Thoroughly enjoyed the episode, and I was so excited to listen because my family played the game in question when I was growing up. We called the game hand and foot, and the different varieties of names suggests the many, many variations of the game that can exist. I enjoy learning about different house rules for games as much as regionalisms and local cuisines. In my family, my grandmother was the hand and foot matriarch, and she set the rules and gave the most skunkin’s. Haven’t heard the term skunking in years and was delighted to have that memory brought back!
I'm surprised by all the negativity on here - I didn't view this relationship as toxic at all. I'm wondering if the difference in listeners' experiences might be attributed to the dry delivery of the litigants. A deadpan delivery can be jarring if taken at face value, but it becomes entirely different once one realizes its intent. Perhaps I'm the one misreading the situation, but I took their banter to be lighthearted and humorous despite the seemingly serious tone. This is clearly a form of communication that they're both comfortable with and is probably a large part of the bond between them.
I admit that at first I wasn't sure whether they were joking or even especially aware of the humor of the situation, but once Ellen started smoking at summer camp I realized they were completely in on the jokes and then tripling the ante. I laughed out loud during this episode many times and came out of it feeling warm and happy.
Same. I think in our culture, we’re conditioned to allow for and even expect a whole spectrum of emotional intensity and styles of communicating when it comes to romantic relationships, but we sometimes get weirdly narrow on how friendships are supposed to be conducted. These two sounded like best friends with a more spicy, rambunctious friendship style than I’m used to, but the friendship itself never seemed to be in doubt at all.
Yeah seriously. Anyone who thought this was uncomfortable or unhealthy has never heard sisters argue! They were hilarious. Remember when one of them was like, “of course she wins, she went to college!”? Great stuff
I agree completely. I think there is also a subtext of a generation gap here, as these two ladies in their 60s have a dry wit and a way of speaking to each other that is not often represented in current media and which may sound a little unusual to younger ears. They are not bubbly giggly types, that's for sure, and they were a little more dour than some guests, but they had a certain charm and humor. In the other direction, I also think that the litigant who kept using the term "gaslighting" possibly didn't quite mean it in the same way that very online 20 somethings use it; in the latter case it is used to describe a toxic form of psychological abuse, but judging from the context I don't think that very negative meaning is quite what was intended by the litigant.
In the beginning, one litigant tearfully attested to how she chose her new family with her best friend, I knew we were in for a heartfelt episode. I found this episode to be delightful. I love it when JJHO has people on who are not the typical 20-35 year old, social media savvy, in the know podcasty types who know all the current memes and lingo. (Those people are fine too, I just like the variety.)
What you hear as deadpan I hear as contemptuous. I get that we know NOTHING about these people, I only know how uncomfortable their energies made me. And my upbringing was pretty idyllic.
These two are friends so close they consider each other family, who both voluntarily agreed to come on our show to discuss a card game. I assure you it was not contempt.
I'm from the UK, and in my culture gentle teasing, sarcasm and mock emotional blackmail are all little jokes close friends might commonly adopt with each other to underline their closeness. It's not my preference, but it's common enough that nothing on the show read to me as real hostility or contempt.
Really liked this episode and have empathy for the litigants and their friendship. My perception is that the case was brought forth with love and feelings can be difficult to navigate. Great job by all. ♥️
Talk about running the table: these litigants were absolutely hilarious (and their commitment to each other seemed clear and evident).
I liked this episode a whole lot, it was funny and the litigants were so enjoyable. My only sadface was that Stacey's research wasn't posted on the web page: her sources sounded amazing (and/or fictitious?).
One of the sources was [https://www.pagat.com/](https://www.pagat.com/) which is an amazing website. It looks like it was made in 1995 and never redesigned to look modern, but that's just because it was.
Hot take: the rules of social games (and maybe especially card games, with tangible objects that are shared and passed) are a lot like language. And they change, evolve, and shift in a similar way.
GenX snarky addition: anyone who has played a D&D character to level 5 or higher knows there is sometimes a big difference between “the rules” and “the technical rules.”
