Transcript of Armchair Anonymous: Unauthorized Evacuation III New

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Dax Shepard. I'm joined by Monica Padman.

It's your favorite day.

It's my favorite day. And I'm shocked there's always been 3. We must be titling them different.

We're titling them different.

We must be. But this is Unauthorized Evacuation 3. Tell us about an unexpected evacuation. And they're always beautiful.

They are great.

And endearing and life-affirming.

It's the thing that's going to bring us together.

Yeah, we can all relate, or most of us. And if you can't relate yet, you will relate at some point in your life. Please enjoy Unauthorized Evacuations. Hello.

Hi, Dax and Monica.

Kayla, are you from a long line of Kaylas? Are you the first? I'm the first.

Ayla. My dad said he found it while sitting on the toilet in the baby book, so that's how I got my name.

Nice.

Oh, wonderful. He was leafing through it.

The best ideas can come to you on the toilet.

Yeah, also, I mean, pretty good dad. I don't know when you were born, but probably '90s. Were you born in the '90s?

Yeah, '96.

The fact that he's taking time to read a baby naming book, not probably super typical.

Yeah, and I mean, on the toilet, maybe that's how we got to this story.

Oh yeah.

And if we make the opposite argument, you could also argue he only read it because he was stuck on the toilet and there was nothing else to read.

No, but we're glass half full here.

Where are you, Kayla?

I'm in Orange County.

And it happens even in sunny California. Unauthorized.

I don't like hearing that. Well, we know that's true.

It's happened to both of us personally.

Yeah, honestly, it wasn't my proudest at first, but, you know, I've since been telling to like break the ice at work and at parties, and you know, it's funny now, so that's great.

All right, walk us through it. Tell us the year, what was happening.

So it was 2019. I was freshly in college. I honestly was like very, very stressed at the time. I was working a full-time job at a makeup counter and then a part-time job at this snow cone place, and then I was also going to school full-time.

Wow. Wow.

I set that up to say I was very, very stressed. My GI wasn't exactly working.

So like periods of constipation, then harness.

Exactly. Yeah. It had gone like 6 days and my now husband was actually telling me and he was like, you know what? Like I had to get an enema one time. Can't let this go any longer.

Yes.

6 days. Oh yeah.

I was like, okay, I'll go to the doctor. So I went to the doctor and she was like, you're fine. Probably just a bit of constipation. You've had a lot of stress in your life. Like you're fine. She's like, I'll give you something.

You probably never had a long enough window to sit down and relax to let things start moving. You were racing from one thing to another.

Yeah, my diet wasn't great. It was probably a bunch of things. So like, I was like, okay, cool, we'll fast-track it, go to the doctor, get something for me, great. Next day, go to pick it up at the pharmacy. I am late for work because I'm always late everywhere, but I go to the pharmacy to go pick it up, and they do a consultation with you when you haven't taken the medication before, but I decided that that was the day I was going to tell a little white lie and say, oh no, I've taken this before, like I'm good, thank you. So left and then went to my job at the makeup counter. It was a Saturday, super, super busy. I popped the pill, you know, I'm just going about my day.

Real quick, is this a store in a mall?

So no, it's actually like in a shopping center. I'm not ashamed to say it was an Ulta in a shopping center.

Oh great, you know that, Monica? Oh yeah, trusted brand.

Yeah, yeah, it was super, super busy. I could not even leave the counter for second just because there were so many people. And so I started to feel like a grumbling in my stomach, and I was like, oh gosh, well, I don't have any time to go to the bathroom. I usually crop dust the back of the store, you know, just kind of like take a little walk.

Sure.

But I couldn't. I was helping too many people, color matching, doing all of that to get my commission. And so I felt the rumbling, felt the rumbling, and I was like, okay, I know this feeling. Like, it's just a fart. I haven't even farted in 6 days. This is totally fine. Like, I'll be okay.

What were you wearing, can I ask quickly?

Yeah, that was actually a big part of the story. I was wearing a long black skirt.

Oh, okay, great.

Some tiny women's underwear, and then, uh, yeah, just like this cute little shirt. I had to wear all black to work. Anyways, I'm going to walk around the back of my counter, and I got a second to breathe, and I was like, okay, I'll just let it go right here. So I let it go, and all of a sudden I feel something running down.

Ah, are you in the center of the store, or are you behind the counter?

My counter is in the center of the store, and then I kind of have this little loop behind my counter where I can kind of hide from the rest of the people in the store. So that's kind of where I am, because I was like, okay, no one's in the back here, let me just step to the side.

But it is a public part of the store.

Customer totally could have seen me, and it's a very busy Saturday.

Oh.

I was like, oh no, something's running down my leg. I was like, what did I take? So I go run to the back of the store where the bathroom is, assess the situation, and I'm just covered.

You're covered.

Diarrhea all over my thong, inside my skirt.

Oh, in your shirt because it was tucked in your skirt.

Shirt, skirt, and shirt. My shirt was tucked into my skirt.

Full wardrobe took out the whole—

literally took out the whole wardrobe. I'm like panicking now. Thank God no one's in the bathroom the same time as I am. But I'm taking all the toilet paper, just like trying to like get it off myself. I throw away my thong because I'm like, there's no saving this thing. And I'm panicking. I'm like, what did I take? What do I do? I don't even know. I'm panicking. I'm not thinking. And I live right across the street at the time, like literally, like I could have walked home, but I obviously didn't for obvious reasons. I get out of the bathroom, I see my manager in passing, and I say, hey, I gotta go, emergency, I'll be back. And she was like, everything okay? And I was like, I gotta go. So I just booked it out of the store. I sit in my car, can't believe that happened. I'm like crying. I'm like, oh my gosh, like what am I doing? And I look at the pill bottle, type in the name of the pill into Google. Sure enough, it's a laxative.

Yeah.

And I was not supposed to take it. Until I was at home or by a toilet.

