Awkward Boy Stories | Shawties Podcast Ep. 3

Listen to this podcast episode here: https://spoti.fi/3qbO1mr

Sinead: Hey guys, welcome back to the Shawties Podcast with your hosts Sinead and also my host 

Shasha: Shasha 

Shalom: Shalom 

Sinead: my sisters 

Shalom: now yeah yeah guys it’s been a while since we’ve been on here a little bit. It’s been about a month or so 

Sinead: oh has it? 

Shalom: Yes, I think so 

Sinead: No while things have been busy you know right now we just recently launched our family talk show onyx family dinner, which is on the Onyx family YouTube channel. So that was a big project that we were so excited to release

Shasha: and in the first episode just came out today with Emmy award-winning Emmanuel Acho he played for the Philadelphia Eagles back in NFL 

Sinead: and also he just won an Emmy as well. Yeah, 

Shasha: and now he’s making he’s really popular for a series of uncomfortable conversations with a black man about race or something 

Sinead: about a comfortable conversation with a black man about anything really

Shasha: Yeah,

Sinead: That’s what the topic is 

Shasha: so yeah, 

Shalom: yes. So, girls, we’re gonna have an uncomfortable conversation with each other right now. 

Sinead: Yeah,

Shalom: we’re gonna discuss a range of topics.

Shasha: Today we’re talking about makeup. 

Shalom: Are we talking about makeup? 

Sinead: We’re talking about 

Shasha: beauty, 

Shalom and Sinead: not just beauty. 

Shasha: what do you mean not just beauty, What else? 

Shalom: I mean that those are fun topics, but I’m just saying about being comfortable in your own skin. 

Sinead: Yes.

Shalom:  And you know, not needing the maybe like discussing the fact how makeup changes you. 

Shasha: Okay, so when was the first time I just want to ask you guys what was the first time you ever wore makeup? Do you remember?

Sinead: Do I remember? Okay, what counts as makeup? Like 

Shasha: anything? 

Sinead: Anything? Like lip gloss? 

Shasha: Yeah, I remember the first time I was turning eight, and we were going into a spa-like a spa thing. And we got lip gloss on we got medi pedis and it was just like the first time ever was did up and if you look at the photos I think we do have a photo not sure but we do you can see we were feeling ourselves looking extra now. 

Sinead: Oh, yeah. 

Shalom: Yeah, I’m not gonna lie 

Sinead: I don’t know why my first thought even though that this is the first time I remember getting wearing this lip balm. I was about 13/14 wearing this lip balm and it was slightly colored. I mean, when I say slightly covered colored. I mean it was very slightly pink and my mom immediately notice and said go wipe that off. 

Shasha: How old are you?

Sinead:  I was like 13/14 

Shasha: Are you sure?

Sinead: I am positive

Shalom: I remember 

Shasha: Well I just wanna let you guys know, context back then. We were pastor’s Kids 

Sinead: Yeah. 

Shasha: And even we couldn’t really dress heavy.

Shalom:  Well, here’s the thing. We just weren’t allowed in our households you know, we were very conservative. We were

Shasha: We’re pastor’s family. 

Sinead: Yeah, you have just had a certain appearance of how we were looking. 

Shalom: Okay, so my first experiment with makeup I was in grandma’s house right and so I went inside her bathroom and I saw this huge counter full of makeup and so I was like, oh, I’m gonna experiment making sure no one looked so I just grabbed I didn’t notice at the time mascara. I just didn’t even put on my eyelashes I put on my eyebrows because I thought it was gonna give me a little arch you know? 

Sinead: Yeah,

Shalom: some people use it for their arches right?

Sinead: no mascara is not built for the eyebrows it’s just not.

Shalom: You see guys. Like I’m so like I’ve never like I’m 22 right now and I don’t wear makeup like I don’t wear makeup every day well for a few reasons why just because the way I was raised and because of lack of interest and to lack of experiment not that I can get into it I could if I wanted to but I don’t know it’s just not something that I necessarily desire to wear makeup every single day 

Shasha: Yeah,

Shalom: it’s so crazy when I see kids out there they just like every time they go to school they’re like put a full flush of makeup on I’m like whoa, is this like

Sinead:  it’s definitely time-consuming, you have to wake up earlier to do it. You have to spend some time you got to watch tutorials.\

Shasha: I know some people take it as a hobby but it looks like a job to me. 

Sinead: But the thing is the people that see it as a hobby and they’re like genuinely fun to them. I’m like good for you. It’s like an art to them you know?

Shalom: exactly!

Sinead: Like, man that’s great.

Shalom: Oh yeah. Oh yeah, definitely. But do 

Shasha: I thought you like to wear makeup?

Sinead: the thing is, I don’t like to wear it daily but I do have fun and I do wear it so if I’m doing a music video I can have a little fun with them some glitter whatever on the eyelids and blending and stuff. I have a little fun with that when I’m doing it for that I just on the daily I’m not that kind of person to wear it on the daily

Shalom: now let me ask you a question. Do you think makeup really just changes you physically?

Sinead: like how you look? Well, I think that the more you wear it, it could probably clog up your pores and stuff like that and probably give you a little more skin issues if you’re not taking care of your skin because like some people they’re really good at taking care of their skin 

Shalom: right 

Sinead: masks and stuff to replenish their face and then be the makeup and all that

Shasha: I just buy wipes from Walmart just wipe them off. I don’t do any kind of skincare.

Sinead: If you will just do that you’re gonna have skin issues because you’re not fully cleaning it and fully rejuvenating your skin afterward. 

Shalom: Yeah, like buying products that will help Like skincare, like invest in yourself in skincare, 

Sinead: yeah if you’re gonna invest in makeup, you gotta invest in the skincare part, or else you might ruin your skin because makeup has a lot of chemicals and it’s just overall it’s like it’s putting a bunch of chemicals on your skin, which absorbs all of it, which goes into your body. So I always considered that whenever I wear makeup, you know?

Shasha: Oh my goodness. Yeah, I remember we were just having a photoshoot. I think last year.

Sinead: not last year. It’s like two years ago. 

Shasha: Yeah, two years ago when we had all lined up in front of. 

Sinead: oh  2 years ago, Now I know we’re talking about it, it was here, right? 

Shasha: Yeah, Well there’s another photoshoot, we all lined up on the table and she was showing us how to put on makeup for the photoshoot because none of us knew exactly how to put it on properly.

Shalom: I still don’t know. 

Shasha: So we all lined up on the table as following this tutorial. And it was just the funniest thing 

Sinead: it was, that was very interesting. Like we really generally don’t know how to apply. Well, I think that now I’ve learned because I had a little practice.

Shalom: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. 

Sinead: And then oh, imagine if you guys had to do your makeup for Onyx family dinner. 

Shalom and Shasha: Oh my goodness. 

Shalom: I couldn’t I wouldn’t. I know that the lighting would just like catching my bad side. Just like sometimes I please. Like I literally forget my neck sometimes. And it’s like, 

Shasha: Oh my God. 

Sinead: It’ll be like the makeup kind of stops at the chin. Instead of going down to the neck.

Shalom: And I don’t even go up probably and sometimes I don’t even go all the way on my foreheads. Just like 

Sinead: yeah, so that’s an issue.

Shalom: Exactly. So I actually respect those who actually have they do a really great job with their makeup. So it’s like props to you. But I want to ask you guys how you like is too young for makeup. 

Sinead: How young is too young for makeup? I just feel like not necessary 

Shasha: because you already have good skin as a kid. 

Sinead: Oh no. Not everyone have good skin as a kid but I feel like that when you’re at those ages, it should be more emphasized to take care do skincare more than covering it up with makeup? 

Shasha: That’s a good point. 

Sinead: I think there should be more effort in instead of doing tutorials and learning how to do makeup, maybe tutorials and like okay, find your skin your best skin regimen. Okay, what helps dry skin one, 

Shalom: right.

Sinead: finding those kinds of fixes is better. Now some people don’t even wear makeup to cover up skin issues but they wear it because they think that they don’t look good enough. And then I would say to that emphasize self-love before jumping to make it.

Shalom: It’s interesting. You said skin issues right? Because a lot of people have what do you call it? like that sort of acne disease? like acute. What does it call?

Shasha: acne? I think.

Sinead: I think there’s another word for it.

Shalom: I know 

Sinead: not that acne but 

Shalom: no, no. Yeah, there’s something there’s another word to it. But yeah, they have that type of disease. And also they have like another sort of disease like I can’t remember. But yeah, the acne thing. Like do you think that in terms of acne? Do you think that it’s best when someone you know can cover up or do you think that it’s more like 

Sinead: man, the thing is that you can’t judge? You can’t really judge per se someone who does not feel comfortable because they have really really bad skin issues.

Shasha: Yeah, I’ve never been there before 

Shalom: or burns. Like that’s what I meant to say.

Sinead: oh burns

Shasha: okay, That’s a special situation we’re not talking about.

Sinead: yeah  I’m not gonna tell a burn victim. Oh, don’t wear makeup you need to self-love yourself. 

Shasha: Okay, we’re talking about people who just have skin issues. That’s it like nothing more horrific happened

Sinead: no but even though those people might not feel self-confident no one’s getting but I would say that you still got to learn to love yourself with and without the makeup. You still got to learn to love yourself because it’s going to spread to other things if you’re not loving yourself in certain areas.

Shasha: Oh, that was deep. 

Sinead: Yeah,

Shasha: that was deep. 

Shalom: Oh Cystic acne.

Shasha: Cystic acne. Yeah, I’ve seen that. Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. 

Shalom: I mean, yeah, there’s definitely there are some special cases where you know, maybe a person would really want to use makeup for certain things, but if you’re like already Okay, right. And your skin is already clear.

Sinead: And people still wear makeup because they want to look older or they want to look more mature or

Shalom: but what makes you mature? Is it the lip gloss that makes you mature? Is it the arches of the eyebrow? Or is it the actual condition and like

Sinead: and that’s the thing because some people can’t be like all makeup is bad or all makeup makes you look more mature because some people will only do a lip gloss like I mostly I wear lip gloss. That’s basically all I do. 

Shasha: I don’t think that counts as makeup. 

Shalom and Sinead: What really?

Sinead: what do some people do?

Shasha: I think lipstick is I think lipstick counts as make up

Sinead: some people wear only eyeliner, they literally only wear eyeliner. And it’s not even a lot of eyeliner but only a little bit of mascara. They only wear mascara but that’s still makeup but it’s like they’re like oh I want to I think that makeup when it pops out a certain feature like you’re like oh I’m targeting certain features. I’m not necessarily changing myself, but I’m emphasizing that’s the thing. There are two things that makeup can do it can emphasize features you already have. So people that wear mascara might be like oh, I want to show off my eyes more and like put make it emphasize what color my eyes or whatever, then some people want to change how they look and they’re literally some people will change like skin tone on their face, 

Shalom: right 

Sinead: face structure because they feel like their nose is too big or their chin is too square or their forehead is too high. Like all that kind of stuff. And when it gets to that point, it’s like you need to practice self-love and more than change how you look

Shalom: right

Sinead: Appreciate it. 

Shasha: Have you guys ever heard of permanent makeup surgery?

Sinead: Permanent make up surgery

Shalom: what is that?

Shasha: basically it can make it look like you have permanent makeup on. So permanent makeup surgery. It’s like tattoos, a needle basically pigments to where you want it to go. It’s like 

Sinead: What?

Shasha: it was it’s actually heard of that before.

Sinead: okay, listen  What if you said hey, I want to permanently look like I have makeup on right now like okay, we’ll call you on your eyeshadow to be and you’re like oh blue, blue today what? It just does not match all your outfits now from then on you will always have blue eyeshadow. 

Shalom: wait, so does that make it look like? Do you have always have like an arch sort of eyebrows?

Shasha: yeah basically anything I think they make their lips pinker you can have 

Sinead: permanent blush. 

Shasha: Yes. Stuff like that. It’s kind of like tattoos. 

Sinead: That’s that’s kind of extreme to me. That’s that kind of No, it is extreme to me. Like I’m just I don’t know. 

Shasha: Okay, but I for me, I would actually nonetheless, I would actually wear makeup more if I did not have to do the work of putting it on if they can create a mask Elon Musk create a mask. I mean, he’s an inventor, if he invented something where you could put it on your face, and then just like, peel it off and make it was on you. 

Sinead: But that’s not permanent, that’s not permanent. So 

Shasha: no, no, no I just want to like if I just want one some, one day.

Sinead: Are you saying that the only thing stopping you from wearing makeup is the fact that you just don’t know how to do it.

Shasha: Yeah

Sinead: so you would wear makeup every day. If you could do it easily. 

Shasha: Yeah, why not? 

Sinead: Sorry. Wait, are you saying that you’re not satisfied with the way you look? Or just for the fun of it? 

Shasha: Just for the fun of it.

Sinead: Okay, okay, that’s what I’m wondering why.

Shalom: Wait Shasha, what if someone said the same thing about the exercise you love to exercise, right? You like the process of it you like 

Shasha: wait, what? No way, wait wait, But exercise is not

Sinead: No, Listen, someone’s like, Man, I can just slap some abs on, slaps some muscles on. 

Shasha: That’s body image issues. 

Sinead: No, actually, your face is body image, It is part of your body image.

Shasha: That’s like comparing drawing to I don’t know. Why are you comparing makeup to exercise? Why?

Shalom: Because some people just want that perfect body so what’s it like?

Shasha: I mean, I acted just for fun. It doesn’t sound fun anymore. 

Sinead: Oh yea, let’s discuss the topic of makeup for fun. 

Shasha: There’s nothing wrong with that. If the issue comes isn’t when you feel dissatisfied. You’re putting on makeup because you’re dissatisfied?

Sinead: Yeah, but the thing is should that be an issue too?

Shalom: What about being dissatisfied with yourself? Like if you want to up yourself 

Sinead: What I’m saying is if they are dissatisfied and they want to do something to better themselves, they feel like makeup is the way it should that be a bad thing? 

Shasha: Yes. 

Shalom: Well, okay. Maybe 

Sinead: Is that like, 

Shasha: Cause you’re encouraging best self-esteem? What’s your argument here? 

Sinead: No, I’m just asking should that be a bad thing? What is someone’s like, you don’t know me? You don’t know that. I feel great when I wear makeup and like or like maybe wigs say someone’s like, oh, I want to wear wigs because they don’t 

Shasha: Oh, yeah. Yeah, like, like, we use extensions. You know, that’s why I kind of like I had a phase where I wore a lot of wigs but I kind of like I kind of want to take a break. 

