Episode 86: Your Urban Legends XI
/It’s the Witching Hour 24/7 here at Spirits Headquarters, especially when we’re reading your creepy cool stories! This episode features high levels of Spooky Boys, Eric’s existential crisis, cats that say hello, our desire to visit all the haunted restaurants in the world, ROAD TRAINS??, and our disbelief at business naming in Ohio. Remember, stay creepy, stay cool, and stay… pasta?
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Transcript
Amanda: Welcome to Spirits Podcast, a boozy dive into mythology, legends and folklore. Every week, we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world. I'm Amanda.
Julia: And I'm Julia.
Amanda: And this is episode 86, Your Urban Legends part 11.
Julia: Oh, I love the spooky stories. So spooky the stories, they're very good this time.
Amanda: Spooky. Spooky number.
Julia: Is 86 a spooky number?
Amanda: 11. It's the same number but twice.
Julia: Okay, if you say so.
Amanda: Julia, I've been enjoying the leftovers from the six pack that you brought me so please tell the good people what we were drinking during this episode.
Julia: You know how much we love doing hometown local beer for our hometown or our legends episodes. This week we were drinking Bungalow Beer from Crooked Ladder Brewery. It's a really nice pale ale and it's delightful.
Amanda: I know. There's nothing like a Crispy Beer that makes you think, "Yes, I could and maybe will drink this all day long."
Julia: Do you know who else could drink these all day long, Amanda?
Amanda: Would that be our newest patrons: Michael, Amanda, Velm, An actual human person and Sarah?
Julia: For the record, Velm and An actual human person are two separate people.
Amanda: I know. Commas are very, very tricky. Though people who have an absolutely unquestionable grasp over the usage of commas will be our supporting producer level patrons. Philip, Julie, Kristina, Josh, Eeyore, Ella, AshleyMarie, Neil, Jessica, Maria, Ryan, Phil Fresh, and Debra.
Julia: Y'all never have to question whether you're the ghosts or if the ghosts are the person that you're tracking the entire time. It'll make sense in the episode.
Amanda: It'll make sense. And thanks as always to those legend level patrons, which like that tier name to me is enough to say, "Hey, I want to be among this number." But those that support us on Patreon and get a real physical package in the mail every single month: Sandra, Audra, Mercedes, Jack Marie, Leanne, and Cassie. Thank you all so much.
Julia: Y'all are wonderful. Legend barely describes how great you are.
Amanda: We would also love to thank Skillshare who was our sponsor for this episode. They're an online learning community where you can learn and teach just about anything. Whether you're trying to learn a new hobby or teach someone about something you have learned in your career, you can go to skillshare.com/spirits to get two months of Skillshare premium for just 99 cents.
Julia: I can't even buy a beer for 99 cents.
Amanda: Julia, I had the literal same thought in my brain. Twinsies.
Julia: This is why we're friends. But we'll tell you a little bit more about Skillshare later on the episode. If you like our show, you like the Multitude family of products and you should definitely check out our newest show. Amanda tell them about our newest show.
Amanda: Yeah. If you put Multitude into your podcast app, this very podcast app that you are listening to us through, or the website, multitude.productions, you will see our newest show which honestly y'all you have to check it out just for the episode, just for the cover art alone. Multitude art mom, Allyson Kate did her thing again and has made maybe the most gorgeous podcast art ever. I love ours, but it's very good.
Julia: It's quality shit.
Amanda: And the show is called HORSE, it is a podcast about everything that happens off the court in basketball. Now, you might be saying, "Amanda, I don't give a shit about basketball. I'm the mythology nerd. I listen to spirits." Neither did I y'all, until I got to know Mike Schubert and Eric Silver, two people who can make literally anything interesting. In HORSE, they focus on memes and internet beef and drama between players and the weird accounting and law and logistics behind basketball. It is the best. They make sports really interesting for someone like me who has never been a fan so it seems so intimidating to really get into the sport, but HORSE is well worth your while.
Julia: Definitely check it out. The trailer drops this Monday as you're listening to this episode. And the new episode drops Monday after that, right Amanda?
Amanda: Exactly. And you can listen to the very first episode early if you like being exclusive and getting things early by supporting them on Patreon at patreon.com/horsehoops.
Julia: I think that will do it for us today. With that, enjoy Spirits Podcast episode 86, Your Urban Legends part 11.
Eric: Five, four, three, two, one.
Julia: Three, two, one
Amanda: Three, two, one.
Eric: No joke, I always get scared. Like when you guys come in at three, I like suddenly like, "Ooh." And then I have to remind myself that I-
Amanda: Spooked out by his own self?
Eric: ... that I need to keep counting. So I feel like there's always a bit of a weird pause between my three and two because I'm like, "Oh gosh, why are they saying stuff?"
Julia: Oh boy.
Eric: I guess you guys should start it and then I'll get into my ...
Julia: Listen, I have been drinking solidly for three hours so we can do whatever the hell you want, is basically what the thing is.
Amanda: Welcome to Spirits Podcast our 11th, Haunted. That's definitely the cold open. Julia don't worry about it.
Julia: Yep, apparently. It's fun.
Eric: It's very good.
Amanda: This is always really fun for us 'cause we tend to record them on Sunday nights or on Monday nights, like starting out our week with each other. And it's really lovely to ready your e-mails which you can send us any dang time you want at spiritspodcast@gmail.com.
Eric: The closer to the witching hour you send it though, the more likely we will read so I mean that's just-
Amanda: What's the witching hour Eric?
Julia: I think that's true.
Eric: The witching hour is 24/7 here at Spirits Podcast.
Amanda: I love it.
Eric: He brought it back.
Amanda: I love it.
Eric: Guys, I'm dealing with a podcaster's worst nightmare which is a Blue Apron recipe. That's not the bad part, the bad part is that my girlfriend prepared some kind of ... It started with a v, I don't remember the word but it was some kind of style of shrimp. And it was maybe the spiciest thing I've had in some time and my mouth is just on fire and I am trying to calm that fire with a glass of whiskey.
Julia: I feel like beer would be more appropriated in this situation but I don't know.
Eric: We're in one of those situations.
Amanda: Looks like you had a very fun weekend. What did you do?
Eric: What did I do? Me and my girlfriend, we bought bikes and then we went down to the Cayuhoga Valley Towpath, which is one of the largest national parks in Ohio. It's probably the only national park in Ohio.
Amanda: Now, what does towpath mean? Is it towing like I am towing stuff?
Eric: There's a train and there's a towpath. It's part of the Erie and Ohio Canal and you can ride along it where the donkeys used to walk, the mules used to walk. And you can actually get down to this nice town called Peninsula and take a train back. We were unable to do that because the train schedule didn't work with my schedule for later on the day. We wouldn't have gone back till 5:00. But did that, it was great. We also have new neighbors downstairs in our house that we live in. That's exciting.
Amanda: Big weekend.
Julia: That sounds amazing.