Yeah, yeah, not at work. Probably the one they give you for a colonoscopy cleanse, like probably a powerful enema. Yeah.

Oh, that's what my friend was saying. She was like, sounds very similar to when I had mine. I was like, okay, great. But anyways, I have to go back to work. I need this job. I can't just like not show back up. I don't know what I was thinking. I probably could have called, but it was a busy Saturday, so run home, I get changed, don't think anything of it. And I'm like, I'm in the clear. That emptied me all out. I'll be fine.

Well, this is a two-parter.

Maybe a three or four-parter.

I don't know.

Well, thankfully not a two-parter, but it's not the best situation when I get back. I get back and it's still busy in the store and I'm now in like full heavy sweats just because nerves or whatever, maybe the laxative. I don't really know. But I'm by my counter, and my counter was like packed before. There's not a soul to be seen, but the store is still busy. Oh, I was like, oh my gosh, just because I'm not here for a second, no one wanted to help me. Like, what's going on? And so I'm walking around the counter and I'm like, oh my gosh, like something smells really bad over here.

I mean, yeah, yes, of course.

If it ran down your leg, it's gonna land somewhere.

I honestly was like, no, the bad things already happened to me. There's no way like it can get worse. So I'm not thinking. We have kids all the time in our stores leaving stuff around the store, like food and all that. And I was like, oh, someone probably threw something away at my counter. So I like opened the counter doors and like nothing in there. Okay, so weird. I was like, but man, like this is really, really bad. So I go to walk around the corner where not a lot of people go. And sure enough, all over the floor, all over.

Oh my God. Oh my God. It was just a tiny amount.

Okay, a lot of things I'm so glad I didn't ask earlier because my first thought was I wanted to know, do you get it on the floor? But I'm glad that was saved. But how the fuck did your manager or none of the other employees stumble upon this pile of harness when you had gone home, changed, cleaned up?

That I don't know, but I'm assuming probably people in the store had to know because there was no one by my counter. I'll get to the part later about what happened after that to give you more of an answer of people like knew or not, but I frantically just used a bunch of makeup remover and alcohol that they have in the makeup stores, just cleaning it up, making sure no one would see me. Again, back of the counter, I'm like, no one's here anyways, like, it's fine, clean it up, no one knows it's me anyways, right? Except if anyone was in the store and noticed I changed, which I like literally just thinking about now. But anyways, I pick it up, throw it away, all is done. I'm like, okay, cool, like, I only have a couple more hours of my shift, the worst is over, it's fine, it's okay. So that is my story But a couple weeks later, my manager comes up to me and she was like, hey, is everything okay? And the reason she's asking me is because my mom was actually in the hospital a few months before dealing with a whole bunch of things medical-wise.

And I was like, no, everything was fine. And she's like, well, the day that you left, you know, you left in such a rush, such a hurry, and you came back in new clothes. And I was like, whoa, yeah, no, everything's fine. I was fine. And she goes, well, you know, there's cameras.

Well, then why'd she ask you? She could have done the right thing and been like, you know what, this is what happened.

It's in order. There was like 3 great things to do before this. One, ignore it. The girl already dealt with it, she cleaned it up. This doesn't need to be addressed. It's not like she's gonna start doing this all the time.

What if it became a king?

She's like, I just want to make sure this doesn't become a routine of yours, right? And then, yeah, second would be to come right out with it, like, so hey, you know, I saw on the cameras that you had shit all over the floor. Again, I don't even know why we're gonna talk about— okay, I'm sorry. So she says there's cameras, and what do you do? You just die?

No, I literally was like, yeah, you know, I know there's cameras. And she was like, okay. And I was like, all right. And she's like, okay, have a good shift.

Okay, so you never had to say it.

She tried to do it and then she ran out of gumption.

Yeah, yeah.

So I'm like assuming, obviously, she says, you know, there's cameras, she's seen. But like, till this day, I mean, unless she listened to this podcast, you know, I don't know, but We've never talked about it again. No one ever said anything. No one ever told me that they saw anything.

I feel annoyed at her.

You do?

Yeah.

She already went through the worst possible thing that could ever happen to anyone on Earth.

Yeah, I know. I agree. This is a pointless thing to bring up.

Yeah.

Let's make a strongman case for her.

Okay.

She's a manager. Corporate's tough. These tapes are there. They could be seen should someone above her become aware of this and they say, hey, what did you say to Kayla about her defecating on the floor of our showroom. And she goes, I haven't said anything to her. And they're like, you don't think you need to talk to an employee who defecates in the store?

No, because it's not something she does. It was clearly an accident. She came back right away, and most people wouldn't even come back. So I just really don't feel comfortable.

We just have a— well, we have a hazmat procedure for the safety of our customers and the other employees, so we probably should have disinfected. Oh, I know she used makeup. You're fired.

The hazmat situation is crazy.

Unfortunately, those employees were also bad employees because they should have been like, what's happening over there? No one's going over there. Go look. Like, ah, oh no, someone's shit everywhere.

Yeah, someone's diaper blew up.

Exactly.

Some kid.

Yeah, always blame a kid. Someone brought a dog in and we'd say no dogs.

Yeah.

Now really quick, Kayla, I have just recently done the colonoscopy and I wasn't backed up for 6 days. And even Given that I had like 9 or 10 rounds of quite active and like, whoa, there's still more. So I'm shocked that was the only explosion.

That was the only one at work that day.

Okay.

I went home after and I was miserable. The pain only got worse because I just had so much more and more coming out. I had the other job like I said, but I called in that day.

Oh good.

Funny enough, my best friend went through the same thing at the same time as I did. She doesn't have such a crazy story, but We were at a restaurant the next day and her story happened.

Oh my—

oh wow, it bonded us for life. It was a good story afterwards, but man, like, it took me a long time to like admit that that happened.

