Ep 145: Sounds Fake But A OK! feat. Courtney Lang

Hey what's up hello! Our second guest of Auguest is Courtney Lang from our sister podcast A OK! Listen in to hear a couple of podcasters talking about podcasting and identifying as aroace.

Episode Transcript: https://www.soundsfakepod.com/transcripts/sounds-fake-but-a-ok   

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Transcript

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(0:00)

SARAH: Hey what’s up hello. Welcome to Sounds Fake But Okay, a podcast where an aro-ace girl (I’m Sarah. That’s me.)

KAYLA:… and a demi-straight girl (that’s me, Kayla)

COURTNEY: … and an aro-ace girl (that’s me, Courtney Lang)

SARAH: talk about all things to do with love, relationships, sexuality, and pretty much anything else that we just don’t understand.

KAYLA: On today’s episode:  A OK

ALL: — Sounds fake, but A OK

SARAH: Welcome back to the pod.

KAYLA: Oh god.

SARAH: I’m gonna lose my m’arbles.

KAYLA: (laughing) You can’t say it before me. You can’t do it before- why am I even here anymore then?

SARAH: (laughing) This is the Sarah podcast, thank you.

KAYLA: I went on vacation for a week, I come back, there was a m’revolution on the Discord that I missed. 

SARAH: (laughing) There was a m’revolution on the Discord.

COURTNEY: What’s a m’revolution?

SARAH: Well because Kayla is obsessed with just “m’lady-ing” everything, and it’s rubbed off on me, everyone in our Discord started putting an apostrophe after an M in every word that they happened to say that started with an M. So, our @ in the Discord is now Podcast M’oms. The mods are M’ods.

KAYLA: And the meme channel is m’emes. And a bunch of people changed their usernames. And I missed it. I was gone.

SARAH: Kayla wasn’t even there. 

COURTNEY: Sounds fun. 

KAYLA: Anyway

SARAH: Anyway Kayla. What are we talking about this week?

KAYLA: This week we’re talking about our good friend Courtney 

SARAH: And with-

KAYLA: We’re going to talk about her. No we’ll still talk about her while she’s sitting here, I thought.

COURTNEY: Okay, just talk about me I’ll pretend I’m not here it’s fine. Perfect.

KAYLA: Yeah. 

COURTNEY: Great.

KAYLA: Just kidding. She’s here. Hi Courtney. 

COURTNEY: Hi!

SARAH: You guys may know Courtney from the podcast A OK - if you don’t, what are you doing? But it is, we like to think of it as our sister podcast that is way more professional than we are.

KAYLA: Yes. 

SARAH: Courtney when we were on your podcast, you sent us PDFs.

COURTNEY: I did. I’m an office worker. I really like PDFs. I really like spreadsheets. 

KAYLA: Oh I love a spreadsheet.

COURTNEY: If you looked at my desktop on my computer, you wouldn’t think that I liked PDFs and spreadsheets because I’m one of those people who saves everything to my desktop.

SARAH: Me too. 

COURTNEY: And there’s layers of things. There’s folders called Desktop that I drag everything into. And then it fills up again. And then I make another folder called Desktop in the desktop folder.

SARAH: Classic.

Kayla: Oh no

SARAH: Oh, wonderful. But, for those people who don’t know what A OK is, Courtney, do you want to give a quick little pitch to our listeners?

COURTNEY: Sure. I’ll pitch it to ya, and gosh you better listen after this great pitch. It’s a podcast where I interview people on the ace and aro spectrum. So, that’s short for asexual and aromantic spectrums. You don’t have to be both ace and aro to be on my podcast. I interview people who are ace and not aro, I interview people who are aro and not ace. I really like interviewing people. This is going to be really interesting because you’re the ones interviewing me. 

SARAH: Ha-ha. We hold the power. 

KAYLA: We’ve done it. We’ve taken over.

SARAH: We’ve done it. Alright.

KAYLA: So Courtney. It feels weird interviewing you. You just interviewed us.

COURTNEY: I know.

KAYLA: The whole vibe of this feels wrong. 

COURTNEY: I had to give back the favor. I don’t know what it’s called.

SARAH: Return.

COURTNEY: Return! Return the favor. Thank you, Sarah.

KAYLA: Anyway I want to know about your podcast because obviously you’re the one talking to people all the time. And I feel like it’s rare that you talk about the actual podcast on the podcast because that would be weird.

SARAH: This has gotten meta, what’s going on? 

KAYLA: I don’t know. Courtney, why did you start A OK?

COURTNEY: I started A OK to be honest because I was not okay. I felt like I was the only person who was asexual or aromantic out there. I didn’t have a lot of people to look at, and be like that’s like me - I’m okay because there’s someone else like me. And so, I was like, “it would be really great if I could just sit down and listen to people talk about being asexual and/or aromantic. Or not even that. Just sit down and listen to people I know who are asexual and/or aromantic talk about anything. Just like anything.

(5:00)

SARAH: About being humans.

COURTNEY: About being humans, about their favorite hobbies, what sports they like, or how much they love their cat. Just like anything that wasn’t just ace and/or aro talk. And I think listening for me is a lot easier than reading. I found a lot of asexual and aromantic content online that you could read but I didn’t know of anything really that you could listen to that had a huge variety of different people talking. And I really like podcasts and I’d always wanted to make a podcast. So I was like, “Hey, I’ll just make a podcast” about people talking about whatever they want to talk about who happen to be on the ace and aro spectrums. 