Amanda: Big weekend. Lots of stuff.
Julia: Listeners, Eric was bragging about his bike choices in our group Slack this weekend and it was wonderful. It was really great.
Amanda: You're getting really stylish. Yeah.
Eric: Yes.
Amanda: I took the subway to the beach for the first time, which you can do here in New York City.
Eric: Now, you told me that this was happening and I immediately assumed that this is a bad situation. Because we've been to the beach together via New York City and we took the train, which is different.
Amanda: The commuter train, yeah.
Eric: The commuter train, exactly. And that was very pleasant. But you took the subway and I was like, "This sounds terrible."
Julia: There are plush seats in the commuter train, there are not plush seats on the subway.
Amanda: And there are cars at the end of the commuter train that belong to you or your family or friends to take you to the beach. So being from a beach town, I was very hesitant to take the subway to the beach because I was like, normally you just open the trunk, you put in your chairs, your umbrellas, your coolers. You're not limited by the amount that you can carry over long distances, just the amount you can carry from the car to the beach, which may take several trips at some points. Or you give it to your adolescent brothers who carry it instead.
And so I was the nervous to take a train for an hour down to Rockley Beach, but you know what? It was the funnest thing I've done in a long time. It was awesome, the train was very efficient. It was like a four block walk and the beach was lovely. I felt like a pro. I packed my cooler efficiently. I knew what I was doing and it was super fun. My lesson here is take risks sometimes and risk being uncomfortable because occasionally it will work out very, very well. Other times it ends in ghosts so take that with a grain of salt.
Eric: And now that we've done our pretty much end of episode wrap up, where we give you some good advice, that's this week of Spirits. So until next week, goodbye.
Amanda: The conclusion from my e-mails is don't have jobs or relatives or school because sometimes those end in ghosts.
Julia: I mean, that checks out.
Amanda: I'm ready.
Julia: Like logistically. Who wants to start this week? Can I start?
Amanda: Yeah, you can.
Eric: You can start.
Julia: 'Cause I have a followup e-mail.
Amanda: You do whatever the hell you want.
Eric: We got to start with a followup then.
Julia: This reads, "Spirits team, your boy is back! Because-"
Amanda: King of crawdads!
Julia: Yep. "Because I immediately stan anyone who gives me any attention. So congrats, you're all my parents now."
Amanda: Hell yeah.
Julia: "Also, I heartily accept my new role as Eric." Eric, he's got you there. They got to you. Okay, "So since the-"
Amanda: Oh good.
Eric: I got him. What happened? I don't remember.
Julia: They have your role now. "Since the reading of my first e-mail had me making noises that made my mom think that the cats were crying for help, I have decided to send another story. Not one of the previously teased ones though, because none of them are quite meaty enough for an e-mail. Though I may send my siren one at some point if you're not sick of me by the end of this."
Trust us, we are not sick of you.
Amanda: No, continue.
Julia: "This is what I like to call my spooky boy anthology. Four-ish different spooky encounters of mine that all share an uncomfortable similarity. Images and edited notes for my kittens will be provided for your convenience." Which I appreciate, I always want kittens. I'll try my best to keep this relatively short but my hunger for a ridiculously dramatic pros may get the best of me. Future me has got quite the editing to do."
Eric: Okay. So Julia you've seen the e-mail, how did the editing go?
Julia: It's good.
Eric: It's good?
Julia: It's all real good.
Eric: Okay, I'm excited. I mean, I'm sure it was going to be good.
Julia: "First one starts with Tall boy, age at the time, 15. The first S ..." They shortened it to S.B., which is spooky boy. "The first S.B. I shall describe is what I consider the traditional spooky. You know that feeling you get when you're alone in your room at night and feel like something's there? Of course you do. It's like the beach kiss scene of creepy stories. Anyway, I was sitting on my bed writing an essay on Shakespeare's dick jokes and getting a shit load of that feeling. I tried my best to ignore it-"
Amanda: God, 20 friends?
Julia: Yeah, I know.
Amanda: They're amazing.
Julia: Cecil's already our best friend. Anyway, "I tried my best to ignore it but because fuck that. But eventually it was so strong I looked up from writing, which says a lot. And there was this spindly motherfucker." I like that I can read. I know exactly the tone to read these in, I really appreciate that.
Amanda: You're doing great babe.
Julia: "He was standing in my closet, which doesn't have any doors and watching me. He was tall and look like he was made out of scribbles. He had no features except for two long white eyes and he watched. I blinked and he was gone."
Amanda: And this is spooky level one of four?
Julia: This is one of four.
Amanda: Oh my God.
Julia: Yeah. They say, "Now I could have brushed this off as a trick of the light were it not for my previous experiences with these spooky boys."
Amanda: Cecil knows too much.
Julia: "The next one is bed boy, age, 15 but several months before tall boy in the closet. I was over at my friends house for the night, which is never a sentence that precedes anything with these sort of stories. I-"
Amanda: We had a really great heart to heart and got quite vulnerable with each other and it's a conversation I reflect back on with great affection.
Julia: No, never that.
Amanda: No.
Julia: "It was probably around 3:00 in the morning and me being the idiot that I am and forgotten to take my sleep meds, was wide awake. I was listening to podcast to pass the time and had been relaxing to voices that the McElroy's when I felt a weight on me as if something-"
Eric: Hold on real quick. This is not related. How old were they?
Julia: 15.
Eric: Okay. I'm on the cusp of turning 30 and so a 15 year old ... 15, 16, which one was it?
Julia: 15.
Eric: So a 15 year old having the concept of a podcast ...
Amanda: Is wild.
Eric: Is wild to me. And like specifically a McElroy podcast which is like the second, third wave of the big podcast thing situation.
Amanda: Yeah, you could drink by the time the McElroy started podcasting.
Eric: Yeah, exactly. Like I've been listening to those McElroy boys since like pre-episode 100. And by that point, I could already probably run for U.S. representative.
Julia: Jesus.
Eric: So this is just like ... It's like to put this into a time space for me. You can continue.
Amanda: Side note, I love when parents talk about listening to podcasts with their kids. I just think it's so sweet. And like my parents weren't big readers so I couldn't bond with them over the same media that I do with my friends. So the idea of parents listening to the show together and just talking about things that we talk about or other podcasts I guess, it warms my heart. I love it. Send us selfies of you and your parents.
Julia: Okay. So anyway, they felt a weight on them, continuing on, "As if something was climbing across my legs. My friend had a dog and cat so I just assumed it was one of them. Though, it hadn't really felt like an animal. It felt like human. I looked over at my friend, she was fast asleep. The cat crawled up next to her, the dog snoring away at her feet so-"
Amanda: No, fuck that.
Eric: No.
Julia: "Then I saw it. It was the same sketchy white eyed creature as I described before, except this was one was hunched over on all fours less than five feet away from me."
Amanda: In the eating position. That's the position that these eat and suck your brains out.
