E470 Leatha Weatha and Dirty Santa Texts

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If you've been listening to the show for a while, then you know that we are big advocates for mental health and talking about what's going on. And that is why we would love to talk to you about no CD. So that way you can recognize the signs of OCD and get help if you're struggling. OCD is so much more than just stereotypes. It's a serious and highly misunderstood condition that causes people to get stuck in a cycle of stressful unwanted thoughts and repetitive physical behaviors and ocd can be debilitating because there are so many misconceptions out there a lot of people don't know that they even have it or feel shaman about their symptoms and they suffer in silence but not every therapist on top of that even understands ocd or is qualified to treat it effectively which can make it difficult to find the right help but ocd is highly treatable with a specialized type of therapy called erp or exposure and response prevention. 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 they won't judge you no matter what your thoughts are about. And NoCD therapy is covered by insurance for over 155 million Americans. So 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 nocd.com to schedule a free call and learn more. hello and welcome to and that's why we drink i in a first ever event have worn a red lip today for my date i love it i'm here with taylor we're doing a fun as eva called it unhinged speed dating segment um i just taylor and i just kind of showed up so we don't really know we don't know what's happening we have no idea what's going on I actually told Morgan who recorded with Jerry last night I was like I'm you know I'm so grateful that you got with Jerry but I'm also even more grateful I got with Christine because one thing about me and Christine is we never know what the hell's going on so this is going to be a eventful one it's just like okay that way that's just like how we thrive and live you know we're joined by Eva in the corner there with a buzzer and um she has a buzzer from blockbuster don't ask me where that came from um or why she owns it but it's here it's here and we have some questions that we're going to ask and taylor and i obviously are ready to kick things off we are ready to go red look at us and i'm going to ask the first question and he was has this like buzzer up like ready ready ready to go oh my god no pressure okay taylor i'm going to ask you the first question here okay which random vhs tape did your family of origin watch on repeat and the subject is and why was it all dogs go to heaven which is one that my family watched right exactly um okay so i have 30 seconds from eva just buzzing taylor five seconds hello okay so i was an only child for the first like seven years of my life and then my little sisters came and by the time they came cds or were the only like dvds were the only thing so i was the only one with vhs so it was me and i was the queen of the house so therefore it was uh snow white the original cartoon and i cried and screamed every single time that she did that like mirror transition terrifying terrifying but i literally like ruined that tape so fantastic that's a good answer this was sent in to us by the way from that's pretty dark podcast uh eva will you tone it down i'm just kidding i mean it's a 40 year old button i don't know all dogs go to heaven i think um my dad tried to make us watch dumbo a lot and all dogs go to heaven and i think he really was trying to push the like suffering yeah take it away from your family i had to hide dumbo under my mattress and it was like years later that uh we moved out and My dad was like, why is this great film under the mattress? So it was a lot of traumatic events. And then, like, that weird soccer one about Green, Green, not the Green Mile, the other one. Not Green Mile, please, go. What is that green soccer movie? The Big Machine. Hold on. Oh, Green Machine. Oh, what? It's not the big. The Big Green. Who was your first cartoon crush from Spooky Delight? Underscore. I don't think I realized what it, I don't think I, I don't, it was probably, a girl cartoon and I didn't understand what was happening and I wanted to be your best friend but honestly I don't know I feel like a lot of people's answer is like that like animal characters and that always makes me feel a little weird to say aloud I don't yes I this is so lame I don't really have an answer I feel like a lot of people choose like Danny Phantom too like yeah those people that's a good answer okay I have one and I'll just say the timer's gonna be quick actually not Snow White. Sully from Monsters, Inc. Whoa! Interesting! And I don't know why, like, it's not like I married a big, burly man either. Like, I didn't, but it's just like... Maybe you should have. Maybe with his voice, and who voiced him? Who voiced Sully in Monsters, Inc.? It's not Billy Crystal, so that's the good news. Sully, thank God. Sully's Monsters, Inc. Let's see. James p sullivan who are you sir i'm like who the fuck is james p sullivan never heard of that man a day in my life taylor's first crush wait it was so funny what if you didn't say sully what if you said your first cartoon case was james p sullivan and we were all through the fuck who the fuck is that um okay i'm gonna tell you who played okay john goodman you know that man john goodman i sat next to him on an airplane and he was literally the most delightful person was he really and he gave up his middle seat he or he took a middle seat to like let somebody else in the aisle and he sat next to me he's a big man he's a big dude and he was like so kind and someone said like i'm a huge fan and he was like oh that's so sweet and then like he kind of joked and like three different people sent him like whiskeys and he's like oh i'm okay no thanks i was like i'll take uh i'm gonna ask you the next one what is your dream reincarnation that's from mirrorball bookshelf oh my god i mean uh i would always love to be a cat like i think that'd be really nice to be a house cat just lay in the sun eat my food do the things like chase some around yeah you know play with my parents annoy them at night what about you everybody and everything kind of sucks right now so it's sort of like what does what sounds enjoyable for me not really much i mean maybe like maybe like of robert irwin's family member like a family member of the irwin's where i'm like that is such a great call right there you nailed it wow okay wow well we did get a very specific answer for that question um is it my turn to ask i think so okay i'm even numbers right okay literally i don't know how me and morgan on this podcast because i have no idea what i'm doing half the time your listeners are like is she gonna fucking ask if it's her turn again like seriously no don't worry um they'll be like christine needs to know what's going on on her show so the next question is how many seagulls would you have to find in your home to think that someone was putting them there intentionally from underscore underscore megan ruth yeah megan ruth that's the craziest question i've ever a very high question to ask um like a real seagull or like little statues of seagulls? Because those are alarming. I'm assuming a real seagull, right? Yeah, yeah. Okay, well, I don't know that any amount would make me think. If there were 10 in my house, I'd be like, oh, an invasion of seagulls has occurred. I don't know that I would, like, blame a person for it. But do you know? I don't even know the answer. One. A seagull. But there's none here. Like, I've never seen a seagull in East Tennessee my entire life. So if someone, if a seagull would stay in my house, I'd be like, Logan, this has to be legit. Who the hell? put this in here um well this one is interesting we're ross and rachel on a break taylor this is from alissa marie tune one of the most like poignant parts of that entire like section of the film was the fact that he did not respect her job or film the show was that he did not respect her job that he just like kept barging into her office and he kept being like it's just the job she's like you don't understand it's something that like i'm actually good at and like i do and honestly if a man ever like so were they on a break who cares he was disrespecting her irrelevant he's fucking relevant he's just a dick like whether he's on a break or not irrelevant and he's just a big whiner baby oh he's i just don't relate to a whiner baby if a man is a whiner baby to me i can't be a part of it the time only women are allowed to be whiner babies i'm not enough for both of us you know we don't need another one i mean do you think like James P. Sullivan would ever be a whiny baby. No. Absolutely not. That's why I took that middle seat. Oh, that's right. Christine, this is from baby underscore glow glow. What was your AIM username? I'm always crazy. 444. You know, I could have answered that for you because I've listened to your podcast for so long. The mountain brings it up. Everybody probably already knows that. I don't think I had one. Oh, I guess you're, yeah. In any, like, chat room that I did have, I literally always just put my name because I was like, well, what if you don't know that it's me? And so that's where we got. I would just, like, make up fake names and be like, I hope you don't know it's me. Well, it's so funny because everyone's like, what was your first email? And, like, I had a few crazy fake emails that I still own to this day that I will never, ever tell the truth behind because I have about, like, seven that I put in my rotation. Hell, yeah. But, so everyone would be like, what was your crazy email name? And mine was literally Taylor H. at FirstAmericanEquity.com. And I was like, that's company. And he put me on there when he made me an email. It's always like the parents making the email. Yeah. If an alien studied you for a week, Taylor, what incorrect conclusion would they reach? And I think it might have something to do with anything we've said already. Because I feel like the phones, the last names, the voice. The list goes on. Are you kidding me? The Sully crush. okay depending on the week that they hit me okay if they hit me on ovulation they would be like this bitch's face is so symmetrical wow and they'd be like she's so energetic she goes and works out so much she gets so much done at work and she didn't even have to take her second dose of adderall that's how much she got done and then they would catch me in my luteal cycle and they'd be like she's a raging crazy bitch but that would be the correct okay that's sort of the base level okay i think it's pretty transparent once you come into my home like what's going on you know i don't know that like even during my ovulation which like i haven't even thought to put that together i think if i had a better understanding of what part of my cycle did what to me i'd probably have a little grasp the day you wake up and you think your eyebrows look good like that's if I wake up and I'm like wow my eyebrows look so even today I'm like oh my god I must be serious I don't think I've ever woken up and thought I liked my eyebrows so maybe truly no it truly is about like this like how my face looks in the morning when I wake up like some mornings I wake up and I'm like oh my god I think I gouache on only one side of my face last night like what happened to her okay so the next one is can you give me a ride after this from wild underscore puff. Taylor, I would give you a ride any day of the week. Ever since you came to that live show where you had to drive back with Morgan for work at like four in the morning, and I was just like, I cannot believe these people came all the way out here. These people are crazy. What is the most, oh, this is interesting. What is the most common compliment that you receive from Kimberly.Ariel? It really depends. Like if it's about like me as a person, a lot of people like my voice and i'm like well that's literally the most highest compliment you could ever get because that's literally my entire job so i just like when people call me funny that's my favorite compliment um i think that's probably i don't know you guys i don't know tell me my compliment i know my favorite compliment that people give you online what because i agree with them often um my favorite compliment that your listeners or not even just anyone gives you online is like how uh what's the word like how well spoken you are and how you actually can think a lot before you speak i don't have that um so the next one the final one we have is shout out your emotional support water bottle style brand color sticker situation etc if you have one and if you don't why don't you like hydration and this says a little note from eva inspired by creeps and crimes talking about their emotional support water bottles oh my god taylor you inspired a speed dating question oh my god i'm really honored to be here and give this question for everybody okay okay um i have this beautiful uh big it's like this stanley and it's the it's it's black but it has chrome accent and eva mailed that mailed them out to like the a couple of us on the two years ago i think um and it was it this it was last year yeah it has like our our name on it and like a thirsty little rat like a little in like the chrome color and it's just like so like i feel like when i hold it i'm like oh this feels fancy i mean unless you see the rat on the side but other than that big giant rat and then it's like buck teeth um but other than that and then um you know it has like a little sticker that says scrappy and i just i don't know if it's just my that's definitely my my comfort one and it has my name in giant letters and as a gemini that like really speaks to me you know of course it does yes and i agree 100 here it is oh oh that's a cutie so this is my LO everyone Morgan has the same exact one they're 22 ounce pop and fill hers is green mine is yayo and um but the reason why this is the best LO water bottle because they have multiple water bottles it's because not only like I could throw it in my purse and I'm okay right right right this is why it's called the pop and fill okay this little part pops up and then you have the nipple that you can like suck the water up through which is attached to the inside where there's a straw oh my god so you can just fill up the water bottle without taking the straw out and you can put the ice in without taking the straw out but if you need to clean it you can screw the whole lid off and here's another thing what will they think of next they have a lock on the side oh e-l-l-o e-l-l-o okay yellow we've declared these the absolute and this is the pop and fill we have declared these the water bottles of 2026 everyone wants to go a walla no wrong we're going elo we're going enough enough water in there like they have a larger one and i if i had the larger one i wouldn't have to fill it up as much as i want so me and i'm gonna get me and morgan one we don't use stickers on things because we're pickers so we pick everything off of everything yeah and i think that was our last question wow um taylor i had the best time on our date i had hey you want to see each other again um absolutely imagine hmm um let me get back to you I'm really busy. No. I'm all of a sudden blocked from all the pair pods and emails and stuff. Are we in a competition? Like, do we win? I think we did. I'm pretty sure. Right, Eva? I'm pretty sure we won, right? Anyway, well, thank you, Taylor. Go listen to Creeps and Crimes wherever you get your podcast. It's such a fun show. Taylor and Morgan are just a delight, and they talk about the same shit we do. So it's just bound to be a good time for everybody. All right, guys. All right. On that note, thanks for listening. and uh i guess on with the episode what the hell what's that i don't want to tell you let me guess was that an apple slice no is it tuna and celery no it is some bread then i didn't have anything to put on it so i put butter and then i put big hunks of mozzarella cheese off of a block why wouldn't you want to tell me that sounds delicious was it to keep me from being jealous it looks pretty gnarly. I thought I saw a slice of something hit the ground and I did see you eat that. That's what we should be talking about. Okay. That's right. Um, unhinge your jaw girl. You do what you gotta do for the bread. Um, that looked good. That looked delicious. I don't know why we were hiding that from me, but, um, it's just one of those like meals you look at and you go, Oh, oh dear. No, that's how I feel about you and tend to fish though. that's how like i am about most food so yeah well welcome to uh the sickly podcast christine is not feeling 10 out of 10 today but ma'am i bet you're feeling at least one point better with that bread in your system so i am i'm feeling i'm feeling okay i just sound terrible how long how many days in are you four or five i feel better i just sound worse you know when you near the end you start to sound worse for some reason. Like your body's trying to reset. Yeah I sound worse. You sound fine. I slept pretty much noon. You don't sound as bad as I think you think you sound but you do sound sick. Well I've got tea speaking of drinking things. What type of tea? What do you put in it? How do you take your tea? Thank you for asking. So I went to World Market with Leona when they were selling these cute little honey sticks, not like the honey stick that you... They're like little stirrers, but at the end they have a little heart made of honey, and you can stir your tea. I was like, what a genius idea, because I have honey up here, but it's so sticky, and then it gets everyone, and you have to find a spoon to stir it, and it's like... It's giving Shark Tank. You know what? It is giving Shark Tank. I think they can invest a whole $300 in something like this. I certainly hope so. Honey on a stick. I don't know if I saw, I think it was like some clickbait. I think I saw something about like Pete Davidson went on Shark Tank for like, was asking like a half a million dollars for his sock company. Or I had a dream. Feels like an SNL skit or a dream. Well, I've been having to be really careful about what I'm seeing online these days because my mother and I have been getting into heated arguments about how I am not interested in keeping anyone in my life that's MAGA for obvious reasons. Oh, no. Your mother disagrees. She's like, no, come on. She is more nice. She let's put this way. She voted the right way. And, you know, she's we don't need to throw hate at her. I think she still is trying to show some sort of compassion. She's I'm not into it. I'm not. I'm not doing it. But in their day and. Oh, wait, did we record? Yes. A few. Sorry. I'm traumatized