Mandela Effecting Us All: Carlee Russell Case, Music News & SNL

Today we're starting off a bit differently with a word on the devastating Israel-Hamas tragedies. Like Pete Davidson on SNL, we're operating as best we can with some of levity and humor so hope you enjoy this moment away from the real life stuff for a bit of entertainment. (Doctors Without Borders - donate here if you'd like)

Digging into recently released music, including a love letter to Fred again.. and his latest singles as well as Drake's 'For All the Dogs' and Bad Bunny 'nadie sabe lo que va a pasar mañana'. Host Maddy McClain chats about the artists' most recent headlines including relationships and a time off from music.

Then we cover Saturday Night Live's recent return in its 49th season, opening with Pete Davidson's out of character but well-done cold open.

Jada Pinkett-Smith is on a PR rampage and the internet is over it :) She drops bombshells that ring as familiar, taking us down the Mandela Effect rabbit hole.

Lastly, we cover the Carlee Russell kidnapping case and the latest updates in the legal proceedings...and it's not what you expect. .

Enjoy homies! And as always, please drop a line with any feedback, questions or topics you'd like covered in future episodes.

Follow in IG @easilyentertainedpod!

Resources mentioned:
- Carlee Russell timeline (CBS News)
- Carlee Russell 'what we know' (CNN)
- Carlee Russel guilty in kidnapping hoax (CNN)
- Jada Pinkett Smith TikTok video (Jane Fondle @janefondle on TikTok)
- Mandela Effect (CNN)
- Mandela Effect Popular Examples (Today)

Transcript

 Hello, homies, and welcome to another episode of Easily Entertained with yours truly, Maddie McClain. As always, it is a pleasure and a hashtag honor to be with you and serve as your dutiful entertainment and pop culture sherpa. I wanted to start off this week by acknowledging and speaking some words on to what's going on, obviously in the world.

Um, I wasn't entirely sure of how or what to say regarding the devastating Israel Hamas war when the previous episode went out and was released last week. It's to say it's been a heavy, heavy time is an understatement. A grave understatement. It's, it's nearly incomprehensible. Um, the violence, the extreme inhumanities that we've witnessed from across the globe, and obviously beginning with the horrible terrorist attack against the Israeli people and subsequently the destruction of lives going on for innocent Palestinians as well.

Um, and then we're seeing that hatred and division come into our own nation. Not for the first time, and my heart truly does feel broken, genuinely, and I am with you, to my Jewish friends, I love you, and I'm so sorry, you know, the words just don't, my words don't feel big enough, or, Like, I don't have, I can't express the way I really feel about it all.

Um, and equally too, I feel for the Palestinians, anyone impacted, um, by this violence and it's such a complicated, complicated, nuanced war with centuries of history that I quite frankly struggle to understand completely and fully. And I never want to misspeak. I think it's so easy and. All too common for people to jump right onto their social media or whatever account they have, regardless of the size of the platform.

We all have a responsibility to not spread misinformation and confusion and with something so grave and horrific as this, um, I, I definitely did not want to contribute to any of that misinformation or confusion. And then equally too, there's this, you know, you're damned if you do, damned if you don't say anything.

And obviously this platform of mine isn't huge by any means and, but I'll do what I can, you know, regardless, I, I stand with the Israeli people. I stand with Palestinians and I understand that maybe that might offend you kind of this neutrality. It's just, Horrific, and I think that there is no buts to what happened to the Israelis on that horrible day.

Um, and seeing and witnessing what we did, and that's where my belief of duality exists is 2 things can be true at the same time. Right? And, um, Palestinian, innocent civilians are, are being wiped off the planet as we speak and in retaliation at the same time. You feel quite helpless to when it physically hurts to see this and it's hard to carry on with life as normal during times like these.

Um, I do I will be including some resources as I continue to do some more research on what organizations to support feel free to let me know if there are any specific ones. But 1 that I, I. feel confident goes to the cause is Doctors Without Borders. With, with that being said, that's obviously a very difficult topic to, to only give so much time to.

Um, but I, I created Easily Entertained and the whole idea behind this is something to just take a moment away from the realness and the harshness and the stress of life and put your ADD, overthinking, anxious, Terrified brain on a proverbial lazy boy just for a moment in the time that we have together and I fully recognizing that the ability to do so is inherently a, in and of itself a privilege, totally recognizing that and, um, I'm not wanting to tell anybody to bury their head in the sand and.