Eric: I'm out.
Julia: I decided I much preferred shitty Yahoo questions to this actual fucking demon. So I squeezed my eyes shut, turned up the volumes on my headphones and did not look again for at least an hour. Of course, by then it was gone."
Amanda: I mean, that would be fine if there was no feeling and sensation dimension to this haunting, but there was.
Julia: "Next one."
Amanda: Oh boy.
Julia: "Cat scaring boy."
Eric: I'm now going to double down on Amanda's. If that's creepy level two, I'm not ready for three and four.
Julia: There's two more.
Eric: Like he wasn't ready for one. I am no longer prepared at all.
Amanda: Drink your drink babe. Drink your drink.
Julia: Drink that whiskey. Time to go. Alright, "Cat scaring boy. Age, 10. When I lived in the blue house, where I saw the heck popper, I had two thin-"
Eric: So Pokemon and Sapphire had just come out?
Julia: Yes. "I had two things important to this story, a hallway between my room and my brother's with no door, or any other way to cover it, and a cat named Icarus," so weird naming.
Amanda: God, Cecil is just living their best life and they're like a teenager. I love it.
Julia: I love them so much.
Amanda: I love it.
Julia: 'So Icarus liked to sleep in my bed with me because we were bros. It was around 9:00 at night and pretty dark out. I was petting Icarus and he was purring because he was a fucking sucker. I had footsteps in the hallway. He's purring stopped abruptly and his fur stood on end. Concerned about my furry bud, I gently picked him up and asked, "What's wrong?" He gripped his claws into my shirt and stared in pure horror at the hall.
I looked at over and in seconds, my cat and I were wearing the exact same expression. See, we have the special bond. There was one of those figures there. She was watching us like the others and had her hand pressed onto the wall. Now, I say she because while all the others gave off either a genderless or vaguely masculine aura, I could immediately feel that this one was a woman.
You think ghosts would join me in the whole fuck gender category, but I guess not. Anyway, it was horrifying. Also, the first one I ever saw."
Amanda: Oh my God. Let's just get to four. Let's reap the bandaid.
Julia: "The last boy, tiny boy. Age, 16."
Eric: This is about as hard to follow in terms of chronology as Westworld season two and I am into it.
Amanda: I know. I love that Cecil's ghost per year ratio is real high. They are having a lot of significant hot things in the course of one year.
Julia: I appreciate it. "I work as a library page. I'm pretty used to creepy shit there but it's mostly in the form of adult men thinking-"
Eric: Why are you used to that? You don't have to be used to that. Not all libraries are haunted. Go to a different library.
Julia: "But it's mostly in the form of adult men thinking I'm there for them to hit on and ask about dreams. Unfortunately for them, I'm gay as fuck. But this creepy was more of the Grudge junior level and also kinda cute."
Eric: Grudge junior. Grudge Junior was my favorite cable channel in the '90s.
Julia: Alright. "I was shelving books as is my job and one of the shelves is too full for me to put them in. So I began shifting books down to make room. I pulled a few books off and dropped them on my foot when I saw what was behind them. It was a tiny little spooky boy. They were hardly as big as my finger and probably the most adorable housebound I'd ever seen.
Now, the reason why this is the weirdest one is that unlike the others, this guy didn't disappear after a few moments. No, this thing decided it wanted a ride. So when a spooky boy wants something, you better do it. And that's the story of how I had a tiny demon on shoulder gripping my shirt in an extremely corporeal feeling way for at least 10 minutes before it disappeared."
Eric: No.
Amanda: I'm floored. That is adorable.
Eric: Has Cecil said where they live?
Julia: No they haven't.
Eric: Okay. Well, please tell us where you live so we can never go within 100 miles of there. It sounds terrifying.
Amanda: In general times.
Eric: It sounds like you're living in like ... I don't know, the spookiest part of Halloween town.
Julia: Yeah. So anyway, they said, "Anyway, I hope you liked these and I'd like to thank you before I forget forgetting both my name and pronouns right the last time I sent time I sent something in."
Amanda: And always feel free to send your pronouns in with your e-mail because we will default to they if with don't know. And if it is something different, let us know.
Julia: Yes, we would love to use the correct pronouns for y'all.
Eric: It is super helpful. It really is.
Julia: "And anyway, that is from Cecil, the true king of the crawdads with the help of Pepita and Coco."
Amanda: Cecil, absolute unit.
Eric: Can't argue with that anymore.
Amanda: Absolute unit.
Julia: Never.
Amanda: I was super into the idea of like little fairies, like garden fairies and stuff. And my grandma and I would make like little fairy houses out of clothespins and things. And that idea of the tiny little housebound in the library just wanting a hand, a little ride, is so cute. And libraries are the best. They're haunted with knowledge and also hellboys.
Eric: I have two e-mails from Anna. One is listed as Eric friendly or little freaky and one is listed as not so Eric friendly. I have vetted both of these e-mails and I'm starting with the not so Eric friendly one so we don't end on a spooky note.
Amanda: Thank you.
Eric: Or like we end on a spooky note but it's just like fun, casual spooky, not like-
Julia: It's not stone dog sad. Is what you're telling me.
Eric: Not like the saddest thing you've ever heard.
Amanda: Stone dog, get out of my life.
Julia: How dare.
Eric: I did find like another sad dog story in the e-mails at one point, I was like, "I can't do that. I can't do that 'em."
Julia: How dare you.
Amanda: Thank you. That's correct.
Eric: Alright, this story comes from Anna and they write, "Like road trips, camping was something we did nearly every school holiday and sometimes over the weekends. On occasion, we'd even get days off school to get the really good spots and not many people knew about so no one could follow us. This is like some legit camping, not like some traditional like those are the spots, camp there.
Getting the right camping spot is serious in my family. Our father was the person who took us camping while my mother stayed at home. We joked that because she had spent so much time looking after us kids while dad got to go to work to get a break, that he had to deal with all eight children on camping trips out of appreciation for our mother."
Amanda: Hell yeah.
Eric: "I'm the second youngest and always have looked rather slight. I have always been a night owl so I tended to be one of the last children to go to bed. This meant that I had to put out the fire and check everything was locked and put where wildlife couldn't get to. An easy trade-off for getting to stay up late for a 10 year old. That's true. Staying up late on camping is some of the best staying up late you can make.
Around the campfire was always story time. We could be taught our favorite children stories. it's in Latvia and German. Folklore from the old country and names of consolations. If you couldn't tell, I love camping, it holds some of my favorite memories.
One night, as each of my siblings had peeled off to go to bed and my father and I were sitting pointing out consolations, he stands up and he says, 'I need to chuck a piss.' Yes, that's a common saying," they claim.
Amanda: Amazing.
Julia: Apparently.
Eric: I'm not claiming that, Anna is. "So I should start checking everything before we go to put out the fire. And he goes off in the direction where we have set up our toilet. I go about the usual routine when I hear my nickname being called that is only used by family members. I can't make out whose voice it is so I ignore it. I hear it again and this time it sounds kind of like my father's but off.
