Latest / Reverse Jackass / Ep52: Nick has a run-in with a breathalyzer; Evelyn launches Twittergate.

Transcript

Ep52: Nick has a run-in with a breathalyzer; Evelyn launches Twittergate. · Reverse Jackass

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's Reverse Jackass.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to the Reverse Jackass podcast, everyone.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Evelyn, affectionately known as the Canadian Blade.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: And Nick is here with me today.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Nick, say hi to the people.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, folks.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad you're here.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: We are so glad to be here with you for another episode.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: We're in the dog days of summer now, by the time this is gonna come out.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we hope you're relaxing.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: We hope you've uh put your feet in some sand or grass or socks, if you if that's your jam.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're now releasing them like close to when we make them, didn't we?
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: Well get set aligned that way?
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, there's still a few.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: There's a few in the backlog.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, one of your prompts was on Christmas, and I haven't actually put that out yet because it was it was still after Christmas.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: So at this point, I'm just waiting until Christmas 2026 to release that podcast.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I think people are gonna want to hear this one soon because part of what we're dealing with today is response to the previous episode.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_02: That's true.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_02: No, you're speaking your episode.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: It was the it was the pronunciation guide episode.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: However, uh, there is a little bit of feedback that I want to cover from our 50th episode.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Oh gosh, okay, we're starting.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: I got one of the one of my favorite compliments ever, which is that super listener Jason J referred to my Tim Hortons ad as immaculate.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_02: That's true.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: Something that I have carried with me um proudly in the 24 hours since I've received it.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: I told my wife about it.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, that, that right there, that's a compliment.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: I like that.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's from Jason J, who I know doesn't pull punches.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: He wouldn't call that immaculate unless it indeed was immaculate.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_02: So, Jason J, my response to you is no, you're immaculate.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, this is gonna go back and forth a long time.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'll make sure, I'll make sure to put this episode out fairly soon.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to withhold any of this um mutual admiration club that we're going to have going on here.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: So um good.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for not stifling Jason's and my nascent relationship.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_02: But in the meantime, we received a bit of email feedback.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_02: Evelyn, would you be willing to share this feedback with the people?
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I would love to read this email that we received at reversejackass at gmail.com.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and this is from a mutual um friend, acquaintance, person that Nick and I both know, our friend Elise from New York, uh New York State.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Is that how I say it?
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: New York State, the state of New York.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Does she not live in the city?
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Elise, we're not going to allow people to dock.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, look, it's a picture of her house.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: Oh I'm I am going to put your address in the show notes, but no one reads those anyway, so you should be safe.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so Elise wrote us an email at reversejackassidgmail.com.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: She titled it Language Episode Thoughts.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: If you have not listened to our episode of our cross-border pronunciation quiz, that's episode 34.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: And Elise gave us some feedback on this episode.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: She said, and I quote, I just listened to this episode, and I must say, Evelyn's pronunciation.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Whoa, you gotta leave that in.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Evelyn, this will teach me to drink before these episodes.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Evelyn's pronunciation of pasta is unhinged.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Nick, you on the other hand, pronounce all the words correctly.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't understand Zed, as in Z E D for what I'm she just gave a single letter, so I'm assuming she means Z, which she neglected to spell phonetically.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I am choosing to hear it is also the letter Z.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't understand Z for Z.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Does the Canadian alphabet end XYZ?
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: I don't understand.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: Please help X O Elise.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Elise, we're here to answer your questions and comment on your reply today.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Your wisdom.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Nick, do you have any thoughts first that you want to share?
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Because I certainly do.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I I agree wholeheartedly, and I think it's good that uh Elise really compliments the wisdom that I bring to this podcast.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um I am actually very curious.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_02: How do Canadians sing the end of the alphabet song?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we say it exactly.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_02: Can you start with W?