To ignore everything, um, that's going on because a lot of people don't have that option to ignore it. Um, and really, when, when we're all the way over here and feels like there's nothing we can do is spreading that light, um, and loving on your neighbor and, and halting misinformation and bigotry and all of those things that kind of bring out the nastiness from the woodwork of the world, you know, let's move into today's.

What will we be talking about today? We're going to be talking about that. NuNu will be talking about anything that's new on the radar, whether it is music or album releases or movies. TV shows, what have you, that has entered the zeitgeist, whether that is freshly entering into the world, relatively new, or something to look forward to that's coming up.

So that is something new we're adding into these episodes. We'll talk about that. We'll give you some updates on what is going on in the world of pop culture as it relates to Carly Russell, which is a very intriguing. Kidnapping case that has come to a conclusion somewhat, um, and it's a very up and down roller coaster of a story.

So we're going to get in on that and tell you what's going on, um, as the trial has just gone, gone down recently this past few weeks, talk about Carly Russell. We're going to talk about Pete Davidson's SNL return. And well, Pete Davidson, um, plenty to talk about with him and Jada Pinkett Smith. Don't worry, we won't talk about her for long because I think everybody is ready for her to shut up and I'll tell you why the world is ready for her to shut up.

And, you know, it kind of made me think about the Mandela effect, which I thought would be fun to talk about. So I hope you guys are ready for a mixed bag, honey, of an episode. Sit back, relax, buckle up. And. Let's get easily entertained, homies. Let's talk about that new new, aka what's dropped recently. My very, currently, at least over the last few years, Fred again, has been one of my very favorite artists, producers, songwriters.

He does everything. He's incredibly talented. Fred again was quite literally the soundtrack to the first few years of the pandemic, pandemic. I feel like I would not have gotten through that time of my life without Fred again. And, I honestly think he has so much talent and it's so cool to see him being acknowledged or get that recognition that he deserves.

So, Fred again. You also believe at one point was known as just Fred. He's a 30 year old British producer who has been on the scene. Well, really only in a solo career since 2020, so his solo career is relatively fresh. Fredigan is relatively new on the scene as a solo artist, and for these songs that you are very likely accustomed to hearing, like Kyle, I Found You, or Danielle put a smile on my face.

There's so many. Um, but he has been in the music industry for long before 2020. He is, um, he's been a producer for years, starting back in. I'm gonna say 2014 or earlier. He's been around, um, he has worked with artists like Ed Sheeran, Rita Ora, uh, Brian Eno, which I'm honestly not that familiar with him as an artist, but he's giving me, uh, Bon Iver vibes.

Um, I, I used to say that name, Bon Iver. Bon Iver. I swear to God, if somebody lied to me and told me that's how you pronounce his name, and it's really Bon Iver, like I did for years. Yeah, sorry. Um, I will be pissed. But, anywho, so he's actually produced so many popular songs that we've heard before. Entire album, I believe.

Ooh, I should look into this and not say this incorrectly, but he's produced an entire album of Ed Sheeran, and he's done a lot of that. And... What I really love and what kind of sets him apart is he uses clips from Actual Life, which is the title of his, all of his solo albums thus far, Actual Life, and then it'll be like.

In parentheses, a set amount of times was 1st, 1 came out in 2020, and it covered April 2020 to, like, I believe, December of that year. Um, he uses clips, whether it's voice memos, social media clips, other artists singing, I believe he's used a guy who's saying on tick tock and has an incredible voice and use that and he collabs with that person.

And that's usually the name of the song. It'll be a name of a person and then something in parentheses, which is really artistic in and of itself, and so I can really appreciate that. Um, I love Fredigan. I could go on for hours and hours. If you don't know who he is, or if you haven't seen this, highly recommend you look up his Tiny Desk Concert.

It is one of the coolest tiny desks. Tiny desks that I've seen tiny desk. If you is, is NPR's, um, concert series that they've been doing for years and years where musicians will come into a tiny, tiny room with a, you got it, tiny desk and play for a really small, intimate, live audience there. Usually, I'm sure people that work at NPR or something, I'm clear, I think you can be invited and go.

Anyway, um, you'd think, okay, so his songs, Fredigan is EDM, classified, most people hear him and be like, okay, he's EDM, which, yeah, definitely. Electronic, um, indie, kind of soulful, his lyrics are really, Emotional. Um, one of my favorite playlists on Spotify is, uh, Emo Dance or Crying on the Dance Floor. That's the one.