SARAH: Artful.

COURTNEY: Thank you.

SARAH: An artful response. 

KAYLA: It’s much better than the reason we started our podcast. 

COURTNEY: Why did you start your podcast?

KAYLA: Funny. Because we’re funny. We thought we were funny.

SARAH: We thought we were funny. 

KAYLA: (laughing) Not as good.

SARAH: I was going to say “because we were bored” but we weren’t even bored.

KAYLA: We just thought-

SARAH: We just started it. Incredible. I know you said you started your podcast in part because you were struggling in seeing your own identity elsewhere. What was your process in coming to terms with your own identity?

COURTNEY: It was long and hard, I would say. I could make a joke there.

SARAH: (laughing) I was just thinking that - I was like, we’re too aroace for this.

COURTNEY: We’re not. There’s no such thing as being too aroace for anything. I really denied it at first because I didn’t want to be. I wanted to want what everybody else wanted. So it took me a long time to really even admit it to myself. And once I admitted it to myself, I hated myself for it. It was a big journey of self-acceptance I think. And I don’t even know if I’m a hundred percent there. I don’t know if I’ll ever be one hundred percent there. But it’s a lot better now partly thanks to the podcast that I’m doing. Just being able to talk to everybody else about it and listening to everybody else talk about also being ace and aro and other things - that was a big part in helping me kind of accept how it’s okay to be ace and aro, and how it’s okay to not want what everybody else wants even if it seems amazing. There are a lot of other amazing things in the world. I forget what your question was but that’s my ramble. 

SARAH: You answered it in a sublime manner. I think it’s actually really interesting because a lot of times people look to people like you or people like us as “oh this person has a podcast about A-spec issues, they must be so confident in their identity and they must feel so good about it” and that’s not always the case. We’re questioning and struggling just the same as anyone else is, it’s just that we also have microphones. 

COURTNEY: Right, we happen to have microphones that we like to use to talk into the nothingness.

SARAH: And for some reason, people listen.

KAYLA: I do think that’s super comforting though. And we talk about this a lot. And we talked about this with Alice two episodes ago about how like it seems like everyone else has everything figured out and then when you don’t you’re like, “well, I’m a piece of shit.” Everyone else is super excited about their identity, has everything figure out, and then you feel like shit. So then I feel like being so open on a platform, being like, “no I’m actually not always a-okay.” And it’s like, “oh, I feel better.”

COURTNEY: And there’s always that feeling that you’re going to end up alone, or you feel lonely sometimes, and you feel it heavier because you’re ace and aro and you feel like it’s what your fate is. And I think you just have to remember that people who aren’t ace and aro also feel loneliness. It’s not something unique to us and it’s not something that’s permanent. It’s that way for everybody, not just people on the ace and aro spectrums.

SARAH: It’s a human thing. Humans are social creatures. Whether you’re an introvert or extrovert, we’re still social creatures. And so everyone is going to have that fear. 

(10:00)

SARAH: Has there been anything you’ve learned from doing the podcast? From guests or about yourself, or just in general?

COURTNEY: I’ve learned how important an editor is. I think Sofi is the best and I’m so honored to be able to work with her. I don’t know what I’d do without her. Sarah, I’m sure you know because you edit Sounds Fake, But Okay. It’s super time-consuming and it takes a long time. It takes way more time than just recording the episode. So, I think it’s just something you can’t take for granted. That’s on the technical side of it. On the more non-technical side of what I’ve learned - I think I’ve learned just how diverse the community is, and how even if I could have almost nothing in common with the person I’m talking about, they’ll say something that connects with me on a deeper level than some of my best friends, just because they’re on the ace and aro spectrum. They’ll say something out loud that I’ve never been able to articulate, and it’s like an “oh my god” moment. Nothing will beat the time I was talking to someone in her 70s. She had married multiple times and she had children. She had this huge amount of life experience and all of these stories. And I’m sitting here and I’m in my 20’s, fresh, never been married, all that stuff. And she said how much she hated French kissing and I had never felt so validated in my life. So, just things like that - learning how I can have such crazy things in common with total strangers and also have so much not in common with them.

SARAH: I think that’s also just we - as people who are aroace or A-spec - we forget that allos are validated by society and the people around them all the time because they think in a similar way that most people do. They’re surrounded by people who are sharing their experiences and their feelings all the time. And the media is reinforcing that. For us, it’s easy to forget that there are people out there who also feel the same way as us and there are people that can also reinforce our own feelings. It’s just that we have to seek them out more actively than the allos do.

COURTNEY: Right exactly. And I’m lucky enough that now I have a podcast where people come to me and talk to me about it so I don’t have to seek them out anymore. But before that, it was a huge deal to connect with anyone on any of those topics. I think it was nice to know that there are people like you out there, no matter how different they are than you. There are points that you’ll hit where you’re like, “holy shit, you’re right. I’ve always felt this way and no one else has ever told me they feel this.” the feeling is unreal.

KAYLA: I think it also goes back to what you were saying about hearing people talk about it and not just reading it. Honestly talking to people through the Internet is great. We met you through the Internet, we’ve met a lot of really cool people through the Internet. But being able to see someone on video chat or talk to them on the phone it makes it a lot more real. Being able to hear someone say what you actually think rather than type it actually makes everything so much more tangible. And that’s something a lot of aroace people might not be able to experience whether they’re closeted or they don’t know other aroace people or they’re just hard to find since everyone is so spread out and it’s such a small community. 

