Morbid - Spooky Games That Will Ruin Your Actual Life Vol. 4

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

Weirdos, we needed to reset the energy and couldn't think of a better way to do it than talking about some spooky games that are almost certain to ruin your life! This fourth volume definitely shows that sometimes when you play spooky games, you get spooky prizes!Want to read about MORE games?? Purchase 'Dangerous Games to Play in the Dark' by Lucia Peters by visiting https://www.chroniclebooks.com/products/dangerous-games-to-play-in-the-dark.html  Cowritten by Alaina Urquhart, Ash Kelley & Dave White (Since 10/2022)Produced & Edited by Mikie Sirois (Since 2023)Research by Dave White (Since 10/2022), Alaina Urquhart & Ash KelleyListener Correspondence & Collaboration by Debra LallyListener Tale Video Edited by Aidan McElman (Since 6/2025) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, weirdos. I'm Elena. I'm Ash. And this is morbid. Morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid, morbid. I bet you guys loved that. So we are. I bet you did, okay? We are here.

It's a listener tales episode. Rob to you, by you, for you, from you, and all about you. Every Friday. Listener tales. Forever and always. That's actually funny because I have that ghost song stuck in my head. That's like, forever, forever. Love that for you.

Thanks. I do that to you. I love that I do that to you. I was going to say it's like because of you. It's brought to me by you. Yes. Yeah. And we're back.

Ash just swallowed a fly. I don't know why she swallowed that fly. No, I would never swallow. I guess she'll die. Do you remember that when you were little, that song. No, you have asked me that before, too, and the answer remains north. There's that weird ass. I think it's a book, too. I remember hearing it like a spoken word poem kind of thing. Like, it was like very like hacky sack. There wasn't a lady who swallowed a fly. I don't know why.

She swallowed that fly. I guess she'll die. And it was like, whoa. All right, that escalated real fast. It was probably in one of your weird books. No, I think we learned it in like music class in school. Oh. Yeah. Did you have to do the recorder? Hell yeah, we had to do the recorder. Why is that curriculum? Because it's an instrument that anyone can play. But like not anymore.

If you handed me a recorder, I'd be like, I know, I wouldn't know how to do that. Oh, remember the recorders? Yeah, we used to have to go into the basement at my elementary school, and we all used to talk about how Bloody Mary lived down there. Wow, that's spooky that you went in the basement to do your recorders. It was creepy. Oh.

And one time, somebody, like, broke into that. Not while we were there yet. Oh my God. It was like a sad situation that was like somebody like without a home who like needed shelter. That's really scary though. It's an elementary school. Yeah. Like don't do that. Yeah, that's like a little scary for the kids. But back to the listener tales. All right. Here we are. Today's, that was weird. Weird detour. But here we are. We're back. And today's listener tale is going to be themey McThiemercund. Woohoo. For Australia and New Zealand. Two different places. Two beautiful places with beautiful people. We love you. We do. A lot. You guys have been great.

We love you. You're beautiful. Your accents are chef's kiss. I want to go to there. I want to go to there. You know that TikTok sound. So let's go. All right.

Well, my first listener tale is for me very much so. Yeat or be yeated. Or 10 out of 10 would not recommend getting stabbed. Whoa. You know. All right. Hello, Deb, Deb, Ash, and Elena. Just realized that I sent this email without attaching the put-of-a-p PTSD brain.

I'm sorry. This is a re-submission, so please deleteeth the old one entitled, what we don't care about. We don't need that one. We don't need her. Thank you for all your hard work. You're the best. And I'm not going to say the name just in case because I don't know yet. Yeah, I don't think you can say this name.

And even the nickname is a little close to the name, so I would come up with a totally different one. Okay. Just to protect. We're trying to protect you. Yeah. Okay. Hi, or should I say good day, Ash and Elena. You should say good day. You should absolutely say good day. My name is, I'm going to come up with something like fun.

Yeah, you've got to give a fun nickname. I just don't want it in any way being put back to. Stewie. Stooey. There you. I was looking at our picture of Billy Loomis and I wanted to combine Stu and Billy. So you are now Stewie. Like it. Stewie is 22 and is from Australia.

We're not saying their name in the story. legal things. This put-ofa is size 14 font and double spaced for your viewing pleasure. You're welcome. Thank you. This is a resubmission as I reread my old one and the number of it mistakes, my God,

you'd think I'm illiterate. Have you heard me read on this show? This reads for about 15 minutes, but I'm a fast talker, same. So here comes the gushing about how much I love you guys. Ah, hello, I love you both so much. I have permanently been

playing you in my car headphones and speakers. I love you. I love you. I love you. I've been listening to you guys since early 2019 and I consider you both like my older adopted American sisters. And I especially feel that as Bostonians, you relate to Aussies on a level that no American can. Oh, I love that. Hell yeah. And they said, I'm speaking about your accents here. Our accents here. Ash, I relate to your attachment to phrases like yeet and I-oop. On a spiritual level as evidenced by the title of this listener tale. And Aleta, I swear to God, our exes are somehow related. Oh, God, I'm so sorry. Both fuck-headed pricks with tiny Pee-Ps and loads of audacity. Thank the lordy lord that I have found my version of your John.

Hell yeah. Who has been through the worst with me, as you will read in this listener, too. Oh, I love that. I'm happy that you're happy, but I'm sorry that you had to go through the worst with your John. I'm glad you found a new John. Yeah, everybody should go find a new John. Yeah, always. Unless your John's not broken. If your John's not broken, don't fix it. Don't leave a Whatever it is. A perfectly good job. A perfectly good job. There you go.

There you go. So for the longest time, I was really bummed that I didn't have a listener tale to share. It always starts like that. Uh-oh. But that all changed on August 17th, 2021. Oh, this was recent. It was.

And now I wish that I never had a listener tale to share with you ladies. But here we are. Oh, man. This is a long one. I'm sorry. I would tell you to cut it down, but I don't want you to yell at me. We won't. I also changed.

most of the names in this story for privacy and legal reasons. All right, my fantastically morbid friends, buckle yourselves in because the ride is about to start. Ooh, I'm scared. I hate rides. I'll fucking love rides. In fact, I want to go on a ride right now. So let's go. My heart just went into fight or flight mode. As soon as she said buckle in, the ride's about to begin. I was like, nope, I'm out. Ooh, I felt like I was going to go down on a roller coaster. Except I recently, sorry, aside, I went on the rock and roller coaster recently at Universal. And let me just tell you, that changes with age. I think I got concussed. Maybe. I've never been on any of those because I hate roller coaster.

I love them, but it's different now. The aging, you know. I feel old. Anyways, I've worked on the health field since I was 15, started in a pharmacy, then to a nursing home. But eventually as a support worker, I also studied nursing and then psychology. Oh, wow. And I loved it. I felt that I'd found my purpose, helping people was my passion, and I was good at it.

Damn. Good for you, man. I know, for real. As a support worker, I went to the houses that my company rented and looked after. or cared for the tenants and clients that they placed in them. These clients can have physical disabilities, intellectual disabilities, and or very poor mental health. The client involved in this story has paranoid schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, self-destructive bipolar disorder, severe anxiety, and major depression, all brought on by trauma to the frontal lobe from childhood abuse and illicit substance abuse. That's sad.

