Episode 3

Sup, fuckers!

Welcome to another episode of Let's Get Sidetracked

with me, Sophia, and me, Stephanie.

And this was the first time we tried that.

We totally nailed it.

Oh yeah, absolutely.

We both have matching microphones now.

I mean, mine's a little cooler looking.

Yours is cooler.

It's blue.

She has the creator edition, which is like a nice blue.

It's really nice, but I gave it to her and I'm with the silver one.

Plus, I'm the mom, so give me the cool shit.

And bitches love blue.

Bitches do love blue, don't they?

Absolutely.

They do.

What are the topics?

Do we have any topics?

I don't have any topics, but if you have any...

You know, we kicked around an idea of...

A holiday edition.

Yeah.

And this is not it.

Nope.

Nope.

This isn't it.

If you have not joined us before, I am an EMT.

I do inter-facility transports, which is not 9-1-1, thankfully, on my part.

Not that I'm not excited about that stuff, but you know what?

I have had enough excitement in my life at this point.

I am not young, and I don't need to get all excited about stuff.

So I'm totally cool taking me to my home.

And, you know... Meemaw.

I gotta take my meemaw home.

Your weird uncle that you only talk about twice a year.

So I'm alright with that.

And he makes everybody uncomfortable at Thanksgiving dinner.

He doesn't.

He does a really great job.

Other people are not good at communicating with him.

Let's talk about my uncle.

Your uncle is not creepy.

The uncle coming over saying, That knee sure does look smooth.

Can I touch that?

That's a creepy uncle.

That skirt looks too short.

Let me measure it.

Yeah, that's no.

Let me measure that hookah.

Look, to be clear, your uncle is not that uncle.

No, absolutely not.

No, no, no, no.

Aside from all of his, like, beliefs, he's pretty good.

He's a Republican.

Oh, absolutely.

Yeah, he's a super, super red Republican.

And it doesn't make it wrong.

It just doesn't make it right for our family.

Yeah, and he drives like a $100,000 truck.

Like $160,000 truck.

Don't they have a Tahoe?

No.

They got rid of that.

Oh.

He has a Ram now, like a 1500 or something.

Oh, no.

Really?

And his wife drives the Mercedes they bought a few years back.

Oh, I didn't know they had a Mercedes.

Yeah, they bought a Mercedes.

It's like... Okay.

Okay.

I'm not, I'm just gonna say it.

Is it an SUV?

No, it's just like a sedan.

Oh, okay.

It's super cool, though.

Yeah, absolutely.

It sounds cool.

Yeah.

It doesn't sound like.

But it sounds.

Oh, that's nice.

Those are nice.

Yeah.

It doesn't like... it's very luxury.

And my luxury is Toyota.

Well, I mean, it's not bad.

Toyota is not bad.

Lexus, beautiful vehicles.

Oh, love it.

The 4Runner.

I do drive a Lexus.

And I'm gonna just preface that by saying that

we have a friend that worked for a Toyota Lexus.

And so we were able to get a very good deal.

We're still paying it off.

Hey, we only have like five more months.

If we didn't have a hookup, I would not have a Lexus.

Oh, absolutely.

So I'm very grateful to have that hookup because I fucking love my car.

I call her Alicia.

I call it the Lamborghini.

It's not the Lambo.

It's the Lambo.

No.

I call her Alicia for some reason.

Well, no, I know why it is because I don't know why.

But girls with winged eyeliner, I equate that with being named Alicia.

My car, some of the trim... I'm Alicia?

I'm Alicia.

There's some trim that looks like winged eyeliner behind the passenger windows.

Sorry, behind the backseat windows.

I know what you're talking about.

And so I just call her Alicia.

And she's... I don't know.

She's cool.

Like she's a rider die.

I feel like she's a rider die for sure.

I'm just gonna say Lexus does an extremely good job with their paint.

It has a beautiful sort of pearl, like shimmery black.

Mine is not pearl.

Mine's glittery black.

That's what I meant.

I didn't... I couldn't think of the word that I was trying to look for.

See, when we went and did a test drive, I drove a black one.

Mm-hmm.

And I really liked how it felt driving.

And as we... I parked it.

And then as we're walking up to the dealership to kind of talk about the car,

you know how they're gonna try to get you to buy.

Yeah.

I passed by this one and I actually went, and I was like, this one has sparkles.

And Rhonda, of course, laughed at me because she's met me.

And so I was like, this one has sparkles.

And Rhonda's like, well, tell us about this one.

And the dude's like, oh, this is exactly like the one you just drove.

It hasn't finished because it had just been returned from being a... Lease.

A lease car.

Yeah.

And he's like, it hasn't finished the checks yet.

But as soon as we make sure that it gets through,

like we can absolutely talk about that one.

And so that's who I came home with.

Yeah.

So the thing... I brought up leasing.

Why would you lease a car?

You basically pay for a car and then you get nothing.

But you don't have to own a car to have a car.

Yes.

But at that point, just get a shit box.

But what if you want a new car every two years and you don't mind just paying for it?

I'm fine with that on my phone.

But a car?

We just started and we're going to take a commercial break.

Here's some music.

Welcome back from the break, everybody.

The totally real break that happened.

Welcome back from the break.

So yeah, Sydney wanted to go outside because she's a little shit.

She's a diva.

She really is.

And we're going to take a few minutes to talk

about the amount of animals that live in our house.

They are only all dogs at this point.

And the corpse of a fish.

Well, yeah.

Pop it in the filter.

There's always a corpse of a fish in our house because they're Sam and Dean.

And they always die and come back.

And, you know, what are you going to do?

We're just ignoring the not fish corpse.

So here's me ignoring this.

Back in 2011, long before.

Long before time.

Back in my day.

Back in my day.

Long before Rhonda happened.

Speaking of the dog, she was just doing a mischief.

And we had to go check on her because I heard some ripping paper.

And it's not always a terrible thing.

Because she loves the Amazon packing paper.

Just any brown crinkly paper, I think.

She just loves.

She loves it.

She lays on it.

She tears it up.

Oh, yeah.

She doesn't care.

But since we're talking about the dogs, let's talk about the dogs.

Yeah, let's do that.

So the first dog that lived with us back in 2011 is when we got Eddie.

And that was long before there was a Rhonda and Stephanie.

And Eddie was the second dog in that house.

And he was just a few months old.

And his original name was Charlie Brown.

And I know it's so cute, right?

I didn't know that.

I didn't know it was Charlie Brown.

Yeah.

And we originally had Jacob Peter was the dog that we had.

He was a mini pincher.

And I really wanted a dog.

And I wanted a little dog.

And I got this dog.

And then your dad was not very kind to him.

And he ended up being not a very good dog.

Good dog, bad environment.

Bad environment.

And we did eventually have to rehome him to

a very lovely person who really wanted a dog.

And I was very thankful that we could find someone for him to live with.

He was a runner, too.

He was a runner.

He was a biter.

And then we had to move into an apartment.

And that does not... it's not conducive to that at all.

Well, he was a yapper.

So was Eddie.

I mean, Eddie Little Dog is.

Well, yeah.

I still remember we would leave the garage door open because he would come back.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

He would run the entire neighborhood.

And when he got tired, he would just come back through the garage door.

We could chase him literally for miles.

And he would just run and run and run and run and run.

We got a special guest.

It's Sydney.

Sydney.

Speak of the devil, Skidney.

I'm not the devil whore.

Hi.

Don't look at me.

She's wagging her tail looking at me like she's really happy to be here.

She is.

She is.

Sydney is the last of the conversation about dogs.

And so after we moved into the apartment, it was just Eddie.

And then we moved in with Rhonda.

And we figured Eddie was probably kind of lonely.

Because he did have Jake to live with before.

And so we adopted a beautiful Chihuahua.

Lupita.

Lupita.

She was a Chihuahua Italian Greyhound.

And she was a crazy one.

She's lovely.

She was such a sweetheart.

