Xander & Stone - The Science & Supernatural Podcast

Spooktober - 2020 Spooky Listener Stories

• Xander & Stone

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Celebrating our 1st Annual Halloween Spook-tacular.
We asked our listeners to send in their spooky stories! 

You did not disappoint! 
 
Thank you, gorgeous weirdos, you are fang-tastic!

Xander & Stone throw in a few of their own stories along with some creepy Reddit stories.

Remember to check out these AWESOME podcasts on your favourite podcasting app who contributed their stories!

I'm Having The Strangest Dream Podcast 
Paraunity Podcast 
The Strange Sessions Podcast 
Paranormality Radio 

Don't forget to subscribe/follow Xander & Stone Podcast and share it with your tribe!

We love to hear from our listeners - send us a story or just drop us a note!

Send us Fan Mail

IG: xspodcast

SPEAKER_08

Hideous cries, assorted hells, lingering shrieks, louder yells, otherworldly specters, wretched souls, evil monsters, entities of old. Now don't be afraid, even if you're alone, you're in the realm of Xander and Stone.

SPEAKER_06

That that feels like an acrostic.

SPEAKER_08

It wasn't acrostic.

SPEAKER_06

A little longer. Wasn't an acrostic?

SPEAKER_08

That is exactly why we have you on the show, because you figure out the tough things. That wasn't acrostic. It was an acrostic with three extra letters. Um, so that's spelt out the word Halloween eo. Halloween-o! Halloween.

SPEAKER_06

So either Halloweenio is a word or it is an acrostic-ish. Either way, well done.

SPEAKER_08

I think we should contact Collins and have them included in the dictionary. Halloween-io!

SPEAKER_06

Does readers digest still exist? I think it does.

SPEAKER_08

I think it does. It's read by old people in old age homes everywhere.

SPEAKER_06

They would love that book. Perfect.

SPEAKER_08

Halloween is just around the corner that time of year when the shadows move and the other world comes out to play. And I'm joined today by the original Scream Queen with a voice so haunting, even the bravest men fall to their knees. The irresistible siren of science and supernatural, the unconquerable stone.

SPEAKER_06

Thank you for that. I keep I keep trying to decide which one I want as my voicemail message. And that one probably just made the cut.

SPEAKER_09

So thank you.

SPEAKER_06

And we're introducing Xander the Great, Instagram God, and the registered owner of at least seven Swiss bank accounts that we know of.

SPEAKER_08

But people, those are the Swiss bank accounts that the people need to be sending the donations to keep the podcast going to. Like I have the bank accounts, I just don't have any money inside of them.

SPEAKER_06

I was unaware. I was just so impressed with seven separate accounts. I had no idea there was no money.

SPEAKER_08

They're all over. It's all an illusion. It's an illusion. I'm using one to pay off the other one. It's a whole credit network that I've got going. Um but I'm glad you brought up Instagram because I have been almost killing myself on Instagram this week with all the postings. I'm so impressed. But the results have been great. So we have been getting listeners who have been sending us their spooky stories for our very first ever Halloween episode. So I hope you're all ready to hear some spooky stories from all around the world. Our first story today was sent in by Krista, who is one of the hosts of my favorite podcast, The Strange Sessions. And um, here's Krista's story.

SPEAKER_02

Hey, Xander and Stone, Krista from The Strange Sessions here. First of all, I just want to say congratulations on the podcast. You guys are killing this thing. I'm really loving it. Keep up the great work. And second of all, I'm excited to contribute a personal experience to your podcast. So this incident took place at the conclusion of an investigation that Kurt and I, Kurt being my co-host on the Strain Sessions. Um, it was an investigation we had done at a location that we had been to several times as a group, but on this particular investigation, it was just the two of us and the owner. We had had some pretty intense moments earlier in the evening, which was kind of it was sort of hit or miss with this place. Sometimes we would have some kind of crazy things that would happen during the investigation, but then we'd have almost no evidence to speak of. And other times nothing would happen, and then we'd come away with crazy EVPs. So I don't recall if we came away with any EVPs after this investigation, but I definitely came away with an experience that I will never forget. So what's kind of unique about this location is that we would always spend the night there. And I don't mean that we would investigate all night into the morning and then go home. I mean that we would investigate till probably one or two o'clock in the morning, and then we would pull out sleeping bags and pillows and we would sleep there, which probably sounds crazy, and I guess it kind of is, but I mean we did this many times, and this uh occasion was no different. Kurt and I were camped out in the front room, probably about 10 feet away from each other. And Kurt is the kind of person who, like two minutes after his head hits the pillow, he's out. I, on the other hand, am a notoriously terrible sleeper. It can take me 45 plus minutes under perfect conditions to fall asleep and put me in a haunted location. And let's just say I'm probably only getting a couple hours of really broken sleep. So I'm lying there, I'm in my sleeping bag, I'm on a cot, I'm lying on my left side, and I've got the sleeping bag pulled up over my right ear because you know, you just feel a little bit safer that way. And out of nowhere, I hear this breathing in my right ear. It was as if someone was standing directly behind me and over me and leaning down and very deliberately breathing into my ear. I can still hear it today, and this was 10 years ago at least. I remember thinking to myself, what is going on? And immediately I try to rationalize it because that's just how my brain works. And the first thing that came to my mind was, well, I'm underneath the covers. Maybe I'm hearing my own breathing and just freaking myself out. So I held my breath and the breathing continued. And at that point, I realized something really strange was going on. And I got really scared, so scared that I started sweating, and I distinctly remember feeling this bead of sweat dripping down from the right side of my neck all the way across down to the left side of my neck. And I'm lying there, sweating, afraid to move, afraid to breathe, and out of nowhere, it just stops. As suddenly as it started, it stopped. So I'm lying there still, afraid to move, afraid to do anything. Took me maybe, I don't know, five minutes to finally get the courage to peek out from under the covers. And of course, Kurt's sound asleep where he was, you know, 10 minutes prior. Nobody's in the shop. I think Vicky, the owner of the building, may have been sleeping in the next room, but it's not the kind of place you can sneak around in. It's a hundred-plus-year-old building with creaky floors. And to this day, I have no explanation for what that could have been. All in all, the encounter, as I would call it, lasted probably less than 20 seconds. Felt like an hour. But I don't know, to this day, it feels like it was yesterday. I remember the details so vividly. So, anyway, that's my little encounter, my creepy personal experience. Happy to share it with you guys. Uh, keep the episodes coming. You're doing such a great job and stay strange.

SPEAKER_08

So, what do you think of that stone?

SPEAKER_06

She had the fear sweat.

SPEAKER_08

She had the fear sweat. That's so intense. That is intense, right? But like, I I I don't know. If you went on a if you went on a paranormal investigation uh to a place that you knew or or very suspected to be haunted, would you would you spend the night there? Would you be like, let's take our sleeping bags along? Let's sleep in this haunted place.

SPEAKER_06

I I have actually. I have stayed in the park.

SPEAKER_08

Okay.

SPEAKER_06

Just to see. Just to see. Not the sleeping bag part, but just to see.

SPEAKER_08

Okay, so you're gonna have to tell us about that.

SPEAKER_06

But I I do I I am envious. You should come to America so we can check out some of these haunted locations and take our little sleeping bags.

SPEAKER_08

I I am all in on that idea. I'm all in on that idea. I'm I'm starting to get a long list of reasons why I need to leave China and go and live in America and exploring all the haunted places in America, other than your the the the pleasure of the company of your lovely self being number one on the list. Um, number two on the list is getting to explore all the haunted places, and number three is actual UFO sightings. Because if you're gonna go anywhere and find UFOs, Arizona is the place to go.

SPEAKER_06

Arizona.

