High School Memories and a Chilling Crime

Music. All right, I have a question for you. What was your favorite year of high school?

My favorite year? Favorite year. And get closer to the mic. You're really far away. My favorite year of high school. Mine was my senior, far and away. No, I didn't enjoy it. I had a lot of fun my senior year, but I was very angry. Why? Because it was like nothing was turning out the way I wanted it to. I wasn't, you know, yeah, I was very, very angry. Was junior year better? I was going to say my 10th grade year was probably, because that was when everything

was like. Did you get a car that year? I got a car my junior year. All right. Did you have a favorite class? Huh. I had a favorite. Well, I really enjoyed in high school. I really enjoyed her teacher named Laverne Marshall. She cracked me up. She taught language arts and I think history or something. I can't, or world history or something. She wasn't the one when you were reading and you would laugh to yourself and she was. No, that was in junior high. That was misused. Yeah.

But she, I don't know. I just took a shine to her. She was just, I just found her interesting. So you liked her class as a result? I liked her. I was a horrible student. I mean, I, yeah, I, I passed high school by the skin. Oh, my teeth.

Like, yeah. Like, cause I don't know what it is, but I think to, to graduate from high school, let's say you needed 20 credits and i had like most kids who were seniors in high school they had like 28 30 32 i was like 19.9999 yeah did you tremble to give your parents your credit card oh my god yes my dad my dad is like i can always tell when credit when you're when your report cards do because you get all moody uh-huh because i was like oh god yeah and

my parents were just like just pass as long as you pass was christy better at it than you i think christy was a better student but she didn't like school anymore and i did yeah we have it's it's so funny when you look back on it's like i had such major add that i didn't adhd whatever but no but you didn't have that back then no you didn't and i wasn't disruptive like i didn't cause problems but i was a i was not paying attention those teachers

were talking i was anywhere everywhere you know i liked history, Our history instructor, Mr. Clean, was really good. He made history really interesting. I also really like chemistry. And chemistry class plays a role in today's crime. Oh, look at you! Oh, that's funny. Nice segue. So we're doing forensic files. We're back on the forensic files train. Well, actually, did you notice... But in the video, it said medical examiners or something like that at the very beginning of the video.

Oh, it's like a Forensic Files medical exam. It is Forensic Files. They rebranded it or something. Yes, exactly. I never could figure that out. So I got a kick out of that because the guy's voice, I love that guy's voice. I think they're great. They're a great series and there's hundreds of them. This is Forensic Files. Forensic Files. Season six. Season six. Episode five. Episode five. The clunkily named Death Play.

Death Play. So we start out with shots of Dallas, Fort Worth, which they call it the Metroplex, apparently down there. Well, it's all, it's like, it's like a town for miles. It's 1993. And we see Dealey Plaza, which always makes me, I don't, I don't know if I was in Dallas, if I would go to Dealey Plaza because the images of the Kennedy assassination just creep me out. Wow. Have you ever seen it up close? I've never been there. I've never been. Have you ever seen the Zapruder film though? Yeah.

It's creepy. I, my best friend, Frank, went and he said, he said, it looks so big. And when you get there, it's literally an entrance ramp. That's all that it is. But someplace on A&E or one of those channels, they, they had taken every home video, every home movie and put it into a time. Yeah. And it was so interesting and I can't find it again. God damn it. I would love to see it. It was, it was like, cause it was like showing the car turning and everything.

Apparently supposedly trump just opened up a bunch of classified files about it and there was all these new conspiracy well i don't think trump did it i think no i think he just did i thought it was last week yeah no he unsealed documents for a bunch of things oh he did yeah and ufo stuff and one of the things is that the driver in the front seat of the the limo turned around and shot kennedy they're like look at this part

of it you can clearly see him take a gun out and shoot him and and it's like wait what it's one of those things where you're being told to see something. So we meet 38 year old Steven Robards. He's a Vietnam vet. He's a Texas boy and he's working as a mail carrier. And this is his girlfriend. Very proud of his job, which was just a rural route postman, but he liked his job. He liked being outdoors. And felt some pride in it.

