Season TWO! Episode ONE! "Where's the Bean?" Will you be my GenX Valentine?

Gen X Women Drinking Whiskey

Speaker 1 0:00

I'm Megan Bennett , I'm Leslie Meyer and this is Gen X . Women Are Sick of this Shit . Hi Leslie , Hi Megan .

Speaker 2 0:10

How you doing . I'm all right right now in this moment Right , this second . If we're going to be very present in the here and now , like with a good meditation . I'm doing all right . I think that is the best we can do right now . All right , how are you doing ?

Speaker 1 0:28

I am doing okay . Okay , the sun's out . I'm cool with that .

Speaker 2 0:32

That makes life a little better some of the ice is sort of melting . It's been like fucking hoth in my alleyway behind and I keep forgetting and then making the mistake of trying to drive up my alleyway . And it's just like my it's hot .

Speaker 1 0:46

Well , now you've got like you've got divots right like icebergs and my car is like .

Speaker 2 0:51

I really hope I don't run into your garage , sorry , dude , I was driving down your street yeah , yeah , yeah , yeah . It's like that all over the place yeah , good luck and my car already was kind of fucked up underneath , and so the thing that's like hanging off is like I better get that service . I haven't had my Mini .

Speaker 1 1:08

Cooper out of the car , out of my garage , since I don't know what like mid-November or something like that .

Speaker 2 1:16

I'm going to have to go dust it off . You would be like a little tiny hockey puck .

Speaker 1 1:20

I would not be able to make it over some of these ice troughs no way so terrifying . You're just stuck Sideways , stuck sideways into one .

Speaker 2 1:29

I can see that it won't get any warmer , though it's supposed to be in the 40s , I think this week . Oh , awesome . So hopefully we'll have some meltage , so some of that shit will melt .

Speaker 1 1:37

But I still won't see my car , probably until May . Oh , that's all right , buddy , put a little blanket on him , I know Walk by give a little pat , give him a little tea and crumpets , sweet little , sweet little mini Koopa .

Speaker 2 1:52

What the fuck are we doing here today ?

Speaker 1 1:53

We're just gonna have a podcast .

Speaker 2 1:55

I think that's great . Yeah , I think so too . Hey , yeah , welcome back .

Speaker 1 1:59

Oh my gosh yeah .

Speaker 2 2:00

We've had a holiday break .

Speaker 1 2:03

It was great , it was a nice little break .

Speaker 2 2:06

I broke everything . I didn't go to the gym in the month of January , so I well no , that's a lie I went back last week . I saw my trainer last week , but I think I had like four weeks basically off from like routine-y things Cool .

Speaker 3 2:21

Three weeks in there . How do you feel ? Do you feel okay ?

Speaker 2 2:23

Yeah things . Three weeks in there , just how do you feel ? You feel okay . Yeah , it was good . I was ready to go back . I was . It was cold . I went like on the cold this fucking day . But when I was there I was like , oh yeah , this feels good . I remember it didn't feel like everything . I think towards the end of the year was feeling like a chore like a have to and a chore and it just I was being like resentful and bitter and grumpy about it all .

Speaker 2 2:43

I feel that , and so and so I was like , oh , this feels good , I'm excited about it , let's do it . It was still too fucking cold to go there .

Speaker 1 2:50

Yeah , no , and I think we talked about our ice troughs . I'm thinking about all those people in the southern part of the country , like in the southern part of the US .

Speaker 2 2:58

Oh my God , who are ?

Speaker 1 2:59

still digging out from seven fucking inches of snow yeah , well , you know , hell has frozen over it has . And good luck getting orange juice , good luck getting any of that shit because everything's fucked for yes , for lots of reasons .

Speaker 2 3:14

Everything is fucked , everything's . I was looking at the pictures of the snow in new orleans and I was a little like kind of jelly jellyous jellyous , jealous and envious uh-huh jellyous because there is this like vampire cafe in new orleans and it's just so beautiful and it looked so gorgeous in the snow and I was like I know that this is super fucked up that you have snow down there , but they're hating life .

Speaker 2 3:39

They're so cool well , and they were like open . They're like we know tons of people are stuck , like please don't drive , just walk here . But like we are here , like let us serve you drinks . Shuffle your feet there and I was like hell , yes , I would totally be there . Yeah , that'd be cool , that would be amazing , that'd be fun , but you know you couldn't fly or drive there because they didn't have any snow removal on the internet I think they're still , because what , what , what week is this ?

Speaker 1 4:03

this is , uh . We're recording this on the 25th of january . It's burns day burns night . Oh it is , yeah , probably then we'll have to talk about that , I guess , maybe I don't know , but yeah , so , like it's , it's , they're dealing with us now oh shit , you know what else it is today what I will get my brain on track .

Speaker 2 4:22

It's national irish coffee day . Oh , we should be having irish coffee right now we can go to the snug while we're done and get an irish guy I would like that we'll do that , so not only is it burns night , which is scottish ?

Speaker 3 4:35

yes let's be clear we know the fucking difference ?

Speaker 2 4:37

oh yes , it is national irish coffee day . We have four different irish coffees on today . I love it , so caffeinated and drunk okay .

Speaker 1 4:42

So for anybody who doesn't know what an ir Irish coffee is on today ? Ta-da , I love it , so you can be caffeinated and drunk . Okay , so for anybody who doesn't know what an Irish coffee is , would you like to say what that is it ?

Speaker 2 4:51

is coffee and Irish whiskey . But there's more to it . And there's a sweetener of some kind Like there's something to sweeten it up a little bit , and then cream and good for a cold , some form on tap hot whiskeys are good for a cold , because that's lemon oh yeah , like a water right yum , but anything with whiskey is really just good if you're not feeling well , my daughter whiskey uh , my daughter was in scotland a few years ago .

Speaker 1 5:19

um , again , not irish , not ireland , scotland . Yes , um , because we do know , because we do know the difference , we do know the difference . But she was there and she was having , she was there for school but she got some cool like trip that she could go up and do like a boat trip and go see some you know , some wildlife and she gets motion sick really easily and I neglected to remind her that , oh , you're going into the , like you know , the freaking north sea .

Speaker 1 5:48

So uh , it's a little rough and so she didn't do very well on that particular trip and just got just soaked and cold and motion sick and she ended up in a pub and she called me and she said I just I feel so gross and I was like you just turn to the bartender and you ask him or her to help you . Let them know that you were motion sick and you're wet and you're cold , drink whatever they give you .

Speaker 2 6:14

Yes , and you're not the first person to have this experience . They are used to this .

Speaker 1 6:19

This is just a regular Tuesday .

Speaker 3 6:23

A regular Tuesday .

Speaker 1 6:24

This is just a regular tuesday , so she got some , uh , some local medicine that's great I'm sorry that she felt so shitty , but it's good for you right like hair on your chest or something very hairy . Well you know menopause you get hair on your chest . I think think you've got a whole other . That's your chin , just a little too low .

Speaker 2 6:48

Oh , I know , Okay , I know , gosh , we've got to pivot .

Menopause and Gen X Women

Speaker 2 6:54

I have a . What should we be sick of this week that I saw ?

Speaker 3 6:57

in our group .

Speaker 1 6:59

But should we just talk about that ? Yeah , do it , let's go right there .

Speaker 2 7:02

So we're going to move our bullshit and hot gossip . We'll get there . We do have segments on this show . So , fundamentally , though we had time off , we made zero changes to how we do this . So there's been no improvements , it's not going to get any better . It's not going to get any worse .

Speaker 3 7:21

No , it will not get worse . We don't think it will not get worse ?

Speaker 1 7:23

We don't think .

