RedHanded - RedHaunted #6 Don't Name Your Ghosts

Episode Date: January 27, 2021

A civil war ghost named Toby, tribal curses, granddad's ghost, and Banshees in Ireland.... These are your spooky stories, and real life experiences of the paranormal and we can't get enough. Strap in! Send yours in to - [e-mail]    See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah. I'm Saruti. We just spent about five

minutes trying to remember whether we do that bit on Red Haunted, but we do now. We do. Maybe we'll probably have forgotten by next time. And it's fine because you're not keeping tabs or going to shame us if we forget because surely by now you all know who we are and uh if you're a first-time listener and you're starting with a red haunted that's a weird choice don't do that stop listening go listen to something else

a brave choice but possibly a loud confident and wrong choice it's like starting with tahini and not hummus. Like it's, do you know what I mean? It's the wrong way around. That's the best, most like middle-class analogy I can possibly think of for how wrong you are if you have started with this particular episode. So don't do it. Go eat some hummus and go listen to a proper episode

because this is Red Haunted. And for those of you who have maybe just never listened to a Red Haunted before, this is where Hannah and I, via Seb, collect up your very best ghost stories that you have sent us. And then we get in our little boxes and we read them out to each other and we get scared. I think last month's was the scariest one we've ever done, so I'm hoping this might top it because I was genuinely scared. I was reading through the notes this morning before we recorded this

in a house that I already think is haunted. If you've listened to our most recent episode, I'm currently working in my stepdad's house for lockdown because no one lives here. And sometimes I'll come in in the morning and all of the lights will be on upstairs. It's never really bright enough. And I'm convinced that there's just some stuff going on. Haunted. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

My lamp dims on its own, etc, etc. But I started reading these at nine o'clock this morning. Not ghost time. We all know how I feel about ghosts in the mornings. They can't get you in daytime hours. I know that. I logically know that. But reading these notes, I am already scared. I am already too scared to look outside the box.

Don't do it. You are trapped in a box. All of your vision obscured. Trapped in a haunted house. Who knows what's behind you? Don't! And I can't wait. We're not there yet. But in the next few months, once the crap shack I bought at auction is fully refurbished, and it has a terrifying little basement in it, and I'm convinced that there's something going on, there's all sorts of weirdness with it. But we're going to go maybe do... Actually, I'm not going to do a Ouija board in that house. Let's

not kick it off wrong. We'll do something. Maybe we'll just go hang out and be scared in the basement. But I'll tell you guys all about why I think that new place is haunted later. For now, should we talk about their stories? Should we talk about your stories, guys? Yes. Excellent. Yes, your stories. And I'm going first this time, just because that's that sometimes that's how it how it be. That's the rule. So our first one's from Natalie Saar, and it's about a ghost called Toby. In 2012, when London had the Olympics and it was, I thought, the worst summer ever, until 2020 happened. That's true. That's true. We went from one extreme to the other, too many people to no people at all.

So in 2012, Natalie and her best friend Mary moved to their campus apartment while studying at university in West Virginia. The campus itself was built on the grounds of an old civil war hospital which right off the bat bad idea. I feel like it goes Native American burial ground then civil war hospital in like most hauntedness. don't do it we talked about this last time oh maybe they'll have read haunted before about just everything that is creepy happens around something to do with the civil war why are you doing it do you want just hospital old hospital old asylum yeah i feel like a civil war hospital is double whammy because let's face it probably wasn't an actual hospital it's probably a tent the only way it could be worse is if it's also a psychiatric hospital.

An old Civil War psychiatric hospital built on top of an old Indian burial ground. Okay, and the whole town was littered with war cemeteries and other Civil War points of interest. Actually, every year the town was flooded with Civil War nuts who came to see all of the war vibes that the place had to offer. For the first three years Natalie and Mary attended college, there was constant chatter about Civil War-y ghosts from all of the students. Someone had even spotted one in a classroom. Another person had seen one in their halls, and so on, and so on.

Halls is what we British folk call student accommodation. I think Americans say dorms, don't they? Dorms, yes, yes. However, despite being yes. However, despite being a ghost believer, Natalie had never actually come face to translucent face with a ghost of any kind. But that was about to change. About three or four months after moving into their new place, both Natalie and Mary independently noticed weird shit going on in their new apartment. Things would go missing, cupboards would be left open and things would go bump in the night. This all went on for

a few months with both Natalie and Mary assuming it was just the other person being disorganised and clattery just going on night time adventures around the house. You're so loud and disorganised I hate living with you. I've definitely had housemates that was like living with a ghost they just never come out. But sometimes there'll be a plate on the side. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just some sort of nocturnal owl. As the months went by, the girl started to get more and more annoyed

until eventually Mary decided to bring it up with Natalie. She was going to have the table discussion and asked her why she'd been moving her stuff around and leaving everything open all the time. Natalie said that she hadn't. And in fact, she'd also been walking around closing cupboards and looking for her missing stuff as well. After this revelation came, the two of them repaired their friendship, I would assume, came to the only rational conclusion that they could possibly think of.

