Welcome to Night Vale - 193 - Team Having Fun

Episode Date: September 1, 2021

We’re not here to tell you what you’re doing wrong. We’re here to tell you what you could be doing right. Weather: “All This Time” by Ellis https://ellissongs.bandcamp.com/ Transcript available at http://welcometonightvale.com/transcripts Patreon is how we exist! If you can, please help us keep making this show: http://patreon.com/welcometonightvale/ 2022 US TOUR DATES ANNOUNCED! March 27 - June 24, we’ll be all over America with “The Haunting of Night Vale” Tickets on sale now! http://welcometonightvale.com/live Get Joseph Fink’s new novel, THE HALLOWEEN MOON https://www.welcometonightvale.com/books#halloweenmoon Music: Disparition http://disparition.bandcamp.com Logo: Rob Wilson http://robwilsonwork.com Written by Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor. Narrated by Cecil Baldwin. http://welcometonightvale.com Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram. Check out our books, live shows, store, membership program, and official recap show. Produced by Night Vale Presents. http://nightvalepresents.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, Nightville, it is Jeffrey Craneer speaking to you from April of 2026 with a couple of cool things coming up. First off, we're going to be in Europe touring our newest Nightville live show, Murder Night in Blood Forest. We're going to be in Edinburgh, UK, on May 27th. We'll be in Manchester on the 28th. We will be in London on May 29th, and we will be in Amsterdam on May the 30th. You can get tickets for these shows at Welcome to Nightville.com slash live, and hopefully we'll have more. shows coming up later this year. Who knows? Just get on our newsletter. Go to Welcome to Nightville.com. Sign up for our newsletter. We will send you emails twice a month to let you know

all of the news that you need to know about Welcome to Nightville. One of the big news things to tell you right now is that our other hit podcast, Alice Isn't Dead, is coming back on April the 13th, written by Joseph Fink, produced by Disparition and starring Jacica Nicole. More episodes of Alice Isn't Dead return on April the 13th. So make sure you are still subscribe to that podcast. Finally, do you want some cool nightbale merch? Go to welcome to nightville.com, click on store, and we have all kinds of cool t-shirts, things for the summer, tank tops, beach towels, and if you like coffee mugs, if you want calendars, if you want backpacks, all kinds of cool stuff there. So check out Welcome to Nightville.com and click on store, click on live. If you want to see our live shows,

we will see you in Europe. And hey, thanks. love, or die, cry, despair. Your call. Welcome to Night Vale. Let me start today's show by saying how much I love you, listeners. You make the station what it is. I bring you the news, unbiased, direct, and honest. And you listen every single day for, oh, how many years now? What? Who can even know? The point is that we're a small community with a small radio station and a dedicated listenership. I hope you know that you can always call or write in and let me know what you think about my broadcasting. And many of you do.

Good or bad, I'm so thankful for everything you have to say because it means you care. This is how this business works or should work. But, you know, maybe I'm getting old. Maybe the business of this business is passing me by. Station Management hired radio consultants to help shape our program, my program, to reach a wider audience. This morning, two brothers named Mike and Cash came into my prep meeting before my broadcast began. They were very nice. They told me they thought I was great, doing an awesome job, that they weren't here to tell me what I was doing wrong.

they just wanted to tell me everything I could be doing right. The name of their company is Team Having Fun. Yeah, this all seemed fine, I told them. I'm a team guy, because I don't like upsetting station management. And I like having fun within reason. I told them to feel free to listen to my show for a few weeks, and then we could schedule a meeting after that to talk about their ideas. But that's not what Mike and Cash had in mind.

