MFM Minisode 510

Hello and welcome to My Favorite Murder.

That's Georgia Hardstark.

That's Karen Kilgara.

And this is the mini-sode?

That's right. We don't have to say shit. We don't have to make anything up. Just fucking read stories.

It isn't fake that we can't remember how to do the correct intro for each individual. I was just like, as I was saying your name, I'm like, no. It's not a bit. It isn't a bit.

It's a bit. Like we have perimenopause.

It's the easiest thing to remember. The thing you've been doing for 10 years.

And yet.

And yet, no.

You go first.

The brain says. No, no, no. No, no.

No, no, no. Okay. What's that meme?

No, no, no, no, no, no.

Yes.

No, no, no, no, no, no. Well, I'm going to kick this off with a TJ Maxx horror story.

Great. Boom.

Yeah. Let's all talk about what we like. This email begins, Oh, hey. In high school, I worked at TJ Maxx as a sales associate and in the stockroom unloading new arrivals off the trucks. One unforgettable shipment came in the form of hundreds of boxes of olive oil. There had obviously been a mix-up and our location was sent an ungodly amount of the same extra large boxes of said olive oil.

I kid you not, the back room was overflowing with the stuff. The backroom at TJ Maxx, where they have literally everything.

It's enormous, I bet.

And now they're like majority olive oil. In order to get rid of this stock as fast as possible, one of the other employees was tasked with creating an olive oil end cap. Fun. Highlighting the latest and greatest fashionista find, olive oil.

Wait, is TJ Maxx mostly clothes?

Yes. TJ Maxx is everything. So you've got, yes, I would say three quarters in the center, exactly. But then on the outside, that's when you get into your beauty area, lots of Korean skincare.

So home goods or no? Like home goods? Yes. Okay, got it.

And sometimes wonderful, all-clad pan style home goods where you're like, holy shit.

I've never lived near TJ Maxx in my life, so I've never really gone to them, but I like the style of store. Yes.

It's also a partnership with HomeGoods. These are not endorsements.

No, this is not an endorsement.

Well, my life is an endorsement of all these places, but I actually realized I was picturing a Marshalls and describing a TJ Maxx. So I don't know if we're in family, out of family.

Well, they have olive oil. We know that.

Here's what's important. They're the largest exporter of olive oil, second to Tuscany. So I was helping a customer check out when chaos erupted from the back of the store and After the loudest crash I have ever heard, you could start to hear glass shattering left and right. Soon the sound of glass was met with the sound of frantic screaming. I raced to the back of the store only to witness the greatest horror I have ever seen.

The employee making the end cap had filled the fragile glass shelves with hundreds of extra large olive oil bottles. Buckling under the sheer weight of this load, the top glass shelf gave way. cascading down into the four other glass shelves below.

It's like a champagne fountain, but with fucking glass and olive oil.

Yes. If the champagne fountain exploded and then congealed. The shelves below contained, you guessed it, even more olive oil. What was left was an ocean of broken glass and slow-creeping golden liquid oozing its way across the store.

Mm.

And lowering everyone's cholesterol level.

On the way.

Employees and customers were left frantically fleeing from the spreading viscous goop after several minutes of panic and an urgent closure of the store. Store's closed now.

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

Shut it down. And then here's me squatting in the Korean skincare section. Like, I refuse to leave. I mean, there's three things I haven't had here. After several minutes of panic and an urgent closure of the store, we were faced with a greater horror. cleaning up gallons of olive oil off the floor, most of which had spread quite a far away from the initial disaster point and underneath several aisles of shelving. In total, the cleanup lasted well over six hours with the help of 10 employees and managers. To this day, the sound of this tragic event still haunts my dreams. Stay sexy and be nice to store associates. They don't make enough for this shit.

And that's from Bryant. Wow.

There's some things that like you just don't want to spill because cleanup is going to be a nightmare. Yes. And olive oil is on that list, the top of it.

Just the like and also like you have a paper towel, but you're scraping glass as you get the goop up. So it's like getting in your palm, getting in your nightmare. If you have a retail nightmare story, please write it.

