My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 266

Episode Date: February 14, 2022

This week’s hometowns include an apocalypse farm job offer and a famous local rooster.  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We at Wondery live, breathe and downright obsess over true crime and now we're launching the ultimate true crime fan experience, Exhibit C. Join now by following Wondery, Exhibit C on Facebook and listen to true crime on Wondery and Amazon Music, Exhibit C. It's truly criminal. Hello and welcome to my favorite, the mini-soad. It's fast, it's mini. It's just tiny and they're all your stories so you're gonna like it. Yeah, wanna go first? Sure. I really love this email. I'm just gonna start by saying that. I'm excited. The subject line of this is job offer, job offer on the apocalypse farm. Howdy. In this 262 mini-soad, there was a weird customer interaction story so I decided to share mine. I worked for way too long at a chain hardware store

in town. While there, I became a member of the garden section team with no knowledge of plants and then in parentheses, I would eventually be promoted to sales lead too. I never understood why but I took the position for the raise. While working the sales floor, a man in his 60s or so asked me for help loading up bags of soil onto a cart. This was pretty common and it's spelled P-E-R-T-T-Y. Which could have been a mistake but I really enjoy it. This was pretty common for customers that were not able to load up soil for a variety of reasons or just didn't want to get dirty. I didn't mind. Doing this sort of grunt work kept me off the cash register and kept me in shape. This man was generally polite and had this ability to charm other customers into conversation

with him while checking out at the register. While he was chatting with other customers, he'd brag about being a semi-retired professor in England having multiple homes and cars and how he was just in town at his summer home near my college town. He soon became a regular and I'd see him every week or two and seemingly would always be the one to help him. It got to the point where he would wait or ask for me to help him out loading up soil, picking up fertilizers, plants, etc. Again, I don't know plants but I can read a package or look up information online like a champ. We'd chat a bit about nothing while I'd help him out but it never seemed like we became friendly enough for what happened next. One day I'm loading up soil for him and he says,

Daniel, I want to make you an offer. I have a farm in the hills and I want you to run it. It's completely off the grid with solar panels, a creek with clean water, on-site filtrations for the water just to be safe, and rations of canned and frozen food for at least a decade. Damn. Right? I want you to live there and tend the garden and the grounds so there's always fresh produce. Thinking he was joking, I asked, what does this pay? He said, I could pay you. Hell, I could pay you any price but money isn't going to matter soon. You'll have everything you need on my property to keep busy and entertained. Plus, when society crashes, you wouldn't have anywhere to spend money anyway.

Damn. I politely declined being this stranger's live-in apocalypse farmer. Live-in apocalypse farmer. It was so good. Saying I was in school, a band, and stuff I didn't want to walk away from, really it was because of, well, all of it. Yeah, yeah. He took this well but came in a few weeks later and pitched the job one more time as a quote final offer. I said no again and after that he stopped asking for me and waiting for me to be free to help him. He'd still come in for stuff, right? He'd still come in for stuff, either getting help from other employees or loading up his stuff himself for a while, but eventually I never saw him again. I wonder still if there was a farm, if there is, if he's there now, or if anything he's ever said

was true. Daniel. Oh, that's good. Apocalyptic farmer partner. How did you find land with a creek with clean running water? Right, and how do you know it's clean? I lived, we had a creek that was behind our house and I would never say that that water was clean. For any, what? Lights from the mountains, like at the top of the mountains, the snow and the ice and everything. Actually, this, let's figure out where this farm is so we can also go to Apocalypse Farm when. I mean, it's true. There was a fucking apocalypse. I mean, yes, years ago. That idea that it's like you're going to come and be my employee, even though nothing's really happening at the moment. Right. I'd rather go fight the zombies. Yeah, maybe stick around with people like

more than you. Weird old professor that brags. Right, too much. I don't know. I'll start conversations with strangers just to tell them things about themselves because they want to tell things about themselves. Right, it's just like if you're an accomplished professor in England, those people I find, and I'm basing this completely on watching like all creatures great and small, they don't brag that much because they are accomplished. Like they feel the satisfaction. They don't need to take it down to the hardware store. Nobody cares. Truly. You know what I mean? Yeah, not with the apocalypse right around the corner. Trying to buy fucking Alvarenche right now. Friends, can you fucking professor whatever,

