Episode 506: Listener Tales 79

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast. What's the answer, and what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

Hysterical, a new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free on Wondery. Plus. Hey Weirdos, I'm Ash and I'm Elena.

And this is morbid.

It's special, morbid, because it's listenertales and it's brought to you by you, for you, from you, and all about you. I know that we say this every time we have a listenertale, but now that we only do, we're only allowed to do one. Every what is it? every month? I think every month, I think it is.

It feels so far between listenertales. I know it really does. I wish we were allowed to do more, yeah.

Because they're fun and you guys liked them, but you know, here we are. All's well, that ends.

Well, I suppose, so it's spooky season.

So there you go. So we picked one that feels pretty spooky, I think inspired, I would say, I would say, still.

And I'm going to start with one that's titled Listenertale. What the fucking fuck did I see? I hope you tell me, because I don't know I wasn't there. I hope so.

And this one begins Spooky tidings, Queens, Spooky tidings. I love that. Attached is a putt-a-foot of what I saw when I was a wee bitch. That is seriously disrupting my current mental stability.

Now I'm sharing it with you because I don't want to be awake all night alone. You're welcome. It's nearly four double-spaced pages. Because I'm a wordy dumbass, you're not a dumbass, don't.

You dare say that, but I have color-coded my tangents in purple in case you want to shorten the story. No way. I love how organized some of you guys are. Yeah, you guys.

Most of you guys, you guys are on it, you are like, your listenertales are on it. I feel like like our listeners are the kind of people that in school. They have those little like highlighter tabs for each section of the book. And I always used to be so jealous of those people.

I'd be like, Wow, I want to be like you, you guys are inspiring, you are. Also there's a little message at the end to you guys that you can decide what to do with best witches.

Sarah, I see what you did there, I like that, love you Sarah. It says, hello. You can use my name, which is Sarah, because one I am out and proud, spooky bitch, and two because pretty much every white woman my age is named Sarah.

So I could literally be any white middle-aged bitch on the cul-de-sac obsessed. You can also use my spouse's name because he picked it when he transitioned, and we're fucking proud of it. Hell yeah, hell yeah.

I've always been fascinated with ghost stories and haunted houses, ever since growing up in a giant, centuries old farmhouse as a kid. I'm sorry, are you me? I know I don't believe in ghosts.

Ooh, interesting, wow. I don't believe in ghosts, but I love spooky stuff. But again, and this is important. I honestly do not think they are just so, you know where I'm coming from in this story. Until I was about eight, I did believe in ghosts and I 100 thought that the house was haunted.

But by the time this story happened, I'd been convinced by my very not woo-woo family, I was just imaginative. No, it was a ghost. Below is a story that has made me question their assessment and what really happened to me post Halloween Day. In this house, the veil was still thin.

Yup, and it says, along with all the side quests, because I have the attention span of a raisin.

So back to this house, just so you understand how fucking creepy this place was. 10 miles outside the nearest town, which was tiny population 1500, which, by the way, is equal to the number of people who perished in the Titanic disaster. So every time I hear about the Titanic, I imagine my entire hometown floating around dead in the ocean. Because my brain is a haunted attic and I live there, I have to live there. Our nearest neighbor was a farm a mile away. When I say I was isolated, i mean capital.

I isolated. In the winter, the pipes regularly froze and so we had to walk out to the barn to pump water out of the well. Like fucking pioneers when the goddamn well froze. Because we live in Minnesota, which everyone says means clear water in the Dakota language, but I really wonder if it actually means the fucking horse died. So guess we have to live here now, and they just don't want to say that.

So when the well froze, we had to melt snow to get water for cooking, drinking and bathing. Oh my, and keep in mind, I did not live in ye old times. I was born in 1977, so I am the ass end of Gen X and nearly a millennial.

I was not the hall water from the Well generation, and yet there I was.

The day after Halloween, when I was around nine years old, I was chilling at home by myself because my parents had to work. And in the late 70s, if you were old enough to dial 911 in case you died, you were old enough to stay on your own. I think my mom had that same thought process in the 2000s. Eek. So I am sitting on the extremely antique bed in my parents room, which is the same bed my grandfather died in about 11 years earlier. Which we were not rich. So you didn't let a thing like a dead person spoil a perfectly good and very valuable bed. Oh my, my my.

Also because I know you want to know this. No, we did not buy a new mattress. Thank you very much. I wish you could see my face right now. I love you. I am shocked, so I'm sitting there on the corpse mattress and suddenly I feel spooked and look over towards the doorway of the room.

And there's a silhouette of a man standing there, holding what appeared to be some kind of hatchet or axe hanging by his side. That's never good. I don't know if you've ever been so scared. Your hands tingle, yeah.

That's how scared I was. I could not see features, it was just a dark shape of a person with the sun behind them. I'm very surprised I did not scream or piss my pants because I'm pretty sure that is what I would do now. But apparently, nine year old me was a better adult than 45 year old me.

So I just looked at this guy and said slowly to him. I'm going to close my eyes and count to 10. And when I open them up, you are going to be gone. Wow, look at you just taking fucking charge at nine for real, and that is that is what I did. I closed my eyes and counted out loud One Mississippi, two Mississippi and so on.

After I hit 10 Mississippi, I opened my eyes and there was nothing in the doorway and I just went on with my life. I love that. That ghost was just like, all right. He was like, Oh well, he was like, I know who's calling the shots around here, yeah.

He was, like, all right, enough said I just thought I'd imagined it because I was recently converted to my family's belief that I was just imaginative. It is an entire different story. But my mom had recently told me stories of how she used to see her deceased brother in dark rooms as as a child. Or, excuse me, uh, her deceased brother in dark rooms. A child and young woman, and that is how she got these hallucinations to go away. Oh, holy hell. So she saw her deceased brother in dark rooms when she was a child and as a young woman.

I think is what you say, I see, I see. Um, and that's how she got these hallucinations to go away, she said, And she says, quote unquote hallucinations, and she got them to go away that way. But it will go.

I'm not so sure, so that was that. I once imagined a person in a doorway and I counted to 10 and they went away, just like my mom told me. What happened? Clearly just a combination of too much candy, the Halloween vibe and my overactive imagination. That is, until fast forward to me at 43, realizing I have a condition called Aphantasia, Aphantasia, Aphantasia, Aphantasia. I was like, Aphantasia, Aphantasia.

This condition means that I have a complete inability to voluntarily generate mental images. Wow, I've never heard of that. That is fascinating, that is.

I literally can't see things with my imagination. You know what I think I saw? And this is I'm connecting it to TikTok. Of course, I think I saw a TikTok where someone's dad had that, really.

And they were like trying to have their father conjure an image of them. When he closed his eyes and he couldn't do it, wow, like he was having trouble conjuring an image of them. That's so interesting, so I have heard of this and it is fascinating and I wonder if it. I mean, maybe you'll tell us more, but I'm like, is that frustrating?

