A Peaceful Passing
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Gracious good day to you all. This is the Jan Arden podcast. Sarah Burke is here in Toronto. She's got her Blue Jays hat on. Caitlin Green is here. You look dashing with your beautiful blunt cut hair. You don't sound snotty. No, I'm not congested. My son is snotty, but so far today, I'm not. I don't have it yet. Notice I say yet.

Well, you've got some great things for us to talk about, which I absolutely love. Caitlin sent me a bunch of stuff a few days ago. So right out of the box, we have so much to cover today. What's the big thing happening in the Niagara region? Come

Coming up, it is the solar eclipse event of 2024. Yeah, we're recording this in advance. This will be happening Monday of this week. So by the time you lovely listeners are hearing it, it will have already happened. But I just love the fact that Niagara Falls declared a preemptive state of emergency. Well, a lot of people, they're expecting what, 200,000 people?

I know, but I was like, is that really 200,000 people who want to like sit in lawn chairs and drink is now what we're calling a state of emergency? Like it felt like a joke when I saw the headlines. In the U.S., they were roundly making fun of us. So what does that mean? Perhaps the mayor or whoever of that area is like, listen, with that many people coming into the city, we don't have any place to put them. So all the hotel rooms are booked.

In fact, I saw a news piece the other day, a couple that had booked their room over eight months ago at a hotel there had been bumped off so that the hotel could make more money. They literally said, oh, due to extenuating circumstances, we are unable to honor this reservation, which I thought really sucked. And if I can figure out what hotel it was, we'll out them by the end of this podcast. But point being is that maybe they're thinking,

We don't have enough emergency services. We don't have enough anything in case something was to go catastrophically wrong, like a whole bunch of people burn out their retinas. Yeah. So that's the other thing that's funny about this is that because it's such a risk to personal safety for dumbass

dumb adults, but then kids who don't understand, most schools are going to be closed. They have a PA day. So here in Toronto, they declared like a PA day because they can't be liable for all those eyeballs. Like that's just not possible. And didn't they just do it like two days ago? Like...

They should have done it early enough that people could have made childcare plans. Well, I remember when I was still working on the morning show. So February, before that even, I think, it was discussed that they were like, we're probably going to make it a PA day. So maybe they only officially recently confirmed it. But most of my friends have had plans for this.

anyways, because they were kind of like, we don't try, even if they were at school, they didn't like trust what was going to happen at school to keep their kids' eyeballs safe. And at Will's daycare, you either pick the child up before two o'clock or you pick them up after 4.30 when the whole thing is done and have to keep all the little kids away from the windows and they have to cover all the windows so they don't try to look out at it.

So my class I teach, it's the last day of class. I teach 1030 to 130. You're not supposed to be looking at the sun between 2 and 4 p.m., which is when I drive home from London, Ontario to Toronto. Might I also mention that I drive through the region where a state of emergency has been declared. And even if I didn't take like that route, which would be like Highway 403, the other route will likely be jammed as well because of the

the 403. So I just said to like the Dean of the faculty, like my kids are talking, asking if there's class because of the eclipse, they've canceled school everywhere else. Like,

Can I host the last day of class online? I got a yes. So I am hosting class from exactly where I am sitting. Yeah, because otherwise then like then the I mean, I guess they're university students, so they're responsible for themselves. But someone's going to get drunk and burn out their retinas. Do you guys remember? I don't know that it was a total solar eclipse to the extent that this one is because this is a rarity. But do you remember when Trump was president? They had the footage of him looking directly. There's memes everywhere today. There's memes of him staring into the sun.

Everything bounces off that man. I know. It's true. He's Teflon. Teflon Don. And he looks very unusual. He's lost a lot of weight. So he's definitely doing one of the Mungero or Zempic drugs. So he's lost an incredible amount of weight in a very short period of time. And he kind of looks like...

There's a lot of skin going on. That's all I'll say. And he's browner than normal. Like he's tanning more. Well, he's in Florida a lot now. And his teeth are whiter, if that's possible. Listen, I'm glad the man's losing weight. Anyway, we were talking about him staring at the sun. Nothing happens to this man. Everything bounces off. Apparently, he eats McDonald's every day. He loves it so much. And he loves Coca-Cola. And he's just...

He's exactly what you would imagine. Do you remember when he invited the winning basketball team to the White House for a big dinner? It's like this huge deal that happens. He had all McDonald's. Yeah. And people were like, oh, this is so cheap. And I was like, yes, it is. But he would want this. This is what he would want. He really thought about what is the best thing I can give them. And it was McDonald's in much the same way that everyone was like, please, children, do not look at the sun. And he pointed right at it and looked. The best was that Melania was standing there right next to him being like, oh, dear.

He's looking at it. He's looking right at it right now on camera. Well, I remember in school when we used to rig up like these cardboard things that you would look into a box and then the box had a hole and there was like a mirror that you look. It was so fascinating what we used to do like in the 70s to prepare for things like this. And now the kids are, thank heavens, they're all getting the glasses that are handed out like,

Like by the hundreds of thousands, a company has made these glasses. But I don't think we will see any of it in Alberta. Am I correct in saying that, Caitlin? No, you won't see any. Yeah. So it's just the Eastern. It's just Eastern Canada, Eastern US. And they were giving out a ton of those glasses too at the little Easter parade that I took Will to last weekend. And so they have all the police are there, fire services, ambulance. And so they're giving them all out. And then don't you... I knew this was going to happen. I was like, some jerk is going to try to sell these on Facebook Marketplace. Yeah.

