S3 Ep8: Steampunk-Ass Murder Mystery with Tuck Woodstock
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Before we get going today, I wanted to tell you about another Radiotopia podcast you should be listening to, Song Exploder. Song Exploder is an award-winning show about the creative process behind music. Artists break down one of their songs, letting you hear all the different layers in the recording, from instruments to beats to vocals. And most importantly, they talk about why they made the creative choices they did. Song Exploder is not just for music nerds. It's for anybody who cares about creativity or wants to feel inspired to create something.

It's hosted by Rishi Keshe Hiraway, who you might know from the podcast Home Cooking or the West Wing Weekly. The episodes are short, about 20 minutes each, and my recommendation is to start with an episode featuring an artist you love. And then listen to one with an artist you don't know at all. There are over 250 episodes with guests like Fleetwood Mac, Madonna, Solange, Beats,

Billy Eilish, Phoebe Bridgers, FK Twigs, The Killers, Dua Lipa, and John Batiste, and more. Each episode is really a miniature portrait of an artist and how their creative mind works, with the song as the lens we see them through. It's also a great way to discover new music. It's a different kind of experience to get introduced to a song this way, learning how and why each piece and idea came together before you hear the whole song at the end.

Find your favorite episode of Song Exploder and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts or at songexploder.net. So your two options are pursue murder mystery or kiss. Yes. They could do both at the same time also, to be clear.

Hello, and welcome to the season three finale of Normal Gossip. I'm Kelsey McKinney, and in each episode of this podcast, we're going to bring you an anonymous morsel of gossip from the real world.

As it is the season finale and we are very excited to move into a nice little winter break, I just wanted to let you guys know about a breaking news. We are going to be having a live show at Sixth and I, the historic synagogue in Washington, D.C. on December 7th.

You can find tickets for that at sixth and I.org. And we will put that link in our show notes and on our Instagram and basically everywhere that you could possibly want to find it. We'll be selling tickets for the live show. You can come in person and see us and hang out. Maybe we'll all go to a bar afterwards.

And we'll be selling online tickets so that you can watch it from the comfort of your own couch wherever you are. I think it's going to be really fun. We're going to be doing the same story that we did at the New York show. It was a huge hit. Everyone loves it. And we're going to be in Washington, D.C., where they need a little bit of fun and gossip, I think.

Please remember that if you are a subscriber at the friend or friend of friend level, you do get discounts to shows. And those codes are in your emails right now. And if you can't find them, email info at defector.com. If you want to become a subscriber at the friend or friend of friend level, you can do that at support normal gossip.com. That is enough business. In my opinion, let's do it.

Get into it. Today, I am absolutely thrilled to have with me Tuck Woodstock. Tuck is a journalist and educator based in New York. He is the host of the podcast Gender Reveal, which is coming back for a new season next week. He is the co-founder of Sylveon Consulting and a founding member of the Trans Journalist Association. Tuck, welcome to the show. I'm thrilled that you're here.

Thank you so much for having me. I really feel like this proves that everyone should just shoot their shot because I did. I don't know if we should even tell people this, but I did make it onto this show by sending a truly unhinged email that I think was called 13 Reasons Why. Okay. And, like, that worked, so. I don't know. I, like...

I actually had forgotten that you sent that email until just now, but Alex was like, you have to see this. And it was like, honestly, a piece of art. Like maybe if it's okay with you, we'll screenshot it and share parts of it. But like 13 perfect reasons for why you should be on here. Are there any that you'd like to address before we jump into our questions?

No, I already forgot most of them. I remember like scrolling through the list of past guests, which include many of my friends and being like, I don't think they've interviewed a transsexual yet, but if so, not enough. And I can really just use that as a selling point. We're doing diversity and inclusion here, but I don't remember the other 12. The other 12 were like, I love gossip and gossip is important to me, so...

Oh, yeah. I think one of them was that my best friend had listened to your podcast for the first time and 45 seconds and walked into my room and been like, have you been on this show yet? Why haven't you been on this show? You'd be perfect for the show. And I'm like, clearly, my roommate and best friend, they would be the one to objectively note that I should be on the show. Objectively. Yeah. Wait, so why do you think that was? Like, why do you think your best friend slash roommate heard 45 seconds of the show and was like, it's Tuck? Yeah.

So I was thinking about this and I think that I have sort of built my career on gossip in a couple of different ways. And one is that like as a trans journalist, um,

it actually becomes very important to start comparing notes with people to talk about what other journalists are like literally safe to work with and talk to. And if there's a trans person who's not a journalist, who's been contacted by a journalist, I have said publicly on Twitter, like you can feel free to reach out to me and I will tell you if I can get a sense of whether that person has a background in reporting on trans topics and whether like they would tell your story with integrity. And I think that that's actually really useful gossip, but,

But also, as someone who just moved to New York, my entire professional career up until like a month ago was in Portland, Oregon, and there just weren't a lot of people there.

in this industry that you and I are both in, in Portland. And also I wasn't working for a company, I was working for myself. And so the way that I figured out to enter the industry on sort of a national level is to actually make myself like the subject of industry gossip. And then I made people, I didn't do this on purpose, but it is what happened. And then like, once that happened, a bunch of people noticed me and

in probably bad ways, but also good ways. And I was like, well, now I know how to sort this out because anyone who agrees with me about this gossip is cool and we're friends. Wait, wait. I think people are going to want more details there. So let's just pause and go ahead and do them, please. I mean, I feel like I'm going to get in trouble, but... With who? The gossip police?

Well, there's this listserv that everyone in radio is on. And you can tell when there's drama going on in the listserv because everyone in sort of the public radio podcasting world will start doing little tweets about like big day on the listserv, you know? And I was a little baby at the time. And so I was new on the listserv. But this one white woman had posted just this really racist thing about how...

She had really meant to make a diverse podcast, but then, oops, she accidentally just didn't interview any Black, brown, or queer trans people. Okay. All right. And she was like, what? So? And then sort of wrapped it up to be like, in conclusion, listen to my podcast. And then maybe like, I don't know, give me some free advice as to how to do better. Yeah.

And everyone had just been subtweeting it for days. And I was like, is nobody going to say anything? And then finally I was like, I guess I'll be the one to say anything. I can't lose anything because I'm already like not a part of this. And what happened was I said something. I immediately got tone police to hell where they were like, well, of course, you know, like how dare you call out this poor white woman doing her best. But there were like really cool people. Doing her best literally nothing. Exactly.

But there were really cool people who stood up for me, like, almost all of whom were, like, queer women and women of color, who I then were like, okay, we're friends now. But then also just a lot of people in the radio industry, like, pretty high up, just silently followed me on Twitter. And I was like, I don't know if they're doing this because they agreed with me or because they just want to see what other messy stuff I'm going to get up to. And, like, either way is, like, sort of fine. Both of those are helpful for you, really. Right.

And then that sort of just became my role where every once in a while I would go on Twitter and just be like, okay, this thing that no one else will say because they want to keep their jobs. Like, I'm already not employed by the industry. And so I can just say a thing and no one can do anything to me. And I'm also not going to run into that because I'm in Portland, Oregon. Right. Right.

That's what I mean when I say that I like built my whole career on on gossip is that I got in. I met people. I saw something and I said something. Somehow that's like how I got to know all of my friends and in radio is by being annoying on a list serve. What is your gossip life like in your personal life?

Yeah, I was thinking about this, too. And I really wanted to, like, divide the sort of friend-to-friend-to-friend slash stranger gossip from the gossip about people that you actually, like, know and have in your sort of social circles. Okay. Because I love...

the gossip that y'all do, which is like, someone told us this, but someone told them this, or like, you know, my girlfriend all the time will be like, oh, you know, my friend's friend's friend had an affair with this married politician and then she's pregnant and then he ghosted her. But then he reached out two years later to ask if she could help promote his new like line of exotic coffee. And it's just like, how do you know this many just unhinged people? That email is tips at defector.com. She also listens to this podcast and I'm like, you have to tell them everything. Yeah.

She could keep you going for a whole season. So I love that because it's no stakes. It doesn't have to be real. Like, I will never check any of it. I just love to hear it. And I'll never tell anyone because I simply won't remember any of the details. Like, even if I tried. Um...

But what makes me more uncomfortable, not to say I've never done it, but what makes me more uncomfortable is to do gossip about people that I'm in community with. And it's simply because I'm trying to golden rule things and nothing makes me feel more uncomfortable than the thought that anyone is ever talking about me for any reason ever. And so I'm just like, okay, this person seems nice. I'm going to try to mind my business. I'm going to hope they're minding their business when I do something annoying. And we'll just like have that agreement. So how far does that circle extend for you?