COURTNEY: Even if you know what ace and aro are, even if you don’t know that that’s a thing and you’re ace and aro, or ace and/or aro, and you’ve never heard those terms, there’s nothing worse than not feeling like other people. 

SARAH: I was even thinking about us meeting you and we had interacted with you plenty on the Internet and the first time we talked to each other - not face-to-face because COVID - but really interfaced with each other was for our Six Feet of Space fundraiser and we were like, “oh my god, we’re best friends immediately.” It’s just different. It’s a whole different dynamic.

COURTNEY: Yeah

KAYLA: I remember feeling about that way with everyone that participated in the fundraiser because it was the first time that I really interfaced with that many A-spec people like semi face-to-face. And it was just like a very bizarre feeling.

SARAH: It was like, wow you’re a fully-fledged human too.

(15:00)

KAYLA: Crazy. How’d you get that way? You grew up so big.

SARAH: You mentioned editing and Sofi. Sofi is not A-spec, correct?

COURTNEY: She’s not.

SARAH: What’s it like having a non-A-spec person on the team?

COURTNEY: It’s kind of nice because she is super interested in the topics all the time. It’s kind of nice to know you don’t have to be aro or ace to listen to the podcast and enjoy it. It’s also fun for her to learn things about aspects of love or romance or sex that she’d never thought of before. And then she’ll ask me questions that make me ask questions. So, it’s just fun. It’s nice to have another perspective on it. And she as a person is just really great and fun to work with. If it isn’t obvious, I love Sofi.

SARAH: (laughing) When we were on, Sofi asked us questions through you. She brought up new things. She was a very integral part of your pod.

KAYLA: She also showed us her poster collection, if I remember correctly.

SARAH: We talked about One Direction, I think.

COURTNEY: Yeah, you did.

SARAH: (laughing) It was a great time. 

KAYLA: But thinking about it, that was the original premise of our show - one straight person and one A-spec person going back and forth about those topics. And I do think that the way that A-spec people think about certain things like relationships and love, like the split model of attraction, for example - even people that aren’t near the A-spec or aroace spectrums can learn a lot from the way that A-spec people talk about and conceptualize certain things. And it’s cool that she’s forced to listen to it, I guess. I wish we could force every allo person to listen to A-spec content. 

SARAH: I thought you were going to say our podcast specifically. And I was thinking, “we could start getting so much ad revenue.” If every single allo person was listening. 

KAYLA: Man, we’d just be so rich.

SARAH: We’d be rolling in it.

COURTNEY: Rolling in the Casper money and all those other-

KAYLA: The HelloFresh

COURTNEY: Mm-hmm. 

SARAH: The toothbrush one.

KAYLA: MeUndies

SARAH: MeUndies, Quip…

COURTNEY: Quip!

KAYLA: Wow, we have none of these people sponsor us.

SARAH: Classic. 

KAYLA: So speaking of people listening to your podcast, obviously Sofi listens. Sofi is your friend. And obviously, A-spec community members listen, and if they don’t they should. Because, or else. But, do the other people in your life, do your real-life friends and family listen to the podcast ever?

COURTNEY: Well, I’m definitely not out to my family. I don’t think I’ll ever be out to my family for very specific reasons, with the exception of my little sister. She’s very, very supportive, and I love her to death and she listens. And some of my friends do - and this is a weird one - my supervisor listens. My family doesn’t know, but my supervisor does. She’s the only one at work who knows. She’s so supportive, and she learns a lot from it I think, and that’s just really exciting. And she’ll message me when she listens to an episode she especially likes. 

SARAH: That’s so cute.

COURTNEY: It’s very nice. But no, I think a lot of my friends probably listened at first for support. I’d say I did go one a date, which was interesting, and they had listened to my podcast so that was very interesting.

KAYLA: Huh. That’s so bizarre.

COURTNEY: (laughing) Yeah very bizarre.

SARAH: How did they find it?

COURTNEY: Because I accidentally told them about it.

SARAH: Gotcha.

KAYLA: No!

SARAH: Classic. 

COURTNEY: Classic. 

Kayla: With you not being out to your family, how does the publicness of the podcast work? Obviously, your name is attached to it and everything like that. But do you ever just worry that they’ll Google you and be like, “oh interesting.”

(20:00)

COURTNEY: I’m not too worried about it because courtneylang.com is an asbestos removing company. 

KAYLA: (laughing) Wait why? Now I’m Googling it.

COURTNEY: Fun fact. I’m not too concerned. My parents are also not very good at the Google. And honestly, the rest of my family is too busy to care and I’m okay with that.

KAYLA: There you go. I Googled Courtney Lang I did not find asbestos.

COURTNEY: Did you put dot com?

KAYLA: Well, no. I wanted to see if it would come up if I just Googled it. And it didn’t. Hold on.

SARAH: This is important. We’ll wait.

KAYLA: (reading) “London and nationwide!” I want to stick on this for a second. This is for all your asbestos- this is the whole podcast now, sorry Courtney.

COURTNEY: No, it’s okay.

KAYLA: “For all of your asbestos removal needs in London and nationwide.” Correct me if I’m wrong, asbestos is like a mold of some kind that’s in your house.

COURTNEY: Fun fact I just learned this. This is going to blow people’s minds. Asbestos used to be used for almost everything. It was really popular in insulation for houses and so that’s why they have to remove it now because they know it’s bad for you. It is actually a naturally occurring fibrous material that is mined out of the ground. 