I really like when it happens to girls. It makes me like those girls so much more. I like a girl who's had an accident like this more than one that hasn't. Well, all things are equal, identical twins, one has had this experience, I want that one.

Yeah, my dad would have been proud for sure.

Yeah, like you're a survivor. What makes this one uniquely cruel is that you still had a whole shift to get through. Most of these stories we hear, people abscond to back to their hotel or wherever, and you had to keep plodding along.

You should be given a medal, not be put on blast.

Yeah, I love that you just doubled down. You're like, yeah, and that was a great one. It was kind of a fuck you, you want to play this game of chicken? I'm gonna make you say I shit. I'm not gonna say shit, you say yes.

I know there are cameras We all know that.

Here's now what I think may have happened. Corporate got the complaint from a customer that there was human feces on the ground. The manager was asked to account for this. It's like, I don't know, I didn't see any. Go through the tapes. Oh my God, it was Kayla. Maybe customers complain like, there's shit on the floor of your store, and it came to her. She had to review the tapes, otherwise she wouldn't have even known. If it's not that she didn't see it in action, Someone would have told her, watch the tapes. Basically what she wanted to get to was like, hey, when you shit on the floor, you gotta tell me because customers complained and then I got called. And then she panicked when you stonewalled her.

Interesting.

That's also very plausible.

I know, but my guess would be that the customer would go to someone in the store. They're not going to wait till they get home and call the corporate. They're going to go somewhere like, hey, there's something going on back there.

I would agree with you, Monica. I mean, where we live, the complaints we got in our store were like Crazy.

But weeks later, the reason I think we can rule out someone flagged the manager in the store is the manager would have dealt with the shit on the ground. So the manager couldn't have known real time.

But I just think it's weird that they would call corporate instead of just asking someone up front, like, hey, some bougie people, they live to call that number.

It's on speed dial.

Horny.

New perspective of this whole story. I would have never thought someone called corporate.

I would love to get a hold of the manager. I would say recollection and just say like, walk us through this. And what was your game plan when you brought up the cameras?

I have some questions.

If you are an armchair— if luck is on our side and you are the manager and this sounds familiar to you, call us. Please call us.

But know that I'm gonna have some tough questions.

Yeah. And you're not gonna back down when she doubled down. Yeah, exactly. Well, Kayla, and I'm sorry that happened to you, but it's still a very cute story.

Thank you. Can I give a couple shout outs before I go?

Of course.

Well, I just wanted to shout out my two best friends who told me about this podcast, which are Aaliyah and Justin. They've been day one Armcherrys. I started probably during COVID You guys actually have saved me a lot. I'm 2 months postpartum and I was deep in the trenches here for actually quite a long time. So your guys' podcast gets me through day to day. So I appreciate you guys.

Congrats.

Thank you. And my husband who also listens, Brad, who couldn't be here, he's the IT guy. I hope I did this right.

You did great.

And I like Brad because Brad was getting involved with your bowels back in college. He was He's like, I'm gonna have to get an enema for you. He's a good man.

He's got my back for sure.

Yeah, and your backside. Um, well, Kayla, lovely meeting you. Have a great day.

Nice to meet you guys. Thanks so much.

All right, take care.

When I hear these stories, I have to say, like, PTSD. Well, yeah, PTSD, but also I'm really grateful I was alone.

That you were alone?

Yeah.

Yeah, in public is really—

I can't handle that.

Yeah.

I can't even handle like tripping in front of people.

I can't imagine what those people— when I had to go on the PCH. Exactly, because I just was unwilling to go in my pants.

I know, that's so strange.

You think like, don't get it on your clothes?

Of course. But then at some point you're just like, okay, I know.

I think the more polite thing to do would have been to just go on my pants, but I was just like, oh, we gotta pull it out, it's coming out, I gotta pull my pants down. I know, and there's a gutter.

That might be most people's instinct.

It's just mine is like, I guess people had to have thought I was homeless. Yeah, yeah. Okay, let's talk to Josh.

Josh, hello.

Hi, how are you?

Good, good. This is wild.

Oh, it's not even gotten wild yet. Josh, where are you?

I am in Southern California. We'll leave it a little bit vague.

Okay, interesting, because we just got off the phone with someone in Orange County, and I gotta say, we don't talk to a lot of Californians.

It seems to be that this prompt is very California heavy.

Yeah, just considering we're 10% of the population, they're not 10% of our callers.

This story doesn't take place in California, though I have had plenty of He is in California.

Okay.

Of course.

Okay.

Of course. I know Josh. Me too. Me too.

Okay.

So walk us through this episode.

I, after college, was looking at different career paths and joined a teaching fellowship program to become a teacher. So that summer we were on a college campus on the East Coast and they get you all together and it's intensive training you're going through. Pedagogy and how to learn how to make sure the students don't overrun your classroom in the first year and all of that good stuff. And then you actually do some summer school teaching as well. So they throw you to the wolves and they let those summer student kids really take the brunt of all of your terrible teaching at the beginning.

Can I ask, was this a rural setting or a city setting for the school you were going to teach in?

One of the big cities, inner city school. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which was similar to the environment that we were going to end up teaching in for most of us as well. So They tried to mirror that. The first couple of weeks you're there, you're really kind of on campus doing some of these classes. And then summer school starts up and they essentially assign you a school and then you get bussed from the campus to your school every day. So you're up early, you're there before the students get there. There's some prep work that goes into it, and then you get to teach a half day of school and really get that practice.

I'm so sorry, I'm getting mired in the details, but these are students who had to take summer school, right? So this isn't the cream of the crop.

Well, that's right.

Yeah. Well, you know, my troubled kids had to go to—

Sure, sure, sure.

You're not teaching the gifted and talented program.

Overachievers.

No. Yeah, it's like kids who fucked off and got too many detentions. Well, they probably had to go to summer school. At least in my town, that's how it was.

I think it's a lot of that for high school. This was in elementary school. So I think it's also kids who are just maybe a little bit behind and need some of that extra practice.

