Armchair Anonymous: Unauthorized Evacuation II

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Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Dan Shepard.
I'm joined by Lily Padman. Hi.
My favorite prompt. Oh, it's your favorite.
What's your favorite prompt?

Gosh, that's like picking children. Meet Kif.

I love meat cups. No, I like these.
Okay, unauthorized evacuation to baloney. It's the second time we've done that specific prompt.
We've done plenty of

small prompts that are more specific.

So this was a broader net. Okay, we went back to a broader net.
And once again, guys, it's perfect. They're so fun.
They deliver everyone.

It needs its own feed. Just

booty stories. Enjoy unauthorized evacuations part.
Whatever.

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Hard times,

come and go.

Good times, take them slow.

My life,

I had them both.

But one thing,

you gotta know, I'ma keep on shining.

Hi, Doug. Douglas or Doug? I just go by Doug.
Okay, great, Doug. Where are you? I am in St.
George, Utah. I love St.
George. That's right when you enter out of Arizona and it turns all red and pretty.

Yep, it's great. Just like an hour and a half outside of Vegas.
If you're an outdoorsy person, it's a great place. And a lot of pants shitting happening over there?

Not here.

So this story actually takes place out in Jacksonville, North Carolina, May of 2018. I was stationed out there in Camp Johnson because I was in the Marine Corps Reserves.

So I was out there for my MOS training for my occupation in the military. What's MOS? I was a motor vehicle mechanic.
Good for you. Just to kind of give you a little backstory.

So it was was the end of the week. It was a Sunday night.
All my buddies and me were getting together in my barracks room for just an end of week celebration. So we decided to order this big pizza.

We ended up devouring the whole thing. It was great.
Toppings? Oh, golly. It was all meat pizza.
It was like pepperoni, sausage, anything you can think of meat-wise. And next morning floats around.

And every morning we have to be outside in front of the barracks at right around like five in the morning.

So usually I wake up, do your morning business, take care of whatever, and then head on outside for the morning run.

This particular morning, however, I did not have enough time to wake up and do everything that I needed to.

So, woke up late, was scrambling to get my clothes together, slapped on my workout shorts. Are the shorts loose or are they tight like bike shorts? Very flowy green running shorts.

Okay, started to head outside, and I already know I'm not feeling too well.

Something's going on down there and i was like well this is the worst stomachache i've felt in a long time but didn't have time to really like go about it how long is the run scheduled to be it's like seven plus miles each morning

and also are you allowed to call in sick no that's for civilians but he's lost me so many times it's like anything where i would have to be at attention at 5 a.m which means i'd have to get up at 4 a.m because my movement takes a little finessing.

I've got to have coffee and nicotine. Not if you're in the Marines.
You can't do any of that. Well, I know, I just have to wake up at 4 to get this whole thing running.

Do they let you have nicotine there? Of course, they all dip. They do, but you're not supposed to really have it like on the job.
Yeah, you're not supposed to.

Okay, I was over in Afghanistan twice, and 90% of the people were dipping. Listen, Doug is right here in front of us.
Okay, Doug, do a lot of the guys dip. Oh, yeah.
Dipping was a huge thing.

Let's let the soldiers talk, Monica. Let's let them talk.

Okay, go on, Doug. Go on.
Sorry, Doug. So we start out on this run.
We get probably two and a half miles into it. I really have to go at this point.

And so the sergeant who's leading the platoon in this run, he's up at the front. I'm about four Marines back.
Run up to the front. And I was like, hey, Sergeant, I have to go.

Is there anywhere I can go? And he's like, no, it's 5.45 in the morning. Nothing's even open.
There's barracks around us and like office buildings, but nothing's open.

So he's like, you're just going to have to hold it. I'm sorry.
I get back into formation, just keep running. I was regretting all my life decisions at this point.

And I

probably ran for another like 15 minutes or so. And at this point, it was not happening.
Shit was starting to flow. I was prairie dogging.
It was bad.

Oh, no. This is so sad.
Well, this is, you got got to get tough. No,

no, our bodies are bodies. We're on this paved road and there's a little ravine off to the right.
At this point, I don't even care about humiliation. I need to go.

And so I barely make it down into this little ravine, pull my shorts down. They're about down to my knees, I'd say.

And my ass is out in the woods and my head is sticking out of the woods and everything behind me is at this point getting painted. It's like a Jackson Pollock painting in brown.
It was an explosion.

It was an explosion.

Hey, sorry, that's a little

insensitive because, you know, it takes. Well, hold on.
They specialize in this.

We don't know about PTSD. I don't know.
We got to be sensitive.

At this point, everything

is going to hell. My shorts are covered.
My shoes are covered. My socks are all covered.
Really quick, did the sergeant peep what was happening? Yeah, they were calling it out.

