213: Court Date, Yoga Pants, and a Terrible Plan

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Two young boys in an American town riding their bikes to school and Little League practice. Over the years, the boys became fast friends, united in their love for stories where things would go horribly wrong. Pour yourself a strong beverage and buckle up. You're in the shallow end with Schnebly and Toth. You know, Jethro, words are a very fun, funny thing when you stop and think about it. Nancy and I were on our hike this morning and there's a guy in our neighborhood who has one of the coolest first names of anyone I've ever met. His first name is Romeo. Oh, wow. Isn't that cool? That is really cool. That's almost as cool as people whose first names are nouns, like stone or ridge or clay. I like that. I also like first names that are of a title like Marshal, Dean, Admiral. Yeah. Anyway, so we's talking to Romeo C. This is on the backside, this is on the way back down the hill. And he's maybe 30 yards away and I say, good morning. And he goes, oh, I hate that expression. And I said, what? And he said, yeah, it sounds like morning. Like we're in, you know, we're in morning, we're mourning something. And I said, well, that's just because that's the letter U. You just need to take that letter U out and. And you're fine. And he said, I don't say good morning. I say Ohio. And I'm thinking, what the hell? So a Romeo, a guy named Romeo who greets you, says Ohio. So before I can even ask, Nancy looks at him and says, what? Why Ohio? And he said, well, because My wife is Japanese, and all of us in the house speak Japanese. And that's how you say Japanese. Good morning. In Japanese, you say Ohio. Oh, isn't that interesting? I did not know that. So, Ohio, Jethro, Or I guess it's afternoon for you. Ohio. I should have looked up good afternoon in Japanese. Cat and I are working very hard to include the word ahoy in. In our greeting. Okay. Vocabulary. I like it. Did you know. I think. Did we talk about this? We talked about this on box. That Alexander Graham Bell, when he invented the telephone, he lobbied for that to be the first thing you said instead of hello. It was. He said ahoy. It should be ahoy. I like that. I'm gonna. I'm just gonna start answering the phone that way from now on. Yeah. Ahoy. Ahoy. Oh, I dig that. That's really cool. Yeah. Especially if your name is Admiral. Right. Then it would be perfectly fitting indeed. And particularly with you two being on the east coast so close to water and all. It's. It's almost a. It's almost a crime not to. We're. We're. We're. We're pretty much seafaring folk. As close as it gets. Are you. Are you going first today? Yeah. And you sent me a story this week, and it made me immediately suspicious of civilization. So I'm going to dig into it here. Thanks for sending it away. I was. I almost kept it for myself and gave you the story I was going to do. But don't blame. But it seemed. It seemed fitting that. That you should do this. Well, I dug into it, and I got some. Some details here. And the reason I'm suspicious of Civ is not because anything catastrophic happened. No planes fell out of the sky. Fortunately, nobody was dangling on the wing. There wasn't a goose involved. By all accounts, the flights were uneventful. And that's the weird thing. That's the creepy part. Not to give anything away here, but. Yeah. According to Canadian authorities, a former Air Canada captain allegedly spent nearly 17 years of flying commercial aircraft without holding the specific airline transport pilot's license that's required for the position. I just. I just don't even know where to. Where to begin with that. The fact that you could do that. I first thought of the movie Catch Me if youf can with Leonardo DiCaprio, which was a great, great film. Yes, I know. That's exactly what I thought of, too. Yeah. And the fact that this. Well, go ahead. Well, investigators say he flew more than 900 flights over 17 years before a Certification review uncovered problems with his credentials. And if that's not weird enough, here's where it gets weirder. Air Canada, where the story gets weird. Air Canada says he passed the same recurrent training and flight evaluations as every other pilot. And the airline also stated that safety was never compromised because he did successfully demonstrate the skills required to fly the aircraft. So that, to me, was somewhat reassuring that there are things, There are policies in place where you essentially have to re. Qualify. Is it every six months? I'm not sure, but yeah, that sounds right. I think I. You essentially have to re. Re audition to keep your job. You do. And he passed each time? Yeah. I can't imagine the stress he must have felt more than maybe the average pilot. The story really isn't about somebody who couldn't fly a plane. It's about somebody who allegedly had a paperwork problem for 17 years. And that, of course, my friend, raises some fascinating questions. How much of modern society is actually held together by paperwork? Because the older I get, the more I realize that civilization basically is a giant filing cabin wearing a trench coat. I don't trust it. Every day we move through systems that exist largely because everybody agrees the paperwork says that they exist. And to a degree, that's sort of required for survival. Right. Because