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: W, X, Y, N, Z.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's crazy.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't rhyme.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: You can't call a country that's not known globally as crazy.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Crazy for that.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_02: The rhyme scheme of the alphabet song is A V C D E F G.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: That's A.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: H-R-J-K-L-M-O-P-A.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Q R S B.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: T-U-V-A.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_02: So it's A A B A B.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_02: A.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_02: W X Y N Z.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: Here's the Canadian singing the end of the alphabet song.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_02: L M M O P.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: Q R S T U V W X Y N.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's how we do.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: We all know how to make fart noises at a very early age.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: You do you need a second to squeegee off your microphones?
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_02: So how do you pronounce?
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: I wonder if the mic even picked it up because I know it doesn't noise.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: It didn't.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's a good one.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, thank you.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I got a good fart.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_02: I got a good fart noise.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: How do you pronounce zebra in Canada?
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: Is it a fart noise?
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it just kind of is like zebra.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to sort of do that.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: What a majestic animal it is.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: What a majestic animal, the fart bra.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's how we do it.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I wonder if we if we're gonna change the pronunciation of anything, I wonder if we should change it as Ved.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: A, B, Z, D.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Ed, F Jed.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: H I J K Elemental Ped.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Q R S R S T U Ved W E Double Ved X, Y, and Z.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know what?
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: Great job.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna write a letter.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think we're at a point in history where we could make this happen quite easily.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I will say the one thing I will agree with Elise on is that I think the word pasta does sound awful.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I would more naturally say it pasta.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: I think it sounds lovely.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: I believe in you.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: You could do it.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it sounds elitist here because everyone says pasta.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone says pasta.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, if I was in a restaurant and the server said, um, our pasta of the day is, I'm not gonna be like, I'll have the pasta.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I'm not gonna do that.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_02: You have a server who is actively not doing their job.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_02: And you don't feel like it's within your right to correct them a little bit?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: No, they're doing they're doing a Canadian job.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: Their Canadian job.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: They're not doing an American job.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: This is a non-transferable skill.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know any Italians that live in Canada?
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like like from Italy?
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_02: I wonder what they would say.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'll ask her.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: I just saw her yesterday.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know why I wasn't asking her that.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I really missed opportunity.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I guess we're gonna have some more feedback for our next episode.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: Feedback on the feedback.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Elise, we'll get back to you, and maybe what I'll do is I'll have this conversation with my friend and I'll record it and insert it in a future episode.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate that.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: But I just also wanted to say thank you for your feedback, Elise.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: Even if you had been wrong, I would have wanted to receive your feedback.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I just want to invite folks with positives, also criticism, stuff that's correct, stuff that's incorrect, stuff that's supportive of me, stuff that's um constructively supportive of Evelyn.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh feel free to feel free to send it on in to reversejackass at gmailbook.com.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know what?
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: I tend to check the the old inbox first.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: So if it is a message for Nick that you don't want my eyeballs to see, I think we need to start a GoFundMe to pay me to share the password with Nick.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: That's all.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: That's all it is.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing that for free.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: Gotta vet those things.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: We gotta bet these emails.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: I know, I know.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: So well as we've talked about, I'm dangerous with the passcode.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: It it can yeah, it can really go either way.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Nick will weaponize a passcode at any given opportunity.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: And as we discussed before we started recording, Nick sees most things in his life as a future Nick problem.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: So there's really no in-the-moment critical thinking happening.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: So that's why I like to keep those passcodes close to my chest.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and that's smart.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think it is.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well, speaking of being smart, I hope you have a smart prompt for today.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have uh a journey you want to take us on?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: I do.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_02: The theme for my prompt today is substance abuse.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, gosh, wow.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_02: Buckle up, everyone.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_02: I want to take you back to high school.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_02: When I was in high school, and by the way, I want to say that Brene Brown said, I think about this a lot.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_02: She said when she started working with men, she had to prepare her team to work with men, and she said, I want to prepare you for three things that are gonna come up all the time.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_02: The first one is high school stories, the second one is sports analogies, and the third one is frequent use of the word pussy.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: Brene Brown said this?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, which I thought was brilliant, and it's really true.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: Oh that is that is just dead accurate, right?