I dipped off into the woods and all this is happening and they can't leave you.

So

this platoon just keeps doing u-turns running by me as I'm shitting my brains out on the side of the road. So all of my buddies, 35, 40 guys probably are just running past, laughing their asses off.

At this point, I'm very embarrassed, most embarrassing moment of my life because all my buddies are seeing me like this.

So finally, about like the fourth or fifth pass by, the sergeant's finally like, hey, you take care of you. You do whatever you have to do.

We'll meet you back in formation after the morning chow haul. So he takes everybody to morning chow and I'm left just by myself, me and like Smokey the Bear out in the woods.
Nobody's even there.

And this is about a mile from my barracks where I have to get back to to change. Oh, and you're just covered.
Yeah, I have like one of two options in my head.

I can either put back on my shorts and my underwear and they're soaked and run back to the barracks just covered in shit, or I can leave them there and run back just with my shirt and my shoes. So

for whatever reason, I chose the latter. There was a third option on the table, which is remove your t-shirt and then like step through the armholes and make a little dipe.

You could have covered your testicles. I mean, it is a good solution, but I wouldn't have thought of it.
Okay, so you chose to run back with your destiny. Winnie the Pooh style.

Yeah, so at this point, I have the shirt long enough down where it covers my junk, but I'm just in my white sneakers and they're now a light shade of brown and my white socks.

And I'm running back to the barracks. And I am worried.
about everything because a base higher up could see you.

Like there's a lot of different factors that could happen if I get caught streaking on a military base. base.
Yes.

We finally make it back to the barracks and I was like, I can't let my roommates know what happened. So I just strip down to nothing, run inside, shower.
I breeze the whole room.

You can't smell a thing. I was very proud of myself.

So I get back out and I have to dispose of the evidence.

So I toss it in the trash can, get dressed, and I meet them in formation after they get done in the chat hall so we can head to our normal classes and stuff throughout the day.

So I was feeling great about myself. They checked in on me.
They were like, hey, you good? And I'm like, yep, I'm good.

Second part of the story, we march back to wherever we were going for our training that day. And about an hour or so into the training, I'm sitting there and I'm like, oh my gosh, my hands.

are getting so warm and my ass is on fire and i was like what's going on

no

and then it occurred to me that out in the woods, I had nothing to clean myself up with.

And the trees behind me had these pretty decently large leaves. And so I was like, this is all I can do to clean myself up.
So I grab these leaves and I start wiping myself off.

And I was like, great, this worked. Everything's left in the woods.
It's done with. And so now it's starting to occur to me like, what did I wipe my ass with?

This is horrible. It ended up being poison oak.
Then another half an hour or so goes by, and it was on fire at this point. I needed to get like help.
It was burning.

And so I asked the same sergeant who had taken me on the run, like, hey, I need to go to the doctor. Hey, Doug, you're a disgrace to this unit.
Yeah. What if he kicked you out of America?

So he's like, do what you need. Just take care of yourself.
Get better. So he sends me to the doctor, which is probably like two miles down the road, I'd say.

And so at this point, chafe on level 10 and it's May, so it's already hot and humid in Carolina. Oh, they gave me some ointment and medication, and it ended up clearing up in like two weeks.

So I was in pain, and I still had to go on the morning runs.

Oh,

they have all these really intense

tests of durability and resilience. They should add this to like SEAL training.
Now, shit in the woods.

Now wipe with this and now carry on i would argue what you went through is about as tough as a situation as you can find yourself in it it was very unpleasant but moral of the story is if you order a big pizza don't eat it and then try to run the next morning sounds to me

i wouldn't have thought a pizza i mean the meat something probably but it was only you i'm not willing to blame the pizza i think it was a painful pepperoni pizza no Are you still in the service?

I actually get out my contract in September 11th of this next month, so I'm out. And did you like it? I loved it.
It was great to do once, but I wouldn't do it again.

Okay. Oh, well, dog, that was so much fun.
Thank you. I'm sorry that happened.
Yeah, me too. Thank you guys so much for meeting with me this morning.
Of course. Bye.

Okay, I just had a full revelation. What is it? Do you think Winnie the Pooh, the reason he only wears a shirt is because he pooped everywhere and that's why his name is Winnie the Pooh.

Or I think it's so he doesn't poop himself because he's Winnie the Pooh. He poops a lot and he couldn't risk putting pants on.
Okay, it's similar. It is.
It is. It's just what direction.

I just wish you would let me just have my ideas. Okay, I did let you.
It's still your idea. One time he pooped in his pants, right? And then he's like, oh, I can't be wearing pants anymore.

I'm not built for these. Yeah.
And so then he became... His name was Winnie.
Which is interesting. Original.
Winnie is from Wonder Ears. It's a female name.

