Transcript of Listener Tales 109: 80's Tales! New

Hey weirdos, I'm Ash and I'm with the band and her name's Alayna and this is Morbid.

It is 1980s edition.

1980s edition. Yeah, yeah. What was life like in the '80s?

The oldest I was was 5 in my '80s. So I think my life was probably pretty sick.

Yeah.

I don't think I was with the band at that time, but probably not.

Well, you don't know. You might have been a cool, like, rocker, a cool 5-year-old. We were both born at the end of a decade.

I was born in the middle of a decade.

Okay, whatever. If you round up, it was almost over. You were 1985. I was thinking of myself mostly as 1996, and I was like the end of a decade.

I said I wanted I want to take this journey with you.

But you were born towards the end of a decade. In the middle. Well, no, because you're December.

Smack dab in the middle.

You're December. So it's basically the end of the year. Yeah. What? I don't want to talk about it anymore. I'm over it. What were you saying about Nicholas? The background was like, all right, Alaska. All right, Alaska. Oh, that was great.

That was great.

What were you saying about Nicholas?

Oh, I was saying, I bet Nicholas is going to feel fancy free today because I have this like, I have this feeling in my, in my bones that Nicholas is like a, like an 1880s kind of guy.

So you decide, 1880s or 1980s?

Yeah.

In the future, he just said. Why did that work so perfectly?

I wasn't ready for such a swift response to that.

Wow. He's real.

Nicholas.

Nicholas is real, you guys.

All right.

Okay. If you lived in the '80s, like the 1980s ones to be specific, the 1980s, how did you live like this? My hair is destroyed. I teased so much of it that I—

It's such a good one though.

Thank you. It's actually kind of falling cuz I got hot. That's my question. When you guys got hot in the '80s, like did your tease just fall?

No, because you would use an entire bottle of Aquanet.

Yeah. See, I didn't have Aqua Net, but I did use a shit ton of hairspray.

Yeah, you would. A whole bottle would probably be used.

Oh my God.

Like, you could literally, like, shoot an arrow at somebody's hair and it wouldn't penetrate.

Wow. Yeah, that's crazy.

Radio. And radio was big in the 1980s.

Oh, and then video killed the radio star.

Exactly. See, Nicholas, he gets it.

He's into it.

He's on theme today.

See, I don't think I would have done that great in the '80s because I don't feel very pretty right now.

I think you look gorgeous.

I think you would have— thank you. I think you would have slayed the house down boots in the '80s.

Thank you.

Like, I— this is like a little— remember when I dressed as Miranda Priestly and I was like, oh, like, I think I was like this. I think this might be who you are.

I think if I was like old enough to, to, to exist. Yeah, like be like a teenager.

Yeah, you would have been unstoppable.

Thank you.

Unstoppable.

Fuck, wrong decade, I guess. I know, I need it a little earlier.

You're still pretty Unstoppable. You're just dressed a little different.

Just a little. Just a little, to be honest.

Well, I was gonna say, you could, you could wear those pieces separately.

Yeah, to be quite honest, the pants, the pants are like butter.

Yeah, they look nice.

They're very comfortable.

You could wear those to a Ghost concert.

Funny story too, John was opening the mail and he opened all the separate pieces of this and he just sent me a picture of it while we were upstairs working and he said What's this about? And I was like, oh, like, and I said what it was and I was like, and he was like, to be honest, I wasn't sure if you were just buying, buying a lot of clothes. Like he was like, he was like, the only thing that threw me off was the Mötley Crüe t-shirt.

That'll do it.

That was the only thing that he was like, what's that about?

I was so sad. I had like a really '80s like corset thing, but it was, it was going to be— this would have been marked not safe for work. There was going to be a lot of boobage. My titties were up to my chin. I was like, I cannot go on the internet like that. Good for you though, man. Yeah.

Good for you for having boobs up to your chin.

I mean, it's not comfortable. So right now they're sitting nice in the middle. Let's get to the tails, y'all.

Let's get to the tails.

You know why? Because this is brought to you by you, for you, from you, and all about you. Did they— what did they say in the '80s? What were like the— I was like, let's get to the tails. But wait, I have more questions.

Cool. Rad.

Rad.

Yeah. Rad. Dude. Dude.

What, Mikey? What did they say? Wow.

Mikey was also like 6, I think.

What did they say?

I was 5, so I said, can I please have a juice? That's what I said. Same.

What did your people say?

What did your people say?

Did they say tubular?

Probably.

Maybe righteous. Righteous.

All right.

Um, I just wanted to know.

Have we met? See, Nicholas is like, this sounds familiar.

He's like, wait, you guys look familiar.

He said righteous?

Totally righteous.

That could also be from the 1880s. He's feeling very righteous.

Just in a different way.

It's a very different kind of righteous.

I don't think Nicholas— I feel like he wouldn't have been with the righteous.

I don't think so either.

He would have been with the innocent.

But maybe that's why he was like, have we met?

Oh.

Are we on the run together? He was like, because I'm going to run.

Yeah. All right.

We'll learn more about Nicholas as we go.

As we go. It's a learning exercise.

It is.

Do you want to go first? Sure. I feel like you do. Yeah, always.

I do. Uh, let's start with listener tales. A ghost slept with my grandma.

That's a good place to start.

I might take this jacket off soon because I am sweating.

I would take this jacket off, but again, we'd be marked unsafe for work.

Uh, hello spooky ladies, my name is Brian. Feel free to use it and any other names ahead.

Hi Brian!

And I'd love to share the story of the haunted house I lived in as a toddler, but of course I have to start off by joining the chorus of praise for the podcast.