if we were constantly asking every person we ran into for their credentials and license to, you know, perform the task we are paying them to perform, life couldn't. We couldn't go on. That's true. But. But key things in civilization, based on everybody agreeing that the paperwork is in place. Money, for example. Sure. Insurance, property ownership, as you mentioned, professional certifications. Most of us have spent our entire lives trusting that somewhere in some office, a competent adult is verifying this stuff. And then a story like this comes, and you realize the competent adults are just other people who are trying to remember their passwords. I think what makes this story resonate with me, or in me, is that everyone has met somebody who accidentally became an authority figure. Every workplace has one. Maybe not a pilot, but the person who started by asking where the coffee machine was and somehow ended up managing 12 employees. That happened in my workplace, and nobody remembered how it happened, least of all them. One day they're struggling to operate the copier. Three years later, they're giving performance reviews. And at no point did anybody stop the process. Everybody just kind of kept nodding and pushing it forward. It's interesting because I'm realizing that, and I told you and Kat this weeks ago off the air, that I was dreading my colonoscopy really? Because I look to mine. But it occurred to me that even in my, you know, sedation addled state, it never occurred to me to say to this, to this doctor who I think the world of. Hey, you. You do have your accreditation, right? You. You are still licensed by the state of California to practice medicine. Can I see your paperwork before we, before we see here? Yeah, just, just, you know, it would make me feel better when I had mine. You know how they, whatever it is they give you, you're just kind of twilighted, you know. Propofol, I think. Is that what it is? Michael Jackson? Yeah. Yeah. It's. It's a little too delicious. Yeah. I was carrying on a full conversation with the guy doing it, and I don't remember any of it. Apparently I gave him restaurant recommendations in Sanibel Island. Yeah. How very kind of you to put somebody before your own needs. Yeah, that's me. I just want people to eat right. You're always thinking about the other person and where they're going to get a decent meal on the road. There was a guy I worked with one time, he became the office manager. He was like the computer expert, not the manager of the office, but he managed the computer and IT department because he successfully connected a printer one time. That was it. He just, wow. Hooked a printer up one afternoon. Pretty low bar. Yeah. And for the next seven years, people treated him like he personally invented the Internet. And that's how expertise works in a lot of organizations. Not through deliberate planning. It's just momentum. The same thing happens in families, too. Every family has one relative who somehow becomes responsible for the tech, for the technology. Yeah, yeah. And usually it happens because they're 12 years younger than everybody else and suddenly they're getting phone calls at midnight because somebody, you know, Meemaw's television is asking if it can update itself and they don't know what to do. Yeah, I can't get the remote to okay the upgrade. So air Canada guy, 17 years, essentially, without a pilot's license. That's right. That's right. And nobody thought, I guess, to your point, nobody thought to say, hey, you do have your paperwork up to date. And he was continuing to requalify, I think it was every six months. Yeah. And passing and passing and passing and over 900 flights with no incidents whatsoever. So really no reason to. To give the guy a second. A second glance. No, you're right. Commercial aviation has checklists for everything. Pilots, of course, you have checklists. And you have to be recertified mechanics. They have Checklists. People who inspect the mechanics have checklists. If an airline sandwich is missing a pickle, there's probably a document for that. So. Right. You know, there's a lot of framework in place. And somehow authorities alleged a credential discrepancy survived long enough for someone to graduate high school. That takes dedication. Sure. I can't even manage my gym membership. I'm still paying for that, and I haven't been since. Oh, God. I think Pandemic. Was that Barney's Weight Barn up in Maine is that was the right. They had a great monthly special going on where you. You pay to use the facility, and you could also take home all the hay you wanted to feed your livestock. God bless me, that was pretty great. So this lasted 17 years. And as I mentioned before, imagine the stress, because most people get nervous when Netflix asks us to re. Enter our password. Imagine carrying around a credential issue for almost two decades. I would think every email would feel personal. Every phone call from human resources would. Would set my. My nerves a jangle. Yeah, they're on to me. Yeah, exactly. And this story reminds me of one of my favorite facts about human beings. And we've discussed this before. We're so. We're astonishingly easy to convince and not in a malicious way. In a practical sense, you give somebody a clipboard and watch what happens. People trust clipboards, and nobody knows why they do. A clipboard is just a piece of plastic that says, I'm probably involved in something important. And then you add, like, a reflective safety vest, and you're invisible. Pretty much just gonna say, and if you put on a safety vest, it's, steer clear. This guy's in charge. Yeah. You can walk through walls. Right. You can enter restricted areas. You could probably convince people that you're here to inspect the moon. Humans are deeply influenced by signals that suggest competence, whether it's uniforms or badges or titles. Lanyards. Lanyards might be the most powerful object ever invented. