In this episode, Kiki covers Aum Shinrikyo and the 1995 Tokyo Subway Sarin Attack, while Rachel brings us the disappearance of Jewel Paul Wheeler. Then we have a brief chat about what we've been reading and watching and doing.
Side note: We were drinking Boba Tea while recording, so apologies for the slurping noises.
Our next book is "Hell's Half Acre: The Untold Story of the Benders, a Serial Killer Family on the American Frontier" by Susan Jonusas, which we will discuss in episode 16.
Sources:
Jewel Paul Wheeler
Jewel Paul Wheeler: Missing Person. U.S Department of The Interior. Indian Affairs.
Jewel Paul Wheeler, 30, Pine Ridge, 1 January 1973. March 7, 2024. Web Sleuths.
If you have information call 1-833-560-2065
Aum Shinrikyo
Britannica - Shoko Asahara, Tokyo Subway Attack 1995, Aleph
Wikipedia - Shoko Asahara, Aum Shinrikyo, Tokyo Subway Sarin Attack
NYT - A Guru's Journey - Nicholas Kristof
LA Times - Japanese Guru - David Holly
Spiritually Fucked - Aum Shinrikyo: Japan’s Most Notorious Anime Doomsday Yoga Cult Parts 1 and 2
Here's the timeline as promised.
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
In this episode, Kiki covers Aum Shinrikyo and the 1995 Tokyo Subway Sarin Attack, while Rachel brings us the disappearance of Jewel Paul Wheeler. Then we have a brief chat about what we've been reading and watching and doing.
Side note: We were drinking Boba Tea while recording, so apologies for the slurping noises.
Our next book is "Hell's Half Acre: The Untold Story of the Benders, a Serial Killer Family on the American Frontier" by Susan Jonusas, which we will discuss in episode 16.
Sources:
Jewel Paul Wheeler
Jewel Paul Wheeler: Missing Person. U.S Department of The Interior. Indian Affairs.
Jewel Paul Wheeler, 30, Pine Ridge, 1 January 1973. March 7, 2024. Web Sleuths.
If you have information call 1-833-560-2065
Aum Shinrikyo
Britannica - Shoko Asahara, Tokyo Subway Attack 1995, Aleph
Wikipedia - Shoko Asahara, Aum Shinrikyo, Tokyo Subway Sarin Attack
NYT - A Guru's Journey - Nicholas Kristof
LA Times - Japanese Guru - David Holly
Spiritually Fucked - Aum Shinrikyo: Japan’s Most Notorious Anime Doomsday Yoga Cult Parts 1 and 2
Here's the timeline as promised.
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
Okay, looks like we're going All right. Very exciting. It is very exciting. I'm Kiki and I'm Rachel and this is Details Are Sketchy, a true crime podcast, and today we got that part down, but I never know how to continue after that Is it episode 13? I have no idea, dude 13, 14?, 14?, maybe 14?
Speaker 2:It is an episode it is an episode that's for sure, welcome to another episode. Of details are sketchy there we go um.
Speaker 1:So you've got the missing person today and I've got the big case, and then we'll talk about the stuff we maybe watched. Yeah, stuff in general.
Speaker 2:Sure why?
Speaker 1:not Okay, so start with you.
Speaker 2:Okay, we're starting with my missing person, mm-hmm. Okay. So his name is Jewel Paul Wheeler, so this is kind of a cold case. He went missing, was last known to be in Pine Ridge, south Dakota, on September 30th 1974. Yeah, he is a member of the Oglala Sioux Nation and his hair is brown, his eyes are brown, his height is 5'11", his weight 131. He is a male and he has a tattoo of the 82nd Airborne on his left arm. So we'll learn a little bit more about that later. There's not a lot of information about him, unfortunately, but there's a little bit more about that later. There's not a lot of information about him, unfortunately, but there's a little bit. So I'll go into those known details later on.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Okay, so today I am doing the cult Aum Shinrikyo and the tokyo subway sarin attack of 1995. So when I wrote this out I went down over how I got to this case, just because it was. My brain never does that like. I usually start out with maybe one or two options, but I pretty much know what I'm gonna do, and so I had started out with the carrie murphy case just a teen who killed her mom but then for some just a teen surprisingly, there are a lot of those well, I guess maybe not surprisingly.
Speaker 1:It's one of the reasons I'm not a parent reminding me about that um, somehow, and I have no idea how, that led to thinking about doing elizabeth bathory, but they have nothing in common.
Speaker 2:I remember that you had wanted to do Elizabeth Bathory I still want to do that, but I'm not done researching it yet Okay.
Speaker 1:So I'm still that's what she said, jesus I'm still stuck in a rabbit hole on that one. But then I thought, well, there's a similar case in Russia, like 100 or 200 years later. Yeah, I'll do her, and I was totally planning on that. But then I got sucked into a Russian history rabbit hole, yeah, and didn't really focus anything on the case.
Speaker 2:Well, that sounds like fun. Rabbit holes are fun they are fun.
Speaker 1:But I was still thinking I might do that, even though I hadn't really gotten to the case part yet. But then I don't remember what happened. But somehow I got turned on to the case of Winnie Ruth Judd. I had read a book by one of my favorite authors, Megan Abbott, some time ago, and she wrote a fictional version of that, and so I was going to do that. And then somehow that turned into me finding out that a book I've been wanting to read has finally been published in English. Here in the States it's called Butter. That's exciting.
Speaker 1:I can't remember the name of the author, unfortunately, but I had liked the cover of it, the UK cover. I don't like the American cover.
Speaker 2:Is it a?
Speaker 1:Smikes book. No, it's a Smikes book, no, it's a mystery book, but I didn't know what it was. It just the cover intrigued me. The UK cover intrigued me for some reason, so I've been looking out for it. And then I read the summary and it's based on a true case of a female serial killer recently in Japan.
Speaker 1:So I looked her up and I was like I'm totally going to do her. I totally thought it was like a dirty book, like they're covered in butter, no. But when I was looking her up, everything then mentioned Asahara, who is the leader of Shinriko and the Tokyo gas, sarin gas attacks. So then I went to him and that's where I got stuck. But I only mentioned that because it's weird Yay side quest, because my brain doesn't do that. My brain doesn't do that, and it was a really weird experience for me.
Speaker 2:My brain does that all the time. Well, I don't know if that's the case apparently.
Speaker 1:Oh, that made a sound. Um, if you hear a gurgling sound or um anything like that.
Speaker 2:A bunch of balls, jesus where is your head?