That's really sad. I will be calling her Jen. I had been caring for Jen since April of 2021 when I first started working for the company. She had been seen fit to enter the community life after having a very long stint at our local hospital's mental health unit, and I was one of a few people responsible for her transition back to quote-unquote normal life. Jen and I hit it off instantly. She was quirky and funny, and I allowed her to be herself without any judgment. I was thrilled with this job. I loved hanging out with Jen, but she liked to keep to herself mostly so I could catch her.

on my psychology studies whenever she wanted alone time. Jen initially struggled with the transition into living quote-unquote independently. She struggled with having a roommate who also had mental health issues, doing chores, managing money, and struggled with the fact that she couldn't entirely be left alone. It started to become apparent that Jen's moods escalated during the afternoon and evening, and I always had to deal with her episodes of psychosis. Even when another carer was on with her, I was rostered on with her. I was rostered on with Jen's roommate. My co-workers would, oh, sorry, yeah, my co-workers would get me to deal with Jen's meltdowns because I was so used to them.

Despite all of this, Jen and I maintained a good relationship, and she often confided in me with things she wouldn't tell anybody else. It got to the point where I was her main afternoon-slash-evening carer and the main point of contact for her health team. Jen also really struggled with addiction, mainly to cigarettes and energy drinks. She was on many medications to help combat these addictions, in particular nicotine chewing gum. The day of the incident was a fucking shit show. I was drowning in study assignments. My shitbox of a car was making a weird noise. So relatable. And my refrigerator had died, so it wasn't running. I had to. I really did not want to work, but I showed up anyways, mainly because I'm a slut for a good paycheck. That's amazing. When I first turned up, Jen was in a weird mood. My coworker from the morning shift gave me the handover and said that Jen had been moody all day.

I was dreading the shift because I knew that Jen was going to be hard to deal with. And shit was I right. Jen was a handful during that shift, constantly fighting back, breaking house rules, mistaking medication and provoking her housemate. Oh, no. I'm already, like, stressed. I know. My coworker Jamie that was rostered on with Jen's housemate was a new hire. She'd only been with the company for about a month, so she'd never seen Jen like this before.

It was a fucking nightmare. I was worried about Jamie and how she would handle the situation. I was worried about Jen's housemate, and I was worried there would be another emotional breakdown. I should have just called in sick like I was planning to. Uh-oh. Oh, no. That night, I was texting my boyfriend and talking to him about the refrigerator that I just bought off Facebook Marketplace to replace my other one for only $70. A fucking amazing steal, if you ask me.

If you ask anyone. Dude, refrigerators are like ridiculously expensive for no reason. Seventy bucks. We all need them. I know. Anyways, when Jen came inside after chain smoking around 15 cigarettes, I had to keep count for health records. She was clearly in a bad mood.

I feel like my stomach would get so sick from that. She ignored me when I asked how she was and if she wanted dinner. My boyfriend then messaged and asked if he could see the fridge, but I told him, give me a minute, I have to help my client, XX. Jen asked for a piece of nicotine chewing gum. I advised Jen that she wait an hour for the gum as she only just had a cigarette, a rule that she was aware of. Jen became argumentative and started yelling. I tried to distract Jen by asking if she wanted to watch a TV or even a horror movie, which she loves, but I fucking hate.

I have anxiety, okay? But she refused and went upstairs to her room. Jamie and I shared a look like, for fuck's sake, here we go. Luckily, Jamie's client had gone to her grandma's house for dinner an hour earlier, so Jamie could help me calm down Jen. Usually in situations like this, we waited for Jen to calm herself down to a point where she would listen to us and respond to our help. When in her room, Jen started to slam doors, punch things, and yell and scream, I'm going to fucking kill you, you need to die. That's like the opposite of calming herself down. That is true.

Yeah. Jen came back downstairs, and she started to yell at me that she wanted gum. Her eyes were so blown out that they were black. Her fists were clenched so hard that I swear she was drawing blood, and she bared her teeth at the same. me like an animal. I stood up from where I was sitting to try to calm Jen down. Bad move on my part. I'm a foot taller than her. Shout out to my tall queens. So she took it as a sign of intimidation. Jen charged at me and grabbed me by my hair and used it as an anchor to start punching me in the face repeatedly. Oh my God. That is fighting dirty. Surprisingly, I didn't feel shit. Jen was hell as strong and was not going lightly and yet my solid teeth took each hit without fail.

Oh. I tried to reason with Jen and ask her to let me go, but she just kept repeating that she wanted me to die, die, bitch, die. Wow. Oh, I'm so scared. At this point, I called out to Jamie to call zero zero. Also, why did you have to do that? Jamie, just call zero zero. I was eventually able to get Jen off of me. As blood and chunks of my gum started to fill my mouth and my face started to swell, I went to get her chewing gum from the safe where all the medications were kept. Just as I put the key in, I saw that Jen had gone to the kitchen and was looking for a weapon. Oh, no. I yelled at Jamie that we needed to get the fuck out of there and that Jen had gotten a weapon. My coworker and I ran to the front door. As I started to turn the handle, I felt Jen come up behind me. I turned around and put my hands up in an attempt to placate Jen, but in her hand was a cheap, serrated steak knife, a fucking knife.

She grabbed me by my left hand and stabbed me twice under my left breast and once under my left breast. and once under my left nipple. Oh, my God. At first, I thought she just punched me, but when I lifted my shirt up, I saw blood. She stabbed me so deep each time that her fist had punched my chest. Oh, my God.

Wow. So that means the entire steak knife was literally inside of you. Oh, this is hurting my chest. Oh, I feel like I need a deep breath. Oh, where's Drew? I need a pallet cleanse. I'm sorry. Oh, I let Jamie know that I had been stabbed,

and she informed the 0-0-0-0-0-2. dispatcher. My direct quote was, holy fuck, she fucking stabbed me. Yeah, I don't believe me. Like, bitch, I am trying to help you beat your addiction. And this is how you repay me by trying to fucking kill me. What the fuck, dude? Not cool. Not cool indeed. Amazingly, I didn't feel anything at first, other than her fist contacting my chest. But I think that was due to the adrenaline that was pumping through me and the shock of the whole situation. I managed to get Jen out of the house and then locked the door behind her. I started to, excuse me, I started to freak the the freak out? Because what if the police got mad at me for pushing somebody out onto the street with a

weapon? Would I be responsible if somebody else got hurt? Jen was under my care after all. Though internally, my mind was diarrhea shitting itself. Oh my God. I was at work, so I had to keep some form of level-headedness. While you just got stabbed. I know, I was going to say, I love that you, like, could think to even be level-headed whilst bleeding from multiple stab wounds. My adrenaline was pumping, and my mind was racing. I went to call our companies after-hours nurse, but I couldn't find the phone number in the book that the sticky note was always in. Why would someone move it? I then tried to call my boss but got no response. Wow, this sucks. Then when I put my phone down, it was as if I got hit by a Mack truck. My body just crumpled. I laid on the couch.