But then you've never had that, Yeah, you've never had it. So I guess it wouldn't be a problem. Unless other people tell you what it's like to imagine images, and then you're like, Damn, I wish I could do that, damn.

That's just wild, I know. So suddenly, as I was sitting there talking to my spouse, who does not have aphantasia, about what it's like to have absolutely no mind's eye. How I could not visualize anything when I closed my eyes during guided meditations. How I had said I had an imaginary friend growing up, but I could never imagine what they looked like. Suddenly, I went cold very quietly.

I said, Micah, I can't see things with my imagination. Suddenly, it dawned on me that the guy in the doorway, I could not have imagined him there, I literally can't see with my imagination. Oh, I just got to chill now. It isn't proof that there was a ghost standing in the doorway, as some this is people with Aphantasia.

So aphants, probably, I think it is. With schizophrenia, do experience visual hallucinations. And we are just as likely as anyone else to catch a glimpse of something and not see it correctly. Like when you catch a glimpse of your clothes on the floor and think it's a dead body.

Just me? No, not just you. Also, unlike some, I hope it's aphants, I feel like it.

Probably I do see visual images of my dreams, but I was not asleep at the time. I'd been sitting there reading, looked up for my book and saw it, and after it was gone, I went back to reading. You're a badass nine year old.

I know I love that you're just like I wish you had my book. I've never had a hallucination before or since in my life and I didn't glimpse that thing. I looked at it long enough to say an entire sentence out loud to it before closing my eyes and counting to 10. So, while I still refuse to believe in ghosts, Sarah, Sarah, I think there are things that happen that we have not scienced out yet.

Okay, and once we do science them, they will all make sense. I do wonder what the fuck happened to me that day in late fall and what it means for my skeptic status. Well, that's what I wonder, that's the thing.

I think if you want to look at it from a scientific point of view, which I enjoy, which. Yeah, I know you love that. And I think it helps to think of it as trapped energy. Yeah, you know.

And I think it's like ghosts as trapped energy, because you say you still refuse to believe in ghosts. I think I'm like a little looser with my skepticism like that when I look at things, because I want to believe in ghosts. And I do think there's something there that I don't understand, and I do think something happens after someone's gone.

Because a ghost blew in your ear, exactly so that's the thing, so you can't even argue it anymore. I 100 am open to ghosts.

And I think, Sarah, I think I think we can science you back into this. I feel like I think we could, because I think ghosts are pretty sciencey. Yeah, I think they're super biological, super biological.

You know, super natural, biological, super natural. So to clothes. I may have seen a thing I have not believed in since I was in first grade. Or for one day in 1986, I had a very vivid visual hallucination of a creeper with a hatchet. Also as an elder alphabet mafia, I would like to say that if you're a millennial, Gen Z or Gen Alpha, Gen Alpha, what are you doing here?

This is not suitable for your widdle baby ears.

And your parents are shitty about you being in the alphabet mafia. I am your new mom and my spouse is your new dad. And we love you and very proud we got you. We 100 got you Sarah and Micah, I love you.

She struck him with her motor vehicle, she had been under the influence, and then she left him there. In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe. It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location. What happens next depends on who you ask.

Was it a crime of passion? If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling. This was clearly an intentional act. And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia. Or a corrupt police coverup, if you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a coverup to prevent one of their own from going down.

Everyone had an opinion, and after the 10-week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision to end in a mistrial. It's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is. Law and Crime presents the most in-depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen. You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery+.

Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like, stuttering, super bad. I'm like, stop around.

She's like, I can't. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast, like doubling and tripling, and it's all these girls with a diagnosis. The state tried to keep on the down low.

Everybody thought I was holding something back. Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, no, it's hysteria, it's all in your head.

It's not physical. Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since the Witches of Salem, or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here?

Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline, and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical Follow Hysterical. On the Wondery app, or wherever you get your podcasts, you can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and add free right now by joining Wondery+.

I love it so much it, says Alayna Nash. If you want to share my email for our little rainbow babies who need us, we're okay with that. SARAH You saw a ghost and I feel like, so, it sounds scary because that person was, you know, carrying a hatchet or an axe. Yeah, scary.

But you said that you lived in an old farmhouse, so maybe it was just somebody whose job used to be to, like, go out and do some farm shit. Yeah, you don't know, cutting shit with an axe or hatchet. And they were kind of it's like a residual haunting, where they were just trapped in, like the pattern of their daily life, you know?

And maybe they, like, saw that you were a kid, and you were like, I'm going to close my eyes and you're going to go away. And he was like, Oh shit, like, I didn't mean to scare you, I was just going out to chop some wood, I didn't mean to freak you out.

And then he just like, bopped outside and maybe it was like a thing like in beetlejuice. When, like, he saw you? And he was like, What the fuck is this kid doing in my house? And you were like, What the fuck is this man doing in my house? So he was like, I'm going to go outside, and you were like, I'm going to keep reading.

And then you both just went about your lives. Maybe he was like, I just saw a ghost. Yeah, you don't know, whoa.

But Sarah and Micah for the win, for the win, that's that's cool, I like you guys, I know.

I like you guys a lot, I like you guys, I feel you guys. Pour one out for you guys, hell yeah.

Pour two out because there's two of you for mom and dad, mom and dad for mom and dad, Sarah and Micah. I love mom and dad.

Oh, that was a good one. Thanks Sarah and Micah. All right. So my next one is the time I got yeeted into a cemetery by an almost invisible man. Listen or tell?

Ooh, I'm in and let me open the doc. It says. Hey best friends, my name is Bethany and I'm obsessed with your podcast. I like your name.

Hell yeah, Morbid is pretty much the only one I listen to. Thank you, oh my God. I tried hard to get into other ones, but you ladies, just take the cake.

Oh my god, I love cake. thank you. I was going to say that I love cake, too.

The way you guys present the material in such a funny way, while also showing respect and tribute to the victims. Is one of the reasons. Is just one of the reasons. I love y'all, thank you my wife Katie and I listen to you every time we get in the car. What's music anymore?

I love you guys, that's how I feel about, watch what crappens. Yep, it's like all I listen to. I doubt you guys will ever do a live show in Boring Ass, Illinois. And I said that on purpose, but it's just a silly joke.

That made me upset. Good, but I hope to attend one somewhere soon. Unfortunately, this is not a putafah because technology. But I still used an easy font to read and it's double spaced. Sorry in advance for any grammar mistakes.

I have a psychology degree, not an English degree. Ha ha. Hope you ladies enjoy and I hope to hear this on the podcast soon. I have several other stories I'll be submitting as well. Hell yeah.

