Peppermint

What's that at the of my bed.

It's spooky. I'm jooky.

I'm really sure it's dead. It's coming this way.

Wait a minute, I go, said, Hiram's dressed and ends, Pa.

Hey boo, it's me Roz. How are you? I am doing great. I have been so busy, which is wonderful. I've been doing a fun little show here in La called Golden Girls Live at Casito del Campo, and it's just been wonderful. And it's been so nice to see people and sealed friends and to work with friends, and it's just been so great. And I haven't had much time to like watch anything scary lately, but I did

Is it C?

Did I do that? It could be the ghost of Steve Erkle or is it d Diane West, the actress I love Diane West. Okay, here it is again. Do not leave? Is what they hear? Actually do hear that? I hear that as well. I really hear did I eat? But I guess it would make more sense for a ghost to be like, do not leave. No, be here with me? Here, I'll played again. I hear it. All right, Well,

I am, fabby Ross Darling. I am feeling lovely. I am I'm calling. I'm talking to you remotely from Florida, which is unusual for me.

Usually I'm in New York.

But what are you doing in Florida.

I'm here filming a couple episodes of I Am Jazz.

Oh my god, Peppermint, you are so busy, Like I just like, look at your Instagram. I'm like, Peppermint works as I should. I mean, I was actually so lucky I got to work with you during the pandemic. We were on the Sherry Vine Variety Show, which was cute. It we only did it was a very short little shoot, but it was super fun and from what I could tell, you had just been doing all kinds of things this pandemic. So no pandemic is going to get in the way of Peppermint, and I love that.

That's right, you know, I mean it was, it was tough and you know, my career took it. It's it had its effect that the pandemic did on me, and you know, both professionally and also you know, not to be too serious, but you know, there was living in New York. We had a really particular view of what was going on in particular experience, and you know, it brought up a lot of questions like do I still want to live here? Do I still want to work in night life? Do I still want to be an entertainer?

So yeah, I mean, I for myself, I was like, I don't know if I want to like be out all night anymore, and like there's just like certain things. As I go back, I'm like, yeah, and now I think I have a different idea of what I want to do.

I don't do it with your life, and that's good.

I mean, I love podcasting, Like podcasting got me through the pandemic, and it's something that you know, like I mean, of course I'm had to tell the most extravagant drag I've ever been in. Right now, unfortunately no one can see, but you know sometimes in your podcast you don't have to do that, So that's kind of nice.

Too, yeah, doing I think the thing is, I think the digital life, as much as we bemoaned a lot of it and as much as we're kind of oh, I don't want to have to do these zoom calls and these things, I think it's here to stay. I think these companies and corporations like, look, let me tell you I'm Delta Diamond. I'm not trying to brag, but it took a lot of work to get there. And you know, before what that used to mean is, you know,

I'm like, it's better to be Delta Diamond, the Delta variant.

Hello Darling. That's the truth.

And I you know, I'm like, Okay, we have to do this for the pandemic.

And I get it.

And it's obviously clearly it's we're not done with the pandemic again, is I think we need to wait and see what this this winter will bring with miss Delta variant. But but I do think these companies are like, oh wait a minute, we can charge the same amount and just give them crackers.

Girl, this is here to stay.

Yeah, yeah, you were named ACLU's first ever trans Justice Ambassador. I mean, we're living in an exciting time, Peppermint.

Honey, can you believe it? I'm so excited.

It feels really good to be able to the ACLU has always been the people who have been explaining all these really confusing laws and policies and bills that are always coming down the pike that are all discriminatory, and I never understood what they are between the numbers and the build fourteen ninety two fifteen Article eight p. Twelve to knowing like what they're remembering, what they're called, let alone,

Who better amazing, Well, pepper Man, I want to talk about Ghosts me too, Okay, oh man, oh my god. I love that movie. And you know, Okay, it's funny that you bring that up, because I was just I was just doing some research on you. Now. I went to Wikipedia, which Wikipedia famously is always one hundred percent accurate,

It's true?