I laid on the couch as I became dizzy. My vision went blurry. And then I passed out. When I came to, I was sweating. And I started to strip all my clothes off. I kept saying to Jamie, I can't breathe. Why is it so hot? What did you? she do to me. Please help me. Oh, God. I was going in and out of consciousness as Jamie helped me get my jacket and top off. And I could see that she was sobbing and she kept telling me to stay with her. Oh. I was so confused until I heard her tell the ambulance dispatcher that she thinks Jen stabbed my heart. I kept repeating, no, she didn't, not my heart. It has to be my lung. I can't breathe. Oh my God. I'm so stressed for you. This is so stressful. I'm so glad that you are writing this

because it means you're okay. I know. My goodness. The police and paramedics finally arrived after what felt like an eternity, but in reality was six minutes from when the OOO call was first placed. They immediately put me in the stretcher and loaded me into the ambulance. And through all of this, all I could hear was Jen outside screaming, die, die, die, bitch, fucking die. Oh my God. In my delirious state, I kept apologizing to the paramedics and the police for what happened and kept asking them to ring my mom or my boyfriend. When they said they didn't know their numbers, I asked if they had a pen and paper and then told them my mom's number, all while bleeding out in the back of an ambulance. Damn, you're a real one. You truly are. When we presented to the emergency department

at the hospital, I was blue. My lips were swollen, bloodied and purple. My eyes were glassy and rolled back into my head. Because that's the other thing. She also got punched in the face. I just remembered that. Several times. I had no peripheral pulses. My blood pressure was 30 over 20. Wow. Normal range is 120 over 80. And my oxygen saturation was 30%. Normal range is 90 to 100. Wow. They thought I was dead. I was literally medically dead. The only reason they knew I was alive is because they kept saying my name wrong and getting my age wrong and I was fucking correcting them. Hell yeah, you were. Yes. In my half alive state, I was getting mad that they were saying my name wrong. They told me to wiggle my toes to see if I was still coherent and I did like the bad bitch I am. Hell yeah. Seriously, when they praised me for it, I was so proud of myself. You should be. Yeah, to say the least. Eventually a warm sensation filled my body, kind of like being submerged in warm water and my vision went white. I felt like someone was holding me. It was so comforting. Looking back, I felt like everyone I had ever loved was telling me that I was going to be okay. My whole body is chilling right now. I'm warming. I was going to be okay that they loved me and I was

in a safe place. Suddenly, I wasn't scared anymore. And all I could think about was how great my life had been and how sad I was to miss out on the future. My boyfriend and I had planned out. Then I passed out. Oh my God. I was coded as a red blanket. A quick definition. definition from Google. Red Blanket is a rapid transfer protocol that fast-tracks trauma patients with severe blood loss to the operating theater, giving them the best chance at survival. Damn. I ended up undergoing, oh my God. Wow. I ended up undergoing emergency open heart surgery. Jen had punctured my heart's right ventricle and severed a major artery coming out of my aorta, causing me to have a cardiac tamponade.

Holy shit. Kind of like a heart attack. I have to breathe. I'm so sorry. Severed a major artery coming out of your aorta. The fact that you are alive right now. The fact that you typed that sentence. She had also punctured my diaphragm and lacerated my liver.

I lost 60% of my blood volume. Damn. That bled out into my chest, which then was pumped back into my body, along with six units, three liters or 0.79 gallons of blood. blood. I had a 5% survival rate. Holy shit. Which they did not think I would pull through and it was a miracle that I did. While this was all happening, the police called my parents and told them that I had presented to the hospital with minor defensive wounds. Exquise me, bish. I'm obsessed with you. You still have your humor. I love you so much. And that they should go pick me up. It wasn't until they

got to the hospital that they found out the severity of my injuries. Can you imagine being like, oh my gosh, I'm so worried she got in some kind of fight. Yeah, like a defense thing. And then you get to the fucking hospital and they're like, yeah, she's an open heart surgery. She has a 5% chance of survival. Like whoever made that original phone call should be sued. Damn. Jesus Christ. Yeah, they found out the severity of my injuries. My long distance boyfriend was playing video games when he got the call for my eldest brother

about what happened and raced down to come see me. All six, yes, six, and all from the same parents of my siblings, went to my parents' house at 12 a.m. to wait for anyone, any more information about me. When I came to at 6.30 a.m. the next morning, they all came to the hospital to see me. I apparently got mad at my parents for taking so long to get to the hospital. The first thing my boyfriend said when he saw me was, I was so mad because our last conversation could have been about a fucking fridge. I didn't even get to tell you, I love you. Oh, I loved that, which I would have been pissed about too. Yeah. We all cried together, and then I started flipping everyone off and complaining about fake bitches,

trying to be my friends now that I almost died. I was so high on pain killers. Fake bitches. I love that you were just like flipping the bird. Like fuck these girls. He was just trying to get my almost died clout. Yes. My survival clout.

One of my doctors came to see me and told me that if I didn't have such a large chest, then I probably would have died. So thanks to good genetics, my G-Cup movie saved my life. Wow. I now call my left boob the golden tit. Okay, I've usually been like annoyed. about having a bigger chest, but now I feel a little better about it. Yeah, and I feel a little scared. Yeah. As I'm writing this, it's been over a year since the incident. Jen was sent to prison and is awaiting trial on charges of the severest level of grievous.

Grievous. Thank you. Grievous bodily harm. I'm no longer studying psychology, as I don't want to face people like this every day. Yeah, I can't blame you for that. No. I'm not yet cleared to go back to work by my psychiatrist. I've been diagnosed with PTSD. hyperhydrosis, paranoia delusions, depression, anxiety, and my scars make me look like a patchwork quilt. I bet you are beautiful and your scars are just battle scars that make you the bad bitch you are. My hair is falling out. I have nightmares almost every night and I constantly think that people are trying to kill me now. Oh, I just want to reach out and hug you. I know, I do too. But other than that, I'm good. My goodness, girly girl. I'm seeing a doctor, physiotherapist. I call it.

dermatologist and psychiatrist regularly. And we're all working together to try to put me back on track. Good for you for making sure you're doing what you're sort of like you're, you're getting the help that you require right now. And I just, like, I just feel like you're going to be okay. You are. Like just, I know it. I get this energy from you that you're the baddest bitch alive, clearly. And I think you're just going to be okay. I mean, look at you. You're writing about it. That's a huge step. That's a huge step. I have good days and bad days and other days where I wish I'd just died when she stabbed me. But I don't think I would have made it this far in my recovery if it wasn't for my family and boyfriend. Oh, I love that.

That's incredible. They've been so amazing and so supportive. And if it wasn't for Jamie, I would have died that night. She was amazing. Go Jamie. Yeah, shout out to Jamie. My health team have been some of my biggest cheerleaders, which make me forever grateful. I'm not a huge believer in God, but someone was looking out for me that night.

Whether it be my nan, grandma, pop, granddad, or uncle who have passed on, someone was holding my hand and pushing me to live that night. Oh, I keep kidding. I do too. You are chillifying this pause up. I just want to say that in no way, shape, or form am I trying to attack people with a serious mental health disease? From working in the health industry, I have a huge respect for people who live with these issues. Yes, what happened to me has completely changed my life. I sometimes feel resentful, but I don't hold any blame towards Jen at all. She's not well, and her mental state is not her fault. These people need help, not to be vilified and put down. Good for you, man. The fact that you can say that, and I agree.

with you. But the fact that you can say that after all you've been through and while exactly you're actively dealing with this, you're like big person. You're going to get through this because that's your attitude. Yeah. Thank you for taking the time to read my long-ass story. There's so much more I could tell you about it, but I don't want it to go on forever. I love you too so much. And although I had to take a small break from listening to crime podcast after what happened. Why? You ladies have helped me feel normal again. Aw. Thank you. That makes me happy. Honestly, sometimes I feel. I feel. I feel. I feel like, like listening to and watching the amount of true crime that I do probably doesn't help my paranoia or recovery. But oh well, say Levy. Well, you know what? We got you got some spooky in there too.

Yeah, exactly. You can revert to the spookies if you need to. That's why we do it, y'all. Thanks again. And remember people, be kind to health care workers. And to keep it weird. But not so weird that you go back to work just to try, wait, hold on, I'm going to start it over. So it's really good. But not so weird that you go to work just trying to make some cold hard cash and then you get assaulted by your client. And she tries to kill you, which you almost die and have to go under emergency life-saving surgery and go through a freaking long recovery process and then fall into a depressive state. But feel much better now. Yay. P.S. I have attached some articles of the incident and pictures of my wounds below. Also of my dogs and my partner and I. Yay. PPS for all those wondering, I still got my fridge. And I did not get in trouble by the police for pushing Jen outside.

