clue because she apparently told multiple people, like, I just saw. And she told them that day before they were ever reported missing. Like, she saw something really weird. She's like, I just saw these people, like, these girls getting, like, pushed into a car. Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

Well, good storytelling, but bad ending.

[B]

See something, say something, something, you know?

[A]

And also, everyone look out for even women being weird in public spaces because if they try to grab your phone or take anything from you or, you know, maybe even get so close as, like, I know this is crazy, but I've heard horror stories of, like, them dropping something in your bag, and it's like, a GPS tracker or, like, get close enough to your phone that their phone also do, like, the Bluetooth thing, and now they got info on you. If someone says, come to my car with me. It used to be when you were carrying kids, like, don't follow the person who says that they lost their puppy. But now, as an adult, don't follow. Even girls who say that they're scared just say, I'll call the police with you right here.

[B]

Really? Because, like, Dean Coral was called the candy man, right? And he had a candy shop, and it was like, oh, he was giving out candy. And now it sounds so ridiculous, like, oh, don't take free candy from strangers. But it's like, no, this is, like, the same idea. Like, don't just trust somebody. Be inherently. Because they say they're uncomfortable or in danger, which sucks. Sucks because, like, you want. They're using that against us. But it's like, you want to be able to help somebody who's, like. Who's feeling threatened.

[A]

Allison and I recently walked past someone who, like, seemed they genuinely needed help and they needed a phone. I needed a phone. And I was like, you can tell us the phone number, and we'll put you on speaker, and you can yell from over there. It's like. It's like, sorry, it's not you, but it's just the world. I don't just trust. You just got to scream into the phone from over here.

[B]

Did it work?

[A]

It worked.

[B]

Did they do it?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then.

[A]

And they did truly need help. I felt bad afterwards when Blaze and.

[B]

I were, like, first dating in, like, 2014, or 2013. He still had, like, a flip phone, like, back in the day. And I had an iPhone. And somebody stopped us in, like, at night. We were walking from somewhere, and somebody stopped us and said, like, can I borrow your phone? And I was like, yeah, you can borrow my boyfriend's phone. And Blaze, like, handed his flip phone, and they were like, never mind. And we handed it back, like, they.

[A]

Clearly were going to try to steal your phone.

[B]

We were like, holy. But. So, yeah, you never know. And back then, like, there wasn't really find my. You know, like, if you lost your phone, you lost your phone. So I remember being like, wow, that was the one time his flip phone came in handy. You know, the person was like, never mind. They, like, didn't even want it.

[A]

I remember one time someone tried to steal my Back to the future hat. And this was when I had long hair and I had my, like, ponytail through the hole in the hat. And so they cut. Couldn't get it.

[B]

Who does that? Like, we tried to grab it off you.

[A]

They tried to rip it off of me, and they didn't know that it was, like, gonna be, like, attached to my head. And then we just awkwardly stood there, and I was like, did you. I was like, did you try to steal my hat?

[B]

And then, by the way, like, look me in the eye and tell me what you just tried to do.

[A]

I did. I was like, did you just try to steal my hat? And then he just ran away.

[B]

Hello.

[A]

It's so weird.

[B]

Yeah, that was like, the time we handed the phone over, and he goes, never mind. And we went. So we all know what you were trying to. Trying to do here.

[A]

Thank you. Did he stay for a second?

[B]

And you bolted.

[A]

Okay. Okay.

[B]

Bolted. And we were like, cool.

[A]

So. And that weirdly so violating. Even though, like, nothing was officially stolen, but it's like to know that you almost fell into it. It's like.

[B]

And the dumbest part is, like, he's like our age. And I was like, this guy. It just like. And you want to believe people when they're like, I'm in trouble. Like, of course. And like, your gut instead instinct is like, oh, I'll help. And then this time, I remember Blaze going, like, he. Sometimes his dumbass brain. Left brain, right? Whatever it is. He's like, here, use my phone. And the guy goes, no, thanks. And Blaze is like, there we go.

[A]

I mean, honestly makes me feel like I should just have a burner flip phone in case.

[B]

Just to hand out.

[A]

Just to hand out in case someone needs it. And I'm like, well, if you steal it, it's a burner flip phone.

[B]

I've for sure given people my iPhone. And then my thoughts thought is always, well, I have find my friends. I'll track it, I guess if this person runs away. But like, twice now, it's been somebody who actually just needed to borrow my phone. And I'm like, okay. You know, there's hard to know.