Sinead: But would you say that it was because you couldn’t take care of your hair or you really did not like your natural hair?

Shasha: I was lazy 

Sinead: or you, okay you were just lazy. 

Shasha: And see that’s why when it comes bad when you would rather wear fake hair than take care of your real hair. You know I’m saying 

Shalom: hmm, 

Sinead: people just want to experiment have fun I guess the best 

Shasha: I’m not gonna argue if you don’t like the hair because I know natural hair there’s a lot

Sinead: I thought that the real thing we’re just saying is you have to appreciate your natural self 

Shasha: right 

Sinead: as well as have fun with makeup or wigs or whatever.

Shalom: right Wow

Shasha: Yeah. I mean you guys got locks cuz I mean you want to I don’t know you just like that style. Not because you hated natural hair right? 

Shalom: No, no, I love my natural hair. I love the way how it grows and everything 

Shasha: kept you guys were frustrated. 

Sinead: No, I didn’t say I hate I was 

Shalom: no I love my natural hair 

Sinead: and I just said that

Shalom: I like my natural hair now I said 

Shasha: no I mean before,

Sinead: before I didn’t hate my hair,

Shalom: for me before I didn’t hate my hair. 

Sinead: I just couldn’t take care of it.

Shalom: Yeah.

Shasha: I don’t want to hear you’re not like did you have the best self-esteem like

Sinead: no no, I still love my hair. I did not like I didn’t hate my hair and I didn’t feel like I look bad with the hair. I had like a full Afro sometimes like 

Shasha: Sinead’s was very thick. 

Sinead: But I did not have the tools to take care of it or I didn’t know where to find the tools to take care of my hair even though the 

Shasha: right 

Sinead: but I didn’t really think about that at the moment. I didn’t have the right mindset to go that far. 

Shalom: Okay, guys, your nine-year-old comes in your bathroom. She’s crying and she’s like Mom, all the kids in my school are oh, we’re wearing makeup. I want to look pretty too 

Sinead: Oh, definitely I would encourage her and say 

Shasha: no. 

Sinead: I would say no foul be like you are first of all you are nine you don’t even look older. Because the thing is about makeup is it definitely makes you look older. that’s what makes 

Shasha: Yeah, basically not young 

Sinead: and when you’re nine that doesn’t need to be thinking about you need to be satisfied with the way you look.

Shasha: Yes, 

Sinead: it’s always gonna be the thing about wearing makeup when you’re young. It’s like you’re not done developing facial features right

Shasha: Yeah, so no stress go play with the barbie. 

Sinead: I looked drastically different than for me at 13 at 10 Even 16 I look different 

Shalom: oh yeah definitely 

Sinead: I don’t know but you always kind of look the same 

Shalom: everyone thinks that you’re younger than you are Shasha 

Shasha: everyone thinks you guys are younger than you are 

Shalom: no no no literally I heard someone gasp once when they heard your age, like 

Shasha: I heard people scream out and horror when they find out you’re like almost you’re 22 and you look like 11.

Sinead: The thing is, is that make a mix of older and we’ve always been mistaken for teenagers 

Shasha: Have that bothered you guys?

Sinead: for being mistaken as young? No, it doesn’t bother me.

Shalom: it doesn’t bother me

Sinead: not people that I literally know some of my own friends who thought I was younger than I am 

Shalom: yeah but it’s also the way how you carry yourself well actually no when you’re doing it yourself we actually carry ourselves older than you are younger 

Shasha: so since skyjack says look the same for years 

Sinead: she looks young 

Shalom: yeah

Shasha: she looks the same so 

Shalom: but she wears makeup though. I think it’s just more of her body because 

Shasha: you asked me like she’s tiny but also her face looks the same

Shalom: yeah her face does look the same

Shasha: in the real literally so I mean 

Shalom: what but like how could that never bothered us like us just being young looking young 

Sinead: Yes for some people it bothers them to look young but really think about it. 

Shasha: Yeah,

Sinead: at some point, you want to look younger like you know when you’re older than you’re like wait a minute, then people start getting Botox and they start getting like 

Shasha: yeah, fillers

Sinead: they start being fillers and stuff or taking like fat off or whatever right because they want to look younger but I would say I would argue to say that stay away from a lot of well, first of all, eat healthily 

Shalom: eat healthily yes 

Sinead: make healthy choices and don’t wear makeup as often as you think you want to 

Shalom: Alicia Keys she stopped wearing makeup for years now. 

Sinead: yeah she’s really good 

Shalom: Yeah, she does it really good 

Shasha: I remember on top of makeup lady gaga when she was filming was it called again in that film her film 

Sinead: Oh,

Shalom: star is born?

Shasha: start is born she was not allowed to wear makeup for the film and when she’s to try to sneak it in a little bit try to sneak in a few makeups but she had to wipe it off because she wasn’t for her role she wasn’t allowed to wear makeup they want her to be natural so I thought that was what is it Makeup

Shalom: but What is it? How come we’re not in this sort of natural phase? How come it’s just never here it’s always just different makeup trends but there’s just never a natural phase 

Shasha: hmm, because there’s no profit from being natural.

Sinead: Oh, I mean think about it. I mean there could be if people invested in skincare makeup companies will suffer but the thing is if they work together you know mess up your skin a little bit with makeup fix it with skincare

Shasha: what 

Sinead: think about it they both profit from that but if you only focus on natural then only the skincare profits come

Shasha: Oh so so so you can start our company Like a makeup company and then a skincare company number like we give them like these toxic makeup ingredients and then he can clean it up with 

Sinead: well you are creating a master plan. 

Shasha: an evil plan, But you’re right I feel like everyone needs to prioritize skincare first and foremost. 

Shalom: I mean and yeah, I mean like I agree wholeheartedly I mean like I feel like I need to invest myself even more of skincare I mean like I don’t use makeup so it’s like I need to you know substitute you know get those serums and those base sprays yeah 

Shasha: base face?

Sinead: rose water mist thing

Shasha: no, 

Sinead: You never use one?

Shalom: you never used one?  

Sinead: it’s relaxing you know

Shasha: What are you talking about?

Sinead: you never use a rosewater spray. 

Shasha: uh-uh. 

Sinead: You should try it

Shalom: it’s really nice 

Sinead: you spray it right on your face and it’s kind of hydrating

Shalom: I will literally buy you one Shasha Because honestly we need to invest me and you, me and you yes 

Shasha: Trust me we haven’t got enough water it’s from a tap. 

Shalom: Oh no, no, there needs to be more than just water. Three soap involved there needs to be 

Shasha: no I can use soap and stuff. I’m just saying this 

Sinead: Rosewater rose water is refreshing 

Shasha: so you can tell who prioritizes skincare more? 

Sinead: Okay, yeah, you know 

Shalom: Wait, wait, wait what tell us you’re like a little bit of it. You

don’t see the whole thing but like what you remember what are you know?

Sinead: Let me just let me reveal my secrets you know so this is what I do. Most days. I wash my face with some water. I don’t do soap every day because it dries out to this all my skin is even different from like say Shalom skin it’s slightly more oily

Shasha: I just soap every day because my skin is oily 

Sinead: so I don’t do soap every day but I will do water for sure. Then of course I do some serum I’d hyaluronic acid. I think that’s what it’s called. Yeah, that’s what it’s called. Right? Sometimes I do niacinamide. And then I put on some Neutrogena face cream after those. 

Shasha: For me. I wash with Cetaphil I love, I’ve been using the same Cetaphil I forgot what the I think it was specifically for phase out the Barwin I don’t know who would use it Barwin but I use that Cetaphil shojo Scrub. Then I put on what’s called again aloe vera oil and olive oil a little bit of mix of the two I don’t put too much because my face is more oily but just to hydrate it a little bit more. I use a mix of those it’s really hydrating

Sinead: Yeah

Shalom: Nice 

Shasha: try the rosewater though

Shalom: nice 

Sinead: alright okay now 

Shasha: slowly keep going 

Shalom: I have some I have a whole bunch of products but I kind of want to list them but I don’t feel like getting it so I will tell you guys another time 

Sinead: another time? Ok like, what do you do? Do you wash your face with soap every day? like

Shalom: oh yeah, every night at least I would wash it 

Sinead: well you should watch it in the morning too because like when

Shalom: and morning It just depends it’s either I vary either night or day by that I wash it. But I use a whole bunch of other products 

Shasha: Do you wash soap twice a day that wouldn’t dry your skin out with soap?

Sinead: not if you have oily skin

Shasha: oh yeah she does oily skin you got to know your type you 

Sinead: got to know you got to do what’s best for your skin. 

Shalom: Wait hold on I’m gonna get one or two of my products

Shasha: no wait Shalom is leaving the building right now. For now, let’s talk about something besides what is your is your we do have a haircare routine I know you have sister locks for like 

Sinead: the thing is about with Sister locks if you don’t really need a hair care routine, you can oil it every you know a couple of weeks but like and then wash it every couple weeks but like the you don’t really have to do much to maintain it like you don’t have to grind. You don’t need to like what you have to do with your hair and put protective styles in it. 

Shasha: And so it just shows me that you don’t need products your hair because look nice hair. Um, I don’t know if

Sinead: you do need to put products in your hair if it’s like that. But because of locks, the only way they will start locking is if you don’t put a bunch of stuff in. If you start putting stuff in, you’ll start slipping 

Shasha: No, but think about it the way to grow your hair because Sinead’s hair was shoulder length when she started but now it’s been mid-waist length. 

Sinead: But think about it like this dreads are almost like a protective style. They’re like braids, but dreads you know, I mean, the way like that it’s not going to like start breaking 

Shasha: Oh, 

Sinead: because it’s basically a constant protective style. 

Shasha: So the secret to growing your hair is protective style so it doesn’t break 

Sinead: Yes, that’s what I would say it is nicely dressed and not necessarily not putting products but keeping your hair and protective styles. 

Shasha: Wow, that’s interesting. I keep my hair and Afro 24/7

Sinead: I think it will it won’t be protected at the ends in stuff because it’s always out but if you have any protective styles.

Shasha: it’s gonna grow nice Sinead’s hair grew so fast. Oh, Shalom is back with her hair skincare products. 

Sinead: Okay, so what do you have Shalom?

Shalom: Okay, so I have hydro bio serum. 

Sinead: So what is it is moisturizing concentrate? 

Shalom: Yes. And I also use hydro bio gel cream as well. 

Sinead: Okay, more stuff. I don’t exactly know what it is. 

Shalom: The makeup artist in LA used it and then Mom ordered it. 

Sinead: Okay, 

Shalom: so yeah, I also use Insta natural 

Sinead: Oh yeah niacinamide serum. It has hyaluronic acid, vitamin E all that is really good for the skin. I highly recommend using niacinamide serum.

Shalom: I need to buy more of mine. This one’s almost out. I also use 

Sinead: Instanatural I love instanatural so I use it

Shalom: Yeah, instanatural Vitamin C cleanser 

Sinead: I use for my skin to wash my face. 

Shalom: And I also use 

Sinead: Mario Badescu as I say, 

Shalom: I think so. 

Sinead: That’s the rosewater 

Shalom: so yeah, Shasha try some on your face 

Sinead: Yes, try it

Shasha: no

Sinead: okay move the microphone

Shasha: wait I might be allergic to it

Sinead: You’re not allergic to it

Shalom: Shasha It’s natural 

Shasha: That smells good. Why do you spray it to my eyes? 

Sinead: What? you suppose to close your eyes

Shasha: You didn’t tell me to?

Sinead: You didn’t even close your eyes? 

Shasha: No.

Shalom: Shasha?

Shasha: I don’t even know when you’re gonna spray it.

Sinead: I’m sorry. I’m sorry.

Shalom: I have to make your face heal.

Shasha: That just smells really good.

Shalom: You want we want me to buy you one. 

Shasha: No, thank you. 

Sinead: It smells good no Thank you. 

Shasha: really good. Oh, yeah, like I’m running across my face. 

Sinead: And that’s that’s what Im saying. It’s, it’s refreshing. Basically what we’re saying is guys take care of who you are naturally because then you’ll learn to appreciate yourself more and you won’t necessarily feel pushed to wear makeup if you don’t really want to but like society pressures, you know? 

Shalom: Yeah, and it’s okay to have fun with makeup. Do you know? Just know just appreciate your natural self first, you know? 

Sinead: Yeah, cuz deep down you got to make sure you appreciate yourself and love yourself deep down. It’s not even really about like, we’re not even trying to criticize anybody for wearing makeup or anything like that.

Shalom: No, 

Sinead: we just want to make sure that everybody has the best mindset first as they’re going in. As you guys are getting into makeup or getting into wearing wigs or getting into wearing even different clothes and stuff like that. 

Shalom and Shasha: Right right.

Shasha: I think the next topic should definitely be hair. 

Sinead: Hair,

Shalom: yeah,

Shasha: I don’t know what do you guys think 

Sinead: that’s a good idea. 

Shalom: That is a good idea 

Sinead: Anyways, guys, we hope we were able to you know, have a nice conversation with you all that was thought-provoking. You know, thinking about what you’re going to change in your life. Maybe do a skin routine if you don’t have one stuff like that, you know, you know, but anyway, thank you guys for joining us in this podcast. We will see you in the next episode.

Everyone: Bye

Listen to this podcast episode here: https://spoti.fi/3y80wBM

Rita: we are half an hour away and our air conditioner stops working on the RV 

Sinead: well first yeah yeah 

Mirthell: no half an hour after leaving California to come back 

Sinead: no no not in California.

Rita: no not even that on the way there

Sinead: on the way remember?

Mirthell: Oh you’re right 

Sinead: on the way to California it’s 30 minutes later 

Mirthell: it’s true 

Sinead: air conditioning doesn’t work and keep in mind it’s the middle of summer

Mirthell: right and this is new this is a new RV so it’s like whoo and I’m just like I think I’m gonna stop and then I stop and all of a sudden bang!