And then he pooped, and then he became Winnie the Pooh, and he took off his shorts forever. I never overthought the name, but it's a wild name because it's a woman's name and then Pooh.

And it's the Pooh. Yeah.

Good for them. They snuck that right by us.

Hi.

How are you? Do you have a fake name in mind? I don't. I was going to see if y'all could pick one.
Mickey. I love that.
I'll take it. Can you guess why I chose that? Monica's repping it.
Yes, exactly.

I'm wearing a Mickey shirt for the listener. Mickey, where are you? I am in South Texas, kind of along the Gulf Coast area.
Oh, okay, great.

And you want a fake name, which means this is either ultra-embarrassing or there was some illegality to this evacuation. Both are exciting.
Not illegal, just incredibly embarrassing.

Just saving the shame for my mom in case she ever hears it.

Okay, okay, okay. Looking out for the parents.
Great. I understand.

For context, I went to a very, very small school.

This takes place in junior high so that is critical information okay mickey i can't think of a worse time for this kind of an event to happen than junior high absolutely unlike you dox i was not cool in junior high that was not my time to shine i'm sorry oh no it's fine i'm great now okay

but i went to a very small school our entire school fit on one city block even our junior high and high school were in the same building so it was junior high kids walking the hallway with high school students.

Dangerous. Oh, boy.
Yeah, very intimidating. Yeah.
Being at a small school, everybody plays every sport, whether you're good or not. You're almost begged to to make teams complete.

So this takes place circa 2007. I was in seventh grade on the basketball team, and I was not a star athlete.
I was a very chunky, very round kid. I was a good trier.
Okay, great.

A lot of heart. I'm usually the personality hire.

I rode the bench a lot, but I still went to every game and still showed up. When they put you in, what position were you playing? Oh, I don't know.
Playing please don't pass me the ball.

Stay away from the ball position. We had an out-of-town game this night.
And being small schools, you usually have to travel pretty far to go to another small school.

And it's always two-lane back roads through no stoplight towns until you get to your no-stop light town, which is home. So the game went off fine.

After the game was over, tradition was that you change into your street clothes. We dump all of our uniforms in the dirty bag.

The coach takes them back to the gym, washes them for the next game, and we're all riding home in our street clothes.

On the way home, we always stop at Somewhere Berry, Texas, a water burger, a dairy queen, something along those lines, where the only options are greasy burger, greasy chicken strips.

So I'm sure I had one of those two options on this evening. And how long was the ride, do you think? Probably ride at about an hour.
Pretty much all back roads in between.

So we all load up on the bus and I get the coveted cool back seat. You know, the one in the very back of the bus that's the single seat because you don't have to share with anyone.

So I was like, I'm cool. I'm in seventh grade.
I've got the cool seat, you know? And so everything's going fine. It's dark on the bus.

None of the windows windows really rolled down it's old bus so it's just quiet everybody has their headphones in listening to music on our ipod nanos at the time and i just feel this gut punch of a pinch in my stomach

and it just hits me like a wave and i just start getting a little sweaty on my forehead and then it turns into full body chills and this all takes place in a span of about 90 seconds

and if you've ever played sports or rode a school bus you know there's no point in even asking to stop because it's not going to happen.

And in this case, there's literally nowhere for the bus to even pull over. There's not shoulders on these roads.
It'd be pulling into a ditch. Exactly, which I would have been fine with.

So I feel this rush of anxiety, this rush of heat, full body sweat come over me. And the next thing I know, I just explode.

No warning. No warning.
No warning. You weren't even like fighting it.
It just came over me, like literally exploded.

And it was so bad. It filled up my jeans.

It went up and out the back. It was all over the seat.
Oh,

oh, mama, it's a bucket. It sounds like.
Yo.

To this day, I have never seen that much diarrhea in my life.

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Were there high schoolers on the bus too? No, luckily this was only junior high, but it was still, you know, about 25 of my peers, which is not ideal.

It just starts moving up the bus road by a tidal wave of smell.

And you just start to hear, oh, God, what's that?

And someone said, oh, my God, did somebody fart? And all I could think was, was, babe, I wish.

Were you considering being like, I know, ew,

what is that?

At this point, I knew I was going to have to make peace with my mess because there was no hiding it. Like I said, it was all up my back, all over the seat, all in my jeans.

Oh, there was no, let me just quick change into other pants. This sounds very much like a baby's diaper.
Yeah. There's like a baby diaper situation.
Yeah. Yes.

I just had a baby and we just had our first blowout. So it brought back trauma.

There's a piece of this where I definitely trauma blocked. I don't 100% remember, but I know the girls just started moving up to the front of the bus.