But she developed a heart condition.

And so she did eventually go into...

I don't want to say cardiac arrest.

It was congestive heart failure.

Her heart started to fail.

And it was better to put her down.

She had to be in a high oxygen environment.

Which was a very small space.

And she was not happy with that.

And the sad part is that she pretty much the entire time was not a big fan of me.

Up until she passed away.

Yeah.

2018 she started to like me and started sleeping in my room.

And then she passed in 2019.

And then she passed away.

And that was the first time as a family we had to decide.

What is the point where we do say who is this good for?

Yeah.

Do we keep the dog alive for them or for us?

And that's the... I don't know.

It's devastating.

It's fucking heartbreaking.

Because it's a member of the family.

Yeah.

And when a member of the family dies.

Honestly this is going to sound real bad.

I think I cried more at Peta's death than Pop's death.

Because I... You were older too.

I didn't know how to handle the emotions when I was younger.

Well and you weren't really allowed to either.

Well that and... It was a very different environment.

That and it came so quick.

I didn't have time to process.

But both of them did honestly.

Oh yeah.

Well the thing with Peta is it was...

It was like she was on heart medication and then it went...

Well she was diagnosed with the heart failure in I think March or April.

We got her on medication and she started to decline and we had to put her down in July.

July 5th, 2019.

Yep.

At 5.18pm.

I'm so sorry that you remember that.

Well because... It was tough.

Well because I had just talked to one of our neighbors.

I was like yeah we got her on medication.

She's doing better.

And then that next morning... Yeah.

She had to go to the... She was... Had to go to the emergency room.

The last time we didn't...

No, no, never mind.

I was going to say when Eddie had his issue where

we thought we were going to have to put him down.

I thought we went to the same vet but I don't think we did.

We did.

Well yeah we did.

Because we've been with Banfield.

It was the same vet.

And the...

Actually I know what you're talking about.

So the... There was a... There's a... Over in...

I don't know if it's Lake Oswego or Tigard.

I think it's Lake Oswego.

It's right off of Carmen Drive.

Tualatin.

It's in Tualatin because I remember looking up... That's a whole confusing area.

But there's the... Oregon is confusing.

Two different practices share an office.

There's a cardiologist and a dental...

An animal cardiology and animal dental practice.

So we did go to the same office.

Different doctors.

So we went to the same office for Peta where we had to put her down.

And then when Eddie...

Jumping ahead a little bit.

Eddie... Sydney who keeps interrupting us.

She loves to slap Eddie with her paw.

Because he makes noises.

And then she will stand there and lick his head.

And the back of his neck.

And like two years ago now.

About this time of year.

She slapped him.

And he wasn't paying attention.

And his face went flat down into the ground.

And she broke his jaw.

Now to clarify.

His jaw was already weakened.

Chihuahuas are really terrible with dental.

And here she is.

Speaking of the devil.

I'm not a devil.

I'm not a devil.

What did you say?

I'll show you a devil bitch.

So his... We already knew his jaw was weakened.

Because he had already had several teeth removed.

He had...

You know gum disease.

And he had his yearly checkup.

He had his dental work done.

And you can probably Google it.

Chihuahuas are really notoriously terrible for dental health.

And so she broke his jaw.

And so that's when we thought we were going to have to put him down.

Because it was like oh my God.

He's in so much pain.

And he stayed overnight at the vet's house.

At the vet's house.

At the vet's office.

Yeah the vet took him home.

Bridgeport Veterinary.

They are amazing.

If you are in this area you need an emergency vet.

They do have office hours that are not 24 hour.

But if you have an emergency and you need somebody checked out.

They will totally take care of you.

Remember the doctor was saying that he would be perfectly fine.

Because their dog also had the exact same issue.

That was the specialist.

That was the one at... I can't remember the name.

It was the one on the other side of the road from them.

And that's the thing.

He spent the overnight at the vet.

And they were like we need you to take him to the specialist.

And it happened to be the same office for the dentist.

As the office for the cardiologist.

Where we had taken PETA earlier.

And we were...

As parents we were preparing the kids.

Like he may not come home from this.

Just so you know.

We might have to say... So we all went together.

To take him in.

Well the original conversation actually happened in your bedroom.

We were sitting around.

We were like...

What are we going to do?

What is best for him?

It was the night that he stayed over.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So the next day everyone went to the appointment with the dental specialist.

Sorry.

I've got... I've been drinking soda.

Soda pop there bud.

And so it was really shocking when the...

Love it.

The butch lesbian vet walked in.

And she's like is this Eddie?

And we're like yeah.

He...

You know his older sister... Or his younger sister actually smacked him.

And he you know smashed his face.

And you know what are we going to do?

And she took a look at the x-rays.

Took a look at him.

And she was like oh this happened to my Chihuahua.

He's going to be fine.

And I think we were all just stunned.

We went... Oh thank God.

What?

And she explained what she was going to take out the last remaining two...

One tooth on each side of the jaw.

Stitch up the gums.

Give him a couple days to kind of recover.

And that he was going to be fine.

And I think we were all really shocked.

And very happy because he's such a sweet boy.

And he loves it when you call him buddy.

Hey buddy.

The thing is that the house will never... Will not be the same without him.

Because he's the little demented dog that walks around eating everything.

And so we've given each of our dogs a voice.

And we... For some reason we have made him like the old Jewish guy.

Well I think it's like old Vietnam vet.

Well... Yeah.

Both.

Sometimes he's a Jewish guy and sometimes he's a Vietnam vet.

Especially when he looks shocked at something.

It's like... Back in my day we didn't have legs.

We didn't have legs.

We were...

My mom was helping.

You were helping.

You know who that is.

I'm me.

Yes.

Your mom.

So you were helping me fix the Traeger.

And I was on the ground and I was trying to get up.

And I was like... Back in my day we didn't have legs.

And I lost my shit.

And I was still on the floor.

Yup.

Yup.

And so he's... But plus he's just been around our family for 14 years now.

Yeah.

2011.

He just... There's always been Eddie.

And so...

Watching him now he's degraded quite a bit where he walks into a room sometimes and

he just stands there looking at nothing or he'll follow somebody's feet.

And then all of a sudden everyone's running into him.

And so at that point where do you draw the line?

This is one of my topics that I actually had put into my notes.

Where do you draw the line of how old is too old for a dog or a cat?

I think that doesn't... I feel like a vet should be like, your dog is in pain.

They won't do that though.

They'll say your dog is... I cut you off too early.

But they'll say like, well they could be in pain.

Or they could be just fine and demented.

Or blah blah blah blah blah.

But I'm gonna have to pee again in a second.

So maybe we... Let's take another commercial break.

Okay.

Let's take a pee break now.

This time.

Yeah.

13 minutes in.

Yeah.

Bye.

And we are back from the break.

Hopefully you enjoyed that music.

I love it.

So we left off talking about our demented old boy, of course.

Right.

And after we had unfortunately had to get Jake rehomed.

Eddie, we lived for a short while in an apartment.

And then I had... A really short time in retrospect.

It was like eight months.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then I had a surgery and Rhonda helped me recover from it.

And everyone had moved into her house that she had recently bought.

Not recently.

Like just bought.

She had just... She bought it in July.

Well, she bought it in July 2013.

We all...

We decided to officially move in about May of 14.

That sounds about... No.

I think it was a little bit earlier because we got the Xbox.

It might have been.

You would remember that.

We got that in April.

I remember I had my surgery in March.

Yeah.

Of 14.

We probably moved in around April 2014.

So she... You know, it was really super sweet.

Let's get sidetracked.

Sidetracked.

She asked me if I could stay here while I was healing from my surgery.

Yeah.

And so, of course, all the children, the rats that we had at that point,

the Eddie that we had at that point, we all came to live at her house that she

had just purchased less than a year before.

And we all stayed here.

We all slept here.

We had bunk beds in the kids' room and everybody was happy and...

She set that shit up.

She's...

Rhonda's good.