Speaker 2 7:23

Recognize that you need to know what's coming next . I have a list of things to say .

Speaker 1 7:32

We're going to try to give you verbal cues so that you're not lost in a mass of words . I love that you focus on this because it's like so not in my brain .

Speaker 2 7:37

These are important things . When you're producing a podcast , I read about them . It doesn't mean that we do them , but I know that they exist for anyone who's sending us that feedback . You know we should organize the thing that women are sick of this week yes , the discovery that in menopause , your labia and clitoris shrink .

Speaker 1 7:57

Oh my God , yes , that post had me dying , so it was so good . Yes , dying , so it was so good . Yes , uh , so yeah , apparently , if your estrogen levels drop , yes , uh , you can uh parts of your labia minora . Right your internal labia yes , kind of starts to just sort of fade away shrink because you don't have them when you're born .

Speaker 2 8:21

They develop when you go through puberty because of the estrogen in your body , and then it goes away , and then when you go to menopause into menopause , depending on your estrogen levels , depending on genetics , depending on lots of things . It's not 100% of the time , but your clitoris and your I don't want to lose that .

Speaker 1 8:42

lambia can disappear . I don't know about you , but I'm pretty fond of it .

Speaker 2 8:46

I was surprised when I first heard about it .

Speaker 1 8:50

I was like oh , this goes back to this whole conversation that we've had multiple times about why the fuck didn't anybody tell us about this stuff . You should definitely be like hey , BT dubs .

Speaker 2 9:01

Part of your body is going to disappear . Where's my doctor ? Are gonna get bigger , like your nose and your ears and your feet and like I guess things like that the the only upside is we're not alone . Like men have their own issues , like they're you know , yes , they do their balls , just get a little droopy right .

Speaker 1 9:22

Yes , get some droopy balls .

Speaker 2 9:24

Yeah , uh-huh , all your shit changes .

Speaker 1 9:27

And I just want to point out that Leslie is now pointing at producer Tim .

Speaker 3 9:31

Listen , I don't know what you're talking about .

Speaker 1 9:33

Uh-huh .

Speaker 3 9:34

Everything is high and tight .

Speaker 2 9:35

Good luck . Can't wait Just wear those underwear extra tight For the menopause to come through . Why is it called menopause to come through ? Why is it called menopause ?

Speaker 1 9:44

You're going to get ear hair .

Speaker 2 9:46

You're going to get nose hair . You're going to have wild eyebrows and saggy nuts . Well now listen , then we'll just get you a little nutsling and it'll be fine . We're going to come up with something that we can sell on an infomercial .

Speaker 1 10:02

So that we make a lot of money . I like it Back up and wrap up . It's the Nutsling oh fuck , yes .

Speaker 2 10:09

Throwback to a first episode .

Speaker 1 10:11

Back it up and wrap it up . Back it up and wrap it up with the Nutsling .

Speaker 2 10:15

Condom company for the over 50 set . I think that's what it was . I think that's right . I think that's right . So much . I I look forward to shooting this infomercial we're going to need a male model . There are a lot of silver foxes out there . I'm sure we can find one .

Speaker 1 10:32

We can find ourselves one .

Speaker 2 10:33

It would be amazing . Oh my God . So that was a big like .

Speaker 1 10:37

Okay , so with that , with , like , the knowledge that parts of your girly parts are going to disappear , on you .

Speaker 2 10:43

Potentially .

Speaker 1 10:44

Potentially that parts of your girly parts are going to disappear . On you Potentially .

Speaker 2 10:49

Potentially Do we know what the solution is for that . So I will say between my own GYN and myself there was not that conversation , because when I went for my menopause examination and I didn't realize the significance of this , she said , oh nice , healthy tissue , and I was like Great .

Speaker 1 11:08

Thanks .

Speaker 2 11:09

Could it have not been ? So I didn't ask the question . You're just like , oh .

Speaker 1 11:13

What that really meant . You just took it and ran with it . You're like cool , yeah , great . Why would it Healthy tissue ? Why would it be unhealthy .

Speaker 2 11:19

I think I know where it's been . So what I have read is like the estrogen creams can really help with that , and vibrations .

Speaker 1 11:31

Oh . Oh with that and vibrations , oh , oh . So , because it's about blood flow , sure , sure , and hormones .

Speaker 2 11:41

So if you're gonna like do scalp massage , you should probably also do vaginal . You have free reign to use your hsa for as many vibrators as you would like oh , I love that medical treatment bring it on that I don't try one actually try to find your favorite , but I think that you could justify that they sell them at like cvs and walgreens and shit all the like massagers for a reason massages , massages and they're .

Speaker 2 12:08

They just happen to be in the row with all of the lubricants and the condoms , so I mean that's an uh yeah , flexible see I love it sending fsh specs flexible .

Speaker 1 12:20

I have no words right now I like , I like that you get to turn those receipts in and somebody gets to look at them .

Speaker 2 12:26

To be truthful , I have no idea legally if that's true , but I mean I would .

Speaker 1 12:31

What the fuck I would think it would be yeah , absolutely Okay . So those are the two things that I feel comfortable saying , but I so it sounds like that's something that probably we just would encourage people to have a conversation with their doctors about .

Speaker 2 12:44

Yes , ma'am .

Speaker 1 12:45

And if you're not getting answers from your doctor , there are other doctors out there . You can look at menopauseorg . Yes .

Speaker 3 12:54

And find a provider .

Speaker 1 12:55

Hopefully that is more in tune with the latest news and knowledge about menopause .

Speaker 2 13:05

Yep and keep asking and share resources . Oh my gosh , yeah , if you have a good GYN , tell your friends .

Speaker 1 13:12

Yeah , yeah , and you and I have talked about this before too . Like the internet now and social media and everything , it seems like it's opened some nice flood , some important floodgates about having conversations like this Because if your mom never talked about it and she probably didn't and your grandmother never talked about it , no , Like this is how your my grandmother did not tell me that her internal labia disappeared .

Speaker 2 13:36

Right , right , Just wasn't a conversation that we had . Like Leslie , would you like a bowl of cereal ?

Speaker 1 13:40

And , by the way , this morning I noticed I'm too deft .

Speaker 2 13:42

I have no clitoris .

Speaker 1 13:46

Shucky Darns .

Speaker 2 13:47

Good golly , you didn't say Good golly , you didn't say .

Speaker 1 13:50

What brought up this conversation ? Shucky Darns lost my clitoris . Where did it go ? Seemed to have gone missing . Did it just fall on the ground ? Oh my God , I hope not , lord . My bean , my bean , my bean is missing . Oh my God , god , anyway , talk to your doctor , ma'am .

Speaker 2 14:18

Yes , keep your bean I am not a doctor nor are you so ?

Speaker 1 14:22

anything that ?

Speaker 2 14:22

we have said in the past five minutes is not real .

Speaker 1 14:26

We hear tell medical advice we hear this is an old wife . You could lose your bean .

Speaker 2 14:31

You should probably talk to your doctor from the internet there might be some creams , and perhaps vibrators are a good way to take care of that . I like it .

Speaker 1 14:39

Gen X Women Are Sick of this . Shit is supported by Lilas Love you like a sis , a Gen X Women's Social Club . What's Lilas , megan ? Lilas is our off platform , off the books of faces , off all of the other traditional social media . It is our space and place for genic women to come together , have conversations , meet each other . It's a social club .

Speaker 2 15:03

It is a social club . It's a membership based club . Memberships are ten dollars a month . That does help support us in growing the platform . We purchased a platform that would host a network of women so that you could come together and meet each other in real time .

Speaker 1 15:23

In a safer space right than a traditional social media platform and a much more personal space . So what do we do there , leslie ?