Um, Crying on the Dance Floor. Excellent Spotify playlist. I get a lot of my music from that one. Um, but anyway, that's how I would describe Fred again. Um, incredible beats. He's talented. So you'd be like, okay, how is he gonna do that, you know, all live? And translate it into something new at a tiny desk, and he is doing everything on his own there from he learned, which I thought was a glockenspiel, but turns out it's a marimba, where I got two, like, little sticks with knobs on the end, and you're like hitting kind of those wooden keys or whatever, he learned, he relearned how to play that, uses the end of a violin thing, so it's all live music, and it'll put it on a loop, so he'll play it on the loop, Through a synth, and he's singing, playing the piano.

If that doesn't convince you of his talent, Bitch, go get new ears. Just kidding. Ha! Uh, no really, like, fuck you. Uh, just kidding. I am sassafrassy today. Anyways, see, I digress. I've just went on a spiel about Fred again. I don't regret it. I don't. Um, but all of this to say, he did drop a new single called 10 with Josie, J O Z Z Y.

He's kind of switched up the naming recently, just to something to think about. But anyways, it's such a good, it's such a good song. It kind of has like a lo fi hip hop. I mean, I guess lo fi isn't always hip hop. It has a lo fi, chill kind of vibe to it, but it has like a really catchy beat. It's great. Um, this is followed up by his previous single, Adore You.

Definitely check out that song. Um, I get the inkly, tinkly feeling that it's leading up to an album release because that's A few singles being dropped. I think it's about time, so get ready everybody. He's also playing, wait for it, eight nights in a row, I think it is, at the Shrine in L. A. Booked eight nights in a row.

That's crazy. Um, if you see me in L. A., that's why. Uh, who's to say? I really should not be spending money like that. Yeah, but I love Fred again. Okay, so, that's the song to listen to. And then of course... Love me or hate me for it. I, I understand. Drake, for all the dogs, the album, his latest album, dropped. And...

He had been teasing it saying it's the old Drake, kind of the old Drake's back or whatever, which I could sing a certain song by him right after that, but I am, I'm resisting the urge and resisting the temptation because, I don't know, to not annoy you and turn off all my listeners. But I digress. He teased it saying it sound like old Drake stuff and while I, I, I, I agree, and I don't, um, I like the album.

There's, um, I love it. A song with SZA. He has a lot of good other artists that he's working with. Um, this is now, after it's dropped, it's about two weeks now. This was released on October 6th. Um, as of recently, Drake has gone on to say and let people know that after this, now that this album has been released and I believe he finished his tour.

Which was sick. Um, He is now going to take a little bit of a time off to focus on his health. I think that makes sense though because Homeboy has put out 16 albums in 16 years or something like that. Like every single year there's been a huge album, if not maybe two. That sounds like a lot of work and hardly like how, I don't know.

I mean, I am not complaining. I will, I will drink that thing like a water fountain. I'll take all his music, but, um, Oh God, that sounds really bad. Anyways. Um, he, he, I drink, uh, so he's taking some time off. He said for probably about a year, year and a half or so. Um, this, now that this album has dropped, this is his 13th number one billboard album.

That's pretty crazy. And. As he is gone on this little press tour of his his son adonis. Which, first of all, Adonis is like, Greek God, like, that's, Drake would name his, his son that, and I gotta, I gotta say, he's a beautiful, beautiful kid, he is so cute, um, he, Adonis, came out with his own rap song, his first rap song, called My Man Freestyle, and, uh, with a little video.

This kid is, let's see, let's see, Adonis age. He's six years old. Adonis is six years old and he's come out with his first rap. Well, you know what? He and Blue Ivy, they got set up pretty good. Um, I both found this, this music video So adorable, and at the same time, somewhat off putting. I don't know what it is, I can't really put my finger on it.

It's just like, eh, I don't know. Even if it's something cool like being a rapper, like I think forcing a career and a lifestyle on your kid is probably a risk. Um. And a risk that they either will do it and resent you forever or won't do it and you'll resent them and they'll just rebel against you. I don't know.

I'm no parent and thank the Lord for that right now. Uh, we'll see years later. Anyways, we're not going to talk about that. Um, another new music, new album to look out for is Bad Bunny. Nadie sabe lo que va a pasar mañana. And if you're going to make fun of me for immediately switching into a Hispanic accent, F you.

