In this episode, Kiki gives us the story of the Covina Christmas Massacre and the Lawson Family Murders. Rachel tells us about Sophia Adam, who disappeared last month. We also gab a bit, Rachel talks about her beef with a certain baking show, and to no one's surprise, we get our nerd on.
Our next book is "Among the Bros: A Fraternity Crime Story" by Max Marshall. We will discuss the book in episode 8, which will go live on January 31, 2024.
Sources:
Sophia Adam
New Mexico Missing Person Information Page (http://missingpersons.dps.state.nm.us/mpweb/)
If you have information:
Call - Socorro County Sheriff's Office at (575)835-0941.
Covina Christmas Massacre
Homicide For the Holidays Season 1 Episode 3
LA Times (https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-jan-17-me-victims17-story.html)
Lawson Family Murders
True Crime Trine Episode 36
Behind The Song (https://thestorybeyondthesong.weebly.com/blog/the-murder-of-the-lawson-family)
Socials:
Instagram: Details Are Sketchy - @details.are.sketchy
Facebook: Details Are Sketchy - @details.are.sketchy.2023
Instagram: Kiki - @kikileona84
Instagram: Rachel - @eeniemanimeenienailz
Email: details.are.sketchy.pod@gmail.com
In this episode, Kiki gives us the story of the Covina Christmas Massacre and the Lawson Family Murders. Rachel tells us about Sophia Adam, who disappeared last month. We also gab a bit, Rachel talks about her beef with a certain baking show, and to no one's surprise, we get our nerd on.
Our next book is "Among the Bros: A Fraternity Crime Story" by Max Marshall. We will discuss the book in episode 8, which will go live on January 31, 2024.
Sources:
Sophia Adam
New Mexico Missing Person Information Page (http://missingpersons.dps.state.nm.us/mpweb/)
If you have information:
Call - Socorro County Sheriff's Office at (575)835-0941.
Covina Christmas Massacre
Homicide For the Holidays Season 1 Episode 3
LA Times (https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-jan-17-me-victims17-story.html)
Lawson Family Murders
True Crime Trine Episode 36
Behind The Song (https://thestorybeyondthesong.weebly.com/blog/the-murder-of-the-lawson-family)
Socials:
Instagram: Details Are Sketchy - @details.are.sketchy
Facebook: Details Are Sketchy - @details.are.sketchy.2023
Instagram: Kiki - @kikileona84
Instagram: Rachel - @eeniemanimeenienailz
Email: details.are.sketchy.pod@gmail.com
I'm Kiki and I'm Rachel, and this is details are sketchy a true crime podcast. And this is our sixth, fifth, fifth episode and it's coming out right before Christmas, so I've got some Christmas murders for you, happy holidays and Christmas, whatever you celebrate.
Speaker 2:Happy Hanukkah, happy Kwanzaa. Happy Festivus, happy whatever I forgot about what your sources.
Speaker 1:yep, and do people still know the Festivus reference?
Speaker 2:Somebody, somebody out there right Festivus for the rest of us. Yes, somebody watches Seinfeld, so yeah, so I don't know.
Speaker 1:I'm so tired. I woke up at like eight this morning after going to bed at like two thirty.
Speaker 2:My sleep has been so weird. I mean it always is. But yeah, I've been. I just have a really shitty circadian rhythm where I want to be up until like I'll fall asleep on the couch, usually with Jay, until like from like midnight to like one or two, and then we go to bed and I can't go to sleep. And tonight I couldn't last tonight. Last night I couldn't go to sleep and I think I fell asleep around six or something five, forty five maybe and then I had to wake up at like six thirty, get my kids ready for school.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I know my. If I could live the way my body really wants me to, I would be awake all night and sleep all day. Yeah, I'm like a vampire that way.
Speaker 2:So I wasn't joking when I said oh, I get to, I'll get to sleep a little bit, but I didn't get to sleep that long because I had just fallen back asleep when my son's teacher called me. So oh no, yeah, it's okay, we worked it out. But yeah, well, that's good. I hope I didn't sound like a complete bomb when I answered that phone, because I have been out of there.
Speaker 1:It's alright, you're doing fine, okay, so basically, let's see if I can get this really basic. Every two weeks we come at you with a disappearance or unsolved case. The other person then has the case that they are most interested in the last week or two and then we go back and get more information on the disappeared or unsolved case. We give you our sources and we talk a bit and we bullshit and bullshit and hope we get things okay. I don't know what that was that last part things okay.
Speaker 2:We can take that. Yeah, things are gonna be okay when you listen to our podcast.
Speaker 1:And then every four episodes we have a book and we'll tell you what the book is later in the episode and we'll also put it in the show description. So this time around Rachel is doing after two weeks of the time and all murder.
Speaker 2:I know now it's time for me to relinquish the hot seat, to take you again.
Speaker 1:Rachel is gonna give us a local disappearance right?
Speaker 2:okay, the missing person that I'm talking about this week is Sophia Adam from Socorro, new Mexico. So she went missing from Socorro on November 21st 2023, and so we're gonna give more information about her later. Correct, correct, alright.
Speaker 1:So I've got two Christmas murders for you. The first one you all probably know about. I think a lot of true crime podcasts have covered this one, and if you're a homicide for the holidays fan, like I am, then you probably have also heard of this. So Joseph and Alice Rotega were Mexican immigrants and had been happily married for 53 years. Joseph, or Papa Joe as he was often called, was retired, having owned his own industrial paint business. The artigas were active in their community, which was a Covina California. Their neighbors described them as Covina sorry, that's alright Covina.
Speaker 2:Have you seen my crazy ex girlfriend? No, it takes place in Covina, sorry.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's cool.
Speaker 2:Just proceed and take the part out.
Speaker 1:So the actors, the actors.
Speaker 2:Sorry. No, I got you all fucked up.
Speaker 1:That's okay. The artigas were active in their community, covina, california. Their neighbors described them as being an anchor for their street and their community. The artigas loved Christmas and opened up their home to their entire family. Every year they had a traditional Christmas Eve celebration and on December 24th 2008, all five of the artigas' adult children that would be sons James and Charles and daughters Letitia, alicia and Sylvia and their grandchildren, were all at their house that night. The family played a boisterous game of poker. Their grandson, who's interviewed in Homocyber the Holidays, said that that night it was great, just as usual. Everything was amazing. Really, there's no Christmas that didn't go by. That wasn't amazing. The holiday party was winding down when the doorbell rang. Papa Joe's eight year old granddaughter, who was Letitia's daughter, answered the door. It was Santa, but instead of giving out presents, he opens fire.
Speaker 2:Damn.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, it gets worse, it gets worse, that's like an awful like holiday horror movie. I know this whole thing sounds like it should be a splash of flip. I don't know. Could mass murder by gun be a slasher flick, or does slasher flick have to be?
Speaker 2:slasher Usually slasher's don't use guns. Some kind of variant on that?
Speaker 1:Yes, so police began receiving calls. Lieutenant Dim Dim, I'm working on no sleep guys, so the police began receiving calls. Lieutenant Tim.
Speaker 2:This man's name Tim or Dim, it's Tim.
Speaker 1:I don't know why I'm laughing. It's because I've had no sleep this week. Okay, sorry, it's finals and I've been upgrading. Police began receiving calls. Lieutenant Tim Dunin said everything lit up All the way. I can't do this, okay, I got Tim Dunin.