They're like three deep piled in the seats in the front two rows. Like I said, the windows wouldn't roll down.
So the few windows that were, they're like breathing out of it.

Or the adults like, oh my God. I can't imagine the adults like, girls, get to the front.
Yeah, yeah, run.

There was one adult and she was driving the bus. Oh, no.

Someone someone must have put together, like, this is more than a fart.

Someone hit their pants, and probably it was evident that it was me because I was the only one not making my way to the front of the bus.

What if you also just started going on? Look at this tableau of how sad this is. I know.

I am a picture in all these people.

There's nowhere to stop. So I just had to sit in my shitty pool of mess.

You know, the back of the bus is

splish splash, yeah. Until we pulled into a Walmart, and it was like a very small Walmart before they were like super Walmarts.

So, the bus driver makes her way to the back with that can of sawdust that they usually put on throw-up and a pair of gloves. Did all the kids get off the bus immediately and just you and her now?

Yes, and so she walks to the back and assesses the situation. And literally, she says, Oh, God, what what did you do? Drop your britches to poop.

I said, No, ma'am, it was just that much.

Oh, Lord.

So, she kind of sprinkles some sawdust on there. What is the sawdust supposed to do? Neutralize the smell, keep it from splashing around, it absorbs it.
Then, you can also sweep it up now.

You can't sweep up, throw up, but if you get it all in that sawdust, you can't.

Yeah, and I don't know if sawdust is designed for diarrhea or just pull up you know the different makeup so it may not have worked very well but she was working with what she had like we all were sure

so she goes to the uniform bag and this is the callback of where i was a very chunky kid so she goes to the uniform bag and she just kind of fishes for probably the biggest one she can find not my uniform to put on to give me a clean pair of clothes so she hands me this random uniform and says okay go into walmart clean yourself up change so i'm waddling through Walmart, probably dripping shit, just this trail of smell probably following me.

So I go in there. Also, all the other girls decided to take this time to come in there and use a bathroom.

So I'm, you know, can you wet this toilet paper and hand it back to me so I could clean myself up? Oh my God.

At this point, it was like, swallow your pride and get it done. So I come out of the bathroom wearing someone else's uniform.

Poor number 13, you know, every time they put that uniform on the rest of the season, we're probably like, these are the shitty uniforms. So we all load up in the bus.

The bus driver had called my mom because I don't even think I had a cell phone at this point.

And, you know, I was like, you need to be there because it's like 10 o'clock at night by the time we get back to the school. So luckily.
it had happened right before Thanksgiving break.

So my mom let me stay home for two days because I think she just knew that's way too embarrassing. Let everyone have their fun for a couple days.

Then we'll go on break and hopefully the rugs will have died down in 10 days. Do you think people thought you like died? That would have been great.
I might have gotten some sympathy out of it.

Maybe there was a rumor about that going around.

The really only blowback, no pun intended, after I got back to school after the Thanksgiving break was one girl in art class did come up specifically and sit next to me and said, Did you shit your pants while on the school bus?

And I was like, yeah.

She was like, well, why'd you do that? And I was like, I couldn't help it. Why'd you do that?

Kids are so fucking stupid. Kids are so stupid.

It took me probably 10 years to be able to speak about this out loud. It was something I just buried.
But truthfully, listening to y'all's podcast, hearing the other unauthorized

situations.

Yeah, the survivors.

I'm not the only one. So I figured if I can survive that, I can survive anything.
I truly think that's why I don't get embarrassed anymore. I'm probably more confident than I should be.

It's definitely because this traumatic event happened in my formative years and I was fine.

Now having a little baby girl too, I told my husband, I was nervous to come on and tell this story because it is embarrassing. But I said, I want her to know it's okay to be embarrassed.

You'll survive. So I can't wait to show her this at some point.
Oh,

wow.

I told my best friend I was coming on to tell this story. She said, oh my gosh, which story are you going to tell? The airplane story or the school bus one? Oh, great.

You've shit your pants more than once. Oh, it happens like every six months or so.
Oh,

you're kind of like a dude. I like that.
Okay, so we could hang. This could be a sphincter issue.

Well, I don't want to say issue, but. I think you're perfect as design.

I think it's a character building

design.

But yeah, a character building design. There we go.

Oh, that was great. Oh, I love that, Mickey.
Poor Mickey on that boss. Everyone deserves

she was a woman without a country.

They had to do what they needed to do for them, too. Yeah, I don't blame them, but maybe.
But it's sad. It's a sad scene.

I felt so bad that so many people were also affected because usually you poop your pants and it's a pretty insulated event. Maybe one other people.

Not 25 of your peers in junior high are also participating in the misery. This is about as bad as it could get, save maybe hooking up with your dream crush.