Uh, no, just kidding. I would make fun of myself too. Um, Bad Bunny. He's also early on in his career, similar to Fred again. And he is obviously already taken off. He's been global, like, at least in the top global. I think five artists and mostly towards top like three or four, um, since he's basically been on the scene and, uh, we love Benito.

I love his outfits. I would love to go to a Bad Bunny concert. Um, one thing I have with him right now is I just wish I could sit him down and ask him. So why Kendall Jenner? You know, they seem like, they still seem like the most bizarre couple to me. I would love to hear their conversations. Um, moving on from music releases, uh, I was looking at movies and Beyonce's Renaissance Live Tour performance is coming out in theaters, similar to Taylor Swift's.

Um, ERA's tour that's in theaters now. I mean, those bitches are running the economy. I gotta give it to them. Hell yeah. Um, we love, we love to see it, so. And just as a side note, I fully support, along with nearly, I think, every Swifty in the nation, in the world, I fully support a Taylor Travis Kelsey I hope it lasts forever.

I do. I wish them all the best as I'm sure they're waiting for my, my deepest congratulations, but I'm a fan of it. I don't know. I think NFL has overdone it, but so does Travis Kelsey. So Hey baby. Speaking of the writer's strike and all of that jazz, because the writer's strike came to a resolution, Saturday Night Live was able to debut the 49th season.

Almost as many seasons as The Simpsons. Pretty crazy, but we love SNL. It was a, it's a bit of a sad return, I suppose, in my opinion, simply because favorites like A. D. Bryant, Pete Davidson, and Kate McKinnon left SNL as hosts, or are they considered hosts? They left SNL is the bottom line, um, but for this debut of the 49th season, Pete Davidson came back as a guest host, and he offered a Honestly, really unexpected, but a really great cold open.

It was not so much because he was hilarious, but because he offered a little bit of interesting insight in the Israel Hamas situation, in that he lost his dad in 9 11 when he was seven years old. And really what got him... Through those awful, terrible, rough times was comedy, and that was when his mom was trying everything to cheer him up and bought Pete Davidson a Eddie Murphy DVD that she thought was a movie called Delirium.

Turns out it was a comedy stand up special and Pete was playing it in the car as a kid. He's 7 or 8 at the time and his mom tried to take it away and he said, hell, no. And that's how we got Pete Davidson today. To see that side of Pete is interesting and a good second side to see. I mean, he's gotta be a good dude.

He's gotta be. I can't say Pete Davidson without mentioning the numerous, incredibly hot girlfriends he's had, starting with Ariana Grande, Kate Beckinsale. Uh, Kim Kardashian and most recently Madeline Klein, who's from Outer Banks, Netflix's Outer Banks series. And supposedly they're dating, as confirmed, starting in September.

But, you know, he definitely doesn't get the same kind of shit that Taylor Swift gets. Just gonna say, I Just have to put that out there. Um, but that's neither a surprise, nor a shock, nor anything new for, uh, women in the world receiving Shockingly a different response and in regards to their sexuality than men.

What? That's crazy Yeah, but I watched this SNL episode, which to be totally honest, I haven't watched a full SNL episode in a while. Um, this one was good. Obviously the favorite I say, obviously, because it was all over TikTok is the skit. I'm just Pete. I kind of little fun jab at the Barbie movie of I'm just Ken.

It's hilarious and speaks on that girlfriend situation. And. The man's self aware. I'm telling you again, self awareness is the most important thing in the world, quite honestly, what separates a good and great human being from, uh, not so good and great human beings. And what makes comedians so good is their self awareness.

And awareness of others, so might add. But, um, It's great. Taylor Swift, of course, and Travis Kelsey both make appearances in the show in a few skits. So that's pretty fun. Something else that is making its way rather speedily through the interwebs is numerous interviews that Jada Pinkett Smith has done as she is going through PR for her new memoir autobiography called Worthy.

And the internet is kind of done. Um, and it's kind of hilarious. So, Jada Pinkett Smith is Will Smith's wife. Or so we thought, question mark, because over the last week, she had revealed to everybody that Will Smith and her had been separated for the last seven years, which meant that the infamous Oscars slap occurred, and they were not together, and they were separated, but she's, she has that kind of energy, and the way she speaks, that everything she's saying has like this Godly, girthy weight to it, like, it's just...

