Armchair Anonymous: Stuck

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous. I'm Dan Rather. I'm joined by Bert Bakkerat. Hi, I'm Bert.

Hi. Hi, Bert. Did you see? I posted a video for last week's Race to 35, and I did a voice.

You did a character. I was being my follicles. Only guy, can I hear the character? What did the follicle sound like?

I can show you the video. I'm not going to do it. You won't do it on demand. No, I don't remember how to do it.

OK, well, I'll go watch it is what I'll do. But do we think we're moving in a direction of like, if you now posted a video of you doing a character, do you think we're making steps towards more character work? No, I was on so many hormones that I think I was out of my mind. OK, all right.

Well, I'll tell you what people weren't out of anything in this episode. They were stuck, in fact, desiring to be out of something. Yes. Really good segue.

This episode is about the worst place you've been stuck. And I don't recommend this one. I think everyone would do themselves a favor to just move along to the next episode. No, you have to listen.

It's a good one. No, it's not a good episode. Yes, it is. This first story is about a guy stuck in a cave, and I thought I was going to breathe at some point.

It was very uncomfortable, and I didn't like it. And I don't think anyone should listen to this one. We also have a friend stop by and tell us a really fun story at the end. Well, not a fun harrowing.

Very, very special surprise guest. Yeah. Someone we talk about nonstop. I'm just going to say Eric is here.

Eric Richardson with his crazy story. Oh, what a delight. OK, so I take that back. Listen to this episode.

Exactly. OK, you were right, as always. Please enjoy the worst places people have been stuck. All times come and go.

Take them slow. Bye, live. I had them go. One thing.

You better know. Keep on shiny. Tell us about the worst place you've been stuck. I hope there's a bit stuck.

I hope there's a bit stuck in this episode. Hi. Hello. Can you hear me?

Oh, yeah, perfectly. Beautifully. Very good headset. Excellent, excellent.

Are we calling you by your name, John? Yeah, that's great. I do have something that needs to be kept secret, but I'll get to that. OK, wonderful.

I love secrets. Yeah, we really love secrets. More than other information. Are you still stuck?

Where are you? We're stuck. Because you could still be stuck. This could be a call for help.

What if we talked to someone who's currently stuck? Currently stuck. Where are you? We're stuck.

OK, it's the early 90s. And I'm going to go explore a limestone cave with a couple of friends, coworkers. And I'm not talking about a commercial cave with a gift shop where you buy trinkets and polished rocks. I'm talking about a completely wild cave off the beaten path.

No stairs, no hand rails, no signage, nothing. Local cavers aren't going to tell people where these places are. They want to keep them secret. They don't want people to go do stupid stuff, deface the cave, get themselves stuck, stuff like that.

Yeah, yeah. John stuff. Right, right. Well, they don't want to get it closed off because some rando came ruin.

They don't want to get labeled as dangerous and shut down. Right. So this is where my friend Charlie comes in. So he is really an expert caver, accomplished, experienced.

He's basically kind of a smart ass tree-hugging Yosemite Sam, like think huge, bushy, red, old-timey mustache. That's this guy. We're on the Western foothills of the Sierra Nevada, kind of somewhere between Yosemite and Tahoe area. We've brought along our friend Pam.

We work together. She's actually our boss. You work with Yosemite Sam? All three of you are coworkers.

Exactly. Yeah. Three of us are coworkers and she's our boss. And can I ask one other question, John?

Just because I know it's a little about cave exploration. But speedlunking, this isn't what you guys are endeavoring upon, is it? Yes, we're going to go spelunking. But people who are really into spelunking just don't really call it spelunking.

They are cavers. They go caving. I got you. We drive way out into the country, nondescript middle of nowhere, and we just pull off on a turnout.

We get our gear and we hike another 20, 30 minutes just off into the woods and wild lands. And there's an outcrop of rocks. There's an opening that looks barely big enough to fit a person. So we sit down and we start to gear up.

And I am anxious, nervous, excited. But I got my friend Charlie who's done this. He knows this cave. He's been in this cave.

So we've got coveralls. We've got helmets. We've got headlamps, little food, little water. We're good to go.

What's Pam's appetite? She's down to party as well. Or she nervous? She's into it.

So yeah, we do all kinds of hiking together. And we're totally into the outdoors. I don't know if you can call caving outdoors. Indoor outdoor living at its best.