And sure enough, the last week, the local Facebook marketplace for various groups in the east end of the city, it's all people who... I watched them grab like 20 pairs. And I was like, oh, I guess they're getting them for the office. And then I realized, no, they're selling them. And now they're selling them all. But also...

Do we have overcast skies when this happens? This is what I want to know. I don't know. Like, did I cancel the last day of class for no reason? We'll have to, we'll regroup. We're moving on. We're now going to talk about divorce rings. So apparently this is a thing. If you're getting divorced, you get your spouse, ex-spouse, a divorce ring, or do you buy it for yourself, Caitlin? What's the deal on this?

You turn your engagement ring and your wedding ring into a new ring instead of giving it back. Because some people are like, oh, you should give it back. I'm like, I don't think so. No one's giving back their rings at that point. It's not like they called off an engagement. It's like you got married, you went through with it, and now you're getting a divorce. So Emily Ratajkowski, who is a very famous, beautiful model who also has a book,

and she has a podcast as well. And I guess this sort of came out, I think in an episode of the podcast and then Vogue magazine interviewed her about it and said that she calls it her divorce ring. So it's like repurposing this, you know, giant diamond she has. Cause she's not going to just stop wearing it, but it would feel weird to keep wearing your ring.

engagement and wedding rings after you were already divorced, but you'd be like, it's perfectly good diamond. Well, I repurposed my mom's wedding ring and her engagement ring and my grandma's and I made myself just my own ring. This ring that I wear all the time because I'm thinking I'm not going to wait around for someone to give me something, but I revamped it. Like I didn't wear mom's, but that's exactly what I did. I took it to a lovely jeweler named Andrea Blaze. Shout out to Andrea. She's so talented. And

And yeah, I made myself a ring because I ain't going to wait around for someone to give me something. And I wear it on my wedding finger because it is a very great thing when you're traveling, when you're alone, to have a ring on it. And not that anyone's going to approach me and ask me out. You don't know that. It's very doubtful. But I have a confidence. Cynthia Loyce was visiting at my house. She went home yesterday and she got me watching Love is Blind. Jesus Christ. Yeah.

Season six. Things I did not expect to hear today. Well, the reason I'm bringing this up is because it has everything to do with this ring. So the couples that didn't get married, they obviously, someone proposed to them in the pods. They broke up by the time it came up to the wedding day or the wedding happened. And then they said, no, I can't even imagine. But what do you want after six weeks? Jesus, folks, give it a break. Think this through. But these girls are keeping their rings.

So do you think that's part of what they're promised when they sign up for the show? Listen, you get to keep a $6,000 ring. Yeah. They probably have a deal with a jeweler actually because I think that's the way it happens for The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. I think that they have a partnership with jewelers and so they give them the ring that they ultimately propose with for free. So it's not like the person who proposes to them is out money. It's just part of production.

Now, did you have something to do with picking out your ring with Kyle? No, I had no idea. I was so surprised. I'd never thought about it. I'd never thought about rings. I honestly had never thought about weddings.

Like until I got together with Kyle, I was kind of, you know, jury was still out on getting married at all. So yeah. And he proposed, we'd been together for a while, but it was earlier than I thought. I guess he would like, we had never really talked about it. The two of us getting married. No, he just, he fully surprised me and I was thrilled. Well, I love that. I mean, that's very brave of him to go out and pick out a ring and

So there was never any little hints like, do you like a pear diamond? Do you like? Okay. Never a discussion whatsoever. But he went to a really good jeweler who he had like a good relationship with. And so they kind of like led him down the right path and they were pretty tasteful. And he just went with like a classic, you know, and if you want to change something, you can. I mean, I'm all for if someone proposes to you with a ring that you wind up not liking the style of, you can always have it adjusted. So if you and Kyle hypothetically,

You got engaged. You didn't end up getting married. A year went by. Would you have kept that ring or would you have given it back to Kyle? I think I would have given it back. If you don't even make it to the wedding, like if you call it the engagement, I think I would give it back. If you go through with the wedding and you get married and then you get divorced, then I'm keeping it. Okay. All right.

I feel. The next topic, I'm covering these topics today, folks. Jan's rapid fire. No, but I also have heavy shit to put on everybody as we go out of this particular episode. Living in a garage is now for the super rich. Once upon a time, broke college kids were the only garage dwelling people. I myself, as broke as I've ever been, have never lived in a garage.

My friend in Toronto, shout out G, I think for quite a long time, he lived in his garage and rented out his house, which I thought was very smart, except he was, I think he was doing it illegally because it didn't have plumbing. So I'm not sure what happened in that department, but men have it much easier than women. They don't have periods. They can probably shit anywhere. They can pee anywhere, anywhere.

It's not a big deal for guys. It's a little bigger of a deal for women. So talk to me about this. This is a real estate developer in Manhattan. He's turned a parking structure into... They're going to turn this into a condo eventually. And I guess it's because it's in this prime location. And so people are scooping up units. I don't know how much each unit goes for, but the grand total project value so far is like $100 million. Right.

So they buy the unit, then there's renovations to come, obviously. But the part that I loved is that they're maintaining the facade to look like a garage.