Speaker 1:today, I'm the one who reads smut, but your head is in the gutter. But your head is in the gutter. Rachel and I are drinking boba tea. Yeah, and which is dumb of me because cold makes me have to cough and they're cold drinks, but I'm drinking it anyway, because I'm obsessed with these yogurt balls. Yes, they're delicious. They're balls filled with white liquid. Yes, they are white and it's filled with white liquid and it is delicious and maybe even has some protein in it. Um, and my mind immediately went to um morning glory milking farm.
Speaker 1:You've read that one right, yeah, okay anyway, enough with the smut stuff and let's talk about murder.
Speaker 2:Okay, we're getting serious here. Yeah, okay, murder has happened and it is serious it is serious, it is serious okay, which is why we have to lighten the mood a little bit of course, I think most people understand that.
Speaker 1:Otherwise, some of the most popular podcasts are comedy, true crime last episode.
Speaker 2:I I'm gonna be honest, I couldn't listen to the last episode because I didn't want to cry more. Did you edit out my crying?
Speaker 1:I did. That's good. I did what you asked of me, thank you. I mean, there were some parts where I sound I couldn't. It sounded like you had been crying or upset or something. Yeah, I couldn't edit that out. Well, I was crying and upset I remember there was like a solid 10 minutes that I had to cut out. So hence the jokes, and thankfully, I did, otherwise it would have been a two and a half hour episode again. Yeah, yeah, okay. So let's talk about murder now.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the sarin gas attacks in Tokyo happened in 1995. And one of the reasons I had been wanting to do this case and I had it was always on the back burner. I was always intending to do this cult in this case.
Speaker 1:One of the reasons is because it happened in 1995. I was in Japan that summer, just like weeks after it happened I think I remember it being on the news and 1995 had a lot of things happened and that is the only year of my childhood where I remember a good chunk. I don't remember most of my childhood, but I remember a good chunk of 1995. Things other than I saw Air Force One in Japan, clinton was visiting, but that's like the only thing I remember from that year. I blocked out most of my childhood. Okay, anyway, and honestly, now that I think about it, I think that year and all the things that happened which I'll go over probably is the thing that started my interest in true crime. I always say I always say it's the gateway drug. Forensic files yeah right, but I didn't see forensic files until after this and I think I was interested in forensic files because of these events that happened. Katie's origin story, my origin story. I wish it were more exciting, but it's not okay. So 1995 was a big, big year. I've said that before, but it really is, not just for the united states but for the world. And this is not a full list. I will actually um link some timelines in the show notes so you can see all of the stuff. But the stuff that I remember without having to look at the timelines was, besides the sar sarin gas attack, the great Hanshin earthquake. I'll talk more about that later because it has something to do kind of with this case.
Speaker 1:The singer Selena was murdered in March. So the year starts out with the earthquake. The murder of Selena is in March. Oklahoma City bombing, which killed 168 people and wounded 680, happened in April. There was a tank rampage in San Diego in May. The All-Nepone Airways Flight 857 hijacking, which is kind of related to the sarin gas attacks, happened in June. And gas attacks happened in june. Uh, the publishing of the unabomber manifesto. It was the year of the oj simpson trial, which makes it somewhat relevant today. Uh, there were a lot of other things that happened, some of them good, like toy story was released, although that movie scares the shit out of me. Um, this one is good, but it's also fucked up. So the state of mississippi finally, in 1995, ratified the 13th amendment, and if you don't know what the 13th amendment is, that is the amendment that ended slavery, that makes slavery illegal. So let that sink in really fucked up.
Speaker 1:Yes, mississippi didn't sign the amendment to end slavery for 130 years after it was passed. That is fucked up.
Speaker 2:Oh, mississippi, okay and people wonder why racism is still an issue yeah this is why yeah, this is certainly part of it. It's like hundreds of years.
Speaker 1:That is making weird sounds.
Speaker 2:I am sorry if you can hear it Slavery and Jim Crow and you know, and people are like oh, we're so enlightened. No, we're really not. No, we're really not.
Speaker 1:That was also the year that Christopher Reeves was paralyzed. I remember that story. Oh my God.
Speaker 2:Yes, I remember it in People Magazine I remember it too. Pocahontas was released with the cute little raccoon yes, I saw it in the drive-thru.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was the movie that made me want to have a pet raccoon.
Speaker 2:And on the other screen they were playing Romeo plus Juliet, so I got to watch that one too, but without sound, oh nice.
Speaker 1:A bunch of NASA space stuff happened. That's all I wrote. It was also the 50th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. May possibly could have had something to do with the bombing, I don't know. Animaniacs was released, one of my favorite shows of all time.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, desert storm ended, playstation was released, ebay was founded, it was the end of the bosnian war and the un charged car caradisic and melodic for genocide committed during that war. And 1995 was also the start of the dot-com bubble. There's so much more. I just those were just the ones that, yeah, I vaguely remember just some highlights.
Speaker 2:Just some highlights yes, um.
Speaker 1:So again, I'll lick, I'll lick, you're gonna lick 1995, I am gonna lick 1995. I will link the timelines in the show notes, um, but my point was is that was an eventful year. Yeah, it was a crazy year. Okay, so we'll start with the leader of the um shinrico cult, shoko asahara. I am so sad. I have trouble with these japanese names. I lived in japan, I took two years of japanese and I cannot, for the life of me, pronounce half of these names.
Speaker 1:So Asahara was born Chizuo Matsumoto on March 2, 1955. He was one of seven children born into a poor family. I hear that, yeah, his father made tatami mats and if you don't know what that is, they're used as flooring in Japanese homes. They're bamboo flooring. He had infantile glaucoma from birth which made him lose all sight in his left eye and was partially blind in his right eye. His older brother had no sight and so he went to a school for the blind in Kumamoto City, which is on the southern island of Kyushu. When I read that in one of the sources, it made it seem like it was really far away from home, but I don't think it was that far from where he was born. Anyway, the government paid for students to live in and attend the school. Technically it was meant for children who were completely blind, but they allowed Asahara to attend because there was some sort of rule that said that they could admit children who might lose all their sight.
Speaker 2:Eventually, they couldn't let children attend school if they might lose their sight.
Speaker 1:Well then they'd go to a regular school. If they're not completely blind, if they still have some sight, then they could still go to a regular school. But if they had such a disease I guess that would make it likely that they're going to lose their sight fairly early in their life. Then they could attend. Oh, okay, his family felt that that was a good idea, since the government would pay for it, essentially, yeah, and there would be one less mouth to feed. So he went. Asahara went when he was six years old, I believe. A younger brother also was sent there Apparently. He never lived with his family again after his enrollment.
Speaker 2:So was the glaucoma thing like congenital then?