SPEAKER_08

Absolutely, absolutely.

SPEAKER_06

Um, but I think if it was us, I probably would have rolled my sleeping bag over while staying tucked in to wake you up instead of pushing you through the like a stop, drop, and roll. You're just like roll across the floor, just roll, roll, roll, body slamming me.

SPEAKER_08

Body slamming your friend till they're awake.

unknown

Wake up.

SPEAKER_06

But you never know what you're gonna do in these circumstances because you're you know, you're so freaked out and your body just freezes or sweats, apparently. But yeah, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_08

Like I I get I get like the heebie jeebies, even when a living person is breathing down my ear. You know what I mean? Like, I don't like that more so when they're living, more so when they're living, even creepier, probably. But then then something that isn't there comes and breathes on your uh down your ear. I I don't know if I'm down for that. But you know, I love I love she mentioned EVPs there, the um electronic voice phenomenon. And this is something that I've wondered about often. So it's you know, electronic voice phenomenon is something that you can record on uh, you know, just like a dictaphone or a small handheld recorder, or even just on your phone as a voice memo. And it makes me wonder why we don't pick up spirits communicating with us on just general everyday recordings. Like you and I, maybe we could do one right now. Maybe we could do one because we're recording. So let's put that out there. We might not hear it in the moment, but let's put it out there. If there are any spirits around me, please talk into the microphone. I don't know if there's spirits living in my apartment.

SPEAKER_06

Well, you have to be quiet for five seconds, which is impossible.

SPEAKER_08

That's that's probably why I have a lot of.

SPEAKER_06

This is why you never hear the spirits because you're always talking. Just always talking.

SPEAKER_08

It's my job, it's what I do for a living.

SPEAKER_06

See, mystery solved. They're talking to you non-stop. You just can't hear them.

SPEAKER_08

So I want to know, Stone, what is your Halloween tradition? You know, where where I come from in South Africa, Halloween is not a very big uh holiday. We don't celebrate it. Um obviously it doesn't have, you know, when when you think of all the holidays, when you think of Christmas, you've got the white Christmas and the snow. But in Southern Africa, in the southern hemisphere, it is like full-blown summer, 35, 40 degrees Celsius type of thing. Um, so we don't really have Halloween traditions. You don't go knocking around trick-or-treating or anything like that. Um, but I want to know what your Halloween tradition was, either now or growing up as a kid.

SPEAKER_06

Grow growing up as a as a kid, we offer our best friends growing up. My my parents were best friends with other parents that they had met in uh in the Navy and so in the military. And so we were raised at this, you know, we had the same age children and everything. And so we we would always go trick-or-treating with them. And our dads, it took it took me a few years to catch on. But every time at the end of getting all the candy, you would lay it out and then you would trade candy for which ones you wanted. And every time me and Randy Venabone, my best friend at the time, we would always have a rock in our bag, no one else, just us. And so it took me a few years to realize that our our dads were saying, Oh, that's a really heavy bag. Let me see that. And they were putting rocks in our bags to make us think we had more candy, which is so mean. And they, you know, just torturing us for no apparent reason. Um, and then I remember I was, I think we were 16, way past when we should have been trigger trading. And we just kept going. And he and I got to one door, and this older woman looked at us and she goes, Y'all look like y'all should have kids yourselves, is what Southern West Virginia. And I was a little embarrassed by that, but it didn't stop me from trick-or-treating the next year as well. So I I like to make it last as long as I could. And I still dress up for Halloween, I still try to find where to go. So that's why China was a little difficult last year because I I really was dying to go out for Halloween and it's not really a big thing there either, huh?

SPEAKER_08

It's it's treated a bit differently here. And you know, like the the the Western holidays, there's they're they're not so much celebrated for the holidays that they are and for the intention of the holiday, but they're more for like the the decorations and the the a reason and an excuse to to dress up, basically. So what you find is between October and December, Halloween kind of blends into Christmas, and they they both kind of feel like one really long holiday that's kind of the same. So, like here, Halloween, we all know that Halloween is about getting dressed up in costumes, but in China, Christmas is also about getting dressed up in costumes as well. Um so it just seems any excuse, any excuse to get dressed up on a costume. Um but of course, you know, there's there's no trick-or-treating or anything like that um as a tradition here. But you do you do see all the you know the the schools do Halloween parties for their kids and the shopping malls have Halloween decorations. Um so it does, you know, it does exist here, but just not in the same way that it exists in in Western countries.

SPEAKER_06

Um but you know the church the church that I went to, we actually had believed it, believe it or not, it sounds contradictory, but we sponsored the haunted hotel, and it was the biggest deal. And so I always had because we were younger, we had to work concession stand, but my dad was like this headless person, and so everybody thought he was just you know a dummy or whatever, and then he would jump out at people, and it was so so also the haunted houses are a really big deal here. Cool, just to throw that on. Very exciting to me in the haunted houses.

SPEAKER_08

We went um in in a city called Qingdu in China, there's a there's a haunted house, but it's a permanent feature, it's like uh like one of those fun house or escape rooms type of thing, you know, those. But you don't have to you don't have to escape, you just have to get through the fun house. Um, and it is I'll give it, I'll give it to them. It is creepy as fuck. Like it is super, super creepy. They've got actors. I got fondled in the dark by one of the actors. I was like, whoa, like it's okay to reach out, but there's certain things you shouldn't be reaching for. Um but I went with my partner, and what you have to do when you when you go inside is you you have the choice of buying um like uh one ticket, but then the other ticket, you get this little badge. And if you if you buy the ticket with this little badge, it means that they won't separate you from the group. If you do not buy the slightly cheaper one, you will get separated. They'll like intentionally separate you, so you have to go through this place by yourself. And honestly, within within two minutes, like my partner and I got separated. And I'm you know, I'm I'm pretty confident. I know that. You didn't buy the badge. I didn't buy the badge because I'm cheap that way. Um, but I'm pretty confident, you know. I've worked in the film industry. I know what film sets look like. I know what, you know, if you turned the lights on, that would be just some girl in makeup, and that would be a plastic hand with fake blood on it. Like maybe work working in film kind of ruins the illusion for a lot of people. Um, well, for people who work in the industry, but within honestly, within five minutes of being in this haunted house, we got separated. And I was confidently marching forward, not worrying too much about it. And all I could hear, all I could hear from across the other end of this warehouse was my partner yelling in Chinese, I don't want to do this anymore. Let me out, let me out. And then they come and fetch you and they actually take you out. Um, and then you know, I mean, I chuckled to myself about that. I thought it was hilarious. But uh five minutes later, I was kind of regretting it because then I was like, oh shit, I'm in this place by myself. And if I can't find my way out, what am I gonna do? Um, but it was it was a very cool experience. But you know, most Americans most Americans spend their Halloween uh dressing up or trick-or-treating, and other countries also have their own traditions and rituals to celebrate the the night. Um, you know, the night when the veil between this world and the spirit world lifts. And in Ireland, uh, the tradition of Halloween is called Sawen. And Ireland is said to be the birthplace of what we call Halloween today. So the origin stems from this ancient Celtic and pagan ritual, a fest a festival called some um uh soen, uh, which is spelt because you know Irish, S-A-M-H-A-I-N. And I actually had to get hold of Irish people to ask them how to pronounce that because it's not some hein, it's soin. And it's um it's also called the end of the light or the half of the year, and it took place many, many centuries ago. So today, Ireland and Scotland they both celebrate Halloween with bonfires, with games, with traditional foods. One called a barmbruck, which is an Irish fruitcake that contains a whole multitude of choking hazards like buttons and coins and rings.

