Smosh Mouth - #19- Reading The Internet's Scariest Stories

Episode Date: October 30, 2023

This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp — go to http://betterhelp.com/smoshmouth to get 10% off your first month. Shayne and Amanda read the creepiest creepypastas the internet has to offer. WEA...R OUR JOKES: https://smosh.com Shayne Topp // https://www.instagram.com/shaynetopp/ Amanda Lehan-Canto // https://www.instagram.com/filmingamanda/ OTHER SMOSHES: Smosh: https://smo.sh/Sub2Smosh Smosh Pit: https://smo.sh/Sub2SmoshPit Smosh Games: https://smo.sh/Sub2SmoshGames El Smosh (Spanish Dub): https://smo.sh/Sub2ElSmosh FOLLOW US: TikTok: https://smo.sh/TikTok Snapchat: http://smo.sh/OnSnapchat Instagram: https://instagram.com/smosh Facebook: https://facebook.com/smosh Twitter: https://twitter.com/smosh Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:54 From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca Welcome to Smosh Mouth. I'm Shane. And I'm Amanda. And this is our spooky Halloween episode. As of airing this, it is October 30th. Oh my god, the night before. All Hallows' Eve. The most evil day of the year.
Starting point is 00:01:21 It's so evil. But today we are going to be doing something that a lot of you asked for a while ago, which is we're going to read creepy stories from the internet. Some of my favorites. These are known as creepypastas. Have you heard of creepypasta? I have. Only because of you guys, you and Damien.
Starting point is 00:01:48 So first off, Damien was supposed to be here. He is sick. He got taken by a ghost. Yes. The devil's got him. No, he's a sick little baby. He's a sick baby. And he's at home, but he's all right. But Creepypastas.
Starting point is 00:02:00 Creepypastas are something that I've been a fan of for a long time. The name, I i believe comes from copy and pasting a story over and over again all over the internet okay so these are stories that they were they're written by someone but a lot of times people don't know who they were written by because they've been copy and pasted to different websites so at a certain point you're like who wrote this now i know who wrote all of these that I brought today because over time, it gets traced back. But it's what makes them so scary in the first place is like people start to go, was this real? You've probably heard of like Slenderman.
Starting point is 00:02:37 Of course. Slenderman was a creepypasta. At least I'm pretty certain was a creepypasta. And that story was all over the place there's one that is my personal favorite that we'll be reading later called candle cove which i love very scary i've got several here and we'll be getting into them but first uh i wanted to talk i want to also talk on this episode about creepy stuff and i first question i have right off the bat is do you believe in ghosts 100% yeah I'm from Massachusetts I feel like required Massachusetts is spooky like it's got very very old homes old structures that have like never been touched families of generations have lived there never like knocked them down or anything so i just feel
Starting point is 00:03:25 like massachusetts also it's near salem but like we have like witchy kind of like look at look at all these like old school horror movies or movies from the 1600s i mean stephen king lives in maine east coast so i just feel like they have all of this like spookiness also you're talking about creepypasta i was just thinking that me and my sisters read probably original creepypastas when they weren't even a thing we used to read like books of horror stories growing up yeah like have you ever heard of the golden arm yes you have i have heard of the golden arm i don't know i don't either it's from like a book that i had yeah. Like, give me back my
Starting point is 00:04:05 golden arm. So I feel like those were creepy pastas maybe before that was a thing. I mean, they're scary stories. So yes, I believe in ghosts. Okay. 100%. Have you seen a ghost? I think at night I have,
Starting point is 00:04:22 but I don't have like a ghost story that people are like, oh, I have actually been awake. It was, you know, early night and I saw a ghost. But I have really bad night terrors. So it's hard to decipher if those are ghosts, part of my imagination, or like other worldly things. Right. I don't know where I stand on ghosts. Really?
Starting point is 00:04:45 I don't not believe in them, but I'm also not an active, like, ghosts are real. And I've said this before, that whenever I hear about any sort of creepy things happening or people saying, oh, I saw this thing and it was a ghost,
Starting point is 00:05:02 my thought is also, well, there might be a million explanations for it. And some of them might be paranormal. I'm not saying, oh, I saw this thing and it was a ghost. My thought is also, well, there might be a million explanations for it. And some of them might be paranormal. I'm not saying there's a scientific reason for that. You're not seeing anything that's beyond our understanding. I just mean, who knows what that is. That doesn't mean it's a person who died. It could be a lot of things.
Starting point is 00:05:21 So define ghost. Do you think a ghost is like someone that has unfinished business coming to scare you or do you think it's just like a person trapped in like a thin place and they don't know they're trying to still like live in their home but they're trying to get somewhere else yeah i think i my i mean i like i said i'm not an active believer, but I could see a ghost. Any sort of version of a ghost is energy or something that is beyond the physical, right? Any sort of consciousness that's beyond the physical realm is what I would say. Oh, that's something ghost or spirit or what have you.
Starting point is 00:06:04 So ghost to you is like an energy. Yeah, it could be that. But I don't, like I said, I don't have, I'm not walking around going, yep, there's definitely ghosts here. At the same time, I am, I always say that I'm always hedging my bets where even though I'm not like, yes, ghosts are real,
Starting point is 00:06:26 I'm not gonna go to a graveyard and be disrespectful. Also just out of respect for people. You're not going to do a seance in the graveyard? But I'm also not trying to like piss anything off. I'm not going to go to a place where they say this house is haunted and I'm going to go in there and be like, come on, ghost, come and find me. I'm not going to do that because I'm also actively thinking, hey, maybe it exists and I'm not going to mess around with it. So ghosts are energy and you also respect them. I respect people's beliefs and I respect that I don't know most stuff. I respect that there is absolutely stuff beyond my understanding and things that exist
Starting point is 00:07:09 that if I heard about it, it would change my entire perspective on reality. I do believe that. But I'm not, I don't know, I'm not going like, that was definitely a ghost.
Starting point is 00:07:21 Oh yeah, there's ghosts there. Because I think a tough thing is there's what you believe and there is also what you want to believe. Right. What do you want the reality to be? Do you want ghosts to exist? Because in my mind, yes.
Starting point is 00:07:39 Because that means, oh, this isn't the end. Yes. There's something beyond. To the point that almost if there was proof of, this is going to sound crazy, if there was proof of, like, devils or demons, I would almost feel, like, not horrible about that. Because I'd be like, oh, that means there is stuff beyond. And that means maybe the flip side of that also exists.
Starting point is 00:08:05 But I don't have proof of that in my mind. I agree with you completely because growing up in a Catholic church, it was like, if you believe in the devil, he's real. But I like this idea of like bad versus, you know, evil versus good. And like there's, you know, there's karma. And if you make a mistake and if you make the deal with the devil, I also think a devil can be like your inner, like nasty thoughts. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:08:31 Do you know what I mean? I don't believe in it. I don't believe in the devil or demons. I do believe that is all representation for our own interior. I think, I think I go both ways. I think I can't be easily convinced. But when someone tells me a story and I feel something or if I walk into a house and I feel something like I've walked into people's houses and been like, hmm, I don't really feel that good. And a lot of it for me is
Starting point is 00:09:01 like if people get stuff from estate sales that are like really old school mirrors or like vintage stuff, I'll be like, blech. Interesting. And it's been like that since I was little. And I've always been kind of like shoved it away. And as I get older, I'm like, okay, what does that mean? And I'll just simply ask. I'll be like, oh, where did you get this stuff? It's like, oh, yeah, a dead woman died and I got all of her furniture. And it's like,
Starting point is 00:09:26 oh, good to know. Interesting. Maybe you're feeling creeped out because your friend is a creepy person. Maybe that... Your friend's like, I got all these mirrors. I got all these things from a dead person. It's not my friend. It's the stuff. Yeah. It's definitely not my weird friend.
Starting point is 00:09:42 But yeah, I feel like ghosts and creepy stuff is definitely energy. Like, whether we describe it as a ghost, there is something otherworldly going on. Do you think ghosts can be, do you view ghosts overall as just a neutral presence or as evil or good?