from last week. in their day and age in their day in their elderly day now i'm gonna make it now your mom's gonna go no contact with me um in their day and age though it was like oh we could all get along and now it's like things have not gone that way anymore i and i think our generation at least uh people i was surrounded with i grew up in kind of country club living so i was surrounded by people from a few walks of life let's put that yeah and i remember it being normal that you could break bread with those people. But this is a different ballgame we're in now. Totally. Mistakes are much higher. Much higher. And so my mom's defense has been like, for other people, not for herself, for anyone, everyone, back up, leave my mom alone. But she said like, well, have you considered that maybe they're not getting the same material or they're not seeing the same things on their screen that you're seeing, and so they're just not educated. And I'm like, okay, then I'll educate them. And so I've been on Facebook recently flooding my mom's friends' profiles. yeah yeah i'm gonna save them i don't know what's wrong with me i've started getting information that says m schultz posting on facebook and i'm like what and then it like happens every day and i'm like is m like really into facebook now no i'm not at all but i'm just so frustrated because i've i've heard through the grapevine that uh people in fredericksburg are upset with me because i no longer want to speak to them and i'm like okay well then i'll just show you why i don't want to talk to you um so yeah i made it my personal vendetta for absolutely no reason but i've been on facebook recently which has not happened in a long time and now i have to double check everything i'm reading so i'm like shit these people really have just been reading completely different information than me including pete davidson going on shark tank for half a million dollars with his socks what if that was a dream and you posted about it you were like this is real silly maybe and now everything's fucking ai who the hell knows you know what i mean but you know what's wild so i've been getting in fights with this one guy on facebook oh i think i saw him probably he's a work he's a nightmare well he was from oh no he for sure went on shark tank with some socks oh okay so then maybe people on facebook right you're right information um no this one guy's been a real nightmare but he my favorite part is i'm not gonna say what i said i was a little harsh and then i i regretted i was like i don't need what i have to say out there so i deleted what i said but um he he kept being like really we're family and i'm like babe i haven't seen you since i was four years old what the fuck are you talking about we're family please and also we're not like you're a random guy from my town what are you talking about and also so the fuck what yeah exactly like i put out closer people for less baby you know like fuck it we'll burn it all down it's 2026 he said something about like whatever you can just go chase a ghost and i was like i have literally i was like what a weird fucking thing to say i was you know that that's the thing that's offended me the most so far well now i'm pissed well i thought it was very silly because he's very... Maybe I will! Well, I ended up saying, like, um, they got me a job, so I'm pretty sure, like, I don't know what you're complaining about. You got me a job. I made a job. I made a career out of it, you fuckhead. He, uh, the whole argument was about, like, deflection, deflection, deflection, and then I made a point, and he was like, whatever, go chase a ghost, and I was like, okay, whatever. Anyway, so I've been having a lot of fun. He knows you lost. A lot of fun on Facebook. Maybe that's what I think this week. A son and son has never been said since 2012. Yeah, and by fun, I really... It's not fun. I just, I don't know why I've brought this duty upon myself, but I think I'm over my mom defending people that are still in our circles. And I'm like, I'm just going to, now they have no reason to not see what's going on. And if they're still in our circles, then I really, I can't, I don't have to defend myself to anybody, including my own family at this point. You know what I mean? I know. Yeah. I mean, people just see things and then they're like, that's irrelevant to me because it doesn't fit my worldview. I know. You know, it's, but I mean, it sounds like it did something with that guy. So that's good. it got him all all fucking worked up so that's nice i kind of love that right like that honestly is beautiful in and of itself thank you i really have no fucking business even doing this i just i i think this is how my brain is reacting to cracking in half with the horrible news that's coming out every day i'm just like if i just flood other people's feeds and at least my eyes aren't alone in this i don't know you're just like let me just like yeah yeah i don't know anyway you're Derek. I don't know the guy's name, but here, Derek, watch this. It's not Derek, right? Because then it would be. No, that'd be so crazy. You. Anyway, so I guess that's why I drink, but I've like become one of those like, I don't know. I'm not like proud of myself for doing it. I just I think I I don't know why I did. I need to talk to a therapist. Anyway, your turn. Why do you drink? Okay. I drink because my phone keeps like giving me Facebook notifications. It's like M Schultz shared three posts. And I'm like, and you know what it keeps saying is M shared posts you missed. And I was like, that I missed. Like what is happening? And then I always think like, is this some sort of life update the way Facebook is making it sound? It's like you've missed M's major life update. My big ass milestone. Yeah, M and Derek. Nuts. Yeah. Well, M and Derek, the fight, that when I was glad I went into my notifications and got a little peep on that. Battle Royale. No. um battle royale i uh it's mainly the exact same things i've been posting on instagram or wherever i can post them but uh i've just i have a new audience now and so i've actually found some i didn't know this but i was assuming there were some people who had who were on the wrong side of history in my hometown who i have found out are very on my side and have actually like jumped on the comments also which is very wonderful and oh that's always so like satisfying when you see people that you were like not sure where they would land and then they're like yeah no burn this shit down you're like oh thank god you know what i was the most beautiful of them all is this never happens but there were three men from my hometown who all apparently voted in our favor which i did not see coming and they all were like defending my post to that shitty guy and i was like Oh, my God. I'm just watching men fight over me. Ah! Oh, Em, how does it feel? Oh, I've been waiting my whole life. Especially when they bring up, like, Trump and immigrants, and you're like, this is so romantic. It's about me. Oh, I wanted to show you. I told you last week that one of my favorite newspapers in my town is the Burbank Bulletin. That's right. And I wanted to let you know that Brad Corb has done it again. You don't say. Burbank Bulletin. And then let me just prove this to you. Now this. Let's talk about breaking fucking news. Facebook, step aside. I want to know about this situation. I went looking for it because I was like, I literally just, it came in the day that we recorded. It's meant to be. This is called analog breaking news, people, okay? This is the original Facebook post. That's right. This is where Derek fucking has to sit down and just accept the fact. Derek, look within yourself. Look within. look at the fucking derrick pick up a burbank bulletin a fucking eat eat that again kick rod brad did it again wait brad brad did it again with the sale of corina's house in what does that say panorama city in panorama city yeah brad did it again hell yeah every time every goddamn month this comes out brad has done it again so i can't it really in a world full of darkness you know what i can always rely on brad corb i mean we need a little bit of sunshine you know i feel like at this point one there's gonna be a month where brad corb doesn't do it again he's gonna be like cut the press i don't i was gonna say like there's not gonna be a an issue like what are they gonna release an issue without brad doing it again like we although i would say like the day he doesn't do it again is the day that that newspaper fucking sells out through the roof you know what i'm saying i would make brad corb sign it i'd be like i need you to I need you to know that I've been waiting for this time. We thought you could never do it. Anyway, that was, as soon as we finished recording, it showed up at my door and I went, well, I got to see if Brad did it again. He has. The fact that this thing, wow, it's, well, it's good. Thank you. I needed that little light of sunshine in my life. Thank you. You're welcome. Are we both drinking tea? Finally. We never have done that. 470 episodes. It's only nine years in. I finally figured out how to drink a cup of tea, I think. I'm trying anyway. I'm not very good at it. We got stuck on the honey stick, but do you put anything else in it, or is it just honey? Sometimes I put a splash of milk. It's just like an Earl Grey situation. I put a little splash of milk and honey. But today I'm just rocking with the honey stick, and it's kind of a vibe. I like it. yeah, got me some Harney and Sons. You know those pretty ones? Those pretty tin containers that then I keep and tell myself I'm going to fill with wildflowers someday. I understand. You just fill with dust. Well, I have I put out an Instagram post about it and I would like to also leave it to the masses over here as well. I still don't really know what to do because everyone kind of gave the same answer, but it wasn't really an answer I was looking for. I was going to ask what the – so you were looking for a way to turn the scent of this tea that Allison doesn't usually drink, this loose leaf tea, right? Mm-hmm. Into a candle or something. Okay, okay, okay. To extract the scent and use it for something else. Yes. Allison's obsessed with the smell, but neither of us will drink it. It's just the smell that we like. But I am so tired. It's been sitting with us since the last apartment. Like, I'm tired of this. I don't want this anymore. I'd rather use it for good and not take up space. You know what I mean? We already live in a kind of a small spot, and the spot where all of our coffee and tea goes, like, this is a big bag of loose-leaf tea, and I'm like, it's got to get out of here. Yeah, it's got to make room. So I'm trying to find a way to keep the scent but get rid of the tea, and a lot of people said, like, wax melts or something. Oh, to put it in. Okay, okay. Are those just little candles? Am I mixing it up with something else? So a wax melt is more like you have little, like, shapes of the hardened wax, and then you put it on, like, a dish or something, and you put, like, a little tea light. They make wax melt warmers. That's weirdly hard to say. And you put it in, like, a little dish, and then the light, like, kind of melts it, and it, like, makes a really nice smell. I see. It blows my mind that a candle is not just that. Is that not just a big wax melt? Well, there's no fire involved. Well, I guess there is fire if you're using a little candle underneath. But it's more just like it heats up little – and then you can reuse it, right? So it'll, like, kind of harden and you can light it. I have a candle warmer that's, like, just a really – it's a light bulb, and it, like, warms the candle and melts the wax, and then it lasts a lot longer. Nice. Sort of like that. Maybe that's what – maybe everyone's – I mean, everyone's saying either that or like melting it for like an oil diffuser or something? I think that's probably really similar, yeah. Okay. Well, I don't, I just wish I could just get some of my come over here. That seems like a lot of work. Because I don't, I would love to just throw it in like a candle and then burn it, but I feel like burning it isn't, it's not the same thing. Yeah. Can you see what the ingredients were? Like, is there a way to see what's in it and then like kind of try to replicate what scent she likes a lot? Probably. I mean, it's literally just an Earl Grey tea, but there's something about this Earl Grey tea. So I'm like, I'm not, I'm no, I'm no magician. Why won't you drink it? It doesn't taste as good as it smells. It does not taste as good as it smells, but it, I mean, it tastes fine, but it's like, I, she would prefer to smell it compared to me drinking it. Understood. The ones are different. And, um, uh, also I'm not a big fan of loose leaf tea. I want, I like tea bags. Yeah. Loose leaf freaks me out. I feel like I'm just drinking stems. You are. I know. And one's going to slip in there. And then I'm paranoid for every sip. I'm like what got in my mouth so what about the little that doesn't work I don't care I don't care I don't want to hear it I don't want to hear it it's literally what about okay unless there's an airtight lock on it and even then it still has little holes the whole thing's made of holes something's gonna get out yeah it's got to be made of holes you know because of the water like I want my tea to look like this at the bottom you know what I'm saying I want there to be enough just a plastic container a plastic container yeah um oh i i well never mind the time has passed i was gonna say another reason why i drink but i just realized that we that we've done that already um oh but next time next time i've got one in the chamber for the future whoa i don't get dressed up often but when i do i typically feel more comfortable when i'm wearing some sort of shapewear and I've tried them all and to be honest they've never looked cute underneath you know the the outfit you're wearing honey love though is different they have these crossover they're the most beautiful like um they look like lingerie honestly and so when you wear it you feel you feel sexy before you even put your put your beautiful dress on you know what I'm saying um anyway get that out of your mind also it says uh you can show it if you want um and I'm like, yeah, you wish. 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Offer valid while supplies last. Free meals applied as discount on first box. New subscribers only varies by plan. Okay. I have a story for you, Christine. Thank God. And we're going to learn together because I did these notes a bit ago. So let's find out together. This is... That was going to be my big thing. Sorry. What? This is like the third day. It was like, we were supposed to record Thursday. And I was like, let's record tomorrow. Then like an hour before, I was like, I'm freaking out. I'm never going to get these notes done. And then now we're here and I'm sick and it's just a mess. Anyway, I apologize. Because then I was like, oh, poor, I'm not going to remember their story because it's been like a week. And anyway. It's never stopped me before. Okay. Fair enough. This is the, the main name for it is the Laurel Hall Mansion. Although I have seen online it also being called the Bowman House, but it's the Laurel Hall Mansion. So. Laurel Hall is prettier. And it was named Laurel Hall. Bowman House is just named, it's like the house that the Bowmans lived in, but the Bowmans named it Laurel Hall. So like, shouldn't we respect them? Even they knew it was a nicer name. Have you figured out yet what your, your family house would be named? I'm so tired of this, Christine. Just figure it out. You're tired of it. You're the only one that brings it up. Keep waiting. I like the Christine Chapel is fun. I think it's hysterical. But that was my name, and then that includes nobody else in the house, which is fine. I mean, I'm not going to tell. That's fine. Let's do it. Beautiful. I mean, Gio's Castle. There might as well be a Christine Chapel attached. Gio's Castle is cute because that does sound like a video game. It does. I love that. And also, if you were to say Giovanni's Castle, it sounds like a Muppets Place adventure. Okay, something just fell... Okay, so these headphones are really old, and they have, like, these little, like, you know how they peel off? Yeah, but, like, it looked like something just fell out of my hair because I was moving it, and something big, just a chunk fell. And I want people to know that was the headphones, and it was not, like, the gross thing out of my head, out of my hair. Just so you know. Okay, thank you, because... I didn't see, but I'm glad I don't have to worry. I just don't need that slow-mo of, like, just something. I think it's on your shirt right there, yeah. Yeah, it is. It's, like, this gross, like, whatever this is. It's beautiful. Mine is still pretty solid. Mine is fucking destroyed. Mine are pretty good. And when I was last at my aunt for Thanksgiving I don know if stole is the right word but I took without permission Borrowed Yeah Well I took without permission headphones that once belonged to someone who lived there and now they no longer live there and oh and that counts and they when they left they said they took everything and anything that was off in their house was up for grabs so i went okay thank you yeah that's the definition of they were nice headphones hell yeah are those them no i'm waiting for these to crap out and then i've got nice new ones but um got it got it got it got it but these these have lost a long time these went on like two tours with us yeah they look they look much more put together than these obviously no yours look yours literally says studio on top that's so fancy so it does doesn't it mon studio what the fuck does that say oh studio monitor it's upside down and backwards in my in my view um here we go this is the laurel hall mansion it is near cuttingsville vermont and uh it is in it so my understanding of it which you'll realize my confusion my understanding of it is this is an entire estate where like we're just talking about the mansion specifically okay okay which technically makes it a manor by the way because if i have not screamed this enough a manor is just the main house people live in honor the state of buildings i know you've screamed about but I do appreciate the re-up in information. Thank you. Thank you. So it's technically the Laurel Hall Manor, but less educated people than me decided to name it Laurel Hall Mansion. Pathetic. Disgusting. So this mansion is directly across from a cemetery, which is important. The cemetery is similarly named. named this will confuse you because that the mansion is laurel hall the cemetery is laurel glenn okay you don't have to care about that anymore but just know that i