Haunted Cosmos - Shades Over Georgia

Episode Date: April 2, 2025

Savannah, Georgia is supposedly one of the most haunted places on earth. But how far does the darkness go? And what other creeping things lurk in the ancient foothills of Georgia? Join us in this spec...ial offseason episode of the Dusty Tome as we try and find out!Love Haunted Cosmos? Get access to our exclusive show, The Dusty Tome, early ad-free access to main episodes, monthly AMA's, and livestreams with Ben and Brian by becoming a patron of the show: https://www.patreon.com/c/HauntedCosmosBuy the Haunted Cosmos book: https://www.newchristendompress.com/cosmos PS: It's also available as an audiobook!Want to keep nefarious fairy Bigfoots away and also avoid icky seed oils, preservatives, artificial colorants, and other nasties in your daily shower routine? Then check out the vast array of homemade soaps from our friends at Indigo Sundries Soap Co.! Go to http://indigosundriessoap.com to learn more—and as our gift to you, use code HAUNTEDCOSMOS for 10% off your whole order!This episode is sponsored by New Dominion Design Co. Visit their website here and learn more!http://newdominiondesignco.com/This episode is also sponsored by Stonecrop Wealth Advisors! Go to this link to check out their special offers to Haunted Cosmos listeners today.https://stonecropadvisors.com/hauntedcosmosThis episode is also sponsored by the King's Ridge Elderberries! Check them out here and use code HAUNTED for 10% off your first order!https://tkrfarm.com/This episode is sponsored by Squirrelly Joe's Coffee! Visit their website here to get your first bag free!  Share Coffee. Serve Humbly. Live faithfully.https://www.squirrellyjoes.com/hauntedcosmosDesignButter offers mobile, web, and product design for a fixed monthly fee. Check out their services here:https://www.designbutter.com/Finally, this episode is sponsored by Gray Toad Tallow. Visit their website here and use COSMOS15 at checkout for 15% off your order.https://graytoadtallow.com/Support the show

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Every week here at Haunted Cosmos, we release a special story-driven show called The Dusty Tome just for our monthly supporters over at Supercast. But while we prepare a brand new season of the main show in the Honod Cosmos Laboratory, we decided to give all of you a peek behind the paywall. So, welcome to a special release of the Dusty Tome. It was the winter of 88 or 89 in Savannah, Georgia. In that part of the world, the winters are a little more than what an early fall day might feel like. in the higher mountains to the west. The sky was grayed over with clouds, riding the wind,
Starting point is 00:01:07 off the chilled and tumultuous Atlantic during that day. And though it could not really be described as cold, the air was cool and breezy enough for the locals to justify the coats they loved, but hardly ever got to wear. To be sure, it was not warm, after all, it was the dead of winter. In a morning frost here and there,
Starting point is 00:01:25 painting the barren trees a sort of rosy pink in the morning sun over the ocean. It was night, and the echoing streets of the historic, York downtown rattled with the clinking of boots, the running and laughing of children, and the rumble of cars over the brick-laden roads. As the night became very dark, with no moon and no stars to retard the darkness, rain started to fall.
Starting point is 00:01:48 Now, adding to the cold air thick with wetness, there was the chilled drops of southern snow, which is just rain. The previously tranquil streets seemed to churn under the quickened pace of people rushing home to escape that rain. Puddles formed in mere minutes, smoothing out the cracks between the cobblestones, and making the whole town glow orange and yellow as said puddles reflected and refracted the bright street lamps guiding the running family's home. It was dark, a wet dark, and a vibrant dark because of that wetness, the evening wetness
Starting point is 00:02:19 of the east. Through the streaming rain, there rode four bikes belonging to four friends. With backs soaked through from the rear wheels kicking up all the water the rider's shirts could hold, the teenage friends stopped beneath a general store's overhang and propped their bikes up against the red brick. Though it being dry beneath the overhang, the brick looked a dingy brown compared to the almost oily wet red bricks just beside them. They entered the store with a ring of the little bell atop the jam and stood just inside, being careful to wipe their shoes and drip as much excess water they could onto the welcome mat. The store's general manager and owner was a kindly old
Starting point is 00:02:57 man, homely and gentle like the kind of person you might find, well, manning a general store in an idyllic southern town. The place was so quiet inside that it seemed to sing like faint traces of wind chimes on a cold spring day. It was like all the greatest achievements of the antebellum south without any of the vices to tarnish it. The old man greeted the boys with a smiling nod as he looked down through his glasses at the ledger for that day's sails. For their part, The boys waved and said hello before stepping right up to the counter to interrupt the man in his study. Finally, the two parties exchanged words. The apparent ring leader of the friends made friendly eye contact with the old man and held up a dollar bill.