leave me the fuck alone. Trying to survive. God, like anyone. Okay, that's right. I'm not going to read you the title. Hello, beautiful humans and nonhuman pals. Big fan, blah, blah, been listening since episode four. I know. Go me. Yeah. Wow. Let us say it. Yeah, fine. You're mad. Let me start by saying guns were essentially banned in Australia in 1996 with very few exceptions like law enforcement and farmers. Love that fact. Handle it. Right. I know Americans are used to guns, but Aussie millennials are not. I'm 31 and I've never seen a gun up close until this day. So in April 2020, right as a pandemic was starting to impact daily life in Australia, I met my sales job for a big box store. Masks had just been mandated a few days before,

and yet another entitled douchebag comes in bearing his germy face holes for all to see. I sass him until he begrudgingly accepts a disposable mask. There's a little passive aggressive banter and he chooses his items. As I'm looking down at my POS system, I hear him say, oh fuck, I look up directly into his eyes as we both realize there's a gun pointed at his head. Well, this is like 2pm on a Tuesday and I'm on goddamn minimum wage. Yeah, for real. We're face to face, barely a meter apart. My eyes refocus and realize there are in fact four guns drawn on this man. Everyone freezes. The men holding the guns are all heavily tatted with shaved heads and beards. I'm heavily tattooed so I don't like to pigeon

hole people, but naturally I assume I'm about to witness a biker gang hit. Two of the men holster their weapons and throw the man to the ground. He's screaming, I didn't do anything over and over, thrashing around on the floor. They pull out a wallet overflowing with cash out of his pocket and a gun from his waistband. It's only then that the attackers identify themselves as undercover police. This all happened in what feels like ages, but was probably in fact 30 seconds. I grab my radio and start paging any available goddamn adult get here fucking now. When my manager comes running, I stutter. They're arresting him. There were guns. Then absentmindedly turn and greet the next customer waiting with a soft. How can I help you?

He stares at me in disbelief. I burst into tears and raced for the break room. How can I help you? It's just doing the automatic thing. It's like, anyway, is this what I should do now? Next. This person's good at customer service. Yeah. Okay, it goes on. About 10 minutes later, a man in his 60s dressed in fishing clothes comes in and explains what I just witnessed was half of his undercover team arresting a suspicious driver that had been clocked going 180 kilometers or 111 miles. Thank you for that. Per hour. They'd been following him for 700 kilometers, 435 ish miles, waiting for a safe time to nab him. The other half of his squad had surrounded the car in the car park, arrested two more men,

and seized eight kilograms, 17.64 pounds of cocaine and some guns, 17 pounds of cocaine. That's a lot of pounds. Yeah, that's like a toddler. That's like four bags of sugar of cocaine. I never felt safe at that job again. This was only the first in a long line of insane pandemic madness we witnessed in my store. We've had everything from teenagers with axes to organized gangs sweeping entire departments in minutes. Shit. Yes, the company paid for my therapy. Good. That's where my fucking hooray comes in. Now in November 2021, after 14 years in that fluorescent hellscape, 14 fucking years at a job, can you imagine? Shit, yeah. Which is how many years in? Well, that would be like 19. Yeah,

in metric. I quit to pursue my dream of full-time portrait photography. It's kind of a stupid time to become a wedding photographer, but it's still easily the best decision I've ever made. I'll take my chaotic, starving artist's life over wage slavery any day. What happened was super traumatic, but it was the push I needed to start working on my crippling anxiety. I've since received an ADHD, ASD diagnosis and started medication. I'm learning to work with my differences rather than against them. Thank you for all you do to normalize mental health, therapy and medication. Be nice to retail and hospice workers. You never know what they've been going through. Oh, yeah. Stay sexy and don't sass an armed drug dealer unless he deserves it. Jill. PS, everyone always asks,

he was buying an iPhone and a Fitbit. Jesus Christ. So, Jill worked at like either a Target or a Macy's or a Walmart. It seems like, yeah, something but like with tech stuff. So, yeah. Yeah. Damn. Maybe it was like a Best Buy or the Australian Equivalent. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Terrifying. So scary. And also, it is like it's a great reminder is and it's because everyone is going insane and so stressed out and so scared and everyone's been convinced lately that we have to hate other people and fight other people and whatever. But those people taking it are retail workers and people that have to like Starbucks workers. Totally. Yeah. Hospitality workers and retail and fucking minimum wage jobs. Yeah. Be polite. Be nice. Be polite and then also know

