All Episodes

April 30, 2025 • 47 mins

Why are dogs considered man’s best friend? To find the answer, we tell some stories about how dogs have entered our lives…and the paw prints they’ve left behind.

Support the show: https://redpilledamerica.com/support/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
This is Red Pilled America.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Before we start the show, just a reminder to share, like,
and subscribe to this podcast wherever you're listening to it,
and please give us a five star rating. It helps
us beat the big tech algorithm. Also, if you love
Red Pilled America, please consider supporting the show. You can
buy one of our made in America products. We have hats, candles,

(00:28):
a book. That's right, we wrote a book. Or you
can become a backstage subscriber. Well you'll have access to
our entire archive and you can hear the behind the
scenes of each episode along with Patrick and I are
arguing over who's a better storyteller. Or you can just
make a donation to support the show. Please visit Redpilled
America dot com and click support or shop in the topmenu.
That's Red Pilled America dot com and click support or

(00:49):
shop in the topmenu. Support what you love or it
goes away. Thanks everyone.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
I think most familymen out there will look agree that
dogs can be a hassle. All the worst parts of
having those critters fall on the man of the house.
If the four legged mammal eats something that ends up
reversing course on the way down. It's up to us
men to dispose of the bio waste. If there's a
late night emergency, guess who's making an after hour's trip

(01:22):
to the vet. And of course it falls on us
guys on the front line to pick up their poop
every day, you know. Damn well, that's a job that
feminists don't want the genders to perform equally. And that's
just the beginning. Dogs smell, they shed, and they just
lay down wherever they please, which has got to make
most men wonder why are dogs considered man's best friend?

Speaker 2 (01:46):
I'm Patrick Carelci and I'm Adriana Coortez and this is
Red Pilled America, a storytelling show. This is not another
talk show covering the day's news. We are all about
telling stories.

Speaker 1 (01:59):
Stories Hollywood doesn't want you to hear.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
Stories the meeting a mos, stories about everyday Americans that
the globalists ignore.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
You could think of Red Pilled America as audio documentaries,
and we promise only one thing, the truth. Welcome to
Red Pilled America. Why are dogs considered man's best friend?

(02:35):
To find the answer, we tell some stories about how
dogs entered our lives and the paw prints they've left behind.
I guess you can say that I'm the typical man.
Every time my wife brings up the bright idea of
getting another dog, I fight it off with every ounce

(02:55):
of strength I can muster, and I'm sorry to report
that I've lost most of those conflicts. You see, Adriana
likes those four legged creatures more than most people. She's
what you call a dog person, so to keep the
home pleasant, it's a battle that I anticipate racking up
many future defeats. But that doesn't mean I won't put
up a fight. I've resisted the entry of just about

(03:18):
every single dog that's ever entered this household. But it
wasn't always that way. I was around five years old
when we got our first dog. It was the mid
seventies and the hottest movie on the planet was a
little sleeper called Benji. The small golden mut stole my
heart and I began campaigning for a pooch. Then one
day Mom and Dad arrived with one. It was a puppy,

(03:39):
a German Shepherd mix, and I of course named it Benji. Honey,
it's a girl dog. My mom clarified, I didn't care.
I insisted on calling her Benji. Apparently I have been
knowingly misgendering since I was in kindergarten. We had Benji
for about seven years, and that dog did not have

(04:02):
it easy. My dad had a thing about cleaning her poop.
That is to say he didn't, so that didn't make
for a workable backyard. My parents also got Benji to
be a guard dog, but they were probably asking too
much of our resident canine. We were robbed more times
than Kim Kardashian has attended her own wedding, so our
little buddy was spread thin. At one point, robbers kicked

(04:23):
in her ribs. She wasn't the same after that, but
I do remember some good times with her. She was sweet,
but more of a face latherer than a ferocious defender.
At around seven years old, her hind legs gave out.
We rushed her to the vet and learned that her
time had come. That was one of the saddest days
of my young life. I just remember my mom guiding

(04:44):
my sister Denise and I into the vet's office to
say goodbye for the last time. Both of us hysterically
cried for the longest time. I thought that moment was
too harsh for a kid, but In hindsight, I think
it was a safe way for a kid to learn
about death. All that's to say that my initial experience
with a dog left a bit of a mark. All

(05:07):
eleven year old me could see was heartache, flea infestations,
mounds of poop, and unthwarted home invasions. No thank you.
When we moved to Torrans, California in nineteen eighty four,
we'd eventually get a new dog, a chocolate lab we
named Molly. It was a single parent home, mom and
dad had divorced, and again the experience was lacking. Truth
be told, my mom had way too much on her

(05:29):
plate to worry about a dog, and us kids weren't
much help. You see, owning a dog is real responsibility.
Cleaning up after it, bathing it, taking them for a walk.
These were all things that took a back seat in
a fatherless teenager's life. And like parenting, the skill of
dog owning is passed down from father to son, and

(05:50):
Pops was as bad a dog owner as he was
a role model. The one benefit that I had was
that I knew I did not know how to handle
a dog, so I wanted no part in it. When
I moved down after college. The thought of bringing up
hoochinto my home was not even in the running. I
was having a hard enough time taking care of myself,
but that quickly changed when Adriana came back into my life.