It's almost like a cult leader would speak, you know what I mean? Um, the shaved head helps too. And yes, that's the whole reason that the slap happened was because Chris Rock had made a joke about Jada's alopecia and that's when Will Smith got up and slapped the shit out of Chris Rock on live television during the Oscars and then was banned or barred from attending the ceremony for the next 10 years.

Um, That obviously was huge, was major, people cancelled him, you know, that's, like, don't go slapping people. She said at first she thought it was a skit, Jada did, but based on the numerous shots of her looking pissed After the joke was told, I don't think she thought it was a skit, but who knows. She said the moment that Will Smith turned around after he had slapped Chris Rock was when she quote, knew that it was for real.

So, now that it's been long enough where people had finally like stopped really talking about it, like it's still always gonna be a joke. It's gonna be a pop culture reference until the end of time, pretty much, the Oscars slap. She brings it up again. To kind of what people have been saying is quote demasculating him and just being like, I don't even know why he did it.

Like, we weren't even together and then goes on to let us know that Chris Rock had asked her out at some point. And she always brings up to that. Tupac wanted to date her, although his crew has said. Yeah, he never, he didn't feel that type of way towards Jada, ever. Awkward. Um, yeah, so the internet was kind of going aflame.

So I wanted to read a few of my favorite TikTok comments on the matter, because TikTok... Never really fails to disappoint, running to the comment section on a few videos. That's when, those are the times where I love the internet. Okay, so I saved this, let's see here. Okay, so this, I'll play it for you, hopefully this works.

This is from a user, Jane Fondle. On, um, on TikTok? I don't even like Will Smith, but fucking someone save him from that demon lady. What the fuck is that woman's problem? What is my problem? What's wrong with my skin? Anyway, Jada, fuck off! I don't even like Will Smith, but fuck him so much. So, the comments on this.

People who don't even like Will Smith are in his corner. Who needs enemies when you got a wife like Jada? We need a surviving Jada docuseries. Someone needs to send him to his uncle and auntie in Bel Air. Like I didn't ask to be a part of their relationship. The gal who said Tupac faked his death to escape her.

I can't unhear it. Oh my god, I did not know she said that. It's like we're minding our own business and suddenly she's forcing the tea on us every day. I feel watered, waterboarded by the tea, tbh. But now, since that had happened and the Internet's like, can you shut up and never speak again, um, Will Smith has come out with rather positive things to say about the memoir and has acknowledged that the whole family gave her permission to include and use whatever experiences in her memoir as she saw fit.

Um, and Will Smith made a kind of response about his notifications being off and he's unbothered and yadda yadda. So that's what's been going on, but I had a moment where we supposedly had learned of those separation for the first time and I could have sworn to you that we already knew this, that this was announced like years ago.

That they had been separated or something, and like I could, this memory is so strong that I feel like I can remember seeing the headlines in like Us Weekly, People Magazines, and all of that. So, it made me think of one of my favorite theories, or, you know, I guess you could call it a conspiracy, but it's not, although scientific researchers have not been able to really explain it fully, is, drum roll please, The Mandela effect, the Mandela effect refers to a phenomenon upon which a ton of people hold a incorrect.

Memory or false truth, but a huge group of people believe it to be true only to have learned that that was never true in the 1st place. They remember something existed that never really did, um, and it points or points to something different and that their memories are actually all false, but tons of people hold this false memory.

If that makes sense. So the term was coined by a woman named Fiona Broom, um, who studies behavior and. It came about because she, and turns out a ton of other people, held the belief, this was back in the 2000s, that Nelson Mandela had died in a South African prison back in the 1990s. However... That is not the case.

He was eventually let out of jail and ruled over South Africa for years until he died only in 2013. Um, but tons of people held the belief that Nelson Mandela was actually not around, which led a ton of people down lots of rabbit holes that I find very interesting. So, first of all, Here are some examples, and then we'll go through the various theories.

A lot of people, when you think of the Monopoly character, you know, he's all dressed up, when you think of him, does he wear a little eyepiece, like a little monocle, one little eyeglass? I said yes, or I thought yes, that's how I would picture him. Well, he's never had an eye monocle. He's never had that. That is not the case, and yet tons of people have believed that it was there at one point.