Speaker 2 15:37

We host movie nights where we live stream some of our favorites as they are available to us for group watches of films from the 70s , 80s and 90s . We host a space for a monthly book club . We host trivia nights once a month month we have a live text chat prizes four prizes that's true ?

Speaker 2 15:59

um , we , the space , is able to host like weekly text chats so that you can kind of check in in real time with people . I would say the critical difference between kind of what this space is and any other social media space that I've experienced is that it is active . You will have to engage in it or be engaged in it by other people , so it's not like a passive consumption thing , it's like making connections .

Speaker 1 16:28

Yep and if that's what you're looking for the opportunity to meet other people , to find people who are maybe in the same similar spaces as you are .

Speaker 2 16:36

Like-minded , same time phase of life , navigating all of those transitions , Then this might be the right place for you .

Speaker 1 16:44

So check out , lylas . You can learn more about it at GenXWomenPodcom . So we are back

Memories of David Lynch Films

Speaker 1 16:56

. Leslie Megan , what's our hot goss ?

Speaker 2 17:00

for this week , our bullshit and our hot goss . Bullshit and our hot goss . To be fair , it's mostly bullshit . Okay , no Death edition .

Speaker 1 17:10

Oh , more death .

Speaker 2 17:15

It's inevitable On death and dying . Death and taxes only two inevitable things . Um in the month of january , while we were away , yes uh , the film maker david lynch passed away big damn deal for for gen x absolutely uh , because of when we lived because of when we lived , because of when we live . Okay , so let's talk films and television shows and other things yeah , so the shows like the .

Speaker 1 17:46

The number one that comes to mind , of course , is twin peaks . Yes , right , like kind of the 1990 lemon here .

Speaker 2 17:54

I had this pulled up earlier . I didn't look at it . It was 80 19 .

Speaker 1 17:59

I know it started in 90 . I think it started in 1990 because I think it started my freshman year in college . Okay , um , and I ?

Speaker 2 18:08

I was not this is the bullshit . This is the bullshit part . This is the bullshit part .

Speaker 1 18:11

We were like meh . But yeah , I was not a ginormous Twin Peaks fan , but I did hang with people who were so my college buddies .

Speaker 2 18:24

April 8th 1990 . There you go , Two seasons . Yeah , okay .

Speaker 1 18:32

Right on . Some of my besties in college were huge David Lynch , huge Twin Peaks fans Big time , so I remember it being on TV an awful lot . And lots of conversation about you know , who killed her , laura , but also , more importantly , like the coffee and the pie and the log lady in that red room . Right , what Right Midgets ? I mean my God there were like Little people . Sorry , you're correct , we no longer use that language .

Speaker 2 19:02

Back in the day though , yes , there were all kinds of like offensive .

Speaker 3 19:07

Of , course Words .

Speaker 2 19:09

Ways of describing human beings .

Speaker 1 19:11

Log Lady was a big deal . Audrey , hotty , hotty , audrey .

Speaker 2 19:17

And the whole freaking soundtrack Angelo .

Speaker 1 19:21

Bellamenti .

Speaker 2 19:23

So I was a senior in high school when this was out and I was absolutely not watching TV , so I did not pay attention to Twin Peaks until I was in college . Absolutely not watching TV , so I did not pay attention to Twin Peaks until I was in college .

Speaker 2 19:38

And probably after the fact I would say David Lynch , for me as a teenager was Dune , yeah , with Kyle MacLachlan and Sting . Yeah , he was pretty hot in that , absolutely , pretty hot in that , absolutely . And it was the like just being able to see those novels brought to life . Yeah , in a very like 80s inspired , but also nod to a lot of science fiction films in the 70s , just like old looks like well , no , that was the 80s . We were watching , you were watching superman and we were looking at like the set and the costumes and lighting and you can just see the like , the flow or the inspiration , like how design changed . But there's so much that like right is replicated in different films . It's , there's such a vibe and dune was .

Speaker 2 20:29

I mean , that was just such a break from everything it was so unique , and it was arguably well , but well before its time yeah , yeah , like there people were not ready for that top of the charts super hottie actor yeah , yeah , yeah , absolutely um , so that was like high school . And then I had as a young person . My mom , for some reason , was obsessed with the Elephant man story , so we watched both the film of that .

Speaker 2 21:00

There was a play about that story and I think probably that was also the oh gosh . There's sort of like the 70s and 80s obsession with just like unexplained phenomenon Like Reader's Digest would do these books of like unusual things , and John Merrick's story would often be part of that because what he was suffering from was so unusual and incredibly difficult for him , obviously . But we would have all these other things like the bermuda triangle and like spontaneous combustion right there was just this like real fascination is am I remembering right , did michael jackson buy something ?

Speaker 1 21:44

I think his skull , like the elephant man's skull , is that right ? I ? Think that's true okay , I mean I that that was just a thing that popped into my head here , right , so it must be true . I do think that's true . Okay , I mean I that that was just a thing that popped into my head here , right , so it must be true .

Speaker 2 21:55

I do think that's true , okay , I thought there was something which is odd , you know well , let's just say there is such a thing as too much money and too much alone time . Right , right , I really could use a nice skull , so I remember that early on . That came out in , I think , 80 .

Speaker 1 22:13

So I was pretty young when I watched that and just sort of .

Speaker 2 22:16

I mean it's incredibly tragic , like he was part of a circus , he was horribly abused , I mean all of those things .

Speaker 3 22:23

So that really like pulled in my empathy as a young person . Yeah , absolutely .

Speaker 2 22:29

And then the whole Dune experience and then in college just in my film as art class . It was like david lynch films blue , velvet and wild at heart are the two that we studied . And then I remember when fire walk with me came out okay , like as a as a youngster , as a young , young , youngling um , did I mean I ?

Speaker 1 22:52

I had never seen a razor head , but I remember being a little kid and feeling like I , you know , when you're like , you're like looking up to people who are older than you and everybody talking about seeing a razor head and like having conversation about it , and I'm like oh , yeah , yeah , yeah , oh yeah like avant-garde kind of art school film school thing right to talk about , like it was important , but you weren't sure why .

Speaker 2 23:23

Because it really wouldn't make sense no and maybe people knew what they were talking about because I think it came out in 77 .

Speaker 1 23:28

I'm like I was , yes , you know , six years old . I sure didn't have a conversation .

Speaker 2 23:33

It's like everybody's like mm-hmm , yeah , like we all get that but nobody does . But it's cool .

Speaker 1 23:39

Yes , oh yes , it's Jackson Pollock , you know .

Speaker 2 23:45

Yes , yes , I know what all those splashes on a white piece of canvas mean this is the deconstruction of man Right .

Speaker 1 23:55

Speaking of Jackson . No , jackson did not buy the bones of joseph merrick .

Speaker 3 23:56

Thank you for the fact check . As the elephant man , he made a bid to purchase them in 1987 okay but the london hospital uh medical college rejected it oh excellent to be five hundred thousand dollars okay .

Speaker 2 24:10

So he didn't acquire them , but he did try to buy them .

Speaker 3 24:21

Later the Jackson manager said that he had no . When he was making that bid he had no intentions of exploiting the remains , but that he identified with the story of Merrick and just like that's heartbreaking , yeah , that might , might have been .

Speaker 1 24:34

He may have seen the movie and thought , oh I want to exploitation , do something to preserve , or I don't know michael jackson's obviously problematic .

Speaker 2 24:45

Now we know , I mean everybody's gonna sure difficult shit you know so controversial to kind of maybe talk about . But if he was identifying with the exploitation of another human being I could see that for sure for monetary gain . There's the connection I agree .