everybody is really, everybody is really dealing with some stuff right now. And tip well, I think. If you can. Yeah. And also, just don't take it personally. Just know deep down if somebody's being a real prick, they're probably deserved to be arrested. Is that helpful? Does that help? It does. It's comforting in this time of need. Right. Well, I'm not going to read the subject line because it gives it away. Guys, don't tell the end in your subject line. Just basic storytelling. Save the good stuff for the ending. Okay. Hey, friends, this has nothing to do with anything. I just think it's a great story. So, my dad traveled to Russia in 1991 as a part of a diplomatic trip to figure out if certain nuclear waste laws and policies were in okay shape

after the fall of the Soviet Union. And then in parentheses, it says, side note, is my dad a spy? My dad said that if they wanted access to any information, then they had to bribe a government official or the local mob boss. So, he's in some town in the middle of nowhere near a nuclear plant and this Russian mob boss walks into the meeting room with bodyguards and an entourage without saying a word. He takes a huge knife out from somewhere and slams the tip of the blade into the table so it's sticking straight up. My dad, having some questions and possibly some concerns, looks to the translator who says, he's showing you that he's unarmed. You should do the same. So, my dad makes a big show of reaching into his pocket and takes out a tiny Swiss army knife.

He unfolds it, sticks the tip into the table, scowling fiercely. The mob boss bursts into laughter, orders them both drinks, yes, in a meeting and they were best bros. Stay sexy and let's all just avoid bringing knives into meetings in the first place. Abby. That hilarious. Humor, humor is the key to all diplomacy. Oh my god. Let people know that you see them and you think they're a tiny bit ridiculous. It's a good power move. This is called real estate agents beware and it just starts. This story came to me as a local true cautionary tale from my real estate teacher who is the managing broker at his office. There was a young agent who was hosting an open house in a quiet neighborhood. At closing time, the agent began locking up when a final customer

walks up seemingly out of nowhere. This agent explained to him that the house was now closed and she could not let him in. He begged her to show him the house. He told her that he just needed to see the basement and that he would leave after seeing the basement. The agent politely declined and told him he can come next week during the next open house. The man was visibly angry but agreed and left. The next week came but the agent had a bad feeling about that man. So she asked another agent who was a strong martial artist to cover her open house. Good. Sure enough, the man came back to the house again at closing time. Upon meeting this new agent, he asked where the other girl was. He became irate that the original agent was not there. He stormed off down

the street with no car to be seen. A couple weeks later, while they had the news playing in their real estate office, my teacher heard screaming from the other room. Both agents were screaming, that's him. That's the man from the open house. That was the day that Dennis Rader was finally caught. BTK had been stalking the young agent for weeks but was finally caught after 30 years before he could finish the job. Stay sexy and trust your instincts and don't get murdered. No name. I mean. I can. I rate that she wasn't there and I rate that she wouldn't, you're crying, wouldn't let him in. I'm always grateful when the story is I had the feeling and I listened to myself and I did the thing that maybe other people thought was weird and I was fucking right and I was,

this is more than right, the danger, like we are all animals. You can sense danger off of other people. It doesn't mean you should be paranoid and always being reactive or whatever, but you should be paying attention and stuff like that. That's a really smart person who went, why would you want to see the basement? Why do I have to be here? Why are you here when no one else is here? Why are you angry that I'm not letting you in? The thing too about, I kind of love the inconveniencing someone else because instead of being polite, I'll just go back. I don't want to inconvenience anyone or make them work on a Sunday in the same way that it's like, get someone to walk you to your car at night if you're scared after work. You can ask someone and they'll be hopefully

understanding and take you, they'll be understanding. I think it's just such a huge thing that she trusted her instinct so much that she got other people involved. I just didn't think it was going to be BTK. One of the worst serial killers and one of the worst, like he was a torture, he was craven beyond belief. Yeah, and he had killed people in basements before too. Yes, and it killed children and children. It's like, oh, everything about that. Thank God. Thank God. Isn't that wild? My next one's funny, don't worry. Mine is too. Okay, great. Looking for a better cooking routine? With meal planning, shopping and prepping handled, HelloFresh has you covered. HelloFresh makes home cooking easy and affordable so you can