(06:13):
Adrianna loves dogs. She often jokes that she prefers dogs
to people. I'd like to say that she isn't referring
to me, but truth be told, I'm not one hundred
percent sure on that our dogs are her babies, just
like her helicopter mom default with our daughter. Her dog
mom repertoire is second to none, but she didn't start
out that way.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
When Patrick and I got engaged, I came into the
relationship with my Australian Shepherd border Collie mix named Pepper.
We were basically a two for one deal. Pepper was
quite possibly the smartest dog I've ever met. I taught
her to speak, lay down, roll over, play dead, give paw,
and even to smile. Those smots came something else, a

(07:05):
primal instinct to protect her owner.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
She was perhaps the orneriest dog ever held in captivity.
She didn't understand the idea of not biting the hand
that feeds you. I still have multiple puncture wounds. As
an abridged archive of her work.

Speaker 2 (07:21):
Pepper may have bitten more people than Patrick has hair
follicles on his head, but let's be honest, that's not
very many. She was a guard dog who took her
job very seriously, and I have a lot of respect
for that kind of work ethic. Pepper was with me
when I first started living alone. I was in a
city far away from home, all by myself, and there
was a rapist on the loose. Being the genius that

(07:42):
she was, she sensed my fear and that triggered the
pre civilization instincts in her. So Pepper would attack any
man or foreign object that entered my property. Unfortunately for Patrick,
that behavior didn't stop when we moved in together.

Speaker 1 (07:57):
In those early days, every time our postman slid envelopes
into the mail slot in our door, Pepper would attack them. Now,
you've got to remember that this was before bills went paperless,
so everything came through the US Postal Service. Junk mail, bills, payments, passports,
social Security cards, basically everything important came through that slot.

(08:18):
Now this would become a huge problem. Shortly after Adriana
and I got engaged, we started a marketing business. I
just got out of a bad business partnership, so when
Adriana and I kicked off our new venture together, I
was a bit gun shy at spending a lot of
money on infrastructure or even a po box.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
Frugal is his middle name.

Speaker 1 (08:37):
And spending is yours. So anyway, our home became our
office in the rearview. It was a strange situation because
at the time we were a two man show working
with one of the biggest companies in the world and
managing several million dollar projects. But the setup was working

(08:58):
and we saw no need for the added expense of
an office and everything that came along with it. Now,
from time to time, our clients sent us mail, obviously,
and that included payments for services rendered. So right around
the time we expected a payment, Adrianna and I were
on high alert. I remember one time a big check
was supposed to arrive. Listen for the mail man. Adriana,

(09:21):
I warned, the last thing we want is pepper to
eat a couple hundred grand. Adriana was on a higher
defcon level of mail watch duty than I because her
office was right off the living room where the mail
would get mauled. Well. That afternoon, Adriana joined me at
my desk to review a presentation we were preparing. When
we heard it, I didn't register at first, though. We

(09:43):
were deep in conversation about a big client pitch and anyway,
that dog literally barked at men on TV, so hearing
it didn't always set off any red flags. As Aj
and I continued to chat over the presentation, the sound
changed from a bark to some kind of thrashing, and
that's when it washed over us. We looked at each

(10:05):
other and yelled no. As I try to remember it now,
the only visuals I can muster up are in slow motion.
In our panic, we began to almost wrestle one another
to get through the door. I moved with the swiftness
of a gazelle, but by the time I arrived at
the front door, Pepper was standing over what looked like
the output side of a shredder. Oh no. The only

(10:37):
thing that I could hope was that the check hadn't arrived.
But as Aj stumbled in, it became obvious. One piece
of paper looked like it had a routing number on it.
Pepper ate a couple hundred thousand bucks like it wasn't
all you can eat buffet. Luckily, the client was able
to cancel the check and reissue a new one via
direct deposit. At that point I was ready to put

(11:03):
her down. My hand looked like Swiss cheese from her bites.
Pepper even chomped down on a few select HouseGuests, which
pointed more to her being a good judge of character
than anything else. But now we were starting to make
some money, real money, and I was beginning to worry
about a thing called legal liability. Adding the visual of
a chewed up paycheck still burned into my memory, I

(11:25):
thought it was time to get rid of this mangy
mut but Adriana refused. She loved that dog. But that
was about to get tested. As our business began to grow,
we had to bring on staff and needed more room,
so we moved into a bigger house in a borough
of Los Angeles called Mount Washington, and there was a
bit of wildlife in the area, deer, possums, and more

(11:48):
specific to our story, skunks. Pepper being the aggressive animal,
she was never met a skunk she didn't want to confront,
and as a result, she wound up getting sprayed on
several occasions. When that happened, chaos ensued, largely because we'd
have to give her a tomato sauce bath to try
to get rid of the smell. The irony was the

(12:09):
color of the sauce hid the mauling I endured during
the wash time. It was like trying to scrape the
scales off piranha well. One night, Pepper was in the
backyard relieving herself when we heard her scratch at the
sliding glass door. AJ and I arrived at the scene
at the same time, and she opened it to let
Pepper in, and when she did, we were hit with
an overwhelming smell of skunk.