SARAH: Is it that pink stuff?

COURTNEY: It can be pink, it can be green, it can be blue - I think.

KAYLA: Whoa, they can re-install it for you too. But here’s my question. So it’s something you do have to physically remove. 

COURTNEY: Yeah.

KAYLA: So why are they in London and nationwide?

SARAH: I would like to point out that the UK is much smaller than the United States. So that would be like saying, “In Detroit and also all of Michigan,” which is still a lot.

COURTNEY: I think you’re thinking nationwide as in the United States.

KAYLA: I was thinking they meant the world, I think.

SARAH: Were you thinking worldwide?

KAYLA: I was thinking the whole world, and I thought, “why wouldn’t they say the whole world?”

SARAH: Mr. Worldwide. 

KAYLA: They can remove asbestos from London, the UK, and Pitbull. Right. So stupid. (pause) I have a question. Nothing is in order anymore, but going back to your identity process, I was just curious myself of how old you were when you started coming to terms with it, and how you first heard of aroace-ness.

COURTNEY: So I have no idea how I first heard about it, I have no memory of hearing about it. I’m going to assume it was on the Internet somewhere. And I think I was either 19 or 20 when I first heard it, and I think I came out to someone when I was 22 but I still didn’t really want to believe it myself. And I don’t think I really came to full terms with it until I was 27.

KAYLA: Courtney, how old are you?

COURTNEY: Okay fun fact, this episode is going to drop on my birthday.

KAYLA: (gasping) I forgot about that.

COURTNEY: So, happy birthday to me. Not to like gloat about my birthday. 

SARAH: Courtney, happy birthday.

COURTNEY: (laughing) But I’m going to be 29 when this episode comes out.

KAYLA: I’ve been having a lot of problems with figuring out how old people on the Internet are.

COURTNEY: It’s okay I look like I’m 12.

KAYLA: I mean you don’t, you look like you’re our age. How is everyone so-

SARAH: And we’re 12, Kayla.

KAYLA: Oh, I forgot that we’re 12.

SARAH: We really are. I know you touched on this before. But, the format of your podcast involves talking about the person and not necessarily fixating on their identity. Why was that the approach you took in terms of creating it?

COURTNEY: So, I do always make sure to touch on what is asexual or aromantic or demisexual or greyromantic or any of the labels - I always touch on “what does it mean for the person specifically” because everyone’s experience with that is different. But, why I move away from only focusing on what they identify as in terms of sexual or romantic orientation - I guess I started the podcast because I wanted to hear other human beings who were like me in terms of sexual orientation talk about literally anything. And for me, being ace and aro aren’t the defining trait of who I am. I’m a lot more things than just being asexual and aromantic. And I think for me, it’s nice to hear what other people enjoy and what they’re passionate talking about because we are more than our identity. And I think a lot of people from the outside looking into the community just see us as “well they’re aro, or they’re ace” and that’s all they are.

(25:00)

SARAH: And I think a lot of people who are allo or outside the community do kind of look at A-spec people as “oh that’s a weird, exotic identity, now I just want to know about your identity.” Well no, I’m a human person. And I’ll tell you my identity, but please don’t treat me like, “this is the aroace person.”

COURTNEY: Right and it’s like when you have an interesting job - all people want to talk about is your job, and ask you about your job. They don’t talk about anything else and that gets tiring and parties and you don’t want to talk about your job all the time. I guess it’s nice to move away from the job, it’s nice to move away from the orientation and get into who the person is and really get to know who they are.

KAYLA: I also think it’s so refreshing for people within the community too. I feel like a lot of content that gets put out whether it’s in writing or writing or videos - and there’s nothing wrong with this at all, that content needs to be made - but if the only content being made is the educational 101 stuff that the people within the community often already know, it’s like there’s nothing left for us to enjoy as content that isn’t only related to our identities. So it’s very refreshing that you obviously touch on it a bit. Like okay, this is ace/aro adjacent content where that’s in the background, but also it isn’t just the basics. They can get into deeper stuff.

COURTNEY: Yes, and I acknowledge that most of my audience is probably ace and aro, if not all of it, minus my supervisor. So, I feel like I just need to remind myself who’s listening and who I’m making it for. I think that’s where a lot of it comes from. 

KAYLA: Yeah, definitely. And I think the other thing that is good for both inside the community and out - now I’m just like, “this is a commercial for your podcast” - but you were talking earlier about having a 70-year-old guest and I know some other guests that you’ve had on are a little bit older. And something about people in the ace and aro community is that they often seem young. It’s a lot of people in their 20s like us, or teenagers. And people think of it like, “oh it’s this Gen Z/millennial sexuality, it’s not real, it’s an Internet thing” - so I think it’s very cool to get representation of other ages, and other ethnicities and races and genders, so that you can see that the entire community isn’t one thing.

COURTNEY: Yeah. And I feel like a lot of people feel that things don’t exist unless there’s a word for it. But really they exist long before that. Just because there’s no word for it or community around it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Before I knew I was ace and aro, I knew something was up before I was 6. I was like there’s something happening to everybody else that’s not happening to me. There’s something that I’m experiencing that other people aren’t experiencing. And I just didn’t have a word for it. So if you go back in time, I’m sure there were just as many people then as there are now. Maybe not, maybe percentage-wise, because population, but you know. There were people back then who knew something was up, and why did they feel this way, why did they feel broken, why is everybody else experiencing these things that they don’t get or why are they experiencing things that other people aren’t. And there just wasn’t a word for it, so there wasn’t any community around it. That’s pretty frustrating when people say, “oh, it’s new, people are just different.” No, we’ve always been here. We just didn’t have the Internet, so we couldn’t connect with each other. 