Of people whom you're willing to keep your mouth shut for. I mean, I think it's people who I interact with somewhat regularly or like we'll have a conversation with. We'll have to look in the eye or the sort of internet version of look in the eye. And I also think I want to qualify that that doesn't have to do like with someone if they're doing real harm, right? Then it becomes like useful gossip. But just if it's silly and annoying. Yeah, I think if it's someone who I will ever have to like

have an actual conversation with, if I know in my heart that I have just been saying something rude about them for no reason to entertain myself, like it becomes harder for me. Whereas if they're just like a sort of a distant character, like someone that I just saw on Instagram, but have never talked to, I'm like, well, this is fun because we'll never interact. And so they can just be like a little character to me. And I'm sure I'm a little character to like a bunch of other people. And it's terrible to think about. And I can never think about it, but I know it happens, you know? I've been talking a lot about this because it has been

like preoccupying the whole front of my brain, which is that someone I know called off their engagement, but it has not posted anything about it. And so I believe that they called off their engagement because they deleted all of these photos of them together.

And I'm like, this is, it actually scares the shit out of me because I'm like, I'm so invested in this person that like, I think I met twice 10 years ago. And I'm like, how the fact that this is happening to me means it's happening to everyone about so many people, which is like,

It's scary if you think a little too hard about it. No, that's the thing is like, it's fun to detective someone's life and think very hard or like, you know, I have new neighbors now. And I'm like, let me find out what my new neighbors do. Beep, boop, beep, boop, beep, boop. But I'm so much more Google-able than they are. And then I hadn't thought about like what happens when they Google me. And then I was like, oh, no. So.

I also moved pretty recently and had this same thought because I'm like, you know, you get packages delivered to your house and they have your name on them. And I'm like, somebody is going to type in my little name and they're going to be like, oh my God, this bitch tells everyone everything. Like, what?

I can't speak to her. I mean, yeah, you're going to have to get all your packages delivered under a different name. And you're going to have to go back and tell me. Yeah. No one will crack it. Nobody will crack it. My friend used to send packages under like slightly different versions of my name every time. So they would send it to like truck woodchop. Oh my God. Yeah.

That's me. It's me. Really foiling our belief that you should always Google your neighbors by being like, send your packages to a different name. Real normal stuff.

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Today, we're going into the recent past, the early aughts. The fashion is like 30% off from where it is now. The music is like today's with a little bit more pizzazz. But the part of the culture that was like truly different was the internet, right? It was like a bolder, fancier font of the internet we have today. Do you remember the internet in the early aughts at all? Like the GeoCities era or? Sure. Yeah. Can you describe what that was like? Yeah.

I mean, I was on Neopets a lot. And then I was... Were you doing any scams there like the rest of us? Wait, there were... Sorry, this is me being like a tiny naive baby. What were the scams on Neopets? Oh my God. You could like scam people out of their Neopet money. What?

You probably scammed me because I was like, everyone here is good. Um, no, I feel like it was a lot of like graphic design is my passion. A lot of like going to my space and like the background is black and glittery and your cursor has turned into like a wheel of cheese and like an Arctic monkey song is playing like really loudly so that when you go to your friend's page, like your parents wake up because they heard the opening song, uh,

God, what was that? I Bet You Look Good on the Dance Floor was mine. Yes, that one. I also had a killer song and I remember my friend literally getting mad at me because he would go to my website and Brandon Flowers would just go, come with me. And he's like, you have to stop. We can't do this.

Yeah. So it's like that, like maximalism on the internet. Exactly. Yes. So like a lot of people who listen to this podcast are probably too young to remember this, but the internet used to be like a magical lawless land where like,

Just fewer parts of the internet were centralized so that four men could make a lot of money. And so the only thing that people did on there was like, change your background on MySpace. I was talking to someone about middle school and how in middle school, there was no YouTube yet. It just didn't exist. And then when I got to high school, I believe there was YouTube, but there were like six videos and everyone had seen the six videos and they were all made on Flash.

Yes. I know how to count all the way to 56. But I'm a little tired.

Well, have a nap. Then Fazi misses! We're going to Candy Mountain! Come with us, Charlie! Yeah, Charlie! It'll be an adventure! That was the time we were in. Yes, and so this is, today's story takes place before YouTube was invented, right? Like, you're absolutely right. So for another example, most, like, hobby communities and groups of people trying to, like, commune online now will just have, like, a subreddit, right? And that's where they go and they, like, ask each other questions, right?

It's fine. But it used to be that hobbies, you know, take, for example, knitting, though that's not the hobby we're going to be talking about today, would have their own forums on like strange websites with purple backgrounds and like a teal font. And it was like the best advice you could possibly get in the world. Like you ask Metafilter and it gives you some site called Grandma's Knitting Circle and you're just like, bless. Yeah.

Yeah, not to dox myself, but my formulative years were spent on the Shiro's web forum, which was for fans of Tamora Pierce and Meg Cabot books. Oh my god.

And that's where I learned about a lot of things like masturbation. That's what I was gonna say. So yeah, I was there. Because there were just the four websites. There were like four zillion. They each had seven people on them. Yeah. Okay. So our friend of a friend today, her name is Luna. She was like not involved in any of these online communities. She like barely went online at all. Like she had a MySpace, but she was an adult when MySpace was popular. So she was like, I don't really have like a lot of time for this.

In fact, she probably wouldn't have ever ended up on the fated forum she ended up on if her grandfather hadn't died at exactly the wrong time. Wait, sorry, that's just like, so there's a right time for grandparents to die. Well, yes. It was not this. Okay, go. Her grandfather was very old and like, it wasn't all that sudden. So like that part's fine, but he died before he managed to get his will in order. Okay. Do you know why this is a problem? Oh, yeah, absolutely. I do. Did she end up...

having to inherit some weird items that she then had to learn about on the internet. So this is basically the problem with like not having a will, right? Is there's like no delegation of who gets what. So like Luna had been raised by her grandfather, her dad's dad, because her dad was like basically useless on his own. But because the will wasn't done when her grandfather died, everything went to like his children, including Luna's dad, and like she got nothing. Right.

Luna is like, I feel like I deserve something, right? Even if it's small, I just like, this is the guy who raised me. I loved him. I want something.

She goes to the funeral and she like immediately notices that whoever like picked out the clothes for grandpa did a bad job. Like grandpa was always dressed well, even at his sickest. And whoever dressed him put him in clothes that like didn't fit well. He wasn't wearing his favorite pants or his favorite tie. But the thing that Luna like clocked immediately is that there was no gold chain hanging from his pocket.

Her whole life, her grandfather had carried a very old pocket watch in his front right pocket. It had been his father's and was all like dinged up. Luna's like, I remembered as a child, like, you know, hugging her grandfather and feeling like the round cold watch on her ear and like hearing it tick through his blazer. And she's like, the only time this man didn't wear this, this pocket watch was when he showered or went to sleep.

She's like, it was always really carefully taken care of. And like when it wasn't on him, it was in his bedside table. And she's like, I know because I watched him put it there five million times. She's like, so if it wasn't in the casket with him, it's probably in that drawer.

Okay, first of all, I'm sorry to this grandpa because I am now picturing him as like the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland because that's like my number one pocket watch reference. But yeah, I'm stressed. Like I thought we were going to do gossip and now I feel like I'm doing a murder mystery of some kind. We're doing gossip. Don't worry. Diet of natural causes. It's fine. Okay, great. Thank you so much. Sometimes people die. Yeah.

Okay, so after the funeral, there's like an event at grandpa's house. You know, it's like a wake. There's like loads of food, giant bowls of chips, like grandpa's favorite beer is everywhere. Luna's like mourning with her cousins. And they're like, you know, all telling stories about like grandpa being a hooligan and all this stuff. But she like in the back of her mind is just thinking about the pocket watch. How would you obtain this pocket watch?

Well, she's got to do a sneak in rescue mission and see if it's there. Because if it is there, she can grab it. If it's not, then it's so suspicious and she has key information. So yeah, she's got to go and go. Yes. So as she's sitting there, like trying to decide what to do, her favorite cousin is like, Luna, Luna, are you going to take something? I think I'm going to take something of grandpa. So I have something. Yeah.

And Luna's like, what? No, me. I would never do that. And her cousin's like, yeah, no, it's now or never. I'm going to get a few records and like I'm moving right now. So if you want to get something, now's the time.