Like she's good like that.

Rhonda's more than good.

Rhonda's great.

Hell yeah.

Rhonda's the shit, just so you know.

She's the shit.

She's the shit.

She's the shit.

So when I eventually said, you know, it was like six or eight weeks after I had

my surgery, I said, I think I could probably...

we could probably go ahead and move home.

I think we need to leave your house alone.

And she's like, yeah, why don't you not?

Like, why don't you stay here?

Why don't we just do the lesbian thing and just move in way too early?

With no U-Haul whatsoever.

No, we did use a U-Haul.

No.

We didn't?

We did not.

We did not use a U-Haul.

We didn't have a lot of stuff.

Until we bought the big bed for our room.

Yeah.

We didn't have a lot of stuff.

We didn't.

No.

Because we had kept most of that at the old house.

Yeah.

We left a lot at your dad's house because I didn't want to think...

you know, me being me, I didn't want him to feel like we had stripped him of a life.

Except he thought that anyway.

He did.

And, and, and I can't control that part.

There were, there were things... Sorry.

What I can, what I could control is what I felt was appropriate to take and leave.

Absolutely.

So the things you guys needed, we took.

And I left a lot of great things there that had exhibited our life up to that point.

But you know what?

I needed to make a choice to move on and move forward.

And that's what I did.

I left your guys' baby books.

Your baby albums, like all of that stuff there

because that's what was important to him.

What was important to me was that you guys were in a healthy environment.

Photos are really the only thing that are important to him.

In my personal opinion... It does feel like that, doesn't it?

As someone who has lived around him, he prefers the photos that perform the

life that he wants to show everyone that he has.

That portray.

Yes.

That's what I was trying to think of.

That's what you were looking for, yeah.

Like we would be on a trip and he's like, let's take a photo.

I'm like, I'm enjoying it.

He's like, let's take a photo.

And I'm like, okay.

Okay.

And see, I'm the opposite where I'm just like, are you digging a hole over there?

Dig that fucking hole.

Go ahead.

I'll take a picture of you digging the hole.

We're going to take this picture over here.

You just keep going.

It doesn't matter.

You were someone who would take pictures of us doing real things.

Where you would take the picture while we're doing what we were already doing.

Yeah.

Instead of like... Keep doing your thing.

...performative.

There were a few things where it was like, oh, we should get a picture of that.

It was 2016, 2017, we went to a wax museum and there was a picture of Johnny Depp.

In Newport.

Johnny Depp wax figure.

Yeah.

And you're like, oh, take a picture.

Let's take a picture.

I Remembers

That was a fun trip.

Oh, yeah.

That was so fun.

I want to go there again.

But did we just get...

Sidetracked.

So we were talking about... The dogs.

We were talking about the dogs.

We need to talk about the dogs.

So let's go back to that.

Yes.

Yes.

Okay.

This is why it's so hard to make chapters for this show.

Because we jump around so frequently.

Yeah.

And we've...

We actually have to listen back when we take a quick break, mostly because I'm

being... I'm being having cocktails and she doesn't listen.

Is why we have to listen back at what we have been talking about.

Well, the thing is, is I do listen, but it's...

In the moment.

My memory bank is very small.

You're listening in the moment to have a conversation.

Yeah.

And then that just passes.

Yeah.

And I get it.

Because I like to be present.

Yeah.

And if it's not very important...

I get it.

I get it.

We're talking about things...

What we were talking about are things that, like, I know already.

Sure.

So, like, I already got that.

Oh, see, I do that all the time when I just start in the middle of a conversation

with somebody who... Who has not been in the conversation with me.

Me.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like... And they're like, I'm not sure what we're talking about.

I think that's just ADHD.

I am sure it's ADHD.

Like, the older I get, like, the more I realize how ridiculously ADHD I am.

Yeah.

You could just get diagnosed.

What are they going to do at this point, though?

Adderall.

Barely know her.

Jesus Christ.

I wasn't even thinking about that.

Sorry.

It took me a second.

Adderall.

Yeah.

So, let's continue with the dogs.

We had Eddie and Peta.

We got sidetracked again.

And we had Eddie and Peta.

Mm-hmm.

And then in September of the year, I mean, nobody's dying at this point.

Yeah.

We added... You said September of the year.

No.

It was 2019...

For who?

2018 for Chuy.

2019?

No.

No.

2018 for Chuy.

You said 2019.

I know.

And I corrected myself.

Okay.

Well, Jesus.

Are you not listening?

Hello?

I am.

But I only heard 20... Whatever.

Okay.

Jesus.

So, we had Eddie and Peta.

Yeah.

For a couple of years, actually.

And then we were like, let's go look for a big dog.

Mm-hmm.

And we... The lumpiest one.

We met with a dog at Multnomah County Animal Shelter.

Mm-hmm.

And Eddie cannot control his mouth.

No.

So, he squeals and barks and yells and he's super excited

until he gets to smell somebody and he chills down.

He just... He doesn't care.

He's just like totally fine with it.

Or he gets horny.

Well, yeah.

He does.

He has been fixed since he was like six months old.

Oh, yeah.

But he do love a hump.

Oh, yeah.

So, after we scared the shit out of a beautiful little pity... Oh, yeah.

...we went to the place called Family Dog's New Life.

Now, New Asher... or New Life Asher House.

New Life Asher House.

Thank you for looking that up because I was wondering about that.

It's on Perla's website.

Yeah.

Thank you.

You can find... I'll put their website down in the description.

You can link up?

Awesome.

They're amazing.

Oh.

I was... We're not even done with the amazing parts of the conversation.

Oh, yeah.

So, let's finish this part and... Because we got... Oh.

Sorry about that.

I just kicked it out of my arm.

We got a little sidetracked.

Did we get sidetracked?

A little bit.

A little bit.

So, after we scared the shit out of this gorgeous pity at Willamette...

or Willamette, no, sorry, Multnomah County Animal Shelter, we went to...

New Life Asher House.

At that point, it was Family Dog's New Life.

Yeah.

So, we went to New Life Asher House.

And I walked in there and I was like, look, I'm going to be super honest with you.

We have our dogs with us.

One of our dogs can't control himself and he just freaks out about everything.

Do you have a dog here?

This does not give a shit about any other dogs.

And the girl behind the counter went, oh my God.

Yes, we do.

Come on in.

Bring everybody in.

Let's meet this dog.

Yeah.

And so, we brought everybody into a little tiny room that

smelled weird and had like two chairs and a hard seat.

Thank you for mentioning the smell.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, this dog.

So, yeah.

So, I'm going to explain the smell.

But I understand.

I'm not saying it's a bad thing.

But anybody that has dogs knows that smell.

It was urine with a mixture of an enzyme solution.

Yeah.

It was someone peed many times and someone tried many times to clean it up.

And I'm glad that they... I don't think they're at the same location anymore.

I think they moved.

He actually might be at the same location.

Oh, okay.

But how much can you clean a building?

Like, you can't like... Take the walls.

Yeah.

Flamethrowers?

Like, that's going to be it.

Arson.

Problem solved.

Arson?

Burn the place down.

No arson.

No.

Because they keep dogs long term.

Well, no.

They move the dogs.

No arson.

Oh, well, pre-approved arson, I guess.

Don't just burn dogs.

So, they bring this dog in.

And he's this... He's got a gray body.

He's got a dark head with some weird markings on his eyebrows.

Yeah.

He's got little... Little... Little... Little... Little... Little... Little lips.

And this pointy-ass tail.

And like... A weapon.

17 elbows.

Yeah.

Four legs, 17, possibly 32 elbows.

And he just loves up on everybody, and his name is CeeLo.

Green.

Look... Dun dun dun.

CeeLo Gray, I guess.

Dun dun dun dun.

And so, we're like, oh, my God, he's fucking amazing.

And they're like, okay, well, you need to go buy this $400 animal care.

...animal cage, and then you have to get a... this sort of... a martingale collar

is what they described, and it's fantastic.

