Transcript of Armchair Anonymous: Stealing III New

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Buck Rogers and I'm joined by Jean Lightyear, and today is Stealing Part 3. Tell us about a time you stole something.

People are stealing stuff, they're out there stealing, especially you. Yeah, you've done it once, a little bit more, but still not a ton. Okay, okay, it wasn't a pattern.

No, I had friends that were much worse. Okay, I'll just say that. Okay, and I had friends that were better. You Thank you.

Yeah, I stole once cookies.

Yeah, please enjoy Stealing Part 3. Hard times come and go, good times take them slow. My life, I had them both. One thing you got to know, I'mma keep on shining.

Hey, Dax. Hey, Monica.

Can you hear us?

I can.

How are you? Wonderful. Where are you, John?

Currently, I'm actually in a fishing/skiing cabin in southern Vermont.

Ooh. Oh, boy. Just read that's one of the safest places in the country, Vermont. Do you feel safe there, John?

I do. We are in the middle of absolutely nowhere.

Oh, wow.

And this is a cabin you own or you've rented or you're a guest of?

This is actually a yearly fishing trip, and this is year number 36.

Oh, that's so cool!

With friends or family?

Friends and family. It's made it through COVID and wars and you name it.

I love that.

That's such an enviable tradition. Yeah, that's beautiful.

Shout out to my friends who helped me set up this spot.

And what kind of fish are we getting? Is there one we're after in particular? Trout. Trout. Oh, and you eat them or you just catch them?

Personally, I have a shellfish allergy. I don't eat fish. I don't partake in that part of it, but it's good just to be here.

Yeah, when buddies have tried to talk me into fishing, I'm like, let's start with the fact that I do not want to eat a fish, period. I don't care how well you cook it. And then also they're slimy. I'm not dying to touch one. And then the bait, also gross.

Generally for me, in general, it's not great, but we go along with the, uh, with the theme of the weekend.

Okay, so wow, already shocked because you have such a trustworthy face, but you're a fucking thief, John. You're a terrible thief.

Yes, you're a bad, bad person, John.

Not my proudest moment, but I have stolen. Sure, I have too.

Me We've all stolen.

Rob, have you stolen? Yeah, probably.

Yeah, probably.

Isn't it? It's like kind of universal. Makes you realize a lot of shit gets stolen, right? Okay, set the stage for us.

I actually grew up in one of the boroughs in New York City, so this happens in one of the five boroughs. I'm gonna leave that out. We'll try and keep this somewhat anonymous. Okay, so this is the summer of a little bit hazy, 1999, maybe 2000, not quite '21, maybe a year out of high school, a little bit of a different time. All of us had fake IDs. We were able to go to bars. So we one night just decided to go out and have a few drinks, got a little creative. You know how those nights can go. We go about our business, we have a good time. We did the right thing. We walked. Now these are city blocks. We're probably 10, maybe 15 blocks from my house. So we decide to walk home. Now fast forward to the next night. We were having a party at my house, so we thought it would be great to have a party favor just to kind of share with the group. So on the way, another friend of ours' house, very old school Italian family. So grandparents off the boat. I don't know if that's actually a thing off the boat, but that's what we say.

Sure. Yeah.

Now, if you can picture, they had in their front yard a, for lack of a better way of saying it, a concrete donkey. So this is decorative.

For people who have not been to some of the boroughs in New York, this is kind of standard fare for the Italians, right? They like a nice lawn statue.

Really?

If it's made of concrete, we can see lions' heads. You can see donkeys. Wow. It is a thing.

I went this Christmas, my brother and I went to one of these neighborhoods. I think it was deep in Brooklyn, but it was like, it's known for every house is so decorated. And we were walking along there, aside from the incredible light decorations, it was like, again, a ton of lawn statues. Like, you can't help but notice.

So we thought it'd be a good idea to transplant one of these statues from my friend's house to my house, just a joke for the party the next day.

And he wasn't with you in your group of guys that were at the bar, right? No, there were just a couple of us at the bar.

So we thought it'd be a nice surprise for him the next day. A little bit fuzzy on the details, but it was buried. They are quite heavy. Mm-hmm. I've looked them up. They're probably in the realm of 100 to 125 pounds.

Okay.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

This one had been there for quite some time, so it was a bit in the ground. So we must have had to have done a little bit of work just to get it up. We bring the donkey back to my house. We think we go through the kitchen, upstairs to the bedrooms, and off to bed. Next morning, bright and early, I wake up to what I can only describe now is just blood-curdling screams coming from the kitchen in my house. Oh, I'm awoken by this. I come out of the bedroom, I look downstairs, and just a murder scene. Blood and dirt and handprints and drag marks all over the wall. The floors are covered in mud.

Oh my God.

So it turns out the donkey was buried a bit more than we had remembered. It was on top of another concrete block, probably a good 8 to 12 inches into the ground. We, of course, coming from a bar, had no tools on us, so we used our hands. We used whatever we could find to dig it out. Those were the remnants of us thinking we just gently went off to bed. It's just an absolute mess everywhere.