And so Charlie disappears. Earth swallows him. There goes Pam gone. And then I go in.

As caves go, it's not like a super showy cave with all kinds of stalactites and stalagmites. And it's also pretty tight fit. I mean, it's mostly like crawling and scrambling and squeaking through. I hate this.

I know you too. This is really making me. I think I legitimately have, yes, is claustrophobia. I mean.

Are you up for this? You want to keep going? Of course. Yes.

Make us uncomfortable. Punish us. OK. So we're going down.

Maybe I don't know 45 minutes to an hour. And we're not going super fast. You can't go fast. We stop.

Take a break. I kind of noticed a passage. And I asked Charlie. I said, is that the way?

And he's like, why don't you find out? Oh, Charlie. I'm all over it. So I keep going.

We go down, down, down. No. We get to a spot where it looks really tight. We stop.

Take a breath. Charlie says, hey, I've got a surprise for you guys. Because I wasn't quite sure we'd make it this far. But since we have, on the other end of that passage right there is the biggest room in the cave.

It's got stalactites and stalagmites and draperies. And it's beautiful. Immediately I've got cave fever. Like I am so into it.

Charlie consents it. And so he says, yeah, go ahead. So the other thing here is certain passages, sometimes the best move in terms of your physical body is to go in on your back head first. Because it leaves your hands kind of free.

So that's what I do. I inch further in. And I'm just all I can think of is this giant room in there. I go further and it's getting pretty tight.

Oh, God. Oh my God. I think this might be the very first time I can identify when people say triggered. I don't know if I've actually ever been triggered in my life until now.

Have you heard some stuff? Just hearing this. I'm hyperventilating. Look at John.

He's giggling. He's fine. But I'm going to the moment where he realizes he can't move his arms. I know.

OK. OK, John, you're on your back. God. Oh, no.

Real quick. Like my hobbies, they're accompanied by adrenaline and motion and acceleration and this visceral feeling. And that, obviously, is some people scary. What is the kink about this?

Is it your summer no one's been? Is it that you're going to see something no one's seen? Is it your guy? Like, yeah, can you walk us through the appeal of it for you?

Just really kind of a combination of all of those things. I have been in caves, some commercial caves. But also, I had been in one or two wild caves with Charlie. And sometimes you see just amazing cave features, beautiful stalactites, stalagmites.

One time, legitimately, we found a jawbone. We didn't touch it. We left it there. But ostensibly, from some time way back, like it was a human jawbone.

Charlie, as a caver, he later was on a survey team for a cave called Lechigea, which is near Carl's bad. And he actually went underground and saw places no human had ever been. Wow. OK, so it's a sense of like, exploring.

Yeah. OK, OK. Seeing something brand new. All right, I'm with you.

OK, so I'm going to go on your back. I mentioned farther. And I can think of as this big room. I hear Charlie says, John, hold up for a second.

I'm just messing with you. There's no big room through there. Come on out. Oh, Charlie.

OK, I am not into Charlie. You were. I was fine with him. And now I'm trying to process what I'm hearing.

And instinctively, I go to back out. I can't move. No. I go again to back out.

I can't move. I descend into this panic of paralytic fear. My heart rate and my respiration are up. My breathing is shallow.

Like tears are starting to come out of my eyes. I am trying to fight the panic with every fiber of my being. And panic is winning. Yeah.

This is like the worst part of the whole thing is I am in so tight. As I try to breathe in, I can feel the walls of the cave pressing back against me. No. It is like a limestone sarcophagus.

What follows is like this blur. I don't know if I talk to them. I didn't want to touch me. People have asked me, well, didn't they just try to pull you out?

Don't fucking touch me. I'm like descend into my own world. And I'm going through scenario after scenario. None of them end with me getting out.

Really? You were like, this is where it ends. It's maybe, I don't know, hour and a half to get out. It's 20, 30 minutes to the car.

We're out in the middle of nowhere. Who is set up to rescue me? Oh. By the way, that is what panic is.

So it's totally not equivalent in its danger. But the time I had a panic attack stuck on that rock formation in Joshua Tree, the second you go, OK, I need to be airlifted. Oh, what time is it? By the time they call it, it's going to be dark.

Oh, they don't airlift. You know, like once you start doing all those competitions really quick, you are going to, well, this is it. Oh, yeah. So I'm in there stuck immobilized for 30 minutes, which is like 400 hours in your brain.

