Gays Over Covid

Happy (?) five year anniversary of miss panini herself, the queen pandemonium, the original diva - the covid 19 pandemic!!! (and the crowd goes mild) Join us as we share what WE were up to during those fated years :')

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Let's Dig In: @letsdigin.podcast
Matt Benfield: @mr.benfield
Omar Ahmed: @omarahmed.co

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Uhoh. Uh Oh. It's a pandemonium. It's a panini. No, it's a pan. Demi Lovato. Ooh, I forgot about that one. Was that one? I don't, yeah. Pan Demi Lovato. Yeah. Was that one I was stressed. Happy five year anniversary of the pandemic. Fuck me. That's so crazy. And I also can't believe we're making an episode about this. I think I just died. Great. Perfect. The end. Anna, you fucked up. I'm just in lose. Oh, I was, what the fuck are you doing? Stop. That was the song of the Pandemic. That's what I think of The Pandemic. That's a song about, I think and Meal. ZZZ, ZZ. Oh God. 2020 was a foul year to be alive. but also kind of iconic. At the beginning I had fun. Yeah, at the beginning it wasn't so bad, and then we were going into the, like summertime, I guess. So it was fine ish. It was afterwards. Oh God, we'll get to it. So we decided that in honor of the five year effort, honor, fucking honor, honor of what we all went through as a society collectively, dramatically. We went through a pandemic and we're gonna go through our experience of the pandemic and how that was for us. Five. Five years ago. Years ago. It was five years ago. Fuck. Time is crazy 'cause like, oh oh my God, no, that was yesterday. That was last year actually, that the pandemic happened. No, it's crazy. And now it's five years ago that it started. Ooh, 2020 was five. Where were you when the first tower fell? Oh my God. I came home from school actually. I remember turning my mom, my mom had the news on and then I was like, what the fuck is going on? That's so crazy. That's so funny that you came home from school, but I was still in school when the tower fell. It's almost as if time zones are absolutely crazy. Crazy. So let's talk about nine 11 instead. Oh my, I imagine this episode's about nine 11 when that's when, when we're running out of ideas. You will get an episode entirely based on nine 11. That's wild. That's a wild way to start an episode. And the Pentagon. Okay, fuck me. Okay. Fuck. Okay. Fuck. So welcome back to, let's Dig In Where. We are your hosts and you just get what you get. You came to our house. That is the worst introduction. Our podcast. Yeah. You just came to our, we are your hosts, and you get what you get. Yeah. I think that's basically the gist of the show. Okay. You've come to our house and I'm serving you a plate of, eh, not eh, of this is what I could do. And here's the conversation, the titillating conversation, titties to keep you entertained. Titties, the titillating conversation to keep you entertained through your meal. Let's dig in. The year was 2020. No, it was 2020, but we just started the year off in Miami. We were on that brand trip with Levi's. Yeah. Oh, the year was starting off great. No, the year was, no, the year. Let's talk. This is why I will never say that a year is gonna be my best year ever. Or like this year is gonna be the best. This year is gonna be like my year. I will never say that again because I said that about 2020. I remember going in from 2019 to 2020. I was like 20 20, 20 19. I don't think it was, I don't know if it was that great. I don't think. Maybe it wasn't. Amazing. 2019 was fine. It was fine. The 2020, we were like, we, it's gonna be great off almost a year and a half, actually almost two years into living in Toronto. Yeah, we just started filming like great friends. Oh, we were in Canada. We just started forming like a friendship group and we were like, oh, this is great. Our social lives are like thriving. we're really like succeeding in our careers. Like our careers are like really taking off. It's 2020 and oh my God, this feels like such a incredible time to be alive. Yeah. And it's the year 2020. Yeah. We started off New Year's with our friends. Like we had such a cute, like wholesome dinner and then like we wrote our like goals down. Mm-hmm. And we talked about them and then. And then we celebrated the new year coming in and then we went out and got shitfaced. Yeah. And that was excellent. It was an excellent start to the year. And we were like, the world is just looking up. Yeah. And then we went to, you never say that. No. You never say say no because you never know. You could get hit by a fucking bus or a pandemic or both. It might as well have been both. I wish I got hit by a b during the band. Both. Both would've been, it would've been a little bit more exciting. Fuck it out. I, oh, and we just started on, we had just started on TikTok on in October of 2019, right before the pandemic. And I think we had like. our views were coming in. Yeah, we were getting views and then we had this Levi's trip, this Levi's brand trip to Miami in January of 2020, which was so sick. So sick. We saw Khalid. Yeah. Who was our favorite artist at the time. He was, where'd he go? Miss him. He's gay now. Fuck. Thank God. Yay gay. Now he's gay. Now he's gay now. Yay. we had this brand trip with Levi's to Miami, and I was like, this is. A great start to the year. Everything is amazing. I really feel like I'm, I'm like I'm coming into my own. Yeah. Success is within Grasp. Yeah. I'm being recognized for my accomplishments as a content creator. Yeah. And I get to go on cool brand trips and I think that's fucking ex. I think that's incredible. This is a motto for life. Don't get too excited. Don't get too excited. Because then when we were away there was like rumblings. Well, We were in Florida which is. It's, that's one of the epicenters in the US of like where it started. Yeah, I know where, because it's Florida obviously. I know and I remember getting home after that trip. I had a sickness. Yeah. This is before Covid was declared anything. This was before it was like talked about before March. 'cause March is when it started. January we got back from this Levi strip and I was the most sick I've ever been in my fucking life. I was on my deathbed for a whole week and looking back on it, I was like. Was I one of the patient zeros? That was like end of January that year. Yeah. And it wasn't declared a, but it was there. It wasn't declared a national A pandemic Was it called? What was it Declared? A pandemonium. No, it was declared like a national, national health. No, it was declared, can I speak? It was a, yeah, a pandemic. It was declared exactly. It wasn't declared like a worldwide Global pandemic. Global pandemic. A global, what was the words? Global pandemic. In these unprecedented, unprecedented times. You guys, exactly. In these unprecedented times, if you are here and you don't wanna listen to. To us ramble on about the pandemic. I don't care. That's what we're gonna do. You're gonna deal with it. We're gonna make light of a really difficult situation and hopefully we can bond together. come into the inner circle and bond with us. Mm. And it's a trauma dump, so dump your own traumas on us too. Yeah, please. We got back and I had that sickness and I was like, oh my God. I fucking had covid. I think I got sick. You also got sick too? No, we were both on our death beds. Yeah, I remember. But this again, this was like late January, early February. Yeah. Right before. I was like, okay. That was weird. That was weird that I got really, really sick after this. I was still out and about. I was like doing my shit, obviously, because Covid wasn't a thing yet. No. And then what day was it? What was the actual day? March, I think. March 12th. 12th? Yeah. Okay. 13. I think it was like March 12th in It was like declared a. Global catastrophe. Okay. The day was March 12th. No, it was, no it wasn't. 