KAYLA: One of my favorite things is when people are like, “ooh the gay culture in Ancient Greece, they were all so gay.” Okay, they were doing what we see as gay activities, but they didn’t have the word gay. Being gay wasn’t a thing. You can’t take a word from now-

(30:00)

SARAH: You can’t force onto them.

KAYLA: It’s such a weird reverse that allo people seem to do. They’re like, “well I can take the word ‘gay’ and put it on people from Ancient Greece because oh look being gay existed back then.” But they’re unwilling to do that for other identities. Get your stories straight. So you’ve had very diverse guests on the show. How many guests exactly? How many episodes are you up to now?

COURTNEY: 58 just came out.

KAYLA: Wow. So you’ve had 58 guests. Do you have a dream guest? 

COURTNEY: Yes. I do. I don’t know their name but I know their Twitter handle is Picolo, the artist.

KAYLA: Oh is that the graphic designer?

COURTNEY: No, it’s the illustrator. I would open it up on twitter but now my Twitter’s not working. They do some comics for DC, I believe.

KAYLA: Yes, this is the person I was thinking of.

SARAH: Kayla just doesn’t know the difference between graphic designer and illustrator.

COURTNEY: They’re amazing.I’m saying “they’re” I don’t remember their pronouns. But my Twitter is working now so I’ll look them up if you don’t mind. 

SARAH: I’m just saying we talked to Alice Oseman a couple of weeks ago and (whispering) you should have her on your podcast. 

COURTNEY: I know I should. Oh yes, comic book artist at DC. Picolo @_gabrielpicolo. They don’t have their pronouns on their bio. Everyone put pronouns in your bio.

KAYLA: Everyone, do it. Sarah and I just had this conversation two weeks ago.

SARAH: I recently added pronouns to my Instagram bio because they were in my Twitter bio but not Instagram bio. 

KAYLA: Tragic. Anyway, I remember when they posted what must have been a drawing of themselves. But they were like, “I’m ace,” and everyone was like, “yay!” 

COURTNEY: They’re amazing and they put out such great content and my wallpaper background on my phone is actually something they’ve drawn - Digimon - you can’t really see it.

KAYLA: Cute. 

COURTNEY: They just like all the same things I like and they’re amazing.

KAYLA: (chanting) Be. Their. Friend.

COURTNEY: I would love to.

SARAH: This wasn’t on our list and I don’t want to ask you to play favorites. But I’m going to ask you to play favorites. Have you had a favorite guest that has been on, other than us obviously.

COURTNEY: Not to be cheesy but they’re all so great. I’ve really struggled with all of my guests. Everyone’s so amazing, and everyone brings such different things to the table. People are so fascinating. When you really sit down with somebody and talk about something they like. Amazing. Fascinating. You learn stuff. I had an episode where I learned all about gravity. I thought I knew what gravity was and I was wrong. Things like that - I can’t even play favorites because everyone has just been so great.

SARAH: I love it when people are passionate about stuff. Tell me all about the shit you’re passionate about. It doesn’t mean I have any knowledge of it or know what’s going on. But just tell me. I’ll send enthusiastic GIFs in return.

KAYLA: This is what happens during every conversation Sarah and I have. Whatever she’s recently passionate about, she’s just yelling at me about it, and I’m like, “okay.”

COURTNEY: What are you most recently passionate about? Sorry, I’m playing interviewer. 

SARAH: No, you’re good. I think I know what answer Kayla would give.

KAYLA: For you?

SARAH: Yeah. 

KAYLA: The thing I’ve been hearing about most recently has been Succession.

SARAH: Yeah. I finished the TV show Succession a couple of weeks ago. So it just keeps coming up. 

KAYLA: Which is what happens with Schitt’s Creek, which everyone who regularly listens to this podcast knows. 

(35:00)

SARAH: When you started talking about asbestos, I was like, “ooh there’s a Schitt’s Creek reference right here, in front of the noggin. And I’m not going to say it.”

KAYLA: You’re so strong. But now you’re not.

SARAH: No, I just get very hyper fixated on things and then I just move on to the next thing.

COURTNEY: You both are a little bit like that though.

KAYLA: We really are. 

COURTNEY: And I think I’m kind of like that too. Nothing wrong with that.

SARAH: Kayla how’s your paper-making business going?

KAYLA: I haven’t done it in a while cause I was on like 12 traveling trips. I haven’t made paper in a while. Recently, I’m into mechanical keyboards if we’re talking about what we’re into recently. 

COURTNEY: What’s a mechanical keyboard?

KAYLA: It’s the old kind that you used to plug into your desktop into your computer room, with the chunky keys. They just make very satisfying sounds and they’re pretty and I’m getting one in the mail in a couple days. Cause I have a problem.

COURTNEY: That sounds fun.

SARAH: Yeah, before we were waiting for you to hop back on, Courtney, because for those listening at home, our Zoom just kicked us all out. While we were waiting for Coutney to come back on, Kayla was like, “when is it coming in the mail?” and I was like, “what are you talking about?” And she was like, “my mechanical keyboard.”