Okay, great.

We don't need to dive into ed policy, but really a strong proponent of year-round schooling for students because of that summer learning loss that happens. Oh, yeah.

Wow, that was good.

That's part of a Malcolm Gladwell book, The Gap, because— oh boy, I know.

No, go ahead.

Socioeconomically, there isn't a huge disadvantage when you start school, and if you end the school, it doesn't really matter your socioeconomic status, you guys will both get the same amount. It's the summertime that the kids from poor families fall dramatically behind because the parents can't oversee any activities. There's no reading happening. Yeah, so that's where they're falling behind. If you went to school endlessly, that gap— what is that, right?

Exactly. And if you think about just the other advantages of like living in a house with air conditioning over the summer or having parents home to read to you when they're not working all summer long.

Even food.

Yeah, the food.

Food scarcity.

Yeah, exactly. But yes, you don't have the top readers in your class when you're teaching summer school.

Right.

Okay.

You're on the bus 6:30, 6:45 in the morning, and then it's maybe a 15-minute bus ride to school. That morning, everyone's excited. First day of teaching. You get on the bus, you have your little bag lunch, and Pretty early into the bus ride, I know that things are not feeling great. You know, you're okay. It's nerves. First day of school. Butterflies.

Uh-huh. That's your explanation. You didn't go to, like, my breakfast or my dinner or I drank too much. You didn't have any explanations yet.

No explanations yet. I'm young, so the stomach's about as good as it can be at that point.

Right.

Uh-huh.

5 more minutes in and you're really starting to think, all right, I got to come up with a plan here. What are we going to do when we get to this building I've never been to before? And how are we going to go find a bathroom quick? So my mom was in schools for 30 years, and I know in the office there's usually an adult bathroom.

Okay.

Wow. So we're going to get there. We're going to go straight to the office, find that bathroom. We're going to be okay. So we're pulling up to the school. Things are starting to get a little worse. And I'm like, do I need to start, like, pushing my way to the front of the bus here? Like, what are we going to do?

Use the emergency exit door.

Yeah, it takes a while to get off those busses sometimes. I see the building. We're like, okay, all right, we're going to make it. And then we kind of pull around to the side of the school. So we're not, as it turns out, going in the front entrance. We're going to go in the staff entrance, which is kind of around to the side, not to disrupt whatever's happening in the front. The plan is to get everyone together, kind of do a tour of the school, and then settle into our classrooms. And I see the door. I don't know what's on the other side of that door, but I know I need to be on the other side of that door as quickly as possible. So doors open. I kind of just make a run for it. Whatever people want to think at this point, it's better than what's going to happen. Yeah, we're in the school and I'm looking around and I say, okay, we come across the boys' bathroom. Is it an adult bathroom? No, but there are no students in the school. I feel okay about it.

Yeah, yeah.

What is the policy in general? Teachers aren't supposed to use those bathrooms or they can't?

I certainly did in my years teaching, but like after hours. I think it's pretty frowned upon to use the student bathroom while students are around.

That's a good policy. Okay.

Yeah, yeah, I never thought about it.

Trust the women.

Yeah, that's probably right.

Okay, so we're approaching, we see the boys' bathroom, there's no students there, and I'm like 15 steps away, and that's it really.

Oh, we didn't get—

didn't quite make it.

Oh, are you wearing khaki pants?

Khaki pants, of course. Yeah, classic teacher uniform. Khaki pants, button-down tie, textbook. Thankfully, those boxer briefs are doing the Lord's work right now.

Oh, phew.

We're not in great shape, but we're not in the worst shape possible.

Okay, okay.

So we get into the stall, which, as we've talked about, is like meant for a 7-year-old. It is so low to the ground. And under normal circumstances, this maybe isn't the worst thing, but the toilet paper and paper towel situation at schools is not good. We're trying to do whatever I can in there to contain it. I got to keep the pants clean. That's the ultimate goal here. There's no way for me to get back. I I don't even really know where we are in this city. I had no change of clothes. So we're using the paper towel, the toilet paper, all of that. We kind of wad up the underwear. That's a lost cause. That goes right to the bottom of that trash can.

Sure, sure.

Throw a bunch more toilet paper and stuff on top to cover it up.

Because you have manners.

Exactly.

Quick inspection. Khakis look okay. Go rejoin the group. Really, I'm not going to say anything to anyone at that point. We do the tour and really the rest of the day I'm in front of the classroom for the very first time. I'm commando.

Can I ask really quickly, how long do you think the duration was of that whole project? Because my hunch is you're gone kind of a while.

My absence was noted for sure.

They probably thought you were carsick from the bus ride.

That's right.

That would be a generous—

yeah, that's what I would think.

Oh, he's got a sick tummy.

So then you're teaching for the next 3 hours and insanely self-conscious about my sitting over here. Am I trying to hide myself behind books and and I'm not really probably getting up and engaging as much as I should. It's just a weird feeling to not have underwear on in front of a classroom of children.

Yeah, that's—

In khakis too, I'll add, because there's a lot of room for a lot of slip-slappy and bouncing. Oh no, general penis and testicle play.

Oh no. Yeah, did you feel like, I'm not a pervert, but like, I, I'm behaving like one?

It really is a weird feeling. There's no secondary layer, thankfully, to this story. You get through the day, no one has said or noticed anything, and and you really just learn a couple of lessons about what you pack in your backpack to make sure you're, you're covered in these situations moving forward.

I know none of us is ever going to carry a second pair of pants with us, but we should probably— if we have a bag, why not just have them in there?

And I have so much stuff in my bag, why wouldn't I just have an extra little—

you'd set off some bear spray and some mousetraps and shit en route to get the pants.

Once you have your own classroom that's yours, you kind of have a place to, to stash some extra clothes. That's what we ended up doing for the rest of my teaching career.

Well, wonderful meeting you, Josh. Do you wanna give any shoutouts?