I hear my nickname being called again. Very clearly my father's voice this time but it's coming from the opposite direction he went in. Then I hear, 'Help.' In my father's voice. I grab the torch and stand at the edge of our campsite shining in the direction I hear my name. I don't see anything out of the ordinary.
After about 10 seconds, I hear a deep firm masculine voice, "What the hell do you think you're doing?" It was my father. I tell him I thought I heard him calling but it came from the wrong direction. So I stayed within the camp and checked before waking my siblings to assist. My father looked furious.
He grabbed my hand and did all the checks again while holding my hand very firmly and we went to bed. He never spoke of it again. But since then, he would relieve himself before the second last person would go to bed and he would make sure to do the last checks in groups of two or more."
Julia: Yikes.
Amanda: Yikes. Also, what good instincts. Like it is very smart to not go running at the first thing that sounds like someone calling. I would absolutely do that.
Eric: Exactly.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: For sure.
Amanda: Wow, scary.
Eric: I like that this dad like knows. Like he knows there's something out there and he's like, "I got to protect everybody from this thing."
Amanda: Let's not fuck with it. So you're going to make us wait until alter for your second e-mail?
Eric: I am. I'm going to wait until we've refilled our drinks and everything.
Julia: Be a lot though.
Amanda: Alright, let's go do it.
[Musical transition]
Amanda: So Julia, you know that we love learning, that's why we have this podcast. We love learning about people's weird random stories from their hometowns, the scary shit that they did as a teenager, the creepy stuff that their kids say.
Julia: We love the creepy shit.
Amanda: And we also love learning on Skillshare, which is our sponsor this week. So on skillshare.com/spirits, you can learn about literally anything. Well, maybe not literally but pretty much. Skillshare has over 20,000 classes in everything from design, to business, to arts and crafts, cooking, technology and more.
Julia: And the best part is that premium membership gives you unlimited access to high quality classes with these must know topics. So you can improve your skills, unlock new opportunities and do the work that you honestly really love. I have been watching a lot of cooking shows lately. I just watched Ratatouille last night because when I'm sad, Ratatouille makes me happy.
And so, I was checking out Think Like a Chef: A Beginner's Guide to Cooking With Confidence. And it teaches you all the basic and knife skills and stuff like that that one needs to have if you're going to cook things. And it's honestly, it was just such a blessing.
Amanda: Well, I'm glad that you are advancing your actual skills because I was also on Skillshare last night watching a class called DIY Clay Sculpting, where a very soothing teacher made adorable little hamburgers out of clay. There were just making tiny little foods out of clay and it was so soothing. It's like my ASMR. I love watching speedruns and I love watching people make little barbecue foods out of clay.
Julia: That's amazing. So you can join the millions of students already learning on Skillshare today with this special offer just for our listeners. You can get two months of Skillshare for just 99 cents. So to sign up, you go to skillshare.com/spirits. Again, that is skillshare.com/spirits to get two months of unlimited access to over 20,000 classes for only 99 cents.
Amanda: We love the folks at Skillshare, we love learning, we love teaching. Whether you want to learn something new, watch some soothing craft videos or maybe even teach, you can go to skillshar.com/spirits.
And now, back to the show.
[Musical transition]
Amanda: I have an e-mail here from Stephanie with maybe the best subject of all time, beside Cecil's. Haunted pizza. Stephanie writes ...
Eric: Haunted pizza?
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: That sounds terrible. I don't want my pizza haunted.
Julia: That's fair. But as we've discussed, Italian food is haunted.
Amanda: I think Italian food is inherently haunted, Italian American food at least. And as a lactose-intolerant person, all pizza is haunted for me. In that it comes up later.
Eric: No, we got it. We got you. We didn't need any further explanation.
Julia: No, we got it. We did kind of understand what you're talking about.
Amanda: If I ever meet Griffin McElroy at a party, we're just going talk about IBS for a long time and it's going to be great.
Julia: Oh buddy.
Amanda: Haunted pizza.
Eric: That would be great.
Amanda: Stephanie writes, "I wanted to send this in since your Midnight Mary episode. So shout out to Grace McCreight, that was a long, long time ago and it's a great episode."
Julia: Yeah it was.
Amanda: "But only tonight, got the courage to send it in. In short, I work at a haunted pizza restaurant. Not exactly the most exciting I know." Stephanie, check yourself, this is very excited.
Julia: Opposition.
Eric: Don't sell yourself short.
Amanda: Come on. "But as we're curren-"
Eric: I mean, she is right. It's not the most exciting, that's any restaurant that has spaghetti in the name. This is the second most exciting type of restaurant to be in.
Julia: This is as close you can get without the word spaghetti coming up.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: "But," as Stephanie says, "We are currently on quite the streak of haunted Italian food, so I thought sharing my experiences with the community would only be appropriate.'
Julia: Correct.
Amanda: 'I live in the Las Vegas area and got my first job at a popular chain pizza restaurant several years ago. While on training, my managers would warn me that things would occasionally go missing and that they simply blamed it on the pizza ghost. As in, 'Oh the breadsticks never came out of the oven for this order? I could swear on my life I put them in there. Oh well, I guess the pizza ghost stole them.' We would chuckle out the joke and move on. No one took it seriously."
Eric: I'm quickly developing a theory about why Italian food is haunted and I-
Amanda: Why?
Eric: We'll get back to it at the end of the episode.
Amanda: God dammit.
Eric: We'll get back to it at the end of the story.
Amanda: Such suspense. Okay. So, "We would chuckle out the joke and move on, no one took it seriously. A few months in, I was promoted to management and that meant many times I was completely alone in the store, either before it open or after everybody else left at close. This is when I started to notice what you don't notice when everything is loud and you're very busy. What I found after a while was that we were not haunted by a ghost, we were in fact haunted by three ghosts."
Julia: What?
Eric: No, that's three times the ghost.
Julia: Three times worse or better, depending on your sense of judgment.
Eric: Or depending on the ghost.
Julia: It's fair.
Amanda: "This is true. The first didn't say anything. They hang out near the front register. If you're up there alone, you may feel a very cold hand gently run its fingertips over that soft area between your neck and shoulder."
Julia: Nightmare scenario Stephanie, nightmare.
Eric: I don't like the level of description. A call out, whatever you call it, to all of our listeners, all of the people that write in. The more descriptive the better, but also the more descriptive the worst. So do both but like know what you're doing to us. Please.
Julia: It has also a very androgynous zone and I don't want a ghost to be touching up on that. Sorry.
Amanda: Erogenous?
Eric: No.
Julia: Yeah, that one too.
Eric: It's also an androgynous zone. She's not wrong.
Amanda: I was just going to say no one is allowed to touch that zone on me, including my partner 'cause I just get so ticklish and my shoulders go up to my ears and it's so ticklish, I don't like it.
