The Rubber Biskit Road Show Presents: "Breaking and Entering"

The Rubber Biskit Road Show Presents: "Breaking and Entering"

In this emotionally charged episode of The Rubber Biskit Road Show Podcast, "Breaking and Entering," The GYPSY vents his frustration and anger toward the thieves who burglarized and ransacked his studio, stealing not only valuable items but also his car. With raw emotion, he criticizes the ineffective response from the Topeka Police Department and the Shawnee County Sheriff's office, who, despite having hard evidence and identifying the thief, refuse to take action and file charges. The GYPSY confronts this injustice head-on, rightfully asking; Why?

Amidst his recounting of the crime, The GYPSY provides detailed descriptions of the stolen antique tattoo machines, emphasizing their uniqueness and personal value. He calls on his listeners for assistance in identifying the thieves and recovering his treasured property, urging the community to come together in the face of this violation.

Tune in for a compelling episode filled with passion, urgency, and a plea for justice. The GYPSY's heartfelt appeal will resonate with anyone who has faced similar struggles and seeks accountability from those entrusted to protect and serve.

PLEASE NOTE: This is a rebroadcast of a podcast episode from 08/16/2022. I stopped podcasting to help my wife through her battle with stage 4 breast cancer. My wife recovered and I am now ready to start podcasting once more. Over the next couple of months, I will repost my past podcasts and start new episodes in 2024.

I'm The GYPSY and You're Not and This Is The Rubber Biskit Road Show Presented By Artist Alley Studio Featuring The Artisan, Handcrafted and Branded Creations of The GYPSY and Mad Hatter. Visit Us At www.ArtistAlleyStudio.com

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Visit The Rubber Biskit Road Show On The Web At  www.RubberBiskit.com
Tatman Productions LLC. Copyright 2021 - All Rights Reserved. No Parts of The Podcast May Be Copied, Reproduced or Used Without The Express Written Permission Of The Artist.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Episode Beginning
• 1:33 Breaking and Entering
• 6:42 Car Theft
• 8:44 Insurance Dragging Feet
• 10:23 Insurance Cancelled Without Notice
• 12:07 Ineffective Police Department
• 14:00 It's Just Stuff
• 15:34 Still Creating Body Art
• 16:08 The Stork
• 17:13 How An Apprenticeship Works
• 21:30 Exciting News... For Me.
• 24:10 Family Camp
• 25:29 Udderly Ridicules'
• 27:06 A Fair Price
• 28:34 Giving Back Blessings
• 30:53 Episode Ending