took the time to write that down um so there's a mansion across the mansion is across in the cemetery and in the cemetery is the laurel glenn mausoleum so the laurel glenn mausoleum and the and laurel hall mansion are owned by the same people okay they just pick the worst fucking similar names um the mansion fun fact i don't know about the mausoleum but the mansion is on the national register of historic places and our main character is john bowman he was a tanner and he made his wealth selling leather goods to the union during the civil war and he was i guess especially famous for his boots and shoe soles you know what's so funny is nowadays like if you do that job you're basically like a bespoke etsy creator you're like i'm a cobbler at heart right Like, I'm a leatherman, leather good, leather good. I make leather, fine leather goods. Now it's a hobby. Yeah. And it's also like a, like a business, but it's like a really like up there, like fancy business. You're selling things for high prices because it's homemade, handmade. I mean, and if you do work in leather and like a, like a, an old cobblestone shop ran by grandpapa at one point, you're the fifth generation leatherman of your time. this is not information for you but I need everybody else to know that if I needed a leather good today I wouldn't know where to go except Etsy I would have to look for local leather goods so if you are that Leatherman or Tanner I need you to really start promoting yourself get a Gen Zer to do your TikTok and you'll be fine and then Em will find it and then I'll know exactly where to go instead of Em googling where to find leather goods we would like you to get viral so we can find it so we can actually so it can find us yeah that's what we're trying to say yeah i really i really you've already done this is the leather work but i need you to do one more thing um that's right so we're gonna get on tiktok later it's just gonna be fucking leather leather leather leather goods actually it's gonna be like leather goods two dollars and 99 cents off the tiktok shop i think we should redo the snl bit of sweater weather but make it leather weather ah that's good use that to the tanners who are trying to build a tiktok and get famous leather weather yeah yeah um you told them to use gen z folks now you're trying to come up with ideas and i feel like you're immediately kind of giving them conflicting and i'm using gen x references too that's exactly what i was gonna say next and also kind of the content is a little bit outdated i'm multi-generational okay this is why it's the thing the gen z's do where they're like i had a gen z intern film my thing and like mom donnie's was like yay you know like do that you know if it worked for him it could work for itty it was pretty good and even i saw it and i'm not very youthful well so john bowman he was that guy when it came to the union we love um and i didn't see anything about any other team i'll tell you that so i think he was just i'm gonna assume he's one of the good ones i'm also gonna assume he's one of the good ones because not only was he super successful he was loved by his employees he literally not just like made sure that they could afford to live he with his own wealth built them houses so they would have homes and then whatever the average wage was at the time he doubled it so he doubled the minimum wage what? I know so we love him okay but then I ask why hmm interesting that you I know I'm immediately like what's your agenda? are you trying to use money to control me? you want me to work twice as hard? is that what you're saying? are you trying to put pressure on? yeah exactly I am thank you I mean it's fair we can't ask him do you have a Ouija board? do I have a stupid question? we can find out tonight okay how about during the tonight tonight okay how about uh how about during the yaffy hour i will open my ghost at what is it called again ghost tube ghost tube which i did recently oh good because oh and we can discuss your use of it because also i just went um you know we love a rocket money and i just went on there the other day and it was like ghost tube subscription i was like oh shit but instead of canceling it i was like i gotta use that more so today we use that i love it love it i'm happy to um so he uh this john bowman he married his true love jenny and they got pregnant they had a daughter addy unfortunately addy had scarlet fever and died in infancy and a couple years later they had their second daughter ella but in her early 20s ella mysteriously fell ill and also passed away um and i say early 20s because some sources said 19 some said 23 anyway her early 20s and we don't know how she passed away but the thought is something in the realm of typhoid cholera scarlet fever or consumption as we as we love it um ella was their only child that survived into adulthood so when she passed john and jenny were devastated especially devastated and six months later this is like the real kicker Six months after they had to grieve their daughter, Jenny also died. Oh, my gosh. He's going through it. He's going through it. Oh, no. And right before she died, the two of them had been discussing building their dream home to distract from the grief. Get out of here. This is so sad. I know. And you said it was a few months later, right? Six months later. Which, like... You haven't even begun to grieve after five, six months. It's just the shock has worn off, and now you've got a whole new shock. The shock has worn off, but also... it's not like she was already sick so you were like preparing for like losing two people it's like okay we're we're ready now to grieve that and it's like nope now here's another thing right as you think like you've passed that grief oh yeah um so and the the irony of like one of their last conversations being like how do we deal with this grief and then she dies and he's like terrible fuck and now i didn't even know what to do then now i don't know what to do at all terrible well now that he's alone he's grieving his wife and his daughter and i'm sure still grieving you know his his other daughter who passed in infancy um john decided to go through with it anyway as one of jenny's last requests and he decided he was going to build what would have been his family's forever home oh my god that's so dark i know but also like so i mean beautiful in a way of like he had something to do you know like a like a mission to me it feels like um even though she thought that she was requesting this for him she was actually like almost giving him a task like she was before she asked she got to give him she got to tell him what to do project right yeah in her honor almost yeah so that's how he looked at it as like if she were here we would be doing this and you imagine how guilty you'd feel though on your deathbed you're like sorry i would have waited um they um what was i gonna say oh so they lived in new york but they came back home to they he came back home to his state of vermont um and found this one spot he could build which was across from laurel glenn cemetery okay and so simultaneously not only did john built himself their dream home but across the street in the cemetery he built a mausoleum for his family to be interred so we're gonna talk about the mausoleum first um even though the house the house being haunted is what we're focusing on the mausoleum is so important to the story so this was during the first big wave of spiritualism and funerals and memorials were an especially busy business they were very lavish this was like the victorian era so everything was very gaudy and through the roof yeah and yeah as someone who lives in a house that was reconstructed in the 2000s to attempt to look like a victorian style it's something else really with all the like gilded you know curly cues shit like that and also actually we remember when we went to the um winchester house and they were telling us all about like the victorian mourning period oh that was crazy yes i wonder how much of that played into like his grief and building this house because like yeah talk about properly mourning in a victorian way of like i'm going to build you a house and a mausoleum yeah and like the the pomp and circumstance behind the grieving back then was like something yeah um so in his mourning he put his full focus into construction and aim to have the best mausoleum in the whole cemetery um and he put it right at the edge of the cemetery's road so that way it was like directly across from his house so he could always watch his family oh my gosh i know oof um please hold and we'll listen to what hank's telling me to do i was like em do you think he's talking to you i've officially snapped if that i was like okay no i'm gonna take a page out of his book and he's slurping away but that'd be crazy i was like it sounds a little bit like he's just making dog noises it's like alice needs to come home yeah you're really having a moment first time arguing with people on facebook that's literally not my style at all usually but i i can't stop it all of a sudden i don't know what's going on with me um maybe you found like a new outlet you're like this is actually really fun there's also like you're not as sensitive as i am and that's a compliment i mean not anymore really but oh okay no no no no no sorry what i mean is you are never as sensitive as i was i'm much better about it now but like gotcha i would get like so bad out of shape if somebody commented something and you've always been just like whatever fuck them you know like you're better at that so i feel like maybe you've found like a new passion project i think well i i think i'm i think the main motivator has really just been like i'm tired of people using the defense of like oh well they don't know and it's like there's no way you can't fucking know that's bullshit because first of all that's bullshit i guess and of all that's bullshit yeah and i think i my my original motivator with this was like if that's how you really feel then i'll make sure that they do see all this stuff yeah you're probably regretting that can't use that argument and it's just like fucking all over the feed yeah yeah i love that you're making a name for yourself i don't even know if i am probably it's not if it's even being seen if em didn't share on face if i wasn't friends with em on facebook i would never have known that pete davidson went on shark tank and won and i'm so glad i pushed that to you you know what go go hunt a ghost you know what i'm saying Go chase a ghost. Go chase a ghost. Go chase a ghost is so good because it's like go kick rocks, but it's like way less of an insult. It's not, it's not, it's just good. Like, it's like, okay, guy. Yeah, I will. In any other circumstance, I would say like, that was a good one. That was a good one. But the fact that like it was like he really thought that was a good one makes it not a good one. Like, that makes it so much better to me because I'm like, oh, I love that this guy thought he was insulting us when really like I would love nothing more than to go chase a ghost. I think his whole bit is thinking he's really killing it, which makes me laugh. Anyway. There have been a few other people who have said things, too, but he's like, this is how I know that my stuff is getting pushed through people's feeds, even if they don't want to see this content, is because since I started pushing stuff out nonstop, I'm not tagging anybody. I'm just putting it out, and hopefully it lands on your – Your content farm. Yeah. Yeah. and um yeah and he has now been posting just as much shit as me and tagging only me every time to be like as a you're getting him spiral i'm freaking him out which i love i love um okay good and i've even been writing things like whenever he tags me i'll write like weird how obsessed you are with my opinion like no literally derrick like you're being really fucking weird dude like it's chill crazy like uh and also like anyway uh he's a piece of shit okay so let's see where we are now okay he decided that he was going to put a mausoleum at the foot of the cemetery so he could always watch over his family the cemetery i had a hard time understanding what was going on in the world of my sources because some people were covering only a part of it anyway what i have gathered is that this incredible this cemetery was not very flashy it was actually like maybe kind of small and not being taken care of but he came up with some sort of agreement with the town that he would then he would fund improvements for the entire cemetery if he could put in this like really flashy mausoleum oh okay um i think i think the agreement was something like if you were born in this town like you have a free this guy i know community minded you know what i'm saying i've always had that about him we'll have to tell him about that later on the ouija board oh yeah write that down for sure on the ghost tube get him on the horn ring ring ring ring ring ring the ghost tube oh you know yeah i don't i do know now you don't know you don't know what i'm singing oh no was that a jingle you that wasn't you you created that no it's a raffi original banana phone oh but sorry i actually don't always have raffi at the front of mind but why you know if first of all talk about a fucking activist he wrote a song about minneapolis he's like anti-fascist like he and he and miss rachel are on like this next level like i gotta say raffi agenda raffi gets me going and by the way i think we've had to have talked about this at some point hundreds of episodes ago however if you don't mention joshua giraffe i don't want to hear it we've had an extra you're right that we've discussed this because i hadn't known about joshua giraffe and then you told me about it and i looked it up and it upset me and i thought this is not the raffi i remember um that was during his like rebel years i think yeah clearly he had he kind of like veered off track for a minute um my favorite album is where he's dressed as papa noel on the cover and it's um his christmas album and i i made everybody listen to it christmas morning and blaze was so ill that he could barely sit up but he's sitting there and i'm it's like and i made everyone sit there like six in the morning and listen to it um anyway banana phone is fucking oh next level i'm sorry i didn't catch the reference right away but you were right i should have known um anyway shout out to joshua i miss you every day um haven't thought about it in a long time who's that again oh the giraffe yeah oh my god there's a dog at the dog park named joshua i fucking hate him joshua don't get me started please i have never hated a dog more in my life every time the dog were a giraffe would that make it different no i don't think if you met a giraffe and they were like this is joshua you'd be like oh my god i get it yes i thought you meant if joshua the dog dressed up as a giraffe for Halloween. Oh, no, no. I mean, like, if it were a literal giraffe. If I know that giraffe and his name wasn't either Jeffrey or Joshua, we're fucking done. Fair. Good. Case closed. I get it now. Giraffe has the just sound. I was about to ask why they all sound like J names. Joshua giraffe for Aby, Jeffrey giraffe for Toys R Us. Because I'm not an idiot. Let's start there. Okay, well, let's... Wow. Let's get back to basics. Let's start back at day one. Yeah. Jeffrey giraffe. Do not pass go. Do not collect $100. You know what I can't stand about Jeffrey giraffe is it's Jeffrey with a G. G-O-3. It's kind of got to be, you know why? I know. With the giraffe. I know. I don't like it. Anyway, if you know a dog named Joshua and he goes to the dog park from four to six, tell him this. How about that? Okay? Big old middle finger. Jesus! Em is like, put a giant middle finger to the camera. Em? Okay, so first of all, Derek has gotten Em like on a new one. I feel like Derek and Joshua know each other. God damn, Em's on a tear here. Like, Like, oh, yeah, you want the Derek treatment, everybody? Sit the fuck down. I literally had people at the dog park text me when Joshua was there, and they're like, don't come. Joshua's here. And I'm like, thank you for telling me. I can't stand this dog. Oh, my God. And he can't stand me, by the way. And he can't stand Hank. Well, I wouldn't stand you either if you couldn't stand me. He, like, actively, it's the owner. We all know it's the owner. But it's also Joshua. I really have a problem with both of them. No, I was going to say, it seems like it's a little more than that. It's both of them. The owner does not seem to care that Joshua is actually vicious. and then like starts real real bad fights real bad fights especially with hank and like hank is terrified and it's very bad it's very bad and with a name like joshua it's like joshua heal you know it just feels insane i can't say and then the guy he just like he'll see it happen and just keep scrolling on his phone he's such i don't even want to talk about it okay yuck anyway where were we the cemetery i swear to god this these were short notes i just can't stop myself the cemetery was not flashy he decided that he was going to help build it up so that way he could put his mausoleum there and when it came to the cemetery's remodeling this is a quote he greatly improved the cemetery turning it into a smaller version of an elaborate park cemetery and besides enlarging the cemetery his extensive improvements included an 800 foot cemetery wall with three gates walks and carriage drives shade trees two fountains and benches wow he really said lovely i'll give you a cemetery this is a park now i love when they used to be parks sometimes they still are but yeah it's not not not not often you don't see a lot of park cemeteries these days um i think this is how we ended up with the estate definition for this place because technically there's land on one side of the street and he owns property on the other side and he's also funding the stuff going on on the other side. Plus, during his expansion, each of these properties seem to, like, bleed into each other, and he built even more buildings on the property between his house and the mausoleum. So it just became a... Building out his whole estate. An industrial complex of sorts. Oh, nice. He built a conservatory or a greenhouse. And keep in mind, this was so he could... He built all this just so he could give his family a nice place to, like, be um but he my favorite part was that he added this greenhouse and it was just so he would always have fresh flowers for them oh he's if he wanted to he would folks i'm just saying even when you're dead if you wanted to he would seriously and i think even though that was the original intention now i think they use the greenhouse area like for all the flowers in the cemetery i think they've like