Starting point is 00:03:41 He asked for change in quarters. The old man, not at all confused at the request for change, but merely confused at the request for change at this hour of the day, asked the boys what they needed the quarters for. They were honest, lads, and told him straight, We're going to visit Gracie and want to leave her a present. At that, the man dutifully folded the single bill into his fold and counted out the quarters. He even threw in an extra with the parting request, Give her one for me too, will you?
Starting point is 00:04:13 The boys nodded and walked straight back out of the store into the rain, now properly pouring and increasingly bitter cold. Through the heavy darkness of the night, they rode and rode. until their tires streaked patches of dry down a freshly tarmaced side street that towed the line between the savannah city limits and the adjacent town of Thunderbolt. In the mid-motes of the riding, the rain stopped and the wind off the coast gained more momentum. The clouds could be seen to grow thinner and thinner by the moment, as the same cycle of pressure that brought them so suddenly in, also ushered them suddenly away. Soon enough, the four boys were riding, their leader's pocket jingling
Starting point is 00:04:53 with each turn of the pedal, into a darkness soaked with water but now lightened ever so slightly by the silvery light of the moon shining above them. After riding for another quarter of an hour down that same road, one much less peppered with street lights than those of downtown Savannah, the group finally skidded to a stop in front of a black iron gate blocking a grave road. They silently surveyed the gate and what lay beyond it, breathing heavy and with open mouths from the ride. Their breath looked like clouds of tin tinkling in the moonbeams, and they all took a moment to wipe the water from their faces. Over the course of the ride, the cold rain and cold wind
Starting point is 00:05:34 had stopped having such a cooling effect. What remained caked on the boys was a most uncomfortable mixture of water and salty sweat that was sure not to simply dry off in the muggy nighttime air. So often this place felt like a cauldron to them. They took turns pushing one another and pulling one. one another, up and over the thick and square stone posts that flanked either side of the tall fence. Once inside, the canopy of black tree branches looked like silhouettes of lightning or veins of tributaries of the Amazon against the backdrop of the moon. Dead and waterlogged Spanish moss hung
Starting point is 00:06:10 down from nearly every branch in this metropolis of weeping willow. The tufts of the witch's hair swayed slightly in the wind, pointing the boys along the gravel path that led deeper into the cemetery, for of course, a cemetery is where they were. Gravestones with epitaph markings, many of them caked in moss, or at least stained a brownish-green by the ivy hanging above, met the boys' widening eyes, and gave all but one of them pause. Only the leader had done this before. Only he knew the potential harm of all the whispering air floating just around them. The rest of them had not been to this place at night and had not visited Gracie with gifts. They They all had heard her playing in the witching hours of night in the green grass of the park
Starting point is 00:06:54 just outside of her family's old hotel. They had seen her cloudy and white dress, leaving traces of itself on the bench she continuously sat in and got up from next to the park too. But only the leader, with the change, had ever come to the place she was supposed to be resting in. A stone monolith akin to some old Roman arch for the empire's glory rose from the ground, immovable and unfeeling. 10 feet ahead of the boys.