SPEAKER_09

Oh nice.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah, all of which are included for telling the fortunes of anybody who happens to get one of these esophagal clogging knickknacks in their slicer fruitcake. Um but if you get a ring, it is said to predict marriage within the next year. And if you get something like a coin, it's uh said to predict great wealth within the coming year.

SPEAKER_06

Um that's a lovely tradition. I like that one.

SPEAKER_08

But now you you mentioned you mentioned that you stayed in a haunted hotel. So I'm gonna I'm gonna invite you to tell us that story.

SPEAKER_06

Yes. When I first came to Tucson, I actually came to Tucson by putting my finger on a map. And so I came here on an Amtrak train with my little suitcase and a half. And so uh we stayed in Hotel Congress, and I did not know that there was any rumors about it being haunted because I'd just arrived and it happened to be across from the train station. But it is a very old building and has uh each room is uh very different than the room next to it. They're all uh individual, very individualized rooms. And it was pretty creepy, and so the next day we asked, like, if if there was any rumors of hauntings here, because there was a lot of, I mean, it's an older building. So of course there were the creaks and croaks and groans and all those things, and they were like, oh yeah, it's very haunted. So we ended up staying the second night, and then after that, we were supposed to stay four nights, and after that, I think we were good to go. And we went to No Gallas for two nights uh in Mexico. But I think two nights were plenty, especially after it had been confirmed that it was haunted. And I did a little research on it because I like I said before, Metallica won't stay there, and many celebrities actually come to stay there because of it being haunted and people knowing about that. Um, and they say that they see people in the window and walking in the halls. And um the people that so the downtown hotel is definitely haunted, even uh according to the owners. And Shana Oserin, the co-owner of Hotel Congress, said usually when it's quiet, they come through. So maybe you staying there, it wouldn't be a problem, but for the rest of us. Just really getting my digs in today. Uh, she also said they look like normal people, they're not transparent or anything. You might see someone out of the corner of your eye and then turn and look away, and they won't be there. And there have been several, what they refer to as their permanent guests. And so people see them working behind the counter. Uh, they walk past them in the stairs. And like, for instance, one evening uh someone asked about the female they just talked to at the desk, and that night they only had male workers. And so obviously it wasn't anyone working there, but they appeared to be a bell person at the front desk. And most of the most of the ghosts are seen in the same clothes doing the same things over and over again. We come back to that whole same clothes thing, be careful what you die in because you're stuck in it, apparently. Um, and then one of the most familiar ghosts is easily recognized by his old-fashioned attire. He comes through in a top hat and he walks through the lobby and sticks his head into the office door if it's open. So the owners and other people have seen this as well. Uh, one always peeks out of the top of the window. That's the one that scares most people, even from the outside. Another walks through the kitchen, and one who wears a maid uniform is always seen cleaning. That'd be a pretty miserable existence to still be cleaning in the afterlife. And based on an informal lost souls investigation, Alan concluded that he was the one doing it, concluded that these repeated sightings are the results of enduring impressions of people, something a bit like watching a videotape of past events on loop. Okay. So that is Hotel Congress. And it it is really eerie in fairness. It's a very eerie little spot.

SPEAKER_08

And did, I mean, when you were there, was it like viscerally eerie? Like, did you get like a weird feeling? Did you pick up on a vibe?

SPEAKER_06

There's definitely a vibe. And and uh I had actually talked to them about shooting a movie there. So I toured the whole place and I I went up where other people couldn't go to the top, or supposedly somebody had committed suicide by jumping off, but it's usually closed off. And you you pretty much have chills the whole time you're there. It's it just has that quality feeling. That being said, the cup, which adjoins with the hotel, is some of the most amazing food you'll ever have in Tucson, Arizona. So I highly recommend their food. But yes, it's a you have to you have to be kind of brave because the it of course, in in well, maybe not of course to you, but in Tucson, most buildings are one level because we have a big um our big science department and they're uh the astronomy, it's the low flying UFOs. Right, and low-flying UFOs. So so anytime you have uh anything more than one story, it's kind of a big deal in Tucson. But this one, you know, with the creaky little stairs and everything, it's it's it's very eerie.

SPEAKER_08

I'm definitely coming to Tucson. I gotta come to Tucson. And the fact that like a band like Metallica, like a heavy metal band, is supposed to be all about like dark and scary. The fact that they won't stay there, come on, you bitches. You know what I mean? Like we need to get them on the show to talk about that. I would love to hear what they experienced and why perspective. Yeah, absolutely. But you know, it's just like you said number one, be careful what you die in because that's the outfit you're gonna get stuck in for the rest of your life. Um and if you're in something like DAPA, like a top hat, great. But if you're stuck in your maids you can you imagine getting stuck in your work uniform for the rest of your life? And then aside from that And then you're still clean. Well, the the the rest of your afterlife, exactly, and then you Spend perpetuity scrubbing floors. But it it it sounds like um it sounds like the spirit world is quite busy. And it's something I remember from my interview with Michael Gorley is he said that like when you pass over, you don't just float in a cloud for the rest of eternity, like you've got shit to do. Um but you know, I mean if you get assigned to doing the same old chores day in and day out, I think that would piss me off as well.

SPEAKER_06

Um I guess they didn't have to put her on payroll, so maybe that's why the emotions are pretty cool, aren't they? Yeah, clean the bathroom.

SPEAKER_08

That's awesome. Keep it going. And also, I mean, you mentioned that living people are interacting with these ghosts, like the the um the person at the front desk that they spoke to a lady and there ain't no lady on shift today. That's crazy. That is crazy.

SPEAKER_06

Like the And everyone knows, and everyone still goes. So that says something, except Metallica. There there are people that won't go. I've asked people to go there and they're like, oh no, definitely no.

SPEAKER_08

Crazy. I'm gonna do a whole bunch of research. Can you tell me the name of it again? Hotel Congress. Hotel Congress. They should I wonder, you know, I mean, is it registered? Is it like uh would you know? Is it registered?

SPEAKER_06

Historical society, yeah.

SPEAKER_08

It's on like the haunted tours and all those sorts of things, yeah.

SPEAKER_06

Yes, it's uh it's it makes every list in Arizona.