Retail nightmare stories are great. We want them. This is actually on a on a wavelength near it, but not at all. You know, I did the Lane Bryant murder story recently. So that was episode 552. She was such a cat. And here's a follow up that I actually read when I was doing my research for it. It's really interesting. OK. Hello, all. On February 1st, 2008, my sister-in-law, Erica, was ending her shift at a Lane Bryant clothing store in Tinley Park, Illinois. Oh. Oh. Oh. Shortly after opening that Saturday morning, a male carrying himself as a delivery man entered the store. He eventually pulled a gun, demanded the money from the register, as well as the money and jewelry from the employees and customers. He guided the

group to the back room, and around 10.45 a.m., four customers, a part-time employee, and Rhoda were all shot. Rhoda was the manager, and she was the brave one who called 911. She, like, wanted her employee to have her birthday off. Yes. Five of the six were killed. The sixth woman, a store employee, had suffered a gunshot wound to the neck, though survived and played dead, waiting for the gunman to leave. Despite the murder happening in a busy shopping center, a detailed sketch from a surviving employee, involvement of federal and international law enforcement, and nearly 7,500 tips, the shooter remains unknown to this day. Erica has dealt with a lot of guilt, knowing she was originally on the schedule to work that morning.

She now works as a special education teacher, and I can't think of a more patient and caring person to do the job. We were all devastated by the loss of five innocent people that morning, but I'm so thankful that Erica was spared and is here to be an auntie to our two kiddos, Allison. And then I looked it up, and this was written in 2018, and the person who wrote it, Allison, and her husband now have a true crime podcast.

Oh, wow. We're going to talk about this.

It's called Crime and Coffee Couple, and it's hosted by Allison, the writer, and Mike.

Nice.

I can't imagine how awful Erica must feel, but, like, clearly there's no guilt there that she should be feeling.

Right? Isn't that the weirdest thing? That's so obvious to us, and yet when you go through a thing like that, that is what you are left to feel. It feels like, yeah, hopefully, I mean, it's been a long time. I bet you when they solve this case, that will alleviate some of that. And hopefully that happens soon. Yeah.

For it staying unsolved that long and being in that position has got to be rough. Yes. Yeah. Okay.

We'll take a 180 turn. Okay. And the subject line of this email is childhood hijinks from the 90s.

Great. Right?

We'll just go somewhere else. And it says, friends, Romans, and countrymen, lend me your ears. And then in parentheses it says, eyes? I'm a child of the 90s and have the quintessential tale to tell. I'm the youngest of three children and was fiercely independent. And that in parentheses, it says, in the words of my mother from early days. Yeah, that's your mom being like, you're so fiercely independent, make your own lunch. The combination of my sass and my siblings being older meant that my parents didn't feel the need to be so invested in my every move when they probably still should have been. Yeah, that's right. But hey, it was the 90s. They had busy lives. And since we didn't have TiVo, there was an urgency around catching

your shows when they aired live. One fateful night, my parents were juggling watching an unnamed television show and getting ready for date night. Our babysitter had not yet arrived, but my siblings and I were used to doing our own thing. And my sister probably felt annoyed at the idea that they were getting her a babysitter because she was 11, which in her mind meant she was basically an adult. My brother and sister both had televisions in their rooms, Rich, but I did not. As such, I usually found more creative ways to entertain myself. The babysitter arrived and my parents were calling my siblings and I to kiss them goodbye before they were off to dinner and a show. After about 10 minutes, I did not

come to greet them and they started to worry. I was not privy to what happened next, but I'm told that my parents became more and more frantic. They had left the front door unlocked for the babysitter. Had I run outside? Had someone snuck in and nabbed me? Their imaginations went wild and they tore the house apart. They canceled dinner reservations. They worried that every worst parent's nightmare was happening to them. After 30 minutes, my parents called the police and reported me missing.

Do we know how old she was or not?

Imagine the surprise when I woke up dazed and confused to a cop screaming, she's here, she's here, she's alive. From my cozy, dark, perfectly six-year-old-sized nest in the back of a neglected coat closet. That's right, no dramatic exit, no nefarious criminal, no foul play. Just a youngest sibling trying to escape all the hubbub of a noisy house and get some quality shut-eye. I not only got into the closet, but ducked back behind a few paintings, under some coats, and in the very corner where my brain decided it would be the darkest and the quietest. I even brought a juice box so I could wind down before falling into a deep slumber. To this day, I'm still in search of a sleep that deep and restorative.