But if you look it up now, and in the past, Monopoly, the Monopoly man has never had that one single eye monocle. People have looked to... Then there's a planter's peanut who looks and kind of wears a similar like top hat and kind of like holds a little cane thing. Thought that people were maybe confusing him with the planter's peanut guy because he has a little eye monocle.

Um, that's kind of what some people are saying is the reasoning behind it. Other popular ones being Pikachu having a black, the end of his tail being black, similar to the top tips of his ears. But he's never had a black tip on his tail. Um, so that's one people have been very, very certain that Pikachu did, in fact, but he's never had it.

Another one is risky business. The popular belief is that Tom Cruise danced around in sunglasses. The reality is... That's the popular Halloween costume is mistaken and incorrect. He's wearing a completely different outfit. He wasn't wearing shades and, um, was actually wearing, uh, a pink shirt, apparently. So that's something.

By the way, I'm reading some of these from an, uh, CBS Today article that I'll include because it's very interesting too. Another one is Sandy Cheeks from Spongebob that people believe she carried a backpack. But, in reality, she wore nothing on her back, instead is dressed in a diving suit without a backpack.

Now that I say that, I feel like I picture Sandy Cheeks with a backpack, but I don't know. Another one, Kit Kat or Kit Dash Kat. The popular belief is that there is a dash in between. The reality is there is not. Um, let's see what else. There is a widely held belief that there was a movie called Shazam that starred a popular comedian, Sinbad.

But that never happened. Shazam doesn't exist. Outside of now there is one, but it's like a superhero movie, I feel like, but this was before. This just never happened. Turns out there's confusion that maybe Shaq played a character in a movie called Kazam, but that feels like a stretch to me. Febreze. How do you spell Febreze?

I'll give you a few seconds. Yep, nope, it's spelled F E B R E Z E. There's no two E's like how you would regularly spell breeze. That took me out. And a quote from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Mirror, mirror on the wall. You know, mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the fattest of them all? The reality is, that's not what she fucking says.

She says, magic mirror on the wall. Say what? Yeah, okay, I'll do a few more, I'll do a few more, because I want to... Berenstain Bears. You remember those childhood books? I don't know if you read them, but that is how the name has been in my memory my whole life. Only to read this article and find out that it's The Berenstain Bears.

What? So it's... Everyone has believed everyone, I'm just deciding that I'm, I must be right. Um, Steen, like Stein, S T E I N, but instead it is Stain, S T A I N. Weird. And then, the popular peanut butter. One of the most popular ones, it starts with a J, right? Jiffy. J I F F Y? Nope. Incorrect. It's always been JIF. J I F.

Why does this happen? What's going on? And while it's not provable, scientists have had a few different explanations, or possible explanations, is one being that humans ability to recall information in our memory is so unreliable. That's why witness testimony is in true crime cases. Um, I don't know why I say true crime, like, just in criminal cases.

Um, because people see things from their perspective of how they view things, or perception of how they look to be, rather than how things actually are. That that's partially to blame. So we're already primed to be inaccurate when it comes to details. Um, and our attention spans are that of a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny microscopic Particle of dust nowadays, um, that's also something is we're not paying enough attention and because there are so many mental stimuli coming at us on any given day on a daily basis, that what our mind does is we fill in the gaps so that we can make sense of the things that we are witnessing or perceiving another common reasoning could be just getting things Confused that are very similar and the way that that is then translated then one person says the incorrect way like Jiffy and then the mom raises the kids and says give me the Jiffy peanut butter or like our parents always add Apostrophe s to everything like Chipotle is or like let's go to Target's although I doubt anyone said that because it's Target, but you get the gist but my personal favorite and the one that's It's likely not the cause of Mandela effect is a parallel universe that there was and has been a reality upon which there was Jiffy peanut butter, but we skipped time and we're in a different reality.

We don't skip time. We crossed a different barrier, a parallel world, and metaverse.

The multiverse theory is a popular theory in which the idea is the existence of infinite worlds and infinite realities that all exist at the same time. Um, and. Scientists have said, you know, there would be probably no way to test that out, but, and I am paraphrasing here, obviously, um, these universes could exist based on cosmic inflation, which is apparently a thing and no, not like your money going up, but like the universe expanding and pushing out the, look it up.

I do not trust myself to look at to explain that because I simply don't truly understand it. Um, because the other theory is quantum field theory. So, um, yeah, this is not a science podcast. I'm going to go ahead and leave that there and tell you to watch Rick and Morty because Rick and Morty, well, A, is masterpiece.