Thank you.

I've been a listener for a few years and looking forward to the The next episode of A Two-Pata is still just as exciting as the early days.

Aww.

You've both managed to stay so genuine to yourselves despite how giant the Mighty Morbid Empire has grown, and I wish you all the success in the world.

That's really nice.

That's like really nice, Brian.

I know, that was really nice. Thank you, Brian.

Elena, your becoming an author partly inspired me to tiptoe into the field of creative writing.

Hell yeah.

Yeah, Brian, let's go. Like, let's go running into the field of creative writing.

Brian's father.

It's wonderful in there. Wow. I encourage you. Finally writing down this listener tale I've been sitting on feels like a great way to start. Hell yeah. And I'll absolutely need a change of clothes if you ever end up reading this on the pod. We'll give you a second to get a change of clothes.

Ready? Go. Righteous clothes.

Hope you're feeling comfortable and very cool. And that said, and very rad. That said, enough with the flattery and onto the tale. So a little background to start. I grew up in a medium-sized shore town in New Jersey.

I thought he said I grew up in a medium-sized shoe town.

A medium-sized shoe town. Picture basic basic suburbia with strip malls, cookie-cutter houses, constant traffic, but a 15-minute bike ride to the ocean. Most of the details in the story take place when my dad was growing up in the '80s.

It was the '80s, man.

Uh, I always think of that though, the Bluey episode, when he said it was the '80s. Growing up in the '80s, when the town was a lot smaller and the community a bit closer. The haunted house in question was in fact my dad's childhood home. My grandparents raised their family in that house. They had 3 sons and a daughter, plus care of their nieces and nephew for a total of 8 in the small house.

That's a lot of fucking kids.

I only have very vague memories of that place, like the pinball machine in the basement. Oh, hell yeah. And our dog at the time, Misty. Oh. Photo attached. But otherwise, I was too young to remember any of the freaky things that happened there. This story was told to me by my grandma, who I'll call Nan, probably when I was still a little too young to hear it, and I'm doing my best to recount it here. Also very relevant to the story, Nan considers herself to be a witch. Nan, hell yeah. Uh, that's her term, not mine. I would find clairvoyant or perceptive to be more accurate. For example, she knew the moment her sister had died in an accident long before being notified. Oh, fuck. And she always knows if she's being lied to.

Same.

Damn. I even tested her once and she correctly guessed a coin flip enough times in a row to convince me that she really could sense it.

Damn.

I consider her a reliable source, and she had her first experience experience in the house the day they moved in. Oh, they didn't even let you rest. After getting the keys to their new house and doing a walkthrough of the recently finished basement, my grandma got an intense chill and saw an apparition of an older man with gray hair, a checkered or plaid shirt, and jeans. Hate that. Right when you get the keys and are doing the walkthrough, and it's like, hey, so you're doing the walkthrough and you're like, this looks good, this— and you're like, does he come with it?

Or you're like, can he go?

Are you guys taking him?

He wasn't in the P&S.

Yeah, like, do we have to pay extra for him, or We're solid. Can we sign something that says he stays?

Oh, you want him to stay?

Yeah, let's let him stay. Okay, this is his business.

I mean, he was probably there first.

Exactly. Uh, she didn't describe it as a menacing presence.

Okay, all right.

Um, but she ran upstairs to get my grandpa for help. Yeah, naturally, after going back down, the apparition was gone, but there was a persistent and strong smell of dry dog food coming from one of the rooms.

Ew.

Ew. That's not good. This was writing up to be a leftover odor from the previous owners, which would dissipate in time.

Oh my God. If the previous owners of my home left it smelling like dry dog food—

That would be rough.

I would call someone.

Yeah, I would call the authorities. Period. The rest of the move-in went fine, with about half of the basement becoming bedrooms for the kids and the other half as a rec room/concert space for the family band.

Awesome. Okay, rock on. Hell yeah.

Uh, still though, my grandma felt uncomfortable being down there alone. I don't blame her. Yeah. Now, the presence in the house affected each member of the house in different ways, some certainly more severely than others. My aunt, for example, would complain about hearing a metal-on-metal banging noise in the middle of the night.

I hate that.

She also cried fire one night after seeing smoke drifting into, not out of, the vent in her ceiling.

There was an accident. I need you to know that I thought he meant she cried fire. And I was like, what the fuck? And he just casually— and he just was like, she had that one time fire.

It was crazy.

I was like, what?

That's handling it differently. Yeah, like, that's, that's really different. Oh my goodness. Yeah, that's a lot. My dad remembers one night they had a party with all their friends downstairs listening to the band play during a snowstorm. The band TM, you know, the band. After a few too many drinks, my dad ended up getting sick in the upstairs bathroom. Room and was gone for a while. He rallied like a true '80s teenager. Hell yeah. Um, and when he got out, he heard their unrecorded original songs coming from the basement. But when he opened the door to rejoin the party, the lights were off and it was empty. The party had ended abruptly as the storm was getting worse, and everyone went home while he was upstairs. What the hell? There was no explanation for the music he heard. That's pirating, and it's all— it's unrecorded too. Yeah, I don't know about that. Everyone would hear footsteps, doors would slam, the dog food smell never did go away.

Oh, that would piss me off.

Yeah, but nothing truly felt scary yet.

That feels scary too.

That was until my uncle woke up unable to breathe one night. That's scary. But he remembers feeling held down and strangled, struggling to break free and being unable to cry for help. Whatever it was that held over him released when the family came in after hearing the commotion. After the escalation and feeling genuinely unsafe in the home, Nan sought the help of a medium. According to her, this was the fourth most powerful medium in the country.