It absolutely had to be 100% no other option, a ghost. Makes sense. And having both watched paranormal activity which were seb's written in brackets here which were apparently very popular at the time all right fetus like we lived through the time where paranormal activity was popular can confirm it was an extremely popular film oh my god seb was like nine years ago wasn't allowed to go and see paranormal activity it was like an 18 or something yes literally seb was in school he was doing his fucking saps so yeah we've established

paranormal activity films were popular in 2012 and they decided to name their newfound ghost i was gonna say ghost friend but he's not a friend. They decided to call him Toby. Never name your ghost. What did you think of the Paranormal Activity films? Because obviously the little ghost did that. The little girl calls him Toby. So they're just like full on ripping it off. Expect to hear from Paranormal Activity's lawyers.

When I had a cat ghost, I did name him. Because I felt like I named him Toulouse because like in Aristocats you can just go shut up Toulouse and that's why I did that because I was like oh if I just like tell it to shut up and give it a funny name it won't be as scary that's true but it does sort of allow itself to manifest a little bit more like a friend of mine had a brain tumour and she was like oh I don't want to name it because then it'll be able to throw its weight around. So we decided to call it Shrinky Disappearance. And in the end, it did go away.

So she's fine now. That's good. That's good. But yeah, I think like Paranormal Activity, firstly, as a film franchise, the first one had its merits, had its charm, but it was just, I don't get the appeal. It's just like, where's the tension? Where's the fit? It's just like waiting for something to happen that you know is going to happen I'm not a fan but so much money they've

made I think it was excellently marketed that was the whole vibe of it was that like the hype around it which Seb won't remember because he was in the womb the hype around it was so carefully constructed yes that it was always going to be a disappointment because it was marketed as like this film that would literally ruin your life. That's true. That's true. I think it was trying to be like a modern day Blair Witch. Yes, exactly.

But without any of the like charming characters or excellent conversation that is in that film. Or the directors torturing the cast. All of that. All of that. So naming your ghost does sort of enable it to wiggle its way into your brain a little bit more. I think it makes it this thing that's real. Okay, so top tips we're giving out then is don't name your ghost. Are we saying if you think your house is haunted,

don't name it? Probably don't. Okay. The cupboard situation carried on for a while and things continued to go missing and slowly the girls became quite fond of this silly little ghosty boy who wasn't really causing any trouble apart from hiding some shit and slamming some doors until one day the footsteps started. Footsteps that would pace up and down the hallway endlessly during the night. Hate it. Both Natalie and Mary took turns going out to see if anyone was outside, but there was never anybody to be seen. The ritualistic pacing carried on for the next month, with the footsteps pacing from the living room to the bathroom

to right outside the girls' bedroom doors. And now that Toby was making his presence more known, they suddenly wanted quite a lot less to do with him. He wasn't so cute anymore. And after about a month, things got even worse. Now there weren't just footsteps. There was breathing. And it was coming from inside Natalie and Mary's room. At first, Natalie and Mary put some music on and tried to ignore it. But eventually it got too much and Mary shouted stop and just like that it did imagine just hanging out in the room that you can hear this breathing in and just turning

the music up what guys what are you doing well in one of the rooms in my mum's house I hear breathing in there whenever I sleep in there what yeah yeah that's horrendous yeah I tried to convince myself for ages that it was just being able to hear my sister from my sister's room but there's a whole bathroom and about like 15 feet between the room so it's impossible there's no way it's Isabel oh my god I hate it yeah I don't sleep in that room anymore no I don't blame you my mum mum's going to be so annoyed. The next night, the breathing in the stomping was back. And yet again, Mary shouted stop.

And this time it worked for a minute, but suddenly there was an almighty crash from the kitchen. Both Natalie and Mary were too scared to go and have a look in the dark, so they waited until the morning. When they finally got up and went into the kitchen every single cupboard door was open and every single pot, every single pan and every single piece of food was on the floor. Quite rightly at this point Natalie and Mary noped the fuck out of that house and went to stay with one of Mary's friends for the weekend. I would never come back. Well that's the thing, in my haunting experience, if you leave, it's kind of like when you've got high heels on, you can't take them off because you'll never put them back on. So like,

if you leave a haunted house, you ain't ever going back. It's too hard to like go back. Don't do it. So that's why you never leave. You just live there for the rest of your life. After spending the weekend away, the pair consulted Mary's aunt who told them they needed to cleanse the apartment and stop naming the ghost because it might be pissing it off. Mary took charge of the cleansing as Natalie in her own words is quote an Arab girl raised by immigrant parents who usually just pray to God and that's that. Mary's cleanse appeared to work for a few days and it appeared that Toby was no more. Toby or the no-name ghost but it didn't last. Natalie was home alone one day when she heard a loud bang coming from another room. She called out, hoping that Mary had just come home without her noticing.