So when you walk by, it won't scream residential building. And they said privacy is important to celebrities. And so they believe they're trying to lure in celebrities who don't want paparazzi or people to know where they live and don't want the buildings to be identifiable. But then I feel like saying, if you're a celebrity who winds up moving into the garage building, won't everyone just know that? I think it's a marketing tactic. But Taylor Swift has

if you go to Manhattan, people know where Taylor Swift's Tribeca Loft is. Now, she also owns a townhouse and then another property in New York, so no one knows where she is exactly. But there are paparazzi and fans 24-7 parked outside of this Tribeca Loft waiting to see her.

Like you can just see it. They're just sitting across the street hoping that they see her come in or out of the building, whether she's in the U.S., in New York or not. I have a bit of my own Taylor Swift news. Tell us. So yesterday, a journalist published Taylor Swift's iPod, like her 18-year-old music jams. Her playlist? Like her playlist.

And little old Jani Arden was on there with Insensitive. Yes. I love that. 18-year-old Taylor Swift was listening to Insensitive. It's totally for reals. So I went on. I've been sent the article about 15 times. They've published her playlist. And yeah, there's really cool music on there. She was listening to some great jams. I just found it. We'll include it in the show notes. Yeah. I'm very into this. This tells me that we're going to get her on the podcast. Let's put...

there. This tells me I am. I'm saying this out loud because it could happen. Well, I just thought it was really cool. And, you know, Taylor Swift, kudos to you. I think we all know where it started. I didn't write insensitive. Just FYI. And Laurie is a Calgary writer. And it's a great song. It was it was great on her demo when Ann wrote it. And anyway, that was very cool. So that was my I love that. That was my big news.

I went to a really cool event here in Toronto on Friday that now I'm like, I do. I think the host of this would be also an excellent guest on the show. And I also think that Jan would make an excellent guest on his podcast. And it's called Song Exploder. And I'm not sure if you're familiar with this. It's a podcast as well as a series on Netflix.

And what it does is it breaks down a hit song, a specific song. And it goes into all the details and the host is a trained musician. And so he has a great ear for all this stuff. And they'll talk to the artists and the producers and the writers and all this.

But he came in, lives in the U.S., and he came into Toronto to host this event with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra called Symphony Exploder. Oh. He talks to the conductor of that. Well, the music director and conductor of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. And they break down a specific piece, an orchestra, really. That'd be so cool. It was the Rite of Spring.

And it's a famous piece. If you heard it, you would kind of go like, oh, yeah. And it was really groundbreaking at the time. And it's inspired the soundtrack for a lot of movies like Star Wars. And if you listen to The Shining, you'll hear pieces of that.

And so he does the interview with the conductor and they break it down. You hear certain parts of the orchestra play certain pieces and they talk about the meaning. They talk about the story that's being told with it. You know, that was a ballet at the time. And it was quite a controversial piece of classical music. People walked out of it the first time that it played. And it was really,

really, really cool. And it was so well done. And it makes you appreciate classical music in a different way entirely than I think you normally would. I don't listen to classical music all the time. I do like it. I'm not educated in it. I listen to a lot of classical music. So you would love this. And I just think it's such a

such a cool thing. And I thought to myself, he would be so fun to talk to. And also, he would be so fun to have you on an episode of his podcast to break down, you know, insensitive or any, you know, good mother or whatever. Like, I was like, that would be so fun. He's just, he's very charming and funny. And so is the conductor of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. So shout out to them. It's like, it's great. I'm so intrigued by an artist's process, like a creator's process, and

I just remember loving To Kill a Mockingbird so much, that book. Yes. And Harper Lee really didn't speak about it very much at all. Like she was so...

Everyone wanted to talk to her about it. And it must be kind of weird when an author or a music writer just has like that one thing because Harper Lee had to kill a mockingbird. And then you look at artists, you know, writers like Jackie Collins or John Steinbeck or Hemingway, like Dickens and Jane Austen, they had so many books, but to have one thing.

So to couple that whole premise, but being a one hit wonder or a one book wonder or like I wonder back in the day, like in the 16, 17 hundreds, if you had composers that had one symphonic success and then that was that. I mean, I would think there has to be, there would have to be one hit wonders for classical as well. I told you I was on one hit wonders once. Hey, I was watching it. Yeah.

I was in the States watching TV. I'd done some show down there and probably a really shitty bar. And One Hit Wonders came on. It was called One Hit Wonders. And my video was on there with Insensitive. Oh, my gosh. That was in like the late 90s. So in the late 90s, they'd already written me off. They're like, oh, God, get rid of her. Where is she now? That's crazy. I don't know if the show, it must have been called One Hit Wonders. I saw that and it was a breakdown of Vanessa Carlton's

you know, making my way. Oh, the heck's that called? A hundred miles or something like that. We're going to get sued. But yeah. So, I mean, I remember watching that and I thought it was fascinating because they interview her. She talks a lot about the song, what it did for her. So it was fairly recent because it was during the pandemic and she was living with her parents. She had moved back in with her parents during the pandemic. And yeah,

She was a very interesting interview and I just thought it was really cool that she was like talking about the song and I just, it was, it was fascinating. Most people would kill to have one hit. Most musicians would kill for one hit. It didn't bother me at all. I was quite like, you know, you've made it when, which it was sort of the antithesis to sitting in the hotel room and kind of feeling sorry for myself. I was just like, oh, cool. Yeah.