Rita: Welcome to the onyx family podcast and today we are talking about the Onyx family dinner guys this summer we went to um LA and we were out there for about a couple of months

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: and we filmed our first talk show uh season of onyx family dinner 

Sinead: yeah

Rita: it premieres November 4th, 2021 on the onyx family channel 

Sinead: when this comes out it would have premiered yesterday

Rita: right right yeah that’s right

Mirthell: and it’s a youtube original youtube originals

Rita: It’s a youtube originals produced by Pocketwatch youtube and shine global 

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: in partnership with our company we are just ecstatic to finally have it just so for everyone to see we worked so hard on it but I want to kind of go back and talk about the experience 

Sinead: oh yeah like how it all began 

Shasha: well it was about to be filmed at our house 

Mirthell: well that was because of

the whole video and everything like this

was in 2020 or 2020 

Rita: right so we actually pushed back the filming because of the pandemic we’re like well we don’t feel comfortable going in the studio neither did they feel comfortable with us coming in some studio

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: we all had to be very cautious so there was a lot of pushing back and finally summer of 2021 we were able to do it in a very safe environment that controls everything from the testing everything went beautifully um we had no positive cases on the set everything just was great 

Sinead: that’s so blessing

Rita: that was a huge blessing but you know the road there so we like to take road trips, okay maybe I shouldn’t use the word like now it’s just a necessity for us at this point in time 

Mirthell: right

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: so we take road trips so we took a road trip over there so we were tired but we thought in our idealistic you know manner hey why don’t we take the RV and we’ll take the RV with our dog, yeah and yeah we’re gonna be like all those other people you see on the road you know like when you’re traveling and you seem like a whole bunch of RVs and their cars yeah I don’t know why but it’s just I don’t know what experience they’re having but I’m not having that experience 

Sinead: no none of us are having that

Rita: okay

Mirthell: I mean we just always have drama every single time every single first time the first time for those that don’t know we found that the car that we were towing behind us was traveling now alongside us

Sinead: it was supposed to be towed it was supposed to be connected to the back of the RV right?

Mirthell: but somehow it disconnected the metal ripped

Sinead:  yeah the metal fully

ripped 

Mirthell: the car detached and now we see our car traveling down on the side of the road I’m looking like hey there’s somebody that looks just like our car the one like we’re towing

Sinead: I don’t see anybody in this nobody’s driving driver’s seat

Rita: oh my goodness

Sinead: luckily it was an empty road so it was like like deserted you know when you’re traveling 

Mirthell: this is a very fine piece of metal that was still attached

Rita: very fine 

Mirthell: and so when we pulled off it dragged the car over slightly back behind our vehicle and then it went like this way and then it went that way and then we stopped on the overpass like we stopped at the side and then we were able to rectify the situation

Rita: and then what did we do we unhooked it and then we ended up driving

Mirthell: we ended up driving it all the way back home 

Rita: Yeah it was crazy the second time now I had this big bright idea I said okay I said hun this is why that happened because the hitch maybe was too low to the ground and so I thought maybe blowing all these bumps on you know the interstate roads maybe jerked it a lot so I said let’s flip the hitch upside down so that it’s high and let’s do that so I was like we’ve got this okay problem solved

Mirthell: so we’re traveling

Rita: On the next trip

Mirthell: this is the second trip that we did with it and I would say probably maybe about five hours or six hours in 

Rita: yep yep 

Mirthell: maybe seven 

Sinead: no no no it wasn’t even that long because we did not trust me it was not five or six hours it was like three 

Mirthell: well it was true it was two states over 

Sinead: yeah It wasn’t that far

Mirthell: that state that we came oh and it wasn’t the next state was the following statement

Sinead: yeah yeah

Mirthell: maybe three maybe four hours 

Rita: yeah maybe four hours yeah

Mirthell: but anyhow we stopped and um oh no we’re driving and I see a red light ahead but it’s one of those highways that you can drive a little bit faster yeah so I’m driving it into red light and I try to stop as fast as I can to not hit the red light because I know I’m not going to be able to go through it I’m like whoo and I’m just like I think I’m going to stop and then I stop and all of a sudden bang 

Rita: no let’s see this is what happened we were at the red light and I’m looking on the monitor because we have a camera for the back, yeah and I see that the car that we’re towing did not stop it just kept on going and the thing is because we have such a large RV we didn’t even feel it no we didn’t look at the monitor I would have not known so then we go I said hun uh that the thing just crashed our car just crashed into behind us so we come out of the RV and we see sure enough there’s hood damage bumper damage everything so now we try to unhook the RV from the car we can’t do it so I go

Mirthell: in literally a hole in the hood because it just went

Rita: right  so I go in the car and my job was to remember to press on the brake or something while you drove the RV a bit forward right so I get in there like I’m a bad woman yeah look at me I’m gonna do this or 

Mirthell: How were you supposed to reverse

Rita: well I don’t know all I know is that I watched too much fast and furious and or something because I thought I could do something that I could not do when I was in the car and Mirthell like put the RV forward and I’m going backward I don’t know why I panicked because I felt the car was almost being dragged along so what I do is I as well

Mirthell: Open the door while it’s moving.

Sinead: while it’s moving

Rita: I open the door and I’m 

Mirthell: That women Rita rolls out you know Im gonna jump out of the car and do a flip.

Rita: I didn’t do all that but I did jump out and I felt like I hurt my shoulder or something a bit I was just like

Shasha: what you rolled in the ground?

Rita: no I didn’t roll 

Mirthell: no that was my exaggeration

Rita: and I screamed

Sinead: she jumped out of the car while it was moving

Shiloh: like just walkout 

Rita: no because there was I don’t know 

Sinead: no because the car was moving

Rita: it was moving it was a lot of moving pieces

Shiloh: Then just step out

Sinead: no not when it’s moving

Shiloh: no was it going slowly?

Rita: yes it was going slowly but not enough for me 

Mirthell: look at our age let me tell you something at our age

Rita: everything 

Mirthell: what you have in your mind

Rita: yeah yeah

Mirthell: it doesn’t actually play out you think you’re a stunt woman or a stunt man 

Rita: right

Shiloh: At least like hop out like

Rita: I did I hopped out I threw the door open and i 

Mirthell: I think it was more like a hobble out it was more hobble

Rita: all I know is that I screamed and I was scared but it worked you know it did detach and then so then we were like 

Mirthell: oh that was the second time

Rita: so we were like forget it you know we’re not doing the hitch anymore I don’t know how all these other people do it I see them all the time on these streets I don’t know how they do it but for some reason, hitches don’t work for us so now on this trip

Mirthell: this trip now we decide we’re going to drive our Cadillac right behind it

Rita: right behind it 

Mirthell: right behind it so you know or in front like we’re going to drive 

Rita: yeah with it right

Mirthell: we’re not going to hitch it up 

Sinead: yeah 

Mirthell: so the whole trip now

Rita: no before you even go to the first we are half an hour away and our air

conditioner stops working on the RV 

Sinead: well first yeah yeah 

Mirthell: no half an hour after leaving California to come back 

Rita: no no no not even that on the way there 

Sinead: on the way there remember?

Mirthell: you’re right 

Sinead: on the way to California it’s 30 minutes later

Mirthell: it’s true 

Sinead: air conditioning doesn’t work and keep in mind it’s the middle of summer 

Mirthell: right and this is new this is a new RV so it’s like what’s going on here so we bring it back we bring it to uh RV place and they, we really gotta go because we’re in a time crunch because now we have to start filming everything is set up gotta get out there 

Sinead: and it takes four days to get to California

Mirthell: right so we’re just like okay so what we’re gonna do we’re gonna bring it back to an RV place have them fix it and then we’ll get back on the road the very next morning so we drive back they start working and they’re just like oh man we need this part and we need that part we need this and that so what they’re going to do is they’re going to macgyver it and they’re going to like

Rita: because they don’t have time to order them 

Mirthell: and all the parts are not even available because of it yeah so it’s just like they’re going to guide for it and they’re going to like connect this wire to that and

Sinead: they’re going to do this generator or something like that 

Mirthell: yeah and then disconnect this I don’t even know okay because I don’t know 

Rita: yeah anyway it worked 

Mirthell: it worked  so we took off 

Rita: but we have to have the generator on

Mirthell: right 

Rita: So that’s kind of loud at night you know 

Sinead: so that is going to tie into more later in the story 

Rita: right 

Mirthell: so we actually, everything was going fine pretty much on our way there

Rita: right

Mirthell: I don’t think we had any problems on our way there good once we start to get there

Rita: Shalom and Sinead drove a lot 

Sinead: did we well I can’t remember if we didn’t figure out did we figure out how to plug in we didn’t we couldn’t figure out how to plugin 

Rita: oh the plugs 

Mirthell: no what happened is one of the places that we went it was full and the place that we went to actually had a burnt-out plug

Rita: oh yeah yeah the unit

Mirthell: so we couldn’t plug it on that one but 

Rita: that’s we that was our we didn’t know

Mirthell: yeah we just didn’t know but anyhow so everything pretty much was pretty good yeah oh no no no the stairs

Rita: Oh my goodness the stairs

Mirthell: so once we get there everything is fine until we have to go into our Airbnb because we stayed at a really beautiful spot off in malibu 

Rita: no but the stairs started coming out 

Mirthell: no it didn’t come out we were fine going in malibu going uh whatever

Rita: no we were not because oh after we left Malibu

Mirthell: after we left malibu 

Rita: oh yeah

Mirthell: now we went to and we went to our Airbnb right something happened with our stairs where whatever they did whatever they macgyvered or whatever happened it started to like

Rita: I don’t think it was them though

Mirthell: it might not be 

Rita: but before we get to that though we stayed for a while in malibu we were at a beautiful RV park

Sinead: yes 

Rita: and so we thought like I said kind of how I started this thing with our idealistic selves guys look at this we could stay in this RV for a while we’re right here by the ocean, it’s beautiful I think within what a few days we were like we need it we need an Airbnb 

Sinead: yeah this six people in that small of a space 

Shasha: oh my goodness and a dog 

Rita: with a dog

Sinead: and a dog is actually a key part to that because it just takes up even more space 

Rita: Yeah it was nice though it was beautiful it’s nice 

Mirthell: it’s a nice RV it’s spacious but it’s just not spacious for six people 

Rita: we go from malibu now from the RV park now to our Airbnb for where we’re gonna be for like you know several weeks while we’re filming and that’s when we discover as we’re driving the stairs that you know to come out that extend when you open the door to the RV keep on going in and out in and out as you’re driving as you’re driving 

Mirthell: so we’re like this is not safe like the stairs are coming out it could hit a car beside us so we’re just like okay we gotta get this thing was fixed but we decided that we were just gonna park it on the street 

Rita: by our Airbnb, this is in West Hollywood now

Sinead: yeah this RV in the middle of the West Hollywood

Mirthell: right

Rita: to be fair there’s a lot of RVs in l.a I mean a lot.

Sinead: this is a giant RV 

Mirthell: right so we call uh you know a mechanic to come and fix our stairs mechanics don’t want to come nobody wants to come up

Rita: no what happened is there are so many RVs in LA that the people who fix RVs are on backorder or on the waitlist for months for people for us to sign up and actually, have them come to fix our RVs

Mirthell: so the company that we that has us out there they get us a spot they get us um a place where we can bring the RV where we can store it and where they can fix it so, me and Rita 

Rita: no-no not to fix it it was just a place where we can store it we can store it 

Mirthell: that’s true so, me and Rita head out there and stairs are coming out [Music] yeah every second people are honking me, yeah honking me and then we have to wind down the window or not wind down the window but open the window and they’re like 

Rita: yeah yeah and then we’re always like we know we know

Mirthell: we know so it’s just like over and over you know what the irony of it is is is that someone from the set was on the highway a random highway like California is like a big place by millions and millions of people and there is some guy that was worked on the side that had worked on the set was driving down the highway and just like 

Rita: saw us in the RV and then it was like you’re stairs are out.

Mirthell: your stairs and he realizes it’s the Onyx Family he’s like hey hey that’s the Onyx family see you in the morning!

Shalom: I don’t remember that 

Sinead: yeah yeah that happened

Mirthell: so we get there okay so we get to the place where we’re gonna store the RV and it’s just like ah the headache of the RV is gonna be off we’re gonna go back in our Airbnb we’re gonna enjoy the rest of our time and guess what I forgot our insurance card and our registration and the people will not give us and it was Friday so

Rita: it was Friday 

Mirthell: we couldn’t get it forwarded over from where we lived

Rita: what was stunning though was how did we go across a country without this insurance, III no I mean honestly it’s on our phone so that’s one thing 

Sinead: yeah

Rita: but it was something else that we needed was the registration

Mirthell: was the registration or the title one of them 

Rita: registration it was the title or one of them it was one of those and so we had to wait to go and get it um faxed back to us so we had to drive that though all the way back to the West Hollywood 

Sinead: yeah I drove there then get drive back 

Rita: and this is the thing this RV park was all the way in the valley and we were staying in West Hollywood and it was just like Nah this was no good fam 

Mirthell: okay so there’s a mystery I don’t know maybe you guys can help us solve this mystery

Okay so we drive our RV back and when we drive our RV back we park it back on the street now we had gotten a note for some reason 

Sinead: Can I just say for some reason, the door also started malfunctioning when we went to the Airbnb 

Shiloh: it would unlock it

Mirthell: which door?

Sinead: the door just started for no reason

Mirthell: the front door?

Sinead: yeah this door no-no the door of the RV just started malfunctioning because as soon as I opened it start blaring alarm

Mirthell: oh right right

Rita: It has never done that before

Shiloh: Oh yeah, I remember

Mirthell: right so we ended up parking on the street okay it’s a neighborhood really nice neighborhood okay I got a note on the RV that week saying I would like to buy your RV would you like to sell the RV we love you know I really like your RV whatever okay 

Rita: oh I didn’t know we got someone who wants to buy our RV 

Mirthell: yeah somebody wanted to buy our RV

Shasha: remembered I showed you guys the note 

Rita: oh

Mirthell: yeah so someone wanted to buy the RV I didn’t call them back and basically, I’m just like I’m not going to sell our RV, okay that is we’ll call that subject number one okay 

Sinead: okay 

Rita: okay suspect number one

Mirthell: suspect number two was we got into a little spat not a big one but a little spat with the

owners of the actual Airbnb right because they were like something like they wanted to overcharge for cleaning and we’re just like no we clean our own stuff so 

Rita: we wanted to clean like twice a week or something and we’re like

Mirthell: and we’re just like no we will we’ll clean our own whatever thing I think they want to make some money so that’s suspect number two suspect number three there is a Karen that was on the street

Rita: oh yeah 

Mirthell: that lived across and I was parking on that side I didn’t know it was care in there I just parked where there was an opening but I later found out that like one day when I came back to park there she was like no you can’t park here because my serviceman is gonna be here and so you can’t park here so I was just like oh okay fine thank you and I moved on over there and I parked over by a construction worker 

Rita: worksite, like a house being renovated

Mirthell: suspect number four the owner of that worksite or yeah whatever yeah anyhow that day we got a ticket on our vehicle saying that they are going to tow our vehicle if we don’t move it right away 

Rita: right 

Mirthell: we, they are towing our vehicle and we got like a ticket from the city now granted

the whole time we were there we had gotten no ticket until one of these suspects was engaged and it happened around the same time right right where it was the owner of our Airbnb the Karen across the street you know the person that wanted to buy our RV and that other person so we’re wondering like who wants us off the street

Shasha: I think it was a Karen I feel like the person with the RV won by the RV wouldn’t report it 

Mirthell: yeah maybe

Shiloh: I think the moral of the story is to book plane tickets wear some masks and just go on a plane

Mirthell: yeah 

Shiloh: because that’s less time get over your fears just do it

Sinead: what are you trying to say, Shiloh?

