The House Fire and Explosions

welcome, welcome, welcome to Arm Chair Anonymous. I'm Dan Shepppard, and I'm joined by Lily Padmail. Hello. Today, we're going to entertain you with crazy stories of neighbors. We've all been there. I mean, really, it seems pretty universal, doesn't it? It I've had a handful of questionable neighbors. But these really these are tippy top Yeah these are more extreme than I have ever dealt with. Yeah Oh, that's one of these birbs you're talking about, but I knew I did it. And it was I couldn't I't I couldn't help it. I don't actually think that was one. Th was from all the cllostren. I Yeah. That wasn't one I'm talking about. that wasn't one of the tick ones. Okay, please enjoy crazy neighbors This episode is brought to you by American Beverage. We've probably all had that moment where someone says something about an ingredient in your drink and you're like, shouldould I be worried about that? 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Now available in Canada too. That's Qu nce dot com slash dax for free shipping and three hundred sixty five day returns Quins d. com slash AX A times come and go. T Tound. Take them slow You gotta know Johnny. Hi Wait, your name is in quotes. Does that mean it's a fake name And is your fake name Kelsey? My fake name is Kelsey. R. We're not even gonna ask you what your real name is. I'm not gonna ask, but I do want to know is this a nod to the Kelsey brothers. Oh shit No Okay, great. J want to See see what we're dealing with. Why Kelsey, do you have a friend that you love that's named Kelsey? No, I can't actually say much ' I'll give it away. I just thought it was a good option.. I'mop pounding you about it. I just thought it could be a maybe a cute thing. Kelsey, where are you? I am in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada. Oh, what's Thunder Bay Thunder Bay is the same place that you guys had a caller in that had the gross shin melty puddle in the restaurant restaurant. Yeah. Like kind of a seaside party towny vibe. Yeah, up on Lake Superior. Oh, you're on Lake Superior. Right on the northern part there. Wow, and let's just tell people, Lake Superior is the most beautiful of the Great Lakes. It's the biggest, the deepest. It the coper Breezing. Height of summer, what's the temp . Oh, way too cold for me. The kids will go in 'cause they'll go in anything, but way too co. Sure. I couldn't even guess. And it gets dicey and superior like the Edmunds Fitzgerald crash there. You get some high seas, Monica. Oh my God. Yeah. Yes. Okay, so you have a crazy neighbor story. I have a very crazy neighbor story. wonderful. Yeah, yeah we We like a crazy neighbor story I know I was a little bit nervous to tell, but you know what? I'm just gonna put it out there and tell it. So I do have notes just because It was over a few years.so you're in armcherry, which means you're smart and organized in a good story to and you have your nes. It's very common. Yes. This all started during COVID. So during COVID, while I was very pregnant with my second son, we bought a house and immediately got warned about the woman next door Within the first week, my husband and I were like looking out the window and we saw her Lining up rocks. So our yard sort of goes like right against her driveway So she was lining up rocks along the length of our yard and then started digging up our yard as though she was going to like expand her driveway onto our yard. Okay Okay. interesteresting. How old is our neighbor friend? I would put her in her sixties sure. So my husband and I are watching this and he's like, you know what? I'm gonna go out and talk to her And I'm like, okay, let's just tread lightly. I'm a little bit more of the cool Kalm collected. He can have a shorter fuse when provoked. Dack Shepherd tie. A little bit. So we go outside and she immediately screams at us, Stay back. It's COVID. stay back. it' CVID and like puts her shirt up over her face to sort of protect her, I guess, from us So my husband asks what she's doing. She tells us that basically our yard is her property. And there's a little heated exchange where she ends with telling him to go fuck himself. Oh wow. He returned the sentiment and he walked back inside. I'm like very pregnant waddling behind him. Can I ask, is this a vacation property or your primary residence? No, this is like our primary residence. you're not living next to an enemy So we decided, let's be adults about this. We'll get a survey to like properly determine the property line and we will build a fence because as we know, fences make good neighbors. Yes. The survey company came, they marked out the line. Our property actually ended like a foot or two into her driveway. She wasn't home at the time, so they left a card in her mailbox We just thought, you know, okay, great, it's COVID, so we had to wait a bit for lumber because as you guys know, like things were just crazy during that time. No one could get supplies. And I guess she took it upon herself to call the survey company threatened them to the point where the survey company actually called me and they said, Look, we know your husband's working out of town. We've actually gone on lockdown here because she's making threats to come down here so we're just suggesting you sort of lock your doors and do God. They're on lockdown at the surveying place. Wow, okay. Yeah. And so I was home with my three year old son at the time. So that was kind of sketchy, just not really knowing what was going on. So between when we had the survey and when we actually built the fence There were multiple police calls. We actually had her on video saying just wait until your kid comes over here again. But she never finished the threat, so the police couldn't do anything about it. Oh my God Yeah, and he was three at the time. L he wasn't ever going over there. They would take pictures of my son outside playing to this day, he turns nine next week and he's still afraid of her. Well really quick, does she have a husband in the mix or a partner? Yes. He never really gets into the dust ups. It's mostly her, but he is around. Every time the police showed up, of course, the whole neighborhood comes out to kind of see what's going on, especially during COVID. we were all looking for cheaper free entertainment. Yeah Yeah You were providing it. Yeah. She would be out there screaming to everyone about what terrible parents we were because we let our kid roam around She threatened to call children's aid on us. She called nine hundred and eleven so many times. Oh my God. this is like that dock. It is. We ended up being on like a first name basis with the police. My little guy, he thought police were just a normal part of life that they were at everyone's