Welcome to Night Vale - 224 - Liminal Spaces

Episode Date: March 15, 2023

Relax and unwind with a liminal spaces compilation. Weather: “Through the Clouds“ by Checkpoints! Original episode art by Jessica Hayworth Read episode transcripts Our new podcast, UNLICENSED, available now! 2023 US TOUR DATES for “The Haunting of Night Vale” Patreon is how we exist! If you can, please help us keep making this show. Music: Disparition Logo: Rob Wilson Written by Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor Narrated by Cecil Baldwin Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Check out our books, live shows, store, membership program, and official recap show at welcometonightvale.com A production of Night Vale Presents. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Howdy y'all. It is Jeffrey Craneer. I'm not sure which episode of Welcome to Nightville you're listening to, but I am speaking to you from April of 2026. And I'm here to tell you we're going to be in Europe. If you want to see Nightville live and you're going to be in Europe, come check us out at the end of May. We're going to be in Edinburgh on May the 27th. We will be in Manchester on the 28th, London on the 29th, and Amsterdam on May the 30th. Just go to Welcome to Nightville.com slash live to see the show dates and to get your tickets. This is. our newest Nightville live show Murder Night in Blood Forest. It is so much fun. Please come check it out. Also, coming up this month here in April, it is the return of Alice Isn't Dead, brand new episodes of our other crazy hit podcast. This is written by Joseph Fink, produced and with music by Dysperition and starring Jacique and Nicole. So make sure you are still subscribed to Alice Isn't Dead and go get those on April the 13th as new episodes come out. Finally, speaking of other shows, do you want to hear us talk about other things? things. We have three other really great chat shows. First of all, there's Good Morning Nightvale for all of your Nightvale needs. You can hear Hal, Meg, and Symphony talk about every single

episode in order of Welcome to Nightvale. Also, we have Random Horror Number Nine. That is me and Nightville star Cecil Baldwin talking about horror movies one at a time in a random order. And then Joseph and Meg do best, worst, which is a really fun podcast where they look at hit TV shows and they review the best rated on IMDB, the worst rated on IMDB, and if you're a Patreon member, they will review the middleest rated on IMDB. So check out all of those at nightfallpresents.com or just wherever you get your podcast. And hey, thanks. As above, so below. Also, so five years ago, above is very dated these days. Welcome to Nightvale. You might have heard about this new internet craze

the youth have with what they call liminal spaces, by which, as far as I can understand, they mean a photo of any empty public space, especially when the photo was taken at night. An empty McDonald's, an empty swimming pool, an empty blockbuster video, just these normal places we go to every day. But if you take a photo at night when no one's there, then it gives what the youth call liminal vibes, and they cannot get enough of it. Why, my niece Janice watches four-hour-long liminal spaces compilations. She says it helps her relax after stressful days of managing both work and school. She could just zone out and be like, oh man, it's totally creepy when a Forever 21 has no one in it. Anyway, I like to stay in touch with what the new generations are.

up to. I'm hip, as none of the kids say anymore. So I agreed to watch one of these liminal space compilations with Janice. Four hours of empty movie theater lobbies or whatever. Doesn't sound like the most thrilling use of my time, but doing anything with Janus is worthwhile. And I'm looking forward to it. I'll bring a bag of popcorn. Wait, do the kids still eat popcorn? Oh God. Am I old because I eat popcorn? I'm not old, I'm still young, and with it, I just like popcorn, okay? But first, a word from our sponsors. Today's show is brought to you by night jeans, the new jeans for night. We all love jeans. Day denim, sure, can't get enough of it. But don't you wish you could

wear that reinforced cotton in your dreams? Well, now you can. Introducing night jeans. Simply slip off your daytime jeans and pull on night jeans before bed. Settle comfortably under the covers and really get the feel for the night jeans experience. Do you want to put your hands in your pockets while you sleep? Go for it. Do you want to rip the knees off your night jeans? That's cool with us. Night jeans are about you, your needs, and we want you to have fun with it.

And for those of us who want the full immersive experience, now introducing the Canadian Tuxedo. That's right, a full pajama set that is blue denim from top to bottom. Why dip your toe in dark waters when you could cannonball instead? Think of the luxurious experience when your denim-clad body first hits those sheets when you close your eyes and drift into dreams clad fully in jeans from head to toe. jeans. Jeans may be for the day, but night jeans are for any time at all. This has been a word from our sponsors. Okay, Janice is putting on the Liminal Spaces compilation. It's really slow-moving,

just pictures of empty rooms while someone is either doing atmospheric music or has fallen asleep on the keyboard that sound was set to John Carpenter, so I think I should be able to keep doing the show while we watch. Oh, we're starting out strong with an abandoned amusement park. This picture is taken at night. There is a light on in one of the rides, a children's ride where the cars are shaped like teddy bears. In the dimly lit interior of the ride, we can see a ladder and a painted prop of a tree that has fallen over with neglect. Creepy.