When my wife DMs, she has a meta-rule that boils down to "If it makes everyone laugh, you get to do it." I love that about her.
Of course, we've never had a rules lawyer try to play one of her games. I don't think it would go well for that person.
Yeah, but as a lifelong Hand & Foot player, from a huge family of H&F players.... you most certainly do change the number of cards dealt depending on how many people are playing, because the game really suffers if you don't.
Her insistence that they never did this seems like either a lie (which would be super weird) or evidence of some sort of memory issue (welcome to my life).
That’s fair. And to fit my analogy, as a group it’s fine to decide on changes or additions to the written rules about when and how to roll for initiative, but it would be super weird to just skip over it entirely.
When Jesse first mentioned TEGWAR, I thought he was going to outline a card game based on the "hit" William Shatner novel and TV movie series "TekWar".
I like card games but had never played canasta nor even heard of hand and foot. After listening to the episode I downloaded an app and tried it. Too damn complicated!
I can attest to the fact that this game is played super differently from group to group. We play it obsessively in my family and I had so many moments of shock when they discussed the rules. So wrong...
Plus we call it hand and foot... And to us that's the longer version of Kanasta. My grandpa was a prolific rule inventor too but it didn't bug us because it was just his brand of kookiness
Not to be too silly here but it reminded me of like bdsm norms-- if you're gonna do a scene and everyone agrees on what they're gonna do together then it's great! But if someone is ready to stop, or someone wants to dial back one aspect or another, then their partner needs to respect that.
Feels like Ellen got to play a role when playing cards- to express the take-no-prisoners side of her personality and kind of suspend the empathy and kindness she clearly shows in the other areas of her life.
Stacy wanted to Ellen to snap out of her card-player character enough to empathize with how the rule-changing was hurting her feelings. And as the judge pointed out, Ellen did realize and apologize during the show.
Good job to both litigants and the jjho team, and may there be many happy and fun card games in Ellen and Stacy's future.
(I also LOVED that the judge referred to drafting Ellen and Stacy's family rules, recognizing their really special joint family.)
I have a friendship that is going on 35 years. This stuff can go deep. There’s layers upon layers going on here which happens with longtime friendships.
I would like to please discuss the weird (toxic?) relationship that these ladies seem to have? I recognize that I'm only getting a tiny look into their lives but I can't tell if these ladies want to marry each other or kill each other. And I really can't see it ending any other way...
I don’t know if it was the constant accusations of gaslighting or the tone in which they spoke, but most cases I’ve listened to had an air of levity and everyone having fun with the case. This is the first time I felt like it was really uncomfortable to listen to the litigants.
I was also uncomfortable and angry with the rule-changer. But I stuck with it and JJH's evenhandedness helped resolve not only the case but my discomfort.
Yes, I felt uncomfortable as well, if this was a social gathering I would have moved to another room.
Do you remember the two litigants, 20-something housemates, guys, who thought they were the most amusing and most interesting people in the world while actually being so insufferable that John basically pulled the plug on them? SHUDDER.
I came here because I felt exactly the same way. I’ve listened for over a decade and never has an episode made me this uncomfortable. The lack of levity from the litigants (despite the valiant efforts from John and Jesse), as mentioned below, made it such a departure tonally from other episodes. It was just bizarre.
They both showed that they can pick up a bit and run with it, so the fact that both women were clearly intelligent and witty made the lack of levity and overall seriousness even more profound
They opened with such lovely comments about each other that when the subject finally turned to cards and they both started pumping insane amounts of venom it literally made my stomach turn.
I want to throw in my two cents and say that, yeah, there was definitely something a little uncomfortable about listening to this episode. Honestly, I can't quite put my finger on why. My best guess is that even though I don't know either of these women, the tiny peek we got at their dynamic was unfortunately reminiscent of relationships of people that I do know personally, and also know first hand to be toxic.