Speaker 2:I don't know why that's funny Tim. This rolls off the tongue. In a certain kind of way, I can see how Dim would be the conclusion.
Speaker 1:I think I've got the laughing disease. Yeah, I can't, it's not because it's not funny.
Speaker 2:It's a good disease to have. No, it's not funny, but sometimes I think that's good too. It's a good I can't talk either.
Speaker 1:I also know. Sleep, I think, is it punch drunk when you're really tired and you're just.
Speaker 2:It's better making yourself literally sick with a migraine because you get so stressed out about the case that you're studying. Rachel does a lot of deep dives. Yeah, I feel a lot of empathy about things and I can see things from a lot of perspectives and it makes me sometimes I get too emotionally invested in it.
Speaker 1:And you were overstimulated to begin with.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I kind of overstimulated myself and had a little bit of a melt down there.
Speaker 1:That's okay. There are a lot of people out there who I'm sure have had those Hopefully.
Speaker 2:I have definitely had those. I have definitely had those. Conclude in bringing you a great episode.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 1:So for the fourth time police began receiving calls. Lieutenant Tim Dunin said everything lit up, all the lines lit up. One neighbor told a 911 dispatcher that someone's house was on fire. Leticia, the oldest ortega daughter, called police saying the house is on fire my mom's house. Other callers reported gunshots coming from the house. When police arrived at the scene it was chaos, lieutenant Dunin said when I arrived. To describe it as apocalyptic would be accurate. Sorry if you can hear all my paper shuffling. They're all stuck together and I'm having issues.
Speaker 1:Okay, responder, search for any of the party guests who were inside to make sure they escaped the fire. At that point responders were looking for 25 people. They had 16 that they had positively contact and nine people they were still looking for, including Papa Joe and his wife. The only one of the five siblings they could account for was Leticia, her daughter. The one who had been shot also escaped. Those that escaped from the house told police that a person dressed like Santa had made his way into the house and began shooting everyone that he could see. While police were gathering information, worried that the suspect might continue to kill people, 80 firefighters were battling the massive fire. That's eight zero, wow. Yeah, it was described as an inferno. They knew that because the house had been engulfed in flames by the time responders had gotten there. Having gotten there quickly, they knew either an accelerant had been used or there had been an explosion. The police get a lead on the shooter very quickly. A neighbor saw a blue Dodge caliber leaving the dead end street at a high rate of speed, without the headlights on, at around 11 45 PM. So while that's going on in a neighboring city, town, I don't know, I don't know where this place is, so more California.
Speaker 1:44 year old Brad Pardo returns home from a party to find his front door unlocked. He walks into his living room and finds his brother, bruce Pardo, on the couch in a pool of blood. Brad called the LAPD and when they show up they begin piecing together what happened. Bruce had been killed by one shot. The bullet had exited through the top of his head. A nine millimeter pistol lies on Bruce's lap, but they also find a second nine millimeter on the floor. It suggests there may have been multiple shooters at the scene. There's damage on the wall and another bullet hole in the ceiling. So the police of course interview Brad, who describes his brother as very easy going, loving, active and friendly. He tells police that he sure his brother was murdered.
Speaker 1:Now back in Covina, at the same time, the police have been waiting for the fire to be put out and waiting for it to cool down, because obviously, even if the fire is out, you still can't walk around right away. There's structural issues and all that stuff. They now know that they have nine people still missing and they are assumed to have been in the house and therefore dead. The missing were Papa Joe and Alice Ortega, their two sons and daughters-in-law, two of their own daughters and one of their grandkids. Once they're able to go into the remains of the house, they start finding corpses. The bodies were so charred and burned they could not be identified at the scene and they had to be identified using X-rays and dental records. I don't know why, but I keep doing crimes that have my greatest fears in them. The Hawk murder. Drowning is one of my greatest fears.
Speaker 2:Dying in a fire is another one of my greatest fears, because it's something that you can't it bothers you, and so you want to learn more. I can kind of that what is that you can't look away from?
Speaker 1:a train wreck.
Speaker 2:Kind of situation. I mean, I'm a parent and I'm doing baby killer, so yeah.
Speaker 1:Yep, okay, sorry, if you keep hearing me drinking, I'm not I don't know this whole episode. I'm just going to apologize for things. How's that?
Speaker 2:No, no no, take off the apologies. No, apologies, I have a question. This is off topic. Yeah, did you intentionally pick this one? Because it was by Pride colors for me.
Speaker 1:No, but I picked it because it was purple and you said your favorite color was purple.
Speaker 2:It is, but this what is it called? Puppet ball that Katie got me? It has by Pride colors, which are magenta blue and purple. So Nice.
Speaker 1:It was a happy accident, yeah. So the police now believe the Artegas had been targeted, but they still don't know if he's done like, as in the Artegas were the intended victims and the only ones, or if he's going to strike again and then going back to Silmar. The police are looking into Bruce's background. He had a background in computer science and had worked in software for a couple of companies with government clearance. He worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, so he was clearly extremely intelligent. Now, four years earlier, bruce had met Sylvia Ortiz, who had just gotten out of a marriage and moved back home to Covina. Sylvia and Bruce married in 2005. They and Sylvia's three children then moved into a modest home in Mount Rose, california. However, earlier in 2008, bruce had a pretty serious knee injury which required surgery, and of course, that curtailed the activities he liked to do. He started putting on weight and Sylvia said they just weren't getting along and that Bruce had changed. He became more like a hermit. He didn't shower, he wore the same clothes. Their relationship just never recovered from that and she moved out in March of that year. The divorce was finalized December 17th or 18th 2008. It said in homicide for the holidays. It actually said 17 and 18, so I'm not really sure which day it actually was.
Speaker 1:So while the police are finding all this stuff out about Bruce, they came to a startling discovery about Sylvia. Prior to meeting Bruce, her name had been Ortiz and her name before that had been Ortega. She was one of Papa Joe and Alice's daughters and had been killed. The same night Bruce died, so the police wondered if he had been targeted because of his connection to the Ortegas. The murders seemed to be connected, so the two police departments began to collaborate and, in case you're keeping tabs, the tally of Christmas Eve deaths had gone up to 10. All the victims had been shot by a 9mm at close range. Some have been shot multiple times. At this point they still think they have a killer on the loose.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I would think so.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, that's hinting at nevermind. Okay, sorry, no, that's okay, I'm sorry. I was wondering, you didn't, you didn't. They do have one clue, though. According to a neighbor, historically a Santa would stop by the Ortegas Christmas Eve party, so no one would have been surprised that Santa Claus showed up at that time of night.
Speaker 2:Well, and who would be that surprised, anyway, even if you weren't, even if you hadn't like whatever, hired a Santa if you had a Christmas party and somebody showed up dressed as Santa. I don't think that would be a huge surprise.
Speaker 1:No, especially not to an 18 year old. 18 year old, 8 year old.
Speaker 2:No, yeah, oh my God, my kid would be thrilled. Yeah, which though that's awful, that makes it more awful.
Speaker 1:I know, I know. So there was a specific neighbor who had always done the dressing up a Santa thing and the police tracked him down. Now the man admitted that he usually did drop by the Ortegas in costume and hand out presents and all of that, but he said he hadn't played Santa for the last few years because he had moved away.