Starting point is 00:10:00 Because in my mind, I'm like, ghosts are just people without sweaters on. What? because in my mind I'm like ghosts are just people without sweaters on they're they are they're they are I will be a ghost someday when I die if if ghosts are real and I die but I'll just be I'll be myself but without my my armor without my body armor like I mean really that's that's all a ghost is so I'm not if ghosts are real I'm not as scared of ghosts as I am of people. Well, yeah. People are scary. When you say the sweater thing,
Starting point is 00:10:28 that makes me way less scared. Yeah. Because look, I don't know of any proven people getting murdered by ghosts stories, but I know of a lot of people getting murdered
Starting point is 00:10:37 by people stories. Yeah. There's a lot of those. So at the end of the day, ghosts not high up on my priority list of being scared. But those scary people when they die, they become ghosts.
Starting point is 00:10:48 Do you think they, yeah. And you think they continue on with their ways or do you think they change? I think that they are like, they have to do work and they're forced to like either, you know, figure out if they made a mistake. I do think that things follow you. Like I do think that things follow you. Like I do think that things follow you into whatever the afterlife, like karma follows you. I don't think like people always like, Oh, when you die, you're, you're, you're cleaned, you're cleansed. But I do think that ghosts are people who feel like they have regrets or they have unfinished business or they still have the obstacles that they face.
Starting point is 00:11:26 I also think that people have, people live multiple lives. I think that people get to be reborn and live, whether they're like, you know when you see someone and you're like, wow, I have deja vu. You so remind me of this person. I think that that is connected into people living other lives. But I get scared. But I am scared. I get scared. So whether ghosts are real or not, there's definitely energies that some are scary, some are cool.
Starting point is 00:11:54 Okay. Okay. Let's get into our first story here. I'm excited. This one I had not read. I found this this past week when I was just searching for good stories. And I read this one and it's, love this kind of story okay all i love all these kinds of stories but all right
Starting point is 00:12:11 so this one is called mr wide mouth okay it's it's an old one i want to say it's i forget what year it came out but it's been out for it's been on the internet for over 10 years. Or no, roughly maybe. Okay. But I traced it back to a user named PerfectCircle35. So not a name, but a username. But here's the story. Okay. During my childhood, my family was like a drop of water in a vast river, never remaining in one location for long.
Starting point is 00:12:48 We settled in Rhode Island when I was eight, and there we remained until I went to college in Colorado Springs. Most of my memories are rooted in Rhode Island, but there are fragments in the attic of my brain which belong to various homes we had lived in when I was much younger. Most of these memories are unclear and pointless, chasing after another boy in the backyard of a house in North Carolina, trying to build a raft to float on the creek behind the apartment we rented in Pennsylvania, and so on. But there is one set of memories which remains as clear as glass, as though they were just made yesterday. I often wonder whether these memories are simply lucid dreams produced by the long sickness I experienced that spring, but in my heart, I know they are real. We were living in a house just outside the bustling metropolis of New Vineyard, Maine, population 643. It was a large structure, especially for a family of three. There were a number of rooms that I didn't see in the
Starting point is 00:13:33 five months we resided there. In some ways, it was a waste of space, but it was the only house on the market at the time, at least within an hour's commute to my father's place of work. The day after my fifth birthday, attended by my parents alone, I came down with a fever. The doctor said I had mononucleosis, which meant no rough play and more fever for at least another three weeks. It was horrible timing to be bedridden. We were in the process of packing our things to move to Pennsylvania, and most of my things were already packed away in boxes, leaving my room barren. My mother brought me ginger ale and books several times a day, and these served the function of being my primary form of entertainment for the next few weeks.
Starting point is 00:14:10 Boredom always loomed just around the corner, waiting to rear its ugly head and compound my misery. I don't exactly recall how I met Mr. Widemouth. I think it was about a week after I was diagnosed with mono. My first memory of the small creature was asking him if he had a name. He told me to call him Mr. Widemouth because his mouth was large. In fact, everything about him was large in comparison to his body, his head, his eyes, his crooked ears, but his mouth was by far the largest. You look kind of like a Furby, I said as he flipped through one of my books. Mr. Widemouth stopped and gave me a puzzled look.
Starting point is 00:14:45 Furby? What's a Furby? he asked. I shrugged. You know, the toy, the little robot with big ears? You can pet and feed them, almost like a real pet. Oh, Mr. Widemouth resumed his activity. You don't need one of those. They aren't the same as having a real friend. I remember Mr. Widemouth disappearing every time my mother stopped by to check in on me.
Starting point is 00:15:06 I lay under your bed, he later explained. I don't want your parents to see me because I'm afraid they won't let us play anymore. We didn't do much during those first few days. Mr. Widemouth just looked at my books, fascinated by the stories and pictures they contained. The third or fourth morning after I met him, he greeted me with a large smile on his face. I have a new game we can play, he said. We have to wait until after your mother comes to check on you because she can't see us play it. It's a secret game.
Starting point is 00:15:38 After my mother delivered more books and soda at the usual time, Mr. Widemouth slipped out from under the bed and tugged my hand. We have to go to the room at the end of this hallway, he said. I objected at first as my parents had forbidden me to leave my bed without their permission, but Mr. Widemouth persisted until I gave in. The room in question had no furniture or wallpaper. Its only distinguishing feature was a window opposite the doorway. Mr. Widemouth darted across the room and gave the window a firm push, flinging it open. He then beckoned me to look out at the ground below. We were on the second story of the house, but it was on a hill, and from this angle the drop was farther than two stories due to the incline. I like to play pretend up here, Mr. Widemouth explained. I pretend that there is a big soft trampoline below this window, and I jump. If you pretend hard enough, you bounce back up like a feather. I want you to try. I was
Starting point is 00:16:20 a five-year-old with a fever, so only a hint of skepticism darted through my thoughts as I looked down and considered the possibility. It's a long drop, I said. But that's all part of the fun. It wouldn't be fun if it was only a short drop. If it were that way, you may as well just bounce on a real trampoline. I toyed with the idea, picturing myself falling through the thin air only to bounce back to the window on something unseen by human eyes. But the realist in me prevailed.
Starting point is 00:16:43 Maybe some other time, I said. I don't know if I have enough imagination. I could get hurt. Mr. Widemouth's face contorted into a snarl, but only for a moment. Anger gave way to disappointment. If you say so, he said. He spent the rest of the day under my bed,
Starting point is 00:16:57 quiet as a mouse. The following morning, Mr. Widemouth arrived holding a small box. I want to teach you how to juggle, he said. Here are some things you can use to practice before I start giving you lessons. I looked in the box. I want to teach you how to juggle, he said. Here are some things you can use to practice before I start giving you lessons. I looked in the box. It was full of knives. My parents will kill me, I shouted, horrified that Mr. Widemouth had brought knives into my room, objects that my parents would never allow me to touch. I'll be spanked and grounded
Starting point is 00:17:18 for a year. Mr. Widemouth frowned. It's fun to juggle with these. I want you to try it. I pushed the box away. I can't. I'll get in trouble. Knives aren't safe to just throw in the air. Mr. Wide Mouth's frown deepened into a scowl. He took the box of knives and slid under my bed, remaining there the rest of the day. I began to wonder how often he was under me. I started having trouble sleeping after that. Mr. Wide Mouth often woke me up at night, saying he put a real trampoline under the window, a big one, one that I couldn't see in the dark. I always declined and tried to go back to sleep, but Mr. Widemouth often woke me up at night, saying he put a real trampoline under the window, a big one, one that I couldn't see in the dark. I always declined and tried to go back to sleep, but Mr. Widemouth persisted.