For... please, I love martingale collars, honestly.

For a dog with a square head and a tiny neck, or a tiny neck and a big...

wait, tiny head?

Square neck?

Anyway, if it's nice... What is a martingale collar?

A martingale collar is...

The chain?

It's similar to a... I'm using air quotes, choke collar.

Essentially, it has a nylon necklace, and then a chain loop that pulls tight,

so that they can't slip it over their ears when they're backing up.

So it doesn't hurt their neck at all.

It doesn't hurt their neck, doesn't hurt their jaw.

It just stops them from being able to slip the collar.

So, in essence, helps them from getting hit by a car, which happens a lot.

Unfortunately.

And I'm just going to say, for me, personally, I don't think it works very well.

The martingale?

I've had Chuy slip out of the collar many times.

He might not have had it tightened up.

Well, because I'm always worried about hurting him.

Of course.

Because I... he's an older boy now.

Yeah, now he is.

The only time that I ever try to pull him with his collar, which is very rarely,

is when he is trying to find something in the yard.

He is a big rat killer.

Yeah.

Squirrel killer, too.

Well, Sid's the squirrel killer.

Because she can catch them.

Let's get back to... let's circle back.

Oh, we got sidetracked.

Circle back, circle back, circle back.

So they tell us we need to go buy a crate, because he

is... he has separation anxiety, so he's destructive.

Yeah.

Put him in a crate.

Put him in a crate.

He's... he can't... you can't take him home without a crate.

So we go buy all this stuff.

An expensive ass crate.

We bring this guy home, and he is fucking amazing.

He's just adorable, and he has long nails, and so he

has a weird gait, because his shoulders... He's...

he's shaped weird.

We'll put a... we'll put a few pictures up on the... on the website.

We weren't going to get past that.

I'm not going to joke.

I'm not going to joke right now.

Chu-Chu is my soul animal.

Mm-hmm.

He's my spirit animal.

He's my soul mate.

He is my very best friend in the whole wide world.

Oh, no.

Rhonda knows her place.

Yeah.

No.

Yeah.

But she's a hooman.

Rhonda knows her place, that bitch.

She's a hooman.

She knows.

And God, I fucking love this dog.

I never felt a connection with an animal like that before.

But we originally got him because the girls, Lindsay and the middle kid,

wanted to have a dog to sleep with them,

because the other two dogs always slept with us.

And then, all of a sudden, he's like 74 elbows,

and they're like, we can't sleep with this dog.

So the first time we try to leave him alone in the crate, the kids go to school.

Rhonda and I are home, and we hear this horrific noise

coming from what was Lindsay's room at that time.

Not my room.

It was right here.

And I stand outside the door, and I listen.

And I just hear a lot of rattling and some crying.

And I feel really bad.

And so I finally, I just open the door, and I

see some pink stuff on the side of the crate.

And then I see Chuy looking panicky.

And I realize after I get him out of the crate that

he had been trying to chew his way out of the crate.

The pink stuff on the side of the crate was his gum tissue.

I didn't know that.

Yeah.

Oh, my God.

Yeah.

He had tried to chew his way out because he was scared.

And because...

Because of the way his shoulders are, and he has a sway

back, he can't lay down flat unless he has enough space.

And so when he did not have enough space to lay

down, he panicked, and he tried to chew his way out.

That's so sad.

And so the first time we put him in the crate

was also the last time we put him in the crate.

And I gave it away.

And then we gave away that crate.

We gave it away.

And from then on, we would turn on some sort of crime

show in the living room and put blankets on the couch.

And tell him to hop up there.

And you stay here, and we'll be home in a few minutes.

And we left him up there watching a crime show or

listening to a crime show with the two little dogs.

And then at one point, he pulled up a pack of hot dog buns off of the counter,

and he took them over to one of the chairs.

He put it up in the chair, but he didn't actually chew through it.

So it was like...

He was like, I can do this, but I don't know what to do with it now.

I think maybe he was worried that if he did that, like opened it up, that he would

get in trouble.

Sure.

And he was definitely abused in his previous home.

I think he had unrealistic expectations of him, for sure.

Yeah.

Of course.

Someone did not expect him to be a dog.

Yeah.

They thought he was going to be a pet.

Mm-hmm.

And he's just... An object.

He's not.

He likes cheese, and he loves to kiss your face.

And he farts a lot.

Ugh.

A lot like me.

Like fatal, fatal farts.

Oh, my.

Oh, yeah.

Sidney seconds him.

Oh, right?

But Chu-Chu could kill a small animal.

Oh, wait.

He has... But no.

He's not killed a small animal with his farts.

So that's the difference.

Not that we know.

That we know.

It's not been documented yet.

Maybe... Maybe that's what happened with Peeta.

But he...

She got farted on.

I don't think that's it.

Because he has squished rats.

Yeah.

But...

Not rats on purpose.

No.

No, no, no.

Not pet rats.

No.

The rats we have...

We live close to a greenway.

There are lots of things that live close to us.

But we...

Yeah, we have a lot of reserved...

Not reserved land, but like agriculture land.

That like cannot be built on.

We got a lot of greenway.

Yeah.

So the little...

The little streams and stuff that kind of run under the road or next to the road.

It's all preserved.

And we have nutria.

We have deers that live across the street.

Oh, yeah.

I missed it actually the other day when I left.

I was kind of sad about that.

I'm going to...

I'm going to talk about an experience that I

had with that creek that we're talking about.

Sure.

So that creek runs very...

Very far.

It runs... It's the exact same creek that runs from over here across the road.

And it runs all the way up to the park.

Okay.

Okay.

So probably about a mile and a half, I'm going to guess.

Yeah.

So I was down there with some friends because, you know, water, sticks,

throwing things around.

There was a lobster.

I bet there was a crawfish.

No, I'm not even joking.

Like an actual lobster.

I'm being dead serious.

How big was it?

This was like 10 years ago.

I don't remember.

Well, tell me how big it was at that point.

I don't know.

I'm just giving you shit.

I feel like it was probably a crawfish.

It was probably.

Yeah.

But like... Did you...

You grew up over in Tualatin.

Mm-hmm.

What is the August festival they have?

Crawdad and Crawfish.

Oh, the look on your face when you just realized it was the Crawfish Festival.

Yeah, yeah, Crawfish Festival.

So you found a big crawfish.

But I have... Or crawdad.

I saw them once in 2015, 2016 and never again.

Sure.

Never again.

They probably got killed.

Well, I mean, the waterways changed quite a bit.

Not for the worst.

It's actually cleared up a lot.

But what does this have to do with our dogs?

Oh, fuck.

We got sidetracked.

Sidetracked!

But go ahead and tell your story because I like crawdads in the stories.

Go ahead.

Yeah, I was just recently down at the stream.

It's extremely clear.

It used to be very muddy and algae.

I think because they've been doing a lot of work

to bring back the nature of the surrounding area.

Love that.

There's still litter.

I tried to clean up a little bit while I was down there.

Oh, I love that.

Well, because there was a lot.

Is there anything we can say?

Is there anything we can do with you to find

those things and pick them up and throw them away?

Maybe.

Like a bag or something.

Did you have a big bucket?

Last time I was... Did you have little grabbers?

That's it.

I don't want to touch that shit.

So, yeah.

You need grabbers.

Anyway, go ahead.

There were so many cigarette lighters.

Lighters or butts?

Lighters.

Really?

Like actual full lighters.

Sorry.

That was really loud.

Really?

Really?

But yeah, I cleaned those up.

I got a few pictures.

On my website.

On your website?

Or letsgetsidetrack.org?

No, it's letsgetsidetrack.net.

Oh, Jesus.

Fuck.

Letsgetsidetrack.net.

I'll put them down in the description.

Oh, please just go to the website.

Don't trust me with it.

Yeah.

No, go ahead.

Go to lemonparty.com.

What?

Please don't.

I don't know what that is.

Naked old people.