Oh, yeah. Is it an identity shattering experience in some way? You classically take stock of everything and wonder why you did some things and why you didn't do other things. Slowly, slowly the panic shifts to resignation.

Whatever is going to happen is going to happen. And then slowly, slowly this resignation kind of shifts to like, I've got to figure this out. OK. So I start to experiment with some motion.

I mean, I'm not 100% immobilized. And what I finally figure out is that if I barely arch up on my elbows, so I get most of my body to the extent possible off the rock and I scrape backward with my heels, I can move like a millimeter. Oh, God. I do that.

And I'm exhausted after moving my body like an inch. And I just keep at it. And eventually it opens up a little bit. I can move maybe like an inch at a time.

Now, finally, I get to the point where my friends are, and I'm able to sit up. Oh, God. I don't say anything to them. I'm stealing my own little world.

I'm breathing a little bit better. And at this point, Pam, who's our boss, she senses that we're at least somewhat out of the woods. And she falls off and she slugs Charlie. She says, you asshole.

Yeah, you should have fired him. You're fired, Charlie. No. I should have shot him.

That is really not a good job. Not a good job. They come back. They come back.

I'm not ready to communicate with people. I'm sure I must have said something, but it wasn't all like a party. I'm spent. I just start to head toward the top.

I just want to get out. And I'm just crawling, pulling, anything to get me out. And there's that point whenever you're caving, that you can see the very first glint of light. I'm like, oh my god, there it is.

And I just pulling and crawling. And finally, I get to the point where my head's out. And then my shoulders. And finally, I'm able to stand up and take a breath.

This is like the most relieved I've ever been in my entire life. Oh, wow. How long from being able to sit up to getting to the outside of the cave? Time is a little bit lost, but hour plus, no dawdling, no doing anything.

I was at the farthest bottom of the cave that any caver could go. Oh, did it change your desire to go caving? I have been since. I'm trying to think if I've been in a completely wild cave, you know, it took me a while to bring Charlie back into my semi-good graces.

That's Charlie. He's kind of a prankster. Oh, my god. He's like a wobby wob.

It's a rascal. I'm telling this story to my 16-year-old. And she's like, Dad, you're like putting all the blame on Charlie. Nobody forced you to go in there.

It's all about choices, Dad. Wow, she's wise. She flipped the script. That's like what you tell your kids.

The world's full of Charlie's. Who are you? You only got control over you and not the Charlie's in the world. Fuck the Charlie's.

Wow, well, not our Charlie perfect. Well, he actually, I feel like he might do that. So yeah, him too. Well, you can see where this guy's an adrenaline junkie.

He might have thought it was funny. So he wrongly projected how he would take this joke, which would be, I use son of a bitch almost killed me. But John didn't feel that way. So he misdiagnosed.

That made me tight of breath, tight of chest. I've been to Mammoth Cave as a kid. They got a bone arrow with some torches on the end. They fired up into the corner of the cave.

It's pretty cool. That's about the extent of which I think I will try any of this. Yeah. I was chuckling earlier as I'm setting the thing up.

But I start to tell that story when I'm in it. And I can feel that it brings it back. Oh, yeah. Do you not have like rope tied to your ankle or anything?

There's no safety protocol with this. The Charlie, it's such a mundane, fairly small cave. It's not super complex with 20 different passages. So yeah, that wasn't part of our protocol.

OK. Well, John, thanks for telling that story. If I were allowed to take Xanax, I would take one right now. But I'm not.

But thank you so much for that story. That was harrowing. Good to meet the both of you. You guys, take care.

OK, take care. Bye. Yes. That kind of made me look at these.

I think when I read the tell us about the worst place you've been stuck, I didn't mean literally. I didn't mean. You didn't? No, I meant like you're having sex with your boss's wife.

The boss comes home and you're stuck in a closet. No, no, no. Wake up at Spencer's gifts. You're stuck in the store.

We already had that. OK, but I guess I underestimate that people be physically stuck. This is my worst nightmare. I would never agree to this problem.

That was definitely what it always was, because we talked about Ryan being stuck on the mountain. But even that was not claustrophobia. That was better for me. Well, a little, though.

I mean, it's not claustrophobia, but he was stuck there. The notion that when you move your limbs is just panicoducing for me. Yeah, OK. OK, let's do Geneva.