But there was no reply. She texted everyone who could have been in the apartment and they said they were all out. So she made up an excuse for the noise and carried on with her homework, happier to pretend it wasn't a thing than admit that Toby, the no no-name ghost was back. Suddenly, there was another loud bang coming from outside. This time, there was no ignoring it and Natalie grabbed her stuff and ran out of the apartment to hang out with a friend until someone else got home. Natalie spent the rest of the day having the piss ripped out of her by her friend until Mary got home and then they went back to investigate their apartment. When they went back to investigate their

apartment. When they got back their couch in the living room had been flipped sideways and every cupboard in the entire place was wide open. At this point Mary decided against a wall of protest from Natalie to try and contact Toby. Yes they had still, despite Mary's witchy aunt advice to stop doing it, still calling it Toby. Stop it, guys. Stop it. You can't reason with this ghost. He just likes opening doors and slamming everything on the floor. Just leave. Leave. So they decide they're going to try and capture him on film. So they turned on all of the lights and turned on loads of cameras. But Toby didn't want to hang out with them that evening and after another consultation with Mary's aunt, they spread salt across every doorway in the flat

and did another rigorous cleansing. Yet, this time, things really seemed to have worked. Toby didn't bother the girls for weeks and they very much thought that they were out of the woods. Being students, it wasn't long before ghosts and Toby had been pushed to the back of Natalie and Mary's minds. They had far more important things to think about. Like throwing down a sick rager is what Seb has written.

Apparently Natalie didn't actually say rager. She said have a few drinks but rager is what Americans say in films. I say rager. I felt like that was a British thing until I saw Seb's notes that they said it in American films. Yeah. But I'll take it. I'll take it. Maybe it's trans American films. Yeah. But I'll take it. I'll take it. Maybe it's transatlantic.

Yeah, when I move house and COVID doesn't rule the world anymore, first thing on my list is a sick rager. Absolutely. I actually did just read through the lease though and it's like, no music after 11pm. Well, you can get to fuck. I'm going to do what I want in the house that I own. Oh, wow.

That's aggressive of them. Yeah. Well, I'm just not going to do it. Try me, freeholder. So Natalie and Mary, also ignoring their lease, had some friends over and cracked open some drinks and everything seemed to be perfectly normal again. They partied, had a good old time,

and generally put Toby away in the small part of your brain that's reserved for ghosts and childhood trauma. And terrible dates. That night, a few of their friends stayed over after the rager and everything became quiet in their no longer haunted apartment. Until... Suddenly, Natalie and Mary heard screams coming from the living room. Their friends had heard Toby's breathing

and suddenly the lights began to flicker. They all ran into Natalie and Mary's room and hid away until the morning. In the morning, Mary's aunt arrived in person and performed her own cleansing. And then she asked the ghost to leave. And they never heard from Toby ever again. Bloody hell. I mean, Mary's aunt.

Why didn't you just do that in the first place? Couldn't you just have come over? Maybe she lives cross-country. America's a big place. That true that's true but at least she sorted it in the end and at least mary and natalie can now just firmly close that box of ghost experiences and get on with all of their various rages because that's what uni's for is it not to think that the place you live in is haunted which i definitely did and have a lot of ragers, which I definitely did. Yeah, ragers only.

Absolutely. That's the only thing we shall accept. That was a good one, guys. Thank you. And it's like quite typical horror movie stuff. It's just like constantly like, why didn't you move up? But obviously they're just like, well, I can't. I've paid all of my fees to live in this haunted dorm.

Yes, exactly. Like all of the current uni students who are being haunted out of their halls of residence by COVID, but they still have to pay their fees. Keeping it topical here on Red Handed, we will never be an evergreen show. Keeping it topical. But also I feel like if you choose to go to a university that's literally in a civil war hospital, it's kind of the risk you take, I think. Yeah, it was a big part of the orientation conversation, but they clearly chose to ignore that.