Next, we have a photo of a high school hallway. It is after hours, but the lights are all on. Some of the lockers have been left open and empty. It appears equally possible that a crowd of teenagers is about to come herding through here, shouting and laughing, or that no human foot has touched this floor for a thousand years. It is very, as the kids say, liminal. Although, I admit, I don't really know what they mean when they say that. I think they just mean spooky, which, hey, these are some spooky photos, cannot disagree.

Okay, another one of the greatest hits, an empty water park, ugh, super creepy, and you know, liminal. Hold on, there's a man in this photo, sitting with his feet dangling into an empty swimming pool, and I can't quite... Well, he has his back turned, but I know this man. I know him. If only I could see his face, I would know for sure,

but I don't like this man in the photo. He makes me aware that I have forgotten something. There's an emptiness in my brain where there should be a memory, and I have a feeling that the emptiness is shaped exactly like the man in the photo. Oh, thank God to the photo changed to an empty mall. That's fine. Yeah. Uh-huh.

We'll keep watching this. But in the meantime, let's move on with the show. The sheriff's secret police has officially named Dana Cardinal, a person of interest in the murder of Dana Cardinal. She has admitted to the murder describing a situation in which she met herself and, after a lengthy struggle, murdered this other her with a stapler. However, the police cannot proceed with an arrest as of yet because nobody has been found and also because Dana Cardinal is alive and walking around. So the paperwork on that would be a real doozy, a secret police spokesperson explained. However, Dana has been asked to turn over any and all staplers in her house, to which she said, I don't have a stapler in my house, this is 2023.

And also, did you think I kept the stapler? Like a trophy or something? I don't still have the murder stapler. They have also asked her to remain in the same. the state, to which she said that she, quote, has never left the state, doesn't even know which state we are in, and wouldn't know how to leave if she wanted to, end quote. It is definitely very tricky to leave Nightvale, but the good news is, why would you even want to? And now the community calendar.

This evening, there is a safe pug surrender at Grove Park. Now, if you own a pug, you can take it to Grove Park tonight to be disposed of. No questions asked. Pug owners are 90% more likely to experience a pug incident than those who do not own pugs. So while you may think you need a pug for your safety, just know that pug will most likely be used on you or your loved ones. Please, do yourself and your community a favor and trash that pug. Thursday, Michelle Wynne of Dark Hour Records, will be leading a sound back,

and meditation experience. The sound you will be bathing in is Michelle describing the entire plot of Riverdale from episode one. The meditation will also be that as well. Michelle just really needs you to hear how wild the plot of this show gets. There is no cost, but Michelle requests donations of fingernail clippings because she says she would like to put a hex on all of you. Oh, not a bad hex. You know, just don't worry about it.

Just give me the clippings and we'll see what happens, Michelle said. This weekend is the Nightvale Food and Wine Festival at the Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area. World famous chef Emerald Lagassee will be teaching how to boil water, which is the basis of all cooking. If you don't have this, Emeril said, standing next to several different pots of water

that were all being heated in different ways, then you don't have anything at all, baby. And then shouted his signature catchphrase, Bada bing, Bada boom. Renowned chef Nancy Silverton will be delivering the keynote speech titled, I don't know who any of you are or where this place is, and I am pleading for you to tell me that this is only a dream. And our beloved local chef, Earl Harlan,

will be cutting off one of his own pinkies in the Flaky O's demonstration kitchen. Sounds delicious. And finally, Tuesday is Nona's Spaghetti Night at the Taco Bell. Well, the Liminal Space's video is still going. Janice has fallen asleep. But I'm still up and watching it as I broadcast. Now it's doing nostalgic shots of doctor's office waiting rooms and computer labs from the late 90s, really aiming hard for childhood memories of a certain age of person.

Maybe that's what this is all about. Trying to recreate a version of the world where we were small and lost and the outside world was confusing and grown up. We want to become babies again, because if we are not babies, then we are responsible for what is happening around us. Ooh. Now it's showing weird photos from houseless.

things. Ugh. Basements that are bare concrete with a single black leather couch pushed up against one wall. Dark, dirty hallways with crude cartoon murals on the walls. Staircases covered in plush carpet in a color I can only describe as malaise. Okay. Now we are in a computer room in a house. A bubble gum pink Apple computer from when they were trying their best to make Their computers look like candy. Oh, there's that man again. And he's sitting in a brown leather computer chair. Okay, he is on an AOL search.

No, this is not a photo, but this is an actual video. I mean, the way it is shot would make it look like a live feed if the tech and vibe weren't so specifically dated to decades ago. The camera's moving closer, and we can see what the man is doing. He's typing something. in the AOL search bar. It looks like he's typing,

Cecil. I know you can see this. We can't talk now, but we will soon. We will talk so soon. Now he is swiveling in his chair, and in a moment I will see his face, but I don't want to see his face.

And the video just cut to a school cafeteria at night, with a single fluorescent bulb flickering over the tables. Oh, who! I don't know what that was, but I am glad it's over. Okay, maybe now that Janice is asleep, I'll stop this video. I think I've seen enough. Huh. No matter what I click, it's not stopping.

It must be something I'm doing wrong. I'm so bad at this tech stuff. And now for a children's fun fact science corner. You know, despite the name, I've never yet. I've never given any real fun facts. So let's do that today. Fun fact. No one knows what wind is or what it wants.