Starting point is 00:17:50 Sometimes he stayed by my side until early morning, encouraging me to jump. He wasn't so fun to play with anymore. My mother came to me one morning and told me I had her permission to walk around outside. She thought the fresh air would be good for me, especially after being confined to my room for so long. Ecstatic, I put on my sneakers and trotted out to the back porch, yearning for the feeling of sun on my face. Mr. Widemouth was waiting for me. I have something I want you to see, he said. I must have given him a weird look because he then said, it's safe, I promise. I followed him to the beginning of a deer trail which ran through the woods behind the house. This is an important path, he explained. I've had a lot of friends about your age. When they were ready, I took them down this
Starting point is 00:18:28 path to a special place. You aren't ready yet, but one day I hope to take you there. I returned to the house wondering what kind of place lay beyond that trail. Two weeks after I met Mr. Widemouth, the last load of our things had been packed into a moving truck. I would be in the cab of that truck sitting next to my father for the long drive to Pennsylvania. I considered telling Mr. Widemouth that I would be leaving, but even at five years old, I was beginning to suspect that perhaps the creature's intentions were not to my benefit, despite that he said otherwise. For this reason, I decided to keep my departure a secret. My father and I were in the truck at 4 a.m. He was hoping to make it to Pennsylvania by lunchtime tomorrow with the help of an endless supply of coffee and a six-pack of energy drinks.
Starting point is 00:19:05 He seemed more like a man who was about to run a marathon rather than one who was about to spend two days sitting still. Early enough for you, he asked. I nodded, and he placed my head against the window, hoping for some sleep before the sun came up. I felt my father's hand on my shoulder. This is the last move, son, I promise. I know it's hard for you, as sick as you've been.
Starting point is 00:19:23 Once Daddy gets promoted, we can settle down, and you can make friends. I opened my eyes as we backed out of the driveway. I saw Mr. Widemouth's silhouette in my bedroom window. He stood motionless until the truck was about to turn onto the main road. He gave a pitiful little wave goodbye, steak knife in hand. I didn't wave back. Years later, I returned to New Vineyard. The piece of land our house stood upon was empty except for the foundation, as the house burned down a few years after my family left. Out of curiosity, I followed the deer trail that Mr. Widemouth had shown me. Part of me expected him to jump out from behind a tree and scare the living bejesus out of me,
Starting point is 00:19:57 but I felt that Mr. Widemouth was gone, somehow tied to the house that no longer existed. The trail ended at the New Vineyard Memorial Cemetery. I noticed that many of the tomb that no longer existed. The trail ended at the new vineyard memorial cemetery. I noticed that many of the tombstones belonged to children. Fuck. I know. I love that one. I. It's like, it's just spooky enough.
Starting point is 00:20:17 I love it because I feel like when you were talking about the deer trail, I was like, oh, there's something not right there. It feels very like Pet Sematary. And I feel like because Stephen King is from Maine, like there's so many, this is what I'm talking about the East Coast, there's so many woods and like old houses that you can create all these things in your mind. Because there's so much history there,
Starting point is 00:20:43 but also so much untamed land that it's kind of that perfect combination of mystery. Also, why is the mom giving him soda like every fucking day? The mom is giving him so much ginger ale. We should talk about how that's the real problem. I'm kind of waiting for Mr. Widemouth to be like, hey man, I got some cigarettes. Here, smoke these.
Starting point is 00:21:01 These are cool. Also, this five-year-old, you know, he was pretty aware. Pretty smart five-year-old, you know, he was pretty aware. Pretty smart five-year-old. Knives are. Oh, I'd be dead. Oh, 100%. Mr. Widemouth would have killed me.
Starting point is 00:21:11 Trampoline. Yay. Yay. Boom. That's really scary to me because I do think that our imagination is so strong that especially when you're sick. Yeah. When you're sick, you're like, it makes you do crazy things. I like that story for that reason of, you know,
Starting point is 00:21:32 you have imaginary friends, you have all these things that you imagine when you're five, and theoretically, or just fun playing around thinking about it, if a monster existed and showed up when you were five, and then in your memories you're going, that wasn't real though. Yeah, that didn't exist. But that's, I love this story for that reason.
Starting point is 00:21:52 Me too, because then I'm glad that he went back and was like, oh, the house burned down. Let me just check out this trail. And it's a fucking cemetery full of dead children. Yeah. Like, what? I know. But I like that there's an element of mystery about it.
Starting point is 00:22:05 It's not like I'm certain that Mr. Widemouth was real. It's kind of just, huh. And I, I love, I always love scary stories that have an element of maybe it's true. Maybe it's not.
Starting point is 00:22:16 Maybe it's true. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's, maybe it was just, I also think like the movie Pan's Labyrinth, like when we are sick or going through a tough time, our little kid brain naturally creates like a friend. Yeah. Whether they are good or not, but I think that the friend reflects a little bit what's going on.
Starting point is 00:22:35 And when you're sick, you're like, you're scared. So it's a friend who's like, I'm a little scary, but I'm also your friend. That's true. Do you know what I mean? I think whenever I was sick, I would always imagine, I did grow up in the Catholic church. So guardian angels were a thing. So I would always imagine like a guardian angel person near me.
Starting point is 00:22:53 Like I would buckle the seatbelt next to me, but I do think at night when I was scared, that's when the night terrors would come in. And I still like, there's some people like, Oh, you should be a medium. And I'm like, come in. And I still, like, there are some people like, oh, you should be a medium. And I'm like, absolutely not.
Starting point is 00:23:06 But I do think, like, are those just my imagination? Are they just like my anxious thoughts turned into beings? Or are they really like ghosts from the dead, like, help me? Do you know what I mean? Yeah. I've told this story before, but when I was scared as a kid, especially in the dark, what I would tell myself is the opposite of there being something good around.
Starting point is 00:23:30 I would be like, I am the darkness. What? I'd be like, I'm the scariest thing here. I would try to convince myself that I'm like, demons would be scared of me. And I'm just like, no, they wouldn't. You are literally the chosen. Yeah, it's a very chosen thought of just I am the darkness that's so funny I
Starting point is 00:23:48 would never do that I'd be like they're all around me and you know what else kids are so wild when I was what my niece and nephew when they were little I remember my niece was like four years old and I I was living with my sister and I put her to bed and she'd be like can you shut the
Starting point is 00:24:04 closet door and I'd be like why and she'd be like, can you shut the closet door? And I'd be like, why? And she was like, the witch is in there. And I'd be like, oh my God. Now I can't. Now what is it? Let me, let me. And I would be very scared. Of course.
Starting point is 00:24:15 But then also later on, there was a donkey that you'd have to take the donkey out of the room. I'd be like, can you please take the donkey out of the room? Okay. And I finally was like, okay, what's the deal with the donkey? My brother-in-law is from Ireland. So he was like, if you guys leave the room, the donkey will bite you. That was like his thing.
Starting point is 00:24:34 So finally, my mom, who was their grandmother, was like, okay, I'm taking the donkey out. And it was like, okay, you have to think about like what the parents. A donkey? Yeah. He's fucking Irish. I don't know. They're scared of donkeys over there. What I also love about this story is I am a big fan of monsters.
Starting point is 00:24:54 I love... What scares me in a movie or anything is something that doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before. That's what scares me. And Mr. Widemouth, the way he explains them, my brain creates a really horrific looking thing. Don't you picture him though? I picture him. And I'm sure there's artwork online, but I like to just imagine what this
Starting point is 00:25:13 thing looks like. And also for some reason, I'm far more scared of little things than big monsters. A big, like, if a monster's over eight feet tall, I kind of am like, okay, cool. But little, little things that can scurry and hide, that gets me. Little things are scary.
Starting point is 00:25:31 But also big things, like when they are on the wall or on the ceiling. Yeah. I don't like that shit. But a little thing, a little thing on the wall or ceiling probably scares me more in a way. That's true. Because you can get anywhere. Yeah. scares me more in a way. That's true, because it can get anywhere. Yeah, and if it has a face, if it has eyes and a mouth,
Starting point is 00:25:50 that always gets me far more than any sort of thing that looks more like an animal. Yeah, faceless is not scary. And faceless doesn't really get me too much. No, because I can't see you. No. Well, yeah, you can't see.