Speaker 2 (12:31):
Grab her, I yelled.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
As I tried to recover from the smell. Pepper ran
past me and headed towards our bedroom, and we knew
exactly what was going to happen next. Every single time
Pepper got skunked, she would run and hide under our bed,
which would then stink up our room and ultimately make
it uninhabitable for several days. Once she went under that bed,
there was no way to get her out. If we

(12:53):
tried reaching under the bed to grab her, we'd risk
losing a finger. So as she rushed past us, heading
for our room. We both sprung into action. The primary
goal was to stop her before before she could get
in the bedroom. I led the way with Adriana just
a few feet behind me, and we had one thing
going for us. Pepper was spry, but we had hardwood floors,

(13:13):
so her nails would make her paws slide all over
the floor, so we had a chance of hitting her
off at our room. I reached Pepper as she was
just a few feet from our bedroom door, and Adriana
was just a step behind me at precisely the same
time we reached for the dog. But as my hand
approached that band around her neck, Pepper turned, showed her teeth,

(13:33):
and then her head thrust forward to take off my finger.
When my brain identified that familiar move, my body reflexively
pulled my hand back to avoid the bite, and when
I did, the unimaginable happened. With the force of a strong, muscular,
thirty year old man. My hand jolted back, escaping the bite,
but my elbow smashed against Adriana's forehead. What I didn't

(13:57):
know is that Adriana was lunging for Pepper, but she
was right behind my arm. Honestly, this second I felt
it connect with her head. I thought she was dead.
I turned around and she was dazed on the floor,
but alive. One inch in the wrong direction and she
could have easily been dead. At first, it looked like

(14:21):
we dodged a bullet. But then I moved her hand
from her head and I saw an enormous gash on
her forehead. I could see all the way to the bone.
It was a clean rupture that went through layers of
skin and muscle. Moments later it became a scene from
Reservoir Dogs. Blood was pouring out of the wound. I
immediately realized we were in trouble. Adriana said to me, I'm.

Speaker 2 (14:44):
Probably going to pass out, but before I do, tell
me how bad is it.

Speaker 1 (14:47):
I desperately tried to compose myself, but I had just damaged,
perhaps permanently, Adriana's flawless face. It's pretty bad, honey, I said,
with a shaky voice.

Speaker 2 (14:58):
I could see by Patrick's expression that it was bad.
It felt like there was a war arm gallon of
milk being poured down my face. The blood started making
a puddle around me. I took a deep breath and
composed myself. Patrick get me a tell us I can
apply pressure and stop the bleeding. We need to stay
calm and get me to the hospital right away. I
thought for sure I was going to pass out, but

(15:20):
I willed myself to stay awake because I knew that
passing out could spell more trouble, and timing was of
the essence.

Speaker 1 (15:26):
Now Mount Washington was as far from a decent hospital
as you can get in Los Angeles. My first job
was to keep her calm, but she insisted on looking
in the mirror to survey the damage my face.

Speaker 2 (15:38):
My face.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
It was a brutal gash, the kind you see in
the UFC.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
All I could think was I'm going to be scarred
for life. My head was pounding and I was disoriented,
but not enough to ignore the fact that there would
be no hiding from this scar right in the middle
of my face. I'd surely be deformed for life. I
looked over at Patrick, who was weaving in and out
of traffic to get me to the er, and couldn't
help but think, no refunds. Now, buddy, you broke it.

(16:06):
You bought it. Poor guy, His once beautiful wife was
now a Frankenstein, only not as tall or green. It
took us about fifteen minutes to get to the nearest
hospital in Glendale, California. I thought for sure they'd be
taking me back on a gurney for immediate surgery as
soon as they took one look at me. I mean,
my clothes were soaked in blood and you could literally

(16:27):
see a large portion of bone on my face. But boy,
was I wrong. They told us to take a seat
in the waiting room. I immediately knew this was not
going to fly. It felt as if Patrick read my
mind because he blurted out.

Speaker 1 (16:41):
No, this place isn't gonna work. Let's get out of here.

Speaker 2 (16:43):
He drove us across town to the famous Cedar Siinni
Hospital in Los Angeles. When we arrived, they immediately took
me back. They numbed the open wound, gave me something
for pain, and did a prompt sea tea scan. I
had a concussion, but no permanent damage other than the
gaping hole in my face.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
That's when I asked the question that would make the
next one of ours tough ones for Adriana. As the
er doctor was preparing to sew Adriana up I noticed
that he was one of the only doctors dealing with
the mounting injuries in the emergency room. He looked exhausted
and was running around ragged. And this was the guy

(17:21):
that was going to fix my beautiful wife's face. I mean,
I beat out Marky Mark of the Funky Bunch to
win this girl. I wasn't going to just hand over
my prize to some overworked er doctor, so I asked
him a simple question. Do you have a plastic surgeon
on staff to suture her face? The er doctor turned
to me and said, now that you've asked, we legally
have to use a plastic surgeon and he's not coming

(17:44):
in until tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
I ended up getting thirty eight stitches. The plastic surgeon
stitched me up in layers, three to be exact, to
reduce scarring. I do have a rather large scar on
my face. No, she doesn't, but it's not nearly as
bad as I thought it'd be. We've told this story
many times to different friends, and they always ask the