[A]

There's a new way now. I don't know how to do it. I really. I need a younger person to teach me how to do, like, shortcuts, like vote, like, verbal shortcuts on your phone. Because there's something you can. Like, you can program your phone where if you say, like, my phone's being stolen as an example or something, if you say something, then it will trigger your phone to immediately open Find My friends on all your other devices and take a picture so it sees whoever is. Oh, it's like a text. You could text, my phone just got stolen. And when then they open the text, it'll screenshot, take a picture of their face and send it to find my friends and call the police. It's like, I don't know how they do that, but there's a lot of cool things you can do with shortcuts that I don't know how to do.

[B]

But I tried to use shortcuts for a while and it annoyed me because it like takes. Takes an extra two seconds. And I as I said a Gemini and I don't have two seconds.

[A]

I don't have time for that. Yeah.

[B]

Just on my phone, you know.

[A]

Well, anyway, thank you for your story.

[B]

Thank you. I feel like it's been a while for a two parter, but, yeah, needed to be done.

[A]

I like two parters a lot.

[B]

You know, Liana's favorite thing, like when we watch her kids shows, if there's ever part one, part two, she freaks out and she's like, it's a part one, it's a part one moment. And I'm like, yay. And it's so funny because I'm like, I don't know what it is about the part one, part two, but man, she gets so amped about it.

[A]

I know what it is. It's that it. It hasn't ended yet. There's still more to go.

[B]

More. And I'm like, have you heard of movies? Those are long. But she's like, me, she just wants tv. Tv, tv.

[A]

That's very. That's a nice reminder to be excited about part ones and part twos. Because when in movie world, I'm like, what do you mean? I watch three hours of this, and it's not even done.

[B]

Oh, I can't do that with a movie. I don't think she's. She'd ever accept that with a movie. She'd be like, where is it right.

[A]

Now, the next big Marvel movie coming out as a part one? And it's. I'm just like, so, you know, Infinity War, you remember my opinion.

[B]

I remember.

[A]

You remember the whole. So they have another one of those coming out where it's the part one of the next big one, and then I'm gonna have to wait a whole year for the second half to come out.

[B]

I mean, after Wicked, I'm like, this is a lot that they're putting through you. Mentally, emotionally, spiritually.

[A]

Wicked made sense because it was literally Act 1 and Act 2 of a play.

[B]

Fair enough. At least you could, like, mentally prepare for that kind of thing.

[A]

But still, I mean, but also, as much as I just said that, I'm also going to step back immediately because the play itself was three hours long. We could have just done act one.

[B]

True.

[A]

You know, sure.

[B]

But anyway, yeah, I saw that play in one afternoon, baby.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. I saw that for lunch. I saw that for lunch.

[B]

I saw that for lunch. It had a. A crab salad.

[A]

It's excellent.

[B]

You really nailed that one there.

[A]

No, but when. When the next Avengers movie happens, I'm gonna be like. I'm gonna try to be like Leon and be like, it's just part one. It's just. But I feel like I'm gonna go, it was only part one.

[B]

Seriously, I have to wait.

[A]

Well, the last time there was a part one, it ended with every single person dying. And then I had to wait a year to find out how.

[B]

Super duper. Being dead, man, they've really got you one whipped, huh?

[A]

They're gonna do it again. I can already feel it.

[B]

So I just, like, with her, at least when it's a part one, it's like, part two will happen in three, two, one. Cool. Netflix has started Part.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Like, if there's not like a. You have to wait. I don't think she's encountered that yet. And I think it would make her just as absolutely insane as it would make me.

[A]

Anticipation, I can't tolerate.

[B]

No. Patience.

[A]

No, no.

[B]

I said I. Sometimes I'm like, I know waiting is hard. And she's like, I hate it. I'm like, I also hate it. Me, too. I don't know what to do. Tell you it sucks.

[A]

Well, I hope you have fun. Is Blaze still sick? Are you guys good now?

[B]

No, he's way better. Except that he probably can't carry this toilet, but other than that. Yeah, good luck with the pound four. Is he going to expect you to.

[A]

Carry that with you?

[B]

Me? No.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

He said Tim has to carry it. And Tim. Tim got back last night from Germany at like, 11:30, so.

[A]

Wake up, Tim.

[B]

We have a drop. Good morning, Guten Morgan. It's time to. By the way, I just scratched my. My eyebrow and, like, picked up my weed vape. I'm like, good morning, Tim. It's time to carry my toilet up the stairs.

[A]

There's a. Is there like, a famous Guten Morning song? Because when I was saying with Allison's family, they have a second little house in on their property, that is where Allison and I stay, but they have like, all their, like, Alexas and everything attached to. So in the morning, I woke up to our. The Alexa in that house blaring, Guten Morning, Guten Morgan. Or whatever the song is as.

