Armchair Anonymous: Cautionary Tale

Dax Shepard

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Welcome, welcome. Welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Buck Rogers, and I'm joined by the Duchess of Duluth. Where did Buck Rogers come from? That was a show when I was a kid.

Buck Rogers. It was kind of maybe a b version of Star Trek. He was a starship trooper fighter. Okay, when you go by Buck Rogers on those days. Yeah.

Monica Padman

Can I go by Michelle Tanner? Oh, my God, yes. Who's Michelle Tanner? Mary Kate and Ashley from full. Oh, okay, interesting.

Dax Shepard

I guess that works. If we were playing connections, it would work in tv characters. Exactly. But I'm always inclined to pin a sci-fi name on you, like RTD two or RDD. Whatever he is, it has to be something you can pronounce.

Okay. CP, three. No, not sure what that one is. C, three. Po and R.

Rob

Okay. Those have always been hard for me. Do they roll off your tongue? C, three. Po r.

Monica Padman

Yes. But I'm not into Sci-Fi right. Nor are you a robot aerobic. But I am a Michelle Tanner. Okay, great.

Dax Shepard

Michelle Tanner. I'm now learning that name. I don't know that name, but I'm gonna try to cut that. You might have to practice that. Let's go from the top.

And we're still rolling. Everyone back to one. I'm Buck Rogers, and I'm joined by Michelle Tanner. That's me. You got it, dude.

Oh, my God. Grain. You'll have a catchphrase. This works out big time for me. Today we're going to hear cautionary tales.

They run the gamut, as you might expect, these cautionary tales. But I also want to tell everybody next month's prompts, which are, tell us a crazy stalking story. If you were murdered in this one, it probably won't be fun for us. Well, no, we do accept ghosts. Okay.

Monica Padman

Yeah. Okay. Tell us a crazy stalking story. Tell us about a secret your parents kept from you as a kid. Shout out to the armchair.

Dax Shepard

Who suggested that? Great one. Tell us a crazy house sitting story. Also was a suggestion from an armchair. Tell us a crazy mall story.

Monica's suggestion. You guys, mall stories can be lots of things. They can be shoplifting. They can be hookups. They can be in the.

I had a mall hookup in the Burger King bathroom. You already want to tell it? Yeah, but I must protect her identity. My hookup. DJ Tanner.

Rt Tanner. Rdd Tanner. Please enjoy cautionary tales. Hard times come and go. Good times take them slow.

My life, I had them both remember one thing you gotta know, I'm gonna keep on shining cautionary tab. Mine is, don't get sick. That's my cautionary tale. Did you take your lead deep? I did, yeah.

My big breakthrough was taking Tussin DM last night before I went. Tussin? It's the generic brand for Robitussin. Oh, my God. Tussin.

Monica Padman

They're allowed to do that? Yeah. Tussin. I don't like that tussle with Tussin. And boy, oh, boy, I don't know.

Dax Shepard

I haven't been taking that for the last week and a half. Cause I didn't cough it all in the middle of the night, and that's what's been keeping me up. No coughs all night. It worked. Tussin Dm.

Monica Padman

You died. I'm dead. Ready for Amy? Yeah. Amen.

Dax Shepard

Amy Hansen, cautionary table. Amy h. No. I hope it's Amy Hansen so bad. I love it to be Amy Hansen.

Monica Padman

Can it please be Amy Hansen? What if one of our friends called and told a really damaging story? You know I'm dying for that. Hi. Oh.

Dax Shepard

Oh, that's us. Hold on. We didn't plug in. We were chipping. One sec.

Amy. Yes. Hi. Now I can hear you beautifully. We weren't hooked up.

Zara

Oh, my gosh. It's important to be hooked up, y'all. Very. You gotta be. What is this lovely collage poster behind you?

Amy

Well, this is for Monica. It's actually a quilt that our friend Luke Haines made for me. Do you remember him? Yes. Luke, who made our quilt.

Monica Padman

Oh, my God. Small world. And the letters on it say hospitaliano. Is that Italian for hospitality? You know, it's a made up word.

Amy

Have you ever been to the Olive garden? Oh, yes. Yeah. In the nineties, when you walked in the olive garden, the host would say hospitaliano to greet you. Oh, they would?

It was, like, the dumbest thing. I always thought it was hilarious because it's just this word that olive Garden made up. So when Luke made the quilt, he wanted me to put something on it that was, like, aspirational. So that's what I chose. Oh, I love it.

Monica Padman

It's incredible. Also, it's beautiful. He's so talented. He's so talented. And I don't want to get too off topic, but do you know the Zagat guide where they review restaurants?

Amy

Yes. They let their comedic side shine when they review Olive Garden in particular. I don't know if you've ever read any reviews in Zaggot for Olive Garden. I have not. The two that I've memorized is this Italian.

Dax Shepard

Denny's prides itself on blank, blank, blank. And then another one said, if you like airplane food italian. Oh, God. Yeah, they were rough, but I feel like that's where they cut loose a little bit. That's hilarious.

Amy

I'll have to look that up, especially since I'm such a fan. What part of the south are you in? How'd you know I was from the south? Cause you said y'all. Well, I live in Asheville, North Carolina.

Monica Padman

We like it there. You know how much I love it, right? I talk about it all the time. I just moved here four years ago from Austin. Oh.

Amy

Which is another great place. You're hitting up all the good spots. Yeah, you're ahead of me. You're living out many of my dreams. I'm just gonna keep going to, like, smaller and smaller cool, artsy beer towns until there's nothing left.

Dax Shepard

Okay, so you have a cautionary tale. Let's get to the business at hand. I do have one. There might be several cautionary tales within this big meta cautionary tale, so. Okay, great.

Amy

This took place in the summer of 1996, and I was living in Austin. I'd just gotten out of college I was living with my two roommates, Julie and Jason. I don't think we were working. We were just going to see shows and, like, drinking shiner Bach and eating tacos. And that's what we did every day.

It was so fun. So we had this friend named Ian who had rented a cabin for the summer about an hour south of Austin. And he invited us down one Friday afternoon to just hang out, party a little bit, get into some shenanigans. So we drove down and got there around 430 in the afternoon. So it was the three of us and then Ian and then this friend of his name, Warren.

This is all going to make sense in a second. While these, I can already tell Warren's going to be the variable we need to keep our eyes on. You can already predict that. Yeah, I can feel that he's gonna be the issue, but continue. Don't trust Warrens.

Dax Shepard

It's generally the friend of the friend that's the problem. Totally. Yeah. This guy that we'd never met before was there, but the other four of us had been long term friends. So, you know, we start drinking, we're hanging out, and the sun starts to set, and Ian's like, let's go down to the creek and see the water before it gets dark.

Amy

It's really cool down there. You have to take this trail that's like a half of a mile, and then you get to this ridge line, and then you take these rustic steps down with, like, logs and rocks and shit. Then you get down to the creek and walk a little further. So as we're walking to the creek, my friend Julie and I kind of hang back and we're like, let's convince the boys to go skinny dipping, and we'll take their clothes and run. Oh, sure.

Monica Padman

Classic trick. It's classic, right, Monica? Of course we're gonna do that. We're gonna steal their clothes and run. So that exact thing happens.

Amy

We get down to the creek basin, we walk a little ways to get to deeper water, and we're like, hey, guys, what do you think about skinny? And, like, before we can even stop saying the sentence, they're already like, 5 seconds. All their clothes are off, their shoes are off, and they're in the water. They've been waiting their whole lives for two ladies to ask them to get naked. Yeah, totally.

Dax Shepard

I'm sorry to interject now, but this sounds very much like Krause Springs. Do you know where Wimberly is? Yeah, it was in Wimberley. Okay. Have you been to Krause Springs?