(18:07):
same question, did you put Pepper down after the incident?
The answer is, of course not. Pepper was my first
true love. That probably sounds ridiculous to those people that
are not dog lovers, but I love that dog more
than I knew was possible. I never blamed her for
being slightly aggressive, because she was just doing her job
protecting me. Times were rough back then. There was a

(18:31):
lot of instability in my life, but there was one
thing that was certain, My trusty companion Pepper, would never
leave my side. Some of my best memories were spent
with Pepper. She taught me what it means to be
a responsible adult. My years with Pepper account for the
most personal growth I've ever experienced. Living on my own,
finishing college, getting married, starting a business, owning my first home,

(18:54):
becoming a mother, and I shared them all with Pepper.
Pepper passed away on June twenty seventh, two thousand and seven.
To date, she remains the smartest dog I've ever known
and the girl that revealed one of the greatest gifts
in life.

Speaker 1 (19:08):
Having a dog, Pepper was a pain in the butt,
but she did calm down a bit when we added
a second dog to our pack, enter Miss Petula Clark.

Speaker 2 (19:23):
One afternoon in the summer of two thousand and two,
Patrick and I were, as usual, on high alert. The
mailman was going to arrive any moment, and we didn't
want the four legged shredder to get to it before
we did. Almost on cue, Pepper started viciously barking at
the front gate.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
So I made a mad dash for the fence. By
the time I arrived, there was no mail in sight.
I picked over the fence and there was no mailman,
yet Pepper was still barking deliriously. What's going on, I thought,
So I opened the gate to see if there was
anything there, and when I did, a small white dog
darted in, completely unfazed by the threat of our so

(20:01):
called guard dog. The little white, westy looking mutt couldn't
have been more than eighteen pounds and looked somewhat familiar.

Speaker 2 (20:08):
A few months earlier, we'd found a stray on the
street that looked strikingly similar to this dog. At first glance,
we thought it might be the same pooch, but after
further inspection we realized it wasn't the stray we'd found
before had a call her with the name tag and
was really well groomed. This new arrival was disheveled and skinny,
but since she looked like the previous stray, we started

(20:29):
calling her by the same name, Petula.

Speaker 1 (20:32):
Pepper was barking like Kujo. Why would this dog, come
in anyway, I asked Adriana, she's in heat. I looked,
and sure enough, Adriana was right. We immediately took her in,
and to our surprise, she handled her own with pepper.
Our Tasmanian devil tried to get tough with her, but
Petula let her know that that behavior wasn't gonna fly.
Petula was sweet enough, but in my mind we already

(20:55):
had one dog too many. Don't get too comfortable with her,
I told Adriana, its owner will come around any moment.
But is it a regressed We didn't hear anyone on
the block calling for a dog.

Speaker 2 (21:06):
We decided we had to find her owner, so we
took a picture of Beetula, printed a bunch of dog
found signs with our phone number, and stapled them all
over our neighborhood. One day turned into two days, then
three days. Before we knew it, an entire week had
gone by with no call.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
You know, two doggies are better than one, said Adriana.
I quietly admitted to myself that Betula was a welcome
change of pace, but I instinctively resisted.

Speaker 2 (21:35):
Oh come on, honey, we have to keep her. She's homeless.

Speaker 1 (21:39):
Uh, that's not gonna happen, AJ, We'll find the owner.

Speaker 2 (21:44):
A little over a week later, we finally got a call.
It was the owner's daughter. Apparently, Petula's owner was in
his late eighties and lived just five houses down. His
daughter had gotten him the dog to keep him company.
Her father didn't get out much, so he missed the signs.
But when his daughter was leaving after a what is it,
she saw the signs and called, you can return the

(22:05):
dog to my dad. He's home.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
Thank god, I quietly thought to myself, I have enough
to deal with with that beast Pepper. So I picked
up Patula and Adrianna and I walked halfway down the
block to the gentleman's house. What happened next was nothing
short of a miracle. There's nothing that makes me happier

(22:29):
than putting on a fire, propping up my feet, popping
on a movie, and curling up next to the love
of my life. That being licorice from the Licorice Guy.
If you've been listening to RPA for some time, then
you know that licorice is my jam and that it
does not get any better than the gourmet licorice made
by the Licorice Guy. They have a great selection of

(22:50):
flavors to choose from, like red, blue, raspberry, black, and
green apple, just to name a few. The freshness of
a licorice will blow your mind. Seriously, if you haven't
tried licorice from the Licorice Guy, then do yourself favor
and give it a try. Trust me, you will not
regret it. And if you're looking for new ways to
expand your horizons, then consider joining the Licorice Guy's team

(23:11):
by signing up for their Resellers program. They'll train you
and provide you with all the tools you need to succeed.
It's a great opportunity for anyone looking to start in
a new business or make some extra cash. Visit licoriceguide
dot com to get more information on how you can
become a liquorice Guy or to shop their delicious array
of licorice, and don't forget to enter RPA fifteen at

(23:33):
checkout for a discount. That's licoricegui dot com and enter
RPA fifteen at checkout for a discount. Welcome back to
Red Pilled America. So AJ and I found a stray dog.
We named it Petula and after a week we found
the owner who lived just a few houses away. So

(23:53):
I picked up Petula and Adriana and I walked halfway
down the block to the gentleman's house. We knocked, and
the elderly chap answered, oh, oh, thanks, I really appreciate it.
I'm not sure how she got out. Aj had a
sad look on her face. After a week at our home,
she'd gotten attached to Petulla. Oh thanks a lot for

(24:17):
watching her, he continued. She's a rambunctious one. She used
to live on a farm outside the city and was
constantly attacking chickens. She even killed a few. What I
thought this little angel was a hunter? I just didn't
see it. But why would the guy lie? Yeah, my
daughter knew the previous owner and re homed her with me.