And Luna's like, you know, I'm an ally. Hell yeah. I'm gonna go get that pocket watch. The cousin's like, great, let's do it. They high five. I love this. This is great. Grandpa's room is open, right? So Luna just like waltzes in. She sits on the bed. She like cries a little genuinely because she's like, I'm sad. And she opens the drawer and the pocket watch is right there.

And she's like, dibs, slips it right into her pocket. No problem. Great. So Luna's like thrilled. She's like, I've got my pocket watch. This rules. She's like holding it in her hand in her pocket for the rest of the day. And she's like, you know, this makes me feel like stable and rooted, right? Like, oh, my grandpa loved me so much. And now I have this thing that he also loved so much. Yeah.

She didn't realize until she got home that it didn't work. Like the hands on the clock were not moving and she like held it up to her ear and it didn't tick. She like shakes it a little and it like makes a little rattly sound. And she's like, that cannot be good.

Do you have any ideas for her here? What do you do? I mean, surely there's a professional who knows these things. It's not me. But someone somewhere has got to know the art of ancient pocket watches. You'd think. Although now I'm remembering that we did just talk about online forums. So now I'm going to say you go to an online forum on the early aughts internet. Because I put the clues together. Wow. Somebody is too good at storytelling and ruining my plan. Ha ha ha ha.

At the top of the pocket watch, there's like a little wheel. And so Luna's like, you know, maybe as far as I understand the way pocket watches work is you wind this little wheel and then the clock continues to tick. So maybe since my grandfather has been dead for a few days, no one has wound the wheel. I will simply give that a try. So she does it. Obviously, she's like, work, work, work. The winding does nothing.

The watch is like just as dead as before. I mean, honestly, that makes me feel good because I was going to be really embarrassed if I was like, you take it to a professional. And then the professional is like, you twist it a little bit. And I'd be like, oh, okay, never mind. Sorry, my bad. That's what would happen to me, to be honest. I would be like, hello, professional watchmaker. You're so far away on pocket watches. There's a chain, right? Yes. What is the chain called?

Like, it's on the watch. This question is very stressful to me. I think there's, like, a clip on the end of it, and it clips to your clothes. Okay. But just anywhere on the clothes. So that, like, anywhere on the clothes. So that, like, you can pull it out by the chain. Sure. And then you're like, ha-ha, here it is. Then you can just drop it back into your pocket. All right. That makes me feel better that you are also like, I don't know. I'm not sure. If that's not how this works, I don't care. Like, do you mind? Do you?

Don't DM me about pocket watch. Okay, so the winding has not worked. Now Luna has like reached your solution, which is like, there are professionals. She's like, I have a job downtown. Every day I walk by stores that are like jewelry repair, watch repair in neon lights. So she's like, I'll just stumble into one and be like, what's up? My watch doesn't work.

So she does this and she hands her little pocket watch over to the little guy on the other side of the counter. And he takes one look at it and is like, I can't help you.

Because it's so old? He's like, listen, this pocket watch is very old. And it's also like kind of rare. He's like, the problem is that not a lot of people have kept using these watches because the company that made them doesn't make the specific parts that it needs to work anymore. So basically, the only way to fix this watch is to find another identical watch, which is kind of rare, and then use those parts to replace the ones that are broken. Okay.

He's like, there might be somebody who can help you, but it's not me. And this would be harder because it's the early aughts internet. And so it's harder to find like rare items. There was just eBay, I guess. All right. So Luna's like, well, do you know anyone who can help me? And the watch guy's like, if I were you, I'd try this other watch guy like three blocks over. He'll know. If anyone will know, it's him.

So she takes her little watch three blocks over. And this guy's, like, more interested in the watch, right? Like, he, like, uses some needle nose pliers and, like, pops it open. He's in the watch. Like, when he pops it open, the watch is like a jack in the box, right? Like, shit's, like, flying out of it.

And Luna's like, oh, no, that cannot be good. But this guy at least has like a decent bedside manner. And he's like, listen, if I had this watch, I would sell it for parts only. Like it's so messed up inside that like I don't think you're going to be able to do anything with it. He's like the only thing that's really the only thing I could do with it. He's like, since I can tell that like you care a lot about it and it's sentimental, maybe just keep it for that. And like, don't worry about trying to get it to tick. Yeah.

Do you think that that is enough for Luna? The sentimental value of having this watch that does not work? Yeah, I don't know. I mean, for me personally, I'm like, my phone has the time. This is really just to carry around and have like a physical memory of my grandfather in my pocket. But also I don't have a grandfather. So I just can't relate to the situation. I would need it to tick. But also at this point in time, you don't have the giant iPhone clock in your pocket.

Oh my gosh, you're right. It's a little phone with a terrible clock on it. All right, she's got to fix it then because she's got to know the time. She's like, this is also convenient for me to have a watch that I can use that is cute and also works. So she's like, no, this is absolutely not enough. I need it to work.

Now we reach the final course of action, which is like Luna is youngish. She's smart. She's like, I go to my search website. I type in name of clock Omega and the word fix. This does not work. Nothing turns up. Google was worse than she types in Omega pocket watch help. And this is how she ends up on the pocket watch forum. The pocket watch forum, we will call ticking tinkerers.

Incredible. This name is plastered in comic sans at the top of the page. The watch form has a background that like looks like one of those walls of clocks you sometimes see at the airport, right? Where it's like 12 clocks and they all are like showing a different time zone and they each have like an hour minute and second hand and they're all moving all the time. If you want, you can turn on like the sound on this website so that all the clocks will chime on the hour. So that's very exciting. Yeah.

Incredible. I was just imagining, because I was talking about, you know, how you could change the cursor. I was just imagining how the cursor could be like a little like... Exactly. ...as you move around, just to make it like completely un-navigatable. Exactly. So that's exactly the vibes. It's like adorable, impossible to use. Everyone there is like very deeply steeped in pocket watch culture. Yeah.

So Luna like pokes around for a few days reading about pocket watches, like kind of learning the main players. And she's like, I did not know that so many people like collected pocket watches. Yeah.

Did you know this about the pocket watch community? No, but I just got so excited because there's got to be like a pocket watch corner of TikTok. And TikTok as a name lends itself so well to pocket watches. There's got to be like a pocket talk, a pocket watch talk. And we're going to find out about it when this comes out. And I'm really excited. I did not even think about that. And I cannot wait to learn. Okay.

Okay, so people collect pocket watches the same way that they collect like coins and stamps and baseball cards. Like they're not only looking for the rare ones, but they're looking for items that like bring them personal joy, right? They're like, this one's cool. I'm going to keep it. So some people on this forum are like posting listings about pocket watches that they're searching for and how much they're willing to pay. Some people are like, I have this pocket watch. Like, do you want it? Pay me money for it, right? And some people are just like, look at this cool watch that I have.

So she's going to find the organ donor for her watch. That's what she hopes. So finally, she's like, you know what? Fuck it. I'm posting. So she posts a picture of her grandfather's pocket watch and is like, who can help me? This, as you can imagine, is a community of people who love to help. I was going to say, like, rule number one, never post. And then I remembered the long story I told you about. The problem is rule number one is never post except post.

For us. Except for us. Except for us. It's always different for us. Oh my God, Alex, remember the week that you moved to a completely different state and then also at the same time we had a company retreat that was in New York City? Yeah.

That was not my strongest planning moment in my entire life. Well, it's a hard moment to plan for because you're like living in four different places, basically. One thing that I did plan really well, though, was that I ordered a factor box for the day after I came back from New York. What's a factor box?

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And immediately people are like in the forum are asking her questions that she does not know the answer to because she is like not a pocket watch person. So they're all like simply pop it open and send us a picture of the inside. And Luna's like, I do not know how to do that. And when she says this in the comments, like a few people are rude to her because there are always rude people everywhere. Yeah.

But one person, someone named Gabriella slides into her inbox and she like sends Luna a message. And she's like, hey, I can tell from the picture that you posted that like the little latch everyone's telling you to push is broken. Here's how I would open the watch. And Luna's like, thank you so much. So she like uses a little butter knife, pops her watch open.

It looks so nice inside. It's like shiny and gold and there are a bunch of little wheels and cogs and screws. And Luna's like, I'm a little afraid to touch these. Like, I don't want to touch them. So she posts the photo into her like little thread and everyone on the site is like, find the balance wheel. Do you know what a balance wheel is? Yeah.