That's great. Oh my God. You're beautiful. You are beautiful. And look at you. You're in the fucking hospital and look how great you look. My goodness. Look at these wounds. Wow. Oh. You are the baddest beauch. Oh my God. I love your hair color.

I know that's not the point of this at all, but like here I am. You're a badass. Yeah. Yeah. I love you. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, wait.

You're beautiful, both of you. Oh, my God. Look at you. And I like that dress. And you guys are such a handsome little couple. I'm telling you guys. Oh, the dog. They're gorgeous.

They're gorgeous. I'm not going to say your dog's names, but I love them. Oh. Beautiful. And I know everybody's like, I want to see. I know. But just trust us. She's gorgeous. Her boyfriend is gorgeous. And the dogs are gorgeous. Both. Everything about them are beautiful and wonderful and mystical. And I'm so glad that you're here and that you're doing better. Y'all shine from the inside out. You do. We love you. And like, consider this a get better from us. Hell yeah. We love you. You're doing great. You're killing it. You're doing great. You're doing amazing, sweetie. Wow. Okay. So, woo. All right. I know. I'm like, can I breathe? This one is called My Uncle Knows the Answer to a 40-year-old cold case, but not even a million-dollar reward will make them talk.

I'm sorry, Hua. Damn. I'm like, are we allowed to read this? I'm like, can we talk about this? Okay, here we go. Hey, weirdos, my name is Lila. You can use all names. I've changed them all.

I come from the wonderful land of Australia. Oh, good job. More specifically, Melbourne. Pronounced Melbourne. Perfect. I love how you helped me through that, and then we're like, great job, good job. Firstly, I would like to thank you, girls, for sending me to sleep every night. I apparently can't fall asleep to silence.

However, my boyfriend is slightly petrified of me when he hears you girls in the middle of the night in midst of explaining murder and torture, and I'm peacefully snoozing away. I've recommended your podcast to anyone that will listen to me, and I'll continue to do so. Thank you so much. Thank you. It's just the best. Anyway, let's get into the story. Growing up, my Uncle James was the kind of good.

guy that was always on holidays. Just always on holidays. I remember asking my mom at about age 15, Mom, where's Uncle James? You said we don't see him because he's on holidays. Surely he can't still be away. To which my mom replied, sweetie, Uncle James was never away. He made a meth lab in his basement and is in jail. Just kidding. She didn't say it like that. But it was something along the lines. Anyway, that doesn't add much to the story, but you kind of get the gist of my relationship to him, although you're probably picturing a real Aussie Bogan. Anyway, he is actually quite a poised individual who loves to collect Asian artifacts and nowadays gets scammed slash falls in love with ladies over the internet who are more than likely old men.

Oh, no, Uncle James. We're going to see him on like on TLC someday. Damn, this story has a little bit of background information. It doesn't add that much to the story, but I just like weird coincidences, so I have to include. I agree. When my mom was 18, she got in a horrific motorcycle accident. Her work friend asked her if she wanted a lift home on his motorcycle, and my mother, the adventurous being she is, said yes. She was shortly after hit from behind by a drunk driver going 140KS. I don't know what that is converted to miles.

I do not either. Probably fast. She was hit from behind, smashed onto his windscreen. It completely shattered. He then continued to drive for over 200 meters. Oh my God. With her on top of the bonnet. When he came to a stop, he then ran over her.

Jesus. Jesus. 86 miles for Americans. Holy shit. This was on the 21st of November when she was 18 years old. Keep that in mind. Anyway, my after many injuries and many months of the hospital, my mom finally healed. Healed fully.

When she got home from the hospital, her mom decided to tell her that while she was in there, her brother had been involved in slash witnessed a murder. and not just any murder, his girlfriends. Oh my God. Poor gal can't catch a break. Seriously? Her brother James and his two other friends, Freddie and Bailey, were going out on a boat together.

My uncle James decided to invite his girlfriend Sarah along. Sarah was a gorgeous model in 23 years old. Freddy, one of the other people in the boat, was a bit of a wild person and decided to bring two guns to shoot beer cans and just being an annoying boy, apparently. Sarah ended up being shot between the eyes and killed. Oh my God. The story has changed since it first happened almost 40 years ago, and no one ended up being fully charged with the murder of Sarah.

What? It's so weird to think my uncle knows what happened, but for some reason, he's holding this information in. Yeah, you've got to let that out. I know he didn't do it, as he was never a suspect. And my guess, like everyone else's, is that it was Freddie. In fact, I think the police know it was him. They just don't have the exact evidence to charge him.

Oh, my God. Jesus. The story they go along with is that Freddie was shooting beer cans, passed the gun to Bailey, Bailey dropped it, and it fired, right between her eyes. Yeah, I don't think so. Fast forward to 2016, my brother was 18 years old. My mom hadn't thought or heard about the case for over 30 years, and then my brother almost died. Ooh, you guessed it, on the 21st of November at age 18.

He was hit by a semi-trailer truck, and it's a miracle he survived. Holy shit. Many days in a coma, internal bleeding, intensive care, the whole lot. Oh my God. Holy shit. A couple of days after the accident, my mom got a call from Uncle James, which was very weird because they hadn't spoken for years. Uncle James called to let my mom know the case about Sarah was reopening. This shit's like a movie. How weird. Mom's accident, my brother's accident being on the exact day and same age, and this cold case just reopening 32 years later. the case had reopened and offered one million dollars of a reward for any information calling to any family and friends of the people on the boat or anyone on the boat.

It's so weird, my uncle would have to know, but what is stopping him from telling the truth and gaining one milly? And of course, giving her family the justice and answers they deserve. Right. I did a bit of a deep dive and found Sarah's brother's Facebook, and I saw that their mother passed away not long ago. And one of the last things she said was find out who did this.

Oh, that is. It's so heartbreaking and I'm angry for them. It's strange because Uncle James was her boyfriend. You'd think I forgot. Yeah, I totally forgot about that. You'd think he would want to lock away anyone who did this. By the way, if you tell me it was probably him, I won't be offended. I have no relation to him, really.

Anyway, that's a weird story. One other little side note is that a couple years ago, my boyfriend at the time, was telling his mates this story while they were camping. One of his mates was like, wait a second, my uncle was on that boat too. His uncle was Bailey. What? The other random guy, Melbourne is not small. In fact, there's over 5 million populations. So this was just another weird coincidence.

Side side note, this has nothing to do with this story, but I told my mom about your listener tales and what I was planning to tell you guys about. And she was like, but what about this story? Or this one, or this one. The woman has a million stories. So I'm going to settle on a quick little one about when she was just a wee little gal. I'll keep it quick. When my mom was growing up, they kept the windows open during the night and the back door. Fresh air is for dead people.

One night a man came in, grabbed a cloth off the washing line, and in mom's words, put vinegar on it and put it over her face while she was sleeping. What? He then lifted her up and carried her halfway out the front door. Oh, my God. Luckily, my mom's dad heard the screams and chased this man down the street. Mom was interviewed by police and whatnot, but they never found the attempted kidnapper. Oh, my God. However, my mom doesn't remember anything.

She was at such a vulnerable age that I questioned whether it wasn't actually vinegar. That's what I wanted. I think that shit was chloroform. Instead, it would be something that would knock you out. Yeah. I found stories and old news about a girl who would have been my mom's age and in the same area who was taken for four days. and found in a car on a street not so far from hers. I don't know. Maybe I'm just reading into things.