Speaker 2:Makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, even though the neighbor is a bit of a dead end, they now have a few. They now know a few things about the shooter. One, the shooter would know that the party usually went until about midnight Right. And two, the suspect knew that a neighbor always dressed as Santa and would bring presents for the kids, so he's been to the party before. Probably Later Christmas day detectives were able to sit down with the only surviving daughter, letitia.
Speaker 1:Her daughter had survived a gunshot directly to the face with only a bit of cosmetic damage to her cheek. That's pretty astounding. Most people don't make that, yeah, let alone with barely a scar. In her interview she tells detectives that she may know the identity of the killer, despite the costume. She believes the shooter was her sister's ex-husband, bruce Pardo. The problem, though, is that Bruce doesn't fit the profile. There doesn't seem to be anything in his past that would cause him to snap like that. People said. He hadn't been exhibiting any strange behavior in the days leading up to the shooting.
Speaker 1:The police go back to Silmar to look for the car witnesses said they saw racing away from the Ortega's house. They found his keys Bruce's keys with a fob, and walked down the street clicking it until they found his car. It unlocks a blue Dodge caliber the same type that had been seen. Flamed the scene. Inside the car police found a Santa costume, hundreds, maybe thousands of rounds of ammunition and a flare hanging down from. They didn't see where it was hanging down from, but I think it was from the suit. So the car had been booby trapped and when the police pulled the Santa suit out of the car it had tugged on the string and a flare ignited it. Yeah, there was a loud explosion and flames.
Speaker 2:So even though people hadn't reported any unusual behavior, obviously this is a very premeditated crime. Oh yeah, we'll get to it. Okay, I mean, I figure we would, but yeah, no, it's clearly very premeditated, I mean he's anticipating even then finding his costume.
Speaker 1:Yeah? Well, I don't think that they. I don't think the police knew that until Letitia said something. They just thought Bruce was another victim, given what people said about him. Okay, so the car is burned and the ammunition is going off. All over the place there's black powder blowing up. Thankfully no one was hurt, but the car was completely destroyed. However, bruce's keys unlocked the car that they were looking for, so they know that Letitia was likely right Now.
Speaker 1:The autopsy results show that Bruce had gunshot residue on his hands and on his clothing, which showed that he had fired weapons. Along with evidence on his body and the entry wound, it was determined that he committed suicide. The coroner also found proof tying him to the Ortega murders. He had horrific three-degree burns on his hands and arms and there was red and white material that had been seared into his. It says seared into his pants, I think I meant seared into his legs or his arms, I can't remember which. He was found to have parts of the Santa suit on him. Some of it had actually melted parts of his body, as I had just said. I don't know why I keep repeating things. Well, I know why I was watching Homicide for the Holiday and listening to a podcast at the same time. Right, like the exact same time. They were going on simultaneously.
Speaker 1:Okay, then there's another clue. A man calls and reports a mysterious RAV-4 that he had never seen before parked in front of his home in Pasadena. When police run the plate, they find that it's a rental car under contract in Bruce's name. He had doctored the registration to make it look like he owned it. Now this car wasn't booby-trapped, but it was fully stocked with supplies. It had water, food, clothing, Bruce's computer maps of the southwest of Mexico in it. Investigators believe his plan was to switch vehicles after leaving the Ortega house and then flee south to Mexico. They wondered why, though, the car was in Pasadena. It turns out it was parked about 500 feet from Scott Nord's house. Scott Nord was Sylvia's divorce attorney. The lawyer gave police some insight into what might have ended the marriage and provoked the shooting. Apparently it was the tax returns. Sylvia had received a paper in the mail that had some sort of tax write-off for Bruce's child, a child she knew nothing about.
Speaker 1:Three years before Bruce had met Sylvia, bruce was living with his girlfriend named Elena and their son Matthew. In January 2001,. When Matthew was about 13 months old Elena left him with Bruce when she went to get groceries. They had a pool in the backyard. You guys can see where this is going. When Elena came home, she found Bruce in front of the TV and there was no sign of their son. They went out looking for him and found him in the pool. Now, thankfully, matthew what a fucking bomb. Yeah. So Matthew did survive, though but in an almost vegetative state. When Matthew didn't get better, bruce didn't handle it well and left Elena, and Matthew never heard from him again. He did wind up paying child support and wound up listing him on his tax return as a dependent. Sylvia was probably scared at this point, because she has three children and hears her husband who let a child almost drown and then takes absolutely no responsibility for what happened afterwards. She must have realized what an awful, awful, awful person he was, and she left him.
Speaker 2:Listen, I want to clarify. Kids drown all the time, you know. Because it only takes a second.
Speaker 1:But what I?
Speaker 2:meant by? What a fucking bum is that he's sitting there watching TV? Clearly doesn't have a clue where his kid is.
Speaker 1:The implication is and you'll find out later is that he didn't care. He didn't care about his son.
Speaker 2:He didn't care that he would list him as a dependent when he's Right. That kind of says.
Speaker 1:I mean, and it's not just the accident I think Sylvia would have forgiven the accident it's the fact that he didn't care Right, and the only reason he was paying child support is because he was forced to.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know that's what I mean by an awful person. No, we both know people who have had kids that have accidental drownings.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That happens. It's when you don't give a shit that you become an awful person.
Speaker 2:The picture of this guy just sitting there just watching TV and not having or thinking about your kid at all. When you have a kid that age, you have to be thinking about them all the time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the implication was they didn't say it, but the implication was that it wasn't just that he was a lazy, he just really didn't care. He didn't care that he had a child. I don't think he cared that he had a wife. Really you know, it was a hindrance. Yeah, on top of that, bruce's bosses had found out that he had been fraudulently billing clients for hours. He didn't work, and so they fired him. So he's lost his job, he's lost his wife and, as one journalist put it, at some point he broke. The divorce, in particular, really upset him and he began to plot ways to get back at Sylvia.
Speaker 2:Get back at her. For what?
Speaker 1:For leaving him.
Speaker 2:Like he was an asshole.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know, and assholes can't handle being left, I guess.
Speaker 2:That's true, I know, I know, I mean, I know this, but just like, I know.
Speaker 1:No, it boggles the mind that people are that shitty. I guess we could blame it on toxic masculinity and everything else. Can we blame it on capitalism? I love blaming it on capitalism, wow.
Speaker 2:That toxic masculinity is a feature of capitalism. There you go. You could do a podcast on that, but nobody will listen. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't know, would war be a true crime? Because I'd like to do Bodecia Do you know Bodecia Sounds familiar. She was a queen of some people in, or the leader of some people in, england, and she was a woman that the world knew and she was a woman that the Romans were batched afraid of? I do know her. Yeah, I also like the Night Witches. Do you know the Night Witches? Probably they were Russian fighter pilots, female Russian fire pilots that the Nazis were absolutely afraid of.
Speaker 2:I love those. See, I know a lot of this stuff, but like it takes a while to get it from your brain.
Speaker 1:I know I only know it because I teach it, so no worries.
Speaker 2:But yeah, that would be really cool. Yeah, I think that's where listeners interest in that sort of thing.
Speaker 1:Probably not.
Speaker 2:Maybe we could do something like that, like a whatever special or a bonus, yeah. If we do like a Patreon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if we get enough listeners to make it worth it, we could do a Patreon with bonus episodes. That'd be fun.