I do. Thank you for asking. My coworkers Danielle and Caitlin are the first couple of people I found who were also armchairers, and so I appreciate them and obviously appreciate you guys.

Well, wonderful meeting you, Josh.

Yes.

Thank you for that. You guys too. This is super cool. Thank you so much.

All right. Take care.

Bye. You all too.

Hi guys, can you hear me okay?

Oh, beautifully. Is this quote Rachel?

It is.

How did you choose the name Rachel?

Oh, it's so funny you asked that. That's like an alter ego between my boyfriend and I. Oh, so I finally get to use it for real.

Does Rachel only come out in the evening?

Yeah. What's Rachel like?

Or when drinking?

Rachel's fun. Rachel gets a little bit tipsy. She likes her wine.

Yeah, I had a hunch that's when Rachel came out.

She's like silly and frisky.

Oh yeah, everyone should have a Rachel. Well, I have an alter ego, Sana. Sonic. Uh-huh.

She drinks a lot of water.

Oh yeah, it's kind of the opposite.

Yeah, it's really wild when she comes out. It's rare. What?

Okay, I'm just gonna say, if drinking is like your main—

what? Monica does not drink a lot of water. A lot of water. It's like, oh, Sonny's here.

I know, my point is, if you drink alcohol all the time, your alter ego can't be the girl who drinks wine. It's got to be the one that drinks water. I just think that's a really funny reversal, that your naughty girl drinks water.

I know, I'm funny.

Rachel, where are you in the country?

I am from Wisconsin.

Oh, beautiful. Okay, so walk us through your unfortunate evacuation. This is such a bittersweet experience to have to meet us in these circumstances, right?

Exactly.

Yeah, you'd rather be telling us about a first-place trophy you got.

Well, I've never told the story. I pulled story from the depths of my brain. I've never written it out. I try not to think about it. This is one of my deepest, darkest—

this is a big deal.

I feel so privileged. Thank you.

I can't even tell people that I'm on the podcast because then it's gonna be let out. So I will get started. This happened about 10 years ago now. So I was newly out of college. I was lucky enough to find a job right away up by where my boyfriend— we'll call him Cory— That's where he grew up. So we packed from southern Wisconsin and we moved all the way up to central Wisconsin just a couple months after graduation. But we were new to the area, even though Corey was from the area. We didn't have a lot of friends. So both of us were starting new jobs and we wanted to find some other couples to hang out with.

How do you do that?

Right? That's one of the hardest things as an adult, to find adult friends and couple friends. So luckily with that new job, I connected with a girl named Maddie, we'll call her. We have a lot in common, so we both kind of be outdoorsy type. We like fishing, hunting, and we thought maybe we'd hang out outside of work. And we finally reached the summertime, and Maddie was telling me about how her and her group of friends, who are also couple, they were going to go tubing.

Oh, I love tubing! Had you gone before?

As a child, I had been tubing on the Little Rock River, but this tubing was actually on the Fox River, so it's a little bit bigger. Of a river, a little bit different of an experience. So we got invited, I was super pumped. So you guys are familiar with tubing?

Love it. But for people that are not familiar, you get a bunch of friends and a bunch of inner tubes and you get a second or third empty tube, you put a cooler in it, it's chock full of beer, and you float down a river and get hammered, right?

That's absolutely right.

And it's about the most fun you can have drinking.

It is really fun.

Yeah, until you go over a waterfall.

Yeah, I wasn't gonna bring it.

Was that the first time you had gone?

No, I used to go in Helen all the time. That was very low-key.

Okay, great.

For this trip, it usually takes anywhere from 2 to 4 hours depending on how high the is. On this day, the river was a little bit lower. We were expecting a pretty long ride. We're getting ready, we're very excited. Maddie decides to drive with us. It's about an hour and 15 minutes away from where we live. I had a last minute thought. I hadn't eaten yet, and I was going to be on a river all day. I just really quick throw my stuff together. I grab Manny from the counter to make a sandwich.

If this was a show or a movie, there'd be a close-up right now and a push-in on the mayonnaise on the counter.

Yes, that's exactly right. So Corey, like I said, he's coming with— he is a notorious midnight snacker. The mayonnaise was out on the counter. I turned to Corey to say, hey, do you think this is okay to eat? And he very confidently said, yeah, it's probably fine. Spoke the container, it was still a little cool, but no problem. We're probably safe.

Good to go.

I whip up the sandwich, scarf it down, we hop in the car, and we get going to the river. Once we get to the river, we meet everyone, we hop in the school bus. So you have to drive upriver to float down. We got our cooler full of goodies. So finally we make it to the river. I'm still feeling good, you know, it's a good ride, it's a good day, it's super hot, it's very sunny. We were about an hour and a half into the ride And everyone is just hitting it off. We're having a good time.

Have you had some beers at this point?

Oh yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Right, right.

However, I start getting this feeling in my stomach like something's not quite right. If you guys are familiar, it's that feeling that starts at the very top of your stomach and it hurts and it gets really bubbly. And then all of a sudden it's moving lower and lower into your intestines.

You can feel it.

All of a sudden I'm sweating. Yeah, I'm clamming. Oh, I'm very quickly assessing the situation because I know one of two things is going to happen. I'm either going to push the feeling off, it's going to go away, I'm gonna be fine, I'm gonna keep it together, or this feeling is going to keep on happening over and over again. It's gonna be more and more intense until I finally don't have a choice.

Yes.

And if I'm you, okay, I'm really quickly— I'm going, okay, so I could go— I'm gonna veer off to the bank of the river, I'm gonna pee in a bush, which would be weird because everyone's peeing in the river. So you kind of already outing yourself that you're really going to shit. But that's one option— get off the river, shit in the woods. Second is just pull your bathing suit aside, let it rip. Yeah, but the problem there is you're in a current, and there is a good chance that that excrement will float on top. Oh no, come into the group. So you got to consider that, right? So then you're like, do I try to get my tube way out in front of everyone or way behind? This is all the modeling I'd be doing. Were any of these thoughts crossing your mind?