Mirthell: Well I don’t know what but somebody wanted us off that street anyhow we kept the RV there over the weekend and then on Monday we were able to bring it in we had all our paperwork but oh what a headache so

Shalom: let me tell you there are more RV stories than it is film production stories 

Mirthell: I know but that was the first part 

Rita: that’s a huge part

Sinead: it was such a huge part 

Shiloh: I remember you said you know RV owners always have these amazing stories and everything and that was when we first got the RV and now I see what they mean

Mirthell: I think the last so we managed to survive for the rest of the time because our view was away and then afterward on our way back home after filming that’s when that the final 

Sinead: the final clincher oh my goodness

Mirthell: it was my it was the worst 

Sinead: it was again guys it’s the middle of summer okay 

Shiloh: oh

Sinead: finally for some reason the air conditioner now decides to give out

Mirthell: we’re driving through the desert 

Sinead: we’re driving through the dessert 

Rita: we’re in Arizona 

Sinead: we’re in Arizona 

Rita: in New Mexico, texas

Sinead: where it gets to 100 degrees guys 

Mirthell: yes 

Shiloh: we were thinking of going to a hotel we stuck it out and slept in that RV

Sinead: no barely slept we were having fever dreams guys

Shiloh: sweat was pouring

Rita: there was one night I don’t think any of us slept because we were just too hot

Sinead: It was just one night because we were trying to get through those states as fast as possible we did not stay long at all 

Shiloh: wait did we mention the earthquake or the earthquake in Cali?

Mirthell: there was an Earthquake?

Sinead: there was a

Rita: I didn’t know if there was an Earthquake.

Sinead: there wasn’t there was a slight one but you guys didn’t feel I felt it it was in malibu and we were In Malibu 

Mirthell: oh okay 

Rita: oh but all I know guys are that I put my face by a window trying to get cool air but there was no breeze nothing

Sinead: yeah that’s the thing

Rita: it was the hottest I think I’ve ever been 

Mirthell: and this is when I discovered I would rather freeze didn’t have that

kind of heat

Rita: it was horrible 

Mirthell: I would rather bundle up in a blanket and just super cold and cuddle and whatever

Sinead: yeah

Mirthell: but heat 

Sinead: you feel like you can do nothing 

Mirthell: you can’t escape you 

Sinead: you can’t escape the heat 

Rita: you can’t well I mean honestly I don’t know when we’ll take another RV

trip 

Mirthell: no you know what the problem was that I couldn’t breathe the air was so thick I could breathe no RV RV is just not the thing

Rita: it’s not for us maybe it’s for others maybe other families but not for us

Shiloh: always in planes even boats

Rita: I don’t mind boats if 

Sinead: you want to take a boat to LA?

Shiloh: why not like 

Mirthell: we would have to we should have to find from where we are we would have to find a port

Rita: to go through the Panama canal 

Mirthell: right

Rita: all right but you know back to but when we were in la now we’re filming and I tell you guys this is probably our first time well we’ve actually been on sets as guest stars for things like Ryan’s mystery player playdate um and then you guys had done actually a nickelodeon commercial so 

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: but this was the first set that we’ve been in where we were actually the talent and it was like oh my goodness this is so cool you know we’re there we got a dressing room and you just see the whole thing like this really showed us like you know 

Sinead: definitely

Rita: you know you see like I always hear about craft tables, Is it craft paper 

Sinead: yeah crafts crafting

Rita: craft services I always hear about that now I’m like oh this is what it is and it was fun okay so guys I really only drink like Fiji water you know maybe some avion I mostly drink Fiji water so I happen to mention it because I don’t know something was weird one year when I drink some other waters I won’t get into it but I’ll say is that I just don’t drink other I don’t do well-bottled water and he doesn’t do well with avian water right I didn’t have an upset stomach with the other water but it was just a weird thing so basically I only drink Fiji but I only drink fiji water so anyway I happen to mention it to the people at craft services and next thing I know all over said it’s like don’t drink the Fiji water it’s only for Rita and I felt like such a diva that’s not like what I meant to happen but it was like because they had the regular I don’t know arrowhead or whatever it was and then he was like oh you want fiji water let me bring it for you and I was like oh 

Mirthell: They’d be chilling Fiji water just for Rita like Diva Rita

Rita: I feel like Im a diva I know but it was really good

Sinead: yeah and one thing that we did not expect to have I didn’t really think about it when we got up like our own pa our personal assistant I was like oh wow just someone that would be able to get away from

Mirthell: that would do everything for us literally

Rita: right right it was he was just like Dang anything you needed he was always like you guys need anything, you guys need anything yeah I was like

Sinead: it was really nice it was 

Mirthell: it was fun we had a wardrobe would go and buy us outfits if we needed it

Shalom: Did you say wardrobe?

Mirthell: a wardrobe that’s what they call them

Shiloh: I’m literally wearing the clothes he bought me like right now 

Rita: oh Wow

Mirthell: that’s true he did he bought that the top for him

Shasha: yeah I’m wearing a blue dress and I think I wore this too I’m not sure but it was like it was very cool working with the designer

Shalom: I’m wearing the rings that he gave me 

Sinead: oh for real

Rita: well see I guess his impact is still on us, you know 

Mirthell: was it aj?

Rita: AJ

Mirthell: AJ yeah AJ was cool I really like AJ 

Rita: right shout out to Bradley

Mirthell: yeah yeah our first PA

Rita: yeah so there’s AJ, Bradley and oh well we had our own you know makeup and hair, Jordana?

Sinead: Yes! Jordana was great

Rita: yeah she was so so good she made our face look so good like guys I don’t usually wear makeup I have no clue what I’m doing when I do the 

Shalom: same

Rita: um but just to go on there and just roll up and not have to even think about it

Sinead: yeah that just felt nice

Rita: it was nice yeah and then oh man Shy she was the like production coordinator

Mirthell: Oh yeah, she was very cool though

Rita: oh she was so cool she was just like 

Shalom: every day I would see her purple jeep and I’ll be like she’s here yeah 

Rita: yeah she’s lots of energy but it was so good and that’s the point you, I mean there are so many other people on set 

Sinead: yeah we appreciate it, everybody

Rita: like our director Sandy

Mirthell: um I was close with Elion 

Rita: Elion the assistant director like see there’s a lot of terms that I’ve always heard about or read about and all of a sudden now you see it like all in front of you 

Sinead: um you see how it all works together 

Rita: right the grip best boy like there are so many people

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: so many names but I could tell you guys like right off the bat and I’m not exaggerating this like I was saying 99.9 of everyone was so nice 

Sinead: yeah definitely

Rita: was so friendly was so professional

Mirthell: Definitely

Sinead: it was like it was a great set 

Shalom: a great experience 

Mirthell: and they were just like I mean if anything even happened they were hiding all the drama from us, that’s like they literally protect the stars like it’s always just like you know we’d probably never hear anything that is you know happening around us 

Sinead: yeah even if there was we wouldn’t know 

Shasha: and I love the food too I think that I like the vegan food 

Sinead: yeah because every one of the dishes on the set was vegan so that was really nice yeah 

Rita: Yeah it was really it took us out of our comfort zone because these were foods that maybe we wouldn’t normally

Sinead: Yeah

Mirthell: right so that’s true so what about like our first guest like let’s talk about the guests

Shasha: Our first guest emmanuel acho?

Mirthell: Emmanuel Acho that was amazing like yeah this guy he has he’s so intelligent 

Shasha: first of all he came in the room with so much energy

Rita: yeah 

Sinead: definitely

Rita: Confident

Mirthell: I felt like I knew this guy for like the longest time 

Shalom: well you didn’t you? because you’ve been watching him online 

Mirthell: well I’ve been watching him But

Rita: yeah but not personal

Mirthell: he didn’t know me as it wasn’t personal 

Rita: One thing I recognized while I was like sitting there and listening to him talk I’m like I whispered to him like you sound like a preacher and he started laughing like preaching is in my blood wasn’t his like I think his father’s

Mirthell: His father, his father was a preacher

Rita: yeah that was a preacher and I mean like you could totally tell he just had that minister swag

Mirthell: yeah

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: you know 

Shalom: oh yeah

Mirthell: right he’s like a light like drawing people to what he has to say what he has to do and probably drawing a few girls too I mean he has that swag that’s like you know

Shalom: yeah he’s a really great guy I saw he won like an Emmy the other day I just love the like ministry that he has about you know having uncomfortable conversations with you know a black man like I don’t know because it’s something like when people have conversations with us like a black man like imagine the uncomfortable conversation with onyx family

Mirthell: well I guess that’s kind of what we are doing in the show is kind of like

Sinead: having conversations 

Mirthell: some conversations that are uncomfortable some of them 

Sinead: some of them yeah yeah but what I really appreciate about like talking with him is that he really brought a light to what how we can talk with people with uncomfortable conversations like how we should talk be talking to them and how it’s an important thing to do because a lot of people will avoid uncomfortable situations 

Shalom: right 

Sinead: or uncomfortable conversations and it’s not something that you really should avoid but just learn how to deal with it.

Mirthell: that’s interesting because a lot of people think that if they avoid conversations or avoid an argument that somehow it’s just gonna magically go away the problem whatever the dissonance is whatever the challenge is but how can you work on a problem unless you come to understand it and how can you come to understand it the differences that we have unless we’re talking

Sinead: exactly

Rita: yeah so when he first came in he was like wow look at this vegan spread how did you guys know I was vegan and we were like you’re vegan and he was like yeah we’re like well how long he goes like a day and we’re like no that’s you’re no you’re just eating a more plant-based, yeah you know for the day

Shalom: Do you remember what we ate?

Sinead: what did we eat on that day?

Mirthell: that was pizza I believe 

Rita: we had so much food during that whole process we can’t even remember what meals we had on what day 

Shasha: yeah it was so hard to um chew and also speak 

Mirthell: but with Emmanuel, we had pasta I think 

Rita: I think it was pasta, yeah and so I mean a lot of pasta can be very plant-based you know but it was really good food and I just want to shout out you know the chef that was on the show although Mirthell is our cook he’s like our chef you know if you guys watch the feed the soul you guys know yes he is our in fact even after this podcast we have some soup waiting for us 

Mirthell: so the month of November I’m going to be fixing a soup every day just comfort soup 

Rita: yeah

Shalom: I love that!

Mirthell: but it’s all good everything is vegan

Shasha: can you please write down the recipe so I can make it like I’m afraid that one day like you won’t tell me anytime like just tell me

Mirthell: Nah cookbook coming soon and everybody will

be able to get it

Rita: but interesting is a lot of people would think well why didn’t you guys cook it it’s onyx family dinner you know one of the reasons why and at first, we wanted to they actually gave us the option but we said you know what we can’t be all things to all people as much as we would want and it’s not like a cooking show where you know you’re gonna see the food cooked but at the end of the day it is a family dinner and that’s the portion we needed to focus on because cooking for production in fact

Mirthell: everything is perfect

Rita: I forgot what the term is but they basically like um they decorate the food they set it’s it’s I can’t remember the department but it’s the whole department that takes care of it

Mirthell: that person was on set I think longer than anybody else, they would break down the cameras they would break down the sound the computers right and the person that is doing the cooking would have to come there the earliest and end up leaving the latest

Shasha: right yeah coz they have to clean up after 

Shalom: oh yeah 

Mirthell: i couldn’t do that and film and be this one of the stars exactly no I couldn’t do it 

Rita: Exactly, because there’s a food prep scene where we’re prepping the food so in essence, we are helping to prepare the food but we’re not right we’re not the

Mirthell: we’re not in charge.

Rita: yeah exactly so that was really important but I mean it was really really tasty meals  the meals I think even were new to us and I think you know we actually now feel like oh we can probably 

Shasha: like strawberries and pasta

Rita: Yeah, I don’t know about that one

Shasha: it was interesting, I like it

Shalom: I love that I like it

Shasha: I liked it too! Because I love strawberries

Shalom: It was interesting I like the strawberries like the cream cheese it was like an interesting combination

Shasha: I know they didn’t like it I liked it 

Rita: I have to try that 

Shasha: no you didn’t like it even if you did try it again

Shiloh: Did I like it?

Rita: I don’t really

Shasha: do you like it? I liked it it was good 

Sinead: I think it was good it was different

Mirthell: I think I’m glad that we led off with Emmanuel being the first show because I think that it will prepare the audience I think I’m glad that we let off with that because the reason why I really like it is that he models very well how to have conversations that are uncomfortable 

Rita: well he just puts you at ease you know when you start talking to him he has a real way about him and the stories he tells about some of his first incidents where he felt like this pull like were to like when he was at the lunchroom in the NFL like where do I sit who do I relate more to just people who are black or people who are you know maybe they grew up like me like there’s just a lot of different things 

Sinead: and he was talking about how there was a division there sometimes too 

Rita: yeah 

Mirthell: you know what’s interesting uh you know his uncomfortable conversation with a black man focuses on the relations the racial relations and tensions in America and encourages us to sit down with one another especially black and white and others to be able to understand each other more but what’s interesting is that when I see him on other programs that he has because he has like sports programs and other things he has uncomfortable conversations about a lot of things even including in the world of sports because he was an ex-NFL and I remember one of the conversations that he had that was kind of like uncomfortable was about that runner that

Sinead: um um Sha’carri?

