Let’s Talk About Breakdown, Not My Personal Emotional Breakdown But the Podcast

Hello! How’s it going? Christmas is almost here! Are you ready? I am…not. Busted! I still have a few gifts to buy and baking to do. I need to get on that (soon but not right this second). First it’s important to run and eat. And repeat.

The weather is still cold here but not as frigid as Sunday. This morning I got in about 7 miles, but my legs felt super heavy. I was just not feeling it today.

I’m sad that I finished the Breakdown podcast and now have to find something else to listen to while running. I think I might take another suggestion from the Crime Writers podcast even though they are only 1 for 3 on their suggestions:

The HBO series The Night Of gave me an epic night terror – I’m still a little traumatized by my own reaction actually. Seriously.

The Night Of – Grade: Suspended from school.

The Cincinnati Enquirer Accused podcast was a little disappointing. There isn’t really anything super interesting or in depth to talk about – it’s a murder that happened 30 years ago with no new info and no one convicted of the crime. The end. There, now you don’t have to listen to it.

Accused – Grade: C. It didn’t bore me, but I wasn’t very invested in anyone in the case either.

In food news…

I don’t have any pics of breakfast. But I did make a very inventive dinner last night using up pantry items. I made a Thai style noodle dish with peanut sauce and added frozen veggies and canned mushrooms.

I also made a huge batch of roasted broccoli that I was going to take to my family’s lil dinner. But I ended up bailing last minute because my partner in crime was sick and I didn’t want to drive all the way to BFE solo. Womp womp woooooomppp.

Breakdown Thoughts

I finished the Breakdown podcast yesterday. The whole series was interesting and I want to share my thoughts. If you’re into this podcast please leave comments so we can chat about it.

The Breakdown Season 2 podcast is about the death of Cooper Harris. He was left in a hot car all day June 18, 2014 by his dad, Justin Ross Harris. The podcast covers the trial and issues surrounding the case.

– I didn’t know much about the case before listening to the podcast. I saw some basic points on the news and knew J. Harris did some sketchy things. I also saw a clip that his ex-wife testified on the case.

– I think J. Harris is a piece of crap for all the messaging and hooking up and cheating. But, I don’t think that means he would do anything to hurt his son. He was super distracted that morning/all day because he was messaging a lot of random girls the day of the tragedy. Which could be seen as him being negligent. He messed up. He is responsible for his son’s death because he was distracting himself with sexting.

But, being careless and distracted doesn’t mean he wanted Cooper to die. There is nothing to indicate he didn’t love his son. There is no evidence he wanted to kill him.

– From listening to  a lot of true crime podcasts and watching shows on people who have been exonerated… it seems using how someone reacts to a tragedy is NOT a good way to gauge if they did it. Using someone’s reaction to horrible news as proof they did it or don’t care is too subjective. Some people go into shock and don’t react, some immediately lose it and cry and there are tons of other reactions. Who are you to say what is a ‘normal’ response to such a horrible life altering event?

I’ve gotten really bad news a few times in my life. My reaction was different in each situation. The way the people giving me the bad news acted was different for each person too. Using a person’s reaction to horrible news as an indication of how they are processing it and how they actually feel isn’t fair.

– I think the most important piece of evidence in the entire trial was the testimony of Leanna Harris, his ex-wife. She lost everything. I cannot even imagine how heartbreaking it was for her to lose her little boy, have her husband arrested so she had to deal with that alone and then find out he was cheating on her and did a lot of really shady things.

So, she has no reason to come to his defense. When she testified at trial it had been 2 years since Cooper passed away. She was divorced from J. Harris, had moved and had a boyfriend. I just think as a mom she’d want justice for Cooper if she thought J.Harris did it on purpose. But no, she really believes it was an accident and that J. Harris loved his son. I feel like she should have more weight given to her testimony than anyone else the jury heard.

I feel like when someone is killed the victim’s mom should be able to say if the person accused did it or not and what their punishment should be. Okay, that’s ridiculous but I would probably give her thoughts a little more consideration?

– I think J. Harris was shady and should be held responsible for any illegal messaging activities he was doing. But, I kind of feel like it was an accident.

According to No Heatstoke.org – 39 kids died from being left in hot cars in 2016. JUST THIS YEAR it happened almost 40 times. This is horrible and so sad.  I’m scared it could happen to me or someone I love. It happens multiple times a month in this country – on accident. So it’s hard to say without a reasonable doubt if this guy did it on purpose unless you had straight up evidence of him saying or writing that he wanted to hurt his kid.

Ugh. This whole thing sucks and I’m kinda sad to even talk about it because it’s so horrible. But, I got into it when I heard that fact about how often it happens. I make mistakes. I have burnt bagels to a crisp because I got distracted after 90 seconds. I have left a cup on the top of my car. I just think it could happen to anyone and it’s so shltty and sad and I hope it never happens again.

I didn’t sit through the whole trial so I don’t know all the evidence. I can’t really say one way or another, but based on the podcast these were my head movies about it. The end.

Related: The topic of kids dying in this manner came up in a conversation a while back. Someone suggested putting one of your shoes (or your phone) in the backseat when you strap in your baby. You’re not going to leave the car without your shoe! Good idea, but I’m sure there are more.

Car seats should message you if there is weight (a baby) in the seat and your phone is more than 10 feet away – or something like that. C’mon Shark Tank!

Question: What have you been listening to while working out or running? Any suggestions?

Thoughts on this Breakdown podcast?