Who knew a trip to Chocolate Fest could be as exhausting as a marathon, or that a U-Haul van could stir up so much drama? In this episode, we, Dustin and Ashley, recount our sugar-fueled adventure in Knoxville, where chocolate wasn't the only thing that melted — our energy did too! Ashley also learned to have conversations with strangers and that sharing buggies is common around these parts. If you're a fan of Brucie, our furry companion, we've got an update that'll warm your heart like a cup of cocoa on a cold day.
Ever had a cat critique your home appliances? Well, join the club and discuss Ashley's feline who has a thing for noisy water systems. Our confessions continue as we grapple with the tempting siren call of gluten amidst our diet plans, Find out if we broke down and ate Gluten. So, buckle up for a ride through the mishaps of packing with contrasting styles and the universal battle against the snooze button. And, find out if chocolate really does make everything better.
Our Website: https://www.orlandounpluggedpodcast.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OrlandoUnplug
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/orlando_unpluggedpod/
Chocolatefest: htpps://mychocolatefest.com
Mush: https://eatmush.com/
DONATE to the Ronald Mcdonald House: https://www.knoxrmdh.com/donate
Frightworks Haunted House: https://www.frightworks.com
Who knew a trip to Chocolate Fest could be as exhausting as a marathon, or that a U-Haul van could stir up so much drama? In this episode, we, Dustin and Ashley, recount our sugar-fueled adventure in Knoxville, where chocolate wasn't the only thing that melted — our energy did too! Ashley also learned to have conversations with strangers and that sharing buggies is common around these parts. If you're a fan of Brucie, our furry companion, we've got an update that'll warm your heart like a cup of cocoa on a cold day.
Ever had a cat critique your home appliances? Well, join the club and discuss Ashley's feline who has a thing for noisy water systems. Our confessions continue as we grapple with the tempting siren call of gluten amidst our diet plans, Find out if we broke down and ate Gluten. So, buckle up for a ride through the mishaps of packing with contrasting styles and the universal battle against the snooze button. And, find out if chocolate really does make everything better.
Our Website: https://www.orlandounpluggedpodcast.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OrlandoUnplug
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/orlando_unpluggedpod/
Chocolatefest: htpps://mychocolatefest.com
Mush: https://eatmush.com/
DONATE to the Ronald Mcdonald House: https://www.knoxrmdh.com/donate
Frightworks Haunted House: https://www.frightworks.com
Um, but I have the list. Are you doing it?
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm doing it. It's already started.
Speaker 1:Great.
Speaker 2:Oh, I feel dead inside, I feel so dead. After this weekend of pink or what is it still magnolias? The convention center was draped wall to wall with the beautiful shades of blush and bashful.
Speaker 1:It kind of was, though Like in all theory. It kind of was draped in some violence.
Speaker 2:I actually had a conversation with a vendor where we were joking that it was blush and bashful because it's two different shades of pink. Actually, I think it was red and pink.
Speaker 1:It was red and pink. Yeah, definitely red, and pink.
Speaker 2:Still, they're like colors in the same family.
Speaker 1:They really are.
Speaker 2:Well, you want to talk about our weekend and chocolate fest.
Speaker 1:I'm going to guess, Alright.
Speaker 2:well, guys if you're listening, grab a cocktail.
Speaker 1:Or a mocktail. While we Are we unplugging Knoxville, this episode Are we unplugging?
Speaker 2:chocolate fest. Unplugging our Orlando trip.
Speaker 1:Orlando trip. To Chocolate fest.
Speaker 2:In.
Speaker 1:Living Color Wait, did you say trip to Orlando? You said trip to Orlando. Do you know where we went?
Speaker 2:Grab a cocktail or a mocktail while we unplug our. Orlando on our trip to Knoxville. Beat-a-da-da-da-da-da. Welcome back, guys, to another episode of Orlando Unplugged. I'm Dustin and I'm Ashley and we hope you guys enjoyed last week's episode on our two-part series of the beautiful or the city beautiful, excuse me, as we take a look back at Orlando history. Do you know where you live?
Speaker 1:Yeah, the beautiful city.
Speaker 2:The city, beautiful Orlando, florida. Episode two or part two of that will be coming out next week, so stay tuned. We have some fun and exciting things coming out.
Speaker 1:Exclusive episode about how I'm going to feed you to.
Speaker 2:Gators Yay, gatorland. Can't wait, awesome, but for the time being, ashley, what? What did we do this weekend? It's a podcast. You have to talk. What did we do this weekend?
Speaker 1:I was trying to think of like a quippy thing to say, but to be honest with you, it was just probably the most fun I've had in a weekend and a very, very long time, and it was great. We went to Chocofest and we did Chocofest, we worked it, we ate it, we experienced it and now we've become one with it.
Speaker 2:So and all the aches and pains of the body that have come afterwards.
Speaker 1:I feel like you know what I feel like. I feel like I have ran a marathon and then got ran over by a U-Haul van that we couldn't figure out the gas situation with that We'll get there. Oh, it's going to be a mess. This episode is going to be so impactful, but do you know what I'm really excited about?
Speaker 2:What are you really excited about?
Speaker 1:This episode of Orlando Unplugged is being filmed in front of a live studio audience member and I am so excited for it. This is our second episode that we've had a live studio audience. Member.
Speaker 2:And it's only our fourth episode.
Speaker 1:So it's like 50% of our shows Correct. But this is a big deal, Like it's so great. I love when we do this. It brings me so much joy. Plus, like you, get to kind of help to re what is the word I'm looking for. Like in case we forget, yeah, re-remember some shit for us.
Speaker 2:So that's what you mean, re-remember.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that.
Speaker 2:Just remember.
Speaker 1:No, I like re-remember.
Speaker 2:New words Orlando.
Speaker 1:Unplugged is creating a dictionary.
Speaker 2:I like it. Well, before we jump in and we start talking about our trip back to Knoxville, Tennessee and Chocolate Fest.
Speaker 1:I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2:Siri just wants to be a part of the conversation, hey we've got a couple of things that we want to touch base and go over with for you guys. So first off, can we get a Brucie update?
Speaker 1:We can get a Brucie update, guys. She's doing much better. She's back to our normal self. We did realize, though, why the lack of water was a problem.
Speaker 2:Mom upgraded her water system and she hated it, so Well no, the water fountain you had broke, so you bought her a new one, which?
Speaker 1:is nicer. I bought an upgraded one Much nicer. Correct yes.
Speaker 2:And she didn't go any better.
Speaker 1:No, she fucking hated it. So now I had to buy a brand new. A brand new old one.
Speaker 2:That makes noises and stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because now she can hear it, so now she wants it. So, no, we're doing good, we're back to normal, off antibiotics. She's still driving me fucking insane, but she's doing great. Oh, that's good. But I've missed her since we've been gone, so I'm really happy to be back home.
Speaker 2:So at my house. So I know you know this and some of our listeners might know this.
Speaker 2:So I have a really nice Samsung washer and dryer that I brought with me from Tennessee, and the house that I'm renting is an older house. It's cute, though, and it has a very tight space where the washer and dryer go. It's actually in a bathroom and we couldn't fit both the washer and the dryer in the house, and there's nowhere else in the house that's hooked up electrical wise, which the electrical in this house is shoddy anyways. The kitchen light literally fell off the ceiling recently, like there's just an electrical box where the light was.
Speaker 2:But, anyway, so we couldn't fit them both in. So we made the decision that we would put the dryer in my roommate's storage unit for free, because I'd give them access to use my washer.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And then we've been hang drying our clothes which is horrible.
Speaker 2:It's not too bad. I don't necessarily like it, but it makes it hard. If I like, wake up in the morning and I need to wash clothes for work, because when I get home it's super late and I don't want to make a bunch of noise, correct but then I don't have time to dry my clothes and everything. So I got totally tired of doing all of this. So I finally got on Amazon and I started looking at reviews and everything and I'm proud to say that I now have who I have called Lucy.
Speaker 1:I love her.
Speaker 2:She is a tiny, compact dryer that can do up to like five pounds of laundry.
Speaker 1:It's a lot. Is it a lot?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:How many, how many pieces of clothing is that actually Like? What does that equate to?
Speaker 2:It depends on what the material, that's nothing. Well, it depends on what your materials are.
Speaker 1:Okay, so like if my work clothes if.
Speaker 2:I'm washing work clothes. It's fine If I'm washing and I separate my clothes by like socks and underwear, or one work clothes or another, towels as its own thing, and then I've got like everything else goes into one, but like pants get washed together and then just shirts get washed together.
Speaker 1:Do you not separate your stuff by colors?
Speaker 2:No, because it's 2024 and there's literally no need to do that, go call Shan.
Speaker 1:Go call Shan, because Shan is-.
Speaker 2:Do you know why those that-?
Speaker 1:Shan is the reason who taught me to do my laundry Do you know why clothes used to be done like that? No, teach me how. Because of detergents.
Speaker 2:It was all a detergent thing. What our grandparents used to wash clothes a long time ago would make your fabrics bleed.
Speaker 1:It doesn't do that now I just know, okay, but the problem is, is the one fucking time that I put it all together will be the one damn time that it all blends?
Speaker 2:Bleeds. You never wash new clothes with old clothes, like if you've got a brand new red shirt that you buy from American Eagle, or like brand new red pants. Let's say you go out and you buy a pair of red pants, you bring them home. Do you wash them with like whites? No, because it's brand new fabric that hasn't been washed yet.
Speaker 1:Do you know what my favorite part of all these conversations are.
Speaker 2:What. Every single time the fact that you know them right.
Speaker 1:Shut up Every single time, that-.
Speaker 2:She didn't say no.
Speaker 1:Don't look at our one studio audience. Remember to back you up. That's not fair. Okay, now be quiet. Do you know, every single time somebody has a conversation about whether or not laundry bleeds, do you know the first color they say? Red. The red situation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because red and white makes pink and that is the number one issue that people have had.
Speaker 1:I just find it comical though, because they're still like blue and green. So do the same thing, like when you wash a brand new pair of blue jeans. If you wash it with a white towel, it's going to be blue. That towel is going to come out light blue. But, I find it so comical that the first color people say is red.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's been great, life's been really good, and then-.
Speaker 2:How we doing on our gluten free diet.
Speaker 1:Okay, some of us are doing okay, and then sometimes we we, sometimes I feel like sometimes we do really really well and then other times-.
Speaker 2:I don't know why you're saying it Like we've been breaking it constantly for a week. We've done well. We drove or we flew into Knoxville and I took you to this Japanese restaurant that I used to work at out of high school oh my God, that was so good and I've been talking about it for a month and I get in there and I asked the server. I said I want the hibachi chicken and the spring rolls, but could you tell me Wait, wait.
Speaker 1:I feel like we should back up here, though, because we definitely hit some gluten though before we went on this trip. No we didn't. Yeah, I did.
Speaker 2:You have yeah, I come in here and you got a damn chef boyardee can with a spoon in it on your nightstand.
Speaker 1:Why are you calling me out to everybody? That is not fair.
Speaker 2:Because you broke gluten and lied to me about it and then tried to pin it on your brother.
Speaker 1:Stop Bruce, he's getting comfortable. No because it was Rob's, and that's my story and I'm sticking to it, so you'll be all right, you'll get over it, but no, when was?
Speaker 2:gluten consumed on a trip before the steakhouse.
Speaker 1:No, no, not a, not a, not a. Where the steakhouse?
Speaker 2:Oh, you tell it on yourself extra. You tell on me stuff that I don't even know about right now.
Speaker 1:then I definitely had to have a sandwich, because I was really hungry, and my gluten free bread. I'm so curious as to what your bread is going to look like. By the way, do we notice that a gluten free bread molds faster, though, than regular bread?
Speaker 2:I don't think it does.
Speaker 1:I don't know. We shall see. We're going to test the theory.
Speaker 2:Well, anyhoo, so we make it to the steakhouse and I'm like, hey, these are the two food items I want, can you see if they have gluten in them? And she walks away and she comes back and she goes. So the Hibachi sauce definitely has gluten in it. And as for the spring rolls, like the owner doesn't know and it kind of really pissed me off because it was like okay, you are the owner of the restaurant. Pretty sure you have to know these things.
Speaker 2:You would think, and I know they're the exact same spring rolls that they have when I worked there and I'm like all you got to do is go in there and open the freezer because it's on red ink on top of the box, all the ingredients and it'll tell you exactly if that is rice paper or if that is wheat or what the what that is. But I was like you know what, I didn't care, I wanted it and we ate it because we talked about it for so long.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we really did. But do you know what I also found interesting?
Speaker 2:What.
Speaker 1:How many not gluten free options there were when we were flying on day one at the airport, at the Sanford airport, which is the airport that we flew out of.
Speaker 2:Oh, you can't judge anything. At the Sanford international airport. The only thing that flies in and out of there is a legion.
Speaker 1:That thing is about to shut down, but still even not just, not just Tia or not just Sanford, when we were at the what's the airport and Knoxville called. Mcgee Tyson they barely had any as well, and McGee is a pretty larger airport, I would say, than Sanford. I think they're both.
Speaker 2:they're both prospectively. They're smaller airports, though.
Speaker 1:Like there's we have a route.
Speaker 2:There's a Ruby Tuesdays in the airport at McGee Tyson, but that's only because McGee Tyson is based in Marival in that area in the around the Knoxville area, so it makes sense. But we did find some good gluten free options at Sanford.
Speaker 1:Yes, we did. We got to eat a brand new, I guess, rolled oats to you. I've had mush before. Mush it's a. It is the rolled oats that were. They're flavored differently, so each one is a different option. Which? What was the flavor you had?
Speaker 2:The kind that I had. I looked at like the vanilla bean and apple cinnamon.
Speaker 1:I really want to try the vanilla bean it was.
Speaker 2:I think mine was like a maple cinnamon or something with caramel, I don't remember exactly.
Speaker 1:I think it was the maple cinnamon.
Speaker 2:I think it was maple cinnamon, and it was delicious, delicious.
Speaker 1:It was so good. You know it wasn't good, the damn burnt coffee I had from the Cuban comfort food. Yeah, that was not great, that was kind of disappointing.
Speaker 2:Well, all right, so let's go. Okay, let's jump back before we, before we get too far forward. So we're going to break this down into like the stages of how, how we planned this. So we've got like our pre trip, our flight there and back everything.
Speaker 2:So, like I recently loaned and I hope my roommate's not listening to this because he'll be very sad with himself but I loaned my carry on suitcase, my hard shell carry on suitcase, to my roommate back in like December when he was going on a business trip to New York and you're you're messing with cords and it's making the sound. Do the weird thing again.
Speaker 1:I'm so sorry and I loaned him.