(24:38):
I'd only had her a day when she went missing.
I nodded along with him. Truthfully, I was a little
sad to give her back as well. She was a
male dog owner's dream, no hassle at all. But we'd
found her real owner, and that was that. We set
our goodbyes to Petulla and I handed her to our neighbor.
But as the old man took possession, Batula started wiggling

(24:59):
hard and broke free. Then she made her run for it.
This girl was as fast as the wind. She went
tearing down the sidewalk, so I gave chase, yelling for
her to stop. That's when I noticed that there was
a car behind me, traveling down the street in our direction.
Panic entered my mind and the adrenaline kicked my pace

(25:20):
into even higher gear. But just as I was closing
the gap on Petula, she decided to try and juke
me by darting into the middle of the street. And
when she did, the vehicle had reached us, passed me,
and all I could see is Petula disappear under the
front of the car as it drove over her. That's
when I realized, for the first time in my life

(25:42):
that humans weren't so far removed from primates, because I
instinctively let off a guttural roar that only our Neanderthal
ancestors could understand. It was the most animalistic sound that
has ever exited my body. It went something like oh who.
I jumped into the street behind the moving car, and
just as as I did, I saw Petula pop out

(26:05):
from under the vehicle, running full speed. Apparently, when Beetulla
disappeared under the front grill of the car. The front
two tires miraculously missed her. The car was elevated from
the ground just enough to avoid hitting her from above.
She then popped out from under the car between both
passenger side tires. They both missed her. It was a miracle.

(26:27):
As this was all occurring over a split second. My
caveman yell was still in process, and so when Beetulla
popped out from under the car, the sound of my
howl stopped her in her tracks. She laid on the
concrete in a submission pose. I ran up to her
and looked her over. Not a scratch, thank god. I

(26:48):
picked her up, and as I walked back to our neighbor,
a sense of concern began to grow in me. This
man cannot handle this dog, I thought. I reluctantly handed
Beetulla over to him and Adriana couldn't help, but add.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
Sir, please make sure the dog does get out again.
She could easily be hit by a car, you know. Please.

Speaker 1 (27:07):
His age didn't matter. Adriana is an equal opportunity scolder.
The guy looked flustered and a little unsure. He grabbed
Petula tight this time, and disappeared into his house. Adriana
and I walked home, still shell shocked from what we
just witnessed. We entered our home, sat down and began
to privately unleash on our neighbor.

Speaker 2 (27:27):
Can you believe that guy, he shouldn't even own a dog?

Speaker 1 (27:30):
Couldn't agree with you more, babe?

Speaker 2 (27:31):
The house seemed empty without Petula. We sat reminiscing about
our short time with her for about twenty minutes, when
suddenly Pepper began to viciously attack the front gate again
the mail.

Speaker 1 (27:45):
But when we got to the front gate, there was
no mail, but there was a delivery, the best package
we'd ever received. I opened the fence and in ran
a little white fur ball right past our yapping Pepper Pa.

Speaker 2 (27:59):
We couldn't believe it. Petula was back. She ran away again,
and even with Pepper's fits of rage, she wanted to
be part of our family. Patrick picked up the phone
and called our neighbor's daughter.

Speaker 1 (28:11):
Excuse me, ma'am, I'm the neighbor that found your father's dog. Well,
it was almost ran over, and now the dog is
back at our house. If your father can't take care
of this dog, we will. Then she responded, Mmm, let
me call you right back. A few minutes later, she
called and told us that apparently Petula had found a
vulnerability in the backyard fence. I think it's better if
you guys keep her. That's when Petulla entered our lives

(28:32):
for good. Adriana got her wish two doggies. We took
Petulla to the vet and he told us that she
was about three or four years old.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
Petula passed away on April thirtieth, twenty eighteen, sixteen years
after she picked us as her family, which made her
close to twenty years old when she died. Petula was
the best dog we ever had. She was never any trouble.
Oh she never got sick, She never killed any of
our male she never made a mess in the house.

(29:08):
She was just happy to be with us and is
still sorely missed.

Speaker 1 (29:12):
Aj and I married in two thousand and three, and
as the years progressed, we began to approach the upper
range of Adriana's safe child bearing years. When we first
got married, we decided to wait for a bit to
have kids. What was the hurry, Neither one of us
was going anywhere. We also had a small burgeoning business
that needed our daily care, and anyway, after seeing our
mothers struggle raising their kids, we were in no rush

(29:35):
to go down that path. But as we entered our
mid thirties, nature began to call, and I could tell
that Adriana was going to start pressing the issue very soon.
And she did, but in the way that got her
a little more of what she wanted.