Okay, So Nicole, when she went to AMDA, I don't know if you stayed in the housing that she stayed in, but she stayed in a place called the Stratford Arms, which I guess is AMDA student housing, and it's super haunted.

That I mean, let me put I can give you a little precursor.

Okay, Yes, the whole deal with New I mean, I'm not sure how much you talked about it with Nicole or with anyone, but Amda used to Basically they didn't have their own dedicated anything.

They didn't have their own dedicated nothing.

Everything was barrowed or rented from other people or other parts of the city.

And so we all we all went.

To the same school, but it would basically be like ten students in vacant room. Whenever a residential hotel had vacancies, they would put us in it. And residential tells for people who don't know, are like they're exactly what they sound like. They're like long stay hotels that but it's when you say hotel, it's like loose, loosely used term. You're not getting like you know, room service and your

They were like sitting down there in their nightgowns.

And if you did talk to them, they would tell you these stories about.

How they were you know, Broadway show girls and.

Dancing that's kind of amazing.

Course girls that worked at the Zigfeld follies and so you know, this was like a real part of history and entertainment history.

Uh.

These a lot of these people who were living in now these efficiencies where they were just you know, living out their years, you know, and I don't know if they had friends and family.

We never really knew much about them.

But occasionally someone would die in the in the room.

And would you hear people talk about it being haunted.

I never heard anyone talk about Yes, yes I did hear people talk about the Stratford being haunted, But the Stratford, it was really difficult to know if the Stratford was actually haunted, because you know, just like a lot of places in big cities, they have these big buildings that are really useful and valuable and they use them for many different things. The Stratford, like the Graystone which is

It was also outpatient for a.

Sort of like halfway house, and also mental services housing. There was also people who had been, you know, dealing with substance abuse and you know, living there, and so like it was like everybody and their issues was up.

In that place, and so you didn't know, yeah, lots of energy.

You didn't know if somebody was if it was haunted, or if there was somebody was just like took an extra hit of something.

And so all that was going on is what I'm trying to say.

But well, Nicole saw a little boy ghost and her roommate saw the ghost of what appeared to be like a horse jockey in a closet. And then okay, so after I talked to Nicole, I had had a listener of this show, right me, Joey from Quebec went there and lived in the Stratford Arms, and this is what Joey wrote. They say, during my time in the dorms, I always had my own room. However, in my first semester, I didn't have my own private bathroom until my second semester.

Who knows, who knows, if they were ghost, they might not have actually been there, you know, you.

Know, So what's your story with ghosts? Where are you at with it? Do you believe in this stuff?

I do believe in I definitely believe in spirits, and I mean I think there's a different between spirits and ghosts. Maybe I don't know what does that tell me? I think that spirits are well. I think that spirits are the essence of everything, that's all the energy, and that basically our energy, our essence, our energy left over after our body is finished.

And ghosts, I think are.

If spirits are essence and energy, then I think that ghosts are of one particular mood and it's like stuck in that mood. I think someone's a ghost when I mean, maybe I've been watching too many movies and Stevie shows, but I think if someone's a ghost because something went wrong, they didn't get to pass on the way that they wanted to, they didn't get to finish and go through the way that they wanted to.

They're stuck.

They're stuck, and so I think that ghosts are basically a representation of that. And so, you know, even though this person may have lived a full and happy life and different things, if they were in a particular mood and you know, when they were, you know, at a certain point, that's that's the mood that they're in for the rest, for for the rest of eternity as ghosts, That's what I think.

And so all of a sudden, this this.

Lovely lady who was a beautiful, loving mother, who was really who got angry one day and fell off the thing, you know, and then died.

Now her ghost is just angry, you know what I mean. Okay, So I.

Think it's like you're you're whereever you were stuck at, You're just stuck at it. That's that's what I think a ghost is.

Yeah, I mean, I definitely I think that there that that is a lot of times what's going on. But because like sometimes I encounter quote unquote goes where it's like they died, but they just don't want to be dead, like they're they died, they knew they were dying, and they're just like I really like this house. So I'm just gonna stay here for a while or whatever. You know, Like sometimes it's not like like it is kind of like sad and not dealing with whatever they're they needed

They're going to be roam in the halls whether you see them or not.