They immediately signed me up for the Team Having Fun Slack channel and told me they'd be updating me throughout the show with ideas from their remote focus group. I love this already. It's going to be great. And now the news. A report this morning from Old Town Night Vale

of a possible alien abduction. Beth Jones, owner of the combination dog training studio and CrossFit gym at Harrison and Somerset was deadlifting six bull mastiffs above her head when suddenly a bright light from the sky shone down on her. Witnesses said Beth was pulled into the air along with the dogs. Beth was still counting her reps aloud. According to the report, she had completed over 250 lifts as the light enveloped her entirely. The Bull Mastiff's remained in sitting position, not barking or jumping because Beth is a talented dog trainer.

And those are good dogs. Good, good dogs. Beth's neighbors and friends were reasonably alarmed. Casper O'Kelly, who lives next door to Beth, said, Seeing our friend get taken by aliens is really scary. I'm scared, okay, but also I'm kind of excited. Like, you hate to see someone you know get abducted, but also like, Wow, you get to see an alien abduction live right in front of you.

Casper continued. Okay, now I'm imagining all the really cool, uh, uh, terrifying experiments being done to Beth. Whoa, like being frightened is kind of fun. Casper then jumped behind a bush and told the reporter, okay, okay, okay, pretend you don't see me, and then walk by here and I'll scare you. You'll see. You'll see.

What is... Oh, no. Oh, boy! Another message from Team Having Fun Slack! Focus groups don't like hearing bad news, so if you have to report bad news, try inserting a funny sound effect every three sentences. But that's not really my style to... Oh, okay, you know what? The hallway to station management's office is glowing red, so I am on team having fun. Of course I can play funny sound effects during a serious news story.

Great, super great. There are a lot of unlabeled audio files here on my board, and I'm sure they're all hilarious. We have breaking news on the alien abduction. The entire desert flower bowling alley and arcade fun complex has been abducted. How do you abduct an entire building? Oh, wait, that was three sentences. Okay, let me see here. How do I play one of these drops? Here we go. Yep, funny sound effects, totally working.

The bowling alley was closed at the time, but daytime shift manager Samuel Barkway was on duty in the building. Samuel, as many of you may know, is a former resident of the civilization below Lane 5 that attacked our town almost a decade ago. Samuel, being a peace-loving person, defected from his own civilization to become a resident of Night Vale. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Woo. Samuel struggled for years to make ends meet. He was met with distrust from much of our community because he was from a warring state. Yet, Desert Flower owner Teddy Williams found it in his heart to give Samuel a job, a place to stay, and public support.

Woo. So, Samuel, you will be missed. I hope you're okay wherever you are. What is it now? Focus group liked the sound effects, but not as much as we had hoped. New plan, play with your pace. Sometimes you get into a predictable rhythm. What?

That lulls, your listeners, keep them on their toes by speeding up and slowing down. Great. Okay, let's try this out on a local interest story. Last night was the first annual. Media Softball Challenge at Mission Grove Park. Our community radio station made up one of the teams, which included me, my new intern, Patrick Siren, and our sales team, all of whom are named Sean. We took on the staff of the Nightfail Daily Journal, which consisted only of editor Leanne Hart.

All of the equipment was provided by the World Sporting Goods Capital Conglomerate LLC, which just opened a new location. Over by the Ralphs. I don't really play sports at all, but the balls and mitts and everything were so nice. They had metal bats too, but I didn't realize that until I got there. And they were cool. I just loved the sound of aluminum hitting anything. The game was not that exciting. The Daily Journal won 20 to 1.

Our station's team started out strong when intern Patrick hit a lead-off inside the park home run off to Leanne Hart. But knowing she had no other players on her team, she disembowled Patrick with a hatchet and then placed his eviscerated corpse on top of home plate as a warning to anyone else who attempted to swing at her pitches. And so we didn't. We kept... I looked for a story about Leanne's vicious crime in the paper this morning, but there was nothing. Nothing at all. To the family of intern Patrick, he had a... great form on his swing and a terrific follow-through. He will be missed. Listeners, more breaking news.