Fun fact. Once and only once in your lifetime, you will have a thought that no other human being in the history of our species has ever had. You will never know which thought that is. Everything else you think will have been shared with at least one other person, so take that as solace whenever you're lonely. Fun fact. A tundra is just a cold desert. A mountain is just a big hill. And a Kappa Barra, and I'm sorry, but I have eyes, is clearly just a type of dog.

Fun fact. All matter tends toward entropy. The atoms of you are barely held together and someday they must dissipate. Discipation is the great fact of not just life, but of the entire universe. All that is solid will someday become vapor and then mist and then haze, so don't feel bad that you haven't done those dishes yet. On a long enough time scale, those dishes don't even exist. Fun fact. Did you know Reno is farther west than Los Angeles? I didn't.

I didn't know where either of those places are. This has been the Children's Fun Fact Science Corner. I've been texting with Carlos to see if he knows how to stop a YouTube video. And everything he has told me hasn't worked. Boy, I'm a real bumble hands when it comes to tech. Because even if I exit out of the browser window, it just pops right back up. Playing the liminal space is compilation. In fact, every time I do that,

the music on the video gets slightly louder. Why would it work for me, right? Okay, Carlos is suggesting I unplug the computer. Oh, duh, I have tried that right away. I'll just... Ah! Okay, listeners, I unplug the computer and suddenly I am no longer in the studio. Janice is not here. Her computer's not here. I don't even have my mic, so who knows if you can hear me still? I'm standing in an old shopping mall. Everything looks decorated like it was in 2003. There's an advertisement on the wall for the movie How to Lose a Guy in 13 Days, although the top of it has been peeled off so the two actors in the photo are missing their heads.

There doesn't seem to be anyone else here. Hello? Hello? A voice just shouted back from what sounded like a long, long way away. The voice said, You shouldn't have stopped the video, Cecil. You shouldn't have done that. Listeners, I don't love what's happening here. And while I try to find my way out of this weird mall,

let's take you to the weather. Through the mall searching for any way out. Anyway, back to my studio. All of the stores had names I didn't recognize, slant, Ned's Gifts, and More, Thomas Allen Bradley Sports, and the flagship department store, which didn't have a name, only a large red square logo over its door. But finally, I saw a green exit sign and I stepped through only to find myself in an office hallway. The carpets were beige, as were the walls. I could see.

smell, faintly, fresh photocopies, and I could hear as though from on the other side of a great crevasse the sound of a vacuum running. I wandered for a bit, until I stepped through a door that led to a doctor's waiting room from the 90s full of issues of highlights and that one toy where you move the little blocks around on a track. Another door, farther, and I was in an empty subway sandwich shop at night. Then another door led to a hotel elevator, which took me up 30 floors, and deposited me in a house that had a carpet the color of malaise. I recognized this house, although I don't know why.

I walked through the house following an instinct I could not name, and there was the computer room with the bubble gum pink apple computer. and the brown leather chair. In the chair was the man. He was facing away from me. Where am I? And how do I get home? I said.

This is your home. He said. This is not my home, I said. But even as I did, I felt that I was lying. This was not my home now, but it was my home once. When was it my home? I didn't remember. What do you want for me? I demanded, and turned his chair around.

His face was perfectly normal and terrifyingly familiar. I had seen it once in an old VHS copy of Cat Ballou and then again in the murals that were painted around town. I want you to remember you. He said, I don't want to remember, I said. You will, though, he said. You have no choice. And then, quite loudly, through the room, I heard the old modem dial-up sound, which was totally nostalgic. And I was back in my studio, sitting next to Janice with the plug of her computer in my hand.

Huh. Well, I don't know what all that means. and I refuse to look into it further. So, stay to next for a liminal moment, since every moment is only a transit into the next. And good night. Nightvale. Good night. Welcome to Nightvale as the production of Nightvale Presents.

It is written by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Craneer and produced by Dissperition. The voice of Night Vale is Cecil Baldwin, original music by Dissperition. All of it can be found at Disparition.bancamp.com. This episode's weather was Through the Clouds by Checkpoints. Find out more at checkpoints theband.bantamptop

com. Comments, questions, email us at info at welcome to nightvail.com or follow us on Twitter at Nightville Radio and Instagram at Nightvale Official. We now have a TikTok at Nightvale Official as well if you like short videos by a fictional

radio station. And also check out Welcome to Nightveil.com for where we have a twice monthly mailing list and info about our merch shop full of carefully selected stuff made by a handful of artists we trust. That sure was an Academy Awards, huh? Some movies won, but also some movies lost, and not everyone agrees. Wild. Are you squeamish about horror movies, but kind of want to know what happens? Or are you a horror lover who likes thoughtful conversation about your favorite genre? Join me, Jeffrey Crane, and my friend from Welcome to Nightville, Cecil Baldwin, for our weekly podcast, Random Number Generator,

horror podcast number nine, where we watch and discuss horror movies in a random order. Find, here's the short version, Random Horror Nine, wherever you get your podcasts. Boo.