Starting point is 00:26:03 Slender man, you don't scare me. Okay, so little things scare you the most. Do you have monsters that scare you? Definitely. Even classic monsters. Because a lot of classic stuff, zombies don't necessarily scare me. Zombies can be scary. Zombies are whatever.
Starting point is 00:26:16 Yeah. It's fine. I'm really scared of the boogeyman, right? Oh. Under the bed. Something that is in dark places, like the closet, the boogeyman that right? Like, don't look under the bed. Like, something that is in dark places, like the closet, the boogeyman, that can, like, morph on the wall. So I get scared of, like, going into a place
Starting point is 00:26:32 and not looking in the right spot and then, like, looking up. And that's what I get scared about. And they can, like, crawl on the ceiling. Like, the movie Don't Look Under the Bed, the newer movie, everyone's like, ah, whatever. I thought it was really scary.
Starting point is 00:26:46 Also, are you talking about the Disney movie? I was thinking of the Disney movie. That movie scared me, too. It was a scary – when you're young – That movie was so scary. But they had a love relationship. What haunted me as a kid was the Goosebumps episode of The Living Dummy. And dolls really scared me.
Starting point is 00:27:04 And it was that uncanny valley thing of something that looks like it should talk and should be alive, but isn't. I don't like dolls. Dolls. They still unsettle me. They don't scare me like they used to. When I was a kid, I actually could not. At my grandparents' house, they had dolls, just like some very classic looking dolls.
Starting point is 00:27:22 And I would tell them, I'd be like, I can't sleep if they're in the room with me. My grandparents had a doll room. I hate that. I do not like dolls either. Hate it. Hate it. I just don't like that at all. Because I think we grew up
Starting point is 00:27:33 with really fucked up horror movies like Chucky. My God. Chucky I was very scared of. I don't yeah and once again little things. Something about them being smaller scares me and I don't, yeah. And once again, little things. Something about them being smaller scares me,
Starting point is 00:27:47 and I don't know why that is. I think because they can get into any place. They can get up right next to you, and you probably won't feel it until later. That's true. That's true. Yeah, because big things like Godzilla and King Kong or just big monsters, even like Cloverfield.
Starting point is 00:28:03 I'm like, yeah, we all see it coming. It's over there. But what was scary about Cloverfield. I'm like, yeah, we all see it coming. It's over there. But what was scary about Cloverfield is that you didn't see it until later. That's true. They did a great job of that. Wow, this is reminding me of really the old school stories that I grew up reading.
Starting point is 00:28:17 I think maybe they are connected to Edgar Allan Poe, too, stories. But the one story where the girl had her hand over her bed stories that stick with me and it was licking her hand and she thought it was her dog but it was a person yeah okay we read the same i know that i know that story that one was passed around a lot people would tell that story would tell that story um yeah that stuff scares me and just yeah anything that i can't recognize what it is if if I'm just like, what is that? That scares me. And I would say a setting that scares me the most is the woods.
Starting point is 00:28:53 The woods are the scariest fucking place. You grew up with woods, right? Yeah. So actually, I grew up from the ages of two to six. I lived in Virginia. And we lived on a cul-de-sac. And behind our house was an endless forest. Uh-huh. And my brothers, I never got to explore it too much because I was too young for them to let me.
Starting point is 00:29:11 But my brothers talked about going deep into the woods and finding like an abandoned house. Oh, yeah. In the middle of the woods. We're going to get into not our next story, but later on we have stories that involve woods. Great. Let's save our woods stories. It's probably my favorite of these three, but I saved it for last. It's a little less of a story.
Starting point is 00:29:31 I grew up in the woods, too. Yeah. So much of my imagination, I think, comes from these kind of faded memories of those woods. Yeah. I can't accurately picture the woods. I just remember it being a very wild, like... So dense. Yeah, very dense.
Starting point is 00:29:51 And yeah, there was a creek. And then it just... But it's just... I don't know. There's something creepy about it. And then going camping in Colorado. Those woods scare me a little less because I don't know why. I think because people are in there.
Starting point is 00:30:10 No, I don't. There's something about the nature of the trees and the way that the Rockies look that feel less haunted than East Coast woods feel haunted. Because they are. Yeah. West Coast woods have Bigfoot. East Coast woods have ghosts. east coast woods have like ghosts ghosts and murderers okay guys we need to take a breather from creepypastas because i need to let you know that this podcast is brought to you by better help shane do you like therapy especially after
Starting point is 00:30:38 those creepy stories yeah no i'll be talking to my therapist about this stuff. I've been seeing a therapist for years now. Nice. And it's so great. Every week I talk to him for an hour and it really helps me organize my thoughts. It's super beneficial. I cannot recommend it enough. And so if you're thinking about trying therapy, you can give BetterHelp a try. It's convenient.
Starting point is 00:31:01 It's flexible. It's suited to your schedule. All you have to do is fill out a quick questionnaire, and you'll get matched with a licensed therapist. And you can switch therapists at any time for no extra charge. Ooh, I love that. So make your brain your friend with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash SmoshMouth today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash SmoshMouth.
Starting point is 00:31:25 All right. Back to creepy stories. I'm readyoshMouth. All right. Back to creepy stories. I'm ready, I think. I'm not. Okay. All right. Let's get into our next story. I'm ready.
Starting point is 00:31:31 This one is arguably my favorite story. Okay. And so this was also one that Damien wanted us to read. So reading it in his honor as well. We both love this one. We've talked about it over the years. I have not reread this one in years. Ooh, okay.
Starting point is 00:31:47 But it's incredible. It's called Candle Cove. And I think it's even been made into a TV show. Pirates. It was written by Chris Straub. And the way it's written is really cool because it's written out like it's on a forum online, like where people are just kind of commenting.
Starting point is 00:32:05 It's not like a consecutive story. Okay. So this is from the Net Nostalgia Forum television local, like where people talk about local television shows. Okay. So someone, this person named Skyshale posts on their subject, Candle Cove local kids show. Does anyone remember this kids show? It was called Candle Cove and kids show. Does anyone remember this kids show? It was called Candle Cove and I must have been six or seven.
Starting point is 00:32:28 I never found reference to it anywhere, so I think it was on a local station around 1971 or 1972. I lived in Ironton at the time. I don't remember which station, but I do remember it was on at a weird time, like 4 p.m. Someone named Mike Painter, 65, responds saying, it seems really familiar to me. I grew up outside of Ashland and was nine years old in 72. Candle Cove. Was it about pirates? I remember a pirate marionette at the mouth of a cave talking to a little girl. Skyshell responds. Yes. Okay. I'm not crazy. I remember pirate Percy. I was always kind of scared of him. He looked like he was built from parts of other dolls,
Starting point is 00:33:08 real low budget. His head was an old porcelain baby doll, looked like an antique that didn't belong on the body. I don't remember what station this was. I think it was WTSF, though. Someone named Jaren2005 chimes in. Sorry to resurrect this old thread, but I know exactly what you mean, Skyshale. I think Candle Cove ran for only a couple months in 71, not 72.
Starting point is 00:33:36 I was 12 and I watched it a few times with my brother. It was Channel 58, whatever station that was. My mom would let me switch to it after the news. Let me see what I remember. It took place in Candle Cove, and it was about a little girl who imagined herself to be friends with pirates. The pirate ship was called the Laughing Stock, and Pirate Percy wasn't a very good pirate because he got scared too easily. And there was Calliope music constantly playing. Don't remember the girl's name.