Speaker 2:I loaned him my carry on and he was late to his flight at MCO Poor guy. So the flight attendants made him check his bag because they ran out of room in the overhead bin, so he had to put his bag under the airplane, which meant that when he got off of the airplane the suitcase was put through like the luggage terminal and put out on the thing and when it came out he says that the corner will was just obliterated.
Speaker 2:Now the frame is like the plastic the shell is what's broken, but it, the wheel, is still on there, it's still holds up and they've offered to like replace it, but it still works. I put some gaff tape on the inside and the outside. Gaff tape fixes everything, is that?
Speaker 1:like duct tape, gaff tape.
Speaker 2:It's like the equivalent of theater super glue theater and haunted house glue.
Speaker 1:Big sister, yeah, got it.
Speaker 2:It's a very expensive tape.
Speaker 1:Is it really?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's actually. Gaff tape is like what you can use on like hardwood surfaces and stuff and it won't damage it.
Speaker 1:Got it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Look at me learning these things.
Speaker 2:But I like taped it together and loaded that sucker up and I used her for this whole trip and she had no problem. She did great. I was very proud of her.
Speaker 1:She was great.
Speaker 2:Oh God, god. What Taco Bell the night before. Please tell these people what happened to us at the Taco Bell. We're not going to name this location.
Speaker 1:That I'm going to talk about the fact that I spent $55 and our entire food sucked.
Speaker 2:And us walking in the door.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God, and her like standing at the door Just like she was, like trying to greet us, but she wasn't greeting us.
Speaker 2:No, she was trying to discreet us, correct? Because, their lobby closed in nine minutes, so we couldn't place a mobile order on the phone, for some reason.
Speaker 1:Don't know why. That made no sense whatsoever. So then we pull in, we get out, we head to the lobby and she goes. Do you know that we closed in nine minutes the lobby? I'm like um ma'am, we're just trying to place it to go order.
Speaker 2:No, that's not what you said. Actually, you like flung your hair off your shoulder.
Speaker 1:Because I got pissed.
Speaker 2:Like you, was a boss ass bitch. Because, I am. I'm just placing a mobile order for pickup and you walked your happy ass right over to that kiosk and started tapping in our $55 order.
Speaker 1:You know this, this podcast of ours. Every single time we do it, I get more and more humbled as this episode goes on, because you never let me change the story so that I decently sound like a better human being.
Speaker 2:Oh, you didn't need to sound like a human being. That woman was on the clock.
Speaker 1:We didn't give two fucks, though, like this entire experience we had, she could give two fucks less, like we placed our order. She screws up the drinks. She's like listen, I don't even want the back, I don't care, like I'm going home, I don't care.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that was fun.
Speaker 1:Gave us replacement, but the food was.
Speaker 2:The food was gross. Our food was wrong.
Speaker 3:They got multiple things in the order and this is like three.
Speaker 2:This is three for three Like this is the third time we've been to this place, but it's so easy to get to, comparatively to where we're at when we when we want Taco Bell or to have it door dashed or whatever, I don't know where the next closest one is, which just easiest to go to this one.
Speaker 1:It's literally across the street. It's great. I hate it.
Speaker 2:We had our Taco Bell and then we we game. We got back here at the house and then you were like I want to take a nap, I want to go to bed, I want to sleep and what? Tell everyone what you hadn't done at 11 o'clock at night? What had you not?
Speaker 1:done, packed. I hadn't packed because I am a last minute packer because I packed. Do you know why? Because I have a philosophy. I have a philosophy that was late.
Speaker 2:Be late to everywhere, because you don't do anything on time.
Speaker 1:No, if I forget it, I'll just buy it, it's. It's a method that has been embedded in my head for Years mm-hmm for quite some time.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, some of us hourly-waged workers Can't afford that you salaried woman.
Speaker 1:I feel bad for you, I really do.
Speaker 2:I feel, I feel bad for myself most days.
Speaker 1:But no, I didn't want to pack. I don't want to pack at all. But but. But I made you yeah, you did, and it was real fucking difficult and a really annoying because I was like Very okay with not doing it at that moment I was really tired and I knew, but I knew.
Speaker 2:I knew that when the morning came and I would try to wake you up, speaking of which, speaking of which, we went to bed at like what? Two thirties, when we finally got done with everything, had our alarm set to wake up at six, so we'd have enough time to make our coffee.
Speaker 1:And you would be able to get ready to get called down on yeah, every single.
Speaker 2:And then the alarm clock went off at six and I and I got up. I think it was.
Speaker 1:We were sleeping on the couch. It was about.
Speaker 2:It was about the six, fifteen Alarm that I finally crawled off of the couch, made a coffee, made you a coffee because you literally said I'll get up If you make me a coffee in the morning. And I made you your coffee and I walked over and I sat it down and I went Ashley, ashley, and you went what? And I said it's time to get up. I made you coffee, we're going to Tennessee. And you went, fung off and you rolled over and buried your face in the back of the couch.
Speaker 1:Yes, I did, and.
Speaker 2:I proceeded to then turn all the lights on, turn the TV on, and then literally Everyone else in the house got up and left their rooms before you even opened your eyeballs correct, I didn't get up until about six and we said we were going to leave at seven. What time did we leave? Seven, 15, 30 and why did we take that long to leave?
Speaker 1:because I didn't wake up until about 645 and then it took me a minute to Get ready for the day.
Speaker 2:But you know what we made it yes. Yeah, TSA when we met, so we TSA exist.
Speaker 1:Yes but the line at TSA did not well, and it was.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was a easy experience compared to the last time and compared to the.
Speaker 1:I don't normally fly out of that airport. I always fly it at MCO if I'm leaving for see.
Speaker 2:This is why one of the reasons I like Hanford is it's dead, so there's never a line.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I could so rule of thumb here. So the lesson we learned. I Could have slept longer, just say no.
Speaker 2:However, what did you notice? That when we went through TSA, like we had both put our bags on the thing you went through in front of me, we both put our bags on the things. Yours goes into the machine, and then I walk away to go get in that little scanner thing where they Make you stand like a weird stick figure and then it goes zoom, zoom and then it looks Inside your body to see if you got anything in there.
Speaker 1:I hate that thing. By the way, I close my eyes every single time we get in there. I put my hands up and I close my eyes. It just makes me so claustrophobic.
Speaker 2:It just makes me think of an MRI machine and then it makes me wonder that if in like 10 to 15 years you see those, do you or someone you know has mesothelioma? You could be entitled to compensation, yeah, I feel like that's gonna happen because the TSA make them have those x-rays just telling you.
Speaker 1:If that's the case, they're gonna hold a lot of motherfuckers. Compensation in my ass will be the first one in line.
Speaker 2:I know, but they put. So you go through the machine and then I get into the machine and then suddenly your bag comes out, but my bag does not.
Speaker 1:I didn't even realize that your bag didn't come out. By the way. Like I did not realize that had happened, I didn't even do anything.
Speaker 2:It was weird because Well, that's because apparently a flight attendant got into the line. Are you telling me to get that pushed back? And this other woman's luggage? They pulled it back to not let it go to the machine so her baggage could go through the machine. Are you? Serious. Yes, so she could get to her flight but I was like she was in no hurry, no rush.
Speaker 1:And I don't even think she was. She wasn't getting on our flight and I think I overheard her talking to one of the guys that was in behind me and she was like oh yeah, my flight doesn't leave to like noon.
Speaker 2:She wouldn't be there that early for flight in the evening. It doesn't surprise me, but. But we made it through. We got our stuff and then we headed off, and that's when we found our oats and your nasty coffee so so disappointing, um, and I mean they don't have a lot of options for things there.
Speaker 1:No, they really don't. It's a real, real tiny.
Speaker 2:I watched like Five minutes of the crown on netflix because you wouldn't leave me alone or shut up.
Speaker 1:What do you expect? You wake me up. We get an array of snacks for those that probably followed us or probably following us on social media. You saw the very elaborate photos that got posted of the snack.
Speaker 2:Breakfast breakfast.
Speaker 1:No, it was literally a snack.
Speaker 2:It was like a snack table. It was breakfast. You know what's good though that yogurt was good. I had, yeah, we had a yogurt that I'm pretty sure was.
Speaker 1:Was perfect.
Speaker 2:It was like a yeah, but it was like a hotel or not a hotel, but it was like an airport Perfect. Yeah it wasn't like a brand or anything.
Speaker 1:No, but we could not eat that granola. We learned that out.
Speaker 2:Yep, and then we had uh, the mush and pickles which was delicious. We didn't eat the pickles until last night, though.
Speaker 1:Oh, we did, but they were definitely there. Um, but yeah, what else is there?
Speaker 2:Um Do. I have you had coffee and a drink and then we both had waters. Oh yeah, because we hydrate in queens but, um, that was like a nice little breakfast. Um, shout out to mush. I really enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to trying some of the other flavors that they have.
Speaker 1:Um, oh and shout out too much for wishing us safe travels on our flight. That was so great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when I threw that photo up on social media.
Speaker 1:Um, they I tagged the brand mush because I I Great, or I really really very much enjoyed what we ate, and I think so did you so threw it up on socials and, um, not only did they like the post, but they messaged us back and wished us a safe travels for our flights and I was like stop. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so much of you hear that.
Speaker 1:Thank you, we did have a very safe flight and we we really really love your product.
Speaker 2:Yes, and to preface, this is not a sponsored episode.
Speaker 1:They're not sponsored with us, but but like, if you want to be, that would be kind of cool.
Speaker 2:I will link their social info in um the show description so you guys, if you don't know what mush is, you can actually see what it is that we're talking about. Um, it's so good where you can find a store locator, so you know, because I know they're at Whole Foods and a couple other select foods, but they're not Super easy to get to for everyone.
Speaker 1:No, I don't think they're at Walmart just yet either. I think I saw it was Target and For us it's Publix here in Florida, um, and I think, for for those at least up in Tennessee, that I think I saw some in um Whole Foods. No K Roger Kroger Kroger had some Kroger K.
Speaker 2:I miss my Kroger. It's the only thing I miss Kroger and cook out. But we'll get to that.
Speaker 1:Did you have any nicknames for K, for Kroger?
Speaker 2:Kroger.
Speaker 1:See what it's called the K Roger.
Speaker 2:We had nicknames for Food City. Oh, that's cute because their jingle goes food city and so everyone that I know calls it food shitty.
Speaker 1:That's so, so sad.
Speaker 2:And it's only because Food City has taken literally a million years to update their stores, so they literally look like they're from the 90s still.
Speaker 1:I wonder if they're comparable to um Windixie that you have here. I've still never been to Windixie Um so the board is the next week's episode as we take us into.
Speaker 2:Windixie. The boarding process though, like so while we were sitting there, allegiant I wasn't joking when I said that allegiant is the only thing to fly out of this place.
Speaker 1:It is literally the only one.
Speaker 2:There are no other airlines commercially that are flying out of this place, so we like flew out.
Speaker 1:What I thought that was a snap. Okay, our live studio audience, remember, cracked his knuckles and I thought it. He was snapping like this, like I said something wrong. Oh but he like cracked, that was funky. Yeah, I was not expecting that, and I hear it right, he pops like a glow stick.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's scary. Um, I'm so sorry but in you, so you know we're in the terminal and it's like empty and we were. I was so excited because it was like oh it's a Thursday, I guess it's gonna be like an easy Empty flight and it won't be that bad turns out. We were very wrong.
Speaker 1:Oh, so incredible. And I thought, like not just it with. I anticipated that it was going to be empty so that we could move and sit next to each other, because we did not Book our seats next to each other.
Speaker 2:Well, we, I didn't choose to seat select because when I bought my tickets originally, I didn't seat select because I was going to be going by myself.
Speaker 2:And then you joined in on the trip about a month later, um, and you bought your ticket, but I had already purchased my ticket and at that point I had missed work because I was out sick with the flu and just all these things. So I wasn't going to turn around and spin the additional anywhere between 10 and 30 dollars To choose a seat for what we thought was going to be an empty flight. It was not. It was so full, um, I mean, it wasn't bad. I was in 28c, so this plane has like 32 rows. So I was in 28 Almost all the way towards the back. I fortunately I was an aisle seat and I had this really nice couple beside me.
Speaker 2:They were super quiet, they didn't talk a whole lot, but they were part of a larger group and they had a guy in the row in front of us who just was very uncomfortable to be around because he was very much like I'm somebody and he was just standing and he was walking in the aisle, he was talking loudly over all these people to like talk to his friends, who were all scattered throughout the plane and I just was.
Speaker 2:I just wanted this man to sit down and shut up, but he didn't until like the last second, so like he was in people's way while they were trying to get to their seats. But he finally sits down and no one else sits in his row, so he's got a whole row to himself, the whole flight. And then the row behind us people got moved is so they ended up putting a woman, a baby toddler and, like, I'm assuming, like either mother or mother-in-law In the same room and this child this crotch goblin does I like to call them Decided that he wanted to be a professional drummer and he drummed and kicked all over the back of the seats. Fortunately for me, he was not, uh, kicking my seat, he was kicking the seat for the guy beside me, but it still was like super annoying, um. So, uh, we had to take a little break because I actually needed to blow her nose and she about ripped her nose. Ring out her nose, you could.
Speaker 1:You're fine. Um, they think Rob might be right. Those allergies are like kicking my ass.
Speaker 2:You'd be okay.
Speaker 1:It's bruce. We're all highly allergic to the cat.
Speaker 2:Now, I don't fully 100 remember where I was, but that was kind of my plane ride. It wasn't too too bad. I was so tired because we only had like A few, like three and a half hours sleep.
Speaker 1:You didn't get that extra 45 minutes that I kind of know.
Speaker 2:I didn't, because I was a responsible adult major coffee, um, but I Kind of napped, I dosed in and out and then we hit Atlanta and it was turbulence from Atlanta to Knoxville. But how was your, how was your flight?
Speaker 1:But let's start with the fact that I don't like flying. I don't mind it, but it's not my favorite thing to do. So I was in 22 f, okay, which meant I had the window seat. Oh yeah, so that wasn't bad, Mm-hmm, except for the fact that Right next to me was a small child and then her mother, mommy, put on the neck pillow and out. Mommy went, which meant this little kid next to me kept not poking me on the arm and going Hi, how are you? Or did you know we're in a plane?
Speaker 2:Why are you making herself so?
Speaker 1:because that's literally how she was. Oh, that's weird in the beginning, alien In the beginning it's an alien and then halfway through I say halfway, it was like maybe 20 minutes through Then the poking turned into jabbing and she was like I can't see the window. Okay, well then, get the window seat next time. Girl scout, I don't know what you want from me.