At least that didn't happen. But other than that, the seventh grade school bus has really got to be up there.
Yeah, it was pretty rough. Well, Mickey, thank you.
That was delightful.

Thank you for sharing it. You're very brave.
Thank you. Well, lovely meeting.
Yes, so nice to meet you.

Beat the heat down there. I will.
I'm trying. Okay.
All right. Take care.

Bye.

Thank you, Monica, for this beverage. Well, Rob ordered it.
Thank you, Rob, for this beverage. Got it.

I don't know why i thought it was on your account somehow well it was my account it was going to be hi tony how's it going we just got some beverages that were ordered by rob and monica and they've just arrived and we're so excited

what do you have what's your beverage yeah what you got going i'm a cold brew fanatic beautiful where are you at tony well i live in new orleans but at the moment i'm on a road trip i'm in asheville north carolina at an airbnb i'm going in October.

Have you been? Oh, yeah, many times, but Aaron and I are going to go on a motorcycle trip and be based out there and explore. That's very beautiful.
The coffee scene is next level.

Oh, is it? Okay, so from New Orleans, but in Asheville. Not from New Orleans.
I've been living there for 10 years. I'm originally from Omaha, Nebraska.
Wow. Okay.

I'll say you're getting a taste of everywhere. All right, so where did this unauthorized evacuation take place? This unauthorized evacuation took place place in my hometown in Omaha.

Surprisingly, not New Orleans.

I would imagine plenty of people have shit themselves over there. Oh, yeah, yeah.
I got bourbon-faced on Shit Street. It's my favorite shirt.
That's a great t-shirt.

So, yeah, this took place in Omaha circa 2012. I have to provide some context in two ways.
The first is I had a very boring day job.

So, to spice things up a bit, I took a job moonlighting as a bartender. It was at this three-story sushi and sake lounge called Blue Sushi.

They now have like 20 locations across the country, a couple in Nashville, by the way. Shout out to my homies at Blue Sushi.
It's arguably the busiest restaurant in Omaha.

Very high volume, very popular. And the other thing you need to know is I lived in an apartment building.
across the street. This was all in the old market district of Omaha.

I also have to tell you about Jason, who is the manager of our apartment building. Great manager, very fun guy, very sociable, everybody's friend, loved to party, also my neighbor.

So Jason and I shared a wall. It was a very busy Friday night at the bar.

I was working on the third floor, a private party, packed house, having a great time, working with my friend Cassie, taking some shots. And then all of a sudden, this like grenade goes off in my gut.

And my body did not give me any heads up on this. Had you eaten any fish prior to your shift? As I recall, I did not eat any fish.
I don't know if this was something I ate, but there was no warning.

I was feeling great. And then I sharted.
Oh, okay. And you're on the floor with the customers at this point? I am behind the bar.
I could feel it. I could smell it.
Oh,

and I knew that this was not the end. I didn't know what was coming, but I knew it was not going to be good.
And so I tell Cassie, you got a cover for me.

And now I'm like frantically weighing my options because there are only two bathrooms in this whole establishment. The first is on the first floor, which is only equipped for a one-man show.

And it's adjacent to the dining room. And it's like perpetually occupied.
I don't want to do that. And the other bathroom's on the second floor.
It's like a party in there.

And I don't want to subject anybody to what I'm about to do. I did the only thing that made sense to me.
I ran down the stairs. I ran across the street.
I ran to my apartment building.

And then I meet my nemesis, which is the elevator.

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So this is like the slowest, ricketiest, most unpredictable elevator. And I'm just standing there waiting and hoping and praying, doing the, I'm going to shit my pants dance.
Yeah, yeah. Oh,

I'm getting chills. Yeah, yeah.
I thought about walking up the stairs, which is like five flights of stairs. No way.
Anyway, the elevator comes. I get in the elevator.

And before I can get to my floor, the fifth floor, it's like turning on a garden hose.

I know you're going to ask about size and consistency. It just like ran down my leg, gets in my shoe and then it ends up in like a perfectly round puddle on the floor of the elevator.
Oh, cute.

Hold on a second. So you got a lot of work on your plate now because you're going to have to like.

Somehow get the elevator to stay in position while you go inside to get some stuff to clean it and you're covered. What a logistical fucking nightmare.

I have a lot of decisions to make because first of all, thank God there was nobody waiting for the elevator when the door opened. I don't know what exactly to do.

I'm an upstanding citizen, I like to think. I'm not just going to shit in my own elevator and then like not clean it up, but I have to like finish shitting.
I'm like, do I do that first?

Do I try and clean the elevator first? It's kind of a riddle. It's one of these, you've got a chicken, a fox, and a bag of grain, and you got to cross the river.

Cross the river and go back and make only these two can go together.