Transcript

Season2RBRSEpisode33 - Podcast.mp3

Transcript

Welcome to Episode 33 of the Rubber Biscuit Rd. show I am your host, the Gypsy. Well, I know I've been gone for a while and haven't really recorded anything. And if you do follow my podcast, I am sorry for the little hiatus. I took a lot, went on since the last time came on here. I'm the least of which was our studio was broken into on July 17th. Now, if you don't know the story, I'm going to relate it to you. If you do know the story, I guess you can skip to the end of this podcast, but I wouldn't advise you to do so because I got a lot of things to talk about here. So on July 17, about 2:00 in the morning, somebody threw a no parking sign through the front window of the artist Alley studio. And they proceed to ransack the place. They caused and took about $8000 worth of equipment and damage. And it was just horrible what they did to the studio. It was definitely a violation of our space and our property. There was an event going on at the time, just up the road called Country Stampede. Now I'm going to be really upfront about this. I do not like country Stampede and the reason why I don't like country Stampede is because of instances just like this. The year before, during country Stampede, somebody had tried to break into the back door of. Studio they failed, however, because it is a heavy steel door, it is dead bolted and it is also bolted from the inside. If you'd have to take a battering ram and a pack of explosives to that door to get it open anyway. This year however, they decide to take that no parking sign and throw it through the front window. Well. Country Stampede caused a brownout. They were pulling so much electricity. That they cause this brownout to occur. Now I don't know if you're aware of what a brownout is. It's where there's a flicker in the electricity for a couple of seconds, maybe 30 seconds at the most. During that time period, when the electricity flickered, our security system shut down. It tried to reboot itself and it couldn't reboot. One of the reasons why, and I really do wish the security cameras. Annual would have stated this is because the cash and the receiver was full. The manual from the security camera never once ever mentioned that that cache has got to be cleared periodically. Know that now thinks the sheriff's deputy that responded, but then I didn't know it. So the security camera was trying to reboot and the one time that we really needed our security camera was when these low lives broke into our studio. It was a guy and a girl. Now the way I know that it was a guy and a girl is that the laundromat next door? Their security cameras picked them up trying to break into the laundry mat. Just a couple of minutes. Later. However. Those two are not very visible on the Laundromat security camera because he's got an old security system and the images are grainy and. Fuzzy. The most that we were able to get from it is is that it is a guy and a girl. The guy is definitely a punk pants that are too loose on him. Boxer showing the girl the girl was visible with a tattoo on her left knee. Can't make out what the tattoo. Was but there's a tattoo there. So we turned that into the police. So we spent all day Friday. Cleaning up the studio now the way I was alerted to it was sheriff's deputies got a hold of the lady that owns the hair stop next door to the studio. She gave them our phone number and at 7:00 in the morning I was racing down to the studio to discover the violation and the ransacking and the loss of all that equipment. Some of the equipment that was lost was. Was eight tattoo machines, four of which date from the time of my beginning in this career, which was of 1976. Those machines are irreplaceable. They are the first machines I ever owned, and even if I get nothing else back from this vandalism and ransacking and burglary of my studio. I really wish I could get those machines back. If you think that, you know, if you're listening to this and you think you know who did this and who has those machines, please, by all means give me a holler. Let me know so that we can do something about this and at least at least get those machines back. So to continue on with this little narrative. We spent all day, me, my wife, Rachel, and my apprentice Melissa, spent all day Friday cleaning up the studio, removing the glass, putting things back in order so we could open again on Saturday. Uhm. Can't afford? I'm a small business owner and we cannot afford to have our studio closed for any length of time. We did have to cancel and reschedule appointments on Friday, but we were back in operation on Saturday. Now. The story doesn't end there though. When they ransacked the studio, when they violated our space, they got into a drawer full of documents, studio documents. On those documents was our home address. The day after the studio was ransacked early, early on Sunday morning, these low wives come to our home. They got their home address off these documents. They came to our home and they stole our car. That's right. To add insult to injury, our car was stolen. And I put out the word all over Facebook. Please be on the lookout for this car. Or are we Monday morning? Someone that's seen my posting on Facebook. Saul. One of the low lives pushing the car