SPEAKER_08

Super cool, super cool. Um, to me, you know, the the living are actually far creepier than any spirit. I mean, living people can do some pretty creepy things. So I um this is this is like I I was in my late teens. Um, this is back in South Africa, and through, I don't know, some website or dating app or whatever, I had basically arranged a hookup with this dude. Um, and we had decided to meet in the city, which is very quite a quite a ways away from where I live in the rural part of Cape Town. And so I drove through and I met this dude in the city, and um he came through from the opposite end and we kind of met in the middle. And I remember like though, the first thing that I remember is like even uh in him being in his late teens as well, he arrived in a Mercedes-Benz, which obviously, you know, you like great. I chose the right hookup. This guy has a merc. Um so we we get into the car, we get into his car, and we drive up towards Table Mountain on like, you know, like the back roads of the city, and we smoke a couple of doobies and we're, you know, having teenage fun. And this guy just got progressively weirder and weirder and weirder until to the point where he and he was quite an attractive guy as well. But you know, you know, when there's just something that kind of puts you off about somebody, even though they they they seem to be friendly and they're you know good looking and they've got that sparkly eye, they've got that slight like psycho vibe to them. Um, the longer I stayed with him, the more the psycho vibe started kind of growing and getting stronger. And he started going on this rant about like how the whole world needs to shift onto like this commercialism. He was he was saying things like they need to paint a big fucking Coca-Cola sign straight across the front of this bullshit mountain. But in between his rant, he was saying things like, I think I'm gonna kill you. And then he would just carry on talking. Um, and it was really weird. I started getting very freaked out because I was like, Okay, either I'm having a really bad trip here and like that weed was far too strong and I need to go home, or this guy is actually putting threats in between his sentences. Like it was really, really weird. Um I I eventually bailed out. I was like, look, I gotta go, dude. Sorry, I'm sorry, I gotta go. So I like got out of the car, rushed away, um, made sure I got the fuck out of Dodge. And then what I found out a couple of months later is the area of Cape Town where he was from, him and a few of his buddies, um, coming back drunk from a club or whatever, beat a homeless dude to the point that he was in a coma. Um, so I think I actually narrowly escaped attack from a fucking psycho. Um, I I just remember initially meeting him, being very impressed, like he came from a wealthy family. He seemed intelligent, well spoken, he drove a nice car, everything was, and then you start to realize that he's a bit like the dude from the psycho movies, like a little bit too slick and a little bit too smooth. And slipping in, slipping in little segues between his sentences, like, I'm gonna murder you. Um, and it was it was absolutely bizarre. But he ended up going to prison because they they beat a man to the point that he was in a coma. Um so yeah, there's that. But uh while we're telling stories, um I went and had a poke around on the internet as one does and found some pretty whack paranormal experiences by Reddit users. So uh this one is from Abnormally Chay Dragon, and uh this is a haunting story. When I was three, my parents moved us into a new neighborhood. The house was nice, but kind of old. The community was an old fifties track home area, so I had a pretty varied group of people living there. As soon as we moved in, my dad started to notice weird things with me. He would hear me giggling and laughing in my room, and whenever he went in and asked what was so funny, I would tell him that the kids were funny. He would also come in to wake me up and find me curled up in the closet. This happened repeatedly, but my parents didn't think much of it because I was a pretty imaginative kid. The thing that wigged them out the most was that I would flat out refuse to walk out the front door. I would scream and yell and cry until one of my parents carried me in or out of the house. When you walked in the front door, there was a closet to the right, and to the left there was a low brick wall that separated the front room from the living room. It was about four feet high and about three feet long, just as a room divider, but I never touched it or wanted to be anywhere near it. After we had lived there for a few months, my dad started making some renovations to the house. Among them was demolishing the wall. My parents dropped my brother and I off with our grandparents for the day so that we weren't going to be underfoot. We didn't end up going home for about a week. When my dad knocked down the wall, he called the police. Inside the brick wall were bones that turned out to be from children. The cops never did figure out who put them there. The house had been owned by a lot of people, many of them who had just rented it out. So it's just one of the many weird things that happened in my town that was never figured out. Oh my god. Bones in the wall. That's a good thing. Children's bones in the wall. I'm going to put a little disclaimer in here that um when I when I take uh people's stories off Reddit, I tend to fix all the spelling and the grammatical errors so bad. It drives me nuts. I'm a bit of a grammar Nazi. Um like that needs a comma. And you need to rephrase this sentence. This is in the passive voice. Um so I'm that guy.

SPEAKER_06

The gist was there.

SPEAKER_08

The gist is there, the gist is there. So the story is original. I just fixed the grammar for them.

SPEAKER_06

It's very generous here.

SPEAKER_08

I am the grammar fairy. Um, and our next listener story is from Hein in China. Um, and this brings a whole new meaning to voices from the great beyond.

SPEAKER_00

So, for this story to make sense, I will need to create some context. My degree is in theology, and I studied at a performing arts college in South Africa. Um, after I entered the university, I decided to get baptized, which was a very, very big thing for me. And leading up to my baptism, a lot of strange things kept happening. Like I kept seeing some very strange figures and eyes and movements around my room at night. Um, always around three o'clock in the morning, I would wake up and I would just see strange movements and figures in the shadows. And then the night before I was supposed to get baptized, I was packing up um the campus technical equipment for a show we were supposed to do the next day. And everything was cleared out, all the leads and power cords. The only thing still left in the auditorium was the speakers. And as I was taking the one speaker off and placed it on the ground, all of a sudden all of the speakers went up at went on at once, and I just heard the screaming and screeching, pleading voices coming out of the speakers. Um up until now I still get goosebumps whenever I just think of that noise, just the the sheer volume and the pain that of the voices that I was hearing. Logically, this does not make sense as there were no power chords in them, so this should not have been possible. But in a way, it's strange, but that's that's my story. Thank you.

SPEAKER_06

Luckily, we don't deal with logic here pretty much at all.

SPEAKER_08

At all, whatsoever.

SPEAKER_06

Aside from the science segment, we're not really dealing with logic. That is very creepy. It's another one of those, there's nothing plugged in. Yeah, something's happening.

SPEAKER_08

Right. I mean, like, even science wouldn't be able to explain that away. I know with like electronic voice phenomenon, you can be like it's a background noise that's being misinterpreted. But if something's coming through a speaker that's not plugged in, that is the work of the devil.

SPEAKER_06

But seriously, demons.

SPEAKER_08

Seriously, demons, like on that one. And also, you know, he said like he kept waking up at around 3 a.m. And uh, you know, 3 a.m. is that notorious kind of evil time of the. Yeah, so 3 a.m. the devil's.

SPEAKER_06

I don't know that it's always uh I you know, I've often read that that's when the spirits come and the angels come. And I I've often woke up at 3 or 3:33. So I don't know that it's always the dark or bad thing, but I do think it's spiritually activated time.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah. I think it's uh it's one of those things like you know, Halloween when they say the veil between the the other world and this world is a lot thinner. I think 3 a.m. is supposed to be a time when that, you know, there's a window of opportunity for whether it's a good or a bad thing coming through, it's got it's got that's its moment uh to come through.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, that's its moment to come through.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, that was a good one.

SPEAKER_08

We have a favor to ask our listeners. If you're enjoying listening to the Xander and Stone podcast, do us a solid and share it with, we'll share it with everyone. Tell your friends, tell your family, hell, even tell your frenemies about the Xander and Stone podcast. We don't mind if you share the links to our episodes on social media because sharing is caring. While you're at it, hit that subscribe or follow button on your podcast app and leave us a comment or a rating. So, Stone, I know that you've collected a whole bunch of interesting and creepy stories for our Halloween special. So what have you got to share with us?

SPEAKER_06

Well, my first story, I am calling the Bell Witch Blondie. It's my own nickname. Uh but we grew up with this story and and heard it our whole lives. And I tried to get my mom to call it in herself, but she has a bit of a southern accent, which I think is lovely, but she she didn't feel like she had a radio voice. So I called her for notes on it to make sure I'm getting it right. So my mom's mother, my granny, bought a trailer to put on my great aunt Sue and Uncle Earl's property for a while. And when they went to see the place, there were three kids in the bathtub, but no water. It was like they were going to take a bath, but genuinely no water. So that in itself was a little creepy.

SPEAKER_09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06

And she gave the owner the first payment, but then the next payments came back. They were just sent back. So she only ever made one payment for this place. Again, that's odd. So um, my mom was staying there one night, and her friend Debbie was cooking pork chops, and my mom woke up and she saw a woman with long blonde hair behind her, and she said, Who is that? And Debbie turned around and the woman was gone. And so she mentioned it to Aunt Sue and Uncle Earl, and they said, Oh, she saw the woman. And so um, I was at my other grandmother's house, my great-great-grandmother, so my granny's grandmother, and I was talking to my cousins about it, and and we were young at the time, but we were telling spooky stories and doing our thing. And they said, Well, my mom saw, and I didn't realize they lived in Tennessee. I didn't even know they'd ever been in this place. And they said, Oh, we've seen her. She's always brushing her hair, and she's in the rocking chair, and the rocking chair rocks back and forth by itself all the time. And what is even more interesting, so many people have seen this uh entity along the way, but even more interesting, the property was part of the Bell Witch property in Tennessee, which is infamous.