house all the time.. She called by law to falsely report our dog running at large. So things became really uncomfortable. We had such bad anxiety. We didn't want to go outside. You never knew what you were gonna to get with her She would stare at us. So we'll jump forward to this is now like August, twenty twenty And we finally have the materials to build the fence. My husband's very handy. so him and some buddies, some family all came over to build this fence. They would not move their vehicles so that we could get in there. They just stood their hands on their hips staring at us. She called nine hundred eleven, reporting that my husband was standing in the yard with weapons whichich was like a drill and a hammer because we were building a fence. You think nine hundred eleven's ever blocked a call? My work c just be like, you know what, I'm not taking the woman's calls anymore.. That's what we kept saying. Like what a waste of resources to send all these police all the time So the police ended up actually just sort of staying at our house the whole day to keep the peace because every time they left She would call back or we would have to call because she ran into the backyard at one point and was throwing tree branches over the fence. Oh my God. She needs a job. She needs a mental facility. She scribbled on a cardboard sign for sale and hung that up in her tree as we were building the fence. She's very clearly not Well Yeah unhinged. So this is where things started to get scary. So around that same time, our dog out of nowhere got really, really sick vomiting nonstop, lost a ton of weight. We had to take him to the emergency vet and they said that his blood work showed that there were toxins, but unless we knew what toxin we were looking for, they couldn't actually confirm. So the fence got built with police on standby. Did you reclaim all that? Did you go into her driveway or did you back off of the driveway? No, we were nice about it. We just went where the yard line was at the time. We didn't really wantna poke too much. So after my second son was born, I don't know if it was because it was COVID and she had nothing better to do, maybe, but as she backed out her driveway would just blare on her horn. the full minute it took her to back out. Oh my God. My room's on that side of the house. The baby's room was on that side of the house, It would be like early early morning, middle of day. every time she would just blare the horn. Can I'm gonna pause for one second? I just want to check in with Monica, becausecause Monica and I debate about this all the time. and she's right physical violence should never happen. Do you not think this woman just needs to get her ass kicked by another woman? No I mean someone needs to go, you can't act this way. I'm not gonna allow it. I mean I think verbally yes, that won't happen But if what's not that's not gonna deter I don't know that even physical violence would deter someone like that. Like I just think she needs help. She need to be put in a hospital Okay B bye, G. Yeah, bye I could see in the eighties this going on for three weeks in my neighborhood, but I feel like some mom would have punched her and then that might have been the end of it. Right. Yeah, I don't condump her. Okay. All right, we're not there y. Okay. Just checking in. Just wondered if this rose to the Okay, if she the kid, I'll say yes. Okay, okay. I know, not the very like friendly Canadian stereotyppe that we typically have. So she would like stand in her driveway watching me put my son on the school bus. She actually called the school bus company trying to get the stop moved because she didn't want it stopping in front of her house She took so many pictures of us, so many videos of my son. What's the threshold for harassment? Like can you sue somebody this feels like harassment? We'll get to that.. Yeah, she made all kinds of fake police calls. I think at one point she made a nine hundred eleven call saying my husband was like revving his sled, his snow machine in the middle of the night or like racing it down the street something Ridiculous. At one point, she told the police, referring to my husband, She said, I'm not gonna let some snot nosed kid tell me to go fuck myself, which we've always thought is hilarious because my husband is a tradesman. He's in his thirties, He has a full beard. He's very much not a snot nosed little kid. So at that point, I think we had about twenty police reports from all of the false complaints and harassment. But the thing that finally led to her having criminal charges was when she decided to email my husband's employer. My husband drives a work vehicle His company and everything is blasted all over the side. It's not hard to see who he works for. Police were here for something. I can't remember, but they had said to us, they had just talked to her and she was thinking about emailing my husband's boss. So the next day, she sent his company an email She basically laid out that my husband was dangerous, creepy, intimidating. She actually said, I don't think I could take him If something like physical was to happen, which is crazy. My husband's the nicest guy. He would never heurt a fly. But also yeah, you can't take him Right. That's also that. Yeah yeah, you probably can't take a lot of thirty year old dud. Right. She also attached a bunch of pictures of his work vehicle just parked in the street, our house, him walking down the street. Thankfully, she was dumb enough to put it in writing because that was the final straw. That's what led to her being charged with two counts of criminal harassment. Oh God She dragged the court proceedings out for close to two years. We almost went to trial and she finally pled guilty, like days before we were supposed to go to trial. And during the two years where she was about to be on trial, did her antics stop? No, notot as intense, but more of an intimidating like every time we were outside, she would make sure she was outside The pictures never stopped. She did accuse my husband of being a voyer one time while we were waiting She called nine hundred and eleven to say he was peeping in her windows.. You know, I bet when you look at her phone, the nine and the one and the one are like worn out on a security pad. So once she pled guilty, what did they say if you do it again, you could end up in jail? L I can't imagine they sent her to jail for this. No, she didn't go to jail. had I think it's called a suspended sentence. So basically we got like a restraining order so she couldn't communicate with us or our kids, couldn't come onto our property. That was the part that bothered me the most was the kids. Like if you want to harass me and my husband, we're adults? Well, you're snut knows