Speaker 2:For people who are dorks and want to hear about history stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, you do have a history professor here, so I will talk history all day long. Yeah, Okay. So the investigators waited to search Bruce's house in Montrose. They found that the house was decorated for Christmas and had been since just after Halloween. Apparently that's weird, but given the last, I mean I guess maybe in 2008 it was weird we hadn't quite gotten to the dumpster fire. That has been 2020 and beyond. Yeah, Really, 2016 and beyond. Yes, that is my politics talking. Yeah. So I guess now, because now we have Christmas shit in July, so I don't think it's weird now, but I guess maybe in 2008 it was.
Speaker 2:Right. No, it still pisses me off because I want to have a nice Thanksgiving time or whatever, and not think about Christmas.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Even though I love Christmas, but now, especially as a parent, christmas is a lot of work. Yeah, I want to have my holidays a little spaced out and I don't want to be inundated with Christmas stuff like at before Halloween. Yeah, I'm like what?
Speaker 1:is this. I know you can come live with us. It's mid-December and we still haven't even put up our tree.
Speaker 2:I finally got out of the closet, but I haven't put it up yet. We just put up our tree yesterday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right. Well, it's daytime now so you can't see, but our entire area is fully Christmas-ified.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Except for my house, our neighbor's house and their neighbor's house. So there's three right here in the cul-de-sac that are just not lit up. All we did for Halloween which is sad because I love Halloween and I did decorate really nice for Halloween in the past but all I did this year was put a pumpkin out there, and I'm thinking the only thing for Christmas I'm going to do is put the little Santa hat on the pumpkin.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, I'm just a perpetual procrastinator, so by the time I usually get stuff up it's supposed to be time for me to take it down again, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I think last year I put the tree up, maybe three days before Christmas. Yeah, and I told my grandma I was like you know, we should just leave the Christmas tree up and then change the tinsel to match the color of whatever holiday it is, and then we don't have to worry about it. She was not thrilled with that idea.
Speaker 2:If it wasn't for Jay, my tree would probably be going up like the day before Christmas.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh Christmas. We're not really Baahumbug, it's just work.
Speaker 2:No, no, I mean I love Christmas, Like Christmas used to be like when, I was a kid, it was definitely my favorite holiday. My parents didn't allow me to celebrate Halloween, but yeah, I mean, I still love it, but it's, oh my God, it's so exhausting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's not really worth it when you don't have kids Like there's no kids in my family, you know, and I was holding on to it until, like last year, up to last year, I was fully Halloween Christmas, I did the cookies, I did all of that bullshit and then, like last year and this year, I'm just like I'm tired, I don't want to do it I also no longer have a husband.
Speaker 1:I'm divorced, so I no longer have a husband to make him do it while I supervise. That's really what was happening, right, okay, so apparently it's weird, but maybe not in 2008. Most importantly, though, they found the boxes that the guns had been in, those nine millimeters Ammunition, black powder, bomb making material, wrapping paper that matched wrapping paper at the scene. So I don't know. I guess he did actually bring presents, or at least something that was wrapped like a present.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure, like they wrapped the gun, like a present or I don't know.
Speaker 1:I don't think they ever say they found another computer and they took it and searching around they found lists that he wrote for himself to remember things to do lists and they took that To do slaughter wife's. Yeah, I think it's like some of the stuff was regular, like by milk, but part of that list would also be like by ammunition or something like that.
Speaker 1:It was clear he had planned the murders for weeks, if not months, prior. In his workshop, they found that he had taken the motor of a spray device and put a CO2 canister on top of it. I don't know what that means, but apparently it's bad. See, this is where Rachel would do a deep dive, right.
Speaker 2:You'd be like how do you construct this? He took what and put a CO2 canister.
Speaker 1:He had taken the motor of a spray device and put a CO2 canister on top of it.
Speaker 1:Like some kind of explosion kind of thing, not quite an explosion, but you'll see in a minute, probably, my next sentence. I wrote it and then never looked at it again. He had basically made a device intended to spray some type of flammable liquid like far and a lot. Now, with all the evidence found at his home and all the survivors' accounts, investigators believe they know what happened and how. So this is going to be the graphic part coming up.
Speaker 1:So before he went to the Artegas, bruce parked the rental car in front of Scott Nord's house. They believe that he was part of the list of people Bruce had intended to kill that night. I don't think he had a physical list that he wrote down. I think they made a list in his head. He dressed in his Santa suit and drove to Covina around 10.45 pm. He knew he would be allowed in and that no one would think anything was wrong, because everyone knew about the Santa Claus tradition and of course he would know, since he was married to Sylvia. He parked in a neighbor's driveway and wheeled a compressor which was wrapped like a present Nope, so there's the wrapping paper Up to the front door. He rang the bell and the little girl opens the door. He put down the presents, reached into his pockets and pulled out two handguns and started firing immediately. He shot the little girl in the face. He then shoots down the two brothers, james and Charles. He then goes after his main targets, sylvia and her parents. He makes her parents watch him kill Sylvia, execution style. He then kills them the same way.
Speaker 1:Leticia at some point manages to get away without being shot and picked up her daughter, who, just a reminder, was the little girl that had been shot in the face, and they escape. Her husband also gets out. Sylvia's sister, alicia, is killed next. Bruce then kills James' wife Teresa and Charles' wife Sherry. And they had said that a grandson Michael was killed, but they don't say at what point he was killed. I think he was like 19 as well, so he was quite young.
Speaker 2:Just a baby.
Speaker 1:Just a baby. Yeah, ouch, it's my old ass. Hey, I'm older than you, I'm 40 and six months. Once Bruce is out of ammo, he goes back to the front door to start phase two of the attack. Bruce had connected a spray nozzle and a hose to two canisters One was filled with pressurized oxygen and the other with high octane fuel. He described it as jet fuel. I don't know if that's accurate or not, so we'll just go with high octane fuel. He sprayed up to 18 gallons of gasoline.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to say. I think that whatever quote, jet fuel is high octane fuel, but I don't know enough about fuel to discriminate what. Yeah, that's what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. So he sprayed up to 18 gallons of gasoline into the house in a semi-missed form. So that's what all of that stuff was. So it wasn't just heavy liquid, it was just a mist. He stored a road flare in his costume, which was supposed to be the thing that ignited everything. Investigators believe he planned to toss the flare to light the accelerant. See here I am repeating myself. He also planned out. The sentence I wrote does not make sense. As well planned out as oh, I know what I was trying to say.
Speaker 2:When I did my Tylenol outline I found a few sentences that I was like yeah, what is it?
Speaker 1:Okay, now I know what I'm saying. Okay, even though his plan was really planned out, he had not taken into account that there might be an open flame in the house which there was. A candle had been lit. So at some point that misty, accelerant, high-octane whatever hit that open flame and there was a flash fire that was similar to an explosive going off. Bruce was badly burned in the fire and eventually made it back to the vehicle he had parked in the neighbor's driveway and fled. Instead of going to the lawyer's house, as he had planned to do, or probably planned to do, he drove the 40 miles to his brother's home in Silmar. Now he's burned 40% on his left arm, third degree burns Hope.
Speaker 1:James Burns hurt motherfucker, and he has part of the Santa suit seared into his arms. His brother wasn't at home, of course. He was at that party, I believe they say the pain must have been awful, I can imagine. And he decides to fire one shot into the ceiling before he turns the gun on himself. Now, police don't think Bruce ever intended to kill himself. I mean, obviously he had a car with supplies going on, so I would say he didn't. But he didn't intend to kill himself until he was badly burned.