Please do not.

Oh, God.

No.

Uh-uh.

No.

I can tell you about that.

Oh, God.

No.

Please don't.

Whoa.

Okay.

Oh, I think I need a break.

Right now she's gyrating.

I might have to go pee.

Plus, I don't want to hear about naked people.

I'm getting PTSD from her.

No, it's naked old people.

Hey.

Big scrotum.

Big balls.

We will be right back.

Enjoy the show.

Bye.

Bye.

Bye.

Thanks for sticking with us.

We just finished talking about Chu-Chu.

So, after PETA passed, the boys, the boys, the boys, Eddie and Chu-Chu

seemed a little bit sad that they were missing a little spunky

girl, a little spunky girl to, like, fuck their shit up.

And so, we went back to, at the time, was Family Dog's New Life, which is...

New Ash... New Life Asher House.

New Asher...

New Asher... New Life Asher House.

Asher House.

Okay.

We're going to figure it all out.

It's in the description.

And honestly, you can just Google it and fucking Lee Asher is a...

Oh, here's me sprinkling in the...

Lee Asher is the dude that saves all the dogs.

Like, all the dogs.

He has amazing videos.

Please, do follow him.

Support him.

Take a dog off of his hands if you can.

Because he loves them all and he takes care of them all.

And the...

What was the Family Dog's New Life at the time?

They did the same thing.

So, we went back to them and I said, look, we got Chu-Chu and I was sad and

happy at that time that the person who had really connected

with Chuy was there and she wasn't there when we adopted him.

And so, when I walked in, I was like, I don't

know if you remember CeeLo that was here.

And she said... I started crying because they had connected and I felt so good.

And I said, well, we need a girl because the boys are sad and we need a spunky

little pile of crap that will just keep them on their toes.

And she's like, here's the dog you need.

And she was awesome.

Well, they brought in two... No, they brought in three dogs.

Two of them were very, very skittish.

But they were super... Yeah, they were very shy.

And she was like, okay, here's this one.

Don't... Here's this dog.

And she seems really angry.

And all she did when they let her out of the crate, all she did was growl at us.

Yeah.

And it was amazing that she goes, so you can either come back tomorrow and

we'll try again, or let's shove her in the crate

and you take her home and see what happens.

And, you know, us being us, we went, eh, shove her in the crate.

So, we did that.

Best decision we ever made.

Yeah.

No, man.

Man, she popped out of that crate like our best friend.

Like, she was so happy.

And I cannot remember the girl's name at the shelter that introduced us.

But we owe her so much.

We owe her so much.

I talked to her over email.

Yeah.

Almost five years ago.

I forget her name.

We've had them so long now.

And they're just ingrained in our family.

And that's all we got.

We got this...

This crappy little gorgeous thing who, honestly, I call her little fat,

little fatty and pretty girl and come get your fat, fat or whatever all the time

because she's just a loving little sweetheart.

She's the best.

She's the best behaved dog I feel like we

have because she can run out the front door.

We tell her, okay, go ahead.

And she'll run out the front door and she'll follow Sophia around.

She doesn't care.

Unless she has to go.

She'll go pee.

In which case, she will go find her place to pee and then she'll find Sophia.

Yeah.

Or as of lately, because it's been raining, what she'll

do is go pee and then run to the door and wait there.

Yeah.

Right back to the front door.

She does not want to be outside.

But she's a sweetheart.

In the rain.

That is.

During the summer, she... She has a little pink belly.

Yeah.

She loves to lay out in the sun.

We have to put sunscreen on her because she's so, so white.

She burns easy.

And like I said before, we will put pictures of these dogs on the website.

Absolutely.

And if you want a ton of pictures of Perla, you can go to perlathedog.com.

Down in the description as well.

It's a great website.

There's so many Perla pictures.

So after we got Perla... 160 hours to make that website.

Holy crab cakes.

That's a full-time job.

Yep.

Multiple.

Are you sure?

Multiple full-time jobs.

Oh.

Okay.

Well, I mean, that's four weeks at a full-time job.

What?

Yeah.

Okay.

So next dog that popped up was Nola.

Nola came along because Sophia and Lindsey's cousin

by marriage was down in California at school and...

Love you, Em.

Love you.

I want to see you again.

Love you.

Hope the...

I don't know if he gave birth yet.

Oh, do you think their baby's here?

I don't know.

I haven't checked.

Oh, there could be a baby.

So she has since been married and expecting a child and we're not...

I don't know because I didn't ask, but... I'll message her.

It'll be here at some point and there's going to be a little human, which yay.

Yeah.

But at the time, 2019?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

She lived in a house with some other basketball players and they all adopted

this dog and they named her Nova and they didn't have any time to take care of her.

And Lindsey, who is also hard of hearing, misheard her name as Nola, New Orleans,

Louisiana.

And so when Lindsey said, well, they have this

dog named Nola and they need a family for her.

We went, well, fuck yeah, that's right because

Nola is one of my very favorite cities.

So I think it was December 1st or 2nd, it was

like two days after Thanksgiving that year.

We met Nola's, what would be grandparents at that point.

Yeah.

And they handed us this big footed little yellow and white mess.

Love you Charlene.

Love you, Charlene.

We're so thankful for you guys.

Yeah.

And we brought her home and Nola, we brought Nola home.

And we honestly didn't learn until like a

year later that we called her the wrong name.

It was supposed to be Nova, N-O-V-A, not N-O-L-A.

But you know what?

I think it's 2020.

She has turned, she's Nola.

Noodle.

She's Noodle.

Noodle.

Noodle.

Noodle.

She's like, she's the coolest crazy dog.

She's adorable.

I am the first person that ever called her Noodle.

And every time I say that, everyone's like,

no, but I was the first one to call her Noodle.

Dig it.

Noodle, Nola, whatever.

Like when she's in trouble, it's New Orleans, Louisiana and she doesn't give a shit.

She is in trouble pretty much all the time.

Yeah.

Mostly because she's not listening.

She wants, she loves sticks.

She fucking loves her sticks.

Oh you can Bull penis Oh, she does, she loves some bully sticks.

Is that what you were talking about?

No, just regular Oh stick sticks.

Sticks.

Okay.

No, yeah.

No, yeah, she loves sticks.

You can take a little tiny stick and throw it and she'll go run over and grab it.

You can throw a stick and she'll find two other sticks

and she'll chew them up, and then she will might come...

You might come back with a half a stick and be like, Do you want this?

Do you want this?

No, I'm gonna eat this and she'll run away and she's just fucking adorable.

Yeah, she's probably what like 70 pounds at this point.

I think she's a big fucking dog.

Yeah.

And she's so smart.

She's so smart.

She loves her toys.

She loves and so Lindsay is her best friend.

Lindsay is her very best friend.

And so we have an outbuilding on our property that she and Lindsay live in.

Because Nola and Sidney cannot live together.

They try to kill each other.

So I think that covers Nola.

Because that's basically what she is.

Yeah, yeah.

She has she chewed when she was a baby.

She chewed everything.

She chewed all of the wooden things in our house.

She chewed one of the legs on my piano.

She chewed a TV, TV tray.

She chewed two of the legs of a remote.

Is she chewing a remote?

I thought that was a rabbit's.

It was.

Oh, damn.

She was the one she was chewing on the corner of the, the, the, the, the,

the, the, the wall.

Yes.

The trim.

Yes.

And you put some hot sauce on it.

I actually, the first time I put some spray, some of the deterrent spray,

the sour apple spray.

And she licked it.

And she was like, this is fucking delicious.

You also tried a lime.

Yeah, I did.

That did not work.

I did wipe a lime on it too.

And she was like, don't care.

Can I have some salt also?

It made it extra tasty.

Yeah.

And then... Put some salt on there?

I put some habanero sauce on there.

And she licked it.

And I thought she was going to be upset and try to run away.

And she was like, fuck it.

This is delicious.

She licked it again.

I was like, holy fuck.

What are we doing?