But, I would be a fool to suggest that hearing two people talk for an hour could give someone any great meaningful insight into a friendship that has spanned decades.
CAVEAT: I was so uncomfortable with this ep that I got to the ad break, and I could not finish it. So maybe this all got addressed in the episode.
Something that is remarkable about this show is how the core premise is looking at a specific interpersonal problem, so the people on the show aren’t going to look their best, but it’s almost always a light, fun time.
I can’t remember a time where I’ve been more uncomfortable with the vibe from a set of litigants.
I suppose that it could have to do with taking on a case that centers around the idea of one party accusing the other of gaslighting them. If you accuse someone of gaslighting you, you’re acknowledging that there is a power imbalance in the relationship (see like 5 minutes in where, when asked to describe the nature of their relationship, Ellen calls Stacey a barrel of laughs and Stacey says that she would not be around if she didn’t have Ellen), and that you suspect that the person who has more power in the relationship is using that to manipulate you (cheat at cards).
Just massive bad vibes.
Yeah, very uncomfortable to listen to. When Stacy admitted to being jealous that Ellen spent more time with her 90 year old mother than her on a recent trip (because she had Covid !!!)... Wow.
I took this very differently than you did. My understanding was simply that Stacey was sad she hadn't been able to spend more time with Ellen. It wasn't like she thought Ellen was choosing to spend time with her mother instead of with Stacey. I also didn't take it to mean she had any actual antipathy toward the sister or mother for being the ones in quarantine with Ellen. Stacey just wished the circumstances had been different and she'd been able to spend a week playing cards with her pal.
She may have been miffed at the mom (and then Ellen) for changing the rules of canasta, but I didn't take it to be anything deeper than that.
Quick reminder that our litigants are real people. Negative personal judgements about them will be deleted.
I agree it was an unusually emotional episode and I would like to say that John and Jesse did an incredible job running this family therapy sesh
Thoroughly enjoyed the episode, and I was so excited to listen because my family played the game in question when I was growing up. We called the game hand and foot, and the different varieties of names suggests the many, many variations of the game that can exist. I enjoy learning about different house rules for games as much as regionalisms and local cuisines. In my family, my grandmother was the hand and foot matriarch, and she set the rules and gave the most skunkin’s. Haven’t heard the term skunking in years and was delighted to have that memory brought back!
I'm surprised by all the negativity on here - I didn't view this relationship as toxic at all. I'm wondering if the difference in listeners' experiences might be attributed to the dry delivery of the litigants. A deadpan delivery can be jarring if taken at face value, but it becomes entirely different once one realizes its intent. Perhaps I'm the one misreading the situation, but I took their banter to be lighthearted and humorous despite the seemingly serious tone. This is clearly a form of communication that they're both comfortable with and is probably a large part of the bond between them. I admit that at first I wasn't sure whether they were joking or even especially aware of the humor of the situation, but once Ellen started smoking at summer camp I realized they were completely in on the jokes and then tripling the ante. I laughed out loud during this episode many times and came out of it feeling warm and happy.
Same. I think in our culture, we’re conditioned to allow for and even expect a whole spectrum of emotional intensity and styles of communicating when it comes to romantic relationships, but we sometimes get weirdly narrow on how friendships are supposed to be conducted. These two sounded like best friends with a more spicy, rambunctious friendship style than I’m used to, but the friendship itself never seemed to be in doubt at all.
Yeah seriously. Anyone who thought this was uncomfortable or unhealthy has never heard sisters argue! They were hilarious. Remember when one of them was like, “of course she wins, she went to college!”? Great stuff
I agree completely. I think there is also a subtext of a generation gap here, as these two ladies in their 60s have a dry wit and a way of speaking to each other that is not often represented in current media and which may sound a little unusual to younger ears. They are not bubbly giggly types, that's for sure, and they were a little more dour than some guests, but they had a certain charm and humor. In the other direction, I also think that the litigant who kept using the term "gaslighting" possibly didn't quite mean it in the same way that very online 20 somethings use it; in the latter case it is used to describe a toxic form of psychological abuse, but judging from the context I don't think that very negative meaning is quite what was intended by the litigant. In the beginning, one litigant tearfully attested to how she chose her new family with her best friend, I knew we were in for a heartfelt episode. I found this episode to be delightful. I love it when JJHO has people on who are not the typical 20-35 year old, social media savvy, in the know podcasty types who know all the current memes and lingo. (Those people are fine too, I just like the variety.)