Well, here we go the time I almost got yeeted into the cemetery by an almost invisible man. Once upon a time, I lived in one of the smallest, most redneck towns I have ever ventured into. This town was nicknamed Crossroads of America. Because of all the interstates intersected here, the ones running north and south, as well as the ones running east and west.

The mix of local rednecks and out-of-town truckers always made things interesting. In the way of stories. At least before I moved to this magical place made up of cornfields, churches and low-class lazy bars. I already had a little knowledge of some of the town's history. Because I had friends that had lived there their whole lives and had told me hundreds of stories. One of the most, or, excuse me, one of the places I initially heard a lot about was a place called Casbar Cemetery. Supposedly it was haunted.

Me, coming from an extremely religious family, had never really believed in anything supernatural. A theme, a theme emerges always, and I always questioned people who told me stories claiming to have experienced or interact with ghosts and spirits.

Almost everyone I knew had some kind of crazy story about this place. No matter who told me the story, or who they were with, or how much they swore crazy things happened there. I still refused to believe it. No matter how many times I heard about some supernatural experience, I still wasn't convinced until the day I decided to find out for myself.

It was a typical evening in Effingham, Illinois. Why does that like, I love saying that Effingham, Effingham, that's great.

Like, f-ewing-ham, I love it a lot. Effingham. We were all bored as hell and itching for something to do. I've been an, sorry, I've been an everyday weed smoker since I was 18, so that was my usual form of entertainment.

My friends would come over and we'd smoke at my house, outside my house, in the car, on the way to go somewhere. And any time in between, we always managed to find ourselves on some sort of crazy fun adventure. Even if it was just driving down back country roads, smoking, listening to music and stopping at cool places to take pictures, occasionally, we'd go geocaching, geocaching.

Geocaching We were down for anything. So when the subject of Casbar came up, I was starting to regret having such an open-minded, spontaneous friend group. Because I knew they would all want to go, and all of them had been before multiple times. Now I consider myself a pretty badass bitch and there aren't many things I'm scared of, but ghosts and spirits hard fucking pass for me.

I'm always the most chill, laid-back person in a group, so everyone knew I would eventually cave. After about 30 minutes of relentless begging and coaxing me, I finally decided I'd go. What the hell, I wasn't really. It wasn't really haunted anyway. So what was the worst that could happen? Always the best question to ask.

I know it's always interesting to be, ahhhhhhhhh, what did you just do? Oh, Baphomet just stabbed my fucking foot, dude. I don't think we should put it on Baphomet.

I think you struck him with your foot, I did strike him with my foot and it hurts so bad. I don't even care if you leave it in, but fuck, that hurt. We have a little ah fuck, oh my God, I just became his sacrifice.

Fuck dude. I was like, Uh, don't put it on, baphomet, I love that. You were like, Are you okay? I was like, he did not stab you.

My boy Baffy didn't do shit. you just stomped him. Oh, I did. sorry Baffy. But you should be sorry for being so spiky as well. He's sharp, so be careful.

He doesn't like to have his head booped. Well, you shouldn't have left him on the ground. Okay, fuck, this was your fault. No, you're the worst.

I hate you, I don't hate you. I don't just to be clear, Yeah, obviously, but yeah, just also just to be clear. We have like a little statue of Baffy and he was on the floor and I like, struck my foot down upon him.

He didn't stab me, he did not, but that hurt so bad. Yeah, anyways, fuck damn.

It wasn't really haunted. Oh, I was gonna say, maybe Baffy was like, Hey, don't talk shit, but here I am. maybe. sorry baffs. I didn't learn. It's always funny to me when people are like, I don't believe in, like, haunted stuff.

Like, the ghosts aren't real, but then they're scared to go to a haunted location. Yeah, because I'm, like, you, scared of ghosts, because I'm a little part of you believes. You know, I just always love the what's the worst that can happen? Well, the universe is conjuring that for you.

Now I'll go around and find out. But they said it wasn't completely dark yet, so that made me feel a little more comfortable. We all piled into the car and got our blunts rolled and our playlists ready.

And the driver's seat was one of my best friends at the time Jade, and the passenger seat was my wife at the time. We'll call her Casey. I was in the backseat, directly behind the driver. I did just burp through that word.

I'm sorry, and my other friend, Minnie, was in the backseat next to me, although I was not happy about going. This group of people was a good one. Nobody did drugs besides smoking weed, which isn't a drug.

Nobody had any type of mental health issues and everyone was super chill and down to earth. I knew none of them would pretend they saw something that they didn't, or purposely try to freak me out. Anyway. I reluctantly said, Let's get this over with before it gets too dark, so we headed out.

To get to Kasbah, you had to go out of town, about 10 miles, down curvy, narrow country roads. I fucking love it, I'm into this, fucking love it.

Honestly, thinking back, it seemed pretty hidden. You wouldn't know it was there if you didn't know it was there, and probably for good reason. But did our stoned asses care?

Fuck no, fuck no, fuck no. On the way there, of course, everyone started talking about all the crazy experiences they had out at Kasbah, red eyes staring at them from the middle of the woods surrounding the cemetery.

Hearing voices when nobody was there, having car problems while on the property, you name it, they all had at least three stories apiece about this place, whatever.

I still didn't believe any of it. You did, Yes, you did. Once we got close to Kasbah, the road quickly got narrower and narrower. It's almost like the road is like, you don't want to go here.

Yeah, it's like, chill, it's like, I don't know. Hanging crooked from a tree was a faded, barely legible sign that said, Kasbah cemetery. I love it.

With an arrow pointing to an even narrower dirt, road doesn't sound sketchy at all, right? I'm obsessed with this, I love it. We slowly turned down the road. And when I say narrow, I mean narrow as fuck y'all.

There was barely enough room for our car, and definitely not two. The road was dirt and there was a ditch on either side that dropped down about five feet. Fuck that. That makes me nervous because you feel trapped. Well, another car's coming.

Bethany said That alone made me nervous. There you go. This road was probably about half a mile long and was surrounded by thick woods and trees that slumped over, creating a blanket of leaves above us, making everything seem darker and creepier than it already was. As soon as we pulled onto the dirt road, the energy in the air felt different, not necessarily bad or scary, just noticeably different.

Because of the shape of the road, we continued on extremely slowly. A little relevant background info on the place Kasbah had been called haunted for years and years. It was very old and nobody living in the area at the time had any relatives buried there. Well, maybe like generations ago, but nobody personally knew anyone buried there. Because the cemetery had been closed many years before any of us were even born.

So if someone was at Kasbah, it was either to do something illegal or try to get something supernatural to happen. That's awesome. Except for the illegal part, because the property was known for drug use and other illegal activities. If the owner of the land saw anyone there, he would immediately call the cops. So not very often did you run across anyone else out there. If you did happen to see someone. They usually dipped out fast as hell to avoid getting in trouble.

