I feel like you should know something about me, and I need to see a some voluntary raising of hands so that I know I am not in fact, alone in this.
::squints straining eyes through spotlight to a crowd of three to hear cricket chirps::
I have a real penchant for mystery/crime stories.
I was an Unsolved Mysteries junkie as a kid. Dateline NBC kinda freaks me out if I watch too many episodes. Sometimes, I let real-life trials swoop me up until I’m lost in them {in my past life, I was totally Nancy Grace}. And when I was younger, I would stay up past ten to finish up Lifetime movies of choice. Yes, it’s true – even the cheesy crime movies no one should be watching on the simple basis of awful writing. But they might be based on a true story so duh, I was game. I had this obsession with CSI for a while, and think I missed my true calling as a forensic scientist. {JK I’m lying because bodily fluids freak me out – I can barely type out the word bodily fluids.} I’m just now finding podcasts like Serial, because I’m slow on the modernization train, {so any you want to send my way, I’m happy to devour}.
But please tell me I’m not alone?
Here’s my ultimate weakness: I love mystery/suspense novels. I was raised on Nancy Drew and her knock-off version, Mandie {and all her secret tunnels and bad plots in general, just frustrated the 4th grader me} I moved on and alternated between Christopher Pike, R.L. Stine and Lois Duncan. And then eventually graduated to Mary Higgins Clark {much to my mother’s dismay} in high school.
I was the walking stereotype dork, lost in a book. No shame in my game.
I can’t decide if it’s a downward spiral or a great little secret splurge on the side. {Treat YOSELF} Probably both. But I have to regulate my time with them like my new boyfriend in college. {I’m looking at you, Jamin.} Scheduling time when I can read one. Because I can’t put them down. They’re my real go-to. I have free time, and it’s all things book. No one else is around when I become lost in one. I’m kind of surprised I haven’t lost a book in the pool yet. Or the laundry. Or admittedly, the bathroom.
The kids want to be fed? Let me finish this chapter.
I ordered the latest addition to Reese’s Book Club, and it’s horrible timing because back to school. I think it’s my final fling with summer and my sheer refusal to let it end. I’ve experienced all the stages in the cycle now, and I’m finally settling from denial, and circling back around to acceptance. Kind of.
Maybe.
Yes, I realize there is a side affect to my little obsession, and it does not, in fact, help curb any basic paranoid anxiety that I already have. I have to limit the actual real crime stories to once every now and again because if I read too much, suddenly everyone is out to kill me.
See: the time I was almost murdered. I mean doesn’t everyone freak out when they find a hairnet in their house? Also see: how good I am at handling crises a-la Satan’s Garden Stool. HOT. MESS.
Recently, I devoured Michelle Mcnamera’s I’ll Be Gone In the Dark. It was fascinating. I was terrified. And then the most gratifying thing happened when one month later, THEY CAUGHT HIM. It was LiTerally {say it like Chris Traeger} the most satisfying thing that has happened to me in quite some time. Yes, #Irealizethismakesmealoser #pleasetellmeyoureadthisandwerealsoexcited.
There I was, screaming at my computer screen in the studio, from the basement to Jamin in our living room, who kept getting all the unwanted details.
Me: OH MY GOSH they CAUGHT HIM!
Jamin: Who?
Me: the NIGHT STALKER!
Jamin: What?
Me: THAT BOOK I READ THAT I ALREADY TOLDYOUALLABOUT. They’re about to have a press conference! This is INCREDIBLE!
And there I was, high fiving the team of brilliant people, {including Michelle} who helped track him down. In my mind, at least. Why do I suddenly sound like the grown man-child playing too many video games, living in his mother’s basement? And admittedly, my day kind of dissolved from there. Sometimes, you just have to sit back and watch a 40-year-old case unfold before your very eyes, because history. And honestly, because nerd.