Starting point is 00:07:22 It gave them a sense of being intruders. They felt like divers in a school of swarming things deep underwater. It was as though the arch shouted silently at them to leave and let the dead be, to let the dead bury their dead. Of course, they didn't heed the warning and pressed on deeper into the rows of headstones and mausoleums and plinths in the ground until finally they stood before it. The light radiating from the dripping wet marble,
Starting point is 00:07:50 sculpture was like a thing painted by mercury. The boys wondered silently how each one was seeing what he himself was seeing. For each boy wondered how the drops of pert quicksilver falling from the wrinkles in the dress did not paint the pine straw around its base a shimmering light. The carving of the girl, Gracie, so lifelike in her dress and boots and curling locks, stared blankly out at them. The plump cheeks of the six-year-old face appeared anything but solid and the delicate fingers. Some placed in her lap and others propped with their hand on the handle of a wooden bench she sat on, looked at any moment as if they might move. As he studied the image, the boy in the rear of the group felt an impulsive shiver run up and down his spine, and he gave a start at the
Starting point is 00:08:38 sound of a little girl giggling behind him. He jerked his head quickly around but saw nothing and heard nothing more, all tricks of the mind, he supposed. He was relieved to discover, once he turned back, that none of his friends had seen his short little episode. The leader reached into his pocket and pulled the quarters out. He kept two, one for him and one for the store clerk, and handed each of his friends their own. The plan was very simple. They would leave the quarters at the base of Gracie's statue
Starting point is 00:09:07 and then lock hands to walk in a circle around the grave three times. The stories said that upon completion of the third circle, the group could look down to see their quarters magically gone, accepted by the cheerful and still childish Gracie. And this is exactly what they did. Under the pale face of Luna, they spun around the grave together and then eagerly looked down at the same time to see to their disappointment that the quarters were all still where they had left them. They muttered the Christian teenage version of curses under their breath and wondered what they had done wrong. Perhaps, they supposed, it didn't work since the old store clerk had not joined them.
Starting point is 00:09:48 He tried to leave a gift without making a trip. This, they figured, may have upset the sensitive girl inside of the marble. Thus it was that they filed back out of the narrow corridor of bushes guarding the grave from crowds and started the long and dark and wet walk back to the bikes where they'd be in for a late and muggy ride back home. But the fourth boy, the one who had thought he heard the laughing, lingered behind just for a moment. He faced away from the grave and hesitated before turning back in a quick rush and taking his quarter back from the ground.
Starting point is 00:10:24 He thought he may try again tomorrow night, but all on his own. But as he stood up and turned again until his back faced the statue, he noticed the night darken. Gone was the light of the moon and stars. Gone again was the silver hope, making sparkles of the wet world. Gone was the gentle breeze, and in came a swirling gust of violence that made whatever ever cold he had felt before that night feel as warm as summer. He heard the rustling leaves behind him and could swear that somewhere beneath and in the midst of all those sounds, he heard the sound like that of weeping. It was weeping. It was the sorry cries of a little
Starting point is 00:11:02 girl. Slowly, and not wanting to, he turned around to face the statue once more and was cut to the quick by the gory sight, where the moon had lit Gracie up in almost religious beauty just before, She now sat dark in brooding, like a goddess of death and magic, surveying the subjects she was too immature to care about. Her mouth looked to be a chiseled frown, filled with hate, and the once solid and white hair now shook like the stiff gray Spanish moss hanging above it. From the eyes cast down in anger there flowed what looked like streams of blood. Thick and warm it fell to the earth and just kept pouring out of the despairing eyes.
Starting point is 00:11:43 The weeping turned to screams and the screaming. screams turned to shrieks and the boy, frozen up to then, was jolted into a run out of the cemetery by the image of a ghastly figure with bleeding eyes and golden hair jumping out at him from the statue. In the middle of the 1990s, a man named Joe moved across the country from California to Georgia. He and his family had grown tired of the ever-increasing cost of living, the liberalism, and the hustle of living near some of the West Coast's biggest cities. despite not having much in the way of family or another personal connection in the Peach State, Joe was able to find a good job opportunity in the quiet suburbs outside of Atlanta,
Starting point is 00:12:28 and so without much hesitation made the move. Of course, at first, things felt awkward. It took a minute for Joe and his wife to make adult friends and their children had the usual amount of trouble adjusting to the new school and culture of youth they were stepping into. But after not too long, they had really ingraced themselves to the place. Even sooner than they expected, Georgia started to feel like home. Its history and rootedness and simplicity and general practice of Christianity made it seem comfortable and familiar to this small family,
Starting point is 00:13:01 who always felt like a fish flopping on the dock when they were in California. After a while of watching how well Joe liked the South, his brother Michael packed up his own family and moved to be near Joe, even just right down the street. Michael had it a bit easier since he had the foothold of family already there, but even he was shocked at just how right it felt as he drove his caravan of people and possessions across the Alabama line and further east to the rolling pines of Georgia.