Makes sense, anyway. We were about halfway down this dirt road when this dark, medium-sized SUV started coming toward us. Anyone who was familiar with this road knew that. It wasn't wide enough for two cars and you had to wait for one car to go all the way down the road before another car could start coming the opposite way. There was nowhere on this road to pull over on the side or to get out of the way. At first, we figured the person coming toward us would realize the road was too narrow and reverse, far enough for us to get past.

But instead, he kept coming toward us, moving closer and closer to our side of the road. This is freaking me out, I don't like it. We had already moved over to the side as much as we possibly could. If we moved any more, we would have fallen down in the ditch.

It was around dusk at this point. So, although we could make out the color and shape of the car coming toward us, we couldn't get a clear picture of what the driver looked like. His face and head almost looked transparent. I don't know any other way to describe it. I could tell that he was white and had dark hair, but that was about it. He was staring straight at us through his windshield as he continued to get closer and closer to us.

What was he doing? He could obviously tell he was about to run us off the road when he was about six feet away from our car. He finally started slowing down and I let out a sigh of relief. And then something even weirder happened. Even though the car was fine and had been driving perfectly fine this whole time, all of a sudden the car started veering to the right, all by itself.

The driver, Jade, was turning the steering wheel to the left and it kept pulling to the right. We had two choices stop the car completely and risk having an interaction with this creepy dude who had tried running us off the road. Or continue driving and hope that we could make it down the rest of the road without wrecking. After seeing the mysterious man had completely stopped his car at this point, we decided to keep going. I can't even explain the pull we felt on the car.

Someone or something was trying to pull us off the side of the road. And hard. Between worrying about that and trying to figure out who this dude was and why he was trying to run us off the road, my head was spinning. Finally, we made it to the end of the road, into the entrance of the cemetery.

There was a small little spot, just big enough to turn around to head out. We pulled in and sat facing the cemetery so we could keep a watch out for anything strange. I was praying that nothing scary would happen. We were only there about ten minutes when the SUV came speeding into the road, we were in and pulled up right next to us.

I would have shit myself if it had been a cop, he definitely would have gotten out of his vehicle to see what we were doing. And it was the same car that had tried to run us off the road. As he slowly pulled up perfectly parallel to our car and came to a stop, our faces all turned white, as if we'd seen a ghost, because maybe we fucking had.

I think you had, I think you had. To this day, I still cannot accurately describe the description of this man. Nothing does it justice. This man definitely had a human body and features, but his face was really almost transparent.

Very white, but transparent-like. I feel like people say that about us because we're so pale. I was going to say, people say that about me all the time. Yeah. His facial features were a little blurred, but we could definitely make out that this was a man with dark hair, medium-sized and driving a dark SUV.

This thing kept staring at us. It took all of two seconds for me to demand that Jade put the fucking car into drive and get the hell out of there. I wasn't sticking around to find out what was going to happen next. I hadn't expected to see anything weird while we were there, let alone a man-like creature who seemed to be really unhappy with us. After a few more seconds of staring, Jade finally put the car into drive and started to pull out of the cemetery. And onto that god-awful, narrow dirt road.

We got about five feet away from the other vehicle when he jerked his car into drive and peeled out in order to get behind us. And quickly, this is when the panic really started to set in. This definitely was not the owner of the cemetery or even someone visiting a grave. Who was he and why was he following us aggressively? The panic was thick in the air, but we were all trying to stay calm to avoid freaking each other the fuck out.

This dude kept following us, riding our ass like literally, he was almost touching our bumper with the front of his car. He didn't honk, flash his lights, or use any hand motions to signal us to stop. So what the fuck did he want to terrorize you?

Literally, Jade drove as fast as she could, but it was very difficult considering the condition of the road. The last thing we wanted was to slide off the road or hit anything, forcing us to stop the car and dealing with whatever this dude wanted, poor Jade.

I know like, I'm feeling for Jade right now. Seriously, I'm also like, you're all stoned while this is happening, that's like another level of panic.

That'll sober you up real quick. That's horrible. As I mentioned before, this road was about a half a mile long. And when you can only go 20 miles an hour and have to dodge potholes and animals, it can take a while to get to the end. We didn't have too much further to go, but it seemed like a thousand miles at this point we were all panicking.

We were out in the country, alone at night, with no cell service. What were we going to do if he somehow caught up with us or got out of his car? Or even worse? In the next five seconds? This dude got as close to the back of our car as he possibly could. I'm sure he was actually probably touching the back of our car with his at this point.

It definitely seemed like he was trying to run us off the road as fast as possible. Right when my anxiety hit the fan, I looked up in the rearview mirror and the dude was gone, I mean, vanished. His car was nowhere in sight when, one second prior, he had been right on our tail. Remember, this road was so narrow that it wasn't possible to turn around, and there were no other roads to turn down off this road.

He literally had been right there, what the fuck?

I'm like, that is terrifying and to terrorize you, like, right to the point and then just be like, bye, just poof the fuck. I announced to everyone in the car that there was no longer a creeper behind us. No one believed me until they rolled down their windows, stuck their heads out and saw for themselves.

They all were as shook as I was. Where the fuck did he go? By this point, we had slowed down to a stop, still in shock. We sat there for a minute or two, thinking and going over what had just happened. We had all seen it.

None of us were on any drugs besides the weed that we had smoked, and we all recalled the exact same details. That is fucked. The end of the road was literally 50 yards in front of us. Jade put the car in drive and sped to the end of the road. We pulled out onto the paved road and sat and waited.

We didn't know what we were waiting for, but I think we were all hoping to discover some sort of explanation, but the dude never came out. We waited for probably 30 minutes. Trying to see if he had reversed all the way back to the cemetery, or if he was eventually going to come out onto the main road. But neither happened. It would be next to impossible to reverse all the way back down that road, with all the sharp turns and potholes and ditches, did he fucking vanish?

Were we all tripping? Either way? We all decided right then and there that we would never be visiting that place again. Although my friends had all been there multiple times and had seen supernatural things happen for some reason, this was so much scarier. I've come up with so many explanations in my head for what I think could have happened. But honestly, I think Kasbar was truly haunted and that some force or spirit did not want us there that day. From the creepy dude trying to run us off the road, to the even more creepy unknown force trying to pull us off the road, to the ghost-like transparent mystery man tailing us and then disappearing. I've thought about this evening many times, many, many times, and I will never know what truly happened, but it will always be an experience I will never forget. And next time someone asks me to go with them to the haunted cemetery, I'll probably just say no.

Thanks for reading, ladies. And keep it weird, but not so weird that take it away, ash. Not so weird that you get convinced to go to a spooky cemetery while you're super-duper zooted. And you drive all the way there and you get ran off the road almost, and the guy disappears. That was a scary fucking tale, that was really freaky, man, that's a good little spooky tale right there. I don't like it.