Wow.

In parentheses, are mediums ranked? I always question this detail. Who knows? I didn't know that either. But they agreed to come inspect the house. This medium could sense the presence of a spirit, a previous owner of the home still lingering. They also found out that there was a motherfucking vortex in the basement of the house.

Not a vortex.

As in, my old house was a subway platform for all things spooky to come and go. And what advice did Mr. Super Medium give? Not much you can do. Burn some sage and hope for the best. At least they're generally harmless.

Are they generally harmless in a vortex? I—

you can't be sure.

Yeah, anybody can roll through. That's like the S.K. Pier Mansion. There's a vortex in the basement.

Yeah, because somebody broke the rules.

Yeah.

Nan was satisfied enough with the vortex situation as the smudging did stop the more violent behavior, but the resident spirit was more concerning to her. While going through the attic, she came across a box of paperwork left behind. It belonged to the original owner of the home and was mostly old tax documents and such. But to her shock, there was also an old photograph in black and white. It showed a man with gray hair, flannel shirt, and jeans pictured alongside a faithful-looking golden retriever. Oh, as I'm sure you've guessed, the man in the photo was the apparition Nan saw the day she moved into the house. Newly armed with the original owner's name— I'm gonna call him Old Joe.

I love it.

I think that's the perfect name for him, and I appreciate that. Yeah. In a picture of her ghost, she was able to reach out to one of Old Joe's surviving relatives.

That's awesome.

After meeting this relative, Nan learned that Old Joe was a blacksmith in town and lived there with his beloved dog until the day he died in the house.

Wait, what if the, the person that got strangled, your uncle, what if that was just the dog laying on him? Because I know you feel strangled in the night when your dogs—

I do.

Like lay on you.

Sometimes dogs do strangle you in your sleep. Not intentionally. They love you.

They're just big.

Yeah. They're just big.

A golden retriever. That's a big dog.

They're big chunky dogs.

So maybe he was just laying on your uncle. Yeah. And he was like, "Come snuggle." Yeah.

Not wanting to look crazy, though, Nan chose not to mention that her grandpa, Old Joe, was kicking around. Not wanting to look crazy, Nan chose not to mention that her grandpa, Old Joe, was still kicking around, but instead thanked her for her story and left her the documents and photograph. Knowing the story behind her spectral cohabitant and that he was really just looking out for the family in the house. The smells, metal hitting metal sounds— he was a blacksmith after all— oh yeah, we're all just residual hauntings from Old Joe's time in the house. That was until Old Joe made a move on Nan.

He said, "Now you know me.

Now we're familiar." Somewhat absent from the story so far has been my grandpa Gramps. Oh, Gramps worked two jobs to support the family, leaving the house at 2:30 AM to go spackle houses before clocking in for his shift at the railroad at 11 AM. Oh my God, getting home around 8 at night. He's a hard worker. Usually Nan told me he would sleep like a rock, but oftentimes he would roll over in bed and she would end up getting crushed and pushed him back over. Not at all something I wanted to picture, Nan. One morning, she said she was woken up by this familiar feeling but was alarmed by the time. It was about 3 AM. Witching hour aside, this meant Gramps had overslept and was late for work. Instantly alert, she turned over to wake him up and rush him through his morning routine, but found that she was in bed alone. Oh my God, old Joe snuck into bed with Nan and was starting to get all up close and personal, and she was not having it. Oh, it's Mr.

Steal Girl.

Old Joe, old Joe out here.

Old Joe's missed his tea, old girl.

That was the straw that broke the camel's back. Nan could tolerate cabinets slamming shut, she could tolerate unexplained noises, she could tolerate her nephew getting choked out in his sleep, but she would not abide by a non-corporeal cuddle buddy. That's fair. That morning, Nan contacted her pastor to come exorcize the house. A bit to her dismay, she learned that Baptists just don't do exorcisms. But to put her mind at ease, he would be happy to come over and pray in each room and bless the house.

That doesn't always work.

Reportedly, this seemed to do the trick, and all paranormal activity, um, stopped for the remaining years they lived in the house. Yeah, I will not yell. This thing's crazy. Like, go nuts.

It is very '80s.

It is very '80s.

Let it all out.

Oh my God, do you also love Tears for Fears?

We love Tears for Fears.

Do you also think they have banger after banger after banger after banger? Because I be telling everybody this.

I agree.

Nicholas has heard me.

I love Tears for Fears.

I do too. So this includes my 2-year stint there. I was brought home from the hospital in that house and we moved out when I was very young. It was the day that we moved out of the house that it showed its face again. After the final sweep of moving day, the doors inside could be heard slamming as we said our goodbyes and left.

Oh, they were upset you were going.

Yeah, or they were like, good riddance.

One of the two.

One of them. No, maybe two. As I mentioned, Nan told me this story when I was in middle school, and while it had me freaked out a bit at first, I'm no stranger to a ghost story, and having no firsthand experiences with it myself, I never really believed it. That was until I got to high school, and my English teacher happened to be a childhood friend of my dad's. Small town perks.

Oh, that's cute.

First week of school, she told me how many great memories she had. Youth group with your dad and uncle. Summers in your grandparents' pool and the ghost that lived in the house.

Confirmation.

It wasn't until years after being told the story that I had it corroborated with someone outside my immediate family, unprompted. It felt like the whole town knew about the ghost in my grand— in, in my old house. And with consistent accounts from everyone I've asked, I am convinced that my childhood home was haunted by a pervy old blacksmith named Old Joe.

I'm convinced too.