Yeah, yeah, totally so. Yeah. And and the the ghost and spirit thing, I see that too, because it seems that like you know, like all of us when we pass like physically our bodies on this earth, we still have spirit. And it seems that those spirits, you know, they go somewhere who knows. But yeah, I think that it's not I think that with the word ghosts there's kind of like a like a sad connotation or something.

You know.

It's like because, for example, okay, my house as a child, my grandmother who died was chilling, and she was very I would say intelligent and acted like a grandma as a ghost. But I'm like, it's weird calling her a ghost because she.

Was like that's grandma.

Yeah, like certainly her spirit, but like she was exactly. I think she just stayed around because she she lived in that house and she loved it, and she died when I was young, and so she appeared to me and my cousin who was also young the time. So I don't I don't know. So you've never encountered a ghost or.

I don't think I've ever seen anything in particular that was I mean, and I'm not a skeptic. I'm I'm quite a scaredy cat, and so I think I just I may listen, I may have seen ghost. I just don't stick around to even figure it out. I'm like, oh, oh snap, some move, I gotta go.

Well your books. You're like, okay, I got a TV show to go beyond this.

I don't know how that got there, but I gotta go that was mortally my story, but I did.

I mean the one story that the one like thing that I have which I don't want to go too deep into, but my my grandma. It always involves our grandparents. My grandmother was quite the eccentric lady at the at the parties. Let's just say that, you know, after cocktail hour, Okay, if you catch my drift.

And uh.

She eventually passed a lung cancer and that was a really tough time. I was there, you know, helping with her and everything when she when she passed, But my grandfather, she would always accuse my grandfather being you know, unfaithful and on everything and anything that started with she accused my grandfather And we didn't really have that much confirmation.

They were married for seventy five years, wow, and so.

They she had her suspicions, and you know, she knew what she knew, I guess, and I remember I had After she passed, I spent less time at my grandparents house.

But apparently only a few months after she had passed.

Allegedly, and I don't know exactly how it happens, but allegedly, according to my aunts and my mother, my grandfather was in.

My grand It was in their bed.

My grandfather was in their bed with someone who wasn't my grandmother, okay, okay. And the above the bed was the window where a air conditioner was like right above the bed. I don't it's the most bizarre place that you would put it, but it was like above the bed, like if the air conditioner fell out of the wall, it would hit smash her head. I don't know why anyone would put an air conditioner there, but that's where it was.

And so the.

Above the bed air conditioner apparently caught on fire, and there was this huge burn mark on the wall where the air conditioner caught on fire. And you know, I think that was the last time my grandfather had ever tried to use that bed for anything other than sleeping. And yeah, and so I think that and I would I hope that that was my grandmother's ghost.

Yeah, oh my god. Okay, that's good. That's good. Do you ever go to like psychics or have you done anything like that?

I haven't. I haven't gone to a psychic. I have.

I am on a deck of tarot cards, and so I would like to get my cards read. There's a I wish I had their name, but there an art an artiste who makes drag tarot cards from many of the girls from Track Race.

And I'm the two of Wand's I.

Think, And I'm also I'm also on there as one of the village People because we did Village People song in our season and and so I would love to get my cards read one day.

So when you were growing up, did your family have any thoughts on this kind of stuff, like did they believe in it? Did you?

No?

I mean other than my grandmother, Like until those moments of my grandmother, that was pretty much them that that was pretty much the first time I'd ever heard anything about like ghosts from my family or in and around my family. No one ever talked about this house as haunted. But then you know the I think people would probably say that now about my grandparents' house, surely if you're my grandfather.

But we just happened to live.

This is gonna sound so bougie, but I guess there was a moment in time when black families who were educators were a part of that wave which you can probably watch about look at in some other TV shows. Part of that wave in the early in the late forties, early fifties who were actually buying land and building their own houses. And so the houses that I spent a lot of the time and were actually built from from the ground up for the people who lived in them.

Was this in Wilmington, Delaware? According to Wikipedia?