Starting point is 00:34:03 Janice or Jade or something. I think it was Janice. Skyshale responds. thank you, Jaren. Memories flooded back when you mentioned the laughing stalk in Channel 58. I remember the bow of the ship was a wooden smiling face with the lower jaw submerged. It looked like it was swallowing the sea and it had that awful Edwin voice and laugh. I especially remember how jarring it was when they switched from the wooden slash plastic model to the foam puppet version of the head that talked. Mike Painter responds, I remember now too. Do you remember that this part, Skyshale? You have to go inside. Skyshale responds, Mike, I got a chill reading that. Yes, I remember. That's what the ship was always told Percy when there was a spooky place
Starting point is 00:34:45 he had to go in, like a cave or a dark room where the treasure was, and the camera would push in on Laughingstock's face with each pause, you have to go inside. With his two eyes askew and that flopping foam jaw and the fishing line that opened and closed it, it looked so cheap and awful. You guys remember the villain? He had a face that was just a handlebar mustache above really tall, narrow teeth. Someone just, their username is called
Starting point is 00:35:14 Kevin Hart, says, I honestly, honestly thought the villain was Pirate Percy. I was about five when this show was on. Nightmare fuel. Jaron chimes in again, that wasn't the villain, the puppet with the mustache. That was the villain's sidekick, Horace Horrible. He had a monocle too, but it was on top of the mustache. I used to think that meant he had only one eye. But yeah, the villain
Starting point is 00:35:35 was another marionette, the skin taker. I can't believe that they let us watch that back then. Kevin responds, Skyshell says, Wasn't his top hat and cloak all sewn up crazily? Was that supposed to be children's skin? Mike Painter says, Yeah, I think so. Remember his mouth didn't open and close? His jaw just slid back and forth? I remember the little girl said, Why does your mouth move like that?
Starting point is 00:36:15 And the skin taker didn't look at the girl but at the camera and said, To grind your skin. Skyshell goes, I'm so relieved that other people remember this terrible show. I used to have this awful memory, a bad dream I had where the opening jingle ended, the show faded in from black, and all of the characters were there,
Starting point is 00:36:32 but the camera was just cutting to each of their faces, and they were just screaming, and the puppets and marionettes were flailing spastically, and just all screaming, screaming. The girl was just moaning and crying like she had been through hours of this. I woke up many times from that nightmare. I used to wet the bed when I had it. Kevin goes, I don't think that was a dream. I remember that. I remember that was an episode. Skyshale says, no, no, no, no, no, not, not possible. There was no plot or anything. I
Starting point is 00:36:57 mean, literally just standing in place, crying and screaming for the whole show. Kevin says, maybe I'm manufacturing the memory because you said that, but I swear to God, I remember seeing what you described. They just screamed. Jaron goes, oh God, yes. The little girl, Janice, I remember seeing her shake and the skin taker screaming through his gnashing teeth, his jaw careening so wildly,
Starting point is 00:37:18 I thought it would come off his wire hinges. I turned it off and it was the last time I watched. I ran to tell my brother and we didn't have the courage to turn it back on. And I think time passes. This next post is like later on. And Mike Painter posts again on this forum and he goes, I visited my mom today at the nursing home. I asked her when I was little in the early seventies, when I was eight or nine, and if she remembered a kid's show, Candle Cove. She said she was surprised I could remember that,
Starting point is 00:37:48 and I asked why. And she said, because I used to think it was so strange that you said, I'm gonna go watch Candle Cove now, Mom, and then you would tune the TV to static and just watch dead air for 30 minutes. You had such a big imagination
Starting point is 00:38:00 with your little pirate show. What the hell is going on?'s so good i love how that's written it's written so well like a forum like all these people and what's really scary i thought it was a forum no well it's written like it so when it was copy and pasted all over the internet people were like wait is this real it feels so it's written so well it feels so real literally while you were reading it i was like oh wow all these people this is so fun they're just reminiscing seriously but but it's such a relatable thing because how often are you talking about an old show when you're a kid and you're like wasn't there a weird episode and then when someone's like
Starting point is 00:38:41 yes and you're like oh my god i thought it was crazy. That is real. I do that all the time with like, are you afraid of the dark episodes? Where it's like, wait, you remember the mirror one, right? And people are like, yes. Yeah. Wait, I truly this whole time was like, oh, this is like a cool forum.
Starting point is 00:38:58 It feels real. That's what makes these types of stories so scary is because when I would read them back in the day, when you're a teenager and stuff, and also people would amp it up. Like it's real. There's like, did you read Candle Cove? You know,
Starting point is 00:39:10 it's real, right? We don't know if it's not real. The weird thing is I feel like shows back in the seventies that somehow I like watched because I don't know, my parents put it on or whatever. That is like, it's very believable because you sit back and you go wait remember that show that we watched and was like yeah it was old school marionettes like creepy
Starting point is 00:39:32 it's so so scary yeah a 70s kids show already sounds scary but it the i love that it doesn't go overboard this story is is this story is exactly what scares this scares me because it doesn't get to the point where it's like and then they tried to kill me it's like no i i watched this kid show where they're screaming and then that's that's that's it i'm like that's just so unsettling it it's very unsettling i think because if it went to the point where they were like oh they killed everyone you'd be like all right it's i feel like being suspended in will they won't they is what's the scariest thing do you know what i mean like i i think and also seeing it through the eyes of this little girl like why why does your jaw do that i know like the back and forth
Starting point is 00:40:18 jaw to grind your oh i know it's's so perfect. It's really well done. It's so well done because I do think that, like, 70s, I remember that there was this movie about the Ice Queen back in the day, and it was this old 70s movie about, like, the Ice Queen, and she would, like, come down from the sky, and it was, like, these little, and they were, like, these kids were getting stolen, and I was like, I don't think that was real, and I talked to my sisters about it. Oh, they were like, oh, yeah and it was like these little and they were like these kids were getting stolen and I was like I don't think that was real and I talked to my sisters about it oh they were like oh yeah
Starting point is 00:40:47 it was real I also think like that generation and our generation we watched some pretty dark shit that's why this whole time I was sitting there like oh yeah this is a forum completely forgot that it wasn't it reminds me of Courage the Cowardly Dog did you ever watch that show
Starting point is 00:41:04 no oh my god so Courage the Cowardly Dog. Did you ever watch that show? No. Oh, my God. So Courage the Cowardly Dog was an incredible show. But I remember I would watch it, and I didn't have many friends who at least talked about it. So it was kind of my own little experience. Courage the Cowardly Dog is about a dog that lives with two super old people in the middle of nowhere, Kansas. And it's literally – it's a joke. It's like middle of nowhere Kansas where it's this house and there's nothing.
Starting point is 00:41:27 It's just plain desert around them. But every episode something super creepy is coming to harm the old couple. And the dog is the only one who can save the day. But he's like, he's Courage the Cowardly Dog. So he's really scared, but he's always actually brave and handles it. But there's an episode,
Starting point is 00:41:44 there's an episode that haunts me and it haunts everyone who's watched the show where somehow the old the old man is like a piece of shit right he kind of hates the dog he just is mad old man he gets this ancient slab and he loves it and he's like i got my ancient slab and he but he But he keeps it. And then suddenly, this like creepy spirit thing appears in the distance and the shot is so scary because it's like, they open up the door
Starting point is 00:42:12 and you just see this faint like outline of this thing and it just goes, return the slab or suffer my curse. And they start dealing with plagues and the dog is trying to get the slab back to the thing but the old man doesn't, he just refuses.
Starting point is 00:42:28 It's funny, but as a kid, I was destroyed. I was destroyed and still the vision of it, I'm like, okay, I recognize it's not scary, but it really scared me. The show I think eventually got canceled because they had an episode that was straight up too scary and they were like, we need to stop this show. But they would do unsettling things.
Starting point is 00:42:49 They would have things that don't look right. That's what's scary, when things don't look right. That's why this story scared me, because it was the thought of things not looking right. And I do think it was back in the day, budgets and not knowing claymation. Hot take, hot take. Practical effects will always scare me more than CGI. CGI stuff never scares me. Practical effect monsters really creep me out.
Starting point is 00:43:16 And it's because they look cheap and janky. It's like Coraline. Coraline is really scary. It's the janky element. Yes. There's like in Hellraiser. Have you ever seen Hellraiser? Maybe.