Just wonderful. Mwah. No notes. Um, go watch Rick and Morty if you haven't, but that pretty much has all the deal with multiverse. They exist in the multiverse. Um. Okay, now that we've gone down that multiverse, I would love to tell you guys a story. A story about Carly Russell. Okay, sit down, gather round.

Carlethea Carly Russell is a 25 year old nursing student from Hoover, Alabama. She reportedly went missing earlier this summer. In July, after calling 9 1 1 to report seeing a little toddler or a little boy on the side of the highway, Carly was leaving supposedly her place of work in Birmingham, Alabama around 8.

30 PM after making a few stops on her way back home to Hoover. Including a target run for snacks and dinner from a restaurant. This is all revealed to us by investigators that part later and will make sense as to why that fucking matters. So it's around 930 that Carly Russell pulls to the side of the highway and is making this call to 911 reporting what she's seen to the dispatcher.

So dispatcher hears her, tells her to keep an eye on the boy, and they're sending someone right out. Well, right after she hangs up the phone with the dispatcher, Carly then makes a call to a family member, her sister in law, to let her know what's going on, tells her that she sees this little boy, and all of a sudden the Carly, the family member says, she hears Carly scream.

And then nothing, but the phone line is still on, but Carly is gone, supposedly. She doesn't hear anything, so she's obviously very worried after hearing her scream. Police arrive within five minutes, only to find there is no Carly, there's no little boy, but her car is left there with her phone, her purse, um, her wig, and her...

Obviously, her car, but the snacks that she got from Target were not there. However, food from the restaurant she picked up was still in the car. Interesting. Hmm. Dot dot dot. Well, at this time, this news just takes on a... Rapidfire sweeps the nation. It is going all over TikTok. People are showing photos of her to help gather some intel on what might have happened if anyone has seen anything.

Everyone's freaking out. This is terrible. But it is finally good to see some public Acknowledgement or attention on people of color that have gone missing because there is a whole separate theory that and well, in reality of just the missing white woman kind of fascination, um, white women getting tons of media attention when they go missing or something happens of that nature and people of color not receiving that same attention.

Even though there are sadly a scary amount of missing children and women, men, um, of all types and largely being people of color, but the attention is always given to white women like Gabby Petito and that kind of thing. So anyways, that's that's part of the story, too, is we're finally seeing, seeing this take nationwide attention, and we are seeing interviews with the parents who are just obviously beside themselves, worried, um, we're hearing from the ex boyfriend who is asking and pleading for any information TikTok at the time, too, was we're seeing this video and we see supposedly Carly Russell, Pulling off to the side of the road.

We see her get out of the passenger side. And then we don't really see much video after that. This was supposedly captured by highway cameras. That's kind of all that's circulating along with a picture of her. So this is, goes on. She's officially missing for around, it had been about 49 hours. And then, all of a sudden, miraculously...

Carly shows up back home, supposedly it was 49 hours later on July 15th and she bangs on the door of her parents home and she's back home and they call, you know, cops or rather just medical attention to give her the attention. She needs to talk with her. She doesn't speak with police that same night for obvious reasons.

And. But thank God she's found she's at home and she seemed to be okay. We had heard she did not, she was not hurt, but they're still checking on injuries, potential injuries. Well, then there is a, a news conference that goes down and we hear about quite a few contradictions during this news conference.

Police say they can't verify most of the information after speaking with Carly that she's provided. They never had any calls on a missing child. They never even after she was found, heard anything about anyone looking for a kid, um, they couldn't find it on on videotape of the child being missing. Um, so that was 1.

We're starting to get some red flags, right? Um, and they mentioned the fact that she had stopped at Target and got Cheez Its and granola bars, but that they were not in the car. Everything else was. She had stopped at a restaurant. That food was in there. Yet, the snacks were there? I don't kidnapper hungry?

Maybe. Still, really weird. Doesn't seem to fit with what we've been told from Carly. And then we're told what... We're finally told Carly's experience or her side of events of what happened when she was kidnapped or missing for those 49 hours. She says that she was, she saw an older man who had orange hair with a bald spot, but A first paid note, he came out of the woods from where the child was and mumbled something and then grabbed her and that she was then kidnapped and put into a trailer of an 18 wheeler truck and she was blindfolded and heard a baby crying and heard a woman's voice, but never saw the woman at that point.