really put it to work now he also built cottages for his caretakers he built barns he built an ice house um and as for the mausoleum itself it took 125 workers just to build this one mausoleum it's huge it costs the equivalent of two and a half million dollars today whoa and it's made of like seven there's a quote 750 tons of granite 50 tons of marble 20 000 bricks over 500 barrels of cement 10 barrels of plaster and 100 loads of sand like it's fucking huge what the fuck the entire the inside of it is almost entirely made of marble including marble busts of his wife and daughters the fact that the that's the inside the inside like crazy and then the real kicker and what this mansion is most known for now because tourists will go and they always remember this one thing which is across the way from the mansion when you look at the cemetery and you look at the mausoleum outside of the mausoleum is a life-size i think marble statue of himself in grief oh no it's a little scary looking uh the statue um if you were five you might not want to stand next to it um but it's outside the mausoleum he's in funeral clothing he's holding a funeral wreath and a key to the tomb so that one day he can also go in and he's looking into the vault mourning oh my god yeah this is the man who loved his family i mean this is the thing this is a man with a vision you know yeah and like one that will keep it will perpetuate after he's gone oh for sure which it's weird that he built this i feel like a statue is usually commemorative of a person after they've passed but the fact that He's suggested that statue and has since passed. It's kind of trippy. It's, like, so trippy. Can I look up a picture of it? Because I'm just curious. What's his name again? Laurel Hall Mansion statue. I'm, like, so curious. Is he, like, crying in it? No, I only saw one picture of it, and he's just, like, sad. He's just kind of, like, you can tell he's in grief. That is, like, a wild... Oh, dear. like as a child i would be scared because it's just like a large man kind of hunched over and looking sad but as a as an adult i'm like that's clearly he's just like yeah oh wow yeah he just looks sad he has his hat off and he's like clutching into his chest yeah he's leaning on the mausoleum like to for to steady himself i mean it's very it's a great statue wow it's again obvious it's you don't have to wonder what it's all about um oh and then you can fill it he you can fill it with different flowers like he has like a spot in his arm where you can like fill it with a bouquet yes he's a funeral he's holding his top hat and a funeral wreath and i think you can put flowers in the wreath and then um he's also holding a key to the tomb i think wow this is something else man which like i'm and i like that the statue i know i just brought this up but the statue was built by someone who was still alive i like that he was able to approve it like this is exactly how he wanted it to look oh yeah he's like that looks just like me yeah he's like i get it nailed it oh inside there's like a little a little little baby yeah he's playing oh that's sad dude um yeah it's very very sad this was just the mausoleum across the street at the same time remember he's also doing construction building his wife's dream home on right and when that was done they were built within like one or two years of each other they were finished um but the mansion was 21 rooms it had 16 foot ceilings it had it had every kind of room you could imagine it had music rooms grand parlors it had um uh oh my god why can't i i imagine a room it's got that um then they've got it has a wraparound porch you know i love a wraparound it has a tower you know i love a tower i love a tower um ornate wallpaper it had electricity it had temperature regulated running water which was unheard of at the time it had baths it had porcelain sinks it had stables it had fire hydrants on the property wow very fire oh my word very soon we are thought of everything so fun fact this um was designed by a guy named gb croft who i think you would have wanted to use for your own house because his designs he was known for i guess making victorian mansions but they were specifically extra haunted looking yeah i love that he was known to make exaggerated victorian buildings so i think the the one um one of the sites i looked at said that he would build things a little extra jutted out so when the sun hit it right the shadows were more intense sharper angles oh i love it i love it love him so anyway fun fact it was designed by that guy and sadly because he wanted this to look like his wife's dream home even though his family was no longer with him he still put in all the bedrooms that they would have wanted oh wow so this is this is sounding very sarah winchester yes yeah they would have probably done well in group therapy together right like not letting go of of your grief you know for better for worse yeah Yeah. John Bowman had multiple bedrooms built into the home, at least four of them, which we assume would have been for his family and a guest room. And despite the fact that this is a quote, this is like the SAS quote I saw on any of the sites. This mansion was built for a man who had no family. Oh, dear. God, it was so sad. Despite that, he he built all those rooms. And again, this was when spiritualism was very normalized. And so it's rumored that around the time John began talking to close friends and staff about the afterlife a lot. Very Sarah Winchester. Good catch. It is. I just I can't stop thinking about it. It seems that he maybe built Jenny's dream house and so close to her and their daughter's bodies. because then maybe they would be drawn to the house or it would be easy for them to find him again so they could all be reunited. Like as ghosts? As ghosts, I guess, just so that they could be with him. Okay. Other rumors are that he actively got into studying the occult and he was looking for ways to bring his family back. And I don't know what that means, but that's the rumor. He used the house as a summer home, basically, and he used it to entertain friends sometimes. So he wasn't there all the time. Come on over. Come on over. Look at the mom's name. It's a really normal, happy, not at all sad time. Don't look in the bedrooms. Don't look out the window to the cemetery. That looks like me, but it's not. Actually, the statue, we're going to have people cover that up when you come over. It's a perfect replica of me if I'm asking. You're going to have to explain myself otherwise. Yeah. When he wasn't there, he had staff offer tours. So it was already like a museum when he was alive. He was really prepping for what was going to happen after the fact. He's like quite a businessman, though. He's like, he's got it down. He was like, if I'm going to do this, I might as well make some money off of it. But when he was staying there, he'd spend his time looking at the mausoleum mostly and often walking across the street just to sit with his wife and kids. They said he would go over, like, every day after dinner and just sit with them. Oh, my God. Oh, oh. I mean, I guess I can understand that because you're just, like, a walk away and you can just chat. Sure. It's just so sad. Just sad. At the end of his life, he did move into the house permanently. he did pass away there and he was also interred in the mausoleum when he died though he in his will they found fifty thousand dollars which today would be two million dollars oh my word with a note for it to be for future upkeep of the mansion um and with this money by the way came some very odd rules for the staff um that pointed to him really rooting for this existence of an afterlife because remember he was like what if hopefully they can come find me and live in this house with me and that's why i built it this is the quote his will allegedly stated that he wanted his caretakers and servants to act like he would be coming home each evening so in addition to mowing the lawn and tending to the gardens servants would change the bedding each night as if he would want to come home to a fresh bed to sleep in fires would be lit and the cooks would prepare an elaborate meal which would be presented in the dining room just in case he showed up unannounced one night and wanted a warm supper from the dead from the dead so oh dear oh dear okay this is becoming a little bit rough i think he was thinking because i also my understanding was that it was like the table had to be set for four yeah and i think he thought hopefully when i die and find them we can all live in this house together that's not how that works bud i know um also like what do we do with the food then did the staff go like i hope they get to eat it yeah i mean it just feels so like strangely wasteful in a weird way i don't know yeah and i i i hope that maybe they didn't have to cook meals but they just had to set the table and then it's like symbolic of like oh they could have dinner together but it sounds like cooking fucking meals they say elaborate meals yeah it was also allegedly stated that this would be done like i set for the whole family including his wife and daughters and the table would be set for all four so that if they found each other on the other side they could all come home and have family dinners together but in 1953 the funds of two million dollars finally ran out after over 60 years wow which means over 60 years of your job being putting out food for people who won't eat it that's crazy oh dear um items in the home were auctioned off no more dinners were were longer made and the mansion was basically rented out to people and eventually it was handed over to a couple who converted the mansion into a quote haunted bookshop okay but imagine the day he does come back and he's like where the fuck is my food veal cutlet what the fuck um yeah i'd be pissed honestly if i'd be like where did the money go and we'd be like it's been 60 years dude we've literally fed you 60 times over and also in today's world two million dollars would get you like a year of food for sure yeah two million dollars 60 years is wild insane um i'm surprised that they yeah that it lasted that long they should have uh it would have been fun if they could have made it last 100 years and then like the centennial was like the final meal you know oh the last supper you know i would make it a themed party i'd be like i know you would one last time that might be when he shows up i can't resist that'd be so nice i'd be so honored i'd be like he showed up for my party oh my god oh the house is now maintained by the local historical society and holds tours and open houses for people throughout the year but the mausoleum and cemetery are open to the public where you can see the mansion across the way you can see the statue which by the way is covered in the winter in case you're going there to see it um it seems that today the house is haunted and maybe john was right that his family has finally reunited and they live in the house together he put that energy so much into it it wouldn't surprise me if there is some lingering energy of the whole family you know 100 i i i feel like if that doesn't work i don't know what would exactly exactly because like to ponder something yeah before death and then after death be living out your own it would be really believe it and like act on it and spend money on it and put resources and time and energy you're 100 right the manifesting of that is insane cinematically this would be a wonderful movie tm tm people claim to see a flickering light in the windows now as if someone's walking through people feel someone uh watching them on the stairs people have seen shadows moving around them they hear conversations when nobody is speaking including this is how the movie would end a man a woman a younger woman and a baby all talking with each other as if they're like all reunited people also hear a baby crying and see a woman walking through the mansion as if going about her day so she's finally getting to live out what she would have one source said that staff have straight up seen the bowman family all gliding through the rooms together and when the building has been leased out one family's husband was skeptical but his wife and daughter swore that the place was haunted they would wake up to a woman standing over their beds. They would wake up to hearing a baby crying and they couldn't find the source of it anywhere. On one tour that happened at this house, a little girl stuck her tongue out at a painting and the painting threw itself off the wall and hit her in the face. Now that is some Scooby-Doo shit. I love it. I feel like, don't disrespect me. Yeah. I've been waiting for someone to stick their tongue out at me for hundreds of years. I like how since the 1800s sticking your tongue out at someone really is like... I guess so. Maybe it meant something way worse back then. Maybe. I wonder where it first came from. Like, what's the origin to sticking your tongue out of somebody? Maybe it's just innate. Interesting. Yeah. It's just like an innate reaction. There is a dark stain in the house that people think is blood. Oh. Which would mean that it has to be John's blood because nobody else ever lived there. Or someone who had an accident and didn't tell anybody on the tour. but apparently if you step on that blood stain people feel incredible dread yeah I mean I would argue most blood stains I step on wouldn't bring me joy that's a you know what why the fuck am I reporting this that's a great point that's a great point I'm just here to like be you know it's sort of like the view you're right I love a sounding board you know who on the view would you be I've never seen in my life I have no okay You'd be Christine. Got it. I wouldn't be on it because they'd be like, you're this, you know nothing of what's happening. Well, police have been called by locals thinking that somebody has gotten into the house after hours, but nobody's ever found. And one time a couple's car broke down in front of the house. They saw a light was on in the house. They went to go knock on the door for help. And they didn't hear anyone on the other side. And the light turned itself off in the window. like that's me when the like people door to door come to the door and i'm just like if i slide really slowly down the wall they'll never know i was here and they're staring right at me you know i know they're from a different era but they're very meant for today if they're like who the fuck is that the door for real like immediate panic when the doorbell rings um as they finished fixing the car though in horrific news they heard heavy breathing next to them and then the trunk opened itself slammed itself down and this is a quote then one by one all four doors opened and shut and the hood was slammed down one by one oh that's upsetting talk about cinematic that's that's some stupid shit yeah too much for me when the building was a bookstore the owners tried to sleep upstairs a few times and after like two times they never came back they wow they were like we heard so many doors slamming so many footsteps on the stairs they could never stay the night again in fact once it was dark they would close up shop and just go home and i'll end on this quote from the owner of the bookstore he said as soon as the sun starts to go down everybody is asked to leave and we take off too they were like i want nothing to do with that now it's their house it's their house now yeah this is cinematic and this is quite a movie like i would watch this this is cool i think so but i think it's at least very precious that like maybe they all did really find each other and yeah can you imagine being a ghost for decades and then you're like oh my god like now where do we live and it's like oh my god my i'm watching my husband across the street build this fucking giant thing as soon as he dies we're in like a porcelain a gorgeous porcelain with heated water i mean damn you think as a ghost she was like don't put that there and he couldn't hear so it's still a little fucked up write that down i'm gonna have to move that sconce to the others to the east facing wall he'll never understand he'll never understand he's gonna get all wrong i know but he's all we've got left we gotta just root for him he's nailing christine style curtains to the wall with a staple gun um anyway that's the laurel hall mansion very good very creepy thank you that is like dark and sad and weird it is i i know that was a bit i don't do a lot of bummers but um well whatever you know it reminds me of all those stories we've heard that i feel like are i mean maybe they are not less common but i feel like back then if you had such a such a i mean there was a lot of tragedy but if you had such a tragedy where you lost your both of your children and your wife and you didn't have like the resources and outlet you're a man you don't have like therapists you don't have like a group of buddies who are going to be open and like help you heal you know it's just like what are you going to do you have to have an outlet and like and there wasn't like the internet and like so right you don't know what to do if you were to go talk to somebody you'd have to wait like two or three weeks for their letter to get to you it's like so of course you fixate right you're like fixating on this project like this will fix this will help because it'll like make a place for us i mean it's sad but it's like kind of very human oh yeah it's something even with all the resources i currently have if my entire family died i can't promise i wouldn't lose it right yeah and then you think about back then it's like the lack of resources the different time culturally oh yeah oh and it was probably encouraged back then if there was if this was like the victorian mourning period they were like oh he's doing it right and if he's putting money into like the town and making they were like be sad keeping sad you doing great yeah oh wow sorry i didn mean to interrupt you so many times there but no what a what a story um thank you for sharing i gonna go blow my nose because i sure everyone's really sick of hearing me like try to quietly clear my throat um but after that i'll get out ghost tube maybe we can see who's around be wonderful who are we gonna talk to again john bowman oh we were gonna talk to him okay we can talk to whoever you want okay okay brb we have said it before but we cannot be more grateful for mint mobile they have been so helpful to us when we were on the road that really was so wonderful to have before that we were really struggling stop paying way too much for wireless just because that's how it's always been mint exists purely to fix that and same coverage same speed just without the inflated price tag it really has been such a gift to us we hope