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: Like the top three.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna give you I'm gonna give you a high school story today, and I want to take you back to Central Virginia in the mid-90s, young Nick's 16, maybe 17 years old, in 10th grade health class with my gym teacher, who I actually really liked a lot, I think, because he was not very serious about it.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_02: In retrospect, maybe not even like a great teacher, but I needed not great teachers.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like the more somebody needed me to learn, the more angry and resentful I was going to get.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_02: But in keeping, I think I told in a previous episode my betrayal at the hands of my soccer professor in college.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um this high school teacher was unserious enough that he did something that I'm going to tell you about now.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I want to, I want to just paint a picture that I, at that age, was a very, very naive, inexperienced young man.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: I had not dated anybody.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: I think I may have kissed one person at one point.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: I certainly had not had alcohol or done drugs.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_02: I had like I had no experience in my life except for non-stop masturbation, which is native to that age for young men.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: Also comfort eating.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_02: But other than that, that was like sort of my whole life.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I ran track.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Important tandem.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: And so I'm in gym class, and we get to the point where they have a police officer in as a guest, and the police officer is going to talk to us about drinking and driving.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_02: And he talks just about drinking and driving, and he gives the normal cautionary tales, and that's a like an A-OK thing for people to be worried about.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_02: Like, you should not drink and drive, it is very dangerous.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_02: You can do something that you can't undo for the rest of your life.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I'm on board with no drinking and driving as a message.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: And he said, But I want you all to know what a breathalyzer is, and I want you to know how it works so that if you're ever in a position to have to take one, it won't be weird or scary to you.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure he was less nice than I'm being right now.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_02: But like, you know, I want you all to be familiar with this process.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: And my teacher had come to me and said, Hey, uh, I need a volunteer for today's exercise.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: Would you do it?
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, Yes.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: And so the cop said, I think we have somebody for this.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_02: And the the teacher said, Yeah, Nick, get up here.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_02: So I got up there and the police officer ran through a little role play with me where he like pretended to pull me over.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_02: And then he said, Um, I'm gonna ask you to blow under this thing, and he produced a breathalyzer, and I blew well over the legal limit.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I blew drunk, not medically impossible drunk, but like if you go to the back pages of the therapist magazine, there's usually like about 15 therapists who've lost their licenses this season.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and 10 or 11 of them are gonna be because they blew about what I blew on this breathalyzer test.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: No kidding.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I was confused, yeah.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, as you might imagine, and the room was a little confused, and the officer said, Have you had anything to drink today?
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I was shocked and concerned, and I said, Yeah, a couple beers.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: Shut up.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: You actually like you were trying to be funny?
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, but you thought the right thing to say in that moment was I had a couple beers.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_02: A couple of beers, yes.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, and the police officer said, Okay, so I'm gonna place you under arrest.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_02: And then he called scene, and then he told the class that he had sprayed something on the breathalyzer that would give me a false positive.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my gosh.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_02: And that kind of blew my mind.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: And let me tell you, I played it off, but I went down to my desk and sat there and was shaking because nobody told me I was gonna blow drunk on this thing.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I hadn't had a beer in my life, let alone that morning.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I want to say my school started super early.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_02: I want to say it was 10 a.m.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_02: Like it was it was not even Miller time by most people's standards, right?
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: And I was so freaked out.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but also the thing that I think about as an adult is that apparently police have a chemical that they can blow on a breathalyzer and give you a false positive.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: That seems like if it's something you have that you wouldn't want people to know about it because it ruins the credibility of any breathalyzer that you might give in the future.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how do I know he's not just using the same spray that he used on this thing?