And Cynthia was also telling me, we had some great conversations, but she read me a little piece of this op-ed by Patti Smith. Patti Smith is like, because the night belongs to lovers because the night, I mean, she was so amazing, the velvet underground and all these amazing people that she hung out with. And in the eighties, she had, you know, these journalists writing about her, like, where is she now? She's all but disappeared. And she's like, dude,

I was a mother. Just because you don't see what I'm doing publicly does not mean that I'm making, creating, doing, thinking, being. And I loved her take on the amount of work she'd done and the books she'd work on and the poetry and the collaborations. And it wasn't on pop fucking radio. Who cares? I know. It's true. And I just said to Cynthia, God, isn't that just it? Because I must be called irrelevant twice a day.

on socials which to me is I've seen it happen and I'm like you're writing to this person you're writing to this person because you care about what they think enough to write to them so your entire argument is like flawed from the jump it's just wild the last week has been the best because of our guest Nahid Nenshi last week people just really crawl out of their basements for that they

they're allowed to have an opinion about anyone, about any candidate or anything politically. I'm not going to go down that road, but it doesn't even bother me. I'm like, you're engaged. If you're taking the time to listen to what he has to say, it's so about everyone. And I love that whole thing, the point that he made about this is the time to stand up.

and really do something that you're passionate about and, you know, speak your mind. And, and so if those people are speaking their mind and doing their thing, listen, I'm past the point of trying to talk anybody into anything because there is a group of people. It,

It wouldn't matter if Jesus Christ was standing in front of them from the heavens above. There's nothing you can do to convince people to think, and Trump is a perfect example of that, of what he gets away with, the things he does, how he disparages other people, his constant racist overtones, his complete lack of knowledge about anything, and yet he's got half of the country

running behind him, cheering him on. So I don't know how we got to talking about that, but yes, my irrelevance is discussed constantly. But I said to Cynthia, thank you so much for reading that to me because I needed to remind myself of the work that we all do

That people don't see it. They don't hear it. It may not be on the radio all the time, but like the three of us, we don't stop. We're engaged. We're meeting people. We're exploring new roads and new opportunities in our lives. And that ain't always going to be on Facebook. Well, and I also, I think that there is a misconception that people who work in the public eye are

that they necessarily want that and that they cultivate it with every fiber of their being every day that that's their defining quality. And if you happen to know or be friends with public figures or work with them ever, you know that that's not the case. It's very much a misconception that's held by people who are viewing things externally. And so when someone is quiet to them or doesn't pop up

in their algorithm anymore. They're like, oh, what are they even doing? And like, I remember getting, like hearing that sometimes when I worked in radio and there would be some people who, when you told them that you worked in radio, they kind of relished and like, well, I don't listen to radio. I don't really listen to radio anymore. I'm like, okay. Yeah. Cool. Cool.

You're poorly socialized for that. Like, I don't know what to tell you, but you need some social skills. I don't know. Maybe your parents should have taught you a little bit better, but that's an antisocial response. And that's how I feel when I see people talking, just like yelling at a stranger on the internet. I'm like, you have terrible social skills. People probably don't like you. Like, I'm sorry, but you're just terribly antisocial. I almost wanted to keep track. I like, I really wanted to keep track of like the grammar and spelling mistakes of this herd of people. I was like,

Wow. There's one thing I'm seeing in common here. It just reads as largely antisocial to me. And so I don't... I'm like, okay, I don't know. It doesn't really register. But the... You should redo insensitive to be irrelevant. You could rewrite it. It could be a 2024. Well, don't write me and tell me how irrelevant I am. Because...

Whatever your theory is about me, you are disproving yourself. You have to figure out if you've taken the time to write me to say, who are you anyway? Okay, well, I didn't say I was anybody. Girl, you know, though. You're writing to me. You know. You do know. Yeah.

Wasn't it Alanis who did a ironic on Jimmy Fallon? We needed a new version. That'd be so funny. Jimmy Fallon, if you need me on your show, just let me know. Let's get the Jan writers together for that. Relevant. Relevant.

Okay, moving on. And I love this story. Forget Ozempic, okay? Just forget Ozempic. But if you need it, do it. Like I'm telling you, I have nothing against it. Science is amazing and it's changing people's lives or Monjero, whatever you want to do. This is cool though, oat-zempic. So that is the phrase being used for a new trend in which dieters stuff themselves with oatmeal in order to drop some pounds. I don't know if you've heard of it.

Not a good feeling to stuff yourself. So go ahead, Caitlin, explain this little ditty. So I guess they soak a bunch of oats in overnight oats, overnight oats kind of, but it's like water and lime juice. Oh,

Oh, Jesus. And so people are like, oh, I've shed 40 pounds in two months. I'm like, yeah, because you're living off of oats and water. You're on like the Dust Bowl diet. Like this is craziness. So, I mean, obviously anything extreme is going to have extreme results. So I do believe some extreme results are being experienced. And...