Starting point is 00:13:33 From afar, and without the counsel of his brother on the ground, Michael had signed a lease to rent a very old house on an especially quiet street. The house was by no means dingy. it had been remodeled by the owners in previous years and now shown with rich Southern charm. But it was old, and so it came with the noises and smells that you can imagine might accompany a place built in the early 1800s. The fresh facade of craftsmanship and paint and updated appliances cannot remove the history of a place or a thing. That much is certain. But as Michael and his family arrived and jumped out of the car to stretch their legs in the summer heat,
Starting point is 00:14:14 no foreboding thoughts of doom like that entered into his mind. Instead, he smiled big at the already forming sweat on the small of his back, kissed his wife and hugged her with one of his arms, and threw a baseball to his son with the other arm, delighted to see the boy chase the dog laughing through the Bermuda grass and pine straw that painted the whole landscape with charm. His daughter, a little four-year-old girl, was far more sensitive than her older brother. She just stood there quietly, staring at the new home.
Starting point is 00:14:48 She even didn't turn when she heard her mom ask her what she thought about it all. Giving his wife a knowing nod, and after watching her walk back to the car to start getting some of their things in order, Michael knelt down beside his little girl and gave her a big hug and kiss. He asked for a hug. She didn't respond. She asked her what she thought of the white fascia beneath the gutters that in the light almost appeared pink. She said nothing and diligently kept her face deadpan, if not a bit upset. That was when he finally asked her what was wrong.
Starting point is 00:15:22 She'd been so excited for the move up to now, she even led the charge and singing the moving song Michael had made up at some point in Arkansas during their drive. But being four, she had not really understood what it meant. It wasn't until she saw the place and heard her people gawking over it and calling home that she realized she was never going to, back to the place she'd grown up thus far. This to her was not home. It was an imposter, a fake, a stranger. She had always been told never to talk to strangers, and now she was supposed
Starting point is 00:15:57 to just run into this old house covered in makeup and treat it as the only place she'd ever known. Of course, she conveyed these feelings to her father and fewer words, but he understood them very clearly. He sympathized with his daughter, telling her soft stories about all the times he had moved growing up. He told her to the sound of crickets and bees humming somewhere in the background, that his dad once helped him through moving by reminding him that the home was not so much the house as it is the people that fill it. He told her people, her family, would still be with her in whatever place they lived. He told her that this is what made it home. This, he was glad to see, made her go from a frown to a soft smile. He knew it would still be some time before she was
Starting point is 00:16:42 excited again. She was, after all, her mother's daughter, but he knew that the hard part of this job was actually done. She was a low-maintenance girl. She'd come around fine. He invited her to go and play with her brother in the yard and have him take her to skip rocks across the pond. She was terrible at it, of course, but she always asked to do it. In the meantime, Michael and his wife waited for Joe to arrive there to help them unload after work. They waited to go inside until he got there, thinking it would be somehow fun or somehow special to all do it together. Joe arrived after a while and fell right into the family pleasantries of hugs and laughs before it was time to turn the key and finally go inside.
Starting point is 00:17:23 The kids still played down by the pond. The door opened with a satisfying click and the squeak that came from the hinges was deep and welcoming. Of course, it was dark inside, but the sunset light cast rich beams of gold through the windows and onto the floors. dust could be seen dancing in the air inside of the beams. The trio of adults stepped into the family room that the front door gave way to and silently traipsed around, studying all of the corners of the room
Starting point is 00:17:50 and peeking through the case opening, through the dining room, and into the kitchen. Or at least Michael and his wife did this. Joe was still standing just inside of the threshold. Upon his first step into the home, a wave of intense and nauseating fear came over him. He was sure another statement. would make him throw up from being so afraid. He felt like a dog watching a mailman approach his home for the first time.