I don't think so. Anyway, love you girls and hope you enjoyed my long story. You seriously are a major part of my daily routine. You two and your banter is just like Aussie banter. And I think you would fit in great here. What a fucking compliment. My goodness. I can't.

The only Australian thing I can say is nor. NAR. NAR, clear. The only thing I'm struggling with. Oh, okay. You say it right here. Also, I know you aren't, the girls aren't the biggest fan of spiders. I don't see them that often. And when I do, I'm completely petrified. I was going to say the only thing I struggle with is spiders. So I feel like there's got to be places where it's like less active. Yeah. I'm going to go with that. Yeah. I haven't grown accustomed to them and keep them in my room for pets like some people may say, oh, well, anyway, see ya. Bye. Hope you enjoyed and keep it weird, but not so weird that that this. Just that this. Wow. Holy cannolly. That was outrageous. Lila.

And now I just want to know. What does he know? What is he holding in? Why is he holding it in? That's the thing. Can you write us if he ever does say and tell us what happened? Because I forgot halfway through that story, by the way, that it was his girlfriend. Same here.

And then the thing about the mom, like, find out who did this. No parent should ever have to die wondering what happened to their child. Yeah, I can't say, I mean, obviously I can't say what happened on that boat. Nobody was on there except for them. What would you think just from what we know? It's got to be that somebody's protecting someone. Somebody's absolutely protecting somebody because a gun does not drop in fire between somebody's eyes. But I'm also like, was it an accident? Maybe it was an accident and they were just like fooling around. Yeah. Like maybe what happened is she stepped in front by accident or gotten the line of fire.

And whoever was shooting it, that would be their fault. Yeah. But if you say it dropped, no one's hands are on the gun. Then it is nobody's fault. So maybe whoever accidentally did it, they're all trying to save that person because it was not intentional. Even if she had stepped in front of it, though, she would have to be like sidestepping to get shot between the eyes. Yeah. Or it was shot and she quickly turned.

Yeah. To maybe like miss it. I don't know. Or could have ricocheted off of something. That's a wild one. Yeah. I will say that. That's something.

All right. Damn. I'm so sorry for her family. And thank you for telling me us that we would be good in Australia. I feel like very high and mighty now. I do too. I'm going to... That's a compliment.

I don't even know what I'm going to do with that. That is a compliment because we love you guys. We love you so much. So let's read another listener tale from Australia since we're Australian now. Yeah. This one is called Listener Tale from Australia. Hiked a Haunted Mountain. Hell yeah, you did.

There's more mountains than I've ever climbed. Let's get. You know, we're getting away from stabbing and shooting. and we're going to haunt it. Could be scary, though. Could. Okay, dokey. Good day, guys.

Good day. Was that all right? No. Okay. All names can be used. My name is Alexandria, you turn. Or just Alex, whatever floats your belt. By the way, this is like sibling shit.

Yeah, exactly. Like, she's not being really. No, I'm not actually being me. I'm just, that's who I am. I'm blinking a lot, guys. Just blink, blink, blink, blinking. Help, help, help. No kidding.

Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving. in a deck. I'm going to sabotage your Thanksgiving dinner. Well, I'll continue to be a porch to you. A porch? I've never even heard that. Instead of a deck, I'm a porch. That's what I'll say to John. Sometimes I'm like, stop being a porch. That's silly. Yeah. You guys are funny. We're funny. You guys are so American. Okay. Good eye, guys. That was better. I know. I worked on it. Yeah. I wanted to stick it to you. All names can be used. My name is Alexandria. That's a beautiful name. Or just Alex, whatever floats your boat.

Alexandria floats my boat. Yeah. I am writing this in from the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia. My best friend Nicole showed me your podcast a couple of months ago. Shout out to Nicole. Hell yeah. Nicole. I almost said Shaquille.

That's the shoutout for Nicole. Shecole. That's my middle name. Not Shaquille, Nicole. And I have been obsessed ever since. Nicole, Nicole. We both absolutely. Nope.

You're British. Yep. That's what happens. We both absolutely love your humor. Oh, sorry, I'm interrupting you a lot, but I do have to say that it makes me so angry because the way you guys spell humor, I love. It's H-U-M-O-U-R. Yeah, when you guys add the U. The U. But then Autocrac is like, that's wrong. And I'm like, no, you're just uncultured. It's true. We both absolutely love your humor and appreciate all the hard work you guys put into this podcast. Thanks so much. I appreciate you. We too. It is amazing and you guys are amazing. You're amazing. Just an FYI. You use the term soggy wet lettuce in one of your podcasts, and it's become a regular saying in our day-to-day life. You know, it's funny as an Australian listener came up with that. Yeah, I think they were the ones who came up with it. So, see? It's so accurately described some people slash sitzsche-sciwarch. And it just makes us piss ourselves laughing. I really hope you guys remember saying it. Oh, we do. Anyway, this is a long, long, long, long. Whoa. Sorry. And I'm sorry. And I'm sorry. You don't have to be. Don't be. This is the story of the time my boyfriend. And I'm, and I'm,

hiked a mountain. It was a beautiful sunny Saturday in January of 2021 summer in Australia. And Sam and I... What? When you're January and summer? Oh, fuck. Yeah. Isn't that weird? I was like, what? What's so weird about that? You know, the equator. And Sam and I had been dating for just over six months. Sam would travel about an hour and spend the weekend at mine almost every weekend, as we didn't live together at the time. Nothing was different about this weekend. He came over on Friday night and we planned on going on a new adventure on Saturday. My previous boyfriends hated hiking, so I was taking full advantage of Sam loving it, and we would always go on new adventures every weekend. That's fucking pure as hell, and I love it. Doorsy. In Dorsey. We woke up Saturday morning,

had a cheeky sleep in. Oh my God, I'm obsessed. I love the word cheeky. Oh, we've been saying cheeky. We have been saying cheeky. And we've been pretty cheeky lately. I was going to say we've been cheeky. Had a cheeky sleep in and decided to tackle Mount Erewa. Love it. Yeah. Love it. Love it. In the afternoon, so it wouldn't be so hot.

Plus, we had read plenty of reviews, and many of them said it wasn't hard and took about roughly an hour, maybe a little more. Sam and I classed ourselves pretty fit. Oh, my God, I love it. Sam and I classed ourselves pretty fit and thought we would smash it. So we left for Mount Arrowawa mid-afternoon and arrived at the mountain at roughly 3.30 p.m. Sunset in January in Australia is about 6 to 6.30. I thought you were going to tell me that it was at 3.30 and I was so confused. Yep. But it's not. Six to six to six 30. So we thought that we would have plenty of time to get up and down the mountain safely. The drive there was fine. Beautiful, actually. The surroundings were very green with rolling hills in the distance. It was peaceful. Although there was no phone reception. That's peaceful. That's terrifying. That's so peaceful. I crave that.

When we arrived at the mountain, we pulled up on the side of the road and we were the only car there and the entrance to the mountain was a tiny trail on the left unmarked with a roadwork sign next to it. Sam and I were unsure if this was the start of the mountain trail to begin with, but it had to be, right? No. Well, it was. Okay. That worked out so perfectly. We started walking and the trail was very small and I could instantly tell that it wasn't trafficked off him. There was debris everywhere, fallen trees over the track and weeds overgrown everywhere. We were in thick Australian bushland. That's for sure. I was walking in front, and as soon as I entered the track, as soon as I entered the track, a wave of uneasiness hit me like a freight train, like a bad, bad, bad gut feeling I couldn't ignore. I shouldn't ignore, but I did. Oh, no. Little did I know, Sam had the exact same feeling, but we both didn't say anything. I hate when you find that out later and you're like, damn it. We could have fucking bogged it in that moment. I should have said it out loud. We'd been raw. We had been wah. I was combining walking and roughly because my brain does that.