TikTok has decided to run with this one because that is where logical thinking goes to die these days in many ways. And so people are talking about it. But like, I mean, if you want to add a little like a quarter cup of oats to your smoothie or something, it does help you kind of like feel fuller. Oats are fantastic. But to stuff your, to put lime on it,

That would make me throw up. That would be my version. Why can't we just be sensible? Like, why can't we just be sensible? People can't. They just, they can't. They're just like, I want something extreme. Like they love it. They just love extremes right now. Well, that sounds very unappealing to me. And I do, and I love my overnight oats. Like I love throwing in a bit of cinnamon and some walnuts. I'm trying to eat walnuts every day.

I am trying to do things that make me feel energized and good. And please stop worrying about

You know, just stop worrying about stuff that you don't need to worry about. When you're on your deathbed, you're not going to say, I really wish I would have lost 22 pounds. Do you not think too sometimes when people imagine themselves losing weight or looking a different way that their mental image of it includes a bunch of other stuff in their life going right? Like a beer commercial, like happiness. Yeah.

It's like, this is what's holding me back. And if I had that, and then I think what happens to a lot of people who've lost weight is that I'm like, I have friends where this has happened where they're like, Oh, I just am lighter. My dress is a different number, but like all the other stuff I thought was going to happen where like, I don't know what, I think you've just imagined like this perfect thing. And then all this other stuff will open up and you're like, you know, you were just eating oats for a really long time.

and maybe feeling a little bit bloated now as a result. I'm not going to be doing that. I'll tell you right now. I think you are just as easily as served. We are not dietitians on the Jan Arden podcast, folks. Caitlin and I and Sarah, none of us know anything except that I will say Caitlin Post will post

did lose a bit of weight and she did Noom, N-O-O-M. It is a psychological approach. So there's little, it's an app. And Caitlin would have to listen to little stories today about why did you eat those four Oreos before you went to sleep? Like you didn't really need to do that. It was a lot of like also to thinking about stress

stuff that I never really considered, which was like caloric density. So, you know, foods that you could eat a lot of throughout the day and that were like good for you would frequently have a lot of water. And so we're talking a lot about fruits and vegetables and then reducing things that are more calorically dense and

And I know that some people didn't like Noom, but I also think that it responds like with your daily amount of calories you should have based on your goals. So if you say, I want to lose 20 pounds in the next six weeks because I'm going to a wedding, then it's going to give you a really extreme output. So you are driving the bus on this one. So I gave myself a really long period of time to lose what I think was a fairly standard amount of postpartum weight. And it was great.

whittled it down. It's been easy to keep off again for me. I also exercise a bit like I do enjoy running. So I bet you it changed the way you thought about because you're inputting calories and what you ate. And at the end of the day on Noom, it gives you a brief overview. I think it's great. Accountability is a great place to start.

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This is a really weird thing to switch into, but I cannot wait till next week to talk about this. It's so not funny. So today I have three dogs with me. I'm babysitting my friend's dogs. These are friends of mine that are in their late 50s and early 60s. And about a month ago, my friend's husband's parents...

announced they didn't want to be here anymore. They're 92 and 93, and that they were going to do MAID, medically assisted assistance in death, medical assistance in death, which we have in Canada. Thank God. It's an amazing program, and it's very vital to dignity in this world. So anyway, they're 92, 93. My friend's husband's mother has dementia.

Uh, his father who is still quite clear is, you know, had litany of health problems. He's in a wheelchair. He's as clear as a bell, but he's having more and more trouble looking after his wife. Uh, you know, they're in a condo where it's assisted living. They go down the elevator for meals and stuff, but it was getting to the point where he could barely even get down there. He broke his hip last year and he and his wife by now, by the time you hear this, they both be gone. I went over there today and the sons were there and their partners and, and it was, uh,

It was really, they were so filled with joy. They're so excited about their journey. And she says, well, I hope I don't go down there. And she's pointing at the floor. And I said, well, if you do end up down there, say hi to my dad. And you know, everyone was laughing a little bit. And it was very somber when I walked into the room because I was supposed to go over and pick the dogs up like at noon. She said, just come and pick the dogs up because I want them to, they love seeing the dogs and it's really great.

Anyway, I tried to keep it really lighthearted. I said, what an adventure you're going on. What an adventure together. And the room just lightened up. I just thought, I'm not going to be this person. Damn the torpedoes. I don't care what his brothers think of me or any of that. I just said, wow, what an adventure. It's going to be really cool. And this is so great that you guys have this opportunity. And she said, I've had a good life. And anyway, so two doctors would have showed up, two nurses, all

All their family was in the living room. They had a lunch kind of laid out. They took them out for a dinner last night. They had a big family dinner and everyone had a really beautiful meal and they laughed and talked about things. And they asked them again, are you sure you want assistance in your death today? Because right to the last second, you can change your mind. So off they went. And it felt pretty strange leaving the building with the dogs. But I...

had a real sense of peacefulness in my heart that at 92 and 93, I,

you can speak for yourself in a way that's really important because God only knows what happens. Like anything can happen. We don't know how we're going to go out. And listen, I've seen more people in nursing homes that are in such a state of disrepair, sorrow, no one visiting them, not knowing where they are or anything, and just waiting for the grim reaper to finally come and end their physical body because their mental game ended there.

before. So we were talking about it when they were walking me out to the car. I said, I hope I have the mental fortitude and my wits about me that I can make a choice like this for myself. It was pretty cool. I remember this is years before MADE came into legalization, but my aunt and my uncle, she's a vet and they always had a lot of dogs around. They train dogs to do agility courses and they're just huge animal lovers. They actually live out on Vancouver Island and

And I remember them talking about how they felt like when you put a dog down, that it was actually quite humane. Like a lot of the families made the decision over a course of months because, you know, the dog's health was deteriorating. They knew it wasn't going to get any worse. They were in pain, weren't eating anymore. They couldn't see.