That sounds nice.

Honestly, like take me there.

It's all like kind of the everything is muffled and quiet.

You got your juice box.

Yeah. No one's touching you or screaming. Stay sexy and tell someone if you're going to barricade yourself into a soundproof cocoon for a couple of hours. M. She, her.

Oh, my God. Yeah.

But being woken up by a screaming cop is the craziest. It has to be terrifying.

Dang.

What? And also, I'm sorry to say, that is the difference of being a 90s kid and being a 70s kid.

Yeah. They wouldn't have looked for you at all, right?

They would have been long fucking gone. No one would have looked for you. I would have woken up like back there, forgotten that's what I went in there for and then gotten scared.

Yeah.

Date night would not have been canceled.

All right.

I'm not going to tell you the subject. Hi, ladies. In my senior year of high school, each student was required to participate in a senior service project. Some students would go help at the Humane Society or a local soup kitchen. There was also an option to go on a week-long service trip to Honduras, where you would be able to help a community by building a library, picking coffee beans, etc. My older sister went on this trip her senior year and loved it so naturally, I followed in her first steps. My mom was also able to join us for the trip, along with four other chaperones and five students. We had an incredible week of helping out in the little mountain town of Monte Verde in Monteverde? Monteverde. Yeah.

Per tradition. That's got to be it.

Yeah. You're like, sure, I like that pronunciation. Please write in about how wrong.

Because the translation that they wrote is not Monteverde as you would think it is.

Also, I do not speak Spanish or any, I don't speak Portuguese.

No language. The tradition says Monteverde. Monteverde?

Mm-hmm.

So that sounded right when you did it.

But we'll dub that over.

Per tradition, the last day of the trip was designated fun day. The plan was to go hiking and swimming as the scenery around us was incredibly beautiful. We had a local woman guiding us who only spoke Spanish. We did not. And the rest of us followed as she led us through the lush green mountainside. After hiking for a bit, we stopped at a clearing near a ravine.

There was rushing water to swim in and rocks to climb on, and like teenagers do when instructed to have fun, we were being loud, screaming, jumping in the water, laughing, and splashing around. All of the sudden, faster than my brain could even process, thousands of bees started swarming our groove. Didn't think that was going to happen, did you?

I'm just like, what? What was it?

It's hard for me to remember specifics, but all I could hear in that moment was screaming. and then someone yelling at us to jump in the water. Luckily, I was standing next to my mom, and we both were able to jump in together. As the strong current pushed us down the ravine, we were slamming against rocks, bobbing in and out of the water to wash off the bees, and also trying not to drown. When coming up for air, all I could see was my other classmates covered in bees, all caps. So much so that I couldn't even see their skin below it. I'm like, what kind of, like Honduras bees? What kind of bees are we talking? Tropical bees.

That's quite a swarm. And also that it just reminds me of the man with the beard of bees.

Yes.

Where it's just like, Jesus Christ.

Yeah, right. It was truly straight out of a horror film. I tried to go limp and cover my head on the way down, hoping it wouldn't slam too hard against a rock. I was also trying to keep track of my mom who was in front of me. The current pushed us to the end of the ravine where thousands of bees floated in the water and all of us were catching our breath. Some of my classmates who were out of the water when the bees attacked were completely covered in stingers and needed medical attention ASAP. One boy was allergic to bees and another boy was falling in and out of consciousness. My mom, a nurse, and another chaperone, a doctor, and his daughter, who was in college at the time, sprung into action carrying the badly stung kids

up a huge hillside to get to a nearby road. A reminder that we were alone in the mountains of Honduras. The local guide was gone, probably running from the bees as well. That's right.

He's the one that knocked the whole bee hive off.

Bye. And our phones were, too. There was no service anyways. We eventually waved a motorcyclist down and explained with hand gestures that we needed help. We were able to get a ride to a nearby birthing center, which was the closest thing they had to a hospital. The birthing center had no electricity, but they did have an epinephrine pen. Wow.