You guys are bleeding profusely and didn't realize it.

Hands were cut, arms were cut.

Well, you probably just carrying it home too. You probably scuffed up some shit.

We couldn't get the wagon that was attached to the donkey out, but on the back of the donkey were two metal handles that the wagon attached to. That's That's what we brought it home with, just raking open our legs, just cuts and dirt everywhere. So a little bit of a different time. I was underage at the time. My parents were okay with hosting parties at the house as long as everyone kind of dropped their keys in a bowl, no one was driving, you know, was kind of the city, so no real need for that. My parents did allow us to go ahead with the party we were having on night number 2.

Okay, so it was Mom the one screaming like, what the fuck happened to my kitchen? Mom was upset.

It looked as though we dragged a dead body through the house. Now, the donkey was tucked out back. Okay, but we were a little worse for the wear. So we clean the house, party's starting as planned on night number 2. Maybe about an hour in, we hear a car just screeching down the street. We could hear it from the backyard. We come up front just to see what's going on. The brother of the friend that we had borrowed the donkey from comes out of a gigantic Cadillac baseball bat in hand.

Oh yeah, so New York. I love this.

So to set the stage, you know, none of these rumors are ever confirmed, but he was rumored to be an enforcer for the New York Mafia.

Okay, great.

Perfect, perfect scenario. You know exactly what you want.

Yeah.

He comes out yelling and screaming, my grandparents are heartbroken, these bastard kids took this from the front yard. We meant to keep it secret, but we told everyone who was there. And this is a little bit before cell phones, but word got around. So He knew what was going on. We of course come out, we're playing dumb. My mother hears this now, having gone through the horror scene earlier, hasn't quite put two and two together. She comes out, starts yelling at him. They're going back and forth. Finally, you know, something along the lines was said of, get your animal son off of my property, or animal brother, or whatever it was.

Yeah.

So to give you an idea, you know, my mother is kind of the definition of New York grit. For her to stand up to this person that doesn't really know what's going on, wielding a baseball bat. Yeah. Just an idea of the type of person that she can be. She had received a Christmas card a few years prior to this from someone that she had deemed wronged her. Who knows what it was?

Still don't know to this day.

She thought the best course of action was to take that Christmas card, tear it up into about 100 pieces, gently put it back in an envelope, address it, also put a return address, which was her house, and mail it back to the person.

Right. Okay.

Sending a signal.

She can hold a grudge.

She can hold a grudge and she's seen some stuff. So yelling is going on. Close to becoming physical. Finally, the brother leaves. We play completely dumb about the donkey. My mother turns around and sees my friend and I, the one from the night before, who were there, and she kind of puts it together and says, 'So is this what that mess was last night? Did you steal a goddamn donkey?' And I was like, 'Maybe.' And she's like, 'From the New York Mafia?' Everything after that kind of just died down. I'd like to say, you know, our plan was to give it to my friend that day, back to his family. Didn't happen. That donkey has made a move with me 5, 6, 7 times over the last 30 years.

Oh, it was never returned?

It was never returned.

Because were you afraid to return it? Because then you're just copping up.

Copping to? Quite a bit, yes.

Had the buddy not attended the party and seen the donkey—

the donkey was tucked.

Oh, it was hidden.

I would not be surprised if he listens to this. The secret might be out. I did send a picture of the donkey.

We haven't looked yet. Oh, it's Donkable.

It's very cute. So I will say I have taken care of the donkey over the years. It's had quite a few paint jobs and been moved around between a few states.

I would want to steal this too.

I'd want to steal it. Presumably the grandparents have passed. That was 27 years ago. Probably. But does the family still live in that same family house?

So the house is still in the family. Oh. The friend that we took it from, I believe at this point, has taken over the house and lives in the house.

Oh my God.

Now I've yet to go back and see if there's just a lonely wagon sitting in the yard. I don't know if they've replaced the donkey.

I can't I could see a real beautiful ceremonial returning of the donkey and like a mending of fences, all's good that ends well situation.

I hope we don't get involved and then the mafia comes for us.

I want that guy to roll up now, 30 years older, slowly gets out of the car, slowly gets the baseball bat.

Just holds his back as he gets out.

He's like, ah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

If I didn't have sciatica, you guys would be in trouble.

This makes me kind of wish I grew up there. It feels like a very fun childhood.

It was great, you know, until we started stealing from homes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. What line of work did you end up in?

I'm actually in finance. I work in university finances.

Yeah, finance, that's an option. You got like 4 things I'm gonna guess if you're from there. It's like you're a cop, firefighter's gonna be on that, firefighter, cop, criminal, finance. I think that's really it.

My wife and I joke we have a son who's either going to be the President of the United States or in jail.

Yeah, yeah, sometimes you can do both.

Very true, Mike. I want to give a quick shout out to my wife Liz. She is actually the reason why I listen to you guys.