So I'm glad that Toby's gone. I'm glad we all learnt something. We all learnt something through that story, didn't we? Number one, don't name your ghosts because that either makes them mad or makes them stronger or whatever. And number two, if you've got a witchy aunt, just make it plan A to pay for a flight ticket for her to come to your dorms and sort it out for you, I'd say. Yeah, your witchy aunt doing a cleansing is cheaper than therapy. Fly that bitch out.

Exactly. I saw this great advert that was like, do you think hiring a professional designer is too expensive? Wait till you hire an amateur one and I was like that's genius kind of like this isn't it it's like it's really good you think flying Mary's ghosty aunt over from wherever she lives to your dorms is too expensive try doing the cleansings yourself that's what I took away from it so there you go guys great story right would you like to hear one one from Megan Smith or Smythe? Smythe. Sorry, Megan. Yeah, I would love to. Seb has called it Canoe Do You Think You're Dead? What a blast from the past. Oh my god. I think Canoe Man is episode like 46 or something like that. Oh yeah, yeah. It's a long time ago. One of the best jokes I've ever stolen, to be honest. He was back in the papers this week. I don't know if you saw.

Were they? I'm going to save it, though, because we are actually going to be talking about it very briefly in the news this month. So I'm going to save it for that. And if you would like to come check that out, you can head on over to patreon.com slash red handed and become a $5 and up patron and you get a monthly in the news because that's how good we are to you. But anyway, back to Canoe Do You Think You're Dead. So this story was sent in by a lovely listener named Megan. However, it's not actually Megan's story. It was just told to Megan thousands of times by her father who the story is actually about. And one thing I've learned reading this particular story is that Seb seems to have quite

a bit of a crush on Megan's father. So everything that I say, just remember that this is all Seb's annotations, not mine. So while in his mid-twenties, Megan's dad worked at a wilderness camp in Canada. Then Seb has put, I like to imagine Megan's dad as sort of a sexy moustached Matthew McConaughey type, who wears sunglasses and denim shorts like Matthew McConaughey type, who wears sunglasses and denim shorts like Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused. But he's a kayak instructor, so you can imagine whoever you like. Oh, Seb, someone having some confusing feelings. Dazed and Confused, about Matthew McConaughey and about Megan's dad, possibly. I'm not a

particularly big, like, lustful fan of Matthew McConaughey. Doesn't really do it for me. All right, all right, all right. It didn't until he did True Detective and then I was like, actually, Matthew McConaughey, you can do whatever you like to me. I am yours. Yeah, but then he came out all righty, didn't he? All right, all right, all right.

A what? Yeah. Oh, my God. I, ugh, no. That's the meme now. Alt-right, right. Oh, what? Yeah. Oh, my God. I, ugh, no. That's the meme now. Alt-right, alt-right, alt-right. Oh, I've fallen for it again. Sorry, sorry.

He's lured you in. Guys, stop tricking me into being a fascist. He's going to radicalise you. Don't go there. But anyway, so one of the trips that Megan's dad, as here being a wilderness camp instructor in his sexy shorts, again, thank you, Seb, ran a particular camp up in a place called Temagami in Ontario, about four hours drive north of Toronto, where there is utterly no phone signal.

I can't explain how hard I want to come to Canada. Like I've never been to Canada and it is like number one on the bucket list. It just looks fucking amazing. But it also seems very scary after having read this story. So one summer, Megan's dad and his sexy moustache was leading a group of boys through Temagami when a storm began to roll in. The decision was made that the storm was too dangerous to canoe through, and so they stopped by an abandoned trailer home and left their canoes and gear by the side of the river. Once inside the old abandoned trailer home, again, thank you Seb, being the charismatic charmer that he was, Megan's dad decided to tell everyone a ghost story. And not just any old ghost

story. He decided to tell them a ghost story about the old trailer, specifically the trailer that they were about to spend the night in. Excellent. That is very antisocial of you, I would say. Megan's dad, don't do that. So the story that Megan's dad told these, well actually I don't know if they're little kids. Yeah, I think they're boys. So, you know,'s dad told these, well actually I don't know if they're little kids, yeah I think they're boys, so you know pre-teens maybe, about the trailer they were staying in. And it goes something like this. A few years ago, a forest fire had hit the area that they were all staying in and the fire had got so out of control

that the Canadian government had decided to call in some rangers from out of town to fight the fire. Indigenous members of the Temagami community were outraged by this. Their people had been living in the woods and dealing with forest fires since time began. Why should a bunch of whiteys dressed up like village people get to turn up and get paid for something that they could do themselves? So due to this rift between the indigenous people and the rangers, one night a bar fight broke out. And one of the rangers ended up killing two of the indigenous men. That's bad news, Bez. That's never going to be good.