Speaker 1:I have no idea. Nobody said anything. Asahara was by all accounts a bully, but despite that he became somewhat popular with his fellow students, mainly because he could partially see, while the others were completely blind. And that was important, because once they got into high school the kids wanted to go out onto, you know, into the town or city or whatever, and go to like coffee shops and stuff. But they couldn't do that on their own for whatever reason. So Asahara would guide them there, would take them there and they would give him money or pay for coffee or something like that. So he became popular because he could still see.
Speaker 1:His former teachers also said that he could reach out or he would reach out to the unpopular boys who had been rejected by their other classmates. So he had some a bit of a good side to him, but he was mainly a bully and he certainly wasn't liked enough to be elected student body president, which he really wanted to be. He had run three times and lost all three times and according to sources, the memory of losing stayed with him and would influence some of his future ambitions and actions. So while he was not successful at being elected to office, he was successful at getting others to contribute to his future. He apparently wound up leaving school with $30,000 that he had made off of students.
Speaker 2:Oh, made off of like scamming them, probably scamming them Probably getting money from you know escorting them places. I was like money good, but scamming no, no.
Speaker 1:But I don't know if it's getting. They didn't go into detail. Scamming, no, but I I don't know if it's getting. They didn't go into detail. It felt like a lot of sources all kind of fed off each other and like repeated each other. So, yeah, details were.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I find that a lot. Yeah, it's very irritating like source each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like who was the original right? Yeah, all right. So asahara didn't pass his college entrance exams, so instead of college, he moved to the Tokyo area where he ran an acupuncture clinic and opened a health tonics store specializing in Chinese herbal medicines. Still, I don't know, acupuncture was considered like a job that a blind person could do. So a lot of blind people did it. Um, they often studied that in school and that's what he had studied in high school, or probably k through 12 or whatever it was. Uh, he also got married about this time and he and his wife had six children now. Now, on Wikipedia, it says that there were 12 children altogether.
Speaker 2:Twelve children.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there seemed to only be six with the wife. I don't know if he had others, but that is the only place where 12 are listed.
Speaker 2:So we're going to go with six.
Speaker 1:So he was arrested and fined in either 1981 or 1982, depending on the source, for selling fake medicine. His business failed after his conviction, and that experience had left him and his wife with a strong dislike, maybe even hate, toward the police and the media. What do they mean by?
Speaker 1:fake medicine like the yeah like it was basically just snake oil type stuff, like not literal snake oil. But you know how they say, you know like a snake oil salesman, like they say it has this stuff in it but it doesn't it was beyond like what's traditionally used in, like Chinese. It probably wasn't the stuff that it was, and maybe he also promised things that it couldn't deliver.
Speaker 1:I gotcha, but again I don't know. They didn't go into details. So he and his wife either disliked or even hated the police and media. At the very least they became distrustful of them. In 1984, he established a business called Aum A-U-M, which had a yoga studio and sold health drinks, and he developed an interest in religion. He studied everything from Chinese astrology to Buddhism to esoteric Christianity. It's about that time that he grew his hair out and grew out his beard and adopted the name he would be known as for the rest of his life Shoko Asahara. He made several pilgrimages to India and Nepal to study Hinduism and Buddhism. At some point he met the Dalai Lama and later claimed to have reached enlightenment or ultimate salvation. The word choice depends on the source. He claimed to be the reincarnation of shiva, aka the destroyer, although it's important to note, because it becomes part of his religious doctrine, that while shiva destroys, there is also creation.
Speaker 2:things must be destroyed and also to be created. It's like both sides. Yeah, there's also creation. Things must be destroyed and also to be created. It's like both sides. There's also like a masculine and a feminine aspect of Shiva.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so he claimed to be in the reincarnation of Shiva and he was given a special mission to preach quote real Buddhism in Japan. He returned permanently to Japan in 1987 and assumed the title of Sonshi or guru, before stating that he had mastered meditation to such an extent that he could levitate. He promoted his ability with pamphlets produced by his own publishing company. Did we get to see the levitation?
Speaker 2:Um, hold on, just a second Like David Blaine Street Magician.
Speaker 1:And his writings and stuff was picked up by a few occult magazines. So there are pictures, but I mean where you can see him off the ground. But you can do that if somebody you just bounce up and down and somebody takes a picture at the correct time.
Speaker 2:You know, and it looks like he's bouncing right in the in the pictures like the movement of stuff, what?
Speaker 1:no, I'm just laughing at the audacity of like bouncing up and down and taking your picture I know I know he either began teaching yoga at this time or he resumed teaching yoga and meditation. It kind of depends on the source whether or not he started before he went to india or after. Either he started doing it at his studio and his class was known as Omu Shinshin no Kai or Om Immortal Mountain Wizard Association, which I think is an awesome name. I mean, who wouldn't want to be part of a wizard association?
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Sounds good. It does sound good Again. That title, though, is only in Wikipedia, so I don't know how accurate that is, but regardless it gave me a chuckle. Anyway, these classes turned into Om Shin Shin no Kai, later known as Om Shin Shin Riko. I'm not sure if the business turned into a cult or if it's separate business and cult, but both owned by Ashihara and run by Ashihara, but they became multinational entities that were worth tens of millions of dollars. So, like a lot of cult leaders, he lived in great luxury. So a lot of people get caught up in the makeup of the cult's followers. Om shinrico attracted members of elite families, biologists, chemists, doctors, computer programmers and young university graduates, including those from tokyo university, which is one of the top universities, stuff like that always boggles my mind, I know.
Speaker 1:so tokyo university, which is I, if not the top university, is definitely one of the top universities. It would be like equivalent to like stanford or harvard or something like that. It's a really big deal, and by the end of the 80s the cult had followers from the nation's top ministries and also included those in the legal system, like some of the best lawyers in the country. There were 40 active duty members of the self-defense forces that joined Asahara's army. They were active duty, so they were still in the military, and some of them passed classified information on to Asahara. There were journalists, educators, engineers, there were people in construction and telecommunications and there were members from ibm japan, toshiba, hitachi and other major companies. I don't think the membership makeup is all that surprising, given japan's school and work culture, which is to say it's highly regimented and highly stressful. Yeah, it's kind of cultish, yeah, and highly stressful, and there is a reason that Japan has a high suicide rate.
Speaker 2:I'm not picking on Japan, because I'm going to say that all workish environments are kind of cultish, but yeah.
Speaker 1:I would say that these people were probably attracted to Asahara and his cult because it promised them a more meaningful life than just the regimentation of everyday life Right and the extreme capitalism that was Japan in the 80s. So the belief system blended aspects of Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity and various apocalyptic prophecies. Asahara borrowed from Nostradamus, St John's Revelations from the New Testament, and he even had a little bit of Isaac Asimov's Foundation foundation series in there. Why can't?