down the street over in north Topeka between Independence Ave. and Lyman Rd. He called the police and he let me know about it. And I. Immediately headed over there. When I got over to where the car was at, the police had this house surrounded. The police told me that they had arrested a guy that was running out the back of the house when they showed up, but that they could not get him on the on the car theft. Because they did not catch him physically with the card. Now that sounds like a bunch of BFS to me personally. The cars on his property, he was identified as the person pushing it down the street, but because the police didn't see him with it, they cannot get him on the theft. Of the vehicle. However, they did say they got him for possession of stolen property. Well, whoopee, because the vehicle was totaled. They cut into the exchange manifold from the engine. They took the Cadillac converter when they took the Cadillac converter. They also cut through the fuel lines, which I have since found out have been discontinued and can't even be gotten in aftermarket parts. The vehicle is basically totaled. So right now where we're at is we're waiting on Lewis Toyota in Topeka to finish the evaluation and get it off to the insurance company. So the insurance company can say, yes, your car is totaled. And get us a check so we can get a new vehicle. This has become a real concern for us because our rent over from the insurance company is fastly and quickly and extremely coming close to being ended and we still don't have a vehicle to replace the one that the little wife stole. So you can see we've just been having all sorts of fun. Now you add on to this our new landlord. Actually said to me, you know, you're gonna have a glass in that window. And I'm like. No, I'm not. That's not happening. We refuse to replace the window. First off, it's $1500 to replace that window and 2nd. Lee, on top of everything else, I don't want a repeat of what happened on July 17th. I don't want a glass window in the front of the studio and have some idiot. Some disrespectful idiot have the opportunity to throw a no parking sign through the window and ransack our studio again. So we have a really nice. Looking piece of smart siding up there, nicely trimmed out and everything and it looks good and looks professional. My wife Rachel wants me to get a banner that's exactly that size and that looks professional to put over it, you know, for advertising purposes, because the window we had up there said tattoos and piercings. And of course, you know, the smart sign we have up there now doesn't say tattoos and piercings. Now some of you may be saying, well, you know, it can't be too bad. You had insurance on the vehicle and surely you had insurance on the stuff inside the studio. And the answer to that is no, we did not. We happen to be between insurance companies at the time of the. See our insurance company decided that they were no longer going to cover tattoo studios and they had cancelled us without informing us. The way I found out we had been cancelled is that the new landlord was insisting that we give him a copy of our insurance and add him as an additional payee. Well. It turns out that when I went to do that, I found out that we had been cancelled. So I had started looking for a new insurance company. Little did I know that we were going to get hit while I was still trying to find a new insurance company. Well, we now have a new insurance company and the landlord has his copy of the insurance policy with him as an additional payee. We have gone through the studio, we have increased all our security measures in the studio. What happened on July 17th will not happen again. If someone has the nerve to break into our studio, trust me, this time they will be seen and they will be. And as far as our home goes, we've increased security at our home also. I had to go through and I had to change all blocks on the House. We also increased our video security and the home is kind of a fortress now. That's not a challenge for somebody to try to break into our home. It's just thing. That if someone does try to break into our home, they will be videoed and they will be caught. Now I wish I could say that you know, the Police Department is any further on arresting the people that stole our car. And I wish I could really say that the Sheriff's Department was further on arresting the people that broke into our studio. But I cannot say that. They have no weeds, they have not been in contact with me. I've been in contact with the service department several times. But the Topeka Police Department has not once been in contact with me over the theft of the vehicle. We think we don't know for sure because nobody's saying anything, but we think that they're looking at a larger picture here. The house where the vehicle was found was almost empty. And according to the neighbors and the comings and goings at that. House. They think that maybe the house is used as a fencing operation for, you know, passing stolen goods through. They may be looking into that. They may be looking at that angle and it may be why we haven't heard anything. All I know is is that we lost our vehicle, we lost $8000 worth of stuff and it cost us an additional, I don't know around $1000 just to increase our security