KAYLA: There’s this meme - hold on because this is a visual. Just kidding, through an audio medium I’m going to show you a visual meme. This is me.

Everyone: (laughing) Pakidge!

KAYLA: It’s this picture of Snow White with her face stuck up against a window and her nose is stuck up the window and it just says “Pakidge.”

SARAH: But spelled wrong.

KAYLA: Anyway this is about us now. This is why we don’t interview people. We keep talking about ourselves like a bunch of dicks.

COURTNEY: I mean, it doesn’t help that I’m asking you questions because I’m so used to interviewing people and not being interviewed.

KAYLA: What are you going to do?

SARAH: Don’t ever apologize for asking us about ourselves, we’re obsessed with ourselves. 

KAYLA: Okay, we’re going to go back to asking Courtney questions now.

SARAH: Yeah, this one was yours, Kayla.

KAYLA: Thank you. For your podcast child, what are your future goals or how would you like to continue growing?

COURTNEY: Honestly I’m okay with the way it is.

KAYLA: That’s a good answer.

SARAH: I respect the honesty of that answer.

COURTNEY: I have awesome listeners. I mean, more listeners would be awesome and amazing - but I’m not too caught up on the numbers of it. I’m really enjoying the experience. It’s an awesome community. I’m nothing without the listeners obviously, because it’s a podcast. If you have no listeners - that’s fine too if you’re doing it just for fun.

SARAH: But you’re just talking into the void. If your whole purpose for the podcast is to let other people know that here are the people then if no one’s listening that kind of defeats the purpose.

COURTNEY: Right exactly. It’s been a lot of fun, and I’ve learned so much and I’m learning so much. So, I think if things can keep going the way that they’re going I’m going. 

SARAH: And I can say from experience that if your podcast grows too much it starts getting stressful. And when your co-host goes camping for a week and doesn’t have reliable internet access, and you have to deal with your 3-year-old toddler of a podcast all week, you just get stressed and I wasn’t ready to be a single parent.

KAYLA: Sarah had to single-parent and do all of the things that I usually do - which is a lot of just talking to other people. I don’t think Sarah was prepared to talk to so many other people.

SARAH: I’m used to actively ignoring when we get notifications. It’s always like, “oh look Kayla’s talking to the AVEN social person again, just having a conversation.” I’ve learned to actively ignore the notifications and then I was like, “wait, I haven’t answered this person in three days.”

KAYLA: Speaking of, we just got a new message that you need to answer, Sarah. Anyway, I respect that answer so much. You don’t need to, you know?

SARAH: You don’t need to.

COURTNEY: People say I’m very easily pleased so maybe that’s part of it. 

KAYLA: Really just a good way to be. 

COURTNEY: Sometimes.

(40:00)

SARAH: That’s the last of our official questions. I’m trying to think if there’s any other things I want to ask about.

COURTNEY: Yeah have any fun follow-ups?

KAYLA: I want to ask Courtney, what are you like? Because you ask people about their hobbies and stuff that’s interesting about them. I want to know - what are you recently into? What are you doing?

COURTNEY: Let’s see. I’m very much one of those people who get really into something, figure it out, get bored of it, and stop.

KAYLA: Me!

COURTNEY: So recently, I’ve been doing a lot of printmaking - woodblock and linoleum specifically. And then I ran out of blocks, and they were on backorder So, I had to resort to watercolor, which is hard. People who can do watercolor, I have so much respect for you. So much respect! It’s such an unforgiving medium in my opinion. You put something down, it’s there. You’re making it up as you go? My mind - I can’t.

SARAH: You want to try and fix it, you add more water, now your paper’s mush. Now you’re Kayla, just making recycled paper.

COURTNEY: Yeah basically. Watercolor is very hard and it’s so fun and it’s so pretty and a lot of my favorite artists specialize in watercolor which is why I tried it out. It is hard. I have so much respect for people who’re good at watercolor. So that’s one of them. I play a lot of video games I guess. I’ve been playing a lot of Minecraft these days. I just downloaded Red Dead Redemption 2 for the first time. I’m so late to that game.

SARAH: I have heard nothing but wild, wild appreciation for that game.

KAYLA: Is that the one where they make the horses too realistic? That’s really the bulk of whatI’ve heard is that the horses have too many genitals.

SARAH: As you can see, Kayla and I are gamers.

KAYLA: (laughing) I’m a gamer, I play Animal Crossing.

COURTNEY: That counts. 

SARAH: I haven’t been to my island yet today.

COURTNEY: Still counts.

KAYLA: Gamers

SARAH: Acemers. 

COURTNEY: Good try.

KAYLA: No, I disagree. I don’t think that was a good try. 

COURTNEY: (laughing) A for effort.

KAYLA: I disagree. 

COURTNEY: Yeah that’s really me. I go on walks with my dogs.

SARAH: What kind of dogs?

COURTNEY: They’re both mutts, so I don’t know. One’s definitely a lab. Well, my roommate’s dog is a lab-border collie mix. And the other one is totally unknown. A lot of stuff. My old roommate got me one of those dog DNA tests for my birthday one year, and I took it and “super mutt” came up.

KAYLA: How long have you had your dog?

COURTNEY: Two years.

KAYLA: Cute. Watercolor is hard. That was one of my things.

SARAH: Oh you’re going straight back to watercolor, huh?

KAYLA: Now I’m just thinking about it. That was one of my hobbies that I picked up and then put back down several years ago.