Thank you, Liz. Yeah, thanks Liz. That makes me I'm so happy. I like when couples listen. I mean, I like when anyone listens, but I really do think it's sweet when couples share anything you can share, especially if you're married forever. Okay, you guys find something you both like, you're like, okay, this is going to buy us a little more time.

Yeah, yeah, quiet time and just relax and listen.

Well, lovely meeting you, John. Thank you so much for taking time out of your fun fishing trip to talk to us.

Yeah, you guys as well. This has been great.

Thank you.

All right, take care. Bye. Catch a big trout, throw it back in the water. Don't eat it.

You can get a newspaper out and you can hold it like Dax does.

Yeah, that was a pike. Not that it matters, but it was a pike, and I thought it was so big. It was 22 inches long. Then I found out that's not a very big pike.

Oh, but you thought it was so big.

I thought I set a world record. Yeah, I'd never seen a fish that big.

It looks big in the picture.

The stealing problem reminds me, of course, several stealing situations.

You've stolen a lot.

But sometimes these situations just presented themselves, so One time we were flying home, I was with my cousin, he was 2 years older than me. We were flying home from a car show and I was like, oh hey, before we split up, will you buy Aaron and I a couple cases of beer? And there was a liquor store by the airport. He's like, yeah, of course. So we get in the car and we go to this liquor store that we had been to before, and as we walk in, like, the door is wide open and we go inside and we're hearing an alarm, but it's not an obnoxious alarm. It sounds more like, like a freezer door was open or something. And there are lights on, but they're not the normal lights. I mean, all in reflection, it was kind of like the security lights came on, like maybe if you lost power or something, those kind of lights were on. Okay. And we're looking around and all of a sudden it occurs to us, oh God, someone has broken into this liquor store. There's nobody here, it's closed, and someone broke in. And we're like, oh gosh, let's get out of here.

And then I was like, oh fuck, let's grab a couple cases of beer. So yeah, I grabbed a couple cases of beer and I did grab about 5 or 6 packs of cigarettes.

Oh, and did you see anyone like murdered behind the counter?

No, I'd kill to know what had been stolen before we got there, that the people were gone. Or maybe they saw us come in and they hid, I don't know. But we definitely did make off with some cases of beer and some cigarettes. Yeah, but it just felt like one of these opportunities not to be missed.

Yeah, I mean, I understand that's a little bit of a pickle.

I didn't go there to steal, but you did go to get underage. Yeah, that's fine. I think everyone would agree that's fine.

Madison, can you hear me?

Yes, we can. Can you hear us?

Oh my gosh, yes. I just landed in the Philippines. I'm on my honeymoon.

Oh my gosh, congratulations!

Yeah, that's incredible.

You get to have sex for the first time tonight.

Well, it's actually the end of my honeymoon. We're starting our leg back to California. I live in San Diego. So our flight was delayed. It's like 3:50 in the morning here.

Oh, Jesus.

I don't even know if I would like be able to get on the call.

Where all did you guys go?

We flew into Manila and then went immediately to Siargao, which is this kind of surf vibe. So cool. Island hopping. And then we went to El Nido and then we went and finished in Coron. Really random, but we've been gone for like almost 3 weeks.

Wow.

These are all towns in the Philippines?

Different islands.

Okay. I've never been. Is it wonderful?

It is pretty wonderful. It's pretty wild. We were looking for a place that like we would never go again because we do Europe sometimes and we're like, we're somewhere that's going to feel like so far crazy. And it definitely accomplished that. We definitely have had some crazy things going on. Oh wow.

You'll have to write back for honeymoon.

Yeah. Yeah. Crazy honeymoon.

5 days ago I got this crazy thing called jungle rash and it's on my butt. Oh. So the whole like sex thing, it was so bad.

Bad.

I had to go to the hospital.

Oh my God.

Yeah, it was like crazy, so bad, like boiling rash. Oh, so yeah, I'm a little tired.

Well, good. We'll probably get the most revealing version of the story in your delirium. All right, set the stage for us.

You're a thief. Yeah, I'm a thief. Monica, I just want to say, don't judge me going into the story. I am totally grown up now.

I stole too in the first grade.

You've changed your ways.

So no judgment.

The story takes place when I graduated high school, a few weeks after.

What city? In San Diego?

No. So I grew up in Vermont, which does kind of have a little to do with the story being like why you might think Kohl's was a place that I would frequent or do anything like this. So there wasn't much to do. I was 17. I had just graduated high school and I was with my best friend. I'm going to keep her anonymous today. We're going to call her Abigail. I called her to let her know I'd be on this and she preferred I didn't use her name. We were actually in this place called White River Junction. I'm from like a really small town in rural Vermont and we were in a bigger kind of city area for a diversion class. I don't know if you're familiar with that, but like, if you get caught drinking as a minor, I can choose to go to diversion class so that it's like wiped off my record.

Okay, great.

So I was already there for that.

Yeah, great. I'm getting a vibe. I'm getting a vibe we would have hung out in high school.