Starting point is 00:43:29 Oh, yeah, yeah, the old school movie. I think it's okay as a movie, but there's the part where she suddenly enters this big, long, dark hallway, and then there's this practical effect monster that has legs that just touch the sides of the wall, and it starts running down the hallway, but it's this practical effect monster that has legs that just touch the sides of the wall. See? And it starts running down the hallway,
Starting point is 00:43:47 but it's this practical effect monster that looks, you're like, you can tell it's fake, but that's kind of why it scared me. Yes. I love that stuff. I love that stuff. I would rather have practical effects. That's why Sixth Sense, sorry,
Starting point is 00:44:03 it's still one of the scariest movies ever because it's just. Oh, true. It's why Sixth Sense. Sorry. It's still one of the scariest movies ever because it's just, oh, true. It's just like ghosts. It's people. And they might have like a gunshot wound in the back of their head. CGI. That movie's so good. So good. Did you have a movie as a kid that ruined you? Cause for me it was, like I said, that goosebumps episode. Did you have any movie that you watched that, that you were that you were doomed for a while after? I was really scared of The Witches, like the original, like Angelica Houston. I was never scared of witches. Witches have never scared me.
Starting point is 00:44:36 No, I was definitely scared of witches. As you're talking, I know that there's something, but I can't quite think of it right now. I would say Are You Afraid of the Dark? There was a lot of episodes. There was also, this is really dumb, but I was very into Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. Okay. That was my time. And they had a double Toil and Trouble movie. Do you remember that? I never watched any Mary-Kate and Ashley.
Starting point is 00:44:59 Okay. Well, you missed out. Okay. They were every career. They were spies. They were detectives. They were spies. They were detectives. They were cowgirls.
Starting point is 00:45:06 Whatever. So I think it was called Double Trouble. And they had a deal with a witch and a mirror. I also am very scared of mirrors. Very scared of mirrors. Like old mirrors. Oh, do you avoid them? Well, I've had a couple of weird things happen to me with mirrors.
Starting point is 00:45:22 Okay. Do you want to? Sure. So remember how I talked about like estate sales things? Well, like when I was first dating H and I was living with my sister in an apartment and my sister is a hypnotherapist.
Starting point is 00:45:37 I, my friend Evan gave me this mirror and it was like this long mirror with like old school paintings on it and whatever. And he's like, oh, it's from my apartment. Someone was's selling their stuff that's all he told me i put the mirror in our apartment and my sister was like i don't fucking like that mirror get rid of that mirror like it's got weird fucking juju and i was like oh okay and i felt that it was weird but i like
Starting point is 00:45:58 ignored it because i was like okay amanda that's not real so i put it in my bedroom. I had the same nightmare for one whole month. It was the same terrifying nightmare. Every night, an old woman would be below. So my door would creep open. The old woman would be below and a man would be above her. And she had this old school bun and they would be looking in at me. And I'd be like, and I would just sit there. And then onto my left, two heads popped out of my computer chair towards me like, and I would wake up. And I was first dating H, so he would sleep over all the time. And I would wake up in screams and tears to the point where I was like, just let it, just like bear it, let it happen. And I told my sister and she was like, it's the fucking mirror. Where'd you get the mirror? And I was
Starting point is 00:46:50 like, okay. You know, she was like, where did you get the mirror? So I was like, okay. So for a couple nights I would like leave it outside the door and shut the door. The nightmares would like, it would be like half the door would creep, creep open. And then it would be the two old people, but they wouldn't be on, be on the chair. So I was like, okay, maybe the mirror outside the door is fine.
Starting point is 00:47:12 Okay. I finally called Evan to investigate. I was like, okay, let me just investigate. Cause I was just like, I don't want this fucking mirror in this house. You're having nightmares.
Starting point is 00:47:20 You've had the same nightmare. You wake, you wake everyone up every night with a scream. And I was like, yeah, it's been really scary. I called Evan. I'm like, where'd you get this mirror? He's like, oh, this old woman died in my apartment. And the apartment was just selling her stuff.
Starting point is 00:47:35 I was like, what? So the old woman just died in her apartment. And the apartment, she had no family. So they just gave away her stuff i was like don't you see how fucked up that is he's like i don't believe in ghosts i was like well buddy me and mirrors are not friends so i finally was like this is this woman this old woman who's been visiting me it must be her she must want her fucking mirror back. So no lie. I was like, all right, I'm getting rid of the mirror. It's like an old memory, but I, we went outside. I put the
Starting point is 00:48:14 mirror down for one second on the grass, a Prius out of fucking nowhere. I swear to God pulls up. This woman comes out, grabs the mirror, mirror opens thing doesn't even say hi puts it in her car and i was like you might want to sage it didn't even hear me drove off never had the nightmare ever again what the yeah yeah okay so i've been buying your mirrors from target ever since me and my friend evan we joke about it because he's like come on amanda i'm like and now i have my sister and Garde to back me up that that was a thing
Starting point is 00:48:48 that happened. So now when I go to that friend's houses when they have weird mirrors, I'm like, where'd you get this fucking mirror? Estate sale.
Starting point is 00:48:57 Mirrors. So, Double Trouble. So you don't have ghost, you don't have ghost stories but you have mirror stories. Mirror stories. That's. And Double Trouble was all about a witch coming through a mirror with Mary-Kate You don't have ghost stories, but you have mirror stories. Mirror stories.
Starting point is 00:49:10 And Double Trouble was all about a witch coming through a mirror with Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. If I watched it now, I'd probably be like, this movie's so stupid. So it was the exact same dream. Every single night. Not even slight differentiation. Wow. Old woman, man. And it was your room. My room.
Starting point is 00:49:25 I never have dreams where I'm like in my actual place. That's always where my night terrors. My night terrors are when I wake up and I see what I've been dreaming about in my room. But the thing is, I don't know if I'm sleepwalking or if I'm actually awake. I haven't quite figured it out. But it's very scary. So I have to like shut closet doors. Because if there's like a out. But it's very scary. So I have to, like, shut closet doors because if there's, like,
Starting point is 00:49:46 a little bit of darkness through a doorway... Yeah. And I don't have a mirror in my room. Sure. Sure, yeah. I wouldn't either.
Starting point is 00:49:55 Yeah. Not gonna have mirrors any time soon. Yeah, it's weird. It's not like a party conversation that I normally have. You guys have mirrors
Starting point is 00:50:03 in your room? You guys wanna hear something fucking scary? Oh my God. All right, here's our last. I can't wait. This is not about mirrors. Now we're getting into the woods. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:50:16 I read this one a long time ago, and this is one that I read where I didn't know if it was real or not. And so when I read it, I kind of took it as real, and it scared the crap out of me. There's one aspect of this that's like my favorite. I have thought about it so much, but I read this a long time ago. This is definitely 10 years old. I found on Reddit. Is it real? I don't think so. Okay. I don't think so. I'm going to say no, but we'll see. So this comes from a user named Search and Rescue Woods.