Hello. A plus student in her closet. I love it. It's a beautiful closet, too.

Well organized. Thank you. You know, you didn't see before I had to literally remove all my sweatshirts and jeans from the shelves. Mm-hmm.

It's great. And you put these beautiful wicker baskets in. You know, I don't like wicker, but these ones are quite appealing. Yeah, they're beautiful.

He gets so much. Is it Geneva? Geneva, yes, exactly. Just wonderful.

Just like the convention. Sadly, that's not what I was named after. OK, great. Where were you stuck?

So this happened about five years ago in Costa Rica. I was invited to a family trip. It was my friend's extended family. So I was joining them, the grandmother, the aunt, uncles, siblings, parents, the whole gang plus me.

When we arrived there, you know, it was a beautiful house, pool, overlooking the ocean. So excited. And when we arrived, my friend basically immediately became ill. She did not leave this rental for about three days.

Gastrointestinal issue? Yes. OK. Yeah, more dysentery.

Yes. But the first day, she started to feel well. It was about four days into the trip. And we were like, you know what?

We haven't spent much time together. Let's take the paddleboard, which, you know, from last arm turn on of us episodes, we know paddleboards. Do not equal good scenario. True.

So we carry these paddleboards that are part of the rental down to the beach. And we notice as we're walking down that there are a lot fewer boats on the water, there are a lot fewer swimmers than we've seen in previous days. You know, we haven't gone to the ocean much. We've been enjoying the pool.

But when we arrived, it's pretty deserted almost. But we go, you know what? This is the best case scenario, fewer people to run into. We step on these paddleboards.

And I wish I was kidding when I tell you that in about 10 seconds flat, it feels like we're in the center of the ocean. Oh my. Do either of you have any previous paddleboard experience? Somewhat.

OK. On a placid lake. Exactly. Ocean, different scenario.

Yeah, different animal. We're a little bit of a cove. So really, our plan was to kind of explore the cove, come back, return. There's only two paddleboards.

We want to give other people the opportunity to. Well, we are swept away to see so quickly that there is no returning. We start to panic a little bit. We get to the stage of, OK, what are we going to do?

We're a fair distance about when we start to wave our paddles around and try to signal to the people on the shore. This is not what we want. We want to be in the middle of the ocean. Help.

We're not in control. Yeah. Exactly. So we're trying to paddle.

We're on our knees. There's less for the wind to grab onto. Do you think that the wind primarily is what's driven you out there? Or is there a tide somehow?

It's the wind. It is so windy. The force just carried us so far. Our paddleboards were in the direction of the sea.

And we could not physically turn them around to start making our way back. Oh my god. Oh my god. No, where are you?

I hate this. You hate this. We just talked to a guy trapped in a cave. I almost passed out.

No. OK, that's too much for me. I can't be trapped in a cave. This right now, I'm like, I'm in a tube.

I'm in a floatation device. Maybe I'd swim back. I was about to say, were you considering swimming? OK, well, this is a thing.

We debated this. And we started to try. But we're still attached to the paddleboards that will not turn around. So even to try to swim and drag them behind us, it was just working against us, even where that's in the water, was not working.

And at this point, we can't see the shore. And we also like to think of what's in the water. Oh my god. As we're dragging the paddleboards behind us, we start to think of the shark thing.

I think, honestly, at that point, even if we had seen a dolphin, we would have been equally as freaked out, because it just means there's things down there. So we went full disassociation. I might have wanted to have sex with you, too. While it may not have eaten you, it may have tried to make love to you, as you know.

But then maybe you would have fallen in love, and then a little bit of life there. You could have told you, into shore. You could have ridden him. We should have thought of this.

This took me longer than normal. But are you Canadian? I am Canadian. Is it obvious?

I caught you. A little bit. Well, those are so nice and organized. That wasn't my clue.

Like a just a hint of a note. Oh, no. We love our Canadian neighbors. No, you have a love.

OK, let's get back to the whole point. OK, so you can't see shore at this point? No, we cannot see shore. So we also know at that point they cannot see us.

And again, because this cove was primarily deserted, there was nobody else in the water to see us. There were no sailboats out that day, because it was so windy probably. Exactly. No other paddleboarders coming with rescue us.

At this point, we don't know what to do. We're trying the paddle thing. We're on our stomachs, trying to get to the point of, we're just going to shrivel up here. This thing probably been about 20 to 30 minutes.