Yeah, a bunch of times. I love it. But you walk down all these pathways, and there's a ridge, and then there's a beautiful creek. It's really similar. My best friend lives in Wimberley.

Oh, really? Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Shout out Wabi. Wab's best friend.

Monica Padman

Let's shout him out. Matthew Vasquez. Warren Vasquez. Oh, my God. Was it this Warren?

Amy

I hope it wasn't the sworn when you're ever gonna get aired. This Warren does not like me anymore. Okay. So they get naked. They jump in.

As soon as they do, you know, we bend down, scoop up all their clothes and their shoes, every single thing, and we just start running. We run up the steps. We're, like, laughing. You know how you laugh so hard you're, like, out of breath? And just the visual.

I'm imagining the three naked guys with shit swinging around, like, chasing after us. So we don't even turn around. We run straight to the cabin. We throw shit down, we get on the patio, and we're like, yeah, awesome. High five.

Pour some drinks and just sit there and wait for them to come back up the trail. Because this cabin's in, like, a pod of other cabins. There's other people out milling around, and we just thought it was going to be hilarious for them to come up the trail naked. And we would all have a big laugh, but, like, 20 minutes go by. Oh, God.

Dax Shepard

Uh oh. 30 minutes. No, boys. It's getting dark outside. I know.

Amy

And we realized, like, something terrible has probably happened. We remembered that Ian, the guy who lived there, and Jason, our roommate, had grabbed little flashlights when we left the house. And remember, this is, like, the nineties. So there's no cell phones with flashlights or anything. It's either those little bitty mag lights.

Dax Shepard

Yep. So we start rummaging around in their pant pockets, and we find two mag lights, Ian's and Jason's. And we dig around in Warren's pants. Oh, no, we didn't find a flashlight, but what we found was the thickest pair of eyeglasses you've ever seen. Like, coke bottle thick.

Amy

And the two of us pull it out, and we're like, oh, my God. This guy is, like, seriously visually impaired. Yeah. Legally blind for sure. And he didn't wear his glasses.

Dax Shepard

Cause he wanted to look handsome. And now he's trapped down in the water, naked. Exactly. And he didn't want to tell people he was blind. He didn't want us to know that.

You're right. There's a lot of cautionary tales. One is like, don't let your vanity kill you. Oh, you're right. Keep your glasses on.

Madeline

Also. Be nice, or. Well, I think that'll be the overarching. We realized, like, oh, we left this blind guy down there in the creek. It's super dark.

Monica Padman

Oh, fuck. We've gotta go rescue them. So we grab the flashlights, and we head back down the trail. And as I'm telling this, I was thinking about this this morning. Like, it's really funny.

Amy

We did not grab their clothes or their shoes or anything, of course. We're just like, get the flashlights and find these guys. So we get to the stairs area and hear the three of them come. And they looked like they had been to war. Like a complete disaster.

Our roommate Jason was covered in mud from head to toes. Caked on him. Oh, everywhere. Like, lord of the floor. Scratches, scratches.

Dax Shepard

Oh, my lord. Was there a tiger? His hair was all messed up. He had, like, sticks stuck on him. Ian, the guy who lived there, he was just dirty.

Amy

He didn't look as bad, but that guy, Warren, y'all. Oh, no. Was blood coming out of his eyes? Monica. Geez, Monica.

Monica Padman

Well, you guys, he's blind. He looked like someone had full force just punched him in the face. Oh, no. His eye was all swollen up, like it was a black and blue. He had a big gash on his forehead.

Amy

Like, with all this coagulated blood. He looked just totally dazed. His knees were all busted up. Well, also, just see how scary it looked. Like it's dark and they're shining a flashlight, and they're revealing, kneeling Warren's mangled face.

Dax Shepard

Like, you gotta think of how dramatic too, the lighting probably was. Did you guys go like, ah. When you shine the light on us. We'Re like, what the hell happened? Just as we suspected.

Amy

Like, as soon as we stole their clothes, they came charging after us. But since Warden couldn't see, he tripped over this log and he face planted immediately into a big rock award. I want this story to be funny, but it's kind of sad too. It's okay. It can be sad.

Monica Padman

Life is both a comedy and a tragedy. True, he'd fallen on his face, and they thought he was a little concussed. And because it was getting so dark down there, they didn't want to just leave him. Oh, yeah. So Ian, the cabin guy, stayed with him while Jason, our roommate, tried to go find help.

Dax Shepard

Oh, my God. Naked? Was he lost? Yeah. How were you guys able to navigate to the cabin?

No problem. But Jason cause it had gotten dark. Outside and he kept slipping in the mud or something. Wait for it, Monica. He couldn't find the rustic stairs back up to the ridgeline.

Okay. He had some rock climbing experience. So he decided he would climb up, like, the 25 or 30 foot wall to get up to the cliff above. This is also a cautionary tale. Well, he's drunk and young.

Monica Padman

Oh, he's drunk. I forgot. Right. And remember, they're all still naked, which is important here because this wall of this cliff was covered in vines. And so he started fashioning, like, a harness out of the vines.

Amy

Like, wrap the vines around his feet, the vines around his waist. He put the vines between his legs to create, like, this kind of seat. And he literally climbed up all these vines to the top. And then he helped the guys back up. So needless to say, nobody wanted to party anymore.

Nobody liked us. Yeah. Everybody decided we should just go home. So we went home. We drove back to Austin that night.

Dax Shepard

You didn't spend the night. We just drove back. Yeah, let's go. It was bad. No one talked in the car on the way back.

Amy

But flash forward to the next morning. Julie and I are hanging out in the kitchen having coffee when we hear these sounds coming out of Jason's room. Like whimpering, ill groans, sad things. We opened his door, and he was sprawled out on his bed with his sheets kicked off. He was again totally nude.

And he looked like someone had taken his body and dipped it in like acid. Or that he'd been burned. Like his head and neck, arms, palms of his hands, torso, legs, feet. Everything was like this magenta color. And was he a blistered everywhere?

Some blisters had started in all of his crotchal region. Crotchel? Yeah, front and the back. Poison ivy. The vines were some kind of poison?

Zara

Yeah. So we took him to the emergency room and the doctor diagnosed him with, and I quote, the worst case of poison ivy he'd ever seen in his entire career. What did they do for that? They shot him full of steroids, tons of benadryl. But he was just on his back in his bed for days after that.

Dax Shepard

Oh, my. Oh, my God. Did you guys feel so bad? I still feel bad. It's taken me 25 years for me to even want to tell this story because I still feel so bad about it.

Amy

I mean, that cliff that he climbed up was like Jurassic park level. Like poison ivy jungle. And, you know, the sad thing is, it's such a g rated joke. Like, it started out so silly and innocent. It's almost like out of a movie about 9th graders?

Dax Shepard

Yeah. What was that? 9th graders about? 9Th graders? Yeah.

It's so innocent and silly. And you guys almost murdered two people between Warren's concussion and this. I know. But also cautionary tale for Jason. Know your limits.

Monica Padman

You think you're this big rock climber and you're not, right? It's almost like, don't go chasing waterfalls. Stick to the. Yeah, like you can climb rock. That doesn't mean you can climb vines.

You're not Tarzan. He took it a little too far. With making his grundle and stuff. Or his crotchal parts. There was a lot of tales in there, but this one, I think is just.

Amy

Don't steal the skinny dipper's clothes. Any of you stayed in touch with Jason? No, it's been a long time. But we were still friends after that. I mean, we lived together for a while.