So that's the story. If you read this far, then I don't feel bad for not apologizing for the length earlier.

Never apologize.

I know you ladies wouldn't have edited it. Anywho, no, I do apologize for any ramblings or grammatical errors though. Please keep it keeping it real alongside that with a healthy dose of weirdness. Forever spooky, Brian. And I love, PS, attached a photo of a little baby me with our Dalmatian Misty from when I lived in the house. She was a sweet dog but dumb enough to eat an entire loaf of bread, bag, twist tie and all. Brian, that was a great story. I love your pervy old blacksmith.

I love Mr. Steal Yo Girl.

I appreciate it.

Nicholas is expressing that too.

Nicholas liked it.

Okay, tale number 2. Richard Ramirez doubled down on visiting my parents' window. Oh, it was the '80s. It was the '80s and my parents were living in LA, unrelated but coincidentally quite close to the LaBianca house. Damn. My dad was a mild-mannered professional by day, by night played drums in a rock band multiple times a week. Hell yeah, rock on!

The coolest families in these '80s tales. It was the '80s.

Everybody was cooler. My mom would often go to gigs with him, but on this night she was hanging at home and decided to head to bed before he was back. The weather was warm and she decided to get some breeze flowing into their second-story apartment window through their bedroom window.

Don't do that.

Which was one of the old-school ones that slid up and didn't have a screen. Oh, there were windows without screens back then?

Who needs a screen?

What the fuck? In first hearing this story, I asked her why she felt compelled to do that, and she just shrugged and said, It was the '80s. My dad was still out and she was drifting off to sleep, as she was, she heard a mild commotion in the tree right outside their window. Oh no. I don't ever want to hear a tree commotion.

Not even a mild one.

None of the above.

Yeah.

Figuring it was an owl or a cat or some other nocturnal critter, she didn't pay it much attention at first, but then it started getting loud.

No.

Way too loud to be an animal. In another, what the fuck were you thinking move, she got out of bed and peered over the windowsill. There she saw a mop of black hair making its way through the branches. And if the person it belonged to took one more step or two up, they'd be face to face.

No.

I would get a pan and whack-a-mole.

Yeah. Truly, I'd grab like a weight. Whack-a-mole.

Just drop. Get out of my tree. In wild but fortunate timing, my dad was just getting home and the hall light and him asking what in the world his wife was doing sent the new mysterious creep shimmying right up into the tree, away into the night. Unsettling as hell, but probably an isolated event, right?

Yeah. No, no.

Within the next week or two he— or a week or so, he came back. Both of my parents were home this time and clearly didn't heed their previous experience, guys, because that window was open again. I will note that this was during the time Richard Ramirez was just starting out his horrendous mayhem. And, uh, sparking only potential serial killer buzz. So I guess between that and the '80s of it all, I'll give them a teeny bit of a pass.

I love that it's like he wasn't like sparking intense serial killer vibes, just like there was like rumors, just light serial killer. If there's even a whisper of serial killer vibes, I'm getting a full like, like Purge style. Yeah, like press a button and I'm in like a metal box.

100%. I actually would like access to that anyways.

Yeah, I would love that.

Whenever I've seen that movie, I'm like, how How do I get that?

How do I get that?

I know. So, uh, we're giving them a pass. Well, you are.

You are.

I'm not. We're not.

Yeah.

Leaves rustled, branches crunched. That same dude was absolutely in the tree, and they were catching glimpses of his face along with that familiar hair.

Oh, that gross face.

My dad, who even— I know, honestly, even back in his heyday was not exactly a terror-inducing individual— brandished— that's good— brandished a vacuum. A vacuum.

You got to do— honestly, that might be good because it's so shocking.

Like, it's so shock value.

Like, you wouldn't think that. Vacuum. So you're just like, this guy's crazy.

It might stop you in your tracks. That's fair.

Yeah.

And then you wrote, yes, really? Yeah. And held it like a bat, whacking it out the window and yelling, hey, get out of here!

Good for him.

Better than nothing, I guess. But you think the man would be more strapped than— you'd think the man would be more strapped than a Hoover. He defends it was the closest thing with some oomph to it.

K, Dad.

So again, the element of surprise dashed and the man took off. This time my parents called the police. They arrived, took statements, and noted they'd do a sweep of the neighborhood. Nothing resulted from that, but the tree saw no more nighttime visitors. Fast forward to the day Richard Ramirez was arrested, and of course his image was everywhere on TV. So my parents looked at each other wide-eyed and said almost in unison, "That was him." Ugh. Now my parents are long since divorced and didn't agree about much for years, but when I recently regaled my dad with memories of this tale from my mom, he was finishing sentences and noted it was something he'd never forget. Forgot. Damn. My beloved mom unfortunately died last year. I'm sorry, sorry, gone way too soon, but I know she would have gotten a kick out of having this story shared on the podcast. She was a true crime and dark history gal through and through, and we would spend many an hour chatting about different stories and trading podcast and documentary recommendations. Miss you the most, Mom. I'm including a picture of me and her for you ladies to see, along with a few of my dog, who technically has nothing to do with this story but everything to do with everything.

"And isn't she an angel face? Thanks for reading and keep it weird, Erica." Oh my god! That is a beautiful photo. And that dress that you— first of all, your dress is gorgeous and your mom's dress is so pretty.

Your mom in that pixie cut is a slay.

Bitch. And your hair on your wedding day? Funny.

Oh, I love that picture of you guys.

Oh, and your dog does have everything to do with everything.

He does!

Look at the little tongue!

Has everything to do with everything.

This episode is actually brought to you by her dog. Yes, I love that.