Absolutely. I was looking at the water. Yeah, where is it kind of rocky and blurry so it would move around and you won't be able to tell? I don't need floating tits anywhere near me.

Right, right.

Silver lining, I'm wearing a black bikini bottom.

Okay, we love that.

Great start.

The river is lined with private properties. The trees are really thin. There's really nowhere I can go without getting caught for indecent exposure.

And again, I don't want to out myself And I'm stereotyping, but in Michigan this is fine, at least in my friendship group. Like, if there's a gal on the trip and she had to shit, like, this isn't a big deal. I feel like Wisconsin's similar.

No, maybe around people you know. Yeah, it's basically a date.

That's fair, right?

So I want to make a good friend impression. I don't want to be the girl that shits her pants on the river. Well, unfortunately, I got to the where I had no choice. So that's exactly what I did. I kind of frolicked around. We were a few drinks deep at this point. I figured people probably thought I was a little tipsy, so I went to the side of the shore, laid in the rocks, went under the branches of the trees like a child.

This is good.

I made myself feel a little bit more comfortable, and I figured fish poop in this water all the time. Yeah, yeah, fine. This is not clean water. I'm not dirtying anything that isn't already ruined. So I let it—

here's the problem, you know, the thing with the harness is it's floaty.

Yep. So I didn't really know. I didn't want to look.

Yeah, no, just leave it, right?

So I splashed around. I got my tube cleaned out. I don't want the little inside of part of my tube full of poop either.

It's kind of playful too. Yeah, I'm so carefree.

I'm so Rachel. You were so Rachel right then.

Yeah.

I was. I wish I could say that the story ended there. I felt better, it was done, but I can't. So unfortunately, at this point, I was experiencing full-blown food poisoning. I figured it had to be from that sandwich. Now I'm telling you, if I was at home, I would every 20 to 30 minutes be visiting the bathroom.

Right, right, right. Did you have any compulsion to throw Thank God it sounds like you didn't have to throw up though.

Correct. So I evacuated. Yeah, not one, but three times. Oh, did you do your playful thing every time?

Did you keep going back?

Did you alternate strategies?

Honestly, I got to a point where it was so unfortunate. I was just in a situation.

Oh no.

Did you tell your boyfriend?

I did, but he went through his own trauma during this trip, so I actually don't know if he remembers me telling him this or not.

Oh, this sounds like—

wait, what is his trauma? Did he jump off a bridge?

Third-degree sunburn, full of blisters on his back. Oh, couldn't sleep. Wear sunscreen when you go tubing, right?

Also, also don't have mayonnaise before.

Talk about rough showing for the couple, you know? It's like a movie, kind of. It's not the lead characters, it's two folks dogs were comedic relief that have joined the trip. And one shits herself 3 times, the other guy's getting fucking blasted with sun.

We did not make a good impression.

You didn't tell them, right? You didn't tell the friends?

I don't think so. One part of this story that I want to share is this trip had what's called a sandbar. It's an area where about 75 to 100 people gather and party and hang out and take a break.

Right.

Our group decided to stop, take a break. I unfortunately was not done with my situation, so I was way too close to strangers. I'm not saying I looked anyone in the eye while it happened, but I could have.

Ah, okay.

Uh-huh.

Wow, boy, this is great. You never consider when you're out, you're swimming, yeah, one or two of the people are going through this.

Were you worried about the sound?

Not so much.

Okay, that's good, because you're submerged, right?

Yeah, but it's still—

you would be worried about the sound.

That.

Did you ever see some floaters?

I didn't, but like I said, I tried not to look.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's best.

You were dissociated.

Yeah, yeah, TMI probably, but the feeling of it felt like there probably wasn't much solid matter.

Yeah, rounds 2 and 3 were probably liquid. You know, Rachel, this is a highly successful—

I agree, I agree.

If you have to be in this situation underwater, 100%.

And no one even knew.

Yeah, I got very lucky.

What about the car ride back?

I'd be worried. I had 45 more minutes left of the float after we left the sandbar, and I had an hour and 15-minute drive home to just sit in the back and sulk.

Okay, but you were done evacuating, so that's good.

Were you able to be joyful in between the rounds, or were you a total dud on the floating trip?

That's a great question. I wish I knew. Like I said, I was so dissociated. I want to say that I was cheerful, Rachel. Yeah, I was great, and super personable.

You were probably just drunk and weird, but also you were shitting out the beer too, so like you couldn't stay drunk.

The tipsiness and the intoxication was long gone after the second time it happened.

The adrenaline.

Oh boy.

Did you guys end up developing a good double date friendship with this group, or was that one and done trip?

That is one and done.

Oh, okay.

We never saw these people again. I am wondering, do they Did they find out? Is this a part of it? So I have shoved this so far in my brain, it's going back in its little pocket.

They were probably boring, to be honest.

When you're on a tubing trip, everyone's pretty hammered. If you know you're bringing it up, it's not like top discretion time. I think you'd be like, oh fuck, there's poop!

But then it's easy to be like, yeah, what?

Yeah, where did it come from?

Where it could come from? Anything. And even if it's on you, you're like, it got on me!

Ah yeah, there's more on me, it's coming out of my butt! Oh my God, so weird. Got in me.

No, I would not own that. If someone said there was poop, I'd be like, oh my God, poop, where?

Yeah, gross.

We should kill whoever did this.

Again, like, best case scenario for this, really.

Yeah, you kind of got lucky. Of all the places, I got away with it, that's for sure. Rachel, we hear a lot of these stories, and you should tell people this. This is fine. People are not going to judge you or think you're gross. It's kind of an adorable story.

You'd be surprised how many people have dealt with this this.

Yeah, about 90%.