Even if I do go clean, how would that even work? Do I have to like crop open the elevator? I don't have like a janitorial bucket for supplies or anything

so I just run back to my apartment and just finish yes that's wise I feel great and I turn on the shower I kind of wash myself off I change my pants whip on the TV

crack a beer

call my mom and then I like grab some paper towels and some wind decks or some shit that was like all I had and I run back to the elevator I get in the elevator and it's already cleaned up. Oh

no.

I'm confused, but I'm just like, all right, fuck it. So I went back to work.
So I run back across the street. I get back there and Leah, my friend who is also the manager is fucking pissed.

She's like, where the hell were you? And I'm like, Leah, I'm wearing different pants.

Great. That's an elegant way to say it.
Then I finished my shift. I kind of forgot about the whole thing.
Yeah, good night, night, tips, more shots. Yeah.

Some fish. And then I get home and it's like, you know, 1.30, 2 in the morning.

I get in the elevator and there's a sign in the elevator handwritten by Jason that says, whoever shit in this elevator is fucking out of here with like 14 explanation points.

Oh boy.

I didn't really know what to do. I lived in the building for four more years after that, just like harboring this secret, perpetually afraid that I was like going to get evicted if he found out.

So that's the story. And I guess my confession.
So, Jason, if you're listening, I'm really sorry, dude. It was an accident.
He thinks someone did it.

So fuck you. Yes.
It was like an act of terror or something.

And you're lucky, too, there wasn't any shit shoe prints walking to your apartment. I got lucky in a multitude of ways.

There were were no witnesses. There were no residents coming in and out of the elevator.
You had two options.

I think you chose right, which is the other one would have been to buy his favorite bottle of whiskey and come over and been like, hey, man, I'm the worst. I'm so sorry.

I know it must have been terrible to clean. I came back to clean it up.
You got to know. That would have been your only other option.
But you did what everyone would do.

It's not too late to track him down and get him a nice Chivis Regal or something, you know? Hopefully he hears this.

he's such a good time charlie i hope he's still alive and to be honest it sounds like he was burning the candle at both ends i know for a fact he's still alive okay good good good good i saw him the last time i was in oman of course i was thinking about this the whole time i was talking

this is good you finally get to release this yeah unburn yourself well tony thank you that was great

i don't know what my uh spontaneous road trips would be without your podcast so thank you guys so much oh thank you So nice. It was so nice to chat with you.
Yeah. Have a great rest of your trip.

It was a pleasure. All right.
Take care. Bye.

God, our bodies will really become

our worst enemies. You know, your brain is a hostile place.
It's not a safe place, your brain. And your body can attack you.
I know. Our biggest enemy really is ourselves.
It always is. Hi.

Hi, Nicole. Hi, Dax and Monica.
How are you? What pretty wallpaper behind you? I love the delicate little blue flowers on the vines. And there's birds in it.

There are birds.

Did you apply that to the wall or it came with the residents? I did it myself. Oh, God.
Where are you? Currently, I'm on Vancouver Island.

I would say we've had a disproportionate amount of folks from Vancouver Island, considering how sparsely populated it is. It is pretty sparsely populated, and I'm from like a super rural town.

Were you anywhere near Pamela Anderson? Did she live there for a minute? Yeah, she's probably like three or four hours from me, and she still has a house here.

She lives in a small town, too, and the locals see her all the time. So, I'm just hoping casually I'll write into her at some point.

So, how big is Vancouver Island that you can drive three hours on it?

So, I'm at the Bory northern tip, and then for me to get to the southern tip, which would be Victoria, takes anywhere between like six and seven hours, depending. Wow, it's

huge. Yeah, it's pretty large.
I'm gonna look at a map after this conversation. Yeah.
I'm pretty interested.

Okay, and is this where you had your unauthorized evacuation? No, I had it in Vancouver. Oh, okay.
Out on the town? Well, I was at my house on a date. Oh, wonderful.

Take us through slowly and tell us all the details. Oh, I will.

Oh, I'm going to stop you just for half a second because we had a gal on a minute ago who had shit herself on the seventh grade school bus.

And I said that has to be the number one worst, excluding shitting yourself in front of your crush while getting intimate so that's crazy i said that and it sounds like this might be heading it might be heading there a little foreshadowing yeah

so years 2013 i'm around 24 years old at the time i was living with a roommate who had a little boy cutest little guy he was around three years old the week previous to this date they had come down with the plague so she said probably don't stay at home yeah this week and i was like that's a solid i'm gonna go stay with a friend so i stayed with a friend for that week and then i got back to the house i'm like it should be fine by now and i have been casually seeing this guy for maybe a month we've gone in like two dates to a restaurant and he said hey do you want to watch a movie tonight and i said yeah that would be amazing and i'm pretty nervous i'm an anxious girly i don't have a living room i only have my bedroom

okay he was like let's watch a movie but at your house in your bed at my house and can i just ask on the previous two dates, was there any physical activity? Absolutely none. Okay.