No, I'm imagining like the sort of foam roller looking things where you have to walk on them and like not fall off. There's a board on top. No, I'm so stressed. This is like when people are constantly like, oh, you don't know how to fix this thing in your car. Just watch a YouTube video. And I'm like, that's not how my brain works. I'm like, I need a like a 75 year old man named Pete who's been doing this for 40 years to help me. I will not be trying on my own.

Luna's like, fine, I'll figure out what the balance wheel is. The balance wheel, I have learned from my research, is the most important part of any watch. It's like a little wheel that has knobs on it on the outside, and it's supposed to be really still. But when Luna touches hers, it like wiggles a lot. Does this seem good to you? Yeah.

Yeah, it seems great. It seems perfect. I think this is good. I think she should keep going. You think it's fine? It's fine. And there's no YouTube, so we can't tell her that she's wrong. No, I think it's bad. I think I would say, oh, no, at this point, personally. Yeah, that's correct. This wheel is not supposed to wiggle the way that it's wiggle. And I have learned that this means that something called the balance staff is broken. Okay.

The balance staff is like the axle for the wheel. So if the axle is broken, the wheel can't spin. And also it's now moving. So like this is clearly a big problem. And for whatever reason, this is like beyond the capabilities of the online helpers. They're like, we can only help you to fix this watch if you continue to disassemble it.

For the record, I'm nodding like I know what you just said, but if this comes up later on a test, I will not get it. All you need to know is the little wheel that's supposed to be still is not still. Great. Okay, I got that part. It's moving a lot.

I said professionally, it's bad. Don't do it. It's bad. Yeah, you're aware. Do you think, though, that she should keep unscrewing things? I mean, I don't know how good is she at that kind of stuff. She seems like me, in which case I'm like, I don't want to touch anything because I will mess it up. And then they'll be like, you've voided the warranty. And even though there's no warranty on this 100-year-old watch, I feel like something like that would happen. Or they'd be like, well, we could have fixed it, except for you did one thing that you absolutely should not have done. This is exactly what Luna thinks.

Luna's like, I'm afraid that if I take one screw out of this thing, then I'm going to knock the pocket watch on the floor. All the pieces are going to go everywhere. I'm never going to find them again. And I will be just absolutely screwed forever. So she's like, I'm not going to deal with this anymore. I'll just keep lurking around this site and look for a replacement watch that will have the pieces I need.

But in the meantime, Gabriella is like still messaging with her. Gabriella is like, I'm so sorry it didn't work for you. Like, I'm so sorry people were rude to you. And then like most early 2000s internet, like instant messaging, they become like very close friends that are talking about all of their trauma almost immediately. So this like beautiful blossoming friendship.

And because Gabriella knows way more about pocket watches than Luna, she's like also helping her to learn about how they work and like what exactly she will need to figure out how to fix it. And Gabriella is the one who tells her about Mitchell.

I don't want to hear about Mitchell. I actually want to hear about Luna and Gabriella. Me cuting and falling in love on this message board. I was trying to come up with like the name of their rom-com that has like some sort of time pun in it, but I hadn't gotten there yet. And now I have to listen to Mitchell. And anyway, go ahead. Mitchell is like a low level celebrity on the forum. He like doesn't really ever post, but he has tons of followers, like more than anyone else on this forum. Yeah.

And that is because Mitchell has developed a reputation for being able to fix every pocket watch. And Gabriella is like, I only know about this guy because people are always tagging him, like saying his name, linking his profile in other threads of watches that are broken.

Why didn't he help earlier? She already asked.

Luna like highlights the text on this page and sees in this like cryptic font that Mitchell has noted that he's going to a collector's festival in a city directly between Luna and Gabriella.

Do you think that she should go and meet Gabriella, her internet friend, at a collector's festival where they can then try to meet Mitchell? Wait, how old was she roughly and how far away is this roughly? Luna is like in her late 20s. Okay. And the festival is like maybe an hour from each of them. Yeah, do it. YOLO. I mean, worst case, they're both weird. Okay.

All right. Well, I think that you should do it. I think you should take some sort of precautions, some basic precautions like meet in public, tell a friend where you're going. Yeah. But I think that you can do it with those precautions in mind. If they're like, we can only fix it like in this scary cabin in the woods, then I would be like, no, maybe not. Right. And it's...

It's like the early aughts. It's like when people were still finding new best friends on the internet. And so they don't have the kind of situational terror that people had later in the aughts. It's still like the hunky-dory days of being online. Luna's like, I feel safe. Also, I want to meet my new friend, Gabriella. And if I get to get my pocket watch fixed, that's a great bonus. So she goes to this festival. Festival starts Friday night and ends Sunday afternoon. So it's like a big weekend festival.

Luna gets in on Friday and she like waits in her room for Gabriella to come meet her and there's like immediate chemistry right like Gabriella is normal and funny and they get along just as well like talking in real life as they did messaging this is like a blessing Luna is like this is the best day of my life if you could see like the thought bubble above me right now it literally just says gay question mark and like no matter how many things you say I'm just like gay gay I mean who's to say we'll find out I guess

The two of them go down to the festival floor and they like take a lap. And it's like a big convention center. There are like more than just watchmakers there. There's like stamp collectors and coin collectors and like lots of people who just collect things. Yeah.

They find a little pamphlet. You know, I have those like pamphlets that show like where everyone's booth is. Yes. They like find the pamphlet and they're like, here's where Mitchell's tinkering his like little booth is. So they like follow the little numbers on the map and they like get there. And the booth is still just like one of those folding tables with like a white tablecloth on it and a little sign. But like he's not there. There's nothing there.

hmm cryptic okay maybe you should you try highlighting the booth and like a secret font would appear okay that's a good idea but they're like this is annoying but it's fine they're like we're you know we're in love two best friends who might kiss so they're like taking their lap right they like find lots of things to look at they're like buying stuff it's a little shopping spree kind of on saturday they do the same thing but like still there's no mitchell

Mitchell, why did you pay the entrance fee to this pocket watch convention if you weren't going to show up? And why update it on your like little bio if you're not coming? Right. So they're like, we're feeling very frustrated. Yeah.

And Luna's like, this is no longer about like just my grandfather's pocket watch. I now feel included in the pocket watch community in the way that everyone falls into a community of the same community that their crushes. So it's now Saturday night. What would you like to do?

Kiss? Kiss. Kiss. I mean, part of me does feel like this is turning back into murder mystery direction. Like something terrible has happened to Mitchell and we should get to the bottom of it. But on the other hand, I'm like kiss. So either of those two things. I'm really open to whatever. Okay. So your two options are pursue murder mystery or kiss. Yes. Okay. They could do both at the same time also, to be clear. Por que no los dos? Great idea. Por que no los dos? Great idea.

But those are the two paths I'm interested in. Okay, Luna is like, listen, Mitchell is not my problem. What is my problem is my crush on Gabriella. So they're going to the hotel bar. They're having some drinks. They're doing some light kissing. Everyone's having a great time.

And Luna's like, you know what? Who cares, right? Like who cares if this guy doesn't show up? Because like now I have a new cute crush and also I'm obsessed with pocket watches now and I've bought another one. Sure. And I can see like pivoting that into like your like

special interest like career if you really wanted it to right like you could be the lesbian pocket watch expert you and Gabriella together I mean I'm you're on TikTok like she's still on TikTok to this day we can go find her okay so Sunday morning you know our two girlies they're waking up they're rolling out of bed they're getting a Bloody Mary at the bar they're having a great time and they're like you know what let's just like take one more lap around this festival before we go home

And they start their lap and there at his booth is Mitchell. And they're like, oh, Jesus Christ, finally. He looks like pretty much exactly how Luna thought he would look. He's like tall and thin, wiry beard. He's wearing like a tweed vest on top of a T-shirt and he's wearing like dark jeans. On his forearm is like a hyper realistic tattoo of a pocket watch.

And they, like, can't tell. They're like, I don't know, is he doing steampunk? Is he, like, the kind of person who calls himself a mixologist? Like, what's happening here? Oh, no. Yeah, I was gonna say, I'm so glad they didn't waste any time, like, trying to find this, like, steampunk-ass murder mystery man in a tweed vest when they could make out. Anyway, please go on.

Yeah. They're like, thank God that we focused on each other and not on this man. He's wearing like glasses that have something on them called a loop, which is like that little single microscope thing that goes on glasses that like jewelers have. Yeah.