Speaker 2:cult leaders leave the awesome people alone right, just stop. It's because they want people to associate them with that kind of coolness and fame and whatever, and so they're like, ah, these people are associated with us even though they're not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I don't think Asimov would have cared for Asahara and the cult at all. No, he didn't write the Foundation series for drips to take it and put it in their own weird religious whatever. Okay, Anyway. So they believed that salvation only came when Armageddon, or the last battle, was over and members achieved a higher state of consciousness and being through the divine teachings of the Supreme Master, aka Asahara.
Speaker 2:I'm looking at the picture of him jumping right now.
Speaker 1:Oh are you.
Speaker 2:He's definitely jumping. His hair is flying around, yeah, and he's straining like he just launched himself into the air.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yep, yep, yep. Wow, I just sounded like Ducky in what was that movie called the dinosaur one.
Speaker 2:Oh, Land Before Time Land Before.
Speaker 1:Time. Oh, that's a sad.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's a sad movie. But also the little girl who did the voice of Ducky. She was murdered, oh Jesus.
Speaker 2:By her father. Wow, yeah, I think I remember hearing that and then I repressed that memory, sorry. So thanks for the reminder.
Speaker 1:I think about it a lot because for some I think about the Land Before Time a lot.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I also think about All Dogs Go to Heaven.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:And she did, the voice of Anne-Marie in that movie.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, sorry, I ruined some childhood movies there, wow, okay.
Speaker 1:So if you died during the battle, you could still be saved if you followed the teachings to completion and are prepared to reincarnate to an enlightened state. So the end of the world, according to Asahara, would involve a war with the US around 1997. In one of his booklets Asahara wrote, quote as we move toward the year 2000, there will be a series of events of inexpressible ferocity and terror. The lands of Japan will be transformed into a nuclear wasteland Between 1996 and 1998, america and its allies will attack Japan and only 10% of the population of the major cities will survive. And only 10% of the population of the major cities will survive. End quote.
Speaker 1:So I and a few of the other writers of some of the sources were not really sure where his hatred of America came from, because he was born after the bombings, at a point when Japan was starting to do real good again, right, and had been steadily increasing. So it's not really that. I mean there are there's some dislike over the US military presence in Japan, primarily in Osaka, but kind of all of it, it's understandable, because we continue to occupy it.
Speaker 1:We're kind of their. I mean, they have a military, but we're like their defense system essentially Also. I mean, there is the legacy of the atomic bombs, but I don't know, I don't think that those things were the issue. One source claims that his hatred is because he believed the US military dropped sarin on his communes, but there's no evidence to support that accusation at all. He was really obsessed with sarin, really obsessed, okay. So in August of 1989, the Tokyo metropolitan government made Aum Shinriko one of Japan's 185,000 religions with corporation status. So, just like here, that meant that A? Um got tax breaks, oh, okay, um. It also meant in japan that it had immunity from oversight and prosecution, which basically meant that the cult could move forward into its eventual criminal activities with, like, no fear of retribution, immunity from prosecution apparently, unless it's like really really really bad, like murder it's kind of ridiculous it is um.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm I'm sure that there are definitely some rules on that. I mean we kind of unspokenly do that here, but just with Christianity were just loathe to attack or be seen to be attacking any religion yeah official religion in japan, so I don't know.
Speaker 1:So anyway, uh, the immunity covered pretty much everything the cult did, because the government again they didn't like to investigate organized religions. Within six years, aum's net worth was $1 billion Within I'm sorry, six years of being made officially an official religion. Membership also expanded to 50,000 by 1995. There were branches in half a dozen nations and they had branch offices in places like New York and Russia, offices in places like new york and russia also. In 1989, members of the cult entered the home of tsutsumi sakamoto. Oh, I should say this so they are.
Speaker 1:This cult is best known for the sarin gas attacks yeah but it turns out they killed a shit ton of people before the attacks and nobody ever suspected them during doing it.
Speaker 1:So we're going to get into a few of those murders in a minute. Okay, so Fun, not fun, fun, not fun, just in case somebody is Taking things literally. So in 1989, members of the cult entered the home of Tsutsumi Sakamoto. He was a lawyer that was working on a class action case against the cult. They broke into his house, injected him, his wife and infant son with potassium chloride and strangled them. The remains were placed in metal drums and hidden in three separate rural areas in three different prefectures.
Speaker 2:Why did they need to inject them if they were going to strangle them? I?
Speaker 1:don't know. They were big into chemicals. There were a lot of scientists and chemists in part of their membership.
Speaker 2:Did the potassium chloride immobilize them?
Speaker 1:I don't know, or maybe they didn't use enough enough and so they strangled them. So their bodies were not found until the perpetrators revealed the locations. After they were captured in connection with the subway attack about this time, on a sheep farm in australia the cult began testing sarin on sheep. So they had bought some land, little sheepies in australia, and then started testing sarin. Part of me is like how can you test sarin, like a lot of sarin, like they did on the sheep, yeah, and not be found out.
Speaker 2:But then I was like well, I was in australia for six months and some parts of austral kind of remote. They are very remote.
Speaker 1:There are lots of very remote places. Australia is just about as big as the United States, but doesn't have anywhere near the people, so it would actually be pretty easy.
Speaker 2:I like to consume sheepies, but I don't think that that sounds like a very nice way for them to die. No and I don't think you could eat them afterward. Well, sure, I mean, I wouldn't try and eat them, but I'm just saying that that doesn't sound like a very humane death for them.
Speaker 1:No, and I don't think that they really cared. I mean you know the ends, just fight the means.
Speaker 2:No, I'm sure if they're killing people, I'm sure they don't care about killing sheep.
Speaker 1:No, not at all. So then in 1990, asahara and 24 members ran for political office. They all lost, and that loss became a turning point for Asahara. He became more insulated, fanatical and leaned to more violent solutions for whatever he was pissed off about. So he pitched a fit because he lost. Yeah, come on, he's an egomaniac, like all cult leaders. So he demanded that members leave their families and live in communes. He wanted access to their finances and demanded total obedience. Oh no, members were forced to do odd rituals, including things like drinking his bath water and wear electrical caps to sync with Asahara's mind.
Speaker 1:So I didn't find it in any of my sources, but I was listening to a podcast. It's a fairly new one, maybe you'll like it. It's called Spiritually Fucked and it's two ladies and I guess all of their crimes are related to the spiritual stuff. Right, spiritual cults and things like that. But they did one on this group. Spiritual cults and things like that, but they did one on this group and the co-host that was doing the cult had said that, and I don't know where she found it. But she said that Asahara would sleep around with women, and I'll get to that in a second. I'll mention it briefly.
Speaker 2:Were the potential other children Probably.
Speaker 1:I would assume. But he would take a single pubic hair from each of the women and put it in a glass jar and keep it.