Anyway, I think my true calling in life {apart from Nancy Grace and CSI and maybe a dentist or the president amongst other professions on my well-diversified childhood list}… was probably being a librarian. But I’d be a really crap one because I’d want to keep all the books for myself and read in the corner and help no one. Sorry, you’re on the waiting list AFTER ME. Okay fine. Maybe trophy wife would be better, so I could be an excellent beside-the-pool-in-between-fundraisers-and-plastic-surgeries-reader. Yep. Definitely the latter.
But I’ve said all that {thanks for following my train wreck of thought derailment} to say this: What if the coin was flipped? What if I wanted to get away with something? Don’t judge me. If you love stories like this, you can’t say you haven’t thought of it. Because the perp always get caught. Behind the CSI teams and the police force professional people and brilliant investigators everywhere, I’ve seen how this works. And so it begs the question.
I’ve come to a conclusion over time, and it’s that if I ever committed a crime of any kind I would never get away with it.
EVER.
I know it might surprise you when I write this, but I actually don’t have a record. #foreverrulefollower. And also I think that things like say, murder are wrong. So there’s always that. The idea of getting away with any sort of crime is legit a moot point because I’m such the guilty person I would probably confess to someone else’s crime if they held me for too long and looked at me the wrong way.
And then they’d make a documentary on Netflix or something. Cops are amazing and I totally respect them to the point where they actually kind of make me nervous when I’m around them. Because perpetual rule follower. I’ve only been stopped for two speeding tickets in my life. But when I did, I basically cried because I knew I was a disappointment to the system of AMERICA. And it’s terrifying.
I’ve seen enough CSI montages, Dateline NBC scenarios and real life news stories to know I would immediately be incarcerated. I wouldn’t have clean up my finger prints from the crime scene or flee to Mexico or even dodge the family DNA site thingies because they might rat me out.
It would be one culprit that would expose me to the world: Our dogs.
Their fur alone would be the thing that incriminates me. In fact, I’ll probably be incriminated anyway because I’m pretty sure I leave a trail everywhere we go. Eventually something will happen. When they start searching for the shoplifter at Publix, {I can assure you, it wasn’t us} and the trail will lead back to us, because dog hair.
We’ve purchased the furminator.
We’ve used the special gloves that are supposed to reduce all the hair.
I don’t think I need a disclaimer here that says I actually clean my house. I think if you have an animal of any kind, you have an idea on all things love vs. shedding conundrum struggle bus. I’ve brushed and vacuumed and cleaned and all the things. {You know that this has been a godsend.} But I can’t keep them from producing it. Honestly, we’ve even tried fish oil, and considered shaving them {nope, not sorry at all} but they’d look like two bald weirdos with fluffy tails and poofy heads. Bless.
We have never. In our lives. Seen two dogs that produce more hair. A combined, 140 lb force of fluff to be managed. I need a jewel in my crown because taking these two in has required a lot.
Complicating matters further, they rub themselves on all the things.
Exhibit A: Anyone who wears black pants to our house, is doomed. R.I.P. black pants. I have to keep a lint roller by the door, in case of black pant emergencies. Our dogs love visitors and they love all the attention, so rub/hair fest, it is.
See exhibit B: I tried to line-dry my yoga pants the other day, because yoga pants. Line dry is fancy speak for draping it over the back of our kitchen chair. And draping it over our kitchen chair was a bad call because when Rigby sauntered by, she left no less than thirty hairs in her wake. All over my fresh pants. In one split fraction of a second. They were drawn to said dark pants like a magnet. I can’t go to a Barre class without always leave something on the black mats – merely adding to the problem.
#firstworlddoghairprobs
So I’m pretty sure if someone wanted to frame us, all they’d have to do is come to our house, look under the sofa, grab a few dust bunnies and TADA! Planted on the crime scene.
That is, if we haven’t left our own trail already, in a crime scene just yet. A dog hair tumble weed has probably drifted on it’s own, to a future crime scene somewhere, as we speak. And we’re framed. Fast forward to 2020 – Nancy Grace is reading this post on her show, which further convicts me as one big predictive coverup.
And suddenly some other woman is yelling from her computer in her studio about how they FINALLY CAUGHT THEM!