Julia: Oh but you don't ... Okay, I was going to be like, "But don't you love it?" But apparently not, never mind.
Amanda: No, not for me.
Eric: It's not ASMR zone.
Amanda: Alright, that was ghost one of three.
Julia: Jesus.
Amanda: "The second is a female that appears to live in our attic. You can regularly hear a female voice seeming to come from the ceiling calling out, 'Hello?' She seems to be confused like she has no idea where she is. There have been days where I will hear her three to four times. And she can be quite loud. A few employees will hear her at a time. We'll check out the lobby and sure enough, no customers so we shrug it off. But, we all know we heard a voice."
Julia: That's definitely a cat. You're like cat ... First off, why does your pizza rear have an attic? And second of all, there's a cat living in your pizza rear attic.
Eric: Wait, are you suggesting that cats can say hello?
Amanda: Sometimes.
Julia: Hold on one second, first time I ever slept over at Jake's house, he has a cat and at 3:00 in the morning I woke up because I heard a creepy child, like girl child voice going, "Hello? Hello? hello?" And I wake up I'm like, "What the fuck is this shit?" And he's like, "Oh, it's just the cat." I'm like, "Why is your cat saying hello?" He's just like, "I don't know, that's what she does when she wants to play." I'm like, "But ..." So, cats say hello Eric, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about.
Eric: Okay. I think that's that a nice lie Jake told you did to get you to fall back to sleep.
Julia: I heard it multiple times. And he also would be like, "Oh yeah. That's just the ghost that lives in our house."
Eric: Have you seen the cat say hello?
Julia: Yes.
Eric: Okay. Well, that puts an end to that.
Julia: 100%. I saw the cat. The mouth moved, it said, "Herro." And I was like, "Okay, well, it's the cat." Also, Jake would tell me if it was actually a ghost.
Eric: So you're suggesting story two has been debunked. We're now ghost myth busters over here.
Julia: I am Harry Houdini-ing this shit.
Eric: It's just a pizza cat not a pizza ghost, story two.
Julia: It's a pizza cat. I'm calling it now.
Amanda: Discovery Channel, you can pay us frankly any amount of money to have a myth busting ghost show. We're here for it.
Julia: I want it.
Eric: Yeah. We'll fight that like Zak guy that runs Ghost Hunters, whatever his name is.
Julia: Zak Bagans.
Eric: We'll have his opposite show.
Amanda: Yeah, we are photogenic and-
Julia: Ghost adventures, we're actually ghost something else. I can't think of a good word in time.
Amanda: We're photogenic, we're millennials. They're three of us, give us a TV show.
Eric: We want.
Amanda: Alright, back to Stephanie's e-mail. "The third, oh the third. This one is a young man that lives in our walk in fridge. I'm not sure how I know he's a young man, I just get that feeling. I remember my first experience with him was one of my first solo open shifts. I went into the fridge leaving the door ajar behind me. A few moments later-'
Eric: That's a terrible shift. I've done that. I worked at a pizza place solo open, no good.
Amanda: "I went into the fridge leaving the door ajar behind me. A few moments later, slam, the door slammed shut as if somebody had thrown it closed."
Eric: And the door had become ajar as well.
Julia: Weird.
Amanda: "The door never closes that quickly. In fact, it usually doesn't close completely unless you make a point of pushing it all the way closed so I was very suspicious. I left the fridge and checked the entire store. No, nobody came in early to try and haze me. I shrugged it off and went back into the fridge. Again, a few moments later, slam! I was so shaken that I propped the door open with a trash can the rest of the time that I was in there." Smart.
Julia: Solid choice.
Amanda: "Over the next few days, workplace injuries started to increase. Nothing super serious. Getting the occasional paper cut from a cardboard box is standard, but these increased drastically around the store along with many unexplained bruises. And in a few cases, things falling off the shelves and hitting people.
I was sure that it was nothing. I guessed we must have just been having an off week, until I was walking through the store one day and a stack of plastic lids threw itself across the building. Now, to paint the picture, I was in the back of the store and I turned to look at another one of the managers who was sitting at the desk. Between us was the dish sink to my left and a shelf of plastic bins and such to my right.
A whole stack of lids was flung off of the shelf and didn't simply topple to the ground, rather it flew parallel to the ground about five feet before crashing into the opposite wall and finally tumbling into the sink below. It only took a moment, but the other manager saw the entire thing as well and we were both terrified. In hindsight though, it was very courteous of the ghost to make sure that most lids ended up in the sink instead of making a mess all over the floor."
Julia: I don't know if that's what the ghost intended.
Amanda: "I was on the edge for a while after this. A few days later, it was my turn to try another solo open shift. Now, a large part of the opener's job is to check every label in the shop and discard anything that's expired before the store opens. That's every single label very thoroughly. Which means for someone inexperienced, sometimes up to an hour in the walk in fridge, the super haunted fridge.
Needless to say, I was less than thrilled but it was my job after all and I was determined to do it right. At this point, I was so scared, I didn't even want to hear anything out of the ordinary. So I put my headphones on and blast the music as loudly as I could. For good measure, I also sang quite loudly to draw out any ghostly noise that the music might not cover.
No one got injured for a few days after that. It was strange but I was grateful for the peace and continued my plan of listening to music and singing every morning. After a few weeks, it seemed like everything was pretty normal. But then I got bronchitis and I didn't want to risk losing my voice so I didn't sing in the mornings for about a week and a half. And the injuries started up again. I recovered, I started singing again and the injuries stopped. Finally it hit me, the ghost loves music. I've worked at this restaurant-"
Julia: The ghost loves karaoke.
Amanda: "I've worked at this restaurant for nearly five years now and I try to sing I the fridge a little bit every single shift that I work and we haven't had any problems since. I almost forgot about some of this until we hired a cook a few months ago who was terrified of our walk in. She was so scared she avoided it whenever possible and outright refused to ever go in alone and then she quit after only a few weeks. Some of my coworkers thought it was claustrophobia but I of course, hold a different theory.
Things have been pretty peaceful for the last few years. All three of them still hang around and if you guys ever find yourselves in the Las Vegas area, feel free to swing by for some haunted pizza."
Eric: Here’s my theory.
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: Pasta and pizza is haunted by mob members. The mob, traditionally Italian, loves spaghetti also the mob heavily involved in the construction of all the stuff in Vegas. So lots of mob members were in Las Vegas and it's a pizza shop. I'm just saying you got Al Capone, you got the godfather. Those are the two mob guys I could think of off the top of my head.
Julia: Amazing.
Amanda: The only two. Fun Long Island fact, lots of times driving around or at a family parties and stuff, my parents would be like, "That's a mob guys house." And point out like big ostentatious houses where actual mobsters lived, which was very funny.
Julia: Hey, remember when a girl who went to our school her dad went away for a while and that's 'cause he was in jail doing mob shit?