Like, yeah. It was a lot of discomfort. It was a lot of medications. And they just, you know, eventually the owners would make the difficult decision that they had to put the dog down. And so they always referred to the concoction that you would give the dog as the blue goo. So I guess it was, I guess in some way it was like at some point in time, blue. And I remember them both saying...

Like we, we hope that if something really bad happens to us. That we can have the blue goo. That we want to have the blue goo, please. Like, and that was very much their attitude. And I guess she's a vet. So she, she'd put a lot of dogs down probably in her time as having this practice and was always sort of a topic because my grandmother had pretty severe dementia and my grandfather had physical health issues. And so it came up a lot with the family where we were discussing, you know, the blue goo, so to speak. Well,

Well, I think because it's become kind of acceptable now that people really are understanding the importance of having a choice with your body and not leaving it up to nature. Because nature can be cruel and these things can go on and on and on and on. I felt very fortunate that my mom went quite rapidly. Like she didn't. They heard the blue goo chat. They were like, no. Good girl. Good girl. Sit.

You got to be good. They're just bored with me talking. But anyway, yeah, my mom was very long and drawn out to a certain degree with her disease, but she seemed happy and everything like that. I don't think that would have been my mom's jam. I think it would have been my dad's. It never came up, you know. I don't think it was available to them. My dad's been gone eight years. I think that discussion, that conversation around having assistance in death has much changed my

But they both had to go through a very, very long process of interviews. For sure. Like they had to just say, and they wanted to do it together. And that's the part that just makes my heart like squeeze in a million times over. Like when I was there, they were three hours away from the nurses and doctors showing up to end their lives. They had a huge lunch on the counter. They were sitting, talking and laughing and

and so relieved to be going. And I'm not used to even thinking of leaving here in terms of gratitude. The last thing Catherine said to me when I was going out the door, she said, I've had such a great life. I've had such a great life.

And they don't want a funeral. They've said goodbye to everybody. They've done their thing. And when I gave her a hug, she leans and she says to me, next time we do this, we're not telling people so soon. And I said, yeah, you got to keep these things under wrap. I know. I know. But I love the next time we do this. Yeah. The next go around. And she goes, I'll be there. I'll be in the stars. I said, yes, you will. It was really...

I just learned a lot today. It kind of lifted my humanity to watch, you know, obviously the family's distraught, I felt, for the boys. And, you know, these are men in their 60s. But it doesn't matter how it comes, whether...

it's not a car accident. There's something so kind of sublime about it. There's nothing violent or the unknown. You're sitting in the living room of their condo and then the people show up and it's very quiet and they're all going to be sitting in the living room waiting and then they'll get to say goodbye and be able to see them, which I think is really important. Were there less requests, like their favorite, any of their favorite things around that you picked up on? I think...

My friend said that her mother-in-law was trying to give everybody her cashmere sweaters. Every I is dotted, every T is crossed. It's very civilized. It seems very civilized for the people who are obviously making this decision over a long period of time.

And, but you know what, because I'm at such a different stage of life, it's one of those things where I'm happy that the option is there for the people who want it, but it gives me anxiety. It gives me like secondhand anxiety because- Tell me why. Because it's almost like, you know, the anticipation of knowing that this date is coming, right? And the second that there's a date set,

I would imagine that for everyone in their life, like my mental countdown, just the way I'm programmed would sort of begin. So if someone said to me, you know, your, your grandparent or your family member has chosen down their own life and they're really confident about it and everything's positive, but it's going to happen two weeks from now. I don't think I could sleep for two weeks. I would be a huss. It's been terrible. Yeah. For my friend and her husband. Mm hmm.

It's kind of been on your mind too, even for the last week. It has been on my mind a lot just through association. And I've met the in-laws a few times. They're lovely. It seems otherworldly because it's just not part of our everyday conversation. In our culture in particular,

It is so far away from us. And people think if they never talk about it, and we've talked about this on the show before, the whole idea of doing a will. People feel like if I do a will, then I'm going to die. Sarah is covering her face because she doesn't have a fucking will. Why don't you have a will? You're 37 years old. This time it's because Caitlin didn't send the link. That's why. I'm just blaming it on anyone now.

Okay. Well, that's okay. It's not like it's because you have a whole bunch of money, but you do want to have a say in if you are gravely injured, do you want someone to keep you alive? You have to have a living will as well. Yes. Yes. I can see all that. My friends are at the point now where they're running around my goddamn house putting green and blue and red stickers on shit. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm a blue, I'm red, I'm green. And we laugh, but I... It's a good thing you have so many garden gnomes to go around. I got lots of garden gnomes and everyone's getting one of those bossam heads. Where are they? We can't see them. There they are. What is that? It's a wall of heads. It's an English guy named Bossam, B-O-S-S-O-M.

And he does these little, I wish I could make it bigger for you, but I had one from my grandmother and people are like, oh, what's that? I'm like, oh, when my grandma died, I got this head. I was never allowed to play with it when I was a kid. Now, every birthday, every Christmas, I get a Basam head. Anywho. For anyone who's not on YouTube.