'cause we've skipped it. We've skipped it a couple days. We got invited to this drag branch. Oh yeah. And it was a Sunday. So it was a Sunday. Yeah. This was a Sunday before it was declared a global pandemic. I think it was the Monday, I think been like the 11th or the 12th or something of March. And I was like, I really wanna go to this. Drunk brunch like we were invited by this brunch. I think it was a nice day. I think it was a really good day. It was a great day. It was like. If you know anything about Toronto, like it's just the weather's garbage from November until May. Yeah. And so we had a really nice March day and I was like, I really wanna go out and get shit face. I really wanna get day drunk. This would be so fun. Oh my God. And then I was like, there's rumblings. And people were like, oh, maybe you shouldn't go out. Like people are getting sick and stuff. So I feel like that's, yeah. That's like a thing. And I was like, do you know what if this is the last day, get to do this, then like, we're gonna go out with the bank, we're gonna go out and have a good day. And the bar was half like, half full? No, it was a third full. Like There was no, no, there was like important point. It was a barbecue joint where this drag crew, drag show was happening where there was like a bunch of queens from Canada's Drag Race who like, obviously Canada's Drag Race hadn't come out yet, but what was her name? Boa. Boa Bitch on Arrival, which that's what it stands for. Did you know that Queen? Queen? Yeah. Have you seen what she looks like now? Yeah, she's skinny as fuck. Oh, incredible. Period. So yeah, we went to go see them. Obviously they had a show department and I was like, I'm gonna go support my queen. It was us and two other group. It was us, our two friends, and then two other groups of middle-aged women. And that was it. I think it was 15 people maxed inside. Yeah. Yeah, no, that's true. It was 15 people, I think there was like, maybe four or five tables, and then I remember the manager or the, the owner or someone of the bar was like. It. It was like an intermission or something or afterwards I think. And she was speaking really loudly and she was like, they're gonna fucking close the bars. They're going to shut everything down. How dare they, this is so stupid. And then we got home, or the next day, it was the next morning. The next morning we woke up hungover and I, like we, we had the TV on and Justin Trudeau. That little wet blanket he goes on the fucking news and he is like, this is now I'm speaking to my fellow Canadians. It's time to come home. And I was like, this is really crazy. To witness that. Yeah, that like speech and that like declaration of an emergency was crazy. We were glued to the television, but at the same time I was like, ah, this is crazy. And so exciting. Exciting. It was exciting. Imagine being exciting that they're gonna close the borders, but then we like as important note that we are not permanent residents of Canada. We were on visas at the time. Yeah, we were both on work visas, so we, if we left the country, we wouldn't be allowed back in 'cause we weren't permanent residents or they were only letting citizens or permanent residents on. And I don't know if you know anything about Toronto's. Pandemonium. like Ontario was so strict. So strict guitar. Let's talk about the first couple of weeks before we got into the crazy. Oh, it was amazing. Oh my God, I loved it. It was so good. Well, I was like, Parker Posey. Oh my God. It was so good. It was so good. It was really fun actually the first couple of weeks because we were like, oh. Um, I really enjoyed, I, as you heard last week, I really enjoyed moving the couch to one side and jumping up and down watching an Instagram live. Of a random fitness fucking workout video. And I was like, this is pretty fun. I love it. We all thought back in two weeks max. We were like, it's gonna be two weeks, maybe a month max. No, No. There was no month max. We were like two weeks. It was two weeks max. We said two weeks. They're gonna fucking nip this in the bud. Is that a saying? Nip it in the bud. Nip it in the bud. Nip it in the bud. I sometimes say nip it in the butt. Do you know what? Nip it in the butt. Nip it in the bud. Do you know when you like chop a bud from flowering before it flowers. Oh, is that what that's from? I think so. Okay. Nip it in the bud. That makes sense to me. Nip it. What does nip cut? Nip is weird word. So like they're gonna nip it in the bud and they're gonna be done with it. Didn't get done with it. Two years later, flash forward. So the first two weeks were cutesy. We were, We were working out, we were trying to, didn't new. We were, We were cooking at home. They had closed everything, I guess. grocery stores. People were buying toilet paper left and right. Oh my God. The toilet paper. Remember that toilet thing? Oh my God. I mean, like, I. Wish I didn't. The toilet paper thing was crazy. That was so embarrassing for us also like having to go to the grocery store like, 'cause they're still open. I remember also my mom was like, you need to go to the grocery store and stockpile three weeks to a month, weeks worth of supplies. And I was like, no, I'm not gonna do that. But you can. And she did. And she did. She did. She's a freak. Oh. If my mom ever listen to this, she'd be like I disown you. I love my mom, but I You do talk a lot of shit about her. Yeah, you do do that to her. I love her. She's a little bit insane though, for sure. And I love her. Where do you think you got it from? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So what I'm trying to say is why were we buying toilet paper? No, I didn't panic by anything, but why were we buying toilet paper of all things like. If you run on toilet paper, you can use other things to wipe if you felt, if you like, worse comes to worse. Did we have our tushies then? But like what if you No, we got tushies in the pandemic. We got tushies in the pandemic. That was a pandemic thing. But at the end of the day, you should also, you should be stockpiling food in case food goes awry. Yeah. Aw, rye. A rye. Aw Rye. I don't fucking know. So they close on everything in Toronto. Everything. Everything was closed. Honestly, I'm not gonna lie to you. That first six months is a little bit of a blur. Yeah. Oh, we didn't do anything, but that's why Yeah, because we didn't do anything is March, April, may, June. Okay. April, may, June, July, August, September. So that's six months. We did have kind of a fun summer, that was the start of summer. So like the weather was good. Bubbles bubble. So like you could bubble sit bubble. You could sit in like circles at the park. So the interesting thing is that Toronto took the idea of the circles in the park, the like socially distanced circles where you could sit with four people. We took that from San Francisco, started that. They did it ADO Park together. Yeah, they did it at Dolores Park today. Yeah, they started at Dolores Park and then we took that idea and put it in at Bellwood Trinity. Bellwood. Yeah. The people were like at Bellwoods Park and I was like. Why are we sat in circles? Circles like chalked on the ground, so fucking looking back. Hello. Stupid. Also, like if we have common sense also now that knowing the things that we know, uhhuh, knowing the things that we know. Uhhuh, Knowing what we know. Everything we did was pointless. Totally. It made no difference. We've seen it. We've seen the difference. Yeah. That we made. Yeah. You've seen the data. It made no difference. The data is there. Like Texas and Florida, they didn't fucking do anything. And, but we was, so it was all the same. We, I think, 'cause we had a really really strict US two, both of us, we had a really strict experience with Covid. we really did spend a lot of time in the first like couple months, like isolated. We like stopped going to the gym. Like you worked out outside. And I like tried, I think I bought a bench and like some random weights and I was, we bought a bench in weights and those were sold out for so long. I think like one of the last ones. Yeah. And I was like, oh, I made, that's good. I was like, we have to get on this right now. Yeah. That's buy a bench on Amazon. I was like, we're we were trying to make. The best out of a bad situation, but it just turned out really depressing. It's just you can only move your furniture so much. Yeah. Every day without wanting to actually, and we were also living, just to describe our living situation. We were in a typical Toronto, oh my God. Our apartment, bedroom, apartment. Apartment was the size of this living room. Yeah. Our entire apartment was the size of this living room. Yeah. If you live in Toronto or know about Toronto, then you know, it's like condo, concrete, central. With just like windows and gray and that's it. So it was like a two bedroom, two bathroom the ceiling was so low and we had a balcony, but like, how often do you use a balcony in Toronto? It was huge. Yeah, I think we did quite a bit. Yeah. But like we did quite a bit. Not for most of the year, for like a portion of the year. From from June to September. So that first period was, I said, that's where I get like most of my weight. No, that's my depression. It's not, was it not? It's not. You're incorrect. Was that second wave? Yes. Oh, it was number two. You're incorrect now. I don't remember a lot, but I remember that. So March to September? Yes. We were having a summer. Yes, we were having a good time. I think I was actually, oh yeah, I was actually fine then. in the first year, so between March pandemic started and August Uhhuh, we just were doing nothing other than like posting videos on TikTok. We gained half a million followers on TikTok. Yes. So I was like, I'm saying. Career wise for a lot of people, actually covid pushed you in like tr the TR trajectory of most people's, like social media careers would not have been the way that they were if it wasn't for the pandemic. A fucking dreadful time. Totally. But 2020 was really what catapulted us. Because I dunno if you also remember August of that first year, 2020 was when we did that billboard campaign. Yes. With TikTok Canada. So TikTok Canada they reached out to six creators in Canada and we were one of them as like up and coming stars because they just opened the TikTok Canada office. Yeah. And then they did like a billboard, like a huge billboard campaign, like mm-hmm. it was nationwide and we were like featured on billboards on Young and Dundas Square. It was. Crazy. And then they went live in November of that year. And the photos from that November, we look snatched still. Yeah, we look great. Okay. It wasn't until the following year that I drank two bottles of wine a day. I define those years in my life whether I was like fat or not. Yeah, I know. Yeah, me too. anything about 2020 you want to add? 2020. No, it was like culturally defining though. We had a lot of moments, I feel moments, oh my God, we bought a fan. I completely missed that. That's crazy. So we bought. It was in that moment. No, it was in your moment. You dumb ass. You you, you agreed with it. my mom just sold her a house that we grew, the house that we grew up in, and I used the money that she gave me to buy a van. So you like to think, you like to go retrospectively and say that it wasn't your decision as well. But we decided to together because this was in the era of like camper vans and like going off the grid. TikTok, his entire TikTok feed was camper vans. Van Life, Van Life hashtag Van Life 2020 and it was. Honestly it was pretty cool. The gadgets and the gizmos that you can put in a van. So cool. We made the decision to buy a van in like, I wanna say September of that year. Yeah, the end of summer and it was at the end of summer because everything about us screams people who know how to do manual labor. Camping camping. Our best friend in Toronto, she's a camper. Her and her husband, they are campers. We are not campers. We are not campers. We tried Look at us, we tried, look at us. Ew. I'm so sorry. Just we weren't even camping. We were inside a van, so we weren't even technically like camping. We had a bed, but the thing was we bought this having to wake up in the middle of the night to go and pee, and then we had a little like weird little toilet. So I found, okay, so I found a camper van on KA Gigi. Whoa, I forgot about that. Oh my God. That just triggered me. We found a camera van on Ka Gigi, which is like Craigslist. It's like a Craigslist of Canada. And it was a Ford E two. Oh God. Everything in Canada is lame, isn't it? That is so embarrassing. Ka Gigi. Ka Gigi couldi. That is so embarrassing. That sounds like a slur. It does. Oh, so it was a Ford E two 50 camper van. I've said that so much because we did so many tiktoks on it. I was like, we did like, how do you remember that? Because one of our videos came up recently and it was like a year or two or three ago, and it was like, hi, we're Matt Omar and we just bought a Ford E two 50 camper van. Ew. I was like, what was I trying to be with like nice, like vlog music behind it. I was like, hello, do do. Exactly. And it was so it was already redone? It was, we bought it for $20,000 Canadian dollars. It sounds like a lot actually, like a good price for a redone camper ban. And it had a bed that was too small for both of us. Yep. Because we were our tall people and I think it was five foot, I think it was a five foot double bed. cause it had to fit in like a worker van. a, it was a van. Van, but it also wasn't like long, like length waves of the van. It was like short waves from the van. Yes. And how do I describe that in audio form? 