Yeah, extremely bad. Extremely bad. And obviously, as you can imagine, this didn't exactly do much to ease tensions. But luckily, the fires ended before any more carnage could be caused. However, just because the rangers were gone didn't mean that those two dead indigenous men weren't keen on seeking retribution. Rumour has it that the two men haunted the trailer that their killer had lived in, waiting for him to return. The trailer just so happened to be the very trailer that Megan's dad and the

boys were sleeping in that night. Just as Megan's dad came to the end of this pretty great ghost story, I have to say, and as he surveyed the sea of worried-looking faces in front of him, a twig suddenly snapped outside. Megan's dad counted and recounted himself and the staff and everyone there. Nobody was missing. Whatever had made that noise outside wasn't in their group. Oh no. Having convinced themselves that the noise was probably just a large animal like a bear, they all decided to go to bed and try to get some sleep.

But my question is how is a bear better than a ghost? Because a bear could definitely kill you. All of you. They're fucking huge. I watched and I shouldn't be alive about a woman who gets attacked by a bear. She was masoning in the face and it was like, don't care.

Yum. Peppery. I'm going to keep attacking you. So as the sun rose the following morning and the storm cleared, Megan's dad went outside to make sure that nothing had been damaged in the storm. The moment he opened the door, he noticed a large set of boot prints outside of the trailer, stuck deep into the mud.

The boots that had made them had been huge. The prints themselves were much larger than anyone else's in the cabin. Telling himself, against his better judgment, that it could have been left days ago and somehow survived the torrent of rain and wind. Megan's dad went over to inspect the canoes. Everything was left just as it should be, except two of the life jackets were missing. He went back up to the trailer, assuming that maybe two of the boys had taken their life jackets inside with them,

but everyone looked high and low, and nobody could find the life jackets anywhere. So it was decided that the jackets had simply been caught up in the storm, and they might find them somewhere downstream. So they set off back to the outdoor centre on the now sunny day. Strangely though, nobody spotted the jackets all the way back to the centre, and the whole thing was set to be a total mystery however a week later megan's dad was taking another group of fresh-faced young lads up the

same route through tamagami when he decided to stop and show them where he and his previous group had stayed the night as soon as megan's dad opened the door to the trailer, a tight, cold feeling gripped him, because inside the trailer he saw, propped up, waiting for him, were the two life jackets that had gone missing. Someone had been outside that night, they'd stolen the jackets, and now they'd left them waiting for him. They were probably watching him, making sure that he'd return. Ah, Megan's dead. I just, no, I'm not ever fucking camping ever. Like, no, the wilderness is not for me.

It's too many ghosts and things that can actually kill you, like bears. Too many ghosts, too many wild animals, depending on where you are, too many venomous animals and also possible murderers. Like it's the full it's the full fucking bingo of fear. Like don't go there. No, no, thanks. Fucking hell. OK.

Actually, I'm such a fucking hypocrite because I've decided that when the before times come back, the first thing I'm doing is going like fucking Bhutan or some shit and climbing a mountain like the first thing on my list amazing I'm on board with that plan there are no ghosts in Bhutan right they're all too happy no unfinished business I think the only thing that might scare you about Bhutan is how expensive it is to get in but apart from that delightful okay I hear oh do you want to come we should vlog it let's climb a mountain a vlog. Except no one will let us in right now because we're what? Number one in the COVID death rates. Outstanding. The sick man of Europe continues his reign. Yep. Excellent. Excellent. So that's per capita, right? Boris has only fucking just closed the borders. Like, do you think that might have been an idea last year? Oh, my God. Honestly, when they were like, oh, there's a new variant. This time it's in South America.

And we're going to be having some conversations about whether we close the borders to flights from South America. And I'm like, is this not what Brexit was? Is this not what Brexit was about us taking control of our borders? Why can't you just fucking make a decision and close down any flights coming in here from South America? Who are you going to have to talk about that with? I don't understand. Honestly, I'm so filled with rage. I also saw a really amazing tweet about like, you know, there's worries about a food shortage at the moment.

Oh, yeah. And someone tweeted, if the food shortage is actually about COVID and not about Brexit, then why is the UK the only one affected by it? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's all be clear. Let's all be clear exactly which of these two issues is majorly impacting us. You can't have missed it if you're in Britain, at least. But if you're not, let me tell you what's currently going down. Hashtag Parliament was trending on Monday. And I was like, oh, why is that? Maybe there's a new, you know, horrible new conference, press conference I need to be aware of. Click on on it it was because all the fishermen who can't now sell their fish because it's taking too long and there are too many delays in shipping it over to Europe

just filled up their trucks with all the rotting crabs and fish and all the stuff they can't sell and just drove it down to Westminster and just drove around and round Parliament and threatened to dump it all out on the street in front of number 10 and I was like they should have done that they should have done that and then taken what was left and dump it outside nigel farage's house do you know what fair dues just actually everybody just post nigel farage a fish every day for the rest of the year amazing yep so rule britannia rule britannia britannia rules the waves. Not the fish in the waves, apparently. No, just the waves.