Yes, my grandparents' house is in Pennsylvania, which is where I was born, and then I grew up in Wilmington, Delaware. And my mom and I did not build our own houses. I mean, obviously I was a kid.

My mom did. She was a single mother, did not build the house.

We were always the young, poor folks, the youngest and the poorest who just lived in apartments our whole life.

Did you ever go to or hear about a place called the Dead President's Tavern in Wilmington?

Oh, Dead presidents? Yeah, everybody's heart of dead President's.

I've I've been to dead dead Presidents now I moved out of Wilmington when I was eighteen, so I wasn't really I wasn't old enough to go there as a patron. But I believe that the dead dead presidents did events sometimes, and I think I might have gone like just as an event once or twice in the back. But everybody dead presidents is legendary. Is dead president's haunted?

Well, of course? Well else what I bring it up? Okay, I was doing some research on Wilmington and this was the most interesting story that I've found. I think, Okay, there's this presence that haunts it that allegedly this man apparently this is true. It's not just like an urban legend that this man in nineteen sixty they called him Lemonade Muellery. I guess was his name his nickname. I guess his name was Lemonade. But I think that the way he died has something to do with that. I'm

So next time, Willington, next time I'm in Wollington, I will make sure I do not go to dead Past.

This is the thing.

Okay.

I am a horror fanatic.

Okay, what kind of horry do you like?

Zombie is my main and I felt like I'm listening to a ghost story. So I had to get myself some sour Patch kids to eat while I've listened to you talk about lemonade, oh Lolari or whatever his name is, zombie, lemon name, mullerie, that name, that name.

Don't say it again, I'll appear. I love zombie.

Movies, and you know, zombie, the zombie genre is my favorite.

But I love all scary movies.

So what is it about horror that draws you to a because I mean, you're to the point where even your Insta says a horror fan. I know.

And it's really ridiculous because most people are like, what are you talking about? But I've actually met some people who are like, I don't actually like scary movies, and I look at them, I think.

Are you what's wrong with you? How could you not like scary movies? I like scary movies. I like thrills. I like roller coasters. I like things like that.

You like you some zombies.

I love zombies, and I think my biggest attraction is zombie movies. Is the theater theatrical experience when you can scream at something coming on the screen and then grab your friends and like scream and while you're grabbing, ripping their arm off. For some reason, I'm attracted to zombies.

I don't.

I feel like I know a lot about zombies. If zombies come, I you're prepared. I feel like I'm prepared, But I don't. I don't want to die by zombie, but I guess I would rather die by zombies in some other way of dying, I guess.

But Okay, this is messed up. But there was a time at the very beginning of the pandemic when I ran my ass to Target to get some toilet paper and I could like there was nothing like there was. It was scary to see people like running, and I was like, this reminds me of all those zombie movies that I've seen where it's like people start fighting, you know, like The Walking Dead becomes like people fighting over like

The organ trail because it's like penicillin.

Yeah. But my thing with zombies is I'm always like, Okay, if I think I would, I would get to a point where I'm like, Okay, seems way more fun to be a zombie, Like just take me, give me a bite. And you know they seem like dumb, you know, all, yeah, you can eat buffet sounds good to me. Well, I want to see how much of a scaredy cat you are because I have something scary to show you. Okay. Our friend's so Nique, who was on this podcast. She

Wait, I'll watch it.

But we haven't gotten to the scared.

Okay, I want to tell you first. Let me tell you. Let me tell you because you're already scaring me.

Okay, why I don't want scare you too much?

Wow?

I thought you like I do.

I like scary movies, but I don't like. I like scary movies, I like. I like zombie movies, and I like action films. I like things because I know that they're fake. When I know that they're real, it really scares me. I don't like seeing violence or people actually being hurt in real life. I don't like. I don't like when zombies really come around. I don't like, uh,

I I not watch a demon movie before I sleep too.

But then I'm like looking around and thinking, and I'm like, I don't want to look in the mirror. I don't want to look in I don't want to look at any kind of reflection. I don't want to look I don't want to wake up at three fourteen, between three and fours when they say the.

DNS at the witching hour.