Speaker 2:Now again, she's the only one I know that mentioned it making a face, but you can't see it because you're just listening to me.
Speaker 1:You are making a face, um, but. But like I said, I didn't get that in any of my sources and I don't know what her source is. Worse, but I'm just passing that on because it was bananas. There were accusations of attacks, kidnapping and murder of opponents. There was also sexual assault and sexual manipulation of female members followers all the cults, all the fucking cults.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I know. Followers were also subjected to sleep, food and sensory deprivation and given hallucinogens. Sometimes people were allowed to leave if they turned over their property to the cult, and those who refused to do so disappeared, were badly beaten or were murdered.
Speaker 2:Which is also more proof of evidence that religions are not that different from cults, because they're also full of sexual abuse and abuse of women. That's true.
Speaker 1:That's true. They were either. These people either disappeared or beaten or were killed. A man who claimed to be kidnapped and managed to escape reported that for nearly 100 days he had been injected with an unknown medication, ordered to drink two and a half gallons of hot water a day and then throw it up to cleanse his system. He was able to leave only after he promised to be a member of the cult and give asahara all his money. The police eventually conducted a raid on one of the compounds. Um, well, here's this is another question I had. Sometimes they said the meaning there was only one, and sometimes it said one of the compounds. So I don't know if there was one or more than one.
Speaker 2:Maybe there was like a main one, and then, well, yeah, that's what I was thinking.
Speaker 1:But I mean not, they didn't specify. Yeah, I want specificity. Specificity, yes, yeah, me too. My, in my, in me reporting people I'm like more information, please yes, especially if you have the ability to do the research.
Speaker 1:I don't have the ability, right? Okay, anyway. Uh, they found 50 people in advanced stages of dehydration and malnutrition. Oh my God, that was clearly false, right. And then he claimed to have something called Q fever, which he claimed resulted from authorities spraying chemicals onto his compound from airplanes. And this idea though again there's no evidence to support it apparently radicalized him even more.
Speaker 1:Cult members sprayed large amounts of liquid containing bacillus anthracis spores from a cooling tower on the roof of Aum Shinriko's Tokyo headquarters. However, their plan to cause an anthrax epidemic failed. By the end of 1993, aum was manufacturing serin and VX. So VX is the most toxic of nerve agents that is used in chemical warfare. Both sarin and VX were used in assassination attempts. For example, two people were injured and one was killed using VX in Osaka in 1994. The murder was not linked to the cult until the killer turned himself in in 1995. In January of 1995, hiroyuki Nagaoka, who was an important member of the OMS Victim Society, which is a civil organization that protested against the cult's activities organization that protested against the cult's activities was also killed with VX by the cult.
Speaker 1:On June 27, 1994, the cult carried out a sarin attack in the city of Matsumoto. It was in retaliation because the residents opposed Asahara's plan to set up an office and factory in the city. Opponents of the plan gathered 140 signatures on an anti-Om petition, which is equivalent to 70% of Matsumoto's population at the time. Om's original plan to release the gas into the Matsumoto courthouse because they were also targeting three judges who were going to rule against the cult. So they were going to release the gas there, but when they arrived the courthouse had closed. They decided to instead target a three-story apartment building where the city's judges resided. At 10.40 pm, members of OM used a converted refrigerator truck to release a cloud of sarin. Eight people were killed and 100 injured. One of the eight had been in a coma for 14 years before dying in 2008.
Speaker 1:The cult was not linked to the attack at the time. So, if you remember, I mentioned the Great Honshin Earthquake that happened at the start of 1995. The Great Honshin Earthquake that happened at the start of 1995. It's also more commonly referred to as the Kobe Earthquake because it struck near there and most of the dead were also from Kobe. It was one of the worst natural disasters in Japan's history, killing 6,434 people give or take. It was the second worst earthquake in the 20th century, the first being the Great Kanto earthquake in 1923, which killed more than 105,000 people. So anyway, ohm's chief scientist told an international assembly of journalists that the earthquake was quote, activated by electromagnetic power or some other device that exerts energy into the ground. End quote. He claimed the device was possibly controlled by the United States.
Speaker 1:Asahara believed the earthquake was a sign of the impending apocalypse and was a catalyst for his next act of violence. So on May 20th 1995, just before morning rush hour, five cult members boarded five trains on three lines with plastic bags containing liquid sarin and umbrellas with sharpened tips. The trains were timed to meet at a central station four minutes apart, which means that it would expose the greatest number of passengers to the chemical. The attack was intended to not just kill the passengers but to deliver the sarin to main subway interchanges used by thousands of passengers. Once the perpetrators poked holes in the bags and fled, the sirens spread into the packed subway cars.
Speaker 1:I don't think I mentioned it before, but this was during morning rush hour and I've been in Japan on trains at morning rush hour and it is a lot Like you're crammed, you can't really go anywhere, can't really move, so commuters were struggling for breath, coughing up blood and foaming at the mouth. Some managed to make it up to street level before collapsing. In the end, 13 died and more than 6,000 were injured. The Federation of American Scientists said that if the assailants had been competent and able to fulfill their goal quote tens of thousands could have easily been killed. End. Quote. Asahara issued statements denying involvement and was able to elude police. For two months. They found him at the cult's compound, concealed behind a wall surrounded by piles of cash.
Speaker 2:Wait. So he was eluding them, but he was just at his compound.
Speaker 1:I don't know if he was at the compound for all two months or if he just got there, but I mean he was behind a false wall he's behind a wall with cash.
Speaker 2:What good is the cash gonna do you if you're behind a fucking wall? I don't know, I don't know Online shopping eBay just started, so maybe Right.
Speaker 1:Okay, so there was some copycat incidents following the attack. The biggest one happened in June 1995, when an individual unrelated to Ohm hijacked the all-Nippon Airways Flight 857, which, again, I mentioned at the beginning. The man claimed to be an Aum member in possession of sarin and plastic explosives, but these claims were ultimately found to be false. Several hundred of Aum followers were arrested and 200-ish were convicted for the subway attack and other violent crimes. Asahara was indicted for murder, attempted murder, abductions, producing nerve gas and buying illegal atomic rifles. He was found guilty on 13 of 17 charges, including the Sakamoto family murders. Four charges were dropped. On february 27th 2004 he was sentenced to death. There were some attempts to appeal his uh sentence because of mental illness, insanity, that kind of thing, but the sentence was upheld. Yeah, asahara was executed by hanging at the Tokyo detention house on July 6th 2018, along with six other cult members.
Speaker 2:He was clearly not whatever insane.