kids, but yes, I. How many years ago was that that conviction happened twenty twenty two And have you had four years of peace? I don't know if I would call it peace, but things have certainly calmed down since she was convicted. She still lives next door. Oh wow. Oh my God. You know, you never know. I mean, the only compassion I can find in this is She's very unhappy. Well, we don't know if she's unhappy. She is. Well, she's unwell. I think sometimes unwell people might not be unhappy. I think she's so grouchy and easily annoyed and anything that's happening, she feels like it's a personal assault and her fucking fighter flights probably up and her cortisols are dumping. I mean, every's suffering Because of this way she's chosen. Some people get high on that. Well, we've heard various stories from the other neighbors, streets over saying, oh yeah, twenty five years, we've known that woman. She's been like that her whole life. So that's my crazy neighbor. Wow. That's a rough one. That is rough. Luckily, I want to say, I know what it's like to live in that type of area and your neighbors are more relevant that type of neighborhood. Like we have that. We have someone we can't stand. We don't care. We don't see them. Yeah it's gonna happen. Everyone's in their house in LA. It's fine. But if we lived in a rural area and we shared a yard, it'd be a different scenario. Yeah. Especially our summers are so short here. We want to get outside and be outside as much as we can. But I will say after so many years of anxiety, something cool has finally come of this experience I'm gonna count it as a wh. Well I'm glad that there was some silver lin Exactly. Well, Kelseie, lovely meeting you. Yeah, Thankks for telling us that. Thank you so much. Can I just say a very quick shout out just to everyone who has heard this story for years, all my friends, all my coworkers, and of course my husband who has gone through all of this with me. We're a great team and hopefully we don't have any more challenges like this down the road We're sending you all the good vibes. All right, well, lovely meeting, you enjoy this little glimpse of summer coming your way. Thank you so much guys. Take care. Take care. Let's talk about a condition many people haven't heard of, and it turns out it's more common than you'd think Peroni's disease or PD for short D can happen when scar tissue builds up under the skin of the penis. This can cause a curve with a bump during an erection However, some men lead to pain during intimacy and may impact mental health. It may also lead to anger and frustration, depression, lowered self esteem, and even withdrawal from sexual activity and physical intimacy. 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Make sure you enter our show name after checkout so they know we sent you Helixleepot com slash armchair This episode is sponsored by Better Help So Monica, here's something that really stuck with me. BetterHelp's twenty twenty six state of Stigma repeport surveyed two thousand Americans and revealed that eighty five percent of Americans believe getting support is wise. Yet seventy four percent say society discourages people from doing so. That's a huge gap. Most of us agree therapy is a good thing, but there's still something holding some people back from actually going Right. And I think that's where just talking about it, normalizing it makes a difference. I mean, as you know, I'm I obsessed with thepy. I've been in it consistently for years and years and years. and I have said this and I shouldn't say it, but I do think if you're struggling and you've been struggling for a while and you haven't sought therapy, I judge you a little bit. Oh o Okay. Yeah. I know what I'm not. And I gott to go to therapy to work on that, you know, but also there are options for you. You can help yourself And Betterhelp makes that first step easier. They match you with a licensed therapist based on your needs and with over thirty thousand therapists and twelve plus years of experience, they typically get the match right the first time. Don't let stigma stand in the way of support. Start therapy with betteretter Help. Sign up and get ten percent off at betterhelp dot com slash DAax. That's betterhLp dot com slash DAax Oh Okay. Hey, how are you? So good, what fake name should we go with? Well, I was hoping you could maybe assign one to me. Okay I'm going with Claire B Claire's a very friendly name, isn't it? I've known a few Cares over the years. They're all very friendly. I've never met a bad Claire. It's hard to find a bad Claire. Or a bad E Claire. That's easier. My had some bad E Clares. Claire, where are you? I am currently in Maine. Oo, I wna go. Maine's having a real moment, right? A lot of people moving to Maine Yeah, especially after the pandemic, a lot of folks moved up here, including our families. Yeah, I have a good friend who moved there, lived there for the last five years, just sold his house and it had tripled in value in the five years he Oed de That doesn't soundound. I really want to go there. It looks so idyllic It's pretty. Where did you come from? So we moved here from the Seattle area. Oh, okay, so all the way across. Yeah, we like the corners. Yeah you like. You could have also agreed to only live in towns named Portland and still been in the Pacific Northwest. That's true. Okay, so your crazy neighbor's story was it in the Seattle area? Yes. Walk us through at Let us hear This took place in early September of twenty eighteen. At the time we were living in a very idyllic suburban area. Outside of Seattle, there are some very family friendly towns. They have a name and they have their own private park. Kids ride their bikes. stillill it feels very like nineteen fifties. They're just running into each other's houses and stuff like that. And so that's where we were. And we had two young kids at the time and tons of families where we lived.s were like early elementary school. and my daughter was good friends with two other daughters in the neighborhood. They all hung out together and stuff and our families began to hang out. What ages? The youngest being like five and the oldest being eight. I'll give you a couple of names, a couple of the players. So Karen and Heather Karen's kids And Heather's kids, all of our daughters, they all hung out together. And so Karen and Heather and our family, we would get together for trick or treating and Easter eggs and community events and all of those kinds of things. We even went camping together in that summer before. So we knew each other well, but always with tons of kids and husbands and people always around. There was another family, Jennifer's family. She had two boys, but she was like our kids soccer coach. So we all