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at hellofresh.ca slash murder20 with code murder20. That's up to 20 free meals plus free shipping on your first box when you go to hellofresh.ca slash murder20 and use code murder20. Goodbye. Hey, I'm Mike Corey, the host of Wondery's podcast against the odds. In our next season, three masked men hijack a school bus full of children in the sleepy farm town of Chowchilla, California. They bury the children and their bus driver deep underground, planning to hold them for ransom. Local police and the FBI marshal a search effort, but the trail quickly runs dry. As the air supply for the trapped children dwindles, a pair of unlikely heroes emerges. Follow against the odds wherever you get your podcasts, you can listen ad free on the Amazon

music or Wondery app. I can't you've reached the subject line, it gives it away. Hi friends. This past summer, my family and I were visiting one of our favorite spots on the west coast, Lincoln City, Oregon. This was our first outing since COVID began. And since we were all vaxed and staying masked, we decided a little time at the beach would do us all good. We've been heading to the shore for as long as I can remember. And each time we go, we stop at the same local chocolate shop for amazing homemade chocolate. They really stretched out amazing. Amazing. This year, as we walked over from our hotel, we could see that the open sign on the shop was not lit. But the store hours indicated that they were open, and we could see the owner inside.

The door was not locked. So I decided to stick my fully masked keywords head in and quickly check if they were open. When I leaned my body in, I found the owner on the phone. As to not disturb their conversation, I quietly mouthed note under my mask. Are you closed? To which she shrugged back, not taking a break from her conversation. What? At this point, I felt like I was intruding, but I was committed. This time I pointed to the cash register and quietly mouthed note again under my mask. Are you closed? And again, she said, what? I realized the mask faux pas and I was making, and that she couldn't lip read through my double layered mask that was up above the nose and below the chin where it belongs. Good for you. And thought for a second on how to gesture, are you closed

with half my body that was leaning in the doorway? What I came up with in the moment was this. I pointed my index finger right at her and then I proceeded to bring my index finger to my throat and slash it slowly across my neck in a horizontal direction. Oh my God. All while making direct eye contact and still mouthing, are you closed? Oh my God. Her eyes lit up with fear and I figured I must really be disturbing her phone call. So I just nodded and slowly headed back out onto the sidewalk where my family was waiting. I told my family they must be closed and made it a good 10 steps before realizing I'd just threatened to kill the shopper. I'm fucking crying. Oh, can you imagine that woman's fear? She's just like, what the fuck? I turned to tell my sister,

also, the pointing at you first, you're dead and you're wearing a mask. So there is a real, like, yes, there's a real anonymous element to the threat. Oh my. I turned to tell my sister what I'd done when the door of the chocolate shop flung open and the owner yelled, excuse me, and had to convince her and my stunned family that I was incredibly sorry I wasn't threatening her. I had just lost all semblance of social skills in the last year and a half of lockdown. And that we really just wanted to know if they were open or closed. I'm not sure she believed me, but she did let us in to make our purchases. And when we circled back to the shop an hour later, the open sign was bright and lit. Oh my God. Mondays and Thursdays

have been a light in the dark for the past few years as I earned my doctorate. Wow. And there are a few things in life that bring me as much joy as hearing the intro song to a new MFM episode. Oh, thank you for being you. Stay sexy and get the vaccine so I don't accidentally threaten anyone else. Caitlin. Beautifully written. Caitlin. Beautiful. Wow. Caitlin. Oh, wow. Are you cool? That is epic. And it's so funny because, like, as soon as she was like, I lost my social skills near and I just had flashbacks to the first time I hung out with people and it's like, yeah, you forget how to communicate. Yes. At all. Well, I like to tell the story of Alejandra who works on the show with us. Yeah. And when we had our Halloween party. Right. When I first

met her, I yelled, you're so tall into her face because I assumed seeing her on Zoom. Yeah. That I knew how I assumed how tall she was. Right. She's a little bit taller than average. It's not the kind of thing you should be yelling at people. It was so embarrassing. And I was like, oh my god, what am I doing? It's so embarrassing. Oh, the times. Oh, the times. Alejandra is the one, by the way, who goes through the emails and reads all of these and brings them to us and she's killing it and doing a great job. So thank you, Alejandra. She's doing such a good job. Yeah. Like I have so many that I want to reuse. Okay. Yeah. I'm not going to read you the title of my last one. Dear Karen, Georgia, MFM team and assorted pets. I found news articles for this story,