you also use it it really i i hope that you no longer have to struggle. And with a seven-day money-back guarantee and customer satisfaction ratings in the mid-90s, Mint makes it easy to try and see why people don't go back. If you're ready to stop paying for more than you have to, new customers can make the switch today for a limited time and get unlimited premium wireless for just $15 a month. Switch now at mintmobile.com slash ATWWD. That's mintmobile.com slash ATWWD. Uprunt payment of $45 for three months, $90 for six months, or $180 for 12-month plan guaranteed, $15 a month equivalent. Taxes and fees extra, initial plan term only. Only 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy. Capable device required. Availability, speed, and coverage varies. Additional terms apply. CementMobile.com. So I don't own a cat, but everybody in my circle owns cats. My childhood best friends own cats. My mom owns cats. Actually, my mom has the litter boxes in my room. Thanks so much, Mom. And every time I go home, she goes, I hope it doesn't smell like litter in there. And it always does. So what I'm going to do to prevent this problem from now on is I'm going to get my mom BoxyPro. What makes BoxyPro different is that in their cat litter, their formula has probiotics in it, which stops the bacteria that causes those odors. So you never have to smell your litter box ever again. So that means BoxyPro keeps the box continuously odor free infinitely. and all you have to do is scoop off the top. There's no dumping anymore and no wondering if your house smells gross to guests. So mom, you are welcome. And if you are like my mom and you're like, I hope it doesn't smell bad, get Boxy Pro and you don't have to worry about that. If you are tired of switching litters, looking for the one, get Boxy at B-O-X-I-E-C-A-T.com. It's the last litter you'll switch to. Enjoy 30% off with code drink at BoxyCat.com slash drink. That's B-O-X-I-E-C-A-T.com forward slash drink. All right. Thank you, everyone, for coming to this week's musicale. I got a bill. Yeah, we went in, yeah, we were hoping to talk to some ghosts. Not a single fucking ghost. Shut up. But Em played the theme song for a former tenant of the home they live in. Yeah. Resident of the home. Someone who lived here before me was quite the singer-songwriter. And we did get to listen to that. and the ghosts had nothing to say. I think they'd bounce. They're probably out over it. Yeah. All right. Well, I bummed you out for once. So I'm just really hoping you brought nothing but happiness today, Christine. I'm so glad that finally for once I can say, just kidding, I brought a really horrible story today. I'm going to blow my nose real quick. Sorry, Jack. Every time I blow my nose, I'm so sorry, but cut it out. Sure. Christine also did a really I'm assuming very good job on her notes because they apparently are very long they took a long time to get through there was like at least 15 pages worth of notes and so it took a lot of study and oh my word I'm proud of you I don't even know what your topic is yet but Christine sounded stressed about it so we're going to give her a round of applause thank you so much thank you thank you I appreciate it it was it was one of those where I started researching it I mean you know this and you've done this same scenario a million times but I was like oh this is pretty straightforward and then all of a sudden it's like I'm watching three-part docu-series and like I'm on newspapers.com taking clippings of like articles for I mean it is insane okay and I when I texted you to say it's too many pages it's 15 pages um and then i worked on them all day that day and at a certain point i looked down it was 19 pages and i went oh my god well that did the opposite of what i was hoping what's the average page count for your notes seven okay got it so like it's yeah so yeah seven is usual for me so 19 is not as crazy as if it was like yours are like one or something because you make them so tiny minor one but they're one in eight point font yeah exactly because you're a psychopath you're a normal person yeah sort of so this is the story of the tote family murders and i think part of the reason that there's so much about it is that it happened in 2019 so it's relatively recent and so there are just a lot there's a lot of coverage on it and there's a lot of coverage online about it i am i imagine the hardest stories for you to cover which tell me if I'm wrong but not just in the day and age of the internet and TikTok and everyone can like give their opinion but as soon as true crime podcasting became popular I would imagine that there's just almost too much information oh you're totally right because and I'm one of those people who's like the more info the better so I'm like adding like details like this is the movie they watch this is the you know this is the character like I was adding everything and at a certain point you just have to be like it's too much it's too much yeah so i would imagine i would personally out of fear want to stick with the ones that are that have less information so that way it's like a succinct story and like you don't feel bad about having a lot of information yeah that's what i thought i was doing but then you're right because once you realize like oh there's so much more it's like well i can't just cover half of it like i can't half-ass it you know um also i'm i opened my little mini d pep because i really need a little something a little treat you know you know what i found recently which is not common around here is a mr pib i fucking love mr pib i think i love mr p more than dr p i think i do too i although now it's called pib extra no the one i found is a full-blown classic mr pib pib extra was my favorite as a kid maybe i flipped him pib extra had like lightning on it wow i thought mr pib changed maybe not maybe not um i've never seen this logo before so i do think they rebranded i think you're right oh i just looked it up yeah for sure look at this it looks something like i remember but um i they don't make a lot of mr pibb out here i just never see it and i went was in the gas station i went what the hell is this and i bought six of them m of it okay wow tell me coca-cola brought mr pibb back in october 2025 nearly 24 years after discontinuing the original brand oh is that Because for a while it was just Pib Extra, and that was it. And then in late 2025, and in 2026 it's rolling out as Mr. Pib again throughout the nation. It sure is, and I am very excited about that. I was wondering, I was like, is this just a southern thing or something? Because I haven't seen Mr. Pib since I left. No, it's definitely not, but I'm glad it's coming back. I miss that shit. You eat that with a Snickers and a Twizzler and you're on a road trip and you're going to be awake all night, dude. You don't even talk to me, I'm so excited. You are not falling asleep at the wheel. That's what my stepdad always told me. Get a Pib Extra, or Mr. Pib, some Twizzlers and a Snickers bar, and you will not be falling asleep. I like a little Twix action. I would say a Twix and a Pib. Yum. Okay. So here are the dark tales of today. This is the Tote Filmy Murders. We've got this family. Of course they're picture perfect. Of course they light up a room. Of course, they are well-loved in town. They live in Connecticut. Their names are Tony and Megan. They're high school sweethearts from small-town Connecticut who built a very normal kind of middle-to-upper-class lifestyle. They met in high school. Tony was voted most likely to succeed as his superlative. He kind of fulfilled that. He earned a master's degree in physical therapy and opened his own practice in Colchester, Connecticut, which by the way, fun fact, is where Blaze worked at Blockbuster in high school in Colchester, Connecticut. Get out. Yeah, at the local Blockbuster. Still have the t-shirt. It's pretty cool. Fun. Yeah. So Megan, who also held a degree in physical therapy, was described by her friends as a gentle, kind-hearted soul. She was just a very empathetic, loving person who wanted more than anything to be a mother. by the late 2000s that dream came true they ended up having three kids it was Alexander also known as Alec Tyler and Zoe they were a very beloved family you know he coached youth soccer he volunteered at like a special needs school he just like a very in the mix kind of family um Megan homeschooled the kids but was very very insistent about taking them places traveling with them um cultural things to travel to meet other kids so they were still very social even though they were homeschooled um around 2017 the totes made a big life change that in hindsight marked the beginning of um kind of their downfall they moved from Connecticut to the town of Celebration florida do you know much about this town my mother's obsessed really she's obsessed oh my god that was one of her big like retirement dreams she's like one day maybe i'll just move to celebration florida i'm like okay girl that is the most like reagan era nonsense i've ever heard she you know it's stuck in her way sometimes celebration okay so if you're not familiar it's basically an upscale master planned community originally conceived by the walt disney company it's like right near disney world um it's like this storybook type town um the idea behind it was it's basically a social experiment is what it was described as like it's the your mom would just waltz right into a social experiment on purpose happily and she'd go i don't really know what that's all about but i'm loving this and i do not care um it's meant to be very story but it's to look like old school traditional americana disney vibes like just pristine green like like the chance to live in disney world like if you could it's like it looks like you're living on like i imagine main street usa yes and even the hospital is like disguised as like an old-timey hotel like you know it's just really something else um as someone who loves sets i'm not gonna sitting here and pretend like I wouldn't fucking eat that up. Oh, and fascinating. I mean, it's fascinating, and especially because it was created by this sort of, like, over committee who, like, kind of secretly – it's a little creepy. Like, the whole thing is a little creepy the way it was created. But, you know, everything's very whimsical. It's meant to encourage community, and they have, like, these little courtyards where people can gather. and you know apparently from what i saw um you can get from there to inside disney within six minutes holy shit yeah it's it's built for disney heads it really is just an extension of disney it's just okay and it's no longer owned by disney they sold it but it was originally owned by disney now it's just like right next to it and it sort of still vibes that same way imagine working at that hospital and like you need you need full access to like people rolling in and gurneys and there's just tourists coming in to take pictures oh my god and there's just like robin williams like in um in what's that movie is it patch adams patch adams with a clown nose and you're like no this is a real hospital please like get out of here a theme park anymore um so they moved there and they bought a home on a reserve place in celebration. They wanted to kind of have this like sunny, warm Florida dream, much like Linda. But of course, Tony, he's still working. So he's still tied to Connecticut in this way. He continues to run his physical therapy clinic up in Connecticut. Then he would commute down to Florida, which is not unheard of, you know, especially if you have the money for that kind of thing. He would fly down on weekends to be with his family. So that often meant he spent weekdays alone in Connecticut and weekends with his family in Florida. So I know I already kind of hinted at this, but in Connecticut, the family was very socially engaged, very active within their community. But in celebration, neighbors didn't really know them as well. They were more withdrawn. They kind of kept to themselves. They didn't dislike the family, but they just didn't know too much about them. They did know that Megan was a trained yoga instructor and physical therapist and was homeschooling her kids. but privately, which was not really known by neighbors or people on the surface, is that Megan had been dealing with some health challenges. So in 2017, according to Tony, during one of the family's frequent trips to Disney World, she was bitten by a tick and contracted Lyme disease. Yeah, and this became chronic, and Tony would later claim that Megan's health never fully recovered, that she suffered persistent pain, fatigue, even miscarriages, which led to bouts of depression. By 2019, some friends had noticed Megan had lost weight and become more subdued, like a less bright version of herself. Tony also started to change. He had once been, like, very fit and energetic and active. But very quickly, he had gained a significant amount of weight. He developed type 2 diabetes, which he attributed to stress. And things were struggling. And do you have a guess? Because I'd forgotten that I wrote the notes in this way, but it's an interesting question. Do you have a guess as to why, like her health decline appears to be related to Lyme disease. Do you have a guess as to what Tony's health decline has to do with? I would just guess something hormonal. I have no idea. Money. What? he was crashing and burning financially so he is gaining weight he's developing diabetes he's stress eating he's not taking care of himself he's not sleeping his cortisol i imagine is through the roof this fucking guy classic story finances can fuck you up he was grappling with a full-on financial crisis behind closed doors um in april 2019 federal agents from the u.s department of Health and Human Services opened an investigation into Tony's Connecticut physical therapy practice for health care fraud. Auditors discovered that Tony had been billing Medicaid and private insurers for therapy sessions that never happened, effectively charging patients for care they never received. Dang. Yeah. So it's just a lot of fraud? A lot of fraud. Okay. A lot of fraud. over time the fraudulent billing added up to about 130 000 in ill-gotten funds and by his own later admission he'd been using this income to like keep his family afloat financially um he had to help pay he had to pay the mortgage on the celebration house they went to disney world often basically they're living out of their means you know outside their means Tony had also taken out additional loans from financial firms so that was the excuse me the hundred some hundred thirty thousand dollars was um insurance fraud then the like for just an example he apparently filed um insurance claims for one patient for like 53 visits in like a four-month period and they hadn't come in once so like he is like pushing it. Like he's looking through wherever he can get. He's in full panic. He's in full panic. He's pushing it to the limit. And of course, it caught the eye of the feds. But in addition to the financial, the investment fraud, he's also taking out additional loans from financial firms. So in 2019, he was over $100,000 in debt, being sued by creditors for nonpayment. Court records in multiple states showed liens eviction notices and lawsuits so like the stress it makes my hit sweat just thinking about it the pressure was immense um and at first when they investigated and questioned him about the billing irregularities he maintained his innocence like he really tried to bluff his way out and it's like good luck guy like they've seen it all before oh my god yeah i'm stressing for him i know he told agents that Megan knew nothing about the scheme that she was totally out of it out of the picture about this he also said that his employees had nothing to do with it um he he confessed finally said okay yeah I I'm in a tough I'm in a tough place I'll cooperate this is my doing my wife had nothing to do with it my employees had nothing to do with it was all me so he took the blame and definitely the children of course did not know they were pretty young at this point at this point am i allowed to yeah yeah talk away am i allowed to pity him so far because it sounds like i you're allowed to do whatever you want baby i'm not gonna tell you what to think and feel well i just i so far i can't imagine you know i'm imagining he got into the fraud out of panicking like i mean think about that like stress like we've all been in like yeah well maybe not all of us but we've most of us have been in that financial stress of like how do you squeeze another penny out yeah i could see desperation doing crazy things oh yeah like and now your whole family is going to have to deal with the repercussions from that so in that way i do feel bad for him i don't i'm not defending the fraud but i can understand the fraud yeah i mean and it's like a tale as old as time right like you get in over your head you try to you try to borrow some money and then you need to borrow money to pay back that money that i mean it's Just like classic story. So just to give you an idea, the kids at this point, Alec was 13, the oldest. Tyler was 11. And then Zoe was four, just to give you an idea of like the ages of the kids. So they were not privy to this, right? Like they didn't know. They were just living their lives, going to Disney, probably having a good time. So he confessed. He said, my kids, my family, my employees had nothing to do with this. Essentially, he was living this double life, right? On the one hand, he's a family man, and he's taking his kids to Disney, and he's just like man about town. And then secretly, he's drowning in debt and legal trouble and the friends are after him. By late 2019, Tony's Precarious Balancing Act was heading toward disaster because his license to practice physical therapy had expired in September 2019 after he failed to renew it. And he's still at the office, and his clinic is faltering. One office had been evicted because he didn't pay rent. Patient appointments were being canceled because he was just calling and saying, personal reasons, I can't do your appointment. I mean, he doesn't have a license to even practice anymore. And he's just hiding that information. Totally. And so around Thanksgiving of 2019, his business is pretty much collapsing. The feds are like, we need to talk to you about this and get this figured out. And he says, okay, okay, yes, I will talk to you about this, but I have to go to Florida for Thanksgiving. I'll be back by December 8th is what he tells them. So meanwhile in Florida, the Toots had moved into a rental home in the North Village area of Celebration, which is a different house that they had been in. But by December, they were also behind on the rent there. I know. It's just like this stress. And his wife still has no idea. As far as we know. As far as we know. Wow. The federal agents said they did not believe Megan had any knowledge of this. And I feel so bad for her, too, in hindsight, being like, oh, I was, like, saying let's go on all these trips or let's do this or we should get this for this kid's birthday presents. Like, he was totally panicking. Yeah. And she's sick. So on December 26, 2019, the day after Christmas, yikes, the Osceola County Sheriff's Office posted an eviction summons on the totes door for failure to pay rent. and Tony essentially knew that federal agents were closing in, and there wasn't really much else he could do. Like, time was running out. He said he was going back by December 8th. The clock is ticking. It's end of November. But, of course, they tried to maintain some sense of normalcy. For the first time in years, they decided not to travel back to Connecticut for the holidays, which they usually went back to Connecticut for family events like Christmas, you know to see family to be in like the winter weather the snow um oh apparently celebration florida also like puts out fake snow like in um winter months like they like put well you gotta there's no snow coming and they also um type bird songs through hidden speakers throughout oh my god oh my god i mean it does feel it i like how there's two feels disney there's two trains of thought here because you say creepy i think that sounds magical yeah right i know i know so you're like you're like i'm into it actually i could understand the for the aesthetic i get they're committing to a bit i love committing to a bit you know what i can't fault you for that that's beautiful all right so back to this so they're trying to maintain like some sense of normalcy um at this point you have to imagine that megan knew at least about the rent payments right because if they have eviction notices on the door like she's got to have some understanding i would think that things are not quite as picture perfect as they seem right so they decide to um not go to new england this year to see relatives but stay in the sunshine for the 2019 holidays on December 14, 2019, Alec and Tyler participated in a music recital. They were gifted musicians at their school in celebration. It was a holiday concert showcasing talented kids in the community. That night, 13-year-old Alec received a special commendation for his piano and violin performances. 