Is there a payment factor to this? Like was he paying to cuddle someone? Was he being paid to cuddle? What is platonic cuddling, and then after some time it got physical? What does that mean? What, how did you-

Sounds to me, and there's a m- and the only reason I believe this was true, 'cause I believe there's a movie that Helen Hunt did about this, where it, I, it's a service where people can pay other people just to cuddle.

Which, okay, it feels like a gateway to something, but also cuddling, it's not like he's with a wife that isn't capable of it.

It's not like, "Oh, my wife lost her arms and she can't cuddle, so I'm gonna pay somebody else to do this." I don't understand it, why he needed to go outTo another service for something that his wife, who clearly, at least from we've seen on the show, is pretty loving, loving to him.

She doesn't seem cold.

She doesn't seem like, "Don't touch me." She's not Marjorie.

Um, so it's, it's strange to me that he would go there.

Yeah

[upbeat music] It's time for Banned Camp News.

Truth seeker, news speaker.

Be Wolf Rocklin.

It's a weird name, but he's got good news, 'cause he can't ban the truth, babe.

Jennifer, you have a food truck a block away from your house, right?

Yeah, it's, like, on the corner.

It's like Trump's worst nightmare, taco truck on every corner.

Not yet.

OK, OK.

So Wolfbird is an AU, an alternative universe where Ilya is a sex worker and Shane is going to see him to which I haven't started reading it.

So I've stayed a little ways away from it because I was waiting for it to be finished.

But Ilya is a sex worker in this fic and Shane is I think he still is in hockey in it.

I could be wrong, actually.

But either way, he starts seeing this.Sex worker named Ilya Rozanov, [laughs] which you're like, "Wow, that's interesting," right? But this fic is in-- it is the number two most watched fic under the tag, right? So the number one is this one that actually was pre-TV show, so, and it's in the teen level, which that doesn't mean it- they're teen characters, it just means there is no sexual content in it at all.

And so what I want to ask from, from your perspective, what has it been like?

Plus, we've got our fact-checking robot onboard to make sure we don't spread any misinformation or what they call alternative facts.

We've covered the classics like To Kill a Mockingbird and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, plus Fahrenheit 451 and The Outsiders.

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That's banned with two N's.

... grated cheese, melted cheese even?

Yeah, so there's a few differences.

So with just solid pieces of cheese, I'm looking for shapes and patterns and holes and cracks and, like, with the way the mold goes on the surface of the cheese.

Um, for, like, shredded cheese, sprinkled cheese, or, like, a bundle of cheese curds, [laughs] I'm kind of pulling back and looking at the shape that they have fallen into on whatever plate they're on or in whatever dish they're in.

Um, and then melted cheese, historically this was done by holding melting cheese, like basically fondue, holding fondue up and letting it drip down and having a candle cast the shadow of the fondue onto the wall and reading the shape of the shadow.

Um-

I love that.

Yeah, so that doesn't work for me.

[laughs]

It is so frustrating.

So I guess my biggest question right now, because I know that my goal right now, like my first step from watching a lot of your videos and stuff, is to try to get a bank account allocated just for the bills, auto-pay and that, so that once...

I know my bills are taken care of.

My problem is actually getting to a point where there's enough money in that account to actually cover the bills, 'cause I really live very close to the edge as far as like due dates and cutoffs and stuff like that.

I can't seem to get like that one-month ahead situation, and I, I, it seems to be like my biggest, like the first step is always the hardest.

Okay.

And that, and that was a, I think, and honestly when we first started I was doing really well financially, and he was still getting his, getting into his life.

So how do you help with burnout?

So, you know, one thing with burnout, I, I don't think you really realize it until you're deep into it.

And, you know, it's, it's the expectation of, you know, wearing all the hats and doing all the jobs and, and doing all of them really well and, and to the extent that you need to.

And, and I think that, um...

You know, the pressure of everything all at once.

But you have to find what works for you, what is working for you, and what isn't working for you.

And don't be afraid to change that.

What do you think is the best part of growing up when we did? But when you're looking at kids today, what are you thinking? Because it's very different.

Yeah.

But there weren't any real indications on there that the, there were buttons.

So just like on the screen here, if you, um, double click the top, it would unlock it.

If you'd clicked it once, it would unlock it.

Same with the frunk, same with the trunk, but there weren't any, um, symbols on there to indicate that it would do anything.

So sometimes people didn't even realize that it had buttons.

But if you're driving, and you still have to push the thing, and you're like-

Well, that's the whole point is if you're not supposed to be looking at your phone while you're driving, apparently a giant screen is better.

How, how you got the news.

Yes.