Speaker 2:But he acted impulsively because of the pain of the burns.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and he wouldn't have been able to go to the hospital if they'd catch him, not exactly.
Speaker 2:I mean, he would have been fucking caught anyways, dumbass.
Speaker 1:Yeah, eventually, even if he hid for a while. So if everything had gone according to plan, there would have been in the area of 30 dead. That would be the 25 retigas and the lawyer and his family. All right, so that's the end of that one. I apparently abruptly ended it. So the total nine murdered, one suicide Right.
Speaker 2:God, yeah, I don't know, just thinking about how he didn't care about his baby drowning and how he shot the little girl in the face.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like fuck you, there were going to be lots of grandkids, so if he had killed everybody he had no problem killing, you know, half a dozen children or whatever.
Speaker 2:All to get back at his fucking ex-wife. Yeah, and keep trying. Oversees good and armed together and empowering.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yep, people never cease to amaze me. They're cruelty. Okay, I've got one more murder. Okay, it's old. It's also a family annihilation. I don't know, would the Kavanaugh murders be family annihilation?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say so. I mean, I would think he considered it a family, his family. That's why he killed her, right? Well, her family. He didn't want to let her go, right, he wanted revenge Revenge.
Speaker 1:He wanted to get back at her, so he knew her family was important and so he wanted to kill them all. Okay, so the Lawson family murders. We're doing some history here. Charles Lawson was married to Fanny.
Speaker 2:Manring this sounds. I think I know this one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a very popular one. Okay, continue, Thanks. Charles Lawson was married to Fanny Manring in 1911. They had eight children, but one, William, had died of an illness in 1920. I did the math. I think he was like six maybe.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They lived in Germantown, north Carolina, and several weeks before Christmas 1929, charles took his wife and children, marie 17, arthur 16, carrie 12, maybell 7, james 4, raymond 2, and Mary Lou four months into town to buy new clothes and to have a family photo taken. They were not a wealthy family. In fact I think the book written by like a relative or somebody, actually says he was a sharecropper, which means they were poor Right. So that would have been unusual. Not just new clothes but pictures. Back then that was a lot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a lot now. Yeah, yeah, especially for that many kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think it was just one photo of the family, yeah, but still it would have been pricey in 1929.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I was thinking more about the clothes for all of those kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and I say this for two reasons One, the kiddos and the wife were all found in the new clothes when they had been killed. Yeah, and second, some see this and I see this as premeditation, right, right, he was clearly planning it for a while. This was not a snap decision. So on Christmas Day of 1929, and remember, it's December of 1929. So the stock market had crashed about six weeks before, although their rural so probably wouldn't have affected them much, but that's the background happening on, people were freaking out. So on Christmas Day, charles began the murders of his family with the two daughters, carrie and Maybell, I should say the two younger daughters, I think three. The girls were on their way to visit their aunt and uncle. Apparently, charles waited for them by the tobacco barn and shot one with a rifle and the other with a shotgun. He then bludgeoned them with rifle stock, with the rifle stock, and then, in order to make sure they were dead, and then he carried their bodies to the tobacco barn. I probably should have said it gets graphic, but I forgot. He then went to the house and he shot his wife, fanny, who was sitting on the porch. He entered the house and shot Marie, who a lot of people make a big deal out of this. She apparently had just made a raisin cake. And then they found James and Raymond who were hiding, and he either shot or bludgeoned them to death. It depends on the source. He then either shot or bludgeoned baby Mary Lou in her crib. Again, sources differ.
Speaker 1:Charles then went to the woods. Now, if you've been keeping track of the kiddos, there is one survivor, arthur. Charles had sent Arthur into town for more shotgun shells because they had a he, or they, I should say. Arthur and Charles and a cousin were supposed to go rabbit hunting. Later that day Arthur with his cousin found the bodies of his family. They returned to town and alerted authorities. Again, it's 1929, rural, so no telephone. It says they went to town and called the authorities. I don't know if it was actual like a call or like they went and yelled out to them Okay, so the police get there.
Speaker 1:They're checking things out and I think one of the police officers was down in the woods looking around and they heard a gunshot and they found Charles. He had two incomplete suicide notes on him. The family was buried on December 27th. Around 5,000 people came to the funeral. Now no one knows why this happened, but there are several theories floating around. The big three are that Charles thought he would lose the tobacco farm, since the stock market had crashed and the family would become destitute. Remember again 1929, this is before FDR, this is before welfare and aid for the poor. And also President Hoover and his advisors were wildly out of touch. But there's no evidence to support that. And also, this is rural North Carolina. It took a long time for the Great Depression to hit rural folk, so that's probably not wasn't a thought. A second theory is that he had had a severe head injury. I guess he got hit in the head with a pickaxe or something, a head injury.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Some family and friends thought that might have altered his mental state. Newspapers at the time labeled him insane and at least one thought that this might be the reason for his insanity. I looked at a few newspaper headlines. They all said man went crazy, man went insane. Although that was kind of.
Speaker 2:I feel like a lot of people got labeled corner, corner insane.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, and this is an unheard of crime. Things like this just didn't happen. It was a big deal. The newspaper is, I felt, everything from the New York Times to little nowhere newspapers. So I think, yeah, I mean they would have been labeled insane regardless, but I think people just couldn't wrap their brains around there being any other reason for a father to kill his children, right? So a lot of people rule that out because there was a study done on his brain at John Hopkins and they found no abnormalities. So a third theory is the one that most people currently believe, which is that Charles had been raping his daughter. No one puts it in those terms. They put it as having an incestuous affair, but she's 17. Incestuous, she's a father. It's fucking rape.
Speaker 1:Yeah let's call it what it is there's no consent. Yeah, exactly, there's no consent.
Speaker 2:And isn't she dead like so she can't, she can't defend herself. Yeah, exactly, that's character assassination. Sure is Poor little dead kid.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so the evidence that is used for this motive is one. An anonymous source said they heard a rumor about it while they were touring the house shortly after the murders. So yeah, you heard that right a tour. Charles' brother turned the house into a tourist attraction. He charged 25 cents ahead Tacky. The second is Stella Lawson. Charles's niece said she overheard some of Fanny's family members say that Fanny had told them that she was concerned about an incestuous relationship between Charles and Mary Three. Ella May, who was a close friend of Marie, said that she had told her she was pregnant with her father's baby and that both Charles and Fanny knew about the pregnancy. All of this came out like in the 80s, so yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't know how accurate that might be, but that's, that's the theory. I think he's. Why does any person murder their family? I think. I think he was probably just stressed and done with shit.
Speaker 2:I mean, I certainly hope that that's not true about him raping his daughter for her sake. Yeah, that's so. What an awful short life to live.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, oh, my sources. So one homicide for the holidays, a Christmas massacre, which is season one, episode three, la Times by Ari B Bloomkeps and Hector Becerra. There's also behind the scene, behind the song blog. So if you're interested, I forgot to mention this. There was at least one song, murder Ballad, written about this. Many covers. The most famous one is done by the Stanley Brothers. It's on YouTube. You can listen to it. I think it's called the Lawson Family or the Lawson Family Murders or something like that, and also the Chicago Daily Tribune. I didn't list all the other newspapers I looked at, but that was the one that I quoted. The insane part about there's one little extra. It's also oh no, I'm never mind, that is not a source, I just have a link here that I will put up in the in the show description that has the link to the song which is called Story of the Lawson Family.