I'm getting word that the alien spacecraft has been abducting people all over town. Witnesses describe the ship as a large disc with blinking lights all around the edge. Below the saucer shape is where the bright light beams down and in the windows of the vessel are beams of astonishing structure. The ship was last seen over the Barista District and, um, reports are coming in that the entire Barista District has been abducted by the ship. I... Oh, come on. Doing great as always, cease. Ugh. Focus groups loving the new energy, but they don't like how polished you sound. They think, you think, you're better than them the way you speak so smoothly. and preparedly you don't sound natural.

Try dropping written scripts entirely. Speak off the cuff, bud. Bud? Maybe say um more often, like a common person. They want to know you're one of them. I am one of... Mm-hmm.

Okay. Okay. Putting my pages down. I'll just do this community calendar from memory. Extemporaneously. How's that? All right, so community calendar. Thursday is the premiere of Tosca, which is an opera at the new old Nightvale Opera House.

Tosca, right. That is the one, it's probably a, there's always like a soprano cortisan with an alto friend that falls in love with a tenor. And there's always a baritone that's trying to break them up. Anyway, whatever. That's on Thursday. Friday. Okay, Friday, Dark L Records. Okay, there's going to be a concert by, a live concert by Megan the Stallion.

No, Megan the stallion. Yeah. But it's all acoustic. She's going to be singing her hits, which include that, looking at life from both sides now. I could drink a case of you, whatever that song is. And 1999. It's more of a dancing song.

There are unfortunately no tickets available right now because Michelle Wynn and her girlfriend, Maureen, have decided that this is really just a date that are coming on. And it's really just for the two of them. Because I don't think they're in an open relationship right now. Okay, so Saturday, over at the rec center, we're going to be starting some pottery classes. These are classes for beginners, so you don't have to have any previous experience. But things that you will learn how to make include clocks, keys, and bongs.

And Sunday is, you know, I don't know. Oh my God, this is ridiculous. Doing awesome. Killing it, guy. Oh, God. Focus group loves this common folk thing you're doing, but like you still sound like a radio dude. Don't think of this as a radio station, Cecilia.

Uh, mm-hmm. Think of it like a bunch of friends sitting around a bar, eating nachos, drinking suds, chit-chatting, you know. Consider eating on the air, get a snack, give us that normal fellow vibe. Team having fun. Out. Okay.

A bunch of bros in a bar eating nachos. Talking news. Fine. Here we go. Breaking news, Nightbale. The entire city hall, including all of the city council,

has been abducted by the alien spacecraft. And now it's completely gone. No word on how this ship which is approximately the size of one and a half applebees can fit an entire city hall, a bowling alley, and a Barissa district in its hold. But I'm sure none of those who have been taken from our quiet little community are still safe.

Oh, God, the horrible experiments being done to them, it's too awful to think about. But also, you know, kind of exciting. Like, I don't want to make light of it. It's super frightening what's happening. but like in a thrilling sort of way. Because, you know, being scared is sometimes fun. Like, I don't know.

Like a haunted house or horror film or operating a microwave. Oh my God, thank you. I can see the alien craft through my window right now and it's headed right for the station. I don't know if it plans to draw us into its deadly beams but maybe I should go and save myself. No, no, no.

Of course I shouldn't. I mean, I'm a newsman. I'm your news. Newsman, Nightvale, and I would never leave you when there is news to cover. It is my duty to you. Oh, come on. What now? Mike and Cash, what do you?

Focus Group hates the spaceship. You need to get rid of the spaceship. CC, please respond. Okay, shirder. Okay, fine. We'll do with it. Listeners, Mike and Cash have just run out to the front of the station, and they're waving frantically up toward the flying saucer and a light.

Oh my God, it's so bright. is shining down on them and there they go drawn straight up into the hull of the ship and just like that the spaceship is gone well I guess we should celebrate honor

their memories with a weather report is a really good chipch Stephen King calls scary as hell everything here is impossible but it's also real Sci-fi vision calls it the best show streaming right now. We're running out of time and we still don't know the rules.