Speaker 1:No, no. So yeah, he was executed by hanging in 2018, along with six other cult members. Relatives of victims said they approved the execution. Executed by hanging in 2018, along with six other cult members. Yeah, relatives of victims said they approved the execution. Asahara's final words, as was reported by officials, basically said that his remains should be given to his fourth daughter. Now, his fourth daughter was unsympathetic to the cult and stated she planned to dispose of the ashes at sea. This, however, was contested by Asahara's wife, the third daughter and other family members, who were suspected of wanting to enshrine the ashes where believers can honor them. As of 2020, the ashes were still at the Tokyo detention house, but in 2021, the Supreme Court of Japan ordered Asahara's remains to be released to his second daughter, which was affirmed by the Tokyo District Court in 2024.
Speaker 1:I should say about the hanging of him and the six other folks that they didn't tell Asahara or the cult members that they were going to be hung, didn't tell their families, didn't tell Asahara or the cult members that they were going to be hung, didn't tell their families, didn't tell victims' families that they were doing it.
Speaker 1:The Asahara and the other cult members found out they were going to die a few hours before they were hung and hanging is the official form of execution in Japan. The official form of execution in Japan. So the group still has about 2,100 members and continues to recruit new members under the name Aleph, as well as other names. They have renounced the attacks and the other violent acts that were done in the cult's name. They continue to follow Asahara's spiritual teachings, though, and members operate several businesses. However, boycotts of known Aleph-related businesses, in addition to various police searches, confiscations of possible evidence and picketing by protest groups, have resulted in closures of most of those businesses and, I should say, for the death penalty. I don't know a lot about it, but I did read that they don't just assign the death penalty the way that we do. Usually you have to have committed more than one murder, yeah, and it has to be particularly egregious for it to warrant a capital punishment.
Speaker 2:But it's not like here, where you can like appeal and shit like that. Clearly they're just informed a few hours before it occurs.
Speaker 1:Well, they did appeal. I said that, oh, I miss it. They appealed on the basis of insanity, they appealed the sentence. So they didn't do the appeals until after he was sentenced.
Speaker 2:But how do they? If they don't, then that he's going to receive that punishment they knew that at the sentencing.
Speaker 1:That's where you learn you're gonna die. They didn't learn the day that they were gonna die until a few hours before.
Speaker 2:Okay so no, he knew that he was going to die, but I knew, but they don't know when, right I think normally they do surprise motherfucker.
Speaker 1:Well, I think in normal circumstances they tell everybody, like they tell the prisoners, the prisoners families and the victims families, yeah, but I think, because of the fact that this was a cult, they didn't want all that fanfare and, you know, they didn't want to turn it into a spectacle. I'm guessing, but that would be my, my big guess. Um, cause the the attack like deeply affected Japan.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like deeply affected them. Yeah, it was mind blowing for them.
Speaker 2:Um, okay, so that is I can't say I agree with the death penalty. But if you are going to do it, that's the kind of thing to do it for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, so that was my case. Anything. Um, yikes, yikes, yeah. Yeah, I was surprised by the additional information. Like I said, the only thing I really knew was the stuff that I remember from when I was in Japan that summer visiting my grandparents.
Speaker 2:I find it particularly egregious that people are still following this cult.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, although in some ways it's not surprising Like one of Manson's followers is still a follower.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've heard that he's still got quite a following as well, yeah.
Speaker 1:I didn't realize that there were so many more murders than just the sarong gas attacks. Right, I didn't realize that there were two.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But then I never really looked into it. Yeah, but then I never really looked into it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, how do they try and distance themselves? Like you said that they don't. They try and distance themselves from the attack, saying that it's not like them or it's not their part of the cult. But isn't it their own leader's enterprise? How do they justify that Like? How do they square like this is what their founder has done and it's obviously a critical part of the ideology. So how do you get around that?
Speaker 1:Well, I don't know if attacking Japanese people is part of the ideology. The idea was that the United States and their allies was going to attack Japan, yeah. So I don't know, I don't know how they justify that. Maybe they think he really was crazy because he did act like he was insane, like he would just talk, gibberish, he, you know, he, I don't know, he did things that would make people think that he was insane. And I would assume if you were a devotee you would believe it. No, I mean, obviously not.
Speaker 2:Or maybe it's part of a show.
Speaker 1:I mean it was part of his insanity defense not to get the death penalty.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean he didn't start acting that way until after the sentence sentence and his lawyers were going to appeal the sentence on grounds of insanity. But I mean, what I'm saying is you're asking for rational thought for people who are not rational.
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know, that's true, like if you're that deep in it you can make up anything to justify things.
Speaker 2:I just want to know what they're. I mean obviously. I mean there's different definitions of rationality. I want to know what they're. How do they rationalize it for themselves? That's what I want to know.
Speaker 1:I don't know if they do more in the sense that, like they regret what happened, they apologize for what happened, they've set up funds to aid victims' families, like I don't think they deny it or anything like that, or think that it was a good thing. I think they're just trying to like show remorse and say we are not that way anymore.
Speaker 1:We may follow his teachings, but we are not that way anymore. We may follow his teachings, but we are not that. Huh, but I don't know. The sources didn't say, and it's in japanese, so right, so I don't know interesting but I do, I'm not going to netflix. There is three series, okay, that are is narrated by peter danklage nice um, so they're different.
Speaker 1:Like one is like how to be a tyrant, how to be a cult leader, and I think the newest one is how to Be a Mob Boss. The how to Be a Cult Leader has an episode on Asahara, okay, but I want to give a shout out to those because those are really interesting shows and episodes.
Speaker 2:I'll check it out. Do you just hear Peter Dinklage's voice?
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's not in them.
Speaker 2:It's all dinklage's voice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's not in them. It's all, it's all um. If I remember correctly, it's primarily like footage of the whatever the tyrant and um clips of scholars and or people who are part of the cult or things like that. Yeah, um, but yeah, he, he just narrates it but it's awesome. I mean his voice is. Yeah, he's got a nice voice.
Speaker 2:It's a great voice, but he's also handsome.
Speaker 1:He is also handsome.
Speaker 2:I was like, do I get to see him? I?
Speaker 1:know he is also handsome. And, on a side note, there is I forget the name of the show. I will put it in in case anybody's interested, but they, the episodes are, all have a different theme, but one of the themes is like the history of torture, yeah, well, no, let me. Let me rephrase that it's the history of execution. So it goes from like some of the first all the way to like modern day executions, right and, and it's really good. I really enjoyed it. They had really great professors of history and whatever, and psychology, whatever, people who know stuff, good academics. But it was horrifying. The way humans are able to come up with creative ways of killing people, particularly in the name of punishment, blows my mind. It absolutely blows my mind.