But it feels like it's been lifetimes. Yeah. Yeah. Your adrenaline is through the roof.

It's like we're crying. We didn't get to the crying stage, but I would say we were very, very close. But of course, I'm here. So the story, thankfully, has a happy ending.

Yeah, that's the good news about these stories. Yeah, exactly. But eventually we see a boat coming toward us. And we also start to get a bit nervous for like, OK, this boat's coming toward us.

How do people even know that we're out here? You know, what could this be? This boat starts coming toward us. And we see on the side of it, Costa Rica Coast Guard.

Oh, thank heavens. Thank goodness. God, are you guys lucky? I mean, just wave.

What are the odds? Yeah, so we're waving our paddles. And they load us into this boat and drag the paddleboards on top. And we're anxious to get back to shore at this point.

We're like, start this boat. This shows over. We are just ready to touch the fans. But they ask us for a passport information.

Oh, wow. And you're like, well, yeah, sorry, I don't have that. And they seem surprised. We didn't have the number memorized.

Isn't it like 40 digits, as I recall? I mean, it's a long number. It's not one to memorize. Longer than my credit card number.

I'm like, here we are, 220-something in bikinis. But the aspect I don't have a passport. So finally, they drop us to shore. And we're walking back.

And we're just so relieved at this point. But it ended up that it was all luck. They were actually going past us to rescue somebody else and kind of saw us on the way by. Oh my god.

Yeah, we hit shore. We got a good talking to from my friend's older sister and her parents. Yeah, that's what you needed. Yeah, exactly.

And then when people tell you after you've just experienced the worst possible consequence, they then tell you what could go wrong. Do you know you could have been swept out? Yeah, motherfucker, that's exactly what I just experienced. Yeah, did I have a choice?

No. Oh god. Yeah. So let's just say there was a lot of that costary can beer hat after that.

OK, deserved. Yeah. Well, Geneva, I'm so glad that Coast Guard happened by. I wonder if I know who called in the first emergency to thank them.

I mean, really without the people who first got. They didn't make it in my case. Oh my god. Maybe they'll be next.

Yeah, maybe the next one that's happened before. Yeah. Oh, that'd be great. Wow, I'm glad you're alive.

That's really scary. I would have never would have been out there in a paddle boat anyway. Or paddleboard anyway. You don't even know what the paddleboard is.

But that is my worst nightmare. Worsens, you being stuck in the cave? That's really bad too. But water adds a different element to it.

That's like, I can't swim probably animals. Yeah, there's so much. Yeah. At any point, were you thinking like, well, I should just drown.

Everything gets brought to shore eventually. Like, did you have that thought? I don't even know that that's true. That's not true.

You know, we were just worried, though. What shore would that be? Yeah. Where would you even be?

Wow. How old would you be? I'm serious. What did it mean?

It was 10 years later that you watched it. Like, Gilligan's Island. Oh my god. I'm sorry that Monica's made light up.

It was a very traumatic experience. I know that this was not an episode of Gilligan's Island. I'm serious. This is my nightmare.

But we were this close to it being not. Who knows? Oh my god. Well, I'm glad you made it.

Thank you. Do you think you'd ever paddleboard in the ocean again? Or is that a wrap for you? I think that's a wrap for me.

We actually had to Mexico this week. And I was thinking about this. I think I'll stick to paddleboarding in the pool, if that's an option. But I don't think I'll go in the ocean.

I think that's smart. This is what I don't understand about a lot of these stories we've had on armchair and on. People are very harrowing. Like the campers who almost got eaten by the wolf.

And then even this cave guy. Like, then they're back at it. Like, you guys. I can't really sling mud because I've had crashes at the track.

Well, I had a crash at the track. Such an honor to chat with you. Oh, thank you so much. Right back at you.

OK, have a great day. Bye. Bye. Oh, that was scary.

Listen, we should call Eric. Oh my god, yeah. Yeah. I'll talk to you.

Hey, come, are you around at like 240 for us to interview you? Question mark. Here comes Monica. Oh, no.

We're going to do something. Oh, it's going to do something. Thank god, you're here. You just saved Monica.

Monica. I was about to sing a little bit of Tina Turner. Do you want to hear it? I'm dying to hear it.

I have to go like this. So Monica can't see me. You can see me though, right? Other Monica.

I can see you. OK. I'm your private dancer. I dance for money.