Speaker 1 25:06

Well , it's interesting . Thank you for the fact check because uh yeah , sometimes in our heads we're like yeah yeah , oh yeah , I bought them and they were on display in Neverland and I don't know .

Speaker 3 25:16

This is where the bullshit can get us into trouble .

Speaker 2 25:18

They were not Definitely fact check every episode that we do , don't believe us about 50% of the time .

Speaker 1 25:25

Producer Tim in real time is doing that . Yeah , yeah , I think I mean David Lynch , obviously so many cool things . And I think about I mean David Lynch , obviously so many cool things . And I think about while at heart I think that was the first movie of his that I was like , oh yeah , this is pretty cool really liked it .

Speaker 2 25:41

Nick Cage yeah Lord , earn that soundtrack . Willem Dafoe the most disgusting role ever playing .

Speaker 1 25:49

Bobby Peru yep , yeah , good , good stuff . Lordura , dern and diane ladd together mom and daughter doing are doing their brilliant yep , yeah , that and that was that . Um , uh , that wild at heart song was the wicked game , wicked game with chris isaac .

Speaker 2 26:09

That's right . Super sexy . Forever is that song . It's pretty good . I kind of talk backwards sometimes . That song is hard . So that was sort of my like Gen X chronology . I was kind of like these are all my memories but like in what order would I have experienced these things ? And I think most of the like big influence was college mm-hmm , I remember .

Speaker 1 26:35

I remember people talking a lot about how hot Blue Velvet was too like oh , that's the sexiest movie ever these were while we were raised , on Purple Rain , you know yeah high expectations .

Speaker 2 26:50

So , and then just David Lynch in his later life . I mean , I didn't like keep up or anything but from what I've read and what I understand now is that he was a big believer in transcendental meditation and the reincarnation of the soul . You know , we've done this a million times . You know we come back and we learn yeah again , and maybe we get him again . And the wheel of life , and just the value of creativity and the pause and being in the moment , yeah . So when he died I was like oh .

Speaker 1 27:22

Well , big shout out to my friend Elizabeth and my friend Chris .

Speaker 2 27:26

Shout out Elizabeth and .

Speaker 3 27:27

Chris .

Speaker 1 27:28

Yeah , they were huge . I'm sure still are massive David Lynch fans .

Speaker 2 27:34

Is there a specific memory that you have about that ? No , just

Media Consumption and Nostalgia

Speaker 2 27:36

.

Speaker 1 27:36

I lived with both of them at college and I just lots of conversation , Lots and lots of conversation about David Lynch .

Speaker 2 27:47

I love that I had a professor at Hanover when I was there who taught the film as art class . That was our like spring term , spring term , four weeks of film as art which was like we get to party for four weeks and watch cool fucking movies and that was my freshman year what other filmmakers were you talking about ?

Speaker 1 28:11

I don't fucking remember . Yeah , I mean , that's a big one . Those are the two .

Speaker 2 28:15

Most David Lynch was a really big one , I'm confused because I also took a class in Hitchcock , but some of Hitchcock may have also been part of Filmazart . I probably have that spiral-bound text because they created their own text somewhere .

Speaker 1 28:29

Yeah , that's cool , but those were the two . So , leslie , we were also going to talk about some things that we might be a little bit sick of .

Speaker 2 28:37

Yes , it wasn't just . We're not just sick of our lost labia and missing beans oh , missing beans .

Speaker 1 28:43

I did have a thought during the break .

Speaker 2 28:44

We should do a t-shirt that says where's the bean , like the old where's the beef t-shirts where's the bean where's the bean ? Maybe it's two pictures of you and I like screaming we're like looking at like a little counter with like curly wigs on where's the main ? Uh , yes , that we'll look for that in the etsy store , but it is at the time of recording . It's like the end of january and we are five days into a new administration administration .

Speaker 2 29:12

We're watching the just slow erosion to access , of access to health care information health information , national institute of health , all of these websites that we count on for regular reporting of statistics we have currently down drawled from the who yep who supposedly , I don't know how long paris climate accord yep , um oversight , much of government oversight , independent watchdogs there were like 15 fired overnight . Um , we're just watching the rollback of rights that our mothers got when we were small children .

Speaker 1 29:54

We have watched as the new administration decided to get rid of DEI because for I guess they don't understand what DEI means or how it works which mostly ironically benefits women .

Speaker 2 30:08

I wonder how that will . I'm thinking out loud , I'll stop . I was wondering how it will impact . I'm thinking out loud , I'll stop . I was wondering how it will impact other things , because that also offers protections for , like , veteran-owned businesses , women-owned businesses .

Speaker 1 30:20

Yeah , Like how that works in local government and it's pretty disheartening . It really is , and it's been five days .

Speaker 2 30:30

Yeah .

Speaker 1 30:32

It's just been five days . Yeah , it's just been five days .

Speaker 2 30:35

We're talking about our current news sources and trying to keep them kind of like in their lane .

Speaker 1 30:42

Do you ?

Speaker 2 30:42

have something that you rely on .

Speaker 1 30:44

I listen to Pod Save America and it's Crooked Media . I've listened to those guys for ages . Well , since they started , they actually are or were in worked with the Obama administration . They were speech writers , they were policy guys and then , after the Obama administration , they created their own media company , this Crooked Media company . So they've got Pod Save America , pod Save the World . They've got a couple that are . They've got a podcast that's just women talking about supreme court actions and what's going on with the supreme court , yeah they're fantastic .

Speaker 1 31:23

So I've been listening to them and letting them kind of bring the news to my ears , instead of trying to absorb it from all of the different locations and all the different places , because it's just too fucking overwhelming right , so I just need a lot of .

Speaker 2 31:43

What's happening is sort of just this like it's a just explosion of carpet , blanket carpet bombing yes there's a lot of noise and fury and and um shock and awe and we'll see what all sticks um . But it is incredibly I don't even know if there's a good adjective like they don't seem they're not strong enough , yeah you know , it's like people are concerned people are terrified .

Speaker 1 32:16

So and yeah , and it's that I'm pretty sick of it . It's five days and I'm sick of it um .

Speaker 2 32:23

My kind of online news source right now is jessica yellen and her news not noise network . She started during covid . She's a former cnn white house correspondent um and she created an independent media company . So during covid she was just stuck yeah you know so doing news independently from her home . And then that's grown and she has a sub stack that you can subscribe to . But she does a lot of regular updates currently through . Instagram . We'll see what happens with platforms in the future .

Speaker 1 32:58

Yeah .

Speaker 2 32:59

And she is very clear about like reporting actual news . You know she'll say this is a little noisy , but I'm going to share it because it might be important down the road Right and trying to stay kind of not just balanced but like factual , you know , like journalism , Of course . Yeah , Like you know journalism , Like the journalism that you and I may have studied when we were in school .

Speaker 1 33:22

That has an actual method that has been done for centuries . Yes , I think that's important too , like just this . The fact that people have such an easy way of discounting media is so infuriating to me , because there is definitely a difference between social media getting on there and talking about your opinion about something .

Speaker 2 33:46

Yes .

Speaker 1 33:46

And factual information Right .

Speaker 3 33:49

That is your opinion , that is your opinion .

Speaker 1 33:52

Information right . That's your opinion . That is your opinion and factual information that is researched by human beings who are trained to do that yes , and it's , and pay attention to the language that they use , correct ? I mean they're very thoughtful about how they present inflammatory language and misleading headlines .

Speaker 2 34:09

I mean , that's where we we're kind of at the height of consumerism and capitalism right now . So the click is the most important thing . Right and the truth may be , you know 45 lines down , way , way down . If you sit on the toilet long enough to read the rest of that article .