Speaker 2:I read some things. Where did I read some things about that? I was reading about medieval times. Oh yeah, they were fucked up. They really enjoyed killing people in very brutal ways.
Speaker 1:They sure did, they sure did and they do not. That's the thing about that show is that they do not shy away from it Like you see shit, oh, wow, you know. I mean obviously it's acting, yeah, but I mean they make the sounds and everything and it was truly awful, okay.
Speaker 1:And that's also the Peter Dinklage show. No, no, no, no, no, that's a different one. I will. I'll say the name. I mainly was just thinking about the death penalty and execution, and I had just seen that one. The wheel is particularly awful. Yeah, but I'll put that in the show notes as well, since I mentioned it, and I'll tell you when I figure out what it is. I'll text it to you.
Speaker 2:Sounds good.
Speaker 1:I don't remember what the other episodes were. I think I only watched that first one. I wasn't expecting it to be so ghoulish. Yeah, okay. So anything else, you're going to do the rest of your thing, or do we have anything else to say?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we got to do that. We can't take too much longer because I need some time at home before the dog thing. Okay, the gentleman's name was Jewel Paul Wheeler and there's a nice picture of him in his army uniform and it's kind of faded. But he looks young and happy and hopefully he's okay, though he's been missing for quite some time. Maybe he started a new second life, maybe a tattoo on his left arm of the 82nd Airborne.
Speaker 2:The BIA OJS Missing and Murdered Unit is seeking information that may assist them with their ongoing search. So you can submit tips by texting or by calling at 1-833-560-2065 or emailing ojs-mmu at biagov. His last known location was Pine Ridge, south Dakota, in the Calico community. The case is open. The agent assigned to the case is Savannah Peterson and on this other site we have a little bit of information about them. He was last seen on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation near the Calico community. Based on his photo, he was a veteran of the United States Army, so it's possible his fingerprints are on file. So in the photo you can see that his right hand wrist one finger is bandaged. So that could be something to consider in a John Doe case that had displayed a heel, injury on the right hand or wrist. The exact date of the photo is unknown but it was probably taken before 1973. Looks like it's pretty old.
Speaker 2:Depending on his military service status, there may be an AWOL report on him. So there was a municipal court snippet from 1974 in the Rapid City Journal of someone named Jewel Wheeler, arrested for non-falonious breaking and entering and sentenced to six months in jail with five months suspended. The individual was fined $200. And it's possibly notable because this individual with the name Jewel Wheeler had no address listed on the report. So although there may be multiple Jewel Wheel wheelers out there, that could be notable. So maybe he was living homeless or something. So if you have any information, definitely contact. Yeah, cold case. Hopefully he's all right.
Speaker 2:And if not, hopefully, some information that can be found so that his family will know what happened to him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so um what did you read, watch whatever this week?
Speaker 2:or what'd you do? What did I?
Speaker 1:do. Did you do anything fun or exciting? I?
Speaker 2:did listen to like two books. Was that over the course of just this week? Or I may have encompassed last week as well, but I'm let's see. The days have kind of bled together, but I have cleaned a lot, I have worked, I have done. What did I do on Wednesday? Oh, I had to pick up some meds and I ran an errand with Stephanie and that ended up taking several hours. Errand with Stephanie, and that ended up taking several hours, and then that was like most of my whole day that the kids were not at home. Yeah, on Thursday. So on Monday, tuesday, I worked, I did the training. On Wednesday there wasn't any work available because training was still open, but I had already finished it, right, so I should have drug my feet a little bit more, like there's only so much you can do, that I was like I'm ready, you know Right.
Speaker 1:So training for the scoring job that you have.
Speaker 2:Yes, and then on Thursday, friday, I did that. On Thursday my air got turned on so I cleaned a lot so my apartment would look nice when they came to turn on the air. They sent us an email notification, but they didn't send one to my mom. Oh no, like you're supposed to do that right so I feel like sometimes they think that because she's my mom, that I tell her all the things, yeah, but that's not necessarily true.
Speaker 2:Like I assume that she would have received her own one Right? So anyway, Air is on, that's nice. And yeah, it made quite a significant difference. After the air was on, I was like I was doing chores. I was working and doing chores at the same time. I mean, I was just focused on my work. No, I was. I was focused on my work.
Speaker 2:But I was you know you have to because I have to do certain things before the kids get home, Because once they get home then they start making messes, Right, and so anyway, and I was like, well, I'm glad that it's a nice cool day today because I'm not sweating. And then I was like, oh wait, it's because the air is hot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's amazing how much of a difference that can make. Yeah, it really does.
Speaker 2:Yeah, two manis in two days with nail art because I accidentally clipped my ring fingernail a little bit trying to clip off a hangnail, and so I had these collabs that I was doing and I needed to finish them before my nail got ripped off. But now I got nail glue so I'm going to try and do a repair and hopefully it'll grow out.
Speaker 1:You also made manicotti for me last week I did which I haven't had since I moved away from my mother, like 20 years ago or something. How did that work out for you? It was good, great, it was delicious. The manicotti was good. So shout out to my mom you made good manicotti too. Enough that I thought about it 20 years later.
Speaker 2:Yep, so I miss some of my mom's cooking too.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:My mom lives right next door. She doesn't cook much anymore, so yeah, some of her dishes like her. She used to make these like beef ribs with this like like honey mustard crusty stuff on top oh so good.
Speaker 1:Did I say 20 years or 30 years? It's been about 30 years. I keep thinking I'm 30, not 40.
Speaker 2:I'm like 20 years or like, or even like 10 years, and I'm like no, no wait, yeah, wait a second.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm only a month and a half from 40. Yeah, yeah, I feel like I'm still in my 20s. To be honest, I still don't feel like an adult I do too.
Speaker 2:yeah, that's what I was saying about that aging book. Yeah, what was it called? Aging Happens.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like my body is definitely aging but mentally.
Speaker 1:I'm still you called me juvenile. Yeah, yeah, no, I know. Juvenile, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I know. I'm faced with it nearly every day because my students are so young and none of them were alive on 9-11 yeah I was like you know, so I always have to explain like how much the world changed after that.
Speaker 2:That's a feature of millennials. We all remember 9-11.
Speaker 1:We're all old. Well, those of us, those of us who are older millennials, yeah, even younger millennials, because well, they were babies. So I did have one kid in the class who was about six at the time and he said that he doesn't remember I remember stuff from when I was six.
Speaker 2:Do you remember when you were six?
Speaker 1:no, I remember nothing. Well, maybe not nothing, what do I remember? The only real vivid memory I have is of that stupid kid who got me into trouble, and I still want revenge. I don't know his name and I don't know what he looks like, but if I ever come across him, my earliest memory is from when I was like two and I was in the hospital.