I do what you want me to do. That's powerful. Thank you. Thank you.

I don't have any of the notes, but I think I have the motionality. Do you have the words right? Yeah. I don't know.

I don't know. Oh, yeah. I'm your private dancer. I do what you want me to do.

I don't know the words either. So that was perfect to me. OK, so Monica, you found yourself stuck in a spot in a space in a place. Can you share with us what happened?

I would be delighted to share. Yeah. So this was in June of last year. I had just started a new job.

Things were starting to open up COVID-wise, but they didn't want to be remote for too long. And so when they said this, I was kind of like, you know what? I think this might be my last opportunity to be a Nomad. It's not like great.

I'm just going to set up on the road. Because I have to work simultaneously. I was like, I don't think I can drive. So I decided to do a cross country by train trip.

Oh, wow. OK. Romantic. Very romantic, very exciting.

But the thing is, I can't sleep on any kind of public trains. It like planes, trains, cars and all that. It's a lot of over night trains, especially Denver up to California. Are you poining up for the sleeper car?

You're trying to get the sleep done in a chair? That's the other thing. I'm doing this like as cheaply as possible. I'm just in a chair also masks were still required.

So trying to sleep with a mask on you can breathe lucky didn't die What if your story was you were stuck in a mask? Yeah, that could go this way That night when I'm like trying to California. I don't sleep awake. I'm exhausted.

I'm thinking by the time I get California I'm gonna get a nice hotel and I'm gonna like take a hot bath hot shower We are like way behind schedule I only have one night in Sacramento and I've been there a few times before but I kind of wanted to like explore So I love redwoods. I think this is really cool. It turns out it's like a two-hour drive from where my hotel is I was gonna say quite a hike from Sacramento. I drive a lot like I have a two-hour commute to work.

That's nothing to me Okay, that's baby shit, baby something. Okay, exactly So I'm like, oh, you know, I end where to three because I'm at the East Coast time two hour drive I can be there at five the park closes at six and so I can be back at the hotel by 8 p.m It's gonna be amazing that I'll have a wonderful night Everything starts working kind of perfectly, you know, I look up how to get to the mirror ones You need a parking pass and there's only one opening one parking spot for the exact time that I need to go I'm like perfect. I end up downloading like a zip car app. They approve me right away You just upload your license I'm literally on the phone with my sister on the driveover and I'm just Raving about how perfectly this is all going.

I'm like a commercial for a cigar. Yeah, sure So I finally get to the woods. Let's take half a second to say and your woods is one of the most epic places you could ever go in your life, right? It's incredible incredible and the timing was amazing because the sun was starting to set and so the light rays were like piercing It's almost like god like it's like incredible They've bisected some of the trees and they have on display, right?

This is my favorite part of your woods and then they put on the timeline Monica on pieces of paper on the rings It'll say declaration independence may flower Jesus It's like looking at ancestors. It's incredible I end up staying a little later than I wanted to and so as I'm leaving kind of everything this clothes the parking lots are empty The visitor centers closed. I'm passing park rages. They're on their way home And I'm down at like an overflow all the way in the back of the parking lot and so I'm walking down there and of course the car won't start There's no cell service.

This is like a very remote area and I also have no battery left So I start kind of making my way up to the visitor center. I'm walking around the park I'm just like holding my phone and all these kind of weird positions trying to get like one single bar of service finally get one Up near the entrance I calls the car and they're like oh, yeah, you can't start the car if you don't have self-help service And I was like what so they're like, okay, we're gonna need to get a tow truck out there So they're like we'll call you back in like 20 minutes. I'm like great except my phone's about to die So I'm sitting there and I'm like I don't know what to do All of a sudden everything turns sinister the sun goes down clouds roll in a storm comes the fog rolls in It's like pitch light all the sudden and so my heart starts pounding and I end up getting one last call and they're like yeah We can't get a tow truck. Oh my god.

He's just kind of like oh no And I'm just like sitting there and I think I a lot of two minutes to just like crying as hard as I could and then I was like Okay, here's the thing yeah time for grievings over time for actions now Oh my god, I'm from the Appalachian Trail area, but even I I'm like the one out of all my friends I was always the one that was like on edge. I just have nightmares about my headlights going out or my flashlight going out You have the wrong disposition for this exactly and so at that point I'm like oh, that's why I was having all those nightmares I was okay. That was a premonition exactly So I finally get out of the car and I just started making a run for it way her very hilly there too everyone should know Very going my god. It is very hilly and so I just started running down the road at one point I mean I can't even tell you how scared I was like it was pitch black It was pouring rain.