It looks kind of like there's a voodoo vibe to it. Now I've got cowboys. I've got Dickens characters. There's some animals. There's pirates with parrots. There's all kinds. This guy was a really interesting artist, and he had an amazing body of work. I don't think there's any end. I'm going to run out of wall. A question came up in my mind about this end-of-life discussion, if I may ask you both. Did you overhear any discussion about...

How they wanted to be perceived like in signs after. Nope, I don't think anyone said that. Like I said, my friend's mother-in-law said, I'll be in the stars. And the room was very heavy. And like I said, I went in there, guns a blaring, and I just thought, I am going to be the person kicking the elephant out the door. And I said...

Soon as I walked in the door with Poppy to collect their dogs, I said, boy, you guys are going on an adventure, hey? Because I wanted to change something. I wanted to go in and give them a break. Like I said, I'm not a relative. I don't have a dog in the hunt here. I just was like, I went in with a lot of joy and positivity. I was big and bold and loud. Like you know with your mom, how she was like, oh, I'll be in the animals. I don't know if she heard me, but I said, mom, just come bring the deer. And oh,

And I have had nothing but wildlife in this yard ever since she's gone. But listen, whatever your thing is, and I don't want this to be an upsetting podcast for anybody. I want you to know how much joy and positivity was in that room.

And yeah, there's sadness because saying goodbye to anybody at any time is always kind of sad. But anyway, we're not going to end this podcast with this. I want to spend the last couple of minutes just talking about, this is so random. We're flipping all over the place today. But when Caitlin sent me this article, I had to read it about four times and it was about people back in

back in the freaking day, used to invest in gold. Yes, they did. Bitcoin kind of got away from me a little bit. I'm like, I'm not going there. However, I have many friends that have made a fortune with Bitcoin. Bitcoin's back too. It dropped and now it's like rebounded. If you still have Bitcoin, I do. Just hang on to it. Don't let go. Okay. Anyway, I'm a little leery of it. So instead of gold, you know, the good old tried and true gold and silver, handbags,

are something that they are encouraging people to invest their money in. Yeah. And it's like when they walk out, like, is it a Birkin bag, Caitlin, that when you walk out of the store, it's actually worth more money than when you bought it 10 minutes before? Yeah. Birkin specifically. Birkin's like depending on how difficult they are to get in terms of the material they're made of or the color or whatever.

they're very, they're rare. They're hard to get on. There's a wait list to get a brand new one, vintage ones sell for a fortune. And it's kind of similar to like Rolex watches or certain types of, you know, very, very high end watches that they just, the supply is,

is controlled so that it can't keep up with demand to create this high demand high value item so yeah Birkin bags have gone up so much in value and the same can be said of many purses everything is more expensive so why wouldn't it apply to bags but like Chanel bags same thing certain types well when you drive your car off the lot I know and it's still such a purposeful thing meanwhile if you bought a you know if you bought a Birkin bag for say 10 grand however many years ago

Oh, Jan, now you can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on some of these collectors' Birkins. I feel bad about my mountain equipment co-op pouch that I still use. You know, I was just, you're reading my mind. I was going to say, so my roots bag, what's that worth now? It has a lot of sentimental value. Yeah.

I've bought one expensive purse my whole life. And like when I say my level of expensive, like- How much did you spend? Like $130. $130. And that was, were you in winter? It's like, where the hell did you go? It was like the Kate Spade outlet in Niagara. The most I've ever spent on a bag. And it was a canvas. It's a Gucci, a little like a postal thing. And I think this was years ago and it was 1200. I felt sick.

For two weeks. But ask me about my microphone. Yeah. I bet your microphone was what, 300 bucks? No, this one's like, this one was a gift from the ex-boyfriend. Thank you to the ex-boyfriend. But this is like 500 bucks. You bought me a nice microphone. This better not have been $500. It's a little bit less. It's a little bit less. Well, I'm very grateful for this. And that was very kind of you. So am I. And the sidebar to the story as well, and Caitlin, I think you and I were talking about this, is that Drake...

has like a basically a safe room filled with purses for the woman he's going to marry someday. All these designer purses. Yeah, it seems like a mentally unwell thing to do in my personal opinion. I'm no psychiatrist, but I don't know about doing that. I don't love it. I don't love it in many ways.

because it's sort of this like reward system for this imaginary idea of a woman that may or may not come along. Like, I do think there's like an objectification situation happening to a certain extent there. But I digress. He does have quite the collection. He's got a lot of money. I mean, so he can afford it. He can lock up these Birkins. And that's why Hermes says, I think it was something like one in three or one in four people who purchase a Birkin bag never use it.

They just immediately put it into storage because they know that it's worth so much more money. Well, you've been listening to the Jan Arden podcast today. And I'm here, of course, Sarah Burke is running the big board. She does all the edits and everything.

These girls are doing it all. I really don't do anything. I just show up. You see my head. I looked so terrible last week that I actually blew dry my hair today and put on glasses because sometimes I frighten myself. But it's not about how we look on this show. It's just not. Although we are on YouTube now. And this is what I'm starting to think about. But you know what? Obviously, my relevance is of no importance because...