Apparently pocket watch tinkerers also need these. Luna and Gabriella like approach him, but a little hesitantly because they're like, who is, what's happening here? This is like a stressful environment for us. And they're like, hi, like we're Luna and Gabriella. We each have a pocket watch. Both of our pocket watches are broken. We've heard that you're like the pocket watch tinkerer. And he's like, sure. What are your problems? And so they like kind of describe their problems. And Mitchell is like, show me like you, Gabriella, show me your watch first. Okay.

And she like hands it to him and he's like, move. And so she like backs up and this guy like dismantles her watch like extremely quickly. All around him are like little tools, right? Like metal pliers and tiny screwdrivers. And there are like watches everywhere. And things are just like flying places. And Gabriella and Luna are like, this is very overwhelming. But also like this man seems to know what he's doing. Right.

And incredibly, Mitchell fixes Gabriella's watch while they stand there, like watching him remove little wheels and replacing them. He's like, done. Like it's some kind of like time trial. He says it so loudly that both girls like jump back. But Gabriella's pocket watch is fixed. And she's like, I'm so happy. And Luna's like, I'm so happy for you. And Mitchell's like, next, who else has a watch?

It's still giving like Alice in Wonderland to me and he is like wearing the Mad Hatter hat and springs are flying everywhere. Yes. And he's wearing like the weird glasses. Yeah, this is perfect. Luna's like, okay, here's my watch, right? She like hands it to him out of her pocket and his eyes get like as big as saucers. And he's like, oh shit, this is like a really cool watch. Yeah.

He's like, did you know that they don't make pieces for these anymore because they were all part of a kind of unpopular limited run right before the brand changed the way that they made pocket watches? And this is a real collector's item. This is a great watch. And Luna's like, I did actually know all of this because it's broken and I can't fix anything. I got it for my grandfather after he died and I don't know what to do with it. He's explaining her watch to her. It reminds me of this famous Only To Me story where I was wearing a Mitski shirt and

And I went into a coffee shop. It said bury me at Makeout Creek. And this guy looks at my shirt and says, oh, cool shirt. Do you know the reference? Oh, my God. And I was like, it's a Mitski shirt. And he's like, no, but do you know, like, bury my heart at Wounded Knee? And I'm like, yeah, I do. But this is...

A Mitski shirt. But yeah, it's a reference of that. And so now every time I wear that shirt, my roommate will go, oh, cool shirt. Do you know the reference? And it's just like, it's like that. Yeah. I know it's mine. I know. I bought this.

Anyway. She's like, okay, like, this is my grandfather's watch. Like, can you do something with it? And Mitchell does look, like, genuinely moved by this. Like, he's like, it's so nice that you, like, are keeping your grandfather's watch and that you want it to work. Like, not everyone appreciates history like this. Like, thank you for bringing it to me. And she's like, cool. Can you fix it? And Mitchell's like, I don't know. I haven't even opened it yet. Right.

Luna's like, great point. My bad. So he like opens the watch and immediately like cringes. He points out things that like the other watch fixers have pointed out, the balance wheel and the staff that we already talked about. But he's also pointing out like other smaller problems that no one has pointed out, right? He's like, this is also a problem. This is a problem. Like all of these are due to wear, but like probably it was just a really long time coming, right? Like your grandfather used this watch too much, basically.

So they're like standing there watching him do this. And he's like, can I get some space? Like, can you guys back up? And they're like, sure. And then he's like, actually, can you like just take a lap? Let me work. And they're like, okay. So they take their little walk. They like get their snack. They like have a little handhold as a treat. And they like come back and Mitchell is like, listen, I can fix this watch. Like it needs very specific pieces to tick again, but I can get them.

He's like, but I'm asking you if I can take this watch home with me. Do you think that they should let Mitchell take the watch home? Sorry, that was the obvious question, but I needed you to ask it because I was just holding my breath. Yeah, I could see you panicking. Oh my gosh. I feel like she has to ask in her heart, is it worth it?

right? Because she can either for sure have the watch, but it doesn't tick and she won't know the time. But Gabriella, her new wife, has a pocket watch and can tell her the time. That's a great point. She can get it to tick, but she might lose the whole watch because Mitchell is like some guy from the internet who clearly is flaky because he's really hard to get a hold of and like doesn't even show up to things he says he's going to show up to. So I mean, like,

again, not understanding the investment of the tick. I would just keep it in my pocket, but that's because I'm neurotic about those things. And like, maybe it's, you got to live a little and risk things. I don't know. So trust him. Gabriella is like, can you show us how bad it is? Right. Like what's how, because she knows more about pocket watches.

So she's like, can you show us like what's going on here? And he is like, OK, the real problem is do you see this one wheel here that is like rusted out? And they're like, yeah. And he's like, that has to be replaced for this to work. And like it's not going to work without a new one. And like the only way I can find it is like by finding another watch, which like I think I have one at my house. Like that's why I really want to take it home.

And Luna is like kind of on the verge of tears because she's like, I don't know what to do here. And also like, I really thought that he was going to be able to fix it immediately because he fixed Gabriella so quickly. And he's like, okay, listen, I can fix it. Like, give me time and I'll fix it. Look at this whole stack of watches that are like in little packets that I'm taking home to fix. Like, I will give you my business card. I will fix it. I mean...

Is there going to be another watch expo? Can he just bring a little part to the next one? That's really thinking ahead. That's not what our girls are doing. Okay. What Luna is doing is, do you know what the sunk cost fallacy is? Yes.

Absolutely. Can you explain it to the listeners? Sure, sure, sure. It's like you've invested so much into something that even though it makes sense to bail on it, you're like, I can't possibly bail on this because I've already put so much into it. And that could apply to anything from waiting a really long time for a train to show up to like your marriage, right? Like it could be any of those things. So yeah, I guess it is watch ticking now. Here it is watch ticking. So Luna is like, take it.

And Gabrielle is like, I think that's the right decision. Like he's fixed so many things. He fixed my watch that I couldn't fix. Like, I think this was a good call. And like, I think it will work. Luna's like, great. And at first she feels really good about this decision. Then she does not hear from Mitchell for like one week, two weeks, three weeks. Yeah, he's bad at communicating. We knew this. What point do you follow up?

Oh, I mean, I'm following up the whole time. I mean, I'm just like once a week, at least. I'm like, hey, Mitchell, what's up? Just wanted to check in. ETA, ETD, TBD, TK, any other acronyms I can throw at him. Yeah, no, we're, you know, we're getting, I would also feel, though, that I would ask for a firm timeline before I gave it to him so that I knew when I should start being annoying, you know? Yeah, that would be smart. What Luna does is she waits a month.

And then she starts calling the number on the card that he gave her like every day. Every day she gets an answering machine. She leaves a message. He does not call her back. She's following up, you know, for two months, for three months. At this point, it's been like seven months since she got the pocket watch in the first place and it like still isn't fixed. And now she doesn't even have it.

See, I almost asked this at the beginning, but it felt too unhinged. When she got a business card, it didn't have like a physical address on it, did it? No. Okay. Because I feel like that would be good insurance. Like I could just roll up, but no. No, it had only a phone number. Okay, that, no, we can't. See, I already would have been like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Yes. So while this very stressful thing is happening, something also not stressful is happening, which is that Luna and Gabriella are obsessed with each other.

They're talking all the time. They're having a great life, right? They're like AOL messaging while they're at work, right? They're living their dreams. They don't need to know the time because they're on Love Island, baby. And it doesn't matter. The time is smooch. Smooch o'clock. Exactly. Exactly.

So one day Luna's at work, like I am in Gabriella, like she is every single day. And Gabriella emails her a link to the forum. And the forum entry is titled, what to do about Mitchell. Here's a part of the message that I have for you. Yay. We all know that Mitchell is one of the best tinkers in this group, but his speed and reliability is really exhausting and kind of frustrating. I'm not sure exactly why we put up with this. Shouldn't there be like some accountability for him?

I'm so distracted because I've just never heard someone use the word tinkerer so much as we have in this conversation. And I didn't know that it had this sort of official meaning and I'm just delighted by it. I feel like I'm in like Beauty and the Beast or something. It's so nice. Anyway. Do you feel good about the fact that it's a known problem that Mitchell just hogs watches for months? Yeah.

I mean, it's kind of both. Like on one hand, you're like, okay, it's not just me. It's, this is a known thing. I have people that I can complain to and with now. They can tell me if they've ever successfully gotten a watch back. Maybe someone knows a better way to contact him. Maybe we can like gang up and peer pressure him. You know, it does feel like, like you're sort of unionizing against Mitchell. And I like that energy. But it must also feel bad to be like, oh no, this is like a thing that does happen and is likely to continue happening. Right.