That guy Warren, though, he told Ian, like, I never want to see those girls again. He doesn't have to see them if he doesn't wear his glasses. You know what's crazy? Don't make fun of people. I'm sorry, that was just poor people.

Monica Padman

It was really good. I can't believe you didn't laugh and. I had to be sad. I was thinking, what's funny is I had this dead wrong, which is Warren wasn't the issue. You guys were the issue.

Dax Shepard

And from Warren's point of view, it was like, well, these friends of friends fucking almost killed us. Uh huh. Warren's like the innocent story. You're the friends of friends? Yes.

Monica Padman

Oh, my God, what a twist. If you found Warren and he told the story, it would be the opposite side. We're talking to Warren at 240, actually. Oh, my God. I wonder where that guy is now.

As a doozy, I mean, I'm gonna say, yeah, no more pranks for anyone. Well, yeah, you gotta add up all the pranks over time. The ones that went good, the ones that went bad. Did it curb your future prankiness? Did you back off pranks after that, or.

Dax Shepard

No, no. Just, you know, the stealing of clothes. I love to play pranks on people. That was a rhetorical question, but wow. Yeah, I had a hunch these cautionary tales are gonna be a bummer because no one's really learned any lessons.

Well, I guess that's true. Maybe you're just telling this story to yourself. We do that sometimes. We tell other people the stories we need to hear. That was kind of therapeutic.

Amy

Thanks, guys. Needed to get that off my chest. Well, Amy, that was a joy. And you seem like you were really fun to grow up with. I'm a little jealous that I wasn't in Austin with you.

Dax Shepard

Or now in Asheville, because I love to go skinny dipping and get poison ivy. Come on, it's not too late. Thank you for chatting with us. Yeah. Very nice meeting you.

Amy

Could I ask you a super favor to say happy birthday to my friend Lori? She is such an armchair fan. She loves you. She turned me on to you guys. And she's turning 50 next week.

Monica Padman

Oh, amazing. Happy birthday, Lori. That means we were both born roughly the same time. I guess she was probably 74, but I'm knocking right on the back door. Hope she has a great birthday.

Dax Shepard

Stay strong, Lori. Happy birthday. Thank you both so much. Yeah. Take care, Amy.

Monica Padman

Even though I wanted it to be Amy Hansen, that was very fun. It was. She's a fun person that Amy we just talked to. I hate pranks. I know you do.

Dax Shepard

They're one of your triggers. Should we do that as a prompt? Oh, that's good. Pranks gone wrong. We not done that one.

Zara

No. Didn't we, cuz? Member the girl in her school? Yeah, we did. I don't care.

Dax Shepard

We can do it again. We're gonna have to recycle, for crying out loud. We gotta do. Not yet. 48 again.

Monica Padman

Six more years, then we recycle. All right. Here's Madeline. Hi, Monica. Hi, Dax.

Dax Shepard

Hi. Is this Madeline? It's Madeline. Look at your closet, Madeline. It's one of the most beautiful names in the world.

And I don't know if you've heard enough episodes to know that my grandmother's name was Madeline. And she thought because she was born in, I guess, the thirties, that Madeline was a grandma name and an ugly name. So guess what? She went by her whole life. So much prettier.

Midge. Midge. So much prettier. Objectively, I love my name, so thank you so much. No, it's so beautiful.

We were always confused growing up. Up. Like, why does grandma Midge think Madeline is so gross? But Midge is like a super elegant name. Midge Boltink.

Monica Padman

Oh, wow. Yeah. Boultink. You heard it? She just doubled down.

Dax Shepard

I guess she did. Good for her. She did. Yeah. Maybe Madeline Boultink was, too.

Mixed messages. Yeah, she's a straight shooter. Madeline, where are you? Other than in your closet? I'm in my closet in London, Ontario, Canada.

Oh, my God. So close to Detroit. Yeah, pretty close. Do you ever go to Detroit? No.

Yeah, of course not. You're what, about an hour and a half from Toronto, 2 hours. About 2 hours, yeah. And you know Rachel McAdams is from your hometown, right? Oh, my gosh, she is.

Madeline

One time I saw her in a coffee shop. Wow. No. What did she order? Do you know?

I don't know what she ordered. She was just in the coffee shop. But I used to work at the University of Toronto and there was a coffee shop on campus that she went to. Oh, my gosh. Was she with Ryan Gosling?

No, I don't think so. Was she a student there? No, I think that she was just in Toronto. Can you tell us more about her? I wish I could.

Dax Shepard

Okay. So, Madeline, you have a cautionary tale. Does it take place in London, Ontario? It doesn't. It actually takes place in Alberta in a city called Grand Prairie, which is quite north.

Madeline

In Alberta. Sounds beautiful. It was like a prairie, but it was close to the mountain, so I mean, I couldn't complain. It was back in 2017 and I moved there with my boyfriend at the time, who is now my husband, for his job. So we were going to move into our first house there and we worked all week and.

Wait, should I tell you the name of my cautionary tale first? Yeah, please. I didn't know you made a name for it. That's great. I did the cautionary tale.

Bottom line is don't brush your teeth sitting in bed. Oh, okay. I love. Okay, good, because that sounds very innocuous. I wasn't dangerous.

Yes. We worked all week and then got home Friday afternoon. And we're going to pack up the house to move over the weekend. And so we packed until probably about midnight, decided it was time to call it quits. And so my husband went into the ensuite and was brushing his teeth, getting ready for bed, and I was like, I'm just going to take a beat, sit on the bed, scroll my phone for a minute really quick.

Dax Shepard

Madeline, I hate to interrupt your flow, but you call the bathroom off of the bedroom and en suite. You just educated me on something. Yeah, that's what we call it. Wow. Do you know that Monica primary bath?

Rob

I've heard that. Is it canadian or is. It's not, right. Okay, so he was in the ensuite, which is the bathroom connected to the bedroom. That's correct.

Dax Shepard

Okay, lovely. I was just sitting up against the pillow, scrolling my phone. And my husband's very sweet every time I'm around and I haven't brushed my teeth yet, and he gets his toothbrush ready with the toothpaste. He does mine as well, so I knew it. Was sitting there waiting for me.

Madeline

So I was like, can you just pass me my toothbrush? I'll brush my teeth while I'm sitting here and get up and continue with my bedtime routine. And so he did, and I'm sitting there just brushing my teeth. And it's an electric toothbrush, and it runs its course, and it's done. So I'm sitting there holding it in my mouth, still getting up to go rinse.

And since I was leaning on some pillows, I needed a little bit of momentum to get out of bed. Okay. So I leaned back, and I went to, like, sit up. As I went to sit up, my knee also came towards me, and it met my elbow and hit my toothbrush, which lodged into the back of my throat. Oh, my God.

Monica Padman

What? So, like, I impaled my throat. My. It punctured your throat? It did.

Madeline

No, it went into my throat. Yeah. So I get up, I run to the bathroom, and I, like, push my husband out of the way, and I spit into the sink. And it's just like a bloodbath really quick. When you hold your toothbrush out of your mouth, did you feel it coming out of the back of your throat?

Good question. I don't remember. Yeah. You're in a state of shock. Oh, my God.

Zara

I know. I already had the heebie jeebies at the notion you were brushing your teeth without water. Oh, my God. Like, that's where my heebie Jeb. What do you mean?

Dax Shepard

The toothbrush had been buttered, then brought to her in bed. Yeah. For me to brush my teeth, I gotta butter it, and then I run it under water. I need a lot of water in there. You did that before.

So it came in almost drippy and a little. Mine doesn't need to be dripped. I rinse it first, then I butter it, and then I brush. But just imagine, like, I did dry toothbrush, toothpaste, then handed to you in bed, and you just start smearing paste all over your mouth. I get what you mean.