Starting point is 00:18:15 All the hair on his arms and neck stood at attention, alerting him that something was very, very wrong. He staggered from the force of it all and immediately wished with all his heart he had never come in here, that his brother had never moved, that this house had never been built. Even though it was just for a few minutes, the debilitating terror felt forever. He was sure that some threat would sweep out of the shableness,
Starting point is 00:18:38 and kill them all at any moment. Maybe some demonic horror made out of shadow, but smiling with a bloody smile and piercing white eyes. Eventually, the feeling passed, but Joe didn't forget it. He clenched his teeth and calmed his racing heart and built up the courage to help his brother start moving things in. He wondered how on earth he was the only one of the group feeling any of this.
Starting point is 00:19:04 About an hour later, Joe found himself carrying a box up the end. ancient feeling stairs completely alone. He had not ventured up there yet. Michael had told him to take the box up to the end of the upstairs hallway where the master bedroom was. Joe did not want to seem like a coward and so made off to do the job as quickly as he could. The top of the stairs, when he reached its landing, felt a mile away from the door at the end of the straight hallway. The hall itself appeared to stretch out before him until it was longer and darker than could possibly be natural. He was too in his own head, he thought. He closed his eyes and shook his head back and forth before
Starting point is 00:19:43 taking a deep breath. He looked down at his shoes while he opened his eyes. He noticed a small dark stain on the otherwise new beige carpet and lifted his face once more to stare down the house, his new foe. He walked dutifully down the empty hallway, past the kids' rooms, and passed the bathroom they would share and finally into the bedroom. He put the box down and straightened back up to leave, but before he turned around, he heard the sound of aggressive whispering somewhere behind him and maybe even above him. It sounded like the bickering of two people who had known each other for far too long. Bickering might be too soft of a word, though. It was a real fight with real passion and real anger coming from both sides. It came from the ceiling and Joe looked up
Starting point is 00:20:31 with fright and stepped backwards out of the bedroom door. Once out, he turned and sprinted down the hallway, down the stairs, and out of the front door onto the wraparound porch. Even this, he left as quickly as he could, like a kid running up the stairs from a dark basement and shaking off the fright once he reaches the kitchen, sure that some monster is pursuing him, nipping at his heels. Michael asked Joe what was wrong, and his question opened the floodgates. Don't you feel it, Mike? Something's off about this place. Something's not right here. Didn't you feel it when you first went in? Yeah, I guess I felt a little weird, but it's a new place.
Starting point is 00:21:10 It's bound to feel off. It's just not familiar yet. I never want to be familiar with this house. I just heard horrible whispers coming from the ceiling upstairs. Oh, come on, Joe. You know that's insane. You have always let this stuff run wild in your head until you start hearing and seeing things.