SARAH: Yeah we were still living in dorms when you did that.

KAYLA: Yeah, it’s hard.

SARAH: It is hard. 

SARAH: I have no artistic skills whatsoever.

COURTNEY: Aw I’m sure that’s not true.

SARAH: I’m just really impatient, that’s the problem.

KAYLA: I have to disrupt everyone with a picture of my cat.

EVERYONE: Aww!

KAYLA: So my parents’ hobby is that my parents have a garden. My parents also have 25,000 hobbies. And one of them is a garden and they can the vegetables and they make the tomatoes into homemade spaghetti sauce. And so the tomatoes have been harvested and it’s almost time to make the sauce. It’s almost the sauce season. Since I live in my parents’ house, my cat has taken a real liking to the tomatoes. So she will push them off the counter, she will lick them when they’re sliced open, and now she’s just laying on the counter on top of all of the tomatoes. 

SARAH: Lovely. Speaking of gardening parents, my father has taken to Facebook to posting pictures of his vegetables from him garden that says, “take a break from the -” what is it? He says the same thing every time

KAYLA: You’ve sent it to me one time.

(45:00)

SARAH: I’ve sent it to you. It’s on the top of my feed. “Take a break from the political/viral and behold the fill in the blank.” And he posts pictures. It’s a salamander.

COURTNEY: Wow.

KAYLA: Jack is the weirdest person.

SARAH: Jack is so weird. That’s where we got it from.

KAYLA: Anyway.

SARAH: Anyway. Well. Who are we? Okay. Kayla, what is our poll this week?

KAYLA: Oh god.

SARAH: Is Courtney the coolest? Yes or Big Yes?

KAYLA: Is Courtney your new mom? Yes.

SARAH: Yes.

KAYLA: She is my new mom. Is it possible to make a poll with only one choice? I really wanted to, but they don’t let you.

SARAH: Wow, it’s almost as if that defeats the purpose of a poll. 

KAYLA: It would be funny though.

COURTNEY: It would be very funny.

SARAH: So what’s the poll going to be, Kayla?

KAYLA: (sighing)

SARAH: That’s not a poll.

KAYLA: I miss the old days when I just thought of a poll on the spot. 

SARAH: We’re putting you under pressure hell?

KAYLA: No! 

SARAH: 150 episodes later we can’t come up with a poll. Put her under pressure.

KAYLA: Yes, not yes, no, I suck.

COURTNEY: AVEN just tweeted, “cake?” and that’s it. 

KAYLA: Good.

SARAH: Excellent. Wonderful. Well, we have got to do some beefs and juices. Courtney, I don’t know if you prepared yourself for this.

COURTNEY: I am so unprepared.

KAYLA: Me too.

SARAH: We’ll let you go last. Oh, should I go first because I wrote this down.

KAYLA: I’m never prepared. It’s like you’ve never done this podcast before.

SARAH: My beef. I have two beefs. First beef is America. Everything is bad. Fuck Louis DeJoy and all those people who are trying to cut the US Postal Service. Send your mail-in ballot requests and your mail-in ballots as soon as possible. And if your area has a ballot dropbox, do that. I’m just saying. My other beef is that there’s some real shit going on with the election in Belarus. “Why do you know about this, Sarah?” you ask. Great question. I have a friend from college who’s from Belarus and shit is fucked up. The opposition candidate had to flee the country. They turned off all Internet and cell service and she couldn’t talk to her grandparents because of the riots. Cute. So, just going to stay, stay informed about anti-democratic happenings around the world. I mean, they are happening in America but who is to say.

My juice is - and I’m going to give a caveat, regardless of what your opinion on Kamala Harris, I know you have opinions on Kamala Harris, I know you do. My Twitter feed is one-third ecstatic people, one-third pissed people, and one-third people who are like “well, that’s it.” But for those of you who don’t know she was announced recently as Biden’s VP pick. Regardless of what you think of her, I would like to take a moment to appreciate that a Black and South Asian woman is on the ticket for a major party for VP. Feel free to critique her, I mean, you should, given the position she’s in. But just remember the gender and racial biases that may color your thinking and also appreciate that there’s a woman of color in that role. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. 

KAYLA: Sarah loves to politic at the end of the show. 

SARAH: Kayla, what’s your beef and your juice?

KAYLA: Oh my. Always a treat to go after the political rants. My beef is that I’m back, not on vacation anymore, which is exciting to Sarah, but not exciting to me because when you’re gone from work for a week, then you come back you’re like, “oh god, there’s so much to do and I want to be in the woods again.” My other beef is that on our second-to-last day camping, there was a big thunderstorm literally on top of us.

(50:00)

KAYLA: The lightning was literally right there. You could simply see it. I got very wet. Usually, you’re like, “let me count the seconds between the thunder and the lightning.” No. You simply couldn’t because there weren’t any seconds between them. So that’s scary and we had to run from our campsite because it’s just tents and some tarps. We had to run away in the rain and hide in a public bathroom. We hid in the boys’ bathroom which was very exciting for me.

SARAH: (whispering) Scandalous.

KAYLA: There wasn’t even a single urinal now that I think about it. Pretty lame. 

SARAH: If we’re going to gender our bathrooms, at least put urinals in them for Kayla’s enjoyment.

KAYLA: Exactly. I want to look at them.

SARAH: I don’t know why I keep taking on a weird radio presenter voice from the 1930s.