Yeah, I'm gonna say 99.

Yeah, I can't be the only person who's pooped themselves on a lazy river.

No, exactly. That river was full of other people.

Yeah, I think I've gone, but intentionally, you know.

Yeah, people are doing it intentionally.

They're terrible. Uh, well, it's lovely meeting you.

Thank you guys, I appreciate it. And I just quick give a shout out to my friend Michelle for letting me borrow her internet in her closet today.

Oh, thanks, Michelle.

Thanks, Michelle.

And Monica, just a special shout out to you for all of your big sis energy and helping me get through my 30s. I really appreciate it. You're so kind and so sweet.

Oh, that is really nice. Thank you so much.

Of course.

Bye.

Here's Cara.

Cara the Hotel.

Cara or Cara?

Oh, I think I was at Cara the Hotel the other day. A couple armchairs came up.

Hello, is it Cara or Cara? Cara, right?

It's Cara.

Cara!

Rob was right. Wabiwa was right.

Monica, I am a real follower to The Most Pain, so it just kills me that I couldn't make a fork because I'm at work.

You don't have to. You sound great. I need you to release yourself of that.

And I immediately need to talk about the little kind of anime cartoon you see on the wall.

I think this is Mira from the Demon—

oh, K-pop.

Yes, I'm a children's therapist, and so I have lots of crafty things.

Oh my gosh, good for you!

It does look fun and inviting already. And then what's over your left shoulder on the wall?

It's like a collage of raccoons dancing.

Oh, very playful raccoons. Can you tell us what part of the country you're in?

Yeah, I am in Seattle.

Oh, okay, wonderful. Okay, so you have an unauthorized evac story for us?

Sure do.

Oh, we're so excited.

It is in the Princess Louisa Inlet in Canada at a camp. Are we familiar with Young Life at all?

No. And I also need to know, is that on the West Coast or the East Coast? West Coast.

West Coast.

Okay, up by BC.

Is Young Life like the religious camp?

Yes.

Okay, tell me more. I don't know about it.

It's an evangelical nonprofit that's a lot about taking kids who aren't Christians and trying to take them to these camps where they have these like spiritual experiences, and then they're like, I want to be a Christian now. I was a camper and I was leader and a staff member.

Wow.

And now I am none of those things.

Sure, sure, sure.

Your life has taken a lot of turns.

Yes, the emo teen to Young Life staff to therapist pipeline is crazy.

And were your parents involved with that, or did you initiate your involvement?

I grew up in the church. I mean, at the time it was a great community. It really, I think, served a lot of purposes that I can still hold on to. And one of them was that, like, I had some really great times at camp, and this is where that camp was. It's called Malibu Malibu, but it's not anything like Malibu, California, except that it is really beautiful. And this camp, you take one ferry and then you drive for a while, and then you take this boat that just has campers on it. It's a 3-hour, very slow boat ride to this like secluded camp that used to be where celebrities would go. They used to have like pictures of celebrities on the wall, but it's this beautiful camp that just shows up out of where there's an outer dock that you get dropped off at, and then there's like a half a mile walk into camp.

Wow.

It's Christian summer camp where there's lots of activities. It's kids that do Young Life all over the world that will come to this. You're also there with just a lot of different people, not just people from your area.

This sounds so fun. If we could take up the scripture, I would be in.

Yeah.

Honestly, they do camp wonderfully, and it was a blast. And one of the activities that we do as a camp camp. In the evening, we sing songs and they talk about Jesus and all that, and then we go back to our cabins and we do cabin time. I went to camp with some girls that I went to high school with, and at cabin time, it's like, what did you hear the speaker talk about? And you've been doing camp activities all day, and so you're super hungry and super tired by the time this cabin time comes.

It's for reflection, it sounds like.

Yeah, a lot of tears, a lot of, I've made out with boys, I shouldn't do that, I'm so sorry. It's also fantastic food. So we have like had a lot of camp food, but at cabin time we had a bunch of snacks, and one of those snacks was Fiber One bars. Oh, I didn't have that reaction because I didn't know what they did. I just finished my sophomore year of high school, so this was in 2011. I was really hungry, so I had 3 of them because I didn't know what fiber did.

That was me and space cake in Amsterdam. I was like, it's just delicious. I didn't anticipate.

So I had the Fiber One bars. We had the next day of camp, and our cabin activity for the day was going on a Caribe ride, the inner tubes that go behind boats that's like shaped like a banana, but like in a hot dog bun sort of. You like sit on the banana, put your feet on the hot dog bun.

Oh, cool.

You've seen those, right? And like 5 or 6 people can ride on it. They're pretty long.

Yeah. The videos make it look really easy to stay on them. I was very disappointed by the amount of time I spent trying to get on that thing to the amount of time actually on it. So we did that for a few hours. That's not true. That was really dramatic. We made it. We did it for like an hour.

Yeah, yeah. I also love the irony and the phallic nature of all the young Christian girls riding this humongous yellow dick around the water for an hour.

The horniness at the camp is crazy.

In reflection, it's like, I had impure thoughts on the banana today.

They set you up for it and then they're like, how dare you? Yeah. Oh, so something about my swimsuit to know is I was wearing spandex shorts in case something were to come off, so I just tried to keep myself secure. It's always on the last run, as we know, and so this was the last run before going back in. And we took a turn, everyone falls off, and we all had helmets on, and I hear like a thunk, and then I fall in the water, and water shoots right up my butt. Oh wow, like a hose, just straight up. And then my Fiber One bar poops come out.

Oh no.

So you know, like minestrone soup.

Uh-huh, sure.

So if you were to like dump that out into like a tub, already has water in it.

Oh no.

But then you like sit in the tub with it.

Oh, this is horrible. Had your spandex shorts come off, or just somehow the water passed through the spandex shorts and all the shit come out the pant legs, or who knows?

It had to because there was some stuck in my shorts, but it had also all come out, and I'm just seeing it floating around me.