So Luna is like reading every single word of this forum, like with her heart in her mouth, right? Like she's so stressed. She's like reading all the comments and the community is like,

pretty split on this. Like some people are like, yeah, fuck Mitchell. He has my watch. I want it back. Some people are like Mitchell is slow, but he's like really good at his job. And he like fix this watch that I like never thought would be fixed. And then the first people are like, well, I'd love to believe that, but I've seen absolutely no proof of it. And the other group is like, well, that's because you're being impatient. Like you just need to wait.

Wow, rude. This debate goes on and on. As you can imagine, it rapidly devolves into like personal insults. Luna reads every single word of it.

Do you think there are, like, special slurs for the tinkering community? I'm sure there are. Anyway, sorry. Go ahead. The burns that only tinkerers know. If you know them, please let us know. Luna, like, meanwhile, is searching the forums for Mitchell's name. Right? Like, she's like, I'm going to read every post about this guy that's ever existed. Of course. And, like...

There are plenty of examples where someone has posted something and been like, Mitchell has my watch and he won't give it back.

And then people have devolved into the same argument. And then later they post again and are like, he gave it back. It's fixed. This would for sure be me. I have to say, as like a very patient person, as a Sagittarius, I would just be like, this person won't do this thing for me. And then I'd be like, ding. And I'd be like, nevermind. It's fine. Sorry. So sorry. So now Luna is like, okay, I'm willing to give this guy a little more room. Sure. Another month goes by, still no word.

She's like, now I'm calling once a week trying to get a hold of him. She's still having no luck.

Do you have any ideas at this point? How are you feeling? Let's check in. I'm not feeling great. How are her and Gabriella doing? Are they doing well? They're doing great. Okay, great. I feel good about that. They're bonded together over this Mitchell problem. They're traveling to each other's apartments. Adorable. Good. That's good. I mean, I don't know. I already had unionized the forum against Mitchell. And then after this, I actually don't have ideas. Like, that was my main one. A lot of, I think, my sort of

terrible internet stalking tendencies that are coming out weren't existing then and even if they did exist he sounds like he would be sort of like a chronically offline person um and so yeah i don't know i don't feel good about it after mitchell has had her pocket watch for four months he updates his profile and it says that he will be at a collector's festival in gabriella's city

Maybe. We don't know. Right. He says. That's great, though. That's a great excuse to visit your girlfriend. So you're going? I mean, yes, of course I'm going. Yeah. I mean, if nothing else, we're like, wow, remember about how this is how we met? Going to a tinkering convention to look for Mitchell? Yes. And it's like a fun...

throwback. Yeah, literally they're having the best weekend. Is Mitchell there? No. Of course he's not there, but they're like going out to dinner. They're walking around the Tinkerer convention. They're buying like another pocket watch. They're like, you know, making clock puns. They're having a great time. I'm imagining them wearing cargo shorts and then every pocket is filled with a different pocket watch. Just like chains everywhere. Exactly. All weekend, they're there. They walk around constantly. Mitchell never shows. Of course. What do you do?

It's the end. We've made it through the whole day or the whole weekend. He never shows. What do I do? I mean, flip the table over. No, I don't know. Um, I don't know. Like, I, we can't say murder mystery anymore because we know that this is just how we is. Yeah. I'm out of ideas. Luna's like, she's like, somebody here has contact info for him.

Right? Like, she's like, I'm at the festival still. There are people walking around with clipboards. One of them has information. I mean, but she has information and it's not working, but she thinks they have more information. Yes. All right. So she, like, finally convinces one of these, like, little festival employees to give her the information they have for Mitchell. And they have the number that Luna has, but they also have an email. Okay. Okay.

So Luna goes home and she types her little email and she's like, where is my watch? Please email me back. It's just that it's so easy to ignore an email. We all do hundreds of times a day, but I'm rooting for her. Finally, two weeks after this, Mitchell calls her, doesn't respond to the email, calls her from the number she has. Luna's like, oh, so this number does fucking work. Interesting. He's like, hey, I'm so sorry. I've been kind of sick. It's been hard for me to work, but I have finally located your part.

Once it arrives, all I have to do is add it to the watch and I'm ready to mail it back to you. I mean, that's Sunkost's fallacy, right? Because I'm immediately like, well, he's had it for this long. He may as well keep it for a little bit longer and maybe get it fixed. Yes. And that is what Luna decides. She's like, it's been so long. I haven't seen this watch in ages and I want it fixed.

The next week is the holidays. She like goes to celebrate with her family. It's like the first time they've all been together since the grandpa died. And she and her closest cousin are like chatting about work, about bad relatives, about like everything when the cousin is suddenly like, oh yeah, did you ever get grandpa's pocket watch? What's happening with that?

It is only after this conversation that Luna realizes that she has been completely corrupted by the world of pocket watches because she goes on a rant so long and so specific about like which parts of the clock we're mixing and the links she went to fix them that the cousin is like, wait, what? And Luna's like, yeah, you know, I just really want it to be fixed. I want it to work the way it did for grandpa. And the cousin's like, dude, I don't know how to tell you this, but that pocket watch hasn't worked for decades. Yeah.

Like it definitely hasn't worked since we were kids. And Luna's like, what?

And the cousin's like, yeah, he just like carried it around out of habit, but it's definitely been dead for years. Something about this causes the like scales to fall from her eyes and she's suddenly like, oh my God, have I lost it? Like did I enter into a grief-induced stupor where like I now have a girlfriend who's obsessed with pocket watches and also all I think about is pocket watches? Yeah.

She's like, what does this mean? I mean, it's called special interest, baby. You gotta have one. It may as well be pocket watches. So she, like, the next day, she, like, gets home and she calls Gabriella and she's like, have I lost it? Like, are we in love? What's happening? What?

This is based on a lie. It's like, I'm sorry, we have to break up. It turned out that my grandpa's watch never worked. Gabriela is like, are you fucking kidding me? Like, I'm coming over. I'm driving the two hours to your house. Like, we're gonna spend the weekend together. Like, you're being nuts. And so she shows up and Luna's like, yeah, I do really love Gabriela. She's perfect. But also like, how come my watch never worked? And Gabriela is like, well, babe, it's like,

too late now right like you're down this path both in the case of our relationship and also in the case of fixing this watch like you can choose to leave but you're you're here now yeah luna's like yeah you're right gabriella goes home the next week they're like back at work awful they're on aim and gabriella is like uh are you on tinking tinkers right now and luna's like

No, I'm IMing you. And Gabriella's like, you better get on now. Get on right now.

I just got really excited because I forgot when we were talking about early odds internet that early odds internet involves getting onto the internet where you have to like dial up and it goes da-dun, da-dun, da-dun. Yes. And I just thought we couldn't go through the whole episode without me doing that. That was beautiful and I'm glad that you added it for us. Thanks so much. It's the foley work that I'm known for. Thank you. Sorry, go ahead. While she's waiting for her dial up to connect, so great timing, Gabrielle calls her on the phone and is like, are you on yet?

And Luna's like, no, I'm waiting for my internet to boot up so that I can get on. They get on. Luna logs on. On the main page of the forum is a post from Mitchell. This is weird. Mitchell never posts. The subject line is an announcement.

I feel like I've seen this coming the entire time where he's gonna be like, "JK, no more watch fixing," and then he just like absconds into the wilderness. But tell me that's not what it is. I will now read the body of the post. Yay! I love a primary source document.

Mitchell loved this community and talked about it frequently. He enjoyed meeting so many of you at conferences and loved bringing home your broken pocket watches to try and fix them. We are heartbroken to announce that Mitchell will no longer be posting. He died last night. No! At home. That's not even real. He's now in the hands of the watchmaker in the sky. He'll be with us every hour, minute, and second of the day. Thank you for making his life so full. Okay.

Okay, one, this is not real. He's trying to scam everyone. Two, I feel like I have been saying murder mystery this entire time. Wow. Okay. Wow. This is nuts, obviously. Everyone in the comments is freaking out. But they're all like, so sorry for your loss, like R.I.P. Mitchell, blah, blah, blah.

I mean, that's the thing is, like, one, if it is somehow real and he is with the great watchmaker in the sky, you gotta be like, R.I.P. Poor one out. But also, like, even if this is a weird scam, like, it does not get you anywhere to call it out. So you still have to, like, play within the rules of the fiction and be like, hey, whoever this is, I'm so sorry to hear about your loss, but Mitchell did have my watch. You obviously don't need it and he's not gonna fix it. So, like, can you just send it to me? Right. So...