knew each other. and again, kids all in the same age going to the same school, same bus stop And in early September, one of the daughters had a birthday party. Heather and Karen and I, we were hanging out after the birthday party and we're like, we should do a mom's night out. Like school is back in session, long summer. let's have a good time. Yeah. We decided that we're gonna do it the following weekend. And in between time there was a soccer practice. So I was like, Hey, why don't we invite Jennifer to? Because she's cool She's friendly, super funny. And she's the mother of the boys. She's the mother of the boys. And the other two moms are like, yeah, that sounds great. We decideed to go to a country Western bar with a mechanical bull. The moms are going hard. Keep in mind, at this point, I'm in my early forties, so is another mom. Everybody else's late thirties. We are not mechanical bull writing appropriate age Sure, sure, sure But it's hilarious, and why not? Yes. And Chippenales isn an infashionist That's right. And that wasn't really our style anyway. We're like, let's just go and make fun of ourselves and have a couple of beers. But in the lead upp, we start a group text and Karen sends a text of Deborah Winger from Urban Cowboy. Yeah yeah know her well. Bud and Sissy In that movie, Cissy is like erotically wriding the Bll. She's in a white tank top brawless. Okay Yeah, that's a lot. It's a lot. So she sends a gIF, giff, whatever you call it of Deborah Ringer riding the Bll Now again, this is not really our vibe for the rest of us. So we're like, that's a choice. It could be funny? Yeah. We were like, okay, let's go the funny route. Yeah. So we were like, all right, let's embrace our Deborah Wingers. you know, we're gonna have a good time. So I'm the designated driver. The rest of us, we all meet up. I take everybody out. Heather is particularly happy. She just got a new job. So she's like happy drunk. We're all just laughing, having a really good time Haren is a little on the quiet side. We decideed to go do the mechanical bowl. Really quick, had she arrived in an overtly sexy outfit or just normal. Just normal. All right. We were all just kind of normal trying to get our country on, but that wasn't really our situation either. So I go at first, I comically fall off the mechanical bowl kind of instantly We're laughing really hard. We're all having a good time. Jennifer goes up, Heather goes up. We all instantly fall off. Karen goes up And she's been very quiet, very kind of serious this whole time, and she does kind of seductively ride the ball A little longer than the rest of us. She's kind of whipping her hair back and forth.. Living out of fantasy. We're like, But we're cheering for her. We're like, that Wasn't what bus stop moms we were expecting, but we're like, go Tabra, you know She gets off and she kind of struts over to us. She's very straight faced. We're laughing. We're just enjoying ourselves and making fun of the whole situation. And she's like, yes. My husband is a very happy man. Oh, all right. Oh wow. Thanks for telling us. Wow. Okay. And she kind of keeps walking back to the table. Oh she says it in pass. Yeah. She throws it away. So she goes back to the table. You know, we carry on. we're having a good time. We're line dancing, a couple hours in. and again Karen's pretty quiet. I come back to the table from line dancing And it's just Jennifer and Karen at the table and Jennifer's kind of te up. Oh Okay. And Karen is veryy flat f like flat affect. And Jennifer's immediately like, I'm going to the bathroom. So she goes to the bathroom and Karen follows her. Oh, I have no idea what's going on. I'm fat dumb and happy. You're not even drinking, right? Yeah, so I'm like, and we're all grown ass women. Yeah. You're like, what You know what I mean? Yeah. But Heather immediately is alarmed And she said Something's wrong, I think Karen is attacking Jennifer Once Whoa. And I'm like, what are you even talking about? Keep in mind, we had just gone camping together the month prior, like this was so out of left field. And so Heather's like, you need to go check on them in the bathroom. Okay, hold on one second. Do you have a guess? A little bit I have a guess too. Minimally she thinks this woman's fucking her h. That's right, right. That's Karen thinks That Jennifer Jennifers fucking h That's my gu. She's like, I'm sexier than you. My husband's very happy. You don't even think about it You fucking think about shit, I'm gonna assault you in a bathroom. because actually I'm very insecure. Okay Okay but we don't tell us if we're rights. Yeah. I go in long story short, they wind up leaving. Karen walks out of the bathroom. Jennifer looks at me and is like She is a crazy fucking bitch. My God. And this is not how Jennifer talks and And I'm like, what? just happened. She's like, I don't want to cause any more drama. She's very territorial with me. She's saying really nasty things about me. She basically just verbally attacked me for the last ten minutes. Wha. And Jennifer's like, I'm catching a newber And I'm leaving. So Jennifer Laves, I come back to the table and I have a lot of experience like de escalating heated situations, both personally and professionally. And so that part of my brain kind of clicks in And I'm like, I'm going to stay cool and cal and collected. I'm going to leave with some curiosity. I'm really clear about what's mine and what's not mine and clearly whatever's happening with Karen is not mine. So I come back to the table and I'm like What's going on? And she's like, you know what's going on. She starts talking in this like really cryptic kind of hostile way towards me. She says, you are such a bully and you know what? so is your daughter. Oh Now it's gonna be hard to de escalate. You've brought my child into it. Oh my daughter, she barely turned eight at this point. Everybody that I talk to about her is just like, she's the sweetest, kindest kid. So I kind of instantly know, this has nothing to do with me. This has nothing to do with my kid. And if there is something of mine or something in my daughter's some transgression, I'm happy to own it. We get talking and I'm like Tell me more. She's kind of circling around, you know. The only specific thing I can get from her is one time My daughter and Heather's daughter whispered in each other's ear and didn't tell. Karen's daughter what they whisper. So a bully. She's a bulloy. Big dad. Yeah, big bully. And so I was like, I see that as a parenting difference. I'm okay with children whispering in each other's ears She's not de escalating. In fact, she starts then verbally attacking my husband. So I'm all done with this conversation. I'm starting to get triggered This has gone on too