Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em Podcast

by Sarah Hepola It was my third morning at an Austin spa so dedicated to self-care they charged $375 if you lit up a cigarette. The sky was still dark, and I was sitting at a wedding spot tucked off the highway, a mile from where I was staying. I’d stumbled upon this place the first morning of my low-key rebellion, because I needed a quiet spot to smoke, and I’d followed a sign that said “historical landmark.” I expected a bench, a sweeping view of the Hill Country; I discovered a wedding tent with empty tables and chairs, a couple plastic floral arrangements on the floor, like everyone had just been raptured.The wind was picking up, the cords of the tent creaking, and while this woodsy paradise was surely a lovely place to get hitched in daylight, it was downright spooky in the dark. A real Stephen King vibe. I took a seat at a nearby fire pit flanked by five small logs; they weren’t comfortable, but a hole in the center of one made a nice nest for a styrofoam cup I was using as an ashtray.I held the flat black rectangle of my iPhone close to my mouth. “OK here I am at my wedding retreat,” I began, in my raspy early-morning voice. “I feel like you and I have used this tent more than any other couple in the Austin area.” The voice memo was for Nancy Rommelmann, my new buddy and co-conspirator in a podcast we had named, in part because of my retro commitment to stogies, Smoke ’Em if You Got ’Em. I’d made her a voice memo on the first morning, as I wandered the surreal matrimonial landscape, and she enjoyed it, so I sent her one the next morning, which she also liked, and now we had a habit. My morning had gone from “Where can I smoke?” to “Where can I record my voice memo for Nancy?”Smoking is a bad habit, but it’s mine, and ever since I picked it up again during a rough patch in the pandemic (after more than a decade of abstinence), everyone in my life who cared about these things had made a deal, either silently or quite directly, to keep their opinions to themselves. It seemed to be a phase I needed — and since booze had been a more dangerous phase I’d once needed, and I was determined not to pick that up again after nearly 12 years of sobriety — I was mostly left to smoke in peace. “I hate that you smoke,” more than one person told me. But often they expressed a guilty affection for this once-common habit turned taboo. “I shouldn’t say this, but smoking looks cool.” This post is public so feel free to share it.But back to the voice memo. “I was driving over here,” I continued, not sure where I was going with this, “and I’m driving my mom’s car, which beeps at you whenever you do anything.” The road was winding and largely unlit, and every time I strayed from the parabolas of the yellow lines, the car beeped at me, even though no other cars were around, and the robotic fusillade made me feel as though I were being pelted with pebbles. “I don’t feel comfortable about our automated future,” I said, and proceeded to free-associate through a rambling monologue that somehow covered the disappearance of customer service, the secret lives of trees, a girlhood crush on Johnny Depp, a DoorDash order to the Cheesecake Factory, of all places, and why Nancy (though it was a low bar) was my #1 Nancy.The voice memos were not new, but making them for Nancy was. We’d only met a month ago, though we’d technically never met, having only connected through phone calls and text messages and a podcast app called Zencaster. But I’d been making voice memos for at least six years — waking up early, capturing some fleeting moment in audio form, usually when I was traveling, something I mostly did alone. California, London, a place in Tennessee — I’d find myself with all these thoughts and no place to put them, which is the writing impulse, except I was tired of writing that year, tired of staring at the glaring white screen, so I started the voice memos.