While in the comments of this post, everyone is like, RIP Mitchell, we'll miss you, like king of fixing watches. There are 500 instant messages happening around the watch community where everyone is like, what the fuck do we do? Like, we respect the dead theoretically, but also he has my pocket watch and I want it back.

Okay, what do you do here? I mean, I have already outlined the message I would send, which is respond to whoever. So sorry for your loss. Since you have to get rid of these watches or something, I don't know. I would like mine back. He did owe it to me. Sorry to put something else on your plate in this incredibly tragic time. But I also lost someone recently. And so you can understand the grief that I am feeling and how I would like to have this watch. They needed your guidance. After five days, there is another post.

This one is from Mitchell's wife. Luna is like, I didn't even know he had a wife. This is what the post says.

Thank you all for your outpouring of support over the loss of Mitchell. I am devastated by this loss. I know that many of you are concerned about the pocket watches you had entrusted to Mitchell to fix. I am going to get your watches back to you. But Mitchell's system for organizing whose watch was whose seemed to only exist in his brain. So if you had a pocket watch with him, if you could call this number and tell me what kind, I can make sure it gets back to you.

Okay. I mean, this is sort of great because if you talk to someone on the phone, you know that it's a real person and you can feel out whether this is like a real thing or a weird scam. And if it is real, then I'm sorry to Mitchell for doubting him immediately. But I don't know. I'm just still so stressed. I just can't believe that the watch is ever coming back. I know. The other problem is that like,

Lots of people have posted on this site about Mitchell having their watch and like the type of pocket watch they gave him. So like theoretically, if you've spent a lot of time on the site, you could call his wife and be like, hi, and describe the watch that Luna had given to him and she would send it back to you. Well, she's got to call very fast then. Yes. So Luna calls immediately. No answer. She leaves a message. She calls again the next day. Nothing. Nothing.

People on the site are like asking for an address to send flowers to, asking why she's not answering the phone, asking all of this shit. But after this post, the wife disappears from the site. She doesn't answer the phone, doesn't respond to any of the requests. Oh my gosh. At first, everyone is like, she's grieving. After two months, everyone is like, okay, we get it that it's like hard that he's dead, but also you have our pocket watches on

It's really important. Cell phones are good. We need to know the time. Yes. And every time someone posts about this, a giant fight erupts on the forum between people who are like, I gave him my watch and I want it back. And people who are like, well, I gave Mitchell my very expensive and rare watch and you don't see me pitching a fit because I respect grief. Oh my gosh. Good for you. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Luna and Gabriella talk about this for a long time. By this point, they have moved in together. Congratulations, Luna and Gabriella. Congratulations. Well, hey, you all. We love them. Yeah, so cute. The thing is, they're like, somebody needs to go get these watches.

They're like, if his widow, you know, can't send them out, she needs to just let someone else do it. Like, maybe we should be the ones. We already rented the U-Haul. Exactly. They're like, we have this U-Haul. We might as well figure out where Mitchell lives, go there, get all the watches and send them back. I'm thrilled. They call the number again and it has been disconnected. Oh,

Oh my gosh. Scammers gonna scam. They're like, it's time to post. It's time to post. I said never post, but when a steampunk man fakes his own death to run away with your grandfather's watch, which it turned out never ticked, you gotta post. You simply have to post. They post and they're like,

You know, they're trying to be like, out of the goodness of our heart, we want to help his widow redistribute all the watches to this community. We are saints trying to do a good thing. But in reality, they're like, we want. No, that's the way you got to do it. You got to play the game. In their posts, they're like, we're so sorry to bother everyone. Like, we are really not in a rush to get this watch back. But like.

We noticed we couldn't help but notice that the you know, the phone number doesn't work anymore. So if anyone has any information on where Mitchell lives, we would be happy to help everyone. And we know that he like must live in this region because the area code on the phone number and the shows he's been to are near us. They're like, so if anyone has any information, that would be very helpful.

My brain just went straight to like Mitchell as like the Unabomber just like in the woods. I don't know why I went straight there. I was like, it's gonna be like the creepiest cabin. No one's been there in 20 years. The mail doesn't deliver there. Okay. He's probably in a normal house. They get like a few messages from people that are like, he fixed my watch years ago and I got it back. But like it didn't have a return address on it. It only had like the little like postmark stamp. Sure. So.

So this is helpful because they're like, okay, we're right. We know the metro area that he's in.

They're like, um, an option could be that we go through the white pages and we call every Mitchell. Wait, they don't know his last name? No. Everyone's just literally saying Mitchell. Yes. I thought you were just doing that for the story convention. Oh my gosh. Wait, so the booth is just like, it's Mitchell. Oh my gosh. Yes. Go ahead. So they're like, okay, I guess we'll start calling Mitchells. Oh my gosh. So they start calling Mitchells in the white pages, but like...

Oh, it's really fucking awkward to be like, hi, is this Mitchell? Is your Mitchell dead? Did he use to fix pocket? Oh, my God. No, this is desperate acts from desperate people. They do this for like, you know, seven or eight Mitchells. And then Gabriela are like, we can't fucking do this. It's too much. They order a pizza. They're like, we give up. Right. We'll just wait for more information.

A few days after they post, they're like, please give us information post. They get a private message from someone on the site that they don't know.

And the message has something like, hey, I know this is a little weird, but like I live in the city that Mitchell lives in. Last weekend, I was at an antique fair that they hold every year in the city. And I saw someone who looked a lot like Mitchell. Yes. Yes. They're like, I've never met him. And I know he just like looks like some regular guy, but he had the same forearm tattoo. Yes. That everyone was talking about. Absolutely. Yeah.

You can't trust a steampunk man. You just can't do it. What do you do with this information? Okay, so all they have is he's in this city and he went to this one... Antique fair. Antique fair. Is it like an every Saturday thing or a once a year thing? It's a once a year thing. Shit. I guess you get the phone book back now. Wait, is this still... I mean, because like back in those days, phone books had addresses too. Yes. Yes.

So it would be worth seeing if you could get him on the phone. I don't know what you would say, but...

You also have to remember that like Luna and Gabriella are shocked because unlike us, they did not think that this man was not dead. They thought that he was extremely dead. So now Luna is like, I've done someone dying recently. I know what this rigmarole entails. And she's like, you know what? It's time for me to find out if there's an obituary. So she's searching like Mitchell, the city, Mitchell, the city death, right? All this stuff. There's nothing.

She, like, goes through all of the obituaries for the, like, few days after he died, and there's absolutely no record. She's like, that's pretty weird. It's almost like he was scamming you to get all of your watches. But who would do such a thing? So now what? You're going back to the white pages? I mean, how big is the city? Is it big? Big. Okay. I mean, either you can just...

be fully unhinged and just sort of live your life or you can really go off the deep end and start just thinking of other places that he might hang out and do tinker related activities and start staking those out.

I don't know what the in-between is. But you can call around. There are pawn shops. Is this guy with this very specific tattoo? Again, these are unhinged options. But I don't feel like we have any normal options left. Luna wants to do all of those options. And Gabriela is like, okay, maybe let's chill for a second on the one tip that we've gotten from someone that a guy we think is dead is not dead. Maybe let's take a breather. And Luna is like,

Okay, sweetie, I'd love to take a breather. And then in the middle of the night, she's at the computer. She is not taking a breather. She's Googling. And she ends up on the local newspaper's website.

Do you remember like what local newspaper websites looked like in the early afts? Frankly, some of them still look like that today and they've never updated them. They truly do. So yes, I mean, there's a lot of them are vaguely unusable. I know the paper for my hometown used to be my desktop homepage thing like 10 years ago. And I would screenshot because the headline would be like,

spaghetti factory comes to town or squirrel something, something, something. Exactly. So Luda is like on the local newspapers for this city. And she's like going back to the date that this guy saw Mitchell, theoretically. Yeah.

Something local newspapers loved to do in the early aughts is, you know, post a slideshow of 100 photos from something. And then there's like an ad every four photos. It's completely unusable. Luna is like, I'm going through every fucking photo from this festival. I'm looking at all of them.

She's like, click, click, clicking, right? Click, click, click. There, on the 30-second pic in the slideshow, the man in the background is wearing a college sweatshirt and athletic shorts. He's wearing Skechers, but his sleeves are rolled up and he has the same hyper-realistic pocket watch tattoo. I'm so proud of her. Do you believe that this is him? Well, does it look like him?