Speaker 2:Did you close the window?
Speaker 1:Yes, I did. I just wanted to read my book, pray to the lord that I wasn't gonna die because we hit some nasty turbulence and it scared the crap out of me and I just wanted to get off because I had to pee this little shit.
Speaker 2:I would not stop poking me really do dislike Public transportation with children. I really do not because I dislike children, but because I dislike the fact that parents do not parent their children in public. No and we'll talk more about that on the flight back, because we kind of had some issues today with a parent not parenting. I don't understand.
Speaker 1:I mean, I understand the fact that, like Traveling with children is stressful. I remember traveling with siblings that were pretty young when I was a kid and then, when I became a teenager, they were still pretty young, so I understand that. However, completely neglecting your child and falling asleep when they are not asleep Was ridiculous, because what if something happens? What if that kid needs something? What if she has to go to the bathroom? What happens if she pees her pants or throws up? It's not my job to make sure she holds the puke bag that's in front of her seat.
Speaker 2:Oh, hell, no, I'll be slapping the mom on the back of her head like wake up princess.
Speaker 1:Correct. And then you start vomiting on me. Oh, you're gonna pay dry cleaning and replace my shit um, but, like I mean, it wasn't.
Speaker 2:The worst part about the flight, though, is so I have airpod pros and, um, I've had them for a few years. I got them, like during the beginning of the pandemic, and within a year I had to have my right earbud replaced because it like busted inside the speaker and started doing this really weird shaky thing where you could hear things, and it started doing that again on. You guessed it, the right earbud, which is the one I had replaced, and I've very quickly learned that, um, when you're inside a plane that is pressurized and you have that, oh Ashley, what you keep messing with the thing and it sounds weird in my ear and I don't. Okay, there it goes notes, I don't know Um.
Speaker 1:I'm sitting right here. I haven't.
Speaker 2:This is a traumatic experience for me, because this is like my air pods on that airplane when I could just hear In my ears the whole time.
Speaker 1:It's just your ears.
Speaker 2:Maybe I have 20, 20 vision and not 20, 20 hearing. Now that was okay, um, but anywho. Um. Yeah, I was pretty much in the back of the plane and just doing my own thing and you were up front. What happened when we landed, ashley? What? Did you wait until two days before we left to tell me you had to do?
Speaker 1:Because I found out two days before we left that I had to do kind of what did you have to do? I had to sit there a two hour meeting.
Speaker 2:And I was like what time did that meeting start?
Speaker 1:at noon.
Speaker 2:What time was our plane? Scheduled to land. At noon we landed before noon.
Speaker 1:Yes, we did, so that was nice.
Speaker 2:That was weird, jinx, hey, guess what. Remember that time I told you I didn't want to charge her for my iPad.
Speaker 1:You want to charge her for your iPad.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's dropped from 11 to 9% in about three minutes. Hold on.
Speaker 1:We're gonna resituate Technical difficulties. Oh, can we have a? Can we get a song for that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, hang on that baby?
Speaker 1:Absolutely not. Whatever that was, I don't want that ever again.
Speaker 2:Do you not remember the live action cat in the hat movie when he chops off his tail?
Speaker 1:It's your job this week, while these next two weeks you need to come up with a technical difficulty jingle. That sounds great, do that? Do that? You can just give us a little bingo.
Speaker 2:Banjo Bingo. What is with you? And not being able to pronounce words correctly?
Speaker 1:I don't know you tried to call Deanna no, don't say this, because she's gonna listen to deanna and hate me and then die. And you know, listen, I'm just gonna start calling her princess, because that's it.
Speaker 2:That's. She is a princess.
Speaker 1:So she'll love it.
Speaker 2:So. So when we arrived in Knoxville, you dropped or you. We went down the baggage claim. We got your checked luggage and my dad came and picked me up. I drove down the road to you hall, while you stayed back at the airport in your meeting.
Speaker 1:Part for like a little bit of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then?
Speaker 1:Got in the u-haul and still continued the meeting.
Speaker 2:Well, I had issues. This is where we have some issues. So I'd looked at renting a car for the weekend and it was looking like close to 500 dollars. Like it was just 340 and this and that, and then you have to add gas and all these things. So I chatted with Brad and Deanna and was like, hey, I'm actually gonna rent a u-haul cargo van. So I was a nine foot cargo van, it was like 1995 a day. So that came out to like 59, 85 For the whole from thursday to sunday.
Speaker 2:And then we pay an additional 69 cents per gallon For not per gallon, 69 cents per mile that you drive during the rental, since it's considered an in-town rental. And I prepaid like almost 30 bucks for 40 miles and I was like, oh yeah, 40 dollars will be totally enough and if I go anything over that it won't be like maybe 60 miles total and I go to pick up the truck and I use their the mobile app for u-haul and like the mobile check-in and it's the most annoying thing I've ever done in my life. I was expecting it to be like fun and super easy, but like you had to confirm your identity and take a picture of the front and back of your driver's license and then take a picture of yourself. But you couldn't do that ahead of time. You could only do it the day and the time that you were actively like in the parking lot.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh, sorry. I think that it's so dumb like the idea that you can't do that In person that it has to be like a mobile thing, like ice covets over.
Speaker 2:Come on, no well, no, no, no. I liked that but the, because I don't like going in and standing in line for 30 minutes Because some stupid person doesn't understand how to rent a freaking u-haul. But the app didn't work. I couldn't confirm my mileage, I couldn't confirm the gas, and then I Picked you up and went back because I called u-haul on the phone and the first time they were like here, we're going to send a link to your phone, go and confirm, like make sure the pictures match and and the mileage and everything. And it wouldn't let me click submit, like I couldn't complete it. So then we drove back and then that's when I called the second person.
Speaker 1:Huh, all of this happening while I'm on the zoom call I know.
Speaker 2:And then I called back and talked to someone else and they're let me put you on a brief hold. And I was on a hold for like five minutes and then the line just went dead. So I just pulled up into the u-haul and went back inside and started talking to the guy in the lobby and he did. He was like I apologize, we've been having some issues, apparently not only with the app but with, like our software, like what they're using in the stores. Um, so it just sounds to me like u-hauls having some trouble, some trouble right now, but, um, I hit my iPad's almost dead still so it keeps going to sleep.
Speaker 1:Um, so not charging.
Speaker 2:You know it is charging, but it's in low power mode, so it it keeps like turning off. Um, but in the end, uh, we were expecting to pay like 139 dollars for the u-haul but evidently I didn't well see. I didn't track the mileage this weekend because I didn't think I would need to, because I prepaid for 40 miles. We were driving from marival to noxville, which is not far, it's like 10 miles. If anything, I expected male, maybe I'll go over like 10, maybe 20 miles. No, we prepaid for 40 miles.
Speaker 1:Yes, you did.
Speaker 2:How many miles did we drive?
Speaker 1:196 196.
Speaker 2:I still don't know when or where we drove 196 miles, but we did.
Speaker 1:Hey, brad, did you take the van on a joyride?
Speaker 2:Evidently, I wonder how far like from noxville.
Speaker 1:What's 196 miles from the convention center?
Speaker 2:nashville.
Speaker 1:Brad, did you go to nashville?
Speaker 2:and back. He just flew the car back, um, but yeah, so I mean it was like 230 dollars, but still 230 dollars is a million times cheaper than the rental car that we were Originally looking at getting.
Speaker 1:So I mean, and it fit all the stuff that we needed for the event, so that worked out pretty well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we were able to get everything that we needed to get to and from the convention center in the van, so that was also.
Speaker 1:All passengers must ride in the cab can we also talk about, though, how the van looked like it had those little holes in?
Speaker 2:the what's up losers. Hey, oh my god, we miss you too. You. Wait can we?
Speaker 1:pause for like two seconds.
Speaker 2:I just want to give yeah, yeah, we'll be right back. Hold on, enjoy this commercial.
Speaker 3:How much fright can you take in one night? Take it all at right work With more blood for your buck, more chainsaws for your change, more dismemberment for your dollar. Five Fantastic fright zones, just one place, just one ticket. Right works Knoxville's in town indoor factory of fear on western mary road. Buy your tickets now at rightworkscom.
Speaker 1:Stop it.
Speaker 2:So you got to watch some ads and stuff for fright works.
Speaker 1:I've got to do a lot of seeing a fright works. I'm now actually um A fan.
Speaker 2:I'm representing even though I wanted to take you by there and give you a tour so you could see my humble beginnings and you were like I'll stay in the car.
Speaker 1:Well, I also stay in the car, because who we were going with, I didn't want to and that did nah you watch those.
Speaker 2:You watch those walkthrough videos and you jumped, I did.
Speaker 1:I got nervous as fuck. Well, that's that guy, and I saw the christmas one that you guys did and that's the one that did me in. That made the one with uh, we had sharp productions.
Speaker 2:Do a walkthrough.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's the one that and they go to like halloween horror nights in all those places.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, well, so, anywho, we're back. Thanks for listening to that. Thank you for listening to fright works commercial. Sorry, we wanted to plug that instead of my podcast because, you know, we were in Knoxville this week and, uh Uh, you got to meet a lot of people that have been involved in chocolate fest and with, uh, the fright works community in the hot industry that I've worked with.
Speaker 2:so we just figured that we would play you guys a fun little snippet from that and be sure you guys check out Frightworks at frightworkscom definitely check it out and check out creepy gone and check out chocolate us.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, we'll be talking about all those, but anywho plug in all of them.
Speaker 2:So we we flew into the Knoxville. Yes, we did and um, apparently the day before that there was still like an inch of solid snow and ice on the road.
Speaker 1:Looking forward to seeing some.
Speaker 2:I was not.
Speaker 1:And oh, so it was like two days prior. Okay.
Speaker 2:It rained the previous day and apparently it all melted, and then suddenly we were living in the land of Noah's Ark. So we went from an arctic tundra to Noah's Ark. Everything's flooded, everything's rainy.
Speaker 1:But I was really sad. I was really looking forward to seeing some snow again.
Speaker 2:But I mean the weather was okay. It was in the 60s.
Speaker 1:It was kind of cold the first day. It was kind of cold but it was comfortable, like I was. It was low.
Speaker 2:It was low 60s, breezy and rainy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2:It was a lot, but then it got better the second day and then it was just cold and rainy the next. But um, so when we made it into Knoxville, Got the van situated. We. I took you over to one of my favorite hangout spots from when I was in high school and I know freshly out of high school 10 years ago Um called, really been 10 years I graduated in 2012. It's been 11. Um, mm-hmm, yes, I'm that old. Thank you.
Speaker 2:No, I know you're that old, um, but I took you to one of my favorite spots, which is called Vienna coffee house, and you were in your meeting. So I was like I'll go get us tea, you go find us a spot to sit, um. So you went over and we got a nice booth by the window because I'm still on my zoom call at this point and I got us um A teapot.
Speaker 1:Of english breakfast tea.
Speaker 2:It's very good and it was um. I wish they would have cleaned the dust off of the teapot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she was dusting.
Speaker 2:She she had a little bit of dust on her. I don't think people use the teapots as much as they did back when I was in high school because that was like all the rage. We had the endless cup of uh coffee. You could pay like $2 and you get a vienna coffee house mug and you could have unlimited refills of coffee and we would do the teapots because you could. They would re steep the tea bags For you as much as you wanted once you bought it.
Speaker 1:That's so cool.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that and they had a bunch of lunch things and stuff that we already had lunch plans. So you finished up your meeting.
Speaker 1:We had our tea and um we got to chat in real long with the barista that was there she was great, we did, we introduced her to the podcast, so she was really excited to hear that. So if you're listening, welcome, welcome.
Speaker 2:Um, but I think one of the things like how would you describe vienna being in there?
Speaker 1:Um, it was kind of like older, like all the. They had hardwood floors, that when you walked every noise were creaky.
Speaker 2:So those floors are the original floors to the building, and the building that we were in was, if I remember correctly, it was the first furniture store in the city of Marival, wow. I love that, so it is a very old building.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of history.
Speaker 2:And it was full, yeah, it was really, really busy. When I think of Vienna, I think of, like the coffee shop from the Gilmore Girls TV show Small town coffee shop, just a small town coffee shop, like you would see in early 2000s sitcom.
Speaker 1:You're focusing on that.
Speaker 2:It's like a Luchs. Yes, I think so.
Speaker 1:No, Luchs was a diner.
Speaker 2:I'm talking about. I'm saying like if there was a coffee shop in the Gilmore Girls, that would have been it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think so that's what I'm going for. I don't think you're wrong there. It was cute and I like their stickers, and now I'm a Vienna coffee fan.
Speaker 2:Where'd we go after that?
Speaker 1:Food we went to food.
Speaker 2:We went to Osaka Japanese grill Osaka, so Osaka I had talked this up for a long time, so I worked there out of high school.
Speaker 2:I had a friend in high school named Sumi Chin and her mom and dad and her mom, kathy, and her husband, who I've only ever known him as Chin, which I know that's their last name, but I've never known his first name. But they started this restaurant when I was like a junior senior in high school and all they had was hibachi and teriyaki entrees, salad and like I think it was called cara age wings. Like that was it. Nothing else Struggling. You're fine With your kombucha, it's good for my gut, but I wanted to take you there because it was so good and it was known as a staple in our town for many years and they sold it around 2018-ish and it's been under new ownership since and which is sad because it's still good. But it's been hit or miss a couple times when I've gone. But the day that we went, total hit, minus the fact that they couldn't tell me if some of their food had gluten in it or not. But what did you think?
Speaker 1:I thought it was delicious, like I thought it was so good, and they were very fast, very, very large portion sizes. I could have definitely eaten on that for a day or two. I did not like the dressing that was with the salad.
Speaker 2:Now, that was a different ginger dressing from when I worked there. When I worked there, the ginger dressing was like red. Yes, like the typical ginger dressing that you get it almost to me looks like they took that old ginger dressing and then mixed in ranch dressing, because that's what it looked like. It looked like horseradish sauce, it actually tasted like.
Speaker 1:It tasted more like coleslaw dressing. Oh. It was real sweet. Not ginger at all, because I'm a big ginger fan. I eat it with my sushi all the time. This literally tasted like coleslaw dressing and it was just not the vibe. But the miso soup was fantastic.
Speaker 2:I've never had the miso soup.
Speaker 1:It was so good and I love that it came in like a coffee mug, that was great, yeah, and my friend Claire came and met us down my old roommate she did. I love that she showed up in her Sex and the City shirt. That was great.
Speaker 2:Do you want to know something really cool about her? Tell me. She used to work for the Titanic Museum in Pitch and Forge.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 2:She actually she went in and auditioned. They were doing the exhibit from the movie because the movie turned, I think, 20 years old or 30 years old or something like that, and they had the costumes from the movie that Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio wore.