Absolutely.

Oh, that was a crazy fucking story though.

No, I hate that he was coming to your— and what kills me is that he saw the husband. Yeah, got freaked out by the husband showing up, but then came back knowing he would be there, and he did that several times.

No, but that's the thing about him, that's why he was so scary, because there was just like nothing—

there was no limit. Yeah, yeah.

Oh, I remember people said his breath smelled like wet leather. Yeah, he loved candy.

Stanky chops. Ew, he loved candy.

He did, didn't he? Like a lot of candy all the time.

The way you say you're like, he loved candy.

Ew, like that was the worst thing about it. Because it's like, that man loved a lollipop. Because picture Richard Ramirez eating like cabbage. I was gonna say cabbage patch kid. Honestly, that's Scariest thing you have ever—

Ah, I just pictured that, just nomming on cabbage patch kids. He would, he had like sharp teeth and shit. Ew, I hate it.

Why did I say that?

God, you just created the most unsettling visual. In my mind.

Oh no, somebody make that picture. Oh no, oh man, I meant Sour Patch Kids.

I was wondering, I was like, were you saying cabbage?

Like, I was like, I don't think he was eating cabbage.

That was part of his problem. He needed some cabbage. Oh man. Oh my God. All right, so this next one is the story of a house in which a friend shouting, get out, he's in your bedroom! And a tater tot loving ghost meet up for one hell of an '80s mashup.

One of these things is not like the other.

What a fucking title.

He's in your bedroom and a tater tot loving ghost.

Yeah, that's going to be me when I'm a ghost.

I was literally just going to say I'm a tater tot loving person. I'm so heavy with a tater tot.

Hell yeah.

In fact, I really like some. Have you ever had a sweet potato tater tot?

Oh yeah.

That shit slaps.

It really does. All right.

Let's get tater tots for lunch.

Yeah.

Period.

Period. Period. First, but first, first, I will gush, as have many before me, that you two are absolute unicorns.

Thank you.

Thank you.

You got a unicorn.

Oh, is that—

thank you. Thank you. I don't know, just came to me.

I like that.

Thank you.

Uh, I really appreciate the compassion and care you put into each story. I feel that the victims are treated respect and dignity, and that your research is tight. And hell yeah, Dave. Dave, thank you for being you, Elena. If I wasn't old as fuck, I would swear that you are my long-lost sister because we think a lot alike. Anywho, keep doing what you awesome humans do. I have been listening for about 3 months and I'm already on episode 219. I'm obsessed. If you choose to read my story, I've changed the names and I am providing a pseudonym for myself. What happened in the '80s stays in the '80s.

What's the thing that Debbie said the other day? A pen de plume?

Oh yeah, I love that. A nom de plume.

Nom de plume. I knew it wasn't pen. I like nom de plume. Nom de plume.

Uh, the scene is 1982. I'm in college.

The beginning.

The beginning of a decade. See, she knows where things lie in a decade.

Don't worry about that. Numbers.

The scene is 1982. I'm in college and want nothing more than to not have to live at home in my a small-ass watch-the-paint-dry town during the summer. Some friends were renting a house for the summer on the outskirts of our college town, somewhere in central Illinois, and I was all in. We envisioned a summer of fun and mayhem. By living on the outskirts of town, we could be as loud as we wanted and not bother townie neighbors. We of course did not think about the fact that if no one could hear us, we might be excellent targets for humans who are up to no good. Yeah, on that later. So imagine 1982. Neither of you were born yet. I'm old as fuck.

You're not that much older than Elena.

Yeah, the hairspray alone in the bathroom of that house could kill you if the hair itself didn't poke an eye out. See? Ah, Aquanet, how I miss you so. I was more of a punk myself. Hell yeah, you were. But we had a whole spike— we had the whole spike thing going on, so, you know, still Lethal Weapon type stuff.

Oh, you know those like Liberty spikes? Oh yeah, those are so cool.

Those are cool. One night we threw a particularly hilarious and chaotic party that involved many of the things that the '80s are known for. I kid you not that at that party someone took a mirror off our living room wall and made it snow. It really was a great time to grow up before we knew how bad many of these things were for us, and to have very little safety instructions other than to not eat candy that wasn't wrapped on Halloween or Cabbage Patch Kids. No, don't eat those. Don't do that.

Oh no. Oh no, the old is using the computer.

How to make it stop. Oh no, hold on, hold on.

The young is struggling too. Sorry, I was born in the middle of a decade, okay? The young isn't so young anymore. The young is approaching a thirties.

Hello? Hello? Oh, look at that, I can see now.

Yeah, I can actually see so much better. Um, it's like, it's like at the eye doctor when they slide the lens in there, like, is this better?

I always act so relieved whenever it flips by. I'm like, oh, that's it, that's the stuff. It's like last night. Oh, that's good, that's good. Oh, that's good, that's good. By 3 or 4 AM, we all crashed in our various rooms and the party got goers had gone home. Since I had not listened to your podcast yet, because you were not born and I'm old as fuck—

you're not that old—

I did not know that open windows are for dead people. It was a hot midsummer night in the Midwest, the Midwest, the Midwest, where even the mosquitoes were too scorched to do more than look at us. So yeah, all our windows were wide open. We had screens to keep out the bugs, so we reasoned that was good enough.

Oh, they have screens.

Yeah, they have I should give you the layout of the house. There were 3 of us legally living there. The house was an old farmhouse with 2 stories. All the bedrooms were upstairs. 2 people shared 1 room at the left of the stairs. 1 person had the room to the right, and I had the room in the middle. Back to that night. I'm awakened by my roommate, Kyla, yelling at me, get out, get out, he's in your bedroom.