Monica Padman

You need it to be a little wet. But he had already gone ahead. Yeah, we didn't raw dog it. Oh, my God. I just remembered the throat.

Dax Shepard

Oh, yes. Okay. Bloodbath in the sink. And he's like, oh, my gosh. What happened?

Madeline

And I was like, I hit my toothbrush in my throat. So he looks. And his face instantly changed from like, why are you pushing me to like, oh, my gosh. We have to go to the emergency room right now. Oh, gosh.

It's well after midnight. We're driving to the emergency room, and we get there, we're in triage, and the nurse is like, what happened? And I'm so embarrassed. Like, I don't want to tell her what happened. Yeah.

What I say is, if this is any better, I say I just brush my teeth a little too hard. Oh, that's worse. Aren't we all weird? We're so weird. It's such a bizarre decision to make, but I can totally relate to doing it.

Monica Padman

Me too. Yeah, I was like, fight, flight, or freeze? So they still provided me excellent care. We go into the waiting room, and we waited probably an hour, which is not bad. We get into the patient room to see the doctor, and he's just, like, flabbergasted.

Madeline

Like, has never seen anything like this before. And he's like, well, it's really late at night. I'm not calling the dentist on Cole, but we need to stitch this. Oh, he goes and gets the materials he needs to put stitches in my throat. I feel like you need a surgeon.

Monica Padman

For this too, because how do you even. It's so deep in your. Okay, we'll get. Exactly. So he gets it with this big, big, long needle, freezes it.

Madeline

Once the anesthetic sets in, he pulls up this huge needle that is, like, curved like, it's like a huge fish hook. So he starts stitching, and I'm laying back, and there's all these, like, surgical lights above me. And my husband's standing there, and he's watching him, and he'll do a stitch, and then, like, pause for a second, take a step back, and at one point he's like, I understand why dentists have those suckers, because it was just, like, pooling saliva. Oh, sure. Of my throat.

So we do a stitch, undo it, do a stitch, undo it. Like, I couldn't feel the pain, but. I could feel it. So anyways, he finishes up, writes me a prescription for antibiotics so I don't get an infection, and sends us on our way. So then the next day, I go.

To the pharmacy to get the antibiotics, and she's like, I see you have a penicillin allergy, but we normally don't prescribe this antibiotic. Can I ask what it's for? And I was just like, I can't tell her the story either. So I'm just like, oh, I have a cut in my mouth. And then I, like, ran out of there right now, though.

Like, it healed up perfectly. How many stitches did you receive? Do you know what? I don't know, but I did send in pictures, like before and after. Oh, Rob says he doesn't have them, but I bet Emma has them.

Dax Shepard

Did you send them to Emma? I sent them to Emma. Let me text her. I gotta see this. I'm gonna regret seeing this, but of course I have to see this.

So. Wow. Okay. That answers my question. Cause you can't get your fingers back in there.

So you just have an enormous, long fish hook that you do it with. Yep. That's how they do it. Which I never would have known. I do wish he called the dentist on call, though.

I just love, though, that you're, like, ascending level of embarrassment. You had the one lie, which is I did it brushing my teeth, which you didn't then even. That's too embarrassing. So now it's just. I cut my mouth.

Madeline

Yeah.

Dax Shepard

The idea of having a whole. Yeah. When you were swallowing, what was happening? It felt like, you know when you have a sore throat and it's razor blades? Oh, you were just talking about that.

You just had that. And that's a horrible feeling. So I took lots of tylenol. I didn't really eat anything solid for a few days, but then it was like those stitches that dissolve and out they went, and I just carried on. Wow.

Yeah. And your mouth heals very quickly. I imagine your throat does too, right? It does such a specific cautionary. I am scared now.

Monica Padman

I am definitely only going to brush my teeth in an upright. Standing up in the ensuite. Yeah. Although you don't have an en suite yet. Monica has to go in a hallway like a caveman to go to her.

I do. Sucks. It's a long walk, but maybe it saved my life. Could have. Oh, God, I would love video of you trying to rock yourself.

Dax Shepard

Oh, they've come. Let's see. Oh, it is a legit. Just whole. Okay, great.

Though this is slightly better than I was expecting. It's after the surgery. Well, it's on the side of your mouth. Oh, here's a little more fresh before it's healed. I guess that's the stitches.

Monica Padman

Yeah. I was picturing the center punching your throat. No, it was kind of like biting it throat. It's just a little on the side. But also your tongue is so cute.

Dax Shepard

Do you notice how you don't have any, like, white on your tongue or anything? It's so healthy. Maybe she did a filter on it. This is, like, one of the healthiest tongues I've ever seen. It's like a baby's.

Monica Padman

It does look nice. I feel a little weird that we're zooming in? No. Do you like this? Right?

Dax Shepard

Cause it's so complimentary. Sure. I'd be so anxious if somebody was zooming in on a picture of my tongue. Unless you had that tongue. You'd be like, yeah, go ahead and get close.

Monica Padman

Things have gone too far. But we're very grossed out by your story. Well, I'm glad you're grossed out by it. Actually, after I submitted, my friend was like, no, you should submit a different story. Well, maybe we'll talk to you a second time for a different story.

Dax Shepard

Do you have a lot of stories? Yeah, I'm a pretty clumsy person, so I also had another good cautionary tale. But if something comes up about washing machines, maybe I can do that. Okay. Okay, great.

Well, it's very nice to meet you, Madeline. I'm glad you healed up. Thank you for having me. This was like a bucket list together experience. Yeah.

You probably don't even have a scar back there, right? Because the mouth heals so nicely. Not that I've noticed. We'll send a picture, close up picture of your tongue in the side of your mouth. I'll give it a good once over.

I'll tell you. You just want to see my tongue again. It's gorgeous. You should be very proud. Well, really nice meeting you.

Thanks for telling us that story. Amazing. Thank you, guys. Bye. I feel like I want to go look at my tongue in the mirror.

Up close to see if it looks like I want to see. What? I would be very nervous that mine had, like, some white on it or something. I don't know. I drink a lot of things.

Monica Padman

I know. I don't know. Most of us, you know, small fuck. I don't want to make anyone self conscious, but, you know, sometimes you see someone, their tongues, like, white. That's.

You're right. We're not allowed to. Yeah, because I don't think anyone's picking that or doing it intentionally. I don't think you can give yourself that on purpose. But I brush my tongue really thoroughly every morning and every night.

Me, too. Because I have a big fear of having that whiteness. Well, also, that's where a lot of the bacteria lives. And you know where else it lives? According to my dentist.

So once I learned this, I do it all the time. Your palate, that's tickly. Yeah. It's gaggy and tickly, but it's important to do. I'll do it.

Dax Shepard

I'll add that tonight. In fact, I can't wait now to brush my teeth. I might do it in bed. No, I'm not gonna go into the ensuite. Oh, my God.

You know, my therapist said to me, I've never laughed this hard in therapy. I haven't laughed this hard in a very long time. But he said to me, well, so you are, let's say, very resistant to learning. Oh, that is. I fucking.

That hit me. That's not true, though. So hard. In many ways, it's really a bullseye. I mean, in some ways it's true.

Monica Padman

In some ways, it's not true. Yeah, it really floored. Oh, my God. You could hear that. Oh, my God.

Dax Shepard

You know, like, when someone hits something. You can only hear that coming from a few people. Hence the. You have a hard time learning. Oh, yeah.

Cause you don't trust anybody or anything. So kind of came out of the blue. I just said that because. Tongues. Yeah.

Cause I am gonna try brushing the roof of my. And you're gonna try to impale yourself. No, I'm just gonna make an effort to be more open to learning. Oh, that's good. I was laughing, Zara.