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: So, anyway, in retrospect, what occurs to me is that that gym teacher picked me because he was positive I wouldn't have had anything to drink.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: I think, I think I was the safest bet in that classroom for somebody where he was gonna do this thing and it wasn't gonna be a shred of truth.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_02: So I think it was actually in retrospect.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think he picked me because he liked me, which was what I was hoping.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think he picked me because he knew I'd be cool or a good actor, which might have been another hope of mine.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: But I think he picked me because he thought there's no chance this dork is gonna have even seen a beer this morning, let alone done anything.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_02: So he'll be perfect for this.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_02: And the result was me going into cardiac arrest privately at my desk after this thing, and uh and a and a general sense of betrayal by authority figures.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: So all this is to say, folks, uh, appeal if you get a breathalyzer and you haven't been drinking, only if you haven't been drinking, appeal the results.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_02: And secondly, that was a real betrayal by an authority figure.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_02: And so my question for you, Evelyn, is what has been your biggest betrayal by an authority figure that you're willing to relate on this podcast?
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, geez.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, geez.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I definitely And I say this, this is germane to this podcast, by the way, because Americans do love their authority.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_02: We're having a real complex relationship with police and authority right now.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a it's a weird, it's a weird time down there over there.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's when I was still a teacher and there was a principal that I had.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: So it was during the pandemic, and so at this time teaching was uh, I don't know if the general public knew this, an absolute dumpster fire.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: The education system, I would say six months worth of diapers, filled dirty diapers, and you lit them on fire and put them in a dumpster, that would probably still deserve more respect.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_02: Can I just point out a big difference between the US and Canada right now?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_02: In the US, we would put the diapers, we would fill the dumpster with the diapers and then light them on fire.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: In your plan, you light them on fire and then you place them in the dumpster.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_02: And that to me seems dangerous and probably labor-intensive.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's an interesting thing you've chosen there.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I can't say I've chosen, you know, this order is not something all Canadians would follow.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's just maybe what I would do.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Got it.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure other Canadians would fill the dumpster, light it on fire, right?
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: I chose to have more of a light it on fire and throw it into a dumpster, a bit more of a Molotov cocktail effect.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: If I can be so honest.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it was during teaching during the pandemic, and my assignment was so I'm gonna say there's um, I'm gonna use tur two terms in this story.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: There were mainstream classrooms and developmental or special education classrooms.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: Special ed classrooms would be like the smaller classrooms.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: There's a max of 10 kids in there.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you have students who are incredibly high needs, like they might need toileting, they might be nonverbal.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: We've also called them developmental classrooms, developmental education.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: Those particular students, our developmental special education students, were allowed to attend class in person at a time when all the other classes, mainstream classes, were to be learning from home.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: So this was a high point of contention with teachers.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: It was a really tough thing to do.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: You're going in, you're wearing all the PPE.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was wearing my glasses with goggles on top.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: I was wearing two masks, the board mandated one, and then a KN95 that I chose to wear underneath.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you'd be wearing a gown, sometimes you'd be wearing like a face shield.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes, like some of these students, there are some students who would spit or vomit or throw feces or bite or well, though that's a different protective gear that you would wear.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: But like you're really protecting yourself in these classrooms from all the fluids.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's that's a big thing.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: You might wear gloves in a gown.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: No, not like a welcome to my prom.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's more like the the medical gown.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: Got it.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not an embroidered, fancy elegant.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I bedazzled mine.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: No, I'm kidding.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: No, there's no, there was no, there's no it, you're not putting this thing in the wash.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like you're full taking it out of the bin, you're wearing it, and then you're stuffing it into the garbage at the end of that day.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like disposable gowns.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: It took a lot of emotional energy, it took a lot of physical energy.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the way our schedule worked was that we had one week of one class all week and another week of another class.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: So one week I was at home teaching guitar on Zoom with my grade 10 guitar class.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then the next week I was in the school teaching this developmental class.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: And and for what it's worth, I loved the class I was assigned.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_02: It was awesome.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_02: It was no, I really didn't.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: You were like, oh, it was amazing.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_02: Every time and one of them tugged at my gown and then barfed all over me.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_02: I thought, oh, what a little miracle you are.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna do this career for the rest of my life.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: There's no way I'm quitting this.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_02: There's no way I'm quitting this in six months.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: This this group of kids, I should say, was a hoot.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't have it.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: There were no biters.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: There were a couple of kids that were really challenging to kind of you just really had to keep an eye on them because they're it's a switch that could flip and they can destroy a room in seconds, right?