I don't want to do any like. I'm wary of all of that. And right now I'm staying on a I won't even tell you what has happened. I'm staying in an airbnb by myself in Florida, and it scares the heck out of me.

And so I'm just we can pass on it. We can pass on it.

You can show it.

Now, Wait, can you can you give me a little bit of a precursor or like that?

So what do yeah tell me?

So so Nique? So Nique was just chilling in her home and she was just you know, I think she was on live. This is a number of years ago, and all of a sudden she was like looking into the camera on her computer and she saw somebody behind her. And there was nobody behind her. But you can see

Okay, so you see so in this video, it's not her telling the story. It's actually the video of.

No, she was recording video. Yeah, it's the fast.

How do you know that there's nobody behind her? Well you have to see Oh my god. Okay, you go ahead and play it.

And if I need to look, I'll just look away. I might just see it peripherally. I'm just looking away.

Okay. But we're gonna we're gonna be looking to like the right side of her where like that cup is. Okay, Oh jesus, it's a short clips.

Okay, here we go. Do you I don't know if you have of course, you have curs and you have Nicole on there.

Yeah, of course, Here we go.

Okay, I'm not looking. Okay, go.

Keep looking. Did you see it? No?

Good, We'll glad I didn't see it. Thank god. I feel like I dodged a bullet. Can frame on it.

Okay, okay, go through it slow, Okay, here we go.

Frame on it.

Yeah, because it's a right where that cup is? Okay, here we go. Do you see that it's like a guy reaching for like a fry or something. Okay, now that you've seen it. Can we watch it in real time? Now that you've seen it? Okay, here we go.

Girl, Uh, what's this reaction? No?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no no, honey. If that was a if you I saw something behind me, you would have seen me. I would have been out of.

There so quick. I would have screamed. I would have knocked over the camera. I would have jumped, I would have ran. I ain't looking all slow, girl? What's wrong with you? How people get killed? But you know, nonchalant ass reaction.

When if you know that you're nobody's in the house, you're supposed to run.

You know, soniqu too? Like, well, first of all, I've seen a video of Sonique whipping somebody's ass that tried to take her tips. Sonique is tough, but she's also the sweetest. Like I truly believe. I don't think that she like that this is fake or anything like. This is to me, a genuine one of the best ghost videos I've ever seen.

Girl, I don't get I mean, I yeah, I'm it's for I can't engage with it too much because it does scare me. But I just don't understand why she didn't go, because that's what I would have done.

But because she looks back and there's nothing there, so she's like, oh, maybe there isn't anything. And it wasn't a haunted house where she lived. It was just like a thing that happened. Which could see that happen. We don't know. But Okay, I'm glad.

You Okay I watched it. Don't keep showing.

It, Okay, okay, Okay, I feel like I have scared you enough. Now. There is something that we usually do on the show, but I am totally fine, seriously with not doing it if you don't want, But I'll tell you what it is. We listen to ghost voices which people believe that they've captured ghosts speaking on camera, like from Ghost Hunting, and I play them and I have you guess what the ghost is saying? Would you want to give that a try?

No?

No, hell, no, hell, you bitch. I ain't listening to no ghost talking to me. I don't want to know what they have to say. I don't want to know what a ghost voice sounds like. I don't want to recognize no ghosts. If I thought it was the lawnmower, I want to still think it's the lawnmower. If I thought it was a duck, I still want to think it's a duck. If I thought it was whatever, I don't want to know. I don't want to know.

Y'all, y'all, Roy, yes, don't do it.

Okay, we will do it, though we'll skip it this time. Okay, then let me tell you about one more thing. Have you ever have you ever heard of La Pascualita?

No, tell me about.

Okay, in Chihuahua, Mexico, which is actually where my family is from. Originally, there's a local legend and so basically this woman owned this dress store. Her name was Pascuala Esparza. She owns this dress store and her daughter died of a black widow spider bike. Oh no, okay, this is

And when today did to this day, to this.

Day, she's like an urban legend. I mean, now we don't know if it's true or not, but I mean it it's kind of convincing. But can I show you a picture of what she looks like.

Oh, well, what are you doing?