long, but I'm still the designated driver. We're a half hour away I'm still willing to take you in my car. And keep in mind, Heather is sitting there the whole time, but she's no longer happy drunk. She is very sad drunk, holding onto her beer like This was supposed to be a very fun mom's night out. did not turn out. Sounds more like a trip to Vegans. That's right. I had been texting my husband this whole time because he's like, how's it going? And I'm like, holy shit. Going sideways. So I'm like going once, going twice Okay, you guys are saying, I'm leaving. I leave. I call my husband. I'm talking to him on the phone, trying to tell him all the crazy things that had happened. I'm just a minute or so out and Heather calls. and I'm like I answering your phone call. I don't want any like come on back. We were having fun. you know, I don't want any of that. And I'm like, you chose to stay. So I'm out. I keep talking to my husband She calls a second time. I ignore her call second time, but I tell my husband, Hey, Heather just called me twice. If she calls the third time, I'm answering. She calls a third time I pick up the phone And she says She punched me. Oh my go, she punched her? Oh my God. Where this bar was, it's kind of like four wide lanes of highway like car dealerships around, you know, like very industrial kind of place. She had crossed the street and was just h tailing it in a direction on the street. She's like, canan you come back and pick me up So I do. I come back, I pick her up, and she's like covered in beer. Apparently what happened is I left the bar. Heather, who's been kind of standing by her side this whole time, turns to Karen and says It's just the two of us now. What are we gonna do and Karen punches Heather in the face. Oh my Godd. Heather drops to the ground Karen punches her a second time on the ground. Let's remember, within an hour of bully allegations, which is spectacular. I think she was just like raging with impotence. I could tell she wanted to get a rise out of me and I wasn't giving her that. and I think she just kind of snapped. But somebody helps Heather up, Heather walks out of the bar, Karen follows her screaming at her. Heather crosses the four lanes of traffic, and that's when I pick her up turnurns out in the car, Heather opens up to me and begins telling me that Karen had had a baby a year or so prior. She was postpartum going through something, had kind of sworn Heather to secrecy, was really worried and paranoid, but had been doing all this emotionally manipulative stuff that is more prevalent in maybe some emotionally abusive relationships. She had also been verbally attacking Heather's daughter and like really seemed to be targeting a lot of hostility towards not just my daughter, but hers. So there was like a long standing pattern that I had no idea about And Heather was actually reluctant to come out with us that night, but because I didn't know anything, I was just like, was I last night. And anyway, that night Karen reached out to Heather. Heather sent her a text that said, You fuck off and die, don't ever talk to me again. And Karen kept texting. Heather filed a police report. A restraining order was issued. I was able to fact check myself because we have a lot of court documents documenting the whole night. boy. And when the police officer came to take the report, he was like, Oh my gosh Moms, soccer, moms fist fight. By the way, in their defense, there's a lot of fist fights at that bar in Uurban Cowboy So she like really was living now. I think even Cissy got in a fucking girl fight. She really was living. Yeah She did it. She did it. It was really awkward because Jennifer was still our soccer coach. Karen and I were still on the soccer team. The season had just started. Her and her husband pretended like nothing had happened. Oh boy. I had to send some strongly worded text to everybody saying Oh no, we're not pretending Parents countounting of the night because again, a restraining order was issued And her recounting of the night was that Heather had said, Ohh, I wonder who you're going to fuck tonight. And also that she had accused Karen of doing sex acts with Jennifer's husband. Okay. Okay Nixon at all. So it was a very like dissociated from reality but the daughter's still So we had to tell our kids you can't hang out with her daughter anymore because she was so targeting our daughter. That's tricky. Yeah. And they would like find each other in different friends' houses and we wanted to protect her mental health status and her daughter's ability to shape friendships. You're making me grateful. I haven't become friends with a lot of her kids' parents. I just supply felt guilty about that, but now I'm feeling m. I know. It's by a mesh. It can get so fucking messy. Yeah. There were two big takeaways from it. One was that the judge said he wouldn't have issued the restraining order My friend not been so clear and said, do not contact me again. And the other thing was, Jennifer and Heather and I have trauma bonded and we are still in touch. We talk to each other every week. But one of the things that we found when we were all debriefing about some of the weird stuff that had led up to it was that we kept using this word weird. like, o, I had this conversation with her and it was kind of weird. and this situation happened It's kind of weird. And I'm like, you know what I have a new mantra. Weird equals warning. Not weird Al Yankovichch weird. Like delightful weird. Not like Austin No we. like to use it that. Yeah, that's right, right. That weird is fantastic. But those conversations where you're like trying to justify it and being like, huh. Did we find out if she had fucked anyone's husband or H H her husband fucked anyone? No No, we don't think any husbands were fucked besides her own.. Who would very happy? Yeah, she does it well.arely. Okay, so there was noing outside of her own imagination, probably. P she was kind of like Yeah, she had psychosis. Yeah. But didid she have a period where she was infatuated with you? You know, she did send me kind of a cryptic text that was like, I so admire you and the strength you have. You think she has bordal? And then she thinks everyone's out to it get her. Ito the point where you're willing to punch someone and you've really convinced yourself trying to harm You're not supposed to do that, but I'm going to keep doing it. Yeah. I just want everyone to know If you tell me not to, it's a waste of your breath. I'm gonna continue to do it. There were signs of that kind of borderline stuff because one of the things Heather said is one day she kind of followed them after the bus stopped and she had her four year old with her. and she would yell at Heather about what a terrible