Continue. Yeah. So me and my friend had gotten caught drinking and we were there for diversion. I had diversion early in the morning. She had a class hours later, and I think we were just feeling like, fuck it. Fuck it, let's just like go ham. Hahaha. We did sometimes frequent the local CVS and like pocket a couple things here and there. Like it wasn't something crazy, but I think both of us at that day were like, let's go to Kohl's. Oh yeah.

Let's take it down.

There's not many stores in the area. There was like a pet store and not even a Target. And I think Kohl's, we were less security, less risk. Cheap stuff. Let's just go ham.

Ocean's Eleven. Let's take it down.

Yeah. So both of us grabbed carts, individual carts, and we weren't even like thinking. I'm putting everything in my cart.

Stuff you don't even want.

Right. Because it needs to be stuff that I am going to take and also stuff that I am just putting in my cart to kind of trick everyone in the dressing room.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The things that I'm like, we're taking, it's like jewelry, shirts, camis, bras. Hats that I was like, I don't even need this shit. But we were just feeling like, let's just do it. I don't even know how much stuff was in my cart and vice versa, but we both kind of went into the dressing room and how you do it is you put stuff on in the dressing room. I had probably like 5 layers of camis on and jewelry on, same with her. And both of us were like, where are you putting the tags? Like, you take the tags off the garments and I'm like shoving them under the mirror and like up in the walls. There's enough stuff stuff in our cart that we're like, oh yeah, we don't want these things. I have a big purse. My purse is like chucked full of shit. And I don't know if you guys have ever stolen much, but the adrenaline is pumping as we're leaving this Kohl's. Oh yeah. What we didn't notice— I'm honestly like getting a little anxious telling the story. What we didn't notice when we were going on our rampage was that it was stock day at Kohl's.

So there was a lot of people in the aisles taking stock of what was in the store, counting inventory. So there was, like, a lot of workers that day that I just don't think we were tracking that were very aware of, I think, our movements.

Oh boy.

And we didn't know what they were doing, but what they were doing was seeing essentially how much shit had been stolen over however long. And so there we are. Layers on layers of clothes on, the two of us, shit stuffed in my bag, thinking that we just got away with the world's greatest heist. And we're just walking out, la da da. And, you know, we walk out of the doors and no alarms go off. Huge sigh of relief. And then all of a sudden, these two guys come walking up to us very quickly and they're like, "You need to come with us." Oh, boy.

Oh, boy.

And I just, like, look at my friend. And meanwhile, I just have to remind you, we are 17 years old. Like, we got in trouble accepted to college. I am freaking out. They tell us to come with them, get back in the store right now. They know that we've been taking stuff. They walk us to the back room, all the way in the back of the store. And, uh, Miguel is just starting to get a little hysterical. I'm starting to not be able to, like, communicate too well with her.

Getting caught is an overwhelming experience for the nervous system.

Yeah, and I think we were handling it much differently, which we'll also get into a little bit. But so they take us into the back, and I'm, like, silent at this point. I'm not saying anything. Anything until they catch me in the act. And they pretty much get us back there and they're like, "Empty your bags right now. We've been watching you. We know that you've been taking all this stuff. Empty your bags. I want to see everything." So there we go. We're emptying our bags. They also didn't know at this point that we had physical stuff on ourselves. Abigail and I look at each other and we're just like, we gotta tell them we have stuff on.

Okay. You're at that point.

He's rolling his eyes, like, looking at his security guard. They're like, "Are you fucking kidding me?" And they walk us with a female worker to the dressing room and wait for us as we're unclothing ourselves and taking everything that we've taken off and handing it to them over the dressing room. We go back to the back room. They have everything in front of them. Abigail is hysterically crying at this point, and I'm looking at her and I'm like, like, pull yourself together.

You're disappointed. You picked the wrong crime partner.

Yeah, she's pleading with them, please don't do anything, we're going to college, please don't call anyone, I'll call my mom, I'll pay for everything. And he's like, we're calling the police. You guys have stolen over $800 worth of merchandise.

That's almost impossible to do. That's really hard to do.

Yeah, it's really impressive, especially with Cole's cash. Yeah, ding ding ding.

They're They're like, "This is a felony offense. We're calling the police." Which, if you don't know, anything over $500 is a felony offense. I'm just asking them if there's anything that we can do. They are not having any of it. Police are on their way. They're like, "We already rang the police when we picked you up outside." Absolutely not. So we're just kind of waiting in silence until the police show up. The police show up. There's 4 officers that come crammed into this back room with us. I'm just paralyzed with fear. They essentially were like, "You're coming down to the station.

You're under arrest." Oh.

They take both of our bags, our little purses, each one of us in handcuffs. They walk us out the store in the middle of Vermont. I know a lot of people in the area, and this room that we were in was all the way in the back of the store. So there we are, handcuffed individually with the police officers holding our bags in one hand and holding the back of us in the other and just walking us through the entire store. People are looking at us, kids are pointing at us. I'm just like—

Yeah, it's very exciting.