Speaker 1:Paint me like a French mother.
Speaker 2:She went and auditioned and was cast to play Kate Winslet acting as Rose. So she dressed as Rose from the movie and played that fictional character on the ship and then, when her time was done with that, she was actually the Titanic princess for a while.
Speaker 2:Stop, that's so cool so she's on postcards and all sorts of stuff. She used to wear this beautiful ball gown and she would ride around on the Gatlinburg Christmas parade and she would go to like formal events and stuff. So she also does film and television. She's in Snapped, which is filmed in like East it's Atlanta, east, tennessee area Like Snapped Killer Couples and she's done a lot of things and she's been in a movie called Octopus Games which is a spoof on the Netflix series Squid Games oh that's so cool, yeah, and she's been this like creepy monster character in another movie and all sorts of so yeah, she owns a horse.
Speaker 1:Of that.
Speaker 2:So she rides horses, show horses and stuff.
Speaker 1:What is this?
Speaker 2:Her riding show horses.
Speaker 1:I wish you could see that.
Speaker 2:She's just riding show horses, but she met us for lunch.
Speaker 1:She's great.
Speaker 2:And she's on a gluten free diet because she's gluten intolerant and she has a lot of intolerances when it comes to food, so she was able to have some miso soup with us while we were there, so that was fun.
Speaker 1:But I got to see her. That was great. That was great.
Speaker 2:Now here's the question I've been wanting to ask, oh, ask me. When you go to a Habbachi restaurant and you get a bowl, either a little like a ranch, a brandy, a brandy can, or a squeeze bottle, sure Of this sauce that's usually of a pinkish color.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:And you put it on Everything, everything. You put it on your rice, you put it on the vegetables, you put it on everything. What do you call that?
Speaker 1:Yum-yum sauce. No, yes, no, yes, no, yes, it's shrimp sauce. I'm on a phone, a friend, okay.
Speaker 2:Hey, Julia Come here, come to the microphone. Come quickly, quickly, hey, julia.
Speaker 1:Hey, julia, in our fridge right now, on top of our fried rice, what's the sauce that you put on top of it? That sauce, what's it called Yum-yum sauce? I'm sorry, say that again. Yum-yum sauce, really. And what is the label? Nope. I'm phoning the friend. You be quiet. And what exactly? And how do you know that it's called yum-yum sauce? Huh, Because of the label. Oh really, and the label says it's called what again, I'm sorry, yum-yum sauce. Oh, there you go.
Speaker 2:No, there it is. I understand that someone has capitalized on it and they've put it into a bottle, but it is not yum-yum sauce, it's called shrimp sauce.
Speaker 1:No, it's not. That's a false statement.
Speaker 2:Yes, she is.
Speaker 1:She's covering the label.
Speaker 2:You can bring that label all you want. I have a bottle of that stuff at my house too, but that's because they don't sell it in the stores calling it shrimp sauce. They sell it called yum-yum sauce, but it's still not right. That is sound so disgusting. Who wants to go into a restaurant and look at their waiter and be like hi, mr Waiter, can I get some of that yum-yum sauce?
Speaker 1:What? Look at, Julia. You're really in front of her listeners. She is literally brought us to the bottom. That was yum-yum sauce, Yum yum, Listen. No, I'm going to walk back and look you too.
Speaker 2:Look at me right now. Do you want to walk into a restaurant and look at a waiter or waitress and be like, excuse me, can I get some of your yum-yum sauce? Ha-ha.
Speaker 1:What just happened? Wait, wait wait Hang on, hang on, hang on what just happened.
Speaker 2:Sorry about that. We had to go away for a minute because some dumbass decided to scream so loud that the system detected it as feedback and stopped recording. I do that quite often, so here's your coffee. Come in a couple. Actually Turn the microphone towards them. If they're going to talk, at least Come closer, come closer, come closer, as your producer. Unfortunately, dustin is correct.
Speaker 1:False.
Speaker 2:Thank you. So it is yum-yum sauce Close.
Speaker 4:However, it is yum-yum sauce. However, just like Band-Aids and Pork Roll versus Taylor Ham, it's Pork Roll. Taylor Ham is the brand name, it's just a brand name.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Now see, here's one thing I want to do.
Speaker 1:I looked this up. I think we're firing our producer. Hold on, I looked this up. Anybody interested in the job?
Speaker 2:And I could not find anywhere. So I knew it as shrimp sauce for years. First time I went to this restaurant, that's what they called it. That's what I stuck with. And then I started working at Osaka and this customer came and I was like, can I get some yum-yum sauce? And I was like what? And they were like you know, yum-yum sauce, the pink stuff. And throughout my entire adult life I've heard it called either. I've looked it up online and literally people on Reddit they're like I don't know where that name come from. I don't know where this name comes from, but it depends on the type of restaurant you go to. It depends on what they call it.
Speaker 1:I grew up with it being yum-yum sauce.
Speaker 2:I grew up with it. It's shrimp sauce.
Speaker 1:I think it's wrong. You are wrong.
Speaker 2:No, sorry, just you know what I showed you a whole new world in Tennessee, and this is going to be one of those whole new things for you, so just be excited about it.
Speaker 1:No, I'm sorry. Listen, I have adapted. My card is no longer a card, it is called a buggy. I am a full Tennesseean now and I accepted it and I love it. However, that is yum-yum sauce and you saw our wrong and we need a new producer because ours is fired.
Speaker 2:Well, okay, well, we can agree to disagree. Ladies and gentlemen, that's the show.
Speaker 1:That's all she wrote, goodbye. We'll see you next week.
Speaker 2:Okay, so after that, now that we'll move on, now that we've wasted a long time on that, After that so I took you by my childhood home.
Speaker 1:Oh, my gosh. That is the most beautiful house I have stepped foot in. So your dad did a fantastic job in that place.
Speaker 2:It looks so good. And stepmom.
Speaker 1:And stepmom. I'm so sorry so my I grew.
Speaker 2:I spent a lot of my time growing up in my grandmother's home in East Tennessee and unfortunately, this past year the decision was made that my grandmother needed to be in an assisted living facility because we needed to make sure that she had bless you.
Speaker 1:That's this to me. Every time you do that, I can't sneeze anymore, you're welcome.
Speaker 2:But it was determined that she needed, you know, around the clock care. She was diagnosed with dementia two years ago now. So in that process, as time has gone on, the decision was made to not necessarily sell off her things, but we wanted to make sure that, you know, she was well taken care of and had the money that she needed to be able to do what needed to be done throughout the remainder of her life so she can continue to live comfortably. So my father has now got ownership of their home. So my grandparents built the original home in 1961, when they were married.
Speaker 1:Bless you, bless you.
Speaker 2:And I didn't sneeze. Gavin sneezed.
Speaker 1:No, he didn't. He's trying to tell me nevermind Big old book.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry you are getting a book because you make me stop talking every five seconds and I'm like this is turning into a four hour episode again. But anywho, my dad has the home now. The original home was built in 1961. They added onto it in the 70s and it remained exactly like that until now. So my dad and my stepmom wanted to turn, move back in and create their forever home that they'll be in and, wow, it's beautiful. The home is now open concept. It has beautiful hardwood floors, granite countertops.
Speaker 1:Look at the black. The black is my favorite part of it Very contemporary. Oh yeah, it's very Joanna Gaines yeah.
Speaker 2:I can see that and I think that I like that.
Speaker 1:Look, I think so did your dad too, because he made that comment a couple times too, that it was very, and then, once it's going to be decorated, I want to see it again.
Speaker 2:So after we stopped by and we visited that Guys, do we?
Speaker 1:have more studio hot-eared peppers, oh my goodness, this is ringing the best wrenched onion dip. It's from Trader Hoes. It's so good. We'll talk about Trader Hoes in a minute. Yes, we will.
Speaker 2:So afterwards, after we visited my parents' house, we wanted to go meet up with some old co-workers of mine from when I used to work at the Tombers Agency. So we drove up to downtown, up to Gay Street, and then I parallel parked a nine-foot U-Haul in one try.
Speaker 1:Like a pro.
Speaker 2:I was super proud of myself.
Speaker 1:So was I.
Speaker 2:Mostly because I haven't parallel parked in like five years. But that was nice. And then we rolled up and we went to like pay the meter because it was only like what it was 5.15. You know, I never got charged.
Speaker 2:Well, it kept saying so. Parking in downtown is free after seven o'clock on weekends, or free, but it wouldn't. Every time we would put your card in it would say that the limit was reached and then so we were just like, okay, we're going to walk away and hope that we don't get a ticket. Never did, I think it was because we were so close to that time so you couldn't pay for two hours because there wasn't two hours until the meters went free. But anyhow, how was the walk up that hill actually?
Speaker 1:I did it in heels.
Speaker 2:How was that versus Orlando? It was a hill.
Speaker 1:Orlando is flat. There's nothing there. You go downtown Orlando, there's it's all flat. You can walk heels, you can wear whatever you want. Downtown Oxford is not, it's not flat. Do you remember what I told you? She's got mountains.
Speaker 2:Do you remember what I told you, from where we parked the car and then we had to walk up that really steep hill to Gay Street, why that hill existed? Remember what I told you? What is? Gay.
Speaker 1:Street.
Speaker 2:So Gay Street is the second story.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, you just have to remember this. It's on the second story, it's not the first story, so you have to go up to get to the top.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the original. Yeah, there's like a whole city underneath.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, it was really strange but so cool at the same time but also really sucked. And you know what else I really don't like about downtown Knoxville? What Greats.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:They're everywhere and they're not like little ones. No, these things take up like entire sidewalks. I'm walking in streets because I have a fear of those things, of falling in, like I have a fear of escalators. It's a real thing I have and I had to walk around them. It was so stressful and terrifying and I know not a fan, so it's okay. Knoxville.
Speaker 2:I'm going to need you to take a bow, but it was all worth it, though, right, because we made it to. We made it to Market Square, which I was super excited to show you about, but it was a chilly, rainy night. It was cold, no one was on Market Square.
Speaker 1:It was so dead. But it was kind of nice that it was dead, though, because you could see everything, so that was really nice.
Speaker 2:And the plaza had just been emptied. So that big empty open space that you saw is where they have the ice skating rink.
Speaker 1:And the bartender when we got to the bar. Chloe, hey, shout out to Chloe, we love you. Thank you so much, hey, chloe.
Speaker 2:She was. She had said that that morning they had just came and picked up the last of the big metal shipping containers that they had put the ice rink in that day. Love that, but then I took you to a place called Alice, in Apple that's my new favorite place. Have you posted any of those pictures on our socials? I?
Speaker 1:did. They've been all over the story. They're all over the story. I have yet to do an actual post about them, but it is being put up. This is coming out on Monday, so you will get them either Monday or Tuesday, so you'll see photos, because it's getting its own entire post about it. That's how great it was.
Speaker 2:So Alice in Apple. That is one of the newer places on Market Square. It's been there for a little over a year, I think.
Speaker 1:That's what Chloe said.
Speaker 2:I had never gone to it when I lived there because they held some odd hours in the beginning and we were still coming out of like a weird pandemic-y time for businesses still. But we went in and that was like the coolest place I have seen on, like there was flowers and plants.
Speaker 1:The theming of that. It's all based on Alice in Wonderland and it feels like I'm in Alice in Wonderland.
Speaker 2:No, you're wrong. It's all themed about Alice being in Appalachia.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, okay.
Speaker 2:But we had a really cool bartender there. Her name was Chloe. When we walked in, she was great.
Speaker 1:She was hopefully, I wonder, when she said she was seven months pregnant. So hopefully everything is going great for you.
Speaker 2:Congratulations. Loved her. Loved her, break a leg.
Speaker 1:Do you know what my favorite part of that entire bar is? Do you know what my favorite?
Speaker 2:What. What is happening right now? They're laughing at me because I just told this pregnant woman to break a leg. We're the worst. I meant break a leg is in good luck.
Speaker 1:Chloe, I like you Apparently. Dustin wants you to break something, but please don't do any of that. I need to come back and see you.
Speaker 2:Hey, what was your favorite part?
Speaker 1:They had an entire menu dedicated to mocktails.
Speaker 2:They did. They had cocktails and they had mocktails.
Speaker 1:They did.
Speaker 2:But before we talk about that, before we talk about that, I have to just shout out how much I love this. We walked in. There was no one in the bar.
Speaker 1:Not a single person At all date. We were her second people.
Speaker 2:I look in the bar and all I see is her sitting there looking up at the TV, watching YouTube videos of Elvis Presley Elvis Presley, just full on.
Speaker 1:It was great and it was the funniest thing.
Speaker 2:I absolutely loved it, but she was awesome, she was great. I asked for her recommendation on drinks. I told her that I was trying to stay away from gluten so I can't have any form of alcohols that have barley rye or any wheat in them. So she showed me the ones that she recommended, what she knew was available and what I shouldn't drink. So I'm completely spacing on what I got the first time. But the second drink I got was called a Glitter Kitty and it was just full of glitter edible glitter. But she loved every minute of it.
Speaker 2:It was delicious, it was so good, and do you remember what it was that you got?
Speaker 1:I do that entire thing. I remember my first one was Tweedle Don't and it was watermelon puree, watermelon juice, hot honey, lime, a splash of spray, and she rimmed my glass with tahin.
Speaker 2:And I think the thing that I liked most about that was they didn't make this drink up from scratch. So it's actually the non-alcoholic version of the Tweedle Dis or Tweedle Dat, which is all of the exact same ingredients, except for that one has tequila in it, yours just had everything but the tequila and it was great. And it was more than half the price.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my drink was only $6. Where yours was like $12?.
Speaker 2:I think it was $7 more expensive than what yours was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yours was $13. It was great Now that was fantastic. And they came in the same glasses. So, everything was still super cute. I didn't just have to get a Shirley Temple, I got to still be a part of everything while everybody else was drinking. It was great.
Speaker 2:And then I got to see my coworkers, which was really, or my previous coworkers, which was really fun. I'm glad to see that they're still being super successful in their careers. Will is doing a fantastic job with what he's doing.
Speaker 1:Hi Will, hi Will.
Speaker 2:I know he just found out about the podcast that day.
Speaker 1:And then he said he was like no, I'm going to start listening to it. So, hi, will he subscribed, so I'm sure he's listening.
Speaker 2:And I got to see Melisa and hear about everything that's been going on in her life.
Speaker 1:Love her.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you got to do it. So she has animals, but she also fosters. No, I didn't know that so she has a literal zoo at her house, she's got her pets and then she has her foster animals that come and go and I don't think I have met a more awesome person in Knoxville than Melisa, because she was definitely my rock when I was at Tom Briss and she definitely was. She was my buddy.