Don't miss what the movie blog calls something you need to watch. Saving those children is how we all go home. From Binge All Episodes exclusively on Paramount Plus. Nightfail, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the aliens are still here. I do, however, love to be the bearer of good news, which is that the aliens have returned all of the people and places they abducted. Unfortunately, they didn't do it right. City Hall is now in the Barista District,

and the Barista District is now where the Bowling Alley was, and the bowling alley is where City Hall was but facing the other way. Daytime shift manager Samuel Barkway at the Desert Flower said he's so happy to be back home, and he reported that the NBA Jam Machine and the Archie, Arcade is now a Gallagher, which will be very disappointing to my brother-in-law, Steve. But super exciting to me. It'd be nice if the aliens had put it all back the way they found it, but one should never look at a gift horse. The point is, everything and everybody has been returned.

Beth Jones from the Combination Dog Training Studio in CrossFit Gym is also glad to be back in Nightfail. She claimed, though, that she endured some intense procedures by the aliens. They surgically removed large sections of her brain through her nasal passage. Then they replaced what they took with new, more powerful brains. And Beth can now speak in over 2,000 additional languages, although none of them are Earth languages. But still, it's kind of neat, she said in Zilsarian, the language of the Ross 128 star system. Oh, and the Mastiffs are telekinetic now. Now, of course, Mike and Cash have also returned, and honestly, I'm happy they're okay.

Look, I'm sorry if I sounded irritated with them or pleased that they were abducted. They were just doing their jobs. And they really do live up to their name, Team Having Fun. Speaking of doing their jobs, they also acquired a new client, which is kind of a relief, to me, because they're too busy with that to keep sending me silly ideas on Slack. Conversely, station management looks super angry. But there's not a lot they can do about it, though. Team Having Fun's new clients are the alien abductors.

And even station management is afraid of irritating our potential intergalactic destroyers. But Mike and Cash seem to really be connecting with the aliens. They've been added to the Team Having Fun Slack channel and they're receiving tutorials on how to use Twitch. According to Mike and Cash, focus groups do not like aliens abducting people, but they love watching them play Rocket League while eating edibles and trash-talking 13-year-olds on the internet. Team Having Fun is currently communicating all this to the beings of astonishing structure via their new translator, Beth Jones. Good work, Beth.

Also, good luck, Team Having Fun. I'm pulling for you. Like you wouldn't believe. Stay tuned next for Cat News. The News, for cats, by cats, about cats. And as always, good night. Nightvale, good night. Welcome to Nightvale as a production of Nightvale Presents. It is written by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Craneer and produced by Dysperition.

The voice of Night Vale is Cecil Baldwin. Original music by Dysperition. All of it can be found at dispirition.com. This episode's weather was All This Time by Ellis. Find out more at ellisongs.bancamp.com. Comments, questions, email us at info at welcome to nightbale.com or follow us on Twitter at Nightville Radio or shout at a bird. Check out Welcome to Nightvail.com for info about our 2022 tour.

That's right. Us. Back in a room with you. We cannot wait. Today's proverb, be careful. what you wish for because your wish might not come true and then you'll be sad. Hey, Jeffrey Kraner here to tell you about another show from me and my Nightvale co-creator Joseph Fink. It's called Unlicensed and it's an L.A. Noir-style mystery set in the outskirts of

present-day Los Angeles. Unlicensed follows two unlicensed private investigators who small jobs looking into insurance claims and missing property are only the tip of a conspiracy iceberg. There are already two seasons of unlicensed for you to listen to now, with season three dropping on May 15th. Unlicensed is available exclusively through Audible, free if you already have that subscription. And if you don't, Audible has a trial membership. And if I know you, and I do, you can binge all that mystery goodness in a short window. And if you like it, if you liked Unlicensed, please, please rate and review each season. Our ability to keep making this show is predicated on audience engagement. So go check out.

unlicensed available now only at audible.com.