The Diary: My Ears Are Ringing

Howdy howdy ho and welcome to fantasy fanfellas. I'm Hayden producer of the fantasy fangirls podcast and your resident lover of all things sanderson and I'm steven your bookish internet goofball but you can call me the smash daddy and we are currently deep diving brand and sanderson's fantasy epic

Missborn, but here's the catch Stephen here has not read Missborn before that's right. Hey, hey, so each week you'll get my unfiltered raw reactions to every single

chip and along the way we'll do character deep dives magic explainers and Stephen will even try to guess what's next spoiler alert he'll be wrong news flash I'm never wrong episodes come

out every Wednesday and you can find fantasy fanfellas wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, Sam, Hank, what's going on? We haven't worked a case in years. I just bought my car

Carvana and it was so easy too easy. Think something's up. Shoot tell me they got thousands of options. Found a great car at a great price. And it got

delivered the next day. It sounds like Carvana just makes it easy to buy your car. Yeah, you're right. Case closed by your car today on Carvana delivery fees may apply.

Hey everybody, I'm just getting ready for the day here.

Get some cold water. Everybody needs cold water for the morning.

I don't know how you live without your cold water for the most being a little quiet because my wife has had a really busy weekend and is sleeping in a

little. It's only 737 30, but still letting her kind of have some space while I get ready for things and I can be a little

louder when I get down here. Okay. So yeah, that was a that was a crappy weekend. My wife's mother died on Saturday morning.

After a what felt like both a brief and a long battle with vascular dementia and strokes. She was kind of having a bit of a decline over the last

couple of years. We could sort of tell, but the the big stroke that she had a couple of months ago was kind of the big, you know, the big one.

And as a result, it meant, you know, an attempt at rehab. It didn't really work. So they eventually decided, well, let's just get her home and in some sort of, you know, reasonable hospice care type situation.

And so that's where we've been for the last couple of months, month and a half. And boy, she was a stubborn lady. She even in death, she she just was like fighting right up to the end.

Like they were the hospice nurses were surprised they were given her enough morphine on the on, you know, the regular schedule of morphine that you do during the what should be your final day or final hours.

And she just kept going and going and going. And there were times where she would stop breathing for like two minutes, two straight minutes. I can't even hold my breath that long. I don't think.

And then suddenly she would wake up again and gasp for air. And this this happened a bunch and there was one point where they said, yeah, I'd give her an hour.

And so Kim and her sisters were there and an hour passed and two hours, three hours before we knew it 24 hours had passed and she was still kind of, you know,

still there and wasn't until the very next day. So another 24 hours later on the morning of Saturday that she passed.

But boy, I'll tell you this this version of this this version of version of family loss is sure more cathartic when everybody in the room likes each other.

There's no 94 year old narcissistic control freak gatekeeper weirdo making everything hard, which is what happened to my mom's case.

And some of you know that story. I'm sure I've told it here. I don't remember. To be honest, the last couple of months have been a huge blur.

That stroke happened the day my mother died.

And so we haven't really stopped. And so I'm sweeping some stuff up my.

I was playing World of Warcraft yesterday and I tend to eat some fire seeds while I play.

And I have a garbage can right here. So the seed shells should be going straight into the can. But I'm kind of terrible aim.

And I'm also trying to level a character. And so I've got what do you call this seeds all over? What do I call this?

So anyway.

Yeah, what a weekend, man. Like just chaos.

Funeral's next week. Everybody's prepared well prepared in advance. There's no weirdness around it. Everybody's got what they're going to do.

They're doing two. One in here in the valley or in what's not actually in the valley. It's in Utah Valley out in American Fork and then where they lived.

And then her dad and the siblings are all going down to Mississippi with her ashes to do another funeral down there.

Because that's where they're from, spent most of their life and marriage there. Although I guess they've been in.

They've been up here near us since 2004. So 21 years, 22 years almost.

That's a big portion of their lives, I guess. But that's where they're from. They have a.

They have great plot down there and you know, a lot of family. So.

So they're going to go do all that and they're going to.

Leave most of the husbands here. In fact, I think all of the spouses are still here. Everybody's got piles of stuff to do. Plus tickets right now are stupid.

Like even they don't even give you the bereavement discount anymore. I don't know when airlines quit doing that, but.

It was a nice perk and I don't know. Did people take advantage of it? Or did they realize that lots of people die so we can't be given away these.

Discounts are, I don't know what they did, but none of them have.

They all claim like, oh yes, we have a bereavement thing. It's like.

2.1% off, but also the tickets are.

1200 bucks for a round trip to Mississippi for some reason at this exact moment.

I just don't get it.

And like a week later or two weeks later, they could be $200. It's, I don't understand. That business is weird to me.

It doesn't seem like if we, if this is what.