mom she was. and then the four year old started crying. and then she would like switch and be like, everythingthing's okay, it's okay. And then she would go back to attacking. And the reason why everybody's names have been changed is because Jennifer and Heather and Karen still live here. Yeah Wow. got some years left. Yeah. You were like, fuck this. let's go to Maine. see seeee how the people in Maine are God. Well, Claire, what a spicy night out for the mom. It not what we were expecting. But it broke the monotony, some drama' kind of fun. I'd be liking it all Main. Neighbors because you can't remove yourself. That's the problem.. It was awkward ' she's a big part of the PTA and would be a part of family events. It just got really awkward. But yeah, it does make for a good story. and Jennifer and I would celebrate by sending Heather Little gifts like punch and stockkeye salmon. know perfect st. Cemorate the budding of our intimate friendship, our strong friendship that we now have. thank. yeah, thank you, Claire. That was great. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. If I could give just two shout outs, just shout out to Shehalise. She is a day one listener who got me hooked into. Thank you, Shealise. And then the other thing I just want to say, Dax, I know a lot of people talk about how much your stories of sobriety means to them My dad was an alcoholic. He never went into recovery at all. In fact, he went the other way, died of cirrhosis, tragic. But your stories have been healing for me even after his death and shows me the amount of courage and strength and fortitude and support that my dad really didn't have. and it gives me a lot of compassion for him. Oh good. It's very hard. It's healing for me, so I appreciate it. Oh, my pleasure. It's so nice to hear. Thankk you. All right. Have a great summer up there. Bye. By This episode is brought to you by Sfi. It All all in one finance app where you can bank, borrow, and invest all in one place. Let's talk bank accounts for a second. The average bank savings rate is zero point three nine percent in interest. You're earning pennies on your savings, but it does not have to be that way. With so far high yield checking and savings, the money barely making moves sitting in your savings account earn over eight times the national average savings rate with eligible direct deposit. No account or overdraft fees, which feels rare these days. You can get your paycheck up to two days early, perfect for getting ahead of a bill or grabbing what you need right when you need it. Plus, get up to a three hundred dollars welcome bonus when you sign up with eligible direct deposit Sign up for soFi checking and savings at sofFi. com slash armhare. 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Winners may pick up their cars at an enterprise or an enterprise car sales location on a corner near them With over a thousand corner kicks expected, that's a lot of chances to win For more details and an additional chance to win, visit on everyverycorner. com The purchase necessary for legal residents of the fifty US states in DC, Puerto Rico, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Spain, who are twenty one and older. Sweepstakes Es july nineteenth, twenty twenty six Void wherear prorohibited. Prize awarded if a corner kick goal is scored. For entry details and official rules, visit onverycorner. com How are you? What name are we using? Your name is in parentheses, which makes me think it's a codename. It is a codename. I'm gonna go by Caroline today. Caroline Caroline, where are you? First of all, your environment is so well put together. It is. This is my home office. I'm in Colorado. Oh, okay, great. Your arms are ripped. Are you like a climber or something? Absolutely not. I just have two toddlers, so I car a lot of really bulky children all day. They'll tone up those biceps. That's one of the favors they do for us. Exactly And are you from there or did you move there? Moved there actually. So originally from Maui, which is where my story takes place. Oh. That's rare. My story takes place around twenty sixteen and I was with my boyfriend for about a year at the time and we decided to move into our first place together. So big st up, we found this gorgeous apartment, like especially if you're in your twenties, this was a score. It had like a spiral staircase. It was lofted. It was in a dream apartment. We moved in and it was great at first. It's a large house to give context that was subdivided into multiple units. So kind of a slum lord situation. We had our place which was probably like an add on to the house. It was above a carport There was the main house that had maybe three people living in it There was a unit around back and then there was a two car garage that had been converted into two studio apartments. And that's kind of where the focus is. So we had James on one side and then Jamie on another side. And they had actually started dating and became a couple. Oh dangerous and fun. Yes, exactly. James we kind of knew of, he was kind of in my parents circle. so we knew him And Jamie was Very quirky She was, let's say mid fifties. She had a giant tramp stamp and she always walked around in a sports aroundound tiny shorts. Yeah, good for her. Will you give a vibe check for Maui? because I imagine a lot of people move there with kind of interesting lofty spirituality dreams or something. Is it a hodgepodge of people? You get a really good mix of people Hippy crunchy, you get obviously people that are native There's a lot of different competing vibes there. It's kind of a strange place. A lot of vibes is just the best way I can say it. And Jamie had a vibe. She really did. I mean, she would smoke cigarettes outside all day She didn't work. She told us she was undergoing cancer treatment, which I'm not sure if that is true or not because I don't think she left the house much at all. So anyway, we're enjoying our apartment, everything's great My now husband, then boyfriend, made great friends with Jamie. They get along great, super friendly, quirky, but not threatening. And then fast forward to maybe a month living in the apartment and I received a package of my name. I opened it up. It's from Sephora. and it's like a laser device of some sort, Maybe like a laser skin device, I want to say. I did not order this I looked it up on Sephora and it was like eight hundred dollars.. But it was your name, not just your. In my name, to my address, but I had not ordered this. and there's no way I could have afforded this. I was like twenty three, twenty four at the time. Like this was expensive. I kind of set it aside. I was like, I'm gonna to have to investigate this. I'll ask around our neighbors. This is