'cause obviously I just gave a visual representation of what that looks like. The bed was not the length of the van. It was the width of the van. Yes. So from wall to wall, not from like trunk to front seat. Yes. So that's not a big space for two grown adult men. Yeah, it was tiny. Oh, we'll get to my non-binary phase instead. Oh, Oh my God. That's, wait, so much happened. Okay. Stick on the van. So much happened. Stick on table. The non-binary shit. We'll stick on the camper van. Shit, we were so fucking weird. Oh my. Oh my God. we were. We were weird camper vans. And blue haired liberals. Oh my God. Camper van had solar power. It had running water. It had a sink. Not for long. Not for long. So as soon as, as soon as anything went wrong, we went on a few trips. We went on a few trips with it. Do you know why that happened? the sink worked. There was a faucet that like ran water. Yeah. But we started camping in like September, October, November. In Canada, December. We are cold. We're like going into like rural Ontario and there were no facilities. There are no, open your eyes when I say this. There are no facilities for camping in the winter. So when anything would break or the water would freeze, so we didn't have any water. We should've like, I'm like, why is the water not coming out of the, the the guy, I can't brush my teeth 'cause it's frozen into a thin block. So needless to say, we didn't know what was happening with most of it. And then we stopped using the water. The solar probably needed to fix the engine. Ran out. Oh, so because we were gone when we went to, oh, 2021. This is the end of the camper story. 2021. We went to Mexico for six weeks. We left the camper van we were like allowed to travel for the first time. We were like, I'm going to Mexico. Fuck you. Yeah. So we fucked off to Mexico for six weeks. Left the camper on the street. we had parking inside our building, but we couldn't use it because the van was too tall to fit inside the garage, which is so annoying. Seven feet and then it, so we would like be driving around. Queen West looking for parking every time. We need to seize the van on the street with our massive ass van. It was ugly. It was a white, yeah. A white worker van. Yeah. It was like, you wanna look in my van kind of van? That's exactly the kind of van it was. Exactly. And then we tried to make it nice. We did a West Elm campaign. Oh my God. Did a West Collabor. I could talk about, wait, this, we could change your whole episode. I forgot how much happened. There's so much happened. We did a West Elm collaboration. X van we decorated where we style the van out. Yes. With West Elm shit. Yeah. Like it looked kinda cute. No, it was cute. It was very bohemian, let's say that I must say the film, it was like really great practicality wise. It was not very functional, but it looked cute. No, we tried to hang so much shit on the walls and I'm like, it just fell off because we were in fan. Yeah. Crazy. I'm so embarrassed that we did that, but my point was when the, when we left it for six weeks when we went to Mexico. The engine died. Yeah. Because it was cold and needed. Yeah. Yeah. And that you needed to just start it every so often. Wouldn't start, had to take it to a mechanic multiple times to get it fixed. Had so many issues with it. We had to get it towed that time. We had to get it towed that time because we couldn't fucking move it. Yeah. Because we were idiots. Like we didn't know anything about cars. Do I know anything about a car? No. We had an electric car now. I didn't know anything about it. Exactly. I don't need to, the like wiper thing was on for seven months and I was like, let me figure out how to put like wiper fluid in this thing. Okay. Stop yelling at me. Fuck. And then so then we eventually sold it. We in the camper van story, we eventually sold it for the same amount of money. Exactly the same amount. We bought it for $20,000. So random German guy in the north of Ontario somewhere. B be Belleville. Belleville in Belleville, Ontario, Bellevue Belleville, Belleville, drove it up to Belleville and took the go train back and took the go train back. He gave me a check for. 20,000. 20,000 Canadian dollars. Was it 20,000? It's 20,000 Canadian dollars. That's crazy work. We sold it for exactly how much we got it for. It was not, I'm sorry if the German guy's listening. No, I know. It was not worth that. I know. Sorry. We scammed you. Sorry, girl. I didn't scam. I didn't scam. I put it up for $20,000 and he took it for $20,000. Yeah. And I said there was work that needed to be done and he took it and do you know what the thing is? We'll call that a slight investment. On return because we got the money back. We put down 20,000. We got exactly as much as we paid for it back. It was a savings account. Exactly. Go us. Wow. We're so smart. Should we buy another van? No. Now what about this non-binary boss? I'm kidding. The pandemic started, and if you or anyone or or a loved one experienced were affected by, were affected by non-binary. Non-binary is a you be ent. You may be entitled to compensation. Wait, that's too funny. That was a good one. That was a good one. I'm keeping it. Oh my God. Okay. You can joke about it. This is, you're curious. Yeah, I know. Yeah, you can joke. I lived as a they them for a second. More than a second. So the pandemic came about and TikTok. My for you page was very. Hey, do you think you might be different from everyone else around you? If so, you could be non-binary. It's like a BSA that went out to everyone. No, literally. It's like indoctrination and I was like wait. That's true. It might be. Yeah. And honestly, like I'll get to it probably in another episode if we wanna talk about that gender identity, like exploration of that? I exploration, exploration, exploration. Oh, it's an exploration. My exploration. Is that the exploration of my gender identity? Yeah. No, no, no, no. I really leaned into it. I like, I found this like community online and I like really was like, whoa, this is crazy. And I did a lot of learning 'cause I had nothing else to do other than consume content. And then I was like fully in, immersed into the non-binary. World. I've always had these like emotions and feelings. the coming out episode, I was talking about how when I was first as a child discovering like sexual attraction, I was like, maybe I'm supposed to be a woman because I have these feelings and I don't what gay means yet. So that's just the only way I can identify that in my head. Turns out I just like boys and I was a bi. And then in the pandemic, I was like, I think I'm non-binary because I don't really feel like I've