Speaker 1 34:27

You know what I mean .

Speaker 2 34:28

So being able to use accurate language matters .

Speaker 1 34:32

It does matter a great deal .

Speaker 2 34:36

Which is maybe a divergence from what we do here , because yeah , we just make shit up , we just make shit up , but we do try to use accurate language and we give lots of caveats and fair warnings and please fact check us .

Speaker 1 34:51

If your bean is missing , you should go to the doctor . Yeah , is missing , you should go to the doctor .

Speaker 2 34:54

Yeah , you should definitely go to the doctor , but obviously the difference for us here is we're not trained to be the authority on anything other than our own damn experience . That's right , and that is as far as my authority goes , so I imagine this will be like an ongoing conversation probably something we're absolutely gonna bring out maintain this , um , because it's impacting our lives and and we have young people that we care for and love a lot and we want them to have good lives . And , yes , I'm waiting for cheaper eggs clock's ticking .

Speaker 1 35:29

When do I get my cheaper eggs ? Um , okay , we should talk about something mildly entertaining that has to do with gen x and nostalgia and we need to talk about something fun , because if we don't , we will cry absolutely let's talk about something fun .

Speaker 2 35:51

So this episode's coming out in February , february , february .

Speaker 1 35:56

Which is I always had a bitch of a time spelling that word .

Speaker 2 35:59

Did you ? Yeah , because you have to remember to put that other .

Speaker 1 36:01

R on there , it's like ver-ver-ver .

Speaker 2 36:02

Often it was just Feb . It was just easier that way . Feb with a dot . This is the birth month of our producer .

Speaker 1 36:11

Not only the birth month , but he's born on a very special day . A very special holiday , a heartwarming day .

Speaker 2 36:19

Given to us by Hallmark . And Catholicism , martyrdom and defying the Roman Empire Right . The ultimate act of rebellion was by St .

Speaker 1 36:37

Valentine , st Valentine . Did St Valentine have a first name ? Just out of curiosity .

Speaker 2 36:43

It was Saint , spelled S-T with a dot S-T period , I don't know . There were so many Valentines .

Speaker 1 36:51

I believe that's short for Stephen Stephen , stephen Valentine .

Speaker 2 36:55

Stephen , stephen , valentine , valentine . We're just going to use the wiki , which is our highly accurate research source .

Speaker 1 37:08

Happy birthday in advance , by the way . So much effort , it's great .

Speaker 2 37:11

Happy birthday Producer Tim . You all so much effort .

Speaker 1 37:13

It's great . Happy birthday . Producer Tim .

Speaker 2 37:14

You all know what you signed up for . Okay , we're not selling anything that you're not getting that's fair . There are . Here we go . I'll just read what you got . Valentine's Day , also called Saint duh there's his first name Valentine's Day , or the Feast of Saint , is celebrated annually Seen away .

Speaker 1 37:36

Okay , hang on a second . The Feast of St Valentine . The Feast of St Valentine , that to me means that you're eating him and that seems wrong . Maybe he's super tasty ?

Speaker 2 37:44

We don't know . It's celebrated annually on February 14th . It originated as a Christian feast day where they were evidently eating St Valentine , honoring a martyr named Valentine and Stephen , stephen Valentine , and through cracking myself up , I'm sorry and through leader folk traditions , it has also become a significant cultural , religious and commercial . Thank you , hallmark celebration of romance and love . In many regions of the world . There are a number of martyrdom stories associated with various St Valentines connected to February 14th . Let's be clear , people , there's more than one .

Speaker 3 38:28

Right , this is all mythos right , this is all made up shit hundreds of years after the fact . This is where the Council of Tims comes from .

Speaker 1 38:37

Right , there's multiple Tims . There's lots of Stephen Valentines .

Speaker 2 38:42

Yes and many women named Jennifer from the 80s , including an account of the imprisonment of St Valentine of Rome . So I think this is what we're talking about . St Valentine of Rome was imprisoned for ministering to Christians persecuted under the Roman Empire . Oh my gosh , are we living through our own Roman Empire In the third

GenX Valentine's Day Memories

Speaker 2 39:04

century ? According to an early tradition , st Valentine restored sight to the blind daughter of his jailer .

Speaker 1 39:11

It's always something nice like that it is nice sight to the blind daughter of his jailer . It's always something nice like that . It is nice . I want to know how does it give you in the Wikipedia in that very , very well ?

Speaker 2 39:20

researched authoritative source .

Speaker 1 39:24

Does it tell you why suddenly it's all about love ?

Speaker 2 39:27

Here we go , we're right there . It's as if you knew you for the transition . The very next sentence after healing the blind , um . Numerous later additions to the legend could have been done by hallmark , we don't know have better related it to the theme of love . Tradition maintains that saint valentine performed weddings for christian soldiers who were forbidden to marry by the roman emperor an 18th century embellishment 18th century embellishment to the legend claims he wrote the jailer's daughter a letter signed your Valentine as a farewell before his execution , which she could see , by the way , because he gave her a sight back , that really sounds like the beginning of one of our contemporary fantasy romance novels .

Speaker 1 40:14

It does . We romance novels it does . We should write this , we should write this . It's already partially written on wikipedia , so it's practically there um .

Speaker 2 40:21

It goes on and on and on . You can read you can find it all but really what we're talking about , we didn't know about any of that when we were like children no , no .

Speaker 1 40:32

When I was six years old , sitting in first grade , getting that little paper cut because of my little Valentines .

Speaker 2 40:40

Yes .

Speaker 1 40:40

I didn't know anything about this .

Speaker 2 40:42

Valentine's Day and basically what we kind of were chatting about before this was like how fucked up was it that we were celebrating ?

Speaker 1 40:52

Answer Very .

Speaker 2 40:53

Very fucked up . Valentine's , we were celebrating . Answer very , very fucked up .

Speaker 1 40:55

Valentine's day like as children five-year-olds , six-year-olds , seven-year-olds I'd go even a step further , like okay , so we're celebrating valentine's day because I'm I'm guessing teachers really just needed a goddamn break they needed that day off right lots of crafts that you can do related to and they probably didn't have 500 different tests .

Speaker 2 41:17

They had to make us prepare for absolutely at that point , we were doing appropriate things .

Speaker 1 41:22

We had the ability to fucking play a little bit and they needed a day to you know . Just let us run wild , I guess and we were learning to use scissors full of candy we were trying not to eat glue right we were putting glue on our fingers and then picking it off peeling it off .

Speaker 2 41:39

We were pasting things right , remember paste .

Speaker 1 41:43

There was a lot of much bigger deal in the 80s paste was a lot yeah we were trying to color in the lines . I mean , we were just learning sort of basic skills and the fucking guilt if you didn't color in the lines like that stress .

Speaker 2 41:55

You want to know why we're all so anxious . Yes , that's why . Thanks a lot . Thanks , teachers In the lines .

Speaker 1 42:02

Well , so yeah , I think it's weird that we had that particular holiday , but , man , looking back on it , there was a lot of heavy stuff in that particular holiday because you like when you got your box of Valentine's . So first of all you had to go to the store and you had to pick out what your box of Valentine's was going to be , and this is sort of like the origination of what is contemporarily called a brand Right right . What is your brand ? They were super branded .

Speaker 2 42:33

At five , six and seven years old . Who are you ?

Speaker 1 42:36

well , because I know my mom , my mom , when she would have done valentine's day in school , um , they wouldn't have had , like you know , branded valentine's day , as much valentine's as much we weren't getting transformers , then right , transformers didn't exist , right and then for us it was like oh look barbie , oh look care bear , oh look strawberry , strawberry shortcake or just generic , weird , random , like I remember garfield aliens oh yeah , space creatures yeah , just like kids with hearts disney , huge disney , sometimes right yes , I was like berenstein bears rainbow bright I mean there we

Speaker 1 43:16

go , but those just the more generic ones puppies , kittens ?