“I’m sitting on the lip of the Pacific,” one began. “I’m standing near a swamp. Can you hear the noises?” They were love letters of a sort for a man to whom I’d been profoundly attached, though I didn’t send most of them, because he and I were in the slow process of untangling our lives. Also, he shared a bed with someone else, and I was never certain what kind of communication was allowed between us, what would mark him as unfaithful, and what that word even meant.This was 2015, or 2016, and the iPhone with all its fantasy-scapes was swiftly supplanting hand-to-hand contact. IRL was the acronym, in real life, but sometimes it was hard to tell which was RL: the black rectangle where I shared sumptuous conversations, songs and video clips, intimate pictures of my days and my body, or the mundane solitude of me and the cat, me at the laptop, me watching Netflix. That guy didn’t live in my neck of the woods. Even during the years we enjoyed a beautiful physical connection, we were largely bound by texts and emails and phone calls that could last for hours, me holding a hot glass brick to my face for such extended periods that I googled “can your phone give you brain cancer” more than once. (Eventually, I got a headset.)My mother tells a story about me as a baby, how we were talking to each other before I could speak, the two of us going back and forth in a nonsense babble that must have been very gratifying to a one-year-old who had no words for what she wanted. Bluh-bloop-bluh-bloop? I’d ask, and my mother would respond, in a tone meant to convey reassurance, Bluh-BLOOP-bluh-bloop. I was learning the rhythm of communication before my tongue could master nouns and verbs, and this deeply mutual exchange delighted my mother so much she nicknamed me Word Bird.My mom went back to school to become a therapist the year I enrolled in kindergarten. Good timing, at least from a distance, but she grew estranged in other ways — camping trips, newfound friends, a life that was not our family — and while this is a story of liberation for her, it was for me (at least briefly) a story of feeling left behind. I searched for her in the top drawer of her walnut dresser: a pink cameo ring, a sprig of lilies-of-the-valley, dried and pressed, a tiny vial of Diorissimo perfume I could dab on my pale inner wrist to summon her smell. I was seven when I got my own bedroom, exiled from the bunkbed I once shared with my swashbuckling 12-year-old brother. It was a converted utility space, cold and creepy with shuffling noises in the dark, and after I went to bed, I had long conversations with myself, and maybe this is storytelling, and maybe this is prayer, and maybe this is just a survival instinct: We make the company we need.Word Bird turned out to be a good nickname for me. I became a writer, an editor, a podcast addict on her way to starting her own podcast. I wrote text messages so long they required scrolling, the opposite of an emoji. By 2017, that guy had disappeared from my life, but a new one appeared the next year, a connection that was profound and complicated in its own way. Fourteen years younger than me; family stuff; a resistance on his part that even he professed not to understand. When we were together, things felt right, but when we were apart, he seemed to find new and creative reasons for the two of us to remain that way. (Long story, read the forthcoming memoir.) But I sent voice memos to him, too.“Your voice,” he responded. Sometimes that’s all he said: Your voice.“I’m sitting outside, it’s 9 o’clock at night. I like to sit out here and listen to the night sounds,” one voice memo began, though I never sent it, because by then, we were estranged too, and even though he was the one who requested the memo, the recording wasn’t good enough, or interesting enough, I was just babbling. But I kept recording memos for him that I never sent: in the desert, at the beach, but mostly on my outdoor smoking couch in Dallas. He was also sharing a bed with someone else by then, but the voice memos gave me a feeling like I was still talking to him; it was strange and wonderful to discover he could comfort me, even when he wasn’t there.Was this “real life”? What is real life? Over the years I’ve had colorful debates about our technological transformation: Does Twitter matter? Is sexting cheating? What about porn? What about long text exchanges with a man who is not your husband, full of secrets you don’t tell the others? Infidelity was blurry, but for that matter, so was connection. Can you really be close to someone so far away, or are you merely having a love affair with your own fantasy projection (and doesn’t that describe most romance)? Facebook and Instagram were holograms, press releases for the happiness most of us never quite felt (otherwise why were we spending so much time online)?