always 100% identified as male. But I've never identified as female. But also, I don't think, not male and female, but like boy and girl. In the way that gender is, because I do feel like gender is a spectrum, or like gen gender expression is a spectrum. in the pandemic. I swung that pendulum to the left. Swung it. No, I fucking, I fucking What's the, what's that thing that Miss Trench Bull does in Matilda, the shot put, oh yeah. I fucking shot, put that pendulum all the way to the blue head bitch side. And I did, I dyed my hair lavender. You did. You were a blue haired liberal. Yeah, I really was blue haired, they them liberal. And I was a barista at one point, so Oh my God. The cliches kept cliche. You honestly just had to, you had to fill that role for a second. And I think as well, like in my mind, I think this is a lot, I feel like a lot of non-binary people experience when they first like figure out, or like want to explore gender identity away from like the social norm. They lean heavily the opposite. Mm-hmm. Way. And I was like. Practicing like makeup for the first time and like wearing clothes that I'd never would've worn before, and those took a long time to figure out my fashion. Don't scroll back. You heathens. Scroll back. Don't I delete everything? I delete it all. Scroll back on the TikTok. Don't. No, don't do that. You fuck you. Little fuck. There's still, I'm about delete those. You little fucker. I'm not scrolling back all the way. You little fucker. It's way hard to scroll down on TikTok all the way. No, I know. For Instagram supposed be fucking seconds. Exactly. yeah. Had that moment and yeah, a little house on the prairie. Yeah, I did wear like a little frock here and there. Your fashion, I would describe everyone did that. No, I know, like a little like, like a little peasant witch. Everyone dressed like a little peasant witch at one point or another during the pandemic. Okay. It was just the frog. You even, it was the frocks. I know you even, I experimented as well. Mine was like full witch peasant from Salem witch trials but in the middle of being burnt at the stake, that is exactly how I dress. That was my aesthetic for like most of 2020. Also, I bought an iPad and I was like, I illustrate now, do you remember that Very millennial illustrations? I do. No. I was like, let me buy an iPad and trace. Trace things. Let me get like a picture. And then, what's the fucking app called that? Everyone the, the fucking drawing app? InDesign? No, no, No. There's a, like every little millennial girl who will just buy an iPad and download this one. It's like a, I don't know, it's one app. I fucking can't remember it. But it's a great app and I would like, I'd be like, I'm an artist and I'd like. Trace shit. But we sold some stuff. Uh, We sold t-shirts. I Desi actually did design those t-shirts. We did have gay ass merch for a second. We had gay ass merch and then I had phone cases I designed Yeah. And sold those. Wow. So you could say I really was broadening my horizons in 2020. We were experimenting. It was an experimenting time. Yeah. It was time for experimentation, honestly. Was it that bad? Actually, no. Wait. It was bad when we got fat. Yeah. Yeah. 2021 was bad. Yeah. 2022, no shit. 2020 was 2020 was good. Pretty okay. Yeah, it wasn't that bad. 2021 was when things got uh, we also like stopped making money in 2020. Like we stopped getting campaigns. Yeah, I guess so. 'cause no one was doing campaigns, so like our, no, I guess that first six months of the pandemic. We weren't making any money. No. but I, but I will say what one thing happened. What all of a sudden, I think this specifically happened in Canada. I think it happened like in North America, but I think specifically in Canada, everyone was all about the diversity. All of a sudden everyone was like, wait, we should hire not white people all the time. Yeah. Which was a crazy concept. This was doing like 2020 was a Black Lives Matter protesting. Yeah. And so people were like, let's pay people fairly and let's like. Maybe diversify our entire teams and then all of a sudden all these stories were coming out and like I remember I wrote a story about like my old workplace. a girl at at my old job in Toronto. She was like looking for stories 'cause she wanted to write a think piece. Yeah. On our old hotel. And I was like, I got quite the story for you. about the mistreatment of pc. Yeah. Mistreatment of anyone who wasn't white. Yes. I was like, you didn't say why. Yeah. Sorry. I was like, I did in my head. so towards the end of 2020. I started seeing an increase in earnings all of a sudden. And that was crazy. So by 2021 this was when I was like fully in my like blue head bitch. Blue head, 2021 blue head bitch. But drinking a bottle of wine every, at least two bottles of wine every single night. Yeah. And gaining weight and dressing like a, like a. Honestly like a 1920s midwife. But the brand saw you and they said tick that box. Tick that box. Tick that box. a brown, non-binary ex-Muslim. Oh my God. I could keep you going with the, with the everything. With the little, um, Identities. Yeah, maybe identities. All the identities. All of all of All of them. Collecting them like Pokemon. Canada was, and I think is very prone to tokenism. I fucking brand specifically, girl. I know. I was like, do you know what? I'll take it. Pay me, I'll take it. No, see you've got so much money. You've got so many campaigns. I started not getting any campaigns 'cause they were like, no white people. 20, 20, 21. They were like one white person on the campaign. 2021 I could say was probably the most depressed I've been in a really long time. A hundred percent. And then I gained a lot of weight and I was just like not happy. And also just like life was shit. second wave and the lockdown was so much more intense. Yeah. And winter. First winter stuck at home. Wintert leave, we couldn't leave from September of 2020 to March of 2021. We didn't leave our house. Yeah, we didn't speak to a single person in face to face. Yeah. We spent New Year's Eve by ourselves in our own apartment FaceTiming with our friend. This was during Zoom, Mario party days. Oh my. And like Zoom. DJ sets whole food depressing as fuck. That was the worst. That was when I started eating a lot. Drinking a lot. You started eating a lot. Drinking a lot more. So drinking. I would eat so much because I was bored. I was like, what the fuck am I doing that lot? I see. Honestly, I would be like 4:00 PM thank fucking start drinking now. Yeah. I honestly, I would be like, thank God I can start drinking now. Yeah. 