She seems so sweet. She seems sweet. She seemed genuinely upset about the whole thing. We meet his 16-year-old daughter, Marie, and she recently moved in with him. She didn't like her mom's new boyfriend. So the best thing was for her to move in with her dad, and apparently it was going on pretty well. This is Mitchell Poe. He ends up being the prosecutor in this case. So they were living in a one-bedroom apartment at this time, And he was on the list to get the next available larger apartment.

And he was very happy about having his daughter in his life at this point. So Stephen is happy to have Marie there. She's going to Eastern Hills High School, which is a generic high school. That high school could have been in Norwich. And popular straight-A student gets in no trouble. This is Skip Hollinsworth. He is the editor of Texas Monthly. I think he's in love with her. He's creepy. I mean, he just goes on at length like a stalker.

And there are all these articles written about how creepy he is talking about her. Oh, it is. Because it wasn't just me. Because I'm like, all right, settle down, Skip. He's here a lot. Quiet, studious, elegant, the kind of girl that sort of you looked at twice and always wanted to get to know because she seemed so reserved, so poised, so intelligent. There was never a flaw about her. I mean, her face complexion was perfect.

So she's got her life together, but their lives change forever on the night of February 17th, 1993. After a church service, I think it was Christmas? Christmas service? They go back home and after dinner. Stephen, was it February? Well, you just said it. Did I? Possibly be at Christmas. Oh, sorry. I did. Look at me not even reading my notes. So after dinner, he gets violently ill and he takes to the couch and his condition

deteriorates rapidly. They don't know what's going on. They call an ambulance. And by the time the ambulance gets there, he is beyond saving and he dies. After a little while, he started getting stomach cramps, severe stomach cramps. And they became more severe as the night progressed. Are you feeling any better? I feel terrible. After a few hours, ultimately, 911 was called. And he went into what appeared to be a coma-like state right there in the living room.

He began to foam at the mouth and became nauseous. And by the time the ambulance guys got there, he was dead. The coroner reluctantly rules at cardiac arrest, but he's only 38. And I didn't want to believe it. How could it be that bad? He was 38. How could it be that serious? He was 38. So we learned that his heart was mildly enlarged and maybe 20% larger than it should be for a man of that age. but not so enlarged as to cause a heart attack.

This is the medical, this is the regretful medical examiner who was like, this just didn't sit well with me. But he couldn't prove it, couldn't prove it in the other way. I think that happens a lot with medical examiners. Well, especially because of medical, the cost it takes to run the tests and the equipment to have to do the test. Right, your suspicions don't justify $50,000. Something doesn't seem right. Well, it's going to cost $150,000 to do this.

So, you know, they're going to stick with it. His heart was mildly enlarged. It was probably 25% too heavy for a man, his age and size. And somewhat uncomfortably, I signed it out as a natural death. So after his death, she goes to live with her grandparents and transfers to Mansfield High School to finish her senior year. So for one year, Marie lived the kind of perfect life every parent would hope their child would live. She was an excellent student. She never got in trouble.

She always turned in her homework. She dated some, but she was never in any way regarded as a wild girl. So again, she was a good girl. After graduation, she used the $60,000 she got from her father's life insurance and enrolled at the University of Texas. Now, she wanted to go into a pre-med program because she wanted to become a pathologist, like the one we just spoke to. And this is where we get those glam shots, those 90s glam shots. Your sister ever do that? No. Your mom? No.

Our secretary at work did. Oh. And she had it on her desk at work. And it was ridiculous. You've seen me. I've shown you. How many times have you seen me? They do that. And I go, clear her shots, and I'll hold the collar up around my neck. Yep, that was what she was doing, too. And I'll do the hands under your chin as you look up at the sky with bright eyes. And it had a big gauzy filter on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And she had it on her desk at work, and she was front and center.

Listen, if it makes you feel good, you knock yourself out and you do that. But unfortunately, a lot of people look really ridiculous doing it. Oh, that's funny. My aunt did it. My aunt Jean did it when she was like 83. Really? And she did the pose. Good. And it was like a leather jacket. Yeah. Oh, when I saw that, my mom saw it. She was like, Jean. Jean was the racing woman. We now meet Stacey Hyatt. She is Marie's best friend.