We have been rocking. We had been walking for roughly three minutes when all of the sudden, out of nowhere, the sound of a vicious, wild, angry dog halted us in our tracks. The dog barked at us for what felt like an eternity, but in reality it was about 10 seconds. I felt as though the spit from the dog's aggressive bark was spreeing into my face. I was shaking like a leaf. And Sam told me to get behind him. Wow. We love. Sam. This is so hot right now. And we both picked up the closest logs ready to defend ourselves from this dog when it finally showed itself. But it never did. We never saw the dog. We never even heard the rustling of it running away through the bush. It was like it never existed in the first place. What? Just to preface. Sorry, I hit some chips. I'm not about

animal cruelty. But if a wild hound is about to mall my boyfriend and I, I'm going to protect my arse. Oh, hell yeah. You got to. When I used to walk Bailey at night and we have like coyotes and shit around us, I used to spend the entire time telling her how I would punch a coyote in the face for her. Oh yeah.

I've heard you say that before. Multiple times. Hell yeah. I'm like, Bailey, no. Just know that I will punch it. I will fight a coyote. Yeah. I will send you running home. Yeah. And I will beat that coyote. And I am not about animal cruelty. That's love. But you got to protect yours. That's absolutely love. Actually, your kids were leaving my house the other night. And if one of them, we'll almost just like out at that, one of them was like, is that a coyote as I was literally hovering with my leg dangling out the door, like buckling them in. And I was like, what? She was like, just kidding. I was like, I was like, I almost just like lost it.

You're like, God damn. I thought my, I thought my, is that your femur? This is your femur. Oh, that's your tibia. I thought my tibia was in goner. So Sam and I was frozen. Logs. ripped tightly in our hands, but we continued walking. Looking back, I have absolutely no idea why we went on. But we did. Adrenaline, maybe. Wow. Not wanting to seem scared, maybe. Maybe. Not wanting to let the other person down, maybe. I don't know. But we kept walking, logs still gripped tightly in our hands. The track stayed just as overgrown as it got worse. Uh, no, and it got worse, the deeper that we got into the bushland. Turn back. Turn back now. Before it's too late. Before it's too late. Exactly.

What she said. The track bended to the right and started sloping downwards and a deep gully. I love the word gully. Gully. Reminds me a fern gully.

I was just going to say where I know you were and I read your mind and I said it first. You did. We'd only been walking for another two minutes when we entered the gully. Furn gully!

I almost just said the fern gully was deep. The gully was deep. We walked down a steep slope to get into it and we could see that there was an even steeper slope with a rope. A slope with a rope, you say.

Slope with a rope. That's dope. To help you get out of it at the other side. It was about the width of a small river, and it was densely covered in trees and ferns. So it was a fern, gully. Sam and I walked to the gully, and all of a sudden we were punched with the smell of death. Oh. The smell was so strong. I felt like I could taste it.

At the back of my throat, and we were swarmed with flies. Ooh. Uh-oh. That's like the start out of there. That's like how the butcher and the wrens. starts. Get out of there. Spoiler alert. I started swatting the flies away from my face and we both started running up, running up the other side of the gully. As my first thought was, we had stumbled onto the vicious dogs kill. But we saw no carcass. There was nothing. How could something small

that strong and be that vile, but there be no carcass? How could there be a thick swarm of flies and there be no carcass? How? It's haunted. Mm-hmm. That's a haunted place. That's a haunted hack. That's a haunted hack, you're all. Sib and I pulled ourselves up the other side of the gully using the rope. That was dope. For the slope. Yeah.

I was about to say, nope. I just said, yeah. I decided to be your height man instead. That's nice. Yeah. Yeah. I love that your like internal thing was like, say no. No, say no.

Say no. No, say yes. And then I went with, yeah. Yeah. So we used that rope that was dope for the slope and finally started to feel okay and safe because yeah. Because we heard the sound of children laughing. Oh no. That doesn't make you feel safe. I was going to say TBH, like that doesn't make me feel safe at all. You're in the bush. It was all going to be fine. We could run into the children and a family soon. We kept walking. And I decided to yell, co-wee. Oh my God, yes. To the kids. I don't know if you guys know what that is, but it's a noise you make to attract attention. If you co-wee, I wonder if I'm doing it right. Coo-ee.

You are. Oh, awesome. That's how we do it, at least. That's how we do it. If you co-wee to the people nearby, they will co-wee back. So, you know, you're close. There was no co-e-ey back. I did it again and nothing.

What kids don't co-wee back? I love that she's like, what kind of kids don't coo-e back? I mean, I feel the same. What kind of bullshit is this? are lame as fuck. No kid I want to run into. I started to realize that the voices were staying the same direction. I started to realize that the voices were staying the same distance away from us. The children's laughter was always to the right of us following us up the mountain. Nah. The laughter was coming from the dense bushland. How can kids be out there?

How, though. How, though? Make it make sense. Yeah, are they just consistently laughing too? I'd be like, what the fuck is so funny? are you lolling at? What are you laughing at? I'll teach you what to laugh about. The laughter was coming. No, I already read that. I thought to myself, and why would their parents allow them to play up a mountain in the dense push land? I wondered that as well. Maybe they would appear on the track soon with their parents. Maybe they will respond to my quiz, but they never did. Wow. I don't like this. It's very Blair Witch, Australian style. Yeah. Oh, fuck. I just saw the scene of the kids, and I hate you. The kids with the hands on the tent.

I hate that. I fucking hate that scene. It haunts me. That sound, the sounds, they're just like the, oh. Yeah, no, the hands. Little kid hands are gross. Just kidding. I mean, usually there are. Dead little kids' hands are gross. I would assume. Oh, fuck. Anyways, it got to the stage, Sam and I started to blast. Yeah, it got to the stage. Okay, I understand. You got this. It got to the stage that Sam and I started to blast music to help drown out the noise of the laughing children following us on the map. It might have just been a coincidence, but the first song that happened to come on shuffle was Call The Doctor by J.J. Cal and the sequence of songs that followed made Sam and I so uncomfortable, we ended up turning the music off altogether, also to save our phone batteries, as it was roughly 430 by this time. I hate this a lot. Turn back. Turn back now. The track started to get rougher by this time, and I had started walking in front of Sam again. It was beginning to get really hard to identify where the track. was, and we relied solely on where we could see other hikers had walked previously. There were many times Sam and I looked at each other and asked, is this the right way? And I know that made both of us nervous. I still don't know why we hadn't turned around. Although I was determined now to make it to the top. And I thought, we have made it this far. We've got to get to the top. You're a determined biotch. This mountain was taking us way, way longer than we thought it would have. And when we reached the

first peak, we thought the second peak wouldn't be too far. We would get there, admire the view for a second, and then pace quickly down before dark, but, as you can probably guess, that was not the case. We reached the first peak, and we started walking quickly towards the second. I could see in front of me the track passed between two trees in a V-like formation. I walked through the two trees, and my heart skipped a beat. As I passed through the two trees, it sounded as if a squeaky door slowly open to let me through. No. Mm-mm. No.

Nay. No. Nay, I say. Sam wasn't too far behind me, but he stopped after he passed through those two trees and yelled out to me that he wasn't going any further. Did he hear it too, I thought to myself? I think he did. I think so.