You know, I feel like through this journey in the last four years since this happened with my sister, I've become my own unofficial resource on grief and how to deal with it, and I th- think a lot about the day and the moment I found out that happened.

I woke up in the morning, went and made some tea, never looked at my phone, and when I came back and looked at my phone and turned it over, my phone was blowing up, and I had tons of calls.

My, my, all my family was calling me, and I was like, "Something happened." But I just remember picking up the phone and speaking with my stepbrother and just literally, physically collapsing inside and out, and, you know, you see it.

It's like you can see it in the movies and on TV when people lean against a wall and just are crushed.

I'm here.

Can you, can you walk me through what, what that felt like for you?

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If you like comedy, then you're gonna love This Week Again podcast, where we make fun of the news so you don't have to.

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New episodes drop every Tuesday and Thursday.

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Just search for Banned Camp.

That's banned with two N's.

[upbeat music]

Are there teams, I guess?

Yeah, there are teams.

Um, the, s- in our area, and I'm sure this is very different depending on where you are, but, um, in our area there, there are not teams.

Like you all know that, you know, a lot of us play in the different local, um, you know, I mean, we call them Eno and Cary.

And in, in our area you can kind of travel not far and play.

So a lot of our friends play on, you know, two teams in Raleigh, two teams in Cary, and an Eno team.

And it, you know, so you kind of can build all these teams that you're playing on.

Yeah

Mm-hmm

... um, everybody in the family was kind of doing their own thing, so I was lucky enough to have a bunch of older women in my life who I spent almost every weekend with.

Um, I grew up in Cincinnati, um, even though I live in northern Kentucky now, so this story is based in Cincy.

Um, so my mom's mom, we called her Oma, and, um, she was a, grew up in a r- really poor family in an area called Oakley.

And she was hired by a wealthy woman who, she and her, this woman and her husband built a big, beautiful Tudor home in the '20s in an area called Hyde Park in Cincinnati.

And this woman, her name was Marie Ellerhorst, and they didn't, she and her husband didn't have any children, and she hired my Oma when she was in, um, high school to be a, a maid for her.

Mm-hmm

... we ended up being there for three years.

Please.

I was holding on really well.

I liked how in the beginning of this new half-marathon training plan, you did put, the miles weren't as many.

Um, it was, it was definitely gentler than last year's training, which helped, and I was holding on strong up until, um, the goal pace miles started to get a little bit longer.

And then suddenly I could feel my body about to cross that tipping point, so we would modify and adjust.

And then the more we had to modify and adjust, I felt kind of discouraged because I'm very type A, let's follow the plan.

And then I was, you know, it, it kind of, it was one of those, like, just keep going.

[laughs]

Mm-hmm

... energy, and, like, the excitement from the people who were comingAnd that is what I'm feeling, and I'm like absolutely riding off of that high of this, like these new people.

Like I don't even know them, and they're like, "This is my car, and this is what I'm bringing." And I'm like, "Oh my God." And, and somebody in a SN city community today, which is, uh, the, the group that's gonna be centered around the show, was this guy was like, "I got bored yesterday, and I went through my entire phone and looked for every SN that I've ever owned, 18 of them, and like listed them in order of ownership, and like a picture of each one." And I'm like, "These are the people that are gonna be coming to this show." And I'm reliving it in the way that I remember meeting people who had, you know, uh, they're like, "The only car besides, you know, my regular daily that I've ever owned is a Fox Body.

Every one of them has been a Fox Body." And then they like list off all of them, you know? Um, and so these are like super fans essentially.

And so, [laughs] so it's like I'm reliving it in that way.

I'm reliving it in like the excitement of like, "Oh my God, these are all just like these cars." Like everyone here, I have something in common with everyone here.

I don't have to like sort through the crowd and be like, "Are, do you, uh, can I talk to you about my car?"

Mm-hmm

Let's grow for the sa-" Growth for the sake of growth is kind of a tax strategy, because they're like, "I'd rather grow the company and, like, do more with it here, pay myself more different things, than have to give it to the government."

Yeah.

It is interesting, and I had never thought about it in that correlation before, this idea that you've had a successful year.

You get to Q4.

You're like, "What can I do to minimize my tax burden?" And then people will do some big spend downs and things like that.

And again, certainly if we can be strategic for tax purposes, it's not that I'm opposed, but again, I think we tend to latch onto one thing and say this, the most important thing is not paying too much in taxes.

I think it's more important to take, like, more of, like, the circle approach, right? Like, what's the diagram that's like a circle where there's all the pieces that fit together like a pie? Like, there's not necessarily...