So mortified. And there's two cop cars and they want to separate us. So they put Abigail in a cop car and they put me in a cop car, shove my head down, the whole nine yards. I get in the cop car with him and there's like a 10-minute drive to the police station. And at this point I start crying. Can you just tell me, am I going to be okay?

Am I going to jail?

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm supposed to go to college.

I had a scholarship.

Oh my God.

I just was getting out of diversion. I'm like, my mom is gonna be so disappointed. And he's like, yeah, you're going to jail. This is a felony. So we get to the jail and we are in jail. There is a cell. We're in there with one other woman who seems to be on crack. So we got fingerprinted, mugshots, all that stuff. And I think our bail was something like $150.

Not a lot. We didn't have to call our parents.

Parents. I think that we waited a certain amount of time, I paid the bail, and we were able to go. And she kind of thought the same thing, like she had not called her mom. And I remember we finally got out, it had been like maybe 4 hours, I called my mom. And my brother was a pot dealer and like he'd gotten kind of in trouble with the law, so it was not the most horrifying news, but she was very disappointed. It was just not helpful. Yeah. Yeah. Long story short, we did have to go to court and we ended up getting a Class A misdemeanor, which is just below a felony offense. We had to go present ourselves in front of a judge. 100 people are in this courtroom awaiting their moment with the judge to plead not guilty or guilty. Our parents didn't go with us. We didn't know, like, what to do. And I thought this was going to be on my record if I said not guilty. No one's advising us what to do. And so we go up to him. He's like reading the case in front of everyone. He's like, mm, shoplifting Kohl's.

$800. Jesus Christ, ladies, you have nothing better to do? He's like, how do you plead? We plead guilty because obviously we were caught red-handed. And he's like, I'm going to stop you right there before you do something stupid. Don't plead guilty or else you're going to go to jail.

What?

Really? He's like, take the not guilty plea because what just happened in the state of Vermont was like those diversion classes that we were just taking for drinking. You can now take them for shoplifting. Oh my God. Like one week before this.

Why would not guilty be—

because maybe then they're gonna offer a plea to have to avoid having a court case over this. If I plead not guilty, then the state's gotta present a case and prosecute you in front of a jury, and the state's gonna go, we are not spending all this manpower on prosecuting these two shoplifters. So then they would come back and offer a plea like, okay, if you cop to a misdemeanor, oh, you'll be guilty, there'll be no trial. Maybe.

Yeah, that's kind of what it was sounding like. So I remember I got I got $1,500 for my high school graduation, and I had to spend every last dime of it on that diversion class.

Oh, pricey.

Yeah, very pricey. And so, yeah, that ultimately is the story of how I'm never allowed into Kohl's for the rest of my life.

Are you really?

Are you banned from Kohl's?

I'm banned.

Yes. Wow. Sorry, you can't use Kohl's cash.

What if you put a ton of effort into getting that expunged from your Kohl's record because you were a minor and you're like, I do want the right to shop at Kohl's.

I'd love to go to Kohl's.

And then they could put you in a commercial like, this woman fought to shop here.

Oh wow.

It would be a full circle for everyone.

I'll give them a call.

Did you get to go to college?

I did, yeah. Everything was wiped from my record with a diversion class. It was a wake-up call for sure. I never stole again.

Oh, that's good. That's good.

Sometimes you gotta hit rock bottom.

Yeah, yeah. Madison, we're so grateful that you took time out of your honeymoon and your jungle butt to find Wi-Fi in a toilet and tell us the story.

I know, I can't believe of all times, like, this is how I I have to see you guys. Can I just give a quick shout out to my Armchairy besties? I have an Armchairy shirt too that I'm not wearing. My friend Emily got it for me, and it's a really great station.

Oh, it's a good one.

Anytime anyone's like, "Station," we'll be like, "Really great station." Really great station. My girlfriends Emily and Laura love them, and we're Armchairy group, so we always debrief the episodes. And I love you guys so much. This is so surreal.

That's so nice.

Well, shout out to them, and so nice meeting you, Madison. I hope you get home safely.

Thank you, nice to meet you guys.

Take care.

Hello, hello.

Occasionally we have an armchair with a headset like yours, and I always love it because it makes me think we're either gaming together or I've called AT&T.

I do feel like I'm gonna do some telemarketing after this.

You should.

And where are you, Rachel?

I am in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Oh, lovely. What a lovely city Milwaukee is.

You don't expect a lot of stealing there.

Well, Laverne and Shirley were rascals. They were there in Milwaukee. I guarantee there's an episode where they steal something. They did all the hijinks.

Well, this does not take place in Milwaukee.

Okay, tell us where it takes place.

December 2008, my then-boyfriend and I went on his work trip to Cancún, Mexico. This was such an exciting time for me. I was in my late 20s. This was a new relationship. We had been dating for about 5 months or so. This was our first big trip together. This This was my first time going to Mexico. At this time in my life, I was living with more of a scarcity mentality. I had undergrad and graduate school student debt. And so this was just like a dream come true for me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. A reprieve.