I can't give you an explanation for that. Yeah, I really hate it, but I'm sure that changed your view of haunted things. Because how do you explain that? Yeah, I don't know how you explain that at all. Damn Bethany, I feel for you, I feel for Jade, most of all, for having to drive, to be honest.

I'm very, I'm like, Jade, are you okay? Yeah, that's traumatizing, that's a lot. Having that on your shoulders, you're like, I can't make this fall into the ditch because everyone will die, maybe.

I just don't know, that's so scary, damn.

All right, well, the next one is Listener Tale, the time a double murderer stayed in my guest room for a week. Oh yeah, just that. Hello Elena and Ash.

I've been binging your podcast for the past couple months and just had to share a few of my own experiences with you both. The first is about the time my path crossed with a double murderer and segs into the paranormal. Oh, I love all this. I look forward to hearing your reactions when and if you choose to read this on Listener Tales episodes. But regardless, I know you two will appreciate the random collection of events and happenings.

Enjoy, yay. P.s I'm also attaching photos of my current furry friends Wesley, Jax and Chloe. Oh, oh my god.

All our rescues. Oh, I love it, I love them so much. Oh my God, when you live in an 120-year-old house.

I love that, and Jax is a cheweenie.

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That's a great, a great name for a dog, or a great name for a dog breed. Ooh, your house is beautiful. Um, I am going to censor this listener's name and also the name of the double murderer in here. Because they did not specifically state whether we could use it. And it feels a little precarious to me, so I just don't want to put anybody in a weird spot. Yeah, um, so I Nicole, that's my middle name.

There you go, I, Nicole, found myself listening to a listener tale today and realized exactly why I'm addicted to listening to your podcasts, especially the listener tales. See, I knew you guys love them. I caught myself totally engaged while following a three-minute discussion of whether peanut butter is savory or not when it clicked.

It is I, too, have a stream of consciousness that makes absolutely random connections and leaps like you two do, and it feels so comfortable to just listen to yours. I love this constant, loosely connected stream of consciousness. So much, even so much, even with this, uh. When the stories range from home invasions to demon possessions, I settle in to listen to you, to you, Alayna and Ash. And I feel like I'm wrapping myself up in a well-worn and favorite quilt that is the perfect texture and weight. I think that might be the best compliment I've ever received.

That's the nicest thing we are. Your quilt. I also am such a blankety girly. Yeah, like, as I put my, she's putting like a blanket robe on right now.

As I put my blankety robe on right now, I love a blanket, so that is a high compliment. That is great. I just got a really cute Halloween blanket that I'm going to get you one of, too.

Oh, I love a Halloween blanket. I meant to tell you that earlier. Thanks, you're welcome, I'm excited.

I have a few stories to share with you today, and I guess I will do this in consecutive order, because why not? I will start with the time a murderer came to stay in my guest room for a week. I have to confess that I am generation X. And I used to listen to Art Bell think, mature white dude with a bent for conspiracy and the unusual on the radio. I know who Art Bell is.

From midnight to 2 a.

M When I couldn't fall asleep, counterintuitive, I know, but I could fall asleep to stories and interviews about ghosts, all things paranormal, as well as government conspiracies. The only stories that truly freaked me out were the Alien Abduction episodes for a couple weeks after those shows. I would constantly jerk awake. Positive that I would be sucked out from my home through the closed windows to be probed, and no amount of blankets would save me.

The point to my ramblings is my openness to all things strange and scary. Which you would think would have made me a little more discerning about who I allowed into my home. Anyways, fast forward to several years later, when I bought my first home, I had a guest room that occasionally was used as such. But one day, my cousin, I'll say Zoe, called me and asked if she could rent the room as she just got a job in Calgary. I happily agreed as I was struggling with all the associated expenses.

Why was that so hard to say? Associated expenses It's a lot of S's associated expenses that I took on with home ownership and could use the rental income when Zoe moved in. Or perhaps in the phone call, when she asked me to live with me, she told me in full transparency that her boyfriend.

Carl, who would not be moving to Calgary with her, had been charged that year with a double homicide of his landlords in British Columbia. In spite of them finding his DNA on the tape used to tie them up, he was released eventually as there was insufficient evidence to convict him. Blink, blink, blink, blink. Zoe assured me that, of course, he didn't do it. I naively believed her and she moved in.

Oh, my Nicole, but the DNA do be there. A few months after my cousin took up residence, all was going well. And Zoe informed me that Carl, the murder suspect boyfriend, was coming to Calgary to visit her. And she asked if I was okay for him to stay in her room with her. No accommodating soul that I am. I agreed to this as long as they were both okay with sharing her single bed for a week.

She assured me this was good with them and so he came to stay. The murderer Nicole, Nicole. While Carl was visiting. I did not see him hardly at all as they were busy, both in my cousin's room and going out on the town.

The week passed with zero incidents, and I think I only spoke to him when he first arrived. A few weeks passed following Carl's visit, and I came home after work and was visiting with Zoe at the kitchen table. When I noticed a business card laying on the table, I picked it up to read that it belonged to a constable of the RCMP. Royal Canadian Mounted Police for non-Canadians. I was confused about what it was doing there, and my cousin brushed it off as nothing.

I'd be like, You're putting me in danger, girl, truly. The police officer had a few questions for her, likely triggered by Carl's visit. She assured me that they were just asking her routine follow-up questions, trying to find out if he had shared any details about the murder with her. You know, the one that he didn't commit during his stay or any time previously. But she assured me that, you know, as he had not murdered anyone, there was nothing to tell.

Again, I believed her. You're a good-ass cousin, you're the best cousin. Can I say to any of my cousins? listening? Nah, let me tell any of my cousins, I'm not that good of a cousin.

No, me, either. The next few months that Zoe lived with me, our landline had a hollow echo, and this persisted until I moved a year or so later. What were your phones tapped?

A hundred percent. I found out much later that while she lived with me, and for a time afterwards, my home was not only under surveillance, but our phone had been tapped. As they still believe they had arrested the right suspect, but lack of evidence to prove it yet. Yo Zoe eventually moved with Carl to Quebec, and I learned a couple of years later that she and the Carl had, she and the Carl.

It says the Yeah, I like that. She and the Carl had been befriended by a couple of undercover police officers as part of a Mr. Big sting operation.

And the police finally were able to collect enough evidence, likely in the form of a confession, for them to arrest and eventually convict him of double homicide. Um, I forget the case where I learned about Mr. Big sting operations, but I love that they're called that Mr. Big.

Yeah, it was only then I found out the details. He had brutally murdered the couple and attempted to obscure evidence by lighting the home on fire. I googled Carl again recently and found out that he will be eligible for parole in the next couple of years. Well, shit.

That is why we took out a small part that could have, like, kind of connected it to what this is. Cause. Again, I don't know if this listener would like to be connected. Yeah, yeah, you know.