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We've got another one. We'll leave the real terror of politics for another time. Leah Torres has sent us a story which is called Ghost Grandpa? When Leah was younger, she was fearful of a lot of things. This is actually quite a nice one. She was mostly scared that a hand was going to grab her while she was sitting on the toilet. So she couldn't go in there without company. Seb has also commented that he was too fearful of the dreaded toilet hand.

So, I mean, mine was always the snake. I don't think I was ever scared of a hand. I was just scared of, like, snakes. Yeah, yeah, snakes, toilet snakes. Mine was a snake. What was it, the snake coming up from the toilet and biting me? Yeah. It didn't help that Leah's dad and his entire side of the family were obsessed

with the paranormal. Her dad spent hours upon hours watching shows like The X-Files and his mother, Leah's grandmother, once told Leah that not only were ghosts real, they were invisible. Leah's grandma. I know right. Stop it. Didn't your grandma do exactly the same thing though? That's true though. That is true She'd tell me all sorts of shit And I was just like, I would be scared to look outside the window In case I saw something So Leah slept with the covers over her head For quite some time because of what her grandma had told her

And around the age of about five or six Leah became very ill She got a cough that was so bad it would keep her awake for hours at night And her parents were really worried about her So her parents began leaving the door to Leah's room open so she could check that she was all right as they walked past. Her bed faced directly out of the door with her feet closest to the doorway and her head looking out so that she could see all the way into the kitchen area. One fateful night, Leah fell asleep after hours of relentless coughing only to be woken up again in the early hours of the morning

Frustrated and annoyed by her stupid cough, Leah opened her eyes giving up on the idea of trying to go back to sleep And as her eyes opened, she was blinded by a bright white light coming from the kitchen through the door And as her eyes adjusted, she could make out a clean shape of a figure shining brightly in the kitchen. The figure wasn't a fuzzy imprint. She could clearly make out its head, body, arms and legs. Strangely the beaming light of the figure didn't seem to be illuminating her room or the kitchen. The creature didn't move, it just stood motionless in the kitchen. Leia felt

petrified and struck with fear. She didn't want to scare the creature or alert it to her being awake. Eventually and very slowly, Leah brought the covers back up over her head and hid until she finally fell back asleep. The Hannah Maguire technique. The whole experience shat Leah right up in her five to six year old self and she decided not to tell either of her parents because they'd never believe her anyway and the years went by but the memory of the crisp white figure beaming in the kitchen never left Leah. Leah and her family moved out of that house a few months later when her parents divorced. When Leah was 15 she decided to tentatively bring up

the ghost with her dad and she took a breath and began to tell him the story. Strangely her dad normally couldn't shut him up, didn't interrupt her. He just sat there absorbing everything she was saying and when she'd finished, just in case you think Leah's just had sleep paralysis, when she finished her story her dad replied, I saw the same thing. Oh my god. At first Leah thought that her dad was joking but he continued with utter sincerity that he had seen the very same crisp white figure at the end of his bed around the same time on the same night. And the next day, he'd woken up to find out

that his father in Puerto Rico had passed away. Oh, that's sad. It is Ghost Grandpa. It is Ghost Grandpa. All I could think, when we first started saying it, all I could think of was that episode of The Simpsons when Mr Burns is wandering around in the woods. Yes, oh my God, yes.

I bring you love. Exactly that. Have you seen the picture on the internet of someone who's cut a kiwi in half and the white bit in the middle sort of looks like a little Mr Burns thing and it looks like Mr Burns' radioactive kiwi oh that is very funny oh well thank you that was a really nice one I love I love old people and I love apparently I love dead old people as well

because that's quite nice if it was the grandpa and not just you know some sort of horrible gas leak and everybody's hallucinating. Okay, I've got one from Ashlyn McLaughlin, and it's called The Banshee. Oh, no, I hate them. Yeah, me too. Horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible. And Ashlyn, if you haven't already guessed, is from Ireland. And her story is a bit of a red haunted first because very excitingly it involves folklore. So the name the Banshee comes from the Irish for woman which is and I might destroy all of these pronunciations I apologize profusely Irish for woman which is bien, bane, bean, ban, ban there we go more sense, doesn't it? Because it's like banshee. And the Irish for fairy, oashee, I think. So banshee translates roughly to woman fairy.