Speaker 2 (29:50):
You know, honey, three doggies are better than two.

Speaker 1 (29:58):
No, absolutely not. This time. I was putting my foot down.

Speaker 2 (30:03):
Come on, honey, let's face it. We're gonna have to
have a baby soon, so we need to get used
to having something small around the house.

Speaker 1 (30:12):
Aj we already have two dogs.

Speaker 2 (30:14):
No, I mean something really small, like a Yorkie.

Speaker 1 (30:17):
Oh, what's that?

Speaker 2 (30:18):
They're little small terriers, maybe five pounds max.

Speaker 1 (30:22):
No way, we already have two dogs. That's it.

Speaker 2 (30:26):
Well, it's either that or we're gonna have to have
a baby right away.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
I was a numb school at the time. I was
trying to hold off having kids for as long as possible.
If I had it to do over again, we'd have
started making babies much earlier. But I wanted to create
as much of a financial cushion as possible. So that
we didn't have the same issues my parents struggled through.

Speaker 2 (30:45):
Listen, let's just go check out the Yorkies. If we
go there and you still don't want one, I'll let
it go. I promise.

Speaker 1 (30:52):
I'm a sucker for Adriana. And it sounded like a
fair deal, all right, But I guarantee you we're not
getting another dog. I told her. Now, Yorkies are not
a mut dog. You tip can't just go down to
the pound and pick one out. You have to go
to a breeder to get one, which usually means they're expensive.
Back in two thousand and six, they went for about

(31:13):
three thousand dollars. That was a stunning amount of money
for this ghetto boy who'd never spent a dime for
a dog. But at the time we were flushed with cash.
Our advertising business was killing it. We had no kids,
so I had no financial excuse. I needed to come
up with another out if I was going to successfully

(31:33):
avoid adding a third dog to this family. As we
entered the breeders building, I had the same expression that
most of the men had in that facility, kind of
a hybrid oh hell no look mixed with general contempt
for the staff. I made sure to stand back from
the glass window displaying the puppies. I figured if I
could create enough distance, I wouldn't be seduced.

Speaker 2 (31:54):
Honey, come over here, come over here and look at
this one.

Speaker 1 (31:57):
Nah, I'm good. I was completely disinterested. I mean, those
so called dogs looked to be maybe a hound each.
They were obviously meant for women and feminine men.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
Honey, come here, come over here, look at it, Look
at this way.

Speaker 1 (32:12):
I shook my head.

Speaker 2 (32:13):
No, listen, If you don't keep your promise and get
over here, I'm not gonna keep mine either. You're gonna
be hearing about your keys every single day.

Speaker 1 (32:27):
So I acquiesced. As I approached the glass window, I
noticed the puppies were all playing with one another, completely
oblivious to us, except for one. The little guy propped
up its two tiny paws onto the glass window, locked
eyes with me, and began to whine. As I stood
there about a foot away from the glass, he began

(32:49):
to scratch at the window, as if he was trying
to dig his way to me. The little guy was
the cutest thing I'd ever seen in my life. The
look of oh hell no evaporated. Adriana could see the
hook she'd throw in front of me, poking through my cheek.

Speaker 2 (33:05):
I almost had him. All I needed to do is real?
I mean, do you want to hear red Pilled America
stories ad free? Then become a backstage subscriber. Just log
onto Redpilled America dot com and click join in the topmenu.

(33:27):
Join today and help us save America one story at
a time.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
Welcome back to Red Pilled America. So Adriana dragged me
to a pet breeder that sold Yorkies. I was reluctant
until I saw one of the little guys prop up
his two tiny paws onto the glass window, locked eyes
with me, and began to whine he was choosing me.

Speaker 2 (33:49):
I almost had him. All I needed to do was real, Am,
Can we see that one, please? I said to the
female owner of the establishment. Sure. The lady scooped up
the little guy, but instead of handing him to me,
she gave an to Patrick.

Speaker 1 (34:05):
This woman was a pro. The little guy was as
light as a feather. He was only fifteen ounces, and
he smelled like chocolate. He had dark brown hair over
most of his body, with a few patches of golden brown.

Speaker 2 (34:19):
Is that a boy or girl?

Speaker 1 (34:20):
He's a boy, how much is he?

Speaker 2 (34:22):
Hmm, let's see.

Speaker 1 (34:24):
That one is twenty five hundred. I honestly didn't flinch.
The little guy had me and Adriana could see it.
I gave him back to the owner and turned to
Adriana and said, let's think about it. As the owner
placed the dog back behind the glass, the little guy
propped up his paws back onto the window and continued
staring at me. The image burned a hole in my brain.

(34:45):
We left, but I didn't need too much time to
think about it. I was in I must have been
craving a child, because it was already a foregone conclusion
in my mind. We went back the next day and
brought him home. We named him Preston, and Adriana quickly
came up with a song for our growing pack of
furry children.

Speaker 3 (35:03):
One doggie is better than none, Two doggies is better
than one.

Speaker 2 (35:10):
Three doggies is better than two.

Speaker 1 (35:13):
In fact, Adriana made a song for every dog that
entered our family.

Speaker 3 (35:18):
I had a doggie, Toola was her name. Bloom Boom
boom boom. Since I met too La, I've never been
the same.