SPEAKER_08

So remind me again what the Bellwitch property is or what the Bellwitch haunting is. I've heard of this before, but I can't recall the details.

SPEAKER_06

You know, I it's been a long time since I've heard it. Let me see how fast my fingers can fly and make sure that I get it right. According to Wikipedia. The Bellwitch Haunting is a legend in southern United States folklore centered in the 19th century Bell family in Robertson County, Tennessee, which is where this property was. Former John Bell Sr. resided with his family along the Red River in an area currently near the town of Adams. According to legend, from 1817 to 1821, his family and the local area came under attack by a mostly invisible entity that was able to speak, affect the physical environment, and shape shift. Some accounts record the spirit also to have been clairvoyant and capable of crossing long distances with superhuman speed, uh and being what in more than one place at a time. I know there was a one of the presidents, I'm pretty sure, actually went to investigate it himself because it was such a big deal at the time.

SPEAKER_07

Yes, I remember hearing that as well. I I also remember hearing about that.

SPEAKER_06

Right. So anyway, the property that they had was part of this Bellwich property, apparently was on the the you know, the skirts of it.

SPEAKER_08

So wow. I want to say it was I'm gonna say it was President Jefferson. I don't know why I want to say Jefferson, because I know absolutely nothing about the US President.

SPEAKER_06

We're pretty sure it's a J name.

SPEAKER_08

We're channeling a J. We're channeling a J name. Jackson, Jefferson, definitely not JFK, but it's one of the ones with a J.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, it's one of the it's one of the other J's, we're pretty sure.

SPEAKER_08

But that's crazy. So like your family actually had this like long, this like blonde hair. Generational generations of crazy, yeah, crazy.

SPEAKER_06

And then and then the whole kids, honestly, probably one of the creepiest parts of the story to me is these three kids in the bathtub with no water.

SPEAKER_08

Again, no, it comes back to the the living are far creepier than the dead. I'm sorry, but they really are. Like what are three kids with doing in a bathtub with no water just sitting there? Like, what the hell is going on here?

SPEAKER_06

Like, oh, she only paid them one amount and no other payments ever went through. Which it was like they were just getting rid of it. They had to get rid of the space.

SPEAKER_08

So maybe it's a haunted trailer. Maybe the trailer's got something to do with it. Maybe they were more than happy to get rid of that trailer.

SPEAKER_06

That's what it seems like. There, I mean, anyone that wouldn't be willing to accept future payments on something they sold, you would think. Right. Something's up with that.

SPEAKER_08

And then also the rock the rocking chair as well. Like it's always a rocking chair, ghosts and rocking chairs. But you know, I mean, maybe it's because we see the chair is actually moving, it's rocking back and forth, and that's what makes us aware that there's an entity there. So for all you know, there could be just like an entity chilling on my sofa right now. It just has no way of communicating that because it can't rock my sofa.

SPEAKER_06

Um, so you know, you know, my mom gave me this beautiful antique chair. Yeah. Beautiful. And I had it in my bedroom, and it was facing me. And I woke up in the middle of the night and I looked at the chair and I was like, yeah, I can't do that. Um I moved the chair. The chair is now in my living room. I just I can't have a chair in my bedroom because I'm always concerned someone's just chilling and watching.

SPEAKER_08

Just watching, just looking at you while you're sleeping. Yeah. I wonder if there's my own little weirdness. There might be something in feng shui about that, because feng shui has a lot of rules about what type of furniture you can have wear in a room, and particularly in the bedroom. So, like I know with feng shui you can't have mirrors facing your bed because that's creepy. And I mean, you know, it's creepy for so many reasons because there might be entities that there's sometimes a portal coming, you know, for for spirits to pass into this realm. But also if you're waking up in the middle of the night and you jolt out of bed and you see your reflection like the moment your eyes open, I think that would freak quite a lot of people out. And then there's the last factor, which, you know, who really wants to look at their husband's asshole while they're having sex? So don't have a don't have the mirror facing your bed.

SPEAKER_06

Hashtag facts.

SPEAKER_08

You know, hashtag my husband's asshole. Uh but more Halloween traditions from around the world, and this time we're going to look at the Hong Kong Festival of the Hungry Ghost. On the 15th day of the seventh lunar month, which is around mid-August to mid-September, Hong Kong people celebrate the Hungry Ghost Festival. In several parts of East Asia, people believe that spirits get restless around this time of year and they begin to roam the world. The festival is a way to feed the spirits both food and money that they need for the afterlife. It's part of a larger long month-long celebration that also features burning paper and food offerings. And this is something that I see in China all the time. And it can happen around the anniversary of a death, it can happen around specific festivals and holidays, um the Hungry Ghost Festival, the Tomb Sweeping Day, which is in April. And what people in Asia do, or particularly in China, is they go to any intersection where there's a crossroads and they will take along um paper money. It's not actual paper money, it's money made to paper made to look like money, and things like uh paper cutouts of clothes, and they make a small fire and they burn this, and then this sends it into the afterlife. So at any given moment in China, you will stumble across people standing at the middle of a very, very busy intersection in China, all gathered around a small fire. Um, but what my my partner, who's obviously Chinese, he told me is that um it's very bad luck to step over the ashes once the fire has gone out. So if you're walking on the sidewalk and you come across a pile of ashes, you need to go around it. And it's also very bad luck to look at the fire while it's burning, like especially if it's another family, because the spirit might then attach itself to you. Uh so watch out for people standing at intersections making little barbecues because uh you might end up taking something home with you.

SPEAKER_06

That is creepy and and good to know as far as superstitions go. Yeah.

SPEAKER_08

There's also another one, and um people think or people have they often ask, like, um, why is it rude or considered bad manners to stick your chopsticks into your bowl of rice so that they're standing kind of vertical in your bowl of rice? Um, and people sometimes think that it's just general bad manners, the same as like you you you kind of wouldn't stick your fork, like you know, standing vertically out of your steak on your plate. Um but in fact, what the the tradition is is that when the chopsticks are in the bowl of rice, it looks very similar to um incense standing up in a bowl and uh burning. So what um at a at a Chinese dinner when the family's all gathered, you would actually set a place um uh you know for a member of the family that's passed away, and you would set a bowl of rice and a s and a set of chopsticks there for them. Um but if you were to put your chopsticks directly into your bowl of rice so that they're standing up, it kind of reminds people at the table of death because it looks like incense burning in its holder. Um and it's it's said to be a bad omen. And of course, you know, you don't want to bring bad omens to the dinner table. It's just plain rude. That's just bad for plain rude. And the next story was sent to us by listener Ryan in Russia from Instagram. Back in 2001, I worked in a two-story restaurant called Gosh Mill Mill in Surrey in the UK. The mill is super old, and you can find records of it dating back a thousand years in the tax books, known as the Black Books of England. The old family quarters of the mill used to be where the kitchen of the restaurant is now. When we used to lock up at night, we would start by turning the lights off in the staff room on the second floor above the kitchen, then making our way all the way down the stairs and passage, past the storerooms, through the kitchens, and then through the main area of the restaurant, flipping all the light switches as we closed up for the night. You must remember that this is a very old building. There are no double light switches or main controls. Each room had its own light switch, so you can't turn the upstairs lights off from downstairs or vice versa. After methodically going from room to room, turning off each light, we would eventually get to the front door, lock that behind us, and walk out into the courtyard. On more than one occasion, we would turn back and notice that all the lights had been turned on again. We would need to unlock all the rooms and go back through the whole restaurant, the kitchen, the passageways, and the staff room, turning them all off again. On more than one night, after going back through all the rooms three or four times to turn all the lights off again that had mysteriously come back on, we would just decide to go home and leave the lights burning. What's even weirder is when we came back to work the next morning, all the lights would be turned off again.