After calming everyone down, giving medication to those who needed it, and picking out stingers from people's skin, we all ended up okay. Traumatized, but okay. When we flew home the next day, we looked insane. Our faces were so swollen and misshapen from the bee sting welts and swelling. Let's just say... We were the last class that went to Honduras. Oh.

It's not their fault. That's right. That's right.

They ruined it for everybody.

So I guess in the spirit of forgiveness, the message is stay sexy and save the bees. JJ.

JJ, I relate to your trauma. I've also been covered in bees.

Have you?

Oh, yeah. You've heard that story.

Probably. As a kid?

You just listen to this podcast.

I don't listen to this podcast. Okay.

Yeah, I was 12 and we took a big length of PVC pipe and drove it into the ground. We put a bucket over the top of a, I think it's the hornet's nest that are in ground.

Oh, God.

And then the bucket turned black. So then we went and got a big pipe to knock the PVC bucket off of where it was. And we're like, one, two, three.

Thinking you were far enough away. No, you just pissed them off and they were like.

We knocked the bucket off and then the pipe went straight into the hole and then a swarm of bees rose up out of the ground. I can't believe you don't know this story. We watched it rise up out of the ground, pause, and then come at us like that. It was fucking nutso. And we ran and we were covered in bees. Those weren't bees.

Hornets and bees, let's not call them the same thing.

Yeah, that's true.

Like, that is terrifying.

It was like a cartoon. I almost laughed as it was happening because it was truly like.

Yeah, when they do the like.

Yeah, they're like, oh, you there, like the shape of a hand pointing at you. And then I ran to our back door. We lived five miles out of town. The back door was locked, so I couldn't get inside. It was nuts. And I also sat there. I can't imagine traveling like that because I had like my... baking soda poultice all like head to toe just covered in bee stings my parents still went out to dinner they went out to dinner they did they're like you're good right yeah you're she's not moving she's not going anywhere.

Is she gonna have anaphylactic shock we don't know.

It look she's very dramatic she might call us if you get anaphylactic shock.

I don't even know if that's what anaphylactic shock is.

I think it is okay great no you're you're dead on I think my sister might have been slightly nice to me that night. I think that's that was the big difference.

OK.

Here's my last one. I am not going to read you the subject line. It says, Dear Karen and Georgia, my name is Joanne and I'm a longtime listener from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I'm 73 years old. I wanted to thank you for your 9-11 episode on the unsung heroes of the 88th floor of the Twin Towers. That is my story. That's my credit.

I remember that one.

That's my credit.

That I remember.

This you know.

Yeah.

The main hero, Frank Demartini, touched my heart so deeply. I listened to the episode at least three times. The story felt so significant and brave that I played the first 15 minutes as a reflection for my prayer group on 9-11.

Oh, my God.

The group was very receptive. Prayer group?

We shouldn't be anywhere near a prayer group. Like, we're not permitted to be within five yards of a prayer group.

Joanne believes in us. And if we've convinced Joanne to the point where she's bringing it to the prayer group.

Totally.

Well, listen to this.

I'm like sweating right now. For real.

I'm like, how many times did we say the F word during that episode?

And me going, Jesus fucking Christ, over and over again.

I started an episode recently just kind of making Jesus jokes in general. That's right.

We did that.

That's right. Although 12 years at Catholic school, it's earned.

Yeah.

Okay. Anyway, here's the good news. The group was very receptive, and after listening, we continued to pray special intentions for the victims, families, and survivors of this tragedy. It opened the way for us to share our own experiences and memories from that day as well. Something else happened that felt meant to be. On 9-11, I came across the live reading of the names of those who died. It was happening live in real time. They were reading the last names that started with D. I stopped and listened, and I heard the name Francis Albert D. Martini read aloud.

I felt honored to hear his name. Wow. Joanne, you're getting me. I felt I was supposed to hear it. Thank you for telling Frank's story and honoring him and the other heroes of the 88th floor. I wanted you to know that you now have reached a point in your podcast career where an episode was used as a topic for a prayer group reflection.