We couldn't, we couldn't do anything to tell her.

She just had to outgrow it.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Which wasn't too long after that.

It didn't take very long because she, I feel like much like a lot of big footed

dogs, she grew out of it fairly quick.

We did have a DNA test done on her through Banfield.

And I don't have her percentages, but she's

mostly American staffy and American bulldog.

And she's...

She's got the underbite.

She's got the big body.

She's got everything.

She's got the square ass head.

She's fucking adorable.

She has all the kisses, all the hugs, and all the murderous intent when it comes

to Sydney, who is our COVID dog, our COVID dog that Rhonda...

Yeah, Rhonda.

Rhonda introduced to the house.

Rhonda Fulai.

We fucking love Rhonda.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But... Yeah.

We had four dogs in the house.

We thought we were done.

Four dogs is a lot.

Until we heard Sydney's story.

Well, four dogs feels like a lot.

I feel like, as I remember it, that's the legal limit of animals you can

have, definitely domesticated animals you

can have in your house in Washington County.

Please do not quote me on that.

I'm not 100% sure.

I thought I read that.

So after we had Nola...

For almost a year, we thought we were done.

And then Rhonda had a friend who fostered dogs from down in Houston.

Houston?

Houston.

Houston.

Texas ass.

Texas ass.

And she was watching a video and we... I think we were... We were having...

So this is during COVID times.

So we used to go out to lunch on our days off.

And she was watching a video.

We had lunch.

We played a little lottery.

We came home.

We did, you know, went to Goodwill, whatever.

But then when COVID times happened, we had to figure

out something else to have to do for our dates.

So we decided to have car dates and we would order takeout from a place and then

we would find a nice place to park and have our lunch and watch a video or like I

had my phone connected my car.

Like I put my phone up.

And we watched part of a movie or we'd watch

NCIS or we'd watch whatever on the phone.

And so we were sitting there watching a video and she goes, look at this dog.

And I was like, okay.

And I look at this dog and she's looking at me like with big puppy dog eyes.

I'm like, who are you?

What is going on right now?

What did you do with my Rhonda?

What is Rhonda doing?

We had four dogs.

That's enough.

And she's like, look at her.

She's amazing.

And her friend in Washington had been fostering

this dog and this dog had been found in a ditch.

She had been hit by a car.

So Jenny's Rescue Ranch was a different name at the time, but it's the same people.

Well at least Jenny.

It used to be Zoo.

Zoo's Rescue.

And Jenny went and found her in this ditch.

They wrapped her up in a tarp and they took her to Texas A&M.

University who fixed her.

She had a broken femur.

She had a dislocated hip on the other side.

So they put a pin down her one femur.

They put...

I'm sorry.

I'm going to back up.

They put a rod down her one femur.

They put pins in the other hip.

And then Jenny and her crew took care of her until she was up and running.

So to speak.

To speak again.

And they advertised her.

They showed everyone, here's this dog.

She's had a shit life.

Look at how amazing she is.

You should hang out with her.

Yeah.

Devastating video to watch.

Oh, I don't want to.

I don't want to see it again.

The recovery was recorded because, I don't know, insurance reasons.

I don't know.

But she did not care anymore.

Sidney.

Sid?

She gave up.

She did not want to live.

She knew that she was probably going to die.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Luckily, she didn't.

She's safe.

She's a beautiful dog.

Don't cry.

Oh, please.

You're going to make me cry.

I'm sorry.

So Rhonda showed me this video of this half

shaved little shepherd mix running around a yard.

Just being the happiest little fucker in the world.

And I had thought we were done with like adopting dogs.

I was like, who are you?

Why are we looking at this dog?

And she was like, let's go meet that.

Let's we need to meet this dog.

And I was like, well, we can't meet this dog unless we agree to take her on.

Yeah.

And so because I love Rhonda.

And Rhonda loved this dog.

I contacted Jenny's Rescue Ranch.

I said, hey, how do we how do we adopt this dog?

And she forwarded me paperwork and we paid a handful of money.

And then on I want to think it was October 31st, 2020.

We met.

It was the 30th, I think.

Was it?

We met the... We met the van down Jansen Beach in Portland.

And this little scared, just gorgeous little shepherd mix.

She was so little.

And they were like, oh, she's about a year and a half old.

Tiny girl.

She was actually not.

She was a lot younger than that because when she got to our

house, she started chewing on shit like nobody's business.

Yeah.

And she accepted us.

She soon started trusting us.

And pretty soon she started bossing us around.

Oh, yeah.

She's the boss of the house.

No one else is.

Because then we learned that she was not just an Australian German Shepherd mix.

No Aussie Shepherd.

She is 37% Husky, 23% German Shepherd.

Yep.

And she makes it known.

And like 4% Chihuahua.

I can post her mixes if we need to.

But she is... Let's do that anyway.

So fucking full of shit.

She's so full of shit.

She bosses us around.

She will boop us with her nose.

Hard.

It hurts.

Yeah.

She'll move us around on her.

Yeah.

Whatever she wants us to do.

For me, she likes to boop my inner knee, which will cause my knee to buckle.

What she loves the most is to wake you up.

And she will get up on Sophia's bed.

She'll get right in her face and either yell or she'll scratch her face with her paw.

Beat my ass, basically.

She cuts her own nails.

She will lay there at night and...

No, she's not cutting them.

She's sharpening them.

She will sharpen it.

She got little shivs on her hand.

Like prison shivs.

Full of prison shivs.

Yeah.

She'll fuck you up.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I have a scar.

We all have scars in our house.

Most of them are emotional.

Yup.

Oh, so many emotional.

We all have physical scars from Syd because she wants us to do what she wants us to do.

And we totally play into it.

It's all our fault.

It doesn't matter.

Yeah.

She's amazing.

And she loves everybody that lives in our house.

Eddie, I feel like is her favorite.

And then Rhonda.

And then Chuy.

Chuy, Chuy.

She loves Chuy.

Chuy loves everybody to begin with, but... And then she's scared of Perla.

Well, Perla's a little cunt.

What is she going to do?

That is true.

Yeah.

But Perla... They're getting better.

Getting better.

Perla was, from what I know, an only dog up until she was with us.

Okay.

We're going to take a quick commercial song break.

Well, welcome back.

Welcome back from that little tiny break.

We were chatting about the dogs.

We were talking about how many dogs live with us.

Yeah.

Was that your phone?

That was my phone.

Holy crab cakes.

That was loud.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

We were talking about, you know, having all them dogs.

How we got the dogs.

Camp had the dog.

Camp had the dog.

So we had... Okay.

So we had all these dogs that lived with us.

And our oldest kid, Lindsey, went to school at...

OSU?

Oregon State University.

She went to studdle... Studdle?

She went to study animal... She really went to studdle.

She went to studdle.

She went to study animal sciences.

And she spent a year... Wish that worked.

She spent a year there and it just was not her jam.

For sure

It didn't work out.

And I get it.

Because I...

Sometimes you just do not click with what you

want to do and what you're supposed to do.

That being said, she still doesn't know what she's going to do.

But when she left, Nola got super, super anxious.

And she and Sidney started fighting.

And not even like, oh, yeah, punch, punch, punch.

It was, I'm going to fucking kill you because my kid's gone.

Mm-hmm.

And it took us several fights before we were able to figure

out what was going on and that we needed to separate them.

Including having a animal, Caesar Milan type.

Oh, yeah.

No, we had a dog trainer.

We had a dog trainer that came in for quite a few weeks and she was amazing.

I...

Oh, God, I wish I could remember the name of the...

It was... Little Asian lady.

Little Asian lady.

You talk, I'm going to look it up.

Okay.

Yeah.

So she came in for a few sessions.

I think in total we had maybe six sessions.

Well, we had several weeks that we visited with her.

Yeah.

And eventually we realized that this... Wasn't going to work.

This wasn't going to work.

Yeah.

And I think it took one more fight without her than we had.