Cause I'm like, it's so right. And how embarrassing. I'm expressedly someone who claims to love learning. I like learning info from a book that no one has to deliver to me. I know.

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How's your social battery? Right now, it's pretty low, although I think I'm coming back. You're on the upswing. I'm on the upswing. But for a minute, it was low.

And you just had therapy on Saturday. I saw you right after you had had it. Did I feel happy? Yeah. You felt level.

Monica Padman

Yeah, I felt it. I've been talking about that therapy session all week. I learned something really important in that therapy session, and I have been sharing it. Look, it can be easy to ignore our social battery and spread ourselves thin, especially with social gatherings picking up after the winter. Whats the right amount of socializing for you and how do you recharge?

Dax Shepard

Maybe you thrive around people or maybe you need some time alone. Therapy can give you the self awareness to build a social life that doesnt drain your battery. And when you are feeling worn out from socializing, therapy can help give you the tools you need to take care of yourself and recharge, because a full battery is the key to a full life. If youre thinking of starting therapy, give better help a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule.

Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapist anytime for no additional charge. Find your social sweet spot with betterhelp. Visit betterhelp.com dax today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp. H dash e dash p.com dax.

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Rob

All right, here's Eric. Eric Richardson. All our friends are calling in. Hi. Is it Eric?

Yeah. You've draped some kind of makeshift sound dampener behind you. I like it. Me, too. It's blankets and, like one of those arc lights.

I got some potato chip bag clips. Oh, you went all out. It looks good. It sounds good. We appreciate it.

Dax Shepard

Are you a fabricator by trade or just today you stepped up to the plate. You called me on it. I'm an architect. Oh. Oh, my God.

Rob

I'm a nerd. Architects are cool. My best friend's dad is an architect, and he's very cool. Where are you at? I'm in Seattle.

Dax Shepard

Great town for an architect. It is. And do you do commercial or everything? Did you love Fountainhead? Do you like Howard Rourke?

Tell me. You know, I read it when I was in the 8th grade when I was a little kid. I was obsessed with it. I was like, that's what I want to do. Then it kind of came out later that it's just this kind of narcissism, and there's all this toxic philosophy in it.

Rob

And I was like, huh? Yeah. But I did a long roundabout thing before I got into architecture. I went and I was a design builder and I built, like, earth houses. Okay, wow.

Dax Shepard

Very Washington of you. I lived all over the place, so I moved all around in Colorado, California. You've done it all. Yeah. The fountainhead, I think, appeals to a young man a lot because it's all about having conviction in who you are and a vision.

And then you get older and you're like, yeah, it's my way or the highway. And then I'm lonely and no one likes me. So maybe there's another approach. Well, that's the biggest problem with architecture is egos. We call them like, you know, the caped architects.

Rob

They come in and it's like, I've come to save you poor, ignorant people. Yeah, it's terrible. And I mean, it's one of the most collaborative professions there are. And it should be all about good interdisciplinary thinking. You know, asking the questions is the funnest part.

Monica Padman

You sound nice. Like my architecture bill. Shout out. I love him. I take that as the highest praise.

It is. Okay, you have a cautionary tale. Yes. This is actually from my honeymoon, 2007. My wife and I got married in Portland.

Rob

We wanted to go to Thailand for like, a month and really, like, do it up. My wife's best friend decides to get married the week after, even though we've been planning it for forever. So anyway, we have to, like, go to New York City right after. So we're like, okay, where's close? We were kind of dirtbag kids.

27 is kind of young, I guess, to get married. Yeah. So we've done Central America a bunch, but we've never been to Belize. It's super beautiful for a honeymoon. It's great because there's not a lot to do, so you can just do what you need to do on your honeymoon.

Dax Shepard

And it's on the Caribbean. Yeah, yeah. We were in Ambergees cay. We stayed at this little beach cabana, three cabanas, and then like a restaurant, like a little tiki bar type thing. This sounds like heaven.

Monica Padman

I want to go there. It really was like, the owners, maybe they've been on, like, Jimmy Buffet tour too long. Like, stay too long in Margaritaville, a little bit older. Expat. Very nice.

Dax Shepard

Boozy. Very boozy. I think one of them was reformed, but then it would, like, kind of go off the rails. Sure. Dax Shepard type.

Rob

Yeah, they have a 14 year old son. And there was always this kind of, like, tension and drama. Like he was always getting into trouble. We were just having a good time, and we're trying to, like, ignore all of that. There are these, like, kind of fights, and, like, we're gonna send you to military school.

Monica Padman

Oh, my God. There's a little bit of a lot. But anyway, so we kind of ignore that. We have beautiful days. And then on the third night, we went to the nice local restaurant.

Rob

My wife decides to eat the salad. Oh, okay. And I was kind of like, oh, I don't know, the next day. Jackson Pollock and porcelain type situation. Yeah.

You know, I wanted to, like, stick around, but, you know, out of here. Monica policy. Yeah. I was like, all right, what do I do? And then I remember this kid that I've been, like, trying to put out of my mind.

He's very boisterous. He was like, I'll show you the best spots on the islands for spear fishing. I was like, oh, great. You know, that's going to be fun. I lived in Hawaii, done some spear fishing before.

I was like, that sounds great. So I got really excited. I'm like a big child when it comes to the ocean. Fins, masks, spears, hop into a kayak. The whole place is like this big, linear beach.

And then there's a reef. I did my Monica fact check. It's the longest barrier reef in the western hemisphere. Wow, 700 miles. There's, like, a half a mile between the beach and the reef.

And it's just this kind of, like, monolithic extrusion. Yeah. So we went out. There are different little anchor spots. You tie off your kayak.

It's like a swimming pool. There's not a lot going on. It's kind of boring, and there's no fish. So it's kind of like, what about the next spot? This kid kind of had a lot of pigeon y isms.

Dax Shepard

Oh, okay. What's that hybrid language, like slang. Island slang. He was, like, really trying to fit in, take on the local language. But it was kind of like, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, sure, sure. Poser. Yeah. We went to the next spot. Same thing.

Rob

We went to another spot each time. You know, it's like, oh, big time. I know what? You know, we're going to find the spot. You know, it's going to be great.

Tons of fish. Every time. I was like, all right, you know, I think it's third or fourth time. And, like, we left at, like, eight in the morning. It was well afternoon.

Like one or two. We just brought water. It was, like, hasty. When I was running out to the kayak, I was, like, applying the sunscreen myself. Yeah.

I didn't want to ask my wife, but something snapped within this kid because I started complaining and, like, questioned I think his masculinity a little bit, that it's like, okay, fine, I got it. We're gonna go to the spot. I was like, all right, great. I think this is a breakthrough moment. So we paddle way farther south from where we were half an hour.

Paddle, same thing. Anchor, tie off, hop in. And we start cruising around and does start to, like, drop off and get deep. And I'm like, oh, this is sweet. Start going down and checking stuff out.

Like, this is perfect. And as I'm just kind of happy enjoying it, you know, look over the kid. Like, good job. About that time, I started to realize that we're being pulled and being pulled pretty fast. Oh, you're in, like, a current.

Basically, he took me to this huge channel where there's this kind of cut in the reef. We're, like, in this river where basically at low tide, that whole 700 miles thing was just emptying out in this channel, out through the reef. Oh, my God. I look around at him and again, I'm like, all right, time to turn around. And so we basically just start paddling back.

We're paddling pretty hard. This is probably, like a quarter mile gap in the reef. So there's no rocks on either side, but we're just continuing to get pulled out. Oh, boy. It starts to fuck with your head.