They were very, very close. Well, this is the one thing I want to pop on this. They were best friends, but she'd only been, she'd only been at this high school where, This was another high school. Yeah. So she'd only been there a very short period, less than a year. But you know how intense high school friendships can be. I agree. No, no, no. I'm not taking that away from it, but it's just interesting. This is my best friend.

We've known each other for nine months. Yeah. I'm always amazed who or when women in their 50s find their new best friend. But you've heard me say that. Oh, my new best friend. Yeah. Or this is my new best friend or whatever. It's kind of late in life to be discovering your best. Well, no, because it's always nice to seek out people that make you feel good or you enjoy their company. It's very important to be normal, to have friends outside of the house that

you live in. I agree. They met their senior year. I would have to say we were best friends. You know, we kind of fell in love with each other. You know, just it was, we had so much in common. Stacey sees in Marie. She sees something in Marie. She sees through her in a way. She realizes that that poise and that perfection is disguising something. So one day they're in the library and they're reading Shakespeare. I never, ever, in any of my literature classes in high school, did we do Shakespeare.

I never, never had to read Romeo and Juliet. Did you read it? I remember in junior high reading Romeo and Juliet, and we had to do projects about it. And we did, there was three of us. It was me and Janelle somebody and Terry somebody. And the three of us, the two girls and I, we did this little skit and there was props and I had a, I was trying to make it funny, of course. And I had a sawhorse with a jean leg that was stuffed, stapled to it.

So it looked like I was riding the horse and it was just, yeah. I didn't, I didn't, people make these references and I'm like, I know what they're talking about. Never did. I feel like I missed something. I am sorry. I know I'm an idiot. William Shakespeare is the hardest to read. I don't, I never understand the, the, the way the, well, it's said this way. because it means this. Well, how, how do you know? How is it possible?

Bard. I just, yeah. And he was responsible, Shakespeare, for so many expressions we take for granted. And I agree and I see it and I like it and I enjoy it, but I can watch a movie, but oof, to read it? Oy vey. Well, they're reading Hamlet and one scene where Claudius is agonizing over killing Hamlet's father. Yeah, I was going to say, isn't Hamlet specifically about killing a father? Yeah.

So anyway, they're reading it and- Well, Marie gets very upset. Yeah. Music. America. So Stacy reads the line and goes, isn't that cool, Marie, how that's written? And Marie's standing, frozen, and tears begin to stream down her face. She asked me, Stacy, do you think people can go through life without a conscience? And there was Stacy with her questions. Do you have a secret? Yes. You've done something? Yes. And you know, Stacey's first question, oh my God, you're pregnant.

Marie, no, it's worse. So after a while of guessing, I said, did you kill someone? She nodded her head yes. And that's when Marie broke down and cried. Here we go. She's admitted to killing someone, but just not, she's not saying who. And if you know her, there's only one person that she's probably killed. Now I want you to think about that. I didn't see this coming. You're sitting with your friend, a friend, It doesn't matter how close you are.

And all of a sudden they say, I killed someone and they break up crying and they have to run out of the room. Aren't you going to be like, what the fuck? Yeah. What the fuck's going on? What the fuck's going on? And I am such a paranoid individual anyway. If somebody said that around me, I'd be like, nine, one, one. Okay. My friend just called me and told me that he goes, you know, like I am not good. You're not taking me down. Frank. It's a good thing. Um, Frank wasn't friends with, oh God, no.

Frank, Frank. would have gone, you killed somebody right there. Really loud in the library. Really loud in the library. Who did you kill? Thanks, Frank. That's really funny. So eventually she tells Stacy that it was her father and that she had stolen some poison from the chemistry lab at school and put it in his Mexican food. They go out of their way to say, we are not going to name this poison in this episode, but I'll tell you- It's all over everything else.

Yeah. It was barium acetate. Yes. So it's a- What is that used for? Do you have any clue? No, I don't. It has some industrial purpose, I think. Well, of course. So they show her using the little shovel you got in chemistry class and putting some. They were reenactments. Took me right back to high school. With your Jansport backpack? Jansport. Did you see that? She had a Jansport. I know. I had an LL Bean. The favorite of lesbians everywhere. Oh, Jesus.