I think it's important to, because that sounds quite nice, Lady Fairy, but fairies in Irish folklore are not nice at all. Yes, that's true. Like they're all the kind of like olden timey fairies. They're the ones that like steal your kids, make you sick, give you a changeling. Like it's not good shit. It's not stuff you want to happen. Never accept a present from a fairy because it means they've taken your soul. Exactly. There's that too. But this isn't some common or garden variety woman fairy that we're talking about here. Even though the fairies are not particularly nice, a banshee is even worse because she's a lamenting woman dressed in all black, sometimes combing her hair.

Though I do have to say you of a loved one's passing i always thought growing up that like if you hear them scream that means someone you know is going to die oh that's sad that does make sense i feel like i've heard that so yeah that's the kind of vibe in which the banshee sits so the legend goes that there is a different banshee for people whose second name starts with a different letter. So for example, there's a banshee for people whose surnames start with an O, like O'Donnell, and a banshee for people whose surnames start with a M, like McDonald. That's clan-specific, basically.

Yeah, clan-specific banshee behaviour, banshee action happening here. And although the banshee can occasionally be seen by people whose names don't fit into either of these categories she usually appears outside your home or if you're walking alone and she always appears the night before a loved one's death so basically like generally it seems that if your name starts with an o or a muck and she usually appears at night and if she does bad news bears the next day because someone you know is probably gonna die that's where i think we're at so far with the banshee folklore so last october ashling was sitting on the sofa watching tv with her parents when her mum mentioned the story at first ashling's

dad flat out refused to tell her the story because she's such a scaredy cat and her dad thought that it would freak her out. Eventually, after a lot of badgering, he finally gave in and told Aisling the tale of how he had met the woman fairy. It was the late 80s and Aisling's dad was the classic no-nonsense, doesn't-believe-in-ghosts kind of dad that seems to be the subject of a lot of Red Haunted stories. He was 20 years old at the time and walking home late at night from his girlfriend's house. It was 3am and the streets of Ballymun in Dublin were completely empty. The night was cold and walking around Dublin in the late 80s might not have been the best idea. But his house was close to his girlfriend's, so the walk was short.

As Aisling's dad walked home, thinking early 80s thoughts like, I wonder how the Berlin Wall is getting on. I'm stoked we haven't had any large-scale nuclear disasters yet. And I hope John Legend is doing OK. And I hope John Lennon is doing OK. Oh my God, do not you dare cut that out. I do hope John Legend is doing all right. Whoops. And as Aisling's dad turned a corner to walk down a dark alleyway back to his house

he suddenly found himself frozen still as he saw an old woman dressed in all black, standing under the light of a distant streetlight. I hate that. I hate that so much. Shaking off any feelings of unease, he thought she must have just been lost or struggling to make her way home. As he walked closer to the old lady, he realized that her face was covered by a long shawl. Oh no.

Do you know what? I just love the idea that it's just like an old woman who's bored, who's just out freaking people out. She's like, I'm going to go out with the shawl on today. Just freak some people out. Stand under that streetlight. But as Aisling's dad walked past, he saw that the only thing visible from under the woman's shawl

was her crooked, beaming, maniacal smile. No! Feeling quite freaked out by this point and not wanting to be seen off by an old lady and worried she might be suffering from her old age and maybe needed help, he got closer. He stopped a few feet away and asked, are you okay? But there was no reply. He asked again, but again there was nothing. Oh my god, I hate it. A cold fear started to grip him as the old lady stared back at him, doing nothing but peer from out of her shawl with her crooked beaming smile.

I am sweating. I hate this. Slowly, he lowered his gaze and saw that she was stood in the freezing cold in her bare feet. And laying on the ground next to her was a red comb. And remember the band she combs her hair in the folklore? This was enough for Aisling's dad and so he decided it was time to get the fuck out of there. So he turned on his heels

and ran as fast as he could the last hundred yards to his front door. As he scrambled to get his key in the door the hairs on the back of his neck went up as he heard a blood-curdling, gut-wrenching screech of a scream. When he got inside, the commotion of him crashing through the door had woken his siblings, and he asked them if they'd also heard the screaming, but they all replied that they hadn't.

The next morning when they all woke up, they received the news that their uncle had died. Moving forward 40 years, as fate would have it, Aisling's ex had a second name that started with O, and without really thinking much of it, Aisling brought up this creepy story at a family meal. Her ex's dad, who was much like her father, a quiet, serious man, had the blood drained from his face as she told the story. When she finished, his mouth hung open and he replied, I've seen her too. She stood at his window one night when he woke up unexpectedly. She didn't scream. She just smiled through the window, combing her hair. No, I am right next to a window right now and I am not enjoying it. That is terrible.