I kept walking without him because I'm a dumb bitch. You are not. No, you're not. The track was so overgrown. I could still see Sam, but I didn't know how long I had left until the second peak. Was it 10 meters or another 30-minute walk? walk. Sam started to disappear from my sight and he called out to me. I hate not finishing things, but I needed to pick my battles. The sun was setting quickly and we still had to venture down the

poorly path mountain after facing everything that we just went through. Tensions were high. We were both on edge and we both knew it. Sam had already walked back through the V-shaped trees and was waiting for me on the other side. I was quickly walking and as I passed through the trees, the sound of a squeaky old door slammed behind me. Am I hearing things? No. Nope. Sam heard it too. Are we both hearing things? I guess that's something we'll both never truly know. We started pacing down the mountain quickly and we could see the sun was getting, sorry, we started pacing down the mountain quickly as we could see the sun was setting fast, and we didn't account for the thickness of the tree canopy taking away the sunlight quicker than we'd anticipated. We were both stressed and I was getting ahead of Sam. He yelled at me to slow down. He didn't want to lose sight of me. As I stopped and waited for him, I noticed something.

Something I did not see on the way up. A riverbank looking gully to the right of us with a huge fallen down tree within it. I knew that would have, I knew that would have been something I would have noticed on the way up. I looked around as Sam caught up to me. This isn't the path, I said. Oh. Mm-mm. This is literally the Blair Witch.

I hate this. We'd not been paying attention, and in the hurry and panic of trying to get down the mountain, we had drifted off course. No. We were not on the path. Get on the path. Get on that path. Sam asked me if I was sure. I had never been more positive. My gut sank. The sun was setting quickly behind the thick tree canopy. It would be very dark soon. Very soon. Our phones were about to die and we had no water or food. Sam suggested following the gully, but no, we couldn't. We had to try and find the path. We had no other option. This mountain was not like others we had climbed. We knew no one else was up here. It was secluded. It was dense and it was about to be, pitch. black. I'm like so stressed out. I don't like this. I actually hate it and that's exactly why I wear a sweatshirt that says indoorsy. That is true. This tail right here. We had no reception since driving to the

mountain, but I tried. I pulled up the app all trails on my phone as I walked to the left when all of the sudden, ping, one bar of 3G. Thank fuck. Thank fuck indeed. We got ourselves back on track walking faster than we were before. The sun was setting so quickly now. It was nearly dark beneath the tree canopy. We knew that we were on the home stretch. We were nearly to the car when all of the sudden, a sound stopped us right in our very tracks. It was the most eerie sound that to this day gives shivers down my spine. What is it? Oh, you scared the shit out of me. My back is like slightly turned to Alina, so I had no idea that was coming. You ass. You arse. I got it out. It gives them shivers down their spinal cord and a horrible feeling in their tummy. Oh no. It was almost an

indescribable sound, but it sounded like a man in pain or a man who had just lost a child, like a howl or a groan, kind of both of pain and suffering. It's so hard to describe. I can hear it. I can too. Oh, I got scared. Oh, I don't like it. And it was haunting. It's a sound that will stick with Sam and I forever. You guys have to get married now, by the way. You have to. It's just the rules that don't make them. This bonded you for life. Yeah, your trauma bonded. We started walking as fast as we could. I wanted to run, but I couldn't leave Sam behind. He couldn't run.

But God damn, I wanted to run as fast as I've ever ran in my life. And I know that he wanted to as well. We were nearly at the car. It was so close. We arrived at the steep slope leading to the gully. Sam went first, using the rope to lower himself. I followed closely behind him. When we got into the gully, we raced through it.

And we knew that we had a short jog to the car from there. We made it to the car, exiting the trail just as it got dark. When we realized, there were no sounds of laughing children, no smell of death or swarming flies, no visions dog on the way down, just the horrific sound of a howling man. I swear, I kissed my car when we reached it. When we got inside of the car, I locked the doors. What the fuck just happened to us? Did that really just happen? As we were about to leave a car, as we were about to leave, a car with two blokes in it pulled up. Sam and I got our car. Have you guys climbed to this mountain before we asked? Yeah, all the time. How good is it? They replied. What the fuck. And that's the

end of the tale. That's the end of the tale. Wait, is that, that's it. That's the end of the tail. What a way to end. How good is it? Oh, damn, you need to write. That needs to be. That's like a short story. That needs to be like a movie on Netflix. How good is it? Like, I'll watch that. I'll help you write it even. Let's go. I don't even know how to do that.

Go. LFG. Holy shit. I'm the scariest that I've ever been in my entire life. Oh, my goodness. Hate, hate, hate, hate, loathe entirely. Ooh. I'm so terrified.

All right. Let's try to end on a funny one. Let's try to do that. Because I am stressed. I am stressed. All right. So let's end. end on a New Zealand listener tale?

All right. Chickens, parks, and not a dead body. Oh, okay, that's always good. So we love to hear it. Not. All right, let's see. Look at this, baby's little curls. Oh, my goodness. Shut up. I'm, like, dying for my future children to have curly hair.

It's just like a thing I've been thinking about lately. Oh, I love that. And... We love a curly hair, babe. I mean, I don't have curly hair and neither does Drew, so... So the odds are pretty low, but... Maybe our donor will. There you go. All right. It says, you guys, first off, thank you so much for taking the guilt out of guilty pleasure when it comes to true crime and spooky tales. It's so nice to have a space where it's cool to be a weirdo. Yeah. Thank you for being there. I found you guys about six months ago and you immediately became the longest lasting ADHD fixation I've had so far. Oh, we were just talking about ADHD fixations. There you go. My ADHD dopamine craving hyper fixating ass cannot function on a day-to-day basis. We're talking brushing teeth, getting dress, finding the dog leads, walking to the door to the car, without something interesting and stimulating enough to get me going.

I feel that. Since I discovered you guys, I've basically lived my life with one headphone in at all times to the point that my fiancé and I just wanted to drop fiancé in there so I could say that we are engaged. Yay! Had some friends over for dinner and they asked what we had been up to and our six-month-old interjected saying, oh, Ila is just, I love that name. Oh, Ila is just listening, listening, listening, crime, bad people, scary things, criminal justice, not for kitties. I can't wait until he's old enough for us to listen to you guys together and you can be part of his collection of strong female role models.

Oh, my God. What a badass. I love you. Anyway, this is less of a true crime story, more of a palate cleanser. That's a great way down this. Perfect. So far, I've been lucky enough to scrape through life without any gnarly tales like the wild and ones you guys send.

I'm studying criminal justice. though, so maybe I'll have something a bit more salacious to send in the future. This one includes our brady-ass rescue chicken in a public park. It's a bit anticlimactic. I don't know why I got an accent there, but it's a bit of a laugh. A soul came out. Anywho, I've attached an appropriately sized space pitiful spelling, detailing the time I thought our son found a dead body while taking our chicken on an

outing to the park. Oh my God. Hashtag only in New Zealand. P.S. I'll actually be using the indigenous name for New Zealand because fuck colonization. Hell yeah. So thought I'd pop the pronunciation in here for you. Thank you. Otaya Roa. Otaira. I hope I said that right. Or Oteaeroa. Otea Roa? Othaya, Otea. I'm going to say Tea. Okay. Otea Roa. Thank you so much for that. I've also attached photos of our dogs and chicken for extra cleansing of the palate, which you are

welcome to share if you want. Ooh, we got permission and your chicken. And I didn't know that there was such thing as a rescue chicken. I don't know that either. But I want one. So it says, All righty then. Hello, Spooky Pals. My name is Ila, and you're welcome to use all in any names involved here. We're gonna. I feel like it's necessary to give you some context on why the actual fuck we were taking our chicken to the park. Fair. Thank you. So I'll quickly tell you a bit about Penny. Yes, short for the incredibly original name, Henny Penny, the bratty chicken. Icons. So this is Penny. I've included a few photos so you can really gauge the audacity of this bitch who thinks she's a third dog. I do apologize for the shoddy camera quall. The cost of living