Speaker 1:She's great. Yeah, they both were.
Speaker 2:And then we went to leave and then we're like going towards the car and you just be lying off to the right because you see a candy store.
Speaker 1:I did. I acted like a five year old, and it was fantastic, and I'm so glad we did, though, because we walked in and they had an entire wall of saltwater taffy.
Speaker 2:And other like small candies, correct.
Speaker 1:But I was too excited. I wanted saltwater, taffy and the best part, you get this bag. There's two options you get a normal size and then the mega size, which, of course, no surprise to anybody. I got the mega size and they go fill it, not like by weight, it is $13, $12.99 to fill the entire bag.
Speaker 2:And what did Ashley do? She left about two and a half inches from the top and we get over to the register and the woman's like no, go fill it up. So, as Ashley's like, she's like you pay and you go fill the rest of the bag, so I go to, I grab the bag and I go to walk over to fill it and Ashley's like, don't get anything disgusting, they had some weird flavors. And do you know? Do you know what I did in that exact moment?
Speaker 1:That motherfucker put pickle taffy in it.
Speaker 2:No, no, no no, you're ruining it.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 2:In that moment I said you know what? Fuck this bitch, I wasn't going to get anything weird. So what did I do? I went and I grabbed a handful of the most random nasty dill, pickle and maybe some other flavors I'm not going to tell you and I mixed them into those bags so you wouldn't know. I'm so weak at it. And today on the plane, she opened up what she thought was a watermelon, took a big old whiff and gagged right there on the plane for God and everybody, because she was still pickle.
Speaker 1:I literally am sitting here and I look at these two boys sitting next to me and I go. I full on. Just took a cocaine sniff of dill pickle taffy. That shit hit my brain.
Speaker 2:Oh God, that was good.
Speaker 1:That was horrible. Um, don't like dill.
Speaker 2:So we finally got back on track.
Speaker 1:We jumped in the van. No, we didn't. No, you did not. You are missing the best part of what happened then.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I introduced you to one of my favorite coffee spots.
Speaker 1:My new favorite obsession Coffee chocolate.
Speaker 2:I love them.
Speaker 1:I love them. I love shit talking is happening. I can feel it. I love them. I love them so much. They are fantastic. I loved what we got. I liked the interaction with our our barista. She was fantastic and the best part is all the chocolates are super cute. They have like turtles in actual shapes of turtle. It was adorable. It was fate. I'll fire you. I will fire you as an audience member. It was great. No big fan, big massive fan. I really liked them.
Speaker 2:What did you get when you were there?
Speaker 1:We got the same. Thing. We got the peppermint.
Speaker 2:Peppermint white mocha.
Speaker 1:With oat milk.
Speaker 2:Yes, and it was delish one of my favorites, big fan and I'm so glad I got those rewards points that I won't be able to redeem anything for because I'll expire before I back in Knoxville, but that is okay, and coffee and chocolate. Was also a vendor at Chocolate Fest, which was pretty neat.
Speaker 1:Thanks, coffee and chocolate, we love you.
Speaker 2:So then we got back on track. Yes, we did A little bit later than planned, but we made it over to the storage unit. We met up with Brad and Deanna. We got everything loaded up there and then we went back to their house to finish loading up some stuff, and that's when Merkadoo and Gavin came in the picture.
Speaker 1:Hi guys.
Speaker 2:Oh, hey, look, it's Gavin, he's sitting right over here. You can't see him, but we can.
Speaker 1:He may or may not be a part of our audience members.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but we met, so that's when I got to introduce you to them, and Merkadoo or Toyota, or Mercy or Mekrides or Mercedes, as she is actually named.
Speaker 1:Government legal name.
Speaker 2:We decided that it would be a fun blast to stay at Mercedes house for the weekend.
Speaker 1:I love them, like I love them.
Speaker 2:I know they're a lot of fun. They are so much fun. I do a pretty decent job.
Speaker 1:I love how I'm going to talk about you and you're going to sit right here. This is going to be great.
Speaker 2:I do a pretty decent job of realizing what humans on this planet are decent human beings and know how to pick my friends Well, so you're welcome.
Speaker 1:You really, really do, though that's not not a lie.
Speaker 2:I know I have good friends and you're welcome that I introduced you to all of my friends in Knoxville.
Speaker 1:And now they're all my friends.
Speaker 2:Literally your friends with all of them on Facebook. I am hey guys Nice to see you, but after that we made it over to Deanna's house. Well, it was nice for you to see.
Speaker 1:No, no, no. Hey guys, nice to see you. Yeah, they're totally here, they are.
Speaker 2:But then we went over to Brad and Deanna's for a bit and I had a hard Mountain Dew Baja blast and it was actually pretty good. I liked it.
Speaker 1:It tasted like a Baja blast.
Speaker 2:But then, oh, do you want to talk about the four legged friends at Brad and Deanna's?
Speaker 1:I love them. They're so cute, they're so adorable and it was so nice because I miss Bruce every time we go on trips or every time we, every time I go on a trip. So it was really nice that they were just so cute and cuddly and so you got to meet Kit Kat. Yes.
Speaker 2:And you got to meet Penny, aka Pinaffer.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And you got to meet Goose.
Speaker 1:Goose.
Speaker 2:And Goose is my favorite because whenever, whenever you tap Goose on the back, like, like you know, butt pass and Goose loves them, but then Goose just goes, she squats, and it's the funniest thing ever and I got to hear it so many times. But then, after we left there, we decided to go grab some cookout.
Speaker 1:I love cookout. I love cookout. You know, I got introduced to.
Speaker 2:Orlando needs to get a cookout. I think we should petition this right now, right now, I'll sign it.
Speaker 1:Let's be the first to let's do it, sign it. Great He'll sign it.
Speaker 2:He wants to cook out when he comes down here to visit. I think we should have a cookout here. I'm putting it in the air, yeah, manifesting it for anyways, no, cookout is fantastic.
Speaker 1:Cookout is so good and it's cheap. So if you're balling on a budget, it is good.
Speaker 2:We always be balling on a budget in this household.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we do, but it's great.
Speaker 2:No, a big fan and their tray options are great and all the excuse you, okay, smoky, another one there, sherry, but anyway. So we went, we made it over to Mercedes and we had our cookout and we were like, let's show you a couple of Frightworks videos and show you what Frightworks is. And then the next thing we knew it was 2 30 in the morning.
Speaker 1:Yes, it was hey that couch, though 10 out of 10 would recommend.
Speaker 2:All right, mercedes, you have a nappable couch. Yes, you do. So. We finally got to bed at like 2 30 in the morning. We had plans. We were like we're going to wake up at six, we're going to leave the house at 6 30. That'll give us time to get some Starbucks and be there by seven. Yep, we woke up at 8 30.
Speaker 1:Can we come up TV time out? I'm going to pause and just go back to that morning conversation we had about how I didn't wake up for the airport and got judged hardcore. All of us, including the judgmental mofo sitting across from me, did not wake up either. Yeah, but see, here's the thing.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no. Here is the thing. None of us woke up. Actually, every single one of us slept through our alarms, except for you. You woke up and said oh, no one else is awake, I'm going back to bed. You told me you did that. I did do that. Okay, the difference here is we would actively try to wake you up. Ashley, wake up, ashley, wake up, ashley, wake up, and you won't get up.
Speaker 1:You are the worst.
Speaker 2:There's a difference.
Speaker 1:Not only are we looking for a new producer, but now I'm looking for a new co-host. Any takers? Yeah, well we got up in the links below.
Speaker 2:We woke up in the links below. But we got up, we got dressed, we got there. We still made it before the time that we needed to be. Vendor Loden started that day at 10 am. We were there by nine.
Speaker 1:Coffee in hand.
Speaker 2:I had everything in the van so no one could really do anything until I got there Correct. But it was fine, we got there. We got everything set up. Actually, me and Gavin jumped in the van, we went to the convention center and then you and Mercedes went to get coffee and to pick up Chris.
Speaker 1:Hi Chris.
Speaker 2:Hello Chris.
Speaker 1:Does he go by Chris or by his last?
Speaker 2:name he goes by either. Either one yeah or dumbass? I don't think I can say what I call him on the podcast. Yeah, that's also true. Super big shout out to Mercedes that morning, just showing up with Starbucks gift cards. She was like Merry. Christmas I turned around and handed the gift card back to you so you and Mercedes could go get us Starbucks that morning. Did you use those?
Speaker 1:Yeah, we did.
Speaker 2:Okay. I wanted to make sure that she didn't just like outright. I mean, she bought us coffee because she gave us the gift card. So thank you, Mercedes, for the coffee and giving us a place to sleep. But most of all of the staff started.
Speaker 1:It was so good. Big big fan, Big massive fan, it was great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, but most of the staff arrived by nine o'clock and we began to set up. Vendors started showing up around 10. And so the way that set up for Chocolate Fest works is, when we get to the building and we're there, the rental company has already come in a day before us and they've set up all the pipe and drape and they've set up the floor plan. And then we come in and they make any minor adjustments that need to be made or changes in case we have booths dropping out or more people coming in, which I believe, if a mistake in Chocolate Fest was completely sold out on the vendor in this year, they expanded the show to the second floor, so this show is held at the historic Jacobs Building, which has been a part of Chilhaway Park in Knoxville, which is adjacent to Zoo Knoxville and the same location that they have, the Tennessee Valley Fair Did you know that there was 116 of those vendors there.
Speaker 2:That's right, there was 116.
Speaker 1:116. That's how many booths there were. That's insane.
Speaker 2:A lot of new vendors this year too, people that I had never worked with before.
Speaker 1:They were great. They were big, they were great. That was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:So the way that load-in works at this place is there's actually a back alley that is barely big enough to fit two cars, but you can technically fit two cars down through there, and we had two different bay loading doors. When the morning started I was at the first bay door and so I would get their name and figure out are they on the east end? I'm going to call my in the east end if they were on the east end or if they were down on the west end of the floor and determine where we would send them. So if they were on my side we would pull them up to the wall.
Speaker 2:One of the things that I've really enjoyed about working with Chocolate Fest is that they really do care about their vendors, because without their vendors they can't have a show. So this is the only convention I've ever worked other than CreepyCon, which is also owned by the same company. They assist their vendors with unloading their vehicle. They assist their vendors with getting their stuff to their booth and unloading that cart so they can get that cart back over to the door and help the next vendors that load in. And it's a pretty seamless and easy process, depending on the venue that you're at Some venues are harder than others to do that with, but the vendors I've seen it's been a great opportunity because it gives our staff well, their staff I say our staff because we work the show, but it gives their staff an opportunity to really get to know some of these vendors, like the folks from North Carolina.
Speaker 1:Fudge who pulled?
Speaker 2:up and called me by name and said they were happy to see me again and they sent us away with some fudge at the end of the show for us to bring home to Florida. But there were vendors there that I you know, candy by row. I've known them since 2014,. Since this convention came back and I've been working at every single year and it's just fun to be able to make those connections and meet all of those people and see them, you know, year after year, and then see them outside of the convention.
Speaker 2:I think, it's a really really neat and fun thing, but it was a pretty busy day, like we had a lot going on. We had chocolate samples coming in, we had bakery samples coming in, we had campers and trailers coming in the door and it was just. It was busy.
Speaker 1:It was insane. That entire day was insane because not only did we have all the vendors coming in, but so there was a group of people that were helping to them and love that, so shout out to them you guys are great. And then there was also an entire group of people that were counting for the tastings that were going to happen the next day, to get that ready to go and sorting all of that. My head hurt from the math of counting so many pieces of chocolate 22 and like 22 different pieces, or 22 different companies brought their candy or the chocolate cookies.
Speaker 2:And it was how many samples did they have to do?
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm sorry they had to bring 1250, 1250 pieces of whatever product that they were doing for the tasting. I say whatever because there was salsa, there was cookies, there was chocolate there was fudge there was. Fudge there was. Toffee there was free stride popcorn at the end of it. It was there was a lot, there was a lot going on, so it was insane. It was a very insane day.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and this year it was a fun year. So chocolate fest. In years past we would go out and just buy a bunch of food and bring it back. They'd usually send someone to McDonald's or somewhere. But it's gotten to the point that the staff has so many different dietary restrictions now that they would spend so much money on this food and we wouldn't always eat it. So this year the owners of chocolate fest were like hey, we're going to try something a little different this year.
Speaker 2:This year, just whenever you get hungry, you decide it's time to go eat, just let us know and then you can head off property and go grab food wherever you want. So you can get whatever it is that you want to get, versus having to eat a McDonald's double cheeseburger or something. And we were, you know, we were so busy and the day was going so crazy that Mercedes left the property for a little while to get what we needed. And she calls. She calls me and she goes Are you okay with chicken? And I was like yeah. And she goes Okay, are you okay with sushi? And I was like yeah, just nothing with the crunchies on it, because I thought that that was gluten, which it may still be at some places. So she goes, okay. And then the next thing in the end she comes back and she's like hey, your food's over there in that bag. So I go to get the food and I pull it out and it's a whole ass rotisserie chicken.
Speaker 1:And we ate that Like it was the last meal on earth. We tore into that shit so fast.
Speaker 2:And the best part is there were three packets of sushi in there and there were two that were identical, that were like I think it was, was it salmon?
Speaker 2:I think salmon and tuna salmon and tuna and we're eating it. And then there's this one other one and it looks so good. It had ill sauce and spicy mayo and it had the crunchies on it and I was like, Did Mercedes buy us this? I thought I said no crunchies. So then I call her to be like hey, did you, did you not? Did you misunderstand me and think I said crunchies? And instead of don't get crunchies, and so she doesn't show up and I'm like that ill sauce.
Speaker 2:And it was the only one that had ill sauce was one of the crunchies. It literally was. So I. So we, we rip it open and we start eating out of these three packs of sushi and there's rotisserie chicken. And then she rounds the corner and I see her was like oh Mercy, I was calling you to see if you bought any sushi for yourself. And she goes yeah, it's the pack that you're eating.
Speaker 1:And then that was it.
Speaker 2:And I felt really bad and I was like Well, you can have some of yours hours if you want, and we did.
Speaker 1:We ended up sharing. It's great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was really sad, but are you getting distracted?
Speaker 1:Do you need a minute?
Speaker 2:Sorry, my work chat is like blowing up blowing up. Apparently someone passed out at work or something today. I don't know but any who next week's podcast. Yeah, evidently. So we went back and after we ate, mercedes sushi sushi, sushi. Yeah, and we finished our. We finished our load in, we worked we. We got finished at 7pm, which was our scheduled out time.