Speaker 1:So that is my bit. Well, we're gonna have a short episode on this. We can come up with some interesting shit to say.
Speaker 2:That's really awful. It is.
Speaker 1:It is. I thought it would be longer, so I didn't do the third one I was gonna do oh yeah, which would have been even more brutal, just tell us what. The third one is maybe I think the name is Renee Jean Simmons. He murdered, like in the 80s. He murdered into the teens at least 14, where his family members, and then he murdered others. Okay, I googled Christmas murders and there are a lot, so you know?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think some ones that sound interesting to you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, I forgot there was another blog. I didn't, I didn't, it was actually. I shouldn't say it was a blog, it was an episode, and it was an episode 36 of the True Crime Trine podcast, right Trine being astrology. Just FYI For those of you that enjoy astrology out there, my lips are sealed, rachel, if you can't tell. Rachel is a very science-based individual.
Speaker 2:I'm not trying to yuck anybody's gum. Y'all enjoy your astrology, yeah.
Speaker 1:They're fun to read. I'm going to roll my eyes in the corner.
Speaker 2:They are fun to read okay.
Speaker 1:They're not, but no, I don't agree that they're accurate either.
Speaker 2:One time, just Katie and I were just walking, no, and we're in Egypt and that guy came up to us and he tried to tell me some stuff about my astrology sign or something. I was like, oh my God, I was like get me the fuck out of here. Basically he was trying to sell us something, but I was just like, no, this is going to convince me at all yeah.
Speaker 1:So, Rachel, you got some particulars on your disappearance.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, let me grab my phone off the floor, brush.
Speaker 1:Let me see it off of it. She put it in the dog bed, which was a mistake.
Speaker 2:if you don't want hair, Well, I didn't want to drop it on the wooden floor, so I wanted to get the buzzing off the table.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so my missing person again. Her name is Sophia Adam. She went missing on November 21st 2023 from Sequoia, new Mexico. She's 13 years old. Her date of birth is January 31st 2010. She's a girl. She has brown hair, black eyes, her height is five foot eight inches, Her weight is approximately 120 pounds and her race is listed unknown. Slash other there's a note that she may have red highlights in her hair and she was last seen wearing a gray hoodie and blue jeans. So if you have seen or heard of her, you can contact the Sequoia County Sheriff's Office at 575-835-0941, or you can also contact the New Mexico Department of Public Safety's missing person hotline at 1-800-457-3463. So give them one of them or both of them a call if you have any information about Sophia. I'm sure that her parents really miss her, and she's just a little 13 year old, and so hopefully she'll be found soon and be reunited with her family.
Speaker 1:Well, let's hope so. I'm sorry I forgot the date. When was the date? It was recent.
Speaker 2:Yes, it was November 21st.
Speaker 1:Oh, really recent yeah, like not even a month.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so hopefully she can be found.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. What have we been reading and listening to, so?
Speaker 2:I finished Patrick Stewart's autobiography. Ooh, so Was it good? Yeah, it was really good. Yeah, I thought it was a lot of fun. He reads it right. Yeah, he reads it.
Speaker 1:He'll get it just for his voice.
Speaker 2:I like him.
Speaker 1:He did the voice for I want to say one of the Lion Witch and the Wardrobe books. I think, yeah, I don't like those books but I listen to it just because of his voice and the listening to it every night.
Speaker 2:His voice is delightful and it has changed a bit.
Speaker 1:You know it's more grizzled and such with age, but it's still Well, he's like 80 something right? Yeah, he's 83.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, absolutely delightful to hear him narrate and just his yeah, hear him to, you know, act out certain parts or that's just really nice, yeah. And he talks a lot about his theater background. You can really see like his passion for acting, especially for the theater but for all acting and obviously is so fun. You know, hearing about his experience in Star Trek and how Gene Ron and Barry hated him. I thought that was so funny, like I knew that Gene Ron and Barry like had wanted like a more Kirk like figure for the next generation, but I didn't know the extent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, yeah, and so I thought that that was real funny how he had Gene Ron and Barry had shunned him so much. Okay.
Speaker 1:Question yes, kirk like as in looks or Kirk like as in character. Yes, both, both. Yeah, because I was going to say, if it's just looks like Patrick Stewart even though he was older and bald, he was probably I think he's the hottest of the captains, honestly, yeah, yeah. No shade to William Shatner. He's hot too.
Speaker 2:They didn't like that. He didn't like that he was bald, but he also didn't like, I guess, his demeanor either. But they had made it auditioned. Well, he, originally he had gone to Gene, Ron and Barry's house for a brief audition which didn't seem to go well right, Because he said that Ron and Barry was very dismissive. So then he left and he called this agent. He was like, well, that's not going to happen. And then, but then they called him back for like another audition, and so he went to go to the studio and then when he was like flying over, they called them. They're like do you have a hair piece, Can you bring it? And so then he had to call his wife, at the time Sheila, to have her like send his airpiece on another plane.
Speaker 1:Oh man.
Speaker 2:So that he could have it for the audition. So then he went to the studio and to the audition in the hair piece, but then when he he had gone back so the makeup artist could remove it, and then the execs came back and the makeup artist was like that's really good, they want to see what you look like without the hair piece. And sure enough, I think it would have been.
Speaker 1:I can't imagine If Picard had been wearing a hair piece.
Speaker 2:And I think that, with all due respect to Gene Ranaberry, he's a genius on the visionary. But I think that if Picard had Picard's character had been just like Kirk, I don't think it would have been as effective. I think that would mean Picard's so wonderful is that he was very unlike.
Speaker 1:Kirk and also kind of snarky yeah, which I love.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he was snarky and Hated children.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he was kind of a great witch, I love.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he was that one. I just sent you that little video. Shut up, Wesley. I love that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And he was complex and he, he was thoughtful and he was he's kind of the anti-Kirk. Yeah, I think it makes sense for somebody in that position to be someone who's more middle-aged, someone who's more experienced yeah, and. And Comer, yeah, exactly. And I don't think Starfleet really would care if their commander was bald or not Right.
Speaker 2:I don't think that would be a consideration to whether they would promote somebody to their right good captain, and so also Patrick Stewart looks great and he looks great. He looks very distinguished as a bald man and like I don't know, some people really pull it off and Patrick. Stewart is definitely one of those?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because he's confident, Absolutely. You know, I hated Next Gen for like most of my life I hated it. I really like it now and one of the things that I appreciate about it is that the I mean, obviously they have pretty people on the show, but they also have regular looking people in main parts and I like that, especially in comparison to Enterprise. Now, don't get me wrong, I love, I loved Enterprise. I'm probably one of the few people who actually loved it.
Speaker 2:I loved Enterprise too, even though I know a lot of people didn't love it.
Speaker 1:The last season was awesome, except for the last episode. Oh my God, the last episode was awesome. Yeah, that is only that is the only last episode of any show that I've willingly seen, like I've seen last episodes without realizing their last episodes, because the show got canceled. But this is like we knew it was the finale. It's the only show ever and I regret it. It's one of the biggest regrets of my viewing life, finale's are usually not good.
Speaker 2:No, and this, the Enterprise finale, I think, is probably the worst one.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, and part of the death. But anyway, I brought up Enterprise because I mean that was a show of beautiful people.
Speaker 2:Right, it's true.
Speaker 1:And they knew it because every episode they found a way to just run around in their underwear Right, which I love, don't get me wrong, scott Bacchula.