Starting point is 00:50:48 And the post is, I'm a search and rescue officer for the U.S. Forest Service. I have some stories to tell. I wasn't sure where else to post these stories, so I figured I'd share them here. I've been an SAR officer for a few years now, and along the way I've seen some things that I think you guys will be interested in. I have a pretty good track record for finding missing people. Most of the time they just wander off the path
Starting point is 00:51:14 or slip down a small cliff, and they can't find their way back. The majority of them have heard the old stay where you are thing, and they don't wander far. But I've had two cases where that didn't happen. Both bother me a lot, and I use them as motivation to search even harder you are thing and they don't wander far but i've had two cases where that didn't happen both bother me a lot and i use them as motivation to search even harder on the missing person cases i get called on the first was a little boy who was out berry picking with his parents he and his sister
Starting point is 00:51:34 were together and both of them went missing around the same time the parents lost sight of them for a few seconds and in that time both kids apparently wandered off when the parents couldn't find them they called us and we came out to search the area. We found the daughter pretty quickly and when we asked her where her brother was, she told us that he'd been taken away by the bear man. She said he gave her berries and told her to stay quiet and he wanted to play with her brother for a while. The last she saw of her brother, he was riding on the shoulders of the bear man and seemed calm. Of course, our first thought was abduction, but we never found a trace of another human being in that area. The little girl was also insistent that he wasn't a normal
Starting point is 00:52:10 man, but that he was tall and covered in hair like a bear and that he had a weird face. We searched the area for weeks and it was one of the longest calls I've ever been on, but we never found a single trace of that kid. The other was a young woman who was out hiking with her mom and grandpa. According to the mother, her daughter had climbed up a tree to get a better view of the forest and she'd never come back down. They waited at the base of the tree for hours, calling her name before they called for help. Again, we searched everywhere and we never found a trace of her. I have no idea where she possibly could have gone because neither her mother nor her grandpa saw her come down. A few times I've been out on my own searching with a canine and they've tried to lead me straight up cliffs. Not hills, not even rock faces. Straight, sheer cliffs with no possible handholds. It's
Starting point is 00:52:56 always baffling and in those cases we usually find the person on the other side of the cliff or miles away from where the canine has led us. I'm sure there's an explanation, but it's sort of strange. I was teamed up with another SAR officer because we'd received reports of bears in the area. We were looking for a guy who hadn't come home from a climbing trip when he was supposed to, and we ended up having to do some serious climbing to get where we figured he'd be. We found him trapped in a small crevasse with a broken leg. It was not pleasant. He'd been there for almost two days, and his leg was very obviously infected.
Starting point is 00:53:28 We were able to get him into a chopper, and I heard from one of the EMTs that the guy was absolutely inconsolable. He kept talking about how he'd been doing fine, and when he'd gotten to the top, a man had been there. He said the guy had no climbing equipment, and he was wearing a parka and ski pants. He walked up to the guy, and when the guy turned around, he said he had no face. It was just blank. He freaked out and ended up trying to get off the mountain too fast, which is why he'd fallen. He said he could hear the guy all night climbing down the mountain and letting out these horrible muffled screams. That story bothered the hell out of me. I'm glad I wasn't there to hear it. One of the scariest things I've had to happen to me involved the search for a young woman
Starting point is 00:54:05 who'd gotten separated from her hiking group. We were out until late night because the dogs had picked up her scent. When we found her, she was curled up under a large rotted log. She was missing her shoes and pack and she was clearly in shock. She didn't have any injuries and we were able to get her to walk with us to the base ops. Along the way, she kept looking back behind us and asking why that big man with black eyes was following us. We couldn't see anyone, so we just wrote it off as some weird symptom of shock. But the closer we got to base, the more agitated this woman got. She kept asking me to tell him to stop making faces at her. At one point, she stopped and turned around and started yelling
Starting point is 00:54:39 into the forest, saying that she wanted him to leave her alone. She wasn't going to go with him, she said, and she wouldn't give us to him. We finally got her to keep moving, but we started hearing these weird noises coming from all around us. It was almost like coughing, but more rhythmic and deeper. It was almost insect-like.
Starting point is 00:54:55 I don't really know how else to describe it. When we were within sight of base ops, the woman turns to me, and her eyes are about as wide as I can imagine a human could open them. She touches my shoulder and says, he says to tell you to speed up. He doesn't like looking at the scar on your neck.
Starting point is 00:55:08 I have a very small scar on the base of my neck, but it's mostly hidden under my collar, and I have no idea how this woman saw it. Right after she says it, I hear that weird coughing right in my ear, and I just about jumped out of my skin. I hustled her to ops, trying not to show how freaked out I was, but I have to say I was really happy when we left the area that night. This last one I'll tell, and it's probably the weirdest story I have. Now, I don't know if this is true in every SAR unit, but in mine, it's sort of an unspoken,
Starting point is 00:55:36 regular thing we run into. You can try asking about it with other SAR officers, but even if they know what you're talking about, they probably won't say anything about it. We've been told not to talk about it by our superiors, and at this point, we've all gotten so used to it that it doesn't even seem weird anymore. On just about every case where we're really far into the wilderness, I'm talking 30 or 40 miles, at some point, we'll find a staircase in the middle of the woods. It's almost like if you took the stairs in your house, cut them out, and put them in the forest. I asked about it the first time I saw some,
Starting point is 00:56:07 and the other officer just told me not to worry about it, that it was normal. Everyone I asked said the same thing. I wanted to go check them out, but I was told very emphatically that I should never go near any of them. I just sort of ignore them now when I run into them because it happens so frequently.
Starting point is 00:56:21 I have a lot more stories, and I suppose if anyone's interested, I'll tell some of them tomorrow. If anyone has any theories about the stairs or if you've seen them too, let me know. What?
Starting point is 00:56:32 The staircase one sticks with me. Are you sure this isn't real? I don't think it's real. That's my theory. I don't think it's real. What happened? This user posted a bunch more parts. Did he find the boy?
Starting point is 00:56:46 According to him, no. This is like the... So do you think that this guy is not a real search and rescue person? I think this is someone who writes really good stories and creates this lore. That's kind of amazing. It's really well done. No, I have a lot of respect for this writer.
Starting point is 00:57:01 I mean, these are really cool. I read like part two and there's some cool ones. There's one where they were searching for this guy, this old man who had gone hiking on a trail, and they found his cane way up in a tree, like so far up in a tree that they're like, nobody could even throw it up there, but this old man, there's no way he got up there.
Starting point is 00:57:22 But there was no other evidence of him. I love stories like that. I mean, in a scary way where I'm like, just pure mystery and what's going on. The staircase one, absolutely, I picture it all the time. Just being out 30 miles out into the woods in the middle of nowhere and seeing a staircase. Terrifying. Really? I actually think it's mystical. It's mystical, but it's also... miles out into the woods in the middle of nowhere and seeing a staircase terrifying really i actually
Starting point is 00:57:46 think it's like mystical like it's mystical but it's also it's scary to me because i'm like that is so unknown yes you're you're treading into complete mystery and that's that it's a different type of scary that's my favorite that's like i get like a rush of like where my all of my, you know, when your eyes water and your skin stands up. That's where I get that. I love forest. I feel like I grew up in the woods, too. And we literally live on a state park. I think I told you this and where I grew up.
Starting point is 00:58:21 And so there's so many there's so much woods and i don't know if i told you this but i grew up with a bunch of norwegian like 19 year old au pair vibe maybe people who wanted to like live in america my mom i have four sisters so my mom and dad worked all the time so people who wanted to live in america would live with us okay and they were also like we would call them our nannies or au pairs or whatever so they would just like hang out with us take Okay. And they were also like, we would call them our nannies or au pairs or whatever. So they would just like hang out with us, take us to school and stuff like that. And we had all different types.
Starting point is 00:58:51 We had two sisters who lived with us the most and grad style. They're from Norway. So every time we were in the woods all the time to like walk and I had camp there, they would tell us about the Norwegian trolls. Cool. Right? I love that trolls is their thing.
Starting point is 00:59:08 We had them all throughout our room. We had the old creepy trolls with the jewels in their belly button and the crazy old hair. Yeah. So they would tell us that these trolls would hide behind trees, all around the trees. In Norway? No, where we were. Okay. This was like their thing. Like in the No, where we were. Okay. This was like their thing.
Starting point is 00:59:27 Like in the woods, this was what they would tell us, that trolls would be following us just to make sure that we were doing good things. Like we were being good. We were on our best behavior. And if we turned around quick enough, we could catch the little troll like hiding behind
Starting point is 00:59:41 because they had big, big crazy hair. And I'm not kidding like you know you just like treat that as normal but i think my sister was like hey should i buy this troll and send it to you and i was like oh my god and it opened up this whole world and then on netflix that movie called troll i was like mom do you remember troll and she was like oh yeah toba and monica just had you guys believing that there were trolls all around the woods i was like, mom, do you remember troll? And she was like, oh, yeah. Tova and Monica just had you guys believing that there were trolls all around the woods. I was like, no, I still believe that. They're out there.