So now Stacey starts to lose her shit because she has this secret and they do this really, really cheesy reenactment of the nightmare she's having. One of them, she's walking down the street. Oh my God, yes. And Marie's dad's on the front porch beckoning to her in golden light. Oh my God. And in another one, she's walking through a cemetery and it's really poorly done. It was really bad. And forensic files, Marie, no, Stacy, is it Stacy? What's her name?

Stacy does not look like real life Stacy. It's a terrible... And the Marie didn't look like Marie. It was really bad casting. Before I forget, because, you know, I'll forget if I don't remember right this minute. Matthew McConaughey was on one of these ones. A forensic file? Yeah. I don't think it was forensic file. It was one of the other ones. But he's a young guy mowing a yard. And I saw the clip. I thought I sent it to you if I did.

See, I think I sent you shit and you don't see it. But anyway, but Matthew McConaughey, when he was a, you know, you know, teenage, you know, beginning actor. It's always fun to see stuff like when the actors are younger and like the stuff that they do. I just had to blurt that out because you know I'd forget it if I didn't say. I saw a clip of everybody who was on Andy Griffith's show. There were a bunch of actors who were like on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh, and Flipper. Flipper? Flipper. David Soule was on Flipper once as a park ranger. That's really funny. Now, see, the other, because I watch a lot of English television, Midsummer Murders. It's a very, it was a very, I haven't seen it in forever with the new Barnaby.

But it's been on forever and every english star has been on that show every single they make big deals like oh orlando blue you know it's like okay everybody's that's a great series everybody's gotta start somewhere those are those are quality shows yes they are so stacy eventually at one point she was uh she asked her mom if she could go to rehab or something she was really getting bad for eventually she told her mom but she's like it's

my word against marie's i don't know if anybody's going to believe me. So they eventually told the guidance counselor, then they told the cops and then the cops were like, they, they were like, well, a period of time had passed because they didn't, they didn't do anything to her until she went away to call it. Right. So, all right, here we go. So they went to retrieve the tissue samples from Steve's autopsy. And thankfully there was, they were still there.

They were days away from destroying them because there was no reason to hold on to them. And of course me, how long do they keep that stuff normally? Yeah.

None of that information was given yeah and they found that he had 28 times the lethal limit of this barium acetate so this is detective t.w botcher the homicide investigator and they went right to the college and pulled her out of class and arrested her and she didn't and she did not resist she came out in the hallway and i introduced myself i told her she was under arrest for the death of her father stephen robards years earlier. She had no response. There was no reaction.

And Marie quietly went with them, poised as ever. And once they got in that little room. They barely had to ask a question. And she confessed and broke down. And she was pretty forthcoming with information fairly quickly. She didn't try to hide. She apparently was either guilt-ridden or had thought a lot about what she had done and came forward with the information. They get her back to the, the precinct and apparently they didn't have to do much. And she was like,

yeah, I did it. I did everything. And I, I think, I think she regretted it. It's very, it's very weird. Well, if you choose to believe her. Yeah. She only wanted to make him sick. So she had an excuse to go back to her mother. Okay. That's not how I got it. Well, the, the, the defense did that later. Right. But, but she, Marie wasn't, she didn't, I don't think she knew about the life insurance policy. She didn't know about any of that stuff. She was, you know, she was a kid in

high school. I don't think she was doing it for that. She was doing it for the purposes of this isn't where I want to be. I don't want to be in a one bedroom apartment with my dad and his girlfriend. I want to be back with my mom and go back to that house and live there. I don't think she disliked her father. I don't think it was a matter of not liking him or loving him or whatever.

If you believe her which i i have in trouble with this one because i'm just having trouble with this one i'm saying well okay this is what fascinated people was her motive let's get this out of the way right what was it that made you want to kill your father and she said i wanted to be with my mom but in an ironic twist like something out of a shakespearean tragedy it was all in vain because Marie Robard's mother and her new husband were planning to move

to Florida and didn't tell her until after her father's funeral. Marie had no choice but to move in with her grandparents so she could finish high school in Texas. And thus began this tale that in many ways is a kind of twisted modern parable of teenage girls in the suburbs. These girls that are.