Speaker 2:Oh, my God.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I love they also have, I think, the best Mirror Mirror episode of any of the series.
Speaker 2:The Mirror episode is fantastic.
Speaker 1:I agree. Yeah, if you weren't a Trekkie, at least watch the Mirror, mirror episodes of all the shows, because they're really great. They're really great.
Speaker 2:Now I want to do that.
Speaker 1:You mean, have us watch it together. We've got so much planned in our lives.
Speaker 2:We're going to be overloaded with entertainment, it's probably good.
Speaker 1:Okay, so off the Trekkie thing. So you, you finished Patrick Stewart's memoir, anything else?
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, I did do else, but let me. I'm mostly been researching this case, which I'm not going to say because then I don't want to spoil it. I oh, I know that we're supposed to watch that in the coming year, but I watched the first two Predator movies.
Speaker 1:Because oh is Predator on the list.
Speaker 2:It is on the list because it came out in 1987.
Speaker 1:So it's fine, I don't want you to get in, in case everybody's confused. Time Reads had a list of movies from 1987 because that was an awesome year for movies and Rachel and I decided we would watch a movie a month. So our first one is Fatal Attraction. I've seen it, rachel has not. I have not.
Speaker 2:But I saw I saw some meme about having a girl's night out by Amy Popcorn and watching Predator, and I was like Jay.
Speaker 1:I want to do that, so you watched the first two.
Speaker 2:Predators the first two Predators Nice.
Speaker 2:And on both of them. I kind of fell asleep in the middle part and woke up for for I was away for the beginning and the end part, so whoops but but yeah, no, it was hilarious, the first one, I mean, it's not supposed to be hilarious, but it's just hilarious. These dudes, they're like Arnold's arms. I was like, how many raids are you on Arnold like you know that meme? You see that meme right Of the like the big buff the like white arm and the big buff black arm and they're like shaking hands or whatever. And it's, it's like a meme or whatever. Have you seen that? I don't think so I'll have to find the meme format and I'll send it to you. But apparently that's based on a scene in the original Predator Interesting.
Speaker 1:So Arnold Schwarzenegger's in it? I did not know that I've seen.
Speaker 2:Predator, but I don't remember. Arnold Schwarzenegger is the star of the original Predator.
Speaker 1:I think I blocked it out because I did see it so well you will be. I will be entertained, entertained, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and he's got like a cigar in his mouth and his name is like Dutch and you supposed to be just like.
Speaker 1:Does he? Does he kill a lot in that movie, arnold? Yeah yeah, I'm just wondering, because I was on a Sylvester Stallone kick for like a year and I watched all of his movies and apparently Stallone and Arnold had this like feud going and every movie they did one would kill a certain number and then the other one had to up him in the next movie and it went on like that for a while.
Speaker 2:Well, they play this like whatever, like military special ops team and they're supposed to be going in, you know, to whatever unknown jungle location in South America and they have to some kind of operation. I'm not exactly sure because I was kind of dozing in and out, but yeah, at some point. At some point they have an encounter with these people and there's like a big fight, bloodbath, but then after that they start being attacked by the predator and so then it's more of them versus the predator, but but yeah, before that they take out a number of people. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then anything else. Did you listen to anything? Did I listen to anything Other than the podcast that depressed you terribly last night, which we won't say because it's part of the case she's going to do eventually. That's mostly been it, though, because every time I well, well, you listen to the same one of wine and crime, right, or cocktails and crime.
Speaker 2:I didn't listen to their newest episode. No, no.
Speaker 1:I listened to one where they gave me, not me personally gave us the term cockroach.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, which I think is hilarious. I listened to a couple of episodes. Yeah, it was hilarious, and Way too graphic about the birthing stuff, especially for somebody who has never given birth and then Katie was telling me, kiki was telling me about it, and then I told her some information about it, about my birthing experience, that she could probably live with.
Speaker 1:I don't know why. I don't know if other people get this or other childless women get this, but a lot of times women who have children will tell me, as a childless person, their birthing secret not secrets, but their birthing experiences.
Speaker 2:Well.
Speaker 1:It's weird.
Speaker 2:Here's the thing that I felt like when I went through it. I felt like not preparing it, because I felt feel like, although whatever, I feel like there's more stuff now, more real stories now available, but like Birkin Marry Day, which is not that long ago. Well, I guess whatever 10 and six years ago. Yeah, but 10 years ago when I had my first, you know, I had all these pregnancy books and stuff and they describe whatever things and clinical terms and things like that. But you don't really know.
Speaker 1:Until you experience it Exactly.
Speaker 2:And I feel like I was like man. I wish that I had no more people that had told me what their experience was like, and then afterwards, because I wasn't like this birth month whatever.
Speaker 2:And so then afterwards, like a lot of people like I was hearing about their stuff and I'm like I could have used this information six months ago or something, so that I would have been more mentally prepared for it all. And so not that I think you're going to be popping out of baby, but I just think it's important information that people who have uteruses should know.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I didn't have you ever seen Michelle Wolfs stand up. Maybe she's the one. She did the White House Correspondents' Dinner and everybody got mad at her afterwards because she said something nasty about Sarah Huckabee or whatever her name is. Yeah, I think I've seen some of her Well she has one stand up where she talks about birth I don't think she's had a kid, but she was talking about it and how we should stop saying that birth is a miracle and start treating it like a natural disaster. Well, it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:No, that's what I'm saying. We always make birth sound like this magical thing, but it's really horrible on your body.
Speaker 2:I think I read somewhere humans are one of the more inefficient species when it comes to I mean, some species have a worse than us, like hyenas, for example, but we're one of the more inefficient side when it comes to birthing, because we're growing these babies with giant heads and that's not super simpatico with our body. That's also why we give birth to our babies in such a fragile state, because we just can't support them or we couldn't give birth to them if we waited any longer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but then that's why they say those first three months they call it the fourth trimester because, those babies are so, so fragile, so much more fragile than babies of like any other species, because they're really not quite whoops, they really not ideally suited to be out yet. Yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 1:What else Did we read during this hiatus of our episodes? That book with the murderous dog. Yes, hellhound yeah so we read Hellhound. So Rachel and I I don't know if I've said this before, but Rachel and I read. We agree on three books a month and we read them, or usually read them. Sometimes I'm like fuck this, but most of the time we read them. This month was Hellhound about a murderous serial killing dog.
Speaker 2:Doggy. Yeah that was a fun ride. Yeah, it was interesting. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:Let's see for me what have I watched? The usual I just I don't really watch things. I just kind of turn ID on or snapped or something and just let it run.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. No, sometimes we put on stuff. The other thing I'll be watching is like the British Great Baking Show, so that's it. I mean, I have thoughts on that. I'm not finished on it. Nobody spoiled me. We're at like the botanical week, but I don't know. I feel like the quality of the show has gone downhill.
Speaker 1:It has gone down. Yeah, I think you mentioned that before.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I feel frustrated with. I feel like I don't know if the contestants just have less time more, because I feel like earlier on and as as recently as a few seasons ago, we were seeing contestants being able to pull off way more interesting and intricate bakes, really beautiful like artistic stuff, and I feel like these past couple of seasons we haven't been able to approach that kind of artistry. Because I feel like the contestants I don't know, they're just rushed for time or something. They're barely able to throw things together.