“Instagram is stupid,” an editor declared one morning when we met for coffee, and I asked why, and he launched into a short critique of its performative nature: look at my toes in sand, look at my fancy hotel, look at the book I just read. “But what if that isn’t performance so much as an attempt to share some experience?” I asked, because he was married with kids, and I was single without them. I couldn’t count the number of vistas I’d looked upon in the last few years, wishing someone were at my side, and they weren’t, but I could post a picture on Instagram and, voila, suddenly people were there. The editor didn’t buy this, and maybe I didn’t either, but I understood loneliness to be a modern affliction, as well as a personal one, and the world had given us so many ways to feel connected, even as we remained alone.The voice memos, though. I began to wonder if the late-night dispatches to absentee partners, squirreled away in the cabinets of my phone like a 21st-century Emily Dickinson, was the best use of my voice. I started working on a podcast for Texas Monthly about the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, and voice memos were part of my mandate. I’d leave interviews and football games and unload some experience into my phone. “OK, I just left the stadium,” one began. “Well that was wild” began another. We used a few in the podcast, America’s Girls, and I liked the intimacy they created, the sound of my mind latching onto an audience, unseen at the time.So I began sending voice memos to Nancy. I never planned what I’d say; I was mostly following an intuition, tugging on a thread, and it was nice to share space with her, even if I had yet to actually share space with her, because she lived in New York City. I’d fallen into friend-love with Nancy, one that was mutual and easy (nice for a change), and even though the memos were getting a bit out-there, wandering down corridors that surprised even me, I didn’t feel queasy or embarrassed after I sent them, because the stakes were quite low. What was she gonna do? Stop talking to me because I sent a 17-minute missive on AIs and DoorDash delivery?“Sarah this is amazing,” she wrote back that morning. “This is so Joe Frank it’s insane.” I had no idea who Joe Frank was, but she sent me a video that cleared that up. A radio legend who’d worked in New York and Los Angeles, Frank was known for atmospheric audio rambles that seemed to take place on a road to nowhere.The Frank audio reminded me of Tom Waits, the moody spoken word of “9th & Hennepin,” and while audio commentary on Johnny Depp and the Cheesecake Factory doesn’t quite match this transcendent arena, I was still proud of the association she’d made, that whatever my mind had cobbled together in the wee hours had some slight adjacency to these masters. Then she told me something I probably already knew: We had to share this on our podcast. I felt embarrassed and triumphant at once; I’d only been talking to #1 Nancy, I hadn’t known I was on a stage, but then again, the story wasn’t terribly personal, far less personal than other parts of my life I’d exposed in books and essays, and I knew I could keep doing this, easy. Voice memos were my thing. Voice memos for everyone! Every! Body! Gets! A Voice Memo!And thus we arrive at my debut, embedded at the top of this page. I have no clue how many of these I’ll do (I have a couple queued up already), but I travel often, and I find myself in the quiet lonely hours quite a bit, and the voice memos need somewhere to go, so why not here? This one is open to the public, but we’ll make the following voice memos part of our paid subscriber content, because people who pay real money deserve rewards, and because Nancy bakes cookies and pies and makes delightful videos of herself, but voice memos are what I do.So I submit this first entry in a series, which is a love letter to you, or Nancy, or maybe only to myself. The sound of my voice in the dark, creating the company I need.To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Voice Memo Notes:“Ultimate Hill Country Tour,” by Joe Nick Patoski (Texas Monthly)“The Rise of Human Agents: AI-Powered Customer Service Automation,” by Brad Birnbaum (Forbes)Sarah Hepola on Twitter: This screenshot prompts a small correction, which is that my DoorDash AI was actually named Caroline, though I stand behind my assertion that Nancy Rommelmann is #1 Nancy. Her, official trailer (YouTube)That Joan Didion line from Blue Nights: “As adults we lose memory of the gravity and terrors of childhood.”