You better get out. Get out, leave right now.

Like, if I hear that, I'm just going into straight up cardiac arrest.

Yeah, where do you go?

He's in your bedroom.

Who? Get your vacuum.

I sleepily jerk awake and look around. It's pitch dark because country, and I can't see a thing. My heart is pounding in my throat and I feel like I'm gonna faint. I'm desperately thinking that I might run into whoever is trying to get me if I just barrel on out of there. Then my amygdala sucker punches my front lobes and says, run, motherfucker, run! I should mention that my amygdala is aided by my friend still shrieking at the bottom of the stairs, run, dumbass, he has a knife and I saw him go in there!

Oh my God. What? Why is your— what is your friend doing?

Bitch.

What is anybody doing?

I sprint down the stairs faster than Usain Bolt, who also wasn't born yet. I am an old fuck.

My goodness, you need to be nicer to yourself.

I love you a lot. I join my roomies on the front lawn who are discussing having heard and seen not one but two men in our house.

No.

Another roommate, Maggie, says that she was awakened by the sound of someone climbing through the window at the bottom of the stairs. I hate this a lot. She then heard them walking around the house, opening drawers and such. She thought she had heard them throwing something out of the window.

Was it tater tots?

I'm, I'm waiting for the tater tots to arrive because so far it's not—

it's scary.

Maggie thought she should act all like she was, like she was asleep. Like she should act all asleep and shit and hope that they were just robbing us and would soon leave. Things changed for her because honestly as they say, if they come during the day, they're here for their stuff. If they're here for the— at the night— that really fucked up. If they're here during the day, they're here for your stuff. If they're here at night, they're here for you.

They say that.

That's what my old criminal justice professor used to tell me, and I hung on to it because think about it.

No way.

Why are they in your house in the middle of the night trying to steal your stuff? You're there. Middle of the day, they're coming to get your it.

I have an alarm system.

Yeah, middle of the night, pew.

You hear those dogs?

Yeah, you hear those dogs.

Dolores will chop your head off.

So things changed for her when she heard them clomping towards the stairs. We were lucky to have a phone extension upstairs, so she quietly called the police. She then waited until the humans— the humans went into my room, ran across the hall and got the other two roomies, and they hightailed it downstairs with Kyla calling up, as Afro mentioned. So she waited until they went into your room. Hey, you gotta— are you still friends with them?

You gotta plan. Like, what the fuck? She yelled for you.

The police showed up and went through the house. The screen in the window at the bottom of the stairs had either been cut or pushed in, and the back door was open. The police figured that the humans ran down the stairs after I boogied and left through the back door while we were waiting for the police in the front yard.

Oh my God.

Many things had been moved and a few drawers were open, but nothing was missing because they were there for you.

Yeah.

The police tried to calm us down, but they didn't really have an answer for us when we asked if they weren't here to burgle us, then what did they want? They didn't want to kill you. The answer to that question was sitting like a stone in the bottom of my stomach. What would have happened if my roomie had not been awakened?

We wouldn't be reading this.

We remained terrified for a long time afterwards that these guys might come back to finish whatever fiendish and evil deeds they had planned for us that evening. I don't I don't think I could have stayed in that house.

I know, I don't think so either.

I don't blame you for staying there because obviously you don't always have options.

I think I would just drive around until morning.

Literally, I think I would become nocturnal. We did not sleep well and started closing the windows downstairs at least. Our upstairs windows also for dead people, discuss.

Yes, I literally said this to my grandma the other day. I was like, people have ladders.

And we just read a story about Richard Ramirez climbing up a tree to get to the second story.

Exactly, if they want you, they're gonna get you.

The next weekend, everyone but me was going out of town. I was freaked. I invited all of my friends, especially my guy friends, to come stay at the house that weekend. Until my friends arrived, I sat staring at the window and the door to the basement, expecting them to open at any time with a knife-wielding maniac jumping out at me. I knew the basement did not figure into this story, but basements are creepy as fuck, so out of principle, I stared at that son of a bitch also. Honestly, Valid. Mm-hmm. My friends finally arrived and we got through the weekend. One problem with this situation is that one of my friends was so weird and probably on an acid trip that I was most likely more in danger from him than whatever else was out there.

Damn.

Needless to say, I made it through the weekend. Fast forward to about 2 weeks later. We were having a hectic morning jostling around each other as we each got ready for respective works and classes. Maggie comes into the kitchen where the rest of us are. Maggie is all pissed off. Maggie ran a little grumpy anyway, so she just shrugged and continued what we were doing. She says, "Who did it?" And we say, "What?" And she says, "Who ate my fucking tater tots?" Ooh, that's a crime. Now, if it were more recent times, I would have said Napoleon Dynamite did it and she would have thrown something at me. In 1982, I said, "Maggie, no one ate your damn tater tots." Everyone shrugged and life went on, although totless for Maggie, which she continued to gripe about. That's fair. A few days later, Maggie was at it again. She said, "Where's my lasagna?" Again, she's met with blank looks from all of us. We're not above eating each other's food, but not this time. I began wondering if we had a ghost or a poltergeist. I have been a weirdo spooky bitch my entire life, so it was a logical explanation for me.

Feels logical to me.

Me too. Once again, I was afraid of my own house. A few days after the lasagna incident, some people came over who we sort of know.

It made me think of, shit, I don't even know my own kid. I'm afraid of my own house.