I knew that. The last thing you want to do is panic. Just stay calm. This kind of went on. We got pulled out into the ocean pretty much just, like, past the reef.

All right, now we need to kind of figure out a way to, like, come back around. And so we started trying to get to the edge of the channel really quick. Are you swimming or you're in the kayak? At this point, we're swimming. We have our, like, fins and masks on.

We have our spears. Well, don't lose those like a couple of idiots. So as we're, like, out there trying to come back, when you're, like, a half a mile away, you don't realize how big the waves are on the reef. The waves are huge. Crashing on big, jagged, rocky reefs.

Trying to, like, thread the needle of getting out of that big channel in the current and getting close to the reef, but not too close. And we were probably paddling, like, an hour or so, just trying to get back in, and it started to go through those, like, head games of my wife flying back by herself. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Oh, did you hear about Eric?

What an idiot. They never found him. Oh. Or I was, like, thinking, oh, well, we're gonna be those people that are just, like, out in the open ocean for multiple days, slowly getting pecked at. So it was like, all these terrible thoughts, and I swear to God, I could see back to the cabana, like, a half a mile away, and I could imagine my wife just sitting there, just like, where is he?

What's going on? Like, it's just like, please. I think as I was spinning in my head, this kid was also totally losing his shit. Freaking out, of course. So he, like, pulled his mask off, you know, water, and he was like, I can't.

Monica Padman

Oh, God. I'm not as tough as I thought I was. And I don't speak pidgey. The mask was off. Like, literally, the mask was off.

Rob

The dark part of our brains was like, he can't swim anymore. Like, what the fuck am I gonna do? Yeah, every man for themselves at this point. And then I was like, I'm not gonna ditch the owner's kid and try and go and get help. Grab the kid's hands.

And I'm like, we're fucking going. Like, you are swimming. Kick. Like, stop. And I think basically, because I had to convince him to keep going, I basically talked myself into continuing to push and kick.

Dax Shepard

You told him what you needed to hear? Pretty much. We made it out right around the edge. There are a few times where he got pretty close to rocks, but got out, got back to the kayak, paddled back onto the beach, stumbled into the cabana. The first thing I did was just lean into the sink and just drink out of the sink, which is, like, the last thing you should ever do.

Monica Padman

Oh, yeah. Oh, my God. I didn't have water in multiple hours. My whole back. You could see where my fingers were trying to apply, and there's just this, like, red raised well, so the cautionary tale is, don't do anything aggressive on your honeymoon.

Dax Shepard

That's not the time. Don't listen to boisterous kids and take them for their word, which is obviously, like, a duh. Yeah, I feel like the cautionary tale is much more. Don't allow a 14 year old boy to lead you anywhere. Cause they're gonna be full of bravado, and they do not know what they're doing.

They're trying to act like a man. It's like, an awkward situation where it's, like, oh, this kid's kind of a guy. This is totally fine, right? Sure. And I don't know what 14 years old is on the island.

Maybe that's 19 in New York. I hope he got sent to military school. I kept pushing him, too. I only made it worse. Maybe that's part of the cautionary tale.

Monica Padman

Don't. Don't challenge your 14 year old guy. Your wife, when she has the harness. Right. Oh, that would have been so sad for her if she got food poisoning and her husband.

Dax Shepard

Well. And then she would tell herself it was her fault. Cause had she not gotten food poisoning, he wouldn't have left her. No. She'd be like, my husband's an idiot.

In a weird way. I don't know why I think this, but I've been in this situation probably four times in my life where you're losing your shit, and you have to say, oh, this is that time you hear about. You need to get your thinking together, or you actually are going to die. I feel like my Bora Bora story that you probably heard is very similar, being halfway between that island and the barge they jumped off of and just going like, yeah, well, I can't swim to either of those points. I don't have enough energy left.

But in a weird way, I'm super grateful to have had that experience. Do you feel that way? Like, I feel like people should have that. No. Cause a lot of people die.

Rob

This has happened twice, though. I. One time when I lived in Hawaii, I was out swimming with the dolphins. Perfect day. The humpbacks are just there.

I can totally see them pectoral fins waving. Tried to go farther out, and, yeah, I had a really long, tough bout trying to get back where you keep. Like, getting on your back. You're like, well, the only way I'll make it is if I float on my back and paddle. But then you can't see where you're going.

Dax Shepard

You get off course. Just no more oceans. Yeah. So I don't fuck with the ocean anymore. Yeah.

Monica Padman

Smart. That was strike two. Strike three. I'm done. Yeah.

Dax Shepard

Yeah. I just don't want to ever, like, get on a cruise ship and get, like, knocked off. I think about that every time I've been on a cruise ship. You're out at night looking at the stars. It's beautiful.

But then you start looking at the churn water, and it's black, and you're like, oh, my God. And it takes the boat, like, 5 miles to turn around. That's kind of terrifying. Well, Eric, I'm really glad you made it. I actually am more curious.

So that was 17 years ago. So that boy's 32. Oh, my God. I wonder if he took over the family business. Maybe he'll call in for a prompt at some point.

Rob

I was an idiot kid, so no judgment. And also, I was an idiot 27 year old. That's true. Well, it's very nice meeting you. Hearing that story.

I just have to say, you're obviously at the top of the game, and what you do for me, it's like, how can I be a better human? Your honesty, your love, your truth, your banter, everything. You guys bring so much joy to my life. And I know so many other people. So thank you, guys.

Monica Padman

Thank you. Thank you, Eric. Well, it's so nice meeting you. You're every bit of every armchair. You're super smart and kind.

We're grateful for you. Yeah, big time. Back at you. All right, be well. I'm so glad he didn't drown before he listened to us.

Dax Shepard

Me too. We could have had one last cherry. We need him. We love him. Okay, seriously though, I'm.

Monica Padman

I'm saying it and I mean it. I'm never getting in an ocean. Oh, wow. Cuz I already hate it. And I already have spidey senses.

It's not good for me. But we've had an so many bad stories. Yeah, the ocean's a bit unpredictable. Yeah, I prefer my unpredictable on terra firma. Yeah.

In my fragrance. Oh, okay. In your connections group. Yeah. Here's Riley.

Hello. Hi, Riley. What does your sweatshirt say? Camp something? Yeah, it says the camp store, Carlsbad.

Zara

I'm from San Diego, so we go camping in Carlsbad every year. Are there caves there? Caverns or something? Yeah, there are, but we camp right on the Carlsbad State beach. And I got it because it looks like padres colors.

Monica Padman

Oh, wow. It's a cool sweatshirt. Your voice sounds like somebody, and I can't place it. Well, give me some time. I'll work on it.

Rob

Okay. Where are you at currently? Currently, I'm actually in a place called Jersey Channel Islands, which is in between England and France. It's 11:20 p.m. Where I'm at.

Dax Shepard

Wow. In my head when I imagine this moment, I was never in a hotel in Jersey, but my dad's from here, so, like, all my family lives here, so I'm just out here visiting family. Oh, fun. And is it owned by France or England? England, but it's actually closer to France.

Interesting. Mixed messies. Okay, you have a cautionary tale. My cautionary tale is set in 2019. I was a sophomore in college at San Diego state.

Zara

Like I said, I'm from San Diego. So I was working at a brewery next to my house where my parents lived, and I was kind of on, like, a health kick, not feeling so great after two years of college partying, I was trying to be more active, going to spin class, going to yoga, drinking kombucha, like, on a health wave. So every day, I would come into work, and I'd bring a kombucha with me. I had this one co worker who took special interest in me. I was not reciprocating, but he was nice.

And one day, he came into work and was like, I brought you something. And he's like, it's a kombucha. And I'm like, well, that's awfully observant of you. Thanks. I'll take it.