Speaker 2 43:21

there was no . There were even like very unbranded generic , but you were kind of selecting , like who am I a kitten ?

Speaker 1 43:28

right , like am I ? Is it ? Do I want these star wars ones ?

Speaker 2 43:32

or do I want ?

Speaker 1 43:32

like , like the Ralph Wiggum , I choo-choo-choose you . You know which one do you want , which didn't ?

Speaker 2 43:39

exist when we were children .

Speaker 1 43:40

No , it did not .

Speaker 2 43:42

Oh , there's some Sesame Street . I guess Garfield might have been around .

Speaker 3 43:46

Love in the 80s ?

Speaker 2 43:47

Oh yeah , for sure , those are great Superheroes we probably would have had , like some spider-man , batman , yeah , like , because the boys would have picked that . The boys would have picked like batman and x-men or whatever right like . So you had to pick your brand and then you had to give them to everyone you had to select , yeah , which valentine went with which person ?

Speaker 1 44:07

and you have to be really careful .

Speaker 2 44:08

Right because you didn't want to send the wrong message yes , you don't want to use the word love on the wrong valentine which , by the way . Why are we worried about this ?

Speaker 1 44:16

we're five years old but , we , but we did and we knew it was like it was important like there is . So the indoctrination to find a love match began , yep , in kindergarten so you had to , and in school I don't know if this was how your school worked , but we had to make like a box . So you got like a cardboard box , like a shoe box or something , and you had to make your mailbox .

Speaker 2 44:38

All right , level up our pasting skills Use your pasting skills .

Speaker 1 44:41

Use , like you know , doilies or something like that .

Speaker 2 44:43

Oh , yeah , paper doilies Learning to cut out a red heart .

Speaker 1 44:47

Yep , yep , fold it in half .

Speaker 2 44:49

Butterfly hearts .

Speaker 1 44:51

Yeah , cut the fold the piece of paper , covering it with hearts .

Speaker 2 44:54

We're putting your name on it did you ?

Speaker 1 44:57

did you in your school ? Did you have to give a valentine to everybody , or did you , you did ?

Speaker 2 45:05

everybody . You were given a list , so it wasn't probably said you have to give them to everybody , but you were given a list of all the kids in your class .

Speaker 1 45:13

Okay .

Speaker 2 45:13

And the expectation is that every child's name would have one . Now nobody checked that .

Speaker 1 45:19

Right . And I'm sure like I know , I think there were times that I didn't get them all , so this is the beginning of like bullying and exclusion .

Speaker 2 45:29

And it's like state-sanction , or if you were sick , like that was the worst because you missed out on the social experience . It's such a double-edged sword . It's so hard Like part of it is such a mind fuck . You're like why are we doing this ? But then if you missed out on it , you didn't get your stuff , or it was put in a box on your desk that you didn't get to decorate or whatever .

Speaker 2 45:49

Yeah , also , you didn't get to decorate or whatever . Yeah , also back in the day of like parents could just make shit and bring it in like cookies .

Speaker 1 45:57

Cookies , yeah , cupcakes , absolutely , and I was going to say the same thing . It's like I remember just , and they weren't wrapped . It was like you know it was like , made them in your kitchen . Here's your cookies .

Speaker 2 46:08

There was like one kid with peanut allergies that had to like sit in the fourth corner of the room , if he even knew he had peanut allergies , right , it was pretty rare . But occasionally I think that was probably the one thing that I do remember it's like nut allergy for some reason , but just being you know , that was it . I mean and so we would have homemade treats and hand out these valentines with lots of pressure .

Speaker 3 46:30

Some of us got cupcakes .

Speaker 1 46:32

Yeah , every year .

Speaker 2 46:35

Dang of candy with lots of pressure .

Speaker 3 46:36

Some of us got cupcakes , yeah , per year . Dang , that's because it was your birthday . You got damn right , although it's not producer tim day .

Speaker 1 46:42

No , I'm sorry , it is valentine's day is absolutely , but when I didn't know ? You existed , it wasn't producer tim day well , you weren't born yet did you have games that you played in in school when you were ?

Speaker 2 46:56

for valentine's day like during that day , right like as you said that , I was like like pin the tail on the I don't know on the little boy what are we pinning on the cupid ? It wasn't a tail . Pin the wings , pin the peepee , pin the peepee on the cupid maybe it's taking me back to our missing labia . Where is my name ? Uh , I don't .

Speaker 2 47:22

I would assume so , because we had to have done something to be entertained right outside of , just like walking from desk to desk , past kids that you liked and that you didn't like , and then making sure that you're giving them the right and then staring . I do remember that now . Maybe that filled up sometime . Okay , because when we would deliver not invitations valentine's , everybody stayed in their desk right and we would get up one at a time and oh , okay , put them probably , so it wasn't just fucking chaos well , and and boy , that's gonna be glaring if somebody didn't get one right ?

Speaker 2 47:57

and what if you accidentally , really accidentally forgot like ? Oh , you're giving people a lot of grace because , I don't think it was about forgetting I think it was like sometimes that's the kid who picks his nose .

Speaker 1 48:07

I'm not giving him a valentine's , because I don't want to make him think that I'm cool with him picking his nose right , it's not okay .

Speaker 2 48:14

But the other thing that would happen there is like what if your family couldn't afford valentine's right like there were ? Kids , there was zero thought to that homemade like stuff that you would just make at home I don't remember there being any thought to that at all no , oh no , not until I mean , I mean , that's why maybe things are a little better now .

Speaker 1 48:34

Right for being aware of that type of stuff . But yeah , yeah , zero thought of that .

Speaker 2 48:39

So there was this very like I'm sure it was a classroom management strategy .

Speaker 1 48:43

However , it also was like you're being stared at You're walking by everybody .

Speaker 2 48:50

What if there's somebody you hate in that room ? All of it . So I do remember that and I would imagine there was like a lot of time running around outside on very dangerous playground equipment .

Speaker 1 48:59

If it wasn't well , it's like even that , even like , so the valentine's have sayings on them . Then you've got those damn candy hearts that had sayings on them . So you didn't want to give like a candy heart to somebody that said like be mine if you're like no , you're the booger picker or I love you , right like no , be careful with that like that's a lot of pressure on a little kiddo do you remember games ? I vaguely like I couldn't tell you what they were .

Speaker 2 49:23

I just remember like the afternoon being filled with something yep , um , there weren't like valentine's movie , there wasn't like a valentine's charlie brown .

Speaker 1 49:32

No , I mean not , I don't say that . And then I'm like , oh , maybe , but not something that we would have watched in school right .

Speaker 2 49:41

There were no specials like at christmas , when we were waiting anxiously for the right .

Speaker 1 49:45

No , not the same .

Speaker 2 49:47

Not the same uh , so when did a lot of these memories are kind of like elementary school .

Speaker 1 49:53

Which is real hard to get back into .

Speaker 2 49:56

That's a long time Out of this indoctrination . When did Valentine's Day begin to kind of have like romantic overtones , like sort of liking someone and maybe kind of knowing what that means ? Like sort of of liking someone and maybe kind of knowing what that means , or just the like that it should have something to do with that ?

Speaker 1 50:19

I mean , I think part of that was well part of that , probably in elementary school a little bit . Just with that , with that awareness of like I want this particular valentine to go to this particular person um gosh man , I don't know , like that . But I mean , then you started having like valentine's day dances and stuff like that at school that were , you know , hello .