'cause what else am I gonna do? I'd wake up at I don't know. 10 11. Make a few tiktoks. Yeah. Put up a few videos. Don't do any work. Suck drinking. Again, nothing really meaningful. Like we were, like, we were actually, I think our content, I was like a blob of a person. We were a blob of blob blob of people. We were two blobs blob people. We were two blobs just like blobbing together, like doing nothing. But I think our content that we made was really meaningful for people in the pandemic. Totally. Because it did bring a lot of positivity in a very negative time. Totally. People really enjoyed our British versus English challenge, which was, yeah, it was like a road to success. I guess I was gonna say rotisserie. I was like, whatcha talking about rotisserie for? It was a road to success. What? I don't know. That was a road to success. Yeah. No, that sounded like rotisserie. Rotis success. We should have a little rotisserie, like a fake one chicken, a little rotisserie chicken in the middle of the table, just so we can have something at the table. That'd really cute. Should we get like a fake rotisserie chicken because we love rotisserie? Something about us as well. I'm gonna, I'm gonna about to, I'm about to spill some lore. Lore. Lore. Yeah. Whenever we say something where it's like, say, we say like, oh, I'm done, or something's done, we say it. Chicken ready? Or like it's chicken done. Why? I don't know. Why. Why? Oh my god. tell me when you're done in the shower. Oh, the chicken's ready? Or maybe the chicken's ready. Maybe that's how it started. I don't know. You'd say the chicken's ready. And then it started being, it started it, it evolved from it's chicken ready to like chicken ready or like I'm done in the shower. I'd be like chicken done. And now with the Jen Moji thing, I typed in chicken done on Jen Moji and it would be like a rotisserie chicken with like steam coming off of it. And I'd be like, great. That's how you know I'm done in the shower. I'll send you a rotisserie chicken with steam coming off of it. To let you know I'm done in the shower. We are so dumb. Chicken done. That is so dumb. Yeah. I love it. Well, chicken done, Chicken done. Back to the topic of fucking hand. Jesus Christ. Huh? The topic at hand. Oh, the topic at hand. I thought you said chopping the ham. What? I don't know what's happening. 2021. That was bad. How? What else? Okay. When did the pandemic end Pandemic still has it? End? Wear your mask. Shut up. No. No. No, I'm not doing that again. I'm not going back. We are not going back. I don't if a pandemic happens, I don't think the majority of people would be able to go through what we went through again. No. At least we're in sunny California this time round. I have emotions and feelings. We were very also, I think, 'cause we couldn't leave the country for ah, that long. oh, that, this was the time, I don't know if you know this, but there was an Instagram account called Gaze Over, gaze Over Covid. Gaze Over That should be the episode name. Gaze Over Covid. Gaze Over Covid. Got it. Love Gaze Over Covid. That's so funny. That a time. That was a time I'm dead. That was so funny. It was the most self-righteous bullshit at the time though. I was like, oh my God, get them diva. Literally at we were, we were very much behind because we were also self-righteous pieces of shit. To explain what it was, it was an Instagram account dedicated to outing gay people who were going on vacation during Covid. Yeah. Basically somewhat notable like mini influencer. Influencers. Influencers, yeah. Influencers or like people. Who were, I don't know, present, had presence on the internet or just when like a bunch of gay people would be out of the country during Covid. It would be like, attack them like a bunch of people. Went to PV for New Year's, for New Year's Eve. And like this account named and shame them. This account went and found Venmo history 'cause some people didn't post it was like public. You can make it public. Yeah. And was finding receipts for payments to places in. Pv, I am sorry if you to find out that this certain people were like traveling during the pandemic. That's crazy. I'm sorry if you have nothing better to do than sit on your little phone and call out so many people. I wouldn't know. I who, that was what benefit is, what are you doing? What is the benefit? At the time I, I was like, oh my God. Yeah, I get them. Yeah. But like looking back on it now, I'm like, what the fuck? What were you doing again? You need to realize our mindsets at the time were twisted. Totally. So we were like, this is a good thing, I think. Mm-hmm. Until we realized it wasn't Yeah. It was like, this is kind of hateful and like really toxic and it's also harming people's lives a little bit. Also, it didn't matter. Nothing mattered. It's just mean spirited. No, it's really and at the end of the day, like when you really think about it and like when you, like retrospectively. Retrospectively, yeah. Is that when you look at things from afterwards? Yeah, Yeah. Fuck me. Nothing. It didn't matter. It didn't matter. It didn't matter. So you're being hateful for no reason. Oh. Oh, you think you're a gossip? Go. Okay. Literally, good job. You fucking loser. I think we were part, we were like. Egging it on because I think I had so many arguments with people. I had an argument with this one influencer about it um, that went traveling. Uh, Oh. I, me, I stayed outta the drama. I was into the drama for some reason because I think. We were jealous, honestly for sure that we couldn't leave the country and go on vacation. We were fat and gray, fat and decomposing. Literally in Canada, in Toronto. And I was like, I really, two blob people, two living people living in an igloo, two little blah. People living in, in igloo. That was us in 2021. And then we drink wine and cry. And that's also the name of this podcast. No, I think that was a stupid time and people were a always looking for something to do and someone to be mad at and something to make themselves feel purposeful. Maybe that was why people attacked gay people who went to places, and I was like, what is the purpose anyways? Do you know our opinion on that? That it had no purpose? Yeah, that was crazy. What else happened in 2021? Oh, we got married. We got married in the meantime. Oh my God. We're applying for permanent residency in Canada. Because we'd just been applying for it for two years by this point. We were in the process of at least for a good three years by this point. Yeah. But then they stopped taking applications. We were like doing the most to get there. So I think two years into living in Canada, we were, no, not even. I think for after the first year of living in Canada, we were taking actionable steps to apply for permanent residency. Yes. We were like going to the English exam. We were like paying all that money to get our like degrees. Transcribe to the Canadian standard of Yeah, yeah. yeah. Edu, whatever the fuck that was. Yeah. We spent thousands of dollars Well, They stopped taking applications for about two years from, they stopped taking immigrants. Into the country for two years. Yeah. And then by that time the qualifications had changed and like our application was moot. And also I think we decided that we did not want to live in Canada anymore after all that experience through Covid. Well, I, I think, I think the day that we found out that we were like, could, there was no way for us to get permanent residency. We'd have to do another application. I had a year left on our visa and. We were self-employed, so it was, there was no avenue for us to do it. Like within the year. when we found out, I was like, okay. I was like, you were sad 'cause you, I think you thought like I, careers were like really thriving and whatever. But then I was like, it's actually fine. I don't think I care that much. But like our lives were. Settled. We had a great friendship group who were like our core friends. Some of our core friends in life love them to death and it was so sad to have to leave them. But isn't it so amazing that we have friends all over the world? Yeah. we found out we couldn't stay in the country and then within two weeks we had organized a wedding. One of the said friends, her. Now husband's parents offered their backyard in Guelph, Ontario. And we got our marriage license organized, everything. We could only have a group of 10, 10 total. So us two, seven of our friends, the officiant and four of our dogs. Got married in our best friend's, husband's parents' backyard. 