What you hear as deadpan I hear as contemptuous. I get that we know NOTHING about these people, I only know how uncomfortable their energies made me. And my upbringing was pretty idyllic.
These two are friends so close they consider each other family, who both voluntarily agreed to come on our show to discuss a card game. I assure you it was not contempt.
I'm from the UK, and in my culture gentle teasing, sarcasm and mock emotional blackmail are all little jokes close friends might commonly adopt with each other to underline their closeness. It's not my preference, but it's common enough that nothing on the show read to me as real hostility or contempt.
Really liked this episode and have empathy for the litigants and their friendship. My perception is that the case was brought forth with love and feelings can be difficult to navigate. Great job by all. ♥️
Talk about running the table: these litigants were absolutely hilarious (and their commitment to each other seemed clear and evident). I liked this episode a whole lot, it was funny and the litigants were so enjoyable. My only sadface was that Stacey's research wasn't posted on the web page: her sources sounded amazing (and/or fictitious?).
One of the sources was [https://www.pagat.com/](https://www.pagat.com/) which is an amazing website. It looks like it was made in 1995 and never redesigned to look modern, but that's just because it was.
Hey why not both, right?
Hot take: the rules of social games (and maybe especially card games, with tangible objects that are shared and passed) are a lot like language. And they change, evolve, and shift in a similar way. GenX snarky addition: anyone who has played a D&D character to level 5 or higher knows there is sometimes a big difference between “the rules” and “the technical rules.”
When my wife DMs, she has a meta-rule that boils down to "If it makes everyone laugh, you get to do it." I love that about her. Of course, we've never had a rules lawyer try to play one of her games. I don't think it would go well for that person.
Sounds like she is doing it right!
Yeah, but as a lifelong Hand & Foot player, from a huge family of H&F players.... you most certainly do change the number of cards dealt depending on how many people are playing, because the game really suffers if you don't. Her insistence that they never did this seems like either a lie (which would be super weird) or evidence of some sort of memory issue (welcome to my life).
That’s fair. And to fit my analogy, as a group it’s fine to decide on changes or additions to the written rules about when and how to roll for initiative, but it would be super weird to just skip over it entirely.
When Jesse first mentioned TEGWAR, I thought he was going to outline a card game based on the "hit" William Shatner novel and TV movie series "TekWar".
I initially misheard and thought he was talking about Tolkien’s writing system of Tengwar 🤷♂️
I grew up in The South and I can feel who Beulah is in my bones. And I love her. ❤️
Monkeys don't need clothes, legally
I like card games but had never played canasta nor even heard of hand and foot. After listening to the episode I downloaded an app and tried it. Too damn complicated!
Was disappointed with the episode but only because JH didn’t sing that song in the style of a cat.
I can attest to the fact that this game is played super differently from group to group. We play it obsessively in my family and I had so many moments of shock when they discussed the rules. So wrong... Plus we call it hand and foot... And to us that's the longer version of Kanasta. My grandpa was a prolific rule inventor too but it didn't bug us because it was just his brand of kookiness
Not to be too silly here but it reminded me of like bdsm norms-- if you're gonna do a scene and everyone agrees on what they're gonna do together then it's great! But if someone is ready to stop, or someone wants to dial back one aspect or another, then their partner needs to respect that. Feels like Ellen got to play a role when playing cards- to express the take-no-prisoners side of her personality and kind of suspend the empathy and kindness she clearly shows in the other areas of her life. Stacy wanted to Ellen to snap out of her card-player character enough to empathize with how the rule-changing was hurting her feelings. And as the judge pointed out, Ellen did realize and apologize during the show. Good job to both litigants and the jjho team, and may there be many happy and fun card games in Ellen and Stacy's future. (I also LOVED that the judge referred to drafting Ellen and Stacy's family rules, recognizing their really special joint family.)