Speaker 2:Anyway that's my little beef from the British Great Baking Show, but other than that it's fun and it's nice to see all the yummy things and yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I can't do shows like that or reality shows. I get like secondhand embarrassment.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:For some reason, I don't know, it's frustrating because I want to be that person, but I'm not that person.
Speaker 2:So Well, the thing about the baking shows is supposed to be more calming.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Not as much, but it seems like I don't know like that. While it's not, like it's still very much a British show, but Americanized in that I don't know like American reality TV norms have been pushed on it more. I think since Netflix it's picked it up. Yeah, exactly, and I miss the old hosts. They were so cute Anyway.
Speaker 1:So yeah, so I watched a watched with quotation marks a lot of true crime. I do have movies queued up. I bought some on Amazon. So body heat, I want to see body heat again. Okay, I like body heat, and partly because I also find it hilarious. Have I told you you haven't seen it? Have?
Speaker 2:you.
Speaker 1:I haven't seen it. Body heat's great. It's a redo of double indemnity, which was originally a book and then a movie, and they've done various versions of it, but this one has.
Speaker 2:I think I remember you telling me about it, yeah.
Speaker 1:It has Kathleen Turner and William. Hurd and Ted Danson and a bunch of other folks.
Speaker 2:I remember, because I mean comments about Kathleen Turner and her amazing voice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, she's another one who could read me to sleep every night. I like those voices, yeah. But yeah, it has that scene that's supposed to be romantic and it's just kind of hilarious to me, right. But I also I don't know I'm in a mood for a good female villainess, so I got that one. I bought Basic Instinct.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:I've been jonesing for that, since I only got to watch half of that when I was at Crimecon. What's the other one that I got? Oh, I'm looking. I'm trying to find Jane Seymour's version of East of Eden.
Speaker 2:You know Jane Seymour.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, for those of you that don't, she was in Dr Quinn. That was her big show. She's been in other things, but that's the big one. But she plays Catherine from East of Eden, who is one of literature's best horrible, terrible women, and she was really good at it. So I'm trying to find that one, but I haven't been able to find it in any version.
Speaker 2:That's weird.
Speaker 1:And I'm trying to get in a lonely place because Rachel and I are reading that for this month and I want to rewatch it because it has Humphrey Bogart, who was my first real crush.
Speaker 2:You know what I have heard some I forget which actors, but I've heard some actors speak about concerns about having all content only in digital form, and one of the concerns is that things might just disappear.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's definitely that way. So I've got those things queued up and then I haven't read anything because I have been busy grading and, god, finals are over this week, so I will be done by Sunday evening, hopefully sooner than that.
Speaker 2:What else?
Speaker 1:have I listened to anything podcast-wise? So yeah, cocktails and crime. Listen to a couple of those I will forever be grateful to. I forgot the host's name.
Speaker 2:Laura Nash and Christie. What is her last name?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I will forever be grateful to Christie for my new favorite term, cock Grudge yes.
Speaker 2:Oh my God, what's her last name? It's going to bug you, I'm going to look it up because we also. I want to give her credit. Yeah, and she does a lot of the research for the podcast.
Speaker 1:I've been in the mood for a reading podcast, even though I'm not going to read. Probably I've been in quite a slump. Normally, I read at least 100 books a year. I have read 30 this year, so, and that's only because of Rachel. What was I saying? Oh, I read books. Who did you listen?
Speaker 2:to do this reading thing. It was someone else's-.
Speaker 1:It was our mutual friend who has not read a single thing, and we just kind of stopped asking her and took it off on our own. It's no fault of her own, she is just an incredibly busy person.
Speaker 2:She's so busy. Christie Oxborough, yes. So shout out to you Christie Oxborough, you're awesome, yeah.
Speaker 1:Lauren is awesome as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, they're both awesome.
Speaker 1:But the Cock Grudge is going to forever be my favorite word. Oh, yeah, okay. So I think that's it for that. Is there anything gabby we want to talk about? Just gabbing? Yeah, I don't think we do. We kind of gabbed a bit.
Speaker 2:We have gabbed quite a bit about various things.
Speaker 1:Yes, so I think we're both running out of steam. So I will mention the book. Can you get me the copy? Thank you, among the Bros. So episode eight, which will be out January, february, I actually don't know. I had it written down and now I'm unprepared. I don't know Y'all. I used to be the most organized, prepared person on the planet, but it's like I turned 39 and my life just began spiraling.
Speaker 2:You've been doing a lot. You've been doing a lot. You spread a little thin.
Speaker 1:That's true. Well, no, here's the thing. I have time. I spend that time playing a coloring game on my phone.
Speaker 2:Okay, but you have to unwind Like you can't be efficient all of the fucking time. Nobody can do that.
Speaker 1:That's true. That's true, although I feel like some people can. But yeah, I'm not naturally inclined that way. I am either by nature a catch person.
Speaker 2:I'm naturally inclined the other way. I feel like I was so little like spoons compared to some people some days and I'm like how?
Speaker 1:I know, I feel that all the time. My grandmother is in her late 80s and, granted, she doesn't do anywhere near as much as she does, but she has energy that I do not have, even though she's sick. She's taken a bunch of pills and I'm healthy and I do have time, but I just like I come home or even go before work, I have the full morning before I have to go to work.
Speaker 1:I just can't, I just can't. I envy that. I envy people with energy and ambition. So today is December 20th Not really, but not while we're recording, but when this comes out is December 20th. The next one, episode six, will be January 3rd, it's seven on the 17th and episode eight on the 31st. So January 31st will be our book club episode. So that means Rachel and I have to get it done sooner. Our next book club book, or buddy read let's call it a buddy read. It's not a book club Buddy read is Among the Bros, a Fraternity Crime Story by Max Marshall.
Speaker 2:If you want to get maybe it could be a book club for listeners.
Speaker 1:Wrote in or whatever, if you want to, if you want a little snippet not necessarily a snippet of it, but you want to read a little bit more of it and you to hear from the author. I believe crime reads has a little interview with Max Marshall about it. Okay, that sounds like fun, so I would Google it. I would say that I would put a link in the descriptions, but if I remember, I will. So if it's there, it's there.
Speaker 2:If not, google. If it's not, it's not, you gotta Google it. So I think that's it. I think that's everything. So thank you for listening and I want to remind you if you like our show, please subscribe, rate and review us. You can follow us on Instagram at detailsrsketchy, or you can also follow our website, detailsrsketchypodcastbuzzsproutcom, or our Facebook page, detailsrsketchy.2023, or you can email us at detailsrsketchypodcom and reminder the R's are A-R-E. Yes, a-r-e, yes, all the words.
Speaker 1:Yes, All the personal accounts. I only have Instagram at kikileona84.
Speaker 2:Mine is eni-manny-mene nails with a C.
Speaker 1:We have it in the description of the show, including our personal ones, and on top of that, I think our website actually links to those places, Just to be warned mine is just pictures of my mannequin.
Speaker 2:Mine is just pictures of my mannequins. So if you're interested in indi nail polish, then you might want to check it out. If you're like that's not even remotely interesting to me, then you probably won't like it, because it's only pictures of my mannequins.
Speaker 1:Mine's mostly of my pets because I don't have a life. So rate, follow what was it? Review Great, follow, review. Okay, and thank you for listening. And have a merry holiday season.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and a happy new year.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Are we going to record again for the new year?
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, but it won't be out till after the new year. So happy new year as well, happy new year. Thanks, thank you you.