'cause her, she was like, I just planted flowers. And we just got a pool installed in like a hot tub and we were like, okay, let's do it. It was excellent. I was just gonna go to city hall and just be done with it. This was like June. It was like a beautiful day. It was like the end of June. So really nice. So Toronto, like Ontario, end of June. It was like good, like 25 degrees. Yeah, it was so nice. And then, yeah, we got married and then we also like, we have a year left in Canada. The application process for a green card takes at least a year, most likely a year and a half to go through all of the things. It is like the most tragic waiting game you've ever been in, waiting for a green card to this fucking country. So we knew we had to start right away, so that's why we did our marriage license in two weeks. We got married, we were like good to go. If you dunno, Matt's from the us We got married so I could move here. Yeah. Green car wedding. Yeah, but also love. Also love. Also love. Mostly love. Like we were gonna get, we were gonna get married eventually. But this like just were we? Yes. Were we for tax reasons? Oh yeah. I love tax. I love tax. But then we, I love tax 'cause I don't have to think about it. Yeah, you don't do the taxes. I do. We have an accountant. Yeah. I tell them what to do. I have never spoken to the accountant for in my life. It's fine. I have these emails come in and I'm like. It says like tax or like something to do with your accountant. And I'm like, I'm ignoring that. If I don't know anything about it, it doesn't exist to me. There is always one person in the relationship who's the financial one. Yeah. And that is me. And then there's one that's the entertainer. Exactly. You provide the substance. Thank you. You're welcome for saying that. You're welcome. I also provide the substance for spilling diva. We got married blah, blah, blah. Moved to the us You all know. You know the story. Yeah. You know that story that happened in the Was the pandemic. That was in the pandemic. Yeah. Pandemic wedding. Yeah. Pandemic. Shotgun. Wedding elopement. That was a lot 20. That was a lot more than I thought. It was A lot more. I think there's a lot more that happened too. I think I always think of myself as two years younger than I am right now, because those two years are such a blur for me. Me, I'm not say too, no. 32 is I'm 28. Crazy. I feel like I've just turned 30. Yeah. So I'm sorry. I don't care. Yeah. I like, I don't care. I think that happened for a lot of people. Like those two years just feel like nothing happened, but so much happened and so much happened. So that we blocked it all out. Yeah. 'cause it was a traumatic time. we put that little in my, we put that in the box in the back of our heads. In my mind though, I do wonder like how life, obviously like how life would've been big fat, what if but. What would our lives look like if there was no pandemic? Because we were making new friends. We were like socializing more, like our social circle was like expanding. We were forming like really great friendships, which ended up being long lasting friendships because the pandemic didn't stop us from keeping in touch with our closest friends, but we were like working out so well. I feel like I was like, it was the first time I was on a good trajectory with like fitness Totally. And total health and nutrition. And we went vegan that year 2, 20 20? No, it was 2019. Beginning of 2019. We were vegan fully through the pandemic. And we were gonna move to Vancouver too. We were gonna move to Vancouver. Wait, there is an alternate timeline version of us that didn't experience the pandemic. We moved to Vancouver. We got permanent residency. Yeah. And we live in Vancouver, vegan. And we're vegan, blue haired, liberal. And we're blue haired liberal freaks. We're still liberal. Okay. Just to note, I'm saying blue hair liberal because it was a fucking sound on TikTok. I'm still a liberal. I just think it's funny. No, I think it's funny. I just think it's funny. I just need to note, unless someone comes into this podcast. Yeah. And this is the first thing they listen to and they're like, these conservative gays. And I'm like, that's not me, baby. No. It's just a joke. but that would be an alternate timeline and we've, that is the alternate timeline. Vegan living in Vancouver, permanent residence of Canada, and just like constantly wet from the rain. I know. you hate your hair being wet. I know. I am well aware. Why are we gonna move to Vancouver? I'm well aware You're from the uk. I am well aware. You were like, I am fine with the rain because I living in, I'm from the, I'm from Manchester. It's like one of the rainiest places in, literally in the uk. That's Vancouver's more rainy. No, I know. I Google, I remember I Googled it. Yeah, actually I think they get like the same amount of rain and you're like, I can tell whenever, like I, like sometimes I like to just see like how my mom is, how my mom is experiencing the day. And I like, we'll just like, check the weather in Manchester Rain. Yeah. Five degrees Great Celsius. Stunning. Fuck. Those people exist in the world, in, in another timeline. Parallel universe. Yeah. Yeah. And we are here, those people, but I don't think, okay. We were like, like we were still, we were already starting TikTok and I feel like, I don't know if TikTok itself would've. Had this humongous explosion without the pandemic, if it wasn't for the pandemic and people having nothing to do. Totally. I don't think it would've seen that many users in that short of a time period. Totally. I don't think it would've succeeded. It might've been fine. Like it might've been like, what was that one app? Which one? When we were in Europe, it we, in, in the limbo period between us moving out of Canada and moving into the US we had to go to Europe for a little bit because our visas in Canada expired. And I had to wait for the US Embassy to invite me for an interview in London. And so we were just like in limbo in Europe. Yeah. And which is a very fine place to be in limbo. Yeah. And we downloaded this app and it was like. Be real. Oh my God. Be real God. This is 2020 now. People use that. This is 2022 now. Yeah, this is 2022. When Be Real happened, be real because are we still, when did like officially pandemic like rules end. 2022. You think so? Yeah, because I remember like my birthday's on the 1st of June and 2020. My birthday was shit, 2021. My birthday was shit. But 2022 I turned 30 and my birthday was excellent. And we went out and we saw the sunrise. It was a great birthday. It was lifting. 