Even though didn't really want to take it, mostly because it was watermelon, which is not a flavor I enjoy. Okay. But I was like, whatever. I'm just gonna take it to avoid the awkwardness. And I also just felt awkward.

I'd rather just do my job, take your nice gesture, and move on. But I didn't want to drink it because I just don't like the flavor. So I put it in my car, forgot about it. Fast forward, like, two weeks. I'm driving over to spin class.

Life's good. I get home, and I'm like, I'm gonna clean out my car. I was cleaning everything out, grabbing everything I possibly could in my hands, and I see the kombucha bottle underneath my seat, and I'm refusing to take two trips. Yes, of course. Cautionary tale.

Monica Padman

Already. Cautionary tale. Number one. Take two trips. I'm putting everything in my arms.

Zara

I'm carrying it all. And as I'm walking into my garage, I can hear, like, my phone's calling somebody. Oh, boy. And I'm like, what? So I'm trying to fumble around, trying to turn off the phone, because I don't know who I'm calling.

Can't see it. And I can feel the kombucha slip out from underneath my armpit. It hits the ground. It makes the loudest sound, like I can hear it in my head to this day. And it explodes into, like, a billion pieces.

Dax Shepard

Yeah. Because the pressure in those things build up, right? As it ferments, it's releasing gas and getting pressurized. Right. It's been in my car for, like, a couple hot weeks.

Bumpy bumpy. Swervy. Swervy. Shaky, shaky. It's been ready to go, so it explodes into, like, a billion pieces.

Zara

It makes the loudest noise. I'm like, what the hell? I look down, and there is a hole in my leg. Were you wearing shorts? Cause you're coming from spin class.

I'm in my spin outfit. I'm like, oh, my God. And meanwhile, my best friend, I can hear her voice going, hello? Riley? Riley, are you good?

If I would have just let the phone call go, that wouldn't happen. I see the hole in my leg. I'm like, okay, what the hell? So I get on the ground. I'm in, like, a very interesting position on all fours with my leg kind of, like, propped up.

Dax Shepard

Interesting choice to observe your leg, but I understand that's what happened. It was, like, right here on my. Leg, above ankle, gap between ankle and calf and back. So I'm, like, looking into my leg. There's no blood.

Zara

Just a big hole. Like, this big what she's putting up the size of a silver dollar. The second I start to sit down, blood is rushing out, like, all over. I'm wearing a sock. It fills the sock.

And I'm like, okay. Shit. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. Going back to. So I call my mom, like, hey, I've dropped something.

I've cut myself, and we're probably going to need to go to urgent care. I'm fine. Everything's fine, but it's pretty bad, and can you come home? She's like, riley, I'm in line in the grocery store. Can I check out with my stuff first?

Dax Shepard

Yeah, this would be me. And by the way, this is a family tradition because she, too, can't deviate from this. Like, making two trips for her would. Be, you know, what if she dropped all her groceries, and then he also got a hole in her leg, amputated. Her, and then she called her father.

Monica Padman

Yes. He lost his sternum. So she's like, okay, fine, I'll come right now. I'm like, yeah, please, just come. A work shirt was something that was in my pile of my arms.

Zara

So I take the work shirt. I, like, tie it as tight as I can around my ankle. Great. So I'm just waiting. Feels like 45 minutes, but it was probably, like, five.

She was not very far away. She gets there. She's like, okay, let me see. So I unravel, and I show her. She's like, I'm calling 911.

Monica, I'm sure you'd appreciate that. I love her. Cut to the chain. You guys love 911. I love it.

Monica Padman

Knock on wood. Knock on wood. That might sound, like a little bit silly, but there was glass literally everywhere. We didn't know what was in there, what had happened. We didn't want to cause any more damage.

Zara

If we tried to move me. Let's just call 911. They get there, I'm still just kind of being like, what the hell? They wrapped me up. They put me in the ambulance.

They take me to the mercy room, and I'm, like, sitting there and I'm crying, finally. And they're like, like, oh, are you in pain? And I'm like, honestly, I'm not in pain. I'm just so frustrated. Mad at yourself?

Dax Shepard

Yeah. Like, now I'm gonna have to get stitches. I'm not gonna be able to, like, go to my workout classes. I'm not gonna be able to be active. I'm gonna have to prolong my health journey for, like, another two weeks.

Zara

I'm just annoyed. This is so avoidable. I get to the hospital, and after a while, they come, and they're like, we're gonna clean it out. And they stick, like, a bottle inside of my leg and just squeeze as hard as they possibly can. And I start screaming.

I'm like, okay, that hurts. That hurts. That hurts. Like, oh, do you want us to numb it first? I'm like, that was an option.

Yes, I would like you to numb it first. And so they numb it. They stitch me up. They're like, okay, you're good to go. Just stay off of it for, like, two weeks.

And they're like, hold on. We should maybe check your achilles because it's kind of, like, right over your tendon. I'm like, okay, yeah, go ahead. They have me lie down on my stomach, and they squeeze my calf because that's how you can manually check your achilles. Your foot will move.

They squeeze my calf. Blinding pain. Foot not moving. Oh, boy. It severed your kidneys.

Dax Shepard

This is greek all of a sudden, Icarus. And you might have a little bit of a tear, might have a little damage. You should just follow up with ortho. And in my head, I'm still thinking, like, it can't be that bad. We go meet with another doctor the next day, and he's like, yeah, if it's not hanging on by a fiber, I say it's completely cut.

What? Really quick. When they got in there, and they flush it out, and then they stitched it, did they find a big chunk of glass? No. And did they find the watermelon scoby.

Zara

In there, they found nothing. They even did an x ray to make sure that there wasn't anything in there before they stitched it up. He was like, yeah, I'm going to have you meet with a surgeon because they're going to need to repair it. So I meet with the surgeon. He's telling me very nonchalantly, right, you're not going to walk for a year.

That health journey is just getting pushed farther and farther in the distance. You'd be like, if you're still alive, your health's going to decline so rapidly. Yeah. So he's like, a full year for full recovery. I'll put you in a series of casts.

Those fibers will naturally grow back together so we can actually avoid surgery. Then we'll put you in a boot with ankle lifts so that we'll gradually put it down, and then we'll get you walking in physical therapy and all the works. And I'm like, how did this just happen? I can't believe I've done this to myself. He didn't believe me when I told him the story.

He was like, just so you know, this is a one in a million chance. I'm like, wow, I'm so lucky. He tells me all that. He's like, we're going to get an MRI just to make sure. So I get home after doing my MRI, and he calls me, and he's like, there's a four centimeter gap in your achilles.

And it was much lower than normal because it was a slash, not a tear. Yeah. So he's like, this is going to be the biggest incision that I do as an orthopedic doctor for feet and ankles, and I'm going to go all the way up to the back of your knee from your heel. What? My God, this guy's a Frankenstein, right?

He's like, I'm going to have to get creative. I'm going to be honest, I'm not sure what we're going to do. Wait. They should never wait till I have you. Open up.

Monica Padman

They should never say that. He basically said, I'm gonna wing it. Cautionary tale number three, don't tell people that. Well, when your doctor says he's gonna wing it, second opinion time. So he's like, when I get in there, there's a couple of options.

Zara

I could shave a piece of your calf tendon and then sew it to the starting gap and then nail it into your heel. And I'm like, I'm gonna be honest. I don't even want to know. No, whatever you got to do. Just do it.

My mom did ask, like, a friend who was a doctor, should we get a second opinion? And she was like, honestly, he's the best in the business. If he's saying this, this is what's happening, so just go for it and get it done as soon as possible. So I go into surgery, and my parents get a call, like an hour and a half later. They were expecting the surgery to be, like, 6 hours.