“The Social Life of Forests,” by Ferris Jabr (New York Times magazine)The Overstory, a novel by Richard PowersJohnny Depp centerfold in my seventh-grade bedroom This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Nancy and Sarah tackle the curious case of Frank Langella, the celebrated actor fired from Netflix’s Fall of the House of Usher after a young actress complains about an on-set interaction, while Fred Savage gets disappeared from The Wonder Years reboot for “abusive behavior,” though we’re not sure what kind. On the Depp-Heard beat, Nancy and Sarah consider body language in the courtroom, “mutual abuse,” the problem with psychiatric diagnoses, and why women are the most complicated characters. Sexy selfies are discussed, but not enough (future episode!). Meanwhile, the fire over Roe v. Wade keeps raging, but Sarah finds hope and wisdom in another podcast, and Nancy has a message for anyone who thinks motherhood is the end of freedom.Also, Sarah rewatches Citizen Kane, prompting the memory of Orson Welles commercials for Ernest & Julio Gallo wine, though it turns out to be Paul Masson, but we’re not sure Welles remembered that either:Episode notes:Conor Friedersdorf’s The Best of Journalism Killers of the Flower Moon by David GrannOrson Welles on Woody Allen, Elia Kazan, Jean-Luc Godard, etc. (twitter thread)Dorothy Comingore, exiled actress from Citizen Kane (Wikipedia)Wanderer by Sterling Hayden“Fired by Netflix, Frank Langella Refutes Alleged Allegations of ‘Unacceptable Behavior.’” (Deadline)“Netflix’s Big Wake-Up Call: The Power Clash Behind the Crash” (Hollywood Reporter)“It's Official: Linguistic Intent No Longer Matters at The New York Times” (Matt Welch, Reason)“The disturbing story behind the rape scene in Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris, explained” (Vox)“CBS Studios’ ‘Last Tango in Paris’ Series to Focus on Maria Schneider’s Perspective on Controversial Production” (Hollywood Reporter)Nick Wallis on Depp v. Heard (YouTube)“Johnny Depp, Amber Heard and the harmful logical fallacy of ‘mutual abuse’” (Lux Alptraum, Think)“Legally, Dirty, Blonde” podcastFleishman Is in Trouble: A Novel by Taffy Brodesser-Akner The Unspeakable Podcast, with Meghan Daum: “The future of abortion: Frances Kissling on Moving Forward in a Post-Roe World”“How Dare They!” Andrew Sullivan, Weekly DishChristopher Hitchens’ “The Poison Chalice” (YouTube)Corrections: Did Justice Alito perform abortions? Not according to WikipediaCheryl Tiegs, Sports Illustrated Swimsuit editionOutro song: “Starry Eyes” by The Records This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Live, from Chinatown NYC, a reading of this past weekend’s essay about the best of the best true crime books. Just want the list? That’s below, with links. Speaking of Chinatown: let me know if you’re interested in reading The Snakehead, by Patrick Radden Keefe (his Say Nothing is included here), which I started last night and which takes place in my exact part of Chinatown. Thinking of starting a Smoke ‘Em true crime book club.Speaking of Radden Keefe: Michael Moynihan had a fantastic conversation with him about Say Nothing, over on the Fifth Column podcast, which moved to Substack this month. Go subscribe! If you’ve already subscribed to this podcast, thank you! If not, there’s the clicky xx Shot in the Heart, by Mikal GilmoreLost Girls, by Robert KolkerBlood Will Out, by Walter KirnThe Adversary, by Emmanuel CarrereColumbine, by Dave CullenDown City, by Leah CarrollI’ll Be Gone in the Dark, by Michelle McNamaraSay Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern IrelandThe Journalist and the Murderer, by Janet MalcomHelter Skelter, by Vincent BugliosiIn Cold Blood, by Truman CapoteCrossed Over, by Beverly LowryUnder the Banner of Heaven, by Jon Krakauer This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

After a ten-minute chat on why we love boobs (any size), Nancy gives an update on the Vicky White/Casey White jail break, and Sarah brings us up to date on the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial, with an eye on Heard’s small-town Texas past and her first appearance on the stand. But the story of the day is Roe v. Wade, which Sarah knows particularly well, since the case started in Dallas. Nancy admits to agreeing with the politically unpopular Bill Clinton dictum that abortion should be “safe, legal, and rare.” Sarah tells the story of her own abortion at age 30, how it changed her life in ways that can never be measured, and remembers what Milan Kundera wrote in The Unbearable Lightness of Being: “We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come.”Episode