'cause I think you could, you still had to, we were in Italy that one time. And then you said I had to wear a mask on the train in 2022. I think European, like some European cities, countries. Yeah. So it was like lifting and like mostly things were like going back to normal because I also think our flight from Toronto to wherever the fuck we flew, I think we flew to Edinburgh, had to wear a mask. We had to wear a mask on that plane wearing a mask. I didn't even talk. We didn't even talk about masks. Masks. The acne that I got from my mask. Unparalleled the disgusting nature of a fabric mask. Like Yeah, you could wear an N95. I wasn't gonna wear an N95. I was gonna wear a fabric mask because that was, that's what everyone was wearing. Or I could wear like a be a bejeweled mask like Lana Delray. What did I, oh, CCY. Ccy move. People thought that was a fake mask. It was. It was a real mask. She was wearing a layer underneath Leave my girl alone. She was just looking cunty. I know people tried to cancel it for it. This is the era of people canceling everyone I know. Cancel culture. Cancel culture. Horrible. Should we talk about that in one episode? That's funny. That's a whole ass. That's a whole ass episode. That's funny. We can delve into so much in separate episodes. When you dig back into it, it's like there's so many things that you forgot about or that you blocked out and you're like, whoa, I forgot we had a camper van. Her name was Ophelia. Her name was Ophelia. A camper Van's name was Ophelia. We named Ophelia. Ophelia On Wheels. Ophs on Wheels. Short version. Shortened for Ophs On Wheels. Ophs on Wheels. S on Wheels. There's a story there. Wait, there's a story. The time that we got stuck in the mud in the camera bed. I will kill myself. Can we tell it? I will. Yeah. Tell it. Can that be like, tell it? Okay. I, where we were. I'll preface this story by saying this. Incident made me want to jump off a fucking bridge. I think back and I cringe so hard 'cause it was the most embarrassing shit. We were in fuck nowhere. We were driving to some random camp ground in Ontario. Yeah. And it just rained. And it just rained. Okay. So it was like a storm and then I think it was gonna be nicer weather. And I think how he was using like the Wiki camps app. Yeah. To find these like nice campsites, remote campsites that have like great views or like great access to like trails or something. Yeah. And this one particular trail was four wheel drive only. And I said Matt was driving obviously. This was in my passenger princess era. Yeah, we should have a license and Matt was like, I don't think we should take this van down that road. And I said, what's the worst that can happen? We got stuck in the mud. It was our dog was with us in the van. It was the possibly the worst road I've ever driven on. There were holes. There was, it was, there was like sink holes throughout the road and we were like, and it was narrow as fuck. So it only like one car could though go through and back. Yeah. And I would have to rev the fucking engine go so fast through these. Holes full of water. Yeah. In the ground. Yeah. Get through. We had water probably in the engine. Yeah. 'cause it was very deep and we were just going through so much. If you were that German man listening to this No we didn't. No, we didn't. there was a parking lot in the front and then this trail and then the actual place with the good view where you would camp out was at the end of the trail. Yeah, yeah, yeah. halfway through, probably stuck. Stuck. Stuck in the mud. The mud grabbed onto our wheels and said, I'm not letting you go. You were gonna stay right here in a, by the grace of Satan, another driver was coming back the other way and we were like, we are stuck. Do you have anything that can help? He had he had another choice. 'cause it was only one way road. Yeah. Yeah. He couldn't get out until we got out. Yeah. we're all stuck. So I was like, do you have anything? I was so embarrassed. You know what they had? They had so much stuff. Yeah. Emergency equipment. They had something to put underneath the wheels to get the wheels out, to give the wheels traction. They had ropes and pulleys and a whole system, and all of these members of their family came out and joined them in this quest and they felt so accomplished. I was like, do you know what? Go for it. And I was like so embarrassed. 'cause I think they were like, they, at the beginning, I think they were huffing puffing a little bit. They were like, what? Are you idiots? Yeah. Yeah. You dumb fucking gay bitches. Yeah. Why the fuck are you over here? I was like, oopsie. I didn't know. I thought we had four wheel drive. We have four wheels. We have four wheels. I thought that's what that meant. Fuck. Oh this fucking camper van. And then we eventually got out. We did get out, we got, went back and forth. A lot of times we went back to the. Wet. We went back, we went back. There was something rattling in the car. And do you know what the moment the ties were released, that was a hallelujah moment. I was like, we're not selling this shit. We put that up on a Gigi I think very soon. No, we kept it. That was, oh, we did keep it. Yeah. It was 2020 I think. We didn't go on another trip until we didn't go out. That was traumatizing. We paused for a while. Yeah. 'cause that was horrible. Okay. I don't wanna talk about that fucking van anymore. That was the last story about the van. And that was the last story about the pandemic. Yeah. Can you think of anything else that happened? Grown? No. We've been going for an hour. I'm trauma dumped out. This is when I know I need to stop. 'cause I'm like, I'm like, I feel like a, now I feel like a blob person. How was the pandemic for you? Let us know in the comments. Oh my God. Sorry to bring up all of this trauma. great. Well, If you enjoyed that episode of whatever the fuck that was, please leave us a review on Apple Podcast and subscribe wherever you wanna subscribe and follow us everywhere. And I'll leave you with this. These gaze are over covid and I ain't going back. I ain't going back. I ain't going back there. Sometimes I love to put on this like Republican voice. and just speak like a Republican word. I ain't wearing no damn mask. It's fun to cosplay. I love it. Just let out the inner conservative did full episode as conservatives, as a conservative. No. 'cause someone's going to, oh, come onto that episode. That's true. And think we're conservatives. Gage for chomp. Gage for chomp. Ew. Ugly fucks.