The first time in history of this podcast, I hope.

I mean, I think we have had a nun write in.

That's right.

So we have, we've creeped up to the edge of the spiritual community.

Yeah, maybe we need to make more stay saved and do God's missions.

March.

Right?

I bet Joanne would love that story. Joanne, if you would go and ask other murdering us to tell you the stay saved and do God's missions story, I think you'll really enjoy it. And perhaps the prayer group will too. Now I'm acting all like, and perhaps.

Okay.

Your work brought reverence and comfort to us. Wow.

Do they know I'm Jewish?

I think they like that you're Jewish.

Oh, that's nice.

Okay. Then it says, with gratitude and appreciation, Joanne Yeager Stachewicz.

Amazing.

I know.

Well, tell your Bible study people we say hi and tell Jesus we say what's up.

Joanne, if you could put in a good word and just let everybody upstairs know we've been doing our best sometimes. And then the other times we didn't do our best intentionally.

Yeah.

We've been trying to make up for that.

And we're aware that we weren't doing our best. We've never thought, like, we've never been, like, cocky about our best.

No, we've been very invested in less than our best.

Yeah.

Thinking it was kind of a look.

But mindfully.

Mindfully and with humor.

That's right. And what more can Jesus fucking want from us? Okay. Last one's polygraph test. Hey, MFM team, long-time listener, several times emailer hoping this one does it.

We'll see. Oh, wait, it's happening.

It's happening. I work as a forensic scientist for a state crime lab.

Cool.

The state department I work for has several various divisions, including a training academy that outside agencies can send law enforcement officials to. The training programs sometimes require the use of non-law enforcement volunteers, and that's where the nerds at the crime lab come in. Hey. They ask for volunteers for field sobriety tests. They get us drunk and then have us pretend we got stopped while driving. Really? That's your job.

Where do they get drunk?

Karen's like, where do I sign up? I had to.

Do they get to go in the back office or do they get to go to a bar and then come back to work?

I can't imagine. They get to have fun first.

But wouldn't it be more realistic as a test if they were really having fun?

We need to know this, too. You can't just write this and then not tell us.

Yeah, come on.

Also, they do rapport-building interviews. Officers sit down and try to build a relationship quickly to get you talking about feelings. So, Karen, how's the, you know? Try to do it.

Try to get me to do it. Hey. Hey.

Your skin looks incredible.

Thank you.

Oh, my God.

That makes me feel so gorgeous.

There you go. I knew it immediately. I'd be so good at this.

You just glass-skinned me. Just glass-skinned you. And here's what I do to you. Hey, Katz. I love cats.

Oh, you did it. That was great. We did it. And polygraph tests. That's the other training.

Okay.

Do I think the science behind polygraph testing is unreliable? Yes. But if presented with a benign opportunity, do I want to be hooked up to a polygraph machine? Also yes.

Yes.

And that's how I ended up in a random office building on campus with myself and two other women wielding Nerf guns so we could, quote, shoot a person I'd never met before and then lie about it when hooked up to the polygraph. Oh. Because they actually have to do the action to really see if they're lying.

Because the brain.

Right.

Yes.

The brain.

It'll be like it is a factual truth that you shot someone.

Totally. It's just not. Exactly. Exactly. The officer assigned to me chatted with me for a while. We bonded over baseball, talking about how frustrating it is that the Houston Astros are considered the 2017 World Series champions, even though— Real quick, I have nothing to do with this.

We're getting looped into a cheating scandal side to taking a side.

I've never even heard of this. So if you have a beef with this, it's not with us.

I'm going to bleep you while you say it.

Houston Astros are considered the 2017 world champions, even though it's been proven that they lied and cheated and then discussed the shooting, quote, shooting that took place on campus. So nothing to do with me.

This entire email was only written for them to get that word out.

It's written by whoever the other team was who are mad that they lost. And I don't know who that is.

It's the Browns, the Cleveland Browns.

That's right. Is it?

No, that's a football team. I'm just being intentionally ignorant about sports.