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Nobody questions them. The land. The lanyard has spoken. Let this man pass. So the story made me think about the person who finally discovered the problem, who recognized this. Because every major investigation begins with one of the least exciting moments imaginable. Somebody, somewhere taking a sip of coffee, looking at a. At a form. Maybe they're already annoyed about something. Maybe they've got three other projects that are due this afternoon. Then they notice something. And they don't panic. They notice something just enough to create administrative curiosity. And at that moment, it sounded like, huh? And that's how most enormous stories begin. Somebody just saying, huh? Yeah. Then six months later, reporters are standing outside a courthouse. The real heroes of civilization are people who pay attention to the boring details. Amen. The rest of us were just distracted by clipboards and lanyards. They're looking at line 47 on page 112, and every once in a while, they're the reason a story exists at all. The funniest thing about this situation, if you can call it funny, is that it intersects perfectly with something psychologists talk about all the time. And I suffer from this imposter syndrome. Most people occasionally feel like they're fooling everyone. You get promoted and you think it's a clerical error and somebody's going to find out that you really don't deserve it. Or you buy a house and you think, yeah, somebody should have interviewed me first. You become a parent and you suddenly realize hospitals allow exhausted amateurs to leave with a newborn. There isn't a final exam. They just hand you a person and wish you luck. A fun storm in the castle. Yep. Some people live their life improvising. And I would. I would say most of us do, from. From one extent to another. Well, it's kind of like Woody Allen's expression, right? 90% of any job is just showing up. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Some people are improvising at work. Some people had at relationships. Some people improvise during home improvement projects, which has led to some really uncomfortable conversations in my life. What the story ultimately reveals is something both both reassuring and slightly alarming. Reassuring because the system eventually did find the discrepancy. And of course, alarming because it apparently took long enough for an entire generation of smartphones to come and go. Probably right now there's a tired employee staring at a spreadsheet about to discover the next thing that makes all of us wonder how we've managed to keep this whole society thing running for as long as we have my source information. Lindsay Schneble, thank you. Article you sent from. From cnn, also Associated Press reporting and ABC News. So to be clear, the guy did lose his job. That's my understanding. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I. I'm wondering if, because of this pilot shortage that I keep hearing about, if some other airline quietly hired him and said, we'll just keep this to our. To ourselves. Your paperwork is now up to date, and here's a 747. I wonder. Do with it what you will. I wonder if the FAA has any say in that. Probably like, the guy's competent. He can fly a plane. But he did that with no certification for 17 years. Do you let him go and get the certification and then continue his career, or do you say, no, you're banned for life probably? I would guess the latter. I'm guessing they would say this points to your character, that you, you willingly deceived the industry and your passengers and employer for 17 years. And we don't. We need to be able to trust our pilots. Right. Right. And it's Air Canada, so I bet they were really polite when they fired. I'm sure they were extremely, you know. Oh, geez. Yeah. Just. Just going back up that 747A and and come on in for a chat and some Tim Hortons. Over. I love a Tim Horton reference over at the coffee house. Oh, oh, back. Listen, I don't make fun of Canadians. I love Canadians. I lived in Maine, which is pretty much South New Brunswick, and I lived in Canada for a year. And we need to be more like the Canadians. Oh, I think everybody agrees with you there. Yeah, we loves us some Canucks. We do indeed. Whatever your thing, it could be anything. Canva helps you make that thing a thing. Canva is a simple online tool thing. It's a way to design with our magic AI tool, things you can social media your thing, generate images or videos of your thing, make decks or presentations to show your thing whatever needs to be done for your thing. Canva can make it an even better and bigger thing. Canva, the thing that makes anything a thing. Study and play come together on a Windows 11 PC. And for a