Mirthell: Sha’carri right and there were some challenges you know just some people felt really challenged about what he was saying about her attitude and how she’s coming to the sport and he’s taking a pretty strong stance on that particular situation and he’s gotten a lot of people coming back and kind of like 

Shasha: what sense does he have I don’t understand

Mirthell: well I think I think what he’s trying to say is that he doesn’t get why a lot of people are on there saying that you know to fight and saying that like you know this is a woman why are we putting down a woman when really these were everybody that was running were black women so we gotta respect black women but he’s saying basically that everybody that was running was black women and so

Sinead: You need to respect all of them

Mirthell: you know respect all of them everybody needs to be respected including Sha’carri needs to respect the woman that she’s racing with

Rita: here we go again

with the way you butcher her name, “Shakairi” It’s Sha’carri

Mirthell: Sha’carri my apologies to Sha’carri um but um so he is comfortable with having uncomfortable conversations no matter what the topic is

Sinead: and he’s comfortable having a difference of opinion or not necessarily following along with what everybody else is saying

Shalom: see it’s all about respect or like you

know just listening and respect right i

feel like you’re going to see a lot of

this on the dinner table you know 

Sinead: yeah

listening and respect that’s that you’re

Right

Rita: I think that one of the things that we had to actually confront for ourselves was how comfortable were we having conversations with other people see when we do our show like on our on our youtube channel or you know any platform that we have our app or whatever it’s really mostly our family

Sinead: right 

Shalom: It’s true

Sinead: and we’re extremely comfortable with each other 

Rita: Right and we don’t really we have never really tackled these topics before the topics that you’re going to see on onyx family dinner though they are I think topics that everyone is talking about and we are no exception it’s just that we had never talked about it or done anything

Mirthell: with the camera in front of us 

Rita: exactly but we are just like every other family out there we have these discussions too we have our opinions and we have our thoughts and all these things affect us as well there are some topics that we’re going to be getting into that affect us very deeply you know

Sinead: right

Rita: and you know if they ever did like a director’s cut and this and you were able to see the full conversation you’d probably see more but you know we have to fit it in between a certain time 

Shasha: did you say you’re about to cry one of them?

Rita: Yeah there was um there was one where we

were talking about body positivity and

there were ones where we talked about my

grandfather who just passed away and

raced the racial injustice that he often

faced as a black baseball player in the

60s and 50s so there’s a lot of things

that hit very close to home 

Sinead: definitely

Mirthell: well i mean guys

how real do you think we were on when as

we were talking?

Rita: I think we were real you Know

Mirthell: I think for the most part we were

Shasha: yeah 

Rita: well where were we not?

Mirthell: well I just think that we interrupt each other a little bit more 

Rita: oh yeah 

Sinead: oh yeah yeah yeah

Mirthell: like around the table like 

Sinead: we’re a little more polite on camera 

Mirthell: right right 

Rita: Yeah that’s true that’s true

Mirthell: I just want to keep it real 

Sinead: yeah I don’t think we said anything that was not us it’s more like the way we interact with each other

Rita: okay

Sinead: you know a little just a little bit oh that’s right we had to give a good show 

Shasha: like what like what?

Rita: well I was gonna say like Shalom is you know she’s talked so softly here and you guys don’t see her when the camera is off yeah

Shalom: I’m loud

Mirthell: yeah shalom can get it in 

Rita: she can get in there so

Shiloh: that is a cap on most cases 

Shasha: Why

Shiloh: in my honest opinion like Shalom can get mad on the inside but not on the outside

Rita: not mad we’re talking about animated 

Mirthell: animated

Sinead: like she talks like loud sometimes what she wants

Shiloh: oh yeah

Shasha: do you think you were real on your talk show 

Shiloh: yes I think so

Sinead: I think you were too honestly 

Shalom: yeah 

Mirthell: yeah we shared our opinions and everything that we shared was true to life i think that we were just a little bit more polished in a sense that we weren’t really interrupting each other or if we had a difference of opinion we were a little less animated than we could get but for overall i think that we were very true to who we are

Rita: I think we focused on listening, listening to our guests especially and learning and I think that that’s what we hope that you all do as well that you as you listen you learn a lot about what these guests have to say and actually learn more about us too 

Sinead: that’s true that’s i feel like that this is a setting that the show is a setting where people can learn more about background of our lives and how we came to who we are and who we are as a family more than what we’ve kind of shown on our channel sometimes you know

Rita: right right 

Mirthell: yeah and that you’ve been to such a good point about the listening part because you know if we are really going to truly understand each other it’s not so much about telling others what we feel but taking the opportunity to listen and i think that’s why we modeled listening we were very intentional in modeling listening because that was an opportunity for our audience to be able to hear what their story truly is 

Shalom: right 

Rita: right yeah so overall guys it was a great experience we are really excited to share it with you you know like like um sinead said by the time you see this episode of this podcast, it would have aired yesterday 

Sinead: yesterday yes 

Rita: so let us know what you all think let us know like what you guys think of the topics and just the whole vibe so beautiful beautiful set 

Sinead: yes go watch episode one right now it’s um the one with Emmanuel Ocho on our channel on Onyx family on youtube so those who are listening it’s on onyx family on youtube 

Shalom: until next

time when we expose even more behind the

scenes

Sinead: oh yeah we’re going to be doing every after every episode of onyx family dinner we are going to be doing a behind-the-scenes podcast episode to talk more about the topic talk more about the guests and more about the experience 

Shalom: and our experience in California guys yeah so you still have so much to share

Sinead: there’s still so much to share about the whole trip 

Rita: oh i know so much more 

Sinead: so yeah there’s so much more to share guys in these scenes at podcast episodes for Onyx dinner so we hope you guys stay tuned don’t forget to go and watch episode one and we will see you in the next podcast episode 

Everyone: bye

Listen to this podcast episode here: https://spoti.fi/3dxRLrm

Mirthell: like the grocery stores are there is a shortage in the grocery store there’s a lack of products that you’re having I know like I’m not even talking about like toilet paper like how everyone was running on toilet paper there is a shortage of food there is a shortage of supplies

Shalom: do you think it’s worse than when it was in 2020 at the be at the height of Covid 

Mirthell: absolutely

[Music]

Rita: Hello and welcome back to the onyx a family podcast where we talk about issues that families care about today we’re going to be talking about made on Netflix and how that was really triggering for at least me and probably the family because we’ve gone through a lot of those things and we’re going to talk about what’s happening right now with all the supply shortages worker shortages and then we’re going to end off with how do you prepare for what

could be coming okay so guys who watched made me know Shiloh didn’t but who here did?

Shalom: I watch maid 

Shasha: I did too wait

Sinead: Did you finish it? I finished it?

Shalom: I did finish it.

Sinead: oh man I still have like three more episodes or four more episodes

Rita: really?

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: I need to just binge it, oh I would love if I had three or four more episodes I loved that show I was just we were just hooked 

Mirthell: yeah we were hooked yeah definitely binge that

Shasha: I feel like a lot of people were hooked because it was so realistic

Rita: oh yeah absolutely 

Shiloh: so since I didn’t watch it can you guys explain to me what mate is 

Rita: Sure Maid is a series on Netflix and it follows a girl and her mother but mostly a young lady who has a child who is about two years old?

Sinead: yes about two years old 

Rita: and the financial struggles that she goes through once she breaks up with uh the father of the child and so she goes from um homeless well she goes to a domestic violence shelter and then she’s transferred from there to like this temporary housing to a more permanent place but the ups and the downs and especially the red tape with the government and trying to get benefits 

Sinead: and how twisted the benefits are like we’re like I remember seeing a part where she had to get something like she had to get a job but she had to have a job to prove she had a job she had to get a job to get a job 

Rita: oh yeah 

Sinead: it was weird like how do you get a job to get a job 

Rita: right the acting was phenomenal

Sinead: I do like her acting and 

Rita: I love that mother the mother Andy McDowell she was just like she needs an oscar

Shasha: isn’t she the woman from groundhog day? I looked it up it is her groundhog day

Rita: yeah it is her and on Maid, the mother and daughter are literally mother and daughter in real life

Sinead: Wait, are you serious?

Mirthell: yeah that’s why they had good chemistry

Sinead: oh snap I did not know that

Rita: yeah but it was really good but I want to go back

Mirthell: so, what was it a show about poverty do you think that that was one of the main reasons why they even did the show because you know every show has sort of an agenda 

Sinead: an underlying story like moral

Mirthell: right, an online story do you think that showing poverty and the difficulty in America?

Rita: I think in America for me it had a lot of themes one is how do you gain your independence after uh we’re breaking up 

Mirthell: and with a female

Rita: you know yeah and I think another one was yeah how do you navigate the system that is very confusing

Shasha: I thought it was going to be all about what was it called again trying to get our child back that’s it I literally when it ended in episode two I was like wait that’s it what’s the rest of the season

Rita: Right

Sinead: well I thought the whole thing just from the title was just about her being a maid she’s hardly cleaning like she’s like like what I mean like they don’t show that between people

Mirthell: but I think that they wanted to show a blue-collar worker from a female perspective and how they hustle to make it works for their family

Shalom: right 

Rita: yes I for me I actually really like reading books about these types of topics I remember years ago I read nickel and dimed the author that wrote that barbara I think Heinrich, i have to look at her last name but um she’s written a couple of other books that I’m currently reading right now and it’s always about people who are overlooked in society people who people tend to take for granted and it’s it’s just really stunning because you really think about life a lot of times within your bubble and when you’re exposed to what other people are going through it really helps me and I think everybody who understands it to really say wow okay now how am I going to treat this person or this circumstance if I come upon this so for example after reading nickel and dimed and that was many years ago and this is even before we had you know our life change with what we’re doing right now even as a nurse I would always tip people very very high

Mirthell: right

Rita: after reading that book and I understood

Mirthell: and why?

Rita: because in nickel and dime to talk about how there are people who work as waitresses in the food industry and how basically they really live off of the tips it’s not really based off of the salary it’s the tips

Sinead: right but that’s isn’t that more of an American thing?

Rita: yeah definitely just an American thing

Shalom: yeah I heard that I heard in different countries that if you tip you’re actually insulting them

Mirthell: right when I went to Italy they’re really not into tips yeah I know in fact I gave a pretty large tip and they’re just like oh no no no this is too big 

Rita: yeah I feel like that’s what shows well that’s where going back to the Maid that’s the issue is that there are so many things that are great about America but there are so many things that we need to work on we need to fix and one of them is why are people living off of just the tips and those tips are split too 

Mirthell: yeah 

Rita: and a lot of those places 

Shalom: but remember when we talked about a couple of months ago or was it last year how you know how the tipping system ever made

Rita: yeah 

Mirthell: yeah how was it well how was it made?

Shalom: well basically it was like I think it was in the 30s that it was established how African Americans because they were paid so poorly that they made the whole tipping system was they able to you know receive money only just by tips

Mirthell: really I didn’t know that that was it started with you know African American workers

Rita: yeah there are so many things that we don’t really realize and 

Mirthell: but it’s definitely not um minimum wage and that’s that that is a problem

Rita: well it’s less than minimum wage that’s

Mirthell: yeah it’s a lot less than minimum wage and I and I just think that there should be a minimum wage for waiters and waitresses and for people in the food industry 

Rita: but right going back to um like even made now there was a part where she was in the court remember that and remember when the wording

Sinead: yeah legal legal legal yeah illegal 

Rita: what do you guys think about that explain that to our audience what was going on

Sinead: so basically she was in court fighting for the custody of her daughter and the thing is that she was not really experienced in court so everything’s going over her head in here one ear out the other

Rita: because she represented herself too, she didn’t even have a lawyer 

Mirthell: she couldn’t afford a lawyer

Rita: right 

Sinead: right and it was kind of last-minute too they kind of just sprung it on her so she couldn’t even prepare herself so basically the scene went from you know so have you been finding housing for her to have you been legally her legally legal the legal did you legal the legal with her

Rita: right 

Sinead: stuff like that 

Mirthell: that was hilarious I like that part

Rita: and the other lawyer was going well my client is legally legal fully legally legal and this client over here is not legal at all like it was just like 

Shalom: but what I thought about it was that okay they did so well with the beginning in terms of different editings like that but I just wish they had some sort of continuation with that like you know finding different edits along with you know yeah because I was like the first two-three episodes but after that, there was like 

Mirthell: it was just a clever way 

Sinead: to capture the attention 

Mirthell: to capture your attention was funny but it was just a clever way of basically showing the court proceedings and how ridiculous it is you’re not going to understand it even if basically even if they said what was actually going on behind the scenes with the legal jargon, we would not have understood so they just basically said illegal legal legal 

Sinead: yeah that’s true

Rita: even when she was going through her paperwork when she got it from the yeah from her um what do you call the person? maybe her

Sinead: child

Rita: what do you call it what do you call it not advocate um this is the person her benefit worker

the person she goes to that helps her with her benefits and she had this stack of papers and they’re like finish it by tomorrow she’s like how am I supposed to go through it and then she was going through it and you can see the titles of the papers change too you’re not gonna ever understand all this you’re so dumb and all sorts of stuff because she that’s how people feel obviously when we see those stacks of paperwork and this let me tell you why that scene was very triggering for me because growing up Mirthell and me, we were you know middle the class you know we both were in our homes we just you know I never really struggled it was after I got married and we got married young that we started to really learn about whoa this is the real world and it’s and it was hard for many years because I was still going to school to get my degree my college degree um and I was having children at the same time he was working you know just started off as a pastor and we didn’t have a lot of money at all and the thing is for a time when he was in the seminary we were really struggling at first in fact we went into a breadline remember?

Mirthell: yeah

Rita: it was like a circle they said okay everybody they got all the pastor’s wives there and they were like okay everybody goes into a circle and we’re gonna hand out there are these rolls and I was like oh this is so cool we’re gonna get bread so okay you know I stood there and everybody got bread and I was like oh man I’m gonna need more than this I got like at the time I don’t think I had no I didn’t even know I was I don’t even know if I knew if I was pregnant with Shasha you were pregnant but you just I didn’t know yeah but I was like I think I had like two pieces and I’m like no I’m gonna need more like I have two kids at home so I went back in the circle and they were they did not like that, you were here already you can’t have you can’t get another one and I was like oh I didn’t know it was like one time

Mirthell: She didn’t know they had rules 

Rita: Yeah and they went and they got so mad at me and this was like my first foray into that world 

Mirthell: we started looking for different pantries to get more food different places that would help out people 

Rita: but no but remember we went to that one and they gave you like a bag and they’re like

whatever can fit in this bag you can take so we had this challenge right because without the reward.