Irrelevant. Irrelevant. Oh, I really should have known by the time. By the time I tweeted this. See, I'm telling you. I challenge you. Instead of the writers that you write music with, you need your Jan creators to write that one with you. Leah. Leah. We'll do it. Um,

We do have a couple of voice notes we can throw too. Oh, let's do it. Good way to finish it off. So Katie Ferris sent in this voice note in response to your conversation with Nahid Nenshi last week. What a fantastic interview. I've always been a fan of Jan. I've always been a fan of Nahid Nenshi. I wish I lived in Alberta just so I could work for his campaign and vote for him.

Anyway, wonderful, wonderful interview with him. I'm always impressed every time I hear him speak.

Thank you so much for sharing it. Be well, everybody. And here is Melanie from Niagara. Wonder if she's watching the eclipse tomorrow. Hi there. It's Melanie from Niagara. It's Saturday morning. The sun is shining and I've been out in the garden. The garden has made me happy, smiling to see the daffodils and cutting back my bushes and my roses, deadheading the hydrangeas. And you three wonderful women have made me happy.

I listen to you. You fill my heart. You are real women. Caitlin, I miss you on Chum FM in the mornings. I love to hear Will or his chatter in the background. Anyway, you have a great weekend. And Caitlin, I hope your 41st birthday is absolutely amazing.

Take care. And Tara, she had so much to say. There's two of them here. Hi, Jerem. My name is Tara and I'm from St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador. And I am about 10 days away from turning 39. And this happened to me when I was 18. And I've been holding it in my heart for a very long time.

And I've been listening to your podcast and contemplating leaving a voicemail. And I guess tonight's the night I decided to do it. So basically, you know, I don't want to sound hokey or over the top, and I'm sure you've heard this all before, but your music really spoke to me and I find your songs very beautiful and I love the way that you write anything. I read everything that you write, basically. I very much appreciate your talents. And really, your music is what got me into my own music, my songwriting and

Yeah, you've just inspired me a lot in my life. So the Women's Network, back when I was 18, whatever the hell year that was, I'm not good at math, had a contest to meet you. And I applied every single day. But I guess the contest was like Alberta based. And I was 18 and I could vote. So I thought I'm age of majority, you know, so I applied for it every single day.

I won, which is very exciting. So it's Tara from Newfoundland again, part two. So anyway, I won the contest. Very exciting. Women's network called me. They're like, you know, super excited to tell me the news. And, um, when I told them my age, they sort of paused and I could tell that the woman on the phone was having like a moment of panic. And she was like, um,

I'm gonna have to check with legal and I'll give you a call back so my mom who's passed away since she was very like now Tara don't get your hopes up like she could tell right away but I was like no it'll be fine anyway inevitably obviously they called back and were like sorry you can't go on the on the trip and we apologize but my little 18 year old self was devastated

And I've been to see you a bunch of times since. And I'm going to see you and Rick Mercer when you guys come here. And I'm very happy about that. But I was so distraught that my mother had to sort of give me like a little life lesson. Like after about, I guess a couple of days of sort of like lying in my room, just totally devastated and being super dramatic. She came in and she was like rubbing my back. And she was like, listen, sometimes life just disappoints you. But you got to like let it go.

you just got to be like, this is a lesson and we move on.

whatever lesson it was. Anyway, obviously, it's not the biggest of deals, but I did almost meet you once. And I tell that story all the time, as you can imagine. So I love you, Jan. And I love the podcast. And I'm grateful for the chance to leave a voicemail. Thank you. Tara was unloading it all. Thank you, Tara. Thank you for leaving us voice notes. We appreciate it more than you know, you can subscribe to our channel, you can find us on all your favorite places where you get your podcasts.

And yeah, we appreciate it. And you can rate us. It's five stars, but give us eight. Intact is going to be back with us. We're very excited to have our partners, the Intact Insurance folks. And we're going to have lots more to talk about with them and all the ways that Intact can help you. And next week, we have Kate Bowler coming.

Tell us a little bit about Kate. Caitlin, Kate has sent me one of her books before. She is an amazing writer. She's one of those people that inspires every single human being around her.

to feel more positive. Kate is a professional uplifter, but you tell people what she really does. So she's a university professor. She's originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Now she's a speaker. She's got a podcast. She's fantastic. She started writing a lot about toxic positivity when she was diagnosed with cancer. She is currently cancer-free, you know, against the odds, so to speak.

And I guess in her experience with people kind of saying a lot of like unhelpful, toxically positive things to her when she was feeling pretty down and out, she decided that she was going to write about it and her books and her speeches and just her presence on social, her appearances on shows. I mean, everything is just it's funny because she's obviously out to be uplifting, but

in a way that feels very palatable and real and like accepting of the fact that like, like you always say this, Jan, like it's hard to be a person. And she always says similar things. Like it's just, it's hard. Life is hard. And she said that people would always say to her, you know, well, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. And she's like, I like to think of it as whatever doesn't kill you is probably just going to try again tomorrow. Everything happens for a reason. I know. I'm like, that's not always true actually. So,

She's a realist. She'll be our special guest next week. We are so, so thrilled to speak with her. Kate, we'll see you soon. So that's all we have for this week. And that was a lot. We unloaded a lot. Go get your Birkin purse and get your will done. I'm on it. We'll see you next week, guys. Thanks so much for listening. Toodly-doo. This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.