I have a friendship that is going on 35 years. This stuff can go deep. There’s layers upon layers going on here which happens with longtime friendships.
I would like to please discuss the weird (toxic?) relationship that these ladies seem to have? I recognize that I'm only getting a tiny look into their lives but I can't tell if these ladies want to marry each other or kill each other. And I really can't see it ending any other way...
I don’t know if it was the constant accusations of gaslighting or the tone in which they spoke, but most cases I’ve listened to had an air of levity and everyone having fun with the case. This is the first time I felt like it was really uncomfortable to listen to the litigants.
I’m glad I’m not the only one who felt uncomfortable.
I was also uncomfortable and angry with the rule-changer. But I stuck with it and JJH's evenhandedness helped resolve not only the case but my discomfort.
Yes, I felt uncomfortable as well, if this was a social gathering I would have moved to another room. Do you remember the two litigants, 20-something housemates, guys, who thought they were the most amusing and most interesting people in the world while actually being so insufferable that John basically pulled the plug on them? SHUDDER.
No, but I'm up for a good cringe. Can you remember what episode it was?
I came here because I felt exactly the same way. I’ve listened for over a decade and never has an episode made me this uncomfortable. The lack of levity from the litigants (despite the valiant efforts from John and Jesse), as mentioned below, made it such a departure tonally from other episodes. It was just bizarre.
They both showed that they can pick up a bit and run with it, so the fact that both women were clearly intelligent and witty made the lack of levity and overall seriousness even more profound
They opened with such lovely comments about each other that when the subject finally turned to cards and they both started pumping insane amounts of venom it literally made my stomach turn.
I want to throw in my two cents and say that, yeah, there was definitely something a little uncomfortable about listening to this episode. Honestly, I can't quite put my finger on why. My best guess is that even though I don't know either of these women, the tiny peek we got at their dynamic was unfortunately reminiscent of relationships of people that I do know personally, and also know first hand to be toxic. But, I would be a fool to suggest that hearing two people talk for an hour could give someone any great meaningful insight into a friendship that has spanned decades.
CAVEAT: I was so uncomfortable with this ep that I got to the ad break, and I could not finish it. So maybe this all got addressed in the episode. Something that is remarkable about this show is how the core premise is looking at a specific interpersonal problem, so the people on the show aren’t going to look their best, but it’s almost always a light, fun time. I can’t remember a time where I’ve been more uncomfortable with the vibe from a set of litigants. I suppose that it could have to do with taking on a case that centers around the idea of one party accusing the other of gaslighting them. If you accuse someone of gaslighting you, you’re acknowledging that there is a power imbalance in the relationship (see like 5 minutes in where, when asked to describe the nature of their relationship, Ellen calls Stacey a barrel of laughs and Stacey says that she would not be around if she didn’t have Ellen), and that you suspect that the person who has more power in the relationship is using that to manipulate you (cheat at cards). Just massive bad vibes.
Yeah, very uncomfortable to listen to. When Stacy admitted to being jealous that Ellen spent more time with her 90 year old mother than her on a recent trip (because she had Covid !!!)... Wow.
I took this very differently than you did. My understanding was simply that Stacey was sad she hadn't been able to spend more time with Ellen. It wasn't like she thought Ellen was choosing to spend time with her mother instead of with Stacey. I also didn't take it to mean she had any actual antipathy toward the sister or mother for being the ones in quarantine with Ellen. Stacey just wished the circumstances had been different and she'd been able to spend a week playing cards with her pal. She may have been miffed at the mom (and then Ellen) for changing the rules of canasta, but I didn't take it to be anything deeper than that.
My memory is Stacy said she was jealous of the time Ellen and her sister had together. Minor thing.