Taxes, ubers, buses, any other.

Kinds of transport that you pay for if that, if they fluctuated that wildly.

People would be up in arms all the time. Why we're, why we're cool with it with airlines. I don't know. I don't get it.

Someone want to explain that to me. We got anybody out there that works for Delta or United or somebody.

Anyway, and then on top of that, you may have seen the YouTube video. It's up and full on my channel, my Chanel.

But Van, who's seven years old, my little grandson Van. I can't believe he's seven.

Anyway, he decided one day. I want to get my ears pierced and his mom said, heck yeah, let's do it.

Because I raised my kids not to stigmatize stuff like that.

There are a couple of black studs in his earlobes who gives a crap, you know.

So she did and they did. And then he said, pops, you should do it.

And I said, oh really? He says, yeah, you wish you could be twins. Do you want to do it? We could do it.

And Carter went, hey, I've done it before. I'll do it. I'll give you the holes. I'm like, oh boy.

So my daughter's willing to do it. His desire to have me do it. That was like enough.

So I said, yep, let's do it. All these years later.

There was a brief window early junior high school where I was contemplating me and my friend.

We're contemplating getting studs and we didn't do it.

But yeah, and all the jokes are real funny. Everybody's like, well, this is only one step away from a giant tattoo on your butt or whatever.

No, it's not. These are two simple holes that if I decided to let them heal and close up on their own, I certainly could.

But for now, as I look forward to my eventual Harrison Ford years, I will now look like him.

No hoops, though. Hoops make you look like a pirate. And I don't want to be a pirate.

I don't want to be a pirate.

Silent Field fans will know what I'm saying. All right. Anyway, so that video went up and it didn't do whatever it did.

So then this is something I just started to notice. And I'm not used to this because, you know, I don't really, I'm not like a big mom color in my hair green this week.

Or I'm going to, I don't know, you know, I'm not I don't do wacky stuff that changes up my parents that often.

It's just not my, you know, it's not a problem. It's just not something I'm into or that I think of busy doing other stuff.

It's been kind of true my whole life. So a couple of people will you hang out with on a fairly regular basis. Super nice couple.

I'm very good friends with the husband.

He, uh, he and her came by to bring food over after Kim's mom's past. It was very nice of them and we sat around and talked for a while.

And every once in a while, I would just see them glance at my ears, but then glance away and not say anything, right?

Like they knew they knew they were there, but they weren't like talking about it.

And so finally, I said, you guys keep looking at my ears and you want to know what's going on? He goes, well, I was wondering about that.

And I'm like, well, just ask. It's not a big deal. Are you, what are you going to offend me?

So I'd then I told them the story and I don't know if that was enough or not because it's the kind of thing they would never do.

You know, I haven't felt like that since I was a kid. That kind of like weird judgment.

Not that they weren't being like judgmental in the most negative sense. I just mean like, oh, earrings. What's going on?

Is he, is this some sort of advisor of Ferrari parked in the garage? Are they about to tell us they're getting divorced? Like all those stereotypes kick in?

And none of them could be further from the truth, especially that Ferrari thing. Holy shit. I can't afford that.

No, especially the marriage thing came and I've been to get it forever and we're never going to get more, never getting divorced.

So the whole thing is, is a bunch of hoey, but I don't know, it was just interesting.

It didn't bother me. I just realized, oh, yeah, that's what this is like. I'd forgotten, you know, when I wear a weird jacket with a big symbol on it that none of the old people understood when I was in my teens or whatever.

And I was strutting that around and they were all going, oh, what's that? What's what's rebellion? Is it, you forget what that feeling is like once you're older?

You just forgot, you forget. I'd forgotten what that felt like. The eyes of judgment are upon me and it kind of took me off guard.

So anyways, it's, it is what it is, right? And I actually think they look pretty good. My daughters think I look younger, Kim likes them.

Vance over the moon. Excited. His sister loves it. Like what's not to like, right?

And I'll admit, part of me made that or had them make that video. I didn't make it. They filmed it of me, but part of me made that video or put that video up so that there was a public record as to what I did it.

So even though the judgment of others, the eye of judgment does not bother me, it must bother me a little bit enough for me to say, well, here's the video. Here's why I did it.

Go watch that and then you can stop thinking, I'm, you know, I'm having a crisis.

There was kind of a funny incident though. I was on YouTube. Somebody commented on the video and said, what's that the gay remark? And I went, uh-oh.

And what it was in the video back when I was when I was in high school, I think this is still true in some circles. I don't know.

But that all the talk was if you got an earring and I can never remember if it was left ear or right ear because it changed all the time.

That's how dumb it was. It meant you were gay. It was like a symbol that you were gay. All right. It's the 80s. It was the 80s. And stuff is dumb then.