SPEAKER_05

Um, yeah, so the story I'm gonna talk about is my trip to Cemetery X or Graveyard X, they called it. Now, this happened when I was in high school, so let's put some perspective on this. That was about twenty-some years ago, and cell phones didn't exist, GPS didn't exist. So we actually had to go and find this place the old-fashioned way by driving around and looking. Well, we finally found it, and this cemetery is supposed to be the most haunted cemetery in the state of Illinois, and so we finally found it, and we walk into the cemetery, and the first thing I notice is that it gets about 10 degrees colder as soon as you walk through this part of the cemetery. There's actually two parts to the cemetery. One is an old settlement cemetery, and then the other is still being used today. So one's a little bit more modern, and the other one is from probably the early 1800s. And that first day that we found it, or first night we found it, it was actually really late when we got to the uh cemetery, so we didn't stay long. We only we walked in, walked around, and then left. So, other than the fact that Got really cold after going into the cemetery. I did see like a shadow figure kind of walking the perimeter, and that caught my eye. And we decided, you know, it was getting late. We knew where it was, so we'll come back again. So the next weekend we went back. And the same thing. Uh, we get there, we walk through the cemetery, and it gets 10 degrees colder after we just crossed this fence line. And it's really weird because it's surrounded, it's out in the middle of the country, and it's surrounded by woods. So we walk in, we start hearing coyotes just going crazy, and then I saw that shadowy figure again just walking around the perimeter of the cemetery. And I'm with about four or five other people, and we're walking around, just checking it out, having some fun. And then I noticed that shadow figure in the cemetery, and it kind of freaked me out to the point to where I'm like, I don't want to be here right now. I uh I go into my go back to my car and I sit in my car because I'm just a little freaked out because nobody else seems to see this. And when I get to my car, I shut the door, and I could see it see the shadow figure on my passenger side door, uh walk around my car to my driver's side door, back, and it happened like three times, and I was so scared. I turned the lights on inside the car, started the car, turned all the lights on, and then everybody came back and we left. I told them what happened. They're like, Yeah, we didn't really see anything, but we weren't really paying attention to it. We just thought you went off to do whatever. I was like, Okay, we gotta we gotta go back one more night. Well, we went back one more night, and that night I didn't see the shadow figure at all. We just it walked around and whatnot. Well, I was driving a 1999 Durango at the time, and I'm a smoker, so I left my window cracked about an inch, and it had the little louvers on it, so the rain wouldn't get in. And we walk around for like about an hour, and nothing really happens. We hear some weird noises out in the woods, but when we get back to my my Durango, it is full of white moths. Like I opened the door, and white moths just flew out of the car. Same with the passengers, they uh yeah, it was so crazy. These white moths just encompassed my car. There was no light on in my car whatsoever. Uh, my window was cracked an inch, and that was the only window that was open. And then after that, the smell of lilac or lavender or some some perfumey flower kind of filled the air, and then that was one of the last times I was actually at that cemetery.

SPEAKER_08

Well, there you go. That was that was a strange story. Uh, the thing that stands out to me the most in those stories is the is the moth and the smell of lilac. Um, and once I did a little bit of a dig around on the internet again, uh, moths and butterflies are symbolic uh creatures and they symbolize uh death and life, and the white moth in particular is a symbol of death, and the scent of lilac is said to be uh is to accompany evil. Um so there you go, Jack. Really? Uh that was Jack from the Paranormality Network, the Paranormality Radio Network, who sent us that story. Um, but yeah, lilac, that's the smell of evil and death.

SPEAKER_06

I I would have never put that together because I love lilac. What I would say though is if my friends were back at the cemetery and that was happening to me, I wouldn't have just turned on the lights. I probably would have dro driven off and sent an Uber.

SPEAKER_08

Give him a finger. I've left, sorry, much.

SPEAKER_06

I guess this is pre-Uber time, pre-cell phone time. He had to do the right thing, but man, right. I would have a hard time not pressing the gas on that one. Right.

SPEAKER_08

Uh but I think like lilacs are very associated with like funerals and funerary rites. I think they used to stuff lilac flowers into corpses um before wakes back in the day, so that you know the odor of death wasn't lingering around when the body was in like the family room. Um but I know that when you do some research on the internet, um the significance of the smell of lilac apparently is said to accompany evil. And I can't remember exactly which flower it is, but I know that the there is another smell of a flower that is associated with miracles, and in particular with the miracle of the stigmata, um, and that that the the people who experience stigmata are said to be able to smell a specific flower. And I wonder if it's maybe lilacs or something like that as well. One can only guess. One can only guess. Yes. So do you have any more stories for us on your side, Stone?

SPEAKER_06

I do. Um how about the Slaughterhouse? Anything that starts with the Slaughterhouse.

SPEAKER_08

You've already got my attention, starts with Slaughterhouse.

SPEAKER_06

So interestingly enough, this was also the site of the micro budget movie that I was an extra in called Blood Widow that was just released. And uh, and and so we I filmed there a few times uh doing different different projects, but this one just happened to come out this week. And it is a very creepy place to have to film anything or just be in there were certain parts of the slaughterhouse that I would just run through. If I was by myself, I would just jog because I did I it was just super eerie. But the slaughterhouse was a meat packing company in the 1950s, and an uncle is said to have actually put his uh nephew and niece into the meat grinder.

SPEAKER_08

And it was what just say that again. Say that again.

SPEAKER_06

An uncle who worked there is said to have put his nephew and niece through the meat grinder. My god. That's my god. I mean, it could be urban mythology, but but wow, but that's pretty intense. Yeah. And obviously, uh, I guess some people committed suicide there. Obviously, lots of animals were killed there because it was a slaughterhouse. And and there is a smell there, and you would think since it was from the 1950s, that that odor would be gone. But there is a, I can't even describe it. There is there's a a palpable stench.

SPEAKER_08

The smell of death, the smell of death, the smell of death, yeah.

SPEAKER_06

And and the whole place is just eerie. But uh the slaughterhouse was on the travel channel on January 13, 2018, uh, as one of Tucson's scariest haunted houses. They they actually do a scary haunted house and event right around now. Um, and so it was it was also featured on the 14th season of Ghost Adventures. And the crew, along with the special guest rapper Post Malone, traveled to Arizona to investigate the meatpacking plant turned haunted attraction. And the team from Travel Channel's Ghost Adventures included paranormal investigators Zach Baggins and Aaron Goodwin. And they came to the desert after finding reports on the internet that this well-known attraction was actually haunted. So the shoot lasted for three days in November of 2017. The team met with eyewitnesses and experts to piece together the haunted history. And um, it used to be called Farmer Jones, and it was a quit, they used the latest scientific gadgets and technology to confront all of the paranormal activity. So I haven't seen the documentary. Um, and apparently uh with this article, they hadn't seen it either. But they said that Post Malone was visibly disturbed when he left the investigation. And having spent time in there several times, I can see why you don't have to see anything there to just be creeped out.

SPEAKER_08

So it's also it's got the vibe, it's got the vibe. And I mean, post Malone, Post Malone is a pretty freaked-out looking guy in general. So for him to be visibly freaked out, um that that's that's saying quite a lot. But wow, that's creepy. I mean, like, okay, so Uncle put niece and nephew through Grinder, and then it's just got that general sense of death because I mean, you know, after all, it was a slaughterhouse, and how many lives, you know, whether they're being human or animal, were actually, you know, actually ended there. And I mean, I I would love I would love it if a paranormal investigation team went there and they saw like apparitions of like porter house steaks hanging around.