Definitely. A week before we leave for Cancún, it's my birthday and my boyfriend gifts me a gift card to the spa at the hotel where we're going to be staying. We're in Cancún, trip's going great, and it's spa day. So boyfriend goes to his meetings and I head to the spa for my massage. I have a lovely massage experience, and after the fact, they lead me to this relaxation lounge. Like, it's a nice quiet room where you can sit and just chill after your service and enjoy some zen.

Maybe have a tea.

Exactly. So this is where the story is going now.

Oh, wonderful.

The refreshment. The snacks in this room were out of this world. My 28-year-old self was just thrilled. So we had the cucumber-infused water and the lovely teas and these platters of the most decadent tropical fruits. And the pièce de résistance, guys, was this large bowl of the biggest cashews you have ever seen.

Oh!

Mm.

How big are we talking?

Quarter-sized. These puppies, they were amazing. The salt to nut ratio was incredible. They were crunchy but yet creamy at the same time.

I want 'em.

And I couldn't believe that I could just help myself to as many of these cashews as I wanted. I enjoy these refreshments. Now it's time to go to lunch. My boyfriend gets a lunch break, so we meet for lunch. He's asking me about my morning, telling him how lovely my spa experience was, and then I tell him about the world's most amazing cashew nuts. He's excited that I've enjoyed my day and he's happy that I'm having a good time, but he's not understanding how amazing these nuts are.

You're frustrated. You're like, "You don't understand what we're talking about." Exactly.

So this is now when I hatch the plan to smuggle some nuts out of the spa so I can prove to him how amazing these really are. So because I had had a spa service that morning, I had privileges to use the spa for the rest of the day. I decide I'm gonna try out the plunge pools. I had never done that before. I thought that sounded like that would be a nice experience. So I put on my bikini top and bottom, some regular old flip-flops, and then like a swimsuit cover-up, a V-neck short dress I'm ready to go. I grab a cinch sack. You know those, like, nylon bags that you, like, cinch closed at the top? They're kind of flimsy. I go to the plunge pools again, have a lovely time. I'm now done with that, and it's time to go back to this relaxation lounge, AKA Cashew Paradise. And I'm in the locker room, and I'm realizing I did not bring a change of clothes with me. I'm in my wet bathing suit. I'm gonna take it off. No big deal. I can just throw my cover-up on. Cover up back over myself, and, you know, I got my flip-flops, and I throw the swimsuit in the bottom of my cinch sack.

Go back to Cashew Paradise, help myself to a nice glass of cucumber-infused water, and I'm scoping out the crowd, waiting for all the guests to leave the room so I can start this nut smuggling mission. But I'm realizing, oh shoot, now my wet swimsuit is at the bottom of this bag. I can't have nuts just willy-nilly in the bottom of this bag mixing with my wet swimsuit.

Rachel, I don't want to sound I'm not being critical, but this is a terribly laid out heist. I just want you to know. You don't have clothes. You put wetness in the bag. You plan to take the loot. I mean, this is a terrible plan. You didn't think this through.

I agree. I've gotta now have plan B. Next to the infused waters are these fancy-looking plastic cups. So I start filling up the cups, and I'm strategically placing them in the cinch sack, like pyramid style.

Oh my God.

How many? How many? This is too many. This is like a bad plan on top of a bad plan. Staying upright when you carry the bag. How many of these glasses had you filled up? How many are in the bag?

I'm gonna say like 5 or 6.

Oh my God, okay, you went for it.

You took all of them.

There was an excess. I'm carefully putting the straps of the cinch sack over my shoulders, and I decide I'm gonna help myself to one last glass of cucumber water. But there's a detail I forgot to mention. This spa was so gorgeous. Like, when you walk into the spa, it's this beautiful white-tiled lobby reception area. There's gorgeous flower bouquets everywhere. There's this huge Cinderella-style staircase that takes you up to the second floor where all the services and amenities take place. So I walk out of the relaxation lounge, and now I just have to traverse the stairs down and exit the spa. I can see the doors. It's just me and the staircase, and then I'm home free. Free. So I'm walking very carefully, trying not to be suspicious. I start my descent, and I don't know what the heck happens, but all of a sudden my water goes flying. I start tumbling down the stairs. The cinch sack is flying open.

Nuts are going everywhere.

And when I finally realize what has happened, I am laying on my back, on the middle of this lobby floor, in a pool of cucumber water and cashew confetti, totally naked because my cover-up has now come up over my neck and shoulders.

I bet honestly it's because your equilibrium was thrown off because of all the nuts on your back.

You think that's what it was?

That's what happened.

Now we call this, Rachel, in comedy filmmaking, this is called a set piece. So we've set up all these different situations, you know, the wet bathing suit, the nuts, all of it's culminating perfectly at the same time. And you've executed a real-life comedic set piece. And clearly everyone in the spa is worried that a guest of the hotel's fallen down a flight of stairs, right? So they're probably panicking and running over to you.