Starting point is 01:00:13 That's the thing. So I feel like weird, mystical. See, I attach it to like mystical creatures rather than like creepy like guys with black eyes. I guess, yeah, I don't see the woods like that. I'm the same way where I just think of the woods feel so mysterious. And I love Bigfoot stories. I love the idea of cryptids. I love the idea of there being creatures out there that we don't know.
Starting point is 01:00:41 And I also love that every single place has their own thing, right? Yes. Have you ever seen the map of cryptids? I don't know what a cryptid is. A cryptid is a creature that has not been identified. Or it's kind of like mythical, like Bigfoot is a cryptid because people say there is a giant ape in the US, but they don't know where it is.
Starting point is 01:01:06 There's a recent video of Bigfoot. I saw that. Did you see that? I don't know if that's, I don't buy it, but I want to believe in it. But there's also talk of, there's a clip that constantly goes viral on TikTok of this guy talking about how in the Congo, in Africa, there was apparently a sighting of like a massive snake and then you also have like the Jersey
Starting point is 01:01:28 Devil you have Mothman you have all these things that exist there's something on the east coast that my dad was just telling me about it's by the Bridgewater Triangle it's like it has like spikes and it's I forget what it's called Pudgy Pudgy Pudgy Pudgy
Starting point is 01:01:44 Pudgy? My dad talk aboutudgy. Wudgy Pudgy. Pudgy? My dad told me. Talk about a not scary name. You know my dad believes in all this shit. He picked me up and told me about Pudgy Wudgy. He's like, yeah, Pudgy Wudgy. Look it up. Have you heard the tales of Pudgy Wudgy?
Starting point is 01:01:56 He's coming for you. It's really creepy. Do you believe in any? Pudgy Wudgy, when I looked it up, I was like, all right, Dad. Not Pudgy Wudgy. Do I believe in Bigfoot Pudgy wudgy when I looked it up. I was like, all right, Dad. Not pudgy wudgy. Do I believe in Bigfoot? Or just any sort of?
Starting point is 01:02:09 I believe in mystical fairy. You believe in fairies? Yes. Okay. In what way? What do they look like? Not like little people with butterfly wings. Depends.
Starting point is 01:02:23 I do believe, because also in the woods in Massachusetts, some people would just build fairy houses and leave them. My mom builds fairy houses for fun. What does a fairy house look like? Oh my god, it can look like anything. But right by our house, there's this old school mansion, and there's
Starting point is 01:02:40 all these fairy houses everywhere that artists build, and they look whatever you want them to look like. Like a bird house? No, like they're on the ground. Oh. Like you know those little champagne caps that you roll off? Yeah. That's a table. That's a fairy table.
Starting point is 01:02:56 So they look really, oh my god, you would love it. That's so cool. There's some that are made out of stone, out of wood, there's like little stairs. Some of them have like a whole reading nook. And you believe that there's fairies living in those? I'm not judging you. I'm asking you.
Starting point is 01:03:11 My magical brain is like, hell yeah, there's fairies. I believe that there's little... I think because I grew up with the trolls, that it attached to a mystical belief. Rather than Bigfoot and these big creatures, I believe in like these little
Starting point is 01:03:26 like fairy creatures that live around here. I don't know if they necessarily have wings. I don't know. I haven't fully been asked that question yet. I mean, hey, I respect it.
Starting point is 01:03:38 But I think I do believe in fairies. That's a new one for me. I think I do believe in fairies because I think I love, I love little tiny things. Like little tiny cups and stuff. I would love to take you to these fairy houses.
Starting point is 01:03:51 You would be astonished. You're unbelievable. It sounds great. I'll look it up. Stuart Little could also live in them. I remember Stuart Little. So yeah, I believe in fairies. Okay.
Starting point is 01:04:03 Fuck yeah. I almost thought about doing our segment again where we make up a a lie and for for let's do it where we where we say something about like seeing bigfoot or seeing fairies or something let's do it okay should i say i've seen bigfoot yeah okay because you live it doesn't bigfoot live in colorado He's more like Seattle and Oregon. Okay. Okay. Let me try to think. I think it's like.
Starting point is 01:04:30 Okay. Let me tell this story. Okay. All right. So for those who are watching this podcast, this is a lie. This is not true. This is our own crazy pasta. I've never seen Bigfoot.
Starting point is 01:04:42 Never at all. I've never actually. No, never mind. I have seen bears. I have an idea offoot. Never at all. I've never actually, no, never mind. I have seen bears. I have an idea of how to tell this story. So I have seen Bigfoot. Or I've seen what I can only describe as Bigfoot. I don't talk about it much because people would think I'm crazy.
Starting point is 01:05:01 I was camping in Colorado. And we were way out in this campsite that's pretty far out from anywhere, from any main roads or anything. And we're hiking, and we're hiking in the evening, not too far from camp. And we're hiking along one side of a valley, and I can see across the valley, and there's a river down below, small river, and I see the faint outline of a bear. And I've seen bears before in Colorado, black bears. This one was more brown, like a dark brown, and that scared me because I thought, oh, it's a grizzly bear.
Starting point is 01:05:37 And I thought it was on all fours, and I think it was, and then I notice, as I pass by a tree, I come back around, and it's standing on its haunches. Stop it now. And I think maybe, oh, is this bear looking over at us? But then I notice that it's just fully standing and it's looking at me and I'm like, this structure of this thing is not a bear and it's way too tall to be a black bear
Starting point is 01:06:05 standing on its haunches. And it's standing there looking at me and then it steps to the side, which a bear would never be able to do. And then it's gone. And it's just gone. And my brothers didn't see it. It's so well blended in.
Starting point is 01:06:19 Gone? Well, it just like stood, it went behind a tree into the brush and then it's just so blended in. But I know what I saw and it was looking directly at me. And I mean, it's far away, but I know what that was. Shane, did you see Bigfoot? I guess so.
Starting point is 01:06:40 Holy shit. Cut. Cut. Cut. Boom. People are not going to believe that one. Oh my fucking God. That's going to end up like those Joe Rogan clips with the dernernerner, dernernerner.
Starting point is 01:06:57 It's like, I saw Bigfoot. You showed, yeah. Do you want to try to do one? I feel like the mirror ones. The mirror ones are, yeah, that might actually be. The mirror ones just actually real. My lie is probably not going to get as many clicks as that real story, which is awful. All right.
Starting point is 01:07:16 Okay. I think we've run out of time. Yeah, we have. We have run out of time, which we always do. Yeah. Happy Halloween to everyone. Before we go, what's the best Halloween candy? Oh, Reese's Cup.
Starting point is 01:07:27 Yeah, I was going to say Reese's Cup. I was going to say Reese's Cup. What? I was going to say. Did you trade your Halloween candy when you were little? I mean, not. Because nobody's going to trade a Reese's Cup. Oh, my sisters did.
Starting point is 01:07:39 But I would trade all the like shitty, like the fruity, like ones that are shaped like fast food. Awful. Nasty. Get it out of my face. Reese's Cup is the bomb. It like the fruity, like ones that are shaped like fast food. Awful. Nasty. Get it out of my face. Reese's Cup is the bomb. It's the absolute best. I do think Milky Ways are a waste of time. Okay.
Starting point is 01:07:51 I kind of disagree because Three Musketeers are bomb. Oh, those are incredible. Okay. But Milky Way, yeah. Three Musketeers, Reese's, top two. Butterfinger also. Those have grown on me. I wasn't a fan as a kid.
Starting point is 01:08:01 I rarely got them. Yeah, because they're special. Anyways. Anyways. Happy a fan as a kid. I rarely got them. Yeah, because they're special. Anyways. Anyways. Happy Halloween, you freaks. Happy Halloween. Get spooky.
Starting point is 01:08:11 Be creepy. Be creepy to your neighbors. We'll see you later. Happy Halloween, Bigfoot. Bye, Bigfoot. Bye.

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