[B]

No, I don't think I've ever heard that song outside of my father waking me up at age 4 or 5 and then like, again at age 16. And the song is Guten Morgen, Guten Morgan, Guten Morgen, sun and shine. Which means good morning. Good morning, sunshine.

[A]

I got that.

[B]

And you are not allowed to be sad.

[A]

Yes, you've told us before.

[B]

I've told this before.

[A]

I. I know for you, though.

[B]

Good morning, sunshine. You're not allowed to be sad, which is like, what? And I mean, trauma means like, I'm crying because I'm sad. It's not like, oh, you're not allowed to be melancholy. It's like, you're not allowed to be sad, you dumb bitch. Wake up. And it's like, okay, good morning.

[A]

I know for you that feels like you're for. And probably back in Germany or something. But for me, I feel like I'm right back in South Carolina all of a sudden. But they were.

[B]

Morning, sunshine, you're not allowed to be sad.

[A]

Christmas morning, they were just blaring it because it was obvious that they were saying, like, wait, but like, so where.

[B]

Did they come up with that? Because I've never heard that outside of my own father. Like, even my mother speaks German.

[A]

I think.

[B]

I know. But, like, did she learn that on, like, I need to talk to her. Like, did she learn that on, like, an exchange trip? Is this something they play all the time? Is this. She. She speaks very good German. I'VE spoken to her in German. I just wonder, like, is this a song that, like, she learned when she lived in Germany? Is this something that also haunted her as a child? Like, I have so many questions.

[A]

She. She lived in Germany, I think, for a few years when she was an adult.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So I'm guessing that's where she learned it. But she certainly, like, you know, she's, like, born in Jersey, so I don't. I don't know.

[B]

I know I have questions where this came from because, like, there's not a place that I learned that from except for from a person screaming it at me in the morning. And it's. It's like a really. It's like one of those things you don't really learn until someone screams it at you.

[A]

Well, we've both had that experience now.

[B]

Which is lovely, I was gonna say. And I feel like now we're bonded in some sick way.

[A]

I kind of get why the song says, stop crying. Because I was. It was so early.

[B]

I was like, does it make you stop crying? Because it makes me, like, cry more. I'm like, you can't. I'm like, don't tell me what to do.

[A]

Allison was trying to be nice and, like, give me, like, a hug good morning. And I was like, get the.

[B]

Away from me. When I try to wake Leona up, by the way, like, before school, which we can talk about next episode. But, like, waking this girl up for preschool, I'm like, I know the pain you're in. Like, I know it and I feel it, because I'm in it too. And I'd rather die than, like, make you go to school right now. But, like, you gotta go to school, because also, I have to go back to bed. Like, I've been up all night because you have been having your moment, and Puppy didn't go to Puppy school. Right? Or whatever. And, like, it's just been a time long, wrong day. But, like, oh, my God. Not the best oh, my God.

[A]

Parenting on my end or on my mom's end. But once I got into a college, I would just wake up and I'd tell my mom, like, I'm not going. I'm too tired.

[B]

And she'd go, I'm not.

[A]

Whatever.

[B]

Oh, like, in high school, you were like, I'm not going.

[A]

Yeah. No. If once I got into college and I was just, like, kind of riding out senior year, she would be like, as long as you don't have a test today, I don't care what you do.

[B]

It's, like, hard to even fight.

[A]

She was like, you already made it. So just. Whatever.

[B]

I literally woke her up, and she just, like, fucking screamed like a banshee and was. And then, like, ripped the blanket over her head. And I'm like, oh, my God, I'm going to get injured. I'm going to get hurt. I don't know what to do.

[A]

My mom still, I. You might be able to relate to this. My. My mom, when she wakes me up to this day, I must have been like leona, I guess when I was a kid, because I don't think I'm this terrible anymore when I'm waking up. But she will straight up, if she has to wake me up, like, we're on a vacation, or she'll, like, nudge me and then back up like, I have a gun.

[B]

And she'll go, it's me, it's me. It's out of the circle. What do you call it? Like, the. The danger zone. Out of the danger zone.

[A]

But she really will back up and go, it's me, it's me, it's me.

[B]

As if I.

[A]

Like, I'm gonna hit her in the face. I don't know what I did to her.

[B]

You're gonna, like, detonate a bomb. Jesus.

[A]

Just know if you end up there with Leona, you're not the only one you can call my mom.