Amanda: Yeah, I do. I super do.
Julia: Yeah.
Amanda: Eric I like your theory but I thought you were going to bring up Alexandra the Great. I thought you were going to be like, "Listen, you know ..."
Julia: Why?
Amanda: Conquering Italy. I don't know, it's just the first name that came to mind. That's just the first name that came to mind.
Julia: So our next e-mail is actually from Erin, who is our good friend and also our good friend Mischa Stanton's fiancée. So, hey Erin.
Amanda: Waddup Erin.
Eric: Hello.
Julia: This was one that she had originally told me at PodCon and then I asked her to send it in and we've put it off for so long and now I feel bad. But it's good and there's creepy children involved so I figured it was relevant to our interests.
"In the middle of nowhere, Pennsylvania, there is an all girls school. There is not a lot of public information available since this school caters to the most elite families in the world where you better hide your princesses, like literally Princess Anne is an alumni and there's a ton of kids from Hollywood and stuff. Then a school touch in the square in the middle of Appalachia, I guess. Tuition is crazy but the summer camp they run is even crazier.
I got a chance to work in the riding program at the school, the summer before my junior year. Part of the job was dealing with seven and 12 year olds with very high opinions of themselves. Read tiny stuck up little beings who would have been given real housewives of anywhere a run for their money.
Since counselors got their own cottage, we didn't see the girls after bedtime so it was pretty weird when I looked out our second story window well after 10:00 PM and saw a girl walking past our place towards the barns. The kids tried to sneak off during the day to see the horses all the time. Seriously these kids had zero concept of money. They all had their personal horses trailered at home for a week-long camp. One was a prize jumper from California, the owner was eight years old."
But they knew they would get kicked out if they pulled crap after lights out and I didn't recognize the girl though, she had short dark hair and was wearing nighties and laced up boots. It didn't really matter. She was out of bed and in a world of trouble for it. So I pointed her out to my roommate Liz. I went to get the kid while she got our barn manager to confront the issue. By the time I-"
Eric: Great job.
Julia: I know. Solid.
Eric: Barn manager.
Julia: By the time I got outside, this girl was up the street and across the green, which used to be a cemetery. Not relevant but also a fun note anyway. By the time I got to the-"
Eric: Wait, used to be a cemetery?
Julia: It's the Poltergeist all over again. I don't know what to tell you.
Amanda: Great point Eric, great point.
Eric: They should never used to have been a cemetery. They should say a cemetery.
Julia: “I could hear an ice cream truck in the background in my recording and I was like trying to ignore it but also I really want ice cream. Anyway, 'By the time I got to the lane leading to the barn, she was almost there. I thought maybe she was one of my girls, Athena, yes really since she was wearing a night gown and her hair was in a bob. I relaxed figuring that this will probably be an easy conversation with my one really homesick kid. Maybe even convince the manager to let her stay at the camp.
"And then I saw the loose horse walking down the hill, joy. I was sure it was Tucker. He was a big, gray, old as hell dressage horse who put up with everything under the saddle but was also half blind in his near side and spooked easily in low light. So shit, now the situation was dangerous, both for the kid and the horse and me but like whatever.
Luckily, I heard Liz and our boss coming up the hill behind me so I figured I had sufficient backup to deal with this. I called Athena firmly so I wouldn't scare Tucker but let him know that we were there. The girl jumped and looked at me. I didn't know her. There's a small town built around the school so I figured she was a local so I said, 'Honey, step off the road away from the horse, okay? We don't want him getting hurt or you stepped on.'
Then the horse just disappeared. It walked away from us up the hill and might have walked behind a screen 'cause it was just gone. The kid was looking where it went and back at me. She looked super freaked. I don't know why I wasn't, I just kept going towards the kid. Her eyes were brown like her hair, her night gown was cream colored with lacey bits around the collar and cuffs that were tied around her wrists.
I remember this 'cause I was four feet from her. I remember thinking her boots looked super comfy and her crocked baby teeth made her look like my cousin's daughter. But why was she so scared of me? I wasn't mad. Three feet away and Liz yells at me to stop. I looked back at her and Ellen, the barn manager, and couldn't figure out why they looked freaked. It was just a kid. I heard the kid move and looked at her again. She was running up the hill and then vanished like the horse. Like a dry eraser just wiped away.
We never talked about that night between the three of us, I try to bring it up but nobody was interested in our weird dream that three of us had at the same time. I still wish I knew who she was but I'm pretty sure what I walked up to wasn't a ghost. I think I was a ghost to her."
Eric: No. Listeners, just so you know, if I'm not speaking during one of these episodes, I'm violently shaking my head. "No, no, no. We can stop now, don't need to keep going." And that-
Julia: I always keep going. It is very good.
Eric: I don't like the idea that we're all ghosts in-
Julia: Someone else's story.
Eric: .. a flip where like, "Oh, we're the undead ones."
Amanda: Yeah, that like crossing of the time streams is so creepy and so amazing and I love it a lot, a lot.
Eric: Should I do my Eric friendly story?
Julia: Tell us the Eric friendly story.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: Alright.
Amanda: Do it.
Eric: Now that we've got part two, which is actually part one in their e-mail from Anna about the Eric friendly story. This one, not a bummer.
Julia: God bless.
Amanda: Excellent. Love it.
Eric: "Growing up, long road trips and camping were things that happens several times a year," as we've learned from the first story. "We all get told the standard precautions, don't go walking anywhere at night by yourself, don't follow sounds or lights, if you get lost, stop where you are and shout, 'Whooie!'"
Julia: No, don't do that.
Eric: "What flora and fauna to keep an eye out for and what to do when you encounter some of the natural nasties that are commonly encountered when moving further away from civilization. When I was in my early teens, my mother, younger brother and I went for a road trip from our farming town just outside Brisbane to visit a sibling that lived in Darwin, almost 3,500 kilometers away.
All of my family have done this trip and trips like this so very little to no excitement was expected. We had been driving for quite a while but had yet to cross the border from Queensland into the Northern territory as the sun was setting. There are many dangers on these large stretches of highway. You have road trains which are giant trucks that pull crazy amount of carts behind them-"
Amanda: I have heard of these. It is wild. If anybody has experience about this, please let us know.
Eric: I know nothing about these, I need to google them immediately after this.
Amanda: It's like Mad Max Fury Road style tracking. It's wild.
Eric: I mean, that makes sense because Mad Max Fury Road is filmed in Australia.
Julia: Yes.
Amanda: Well, good.
Eric: "And back when this occurred, there were open speed limits so they went rather fast." Okay, so they're fast, very long carts.
Julia: Horrifying.
Eric: That's terrifying.
Amanda: Yes. Towing like incredible amounts of weight because the distances in Australia like you can't drive across the continent and not stop for gas. So they just make them as big and powerful and fast possible to get from point a to b.