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but for the most part, we had a really good time with these kids.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: I I really enjoyed it.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: I had two amazing educational assistants in the room with me.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: It was actually one of my favorite times during the pandemic was working with that particular class.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: It was a lot of like play-based learning.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it really, in a way, you know, other than the being bogged down by the political nature of all of it and and the constant changing of protocol, it was a really good time in that room where we got to talk about the weather and we got to talk about, you know, what do we wear if it's sunny outside?
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like you're doing things that are kind of really gentle on the nervous system, right?
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Which is kind of nice.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: I would get a little lunch break every day, and I was sitting in the staff room, and there were no, there were only the developmental teachers in the building at this time.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: So if you wanted to work from the school, like to do your online learning, you could.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: If your internet was kind of crappy at home, you could come to school and be isolated in your room.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: So there were very few teachers in the building.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: So at one point, uh, and typically I would have lunch with another colleague of mine, but she was not in there at this time.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was having lunch by myself.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I got a text message from a former student of mine, like a former, former student of mine who we've kept in touch.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: And she's like, Oh, it looks like you guys are going back into the building tomorrow.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: You guys are going back into the classroom.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, What?
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: I hadn't heard any of this from my employer, i.e., the school board or any of the higher-ups.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I was at this point fairly emotionally fragile, extremely frustrated, and really ready to just be crispy at any one of the higher-ups that came into my vicinity because I was just done with this.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because the people who weren't actually on the ground were the one making the decisions.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine that.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine how frustrating.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: Taylor's oldest time, yeah.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: Taylor's oldest time.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I was in the staff room by myself.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: I do remember crying.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: I was so angry and frustrated because, of course, then I looked it up.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: I was still on Twitter at this point, most of us were, and I looked it up, and yes, in fact, the education minister had announced that we were going back into in-person learning in two days.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you get into a routine at home, guess what?
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: You're coming back in the room, and then there's just a list of protocols to follow.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: I decided I had had enough at that point, and so I tweeted uh from my open personal account and said, or maybe I commented under it.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't remember, but I did say this is a lot to handle at this point and incredibly disrespectful of the board.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: I would love to have heard this first from my employer, and then I tagged the school board in my response.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: And in hindsight, I probably could have not tagged them, but I got quite an immediate response from this.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I go back after my lunch, I pull myself together, pull myself up by the bootstraps, I go back in.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: Something we did was always a little bit of some movement in the second half of the afternoon.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: So as I was following a YouTube video of a Tai Chi video with this class, some slow, controlled, guided movements.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was standing up at the front of the class, the kids were all moving, and I look over to my right in the doorway, and I see my principal at the time.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: And she looks at me and gives me the, you know, come here with the with the index finger.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: With the with the like the smoochy face.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: This no, no, there was it was far from the smoochie face, if I can be honest.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I just held up one finger, my index finger for the record, and just said and just said, just a just a minute.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: I just wanted to finish the movement that we were doing.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so I went in the hall and the first thing she said is, How are you doing?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Oh, I'm great.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: Already a loaded conversation on both sides.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: On both sides.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: She said, I need you to take that tweet down.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, Why?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: Is it because it makes the board look bad?