11-year-old Tyler earned an award for his skills on piano and guitar. There's some really cute photos of the brothers smiling and holding their little awards. and then I know it's really sweet and then Zoe age four won a free year of dance lessons in a raffle and was like beside herself with delight because she just loved she was like a little princess like she loved to twirl and um a year of dance lessons was so exciting no one realized this would be the last time that the tote children were ever seen alive in public oh Oh, big shift from where I thought we were heading. Okay. My bad. Okay. So I've got my thoughts immediately, but I'm going to let you carry on on. Thanks. In the coming days, some neighbors believed they saw the family preparing for a trip. One neighbor later told police they observed the Toad's SUV packed with belongings, and they did see the SUV drive away from the home on December 15th, and it's unclear where they were going, if anywhere, But Tony had told various people about an upcoming educational, like, homeschool trip to St. Augustine. And so that's where people and family members thought they were going. For months, Megan had mentioned to relatives that she and Tony wanted to take the boys to St. Augustine as a learning adventure. And so, you know, the plan was to go after Christmas once everyone was feeling better from the colds they had. um so as the christmas 2019 approached the toads communication with extended family became like a little bit dicey like sporadic and a little bit off right so about a week before christmas megan's aunt in connecticut cynthia or cindy copco received a text from tony so this would be her niece's husband her nephew-in-law received a text from tony that struck her as a bit unusual Tony told Cindy that the family was leaving for a short vacation and would be going off the grid and that they would be turning their phones off for a while. Uh-oh. I know. Red flag. He specifically said not to worry if no one could reach them. Given that Cindy was both Megan's aunt and godmother and one of her closest confidants, this was a little bit jarring. It wasn't, like, unheard of. Like, she was like, well, I could picture them doing, like, a tech-free getaway with the kids, right? Sure. Something like that. Sometime around December 22nd, Tony sent another update claiming the family had arrived in northern Florida en route to St. Augustine, but that, oops, Megan had lost her phone, so she won't be able to talk to you. Oh, okay. Soon after, a message came from Megan's own phone. That's weird. Didn't she lose it? That's a great point. To Aunt Cindy. And this time, the text said that the entire family had come down with a terrible flu. Quote, They've had the flu for probably a couple weeks. They were really down and out during Christmas, is how Cindy later remembered the message. The text explained they were delaying the St. Augustine excursion until everyone recovered, which is like, weren't you just on the way there, and then you lost your phone, and now you're home and saying you're delaying the trip. It's just weird. It's all weird. It said, we're just going to wait until we're over this, and then we're going to head out. Initially, these explanations didn't totally raise red flags. I mean, we know, I know personally how rough flu season can be and, like, it can literally incapacitate a whole family, even if not everyone's sick. Yeah, everyone can be put out. Totally. It made sense that the trip might be postponed if anybody was sick. But in hindsight, Aunt Cindy just felt like something was off, especially because she never heard Megan's voice on the phone. And they always called. Cindy is like, this ain't right, dude. She's like, I got a feeling in my gut and my gut's not wrong. And my gut's never wrong. She was a little concerned that Megan never called because they always talked on at least Christmas Day. But there was just silence on the other end. And when she asked if they could talk, Megan would say, oh, I'm too sick to talk on the phone. I mean, hello. Have we never been in MySpace era? We know. I want you to say it again because my webcam's broken. Bullshit. I need a clear hit of that so I can use it as a text tone later. I need you to go, I mean, hello. I mean, hello. I mean, hello, have we not been around the MySpace era? Like, you know, if somebody is catfishing you, that's what they say. They say, my webcam's broken. Oh, I'm too sick to talk on the phone. That's what I did. I broke up with a boyfriend that way. Am I proud of it? No. But did I know what I was doing? Absolutely. We're mean, not idiots. Right. I'm socially averse to any sort of conflict. Not an idiot. Maybe a little bit. There's a lot of things I am. Stupid ain't one of them. Stupid ain't one of them, okay? I know when someone's catfishing someone. so Cindy's concerned as she should be that Megan does not want to talk Megan's too sick to talk Megan the kids are too sick to talk no one can talk to her it's Christmas day they're not up in Connecticut as usual things are just like a little bit concerning at one point a family member texted Tony this is a huge red flag asking for photos of the kids opening their presents on Christmas morning I mean that's like a normal thing right like I always sure with my family members I'm like oh what did so and so get and i want to send pictures of like leona opening things it's just part of like family culture yeah so people ask for photos of the kids opening the presents and tony replies oh the kids are still sleeping on christmas morning huh i mean i'm just i'm just trying to i'm trying to come up with an excuse here and i can see if i were a parent it's christmas i still don't really want to wake up early so maybe we're all just late late bloomers i never want to wake up early either and leona sleeps till nine guess who woke up at 5 30 a.m on christmas morning and said a man santa came no leona i thought i was expecting a geo or a blaze in there no a blaze was incapacitated with the world's worst super flu and i was santa it was a nightmare so she wakes up at 5 30 and i'm like i just went to bed i really can't do this i thought you were going to sleep till at least eight for me nope so kids like lose all sense of like sleeping in on christmas okay as far as i'm concerned a four-year-old an eight-year-old 11-year-old i don't think they're sleeping in late but maybe listen maybe but if that's the case i want to add to that he never sent photos it's not like later that day or the next day he sent photos like there's nothing that's a great point i had not looked at it through the eyes of a of someone who is responsible for a child 24 7 um you're totally right that they you tell them santa's gonna be here and you get a day of opening presents yeah there's like dozens of presents downstairs for you i and cinnamon rolls and no school come on that sounds nice i could use that right now that sounds great really good that's really nice that was really good no you're totally right okay so the assumption now where where we are where we are hindsight is that they are probably already gone by christmas Correct. Okay. Correct. Tragically, yes. Em and I have spent a lot of time in a lot of airports, haven't we, Em? We sure have. We've flown this away and also that away. And round and round and back again. Stop hunting for sketchy airport Wi-Fi or waiting in long lines for a local SIM card the second you land. I remember in Egypt, a few people in my group were not prepared. I had to introduce them to Saley, the game-changing eSIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Again, another favorite of mine, Saley is on a mission to make international travel stress-free by offering affordable data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. And unlike other apps, you only need to install a Saley eSIM one time. There's no need to set up a new one for every country you visit. I remember way back when, if my family and I were traveling internationally, you just bought walkie-talkies. You were like, I don't even want to deal with the phone. Oh, I didn't even think that. That's really smart, actually. I'd never even considered that. We were just buying these things, and sometimes they would be scams, and then you'd lose your money. It was just, it's always, it was never easy until now. Thank God. Until now. And Saley offers 24-7 chat support and provides a full refund if your device isn't eSIM compatible. You can download Saley in the App Store or by scanning the QR code on the screen. Use code DRINK at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. And the details are in the podcast episode description box. So, the kids are sleeping in, but then he never sent photos anyway. And, like, this is not in character. Usually Megan is sending everyone photos. Usually Megan is, like, uploading pictures, taking videos. Like, this is her bread and butter. This is what they live for. But no, nothing. Quiet. The extended family began to suspect, of course, that something about Tony's story was not adding up. In Connecticut, Tony's sister, Chrissy, was especially uneasy because she'd always been really close with her brother and his kids, and she had been texting Tony through late December. And at first he said, you know, we have the flu. We'll be fine. But by the last week of the year, his replies kind of stopped and she started to get worried. So December 29th, 2019, Chrissy was too worried. She placed a call to the Osceola County Sheriff's Office asking them to conduct a welfare check. She said, I'm wondering if someone can do a wellness check on my brother and his family. They've been really sick for the past week and a half and I can't seem to get a hold of them. She mentioned she'd been texting with Tony a few days prior, but he stopped replying and didn't call when he said he would. The only person anyone had managed to contact in the family was Tony himself. Neither Megan nor the children had been heard from directly in some time. So she's worried, and she tells the 911 operator they take this seriously. They send deputies to 202 Reserve Place, and two deputies knock on the door, but they get no answer. The house is quiet. The window shades are down. There's nothing obviously wrong. They check around the perimeter. They speak to a few neighbors who say they haven't seen the Tote family in a while, maybe since before Christmas. There's no sign of forced entry. They look through the door. There's still a Christmas tree standing inside, but there's nobody there. And so they're just thinking, oh, well, they're probably on a trip or, you know, celebration like you were saying about Linda. Like, it's sort of a place, it's oftentimes like a place you go in the winter, right? You're like a snowbird. Like, you go there because, so even though it's Christmas time, maybe they went somewhere for the holidays and they'll be back. Like, maybe this is the secondary home. You even said, like, oh, they decided to stay home for the holidays, but they would usually go somewhere else. So it's easy to assume that they went somewhere else. Or, like, friends invited them over or something. Exactly. And the neighbors said, like, oh, we don't know them that well. And, you know, they're in and out. So it's, like, it's not that jarring or shocking. So they left. They read a report. Nobody answered. Nothing looked amiss. It didn't even look like anyone was home. But the family was not reassured by this. I think I would imagine it made them more uneasy, right? Yeah. It's like nobody answered the phone. It would make me. Also, you was, this is, tell me if I'm crazy here, but I would think on Christmas, you, even if you're not looking at your phone, you have your phone nearby because you always like call family to say Merry Christmas and things like that. So you would. In 2019, like we're all in touch at that time. Yeah. You're at least sending out a mass text message saying Merry Christmas or one of those chains where it's like dirty, nasty Santa Claus or whatever. Do you know about those? Yes. squirt squirt in my stocking and it's like what the fuck renee why the fuck would you send this to me we're 34 years old and i have a child stop sending me this shit you've been a naughty elf or whatever oh yeah tongue emoji tongue emoji squirt emoji i mean jesus christ these fucking things i've been getting these since like ninth grade and they still come every year i'm telling you santa wants your cookies you gotta do shut the fuck up who's the first who's the person let's get baked you know yeah who's the person in your life that sends those to you oh man there's a lot uh one of them one of them is uh my friend Kai one of them is my cousin one of them is someone back home um but then I'm usually it's usually in my friend Cole someone in his family sends it to me it's not always do that that feels right um it's a lot of people I nice to know that it's it's just immediately went to Renee for you. Literally Renee. One time Eva's partner, Ray sent one and I went like, Oh, that's different from the one I got from Renee. And Ray goes, Oh, I made this one. And I went, you. I was like, you don't understand now. This is next level. You made that one. Oh no, no, no. No. I wonder usually copied pastas, you know, I, uh, and I was like, never again, never again. I will block you forever. i'm gonna do my best to just stop speaking because otherwise i'm just gonna talk about every holiday at least one gets sent to me and they're always worse than the last one and then like it's always what you least expect i'm like oh shamrock in the bed and i'm like why is there a fucking the leprechaun ones are especially odd leprechaun ones are like make me like the pot of gold you know so uncomfy dude uh anyway i hate the rainbow my god it gets like out of control this shit just if you guys don't know what we're talking about consider yourself so lucky that you don't have like disgusting psycho friends because like it's for me it really is just mostly renee but she will send like she'll i'm assuming get them from probably 16 of her friends because that's just the kind of circle she rolls in circles like you do love that and then forward them to people who they know are going to feel uncomfy. And there are always these weird long diatribes with a lot of emojis, and they're just, like, deeply uncomfortable. It's like they try to be as X-rated as possible. It's like the old email chains where it's like, if you can send this to six people, then bad luck forever. And it's – so then you just go – I mean, Santa's elves won't blow you. And it's like – I don't want that. To reel it back in, all this to say, in 2019, one of those was probably getting sent to her phone or something like that. You have your phone available in 2019 Christmas morning to at least say hi to somebody or to see elves will blow you, you know? You know, you got to know. And honestly, you think about it, too. Like you're in group chats, right? Like they're so sociable with their town, with their neighbors, with their family, extended family. They're in group chats. Someone has to know where they are or like or be able to reach them to say Merry Christmas. You think so. And like if they're in a bunch of group chats and not responding to a single one, like that's just shady. so Chrissy calls for this welfare check you know they go there they don't notice anything but the family doesn't feel particularly reassured over the next several days multiple parties were trying to locate the family the property manager of the home in celebration grew concerned especially after finding a Facebook group called finding the tote family like someone was looking for them and she the landlord found this Facebook group and was like oh shit because she was trying to get the eviction notice to them and say like you owe us rent and now she's seeing like oh i don't even know and she knew of course that they had kids so she's starting to get really worried yeah um the property manager contacted authorities separately asking them to check the house mentioning nothing had been heard from uh from the family and so multiple people are reaching out to say like they're concerned meanwhile up in connecticut federal agents are actively hunting for tony not because of the missing persons reports but because his fraud case ding ding ding it's well past december 8th