notes:Debbie Harry white dressCheryl Tiegs (not Christie Brinkley, whoops) in a white mesh swimsuitRunning tab on terms Nancy did not know: Queef, keg stand, motorboatNancy’s review of the book Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural HistoryVicky White and Casey White have been on the run 7 days!Amber Heard on the stand, 4/4/22 (video)“America’s Girls” podcast, hosted by Sarah HepolaAmber Heard stole my sexual assault story, ex-aide tells libel trial (Guardian, July 2020)“We Do Abortions Here,” Sallie Tisdale (Harpers 1987)“The Dishonesty of the Abortion Debate,” Caitlin Flanagan (Atlantic, 2019)“The Brilliance of ‘Safe, Legal, and Rare,’” Caitlin Flanagan (Atlantic 2019)“Roe v. Wade’s Secret Heroine Tells Her Story,” Joshua Prager on Linda Coffee (Vanity Fair, 2017)“Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Warning About Roe v. Wade Came True,” Ewan Palmer (Newsweek, 2022)“Things Fell Apart” podcast, with Jon RonsonDavid Foster Wallace on AbortionThe Unbearable Lightness of Being, by Milan KunderaOutro song: “Here Comes the Sun,” the Beatles This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Prison escapes, death row visits, and how to handle (and not handle) homicide. No it’s not an episode of one of those murder-as-snack podcasts, it’s Sarah and Nancy discussing serial killers, lovelorn prison guards, manipulative prisoners, and why people who make it their business to cover murder might do it with a little more delicacy. Plus the surgery Sarah cannot talk about, a wee bit of we-told-you-so over Amber Heard being revealed to have not written the 2018 domestic violence op-ed for which ex-husband Johnny Depp is now demanding $50 million in defamation dough, and Sarah plans a trip to see it all firsthand.Por favor: In preparation for a bonus show, the Smoke ‘Em journalistsas invite you to send questions, mash notes, secret messages to smokeempodcast@gmail.com As promised, a baker’s dozen of true crime books we love:* Shot in the Heart, by Mikal Gilmore* Lost Girls, by Robert Kolker* Blood Will Out, by Walter Kirn* The Adversary, by Emmanuel Carrere* Columbine, by Dave Cullen* Down City, by Leah Carroll* I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, by Michelle McNamara (which, full disclosure, I listened to on audio. Was great - NR)* Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland, by Patrick Radden Keefe (ditto)* The Journalist and the Murderer, by Janet Malcom* Helter Skelter, by Vincent Bugliosi* In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote* Crossed Over, by Beverly Lowry* Under the Banner of Heaven, by Jon KrakaeurEpisode notes:Warrant issued for missing Alabama corrections officer, escaped convictCoconut cream (not coconut milk)Escape from Dannemora, starring Patricia Arquette, Paul Dano, Benecio del Toro“Conversations with a Killer: The John Wayne Gacy Tapes”“Destination Gacy, A Cross-Country Journey to Shake the Devil’s Hand,” by Nancy Rommelmann (Kindle) Nancy reads “Destination Gacy” (come on, it’s free!)“Hit on the Head,” Sarah’s essay about New Orleans stick up“Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hill”To the Bridge: A True Story of Motherhood and Murder, by Nancy RommelmannSkip Hollandsworth’s most recent Texas Monthly masterpiece, “The Notorious Mrs. Mossler”“Sword and Scale” podcast that scared the crap out of SarahOutro song: “I’m Alive” by Electric Light Orchestra Nancy and Gacy penpal Rick Gaez, 1994 Detective Nick and Sarah, 2019 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

A forensic psychologist says Amber Heard has borderline personality disorder, and Nancy and Sarah diagnose social media with the same. Also on the docket: Johnny Depp’s blind spot on drinking + the possible decline of political correctness + the mediocrity of journalist Margaret Sullivan versus the greatness of journalist Tom Junod + a gripping piece on sexual violence at Penn State + the invisible strings of Twitter come for Nancy, but never forget the real star of every episode is YOU, dear listener.EPISODE NOTESThe Price Is Right: Big Wheel, big money.The celebrity that Sarah most closely resembles (spacesuit optional).Nick Wallis on Depp v. Heard: Twitter - YouTubeDonald McNeil Jr. on the changing of the guard at the NYT“Political Correctness is Losing,” by Jonathan Chait (New York magazine)“The Year We Broke the Internet” by Luke O’Neil (Esquire)What Michael Caine and Will Sampson