limited time, college students get the best of both worlds. Get the unreal college deal, everything you need to study and play with select Windows 11 PCs. Eligible students get a year of Microsoft 365 Premium and a year of Xbox game Pass ultimate with a custom color Xbox wireless controller. Learn more@windows.com studentoffer while supplies last ends June 30th terms at aka mscollegepc. The email address is lifeguardshallowandpodcast.com Allison writes Allison. The name immediately makes me think of Elvis Costello. But oh yeah, yeah, I digress. Hi friends. Just listen to episode 212 and as soon as Lindsey said runs us I legit yelled no effing way. Just this past Sunday, three days from this email, my brother was telling me about a video shoot where he was sent out to Omaha, Nebraska. His crew asked the local crew where the locals like to eat. Like a restaurant known only in their city. These guys suggested Runzas. So the crew goes for lunch and the place Is hopping. So they think, okay, this place has to be good. Yeah, not so much. My brother described it as a fast food joint for hot pockets. Seeing the pictures on the website. Yeah, I agree. Parentheses, Sorry, Nebraskans, but you do you. As for the person Lindsay mentioned who brings an empty suitcase just for runzes, I'm from Philly. My husband and I both have relatives who bring empty suitcases just for cheesesteaks and tasty cakes that's gonna make your socks and underwear smell terrible. Terrible. Tasty cakes. Of course, being those Pennsylvania made snack cakes not seen outside of Pennsylvania and maybe some parts of New Jersey. So I get it. So yeah, all the normal kudos for the pod and I'll certainly be listening to more Alison. That's great, Allison. Thank you, Allison. And every community has a place like that that becomes famous. They around for a long time in Tucson. I think of Lucky Wishbone. Very, very good point. Very good point. I was thinking of the. Was it Gordo's Cafeteria Mexican? Yeah, yeah, we've talked about that. Yeah. Casa Molina. Casa Molina. God bless it. Still my favorite. My favorite rest Mexican spot in Tucson. But you're right, Lucky Wishbone, that is. That is peculiar to. I think they're only in Tucson, right? Yeah, I think that's the only one. It's a chicken place, obviously. And also on steak fingers. Yeah, also EG's. There you go. Yeah. Another peculiar to Tucson, actually, I think that's now Arizona. Yeah, I think it's statewide. But that started in Tucson of kind of a. It was a like a frozen lemonade slush kind of thing. And then it grew into a sandwich joint as well. And damn good sandwiches. Yeah, real good, real good. So if you need any more restaurant tips, if you're going to the Southwest, specifically Tucson, let us know. We'll. We'll hook you up. Yeah. Do you hear that? Sounds like breakfast is ready. Because Quakers coming in hot with morning nutrition 100% whole grain oats and a good source of fiber to fuel the rhythm of your morning and kickstart your day. And that sounds absolutely delicious. Fuel to start whatever's next. Quaker official sponsor of FIFA World Cup 26 choice hotels get you more of what you value. Here's a little tune to help you remember. Same drive, different day don't you wish you were getting away? Pack your bags and come on through Texas, Ohio, Alaska, we're up there too. Comfort Inn, it's calling your name Save on the stain oh, and free waffles are yours to claim well, I hope you like my Little Song book direct@sourcehilltales.com you're in the shallow end with Schnebly and Toth. Jethro. My story is called the Courtroom Clothing Crisis of one Devin Turner. Okay, there are bad ideas, there are terrible ideas, and then there are ideas so spectacularly awful that they deserve their own wing in a museum. This is the story of a gentleman named Devin Turner and what historians may someday call the Courtroom Clothing Crisis of Cape Coral. It all began on a bright Florida morning, June 8th. In fact, JG just a few few days back. Most people wake up and think about normal things. Did I pay the electric bill? Where are my keys? Should I have that third donut for breakfast? Yeah. Devin woke up with a different problem. You see, Devin had to be in court that day. According to police, the court appearance was for a burglary charge that he'd been hit with in the not too distant past. So already we're not off to a great start, are we? You wake up and you think, oh, yeah, yeah, gotta go to court. But Devin allegedly had another issue, which was that he needed clothes. And not just any clothes. He needed clothes to represent himself best to the judge in the courtroom. The kind of outfit that says, your honor, I've made some mistakes and I wish to atone for them. Not the kind of clothing that says, I just wandered out of a yoga class after losing a fight with a lawnmower. Yeah, yeah, that's not a good look ever. But according to police, Devin was wearing leggings, a tank top, and carrying a small backpack. And apparently, he looked at himself and thought, nope, judge isn't gonna love this. Now, a normal person might solve this problem by, say, borrowing a shirt or going to a thrift store, maybe calling a friend or neighbor, maybe even going to Walmart and dropping $9 on a brand new polo shirt. But Devin allegedly chose option E. He decided to go searching for clothing. It just happened to