remember when he promised he would be back and now it's after christmas and they're like that's bad buddy where are you you promise you pinky promised us speaking of like his cortisol levels through the roof just because he was like having financial problems imagine now trying to escape so this like the feds the fbi how has he not had a heart attack from the stress yet well that why his health just like plummeted you know Like people noticed he was just like crashing and burning Agents from the FBI field office in New Haven and from HHS were aware that Tony had this home in Florida and suspected he might be hiding out there. So an FBI agent placed multiple calls to the Osceola Sheriff's Office in early January, alerting them that this guy, that now they're sort of starting to become familiar with this family because people keep calling for wellness checks, that kind of thing. Now, the FBI calls and says, hey, just so you know, they have a federal arrest warrant out for Anthony Tote, and he could be down there in that celebration house because he's not up here. So a team of federal agents quietly went to the Tote residence on January 9, 2020. They hoped to find Tony, arrest him on the health care fraud, and then put to rest all these other concerns people were having. But there was no answer at the door, and it's been reported that agents did not see any movement. So, again, they just kind of had to let it go. And now weeks have passed. Two weeks have passed since anyone had heard Megan's voice or seen the children. At that point, her sister has got to be, like, in PI mode. Oh, my word. So it's his sister and her aunt, just for clarity's sake. But, yeah, only because it becomes more relevant who's related to whom later. But you're right. Like, the dread must be. People are absolutely talking around town now, being like, have you seen them? Really worried. Really worried. Especially because up there in Connecticut, like, the employees are not being paid. There's just, like, fucking appointments are canceled. He's gone. The kids are gone. The school? The school is, like, probably going to know where they are soon? Mm-hmm. So on January 13, 2020, things escalate again. That morning, Chrissy calls the police. She's in Connecticut. She calls Florida police. She's now sounding a lot more urgent. You can listen to these calls online. She tells the dispatcher that her worries have increased. And in the second call, she reveals a chilling new detail. She says, and I quote, just in conversations with my sister-in-law, Megan, was making a comment basically that the world is ending on December 28th and nobody has talked to them, she said. so she tells them nobody had physically talked to megan since december 26th and that was just i believe a text message um so we don't even know if that was her right and the comment about the world ending on the 28th was a little alarming and now that they're kind of going weeks without hearing from them she's starting to wonder if that has anything to do with it like if there There was some delusion happening. Sure. Did she have mental illness in her? Not that we know of. No, no, nothing. Nothing in her history. Additionally, Chrissy pointed out that Tony had also stopped texting as of Monday, January 6th. Basically, radio silence. So the Osceola County Sheriff's Office and federal agents decided to coordinate this time to serve an arrest warrant on Tony that very day and do another welfare check and enter the premises if they have to. So January 13th, a team of plainclothes agents from the officer of inspector general staked out the Tote residence on reserve place accompanied by sheriff's deputies. They believe Tony was probably inside. After a short period of surveillance, the agents saw movement. Tony Tote himself emerged onto the porch looking disheveled and dazed, blinking in the daylight. It looked like he was struggling to walk. He had some sort of a limp. Hmm. The agents originally were going to just go right up when he was outside, but he clocked them. They made eye contact. So he noticed their presence, darted back inside, and shut the door. Do you think they watched him just slowly backtrack in? 100%. Oh, he looks pretty guilty. Just scooch back on, click the door locked. So, of course, now they don't want to stand off, so they decide to enter. They knock. They announce themselves. When Tony doesn't reopen the door, they get a spare key, they unlock the door, and they step in immediately, being hit by the pungent odor of decomposition. Yeah. It was a smell everybody recognized on the team, unfortunately. The foyer opened onto a staircase, and at the top of the staircase, by the way, the house had all the curtains drawn. It was dark. It was dim. It was just creepy. and then there's Tony standing at the top of the stairs in a t-shirt in his underwear and he's leaning against the wall for support mumbling incoherently agents start to ascend the stairs and he slurred don't touch me all fall huh he's just being um dramatic yeah okay agent Melissa O'Neill calls out Tony where's Megan where are the kids and Tony says Megan is upstairs sleeping forever probably because yeah the smell of decomp how do you he either he knows i mean obviously he knows he's lying but either he thinks he's really getting away with it which tells you he hasn't left in a long time because he doesn't recognize the smell but he just right oh i hadn't thought of that you know he probably just doesn't even realize that they can smell it yeah maybe he thinks he got away with it there but like there's no way because i was thinking like how stupid is he but you're right like if he was maybe used to any thought like oh i'll just get them out of the house and then i can like which means he's just been sitting in that house for days if he doesn't even smell it weeks oh you're right unfortunately i am right he calls out her name he goes meg megan this fucking guy what do you like at some point you have to feel stupid doing this like you i sure hope so come on at the very least um as if like beckoning her right and then they say where are the children and he mumbles that he's not sure maybe they had a sleepover last night but he can't remember he had a sleepover with his fucking wife and kids what are you talking about no no he's saying maybe the they said where are the kids and he said i think Maybe they went to a sleepover last night? I'm not sure. Really? Really? Okay. Tony's affect was very detached and strange. He was sort of acting like he's in a trance. So they escort him down the stairs, all wobbly. They take him outside onto the porch while the others, you know, of course, rush in to look for Megan and the kids. Agents O'Neill and Jim Newin led the way upstairs. And when they got up there, they noticed the primary bedroom door was wide open. So they glanced in and they saw a pile of blankets on the king size bed, some bundled objects on a mattress on the floor. But when they looked closer, they could see a pair of human feet protruding from under one blanket and beside it what looked like the shape of a body midsection under another cover. And they realized pretty quickly they were looking at multiple bodies. the first identified was 42 year old megan tote lying on the bed on her back heavily decomposed she was discolored uh the heat down there the ac had been off oh my god her skin aiden o'neill described had turned black as leather i mean they're basically like yeah i mean they're decomposing fully bodies in the bed for weeks in the for weeks oh my god Clutched in one of Megan's hands was a rosary with a crucifix as if she had either died praying or someone had placed it there. Yeah. Take a fucking guess. For like forgiveness or something. Yucko. Next to Megan on the bed under layers of blankets were the remains of her two children. This is really hard to listen to people if you haven't already guessed. So just a heads up. Alec, 13, and Tyler, 11, were found side by side on a mattress placed on the floor next to the bed. It appeared as though someone had moved the boys' bodies from their own bedrooms into their parents' room, laid them there, and then covered them with blankets and put a crucifix or rosary in their hands. It's like a symbolic funeral in some way by putting them all together. Also, probably to keep the smell contained for a second at one point in the bedroom. No. No? Because he hung out in this room. What? They found snack wrappers. They found, like, he had been just, like, hanging out in there. this is like the most fucked up version of the story I just told of the man building, like, like wanting a mausoleum. Oh, you're right. You're right. I hadn't even thought, I hadn't even put that together. Except he did it right. He did it the right way. He didn't kill him. How heinous to be like, you have such a beautiful thing and now you, how do you even, I, this is not what's important, but I also can't get past. You are going to get so, please ask because I have the amount, when I tell you sincerely I stayed up till 3 a.m. for I think four total days doing these notes like it is I'm so proud of you slowly killing me and that's probably why I'm not healed from my illness yet yeah um but I got really invested in the details so if you have a question please feel free well I mean my the first thing that is like just coming to mind is just like biologically like like the the bacteria in the air that you're just sitting there and eating snacks and like like you're just eating particles i imagine like it's just there's even a receipt where we can see what snacks he bought fair i ask peanut m&ms i don't know what i expected i don't know what i don't know i don't know what i thought like i have chips i don't fucking know like what do you eat next to your dead fucking family imagine you should be able to eat anything imagine being like what am i hungry for and it's like really and also by the way he had a receipt meaning he went out and bought them thank you i was about to say did he like oh um i have so many fucking this is where i'm why whatever information you have you're not thank you whatever you have because i don't need to ask what's next someone's wondering that's right because when people say like oh he went out of the house i'm like where guess what i'll spoil one for you now he went to starbucks what the fuck are you doing at starbucks and that's one of those thoughts where i'm always like oh i wonder how many murderers i've walked past in my life it's like imagine being working at starbucks you're like how many murderers have i served to like yeah you're like a body in their house right now a fat free cappuccino for this fucking guy and he just murdered his whole he's going home why does he smell so bad because he's been like living in a bedroom with his family i mean it's like i literally think this way there are so many times where i drive it's only because i've watched so much law and order but i'll be driving on the road i'm like how many houses am i driving past right now that have someone like in the basement like oh yeah held hostage it but then we feel like that come out and it's like so unsettling like the chances are at least one if it's happening in celebration florida like the most like happy place on earth or whatever the fuck you know like it's just really dark i yeah i wonder how many people i've walked past that are like who need help and i didn't know like it's it's i don't know why i do that to myself haunting but but imagine being that starbucks person later who's like i fucking knew it that guy smelled like a dead body like he's like and of course something was wrong with this guy or even more unsettling perhaps i didn't notice it notice anything was wrong he was super friendly and fine you are in case you're like trying to withhold information to like speed up the story people want the details so okay good because it's gonna but it's gonna be at the very least a two-parter i'm sorry in advance but it has to be but i'm i'm also glad that you even said like oh he went out to cbs because my first thought was like were people coming to the house and didn't know or did or smelled it and didn't report it or so that that's good to know that he was leaving but also how can you if i left my house and there were dead bodies in there and i whether or not i was responsible for the deaths of them i would be fucking out of my mind paranoid that someone was about to knock on the door and walk right in while i'm gone this is that same thing that we always hit on which is that people like this they're so they think that they're just gonna get away with it did he really think he was gonna get away with it because it sounds like he was full-blown panicking knowing eventually he wouldn't be getting away with it and how do you how dare how do you think you're gonna get away with it when like people are do you really think people aren't gonna ask where they fucking went like what was literally i don't understand i don't get if you if you lived in the middle of bumfuck nowhere nowhere and nobody and they had no friends you would successfully isolated all of them you told everyone that they died years ago or something maybe you'll get away with maybe for a few years maybe forever there's no way when you live in a bustling community where you are active with children who go to school and a wife who is involved in your family and you're ordering on a tuesday i don't understand like it's not just narcissism at that point it's like a illusion all blown you something is it's got a illusion right like it's got to be because you're right like even narcissists don't want to get like they're not stupid right like you can see like oh shit yeah exactly no that's a really good point like when you think like it's you didn't it didn't cross your mind for a second that someone was gonna wonder ever ever don't worry don't worry here's what where i tell you that he's got it all figured out oh my fucking god okay i know i know you're wrong let's hear it so here it sounds like oh how could you ever explain this away but don't worry he's got an explanation okay so he's like maybe the kids are to sleep over uh-huh sure and he when he said that he went i planned that one that's a good yeah i thought about that one i nailed that now they're never yeah nailed it so just so sick just so sick um so the bodies are all in one room sorry the reason that that got into turned into a tangent was because you said oh maybe it was to put them all in one room to contain the smell and i said no because unfortunately he was also like living in that room with them which was he sleeping in there i don't know i think probably like next to his decomposing wife i don't think in the bed i think it was insinuated that he spent time in there like regularly but maybe not that he slept in there i i'm back to the bacteria thing i couldn't open my mouth in there like i feel like i'd breathe i'm breathing it in i know i don't think i could so much like imagine it like i don't even know if i would like i can't i can't imagine it but i know i would like the smell alone not even the bacteria but just the smell would take your breath away you couldn't be in that room for long unless you really had totally but i wonder to it well that's what i wonder i wonder if it's gradual if you do just kind of get accustomed to i don't know i don't know the answer to that but i mean also then you could argue like if he had any remorse at all like if right i don't even want to think about it being my family but it wouldn't matter to me what they smelled like i'd want to be near my fucking family and maybe did he have some sort of like i know you're going to talk about this and people just want the story to get moving but no no no tell me is was there did he have a plan to eventually move them and was he just keeping them there while he grieved because like we don't even it's like he didn't because part of it's like i couldn't i couldn't move someone would have to physically move my parents body out of the he was not let's just say he was not planning on moving them as far as i can tell okay sorry he may he may have planned to eventually try and flee but also he spent weeks there so it's like you had plenty of time to flee i don't know Was he hoping they would, like, I know this is so fucked up. I'm so sorry to everybody listening. But, like, what if I? Like, was he hoping they would just decomp so badly, eventually they'd go away, and then he wouldn't have to worry about it? I mean, there would be skeletons, though. I don't know anymore. I feel like I'm trying to make sense out of something that does not make fucking sense. And he makes it very clear in every sort of writing that he ever does, which is far too much, in my opinion, that he's a doctor. He wants it to remind everyone. Huh? So, remember how he's a doctor? I forgot after everything else you told me. I know, but, like, this guy's a fucking doctor, and he makes sure to remind you. And his wife is, too, by the way, but, okay, I guess we're just going to talk about him. Yeah, she definitely didn't. I'm going to agree with the consensus that she did not know anything was going on. She wasn't in on it. No, no, no. So, at first, this is, again, really heavy and hard to hear. At first, they couldn't find Zoe, the four-year-old. So, they searched the house. They looked everywhere. They looked in the fridge, in the freezer. Like, they didn't know where to look. They looked everywhere. They were hoping, of course, like, maybe she's out somewhere. Maybe she is okay. But they checked again, and they found this time in the primary bedroom that there was another little blanket at the foot of the bed near Megan's feet. Oh, my God. I know. And that's where Zoe was. She had been laid beneath her mother's legs at the foot of the bed. and due to decomp um it was it had just been hard to find her at first because she was so small my god how she was i just want to make sure i'm getting that right she was so badly decomposed they couldn't find her originally yeah she's four something similar happened to the family dog breezy who was also found in that room um the fluffy white dog lying on her side in her dog bed in a corner of the primary bedroom mostly decomposed just a horror show right to walk in on um seasoned law enforcement officers were overcome by the horror of this um just completely in shock uh the medical examiner later noted the bodies were partially mummified consistent with having being dead since late December. Investigators noted other eerie details in the bedroom. For example, all the victims had been carefully wrapped in blankets like they were asleep. The children's bodies were like holding, like I said, a rosary, a crucifix. Did he just go out and buy a bunch of crucifixes or did they happen to already own