of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” (and Nancy’s late father-in-law) have in common“No Exit Plan: The Lies and Follies of Laura Albert, a.k.a. JT Leroy,” by Nancy Rommelmann (LA Weekly)“The Survivor: Running to Find Peace After Unthinkable Tragedy,” by Sarah Hepola (Runner’s World)“Untold,” by Tom Junod and Paula Lavigne (ESPN)Sarah: “Nancy, you’ve been shadow-banned!” Nancy: “What’s that?”Outro song: “Sleeper Awake” by Kelly Hogan This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome to episode 5 (previous episodes archived here), wherein six hours after recording in Paloma Media with the Fifth Column boys, Sarah has to make do with Nancy eating pie in her nightgown. But there’s discussing to be done! Including: * Sarah wondering whether Amber Heard is a synecdoche (a word Nancy can neither pronounce nor spell) for the cultural moment that is #MeToo* Why monster is a dumb thing to call people* The intoxication loophole and why Nancy seriously does not want Andrew Cuomo adjudicating them* “But the goals were noble…”* A Rommelmann #MeToo timeline, from Asia Argento to Kobe Bryant* Sarah on Christine Blasey Ford * Nancy on getting two black eyes* Speaking of getting hit in the face…* Ta-ta dresses and murdering clothes* “You’re the man now.”* Celebrity as vehicle for the conflicts and social anxieties of our time* PopRocks! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Nancy Rommelmann and Sarah Hepola are back! Talking about: + Why they love the Ben Dreyfuss essay "The World is Not Full of Monsters" + Who they listen to in the bathtub (Nancy: Elon Musk's new TED talk; Sarah: Ben Franklin by Ken Burns) + "Who is Max Boot? Did he write for Gawker?" + And speaking of Gawker... + The NYT interview with 8 "conservative" men + Who's allowed to say the C-word and why they're in favor of bringing back "twat" (it's funny!) + The hell that are women's spas and why the one they'd open would be called Fuck Your Intentions + Are 100% of hitchhikers murdered by serial killers or nah? + Virtual romances are intense! + Why Nancy is the "#1 Nancy" of the two Sarah knows. (The other is a robot.) And much more!EPISODE NOTES"9th and Hennepin," by Tom WaitsMuseum of Jurassic TechnologyJoe Frank official website"The World is Not Filled with Monsters," by Ben DreyfussBen Dreyfuss SubstackElon Musk TED Talk 2022Benjamin Franklin by Ted Burns (PBS)The Witches, by Stacey Schiff"The Things I'm Afraid to Write About," by Sarah HepolaNormal People, by Sally Rooney"The 'Pity Me!' Personal Essay" in Gawker"The 8 Conservative Men Are Making No Apologies" in NYT This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Entanglements, they're everywhere! In this episode, Nancy Rommelmann and Sarah Hepola look at: + The Will Smith-Jada Pinkett Smith turmoil + The Johnny Depp-Amber Heard mess + Online's "cruelty in the name of justice!" flamers Plus the modern complications of monogamy, Veronica Lake's hair (good!), the world of child actors in Hollywood (mostly bad), why John Updike got it right when he said, "Celebrity is a mask that eats into the face," why Sarah stands with the bed-poopers, and more!EPISODE NOTES"You can't just use me for social media." Jada Pinkett-Smith/Will Smith video"Dread Carpet," Bill Maher on 2020's Depressing Oscar Best Pics"I spoke up against sexual violence—and faced our culture's wrath. That has to change." Amber Heard Opinion piece (WaPo)"Julia Louis-Dreyfuss's Last Fuckable Day" "The Things I'm Afraid to Write About," by Sarah Hepola (Atlantic)"Jena at 15: A Childhood in Hollywood," by Nancy Rommelmann (LA Weekly) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe

Nancy Rommelmann and Sarah Hepola hop back into the studio to talk Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, faking orgasms, crying (women v. men), why young Ben Franklin is hot (electricity!), why Sarah always dated Tom Waits, Nancy's religious experience at a Trail Blazers game, and much more!EPSIODE NOTESFan-cam dancing to "Since You Been Gone" at Spurs game"America's Girls," podcast about the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders that Sarah Hepola co-created and narratesBlackout: Remembering the Things I Drank to Forget, by Sarah HepolaTo the Bridge: A True Story of Motherhood and Murder, by Nancy Rommelmann"I Always Dated Tom Waits," by Sarah Hepola (Salon)"Blackouts and Sexpots" podcast with Nancy Rommelmann and Sarah Hepola This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit smokeempodcast.substack.com/subscribe