This is horrifying.

Yes. And I'm like, can my cabinmates see it? And we're in an inlet. And so I'm kind of pushing things around, making sure people don't notice. At this point, my brain is just like, oh my God, that's my poop. And then I don't remember how we got back to the dock. Did I get back on the Creebay? Did I get in the boat? I don't remember. But it dropped us back off at the outer dock. So I had to walk the half mile back to camp.

Ooh, a half mile in wet spandex?

Wet poopy spandex, no shoes. And it's like a trail. The walk that you do when you're kind of like flexing.

Oh God, because you thought you had to do more.

Oh yeah, there was definitely more.

Okay, so you're feeling pressure for another round.

Yes, I was like, we are not done.

Yeah, and there's maybe some seawater up in there too.

Oh yes, a lot that needs to come back out. Put my towel tight around me, left my cabinmates. I was like, bye, I don't care. And I just like did this clenched butt cheek waddle all the way back and also could still feel it dripping on my legs and chunkies like on my penis.

This is awful.

And I'm a 15-year-old girl. I'm like, I want to die.

And there are boys there?

Are there boys there?

Yes.

Oh no, I somehow thought it was just all girls.

Boys were very attractive. Oh, instead of going back to my cabin, and I had this whole half-mile walk to plan, I went to the bathroom that's single person. You lock the door and people have to like knock to come in, you know? And I strip off my swimsuit and I throw it in the sink and I sit naked and wet on the toilet and just like keep pooping. Oh, poop until it's done. I'm taking toilet paper and like trying to like dry off, and so then I have like that soggy toilet paper everywhere. Uh, I'm finally done pooping. There's no poop on my body. I go and I rinse out my swimsuit in the sink. I don't want to put my like poopy towel around me, and I also don't want to walk in just the towel back to my cabin. So I put my wet swimsuit back on that's still like a little bit poopy but rinsed off, go to my cabin, get ready to shower, and then the girls go, "We should just go to the pool now." And so I was like, "Yeah, you're right." Oh wow. I was like, I think what would be better than taking a shower is the chlorine would just kill all the bacteria.

So I just decided with my 15-year-old logic to jump in the pool to clean off.

Well, in your defense, that was before they hung the signs up that said if you have active diarrhea, do not swim, which are now ever-present. But we didn't know then. It was a simpler time.

That's right. Now, the girls who went to the camp with me will need to fact-check me, but I talked to one of my friends who went with us last night, and I was like, was it me? And I'm pretty sure that the thunk that I heard when I fell off, I thought it was someone else's helmet, but it ended up being Gabby's nose.

What?

My friend remembers that she was on the Caribe with us, that she she broke her nose on that ride, and Gabby was sitting behind me. Okay, so I think that's why no one really noticed that I was having my poopy incident, because when Gabby fell off, she broke her nose.

Thank God for her broken nose.

Gabby.

But also, percentage-wise, there's 6 passengers, one broke their nose and one shit their pants.

Exactly.

You know, I feel like a waiver needed to be signed.

Maybe other things happened too that we don't know about.

And my friend who was on with us, she also hurt her hip really bad the same ride.

This is a disaster.

Yeah, you sign so many liability waivers.

Oh wow.

When you go.

Not that you guys care, but I think what the problem with those big floating bananas is they're underinflated a lot. So it's like when one kid moves, it shoves Aaron back and then, you know, it's just a wild ride. Such a heartwarming story. It sounds like it could be in Meatballs: The Camp Movie or Wet Hot American Summer. It's got that joyful patina.

It does.

It makes me nostalgic for a camp I never even went to.

I was looking at pictures of when I was at the camp, and I was trying to have compassion for 15-year-old me, but she was a horny, struggling— oh my gosh, I was like taking pictures with these hot boys and posting them on Facebook, and I'm like, they don't even know who I am. This is crazy.

It's just so hard to be a person.

Did you ever have any hookups at this Christian camp?

No, I wish.

But there were hookups happening. Right?

Oh yeah, because I also like went as a leader and a staff member, and there was kids getting in trouble all the time for having sex.

Yeah, well, you gotta tell people, leave room for Jesus between you, right? When they're dancing at those dances.

Yeah.

And then leave room for the Lord.

They're not really having sex, they're soaking, and that doesn't count.

I think that's specifically—

that's Mormon.

Well, no, I have a friend who was not Mormon.

She did some soaking.

She hadn't had sex yet, and then she's like, but he put it in. I was Wait, that counts.

Very liberal definition.

Exactly. She was very religious, and so you find your ways.

The anal one's always a fun workaround. Yeah, that's a fun workaround.

Yeah, why don't you just—

yeah. Well, thanks for doing the Lord's work and working with children. Yeah, I feel like you're the perfect person for this.

Yeah, I appreciate it.

This was delightful.

Have a great rest of your day.

You too, take care.

All right, bye-bye.

I just feel like if I was surrounded by minestrone soup poop, I would panic. Yeah, I would probably do something really like evil. Yeah, like, who did this? You know, I'd start blaming.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the girl with the broken nose.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, she broke her nose and evacuated everywhere. Gross shit everywhere because her nose broke and she just let loose.

She's disgusting. That one reminded me of my mom's story of somehow they hung out with friends in Florida when my mom and dad were married and they were young, and they had a boat. They took them water skiing, but there were alligators where they were water skiing. And so my mom was like in the process of trying to get up and she couldn't get all the way up, but she refused to let go of the rope because she was so afraid to be in there with alligators that she just drug behind the boat for an incredibly long time. And it gave her a huge enema. Yeah, she had the same situation. Yeah, happens to the best of us.

Sure does.

Oh, always a blessing.

It is.

All right, love you.

Do you want to sing a tune or something? We know a 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 Aunt Jerry's, we'll get some suggestions. On the Fly Rhyme Dish. On the Fly Rhyme Dish. Enjoy.