I couldn't see anything It was so foggy to at this point under different circumstances would be like the most enchanted visual ever this beautiful majestic forest and fog and mist and rain But not exactly and it's about three miles down the road that I finally in the distance see this like warm glowing kind of Streetland and so I get there and it looks kind of like it could be like a restaurant or like a little bit of breakfast So I go over there and I'm not gonna door and of course no one answers the doors locked So I just like sat down on the steps and I'm sitting there and I'm shivering I'm just like crying again Then I hear maybe like an hour later a car pull in from the back driveway and so I sprint around to the back They had just gone inside so I start pounding at the door and they turn around and it's like a couple of on my age I had just gone into the building and they turn around and the look on their face made me like very aware All of a sudden of how I looked which was insane They kind of hesitate for like a second But then they end up letting me in I explain the story and they're like why don't you stay in the lobby or something without For you if anyone comes back and so I get into this building and this is another one of those things were in a normal situation This would be so quaint and so cute But in the mindset I was in right now It was like the worst place to be because it turns out this was like an old guest house It felt haunted it felt terrifying. I start looking for anyway to get home at this point I finally get over to work. I don't even have like a picture I have no reviews and I'm like a little dot in the middle of the woods I seem to be driven two hours away in the middle of the night like I look like the murderer here So how'd you get out here? So at around five a.m.

I found like a car company It was kind of like an elite car company. They were 24 seven and they had a messaging up on their website Thank God So I was able to like talk to them They told me if you have an iPhone you can change your settings and you can make calls me a Wi-Fi. Oh sure. Oh God Well Monica, I'm so glad you made it out of the scary force alive It's a little bit reminiscent of red riding hood and some of the other fables about young blonde gals in the woods.

You're yeah A little bit short Suffice to say you got back to Sacramento obviously in one piece I will say the car costs more than getting across country altogether I imagine a two-hour trip in the Bay Area in a town car has got to be in that several hundreds of dollars Yes, many several hundreds Oh my God. Well Monica, I'm glad you're safe. You made it out alive Thank you so much for sharing that story with us I hope this doesn't curb your appetite to travel and adventure not at all have done it many times since Oh wonderful wonderful. Well, nice meeting you Monica.

Nice meeting you take care You're always trying to get me to cut those trees down and that's why I don't want to because your zip car won't work Because like Jesus times oh because of the history. Yeah, you feel like it's disrespectful to the years. Okay. Well, then people all right all right Solid gold so yes the call-in topic was places you found yourself stuck Right so one of them that gave me enormous anxiety was a dude spelunking Oh getting in a fucking tunnel including Oh the worst and then Monica remembered yeah, cuz there was another person who had a water experience Paddleboard mix up got sucked out to the ocean.

Oh, yeah, we had with a rip current Oh the wind in this case turns out how long was this bunker guy stuck? He said he thinks only like 30 minutes of actual stuck But he was down there for a long time He said he's in a panic attack for 30 minutes where he couldn't even talk to the other people that were deeper in the cave Oh, right and then calm down finally and then started being able to like one millimeter scooches Scratching his back Okay, so what year did yours this was like 32 years ago because I was 20 years old this is my first year junior college We have to set up Erica little I feel like we haven't well I was gonna enter I'll go you know Erica we talk about non-stop who loves Monica's feet will be joining us But you're taunting Eric right now you had shoes on when Eric oh my god It got back to you that I want you to lick him I have it I told him okay. Yeah, I said that yeah Yeah, I'm excited So this story involves one of your buddies can we use his name would he do this shit his name is Kevin Kevin Brown okay, he was the same guy almost got killed with in the paragliding accident, but that's it's sorry for another day We'll do a paragliding. Yeah, I had the bocale episode and we'll get you back He was kind of a dentress and I'm not as adventurous So I would just kind of do it he came up with yeah You bought a Hopi cat catamaran which is like two pontoons and there's like a trampoline trampoline right yeah It's not like a sailboat with a hole it's too little out riggers and trampoline okay, and they're meant for lakesite Like little lakes and they're very fast right that's their appeal pretty quick Yeah, well some of them are racing one So this was kind of a jumper one so he told me to get to the oxnard harbor at four in the morning Oh therefore in the morning and my parents didn't know where we were and he said just bring some beer So we just brought two cases of beer okay and showed up and put all the beer in the catamaran We didn't bring any food me any water.