Starting point is 00:21:28 Look, I'm fine. We're fine. We're going to be happy here. Nah, man, I know what I heard. I'm sorry Mikey, but I can't help you. I got to get home. Look, we'll touch base tomorrow, but I've got to get away from this place. Joe left and he never went back to that house, that dark house inside the pines and overlooking the pond. For his part, Michael did start to notice odd feelings and odd noises here and there in the house,
Starting point is 00:21:53 but he tried not to let it get to him. He was sure it was just his brother's fears creeping into his own head. He lived like that for a few weeks, but then something happened that, turn the tide for the young father and sent him speeding away from that dark home, just like his brother. It was by then the middle of autumn. The morning was especially cold and foggy, mists from the north had swept through during the night, and it made the dark early morning fuzzy and almost dreamlike. Michael woke up and stretched his back on the edge of his bed before finally standing up and putting on his slippers. He lazily stepped out of his room and
Starting point is 00:22:30 tried to quietly descend the stairs. Halfway down, though, he was jolted awake by a most worrying sight. The front door of their home all alone on the quiet street was propped slightly open, letting in the cool blue of the dark world outside. His heart raced. He remembered closing and locking it late the night before. He ran back up the stairs and noticed his daughter's bedroom door was also cracked ajar. He shuffled over to it and opened it wide to look inside. She was not there. Michael scrambled to calm down his shaking and then moved into action. He pulled on his coat, strapped on his boots and left the house, closing the door behind him. Had he been less frantic, he may have jumped right into the car and sped off to the police station,
Starting point is 00:23:13 but instead he just picked a direction of the road to run in and started shouting his daughter's name. Emma! Emma, can you hear me? He must have run a mile through the fog, shouting and shaking and crying for his little girl before he finally saw the silhouette of a shadow through the mist in front of him. He shouted more, and it seemed as though the shade of whatever it was stopped moving. He moved slower now,
Starting point is 00:23:42 stepping forward with all the intrepid spirit gone through the fog in the gray light till he clearly saw it. The image was of his daughter, smiling and bundled up in her warm clothes, looking up as if at an unseen companion. Her left hand was raised above her head as if it was being held by one much taller than her.
Starting point is 00:24:02 Michael screamed and charged at his girl, snatching her up despite protests and turning to run back for home. When he asked her what happened and why she had run away into that morning, she calmly told him that she had not run away, that the old lady who lived with them had woken her up to go for a morning walk, that the old woman had made sure she was wearing warm clothes so as not to catch cold. Michael asked how long the old woman had been living with them. His daughter informed him that she was already here when they arrived.
Starting point is 00:24:36 They left the house that day and never returned. Welcome to this second off-season drop of the dusty tome. Hope you guys enjoyed those readings. Yeah, I know I did, and here's the thing. You know what I'm enjoying even more, listener? I'm enjoying recording season six of Haunted Cosmos. While you guys are here in these dusty to, tombs while you're tooming the dust,
Starting point is 00:25:10 we're out there digging content out of the minds of the haunted cosmos and carrying them up the mountain to be manufactured into, this is getting away from me. We're like, we're like, dwarves. We're like Tolkien's dwarves. In the depths of Khazard doom, just dig, dig,
Starting point is 00:25:25 dude, we're like elves. In Moria. We're like el polishing these blades of, dude, we're like looking in the mirror mirror. We're like the men of Numer. This, oh, season five. Whatever.
Starting point is 00:25:38 Martina McBride just reminded us that we're actually in the midst of recording season five. How do they know we're not doing season six? Now they know because I'm telling them. Well, it's because we're not. But pretty soon, it's going to be like season 10. Here's what I want.
Starting point is 00:25:52 We're like Easterlings. Here's what I want. Here's what I want. I want you to summarize that first story for me in a paragraph because if it is what I think happened, yes, then I have some thoughts. Okay, ready? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:26:05 Chat GPT. Ben GPD. Well, consider this your official invite to join us here in Ogden, Utah, from June 12th to the 14th, this summer for our annual New Christenum Press conference. And Haunted Cosmonauts, Ben and I are going to be doing a live Haunted Cosmos show with sound design and everything. There's going to be all sorts of great speakers, times to hang out. Long story short, guys, we want to see you there. Head to the link in the description. It's new christenempress.com slash 2020.
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Starting point is 00:27:42 a registered investment advisor with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Hey, Ben. I just read that our great-grandparents probably experimented with butter on their dry skin as a moisturizer. Is that why you look so radiant? Maybe it's grandma's butter recipe, or maybe it's Grato Tallow. Their tallow products are 100% organic and naturally contain the good stuff your skin craves. No mystery there. So say Sayanara, Sammy, to kitchen experiments and say hello. to healthier skin. Gray Toad tallow, trusted by skin, envied by Great Grandma's butter recipe.
Starting point is 00:28:26 For more information and to get a sample pack, check out graytoed tallow.com. Don't forget to use the code Cosmos 15. That's all caps, Cosmos 1-5 for 15% off your order. In Savannah, Georgia, in the summer of 88 or 89, which by the way, if anyone gets to the reference, the deepest cut reference. I lose like three notches of respect for you. If you get the reference. If anyone gets that, it is such a deep cut.