I also like the lasagna incident. They said they had been at a party where these two guys were talking about getting really drunk a few weeks back, blacking out, then waking up to find a bag of tater tots and a pan of lasagna sitting on their kitchen table. They said they had no idea where these items had come from.

Wait, so they came to your house to take your tater tots and your lasagna?

Our friends asked them if they had been at a party at our address. They said no, but that they used to live at our house.

Oh my God.

The friends asked them if by any chance they might have gone to our house in their blackout state thinking they still lived there. One of the guys said he thought he remembered climbing through a window and running down a street.

How do you think you remember that? Oh, maybe I remember. Maybe I ran down the street after I climbed through a window.

What? The more they talked, they pieced together what happened.

Oh my God.

The guys were smashed. Thought they still lived at our house, couldn't get in the front door, so did the next logical thing and broke through the screen on the window. Oh my God. They then stumbled around the house running into furniture that wasn't where they thought it should be. They were hungry, so they looked in the fridge. It's funny because it's misspelled. It says the frig.

So they looked in the frig.

I don't know why that made me laugh.

No, it made me laugh too.

Finding not much were there due to the party animals eating everything. Anything, uh, that wasn't still crawling. The fridge was empty. Oh, but the freezer contained some delectable items. They threw said items out the window, what Maggie heard, ran upstairs, who knows why, were freaked out to see people were there, ran downstairs out the back door. Somehow they retrieved the tots and the lasagna along the way. Quite a feat for smashed college students. No ghosts, No murderers, just drunk guys out of their minds and craving a good tot. Wow. Maggie never did apologize for blaming us.

Fuck you, Maggie.

Parties continued. Ah, the '80s, keeping it weird at all times. Violet. Wow. What the fuck?

That was— I love how it came full circle though.

That's so '80s. It really was. So they just came back to a house they thought they lived at.

That feels like a movie. It really does. I'm obsessed with that. That was amazing. Oh, but that must have been nice to find out in a weird way because you were probably not afraid of your house house anymore.

No murders, no poltergeist, just— but then you have to worry about these assholes getting drunk again and thinking they live there. I know, like, that's a little scary.

That is a little bit scary. Like, you remember where you live? Like, write it on your hand or something.

And also, Maggie, get it together. Yeah, Maggie, that's sad.

Or Maggie's sad.

Yeah, she said sad way of living, to be— to run grumpy, to run grumpy, to never apologize for it. I don't apologize a lot, but I do when I'm mean.

You do apologize if you're grumpy. Yeah. All right, this one is called Spirit at the Salon. Hi Ash and Alina, this is Rob.

Hi Rob.

Hi Rob. I want to share a more lighthearted story about a positive ghostly experience that helped me understand myself a bit better.

Oh.

Names and specifics have been changed because toxic masculinity is a thing.

Sure is.

In the town where I grew up, I would often spend afternoons hanging out at my aunt's beauty salon down the street from the school while I waited for my mom to get home from work. I love that so much. When I tell you it was the '80s, when you walked into the salon, you knew it. Wood grain cabinets and drawers, pink painted walls. Oh, hell yeah. Shiny linoleum tile, pink vinyl covered chairs. Oh my God, those retro salon decals on the walls. I do.

Yep.

The smell of perm solution soaked into every surface. I hated perm week at school. And a whole row of dryer hoods along the sidewall. Yes, most of them usually occupied by the regulars getting their weekly roller sets.

Hell yeah.

Very Steel Magnolias.

Oh yeah.

I love that movie. Drink the juice, Shelby. I'd spend afternoons in the waiting room fighting the kind of extreme boredom that only a small child with more than 10 minutes of unoccupied time can feel. I colored, read the same 4 comic books on the rack that never changed, and entertained the old ladies who always told me I reminded them of their grandsons. Hell yeah, Rob. And eventually my aunt put a broom in my hands and set me to work getting the that sweet free child labor out of me. One winter day when it was dark and the salon was closed, I was waiting for my aunt to clean up and take me home. I glanced at the picture window, which in darkness had become a big black mirror framed with frost around the edges. Despite the salon being empty other than my aunt in the back room, in the window's reflection I saw a lady sitting in one of the dryer chairs. She had her hair in rollers and was draped in the salon's standard-issue pink vinyl shape. Confused, knowing the salon was closed, I turned around and there was no one there.

Oh, I love her. What a ghost to see.

Forever getting her hair done.

Forever doing self-care.

Oh my God, forever. She's probably very warm though.

Good for her.

I thought about— I thought about telling my aunt, but I didn't want to say anything because I clearly just saw a ghost and saying it out loud would make that real.

Very fair.

I saw this lady more and more over the next few years. She was always in the same dryer chair, always only in the window's reflection after close. Those. I eventually got the courage to bring it up to my aunt, but she has always been a very stern woman who never tolerated any shenanigans, mischief, tomfoolery, or monkeyshines. Yeah, I've never heard of monkeyshines.

I couldn't live that way. No, not tolerating any shenanigans, mischief, tomfoolery, or monkeyshines.

Yeah, that's nuts. I'm all about that. I'm all about that too. I love tomfoolery. That's my middle name. She told me Ash Tomfoolery Kelly. She told me it was just my imagination and handed me some towels to fold. I've lost count of the number of towels I've folded in my life.

I bet.

Same. When you're an apprentice, all you do is wash, wash, wash, dry, dry, dry, laundry, laundry, laundry, fold, fold, fold, and then you pay some parking tickets.

Damn. Ugh.