And, uh, I mean, don't get me wrong. I love growing up in the 80s, but come on now.

So, uh, I talked to some gen alphas, late alphas or late Z's early alphas and they all say that that doesn't exist anymore. No one talks like that. That's not a thing.

Kind of like how people would call you four eyes and tease you for having glasses in high school. That doesn't, they don't do that anymore.

That's like, that's just people have glasses. That's not a thing. So there's progress, right? That's good. Anyway, uh, where was I going with that?

Oh, this commenter was like, what's with that joke? And I said, um, I said what I just told you said, well, it's a reference to this.

You know, when as younger, there was this bull crap notion that if you had an earring and one ear or the other, you were gay.

And in the video, I said something like, because the first year hurt so bad, I'm like, oh my gosh, just, I'll just be gay.

Leave me just leave the one and I'll be gay. You know, so the joke is a reference to that. Everybody in the world got it, including my gay friends. All got it.

I have gay friends. It's not like I'm not, this is not me trying to justify it. I would have said it no matter what. But I heard back from

people I know who are openly gay. The wonderful friends and people who said that was really funny. And they get it. They got the joke, right?

This guy goes, and I explain that to him. I was very nice about my explanation. He wrote back jokes are really good if they're not offensive.

And so I said, well, wait. What are you offended? Are you gay and I've offended you? And he comes back with, no. Well, then what are you doing? They can handle their, they can handle their own offense, offense.

They don't need you over there running, running screens for them. Don't you go white night something else?

Now I realize that was a YouTube comment I was arguing with and that's that's folly and pointless. I understand that. Okay. Don't come at me with that. I know.

But sometimes I like to give people a chance to explain themselves or an opportunity to open dialogue and actually communicate. I like that. And I will always try to do that even when it seems dumb or it's a bot or whatever. Sometimes I'm just going to try doing that.

As cynical as our modern day is I still think that there's some value in trying to do that one you can.

And they'll either show an indication that they want to talk to you or they want to further this discussion or they'll or they won't they'll just fade out and go away.

I'll fight it until you just say, all right, well, I got to block you from the channel because this is just mess. So see you have a good one, you know, which is what I did. Anyway.

So that's where it's at. That's the big update for the day. I hope you've enjoyed it.

We're actually feeling a little bit of catharsis around here around her mother's passing because there was just so much going on and it feels like we have finally got some finality to this ride we've been on.

It feels like it finally maybe ended at least for now like.

We still have the funeral. She still has her trip to Mississippi. She still has all that and I'm swamped with nerd-tacular planning and it's all crazy and.

You know, everything's everything's crazy, but I don't know this this mothers are in peril chapter of our lives feels like it.

It finally has a.

A break, you know, until the next thing.

It's just a lot to do all at once.

You know, not to mention that.

It feels like my country that I love is on fire right now because of things.

Anyway, thanks for listening. Thanks for hanging out. Thanks for being there. If you have any questions or thoughts, go to frogpants.com.

You'll find all the ways to contact me and if you want to get in touch, be happy to talk about stuff on the show.

If you have any thoughts about what I talked about today, that'd be great also.

And if you're coming to nerd-tacular, I can't wait to see it. If you haven't decided yet, now's the time.

We're keeping the tickets at the low entry price. We're not raising them.

So if you get them now, still time, obviously before June to get them and you can find all that at frogpants.com.

Get your hotel nights. Hopefully at the marriott that we're in because they'll save you a lot of money there.

And it'll help us because we need to fill those rooms as best we can to have our commitment filled.

But we got so many cool plans, man. It's going to be awesome.

And it might be the last one. I keep saying might, but I'm pretty sure this is going to be the last, this size of one of these will ever do.

There'll be little bitty ones. The vagus stuff will happen for TMS.

There'll be traveling around a different little one than things like that.

Because I think as far as like, hey, we're all here. We're all doing this at once.

Like, I think this might be it. And I want it to be awesome for you.

Well, end for me. For all of us.

Okay.

Thank you all for listening. And we'll talk to you soon. Bye.

Thank you.

You

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Howdy, howdy ho and welcome to Fantasy Fanfellas. I'm Hayden, producer of the Fantasy Fan Girls podcast and your resident lover of all things Sanderson.

And I'm Steven, your bookish internet goofball, but you can call me the smash daddy.

And we are currently deep diving Brandon Sanderson's fantasy epic, Missborn. But here's the catch.

Steven here has not read Missborn before.

That's right. Hey, hey, so each week you'll get my unfiltered raw reactions to every single chip.

And along the way, we'll do character deep dives, magic explainers, and Steven will even try to guess what's next.

Spoiler alert, he'll be wrong.

News flash, I'm never wrong.

Episodes come out every Wednesday and you can find Fantasy Fanfellas wherever you get your podcasts.