[B]

I do sometimes feel like that I will come in and she'll like, look at me. And if it's Blaze, she'll go, get out. And if it's me, she'll be like. And I'm like, okay, I'm allowed to enter. And then it's like, I turn the sound machine off, and she's like, turn it on. And I'm like, you have to leave in seven minutes. Like, I'm texting your dad right now. Like, put some muffins in a Tupperware by the front door. Like, we gotta get, like, it slowly back away. It's gotten insane. It's gotten insane. And Blaze today was like, hey, I think we need to, like, start back to where we were, like, waking her up at a normal time and not just, like, hoping she gets up, but. And I was like, I. But we're all gonna suffer.

[A]

I think you're gonna really like this. I. I got a kick out of it. When I went to the family reunion. Allison's brother has a daughter, and she. At some point, I saw her, like, not getting her way. She's Leona's age. I saw her not getting her way, and I saw her make this face where she was, like, holding in all the anger, and she would. And then she did this with her hands, and I was like, oh, my God. She's, like, trying to, like, regulate her emotions. That's, like, really, Like. I know she looks mad, but, like, it's nice that she's trying to, like.

[B]

Keep it together and use the power well.

[A]

So I. I saw her do this, but I thought she was just, like, freaking out, and I was like, oh, she's, like, trying to keep us together. Trying to keep together. And then her. Her parents were like, no, she's trying to ice blast me. Like, Elsa.

[B]

No, no. I was about to say Leona does that, but she's trying to freeze me. Yes.

[A]

Freeze.

[B]

Literally. So serious. She literally goes like this, and I'm like, oh. She's trying to get her, like, energy out, and she's like, freeze.

[A]

She's literally trying to channel all of her energy to ice. Bless.

[B]

I'm so serious. This is a real thing.

[A]

That's so weird. I thought.

[B]

Holy.

[A]

She was the only kid. I thought I was gonna.

[B]

I. I certainly have not heard of another. Okay, well, this is great. Let's talk off air, because I need help.

[A]

Leona and Allison's niece are both. Elsa.

[B]

No, that. She literally is like. And I'm like, what are you doing? And I'm like, oh, my God, she's trying to freeze me. Oh, my God, she's trying to freeze.

[A]

Me for the rest of the family reunion. It was so funny, because you just hear. In another room, you'd hear, stop ice blasting me. Stop ice blasting.

[B]

Stop. I. And so Leon will go, freeze, and then we'll, like, freeze. And she'll be like, nobody can unfreeze you but daddy. And it's like, well, he's upstairs. What the do you want me to do? And I start to text him, like, come unfreeze me. And she's like, you can't text him. And I'm like, honestly, I'm just in frozen jail.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

She's watched the movie, like, three times. It's not even like she watches a movie. She just is like, I.

[A]

She watched enough to know what she needed to do. I'm so happy that. To know that there's not another. That there's another kid doing this. Imagine if the two of them met each other and both tried to blast each other. What happens?

[B]

Be. Can't be.

[A]

I think their brains would explode. They'd go, what do you mean? You know, my powers.

[B]

Things would be. They'd either, like, ruin the world. Or yeah, ruin the world. I don't know, something maybe save the world.

[A]

Okay, I will leave you alone, but thank you everyone for listening, if you're still listening. And we'll see you next week.

[B]

See you next week. And thanks for being you. Freeze. Blast.

[A]

Freeze Blast. And that's why we drink. If you're a podcast host, listen up. This one's for you. My name is Allie Jackson. I'm the host of Finding Mr. Height, a dating and relationship podcast that I've been doing for four years now, sharing my positive and practical approach to dating that's built on my own life experience. And I wanted to share another experience that I've had my secret behind monetizing my show. It's called Red Circle and I was just telling my colleague about how much I love their platform. With Red Circle, not only am I getting a seamless hosting experience, but I also love the support I receive. Receive in ad sales. It's not just typical ad sales either. It's targeted opportunities based on my show and my life. And the platform is super simple. You just set your preferences and Red Circle matches you with sponsors that align with your show. You can vet every opportunity and their platform gives you great analytics. More recently too, my Red Circle team has brought me opportunities outside of my podcast on social media to really augment the podcast partnerships. Bring them full circle. I just can't recommend them enough. If you want to give it a try, go to redcircle.com to get your free trial. That's redcircle.com for free trial. From taco night in Tulum to sushi in Tokyo, every bite is rewarding and postworthy. With MX, Gold's 4X Membership Rewards points at restaurants worldwide. Wherever you dine, points are piling up. So bring your friends along for your next course. Because it's not all about the posts, it's about the company and the memories.

[B]

How can gold from Amex sweeten your next food moment?

[A]

Learn [e-mail] Explore Gold terms and points Cap apply.