Have those mercurial emotions, but also many of whom are girls of divorce who are trying to grow up with parents who have split up and seem often preoccupied with rebuilding their own lives and forget about the needs of their own children. Okay, but even that backfired because her mom and her new boyfriend were already planning on moving to Florida and not taking her with them. And they waited until after the funeral to tell her.

So she did all this shit. She stays in Texas with her grandparents. So that backfires. So our editor friend Skip pontificates about how she's, like so many children of divorce, a victim of this, you know, the mentality of parents who don't worry about their kids' mental health. They're more worried about their happiness and their marriage.

And he kind of portrays her somewhat sympathetically. I think she just, if you want to believe that she's a nice person, she didn't want to kill him, but then she shouldn't have used so much, like, if she's going to go into pathology, she knows about chemicals and poisons and stuff like that. She knew it would hurt him. No. She had plenty of opportunities when he was sick on the thing. She had this, I just wanted to make him sick thing. I don't buy. She knew what she was doing. She...

Had all sorts of opportunities to say, I put something in his food. I wanted to make him sick, but she didn't. And he died. She didn't say anything about it. I suspect she might have known about the life insurance. I could easily see. Now, you know, if anything happens to me, I've got life insurance. I bet you she did know about it. And the girlfriend, his girlfriend said, you know, he's trying to get a bigger apartment. He was doing everything he

could to make her happy. He wanted to make her happy. So, you know, it's not like she was tortured under the father's roof or anything like that. No, no, no, no. It's really twisted. Here's Mitchell Poe, the prosecutor, one more time. Anybody who's going to go to a local medical school to study is probably, if they're a high school student, is probably above average as far as in the science department. And as a matter of fact, I mean, that was part of my investigation.

I collected her grades and she had very high marks in school and in the sciences.

I'm with him. She knew what she was doing she gave him way more than enough to kill him she knew about she was an accomplished chemist high school chemistry student and she sat there and watched him die a painful death she had all the opportunity in the world and she was truly moved and it was it's pathological and one of the weird things or however you want to word it is when they were showing her during the court yeah very attractive she looks she looks cold she

does not look she doesn't look upset she doesn't look upset. She looks very cold. So now we hear a little bit about the trial and she gets called some pretty awful things. I must, it must've been very difficult for her, but they did not pull any punches. She killed her dad. Yeah. Literally. Yeah. Murdered him. The prosecutor in the case called her a relentless predator. Another prosecutor called her society's worst nightmare, a girl who kills her dad.

But some people saw her as a kind of Lizzie Borden of Texas. This sweet, charming, successful, industrious young girl who suddenly did something inexplicable. And in this surprising twist, at least for me, I began to sense a sympathy developing for her because in many ways, she was the symbol of what modern divorce has done to our society. So on May 9th, 1996, it took the jury less than one hour to find her guilty of murder. And she was sentenced.

They didn't say first degree, second degree, whatever, but it was murder. She was sentenced to 27 years in prison and i looked it up and she was paroled in 2003 and she is living under an assumed name well one before we get well assumed name one i thought if you killed someone in texas that was a capital i thought so too now that seems like a number one class capital well she was she was a teenager at the time maybe it's yeah i don't know if a 16 year old can be held for.

And she even said, yes, I did it. Yeah. I didn't mean to kill him. Well, you know, here's her defense attorney. He thinks he 27 was too much for her. I don't know what we do about it, but they are kids. They don't think exactly like adults. That doesn't mean you can, you know, they can get by with something like this with a slap on the wrist, but 27 years seems a little excessive to me. So yeah. So we get our typical closeout. everybody has a piece to say.

What she had done was commit the perfect crime. It was by all accounts the perfect crime. Had Dorothy Marie not mentioned it to a friend, she probably would have gotten away with it. I mean, almost certainly would have gotten away with it. Marie has never spoken about what's happened since. What is known is that Marie is the model prisoner at this women's in East Texas, where she's going to be staying for several more years. That she has never complained.