Starting point is 00:28:56 Degenerate. If you get it, I, and I'm not making this up, okay? No. If you can, I will give you, I will personally guarantee that you have full access. No, that's not true. It's too, you've now said it. They could just Google the sentence. It won't tell them, dude.
Starting point is 00:29:14 Yes, it would. It's a lyric. I told you. Okay, what the heck? It's a lyric of a song. Of course it's going to come up if they Google it. It's a paraphrased lyric of a song. Anyway, all right, so it was summer.
Starting point is 00:29:26 It was winter. 88 or 89 in Savannah, Georgia. There was this legend in Savannah of a little girl named Gracie who tragically passed away. And apparently if you go to her grave and offer her trinkets like quarters or toys and then dance around her grave like a witch, the trinket would vanish. And you would have like offered something to grab. I don't know what the point was apart from the like the thing vanished and that's crazy. And so that's what these boys were doing. They got the quarters from the store clerk.
Starting point is 00:29:56 He was like, hey, give one to Gracie for me too, will you? They all go. They offer them at the grave. They dance around the grave. And then nothing happens. And so they leave disappointed. And then the one kid turns around to take his quarter back. Everyone else has just left theirs.
Starting point is 00:30:13 And when he does, this like horrible, grotesque demon impersonation of a little girl is like lunging out at him and scaring him to death. This is why we can't have nice. things. What are you talking about? Have these people not listen to a single episode of Honod Cosmos? I thought you were still talking about the lyric thing. No, I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have those
Starting point is 00:30:34 boys not listened to it? Are you kidding me? After all the work we've done. We've done a time travel episode. We've specifically told people not to do everything, sing every single thing that we get said that you just described. Dude, you sound like you shouldn't be doing. Like, what are you doing? You're leaving sacrifices to demons pretending to be little girls. You're just encouraging them. Yes. You're turning.
Starting point is 00:30:54 First of all, there's something really messed up to me about turning a tragedy, horrible tragedy, into this novel accessory to a city. Savannah is one of the most haunted places in the world, by the way. The ghost tour there is very fascinating. I've been on it in sixth grade at a Christian school. No. Yeah, I mean, all you do is ride around on the bus and they're like, that building's haunted too. This is why we needed haunted cosmos. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:31:19 Dude, if my teachers had only listened to our time travel episode, they would have time traveled in the future. Listen to me and they wouldn't have done this. Yes. But anyway, like that, that's messed up, turning this, this really bad tragedy into this sort of novelty thing. I love how if we have time travel, the thing people are using it to do is go listen to haunted cosmos ahead early. Is there anything else? That's the first thing that would come to my mind. You don't do anything about Jack. Charlemagne. You don't do anything about like Hitler. You don't do anything about 9-11, which you couldn't have. Okay.
Starting point is 00:31:54 You would have warned people it still would have happened. See our future work. Yes. Maybe. I don't know if we'll ever do an episode on it. Probably not. It would get nerfed so bad. So hard.
Starting point is 00:32:03 Anyway, so that's what happened. People here's the, like this is Dusty Dome. We can't go on forever. But let me just kind of round it out here by saying, don't do that. And the second story is one of the creepiest things. Yeah. Seriously, this old woman who was like a befriending this little girl.
Starting point is 00:32:21 Classic. What is it with ghosts and little girls? Classic demon behavior. That makes it creepy. too, because they're like so, you think like a boy would be like, I'm going to shoot it. Oh, if Ari or if my boys saw it, an old lady ghost, first of all, they've listened to all the hunt of cosmos. Yes.
Starting point is 00:32:37 They'd be like, so anyway, I started blasting. My sons, every time, every night, I put them to bed. And I'm like, what are you going to dream about? And they're like killing dragons and wolves and tyrants. Except now one of them says, killing, is it rhinoceros? Oh, my oldest son at the time of recording, things. that rhinoceri are the biggest existential threat to humanity. He's like, well, rhinos are just bad and I need to kill all of them.