Shasha: that sounds like a Mr. beast challenge 

Rita: yeah

Shalom: I didn’t know that we were struggling this much 

Rita: well because when we were at the seminary I wasn’t working yet well I think I might have just started to work as a cashier and and daddy wasn’t even having his full um salary paycheck salary it was like a stipend and so we were really struggling plus we were both in school at the time

Mirthell: but that’s when I found out that if you’re a middle-class person um making above a certain amount even if it’s just slightly above a certain amount, there’s no help for you there are no services there are no government services there are no community services it’s almost as though the only people that really have a lot of help are those that are severely below the poverty line or well if you’re wealthy then it doesn’t matter 

Rita: right but at that point in time we did get help because we were really down there because we were students 

Mirthell: yeah

Rita: and so someone said Rita why don’t you just apply and get food stamps

Sinead: food stamps?

Rita: and I was like oh okay so 

Mirthell: that was the first time in our lives

Rita: I don’t remember how we went down to I guess wherever that place oh yeah we went down to the place where the workers benefits are just like how unmade and I went over there they gave me the paperwork I filled it out and it seemed pretty easy and by this time I found out

I was pregnant with Shasha actually that makes it a whole lot easier because you start getting like a snap I think um

Mirthell: WIC

Rita: you got WIC and some other stuff so basically wick makes allows you to get discounts is it discounts or do they pay for it I don’t remember now basically like formula diapers are it even diapers I don’t know it’s basically stuff for child care

Shiloh: is it a sponsor?

Rita: no it’s the government it’s government 

Shiloh: yeah but like you guys like you’re promoting it 

Rita: no because people should know that’s what I’m saying that’s what these podcasts are for now so that families understand like what’s available to them 

Sinead: right because you said you didn’t think about getting food stamps

Rita: people should,  exactly I didn’t know about that 

Mirthell: we had never we have never qualified for anything and then 

Rita: exactly because I think actually what happened was like I applied for WIC and applying for WIC somehow they also were able to now direct me now to get like the food stamps and so I got and I think what was it was it 400 or 600 a month?

Mirthell: it was good like if it was like it was 400 we were just super happy and this was like the 400 or 600 and I mean yeah I went I remember going to the grocery store I was just overwhelmed that I could actually buy food

Rita: oh yeah 

Mirthell: and it was just 

Rita: and not really be stressed about it because at that time 

Mirthell: I was buying for our neighbors

Rita: right 

Mirthell: I was buying for other people because I was just like well I have to share with you 

Rita: we’re not supposed to do that 

Mirthell: we’re not supposed to do it but I was like 

Rita: we had to because we had money left over and there were a lot of people who didn’t qualify who were struggling right they didn’t have any food and I remember we did that a few times and every time the person would be crying in thankfulness because they didn’t have the money so there were a lot of people struggling but okay so now I’m you know I have Shasha a year is done and now I’m like okay they’re like okay you want to re-up it and I was like oh what I wonder what other benefits there are and so I went for just like what do you call it just the benefits when you’re not working unemployment because you have to be employed and then I don’t even know so basically though I went to do what that woman on maid does 

Sinead: right right

Rita: and then that was when I got a rude awakening because I went to I guess the social worker who was working there and she was like you didn’t fill this outright and I was like well I don’t know what I’m supposed to do and she goes okay well you know you have to report here tomorrow at eight and I was like a report for what she goes well you have to be here to look for a job and you have to like go on the computer there and you have to document not the resumes that job applications proving that you have spent all day looking for a job and it has to be like eight hours a day for you to be able to go and get these benefits

Shalom: but you can’t do that as a young mother I mean

Rita: I was in school 

Shalom: and in school

Sinead: that is that’s literally it was impossible

Mirthell: it was messed up we weren’t on it for long 

Rita: no no 

Mirthell: after that, we were just like

Rita: a year to be honest I don’t remember 

Mirthell: I think you went and got a job at like 

Rita: yeah I started I went and I went and got it it was a cashier who started as a cashier then I started as an aide

Mirthell: Nurses aide

Rita: yeah

Sinead: And you’re saying that you actually did go at 8 a.m and everything though 

Rita: no no no no no no we just 

Sinead: okay because you said that we weren’t we’re on it long so I was assuming that that’s

Mirthell: no we weren’t on the food stamps or EBT card we weren’t right we just decided to go a different route but um but it’s really difficult it was really difficult we were in our 20s

Shalom: yeah because she was 25 when I went and made it I was wondering how old are you guys 

Rita: um I was about 20 a little bit younger because I hadn’t had Shasha 

Mirthell: 22

Rita: 22. 

Mirthell: so we were young we were definitely young when we were struggling I remember I remember getting gas and literally pumping like two dollars gas because that’s literally all I had so when I so in maid it would show like the money and the show the money going down and it just was this I remember those days where it was just yo

Sinead: I saw him when I saw her here’s two dollars I saw her pump two dollars I was like that is that really gonna do anything 

Shalom: no but when she went over the gas like pump I started panicking for it I was like oh no no

Rita: and that’s happened with that oh yeah that has definitely happened it’s been very frightening

Shiloh: when does the maid series take place?

Rita: now, this month

Mirthell: no it’s modern it was a water take but I remember those days these are tough times if I found five dollars in my pocket I would celebrate it would be just like a party like

Shalom: I remember that 

Mirthell: oh my goodness five dollars, yeah you know it was really rough 

Shasha: what was that thing she did when she was going in each house and they slammed the door at her what was she asking for?

Sinead: oh the TBRA or something like that that the t-bird oh let’s see 

Rita: I am not familiar with that but I guess it’s some sort of like government assistance so that people can afford rent so then the paperwork the landlord would have to fill out that a lot of people don’t necessarily like to do all these extra steps and they don’t feel like they get they don’t get, I would say the money from the government on time and on top of that they don’t feel like they’re going to get the right tenants

Shalom: okay so you guys think that the system has changed 20 years ago from now you know?

Mirthell: I think 20 years ago it was a lot harder

Rita: what? I still think it’s hard

Mirthell: I think it’s hard but for instance for an instance when they got dollar stores like I’m talking about the real dollar store I’m talking about dollar tree you know what I mean when you could get everything for one dollar that was huge walking in and being able to get like spaghetti 

Rita: yeah but I think the government all the paperwork the red tape I think is even worse now

Mirthell: That’s even worse now

Rita: I think that’s even worse

Mirthell: but like dollar stores, dollar stores now are like that really helps people we never had dollar stores way back 

Shasha: speaking of dollar store you saw on the news right?

Rita: what?

Shasha: they’re raising their price they already rolled their prices it’s not going to be just a dollar now

Rita and Shalom: wow

Mirthell: well a lot of them were like that like

Rita: not dollars, wasn’t it dollar tree?

Shasha: dollar trees raising the prices

Rita: wow 

Shiloh: what about family dollar family?

Sinead: Family dollar has always been always having different 

Mirthell: they’ve always had different prices 

Sinead: yeah 

Rita: so the dollar tree buyout or is it dollar general it’s one of them bought out family dollars 

Mirthell: dollar general always was, it was never a dollar store.

Sinead: yeah, only dollar tree was literally everything is one dollar.

Rita: first of all, do you guys remember dollar tree Christmas?

Everyone: yes yes 

Rita: someone tells the audience 

Sinead: dollar tree barbies for Christmas dollar tree decorations dollar tree food or dollar tree Christmas cookies 

Shiloh: so I’m confused was everything in there a dollar or was did everything that you have with a dollar like

Sinead: no no no everything in the store cost one dollar no matter what it was it was only one dollar

Shiloh: okay if you had two things would be two dollars 

Sinead: yes yes oh oh you you’re saying that you grab whatever you want and get it for one dollar? 

Rita: oh my goodness

Shiloh: that’s what I thought when I was younger

Sinead: no no

Rita: dollar store Christmas or dollar tree Christmas was great 

Mirthell: they were fun

Rita: it was fun it was just like going there the only thing is that for example, we bought you guys like a barbie house

Shalom: was it the one with the antenna on?

Sinead: no that’s not on dollar tree.

Rita: we basically had to shape it and nail it 

Mirthell: right 

Rita: we put it together ourselves it wasn’t like and it wasn’t easy like IKEA either it was a lot

Shalom: I’m gonna be honest I don’t remember dollar tree Christmas I remember nook Christmas and I remember Hannah Montana house Christmas

Sinead: oh that’s those are good guys we must have been balling at that point or something

Mirthell: yeah dollar tree Christmases was those are those

Sinead: I remember dollar tree Christmas okay

Shiloh: Was I even born?

Rita: yes you were a baby.

Mirthell: yeah you were born but you would not have remembered 

Sinead: you know why I know dollar tree Christmas because those would be the dolls where you can’t even put shoes on them they had beach feet okay they had wide beach feet

Rita: like fat

Sinead: yes you could put no shoes on them

Rita: oh that’s so funny

Shalom: I don’t know why I remember every Christmas I remember going to grandma and grandpa’s house I remember that Christmas I remember pancake Christmas where we got I think IHOP or some sort of like cake or something like that that was the first time we didn’t like

Sinead: I think that you probably pushed out of your mind dollar tree Christmas 

Mirthell: yeah yeah yeah but probably years 

Rita: but that’s the thing like right now that was poverty back then but right now like I’m sure there’s a lot of people here listening or watching where they shop at dollar tree and that and that’s fine it’s just you know yeah that was it was I’m grateful for stores like dollar tree and dollars oh yeah our general and family doll I am grateful because you can go in there like you said to get good deals to find anything you need and be affordable and I think that we really went there for many many many years

Shalom: I remember shopping at dollar tree even more so than shopping at Walmart or target like

Rita: we were always in dollar tree, always

Sinead: Dollar tree was our supermarket

Mirthell: I would always go to the dollar tree that was my go-to place to make sure that I’m making meals for you guys making sure that we’re all eating yeah you know I mean oh my goodness I loved dollar tree, yeah you know what really over there what really got me was when I was watching maid and she got this job and when she got the job she had to pay for all the supplies she had to pay for 

Sinead: yeah that got me too! I was like what?

Mirthell: for her uniform and everything and it’s just like why are there so many opportunities that are not opportunities like they make you feel like it’s an opportunity but it’s not 

Sinead: yeah where you’re giving more than you can get 

Mirthell: right by the time you make it back up you could be fired you could be laid off 

Sinead: right

Shalom: look it was a cut this is kind of a spoiler but it was cutthroat when the permanent boss fired her because she took the other job I mean like I felt really sad for her

Rita: yeah but then I also think about it from the boss’s perspective because she’s probably barely making ends meet and so she can’t have workers that could be undercutting her so in this kind of position you do feel for both for example right now I don’t even know if it’s expired or not yet but we’ve had um rent or is it a mortgage moratorium that’s right or eviction moratorium i

should say um we’ve had just we’ve had things on both ends where it was 

Mirthell: policies that are trying to help

Rita: help right help everybody make sure that they stay housed but on the back end the people who own the homes are left going like and it’s not even corporations I’m talking about people who decided to invest in real estate

Sinead: right 

Rita: and become you know entrepreneurs and now they can’t afford the mortgage to the bank

Sinead: the bank is not giving letting up the bank is still knocking on their doors 

Rita: exactly so I see I see both ends because we were 

Mirthell: that’s a good segue to this to this topic about the situation that we the country is in right now right it’s in a very precarious situation

Rita: right so so we had a handyman that came today to fix a couple of things and he told what did he tell you today 

Mirthell: right so like in the industry right now you know people are not making phone calls to get things fixed.

Rita: right

Sinead: really?

Mirthell: so a lot of people are not and part of that is because you know some people just don’t want to get things fixed because they’re scared of having someone in their home so they’re utilizing the services less but not only that but a lot of their workers either are not showing up or they are getting fired for not showing up or now a turnaround of being laid off so this is happening in every single industry 

Shalom: so in his field that he’s in right now there are people not showing up for work?

Mirthell: there are some times that people are just not showing up for work and part of that is that there are policies that are in place that is giving people a check and this is happening not just

Rita: in stimulus check right?

Mirthell: it’s a stimulus check and so this is happening we had to hire some people in the medical field, aides to take care of some family members that we have and we found the same thing with them they were complaining that people are not showing up we noticed that a lot of people were not showing up 

Rita: right we would have liked a different nurse almost every week and it was like what’s going

on and the people the supervisors and bosses were like we are not being able to keep staff right 

Shalom: same with our shame with our young people we know that we have people to take our garbage and our in our boxes and stuff and they’re not even him wasn’t he just telling you how

Mirthell: yeah he this is the owner is

picking up some of the traffic 

Rita: so he said that his son moved back to work it um actually he graduated from college right and he worked and he came back to now work the garbage business with his dad this is the junk business, not the garbage like on the curb, this is like if you have like a ton of extra boxes and things like that and so he comes they come we call them pretty regularly to come and get like a bunch of our packages and things like that.

Mirthell: extra garbage that cannot fit 

Rita: and they used to be they were supervising like I remember sometimes they would come there’d be like five guys six guys seven guys 

Mirthell: even up to eight 

Rita: yeah and now it’s just several trucks it’s just the owner and his son

Mirthell: that’s it right

Rita: and then our handyman today said that he was the and this is what I was waiting for you to say yeah he was the only handyman that was working for the company for quite a few months now because so many people are either not showing up so things are 

Shasha: and also and also we um not to sound bougie but we were trying to hire a personal driver for us to drive us to uh to California because for our filming stuff but when we called they’re saying there’s a shortage of drivers too so 

Mirthell: every single industry went to go get some donuts one day and at the drive-through Christmas they all remembered yeah we went through the drive-through and all the people were there were new and they had to apologize and say these are all new staff because you know we didn’t have we had a shortage of staff nobody knew how to make the donuts nobody knew how to do anything 

Shalom: you guys, what is going on in this country?

Rita: you went to burger king yesterday was it yesterday or the day before and first of all there are new hours that are posted and they were like stay here at the first window and we’ll tell you when you can move up to the next one we were waiting there for a good while 

Mirthell: and we’re wondering like what’s going on

Rita: what’s going on I remember we had been there like a few times over the last several months and it’s they were always talking about their shortage and I don’t think it’s gotten any better 

Shalom: guys what is going on in this country why is there a shortage of everything 

Mirthell: right yeah we’re doing some renovation on our home shortage of materials so our home is not renovated we went to check out uh some property to look at some property in the state that we live in and the people that we’re gonna like to sell the property 

Rita: oh yeah yeah yeah 

Mirthell: they have a company where they would buy and sell luxury cars and they used to do very well 

Rita: parts right or the whole car?