This is how much we don't know. Okay. After denying any knowledge and involvement of the shooting, I was hooked up to the polygraph machine and asked the control questions, both known truths and known lies. and the case-specific questions where I denied any involvement in the shootings. We went through the questions three times, and at the end, the officer looked at me and said, Now, Sarah, I can tell you're a good person. Maybe you got in over your head, but the polygraph is telling me that you're not being honest. What really happened? Everyone remember that cops can lie to you. Yeah.

They're absolutely allowed to lie to you.

They are allowed to lie to you. But I don't think that's what's happening. I admitted maybe knowing a little bit more, throwing one of the other women under the bus completely. Sorry, Kathy. But sticking to the not being anywhere near the shooting, the officer kept pushing. It went back and forth for a while. And finally, he said, quote, don't be like the 2017 Astros. Be honest here. And that's what broke me. I admitted to the shooting because I refused to have anything in common with those cheaters.

So here's this is a form of cheating. You've written us an email that's supposed to be about something else. But your agenda is shining through. Yeah. And now that's all we can hear.

Write in at My Favorite Murder at GMO and tell us what really happened.

Here comes a legal letter from Major League Baseball. You're not allowed to talk about this.

I want to ask Vince about this when I get home. I should ask him. After I got unhooked and we broke from our roles, the evaluating officer showed me the results and said, quote, we don't get measurements like this in the real world, showing me all the numbers that expose me as a terrible liar, which was honestly the most on-brand part of this whole experience. I kind of want to be I kind of want to try it.

Also, they're congratulating themselves for not being a liar.

That's right.

This whole thing has taken a turn.

Oh, you're right. Stay sexy and remember that the 2017 Houston Astros are cheaters.

Stop using our platform for your agenda.

Sarah from the Cleveland Browns. I mean, Sarah from Sarah.

The Cleveland Browns. That's hilarious.

Explain to us what happened. My Favorite Murderer Gmail. If you have a good story of what happened, it's like succinct.

Yes.

Send it in.

Also, I can tell you, I'll write in an email about what happened in that email. Someone's like, I'm going to use my clout as a forensic evidence.

Because that's sizable in this room.

In this room?

Yeah.

We're like, come on in. We'd love for you to have the floor for your story.

And then switch a room.

And then it's like, I'm here to get my baseball agenda going. Take that shit over to fucking Barstool Sports. We don't care.

This is not and never has been a Barstool Sports podcast.

Although we might do a spinoff, a sports spinoff.

Wow, this has been messy. Send us your emails at MyFavoriteMurder at Gmail.

Please know that it truly can be about any topic except for the 2017 Houston Astros cheating scandal.

From the side of pro-Houston, anti-Houston.

Yes.

Otherwise anything.

The anti-Houston side has been expressed. Yeah. If you want to come with pro.

Come at us.

Although I did bleep you and yell over you the entire time.

I mean, thanks for listening.

Stay sexy.

And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Very important for you to know the other team in question is the Dodgers, our home team. Oh, no. Keep this on. Keep this. Keep recording. How dare you?

You? Somehow. Wait, no, no. How dare you, the cheaters? Or how dare you? Accused.

Wait, no. Yeah, yeah, no. Okay, I get it.

We'd be on the email side.

So they won.

So we're going to take two.

Unfairly.

And I won't interrupt you at all. Actually, I will keep my stance because I'm a Giants. I'm from the Giants.

Oh, that's right.

Yeah.

Okay. I still don't know what's happening.

This whole thing is a real area we don't need to get into.

And I refuse to care.

Although, by principle, what if this is the engagement? This is the content engagement churn that begins.

This is what we've been waiting for to get those numbers up.

Baseball problems. Stay sexy.

And don't get murdered. Go Dodgers baseball. Bye.

Giants forever.

Elvis, do you want a cookie?

This has been an Exactly Right production.

Our managing producer is Molly Smith.

Our consulting producer is Kate Schellenbach.

Our creative lead is Allison Agosti.

Our associate producer is Tessa Hughes and our editor is Aristotle Acevedo.

This episode was mixed by Liana Squalacci.

Email your hometowns to myfavoritemurder at gmail.com And hit the double thumbs up button. Goodbye.

MFM Minisode 510

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