Starting point is 00:33:03 I was like, well, do you know where this came from? No, I have no idea. I'm guessing that grandma may have had something to do with it. She was like, watch out for the rhinos. Yeah, like, I don't know. Grandparents sometimes, you know, sometimes they like the children safe things. You got to keep an eye on them because that, you know, the ghost thing in the house,
Starting point is 00:33:21 the demon, it was pretending to be what? A grandmother. But think about it. Like the little girl, she already doesn't want to move into this new house. Yeah. And then this, you know, very gentle, helpful old woman is comforting her and making her see like, it's not that bad. And then she's trying to take her, heaven knows where, by the way, that morning, probably to like drown in a lake or something.
Starting point is 00:33:43 Probably to the Fay kingdoms. Yeah, seriously. Under the mounds. So kudos to that dad for being so panicked. What a king. That he just, like, ran in a direction. First of all, they should have listened to the brother. So true.
Starting point is 00:33:55 Did Joe or Michael, whichever of the two they should have listened to, the other one should have listened to the other? 100. Whether Joe or Michael or Michael or Joe or Mike, you know what I'm saying. So here's the takeaways from today's dusty tomb. Don't go to Georgia. Ever. Yeah, I mean, that's fine. Don't offer things at the grave of anyone who's dead and then do a little Witch's Sabbath dance around the grave to try and get the ghost demon that's inhabiting the grave to take
Starting point is 00:34:22 them away. That's step one. I feel like did we have to say, like that, that had to be said. I know. I know. I know. It's not fun. It's not funny. Don't do it. Step two. I don't know. I guess if you're a little girl, don't get taken by a demon grandma. Do you see this? Hey, Ben, can you pass me the butter? Yeah, sure, man. Do you want the white camel butter or the golden cow butter? No, not that butter. What other butter is there? I'm talking about design butter who specialize in digital product design, whether it's a mobile or web app, David at Design Butter can help make sure your product is best on the market. Design Better helps you identify problems your users are having and makes the experience better, which results in more sales, return
Starting point is 00:35:08 customers, and a level of trust that makes your brand memorable. Dang, design butter. I can't believe it's not actual butter because it's so dang smooth. Sounds like they need ahead of DesignButter.com for more information. Man, Ben, I knew we were handsome, but I didn't know we were that handsome until I saw our recent Honed Cosmos thumbnails. Yeah, your skin looks so velvety smooth. I mean, it's unbelievable. Chris at New Dominion Design Company did an absolutely fantastic job not only on those thumbnails, but on our recent book cover as well. Yeah, exactly.
Starting point is 00:35:46 And if you need some design work from Chris, you should go to New Dominion Designco.com, get started there, and he'll serve you right. Man, he will make you look 50% as handsome as Ben guaranteed. Ben's Tucker Carlson nicotine pouches are apparently have been behind our market this whole time. Enhanced. This is not even a paid sponsor. Although Tucker, let's talk. It could be. We could move some Alp for you because Ben personally buys.
Starting point is 00:36:18 I have an Alpin right now. 90 pouches a day. Yeah. He has been dropping Alps and writing Cormac McCarthy Purple Pros for, Literally, he's been awake for 72 hours. Dude, I've been climbing the Matterhorn right now. It does. All right.
Starting point is 00:36:33 I think that's probably good for this one. So goodbye, viewers. We'll see you in the next Dusty Tome. Stay tuned for the big season. And hey, just as a reminder, we're going to be dropping the whole season early for literally the day that season season five, episode one comes out publicly. Patrons at the top two tiers.
Starting point is 00:36:54 We'll already have access to the whole season. Supercast.com, we'll be able to stream the whole season on demand. So shout out. Rock it out. To somebody. Keep it up. Summer 89. It was the summer 88. It was the summer of 69. More haunted cosmos, then make your way over to Patreon, where you can get early access to our content as well as exclusive content in regular dusty tomes and monthly live streams with Brian and myself. So go to patreon.com slash haunted cosmos and sign up now.

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