Eric: "As the sun is setting, we need to pull over for the night but we're about and hour or so from the next town so we soldiered on. As it became completely black, my mother noticed some lights coming up behind us. She pulled over thinking it was a road train. You don't fuck with road trains." I need to know more about these road trains. They sound amazing.
"And was planning to follow it until the next town in that sweet wind tunnel that we wouldn't have to worry about the rouse as a road train but turn anything into a mushy pancake."
Amanda: You know what, road train would have been a great item for a fake or folklore because there's no way that someone who hasn't hard of it before would think it was real. It's like an 18 wheeler that's stretched like a human centipede. It's serious.
Julia: I would just assume that it was… I don't know.
Eric: Why does it have to be a human centipede. Why can't it just be stretched like a regular centipede, Amanda?
Julia: Yeah, why does it have to be human? Why?
Amanda: I was wondering if you're going to say something.
Eric: Also, a human centipede is just three humans. That's not like ... Except for the-
Julia: Well, unless you watch that more recent one, it's like 100 people.
Eric: Except for the third one, in which it's too long and just purely—
Amanda: Hold on, I'm putting something in the chat, please wait.
Julia: No. Unacceptable.
Eric: Wait, which chat? Where am I looking?
Amanda: Google Hangouts chat.
Julia: No.
Eric: The Google Hangouts chat. So just click on it?
Julia: Oh okay.
Amanda: Yes, click on it.
Eric: Whoa! That's unbelievable.
Julia: Don't do this.
Amanda: It's like we're high, we're not. We're just a little buzzed but it seems like we're high.
Julia: I don't know why.
Eric: Oh. This is a video.
Julia: No I'm not clicking on the video. I'm not doing it.
Amanda: Just the steel, isn't it?
Julia: I won't do it.
Eric: That's too long. It's too long.
Amanda: I know. It's like it got caught buffering and then didn't stop and God was like, "Why?"
Eric: Yeah. That is literally exactly like it is. Or like when something does a weird clipping in a video game and it just keeps going. Or like the cards at the end when you win Solitaire on like Windows 95.
Amanda: Hell yeah, that's exactly it.
Eric: That's what this is. That is exactly what this is. Anyways, back to our story.
"The lights started looking strange of what they thought was this road train," just to bring everybody back to where we were. "They were bobbing more than they should and the colors kept changing. As they got closer, we still couldn't hear the road train." I assume these things are pretty loud.
Julia: Anyone would assume.
Eric: It's like three miles long, it seems like. "It had become eerily quiet actually. We noticed there were three lights bobbing independently from each other. The lights then dramatically changed direction and were no longer following the road but circling around the left hand side of the car." In Australia, they drive on the left hand side of the car.
Julia: Gotcha.
Eric: "Just a few meters away. They seemed to bob for a little bit in the same spot, on our left hand side for a few minutes, before speeding away in what seemed like an impossible speed. Our mother started up the car and we continued into the town as if nothing happened. She started telling us about the Will-o'-the-wisps and fairy lights, why not to follow them and that in Australia they are called Min Min lights and are fairy common around where we were.'
Julia: I'm calling my short there aliens.
Eric: And then they tell us story two which we've already covered.
Amanda: We cover Waystation episode two, the origins of the will-o'-the-wisp and the folklore behind it as well as the very interesting take that a Lost Girl decides to make. So check out Waystation for more of that.
Eric: Yeah. No I'm just ... I've become more enamored in this crazy long cars.
Amanda: No.
Eric: And they are bonkers.
Amanda: Yes. Please let me draw your attention back to a creepy cool story from Maïnah, whose name I hope I am pronouncing correctly. So they say, "Hello, I've been binge listening to your podcast and I thought you might like to know about my ghost story." Yes, listener, yes.
Julia: Always.
Eric: Yep, of course.
Amanda: "So I grew up in a very small town in France and I went to elementary school in a very old building. To get an idea, google Courcelles-lès-Gisors for an old photo of the school, which I will include in our episode description here. Oh type, just like a stone old school house." Love it.
Julia: Cool.
Amanda: "It had an attic which the students rarely had access to." a) why do they have access at all? Bad idea.
Julia: Don't allow anyone access to attics, ever. Unless they're ghost cats apparently.
Amanda: And b) no place of education or commerce should have an attic, period. So, "The attic, which students rarely had access to and was used for storage, not the normal kind of storage though. I swear you could find anything in that place. We once found a wooden gun that was used to prepare children for the war before World War I."
Julia: What? What the what?
Amanda: Yep. "It was an object of myth for the kids because a lot of weird things happen there. These were mostly related to a statue in the storage whose eyes would follow people which would disappear only to reappear in a completely different place." Julia is shaking her head and scowling.
Julia: No, no, no.
Eric: Wait, the eyes are on a statue?
Julia: And it ...
Amanda: The statue follows you with its eyes and statue disappears and then reappears somewhere else.
Julia: In the attic?
Amanda: Yes.
Julia: What the fuck?
Eric: No.
Amanda: Absolute no.
Julia: What the fuck?
Eric: Unacceptable.
Amanda: "We also heard of people suddenly getting scared for no reason, feeling a presence or being pushed by nothing." This all sound like the reasons-
Julia: Maybe it's a goddam creepy statue.
Eric: Or, I think there was a reason.
Amanda: There was definitely a reason. So, "There was also a mystery surrounding a small wooden door, the size of a window which opened in a wall on the yard."
Julia: That's some Coraline bullshit!
Eric: I like how many different parts of a house were in that sentence. I feel like every other word was a part of ... There's a window, door, wall, yard. It was amazing. It was a great sentence. I loved it.
Amanda: Yeah, it's true. "It would inexplicably open and close itself and bad things tended to happen when it was fully open. We later found out that the other side of the door was actually the attic, which we couldn't see from outside 'cause it was very high up. And people couldn't touch the door from inside the attic. They don't remember why but it was probably blocked by a wall or something like that." So like no one could be opening the door because on the outside it was too high and on the inside you couldn't actually get to it.
Julia: Because it's some Coraline bullshit.
Eric: Overlook hotel, the shining level of architecture that doesn't make any sense in reality.
Amanda: Bad. No, no, no. The bad. Very bad.
Julia: I'm real mad about this right now. I don't know why weird architecture is making me the most mad, but it is.
Amanda: Julia is feisty.
Eric: It feels like it'd be something that should make me the most mad but I am loving it.
Amanda: "During our last year in the school, me and my friends started investigating this. And somehow, we came to the conclusion that the thing in the attic was the ghost of a woman. It was malevolent and that the statue was its sidekick. That's what we thought at first, at least. But as we investigated, the ghost started communicating with us. At the time, we thought it was giving us clues but now I'm not sure. And somehow, that didn't feel threatening or mean at all."
Julia: Why?
Amanda: "The way she communicated felt almost protective, though I don't know how accurate younger me's ghost vibe reading was."
Julia: Probably not super accurate. Just like putting it out there.