So come watch a movie in my bed. It sounds like you must have been expecting there would be some intimacy that evening.
I wasn't sure.

I think I was maybe hoping that could happen, but also we hadn't hugged yet. So I was kind of just hoping for hand holding.
Okay.

Wow. But you know, handholding is actually the most intimate thing you can do.
More than anal. According to Monica.
That's a well-known fact.

Pretty sure he definitely wouldn't want to do that after that happened

he comes over i'm so nervous we go into my room he's brought takeout and beer so nice oh this is so fun i want to do this oh so he likes to eat food in bed some people don't like doing that oh i do i do too but some people are really against it i don't love it but i didn't have a kitchen i didn't have a living room it was my only option.

So we sit in bed, we turn the lights off, we start this movie. So the only light in the room is coming from the television.
He is like starting to reach across the bed to hold my hand.

We haven't cracked out the food yet and I get nervous and I immediately go and grab a beer instead and crack it. Oh, okay.

So I take a sip of my beer and I just put it down in my lap and I. want it to be cozy.
So I'm in like really light colored sweatpants. I start feeling my leg and it feels wet.
Oh, wow.

And I'm like, I wonder if I spilled my beer. I'm trying to be really discreet about it.
He's still trying to make a move on me, and I'm feeling my leg, and it's progressed to my ankle.

Oh my God, you're not feeling anything. I feel nothing.
I don't feel sick. I feel totally fine.
This is scary. Yeah, I'm like, I must have spilled my beer.
There must be a hole in this bottle somehow.

I have no idea what's happened. So I try to do like a little stiff test

just to make sure. And I immediately am hit with a sulfur.
Yeah.

And now you've released it. I would be dealing with so many things at that moment.
There's not just a shit in your pants, but it's like, what the

fuck? Yeah, what's happening? Feel bad. I'm covered.
Like, I would almost feel like someone shit my pants. I think I would say he did it.
He shit and it got in my pants.

I mean, wow, this is so confusing. I panic and I'm like, hey, I'm just going to run to the bathroom bathroom for a hot second.
And as I'm leaving, the movie gets bright. Oh.

I look at the bed and it is bright orange. Oh, man.
What has happened here? It's one of those oil diarrhea. It's like the blockbuster.

Yeah.

Had you had those sugar-free gummy bears that day? I wish I read those reviews when I'm having a bath day. Those are so bad

heavens or Mercatroy. Did you consider just knocking over the beer? I think I would have knocked over the beer on purpose accident so that, like, it's just a big mess.

That would be like, oh, we got to get up and out of here. That would be the best move you could make, but also, you're assuming you're in your frontal lobe at that moment.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I agree.
That would be great. And hopefully, it would mask some of the smell.
Exactly. I would have even picked up the thing of Pad Thai and just poured him on my lap.

Like, I'm so clumsy. All right, I guess this day's over.
See ya. See your way out.

I should have probably thought of that, but I was clenching and running

for the bathroom.

And this bathroom, I don't know who decided to paint it this way, but it was checkered black and white and red, floor to ceiling. Oh, it is everywhere.
It's like a circus nightmare. So I am in there.

I don't know which end to put in first because now full body sweats have fully hit me. I am soaking wet and I need to vomit.
Oh no.

Oh, yeah, because now we remember it's.

Yeah.

I've got something bad. I don't know what to do.
So I sit down and I just unleash and then I start vomiting all over myself,

all over the floor. Oh, Nicole.
This is so bad.

I feel like I've kind of let it all out at the bowel end. So I just turn it around.
I stick the head in the toilet. The little bit of beer I had is gone.
And I

spray the wall with feces.

Oh,

this is a two-end because you're now on your knees throwing up, yeah. And the projectile that's coming out of me has forced it, and it's such a small bathroom, it's really gone everywhere.

And there's no shower in here. What it's like I glitter bombed the entire bathroom.

The checker print has just given me the spins. I curl up on the floor.
Um, this is it. I don't know how much time has has passed and I haven't heard the door open and close to the unit.

So I am assuming that let's call him Sam is still in my bedroom. There's no way he doesn't know.
I hear footsteps.

He knocks on the door and he's like, hey, I feel like you're not doing okay in there, Nicole.

It's the dialogue in these situations, I think, is probably the best. I'm like, yeah, Sam, I've had better days.
Everyone's trying to be so polite. Are you crying? Oh, I'm crying.

I am completely covered. My clothes are destroyed.
I am destroyed. And he's like, I'm going to go.
I'm like, good idea.