Speaker 2:We got the dot we left is like 715 when we finally got out out. But the great thing is we've had a pretty great relationship with the Jacobs building and their staff is very understanding. So we all wrapped up when we got out of there as quick as we could and you and I went to your house Tater Joe's, tater house, tater house, tater house, tater Joe's. We went to the Trader Joe's in Knoxville the only Trader Joe's that we have in Knoxville.
Speaker 1:She's so much bigger than the one we have here in Orlando.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, she is, which I've only been to the one that we have in Orlando. I haven't been to the other one, have you?
Speaker 1:There's two.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's one up on the center town Over by the old Amway center.
Speaker 1:Oh and downtown the Kia center.
Speaker 2:Oh, and downtown yeah there's one there, I don't.
Speaker 1:I don't do that. No, there'd be no way.
Speaker 2:Let's try it one day. But anyway, you, what were we going to Trader Joe's for? Dinner dinner and snacks dinner. Okay, so we were trying to figure out this dinner.
Speaker 1:We were trying to figure out what we were having for dinner and I was getting hungry, slash hangry, and nobody could figure out what was going on. And I looked at everybody that was in the group that was going back to where you're staying and I was like you got allergies. Nope, you don't like things. You say, no, great, let's go. And I jumped in a van, made you drive and we went to Trader Joe's and you almost got ran over by a car in the parking lot.
Speaker 1:Yes, I did RAP to my life, but um.
Speaker 2:You aggressively passed up this woman.
Speaker 1:Stop it.
Speaker 2:Into the buggy corral to get a buggy while she was taking her stuff out and I was like Ashley, you can take her buggy. And that little old lady was like there's nothing wrong with my buggy.
Speaker 1:That is not how she dog. She's gonna come back and beat your ass.
Speaker 2:Well, that's how old Appalachian women sound.
Speaker 1:In the state of Florida. People don't do that.
Speaker 2:Southern hospitality is not known in Orlando. No, it's really not Outside of the theme park world.
Speaker 1:Correct. It's really not one of those things. So you don't offer people carts, you don't apologize, you beep at people. If they don't hit the green, they don't hit their gas. Thank you, fast enough for your liking.
Speaker 2:I don't like going to Trader Joe's down here. There's people everywhere. No one says excuse me no no. I had someone hit me with a shopping cart the other day and just acted like I was a speed bump in the aisle.
Speaker 1:No, it's your fault. And then it becomes your fault.
Speaker 2:But you had a whole conversation with this woman about fake insurance fraud at stop signs. Because we're so freaking nice in Tennessee I did?
Speaker 1:I really did, because the issue is that when you're in people's way, nobody apologizes. So I was actively looking at something she stepped in like, not even in my way.
Speaker 2:But just-, she was already there. You were just looking around her.
Speaker 1:Right, Not like I didn't need what she was looking at. I was just, I think I was looking over her and she was like oh, my apologies, Let me move out of your way. I'm so sorry that I inconvenienced you.
Speaker 2:Okay. She said oh, excuse me, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:But like it was a lot.
Speaker 2:But that's what it meant to you.
Speaker 1:It really did.
Speaker 2:And then-.
Speaker 1:It really did.
Speaker 2:Then I made a joke about being in Tennessee and this woman was like yeah, everyone's so friendly here. They tell you to go at the stop sign and you think they're about to commit insurance fraud and T-Bone you when you go.
Speaker 1:But in reality they just really want to be nice to you and let you go. Yep, it was a whole mood, it was a whole moment. So but yeah, people don't do that down here. It's a whole different ball game.
Speaker 2:What happened when we left the store?
Speaker 1:So we get all the things we need for dinner and snacks and see this man walking towards me with his, actively looking like he's gonna get his cart, and I go hey, you can have my buggy, he takes my cart. I take one step off of the steps to get to the street and jump up and down and go. I gave that man my buggy, I did it. I'm a Tennessee.
Speaker 2:And now and this man put it in second gear and ran into the store to get away from you.
Speaker 1:He was so scared and I was so happy and I didn't care. I did not care because I gave away my buggy and I did it. I was so happy, it was great.
Speaker 2:Bless it, but we got a lot of good snacks. And then, when we how about dinner? We made it back to Mercedes house. You made us a gluten free, dairy free, meatless, vegan, friendly beef fajita pasta.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was great. It's my take on it. It's something that I make actively Actively, no, quite often.
Speaker 2:Tell our listeners about it. What is it? What did you make it with?
Speaker 1:It is. You do three different kinds of peppers, so it's the red, the yellow and the orange and you dice them up or you can do them slices. I did them dice because you and your pepper hatred. So you can either dice them or slice them and then it is a fake ground beef that you Beyond meat. I don't think that's what it is at Trader Joe's.
Speaker 2:That's what we're calling it.
Speaker 1:Sure. So you do that and you cook that all up and you saute all those veggies and then what you do is you add your boil, your pasta so for us it was gluten free pasta. You cook that into the packaged timeframe and then you're going to add tomato basil sauce and I added dairy free heavy whipping cream and you kind of thicken it up a bit, pour that into the pasta, and then I added some dairy free mozzarella cheese on top and you eat it.
Speaker 2:It was delicious.
Speaker 1:I got, there was four people that were eating it and I got thumbs up. I need this and I'm pretty sure Mercedes is eating it this entire week because I made a lot.
Speaker 2:Yes, you did. Then Chris came back to the house with us in his little ball of energy and we decided to show you even more at. Frank Works videos.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very impressive, I liked it and to which you jumped a whole lot. I did, I did, but there's such a media is very, very impressive. He does a very good job of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's, and he's like completely self-taught. He's learned all of this in the last couple of years.
Speaker 1:We need to hire him for our Orlando unplugged.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Sorry, chris, try to get your job. My apologies. Are you gonna pay for it? No, Exactly. It's extra practice for you, chris, if you need anything else.
Speaker 2:It's work for your portfolio. Chris, if you wanna add some work to your portfolio, call us. Call us. We've got some stuff down here in Orlando and then it's an excuse for you to go to Orlando.
Speaker 1:We can.
Speaker 2:He can stay with you on the couch.
Speaker 1:Or with you I don't have the room. You have a floor.
Speaker 2:But, aniha, you got to meet, you got to meet Lola.
Speaker 1:I love Lola.
Speaker 2:Or Leila Lola.
Speaker 1:Leila.
Speaker 2:Lola, lola.
Speaker 1:As long as she doesn't like me, we're great.
Speaker 2:She's a pit bull.
Speaker 1:She's 10, I know she's 10 years and she's allergic to everything that poor doggo.
Speaker 2:And she's the sweetest doggo. She is a sweet doggo, and she licked all up over you and you were just in love with that, weren't you?
Speaker 1:I love Mercedes and I love her house and her couch and I love Lola from a distance.
Speaker 2:This was your first time meeting a dog.
Speaker 1:It was okay, yeah.
Speaker 2:There's a lot for you to take in. You're used to cats where they're like love me from afar, but don't touch me. And then Lola's like I will love you to a fault. You are amazing, mother. I love you, You're a lot. It's midnight and we just got back today. I'm tired.
Speaker 1:Yes, but we got more to talk about.
Speaker 2:We're gonna get unhinged, so we finally we went to bed. We stayed up and we went to bed at 3 am.
Speaker 1:At 3 am.
Speaker 2:And what time were we supposed to wake up? At six, and that was a rough morning it was.
Speaker 2:But let me tell you, when I woke up that morning I had just. I woke up and I was like, oh, I'm up before my alarm. And I look to the bottom of the door and I see a light on and I can hear someone walking in the house and I thought, oh, someone else's are so up. And about the moment I'm getting ready to pull the covers off of me and get out of the bed, mercy just cop knocks and sounds like she's gonna beat down this front door and she's like at the top of her lungs. She's like good morning. And let me tell you, I jumped so hard only to find out that it was like 620.
Speaker 2:And we had slept through our alarms again, but she was up.
Speaker 1:But we had to be there. We were originally supposed to leave, oh no, we were supposed to be at the convention center at 630.
Speaker 2:Which was ridiculous to think. No, it was seven. We were supposed to be there at seven.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but we all decided the four of us decided that we were gonna get there at 630.
Speaker 2:Which is stupid because we weren't able to get in the building, but any home.
Speaker 1:No, because I think we were trying to leave, so then we could get coffee and everything like that too, because we didn't wanna be late yeah, and we knew that we were gonna have some vendors that were gonna be there right at seven o'clock ready to go. And there was, there was people there ready in their cars, waiting for all of us.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, because I still had stuff to load in, because they don't always get it loaded in on the first day. But we made it. We were there on time, we made it by seven. We went and got coffee. Was it me and you went to get coffee that morning? Yep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you and I went to get coffee and Gavin and Mercedes ran by. Well, they were going to run by Freitwerks because they had to pick up another register, because Freitwerks and Chocolate Fest they share, I think, two registers and then Chocolate Fest owns two additional registers, so they have four. But then we found out that Brad was actually going by there, so they didn't have to go by there, so they got to the convention center at the same time that we did so we had our Starbucks coffee and some and some Trader Joe's snackies that we bought to have for breakfast, except for we didn't eat them we didn't eat them.
Speaker 2:I left my Greek yogurt in my bag and I realized at midnight, the fall, like at the end of the day last night, that they were in my bag and I was very upset because I was so excited to eat them.
Speaker 1:And we did not.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Because it was freaking insane.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it was nice, but it was great.
Speaker 1:We helped any last minute and or, I'm sorry, any late vendors that showed up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we had some Couple flew in by the seat of their pants.
Speaker 1:I don't know how they do that. That seems that for me would be so stressful Like showing up there. Some of them showed up 10 minutes before the doors even opened to the public. I can't, I cannot imagine setting up that entire booth like that.
Speaker 2:I don't think they're supposed to show up that late.
Speaker 1:But life happens, it does, it does. But I just can't imagine how stressful that would have been for them.
Speaker 2:And they all got there and they everybody got everything set up and it looked great.
Speaker 1:Yes, they did.
Speaker 2:And the show opened and we got to help 116 vendors with everything. Nope, it's right here, it's all. It's always right here. Oh, now, mine's messed up. Why you got to keep messing with mm.
Speaker 1:You mess with the sound.
Speaker 2:Stop moving, just don't move your body at all.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna get up there, stay in one position. No, you're not getting up Sending some water.
Speaker 2:Nope, you're not getting up, Gavin, go get her some water, please.
Speaker 1:No, don't do that. That's weird. You can find the dishes. No, get her Stanley Cup. Where's the Stanley Cup? That's what I need. Where is it? I don't know.
Speaker 2:I know it's up there. Go find her Stanley Cup. It's on the kitchen counter. She's not allowed to leave this spot. She must stay right here and finish talking because, we're in the middle of talking about our event day.
Speaker 1:I'm so sorry we're in the middle of our event day.
Speaker 2:You can't just stop the event like that, Ashley.
Speaker 1:Can you imagine? You know it was. By the way, the Stanley did not go to the event.
Speaker 2:It's probably a good thing. It probably would have disappeared.
Speaker 1:Probably would have still been in Knoxville. No, this was great. So we also had to not only help with any last late vendors that showed up at the last minute with any of their needs, but we also had to confirm that all over tasting vendors had their appropriate number of samples needed for the tasting event. That was intense.
Speaker 1:That was really intense. I would like to kind of talk about how that operation goes. Go for it Like how the tasting happens, because that's pretty much like only what I did and what you did on. I can barely hear myself right now, Can you guys?
Speaker 2:hear me, you're fine, keep talking.
Speaker 1:Okay, so that's basically what we did. I don't know. Keep talking.
Speaker 2:Okay, I'm talking. Oh, my God Jesus.
Speaker 1:My God, that's what we did during the day that day. So I just kind of want to like touch on how that whole thing works For those that have never been. Thank you so much, thank you. I just kind of want to talk about like how that goes on. So the tasting is broken down into five different sessions. Thank you, words. Today we're just not getting along, and each session they have this amount of people that will come in sit down. They pay almost $30 to try 22 pieces of chocolate candy.
Speaker 2:Which used to be 12 pieces. You used to only get 12, and now they've got 22 vendors.
Speaker 1:They doubled in size. It's huge. And during this time there is a wonderful. I loved him, Love him, he's great and he would describe every single backstory about all of these vendors. So there's a little tip of information that's happening While you and I are and you, me, the entire team of people are actively trying to quickly get all of these guests their sample. Like that, Like it is the fastest operation ever, Because it's supposed to be done in what? 45 minutes, A half hour, 45 minutes.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And we did it. We did it five times and it's great and it's fun. You know what it kind of gives me vibes of when we're passing all those things out, because we kind of have like little quips that we I mean for me. I added I talked to all the guests that were there. I would welcome them. We had little things that we would say, little added things, especially because we had some vendors that had like coupons that they would get when with their tasting we had my favorite was the random salsa that was in the middle of it. It was great. So we had like little sayings that we were saying to everything. But it kind of gave me the. If you've ever been to Gatlinburg and you've done the moonshine tastings and you know how that guy, whomever is doing it, they have like stories that go with everything and it's a grand old time. That's kind of what that felt like to me is that we're kind of giving them a little quip bits, giving them little fun sayings, and then they're trying the product that we're giving to them.
Speaker 2:I just loved like we would get almost to the halfway point and that's when we would do the salsa from salsa, man, salsa.
Speaker 1:I loved it.
Speaker 2:And it was so much fun because I would put the little cups with the lids on them down on the table and I would say, all right, here's your shot. And everyone at the table would be like, all right, knock it back, just like a shot. And they were like, wait, seriously. And I'd be like, no, he's coming right behind me with the chip, but I mean, you can't shoot it like salsa. And I had this one woman. She was like if you tell me to take this shot, I will do it. And I was like as much as I would find that absolutely hilarious, I was like you gotta take it with the chip, you gotta do it right, you gotta savor the flavor.
Speaker 1:Do you know how I was doing that?
Speaker 2:How.
Speaker 1:So our chip guy he's having to do David Great guy.
Speaker 2:Shout out to David. That was like the funnest time I've ever had working with David.
Speaker 1:So much fun, but he had that entire row of tables and we had six tables.
Speaker 2:We had six tables, so we had 60, we served 60 people, so you served 30 and I served 30.
Speaker 1:So while we're passing out single portion, two ounce portions of salsa, he's having to hit every single person with a chip, so it takes a little bit.
Speaker 2:Just one.
Speaker 1:Just one single chip Great To all of these people by myself.