but in the spirit of a hometown, I wanted to write down my account as I remember it from my senior year of high school before actually reading the articles. Don't worry, I will correct myself if something is super wrong. I love that. Like I'm going to write it down and remember it and then I'll fact check. Yeah, then we'll see. Yeah. Well, the brutal crime took place in 2015. I need to go back a bit for everyone to understand the gravity and emotional upheal of the situation. I grew up in what used to be a relatively small town about 20 miles outside of Seattle called Issaquah. We have a charming little downtown with restaurants, a theater, a million-dollar quartet, and next to normal open there. I don't know what that means to you. Those are two movies, I believe.

Okay. And at the very end of our main street, we had a staples office supply, a drive through espresso stand, and a farm store tucked behind it. Growing up, everyone knew about McNugget, the rooster. He escaped from the farm store sometime around 2002 and had just been roaming around since. He was a total townie. He used to fly up to the coffee shop to get handouts from the always willing baristas, sleep in the trees, lining the streets downtown, and patrol the staples parking lot in his free time. He even had a Seattle Times article published about him back in 2013. Oh, yeah. A pillar of the community, if you will. It was April of 2015 when tragedy occurred. I remember the news reverberating around school that morning.

McNugget had been murdered. It feels unreal typing this out right now that this is something that actually happened, but it was big news. Apparently a woman called the espresso stand, McNugget's daytime number, to let them know that she had seen, all caps, a dog running off with the rooster in its mouth. Yeah. The woman then tried to chase down the dog that was unsuccessful. At first, the community was in denial. Perhaps the woman was mistaken, or maybe she had seen a dog running off with a different black rooster. But when McNugget didn't show up to the espresso stand for his breakfast the next morning, our worst fears were confirmed. Following days, I believe there was a small candlelight vigil held at the espresso stand. And in the following months, a shrine

popped up built in his honor. A local artist painted a picture of him with a board next to it for everyone to write down sentiments about McNugget. Someone else built a metal sculpture of him, and all of those things are still at the espresso shop to this day. Our only solace was knowing that he was at least a 13-year-old rooster. When many don't live past eight, and at least he went out with a bang. I have since moved to Michigan for school and work, but every time I'm back home, I make sure to go get a coffee from McNugget's place. I love this story. Thank you all for everything you do to make this podcast, as well as all the others on the network happen. MFM 100% got me through grad school and through the pandemic. Also, I have pictures that

I took of the McNugget Memorial, but I couldn't attach them to the website form. Let me know if you want to see them. Yes, McNugget. Stay sexy and live free like McNugget did. Signed Sage. Live free, baby. I love, well, you know what? It's cool because that kind of small-town stuff, it's like these days, it doesn't happen that much anymore. So when it can and does happen, and it's like, it's about the community. Totally. It's just about people being like, this is our chicken, he escaped from the farm store. Everyone's fashion. Yeah, we're going to support this guy and let him live free. Oh, McNugget. Everyone is living vicariously. I love that during his free time. He would stalk. God, I would go meet him and make him be my friend. His daytime

number is the espresso stand. That's genius. Oh, McNugget. So good. Love you. Love you. This was on video if you want to watch it on the McNugget. On the McNugget. Van Colt. She's renaming it McNugget, TM. Oh, wait. Sorry, really quick. I just got a cease and desist order from the McDonald's Corporation. No, we're not. Ding Dong, what? That was really fast. So fast. Did he bring a McRib? Yeah, thanks, guys. Thanks, guys. Your participation in this podcast is what makes it happen. And we really love you and appreciate you for it. We also love these little insane slices of life that we get in these emails. So stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie?

This has been an exactly right production. Our producer is Hannah Kyle Crichton, associate producer Alejandra Keck, engineer and mixer Steven Ray Morris, researchers Jay Elias and Haley Gray, send us your hometowns and your fucking praise at my favorite murder at gmail.com. And follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at my favorite murder and Twitter at my fave murder. And for more information about this podcast, our live shows, merch or to join the fan cult, go to my favorite murder.com. Rate, review and subscribe.