SPEAKER_07

Right.

SPEAKER_08

So creepy. Big pile of sirloin steaks just right there, ghostly sirloins. But taking another look around the world in Africa and in Nigeria, there is the Awuru Odo Festival. And this festival marks the return of the dearly departed friends and family members back to the living, lasting up to six months. That's not really a holiday or a festival, is it? It's half a year. Uh lasting up to six months, the holiday is celebrated with feasts, music, and masks before the dead return to the spirit world. That's an awfully long time for the dead to be hanging around. That's half a year. But although the Odo Festival is an important ritual, it happens once every two years. There we go. Uh, when it is believed that the spirits will return to Earth. And that's kind of nice because that's but that puts a little bit of a happy spin on it. Like your past ever relatives are coming to spend six months. It's a bit like a vacation from the spirit world, you know? They're coming to spend six months here with the living.

SPEAKER_06

Uh, it also kind of lines up with our reincarnation episode as far as the 16 months before they come back. It also lines up math-wise.

SPEAKER_08

And if you remember from the reincarnation episode, hashtag check out the reincarnation episode. But if you remember from that, one of the ones that we did speak of was that the Nigerian uh belief system still has reincarnation as part of its, as you know, as part of the belief system.

SPEAKER_06

Um, so it makes sense that there's this timeline.

SPEAKER_08

Makes absolute sense that there's this timeline, yes. And our next story is another one from Sharina. And uh this one's a good one because this one's a proper spooky story.

SPEAKER_01

The next story I want to share is um I have had a couple more than a couple ghost encounters, or at least what I consider ghost encounters. Um, I would say that I'm more of the sensitive type. I can feel energy very easily. You could categorize me. I categorize myself as an empath. It took me a while to realize that, but I pick up on energies very, very easily. I've been told that I have like mediumship abilities, but I don't like to exercise those because um that kind of stuff freaks me out. But once in a while it seems to kind of just happen on its own. And I was at a friend's house and she was throwing a party. It was a bunch of high school kids. I'm already like 25 by the time this is happening. It was her son's high school kids and some of her friends, and then me and a little boy was at this party, and he was her best friend's son. He was like maybe eight. And he, you know, we were all having a good time drinking, whatever, but I'm a lightweight, so because I couldn't drive home from maybe like having two beers, I just slept on her couch and everybody left. I it was like 6 a.m. in the morning, and I feel a little boy's hand on my knee. I'm on the couch, I feel this hand on my knee, like rubbing my knee lightly, and he goes, Excuse me, miss, I think it's time to get up now. And I didn't open my eyes yet, and I just figured, oh, it must be the little boy from last night. He must have slept over, you know. So I opened my eyes because I was gonna tell him, Oh, I'm good, I'm so tired. But when I opened my eyes, there was nobody there. No one. And that was really weird. I was kind of freaked out, but I didn't really I was kind of like, I'm tired, I'm just crazy, whatever. I went back to sleep, and then I feel this indentation at the bottom where like my feet were, like as if someone's sitting on the seat, and then he sounded a little angrier, and he said, Excuse me, it's time to get up now. And that's when I kind of jolted up. I opened my eyes because I figured I'll definitely see someone now, and nobody's there. And I wasn't scared, I was just kind of like, What the F is happening right now? I got my all my shit, packed it all up, and I ran the heck out of there. And then my friend, you know, she called me. She's like, You didn't have to run out so fast, you know. You could have had uh breakfast with us, and I was like, No, I'm good. And she goes, What happened? So I told her what happened, and she likes to pretend she doesn't believe in this type of stuff. She's like, No, no, there's no way. Like, I'm not so sure I even like I don't believe in ghosts, blah blah blah. A week later, she got rid of that couch. You don't believe in but ghosts? Okay, very funny. She gave that couch to a friend, she said she didn't feel comfortable with it anymore after my story.

SPEAKER_06

I I think anytime you hear a ghost story that involves kids, it's always much more creepy.

SPEAKER_08

Absolutely, like that is absolutely what I was going to say. Anytime it's like childlike laughter or children speaking or like a ghost coming and touching your knee and telling you it's time to wake up in a child's voice, freaky as fuck.

SPEAKER_06

It is. And she she needs a proper alarm clock, but aside from that, like just get a decent alarm clock.

SPEAKER_08

The ghosts will leave you alone. Come on.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, they won't have to wake you up then.

SPEAKER_08

Yeah, but like the fact that also she said like it was first kind of gentle, and he's like, it's time to wake up now. And then it gets more like, it's time to wake up now. Um that gets like progressively more progressively more aggressive to you as you're uh as as as the story continues. Um but yeah, creepy children and ghosts. And of course, you know, there's there's all those uh the paranormal investigators and all of them that warn against uh uh or even people who use Ouija boards, they warn against uh child voices or or entities that are saying that they're children because they're possibly demons trying to lull you into a false sense of security with like a harmless child.

SPEAKER_03

And if the marking don't say you're a dumbass, um so what's your final story for our Halloween episode, Stone?

SPEAKER_06

Okay, you can have a choice: Jerome, Arizona, or Logan, West Virginia.

SPEAKER_08

Um, I'm going to go with Logan, West Virginia.

SPEAKER_06

Okay, good call. So, of course, I grew up in southern West Virginia, so I I was being a little uh specific on the West Virginia and Arizona stories because I I that way I can do my investigations when I go back. So this is the ghost of Mammy Thurman. Mammy just sounds like a ghost already, if we're all being honest, but during the prohibition years Logan resident, Mammy Thurman lived the life of a carefree flapper. You know, I always thought I would have been a good flapper, just saying. On June 21st, just side note, on June 21st, 1932, her murdered body was found along remote 22 Mine Road. A handyman was charged with her murder, but many suspect it was his employer, a prominent banker with whom Mammy was said to be having an affair, who actually killed her. So wrongful, wrongful uh judgment. Adding to the mystery is that her body seemed to have disappeared and there's no record to be found of what happened with the body. Mammy's restless spirit is said to haunt the area seeking justice in a place of rest. It's said that if you drive your car to the place where Mammy was murdered and you put your car in neutral, the vehicle will roll uphill.

SPEAKER_08

Whoa. I've heard I've heard of this before, actually. I've heard of this like phenomenon of things rolling uphill, which makes no sense as well. I love that you said mammy sounds like a ghost's name. Like, because you're you're so right. Like ghosts always have like the weird, or not the weird names, but like these really old-fashioned names. It's always like Mammy or Edith or Gertrude or the like the soul of Ebenezer. It's never like hey Britney, bitch. Like, you know what I mean? Like the it's never like the ghost's name is Christina. Um, it's always some like old school name. Um, but I love that anyway. I love that. Of course, you know, there's also the uh Dia de los Muertos uh festival.

SPEAKER_06

I was hoping you would come in there because that's a big deal here.

SPEAKER_08

It's a big deal, right? It's a big deal, and that's from November 1st to November 2nd in Mexico and parts of Latin America where they celebrate Dia de los Muertos and Arizona. And Arizona. And that is obviously to honor those who have passed away. It is believed that the gates of heaven open up at midnight on October 31st, and the souls of children return to earth to be reunited with their family for 24 hours. On November 2nd, the souls of adults come down from heaven to join in the festivities. And that's something I didn't know. I didn't know it was like kids first and then adults. Um, so that was that was an interesting thing. That is lovely, right? Um, and uh that was just an interesting fact. And of course, i am I right with thinking that uh this is the day when you get all those beautiful um painted skulls that are related to this as well. Absolutely stunning, absolutely gorgeous.

SPEAKER_06

Um that's what they also hollow out eggs, like they blow out the center of eggs and put confetti in. Oh wow, and then you bash people on the head with it and confetti goes away.