She stated that she was taken to a house and blindfolded, but not tied up and said that. As the captors said, they did not want to leave impressions on her wrists. She said that they took her into a house and made her get undressed. She believes they took pictures of her, but does not remember them having any physical or sexual contact.

This is from a CNN article from the, the police chief. The next day, Carly Russell says she woke up and the woman fed her cheese crackers and played with her hair. The chief said Russell told police she was able to escape after being put back in the vehicle. She said she ran through woods before coming out near her home around 10 45 p.

m on Saturday. So that's supposedly what happened. And then, days later, this is now, so this is coming out, she comes back home July 15th of 23. And now we're hearing about this. Over the course of the next around the 20th or so that the investigators found a variety of very intriguing searches on her phone including and I quote do you have to pay for an amber alert and how to take money from a register without being caught and searches for the movie taken which is a movie of Well, a woman being taken and kidnapped, as well as a search for bus tickets from Birmingham, Alabama, where she lived, to Nashville, with a departure date of July 13th, the day upon which she was, quote, abducted.

Hmm, so that's interesting. Um, this is also when they know about the missing Cheez Its. For some reason, I can't get over the Cheez Its. The fact that Cheez Its were a big, uh, key to solving this is... You know, I think pretty hilarious. Um, and no one heard from the child, yada, yada. And basically the cops were on to her after that information was released pretty clear that she lied.

Um, so then her, Carly Russell's lawyer comes out on July 25th and says that there was no kidnapping Carly. Made this false allegation. It was a hoax, and she did it by herself. There was no child. And she apologizes. And so then, uh, Yeah, so Carly Russell faked that. Imagine being the sister in law in her family.

The amount of attention and time and money that the cop spent searching for her abductor, searching for her. So that's pretty awful. They take her in, they book her. Um, in the jail, but she was let out on a thousand dollar bond. This was back around the July 25th, when the, when she came out with the statement.

Um, so yeah, but then her trial recently went down this last week. Um, this was as of last Wednesday, October 11th. Um, and Carly Russell was... Was found guilty of 2 misdemeanor charges, including false reporting to law enforcement and false reporting an incident. He had pleaded not guilty, but they found her guilty and now she's sentenced to spend a year in jail and pay nearly 18, 000 dollars and restitution.

So, the lawyer, they don't, they don't, you know, disagree with the restitution payment, but they will probably try and appeal. So she doesn't spend any time in jail. Yeah, so that's just all around pretty frickin wild and you want to know why she did it? You want to know why? I'll tell you why. For a man. Yeah, so another person that was found very hurt and bamboozled by the situation was, at the time, Carly's boyfriend.

Carly's boyfriend, at the time when she was missing, spoke out, put this lengthy Instagram You know, when people make notes, like Instagram caption about helping find her and if someone can pray and, you know, he's freaking out. Well, turns out she did that because they'd had a small argument according to him the day before and she wanted to get back at him and I don't know, I don't know what exactly.

Trapping style, that is, but seems, seems pretty dramatic. Um, so, yeah, after he had released a statement, then he was like, I had no idea, obviously, and her actions created a lot of hurt and confusion, and that he was made aware of this false... or whatever after coming to the defense of his ex. Um, well, yeah, ex cause they are now not dating.

So, um, that's pretty wild. She did that as a comeback from a fight with her boyfriend. I don't know. Look, I'm all for the drama sometimes, usually when it's not regarding myself, but I also campaigned for people, you know, they do superlatives in high school. I campaigned to, um, Be voted for most dramatic simply because, well, I think that was the one I could go for and I could live with having and I just wanted to have a superlative, you know, I wanted to be able to say that.

So, but that's pretty dramatic campaigning to be, um, elected as most dramatic. So that's just a little factoid for you. And, uh. That's the craziness of, of what we have this week. Thank you, as always, for tuning in. I hope you guys are keeping yourselves sane out there. I hope you are doing all right. I hope this, uh, hope you were entertained.

Of course. And if you did enjoy this episode, please rate it five stars. That would be preferable. Um, rate it and follow on any streaming platform of your choice, wherever you are listening to this. Um, there is a YouTube channel, too, that I'll be uploading these videos to. Scary, very soon. And... Thanks for listening, y'all.

We'll catch you next week. Follow on Instagram at Easily Entertained Pod. Bye, homies. Bye bye.