You try I saw on Instagram that you like horror movies. Don't blame me.

Movies, movies, movies, movies, actors.

Okay, show me the goddamn now you got me cursing. Show me this, bitch. Oh lord, what are you going to show me a picture of?

Tell me?

Okay, okay, this is the mannequin?

What is this is just.

No, it's just I'm not looking Okay, Okay, let's take it down.

Describe it. Describe it.

It's just a beautiful female mannequin and a close up of her hand that kind of shows that it looks more like a real so something that looks.

Okay.

In order for me to look at this, I'm sorry, I have to take the gas out of it a little bit. It's a it's a mannequin that's in a story that looks very real.

That's what I'm People think it looks really real now based off I've never seen it in person. I think it kind of just looks like a mannequin. But there is a close up of the hand and and it kind of the hand to me, does look way is.

Going to jump out or do something great?

Now?

I swear to God, I'm not shady like that at all. Okay, let's look at it.

Okay, so what I would Oh, that hand doesn't does look like she's a most sad. Yeah, it doesn't look like even the neck area, this doesn't look like a mannequin that came out of the.

Box, you know, like, Oh, she's been there for all these years. Now, how much would you keep I.

Guess if it's a tourist attraction, you're you're going to keep it now?

Yeah, at this point, yeah, it's become like a destination. But how much money would you have to be paid to put on that dress and be in that store for an entire night by yourself with that Mexican.

More than a million dollars? Probably ten. Actually, there's no amount of money. I wouldn't do it. I wouldn't do it. I don't care how much money it is. It's not worth it.

It's more.

It would have to be more money than I could ever spend in a lifetime, which means you might as well get killed because you're never going to spend it.

So I'm not going to do it. Okay.

If the ghost is like, okay, I'll give you ten million dollars because I know you can't spend this money.

But since you can't spend it, I'll kill you.

Then no, like, okay, Well, Peppermint, you've been a great sport. I really hope I did not traumatize you. Are you gonna be okay?

I'm scared, but I'm all right. Oh no, I might watch cartoons tonight.

Well I'm so appreciate you doing this. Can you tell people? I mean, now this could take an hour, but can you tell people what you got going on? Where people can find you? I mean, there's so much stuff going on, but you know, let us know.

Yeah, people should follow me on social media. They should check out my new music. I got something brand new coming out. It is called Moment of Weakness. Letters to My Lovers, which is a follow up to a Girl

Starts in the fall.

Obviously, people should check out I Am Jess, support the show and retweet about it, talk about it because you know, they tackle some really important topics on the show and I'm just really grateful to be a part of too. It's about their family, it's about you know, it's about the Jennings family for those of you that don't know, and their support of their youngest child, who is a transgender woman. Now she was a young girl and they've

I think that's a Discovery Plus probably right.

Well, it was on TLC, but you know a lot of these these networks are having these big old mergers.

Honey.

It's like a network orgy, and so you can't tell who works what and what channel does? Does my password still work? I don't know, right, I'm not sure, but it's it is.

I know it is on Discovery Plus. I don't know if it's only on Discovery Plus, but it is Undiscovery Plus, which I have because that's what all the ghost shows are on too. Well, Peppermint, it's been lovely. Thank you God. I genuinely feel bad that I didn't want to scare you like this.

I've been scared. I've been scared much worse. I'll tell you I'm never watching Hereditary again.

Oh my god. When she's on the ceiling.

I don't want to know. I don't want to talk.

About okay, and then I bring it up. Of course I bring it up. I just I live in this spookiness, so I talk about it so nonchalantly, and then I forget that there's people that like, don't just talk about this stuff every day. So I appreciate you so much doing this, and hopefully I'll get to work with you again sometime.

Yes, I would love that, Gorge.

Thank you so much to Peppermint. Special thank you to Ken Phillips. And if you want to hear more from this episode, go to patreon dot com slash Rosdresfles. On my second tier, you can hear Peppermint's thoughts on UFOs and bigfoots and haunted dolls and that kind of stuff. And you can also hear my new little Patreon podcast that I'm doing with my best friend Sam Pancake for

Gay Bye.

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