between the studio and the House so. All in all, to this date, we really have no satisfaction. Would like some satisfaction. I'd like to see the lowlifes in jail where they belong. I'd like to see them prosecuted to the full extent of the law. It was really, really hard for us to try to forgive them, but you know. No. Jesus said we have to forgive. So why we had a temporary board up in front of that window? I spray painted. We forgive you on it. Don't know how much I was feeling it at the time that I spray painted it, but you know had to do it. I keep telling myself, you know, this is just stuff, this is stuff. I don't think it's the loss of the stuff that bothers me. I think more so, it is the violation of our property and of our security and of our peace. I think that violation. Is what bothers me more than anything else, not the loss of the stuff. We. Are happy people. My wife and I are very happy. We love our business. We love our home and for somebody to violate our business and to violate our home. It violates us and in violating us, it takes away our sense of peace, happiness and secure. 30. We're working hard to get that back right now and I honestly believe that we will get that back. It just takes some time when you've experienced a deep wound. Deep wounds take time to heal, and we will heal. We do forgive these people that did it. We hope that maybe if by some chance they happened here, this podcast, they might do the right thing and. Return those machines to us because, like I said, more than anything else, those machines are very important to us. They can't use those machines. They're old time machines. That takes a special tuning to use them. They'll if they try to use them, they're just going to butcher people. I really do hope that they will do the right thing. And return them to us. Or if you know who did it, that you'll do the right thing and let us know that would. Be nice. So. Where does that leave us in this daytime? Well, leaves us moving forward. Like always. I mean, the studio is still open. We're still creating fantastic body art and we are still doing fantastic piercings. And all you have to do is give us a call and make your appointment and you can get in, you know. And if you don't have the number, it's 785. 571-9500 in case you missed that, I'll repeat it for you. It's 785-571-9500. Now. During all this, well before all this happened and during the period, we have had a very wonderful, wonderful. Lady apprenticing under US and I'm going to tell you a little bit about her story. She was apprenticing for a studio called Fat Cats over in Dodge City, KS. Fat Cats decided to drop her apprenticeship when she only had 70 hours clinical left on her apprenticeship. That was it. Just 70 hours left. Then he held her hours for hostage in lieu of a $10,000 payment. That's right. He demanded $10,000 to release Sir. Ours. Now, that's not all. On this. He also, when he originally agreed to apprentice her, made her sign a contract wherein she would pay him $20,000 for an apprenticeship. And I'm going to tell you folks right now for any that's listening here. That's BS. Period. It's just plain BS. If you are seeking an apprenticeship, either as a tattoo artist or a piercing artist. And someone says that you have to pay them to apprentice. You're in the wrong place. Turn around and walk out the door right now, because they're ripping you off. The way a studio gets their money back for teaching you how to tattoo or how to, uh, Pierce is that you signed a contract with them for about two years and you work at that studio for two years. And during that two year period that studio is going to take 40% of your earnings. And you'll get to keep 60%, but they'll take 40% of your earnings and that 40% is how they get paid back for teaching you how to tattoo your peers. Like I said, you walk into a studio and they won't charge you tattoo or peers, you're in the wrong place. Turn around and walk out. Well, unfortunately, Melissa, that's the name of The Apprentice, Melissa Moss. She didn't know this, and she tattooed with something she really wanted to do, something that she felt she had a knack for, and that she had a love for. So she went ahead and agreed to it. Later on, fat Cats tattoo took advantage of her. And oh, by the way, fat cats. Tattoos in Dodge City, KS, in case you want to know where not to go. Anyway, they took advantage of her, which was really sad. She was eventually able after. You know, paying them their blood money, as it were. To get her apprenticeship hours back and I agreed to take her on to finish up her 70 hours of apprenticeship. Now I am not having her work. For two years for me to pay me back for that 70 hours. Actually, we're just doing it because it's the right thing to do. I don't believe in ripping people off. I don't think people should be ripped off, and I definitely do not believe in wiping out a person's hours when they have done nothing. At the right thing. Now it would have been different if she would have done something to the studio, or if she, if she would have just suddenly walked away without any sort of notice. But he's the one that let her go. She didn't walk. So her hours should not have been held. She should have been able to finish her 70 hours that she had left and go on and do her