Speaker 2 50:43

Now you really have to think about it and if you don't have a boyfriend , then you're you know , yeah , like a well partnering up kind of situation was that ? More middle school for you .

Speaker 1 50:54

I feel like there was , yeah , like I went to a very , very big junior high , okay , um , and I'm pretty sure there was like a freshman valentine's day dance or something , okay , um , yeah , I mean , I , I don't know , I'm like , I'm trying to remember , even like god , who was my first boyfriend . You know , that's right . Oh , I remember mine . Oh , yeah , yes , okay , you wanna tell ?

Speaker 2 51:21

uh , I will not share names because we're still friends in real life , um , but I remember , and so this was my version of a boyfriend I was probably like in third grade Okay , third grade and we just really liked each other . We were friends . There was no like romance Sure In particular but I was given a gift .

Speaker 2 51:45

I like got to school and I went to a very weird school . We don't have to talk about that . But I had a cubby and I got there and my homeroom teacher was like there's something in your cubby . And I was like okay . I didn't know what that meant , right , and so I received a gift with a very sweet note and I was like , oh well , this is a thing I've never had anybody make overtures like this before at the ripe old age of nine I think , uh , eight maybe , and so I was like okay , and we really like to hang out and like do stuff we

Speaker 2 52:22

like to play outside , we like to do stuff together . So our big romantic , romantic date was to go to indiana . Jones raiders of the lost ark , nice , yes , that's a good date . It was . My mother sat two rows behind us and then it was . I didn't remember all of that . And then I got to go spend the night and I slept with his sister in his sister's room Because , like our families were really good friends .

Speaker 1 52:52

Oh , and so we , just we were going to go to like camp or something . Did your mom know that it was a boyfriend-girlfriend ?

Speaker 2 52:58

thing . Yeah , but it didn't mean anything Like . There was no like we just really liked each other . Okay , there was no like knowledge in our brains about like kissing or hand-holding or any of that stuff that's cool . Like literally the beginnings of just being like I like you a lot , yeah , and that's cool . And then we had like kind of similar interests . All right , and that's my memory of it . It was like very age appropriate and I I would say that that probably the feedback would be the same like that .

Speaker 2 53:36

That was kind of like . I think he's maybe like a year older than me , but that was my memory of that time . Uh , because , because our families were friends . You know , when there was like this social , it was like a social thing , so I don't know . It was really like , yeah , very age appropriate okay quite naive , I think .

Speaker 1 53:53

Lovely , my first boyfriend . So my mom worked full-time and , um , this is before my grandmother was living with us . So , um , you know , I was kind of . It was like well , you either are on your own all day during the summer or you go to daycare , truth .

Speaker 2 54:13

So I had to go to daycare and uh so latchkey , but not all the time right , like right , yeah , like I trust you don't want to get arrested , but also as a parent , yeah , right , exactly you can't leave me all day for and my sister to watch over my younger sister .

Speaker 1 54:30

Right , that's probably not the right thing to do so , but yeah , he was .

Speaker 3 54:33

He was in my daycare and I yeah , I'm still sort of in touch with him , which is kind of fun .

Speaker 1 54:41

Gosh , maybe like 10 , 11 , something like that . Okay , gosh , maybe like 10 , 11 , something like that , okay , 12 , something like that .

Speaker 2 54:46

Yeah , yeah , yeah , and he was older than me .

Speaker 1 54:50

He had much more knowledge of all those things than I did . Okay , I was very much not aware of any of it .

Speaker 2 54:58

Was he involved with this boyfriend or was it just sort of like the beginnings of the idea ? Not really , it was sort of like the beginnings of the idea of that .

Speaker 1 55:04

Yeah , so .

Speaker 2 55:05

Yeah .

Speaker 1 55:06

So okay , I mean , I feel like he probably would have been interested in that , but I was like I don't know what I'm doing . I don't know Dirt , dirt , dirt , I don't know so yeah , so there's that kind of like middle school transition .

Speaker 2 55:18

We used to play Battlestar Galactica .

Speaker 1 55:19

Or not , battlestar Galactica ? Battle of the planets together hell yeah , yeah , as kids running around nerd shit , yes , you did .

Speaker 2 55:28

I love that . That's . That's romance for you . There you go , indiana jones and battle of the planets . This is what we're into . I don't know why we ever made like legos pink and shit like no they were all good then so there was a transition there , and then , of course , in high school like there's a middle , a transition there , and then , of course , in high school like there's a middle school transition around the meaning of the holiday , like I had a .

Speaker 1 55:51

I had a transition . I had a when I was a freshman in high school , had a boyfriend , um who he was ? He was like a couple years older than me , so he was yeah and um .

Speaker 2 56:05

And then I , my junior and senior year , had a , a serious boyfriend too , so was there pressure to like have a romantic partner leading up to valentine's day ? Because it was like that day and you have to have a I don't know that there was .

Speaker 1 56:21

I think I just had one . You just I think at point like I just kind of , yeah , I just had a boyfriend . So I don't know that I had the pressure of it necessarily , but how about you ?

Speaker 2 56:32

I was just trying to remember . I feel like it was something that people talked about . I could be making this up , as we well know .

Speaker 1 56:39

Our brains are mush , I feel like it was like a conversation . It was like what are you going to ?

Speaker 2 56:48

like you should have a dating partner , whatever that might look like for valentine's day and christmas .

Speaker 1 56:51

Did any violent ? Did your boyfriend or any uh ever like decorate your locker or anything like that ?

Speaker 2 56:57

for valentine's day . I don't remember that . Okay , I don't remember shit , I do remember . Oh , here's something I remember . Oh , great , yes .

Speaker 1 57:03

I remember in I want to say I want to say it was high school that you could buy a flower for , like your boyfriend or girlfriend , Absolutely and like , give it to them on Valentine's .

Speaker 3 57:16

Day , quite the 80s thing and I think it was just a shitty carnation . I don't think it was like anything good .

Speaker 1 57:20

But I remember it going to like the . I don't like a pep squad or something like that , like the money went to something yeah . But you would buy a flower for somebody that you know .

Speaker 2 57:30

Yeah .

Speaker 1 57:31

You could have them sent , and if you didn't get one , To your friends and rooms . You're back to that whole fucking paper . Valentine's Day , yeah , and all the picnic shit that we have like inundated ourselves with that like makes you .

Speaker 1 57:44

It creates these divisions and like hierarchies and all popular girls had like multiple flowers well and again , like if you didn't have a job or had money if I were smart , I would have bought my own fucking flowers and walked around like I , you know , had like a bouquet of them two dozen flowers . Oh , that's right , like you , because it was . It was like you would buy it and then you would write like the room number , yes , and you write a little note , right , and it would get delivered to that person in front of everybody else publicly shit .

Speaker 2 58:15

I do remember this god the pressure absolutely right . What were we thinking ?

Speaker 1 58:19

that pressure is . There was no thought to it .

Speaker 2 58:22

It was just the like the what's it called Injection of the 50s , four words Right . It's like you know , it's like oh , this is fine , this is harmless .

Speaker 1 58:33

Get a flower , you dunk it . A flower , ugh .

Speaker 2 58:36

All that public exclusion .

Speaker 1 58:40

Man , shit , that was like a nice little . It was rough Memory nugget .

Speaker 2 58:44

So something that didn't exist then , which I appreciate . Now is Galentine's Day .

Speaker 1 58:51

I love Galentine's Day .

Speaker 2 58:51

And valuing friendships and prioritizing friendships over romantic relationships . Or birthdays . If you happen to have a birthday on that Hallmark holiday , you can prioritize that over anything .