Yes. His clothes are wrong. He's not steampunking. Do you think he had a twin? It's like, this has already gotten so, like, there's already someone who's faked their own death and pretended to be their wife. So now when I'm like, well, does he have a twin that he got a matching tattoo with? Like, that's completely unhinged, but so is everything else. Like, I'm losing all grasp of reality, and I'm not even, like, in the story. Yeah.

um yeah i think it's him of course luna like scams down right luckily for her the newspaper has done a very good job there's very long caption listing everyone's name i'm so proud of the journalist too thank you to local journalism may it rest in peace there is his first name and also last name last name yes now what do you do well is it useful or is it smith

It's useful. Okay, yeah. You look it up. You go there, baby. You gotta. Exactly. So they're going to the phone book and they're like flipping through, right? And they're like, aha, ding, ding, ding. There's only two of these. So they call the first one. This is like clearly not Mitchell. They call the second one and they're like, this is fucking Mitchell. They're like, this motherfucker. He hangs up immediately. Of course. The address isn't there though? The address isn't there. They call again. They're like, do not hang up.

We know it's you. We just want our watches back. And we will not tell anyone if you don't want us to, but like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah. Most people are like, not very good at keeping secrets, especially secrets in which they presumably faked their own death. So when they corner Mitchell, he caves immediately. Really? And he's like,

I'm so sorry. Like, I remember you. I didn't want to keep your grandfather's watch, but like it would have given up my scam. He's like, I just got really overwhelmed by the number of watches that I had taken in to fix. And I had like promised too many people that I would fix them and I didn't know what to do. And I also didn't want people to hate me.

Everyone and Luna are like, so you faked your own death? Like it's at once completely unhinged, but also like spiritually relatable. When you ever had like too many assignments and you're like, maybe I should fake my own death. What if I was dead? Luna's like, where the fuck is my watch? Yeah. And he's like, it's at my house. And she's like, cool. I'm coming to get it right now.

And he's like, well, you don't know where to go. And she's like, I sure do. Your address is in this phone book. I'm going to be there in like 30 minutes. So they drive to Mitchell's. It's like a very normal suburban house in a very normal, like cul-de-sac street. They get there and they're like, knock, knock, knock. It's us. Where are our watches?

And Mitchell like opens it and he's like, oh, I'm so sorry. Like, I'm so sorry about all this. Here's your watch. But the watch is like still broken. It was always going to be broken. I was so stressed when he said, I'm so sorry. Oh, I'm so sorry. It turns out I don't have it. I was going to be like, kick the door down. Okay, it's fine. It doesn't work. It was never going to work. Luna is in kick the door down mode. She's like, I'm not fucking leaving this house until my watch is fixed.

Luna, it never worked. Luna. She walks him into his little like workshop room and she and Gabriella stand there with their arms crossed for a whole hour while he fixes this watch. That's dyke supremacy, baby. They can do it. Oh my God. I love this. Works. It works. It ticks again.

And her grandfather comes back to life and says, Luna, thank you. And Luna's like, everything's coming up, Luna. I've got a hot girlfriend. I've solved a murder mystery. Watch forks. Wow, I'm thrilled. But now they have a really big question, which is, do you rat him out? I mean, yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, it's nice that he helped, but it's not like he wasn't doing anything that he should have done in the first place. I just feel like it's...

Not, hmm. Let me restart over. Hmm. Hmm. I think I would feel bad because I know having been in this experience, like how bad it feels when Mitchell steals your watch and then fakes his own death. And so I'm not like, let's rat him out because I want Mitchell to suffer. But I do feel like I would have to give Mitchell an ultimatum to be like,

somehow you have to get everyone your watches back. And you can either pretend to be your own wife for some reason and send them all back that way, or you can just be normal. But either way, you have to get these watches back to these people. They don't have to be fixed, but they do have to go back to them. Yes. So Luna is like, these watches have to go back. She agrees with you. She's like, I don't know that he has to be ousted, but he has to send these back or we have to send them back or something. Yeah.

Gabriella is like, fuck this guy. Gabriella's like, I want to watch the fucking Tinkerer's website. She's like, I am going to tell everyone. I'm going to tell everyone. Do it. And Luna is like, Gabriella is really mad and like probably going to go rogue. Like she's like, she could post at any moment. So she calls Mitchell and is like, heads up. Gabriella's going to tell everyone that you're not dead. Yeah.

This is my favorite couple. Go ahead. She has all your information and I don't think that she's going to hold back. Oh my God, doxing hasn't been invented yet. Gabriella's going to invent doxing. I can't wait. And Mitchell is like, I will post. And Luna's like, well, you better fucking hurry because Gabriella is like dialing up right now.

To Mitchell's credit, he gets his post up before Gabriella gets hers up. And it's like an apology and an explanation. And he's like, I'm mailing everyone's watch back right now. And he like mails it back. The watches return to their home. This is a problem for many reasons. But part of the problem is that like he comes back to prominence. If infamy by returning everyone's watches and most of them being fixed. Yeah.

So everyone now has this like dynamic where 50% of people are like, fuck this guy. We don't want anything to do with him. He faked his own death. He's useless to us. And the other people are like, it's the kind of intensity that you have right now that caused Mitchell to fake his first place. So people keep giving him pocket watches to fix. No, that can't be what happened.

Do you want to hear something truly fucking incredible? Yes. He did it again. No! It doesn't work. You can't. No. Five years after he faked his death the first time, another death announcement went up for him. And this time, the people who had been there for long enough were like,

He does this. I'm skeptical. He does this. And he was yet again not dead. In the same forum? In the same forum. Buddy, fool me once. You know, like, you can't just keep doing this.

This man fucked up the trust of the people on this forum so badly that when a different tinkerer like actually died a few years after that, everyone was like, where's the obituary? Is he a fucking corpse? Like I've been burned before. Oh my God.

I mean, but here's the thing. It wouldn't have happened the second time if they didn't just go back to sending watches to him. Like at that point, it just feels like there was a clean slate. We could have just all walked away. Yes, you could have. But also he was the best one. Apparently. We're done. How do you feel? What do you think? No, I feel so good. Honestly, I mean, I love this podcast. It's a great podcast. But often we get to the end

And I'm like, oh, somewhat unsatisfying to end there because unfortunately life doesn't neatly tie up every story in a perfect bow. But I feel so satisfied by this. Like, I love Luna and Gabriella. I hope that they wore their pocket watches to their wedding. I love that Mitchell did this again. Like, everything about this is perfect. Except I guess the watch, no, the watch does work. The watch works fine.

No, everything about this is good. I feel so good about it. Thank you so much for taking me on this journey. I have a little treat for you, which is that Gabriella and Luna got married. We were in 2009 and they had a pocket watch cake. Wait, this is the best news of my life. I have been in my house quarantined for a week and I'm just like crying about like mystery lesbians pocket watch cake. I'm just like, thank you so much. It's so beautiful.

Love is real, and it only exists in the tinkering tinkerdum forum, whatever it was called. Exactly. Do you think that there's any moral takeaway to this story? Yes, I think that you should just show up at people's houses and demand your watch. Wow.

um it's the wrong takeaway but it's the one i think you should get your website girlfriend to come with you and you should show up and yeah a man into fixing something for you yeah i mean the other option was like you should never believe anyone who says that someone's dead so i think that your takeaway is safer i yelled immediately that it was fake so i already was there

Doug, thank you so much for coming on the show. It was a joy to have you. Thank you so much. I understand the delight now when at the beginning we were talking about what episode it was and Alex just yelled clocks as loud as possible. And I was like, how has anyone ever been this excited about clocks? And I understand now. It was a joy and a treat. It's beautiful.

Thank you for listening to Normal Gossip. If you have a gossip story to share with us, email us at normalgossip at defector.com or you can leave us a voicemail at 2679-GOSSIP. If you love this podcast and want us to keep making it, become a friend or a friend of a friend at supportnormalgossip.com.

You can follow the show on Instagram and TikTok at normal gossip. You can follow Kelsey on all social media at at McKinney Kelsey. This podcast was produced by Alex Sujon Laughlin. Defectors project editor is Justin Ellis. Our editor in chief is Tom way.

Jay Tolviera is our production assistant. Thanks to the rest of the Defector staff. Defector Media is a collectively owned, subscriber-based media company. Normal Gossip is hosted by Kelsey McKinney. And remember, you did not hear this from me. Radiotopia. From PRX.