own thing. Personally, on a personal note, I think what it is is that he got a little bit concerned. You see, Melissa is very good. And she's extremely good. And I really the only thing I've kind of taught her is business practices since she's been with me, she she don't need to learn anything about tattooing practices because she's got it down. But I think he was getting worried because she wants to open her own studio and she is going to open up her own studio in Dodge City. It's going to be called a starting line tattoo, and she's already got a space in the mall there in Dodge City. So if you're looking for a really great tattoo and a really great tattoo artist and someone that has high moral. Ethics and high values and is going to do things the right way. In the Safeway you need to look up Melissa Moe's again. The name of her studio will be a starting line tattoo and it's in the. Well, so anyway, getting back, I kind of digress there a little bit getting back. The only thing that I have asked her to do to pay me back for helping her get her 70 hours is just always do the right thing, always do tattooing the correct way, always do it. The Safeway, that's what I want in return. She is a wonderful person. She's a wonderful tattoo artist and she's going to contribute a lot to this industry over the course of her career. So I encourage you to support her in every single way. Plus not only that, she's pretty funny. So she's a funny guy, so she'll she'll have you laughing. She's highly intelligent. Just check her out. Dodge City, KS, a starting line tattoo. Melissa Moss. She'll be great. So what else is going on in our world right now? Well, I got some exciting news last night. For me, it's exciting news. I haven't got to spend Christmas with my daughter or my granddaughter for. Of millennia, it seems like, but it's been a long, long time. Uh, I think 2011 was the last time I spent Christmas with them. So yeah, you know, it's been a long time. It's been 11 years. Anyway, my daughter and my granddaughter Andrea are going to try to come up for Christmas this year up here to Kansas and I'm really excited about that because I want to show them around. Plus, they're wanting to get to have tattoos. I guess they're both Def Leppard fans. And so they're wine Def leopard tattoos. I'm really concerned, though. Does that mean that my daughter and granddaughter are going to cut off one of their arms so that they can really be true deaf Leopard fans? I hope they don't. I hope they don't cut off their arms, but. I especially hope they don't cut off the arm that I tattoo on, because that would just be terrible because then they'd lose the tattoo. But hey, they're Def Leopard fans so you never know what's going to happen. You know, fans are crazy. They can't do anything. Who knows? But I think I've drummed that joke enough. We'll move on from there and I hope you got that really bad Dad joke just now. Anyway, that's exciting news for me. I really I really look forward to spending Christmas with them. I hope that my son-in-law, Grant, can also make it. My daughter said she didn't know if he'd make it or not because it depends on, you know, what their business does. He's a he's a small business owner too. He he does. Carpet cleaning and upholstery cleaning and that sort of. Thing. Ohh goodness I can't remember what the name of his company is, but he is in Abilene, TX and if you're in Abilene, TX and listening to this and you need, you know your carpets or poultry taken care of. Call Grant Compton again. I'm not really sure. What the name of it is? What the name of these business is, but you can find them. Just call the different carpet cleaning places and ask for Grant Compton. And I'm sure you'll find him eventually. But he does an amazing job and he's very reasonably priced and I feel like this whole podcast almost has been a commerce. And I don't. I don't really mean it to be that way. I just kind of catching you all up on things that have happened since the last time I did the podcast. Like I said, it's been a while. We went to family camp, I got to catch up on that. We went to family camp. Family camp is something that our church does every year. It's an annual thing. For over 40 years now, we went to our second year of it. It takes place at New Life Ranch, Flint Valley. In the Oklahoma. Sharks and it is a fantastic retreat. I mean, it's four days of fellowship and getting away and regrouping and recharging, and it's just a wonderful time. My wife Rachel handles the crafts for the kids. She does a wonderful job. She starts collecting things about a month before we go so that she has everything together and she. Has these mad plans, like a mad scientist putting together the Frankenstein monster she puts together this box full of craft items, and then the kids just absolutely love her and they create these crafts that they can take home as souvenirs. It's a wonderful time and a wonderful thing that she does for the children. Me, I'm kind of more or less on my own. I assist her where she needs it, you know, I help her set up the craft Hut and I help her, you know, with the kids during craft time. I'm in there with them. But for the most part. A lot of times I'm on my own, and so this year, while being on my own, I decided that I'd take my portable weeds