We're just looking out for you, girlies, just looking out for you. I am grateful that I was as oblivious as I was during that time. Since it turned out okay, I was not at risk as the murders had been drug related.

So the risk to my law abiding person was really, very low. But still, geez, was I naive and accepting to allow even someone who had been charged with murder into my home? I mean, I actually shared a toilet and a shower with a convicted murderer. And I am much more discerning now, that's quite a thought. If that's not enough excitement in my life, let me tell you about how recently a ghost showed up in our Team Zoom meeting. I've been dying for that to happen, and it never has.

The company I worked for returned to the offices in July of 2021 after almost a year of working from home. And like many offices, we continue to do staff meetings for the entire office staff. By Zoom, as we do not have a big enough space to sit six feet apart anyways. As bizarre as being back in the office in order to meet in person, but then having to close our office doors to prevent echo. While instead meeting on Zoom. Was, let's throw the office ghost into the mix. Prior to the era, we shall name work from home. We had several unusual occurrences in the woman's washroom.

Our paper towel dispensers were battery operated, the kind you had to wave your hand in front of to the sensor to activate. Weekly, at minimum, and often more frequently, I would be sitting in the stall for a few minutes and while no other person was in the washroom. The dispenser would activate only the one on the left hand side, and only after it had been behind the closed stall, only after you had been behind the closed stall door for a couple minutes. The right one never activated, except the normal way, but the left one would dispense so often that the battery drained several times. During the time. I worked there, and I don't recall the right side ever needing to be replaced.

What the fuck?

Additionally, I had a couple of co-workers who used the middle stall, not my stall of choice, who were freaked out. When the water in the toilet bowl became boiling hot while they were seated. What the fuck? It wasn't until later that either one admitted this because they were afraid of being called crazy. But the one co-worker told me she even jumped up and held her hand closely above the water and it was steaming hot. I'm like, you should probably tell someone about that, but I digress.

Anyways, following our return to the office, paranormal activity in the washroom increased. And instead of just dispensing a single sheet of paper towel, I noticed one particular day that there was a tall stack sitting on the counter where it had dispensed several feet of paper towel. And while still connected to the holder, it was neatly piled back and forth on itself in a stack. I mean, okay, at least they're neat, yeah, you know. The building operator had decided at this time that they were tired of being called to replace batteries. So instead removed the automatic dispensers and replaced them with the old-fashioned manual press to release ones.

At this same time, they also installed automatic flush toilets, so our resident ghost took to making the toilet flush a second time after the stall was exited. And we were about to leave the washroom. He's like, let me one-up you, he's like, we really gotta get this gone. I share all this boring, run-of-the-mill, ghostly activity to explain what happened next.

One fine day, about a month after being back in the office full-time, we all jumped onto our respective computers to join the Zoom team meeting. Let me remind you that we were all separated by our individual offices and had our doors closed. Mine was actually locked because I always forgot to take off the automatic lock. This is important later in my story. Anyway. We were proceeding with the meeting as per usual, if a Zoom staff meeting can be termed usual, when my boss interrupted the meeting to ask, Can I ask you all something?

Of course, we all agreed. And she went on to inquire if anyone else could see the man standing behind Nicole, That would be me. I laughed it off and said that it was just the office ghost, and also pointed out the EMU picture hanging behind me, saying That is perhaps what she had seen. Everyone had a good laugh about the office ghost and we went on with the meeting. Later in the day. My boss and another co-worker were discussing the sighting, and he finally fessed up that he had seen the same figure.

That had not thought anything of it, as he had been used to seeing various alive family members pass in the background of his online students for so long that it didn't register.

My boss described seeing a man come behind me and he bent over as if picking something up. My co-worker then described seeing a man in a plaid shirt, pants, suspenders and a cap standing behind me. Before the man turned and exited out. My doorway, which, I will remind you, was not only closed, but also locked at the time, and it's like you would have heard it open. So, like, what did he just walk through the door? Yeah, right.

When I was telling our admin what they said about what they saw. She also admitted that a few minutes prior to my boss interrupting the meeting with her odd question. And with all other staff behind their respective office doors, plus visible on camera for the meeting. A voice had called her by name from behind, where she was seated two times, and no one was there. No client could have entered as the doors were locked because we were closed for the meeting. And she would have seen them enter anyways because her desk faced the entry door. Shortly after, she heard a disembodied voice call her name. My boss interrupted the meeting to ask about the man standing behind me on camera. I wish that we had been recording the meeting as I cannot explain how only two people saw him. And I was not one of those people, in spite of being the one that the ghost was standing behind.

I later asked the local historian about buildings on the property prior to the office building, which is about 30 years old. He told me that at the office location had been a few homes in the early 1900s that had been chopped up into smaller apartments. And that it was likely that there may have been a few single males renting any one of those apartments at one point. I have always considered the office ghost to be a friendly sort, and he always gave off helpful custodian vibes. He was likely in my office fussing over a few things that had been lobbed towards the wastebasket and had not quite made it in. I had even spent a few evenings alone at work, catching up on files so I could work while not being interrupted by co-workers and clients. But never once felt unsettled, even when the janitorial staff had finished and turned off most of the lights before leaving for the evening.

Perhaps he was just watching out for me. I like that, I like that a lot now. If that isn't enough strangeness, let me tell you about the time my moon water leapt off my living room stool and spilled all over the floor, not the moon water.

A few years back, before I moved into my current home, I was renting an apartment in an old building. I did experience a few odd things there and eventually I got the hell out after the final incident. But I digress. During the pandemic, I started to become more spiritual versus religious, and began to explore my pagan roots. Hell yeah, I think crystals and moon water rituals, etc.

Oh, we know. On the second full moon in October, which so happened to also fall on a full moon in 2021, I decided to make moon water. It was supposed to be a super potent falling, it was supposed to be super potent falling on this auspicious super moon. Plus all hallows Eve. So I decided to use one of those big pickle jars that holds a couple gallons. Because if some moon water is good, well, more is better, right? Hell yeah.

I made my moon water that night, ensuring I put it away in my linen closet before the morning light hit it. Because I was not sure how I wanted to use it yet, and because, well, ADHD, I completely forgot about it until a couple months later. A couple months later, I decided to clean out my linen closet and found the moon water and proceeded to move it as far as my living room. Stool slash ottoman, where it sat for a few more weeks. Because if you have ADHD and have ever cleaned out a closet, you know. One day, while I was speaking with a client over the phone, the jar leapt from the stool and proceeded to spill all over my living room floor. I shouted, dropped my phone with the client still attached, and jumped up to grab towels to mop it up, all while said client was wondering what had just happened.

I didn't have the heart to tell him that. My moon water got tired of not being used and decided to cleanse my living space in one fell swoop. I had a few unexplainable experiences in the same apartment and a few weeks after the Moon Water episode. I also had a very lovely visitation from a deceased loved one that I had hoped to encounter for some years, but never did until 2021. That's beautiful. About 20 years ago, I adopted a lovely black and tan mini. How do you say this?