Speaker 1:So I would go hey guys, here's your salsa, I was like, and you could take it. One of two options you can wait for my chip guy down there, I said, or you can take it my personal way, which is like a shot. Now, this one's not room with salt. However, she'll tell the stage just as good, and at least you can drive home afterwards and they ate that shit up. They thought it was the funniest thing in the entire world and they loved it and it was a good time.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So after they would get to try all the 22 samples there was, they had a scorecard that they had at their table. Each person had their own scorecard that could take their own notes, do whatever they wanted, but then at the end of it, one of the things that was fun and I think it's one of the coolest things that makes chocolate fest One of the neatest things is the guests then get to vote on their favorite. Well, we I think chocolate fest refers to them as a chocolatier or confectioner, but they like it's a people's choice award for who they thought the best person in the competition was, and they All get to place and decide who they think is their favorite and who they think should win the the chocolate fest trophy of the best person. And there was so many votes.
Speaker 1:There was a lot. It was a lot.
Speaker 2:They were counting through the last two rounds of votes to determine who the winner was.
Speaker 1:Can I say it? Do I get to do it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker 1:It was handmade toffee and treats, and they are the third year that they have won in a row. Congratulations.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they have been a huge fan favorite their. Their food always comes out good and I think it was for me. I think the best part this year was that there were so many new People that entered the competition. You know you had Anya's gone nuts, who was there Last year. You had baked that dough my favorite big Oz coffee.
Speaker 1:They were, so did you get to try that?
Speaker 2:I did we we served. We served a little like Dixie cup of coffee to every single guest in them in less than two minutes.
Speaker 1:Yes, we did. I had to hold that tray like a boss.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I got to sit there, though, and hold that tray and look real pretty doing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we had candy by row. Who's been there for years? Choco Lux classic cookie, which is a cookie company based out of Sevierville.
Speaker 1:Did you see how big their sample was?
Speaker 2:It was you know it was a full. That was a full cookie that you could buy at a grocery store. Yes, it was we had handmade toffee and treats, j L Fingeren craft craft and confections, who has been known at creepy con and fright works as J L Fingeren crafts and creations and they coined the name For the.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna mess it up, but it's the s'more. How do you say it? S'more bit, s'more bit, it's a s'more bite and it's so cute and I love it and I got quite a lot of positive feedback too. The guests really love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it was just. It was fun to see her Branch out into something new. I love that there was kill ones, kimmy's kitchen, who's been a part of Chocolate Fest for many years, mama bear sweets and treats, marble city sweets, who were seen on, I think the and not girl inaugural season of sugar rush. If not, they were on Netflix's sugar rush.
Speaker 1:Did you see them? Did you walk past their booth? They all had matching pink chef coats. Yes, I loved that. I thought that was so cute.
Speaker 2:We had Myrtles bakehouse. Who was inspired? By grandma Myrtle, who smoked and Spent her time at East town mall forever, 37 years old. Yeah, yeah, there's something like that. Yeah, our announcer.
Speaker 1:He's down pat.
Speaker 2:Nani's barn bakery. Yes, old South candy salsa, man, salsa, who? Again just delicious salsa. Sassy pants, sweets and treats sugar, mama, cotton candy.
Speaker 1:You get little like two ounce cup of cotton candy yeah.
Speaker 2:Sweet. Some things Sweets in a snap the chocolate ladies who have been a part of chocolate Fest, and then another new vendor.
Speaker 1:I think as long I think the lot when I heard the chocolate ladies. They've been a part of A chuck of us for quite a while. Yeah, I think one of the OG's. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then the last vendor we had, which was also a new one, which was the freeze-dried shop, who they freeze dry everything, which is like a new fad in the candy and dining world. But that was that's the name of just the chocolatier vendors, the people that entered the competition. That doesn't include all the.
Speaker 1:The rest of the almost you know the, the rest of the 116 different vendors that were there. They were all.
Speaker 2:They had everything from apparel to knick-knacks, to t-shirt printing, cup printing Chachis they're not. You know you had like C&D twisted designs. You pick teas, the mason jars something it's like a loose leaf tea.
Speaker 1:I forgot her full name but A couple of my favorites being the tiger blooms. Yeah, she was a great.
Speaker 2:What was she was like an apparel and like Knick-knackies.
Speaker 1:I love her saying normal gets you nowhere. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I love that we had our coffee you brew coffee company With Andrew Ellis, who we had a long, long fun conversation with him, so who knows, we may Do something fun with him in the future. He's not from Orlando. No, but he knows a lot about coffee far more than I ever did and I used to do coffee stuff for a living. But I love that his logo was take control of your cup.
Speaker 1:So love it. Sup, andrew, we'll reach out soon. Yes, please Are. What is the C&D? Twisted designs?
Speaker 2:Yes, the C&D twisted designs is actually a vendor that I met.
Speaker 1:They were great last year and.
Speaker 2:I actually got her in as a Consignment seller at Frightworks in their gift shop and I bought another cup from her this year oh Popping in the city, our popcorn company. Yes, the dill pickle and spicy ranch. Yes, and most of their popcorns are gluten free and the lemon cookie.
Speaker 1:Stop. I'm gonna eat my body weight in the lemon cookie. I know.
Speaker 2:I love how I took the lemon cookie like I took a bite of it and I gave this puzzled face because it was a this flavor this flavor reminds me of a oh, oh yeah lemon cookie.
Speaker 1:The best and she was just dying. She thought that was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. It was great. And then coffee and chocolate were there. Yes, they were they were there, so that was very exciting and there were tons of other vendors, tons of other stuff going on. Knox.
Speaker 2:Ariel arts was there performing, so they normally do silk performances and they hang from silk. But the last couple of shows that I've worked with them they've been doing I don't know what it's called, but it's a pole and on the top of the pole there's like a circle, yep, and the whole thing spins.
Speaker 1:It was insane and they do.
Speaker 2:They were doing shows from that. There was a cake contest.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh, and we cannot forget about our fudge friends, our North. Carolina, fudge yeah they were so great.
Speaker 2:I got a nice fun Tennessee lesson, which is no, you got an Apple action lesson because they're from North Carolina.
Speaker 1:I got an apple at your lesson. It was great.
Speaker 2:He taught you the difference between a hillbilly and a redneck, and a redneck, and he was a hillbilly.
Speaker 1:Yes, and then he also taught me the word young ins and over yonder there over yonder, down yonder down yonder.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's a good book my summer down yonder.
Speaker 1:Oh, and speaking of book, we had the hundred fun things to do in Knoxville. Oh yeah did I also tell you what. What we talked about at the end, what? I don't know where you were, but we have decided that her and I are gonna collaborate so we can do a hundred fun things to do in Orlando.
Speaker 2:No, just Orlando. Yeah, just not like the whole state of Florida.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, because she does it just in cities, so her book was a hundred fun things to do in Knoxville. Okay then she's coming on the new one a hundred fun things to do in Nashville. So she's gonna help me collaborate when do a hundred fun things to do in Orlando.
Speaker 2:That sounds exciting.
Speaker 1:I think it's gonna be great, but um hundred fun things, number one being listened to, orlando unplugged.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm here for that same but then the day came to an end. We had all that fun and excitement going on and then it was time to get them all out. So the show closed at five o'clock and we immediately began working on tear down. So it was at that goal. It was to help the vendors get all the stuff loaded into their vehicles and get them out and then get all of our stuff loaded, and that was probably one of the best and quickest Loadouts that I have done. I think we were done completely by like 740.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think so so it was a little under two hours and I got to boss all of them around so that we could take a big group photo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we did. We got to get all of our staff together Everybody that actually got all the staff together.
Speaker 2:We got all the staff together minus a few folks that had already left for the day, but it was most of the people that was there literally like the whole time open to close both load in and the show day and we were able to Take a nice fun photo. So you guys will see that if you haven't already. But let me tell you by then I felt like death. My spot, my spine, felt like it had snapped in half. Cc was like at one point, laying on the ground back in the Backstage like dying halfway through the day.
Speaker 1:I think Brad was trying to take a nap inside our van.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my feet hurt.
Speaker 1:Mercedes and I, collectively combined between the two of us, walked 50,000 steps between the two of us.
Speaker 2:I, I don't remember what I actually walked the day of the show. I know it was. It was like equivalent to nine miles. I don't remember my steps, but I walked nine miles during the show.
Speaker 1:So insane like my body is still recovering from it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, feels like someone's beat me up and you got to see Becky, my favorite aces employees. So aces is the company that does all the pipe and draping and everything for them and I've known her for a real long time and she, she. I've gotten to know her through all the shows and then when I worked at in the convention circuit as a real job, I got to see her a lot because she would come by and she wasn't gonna be at the show this year. She had stuff going on. But one of the guys called her Stop, did they? Really? Yes, because I was like call her right now. So he called her and he just hands me his phone and she answers the phone and I'm immediately like when are you? And she was like, oh, my god, I'll be right there. So she shows up, she comes and she sees me and she's like I've got to go, I've got to be at one of the high schools nearby, so I've got some stuff I have to do with them. But she stopped by to see me and then she showed back up for tear down the next night and it was really funny because I heard this like Cackling and I just yelled out loud. I said is that Becky or the wicked witch of the east eye here and I round the corner and she is like elbow deep in this Walmart bag of candy. That chocolate fest gave to aces when we were finished because we always like to give out some of the candy that we get To our building staff and everything. So we had given them a bag of candy. And I just round the corner and Becky is like digging through this bag of chocolates and she's like oh hey, honey. But it was really nice to be able to see her on my trip up there, especially now that I'm not in East Tennessee anymore. But it was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:And then we finished up and we went to dinner. We went to Humbnair Rose on Asheville Highway. I had never been to this restaurant before. I had no clue what to expect, but I knew we didn't go to that one last year for creepy cut. No, we didn't, we went to a different Mexican. I have never been to that Humbnair Rose before. Gavin is saying we've went there before. I have never been to that Humbnair Rose. That was my very first time ever going there. You all have at some point, but it was not a time that I went you were there.
Speaker 1:I went to the one that was like in a random place, but any who hey, all of all of the chocolate fist people that are listening, I need you guys to put it on social media.
Speaker 2:They're not gonna know. They've slept since then.
Speaker 1:You never know, I'm any who you buddy.
Speaker 2:We, we get there and I looked at Deanna and I was like, deanna, what are you getting to drink? And she was like a margarita and I was like, good cuz, I want one too. What size did you get? And she was like, I don't know, he didn't ask me. And then a minute he comes out with the hugest margarita on the planet and she goes. Apparently I got this size and apparently everyone at the table got that size, because they were all giant margaritas. I did not finish mine.
Speaker 1:They were huge. Those are massive. But you know what I got to do? I got to literally drink them out of sweetie. Yeah, they ran out.
Speaker 2:But my favorite thing is when Jennifer was like can I get guacamole? And the guy, the server, good no.
Speaker 2:They have the last one. And then he just walked off left and I like we were laughing. I'm was like oh my god, lol. Like did this guy literally just do that? And then he walks back out with a bowl of guacamole and sets it down in front of her and so he goes to take everyone's order. And he gets to me and at this point I hadn't studied the menu enough and I don't know Mexican restaurants enough to know what all their ingredients are. I'm what I can and can't eat right now. So I looked at him and I was like one minute, I've got some dietary restrictions. I just need to look. He set a minute Timer on his Apple watch and he goes you have 58 seconds and then walks away and starts taking the rest of the tables order and then, when his timer goes off, he comes back over to me and he was like your time is up. What do you want? Or you're not gonna? Food.
Speaker 2:Literally and it was really funny like he was. He was being funny and so I got a just a ground beef taco in a corn tortilla soft corn tortilla. But I was like can I just get like a taco With? I can't remember what I said, but he was like what kind of meat? He's like you want ground beef, you want chicken, and I was like just beef. And he was like what kind of beef, ground beef? And I was like, yes, ground like I just I just want what I have like when I go to Taco Bell with some cheese and sour cream, but it has to be corn or I'm gonna get sick. So he brought me that and it was delicious.
Speaker 1:I asked him for extra sour cream on my enchiladas. He brings me home my food and he goes enchiladas, no sour cream. Oh. And he looks at my plate and he goes yeah, you're no sour cream. I was like no, sir, I asked for extra sour cream. And he puts it down and there's these massive like spoonfuls of sour cream. He goes see, no sour cream, stop, oh.
Speaker 2:But it was. It was fun because we got to have the. The after show. Dinner is always one of my favorite things because it's an opportunity for us to go and tell Stories of what have happened throughout the day and some things that like you'll catch the end of something at the convention and then you're like what was that? And then they tell the story of what happens while you're there and that was great and it never. It never fails. If you're gonna work with large groups of the public, things happen that make you like drop your jaw and be like what was that person thinking? Yes, or you know, just some crazy thing or a story of people who just sometimes are unfortunately just disrespectful and rude to people in the hospitality industry and it's an opportunity for us to kind of get together and laugh about it and share our woes for the day and have some good laughs and, you know, have Conversations about things that we're not gonna repeat right now, but Wobbit and Chris know exactly what we're talking about both you boys and Brad need psychological help.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, and that's just a just be glad that Cody wasn't there too. You would have had the full trifecta.
Speaker 1:I blame Chris for that entire conversation that happened.
Speaker 2:You asked the question.
Speaker 1:Yes, because Chris post the, the gave me, brought the entire thing up and it got stuck in my head and I needed to know. Yeah, well and I wish I wouldn't have asked the question.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well. Psychological help we finished up dinner.
Speaker 1:There was a lot of laughs, you know. You know what I have to say about that entire team, though what all those people that I met are mine. I'm getting called out, so I don't. I don't want to do it, but I'm your new favorite.
Speaker 1:They're my new favorite people. I love them. They're great they are. They are so warm and welcoming and they just love what they do and they do it for all of those vendors and for all of their People and they care so much about each other. And it is so nice to be surrounded by People that truly love one another, because they really really do and they love what they do and they are passionate about it and they are effective and efficient at doing it and they're great and I am so grateful that I got to to spend an entire weekend with them.
Speaker 2:And I'm just glad that you finally heard other people other than me say goodbye forever. Yes because that's what we said. That's just what we've always said goodbye forever.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I love it. I love it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but then we we went back to Mercedes house afterwards we were Exhausted no, we did not oh yeah, no, no, we didn't. Where did we go?
Speaker 1:Well, you guys went to go unload the van Right, yeah, yeah, and you didn't go with us to that location.
Speaker 2:I forgot, so I'm gonna talk about that. So we went back to the storage unit where we keep everything.
Speaker 1:I was in the van with my brain stopped.
Speaker 2:We went, we unloaded the van. That's why and we said goodbye to everybody, and then I drove out back over to Gavin's house to meet or well, not to meet, but To see his mom and dad, because it's the first time I've been love her, met her, didn't even realize she was Gavin's mom.