Mirthell: well the whole thing 

Rita: yeah the whole car right 

Mirthell: and they were saying that the inventory is down more than a hundred percent 

Rita: where he was saying but he would do about three a hundred cars per month and now they were just dropped down to twenty-something

Mirthell: twenty-something cars that are just available like the cars are not even available to

buy and people are not buying the cars so it’s like literally every single industry is just crumbling 

Shiloh: do you think it’s because people becoming more uh entrepreneurs these days are 

Rita: no no this goes far beyond that because for many years we’ve had more and more and more entrepreneurs every year this is a combination of Covid people getting sick

Mirthell: some of it is due to just government policies where individuals are receiving incentives or they’re receiving paychecks because they’re unable to get their paychecks and then it turns around and now people don’t have the incentive to go to work

Rita: well because a lot of people were making minimum wage and it’s really not minimum wage in this country really does not meet the needs of what people need to really survive on so yeah when they get the stimulus checks or the unemployment checks things like that and it’s larger than they were making 

Mirthell: why would they go to work

Rita: exactly because they’re struggling

Mirthell: they’re now gonna start traveling they’re now gonna turn around and probably try to start their own business that they’ve been longing to so a lot of the individuals when they get these stimulus checks it’s not that they’re lazy I think some people want to paint it out that

everybody’s lazy but they’re not even making as much as some of these stimulus checks that are coming in and so they take this money and they think okay this is my opportunity to now start my own business or start to like you know make t-shirts or do something that I can work

for myself because let’s be truthful they’re not treated well in these in these workplaces you’re working at some of these restaurants or you’re working at some of these places and you’re treated like garbage and so you’re like okay this is my opportunity to change my life 

Rita: especially now that society seems to have gotten a lot more aggressive so now you’re really being treated poorly

Sinead: right right 

Rita: by the sometimes by your boss sometimes by the customers but

Mirthell: you’re a bus driver and you know that it’s more than likely that you’re gonna get covered because you’re driving a bus you’re gonna say I’m gonna take this stimulus check and protect myself right yeah because I don’t want to be constantly exposed 

Rita: exactly but like you had mentioned earlier how in maid now the how the woman the characters remember how she had to buy her own products and things like that and so every month she has to now figure out you know whatever how much he should take that out of her check like the cost of supplies and it’s not even like she’s working for herself she’s limited for her hours as well in the movie they talked about she could only work 30 hours no more but also there’s in the book nickel and dime that I had mentioned earlier they had a section on people who do cleaning and what they didn’t touch on in the series which they could have is the constant exposure to the chemicals 

Sinead: that is true 

Rita: actually causes health problems which then causes more er visits more doctors visits more prescription medication which then now takes is money out of their pocket so it’s well vicious fishes cycle well I did 

Shalom: well remember the part where she threw up after cleaning that one bathroom inside that yeah but that was like she saw a dead rat we’re talking about like the chemical 

Sinead: yeah exposure to bleach constantly smelling it you know you know that kind of stuff

Rita: respiratory issues and things like that 

Sinead: not just the cleaning supplies but going into places like that that have mold or dust and everything

Mirthell: so when you see people saying I’m not going to go back into work, this is no small decision that they’re making some of them are making life and death decisions or sick or well decisions and they’re saying I worked there because I felt I had to but now that I don’t have to I’m gonna try and find a better way for my family

Rita: so I hate to say it but I think everything’s gonna get worse before it gets better yeah and what do we do already see the shortages in grocery stores 

Mirthell: we haven’t even talked about that yet like the grocery stores are there is a shortage in grocery stores there’s a lack of products that you’re having I know like I’m not even talking about toilet paper like how everyone was running on toilet paper there is a shortage of food there is a shortage of supplies 

Shalom: do you think it’s worse than when it was in 2020 at the height of covid 

Mirthell: absolutely because now we’re having a short on gas we’re having a short on car parts like literally everything is like blocked up at the ports and some of them they’re not even being produced

Rita: Because it’s a global supply chain crisis so there if something is short in Taiwan it’ll affect us like for their time off for the microchips for the cars it just goes all over 

Mirthell: so so where is this going to be are we going to have food insecurities well

Rita: I definitely think we will you know there are companies right now for people who don’t know where you can buy like MRE’s but you know how it used to be just for people in the army it’s um like dehydrated meals that you add water to and then boom there’s your meal and basically there are people or if it’s a cold thing milk or something but basically meal their meal replacements and you can buy it by the buckets and they stay good for like 30 40 years you know or 20 years and so I remember we bought some um because we didn’t know where this pandemic was going I bought some a long time ago and so we have some so there are some companies right now though they are booming those people who are selling that they are making so much money right now because people are afraid that not only will they be shortages but that they won’t be able to afford food that’s another thing because of inflation and that’s another thing we haven’t talked about things are smaller but they’re more expensive

Mirthell: right right right right 

Rita: you know and that’s happening a lot 

Mirthell: everything milk oil everything and then of course gas a lot of people are really trying to get electric cars because they’re really sick you can charge yourself how much gas is going to be ridiculous and when the price is there’s a place in California I don’t know what town but there was a particular town in California 

Rita: right it’s in Monterey county and it’s like right now it’s like eight dollars a gallon

Mirthell: that’s that is incredible wow right so if things get so bad you know um people are probably not going to be able to travel they’re not going to be able to use their cars oh that’s just going to be a luxury car well I would say 

Rita: we had a funeral recently in our family and even prices for airline tickets are super high they’re sky-high right now and so there were a lot of people who couldn’t make it and so it affects everything so again we have to wonder and before I even get to that how does that make you guys feel you know because like right now like we’re talking like family to families right yeah and you know daddy and I have done a lot of talking you know as adults 

Sinead: the thing is those from in my generation and younger like maybe those of you who are watching who are younger or like around the same age as me I know that you guys are probably scared and worried because it’s something that none of us have ever experienced before I think we’ve been through a lot of I’m thinking like in the past 10 years things have never been this bad like people always be joking online like oh you know things are so bad right now but you know what it’s okay there’ll be people who make a lot, of jokes and dark jokes or whatever and now I feel like that we’re in actual serious time and I don’t know how like mentally everybody’s gonna handle it you know what I mean 

Shalom: uh yeah I definitely agree with that but I also um think that a lot of people are going through this even prior to the pandemic so I just feel like that it’s just true you know it’s just different people different stages you know maybe some people are just new at experiencing this more than those are being like oh yeah I’m just used to this like you know maybe you know

Sinead: because people have been going through this 

Mirthell: yeah that’s a good point who do you think is going to fare better I mean because individuals that have been going through struggles I remember when we were going through struggles we just learned about a thousand ways to make potatoes or you know we found those shops where you can get spaghetti for a dollar and making dollar meals that literally can feed the entire family for less than five dollars and so we just learned how I remember when we were going through the worst of our times we learned that maybe it’s not the best idea is to go and get some fast food for five dollars but maybe feed the family for five dollars right it’s just you know these are the kind of decisions that we just had to make

Rita: right so basically if you’re already in the mindset of hustling or making you know a dollar stretch you’ll be left better off right now what do you think Shasha

Shasha: man, just oh man this is just a lot and you must be feeling really overwhelmed

Sinead: do you feel overwhelmed I mean 

Shasha: sort of like you hear all the stuff in the industry, it’s more like what can you do you know what I’m saying

Rita: right how about you Shiloh

Shiloh: I’m not really overwhelmed at all because I mean I feel like I’m too young to really worry about that stuff I mean sure I enter high school and everything but like I’m talking like 12 to like 16 maybe you shouldn’t really worry about this stuff that much about the you know the industry and everything because 

Shalom: well here’s the thing a lot of people your age are you know trying to help the family out now trying to help support exactly like take care of their younger siblings you know work and stuff 

Sinead: yeah the thing is that you’re in a very different spot than 99 of people in the country you know 

Shiloh: 98 point

Sinead: 90 whatever over 90 of people your age you’re in a very different spot so I understand that you’re not really feeling overwhelmed but there’s a lot of people out there who feel like that they have to do their part to support their family and stuff

Mirthell: I’m seeing a lot of job openings I remember like one of the first jobs that I had to help out my family when we were going because I didn’t grow up privileged I grew up you know having to work and I remember one of my first jobs was working at a burger joint and just making enough money not necessarily to help my parents provide but my needs I was able to make a little additional money so that I can meet my needs and prepare for you know things that I had to get done so I just think that at this point in time I’m hearing a lot of people being pretty judgmental they’re saying oh this generation is lazy or this generation doesn’t know how to work or this generation you know is entitled I don’t think that that’s fair I think I think generations just keep on doing that they just always 

Rita: well I think those the people who say that in my opinion are people who don’t understand the work that this generation is doing now 

Shasha: right

Rita: because being on social media or starting an online business is no walk in the park it’s hard yeah and it takes a lot of work and so if people aren’t going and get let’s say getting a fast-food job or doing the other stuff that people are used to seeing they automatically think oh what are you doing just making a video or taking a picture and it’s like it’s a whole lot more behind it 

Sinead: yeah they do not know the behind the scenes 

Shalom: right yeah it takes work

Mirthell: I mean you guys are hard workers like I don’t I wouldn’t say that you guys are I think that you have the privilege but your privilege was not given to you guys actually worked really hard and consistent for it and there are so many kids in this generation I believe that are doing their part they’re working hard they’re doing their part they’re figuring out how they’re gonna make moves next and you know I actually don’t feel that pessimistic about this

generation I actually feel optimistic about this generation

[Music]

Rita: well you know again what can we do to prepare for it possibly getting worse before it gets better

Mirthell: well I agree with what the kids said first, you got to get your mentality right you got to be prepared mentally to know that things are going to change right now and it’s not going to be forever but it is going to be for a time and so you got to get your mind right to say okay I am going to make sure that I understand it’s not going to be the same so step number one mentality

Sinead: yeah Mentality right

Mirthell: what would you say step number two is though?

Shalom: step number two

Sinead: make a plan

Rita: okay make a plan so what would that plan look like?

Sinead: what would the plan looks like 

Shasha: stock up 

Rita: wait now when you say that people say oh don’t tell people to make a run and go and then now we’re gonna have toilet paper shortages

Shasha: well how are you gonna get stuff and you don’t stock up?

Mirthell: that’s a good point it’s true right I do think that each individual and each family needs to make an individual plan and part of that plan is going to be how are we going to make sure that we have some additional resources right and it’s not just-food

Sinead: buying out food and stuff at the market but it’s like

Shalom: it’s like rationing and stuff

Sinead: it’s planning out rationing but it’s also buying like the is it called MRE’s or 

Rita: yeah

Sinead: also buying things like that like that’s not necessarily going to sell out, right?

Rita: right 

Mirthell: right absolutely and I just think that um just making sure that you probably um are like for instance one of the things that we got is we got these planters where you can actually plant vegetables and fruit and different things like that and so that was one of our plans that we were going to have started to ensure that we are eating fresh food still because if we get can have a lot of sodium and you don’t want to always be depending on canned foods um you want to make sure that you’re getting fresh food and things like that so yeah

Rita: right I would say another thing too is like Shasha said I was just teasing her with the stock up she’s absolutely right you do need to stock up you do need to be prepared and if you do it more gradually then there won’t be like a shortage like if you wait to the last minute and then buy like 10 packs of toilet paper that’s a problem but you know 

Shalom: I also think you should do your study like you should study what other people have done in the past to see how they, you know how they stock up how they, you know we how to buy certain things because you know like you know how to like yes and you know just study the ways of how people are doing it even in 2008 because I feel like that we always forget about that year or not forget but like it’s always something that it’s just like exactly right

Rita: and that’s a good point though that you made earlier about people who already were feeling this way but prior to the pandemic because in 2008 even though there was a recession I didn’t feel any different for me really

Sinead: right 

Rita: but it was I was already struggling 

Shasha: wait how come it didn’t affect you?

Mirthell: we were already struggling for 2008

Sinead: we’re already struggling, it’s not gonna get much worse like they’re already used to it, they know what to do they have their plan they have their system 

Rita: yeah 

Shalom: but I definitely do think that this year is probably worse than 2008 I just feel like that’s just slightly different

Rita: I would say also just probably another step I think would start trying to get used to like a simpler life 

Shalom: oh yes 

Rita: like we are so used to eating what we want when we want especially here in the u.s 

Shalom: and shopping all you want

Rita: when shopping and all that stuff and I think we need to get used to a simpler life meaning you might have rice and beans every night for a while or you might have more spaghetti or you might have to wear the same clothes it’s fine

Shalom: I have to admit I actually was struggling with that not ordering amazon packages and not you know doing whatever you want in terms of like you know going out and writing and just like I feel like for someone who’s privileged as me I feel like that was my struggle

Mirthell: I think another great idea and we have done this before and we’ve alluded to it is helping others

Shalom: right 

Mirthell: you have some share it with somebody else just likes how we were saying like when we got our card we made sure that our neighbors were eating too sharing with others is what’s going to get us all through this so yeah sharing with others becomes really important and I’m a big believer in communities coming together because you know somebody may have one thing with which was food another person may be a mechanic and they can you know help someone  have to like bring back the barter system to sort of you know help one another in our communities

Rita: right and I think what you were saying about helping others with your knowledge like for example if you are someone that knows how to garden helping your neighbor

Mirthell: right 

Rita: if you are someone who knows how to fix cars helping you know someone else because I think there’s a lot of knowledge that could help you save money if we kind of pulled our knowledge together not just our resources right and so that we don’t have to be dependent on spending money every time now that being said there are people who are going to need work so there are people like for example our handyman that we use he has been a friend of the family now for years and so I’m not saying like I’m going to go like take his job or anything like that but you know he has a lot of knowledge so he might be able to if he wanted to like help us pass on the information and help others so it’s a really it’s a balancing act you know you want people to still be able to work but then also there are just times where you just don’t have the money and you need something done you know fixed or food or something like that 

Mirthell: and at the end of the day I think that it’s important to have your faith it’s important to believe that better is yet to come you know this is not a doomsday situation where we’ll never come back we’ll never be able to spring back from this we truly believe that things are going to get better soon one day it’s going to get better and what you want to do is you want to be the right type of person make sure that you have the right type of heart where you’re helping others loving others being kind being considerate because you know we’re going to get through this but we’re going to get through this being good people 

Sinead: yeah

Shalom: amen

Rita: right

[Music]

Mirthell: so I’d like to share a story uh with our audience um sort of like a closing thought 

Rita: okay

Mirthell: and um it’s all about your attitude it’s about your attitude because we have to have the right attitude as we’re going into these times so when I and Rita first met and after we had decided that we were gonna get married and we were preparing for our the wedding we went to our a person that would make us a cake it was actually in the south where we got married and this particular lady um invited us over to the home and she had like a whole bunch of cakes like sample cakes spread out for us and we tasted each one of these sample cakes and we were like okay we want this one and I think we decided to go with a rum cake right?