Speaker 1 (35:30):
And of course, my main man, Preston, had his own
song too. His was a bit more specific, though. Preston
loved to chew on his father's socks so much so
that if you tried to take them from him, he'd
snarl and make a run for it. It got to
the point where a mere mention of taking away the
sock would make him tailspin.

Speaker 2 (35:47):
Can you give me that sock?

Speaker 1 (35:49):
Give me?

Speaker 2 (35:52):
Give me, give me?

Speaker 1 (35:56):
So Adriana came up with the song to memorialize his
love for my feet.

Speaker 2 (35:59):
Warmers Asato, gamme that sock? Yes, indeed, that soco? Why
no please? I said, my name is Preston, and I
love us socks.

Speaker 1 (36:07):
Preston was also not very fond of Hillary Clinton.

Speaker 2 (36:11):
Dank you like tomp? Did you love for Tromp?

Speaker 3 (36:13):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (36:14):
Pretty? What about Hillary Cranking? Yi like Harry Cranking? Oh
you don't like her? You Nike Cailla cranking? Oh you
hate her?

Speaker 1 (36:26):
He was a red pilled pup. Preston had the biggest
personality of any dog I've ever met. We had to
put a tiny bell around his neck because he was
so small that we needed something to warn us that
he was around so we didn't step on him. Preston
went everywhere with us. He went to New York City, Chicago, Miami, Washington,
d C. San Francisco. He even went with us to Mexico.

(36:49):
Preston really became my first dog. As every dog owner knows,
each dog in the house typically gravitates more to one
person than all the rest. For Preston, it was me.
Every night, he'd prop himself up on a pillow right
next to my head and would lick my entire bald scalp,
then inside my ears. Sounds gross, but it was really
quite refreshing. Now Preston grew to be five pounds, but

(37:11):
he didn't know it. He ran every dog that came
into our house, and he snored like a three hundred
pound lumberjack, which was obviously a problem because he slept
right next to my head. So to deal with the noise,
I began to wear ear plugs at night. It became
part of my nightly routine. I'd chove them in my
ears before we went to bed. Preston would lather my
entire head. I'd fall asleep, then I'd wake up the

(37:34):
next morning and put the ear plugs on our dresser.
But one morning these things didn't go as planned. That
am I woke up and began my days as always.
When it dawned on me that I hadn't removed my
ear plugs that morning, I went upstairs just to check,
and sure enough, they weren't on the dresser. I looked
around the bed and I didn't see them there either.

(37:54):
Oh no, what is it?

Speaker 2 (37:56):
Why are you waking me up?

Speaker 1 (37:57):
I think Preston ate the earplugs?

Speaker 2 (37:59):
What? We have to take them to the emergency room
right now. This was a life threatening situation. Anyone that's
dropped ear plugs into water knows that they expand when wet.
Preston was tiny, five pounds. There was no way they
were going to make it through his tiny intestines. So
we rushed prestonto the emergency room. They took an MRI

(38:20):
and saw what looked like a foreign object in his stomach.

Speaker 1 (38:23):
What do we do, doctor, Well, we're gonna have to operate.
A nurse handed me the estimate and it was nine
thousand dollars. I didn't blink. I loved that little guy,
and there was no way I was gonna let my
mistake take him out. Now. The surgery sounded complicated. They
were gonna put him out, push a tiny camera down
his throat and into his stomach, then somehow fish out

(38:44):
the ear plugs. We gave the okay and nervously waited.
A few hours later, the doctor came out and informed
us that Preston made it through the operation and they
were able to fish out the ear plug. Wait wait,
you got both right, Well, Sun, there was only one. No, no,
there were two. Well, the MRI only showed one. I
went back and forth with the doctor, insisting that there

(39:06):
were definitely two, but the doctor assured us that that
wasn't the case. We ultimately took the word of the expert.
Our only excuse was that we were both liberals at
the time. Well, a few nights later, I took Adriana
to the ballet and we of course left Preston behind
at the house. There was nothing to worry about the
expert had spoken, but when we got home we could

(39:26):
tell that a terrible struggle had occurred. As I followed
the path of the mess, I found it the second
air plug. That little piece of sponge like substance got
stuck into Preston's intestines until the backup got so bad
that it forced it out. We eventually found our little
guy on his bed no doubt, resting from the near
death experience, I should have demanded our nine grand back.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
Preston had health problems his entire life, not from the
air plugs. You see. These very small dogs are bred
over many generations by choosing the runts of the litter,
often making them on h healthy Like a lot of
small Yorkies, Preston was born with liver shunts, which meant
that some of his blood was bypassing his liver and
basically not getting filtered. The vet told us that he

(40:12):
would only live eight or nine years tops. The Yorkis
lifespan is typically thirteen to sixteen years, So he changed
his diet to reduce the effect of the liver shunts,
and Preston was with us for fifteen wonderful years.

Speaker 1 (40:29):
His last one was a bit of a challenge. He
became weak and even frailer than normal. He got in
a habit of whining at night and sleeping during the day,
which meant I was up all night for that year.
I probably only got four to five hours of sleep
at night. Everyone wanted me to put him down, but
I couldn't. He was alive and we still had fun together.