We didn't bring any clothes. We didn't bring a radio And he said we're gonna sail out to Anna Kappa Island How far is that yeah like 14 miles out through the Pacific Ocean right right right through shipping lane It's part of the Channel Islands, so we go out you know starter drink and probably sunrise It took most of the day to get out there most people would have just figured out we know each other through sobriety If they didn't know before now they Did you have any sailing experience or what was it? Catamaran probably a couple months before and you was used to sailing at that point To sailing at this time But believe it or not at the end of the search he ends up buying a full-on sailboat and going sailing around the world for four years Oh, I just never wanted to get on a sailboat. Oh my god It's funny how it's different but we were cruising around drinking and kind of zigzagging back and forth and we were I don't know probably a quarter mile off of Anna Kappa at probably like two or three in the afternoon it flipped over and usually when it flips over with Cameron You're supposed to like lean back with ropes and it flips back over But one of the pontoons had a leak and so we couldn't get it right size How did it flip they normally flip like you turn too fast or big gusto win?

They don't have a keel they don't have anything at the bottom There's no counterweight so it's like it just goes up on the pontoon and the whole time you're sailing it The pontoons are coming out of the water and right you used to it and then you just go I want to see how far you can get it out of the water and then if you look too far it's pretty That's what I'm asking are you guys pushing the og Okay, hot dogging. Okay, maybe a little bit hot dogging. Especially we're probably on the second case of your back Okay, so it's flipped over so we spend I don't know two or three hours trying to get it right size and Kevin was getting super frustrated because You're supposed to be able to right size it fairly easy And so we try we kept trying we kept trying hours are going by in the water now It starts to get towards sunset. Oh, so I decide I'm gonna swim down a Kappa because we're all between like a quarter of a mile and a half A mile away.

I'm a pretty good swimmer. I'm 20 years old. I surf pretty drunk pretty drunk Sorry for three hours you're just treading water no cuz the cat ran was there and it was floating You know we were trying to get it back sometimes we'd be treading water But we could also hold on to the camera and we're trying to get it right sized. Oh didn't sink right But you're just holding on to the boat sometimes right trying to get right side Kevin says no dude You can't swim back like a great white feeding ground because you have all the seals off of anacapus So it's well known as a feeding place for great What starts now, and it's like you're also going against the current and I came really close to just saying I can swim there I know I'm shocked in fact you didn't knowing you yeah, and then a duck being 32 years of wisdom right Right, I'm not sure why I listen but now it's dark.

Yeah, and we're on an upside down cat ran So it was really cold it just kept getting colder and colder and my pontoon that I'm on is the leaky one for some reason so it's like more in the water than his and You know the first couple hours we kept convincing ourselves that there were helicopters in the distance and we convinced ourselves that those helicopters were looking for us But unfortunately I didn't tell my parents I was going anywhere They didn't even know where I was and he told his parents he was going out in Orange County So they didn't know where we were was all the beer lost when the boat flipped over no we still had some that we weren't drinking at night And that because now we're pretty scared. Yeah, yeah, yeah So there's a partial moon and there stars out We're both looking straight down into the water at like two o'clock a seal started barking Which was interesting because now we're pretty far off anti-couple We're like drifting away. There's like a lighthouse on anacab But you can see so there's a seal that would start barking and then we would bark back at it and I was kind of like fun Yeah, and we're pretty sure it was trying to save us But then at some point the seal stop barking and just a huge whitening that had to be 20 or 32 long just went right under the boat No, I didn't know this part and I said Kevin did you see that and he's like, yeah, dude I saw it just stay still and That sounds cool under fire. Yeah, he's definitely Kevin made this whole plan.

He fucked up. He fucked up, but he also sounds cool under fire. He's definitely cool under fire They're sitting here because he talked about it. Yeah, at this point I'm like God if you get me out of this I will become a better person I will negotiate nicer to girls friends And I was my first year junior college So I'm like I will get good grades because I was at the bottom of my class in high school Yeah, I just didn't care but I'm like I will try to do something with my life if I can get out of this, please It makes me sad because he did oh, yeah, it makes me happy.