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: And she said uh something truthfully I don't remember, but it was about going against some kind of Protocol that was in the employee, bah ba-ba item, whatever, da-da-da.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: I need you to take that down.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, hmm, okay.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: And she said, You're going to get a call from HR.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Nice.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: And they're going to want to set up a meeting with you.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I just want you to know at this point, I was, I was equal parts furious at my employer and shitting my pants.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because I am so compliant in all areas of my life.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: But I had really just been pushed to the point where I could not do this anymore.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was so angry all the time.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I said, okay, I'll take it down.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: And this was probably, I want to say, around 1:30 in the afternoon.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: And by the time the kids were on the bus, shortly after two, I went back to the room to check my email.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I had received an email from the head of HR with a screenshot of my tweet requesting that I take it down and that they would be contacting me shortly to set up a meeting.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: And they were quite, they said I should contact the union.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, okay, it's totally mine.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I did take it down.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I did have a meeting.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: I have nothing else in my file at this point.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so I had an online meeting with one of the people in HR, not the person who had emailed me the screenshot.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so I was in there with a union, and I don't remember a lot of the meeting.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: I do remember just, you know, everyone's calm.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a conversation, Nick.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's all it is.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Non-threatening, non-documented conversation, of course.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I said at the end that I would hope in a time of stress, in these unprecedented times, I would hope that I would get as much grace from my employer as we have been extending to students in a time when their mental health has been tested and has been strained.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: So we left the meeting.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Their final decision was that I get a letter in my file.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh oh.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: And the union said that's bogus because she has never done anything.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: She's an exemplary teacher.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: Darn right I was.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I replied to HR saying I want another meeting with the head of HR this time.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: Because she was the one who contacted me originally.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to meet with her instead of someone else who didn't know the entire situation.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so a couple days after that, notification from the union that they, in fact, had decided not to put a letter in my file.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so there was nothing there.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_02: Great, but I still want this meeting.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_02: Let's still I still want to have it.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think I think this is important to me.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: Because I think maybe you need a letter in your file.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to I want us to come to a decision about that.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think it would have been great.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: My beef here, the authority that I am the crustiest with is my principal, my former principal.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: She could have vouched for my character.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: She had every piece of power in her.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: When she was contacted by the board, she could say, you know what?
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: No, Evelyn is one of my strongest teachers.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: She has always risen to the occasion.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: She is committed.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: She always puts students first.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a really trying time.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I know her schedule has been quite taxing.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna go talk with her.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: Let's do that as a first line of defense.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: She had every opportunity to do that, and she chose not to.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think she chose not to?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think we always gelled.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: I think there was a sense of our priorities were different.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: Oh.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: You were you were about education and she was about looking cool and no, but she did um refer to my size once, and I did not appreciate that.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of problems with this particular principle.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: This was this was really problematic.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: So it was probably the biggest betrayal of authority I've had because I also felt like I I I really tried to connect and I couldn't connect.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: I felt like I just wanted a real person in front of me.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to have a conversation about how challenging this time was.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted someone to say to me, hey, you know what?
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: That actually is pretty crappy that you didn't hear this news from your employer first.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm really, I'm really sorry that it's like that.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Nope.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, nope.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: Nope.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: There was none of that.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: We were always toting the line.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: So that would be my answer to your question.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I think many teachers during that time were so stressed out that they might have also blown over legal the legal limit had they have taken a breath of lies.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: Or that was a really, really awful, dumb time to be a teacher.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: Sounds like it still is.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it's just not your problem anymore.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_02: Well, Evelyn, I'm I'm mad now because both of us have been betrayed by authority figures, but I feel like the worst betrayal that we could give to our audience is allowing this episode to go on longer than a half hour.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_02: So why do you take us home?
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: I hope if you're pissed off about an authority figure, I hope you do something about it.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I hope you do something about it.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you tag them in a message on your social media.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you have a conversation with them.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's okay for you to be angry about these things and be angry about injustice because it sucks.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: And feeling powerless is a really shitty feeling.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: So Nick and I are here for you.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: We are with you.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: We both hate injustice.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: We hate a lot of things, actually, but we don't hate you.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: And we're glad to be here with you.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to us.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you to Nick for getting my blood pressure jacked right up there on a Wednesday afternoon.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we just really hope you come back next time and send us an email because we'll read it live on the air and uh we'll justify our decisions.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm into it.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: Until next time, folks.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: Some neighbors are besties, others quarrel bitterly.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: Stuck together through geography.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_02: One of us has nukes, and the other has tokes.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's American Canadian diplomacy.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's reversed.