(40:50):
I wanted to be as committed to him as he
was to me, And in a way I may have
wanted to make up for ignoring poor Benji and Molly
from my childhood. So I stuck it out with Preston.
Then one day he took his last break in my arms.
It was November nineteenth, twenty twenty. We were all there
with him, sitting in the sunlight as life left his body.

(41:11):
It was a heartbreaking but strangely beautiful moment. I learned
so much from that little guy, how much fun dogs
could be, how they bring love into the house. Preston
taught me what it was like to have something small around,
how to be gentle with the little one, how to
stay committed until their last moment. Preston taught me how
to love and care.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
For a dog. But the little guy was lacking in
one area. He wasn't a very effective guard dog. That's
where Mimimi Jones comes in.

Speaker 1 (41:48):
At one point when we lived in the Hollywood Hills,
there was an outbreak of home robberies. I was the
security captain of our neighborhood committee and had a relationship
with the local law enforcement, so I called the senior
lead officer of our enclave to get some advice. We
already had camera is, an alarm system, and a gun,
but we were wondering if there was anything else we
should do. The officer said the number one deterrent to

(42:10):
break ins was a guard dog.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
By this time, our daughter was just three years old,
so the thought of having a big dog around the
house that could potentially bite our toddler was a bit frightening.
Some friends of ours with three small kids had a
bull Mastive and highly recommended the breed. So I did
some research and learned that bull Mastives are great family dogs.

(42:31):
They do have one of the strongest bites in the
canine world, but they were bred to pin, meaning they
first pin people to the ground and only bite in
life threatening situations. We were sold. We brought a beautiful
brindle bull Mastive into our family in early twenty eleven,
and our daughter named her Mimi. Mimi looked scary, but

(42:54):
she was a gentle giant. She topped out at a
solid one hundred and twenty nine pounds and had the
sweetest disposition of any dog I've ever met. She would
sit by my side and just stare at me for hours.
Mimi was my dog. Everywhere I went, she went too.
Everything I asked her to do, she would happily oblige.

(43:16):
She was the perfect guard dog. She slept outside our
daughter's bedroom, would patrol the house in the middle of
the night, came in and woke us up every morning,
and made us feel safe.

Speaker 1 (43:27):
I never worried about a break in with her around.
We always had security systems, cameras, and added to our
gun collection. But it would be criminal, would have to
be insane to pick our house to rob after seeing
that one hundred and twenty nine pound beast. When she walked,
her back swayed like a lion, and when I took
her for walks, anyone on the street would stop in
their tracks and stare.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Mimi crossed the Rainbow Bridge on April twenty third, twenty twenty.
It was the beginning of the coronavirus shutdowns, and Mimi
stopped eating. I knew it was coming. We were so
in tune with one another. All of our meals were homemade.
Ped up her favorite one in a last ditch effort
to try and get her to eat Theresa and eggs
with potatoes, but she didn't eat it. Bullmasters lived from

(44:11):
eight to ten years, and I knew her time was up.
She was almost nine and a half. We took her
to the vet and they confirmed my worst fear. So Patrick,
our daughter, and I piled into the vet's office to
say our last goodbye.

Speaker 3 (44:26):
Best frinight ef.

Speaker 1 (44:35):
Yes, the death of Mimi Jones was different than any
of our previous dogs. At first, I couldn't pin the
reason why, But after one night without her, it dawned
on me. I hadn't realized until she was gone how
much we worked together to keep the house safe. She

(44:58):
was my partner, there to give me that extra few
seconds if needed to secure our fans. I slept easy
with her around. Mimi was our protector and I'll be
forever grateful for it, Which leads us back to the
question why are dogs considered man's best friend? The answer

(45:25):
is dogs seemed to fill the gaps while bringing love
to the family. When Adriana was a struggling single woman,
Pepper gave her the security she needed when I thought
dogs weren't worth the hassle, but Tula came along to
convince me otherwise. When I needed to prepare to become
a father, Adriana snuck Preston into our lives and Preston
snuck into my heart, and when we needed some security

(45:48):
against a rash of break ins, Mimi Jones came to
guard our family. Without fail, dogs have enriched our family's life.
The only problem with them is that their time with
us is too short. Every time one passes, we think
we can't go the heartache of losing another four legged
family member, but without fail, we add another to our household.

(46:09):
We now have two in our family. There's Willow, another
female brindle Bullmastiff, and we've also added Pablo, a male
English bulldog. But now my problem is that we only
have two dogs, and Adriana is back to singing one

(46:30):
of her favorite songs.

Speaker 3 (46:32):
Two doggies is better than one, Three doggies is better.

Speaker 1 (46:37):
Than two, And I'm doing my best to resist her again.

Speaker 2 (46:43):
Red Pilled America is an iHeartRadio original podcast. It's produced
by me Adrianna Cortez and Patrick Carrelchi for Informed Ventures. Now,
our entire archive of episodes is only available to our
backstage subscribers. To subscribe, visit Redpilled America dot com and
click support in the topmenu. Thanks for listening.
Advertise With Us

Hosts And Creators

Adryana Cortez

Adryana Cortez

Patrick Courrielche

Patrick Courrielche

Popular Podcasts

Dateline NBC

Dateline NBC

Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.