That she always volunteers for the worst choice, that one day a psychologist went to see her and she was wearing this paper-thin prison guard and a cold front had come through Texas. And she was shivering. And the psychologist said, why don't you ask for something warmer? She said, I don't deserve to. She shrugged, she smiled, and she said, I'll be okay.

So that bit about her being a model prisoner and the one person went up to talk to her and it was apparently very cold and she just sat on a really thin coat and they said don't don't why don't you ask for a warmer coat she just smiled wasn't that that huddleston person again he said he related the story i don't think it was him but somebody said that she said i don't deserve it yeah but again i don't think if you are under eight

i don't think you can get the death penalty as a as a teenager well yeah but she was she was past that at that point wasn't she was 17 when she got arrested but that's why i i'm thinking, but did you get any other information on her? A little bit, but nothing that dramatic. I actually like the girlfriend. She just seems so sweet. Marie? Sandra. Oh, the girlfriend, Sandra. The girlfriend, Sandra. Sandra is the guy, the father's girlfriend.

She just seemed like- She kept saying he was 38. He was such a nice guy. He was such a nice guy. Yeah, yeah. And of course, there's only one picture of the mother and she looks like a- She looks like a bitch.

And and uh isn't that horrible she's got that puss on her and then the daughter looks just like her yeah yeah but it's not a flattering photo she looks annoyed so she they're they're saying that she has she lived under an assumed name but according to i'm trying to find it here texas monthly she got married and she didn't she's not living under her assumed name she got married got married so her name got changed yeah they were saying that this crime is so

unusual because patricide is usually male dominated crime where men do it to other men as opposed to a daughter killing a daughter killing somebody unless there's like sexual or something like yeah now we've had a we've had more than a few where a son has killed a parent both parents or a parent she pleaded not guilty explaining her intent was to make her father ill she's believed to be living under a new identity.

I love that. She was released in 2003 and somehow she managed to get married right away. Yeah, well, she's very pretty. Well, yeah, but... I don't know. So you... Okay, Kevin, this person wants to be... There's that weird... But you know, they may have killed their father and gone to jail for 27 years. Heinous murderers in prison have women falling all over them to get married. I know, I know. I'm sure it works in the reverse. I think Texas Monthly, weren't they the one who cracked the case...

Of the guy who was poisoning the old sisters with arsenic? Yes. Wasn't that him? I think it was Texas Monthly that cracked that case. So this story has been made into a book called Give Me Your Hand by Megan Abbott. And it was covered in episodes of Forensic Files, Red Rum, Deadly Women, and Morbid, a true crime podcast. Which is a terrible—have you heard Morbid? No. It's terrible.

Oh, listen to you. No, I'm telling you, it's a couple of 20 or 30-something women, and it is just rambling, and I am not the target demographic. And they started when podcasting was in its infancy. Right. So they got in when the getting was good, because I think if Morbid started now, they wouldn't have the kind of following they do have. It's an incredibly— Well, you know, yeah, well, that all has to do with timing. Yeah, the way Skip Hollingsworth talks about Marie Robards is creepy.

There's a whole page dedicated to it on Reddit. I'm glad it wasn't just me. Oh, no, no, no. I was like, is he in love with it? Yeah, the whole time he was talking about it. And he's got a goofy midday book to him. So she simply got married and took her husband's name. She still lives in the Fort Worth area. And I believe her new, the married name is Strauch, S-T-R-A-U-C-H.

And i i could not find anything on them but of course i couldn't find the husband's name but i mean can you imagine sitting there you know you've put this poison because she was told in chemistry class be very careful with this it's extremely toxic you put it in your dad's meal and then you sit back and watch him die yeah that's well it's more it's yeah it's pretty bad it's really bad well i i'm not i i feel like i'm trying to defend her and i swear to god i'm not but she's 16 and all that'll

just make him really sick and i can get out of this and i don't have to do this anymore so i'm i'm trying i guess i'm trying to give her a i don't know i benefit of the doubt but uh you you just i maybe she panicked and was like i don't want to say anything so i'm gonna get in trouble but your dad died and she the other thing about it was is that at she was really smart she had really good grades she had you know college and all this stuff ahead of her just another year and she was not

going to be living there anyway but she didn't like her mom's boyfriend why did she want to go back she left because of him he's still there well that doesn't make any sense right you know i agree with you could have just gone back she didn't have to kill her dad i have no well she couldn't go back they're moving remember she didn't even know that well that's true but she didn't know that when she killed the father but but she didn't have to kill her dad she could have just gone back.