on paint box up. With me and I sat out on the deck of our cabin and there was a view that I could see along the lake and back towards this pasture, and I painted that view now. Uh, Rachel? Kept wanting me to paint a cow in the pasture. Looking back at me because this one cow kept watching everybody that was in the lake and what have you all day long. Very curious cow. She wanted to call the painting. Nosy cow, but I really didn't want to put a cow into the painting because I thought it was utterly ridiculous. To do so. Even though Rachel thought it would be a moving picture with it, I just. I just couldn't see it and I couldn't hook my horn to that star. So I decided to leave the cow out of the picture and move on from there as I'm going to move on from the cow jokes now. Anyway, I painted this picture and a lot of people saw me painting it while I was doing it and they remarked that they would like to have. Piece of it. So I'm actually going to put up a special link on our website so people that went to family camp can get a free download of this picture if they want it. And our our youth pastor who kind of is in charge of the family camp thing, he thought it was a marvelous idea and told me like. One links up so that he can send out a letter to everybody so that they can get a copy of the picture and but the original picture. I bet you're kind of wondering what happened to that. Well, our worship Pastor Jeremiah, he kind of laid claim to it. He told me he wanted to buy the picture and I asked him, I said what? What do you think? You know it's worth. And he came back in and he said $150.00 and I told him that sounded like a fair price. Little did Jeremiah know at the time that already planned on giving it to him. But then the next day I discovered that him and his lovely wife Amanda had just purchased a home in Potman Place. For him and their family. And I thought, what a perfect house warming gift, you know? So on Sunday I put A-frame on it. And on Sunday I gave it to him. And he says to me, well, uh, I'll write you a check here a little bit later on. And I said what you're going to take my blessing. From me, he says. No, I insist. I'm paying for it. And I said, I insist you don't, he says. But you said you'd take $150.00. I said no, go back and read that e-mail. That's not what I said. I ask you what you thought, what fair price was and you said $150.00 and I said that's a fair price. I never said I'd take 150 for it. I just stayed at that was a fair price. And I said so. For me, the fair price is I give this to you as a House warming gift and you say thank you. And he kind of flushed a little bit, he says. Well, I got to do something for you. We'll we'll have you over for dinner. I said, well, we would have come over anyway, so. But. Anyway, you know I. Yeah, you know, I create art to sell. I do. My wife creates art to sell, but every once in a while you create art to give away. There are certain pieces you just look at and you go. You know what? I need to give that piece away. And it's kind of a way of giving back the blessings that we've been giving, giving for our talent. You know, the talent we have is a true blessing. Like my wife, she'll do memorial portraits for people. For loved ones that have died tragically and. That's her way of giving back me. Every once in a while I'll do a piece of artwork and I'll look at it and go. That artwork needs to be given away. I just need to give it away and I'll figure out a way somehow to give that piece of artwork away. And that's the way it is with this one that I create at family Camp, which I call Flint Valley pasture. And. I mean, if you want to see it, you'll be able to. Uh, you'll be able to see it on the website www.artist-ally.net. It will be posted there as a matter of fact, I think I already posted it there as a blog, so you might go look at the blog. And that way you can take a look and see what it was. But this was a piece of artwork as I finished it, I knew I'd have to give away. So not only have I given it away to Jeremiah the original, but I'm also giving away these free downloads to anybody that you know wants them from that went to family camp. So these are just, you know, these are things you do as an artist. You don't have to get paid for everything you do. And if you're an artist that thinks you need to get paid for everything you do, then you're not really respecting your art. I mean, that's my personal opinion. You're you're not respecting the talent that you were given. There are times as an artist and take heed in the artist that's listening to this. There's times as an artist you have to pay back the blessing that you've been given of your talent, and to do that you give something away. You give a piece of you away, which is a piece of your art. I'm not saying you have to give all your heart away. By no means. Don't do that. Your professional artist, but there's pieces that you can. Afford to give. Up without being paid for them. Seriously. So anyway, I guess that kind of catches you up. I'm I'll try and keep up on the podcast. I know I've been horrible about it, but that pretty well catches you up to date on everything that's been going on. So I'm going to go ahead and sign off now. And I am gonna wish God's blessings on you and yours. Later, Gators. Bye bye now.