Because they got into a fight while she was present.

Yeah.

They got into a couple of scuffles.

And it was mainly over food, but it also depended on who was in the room.

So I was able to... Thank you for talking.

I was able to look it up and it's the cooperative canine.

And honestly, she's fucking amazing.

Extremely nice.

She taught us a lot of things that we could do to get the dogs to get along.

Or what happened when they didn't get along.

And unfortunately, they didn't get along more often than they did.

Yeah.

So we're very fortunate to have an outbuilding on

our property that Lindsey could move out with Nola.

Who actually ended up to be the aggressor in a lot of the situations.

And I feel like that's something Lindsey doesn't seem to understand.

Is that Nola was the aggressor.

In most of them.

If your favorite dog is the one that misbehaves, you don't want to admit that

that's what's happening.

Yeah.

But when we all agreed that it was best if Nola moved out there with her.

Lindsey was cool with it.

She was totally fine with it.

And honestly, both of them have the same sort

of personalities where they like to be social.

Both assholes.

They don't want to be social.

Sorry.

They are kind of assholes.

It's okay.

But when they want to be social, they will.

And when they don't want to be, just fucking back off.

Yeah.

So they... Nola, honestly, Nola is super happy being an only dog.

She doesn't give a fuck if anybody... Oh, no.

I'm going to correct that.

She loves it when Chu Chu comes out because

Nola was a baby when Chu-Chu was around.

And so he kind of raised her up.

And they are the best buddies when they're out together.

And Chu-Chu doesn't give a shit who is with

him as long as he has somebody to hang out with.

He doesn't give a fuck.

So for Nola, she love, love, loves Chuy.

Anybody else, she would love to taste them.

My issue with Lindsey on this topic is that...

She takes no responsibility for things that Nola does.

When Nola destroyed the door, she's like, yeah, well, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

But not like, yep, she did that.

I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to fix that.

No.

But who did she have?

Who did you... One of us has been drinking a lot.

It might have been me.

But who does she have as a role model?

She has me saying, if this is this, then that is that.

But then it's easier if she follows her dad's role model in that, well,

I didn't do that.

So that's not my fault.

I don't know.

It's not me.

I have a lot of those not me-isms.

But I feel like mine are kind of valid in a lot of ways.

In that I shouldn't have to clean up for myself.

Or for other people.

Agreed.

Which, you know, is sound.

And to preface that, I'm going to say, Sophia is the only one of the four of us

that does not have a full-time job outside of the house.

So a lot of, most of us count on her to do things

like garbage, dishes, laundry for if we need.

Some of us are there working a laundry.

Some of us are there for a longer week.

We count on her to back us up and take care of those things.

And we have talked personally about this.

Yeah.

But I'm just going to say it here.

It's extremely stressful.

And then what will happen is we will be talking and you will be like, well,

what do you, what do you do?

Like you don't, you're not doing anything.

And... I try not to do that.

Because I know you have things going on.

But you know, you still do that sometimes.

It hasn't happened in a few months.

And I will be like, are you fucking kidding me?

Because I will, I try my hardest around here.

And I think you know that.

I do.

And I'm not saying that you haven't been showing this.

I'm just, I'm explaining that.

I know that you do a lot of things.

But there are also a lot of things that I really want to have happen.

And on my, it's, it's my shortfall that I don't

say, hey, Sophia, could you please do this?

I, I want, I assume that you know the things that I want to do.

But you don't.

And I feel bad about that.

Because you can't read my mind.

And I don't understand why you can't.

The thing that I don't think a lot of people in this

house understand even is even though I am medicated.

I am still severely depressed.

And I only have a finite amount of things that I can do

before I'm basically completely out of energy for a week.

So, it's not that like I want to die in terms of depression.

But it's like, I only got this.

That makes me really sad to hear.

I'm sorry.

I don't want to make you sad.

I am super sorry.

Because I am unmedicated.

Unmedicated ADHD.

And...

I have diagnosed... Wow.

Severe depression.

I am so sorry.

If you all don't know that.

But I am very sorry that I expect those things out of you without knowing that.

Um...

And the things that I do get done, I...

Doing them is... Exhausting.

It's very exhausting.

So, you doing the dishes is like... But for me, it's like...

I have to do this.

And then...

The things that I really want to do that bring me joy.

I have no energy for them.

And doing the dishes.

That's me being manic.

Like getting home from work on a day that I don't have to go to work that night.

And I have extra energy because I've been running all night.

And I have to do all these things.

And I'm like...

Oh, well, this is like shit.

Oh, look.

There's ants in the thing.

And I'm going to go ahead and do this thing.

And then I do the dishes.

And I... It's not so much that I have to do it because you won't get it done.

Because... It's... It's just for the family.

It should be done.

And we got to get it finished.

Well, me and my oldest sister, Lindsey, switched.

So, she would do dishes.

But then it turned into both you and me doing dishes.

And...

Me also having to do this.

Sorry.

And Perla flopped.

And Perla flopped over to the side.

And her little pointy tail just like wiggled out and did some crazy little dance.

But for Lindsey, she also has...

She is diagnosed as having depression, anxiety disorder.

I can't speak to what it is.

She is not medicated at this point.

And that's her choice.

She doesn't have to.

She doesn't want to.

She's a fucking grown up.

It's not our... Totally okay.

It's not her business how she wants to be medicated.

But I get... We're not even going to speak to that.

I understand her feelings as far as it goes for that with working a very long job.

And honestly, for an introvert working an extrovert's job, it's super fucking hard.

Having to talk to people all day and having to try to make your needs known in

a situation where people only worry about their own needs.

High paced environment.

It's very hard.

And I have had to deal a lot with that with me being an empath and dealing with

people who don't give a fuck about other people.

It's really tough.

I feel like my biggest issue is that those

emotions are there and that's perfectly valid.

But instead of those being... Either dealt with or talked about, she blows up.

And that happens.

You know, I've experienced it.

I haven't had a massive blow up in a while.

When was the last time you remember me having a screaming blow up?

Well, I'm going to say at that point, it's really

hard for her to even navigate those feelings.

Mm-hmm.

And having a blow up or having to...

burst out and say what she actually needs is

extremely hard for her to navigate even on her own.

Mm-hmm.

And just trying to stay at her baseline is probably a lot of work.

Mm-hmm.

Having been unmedicated at several points in my life, it is

extremely hard when you know you're going to freak the fuck out.

Yeah.

To just stay at your baseline.

I...

Honestly, as... We are privileged.

We are a white family, very privileged.

Mm-hmm.

I'm just saying this for the people.

No, agree, agree.

She has... We all do.

We all have the most resources of anybody.

Well, I mean, insurance only pays so much, just so you know.

No, no, no.

I'm aware of that.

But...

But I'm saying we have resources.

You can reach out for sure.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

I've reached out more than once to the Trevor Project.

And that's like... that's at my lowest.

Right.

And... Right.

Now, it's been a while since I've reached out to them, which is good.

Yeah.

Um, medicating has helped me, but it has also kind

of ruined, like, certain parts of my brain in ways.

To where my social interaction has very... it's very shrunk.

It's just shrunk a lot.

Dwindled.

It has dwindled.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think that has to do with being sheltered

at a very important time due to COVID.

Right.

And I'm gonna say right now, your social

interaction is not as rusty as you think it is.

Mm-hmm.

Because today, we were able to go to my work party.

Mm-hmm.

Um, we had a meeting, uh, our... our winter meeting.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, our quarterly meeting at work.

And, uh, we had it at Dave and Buster's.

Love Davey.

And, um, I chose to ask Sophia to go with me because

she doesn't have a whole lot of social interaction.

She does love to hang out with people and... and play games.

And also, Lindsey is super, super tired when she gets done with work.

She does not want to do anything for a good three hours after she's done with work.

And I respect that because I totally fucking get it.

So I asked Sophia to go with me.

And, um, she was graceful enough to hang out with us.