The reception staff, they literally just stood there staring. I was thankful for it because I did not want to have any sort of conversation. I jumped up as fast as I could and just bolted.

Okay, you ran out of there, hightailed it.

In the movie version, The staff starts running down the stairs to help and they all start falling on the cashews.

Cashews all over the ground.

Exactly. They're tripping on the cashews.

That's how you get away is everyone's like, ooh. Yeah.

Yeah.

Ooh.

Did you still have the cinched sack and were you able to return to your room and have some to present to your boyfriend? Was it a successful caper at the end of the day?

That's a great question.

That boyfriend is now my husband and I asked him about this and he does remember that there were a few 2 cashews left in the bag.

I have to say, Rachel, I say this with so much love in my heart, this does sound like the story of an 8-year-old.

It's a little bit Mr. Magoo, right?

He's like, this is like if you let an 8-year-old go to a spa by herself, all the weird dumb things she would get into.

Look, spas are exciting. Oh, we should do spa.

I think we have, but let's do it again. I think that's how it started.

That was massage, but lots going on in the spa, clearly.

Well, congratulations on landing this beau. Did you tell you had fallen and all that, or did you keep that secret?

Oh yeah, because I was so sore and I started to bruise.

Really undid all the relaxation.

Yeah.

Well, you're really tight. Yeah, I fell down the staircase here yesterday.

Oh my God.

Well, that's delightful that you ended up together. Not a meet cute, but it is adjacent.

And we have two amazing children, Jillian and Jonah. They're awesome. So it all worked out.

Lovely. Well, that's a very cute story, Rachel.

We love it. Thanks for sharing it.

Yeah. Thank you for having me. This was such a a trip.

Okay, thanks, Rachel.

Bye.

Oh, there you are!

Hi, how are you?

Oh yeah, good.

What kind of name should we select for you?

Whatever you feel will be the best.

Okay, I'm going with Lindsay.

Okay, great.

Do you co-sign?

I do. I like that.

Lindsay, do you have a fun accent that I'm detecting?

I sure do. I'm from Melbourne, Australia.

Oh, everybody's favorite place, Melbourne, Australia.

Can't go wrong.

Are you liking the influx? You would agree that the world has fallen in love with Melbourne in a way that's kind of new, right? You must have an uptick in tourism.

Yes, we do, but Melbourne's a very multicultural city, so there's a lot of diversity, which is really lovely. Great coffee and great fashion.

Oh yeah, I love that. Lindsay, do you have a stuffy nailed to the wall?

She's holding one.

You're also holding one, but do you have one also nailed to the wall?

Yeah, this is my little cubby that my oldest boy has put together for me, and and he knows that these are my favorites. Oh my God, this is from an Australian artist called CJ Hendry, and she paints, but she makes these little limited edition juju.

Oh my God, cute! You call them juju?

They're called juju after her mom.

Okay, I have to say, sorry, but they're way cuter than those ones with the teeth. La booboo. Yeah, la booboo. Yes, and Frunkles, or whatever that other one is, or something.

Anyway, Okay, so you have a stealing story. Before you tell us yours, we just did kind of a poll. We have figured that all of us have stolen. Almost every kid in the States steals at some point. Would you say that's the same in Australia?

Yes. And also, which is part of the story, where I'm from in the west of Melbourne, it's kind of notoriously, you're either dodgy, so you steal things, or you know somebody that is.

Okay, so tell us your stealing story.

Just a little bit of a backstory. It was 30 years ago when I was 20, so I was working 2 jobs at the time. So one job was in a retail store with a few people, particularly one guy that we'll call Tom, who was a very flamboyant older gay gentleman. So he was probably in his 50s at that point. And in my other job, I worked in a restaurant, so it was all hospitality. You'd work all week, you shut the restaurant, you go out and you party all weekend. And I would come to work on a Monday and always have stories of all mischief that we got up to, and they really loved hearing those stories.

Retail's very boring compared to restaurant world.

Correct. And also I was in the West, so we were always getting up to some sort of mischief. So this guy at the retail store, he knew that if there was someone who knew someone that was dodgy, it would be me. So one day I went into work there with him and he said to me, do you happen to know anybody that could help me do an insurance job on my my car.

Oh, wonderful.

Meaning, wait, I need more.

He's either gonna report it stolen or someone's gonna torch it, and then he's gonna collect the insurance money. Oh God, right? I'm assuming it's the same there, here.

Correct. And I was like, sure, I know some people.

Absolutely, this won't be too hard.

So I went back to my restaurant job, spoke to my boss at the time there, who was always up for something naughty and always up for something that could give him some extra cash. And I said, hey, do you know anywhere we could eventually dump a car? And he was like, yeah. So back to the retail job, and I said, hey, we're on. How much you gonna pay us? And he said, I'll give you $1,000.

Oh, oh wow, beautiful. Okay, great. So I'm sorry, real quick, so this is to like lose the car? So the car was stolen?