One dachshund there you go, named Toby, who was my soul dog. I have had dogs before him and since, but none I have connected with.

Quite like Toby, I mean, he licked my ankles dry when I got out of the shower. And how can you replace that? Toby had passed around the time period and I had been falling asleep listening to late night radio with Art Bell. And Art would interview people who had lost a beloved pet and had experienced a ghostly visit from the pet after they had passed.

I used to wish desperately that Toby would do that to me, but alas, he never did until he did. Fast forward to 2021. And I had brought home a chihuahua named Chloe to foster because she bit everyone, including me. When she first met me, Chloe was....

And it says Foster quote unquote, right? Chloe was more comfortable sleeping out in the living room following a good night snuggle, but Wesley and Jax, my other two dogs, preferred to sleep in my bed and touching me anyway. It was the wee hours of the morning and I was still half asleep and trying to decide if I could fall back to full sleep. Or if I had to stumble to the washroom to pee without waking myself up. ugh, the worst.

I remember smiling to myself because I could feel Jax down by my calves. Wesley had his usual roost up on my pillow, wrapped around my shoulder, and I could feel Chloe tucked in behind my knees under the blankets. I felt so loved and grateful that Chloe felt part of the pack enough to snuggle right in. Just then, I heard a tika, tika, tika of chihuahua toenails on the laminate flooring as Chloe came from the living room and entered the bedroom.

I reached down behind my knees and there was no dog there. I knew that even Toby had finally come for a visit and tucked himself into his favorite place under the covers, in the crook of my knees. Ruin me. Later that week, while I was eating at a restaurant with a good friend who happens to see ghosts routinely. She stopped, in the middle of what she was saying, to look oddly at me. And she told me there was a short-legged black dog around me in said restaurant, and it confirmed that I was not losing my mind. I then told her what had happened earlier and she said, Yes, he's watching over you.

I will conclude this rambling episode with one more weird story, also related to the same apartment about a year before I moved there. I smelled smoke off and on one evening for about 15 minutes, in spite of covering the entire apartment. While sniffing like a bloodhound, I could not locate the source of the hot electrical smoke smell. I unplugged everything frantically and continued sniffing until my breaker blew suddenly.

I discovered that my fridge, which had been closely wedged in an enclosed space, had likely overheated and had shorted, causing the motor to blow. When I pulled the fridge out and looked, the hot wire had melted the insulated coating and melted right through, but thankfully, tripped the breaker before starting a fire. This was inconvenient, to be sure, but on life went. A few months later, I was in a Zoom meeting as I was working from home at the time when I heard a loud banging on my door down at street level as I lived in a sketchy area. I never answered my door unless someone was texting that they were here and I needed to let them in, so I ignored the banging.

When it happened again, and louder, I threw up the window to shout down to tell them to leave me alone. Only to see faces looking up at me. And a fire rig parked down the street, what the heck? So I evacuated and let the fire department tramp through my apartment looking for hot spots as the business downstairs could smell smoke, but no one could locate a source. It turned out to be a ballast in an overhead light in the business space below. That almost started a fire, but they located and removed the light and all was good.

For a while, a few months later, I was again working from home and a repeat of the loud banging occurred, and it was very frantic. So I immediately stuck my head out the window to find out what the problem was. I saw upturned faces and people pointing up and screams to grab my dogs and get out. That the roof was on fire this time. Another electrical fire started, this time in the back apartments, and flames were leaping from the windows to the roof. The back apartment had a dog that thankfully got out the window and onto the roof and was rescued by neighboring business people.

After that very traumatizing day and the third electrical fire incident, I decided I didn't need any further hints that I needed to move for real. I located a house to rent and now live in a 120-year-old heritage home. On the edge of a park and walking trails, with flower beds and grass and beautiful trees. I love my little home with badly painted walls and scratched floors and add-on washroom over what used to be a coal chute. Remember that indoor plumbing was only made common in all homes in the 40s and 50s?

The energy here has really felt lovely from the start, but I did smudge it upon moving in, and I've never experienced anything odd. In spite of the original owner reading tea leaves and tarot. I did notice that someone long before me had tied bells to both the screen door and the interior door. And I wonder if that had been enough to warn away unwanted energies. I added my own touch, a beautiful broom which can be used to protect the doorway and to sweep out unwanted energy when negative. Still alive, people leave. Thank you for reading my odd assortment of stories, as I'm sure this is the only place I can share all of them together. Without ending up on a 48-hour hold at a hospital.

Keep it weird, but not so weird that you end up agreeing to host a murderer for a week and end up with your phone stapped and under police surveillance. What a wild life you have lived. what a fucking journey you just took me on. Girl, my goodness, holy shit, Nicole.

That is wild.

Com and yeah, like, we took out the one little part where I kind of identified what murder this was. Just because I really don't want to connect this person to it. If you know, you just don't know, yeah, yeah. So that was a wild story.

Seriously, and damn, and your baby, your little fur babies are adorable. I know they're so cute and I love little Chihuahua.

And I love your broom and your bells and your just the. She showed us a little corner of her home and it looks like my fucking dream. It's like, cozy. AF Yes, I love it. Do we have time for one more?

I think we have time for one more. All right, I'm going to do. Listener Tale A ghost saved my husband's family question mock, and it has an attached put a foot.

Hell yeah, it says, Hey morbid ladies, my name is Paula, and please say my name. Oh, but it was a Walter White reference.

Sorry, oh, I got the wrong reference. There. You were destiny's child, you know, we all have different, same thoughts. I'm a big fan of the podcast.

Every day when my daughter goes down for her nap, my earbud goes in and your lovely voices grace my ear balls. I also wanted to say that I loved the butcher in the red. Alina, please write more. I did, she did.

Thank you, I received it the day it was released from my best friend, who was a fellow morbid listener. Shout out Mallory. love you, we love you Mallory.

We love Mallory, too, anyway, here goes. So here goes my long tale about a ghost who saved my husband's family from a fire. And also a myriad of other things that have happened to me over the last 34 years. I love that. This is also like a mishmash episode of like, I'm going to tell you all my tales.

All my spooky shit, I love it. Let's start from the beginning. It's the best place to start. My husband Rob's family bought an old house in the mountains of Pennsylvania, surrounded by state forest land, 34 years ago, when my husband was born.

They've used this house for a family getaway since then, for hunting, fishing, four-wheeling and a host of other things. That would cause you, ladies, to inevitably say, fresh air is for dead people. This house, this house, this house, this house was built in the 1800s sometime. And one of the previous deeds to the house stated that the owner would sell the house and land for a dollar. As long as he could stay there until he died, and he did nice.