them? I think they had them. I think it was just they were Catholic. um nearby lay a small shrine of family photos and like a printed out poem about like why god made little boys and like a trophy like they're like all their favorite things and toys and dolls um now the only living being found in the house was tony himself who was of course now in handcuffs outside being tended to by deputies and when they brought him out he started dry heaving and sweating he insisted he was not well so they called an ambulance and paramedics soon learned why he was groggy he admitted he had ingested a large amount of benadryl an entire bottle's worth in an attempt to kill himself so investigators found empty packaging of children's liquid benadryl in the home like family size bottles as well as crushed benadryl tablets and empty tylenol pm bottle in the kitchen trash there was also a typed suicide note um that they found that was apparently written by the whole family like what we and like we've decided that this will be in a better place oh fuck you yeah so he obviously wrote it on their behalf and then planned on doing it to himself and then couldn't get go through with it correct beautiful it said everyone was in a better place no longer suffering that they asked the children and the children agreed shut the fuck up what do you make you want to fucking scream like the fan yeah you ask a four-year-old hey if mommy daddy dies would you want to be would you want to be here alone of course they're going to be like no also like you know he didn't fucking ask any of them well fair enough yeah that that that story is besides the point right exactly i know like he he clearly like but that does prove like he clearly thought that he had a good plan it's like oh yeah you couldn't have written that and thought this this uh this makes me look a lot more innocent like this is well they gave me permission to kill them well they they volunteered for this they asked for it she gets she gets to decide she's four like what the fuck are you on about what are you talking about oh my god so they find this fucking letter and it's like so long and wordy and like kind of unhinged and it talks about the end of the world and it's like we're all in a better place because it's the end of the world yada yada we wanted to be together and die together so that we'd be together forever in the afterlife it's just nonsense so tony was taken to the hospital for treatment about this overdose um he apparently had taken over 40 times the normal therapeutic level of diphenhydramine which is benadryl's active ingredient um he had apparently it had appeared to them that he had been consuming Benadryl over multiple days to keep himself sedated or slowly poison himself didn't work barely 48 hours later with Tony medically stabilized Osceola County detectives sat him down for a formal interview to be like hey bud what the fuck is going on they read him his rights and began asking the question that had to be asked which is Tony what happened to your family and they asked for it that's what it's in the letter it's in the just read did you read the letter yeah it sounds like you don't know how to read this could have been an email check the letter no what followed was a shocking confession oh tony freely admitted to murdering his wife his three children and their dog breezy in a calm detailed voice captured on a taped recording tony explained that he had done it out of love and a desire to save them He claimed that he and Megan had made a mutual pact. They were convinced, he said, that an apocalypse was imminent and that by ending their lives, they could all pass over together to the other side before the cataclysm. He basically then continued to describe step by step how this family annihilation was carried out. I'm not going to read every detail because it's pretty heinous, but I'll read most of it. Tony said that in mid-December 2019, he and Megan agreed everybody needed to die so they could maintain their unity in the afterlife. On a chosen night just before Christmas, they set the plan in motion. And according to Tony, he was the one who physically killed the children one by one. in the recording he gives graphic details about oh oh it's really rough uh suffocating his own children um and then stabbing them in the abdomen with a kitchen knife to ensure they were dead he did the same thing to all three of his children until they were motionless and weirdly enough um just side note later autopsy showed that the stab wounds were post-mortem which is strange to me i don't know how it got worse but okay yeah i don't i don't know what that's about though like why why like just double check or is it like to like stage something i don't know maybe to stage something or like maybe like when he like i'm imagining he's snapped as they say um and maybe when he realized what he actually did he reacted again i don't know yeah yeah it says yeah I mean people can only hypothesize that like he was just trying to be sure that he had done it yeah yeah done it all the way through throughout this recitation Tony remained eerily composed uh just talking through it like nonchalantly pretty much in his confession Tony painted Megan as a willing participant in the plan um he claimed that after he killed the children Megan turned the knife on herself and stabbed herself in the abdomen bullshit I know when those wounds didn't immediately kill her Tony said he felt he had to finish the job out of mercy or spiritual necessity quote I put my hands over her mouth and a pillow over top of her until she stopped moving uh after that according to Tony he noticed Megan was somehow still alive uh so So in a rather cold side note, he added he needed to save her soul so she would see her children on the other side as they had planned. So he needed to make sure that they were all goners, including the dog, because, of course, the dog was a member of the family and they wanted the dog to be with them in the afterlife. uh couldn't just like i mean i get i i guess i get that ass logic but like we can just like send him somewhere no no no no yeah why kill the dog tony's answer i wanted the dog to be with us i wanted her to be with us too because dogs have soul as well souls as well so um what how much of that do you believe in the in terms of like the religious zero okay i also think zero i it's a good question because some people wonder because it's unclear like i'll be honest like we still don't totally know if any of that was true i call complete and utter bullshit that's my own opinion i i feel like that was just the cover he came up with and he texted the the family member like oh the world's ending so that way it looked like it was so it looked like it she was in on it as well right and i watched some creators cover the story and say like well why would she say that the earth the world is ending like was that really part of it and i was just screaming at my computer that wasn't her i can promise you that wasn't her and also planting seeds for his fucking weird ass story he was inventing in this on the spot and also if it was her like and she really believed that like he did quote then she wouldn't have said anything because they'd hidden it up until this point why say anything right before you're about to end it all that's the other thing it's like either you would be telling people like don't worry we're going to a better place i really believe this and you should listen to me too or if you had hidden it for a reason you'd fucking probably keep it that way so yeah right it doesn't really make sense or if you really believe that you would be trying to recruit people you also love so everybody exactly yeah so bullshit and i think it sounds like classic family annihilator where he just absolutely snapped at the financial issues. Killed them all because he thought that it was just easier. He was going to help. He was helping them by taking them out of the suffering that he's enduring or something. And then he was like, that's what he told himself. And I got to make it religious. Yeah. Now I get to start over without all these burdens on me. You know. A sick wife, three kids. And also for weeks, like he had to have been sitting and pondering, like, how do I get rid of the evidence? Like, it's wild that he wasn't proactive at all in any of this like i don't know if that's even the right word but like if you did this truly because i'm a i'm gonna just assume he really loved his family and kids and then he had a full-blown mental breakdown with the financial stuff and then this happened you would think within the next 24 hours after he's killed them he would be like in complete mourning and and but also in total panic that this happened how do i hide the evidence i can't imagine sitting next to the evidence for weeks and not thinking or maybe he thought eventually they're going to get me and i just need to own up to it with a with a story i don't know i don't understand how he had all that time to come up with a fucking plan and he didn't come up with a plan i think he had planned this for a while i think his plan was to make it look like a murder suicide pact between him and his wife sure and that's what he tried to do and then he claimed he just couldn't go through with the suicide part okay well fucking idiot and also like if you really believe that and now it's past december 28th don't you feel kind of stupid but yeah good point everyone's dead now don't you wish you could uh not killed them since you think december 28th was the end of the world well when they asked him uh how he felt now that he was alive and his family's on he said i'm sad i'm still here okay okay well sure it seemed open and shut right so january 15 2020 2020 2020 2020 2020 wow that is how long 2020 felt i'll tell you i feel like it's still happening yeah it's like we're just in an infinite loop on january 15th of 2020 anthony tote was formally arrested and charged with four counts of first degree homicide and one count of felony animal cruelty the state of florida now had a man who had ostensibly confessed to a full familicide like a full what's the word use a family annihilator situation um this is like a death penalty level case so he was extradited from the hospital to the county jail where he was placed on suicide watch um he was kept inside a steel cage which was like some people thought was um because he was a suicide risk but then also it's like you killed your four-year-old daughter like right in cold blood like you're probably going to get the shit beat out of you you know so it could be because of that um as he sat in jail in the months awaiting trial his story about what happened started to change a little bit um would you know it i just might have had a hunch he forgot that he didn't actually kill anybody oh okay actually he wasn't even home when it happened isn't it funny how that works out it's funny how you forget was he's at starbucks he was uh he was getting a caramel macchiato and peanut m&ms what the fuck else do you want from this guy you know so so have we lost the whole plot on like december 28th and religion and we've not lost the plot we've just given it hand over heart to Megan and said she's crazy oh that's beautiful okay yeah you know classic um so in the first few weeks behind bars he called his sister Chrissy uh who was like what the fuck is going on truly and yeah right and these calls of course are recorded and were later obtained by newspapers um tony insisted that he was confused and and had nothing to do with it he said i couldn't stop this because i wasn't there he asserted he had been working in connecticut or maybe running errands like the story would change um essentially he was just claiming he was not home when his family died and he started to now sow seeds of blame toward megan in the jail calls Tony suggested Megan had been very unstable. This wasn't the first time she had tried something. He said there had been multiple attempts. Cryptically, he would say lines like that to just kind of insinuate, you know, that she was dark. Yeah, crazy and dark and unwell. This was the first hint of what Tony would turn into his full defense in court that Megan did everything. He did nothing. At all. Okay. I mean, I'm sure that's the direction we went. Yeah. Right. Of course. Why not? So she pressed Tony on this. She's like, what do you mean you weren't there? What about your confession? And he says, I don't remember a confession. He claimed the entire period of that time of December was a blur and that anything he said to police was under duress or misguided loyalty to Megan. he was like if i said anything that implicated me it's because i was on a lot of benadryl and going through something or i was trying to defend my wife but nobody knows okay i don't even i i imagine as he's saying this to people their eyes are just like rolling so far in their head like he has to be seeing people not believing it i you know and it's hard because poor chrissy is his little sister and they grew up in a very traumatic way that like they were very bonded and so it's really horrible because she's like so confused and trying to understand like they're your kids they're my nephews and niece like what are you talking about you know and also to have gone through trauma yourself with him and then to know that he was arguably just as bad if not worse than he was like the one person you could trust through all that oh um i can't wow you're leading me right into my little segue wow oh it's poignant okay so chrissy later told reporters that tony's claims in those calls were utterly unbelievable to her because she had known megan well i mean they started dating in high school right like she had known this girl since high school they were teenagers and they were really close and she had never seen any sign that this girl was violent suicidal like mentally unwell something in tony's voice hinted that even And he wasn't like he like he kept vacillating, like he would change things around depending on what suited him in that moment. And it just nothing rang true about what he said. In June of 2020, Tony took a more concrete step. This is the last thing I'm going to read for part one here. In June 2020, Tony took a more concrete step to lay out his defense and his version of events. And in doing so, he penned a long, rambling letter of 27 handwritten pages to his father, Robert Bob Tote. Now, Chrissy and Tony had been estranged from Bob, their father, for most of their lives. Because Tony couldn't reconcile and Chrissy couldn't reconcile what their father had done. Oh, shit. Okay. You see, back in 1980, when Tony was just four years old, he had witnessed a hitman that his father had hired to break into the family home and shoot his mother. Great. Like father, like son. Thank you. The apple does not fall far from the tree. And that is part one. And next week we'll get into the story of Bob Totes attempted murder of his own wife. like a replay like imagine that if i find spoiler what bob thinks that this this is the most insane part of all bob the dad who went to prison for attempting to kill his wife when this all happened with his son tony he expressed concern that tony's case was giving him bad press just that's how these people are like they're so just a sea of assholes oh my god like a sea of assholes man that is terrible um and that's like shocking anyway so now you see why i had to go into a part two because like that's like a beginning dude i totally are we gonna go back to it at all or are we oh yeah okay i know if we were just getting a two-for-one situation here but you are and you're gonna don't worry you're gonna get the finale also of like thank god the prison sentence so oh my god i totally get why you needed more time i totally get it and there's so much shit dude like there's so much shit i'm listening to um there's a full podcast on this called finding i think it's called finding this hope family um and where it's like they interview neighbors and like talk to family members and um that's really good too because but that's that's the trouble i get him because then i'm like well i'd like to put all 11 episodes worth of information into my notes and it's like there are there are some stories where i have started them and i plan to finish them but i'm like oh i can do this in like two days nope just like another quote another fun fact there have been some stories where i've started like over a week in advance because there's so much stuff. And then when I think I'm finally done, then there's like a Netflix eight episode special. I'm like, what the fuck? Exactly. Yeah, I can't. Exactly. Oh, the podcast is called Looking for the Tote Family. I apologize. But yeah, it's really good and really, of course, really dark. But if you want to get a more in-depth storyline of how this went down, please feel free to listen. Well, well told. Thank you. I hope you're feeling a little better. Do you have any plans for today besides just bed rest? I got to blow my nose a few more times, and I'll probably make some mac and cheese for everybody tonight, you know? That's nice of you to make mac and cheese for everybody when you're sick. I'd be like, this is my mac and cheese. You should figure it out. Normally I'd make something a little more, I don't know. Now that I have a child, I feel a little more, I don't make it for Blaze. I make it for Leona and me. He eats, like, healthy stuff. Is it just, like, a box snack or you got a recipe or what? You know, I don't know yet. I haven't quite decided. Depends on how I feel in about one hour. I would imagine if you're sick, box it up. Yeah, that's usually how we end up going. Yeah. Well, feel better. Thank you. And everybody who's listening, I hope you're excited for the next episode where we get the finale of this because I am hooked. So well done. And we'll see you when we will see you next week. See you when we see you. I was like, when do we record again? Oh, you know what? The next episode, not this one, but the one we record next comes out on 222. Your lucky number. also by the way if that comes out on susie too that means that this one came out what day two one five two one five oh happy valentine's day happy valentine's day and also um happy fucking nine years well you know i forget every year right so i just realized i was like did we miss it um oh shit of course we missed it when is it february 11 i think so so it's this week. This is the nine year anniversary episode. Very cool. Well, happy anniversary, everyone. Good thing I blew my nose repeatedly on air. We will have to I don't know. Talk about this for the next month. We'll remember in our birthday month we'll give it a shout out. Okay, well, everyone celebrate for us. Have a little drink for our nine year. And That's why we drink.