He'll report it stolen, but really he gave them the keys and they drove off to the middle of the desert and dumped it.

Copy.

Okay. We organized it for that night. He left the key under the mat of the car. My friend drove us there, so there was 3 of us in the car. We picked get his car and we drive off with his car. Oh, everything's going well. But then I start to panic thinking, oh my God, I've stolen a car. And I'm like, we're gonna get arrested. Like I've done some stuff, but nothing that's gonna actually break the law. So I said, I'm like, oh my God. He's like, don't worry about it. No one knows that the car's stolen, but we need to make it look like the car's been stolen. So he starts driving up the footpath. He's smashing into signs. Oh, breaking off mirrors.

I can't say I agree with his logic. There's no reason that we need to hit a lot of stuff just cause we stole. No, you're trying to keep a low profile, probably. Yeah, but that was his choice.

It was fun though.

I was like driving a real-life Dodge Ram car.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So anyway, he had this spot that he knew of that was fenced off, and what I know now was this is where people came to dump stolen cars. So the police or the council had fenced off this block and they'd put a big rise of dirt. So to get a car over this mound of dirt, you had to really like—

oh geez, launch it.

There was a break in the fence, so up we went and we were over. I was like, oh, this It was relatively easy and we're just hooning around in there doing some burnouts.

Oh my God.

And he's like, okay, time to let the car go. So it had an edge, sort of Thelma and Louise style, that we were to drive or push this car over the edge and below was just a creek, like a river. So he puts a rock on the accelerator and boom, the car flies over the top of the cliff and down and we hear bang.

Oh my God. Good.

You guys did a thorough job. You didn't like park it in the next town. No, it was gone.

Drove off. Perfect crime. I get to work the next day, he comes in about an hour late, and he's like, oh my God, my car's been stolen! He was really hamming up. It was a real production. We don't say anything to each other. We get to the end of the day, he hands me $1,000 cash, and we never speak of this again. It is done.

Yeah, perfect.

So I worked there for about another 6 months, and then I ended up leaving, and I didn't stay in contact with anybody. It was like, okay, you know, that part of my life Life's over. Cut to about 10 years later, I run into him in the street and we're having a chat. How you been? Who do you know? What's been going on? And as I sort of went to walk away from him, he said, oh, I got investigated about that car being stolen by the police and the insurance company.

Oh no.

Oh my God.

He said, well, about 2 years after it happened, they were looking to redevelop the area and they did a sonar scan on the water and they found there were cars underneath the waterline. Sure, I've sent you a photo.

Oh my goodness, Victoria Police have started dragging over 120 cars out of the— oh my God, Maribyrnong River. Oh my God, this car that's being hoisted out is so colorful with some kind of barnacles. Might have been a toxic river.

See how beautiful that is?

He says to me, they've dragged me in because the insurance companies and the police were working together to try and work out why there are all these cars I was there, but he didn't tell anybody in his life that he had done this. He and I were really the only people that knew. His husband got dragged in. They were questioned for about 8 hours back and forth of, we know you did this, we know you did this. He said, but don't worry, I didn't mention your name. We've gotten away with it. I denied. We're all good. And I was like, okay, cool. Then as I went to walk off, I was like, okay, see you later. And I said, oh, hang on, why would they have assumed that you were the one that had stolen the car? And he said, oh, you left the key in the ignition.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So note to self, if you're gonna steal a car from someone, take the car out before you push it over.

Walk me through that.

Well, because if a car was stolen, how did the thief get the car key?

Oh, unless you left it.

You're not legally responsible if you were to leave your keys in the car. You're not going to jail because someone stole it. Well, I know in LA, since the keyless fob has come around, people totally leave their fobs in the car.

Oh, all the time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But also now thieves have got a special thing that they can unlock your car without the fob, so they just walk up to it and they can unlock it and your car's gone. That was a plot point in 2020.

2012's mega hit, Hit and Run. I used that technology.

Ahead of your time.

Always thinking like a criminal. Well, Lindsay, I really wish I grew up in Western Melbourne. I think I would have fit in just perfectly.

I feel like you would have. Now I've got my oldest boy here who wants to say hello.

Oh my gosh, yes! How old is he?

He's 10.

Hello! Lovely. What an impressive head of hair.

It's great, isn't it? He listens with me. We love the Unauthorized Evacuation stories.

Of course. Yeah, it's our favorite too. Well, Well, it's so lovely meeting you. We love when there's Aussies that listen to the show.

It's so flattering.

You're a hit down here.

Oh, wonderful. All right, well, lovely meeting you, Lindsay.

Thank you.

All right, thanks so much. All right, well, does that get you itchy to steal?

No, my stealing days, they were short-lived.

Okay, I love you.

Love you.

Do you want to sing a tune or something?

We know the theme song.

Oh.

Okay, great. We don't have a theme song for this new show, so here I go, go, go. We're gonna ask some random questions, and with the help of our cherries, we'll get some suggestions. On the Fly Rhyme Dish, On the Fly Rhyme Dish, enjoy!