... and who you choose, uh, so to that extent, right? But then the other piece is, I think you call it the peace tax.

Yeah

... out of it.

Um, Lelia Pink Petticoats.

So that's, um, was bred by Kate Mungovan.

It's one of the first, um, petaloid forms on...

I think in Australia it is the first one that's actually been released.

Um, and it is utterly amazing.

Mm

Let's go to Jen.

Well, a lot like Jay, you know, growing up here is challenging in that everything seems to revolve around alcohol.

Even with my, like, loving family holiday time, it was like mimosas and, "Oh, you got your coffee? Let's, let's put some Baileys in there." And, and it was just always...

It was fun, it was great, but I just kind of always had that around, and it just became the normal thing.

And then just all throughout my life, it just was a part of everything.

It just was just kind of almost my identity.

And I guess to kinda keep this into a s- small chunk of time, I just kind of...

Yeah, the importance of community, but also before that, was, was there a time when you tried to quit drinking alone and maybe nobody knew about it? It was just you and Jen trying to mentally figure this out.

Yeah, I used to be an Amazon Prime member, and we dropped it, like, two months ago, so.

So, like, do you have a central place? That's, like, the issue with Amazon, is the central...

Like, you get anything, you know? But now you ha- you get your books here, you get your medicine or your vitamins here.

You know, it's like, I don't like how it's all decentralized now.

Plus, we've got our fact-checking robot on board to make sure we don't spread any misinformation or what they call alternative facts.

We've covered the classics, like To Kill a Mockingbird and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, plus Fahrenheit 451 and The Outsiders.

There's something for everyone.

It's like one of those screwball comedies where they start hating each other.

No, actually, I liked Richard.

From the moment I met him, I, I really liked Richard.

Richard and I understood each other in a way, and then he abandoned his friends, and I, uh, consider him at least partially responsible for the death of the professor.

And I, I appreciate the help, but yeah, no, this was, this is the exact opposite of that.

We liked each other right away, and now I don't like him anymore.

Cachaca.

Yeah, cachaca.

Okay

...

so there's that.

And then our first port was, um, I think it's La Goulette in, um, Tunisia.

And we got off there and we walked, um, exchanged some money, and then we took the subway car, it's like a train car, to Tunis and just kind of checked out the capital a little bit.

Um, we did go to the, it's like a big bazaar, um, place and it was too packed, too many people.

Uh, nope.

What was up next?

Jen was friends with Emily.

When she first started telling me that she was dating this guy, Bill, and she was super excited about him.

And as time went on, like a month or so, I would be like, "Oh, when, when do we get to meet your new boyfriend?" And she's like, "Oh, well, you know, we're just kinda laying low.

He doesn't really have a whole lot of money, so we just order Chinese food in and stay at home and watch movies," and yada, yada.

She told us girls that he wears, has an ankle monitor, and I was like, "An ankle monitor?" I'm like, "Well, who is this joker?" And she's like, "Well," and then that's when she kinda told the story.

She started telling me that his ex-girlfriend, Dana, was harassing them a- and calling and asking, you know, harassing Bill for money, and she's crazy, and all this stuff.

And I'm like, "Maybe you should reach out to her and find out what's going on with this guy."

That's pretty much how it went.

So you're the, you're the perpetrator of this whole thing.

I guess so, and I didn't even do it intentionally.

I had a girlfriend, I was riding with her back in December, and she loves racing.

And she's like, "Come on, sign up for a race." I'm like, "No, no, no, I don't race.

I don't like it.

I don't do it." She's like, "Come on," and she, she's kind of annoying me, so I'm like, "Fine, whatever, sign me up.

That's fine." And then about two months later, she texts me, and she's like, "All right, so you're signed up.

Full gas, no brakes.

[laughs]

...

I got my pass.

No, and I, I just was obsessed with, like, every hike, every...

I don't know, I just loved hiking the land.

Like, really the connection to the land itself.En. En ha'aretz Yisrael is nothing like our land.

Um, and that was, that was it.

The spotlight

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It starts with a simple blend that's consistent, purposeful, and precise.

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Vitamix, only the essential.

[upbeat music] I love that.

Okay, we're gonna get into all the, like, fun beauty, skin-

Right.

Watch only on Prime.

Prime.Well, maybe I'll get into my gay sex.

My gay sex is gonna be kind of short today, but it's good 'cause we had a nice conversation.

Um, but I, uh, I went to an open mic last night.

I went to an open mic last night.

Yeah.

It's just crazy.

It's crazy to think about when I was doing open mics, and everybody, guy was like, every guy was like, "I swear to fucking God I'm a feminist, you bitch." [laughs]