Amanda: Okay Julia, maybe it was right though.
Julia: I don't know.
Amanda: "Now my theory was that the woman was a teacher that something happened to in connection with the statue. Which I think is some sort of evil spirit and maybe that's the reason we initially thought that the woman was malevolent 'cause we were confusing her and the statue. Maybe the statue and then, in parentheses, "man????" murdered the teacher but I don't really want to consider that possibility. I think the reason why nothing really bad ever happened to anyone in the attic, might be because the teacher is there to prevent the statue from harming kids. Maybe she even tries to scare the children off before the statue can get to them, but I'm not quite sure.
Anyway, I don't live in that place anymore and I don't think any of the younger children I know still go there so I don't know if they still talk about the attic and the ghost. The reason I sent you the story is in your first Urban Legends episode, you talked about how there's never any ghost from after the civil war and I definitely think this one is more recent than that.
On that subject, it'd be really interesting if you talked about a more modern ghost, maybe from the wars like World War I, World War II, etcetera." And that's with love, from Miner.
Julia: Now, I want to think about all the modern ghosts and I love all of our modern ghosts. All of our spaghetti modern ghosts.
Amanda: I also want to hear about different cuisines. Like if you work in a Japanese restaurant or Tai restaurant.
Julia: Like a good Indian restaurant or something like that.
Amanda: Good Indian restaurant, Chinese restaurant, salad bar.
Julia: Tell me about the ghost there.
Eric: I can't recall if we've done an episode that was specifically like a food roundup because we did something close to that.
Julia: Yes. We-
Amanda: We have because we've been-
Julia: No, we have done a food roundup but we haven't done a food ghost roundup.
Eric: Okay, we did a food roundup, we would like to do a food roundup of like haunted restaurants. If you send us a urban legend involving food in the next month or two, by the end of the year, we will hopefully be able to do an Urban Legends episode that is just haunted restaurants. Any style of restaurant is accepted.
Julia: I'm going to make that tag in our e-mail right now so we can save the restaurant related ghost stories.
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: Put restaurant in the subject line.
Eric: Because we're like honing into our extreme niche which is haunted food and it took us two and a half years to get there but we're cornering the market in the podcast world.
Amanda: We got it.
Julia: It's just us now.
Amanda: Listen, all we need are seven or eight e-mails put restaurant or food in the subject line and we will find it. I'm especially interested in ice cream places and FroYo bars. Like I want the ghost—
Julia: Why?
Eric: No, I agree. 'cause that's such like a happy go lucky place that's like, "Oh."
Amanda: Yeah Eric, that's why I want to fuck myself up with ghosts.
Julia: And also dairy.
Eric: The ice cream place by my house when I was growing up did burn down and they replaced it with another ice cream place.
Julia: That was probably haunted, at least three people died there.
Amanda: Oh no.
Eric: That is called the Cone Zone. That's not a joke, that is 100% what it was called.
Amanda: You know what they say that that's ...
Eric: 'Cause it is a thing. It sounds like a joke but it is not a joke. It was call the Cone Zone. I remember the sign, it was yellow. There was an ice cream cone that said, "Cone Zone." And then down the street was Zero Zest and Zero Zest is still kicking. The Cone Zone got replaced with Honey Hut, which is a local ice cream place in which-
Amanda: Do you have to have rhyming or alliteration to be a business in Ohio?
Julia: Yes, it's a legal statute.
Eric: In which ...
Amanda: Wait, what was Zero Zest? Is it a restaurant that has no citrus?
Julia: What the fuck is that? No seasoning whatsoever, zero zest.
Amanda: None, none.
Eric: Zero zest? You know what, I'll include a picture of Zero Zest in the ...
Amanda: Tell us.
Eric: Zero Zest will be a picture for the two-dollar patrons on Patreon that get our episode bonuses. I'll include a Google street view picture of Zero Zest. Also, I think there's a picture on my Instagram which is @imericschneider. That's not like a plug for me but if you really want to look at it then you can probably find it somewhere in there.
Anyways, Honey Hut's a local ice cream place in which they have actual honey bees and they add a bit of honey to all their ice cream…
Amanda: Wait, that's wholesome and pure. Let's return to what the fuck Zero Zest is.
Eric: I don't know. They had something-
Julia: How do you not know?
Amanda: Well, how do you not know?
Eric: I mean, they had something called the Avalanche which was the same as the blizzard. I always liked those.
Julia: Isn't like a weird friendly ...
Amanda: Eric, you are useless. Useless.
Eric: No, no. It's like a separate building. It's a single building that's only opened four months of the summer.
Julia: I'm light headed right now.
Why?
Eric: And then they serve you ice cream.
Amanda: I can't. I can't anymore.
Eric: It's on State Rd. It's across the street from the old State Road Elementary school, that's closed now.
Amanda: Don't give me anymore useless fact Schneider.
Julia: I can't. I need to know the level of zest, apparently it's Zero.
Amanda: Well, if we get this worked out-
Eric: We always enjoyed about it because there used to be a deodorant called Zest so we would make jokes about that.
Amanda: Well ...
Julia: Well, you've murdered me. I'm a ghost now.
Amanda: You have murdered us. Well, on that confusing and frankly disheartening note, I think it's time for us to pack on up. Again, send us your food and restaurant related myths. We would love to do some roundups. If you work at a TV station, give us a TV show. We'll go, we'll show up. We will eat so you don't have to. It's going you be great.
Eric: Point of order, you do still have to eat. Even if we show up, you do still have-
Amanda: We'll eat weird things in weird places.
Julia: I'll eat haunting food.
Eric: Yeah, we don't want people thinking that if we're eating they are getting sassiness. Legally, you still have to eat.
Julia: I will still eat some fettuccine all'Alfredio.
Eric: I'm done.
Julia: Alright.
Eric: Podcast over.
Julia: And remember listeners, stay creepy.
Amanda: Stay cool.
Eric: Stay pasta.
Julia: Fuck.
[Theme Music]
Amanda: Spirits was created by Amanda McLoughlin, Julia Schifini, and Eric Schneider, with music by Kevin MacLeod and visual design by Allyson Wakeman.
Julia: Keep up with all things creepy and cool by following us @spiritspodcast on Twitter, instagram, Facebook, and Tumblr. We also have all our episode transcripts, guest appearances, and merch on our website, as well as a form to send us your urban legends, at spiritspodcast.com.
Amanda: Join our member community on Patreon, patreon.com/spiritspodcast, for all kinds of behind-the-scenes stuff. Just $1 gets you access to audio extras, with so much more available too: recipe cards, director’s commentaries, exclusive merch, and real physical gifts.
Julia: We are a founding member of Multitude, a collective of independent audio professionals. If you like Spirits you will love the other shows that live on our website, at multitude.productions.
Amanda: And above all else, if you liked what you heard today, share us with your friends! That is the very best way to help us keep on growing.
Julia: Thank you so much for listening. Til next time.