So I hear him leave and I'm like, thank goodness. I can just kind of die on the floor.
I can't even leave this bathroom because I am so covered.

If I start walking to my bedroom, I'm just going to make a trail. The upstairs is my...

roommate slash co-worker and she's got dogs and a kid and all this stuff and she had just left the house and i was texting her, Can you come back and bring me some clothes?

And then I hear the door open and close again. And I'm like, Oh, thank God, she's home.
I'm like, Hey, is that you? She's like, No, I'm like half an hour away. Knock on the door.
There's Sam.

And he said, Hey, I've left a bag of stuff outside the door.

I'm gonna go. And then I really hope you feel better.

Inside the bag was a 10-pack of granny panties. Oh, he went out to the store.
Oh, my.

He got me two towels

and some new sweatpants and a shirt. Oh, what a sweat.

Are you married to him now? So here's the thing. I couldn't come back from that.
Neither did he.

Okay.

So, okay, so we did the right thing, but also no one was going to try. We just, yeah, you'll have to let it go at that point.
Oh, man.

Monica, I know you want the happy ending and the meet cute.

When I met my now husband, it was early on in dating. I trusted a fart.
I shit the couch.

Wow, yeah, wow. Even after that, Nicole, you're wild.
I like it. Oh, my God.

Wow.

Oh, this is really like shame on me, shame on you situation. Well, you know, some people have that condition.
It's like they don't trust anyone loves them.

So they come up with a crazy test and they're like, well, if they love me through this, I think maybe that's simmering in your subconscious.

Or maybe I just wanted to see: is this guy as good as that one guy? Interesting test. Will anyone ever live up to Sam? My husband, the gem that he is, he said, you know what? Don't even look back.

Go straight to the bathroom. I got this.
He disinfected, cleaned the coach. I got to say, Kristen and I had this moment.

We were only dating for like, I think, a couple months, and we went to do this movie together. And we're living in an apartment together.
And both of us got this insane virus. One bathroom.

And yet she was in there both ends. And I came in and gave her a bucket and the whole night.
And we just were in it all of a sudden. That's a threshold you cross.
It is. I had a baby at the time, too.

So we were in deep. Oh, man.
I hope Sam found a nice woman. He did.
He's a good guy. You can take care of.

Good guys find blood.

Wow, that's harrowing. You are a survivor.
I had so many unauthorized evacuation stories. It's hard to pick.
Yeah. Do you think you have IBS? No, I think I just get illnesses or stress tummy.

Like before this, I was worried I was going to have one on the call with you, honestly.

We're hoping for that to happen at some point. A real time.
I know. My sister texts me.
She's like, hey, like, make sure you go and do all the things you need to do, but right before the call.

And it doesn't sound like any of these situations you had any inkling that was coming. Yeah, no, that one hit like a freight train.
I had no idea. It was so fast.

And it's interesting you didn't feel it coming out of your butt. That part is interesting to me.

I've never never had that happen since thank goodness that was like a complete shocker to me wow i'm sorry that happened yeah that's great thank you what brought me to you guys well we wish you well and we wish you some prolonged abstinence from unauthorized evacuations yeah so does my husband yeah

okay take care bye

I love you. That's we have a lot to be grateful for.

It's always a gratitude-inducing

and a cautionary tale. but some of these aren't cautionary.
Well, they are cautionary. It's like your butt can leak.
I know, but when there's no

warning, ever go on dates. Yeah, never leave your toilet.
I guess that's the cautionary tale. Ooh-ee.
All right. All right.
Love you. Love you.

Do you want to sing a tune or something? I'm going to do a theme song. Oh.

Okay, great.

We don't have a

song for this new show, so here I go, go, go.

We're going to ask some random questions and with the help of our cherries we'll get some suggestions

on the flyer rhyme dish

on the fire rhyme dish enjoy

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Hey there, Armcherries. Guess what? It's Mel Robbins.
I'm popping in here taking out my own ad.

Holy cow, Dax, Monica, and I, I don't want this conversation to end, and I'm so glad you're here with us. And the other thing, I can't believe, Dax loves the Let Them Theory.

He can't stop talking about it. I hope you're loving listening as much as I love having you here.

And I also know since you love listening to Armchair Expert, you know who you're going to love listening to? The Let Them Theory audiobook. And guess who reads it? Me.

And even if you've read the book, guess what? The audiobook is different. I tell different stories.
I riff, I cry. You're gonna love it because it's gonna feel like I'm right there next to you.

We're in this together as we learn to stop controlling other people.

So, thanks again for listening to this episode of Armchair Expert. And check out the audiobook version of the Let Them Theory, read by yours truly.
Available now on Audible.

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