She could have just gone back. Well, okay. I see. You know what I mean? He's still there. I don't know why. For some reason she moved out. I don't think it would be, hey, I want to come back now. So she was trying to give them. No, here's, here's. But she was giving, I have to move back in with you. There's nobody else I can live with. That's what she was trying to do. And she ended up having to move in with the grandparents and go to a back there in high school.

But I'm just, I'm just wondering if she couldn't have just said, I made a mistake. I don't like living with dad. I want to come home. But she liked living with them. They had a good, it was a very. She didn't dislike him at all. Yeah. Yeah. There was no reason to dislike. She didn't dislike him. I don't know. Here she is with the loving father. She killed. She hated her stepfather and moved out to go live with her real father. Oh, it was her stepfather.

I thought it was a boyfriend. Yeah. No, no, no. But he had a girlfriend. And, you know, so she, you know, I'll go live with that. Oh, this sucks. Yeah. You know, like that kind of a thing. Yeah. Very, very twisted. But anyway, we're into February. The coldest and darkest weeks of the year are behind us. I thought you said Puxitani saw the. Oh, God damn it. You're right. He saw shadows today. I don't know. Yes.

PETA has appealed to them. They want the people in Puxitani to do a reveal cake instead of the hedgehog, instead of the groundhog. How is that hurting that groundhog? If they cut the cake and it's pink, it means it's going to be an early spring. And if they cut the cake and it's blue, it's going to be a late spring. It's not hurting that groundhog. The thing, first of all, Pete has got a checkered past at best, but think about it.

That groundhog has got the fucking life. He does. He's got anything. Yeah. He's got everything taken care of. Food, water, keepers, doctors. You know, yeah. And he's going to live a lot longer life in captivity than he does in the wild. And he's well taken care of. And it's fun. And those people are just having, it's the one time each year with Puxitani and those old goofballs in the stovepipe hats. And of course, that goes back to Groundhog Day, the movie,

which is absolutely fabulous. I've never seen it. Oh, Kevin, you have not? No. I mean, I get the reference when people are like, oh, it's like Groundhog Day. Because what happens is this news crew from Pittsburgh, Bill Murray, goes to Poxitani to film this. And Bill Murray is like, I got to get the hell out of this town. And he's doing everything he can to get out of town. And a snowstorm hits and just everything hits all at once. And then he wakes up the next morning and it's the same day.

He has to live through the same day. What finally frees him? He becomes a better person. Oh, okay. But the thing that I find interesting about it is if you watch the movie, you're guessing that he relived the same day, probably, you know, like months or a year. Hundreds of times. Like the same day. Oh, and he knows what's going to happen, doesn't he? I know that he just is like waits for the door to open. Right, right, right, right. And it's fabulous. It's really, really funny.

And Harold Ramis was the director. I believe it's Harold Ramis. And he said, no, it's more likely he did it for decades. Oh, my God. That's terrifying. Exactly. So he knew everything in the city. He knew everybody in the city. That makes it go from a comedy to sort of like a Twilight Zone of horror. If you look at it like that, but literally there's a scene where he goes, this is Meg. She does this. She does this. That's Bobby. He just got divorced. They're going to get to everyone.

He could do that for everyone in the town. It's actually a very interesting play on the movie. I may have to watch that tonight. That reminds me of that. That's a very Twilight Zone kind of concept. Like when the guy thinks he's in heaven and that the guy is an angel and he's a gambler and he doesn't realize he's going to spend eternity in hell and he can never lose and it drives him nuts. And it's kind of like he's been there for decades. That's chilling.

All right. Well, I know what I'm going to watch tonight. There you go. All right. Well, thank you for listening. All right, kids. Au revoir, Vang. Music.