Awesome. Rob's whole family has stories upon stories of things that have happened in that house. My mother-in-law tells the story of when she was sitting on one of the old ass dirt original beds that they still have. Oh, old ass dirt, I was like, old ass dirt.

I was like a dirt bed, old as dirt, original beds that they still have, you know, the kind that sink and creak at around metal hospital box type springs. When she felt someone sit down next to her, she thought it was one of her kids who were little at the time.

She looked around, Nope, no one was there. To which I say, Why would you keep the original creepy furniture in this place? Yeah, that's a that's a no for me.

It's, you know, it's for the vibes, it's a no for me. She also has stories of thinking someone was downstairs making cake in the middle of the night because she smelled it. Oh, that's lovely. So at least this ghost loves their carbs.

Hell yeah, I personally have also smelled things cooking to which I say, nope, nope, nope. See, I kind of love that. I say, yes, yes, yes. I'm like, thank you for filling my home with good, smelly vibes.

Yeah, we love it, and aromatic ghosty, yeah. Then there is the apparition that my sister-in-law has seen off and on her whole life. In the living room, there's this big window that you can look out and see wildlife that may come down the hill, as well as the fire pit. That's beautiful.

She says she's seen a man sitting at the campfire when no one was out there. She describes the man as wearing boots, flannel and some type of worn brown pants and a brown hat. She says she's also seen him a second time in one of the bedrooms upstairs, this room called the Ghost Room. For reasons that I'll state later, let's not forget about the regular footsteps that are heard from everyone, myself included.

Oh, and the time. A neighbor who mows the lawn, since our family doesn't live locally, sitting on the porch one day after mowing and hearing furniture inside moving. There was also the time my mother and father-in-law were laying in their bed and saw lights flickering across the ceiling. They didn't know the other one was awake and saw the same thing until the next morning, when they both described what they saw. That's wild cabinets being opened in the morning upon waking up.

The mantle in the living room has old items on it, one of which was a newspaper clipping. I forget what the font of it said, The front of it, Oh, the front of it said, Excuse me. However, once my in-laws found the same newspaper clipping picture floating a few inches from the ground, nothing around it.

And it was turned so that you could see the back of it, which was an obituary. Reading That's wild, I attach pictures of this phenomenon, typical poltergeist activity. No big deal, right?

No big deal, Oh, it is a big deal. Guys. They tell then they tell these stories as if they're talking about a silly family cat that causes mischief and they laugh about it. Nuts, I tell you, that is nuts.

She didn't. You can't you put a picture? Can you turn it to me? Because I don't want to lose my place? Yeah, let me make it big.

Make it big because I can't see, so this is it. Oh my God, and then what the fuck?

It's floating, that's some Matilda shit right there, honey. So this leads me to the main story, the fire.

It was a cold Friday night in February and Rob's family was heading up to the house. This was in the 90s and 90s. Kevin on TikTok. Of course, it was Rob's two parents, his grandmom, him and his two sisters, all who were little at the time.

It was freezing upon arrival. This house has an old wood-burning stove in the living room, which is used to heat the whole house. So as to be expected, upon arrival, they got the fire going as they unloaded. After this was all done, it was after midnight and everyone was very tired. Around 2 a..m. grandmom woke up.

Oh, excuse me, woke everyone up saying there was smoke in the hallway, she'd been asleep and heard one of the kids coughing. She felt someone push her hard in the back and she figured it was the coughing child who came to wake her. As she turned around to see who it was, all she saw was the smoke-filled hallway.

So someone was warning her, so she ran to wake up. The family, every other family member was in their beds. no family member pushed her awake. Holy shit.

They got everyone up, called 911 and my father-in-law began trying to put out the fire, which had begun downstairs. In the wood-burning stove. They didn't see open flames, just a lot of smoke where the pipe met the wall. The fire department came quickly, despite this place being in the legit middle of nowhere, they put out the fire. The neighbor let the family sleep at his house and everyone was safe.

The next day, grandmom told everybody what had happened and how she'd mysteriously been pushed awake, which could have very well saved everyone's life. Absolutely, that's wild. The room grandmom slept in has been called the Ghost Room ever since. It seems most activity has happened there, this being the biggest thing.

No one ever sleeps in there, it's barely used. That is, until my daughter was born in 2020, and we moved back to the northeast, where we could visit frequently and take care of the house. That's right, I inherited the Ghost House.

Hell yeah, me who wakes rob up every time I have to go downstairs to pee in the night because I'm afraid. Now I'm the caretaker of this estate along with my husband, that's awesome, I can do this.

Yeah, so my toddler, I believe in you, I love it, I love that you're like, I can do this.

Like, I am convincing myself right now, so my toddler requires 340 things plugged into sleep, you know how it goes, Sure, do white noise, monitor, nightlight, all the things.

And this room has the most outlets, so now we call it Addie's Room. I don't know if I ever want to think of it, I don't know if I ever want her to think of it as the ghost room. Nothing ever bad has come from all these occurrences, only good.

I do, however, always feel like I'm looking over my shoulder and always waiting for something creepy to happen with the baby monitor. But nothing yet. I feel like it's a good ghost, it like saved the family, so I feel like it's actually like a protective thing.

Entity. I wonder if it's the man who, like, loved that house so much and realizes how much your family loves it. So he's like, you know what, I'm going to keep everybody safe here, yeah.

So this is a story of our mountain house in the Pennsylvania wilderness. Jesus, Sorry, I couldn't say that. I attached a picture of the floating obituary, as well as my daughter living her best life playing there. Adorable.

I'm terrified of this place, even though I hold it close to my heart and love it. We haven't had any occurrences in the last several years, so maybe whatever it was has finally been put to rest, or maybe it was all in our heads. Yeah, let's go with that.

No way it's protected. Never keep it weird, ladies, but not so weird that you buy a super old house with a creepy ass house deed, and then decide to keep all the old creepy furniture inside of it. Leaving whatever is haunted to stay comfortable amongst their own things.

Not so weird that when things start happening to everyone, you just laugh it off and not do anything about it. And just assume it's an angel or a friendly ghost somewhere, when, in reality, it could be something even worse. And nothing bad has just happened yet. But do keep it so weird that you're a kind neighbor who lets a family come stay at your house when theirs catches on fire. All of that, but I still think it's a nice, friendly ghost. I think so, too.

I'm going to go with it. I think you're right. I think it's your daughter is so cute. Your daughter is literally so adorable, but I think it's your....

I think it's like the original owner, that's like, I love this house, and you guys clearly love this house. Yeah, come on, I hope you love this house. The floating obituary is wild.

That's wild, that's truly something. You got a floating obituary there, guys, you did the damn thing for October, you always do.

You always do, and I hope that we did too, because I think we only have like, one more October thing for you. Yeah, so party.

And we hope you keep it weird, but that's a way that you don't rock on out for Halloween, woo Halloween.

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