Now, as I grew up and no longer needed a babysitter, I still visited the salon regularly, partly because I enjoyed the compliments that came along with being their resident handyman. More freely. Labor, but mostly because I enjoyed flirting with the cute girls who would come in to get their hair done. And fellas, if a girl flirts with you while she's got a head full of perm rods and wearing a pink salon cape, then you know she trusts you. I had stopped seeing— that is super valid. I had stopped seeing the ghost lady and had mostly forgotten about the whole thing. But fast forward a few years and I'm home on break from college. I'm on a nostalgia tour around town and I stop in the salon to say hi. At one point, I glanced at the big picture window and had a flash of a remembrance. Thinking of the ghost lady for the first time since I was little. I don't know where the idea came from, but I thought maybe I'd join that lady for old time's sake. That's adorable. Oh my God. I don't know what was more embarrassing for me, asking my aunt to set my hair in rollers or knowing that I was doing it for a ghost.

Wait, I love that you literally did this for the ghost lady.

I'm obsessed with this.

It's so sweet that you just felt compelled to do that.

I love this.

I'm obsessed.

I love this. Uh, she showed herself to the right person.

Yeah, she did. She was so excited to do my hair. I'd been growing it out since college, and she clearly wanted to get her hands on it for quite a while. Soon enough, I was feeling awkward with my hair in curlers, wearing a pink cape of my own, and I sat myself down under the dryer right next to where the ghost lady always sat. I'm gonna cry. I have like chills. I'm actually gonna cry.

Yeah, I love this.

I started asking her questions. I had years of experience talking to the salon lady, so I knew what they like to talk about.

Oh my God.

I asked her about where she grew up, her family, her pets, crafts, and hobbies that she liked. I never heard any answers, not that I could hear anything because those dryers are loud as fuck. Am I right? Yeah, they are pretty loud. But as I talked, sitting in silence between questions to give her time to answer, I felt a growing sense of peace and tranquility.

I love this.

I can only describe it as the feeling you get when you're alone in nature, quietly enjoying view during a very pleasant walk. I don't know if this lady ever was really there or if I, if my keeping her company was helpful to her spirit in any way, but it certainly was helpful to mine. And as an aside, my hair looked incredible. Ladies, if you haven't tried an old school roller set, you seriously got to try it. The pinup waves it gives are unbeatable and they lasted for days. I love this. I'm obsessed with you. Also, I love a pin curl set. I was literally teaching Debbie how to do pin curls. They were a little different this time. But long story long, no, no place feels like home, uh, to me as much as a quaint neighborhood hair salon. And everywhere I've lived, I've always searched for a friendly little salon with kind stylists and regulars who welcome me as one of their own. I may be the only cis het male who has been stand— who has a standing appointment for a deep conditioning treatment and a roller set.

I love him a lot.

I'm in my 40s and I still have a full healthy head of hair. Yes, cuz you done took care of it, baby. And I like to believe that part of the reason is the unnamed ghost lady is my hair guardian angel. This is my favorite story we've ever received. This is my favorite story. She's watching over the hair. She's watching over my hair the same way I looked out for her that day.

Oh my God, I love this.

Thank you for your time. No, thank you for yours, Rob. And keep it weird. Just weird enough that you go to get your hair done with some old school curlers as a tribute to all the badass women who came before. Rob. Literally Rob. I'm obsessed with you.

Rob! That is the—

that is the— I just spit everywhere— the sweetest tail we've ever received. I love that. Wow, that just made my whole day.

Yeah, Rob forever.

We're done.

Yeah, that was it. That's perfect ending.

Oh my God, I love that tail so much. Wow, guys, it was the '80s.

Yeah, I'm an '80s kid.

I can't wait to wash my face and brush my hair. Yeah, I got to tell you something. I've never felt more insane in my life. You look great. I liked being Krampus better.

Yeah. And Miranda Priestly.

Oh, I love—

that goes without saying.

That's just who I am.

Yeah.

Oh, take me back to Miranda Priestly.

I feel pretty comfortable, but you could stay like that.

I could get out of the tight pants. You could stay like that. And I don't think many people would question it. Probably not. No, I love it. All right, well, thank you guys so much for writing in your tales. If you have a tale and you want to write in, send them to morbidpodcast@gmail.com. Make sure to say hello to everybody and title it Listener Tales.

Title it your tale.

And if there's— if there are any pictures or anything, just make sure you give us permission to share or tell us that you don't want them shared. Yes, just like tell us either way. Tell us, tell us. And I think that's it.

Yeah.

All right, so we hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird, but not so weird that you don't go get a fucking roller set with a ghost lady. Don't keep it so So weird that you break into people's house and steal their Tinker Tots.

Like, that's insane. That's fucked up. Those are mine.

You can't be doing that. No, it was the '80s though.

It was the '80s. Lol.

Do— yeah, don't keep it so weird that in the afterlife you assault somebody's grandma.

No, you can't do that. We're talking about you, you pervy old ghost, Old Joe.

Yeah, Mr. Steal Yo Girl, you can't do that. Don't do it. And do not keep it so weird as to sleep with your upstairs bedroom door open and run into Richard Ramirez. He's dead now, but—

or to be Richard Ramirez.

Don't ever keep it that weird. Don't eat Cabbage Patch Kids.

Remember when he got the shit kicked out of him by an entire neighborhood though?

That was pretty wild.

That was great.

That was awesome.

That, if you don't know already, yeah, it was the '80s. It was—

or was it the '90s?

That was the— uh, it might have been the '80s. Oh, he was caught in 1985.

Oh my gosh. Okay, it was the '80s, so that's why they put the shit on him.

You're my bird.

Okay, period. Get So, alright, well, we already said keep it weird, so bye, I guess.

So bye! Love you!

You're rad. Totally tubular.