Speaker 1 59:07

Do whatever the heck you want .

Speaker 2 59:08

Do you two do anything now as grown-ass adults , you and your partner ?

Speaker 1 59:13

You know , not really . There's a yes , I mean we'll go to dinner , but nothing that's too out of the , you know , out of the norm . Nothing wild and crazy there's . I will say he's a great hubby in that I get flowers pretty much every valentine's day , which is lovely , yeah , yeah what would I ? Prefer to have , you know , a big box from tiffany's maybe but you know what are you gonna do , what are you ? Gonna do , I'll take the flowers . Oh , that's fine . I'm very grateful for the flowers

Valentine's Day Expectations and Commercialism

Speaker 1 59:46

.

Speaker 2 59:46

Did you have like adolescent ideas or like 20-something ideas of what a Valentine's celebration was supposed to be ?

Speaker 3 59:57

Because we're sort of inundated with like all the lingerie and like the .

Speaker 2 1:00:03

Victoria's Secret commercials , which were massive in the 90s and like boxes edible underwear , all that shit and what it looks like in movies , sure , and like all the kind of gender norms around that oh , my gosh of course it should be a weekend away right it should be .

Speaker 1 1:00:21

It should be extremely romantic and I should never even have to mention Valentine's Day .

Speaker 2 1:00:28

And it just like magically happens right , Absolutely .

Speaker 1 1:00:31

Like flowers come and you're whisked away to a romantic dinner with candles and champagne On a beach . Whatever ? But of course , yeah , of course , and that , like your dating partner , should like read your mind and know all know all of these things and have infinite resources , especially when you're like right , when you're in your 20s , 22 years old you should have enough money to take me to that expensive steak restaurant . How about you ? You too ?

Speaker 2 1:01:05

I mean , I just was thinking about all of that , like the kind of commercialism of it and and like things that would be advertised as things that you should oh yeah , for partners on a holiday and kind of just thinking about how .

Speaker 2 1:01:20

You know , we read a lot , I think , in the group . There's lots of conversation about relationships , yes , and marriage and dating and divorce Some good , some bad , some tragic , some . Yeah , you know all genders , all sexual orientations . You know just the things that you are fed and taught about what is supposed to be . That is maybe like social structure , right , and then what you learn as you grow up about the reality of like a functional , healthy relationship and what you actually need from a partner , and very little of it has to do with like victoria's secret oh , or chocolate , very little , or maybe maybe much to your , to your significant significant others , like you know , chagrin .

Speaker 2 1:02:12

But I'm just like where did those things even come from ? That like I don't putting those ideas together .

Speaker 1 1:02:20

Well , you're gonna have a hot , hot , sexy night on valentine's night right , 100 percent of the time and that crazy pressure there right like the pressure there like tonight , you better it's only tonight , like tomorrow you can , you know , not get it up like a baby puke all over me again , but yep work on it , whatever so just those external kind of pressures and expectations , and then that internal sense of like , oh , there must be something wrong , or there's like a little sense of failure if that is not a part of your relationship .

Speaker 1 1:02:53

I think it's interesting too . Leslie , you mentioned Hallmark holidays like a couple of times . Do people give cards anymore , like , is it like now that that holiday Valentine's Day is so beyond being Hallmark , right , it's like it's all the other things and I don't know that people even give cards anymore .

Speaker 2 1:03:14

I mean according to the card section at Target , they do Do they . There's 47 million . I don't often because I don't know what to do with them afterwards .

Speaker 1 1:03:25

Right , and they got stupid expensive . It's like $6 to buy a card now , or something .

Speaker 2 1:03:29

Yes , and so if you're going to spend money on something , I think people do . I mean , some people are card givers , but that's sort of like the broader . Maybe this is where we're derailing once again , but that's sort of the broader question about physical mail and Christmas cards . But every holiday changes and there's a whole new rack of like right .

Speaker 1 1:03:48

They do say patrick's day cards which funnily enough .

Speaker 2 1:03:51

I used to always buy because I don't know why , um , I would buy them for my kids yeah , I would buy . I would buy them , for I would do that yeah , and I think maybe early in marriage we kind of did those things . But not now . Maybe it truly is just because they're so damn expensive . Well and like , what are we going to do with it ?

Speaker 1 1:04:14

Right .

Speaker 2 1:04:14

It's just another thing that somebody else has to deal with . Like I get cards and I'm like , oh , I love that , thank you so much , and if it's a Christmas card , I put it in my box . I get it out . Next year I look at it again and it goes in the recycler like I don't .

Speaker 2 1:04:24

My grandmother , when she passed away , I had grocery sacks of cards that she had kept , because that was literally how she kept in touch with people , so their memories and letters and all of these things associated , and now we have the internet and it's very different they were all kindling right like I did look through many of them to see if there were personal letters that I wanted to keep just from an archival perspective . But I had to deal with all of that . Therefore , I do not keep anything unless it is very special .

Speaker 1 1:04:51

Yeah , okay .

Speaker 2 1:04:52

All right , I think it's also just like a shit . What are we going to do ?

Speaker 1 1:04:56

with it ? What are we going to do with it ? Yeah , you're right .

Speaker 2 1:04:58

There you go .

Speaker 1 1:05:00

Well , happy Valentine's Day Happy .

Speaker 2 1:05:02

Valentine's Day Happy birthday . Producer Tim Happy birthday .

Speaker 1 1:05:04

Happy Valentine's Day . Happy Valentine's .

Speaker 2 1:05:05

Day . Happy birthday , producer Tim . Happy birthday . And this will come out before Valentine's Day , but our next episode will come out right after Valentine's Day . Yes , so maybe we'll do anti-Valentine's Day , then Galentine , maybe we do a Galentine's Day . Aw , we'll figure out what we're going to talk about then . It's nice to be back .

Speaker 2 1:05:26

It's good to be back . It's good to be back . Welcome back . Welcome back to YouTube , Welcome back . You have been listening to Gen X . Women Are Sick of this Shit . Hey Megan , hey Leslie . What do people do if they want to find us ?

Speaker 1 1:05:37

Well , we have a website that people can find us on , and that is genxwomenpodcom . We also have a Facebook page . We have an instagram account as well . We have a youtube account where we put youtube shorts and other little tidbits up there . We have a tiktok account I don't talk the dick or take the time . You don't take the time I . I barely talk the tick , but I did put a TikTok up . We're explaining the internet to people again .

Speaker 2 1:06:09

That's okay , though it's great , we need to know how the internet works .

Speaker 1 1:06:12

Can people buy merch ? They absolutely can . We have a merch store on the website itself and we also have an Etsy store too , which is pretty easy to find . It's just Gen X Women on Etsy . So it's just pretty easy to find . It's just Gen X Women on Etsy .

Podcast Promotion and Audience Interaction

Speaker 2 1:06:26

And if you are listening to this podcast , presumably you found it somewhere . And while you're there , give us a review . Yeah , let us know what you think . Throw some stars at us , that'd be great . We'll take one , two , three , four or five .

Speaker 1 1:06:41

Ooh , five , maybe ten , and also make sure that you are hitting subscribe so that you're notified whenever a new episode drops . Most important , we also have a five minutes of fame that I think we should tell people about too .

Speaker 2 1:06:53

Hell , yes , we want to know your stories , your five minutes of fame stories . You can send those stories in on the website or you can call 1-888-GEN-X-POD and leave your story for us and we will play it live in our next episode .

Speaker 1 1:07:10

Yep , we'll listen to it on a little red phone , just like Batman . That'd be cool .

Speaker 2 1:07:16

Let's get a bat phone , a bat phone . I think that's it . I think you're right .