Speaker 1:I hung out with her the whole day. At the end of the day realized that she was your mom. I literally spent a whole the whole day with her. I love that that woman showed up to this event in tights that were Halloween edition.
Speaker 2:Oh, she's Halloween all the time I know, but I love it.
Speaker 1:And her little bat cartilage earrings she had in her ear.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm so cute but yeah, she's great, I love her. But yeah, so I went and saw his parents to say hi, cuz I hadn't seen them since I left in October, and then Then, yes, we went back to the house.
Speaker 1:No, you did. I Went to Freitwerks.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, you went with. You went with Mercedes to Freitwerks to put some put some things away, instead of grab some things and then you guys went home, or did you go somewhere else after that?
Speaker 1:No, then we hit a massive pothole.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:And then I almost got killed by a swan. No Stork, thank you. Oh my god, I thought we were gonna die, but you know that's the closest I've ever came to a haunted house well, just wait until we get to September, because Universal's Orlando unplugged.
Speaker 2:Universal Halloween Horror Nights edition good god. Aren't you excited for that?
Speaker 1:No, I guess. Okay, I am and I'm not. At the same time I'm very nervous about it. But Freitwerks is very impressive. That outside, like that whole outside, is so neat to me. You've got this massive pumpkin that welcomes you, and Mercedes says it. They put, they add fog to it and you can take your picture in front of it.
Speaker 1:So it's like like this massive photo opportunity. And then the entrance is is right next to the ticketing spot and then it's two steps in. You go, you're inside the hot, then you get let out at once the haunted. Once you walk through and it's all done, then you're led into their Adorable gift shop.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:You're welcome, did you? Are you saying thank you?
Speaker 2:That's why I didn't move to Orlando this summer was I had to finish. That was a part of my contract with them was finished. Yeah, that that gift shop is me, deanna and Jessica. It's so cute and Brad and a couple other people helped us with Electrical and walls and things like that, but the design and the concept of everything was me, jessica and Deanna.
Speaker 1:I love it.
Speaker 2:Rob helped a little bit, but we don't like to tell them Love you.
Speaker 1:It was great, no. And then you walk in and there's an adorable food and beverage stand which I want to Obviously help and dip my toes in and use my creative brain.
Speaker 2:So much for that Do you know that that coffee bar is named after me.
Speaker 1:Is it really what's it called?
Speaker 2:It's Gertrude's coffee bar. That's so neat. Which is the? Gertrude is the character that I played at Frightworks for many years before I took her to CreepyCon to MC the zombie beauty pageant and Gertrude's creatures of the night coming August 2004. But 2004, yeah, 2024.
Speaker 1:Nope 2004. That's the Iran 2004. Thank you. No, it was great. I thought that is very impressive and I thought it was I. I'm excited to do it, I how. I want to do it both ways. I want to do the behind the scenes, because I'm assuming at some point I'm gonna get to see it with the lights all on, and Then I want to do it Actually, like in the dark, like you're supposed to do it. Yeah, yeah, I think that'd be neat. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Then you came home and then we came home. Then you came home and we chatted and then we slept and then I slept and we slept until 11 o'clock today. Oh my god, I could have slept all day.
Speaker 2:It was so nice, so good to sleep. Then we got up, we help, we help Mercedes clean up a little bit from our mess, because we kind of created a mess this week. Sorry, babe but we had a. I mean, it was so much fun, it was a blast, and I'm really glad that we didn't end up staying in there like a random Airbnb year at an Hotel, because I think it was just more fun to be, around friends and have a good time.
Speaker 2:So then we packed we packed up, we took the u-haul back, paid a lot of extra money for the u-haul because we're stupid apparently and then we, I got to meet your, your sister.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm and soon to be brother-in-law.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:That's exciting. Congratulations to them. Mm-hmm I finally picked a date, did they really?
Speaker 2:Yes, may 2020 five.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's so cool and.
Speaker 2:And then you met my mom. I did I was, and you already met my dad the other day, so yeah, I was like hey, I see you. Yeah, shout out to dad. We went to the blue moose, which was a burger and wings place.
Speaker 1:So good. I thought the food was really really good. I like the atmosphere.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was fun, and then afterwards we had a little bit of time left over. So, my sister, we all went over to the Starbucks outside of the airport grabbed coffee.
Speaker 1:Every single person's order.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they did, didn't they?
Speaker 1:they did.
Speaker 2:They messed up your sister's coffee except for Gavin, because Gavin or I ordered Gavin an iced matcha latte on my Bogo. Buy one, get one, free you should have done, and then I ordered a peppermint white mocha With oat milk and no whip and they made mine iced and she was like, well, iced is what was on the ticket.
Speaker 2:I was like I get that, but I I didn't say iced and Starbucks drinks default to hot unless they are specifically designed to be an ice drink, like a refresher or something. So she made that and she gave you the wrong tea.
Speaker 1:Yep, I ordered the peach drink quality and she gave me mint and what did they do to? They didn't add her extra shot and they put whipped cream on it and she doesn't do dairy but she was like I'll live, so she drank it anyways.
Speaker 2:I asked for my drink to be remade because I wanted a hot drink, because it was like 50 something degrees and raining outside and it was cold. And then we went back to the airport. We checked your suitcase Yep, it was it still. After adding everything to it, we were still under the weight limit.
Speaker 1:Yay, yeah, I wasn't close to it. I didn't even add any extra things. When I got on the plane the first time, it was 30 pounds. When I got on the plane the second time, it was still 30 pounds. Oh, that's weird and I added t-shirts and a matching sweater and my cup.
Speaker 2:There was a lot of stuff in there. There's a lot of stuff in there. And then we went through TSA and so Gavin has never flown before. Gavin came back with us to Florida for two weeks. So it was you went through the TSA first, then Gavin, then me, so we could make sure that there was no issues and yeah, he could watch. He could watch. Someone had to do it and then he could do it, and then there was someone behind him in case he got stalled out correct work, because we're good friends like that and we get through the machine, like the little x-ray machine they take of your body.
Speaker 2:Yes, and then it takes forever because I don't. I still don't understand why it's like this at TSA. But when that, when the Package goes into the machine, the conveyor belt going in and the conveyor belt going out stops. So there's like three bags outside the exit of the machine, but they stop while they're reading the fourth bag that's still in the machine. So it takes forever for your bag to finally get to you and, sure enough, my bag last bag, not the suitcase, the carry-on bag gets pulled to secondary inspection.
Speaker 1:What was in it? That was the problem.
Speaker 2:I don't know. He didn't say. He asked me is there anything sharp in here that could stab or poke or whatever? And I've always been told and I will always answer it not to my knowledge, because Truly I'm like no, there shouldn't be. But people have stabbed themselves with some weird things. So I always say no, because I packed my bag and I know that there's nothing in there, but I still say not to my knowledge. He opened the bag. He like moved a couple of things around in there. There was a vape, so he picked up the vape and then set it back down. And then he picked up a brown paper bag that had my fudge from North Carolina fudge, and the TSA agent like stared it down and it was. I'm really bad about making jokes at horrible times, so I was about to make a joke of like wow, you pulled my bag over just for some fudge. She could have just asked for a piece, but I didn't.
Speaker 1:And then he was like okay, that would have been how Dustin would have been arrested at TSA I.
Speaker 2:Mean a lot worse, not got, you know.
Speaker 1:I got stopped once Because I had a wine key in my backpack.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, you can stab someone with that it did not have the knife end. The cork screw it was plastic. It doesn't matter, it's a sharp pointy object.
Speaker 1:But then we made ours can't go through. Yes, but that's a sharp, pointy object.
Speaker 2:You can't stab anyone with those, though.
Speaker 1:I.
Speaker 2:Anyhoo, we made it over, we sat down, we were having a good time, and then my phone buzzed and I looked down and it's like a new message from a legion your flight has been delayed by 45 minutes. Boo, but it wasn't a bad 45 minutes like it was. It seemed to fly by pretty quick, like the three of us were having a good time. We were chatting and just enjoying ourselves.
Speaker 1:Prepping for the podcast episode today.
Speaker 2:So we're doing that and the plane showed up, we jumped on. We got the very last row on the plane by Choice yep, we all picked it together.
Speaker 1:Can I talk about my favorite part of that entire thing?
Speaker 2:Was it when you started dry heaving like you were gonna throw up when you had a sour candy? No, what was it?
Speaker 1:So we got on set airplane and you know how flight attendants go through the safety precautions.
Speaker 2:The safety spill the safety spill.
Speaker 1:Hey, the exit for the airplane is going to be this way and that way they do those things. Here's what about going your safe belt. Here's how to do those things well, they start with.
Speaker 2:If you look in the back, the back pocket of the seat in front of you, you'll see the safety guide.
Speaker 1:Please follow along right, you know how nobody does it.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Okay, guess who did it who.
Speaker 1:Gavin Was this first time on a plane, yes, but my favorite thing in the entire planet is that he is full on Reading this square by square, and then go and I go, hey, you know, there's a vomit bag in there. And he's like, oh yeah, she's sitting right there, she's ready to go. And it was my favorite part because I have never, in all the years that I have been flying on an airplane, all the years of my traveling, all everything, I have never, ever, once seen a person pull that thing out and read that. Ever, like ever. They watch the people when I fly Delta. They watch the screen because like there's so much of a pro and Delta that they put on the screen so you can watch them. I've never seen a person pull it up before and not just pull it out but like full on, intensely, read it, like they're live dependent on it that this piece of paper is going to save their life.
Speaker 2:It might.
Speaker 1:I need you to do me a big favor, though, like every time you got on an airplane. Now I need you to do that every single time.
Speaker 2:Well, you do it once and it's over.
Speaker 1:No, no, you better get on this airplane.
Speaker 2:Well, you know what my favorite part?
Speaker 1:proof you doing that you want to know.
Speaker 2:My favorite part of the of the trip was when you put a cherry warhead in your mouth and you started dry heaving and making all these Noises, to the point that the flight attendants were looking through the door at you and this woman, full-on, does a 180 degree. Because you are being so Loud, you are like screaming, it was so sour my cheeks. And then I couldn't breathe because I was laughing so hard and people on the plane are just like shut up.
Speaker 1:You know what my least favorite part of that entire experience was? The mother who didn't mother her child that let her kid come behind our seats.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like the child was actively trying to get into the bathroom.
Speaker 2:And the flight attendants were like, speaking loudly enough for the mother to hear. And the mother, she just looked back at him and then went back to what she was doing, just ignoring her child, until the flight attendants finally were like, is he allowed to go in the bathroom, mom? And she was like no, he doesn't need to go to the bathroom. But she wasn't like no, come sit down, little Johnny. She's just like no, he doesn't need to go to the bathroom, and goes back to what she's doing, just leaving her child running around an airplane.
Speaker 1:And my favorite part is that she just turns around and she looks down the plane and and just like this guy back back on, she's ready to go and she just dead center forward and her kiddos behind her. Mm-hmm and I'm just like what the fuck for the?
Speaker 2:record. This is when we were deplaning not like mid-flight but still and the child would scream and cry if there was any turbulence and she would just go Really loudly and I'm like on the shut up. Like who doesn't?
Speaker 1:lend up about to you to shut up like I was just ridiculous too much. It was too extra.
Speaker 2:But any who it? Was a blast, but we made it back home.
Speaker 1:They took my bag, picked up your bag.
Speaker 2:We caught an uber. Yes, he did and we caught a lift. Actually, we got a lift back here, we got some dinner in us and we decided that we would sit down and record this episode so it can air on time, and it was a fun day.
Speaker 1:Like it's was a unplugging Knoxville.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Actually, I think we should change it. It's not unplugging Knoxville, it's unplugging chocolate first.
Speaker 2:I'm plugging chocolate fest and our inability to count mileage on a u-haul, but anyhow. But, guys, we hope that you have enjoyed today's episode. If you have any questions about chocolate fest or creepy con, which is their other production that they do, feel free to reach out to us on social media. You can, or fry works, you can, don't forget. You can follow Chocolate Fest, you can follow creepy con, you can follow fright works. They're all on social medias.
Speaker 1:I'll link all of those this week, so I will give you you're not linking anything, don't lie, I'll link them.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm looking for a new person. You fired Anywho's, I will also. We will also put All the links to all the vendors that we have talked to, because some of them have websites and things like that. So if you're interested in any of their products that we talked about and want to shop and support local businesses, you can do that as well. I would also like to put in there that we are also going to link in there the Ronald McDonald house.
Speaker 2:That we didn't even talk about that stop it.
Speaker 1:We didn't know, I'm disappointed in us. Let's do it real quick.
Speaker 2:Okay. So chocolate fest, a portion of the proceeds from chocolate fest go to assist in helping the Ronald McDonald house of Knoxville, which has been providing homes for children and families who have to come to Knoxville to seek medical Procedures for children. So the Ronald McDonald house is a place that these families can go to and stay at during this time when they have To be away from their home and their children. So a Profit or a proceed of the admissions goes to the Ronald McDonald house in support of them. So, yeah, so if you guys feel so inclined to help chocolate fest or help the Ronald McDonald house, you guys can go to it's. Rmhk Com.
Speaker 1:Forward slash donate, yes, I will link that this week too. So then that way you can have that because we are wrong. So then that way you can. You can help out if you feel obliged to do so. We will also link as many vendors as we can for the chocolate Any of the ones that we talked about. Any of that you can also go on to. I know chocolate fest has a website that also Links all of those as well, or has at least all of their names and stuff like that on there on Facebook.
Speaker 2:On Facebook, or you can go to my chocolate fest calm.
Speaker 1:Yes, either one. You'll see a ton of behind-the-scenes photos and videos, and pictures and and quip bits and shorts of the entire weekend as well, on all of our social media pages this week.
Speaker 2:I have a correction. Oh, it's Knox, as it like KNOX.
Speaker 1:Nox.
Speaker 2:RMHCorg forward slash donate forward slash donate.
Speaker 1:Love that.
Speaker 2:And yeah. So with that being said, guys, just a friendly reminder that the views of myself and Ashley do not reflect the views or opinions of those Associated with chocolate Fest, any of their staff, volunteers or vendors but we love them just as much. We do and we hope you guys have enjoyed today's episode. Be sure you guys tune in next week when we get to part two Unplugging Orlando.
Speaker 1:I'm plugging the city, beautiful I'm plugging the city.
Speaker 2:Beautiful part two of that wonderful Orlando history. It's been fun. It's been fun, but it looks like Rob wants to chat with us, and we've been gone for a really long time, so let's go give some attention to our family here and I really want to go to bed same so alright, bye guys, bye I.