Rita: yes

Mirthell: but it wasn’t the rum cake that I am accustomed to 

Rita: yeah it was better

Mirthell: ah that’s what she thinks

Rita: it was good it was good 

Mirthell: there’s a Jamaican rum cake that is called black cake where it’s thick saturated it’s like

Rita: no, it’s not good 

Mirthell: it’s delicious

Rita: it’s not good at all 

Mirthell: and then it has this is like white icing with like these little

Rita: it tastes like a fruit cake with alcohol in it

Shalom: ew

Mirthell: it’s just divine so I thought when she said rum cake I thought I was gonna get that cake

Rita: no we got the good rum cake the one that’s

Mirthell: the fluffy white cake

Rita: I don’t even know how to describe it it’s like a regular cake okay with the rum flavor and it’s so good it was so moist and it was so good

Mirthell: anyhow

Shiloh: Was it really rum?

Rita: it was rum flavored 

Mirthell: rum-flavored it 

Shiloh: Was it actually rum?

Mirthell: it’s rum-flavored it’s not it doesn’t have the alcohol content 

Shiloh: Was it actual rum when you guys were together before I was born?

Mirthell: yes it was rum that had a flavor

Rita: What does that even mean?

Sinead: He wants to know, was it a rum?

Mirthell: Were we drinking? No, we’re not drinkers 

Sinead: Did you get drunk off your wedding cake?

Mirthell: we didn’t get drunk off of it bakes out 

Shasha: you can’t get drunk it’s a rum cake 

Rita: you know what it was like it’s like the rum cake we get on we used to get when we cruised because

Shiloh: that’s what I was saying because I didn’t want you guys to think that I was talking about the rum cake we had like did you actually have 

Rita: no no we had that same sort of rum cake what’s the rum cake we usually get on the cruise

Mirthell: it’s like

Sinead: Tortuga

Rita: yes oh my god it’s so good

Mirthell: Guys it’s like that kind of rum cake.

Shalom: y’all if I was there I would just reject both your cakes I do not like rum 

Mirthell: oh well yeah you wouldn’t, you would reject that

Rita: You like the rum cake we get from on cruises don’t you?

Mirthell: you don’t like that rum cake? How about the Jamaican black rum cake?

Shalom: no I don’t

Mirthell: yes?

Rita: nobody likes that

Mirthell: oh common

Shalom: never like that every time the church would 

Rita: and I know I probably offended every single Jamaican out there I’m just kidding

Shalom: she’s Jamaican

Rita: right my grandmother my grandmother’s father is Jamaican so

Shalom: guess what she only found this out this year so, she grew up peeking Jamaican

Shiloh: That’s like calling dad Irish.

Rita: he is his grandfather’s Irish 

Mirthell: but i really want to tell myself so anyhow when we were eating the cake she was giving us a story and she was telling us the story about how she gathered all of these things together all of these ingredients together to make the cake the day before and she’s talking about how she was so stressed out because she knew that she had to have all the materials to bake for us and all sorts of stuff so she was really stressed out and so she was telling the story of why she’s so tired now so what happened was the day before she was at the grocery store she drove there she went in got all the materials bought them and came out and found out that her car was stolen right so so she’s sitting there panicking and she’s looking in the parking lot and she’s just looking everywhere looking everywhere it’s like where is my car oh my goodness i don’t know where my car is oh i already i am behind on making all these cakes i got people coming i can’t believe this and then she calls the cops and she’s like listen someone stole my

The car they took a report and when they took the report she said oh you know it was a honda civic and they were just like a van

Rita: it was a van

Mirthell: no it was a car, it was a car that was

Rita: oh yeah that’s right yeah 

Mirthell: yeah it’s like a honda civic or something like that yeah yeah and so she was just like this honda civic and they were like oh yeah that that car goes missing a lot like there’s a lot of people that are breaking those cars so I understand why people want honda’s it was back in it was back in the 90s and hondas were like really good 

Rita: that was it 

Mirthell: like our first cars

Shalom: yeah all we would have was hondas 

Rita: right we love honda 

Mirthell: so so they took the report and she was sitting on the curb and then the cops after they took her report and everything the cops are like would you like us to drop you home and she said no it’s okay I’ll just have my daughter come and pick me up so she calls her daughter and she’s just like um you know honey could you come and pick me up you know because you know someone stole our car and she’s like the mom you didn’t drive the car you drove the van and right beside her where she was sitting was her van she literally was beside her van the entire time writing a report about a car that was stolen that was not stolen it was sitting at home

Shalom: I remember you telling this story 

Mirthell: and I was just like it just goes to show you that your mentality your mind can play tricks on you if you wake up and you’re like this is the worst thing or I’m going through the worst time you know you’re already setting yourself up for failure you can be having a tough time but it’s your perspective your mind how you choose to look at it can begin to shape your day so because she thought she had a bad day her day went from bad to worse but if she had the right mentality about the challenges that she had to face she might have had the clarity of thought to remember oh you know what I got my van she wouldn’t have had to go through all that stuff with a police officer so I just want to share that with you guys because we just want to encourage you to have the right mentality no matter what you’re facing you know um have that optimistic faithful perspective that you know what things are not the best or things may not be the best but it’s going to work out.

Rita: right 

Mirthell: it’s going to work out for us and we’re going to make a plan we are going to have a great attitude about this right we are going to survive this thing 

Rita: together and we’re going to do it together and we’re going to do it as a community and we’re going to help others and when you come with the right mentality and the right attitude your day won’t go from bad to worse your day will go from pretty challenging time to brighter days 

Shalom: because remember your car is always right next to you on the curb

Mirthell: exactly so um that’s that’s my story thanks everyone for joining us we really enjoyed our time we hope you did too here on the onyx family we love to tell the story feed the soul make you laugh heal the heart join us once again on Spotify

Rita: apple podcast um youtube anywhere where you listen to podcasts or you can watch us here on our channel all right guys

Everyone: bye

Listen to this podcast episode here: https://spoti.fi/32d3kBK

Shasha: hey guys we’re the onyx kids I’m Shasha

Shiloh: Shiloh

Sinead: Sinead

Shalom: and Shalom 

Shasha: and guys I just want to say that we’re doing something a little bit different from our skits you know you’re used to us running around chasing after monsters and stuff like that but in this podcast, we’re gonna go behind the monsters and see how the monsters appeared in our videos.

Sinead: not just monsters but we’re going behind the scenes in all of our videos we’re gonna talk about the process of how we came up with the idea the filming process of what happens behind the camera or things that we’ve cut out things that we wanted to put in or ideas that didn’t even work out. 

Shasha: mm-hmm you’re going to see the raw footage 

Sinead: well not the raw footage but the rock, yeah we don’t have most of the footage anymore but you know like we’re going to talk about

Shiloh: vlogs we used to have the raw footage so

Shasha: I know it’s all deleted so that’s a bummer 

Shalom: oh yeah 

Shasha: but you guys are gonna be surprised at what we’re gonna say so today we’re gonna start with our most popular video ketchup versus honey mustard

Shalom: The iconic hundred million viewed video 

Shasha: not to brag not to brag

Shalom: but it was like the least expected like I thought like there are hundreds of videos I would prefer to hit a hundred million but that one I was like really

Shasha: first of all number one because it was rushed okay I’m not gonna cap it was rushed

Shiloh: we needed ketchup stinks I know immediately oh this is gonna flop

Sinead: she’s shaded Shilo just shaded Shasha’s improv

Shasha: yeah that was improv by the way yeah 

Shalom: so if you guys don’t know about the video we recorded this was about two to three years ago 

Shasha: three years ago 2018

Shalom: wow 2018. yeah we recorded it and it was a last-minute skit like Shasha said it’s like a half skit half music video and it was about ketchup versus mustard which is the better condiment 

Sinead: yes basically shadow and Shasha they were eating like eating a hot dog always eating a burger and they were like okay which is the best condiment ketchup and then they’re like obviously mustard which side are you guys on by the way which are what about you guys are you guys ketchup or mustard

Shasha: Ketchup duh

Shiloh: I’m ketchup, to be honest 

Shasha: mustard tastes gross like sour yeah

Shalom: oh 

Sinead: sour?

Shiloh: Shasha had to be mustard for the purpose of the video 

Shasha: I know 

Shiloh: but she hates mustard I love mustard but 

Shasha: what?

Shalom: but mustard is so bitter I prefer honey mustard 

Sinead: honey mustard is good if it was a choice between ketchup and honey mustard I’d choose honey mustard 

Shalom: same

Shiloh: and like mustard is really good on hotdogs like you don’t understand like it’s good 

Sinead: it’s high you know 

Shasha: anyways back to the video I just want to say am I wrong or was it we weren’t planning to make a music video right no we were not planning to have a song at all I think I was just supposed to be a skit and then we were like hey let’s add this to it, Shalom, you came up with the idea I think.

Shalom: I did?

Sinead: you did and then what happened is you came up with the idea and you started writing some of it and I was like um you know let me try writing some of it you know because I’m a little bit into music I never wrote anything that much before though 

Shalom: right right

Sinead: but I was like hey shalom you’re doing the skit part let me just write the music part for you, okay and so I took over from writing it I wrote a quick little thing. 

Shasha: Wait, why was Shalom writing it? Who was the scriptwriter 

Sinead: because like she was gonna add it to the skit part so she’ll just make it quick but really what I got onto was like flowing with it you know so then it was like 

Shalom: would you say that it’s like differs from the other music that you wrote for our other skits 

Shasha: yeah because we had other music in our skits 

Sinead: that’s true but the thing is before we all worked together on the lyrics when we had other videos that had music because the thing is that’s not our first skit with music we’ve had other skits of music you know like our Godzilla one with the whole little music broadway thing 

Shiloh: the first one actually, we did was the granny one 

Shasha: yeah yeah

Shiloh: I remember when they tried to eat us

Shalom: I can’t wait to talk about that one

Shiloh: I love that video because it was our first creative thing and we didn’t even tell our parents about it at first because we wanted to surprise them 

Shasha: yeah yeah I remember I remember and we were it was in the middle of the skit where we decided to do that I mean I don’t we can’t go into it now but I’m just saying that was the middle of the skit our best skits with the music and I mean our best skits, in general, were like last-minute ones 

Sinead: sometimes when you improv like that like we’re just like okay guys I’m just on the spot let’s do this idea let’s go something no script or more of an outline written for this one you wrote an outline some script element then a lot of it was improvised

Shalom: yeah yeah that’s usually how our skits work though 

Shiloh: yeah yeah but like some skits were like you know guys this is like really hard on this and it doesn’t even get as popular as our other videos

Shalom: yeah that gets me mad so yes

Shiloh: exactly so the popular videos are so rushed with like this is not gonna get a lot post

Sinead: And it gets a lot. Wake up and it has 20 million in an overnight.

Shalom: let’s talk about the costume who bought the ketchup versus mustard costume 

Sinead: dude I think Shasha did she usually what Shasha does is she likes to buy a bunch of props and stuff ahead of time be like okay maybe we can do a video about this so you have bought a ketchup costume and a mustard costume we weren’t sure what we were going to do.

Shasha: so I just bought it 

Sinead: yeah yeah you did oh we bought just a bunch of costumes randomly just to see what we’ll do with it, yeah you’re like okay we’ll do ketchup versus mustard 

Shasha: I bought a fork and spoon for the costume we never used it 

Sinead: we never used that 

Shalom: we never used it 

Shiloh: yeah but like sorry I mean I’m just us doing it now like I’m taller than all of you I know that would be so weird now I have a very deep voice

Shalom: yes you do Shiloh yes you do

Shasha: I just want to say though the beginning of the skit I like the beginning of the skit the most because it introduces so many of our characters like robots and teachers I’m glad that his skit

Sinead: it includes almost all of our most popular characters miss suffering in there we have tom and jerry in there we had tom was there right 

Shasha: yeah tom and jerry jerry 

Sinead: we had Charles 

Shasha: we had Charles

Shiloh: yeah yeah cuz think about it since lots of people who are newcomers to our channel watched it they got familiar with the characters 

Sinead: yeah that’s true 

Shiloh: and then one of them more so you know what it was really smart whoever thought of that

Shalom: oh yeah but you know talking about the music video you know most music videos don’t even hit 100 million views and so for this to be our music video to hit 100 million views more than other mainstream artists are pretty significant

Sinead: I like you that you’re calling it a music video because you know what even though there’s a skit in the beginning I like to consider it a music video because I think about like drake’s kiki do you love me right and there’s almost right in it and it’s still a music video

Shalom: so true that’s what I like about jake’s music there’s always some sort of funny quirky element to it, yeah but you know that’s what most music videos are they start off with the story right and it leads up into the song like you guys name some 

Shasha: yeah watch a lot of music videos

Shalom: but like no like thank you next like you know there’s like a story to it

Shiloh: um but like that specific version of the song the first one we never really uploaded on like an album or anything we did a second version

Shasha: yeah remix

Sinead: right we did do a remix of ketchup versus mustard after the popularity of that one blew up 

Shiloh: because you know why because we wanted to post the first one it was like it’s free copyright music 

Shasha: oh yeah it wasn’t our actual 

Shalom: we didn’t we do it like a year later when we were in California

Shasha: no that was a remix, yeah that was we didn’t we posted the original it wasn’t our beat 

Shiloh: but the remix was better though

Shasha: it was better it

was not banging

the music video two was good too

Shiloh: I think

you’re better than that we put our foot

in it 

Shasha: yeah yeah yeah but we put the whole kitchen I was thinking I was listening to it I was like man I wish we put this version in the hundred million videos because I did not carry That rap I am not a good rapper guys

Sinead: Like when I listen back, it was a nice jingle

Shasha: Shiloh carried it, you have to admit. Shiloh carried it, I did not.

Shiloh: yeah, but every time I watch it I’m like uhh my voice!

Shalom: oh because you were a baby.

Shiloh: ten wait no 

Shasha: he was eleven

Shiloh:  I was eleven eleven 

Shalom: you were a baby to me

Shasha: yeah anyways yeah, first of all, I just do it for you guys but I am not a good rapper-singer at all if you guys ever heard of the song we sing in the Godzilla one you guys know I’m not it wasn’t like this like I just want to find love but the guy in my dove I need help it only sounds good when you sing with me.

Shalom: no she’s a great singer she always downs play it like every time she’s

Shasha: stop

Shalom: yes you are is that you sing so softly like one time I heard you singing I was like oh my goodness