And my mom's thinking like, oh, my God, she's dead. She's freaking out. And he's like, when we got in there, it was just coiled up. Okay. When they cut it, it was like a rubber band and just sprung up and coiled up.

He could just unravel it, fish it out, and reattached it. Wow. So could you walk in less than a year? I could, but I had a gnarly limp, and I still kind of have a limp to this day. But I think that was just kind of, like, the nature of the injury being so awkwardly placed.

I have a very funky scar. Like, usually Achilles surgeries are straight. Mine's shaped like an s because it was going along the site of the laceration. That's his creativity. Yeah.

Monica Padman

That's his signature. So, yeah. Whether the cautionary tale be not to accept a gift from somebody, you don't want to take more than one trip to the car or to always carry a kombucha bottle with two hands. There's a lot of lessons in here. Wow.

Dax Shepard

The one I'm most drawn to because I constantly do this, and I even admit to myself at a certain point, it's taking me way more time to stack this stuff on my arms in this manner, and you realize you've passed the point of no return in the middle of it. You're like, yeah, I would be done by now if I would have just taken two trips. I'm the most disappointed in myself when I do that. Imagine how I felt. Yeah.

I mean, the laziness of us, it's not lazy. We think we're being efficient. We think we're not being lazy. We think it's like, this is the smartest, fastest way to get this thing done. Plus, I can't bear to take a.

Zara

Second trip every time I pass, like, a kombucha at the store. Or if my friends see one, they'll send me a picture, and they'll be like, watch out. They have those, like, big, giant ones now. I'm like, that's my worst nightmare. Yeah.

Dax Shepard

Break your femur. Have you heard the show enough to know who perfect ten Charlie is. I listen to the show religiously, and I haven't told anybody that I'm on the show because they know how much this show means to me. And so I'm just gonna be like, I tell you guys to listen to this all the time. Please listen to this episode.

Zara

So good. Oh, that's exciting. This is a great plan. Also, now we've transitioned from cautionary tale to advice. This is an advisable strategy.

Monica Padman

What is that? She's just gonna trick everyone into hearing her. Yes. I like that. Did you get the voice?

Rob

I think I have it. Oh, who? Jennifer Lawrence. It's not doing what I wanted it to do, but I never figured it out for me either. I got distracted by your story, to be honest.

Dax Shepard

I know I had declared I was gonna figure it out, but then I completely stopped thinking about that. I did start thinking about something else, which is you kind of do look like what Lincoln will look like. Okay, I can see. Can you see? Yeah.

She looks identical to Seth's wife Claire, too. You've got a lot. You have a lot. Wow. Well, anyway, so perfect.

And Charlie, he snapped his. He was humiliated by how it happened. He was doing virtually nothing. And he's a professional bodybuilder. And, yeah, his snap.

But he didn't get surgery in same thing. A year of just barely limping around and waiting. He just now can, like, hike and everything. It's such a bummer of an injury. It was the worst.

Zara

Especially because I wish I was doing something athletic or something cool or like anything else besides a freak accident that was absolutely unnecessary. But, you know, it is what it is. It's a part of my many collections of stories. And I'm here now. Worth it?

Dax Shepard

Not really, but kinda. This past, I was really listening. It is very specific. And there is someone who you sound identical to. No one ever tells you anything.

Zara

Sometimes people say that I look like people, but never the voice. Who do they say you look like? Lincoln. When she gets older. Lincoln.

In 2036, my hair growing up was blonde. People always told me I looked like Scarlett Johansson. And then I dyed my hair red, and then I became black widow. So still Scarlett. I'll take it.

Dax Shepard

If I listen to this episode without looking at her, I'll be able to get it. Okay, we'll get back to you. TBD. I would love to know. Oh, I guess my last single question is if you ever found yourself trying to take one trip again and then been like, you fucking asshole, you already learned this lesson all the time.

Still do it. And every time I'm holding any kind of bottle, it's always two hands. Miley Cyrus. Oh, yeah. That's it, that's it, that's it, that's it, that's it.

Yep. Oh, my God. That's the huge. That is it. Wow.

Yes. Oh, my God. That's, like, the best person you could have said. Oh, I love her. I love her like I am, like, the product of the Hannah Montana era.

Zara

That is my shift. So I've been with her through all the eras, all the things. She's my favorite. And you kind of look like her, too. Like, it's the whole thing.

Monica Padman

Wow. Good job. Boy, I'm glad I got that. Yeah. That was exciting.

Zara

That was really exciting. That was not what I was expecting. Pop out. Riley. Miley.

Dax Shepard

Oh, my God. What if your last name was Montana? This feels like a rip in the or virus. Riley Byres. This was really turning into something special.

I know. It's very sims happening. Okay, Riley. So glad we went long so we. Could figure that out, that mystery.

Me, too. Me, too. Last thing I wanted to say was, my mom and I, we love you as Carl and baby mama. Oh, thank you, Carl Loomis. My dad passed away, like, four years ago, and we went through a period where my mom and I would only watch rom coms before bed just to kind of soothe the soul.

Zara

And baby mama was on rotation, so thank you for that. That's Amy and Tina's compliment, but I appreciate it. You're a huge part of it. Oh, thank you so much. Great meeting you.

Dax Shepard

Love your voice. Keep on rocking. Rocking in the free world. Thank you. All right, take care, Carl Loomis.

I don't get a lot of shout outs. He's funny. Carl Loomis. It's a funny character. It was very fun to be New York in the springtime.

Monica Padman

Okay, cautionary tale. Those were really good. I learned a lot. No oceans, no teeth brushing, no one trip, always two trips. I didn't learn that, but I needed to hear that.

Dax Shepard

Back to my thing. I didn't learn anything because I'm irresistible. Resistant to learning. What a terrible character. Seems like everyone in the world is resistant to learning.

Monica Padman

They've all done these things many, many times. That's true. That makes me a little depressed. Yeah. We're forgetful, as Rami says.

Rob

Yes. The arabic word for human is forgetful. I think he has a new special. This must be good. I want to see it.

Dax Shepard

I saw a guy hiking. I think I was hiking with my hiking buddy Jake Johnson. And I saw Rami walking at us down the street. Hey, say hi. And I was like, oh, my God.

What's up? Not Rami. A guy that looked just like Rami. Cautionary tale. And when I called him, did you.

Monica Padman

Say Rami, or did you say, hey, I go, Rami. Yeah, yeah. No, I told him. Oh, my God. Dude, I thought you were Rami Youssef.

He was fine. Because we're both on tv. The guys that stopped him. So we get a little pass for that. That's not fair.

Dax Shepard

I know it's not, but I'll take it. Okay, well, if we're doing cautionary tales, don't do that. And you won't get a pass. Cause you're probably not famous. Okay, but he wasn't offended.

Cause Rami's cute. Well, you wouldn't be offended, but you'd be like, oh, man, I wish I was Rami. Okay, well, we learned a lot. And nothing knocked on wood knocked on wood and I love you. I love you too.

Rob

Do you wanna sing a tune or something? We know a theme song. Oh, okay, great. We don't have a theme song for. This new show, so here I go.

Dax Shepard

Go. We're gonna ask some random questions. And with the help of arm Jerry's book, it's some suggestions. On the fly, rhyme dish. On the fire, rhyme dish.

Enjoy.

Armchair Anonymous: Cautionary Tale

Primary Topic

Episode Summary

Main Takeaways

Episode Chapters

1. Introduction

2. The Mix-Up

3. Lost and Found

4. Reflections

Actionable Advice

About This Episode

People

Content Warnings:

Transcript