So here’s to you, Rigby and Fitz. Thank you for keeping us overtly honest with your hair bunnies and overtly fluffy balls of hairy love, since 2016.
Conviction by dog hair.
Kate Jaco says
🙂 conviction by dog hair is so funny and true! If you haven’t listened to the podcast “In the Dark” I highly recommend it!!! The first season especially was so good. I’m only a few episodes into the second season.
ashley @ the handmade home says
HAHA! I’m so glad I’m not alone in the scary/mystery podcasts! LOVE recommendations. Thank you! If you have any more, let me know! ;} Oh, and I’m currently stuck on BA Paris – good writer in the books category.;}
Kate Jaco says
No, girl, you are definitely not alone in this 🙂 I recently found your blog and this post made me feel like we would be good friends in real life. Nerd confession…in high school, I almost always stayed home on Friday nights so I could watch Dateline. That was like the perfect night for an introvert and true crime lover like me. Thanks for the book recommendation – I’ll look for that at the library!
Other podcasts in my “True Crime” playlist are: Beyond Reasonable Doubt (this is about the Michael Peterson case – if you saw that episode on Dateline back in the day, or more recently, watched The Staircase on Netflix), Crime in Sports (this one’s done by 2 guys and the stories are interesting but they do use a lot of language), Heaven’s Gate (haven’t listened yet but cults are also super interesting to me), Slow Burn (about Watergate), and Small Town Murder (done by the same guys as Crime in Sports so super interesting cases but lots of language). Undisclosed is one that started as an off shoot of Serial. It’s done by lawyers and is very interesting if you want to take deep dives into evidence and lawyer stuff. Up and Vanished was really big 2 years ago – in my opinion, it started really well but then he started to get famous and it turned into more about him than the case.
Ok sorry that was so long. Happy listening!!
ashley @ the handmade home says
OF COURSE we would be friends because you sound AMAZING. Never apologize for recommending all the things – I LOVE IT! ;}
C says
I haven’t listened yet, but my friend raves about Up & Vanished…they also helped solve a cold case this year. New case starts August 20.
ashley @ the handmade home says
OOOhhh great recommendation! I’m basically a podcast newb {as my x-bow playing kiddos would say} so I haven’t heard this one but they’re on my list ;} Thank you!
Amy says
Oh my, I have nothing to say because I’m cracking up. I can’t relate to the true crime obsession because I’m WAY too scared for that stuff, but can definitely relate to the dog hair. Thanks for the laugh!
Aryn says
My fave true crime podcasts: Sword & Scale, Court Junkie, Once Upon A Crime, and Someone Knows Something. Serial is still the best podcast I’ve ever heard, and I’m forever searching for something to top it.
If you don’t want true crime, I highly recommend both Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert and Michaels Rosenbaum’s Inside of You. They both interview other famous people, and it’s always interesting. Inside of You’s episode with Beverly D’Angelo was really surprising because I only know of her as Ellen from the Vacation movies! Jennifer Love Hewitt was also a good episode, and made us break out our Heartbreakers DVD to watch that weekend. I will never call that a guilty pleasure movie because I have no guilt. It’s a hidden gem!
I’m commuting 2 hours every day, so I go through a lot of podcasts!
Faye says
Okay, Ashley, we surely MUST be related. I can so identify with ALL of this, right down to the doghair. Sorry I didn’t get your looks but otherwise, I could be your twin based on this particular blog entry. (My decorating gene failed to come through so there is that. Oh well, so we can’t be related when all factors are considered!!) Anyway, loved this right down to the very end!!
Laura L Webster says
You are too funny! I think you are great for giving those two adorable, hairy dogs a loving home. My guilty secret is that I have my TV on most of my waking hours on HGTV, DIY, or Animal Planet. I watch almost all the programs on HGTV and DIY. On Animal Planet I watch “Too Cute” and “Dogs 101”, “Cats 101”, and “Pit Bulls & Parollees”. And I’m perfectly happy watching these programs infinity number of times. Thank you Comcast On Demand. Especially “Too Cute”.