KAYLA: I don’t like it. My juice is mechanical keyboards because they look nice and they sound nice and I’m getting one hopefully in the mail this week. And that’s my new thing and I stalk the Reddit and that’s my life now. 

SARAH: You know the children’s book Click, Clack, Moo-?

KAYLA: Nope.

SARAH: There’s a children’s book called Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type - that’s you.

KAYLA: My other juice is Tik Tok, because it’s funny.

SARAH: Courtney, now that we’ve given our trainwrecks of beefs and juices. Do you have any beefs and juices?

COURTNEY: So I was going to say the post office is my juice, but the situation happening with the post office is my beef, for sure. Everyone save the post office. It’s important.

KAYLA: How am I going to get my mechanical keyboard if there’s no post office? Did you ever think about me and my keyboard? 

COURTNEY: There you go. And now Sarah is showing off her stamp collection. 

KAYLA: Wow she has a lot of stamps.

COURTNEY: You have a lot of stamps. That’s three sheets and counting.

SARAH: One of them is an original stamp.

KAYLA: Lot of stamps.

COURTNEY: Wow. Beautiful. And then, gosh, my juice. Not to be too on the nose, but I bought some apple juice the other day and it has changed my life. I have not bought juice as an adult since I’ve become an adult.

KAYLA: Would recommend.

COURTNEY: Holy shit. 

KAYLA: Juice as an adult is great.

COURTNEY: Again, easily pleased. But apple juice is my juice. 

KAYLA: Juice is great. Orange juice, grapefruit juice.

SARAH: I’m not a juice person.

KAYLA: Great stuff, love a juice. 

SARAH: When I was a child, I didn’t drink a lot of juice.

COURTNEY: That’s okay. 

SARAH: Anyway, you can find our poll, you can tell us your beef, your juice - your actual juice - on our twitter @soundsfakepod. We also have a Patreon - patreon.com/soundsfakepod. Our $5 patrons are Jennifer Smart, Asritha Vinnakota, Austin Le, Drew Finney, Perry Fiero, Dee, Quinn Pollock, Emily Collins, Bookmarvel, Changeling MX, Derrick and Carissa, Simona Sajmon, Jamie Jack, Jessica Shea, Ria Faustino, Daniel Walker, Barefoot Backpacker, Livvy, Madeline Askew, Lily 

James, Corinne, AliceIsInSpace, Skye Simpson, Brooke Siegel, Ashley W, Savannah Cozart, Harry Haston-Dougan, and we have two new $5 patrons, We have Vishakh and Jacob Weber. 

KAYLA: Hello!

SARAH: Thank both of you for your contributions to this shitshow of a podcast. Our $10 patrons are Kevin and Tessa who would like to promote @DirtyUncleKevin, @tessa_m_k, Arcnes who would like to promote the Trevor Project, Benjamin Ybarra who would like to promote Tabletop games, anonymous who would like to promote Halloween, Sarah McCoy who would like to promote Podcast From Planet Weird, my Aunt Jeannie who would like to promote Christopher’s Haven, Cassandra who would like to promote their modeling Instagram @liddowred, Doug Rice who would like to promote "Native" by Kaitlin Curtice, Maggie Capalbo who would like to promote - I forgot the word “promote in the middle of that sentence” her dog’s Instagram @minniemuffin19, H. Valdís, Purple Chickadee who would like to promote Initiative: Eau. Our $15 patrons are Nathaniel White - NathanielJWhiteDesigns.com, my mom Julie who would like to promote Free Mom Hugs, Sara Jones who is @eternalloli everywhere, Dia Chappell

who would like to promote the Underrealm series by Garret Robinson, Andy A who would like to promote Being in unions and IWW, Martin Chiesel who would like to promote mental health and Dragonfly who of course, is promoting Courtney this week. 

KAYLA: Courtney looks so shocked.

SARAH: So easily pleased. 

COURTNEY: Yes!

SARAH: Courtney, where can the kids at home find you?

(55:00)

COURTNEY: You can find me in a lot of places. Let’s start with our website - aokpod.com, pretty easy, that will take you straight to our episode list. If you want to go to our fancier website, you can go to aokpod.squarespace.com or you can buy merch. We have merch now.

KAYLA: I saw the merch today. 

COURTNEY: Yeah, it’s very exciting. You can follow us on Twitter @aokpodcast, that’s literally a-o-k-p-o-d-c-a-s-t. You can email me at aokpod@gmail.com.

KAYLA: Or, you can get your asbestos removed at courtneylang.com.

COURTNEY: That is true. It’s not me though, it’s someone else, it’s an imposter. 

SARAH: Only in the UK and not worldwide.

KAYLA: Not worldwide. I’m also unconvinced that you are not the person running that website. I feel like you’re secretly also in England, removing asbestos. 

COURTNEY: I’m just really passionate and anti-asbestos. 

SARAH: Wow, I’m so happy for you. To be passionate about something like that is great.

COURTNEY: Can I change my beef to asbestos? 

SARAH: Aside from yourself and your pod, is there anything you would like to promote? You can say no. Just want to throw it out there.

COURTNEY: Hmm, promote, promote. Be nice to each other. That’s all I got. 

SARAH: A good point. Well, thank you Courtney so much for joining us. Thanks for listening and tune in next Sunday for more rust in your ears.

KAYLA: Until then, remove your asbestos.

SARAH: From your cow.

KAYLA: From your cows. That’s probably not good for them. Come on now.

SARAH: Let them live an asbestos-free life!