Speaker 2:Maybe I was three. I was in the hospital because my sister, my younger sister, had, like her foot was messed up when she was born and so they, they had to, like, put in a cast and do stuff with it to like, you know, help whatever, reshape it so that she could walk. And so she had to get all these different casts and I remember being in the hospital and looking at the blinds and them cutting her cast yeah, so yeah, I remember the doctors taking that piece of skin out of my arm.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I was allergic to something. So they I don't know they took a razor blade and took a huge chunk out yeah see what I was allergic to. They're like, oh, the sun, and I was like that's not helpful. Yeah, and I don't really think I'm allergic to the sun, not any more than other pasty white people, right, yeah, no, I don't really have a lot of memories from my childhood, I think I just I don't know if it's because I'm aging or if it's because I've just blocked them out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, even the good ones, like I just don't I feel like I have quite a few memories from my childhood, but sometimes my sister will be like remember this.
Speaker 1:And I don't.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's definitely selective memories?
Speaker 1:Certainly yeah, so, yeah, okay. So you did all those things.
Speaker 2:You read two books, or listened to two books. Yeah, let me check my Goodreads, so I read oh, maybe, well, we talked about the Great Gatsby last time, right I think so. Maybe, well, we talked about the Great Gatsby last time, right? I think so. Yeah, okay, so since then, I read this Slayers, a Buffyverse story book.
Speaker 1:Very millennial of you.
Speaker 2:I love Buffy but Joss Whedon is such a dick, I know. But this was exciting because it was written by Amber Benson who played Tara, and it is like a whatever audible original, like multicast, like those old radio features.
Speaker 1:Oh, those are fun sometimes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, those are fun sometimes. Yeah, and it had a lot of the actors or whatever from Buffy, not like Sarah Michelle Gellar, but it had James Marsters who plays Spike. It had Charisma Carpenter Cordelia, it had Did it have Xander.
Speaker 1:No, actually the Xander actor is actually quite a douchebag. Oh, the real one, yeah, aw.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That makes me sad yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's not a good guy. It had Charisma Carpenter, it had Emma Caulfield that's Anya. It had Anthony Head Giles. It had Julia Juliet Landau, drusilla. And it had Jonathan Danny Strong. And it had Clem James Charles Leary he played that demon that looked like a sad derpy, like basset hound face, and it had like a new slayer, indira, played by Leila de Leon Hayes. So yeah, and it had Amber Benson as well. Tara Right, and what was your other book? Oh, yes, and then the other books that I read were Graceling and Bitter Blue by Kristen Cashore, because there's like a new book in that series Graceling Realm series and I wanted to read it and I wanted to refresh my memory on it. And now I've started that new book, which is called the Sea Sparrow, and I realized that I should have also read book four called Winter Keep. But now I'm in it, so it's too late. I realized too late that I should have also read that other book.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So oh well.
Speaker 1:Well, you got me into Steven Universe, nice. Yeah, I'm somewhere in season three.
Speaker 2:Yeah, how's that going for you?
Speaker 1:It's going, it's going good, I'm on season five yeah, I figured um what else. I've listened to the new program.
Speaker 1:I discovered spiritually fucked, so listen to that one the other day um, I've gotten back into and that's why we drink to, and that's why we drink, so I listen to some of their back episodes. Um, no, reading this week has been shit, so, yeah, um, I'm doing training for my job, yeah, and on top of that I have to. I'm grading like essays and shit, so, yeah, it's a lot of staring at the computer yeah, I listen to.
Speaker 2:I listen to the books when I like, do dishes, make dinner clean and stuff like that, and then at the end of the day when I collapse, but I cannot. I can't listen to them when I'm working because I have to pay attention to what I'm reading, and I can't focus on two different things at once.
Speaker 1:Right yeah.
Speaker 2:I can't even listen Like I can listen to, like acoustic music, right, but I can't listen to music with words, because then the words of the song are in my head.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I have that too. I can only listen to audiobooks when driving. I can't yeah um, but I've been doing podcasts for the last year, so I haven't really done a whole lot of audio yeah which is unfortunate. I've bought a lot, right, I haven't listened to any. Um, I think that's it for me. It's been kind of boring. Yeah, we're supposed're supposed to be reading Mary by Nat Cassidy.
Speaker 2:Mary, I'm going to start that one as soon as I finish Sea Sparrow. I thought that I was going to get through Bitter Blue faster than I did but life, so I haven't Plus. Bitter Blue is like a 16-hour book, wow.
Speaker 1:Wow, and you don't do double speed.
Speaker 2:Usually not. Yeah, Although I guess I could have done for that since I, Since it's a reread yeah but, I, didn't think about it. Yeah, so whoops, that's all right. Now I'm listening to yeah, the new one, sea Sparrow. Yeah, so this one's told in the first person. I'm not sure how I feel about that. Yeah, it's okay, but like it's always jarring at first, Right, yeah, especially if you're not expecting it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, because the other ones are told in third person. Yeah, so yeah, okay is that? Yeah, because the other ones are told in third person. So yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, is that it? Yeah, that's it All right. So we are off to get a glue stick and then take the doggies to the park and hope my dogs don't die of anxiety. It's going to be fine. Or attack your animals.
Speaker 2:It's going to be fine.
Speaker 1:I've broken up many a dog fight that might. I might lose nails if that happens. But well, don't sue me because I have no money.
Speaker 2:I don't think no, I'm not gonna sue you. I know it's a joke. I had to think about that one. I'm like what money? What are we talking about? I will not sue you. Um, I don't even. I. I don't even think there would be a technical whatever at fault, since both of our dogs would be off leash.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Okay, it'll be fine, okay, I won't worry about it. Okay, so I guess that's it. Okay. So we will talk to everyone, uh, later. Yeah, episode whatever episode comes after this.
Speaker 2:Let's remind them about oh, yeah, yeah yeah the book. What is?
Speaker 1:I want to say hell's kitchen. No, it's not hell's kitchen, but it is hell's half acre. Um, I still do not have the book in my hands. I will post it in show notes, but. But the main title is Hell's Half Acre. It's about the Bender family and, um, we will be doing that in episode 16. And uh, other than that, remember to like download follow subscribe review would be nice Send us an email if you get lonely.
Speaker 2:if you want to be friends, Email us about whatever.
Speaker 1:You can also DM us on our personal Instagrams which will also be.
Speaker 2:I would be so happy to get an email, because I just have the same four emails sitting in our inbox. We haven't even gotten spam.
Speaker 1:Which are not from our inbox. We haven't even got spam which are not from actual people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we don't even have spam in there, no.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you can email or you can hit us up on Instagram. We have one for the show and then also our personals, and they will be in the show notes. So we'll talk to you later. Bye.