And... and she was able to go, uh, off the first few, uh, uh, first few hours.

The first hour of our, uh... Hour and a half.

Hour and a half of our... our meeting.

Mm-hmm.

We had some business stuff to take care of.

Mm-hmm.

One of the things was to, um, was to, uh, announce me as a field training officer.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Thank you.

Uh, thank you.

So I get to teach little EMTs how to not tell

people to fuck off when they really, really want to.

Because...

I deal with them on a daily basis at work.

My... my angry brain tells me to say things.

And then my social brain tells me, no, no, no, let's be kind.

And we're gonna deal with this on a social level.

Mm-hmm.

And do a very nice thing.

And, um, I got sidetracked there.

Yeah.

Because I was very thankful that Sophia would want to go with me.

Mm-hmm.

And hang out with my work people.

That I hang out with, even though we only always hang out with each other.

Yeah.

So it was very fun to have her on this, um, little, uh, off-site excursion.

This adventure.

It was very fun.

Mm-hmm.

And I appreciate you going with me.

Thank you.

That's what you appreciates about me, Miss Katie?

That's what I appreciates about you.

Simmer down there, Squirrely Dan.

Woo!

Woo!

Yeah.

So it was...

Let's take a break.

A commercial break.

Well, it might be a... Enjoy this jazz music.

Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo.

And we are back from that short, tiny little, short little dwarf break.

Yeah, it was short for you, but it was really long

for us, because I have had quite a bit to drink.

Mm-hmm.

So we finished talking on the major depressive disorder, uh, topic.

Pretty sure we did not finish that.

We didn't.

No.

We broached it.

We did.

We lampooned it.

Oh, lampoon.

What a great word.

Is that the right word for it?

I'm pretty sure.

Well, I don't want to make fun of it.

Lampooning?

Yeah.

National lampoon.

But you talked about having a major depressive disorder.

Yeah.

And I, uh, as well, have the same thing.

However, I have anxiety.

I do, too.

To add to it, I feel like we need to, uh, sidetrack to a, uh... A nicer topic.

I feel like we need to sidetrack to some sort of, uh,

therapeutic conversation with a certified professional.

Mm-hmm.

We can't cure each other, although we can listen to each other...

Mm-hmm.

...and give feedback.

And... I...

I'm gonna be honest.

I hate therapy.

I liked one therapist.

Yeah.

And I had to stop going to them.

It was the therapist that was trans, huh?

Mm-hmm.

They were awesome.

Mm-hmm.

But they were not an... an adolescent therapist.

Mm-hmm.

Unfortunately.

I don't... I do think I can't... I... I... I... I can go back now.

You should reach out now that you're a... A... A... A... A... Finger quotes.

An adult.

An adult.

An adult.

You should.

Uh-huh.

Because that would be awesome.

I felt like you did a great job.

You did a great job with them.

I'm just gonna say, the last therapist I have, fuck you.

No.

Not good.

No.

Like... Uh-uh.

Actually, fuck you.

You are horrible at your job.

Yeah.

You can't listen.

You do not understand families.

And... Extremely disrespectful to me.

You should not.

For sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Uh... I would mention things that, like, I was really enjoying.

Like, code-based.

Mm-hmm.

And it's like...

So, do you make money on that?

I'm like, nope.

And he's like, well, you should find out how to make money on that.

And I'm like, that's not the point of it.

I was basically telling him that it makes me happy.

And he's like, we should make it so that you won't be happy.

Right.

Just make money and don't be happy.

Let's go into late-stage capitalism.

Ooh.

That was my dog.

Having a little coffee fit.

Sorry about that.

Ouch.

Chu-Chu.

He's a good boy.

Yeah.

He's a good boy.

And I apologize for that, honestly.

It was your fault.

It was the... once the therapist that you really enjoyed visiting with said,

this is not my bag.

I can't do this.

And... Legally can't do it.

Yes.

And passed you off, said, here's the X amount of people that can.

Try these people.

And we tried those people.

And we ended up with this person that just did not help anything.

I feel like he was a gay man.

Yeah.

And he also was pushy.

He would constantly try to step completely out of my comfort zone, which was

explicitly told out of my comfort zone.

I told him what I found to be not things that

I necessarily wanted to talk about or do.

And he did them anyway.

So he ignored your boundaries.

And that's not okay.

And once... And testing boundaries is okay.

Testing them, saying, hey, push, push.

You push back.

Nope, that's okay.

Cool.

Then, you know, months later, saying, hey, push, push.

You push back or say, yes, let's talk about that.

That's therapeutic, I feel like.

And I can't... I'm gonna put my hands up.

I am not a therapist.

I am not mental health advice.

No, no, no, no.

But I am a mom and I am a health care provider.

However, none of what I say right now is clinical, clinically based.

It's just not peer reviewed.

No, it is not.

No, thank you.

And it's just what I as a human will say and offer up.

And honestly, when I am on the job, it's the same thing.

But at this point, while I'm in my jammies and

having a cocktail, I can't say the same thing.

I will say my opinions, but I can't clinically

say this is what you should or shouldn't do.

So there we go.

And once I got my therapist letter for him to start estrogen, ghosted him.

And he never followed up.

That was the sad part.

I was a little sad.

I was a little sad about that.

Was that he never said, hey, I know I sent you this PCS,

essentially this physician certification, something or other.

I said this.

And have you talked to someone?

Do you?

Are you doing the thing?

What's going on with you?

He never did follow up.

And that's really sad because a lot of people who need health care providers,

mental health care providers.

Need someone to say, hey, how you doing?

Right?

That's, that's what Max did.

Max was fantastic.

They were amazing.

Like, I would want them to come over and hang out with us at dinner if if if

something was going on, which they couldn't do.

Right.

As a health care provider.

Yes.

But as a human, they were fucking amazing.

I think it violates the therapist code of ethics.

HIPAA.

Yeah.

Or something like that.

No, I think it violates their ethics.

They can't have personal relationship with clients.

Yeah, right.

But that doesn't stop our current administration.

But that is true.

Right?

Yeah.

I don't know why I did that.

Well, thank you for joining.

And, you know, we hope to see you next week.

We're actually not going to see anybody.

They're just going to be listening.

They're going to be listening.

Or if you're seeing, you shouldn't.

I certainly appreciate you guys hanging out long enough for us to finish this

episode, which is a crazy amount of time for anyone to listen to anyone just jibber jabber

about stuff and a dog to talk about whatever that is.

So we for sure appreciate you for hanging out with us.

Thank you so much.

And we hope...

And we hope you will join us at the next episode of Let's Get Sidetracked.

And Sophia, what you got to say?

Bye!

Bye!

We do the intro.

And then, hello, friends.

Hello, friends.

Just that.

Let's try.

Hello, friends, and welcome to another episode of... Greetings, everyone.

Welcome to blah, blah, blah.

I feel like greeting sounds like... Greetings, earthling.

Greetings.

Hello, gender neutral term here.

Hello, there, slurs.

Oh.

Suffix.

No.

Hey skinks.

Skinks, hey skinks.

Yeah, um... You know, since I talked about, since we talked about that, I got a few

videos of this guy that raises skinks and he tries to check whether they're boys or

girls and when he picks them up, they go and they try to bite him.

I would too.

It was so cute.

Hello.

Hey.

Hey cunts.

Sup fuckers.

See?

Sup fuckers.

Sup fuckers.

How about that one?

Sup fuckers.

I think sup fuckers is it.

Yep.

Let's do that.

Okay.

You ready?

Yep.

Who's saying it this time?

So, do we want to introduce, do we need to introduce ourselves every single time?

Yes.

So, I'm Sophia.

I'm Stephanie.

Well, when we say sup fuckers, I'm Sophia.

Oh, let's see.

Sup fuckers, welcome to another episode of Let's Get Sidetracked.

I'm... Wait.

Sup fuckers, welcome to another episode of

Let's Get Sidetracked with me, Sophia Atkinson.

And me, Stephanie.