in Otearoa is actually daylight robbery and I cannot afford a phone with a swanky camera. That sucks. That does suck. That's pretty relatable to America. Just under a year ago, we got a knock on the door from our neighbor. We live down a long driveway that leads to four different houses. So we have a good little community going on. He wanted to let us know that he had just seen a stray chicken wandering around his garden, and that he couldn't find it now, but we should just keep an eye out for it in case it needed help. Fast forward to the next morning, I went to open our garage and had a strange sense that there was something more than just piles of old junk that I always go to throw away, but then end up

keeping because I'll definitely need that someday. False. That's an ADHD thing. There you go. Side note, I'm always convinced I'm going to find a murderer hiding out in there, which is not based on any rational logic, but my criminal justice studying us is always prepared for the worst, I guess. Anyway, I opened the garage and waited for a second, obviously for the murderer to jump out and attack me, and suddenly heard a very stern insert chicken noise. I was waiting for

Ash to do it. There we go. I got you. And outstreaded a very offended, raggedy, scrawny chicken. My dog, Mercury, love that name. Same. Who obviously came with me to protect me from the murderer, looked at me very confused. I looked at Mercury, very confused. We both looked at the chicken, very confused. And the chicken did a massive shit. and paraded through the gate and into our Fred Lawn and never left. This chicken is Hay-Hay. This Hay-Hay from Malona. I love that.

She's become a fundamental part of the family ever since. I love that. Oh, my God, I love it. Oh, my God, I love it. We call him Landy. Stop. Spends hours in the garden finding worms with her. She often comes up on the desk and proofreads my uni work by standing on the keyboard

and force quitting my document before I save it. Use Google Docs and AutoSaves. And she keeps our 240Ks. A kilogram, there it is, are 40 kilogram dogs in line and lets them know who's boss by forcing them to give up their beds for her. Oh my God. She's a straight up queen. A queen. So how is this a little sin her tail? Yeah, good question.

Well, we all get a lot of joy out of watching Penny scratch around and do her excited, happy little clucks when she finds a particularly pleasing bug. She gives us so much happiness and eggs. And we wanted to give her a little treat. We have a playground down the road from us that is next to a bushy area. of with grass that Landy thought Penny would love to explore and scratch. So in a very outtaroa fashion, we loaded ourselves and Penny into the car and took her down to the park for a wee outing. That's really adorable of you.

I love that a lot. I've never seen a chicken so genuinely excited. And just as she really gotten struck into a good patch of dirt, Landy, who had been sneaking around in the long grass, came running up to us looking particularly frazzled and mumbling something like, oh no oh no it's bad oh we thought he was worried that penny was going to run away because he wasn't making much sense so we just assured him that it was all totally fine and we were keeping a close eye on her she somehow knows to come when we call her name which i think she just learned from copying our dogs he continued to shuffle around looking incredibly anxious and not saying anything just clinging on to us i'm stressed out i am too one of us said something like it's all good landy and he blurted it's not all good it's all bad there's a man asleep in the long grass over there and I stood on him. Oh, Landy. You unpacked a lot there. We had to recently moved into a suburb that was itself reasonably safe, but was surrounded by a lot less safe parts of town. My partner and I looked at each other like, there's a motherfucking dead body

over there and we're now going to have to pay thousands of dollars in therapy to help Blandy process the trauma that this is going to cause. Oh my God. That's a real parent moment right there. Yeah. Trying to keep it cool, calm and collected. I told him that I'm sure it's fine and I'll just go check it out and see if it needs any help or not. My 24-year-old self was in fact not cool, calm and collected as I tried to remember all the things I'd learned from my years of listening to True Crime Podcasts to prepare myself for this very moment. I walked slowly over to where Landy had said he stepped on the man, and sure enough, I saw the limp form of a man, half curled up in the fetal position, half spayed out in the long

grass. Oh no, where does this become a Pollock Cleenser? I got that feeling that when all the warmth suddenly drops out of your body and and tingles start to ripple out from your stomach all over your body. That's the... That's anxiety. We could only see him when you got about a meter away because the grass was so long. From that distance, there was a very distinct smell.

Oh! Now, I've never smelled a dead body, so immediately I'm like, decomp, definitely a dead body. And I try not to faint because remember, I'm the cool, calm, collected adults in this scenario. I walk very coolly, calmly, and collectively back to my partner, Landy and Penny, while trying to figure out how I'm going to examine.

explain to the one-one-one-operators. It's one-one-one-not-9-1-1 here. Ah. How my six-year-old stumbled across a dead body while we were out walking our fucking chicken. My partner and I decided it would be best if her and Landy dropped penny home while I called no, one-one-one. So we didn't have to look like actual crazy chicken ladies because that's truly a new level of crazy cat lady. Oh my God. So I apologize if you hear the mowing behind us. Oh, fuck away. So I'm left alone in the park with a maybe dead body on the phone to the police saying that my son stood on this man in the grass, and I really can't be sure if he's alive or not

and that he's really stanky. The ambulance arrives before the police, and as I'm leading them to the guy, the medic looks around. We're kind of in a bush, like most places in Atearoa, and says in the most kiwi way, kind of makes you want to go camping, doesn't it? I'm not going to try because I don't want to mess it up,

which I just thought was the most hilariously Aotea Roa thing to say at that moment. but maybe just because I needed to laugh to break the tension. Anyway, anti-climax, the guy had had too much to drink and had laid down for a bit of shut eye. He was not impressed to be woken and surrounded by medics and police, and I felt terrible for being the cause of such a rude awakening. To be fair, he had drunken so much that his breathing was almost undetectable, and the ambulance at first thought he was dead too.

All right. Turns out he was just super dirty, which is why he smelled so bad. I feel so bad for the guy who clearly already had it rough and was now being shaken awake by medics and police because of a paranoid 24-year-old dingbat. Dingbat is one of my favorite things. I think maybe I should just stick to studying criminal justice for a bit longer instead of going around thinking there's a true crime story around every corner. So yeah, that's the story of how our six-year-old did not find a dead body while we were at the park with our chicken. Thanks for listening. I hope your palate feels cleansed.

And I've attached some photos of our dogs. Mercury is the speckled one. Mighty is the Black one in case you've just listened to a harrowing story before this one and need extra cleansing. Keep it weird, pals, but not so weird that you listen to too many true crime podcasts and become obsessed with your chicken and take her to the park with your six-year-old and he steps on a man in in the grass. And you instantly think obviously it's a dead body, but instead you end up giving a poor man the worst wake up of his life. Don't keep it that weird. Wow. Or do because, well, don't because you don't want to like, you know.

I love that was hilarious. And I love your name. I love your name. And that was a really, really funny tale. Your kid is, I was going to say, delicious. That was weird. I was good. Adorable. You know.

And your dogs are adorable. And your chicken is spicy as fuck. Spicy. So spicy. Spicy. Spicy chicken. Hey, hey. So guys, that was our ode to Australia and New Zealand.

Thank you so much for sending those in. You guys rock. Never change. Keep sending them from all over the world. We love to hear them and we'll read them. And we got a million more of these. So we'll get to like everybody. So with that being said, we hope you keep listening.

And we hope you keep it weird. But not so weird that you messed up the ending and you joined me because it threw me off. I don't know, man. But you can keep it that weird because that was a unison vibe. Thank you. Absolutely. Goodbye.