be clothing in somebody else's rv. Oh, my God. Because when I think free clothing store, I immediately think occupied recreational vehicle. I think we can all agree on that, right? No question. Unfortunately, inside this RV was a family just minding their own business, probably making coffee because it was morning, maybe arguing about whose turn it was to empty the gray water tank. Suddenly, somebody starts tugging on the door. The family freezes. The kids freeze, the dog freezes. Even the coffee maker, gurgling, is thinking, hold on. This must be important, because the mystery man outside keeps trying the door, but the door holds. It remains locked. At this point, again, most of us would just leave. But not Devin. According to police, after failing to open the door, he decided to disconnect the RV's power source. And he's wearing yoga pants and leggings during this. Okay. And a tank top. Now, why? And I thought, well, maybe he thought somehow the lock on the door was electric, and if he cut the power to the rv, the electricity would fail and the lock would open. That's. That's the only thing, you know, like, nobody can stop me now. I've turned off their microwave clock. Well, the RV occupants understandably call police. Cape Coral officers arrive, and I imagine they were expecting a standard burglary call, but instead, they encounter a man dressed in leggings who appeared to be attempting to acquire courtroom attire from a motorhome. And that's not in the training manual. There's no chapter called Section 14, Suspect Seeking Business casual clothing during active criminal proceedings. No. The officers understandably questioned Devin. And then came one of the greatest conversations in Florida police history. At least I'm assuming it's gotta be one of the greatest conversations, even though it is Florida, man. The police asked exactly what Devin was doing, and he reportedly explained that he was on his way to court. Okay, reasonable enough. Then he explained he was looking for clothes to wear. Maybe a little less reasonable. Here's the good part. The police asked what he's going to court for, and according to their body camera video, Devin basically admitted that he was going to court to answer for burglary. Now, imagine being one of those officers. You're standing there thinking, wait a minute, you're allegedly burglarizing an rv. Or while traveling to court for your case for burglary. It's sort of like getting arrested for stealing a bicycle while riding to your anti bicycle theft seminar. Police investigate further determined the court appearance was indeed connected to that prior burglary case. The officers probably didn't know whether to arrest him or nominate him for a consistency award. But then, according to police, things got even worse. Because during a search, officers reportedly found methamphetamine in his possession. And because apparently, the morning checklist wasn't complete. Right. Court date? Check. Questionable plan? Check. Attempted RV burglarization? Check. Additional criminal charge? Why not? By now, the officers are probably staring into the distance wondering if they've accidentally wandered into a sitcom. The entire episode feels less like a crime report and more like a challenge issued by comedy gods. Somewhere, a screenwriter read this story and threw away three months of work. The moral of the story, if you're headed to court Plan your outfit ahead of time. If you need a shirt, there are stores. If you need pants, there are stores for those, too. And if you need fashion advice, there are family and friends. But if your solution involves an occupied rv, a locked door, police officers, and yet another burglary charge, you probably need a completely different life coach. Yeah. Yeah. Thus ended the legendary courtroom clothing crisis of Devin Turner, a Florida tale so absurd that even the alligators probably stopped swimming for a moment just to hear how the story ended. Yeah, for sure. Got this from YahooNews.com and the Cape Coral Police Department. So don't ride your bikes on the roof and do not burgle a motorhome in yoga pants because you're on your way to a court date for burglary. And now you've just committed, well, another attempted burglary. Right. And a meth charge. And a meth charge. Because, you know, why not? What the heck? Crikey. Huh? God bless Florida. We've talked in the past, I think, about if we were to put a pin in a, in a map, a world map, for every story we have done on the shallow end, that Florida would probably have more than its share of, of red pins. As does the uk. Indeed, the UK does have its share of shallow enders. Yeah. And across the pond. God, God bless you for that. And again, we love Canada. We do a lifeguard@shallow endpodcast.com hit us up, tell us your shallow end story or just, you know, tattle on a loved one. We always encourage that. That's why we're here. And until we meet again, continue to make good choices. Your life might depend on it. So concludes another episode of the Shallow End with Schnebly and Toph. We thank you for listening. Oh, be a dear. Would you please subscribe to this podcast? Give these people boys a five star rating and think of something nice to say, even if you have to make something up. And visit us online@shallow endpodcast.com okay, gotta go. 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