strange. A couple of days later, we're chit chatting outside on our patio with our neighbors go chance did you guys order a large package from Sephora. I didn't order this and it's really strange because it was really expensive. and I just want to see if anybody else ordered this. I wanted to get in the right hands. I could just see the wheels turning in his head. He goes, well, how much was it for? And I was like, you know, it's about eight hundred dollars He goes, I just had a fraudulent charge on my card from Sephora for about that amount. Oh no. Okay. And we were like, Oh my God. So we pulled a package out. We're all looking through it. We're looking for any sort of clues. We find a phone number. on the receipt. Obviously we're going to call it and it was Jamie from downstairs With the tramp stamp and the cigarettes in the question caner min. At this point, we kind of put together so she uses his credit card, puts it under my name to avoid suspicion, but doesn't work. So she hoped to intercept the package Kind of arrenching her plan. they' call and they get confused at this multi delling Yes. But what she didn't account for was my boyfriend's former roommate was our FedEx driver. So they were tootal buds. and he would just walk into our house and just drop off packages. That was the other thing I wanted to ask you about Maui. It's a small place. There's not a ton of people, right? So if you grew up there, even the fact that you said your parents knew some of the neighbors, everyveryone knows each other I didn't know her. Nobody really knew who she was. But like I said, it's like, okay, well how threatening could she be? We know the other people that live here. We knew her boyfriend. Like how bad could it be? Anyway, we find out she had ordered it. She hoped to accept it. FedEx dririver thwarted that plan We're at this point, we're like, okay, well we have to file a police report So we call the police, the' not emergency line, they send out an officer. He shows up and he immediately is like, is this where Jamie lives? Oh, perfect, perfect. Apparently she had had problems with the other tenants that used to live there. They had maybe accused her of possibly stealing a laptop, but I don't think anything ever came out of it They had since left the apartment So he basically takes her information. She says, you know, we'll file a report, keep me in the loop with anything else that comes up, gives us his card. I want to say maybe a week or so later, I get a credit card statement. I had taken out a new credit card, but I never received the credit card, but I didn't really think anything of it. Again, I'm in my young twenties, I'm not super organized at this point. I get the statement and there's thousands of dollars worth of charges wacked up on this credit card that I never even received. Yeah Call, get it cleared up, basically we're able to figure out indeed Jamie had taken it out of the mailbox once it arrived and gone on a shopping spree What kind of stuff did she buy? More cuty products? No, she bought more short short. It was all Macy's. She went crazy at Macy's. Wow, good for Macy's. Get that canceled and then at this point I luckily had a credit monitoring service through my work as a benefit I started just getting pings after pings. She took out probably eight credit cards in my name in the span of one week. Oh my. Really quick, had you guys confronted her in face to face or no, you just called the police and let them deal with it. We never really confronted her at that point. Okay. o Okay. Down the road, we did a little bit, but I don't want to lose this apartment. Yeah. okay. there we go. That. my dream apartment. Like, I don't want to stve drama So she takes out about eight credit cards in my name, is able to go shopping with a few of them We're able to get those canceled. We continue to file police reports They're telling us, okay, we're gathering evidence. We're probably going to arrest her at some point. She does end up getting arrested And then the next day is out. watering plants outside, acting like nothing ever happened. Then It kind of gets to a point where we're like, okay, this is crazy She she's obviously just continuing to try and open credit cards in my name, fake emails in my name. She's deranged. So we talk to our landlord, he starts taking steps to get her removed from the property. But as I discussed earlier, she was dating James who lived in the other unit So even after she was evicted, we were catching her sneaking onto property going through our mailbox. Did your husband ever pull James aside and go like, B, how do you like this girl? She's a fucking criminal thief? What is funny is then he started to get confrontational towards us. She through the window tried to get confrontational with my boyfriend. I also had my dad over for dinner one night, which is funny, and he tried to fight my dad. Oh wow Oh my go. He was the one though that was also involved in Sephora No. Oh, there was a fraudulent charge, not James, differentnt Lutant. She continues to sneak on property. likeike I said, she actually keeps ordering packages in my name and I keep receiving them. She ordered that same laser to more home. Oh my God. She just quit smoking if she wants her skin to lighten up. That's what I'm most irked about. too be honest at three thousand dollars on these things and never received them. But I hope you used it. Isn't it crazy though the thing I'm most triggered by is like, girl Stop smoking. Don't buy products, like get your shit together. S. It's just getting more and more chaotic, it seems like. She's not gonna to leave us alone But we're just kind of trying to hope like, okay, it'll smooth out. She's off property now. the landlord's involved. We have to switched out the mailbox for a locked mailbox We're just kind of hoping, okay, things are surely gonna kind of start to taper down. Then one day, I am walking into the grocery store, onene big main grocery store that everybody shops at on the island. I'm walking in, I kind of see something out of the corner of my eye. I don't fully process it. I walk into the store and I just had that gut feeling of. What did I just see? So I walked back out and on the glass door is a flyer. My boyfriend's picture is at the center of the flyer. There's a heading, new pedophile to the area. Oh Oh my gos. Oh my go. I did send in a picture of the flyer. Oh, my gosh. If you didn't know what you were looking at, she tried to make it look a f. He looks pretty pedophile in that photo. He's got a mustache. She's working against him. He's got his mustache. There's also what's really funny, It looks like he has a tattoo on his neck. Yes, it does That's a photo of his driver's license and that's the watermark of the