My mouth is dry. My mouth is dry. I've got spicy armpits. It's unpleasant. That was so good, though. I love folklore. Me too. Anyone else got any folklore from around the world?

We've got listeners from everywhere, guys. So like anyone, anywhere. Maybe it's not like a ghost story, but maybe you've got like an interesting folklore story from your country. Send it in because I definitely want to read those because that's really interesting. Okay, last one. This one is the one that shit me up the most this morning. Excellent.

And my palms are already dripping before I even start. It's a short one, but it is a banger. Candice and her boyfriend moved into a new house about seven years ago. And it was a really nice house, didn't have any creepy vibes, everything was absolutely fine. But almost immediately after moving in, Candice started to have the most vivid nightmares. Most of the dreams involved the same little girl walking around the house, trying to wake Candice up. Oh my god.

Candice would often wake in the night after the dreams and hear footsteps or creaking around the house. She always put it to the back of her mind, saying that she was just feeling jumpy because of the dreams and the noises could quite easily be the house changing temperature or the pipes creaking. As time passed, the vivid dreams began to get more and more intense. The girl was coming to her in dreams constantly. And then one night, the dreams changed, and she began dreaming about a group of people standing around her bed, just staring and pointing at her silently,

like fucking Rosemary's Baby or some shit. After this particular round of spookiness, Candice decided it was time to do something about her dreams, and a friend suggested she download an app called Sleep Talk. you leave the app on overnight and it captures any noise you make no i've done one of those before and i nope no you don't want to know you just don't want to know the fucking shit you say in your sleep you just don't want to know or i'm assuming what happens in this which is it picks up somebody else talking. There's neither of them. Well, fucking bide your time, young Padawan. The idea behind this app downloading

was that maybe Candice and her boyfriend were sleep talking and freaking each other out on a subconscious level. Or maybe there was noise coming from outside that was disrupting Candice's sleep. Either way, they could find out what it was and try to deal with it. For a few nights, nothing happened.

Candice didn't have any bad dreams and all her phone picked up was the pair going for a wee in the middle of the night and the occasional meow of a cat. They did have cats, no ghost cats, no Toulouse's here. And then, the girl was back. She was standing at the end of Candice's bed, whispering. And she began by asking Candice to get up. But suddenly, the girl turned to the phone laying on the bedside table, pointed at it and asked, What's that?

Candice woke up the next morning feeling more than a little freaked out and very nervously, she went to her phone to check the recordings. At first, she thought everything was fine. Most of the recordings were just the same sleepy muffles and cat meows. But then suddenly, on the last recording of the night,

she heard a quiet voice of a little girl saying, What's that? Oh my God! And best of all, friends and foes, Candice sent us this recording. No! And I listened to it this morning in a haunted house. It's very faint, right? So I listened to it a few times. I had to really fucking psych myself up to listen this morning in a haunted house. It's very faint, right? So I listened to it a few times.

I had to really fucking psych myself up to listen to it in the first place. And then I couldn't hear it just through my laptop. So I was like, fuck, I'm going to have to listen to this shit with headphones. And I listened to it with headphones, still couldn't really hear it. And then I had to listen to it with like 100% volume in my headphones and I could fucking hear it. I'm scared. I haven't listened to this.

I'm going to try and listen to this. I really didn't want to, but that's my commitment to this show. It would fucking shit me up. It's really shit me up. I really don't want to either. Okay, what we'll do is it's not going to work if we just hold up the recording to the mic because it's so faint. We'll do what they do on fucking Ghost Adventures and just like,

enhance, enhance, and we'll make it as loud as we can and we'll put it in for you volume up enhance clear swipe and we'll put it in here so you guys can listen to it uh tell us what you hear i did hear it i did have to turn it out to the highest possible volume i could and listen through headphones but it's there oh i actually feel sick i hate it okay let's get off this weird fucking box now yeah we need to go now we've got business to do yeah bye guys bye and uh anyone else who has ghost stories especially if you have video audio photos supporting it please please please send them through to redhandedpatreon at gmail.com. And we're going to do more of these because they're just really scary. And you guys seem

to like them. So do that. And we'll see you later. Bye. See you next time. Bye. So get this. The Ontario Liberals elected Bonnie Crombie as their new leader. Bonnie who? I just sent you a profile. Her first act as leader asking donors for a million bucks for her salary. That's excessive. She's a big carbon tax supporter? Oh yeah. Check out her record as mayor. Oh, get out of here.

She even increased taxes in this economy. Yeah, higher taxes, carbon taxes. She sounds expensive. Bonnie Crombie and the Ontario Liberals. They just don't get it. That'll cost you. A message from the Ontario PC Party. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of

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