state of Hawaii going across as. So our theory is that she walked into our house at some point found his wallet, pulled out his driver's license and took a photo of it for this flyer Because how else would she have that? She tried to make it very official. It says newew local pedophile to Maui, Hawaii Criminal Justice Data Center Department of the attttorney General. Like it's a lot of words W. My heart was in my stomach. Like I could not believe that. It's on our address printed dress is not something that makes me feel safe So call my boyfriend, we go home. Immediately, he's like, okay, we got to start telling neighbors like what's going on? Like to let us know if you see her, if you see anything suspicious So he goes and knocks on our neighbors. door She literally tells him, get off my porch. I know who you are. Yeah. see this is now o no She had distributed this flyer in everybody's mailbox in our entire neighborhood. This is a real liable case here. This is you can literally win a liable lawsuit over Yeah. I thought about it, but I'm like, this woman clearly has nothing to her name. They steal your own shit back Yeah Our neighbor across the street had it posted in their laundry room. like this poster had gotten around. And again, small island. peopleople had seen this poster. It had been circulated for a while, but we just didn't know about it. Oh boy. So we had to call the police again. They had to go door to door telling everybody In fact, he is not a sexual predator This is a fake poster. please let us know if you saw this being distributed. He had to go door to door. It was completely wowifying. After that, we were like, okay, we throw in a towel. We're leaving. But what did the police? They can't do anything No. We couldn't prove that she had done it. They kept telling us she's gonna be going to jail amping this up. Like when they arrested her, there was mail on her counter, that wasn't hers. Like there was all of these things pointing towards her, but nothing ever happened to it. Last I heard she was selling hummus at the farmer's market. Oh Do not buy that hummus. Oh my God, do not support that local business. Nothing ever happened. O. After we moved out, I heard that she started harassing somebody else at a house nearby. So Clearly, this was her MO. And did you guys bounce to Colorado? After that, we were pretty quickly like, okay, I think we need a break from the island. Wow. People go crazy on an island. Maybe some methamphetamines toobe. We suspect. Wow. Wow. That took a turn. hated that. Yeah, I don't like her I weirdly admire her. No.. I mean she's just making an absolute mess of everything and sometimowes she's trucking along. Nothing can get her down. I wish I almost had that level of delusion. Yeah, like if I had those things on my shoulders, like the cops came, there was mail everywhere. I've got charges. It would ruin me. I couldn't just parade around. if you were doing drugs. That's true. That would wouldre doing drugs. Yeah. I mean, she was shameless. We would walk by, she would say good She'd be watering. She did not give a crap about anything. She didn't care. This prompt is making us grateful for the neighbor we don't like. Very tame comparatively. Anything is better than that. That's awful. This is about the pe Well, it's so nice meeting you. Yeah. S, Nice to meet you as well. All right take care Bye Hello We're gonna go with a fake name, I'mve just been told. Yeah, yeah, I think I'll keep myself anonymous for this one. Okay, and what fake name would you like? Let's go with Mike. Mike. Okay.'s Nice and generic. Mike, where are you at? So I am located in the foothills of Northern California about an hour outside Lake Taho Oh, okay. This drive Monica crazy. Is it the ninety that runs through there? Close, the eighty. Okay, and dirt bikings big in the area or no? Dirt biking's big in the area, a lot of off roading, just a lot of outdoor adventure stuff. Yeah. we got a lot of rivers out here skiing. And do you go up to Tahoe a lot Yeah, my wife and I spend quite a bit of time up there. We like to ski and take our dogs up theres. Okay, so Mike, you had a crazy neighbor or maybe you've had more than one Yeah, I did, and not so much one isolated incident as crazy neighbor stories often go, but kind of a progressive story over the period of a few years that kind of culminated in one large event. Oh, fun. okay. Breadcrumbs and then a loaf Totally. So twenty twenty two, my wife and I bought our house, moved back to the state. We both grew up in this area. It was a big deal for us, kind of buying our dream house and moving home, being close to family again. And we found this sweet little neighborhood. Everyone seemed really cool. Our next door neighbors very friendly, trails out of our back doors. So it seemed just like this textbook picture perfect little thing And we settled in really well and started meeting all the neighbors and everyone was cool And we met one guy who was a little odd seemeemed like he was successful, was driving around in a nice sports car and to have some odd conversations with him here and there at the mailboxes. Were you guys way younger than all your neighbors We are. yeah, yeah, we're a generation below the majority of our neighbors. but this guy not significantly older than us, but definitely in a different stage of life. Every once in a while, people in the neighborhood will shoot. It's not a big deal. It's the country. I don't mind. Shoot guns? Yeah, shoot guns. It's definitely a culture thing out here in the foothills. and he would, you know shoot guns every few weeks. I'd hear some gunshots and whatnot coming from down the hill and wouldn't really think much of it. Are people on acres in this neighborhood? Yeah, theseese are all like five acre and bigger lots, bigigger parcels, you've got room to do that kind of stuff, so I didn't really think much of it at first It became a little bit more frequent and this is, you know, over the next year or so, the frequencies of these shooting events happened a little bit more. and I just some weird weird encounters with the guy around the neighborhood where he just seemed a little bit off Okay I work in healthcare. I've got a pretty good scope of when people just aren't quite at their proper baseline. Yeah. And I would just catch him out on the roads again at the mailbox and he just seemed a little off Did he seem angry?? N angry but just having very strange strings of thoughts. J those Odd conversations you have where they'll just like interject with some very out there non secitur Exactly. Yeah Yeah ye So I started having those with him and my wife had a couple of very odd encounters out on the road walking the dogs where he was behind the wheel of a car and seemed like