SPEAKER_08

Cool. It's gonna be really difficult to get confetti inside a little hole through an egg.

SPEAKER_06

It's like trying to get I've I've done it. We actually did a Tucson High. They uh you it's like a little square you cut out of each side, blow it out, and then put the confetti in. That's great.

SPEAKER_08

It must be really difficult to get the confetti in, though. Like that's like trying to put salt back into the conference.

SPEAKER_06

They put it, it's just a funnel. Oh, of course, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_08

Okay, that makes more sense. Here's me trying to think of like usually pinching your fingers, trying to like sprinkle confetti back inside an egg.

SPEAKER_06

And I was just trying to convince you the hole's big enough. But yes, there's a funnel that everything goes through.

SPEAKER_08

And I've got one more story today for us from Brandon. And Brandon's going to tell us a story about shadow people.

SPEAKER_04

This is Brandon, the host of the Pear Unity Podcast. I wanted to take a chance to share with you my first encounter with a shadow person. It was near the early part of the fall of 1989. We lived on a quiet road about a block west of the city park that at that time had a circus trade playground theme and was about two and a half blocks south of an elementary school. All of the neighbors got along great, and the scariest part of the neighborhood was running through my neighbor's yard and accidentally stepping on a colony of fire ants that had stationed themselves in the front corner of his lawn. My brother and I used to stay up late on Saturday nights to sneakly watch the old black and white horror movies of The Blob, Frankenstein, The Wolfman, and Dracula that was played by Bella Legosi and hosted by Vincent Price. And later on, we would watch Tales from the Crypt with that creepy-looking cryptkeeper host. We lived in a one-story, two-bed, one-bath house that had a full basement and a pretty decent-sized yard. The worst part about the house was the bathroom. Above the tub was this huge industrial air van. And it always felt like something was going to come out and then get you, or that something was watching you from inside of it. Needless to say, I always kept my bathtime pretty short in there. But, anyways, my brother and I were out in the backyard rescuing the princess from the clutches of the Imperial Emperor Palpatine and the dreaded Darth Vader hiding in the backyard shed. I happened to look at our bedroom window before the raid on the Imperial stronghold and noticed that the curtain was moving. I pointed it out to my brother and he shrugged it off saying it was probably our dad in the room. I agreed, but I remember that a few minutes before this happened, Dad had come around to borrow my quote-unquote lightsaber to go rake the front yard. I didn't have much time to ponder on it because my brother was already on his Twin Millennium Falcon, and I had to hurry up and hop onto my huffy X-Wing Starfighter so we could begin the dramatic escape from the backyard planet of Coruscant to head around the block to our front yard planet of Endor. That night, after the galaxies were safe and we were asleep for at least the first few hours, we were both awoken to a sight that still haunts me to this day. Coming through the closed door to our room was this huge black figure. The door never opened, but it came through anyways. This figure was taller than the doorway itself, and it was at least two to three inches wider on both sides. It was completely black, like black, black, like the blackest thing you could ever imagine. It was literally even darker than the dark room. It had the shape of a giant hooded figure, and it had no other features outside of like just the black mass that it was. I whispered to my brother that was lying next to me that if he saw it, he kind of just squeaked out like, yes. My brother was four years older than me. And then to hear that fear in his voice didn't really help the matter at all. And I but I I mean I couldn't look away. It felt like if I did, this thing would like literally attack us. I wanted to scream for mom and dad, but I could not find a loud enough voice. It was only coming out as a whisper. Realizing this, I did what any brave Jedi would do. I pulled the blanket over my head and hid there for the rest of the night. Now, this happened off and on the rest of the two years we lived in this house. Not every night, but enough to where whenever I'd almost fully have it pushed out of my mind, it would return. But it never came any closer than the doorway. And I never knew how long it stayed because that blanket would have been uncovering my head so fast. I actually ended up having problems sleeping later in life with my head outside of my blanket.

SPEAKER_06

I I think that anytime you have someone to confirm exactly what you saw, it just makes it that much more terrifying, especially with your older brother, because you're sort of looking to them for the courage. And yeah, that had to be unsettling.

SPEAKER_08

And you know, I I really, really hope that he gets some uh good product placement sponsorships from people like Schwinnenhuffer and George Lucas for the Star Wars franchise. Like they should be paying him. That was some pretty vivid storytelling. That was really good. I love the detail in that. Um, but exactly as you say, like it's it's one thing to have a paranormal experience and see a ghost and you're by yourself and you freak yourself out. Um, but you you obviously there's going to be that self-doubt. Like, did I just trip and hallucinate that, or did it really just happen? But when there's somebody else, like with your shadow people stories where other people are actually seeing them or where his older brother sees them, then there's a little there's a lot more credibility to that because it wasn't just you, it wasn't just you.

SPEAKER_06

Oh that's good, that's good to know for future reference.

SPEAKER_08

Yes. So, Stone, do you have any shout-outs for our listeners this week on our spooky Halloween episode?

SPEAKER_06

I have a shout-out to my baby sister Penny in Alabama, to Krista in Greece, and to Annae, Nielli, and Marco in Phoenix, who are actually students. And one day we finished our English a little early and they all started telling me their own ghost stories. And I wish I had a copy of them because they were some of the most terrifying things I've ever heard. So they yeah, they they did a good job of freaking me out. So shout outs to them.

SPEAKER_08

Well, we can always hang on to them for another spooky another spooky session or another spooky episode later on or for next Halloween. Um, of course, I want to send a shout-out and a big thank you to all the listeners who shared their stories with us. So Sharina from the I Had a Dream podcast, Jack from the Paranormality Radio, Krista from the Strange Sessions, and of course Brandon from the ParaUnity uh podcast. And then, of course, to Hein from Tianjin, Ryan in Russia, and then PJ, whose story I haven't told. So I'm just gonna slip that in there very quickly. And I had a phone call last night with PJ, and he told me his story. And his story goes that when he was very young, he used to sleep in the same bedroom with his grandmother. And his grandmother passed away, but he continued to sleep in this room. And then one night he woke up and he saw the figure of his grandmother pulling the blankets down to cover his feet, and it actually freaked him out. You know, that's that was my reaction as well. I also went like, oh, that's so sweet. And he was like, No, it was terrifying. I didn't want to see that, I didn't want to see the old woman, she was dead. Um it wasn't an awesome, it wasn't an R-sweet moment for him. Um, it was a terrifying moment for him that his dead grandma was back in the room. And apparently, since then, or or from that day onwards, he absolutely refused to sleep in the bedroom that he used to share with his grandmother because he was scared that the ghost of his grandmother was going to come and tuck him in at night. Which I again I also thought it was a very sweet story, but to him it was absolutely terrible.

SPEAKER_06

Although if it happened to me, I think I'd probably think it was like it's nice when it happens to somebody.

SPEAKER_08

Other people say that's sexy PJ, yes? That's sexy PJ from Hangzhou, that's right. Of course, a big thank you to all of our listeners for tuning in for our Halloween spooky special. We don't want to just end the listener stories here. So if you ever have a weird, creepy, silly creepy, what's a creepy story? It's when you're creepy when you're coughing and hacking. Uh let's try that again. And of course, a big thank you to our listeners for tuning into our spooky Halloween special. But of course, we would love to still hear your stories. So if you've got a weird, creepy, spooky, strange, silly, or funny paranormal experience or story, feel free to send it in and we'll feature it on an upcoming episode from me, Xander. Remember to live life in excess. We hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you want to reach out to us and tell us your story, you can go and leave us a voice note on the Xanderstone website by following the link in the show notes below. Or if you want to find us on social media, we are on Instagram at Xanderstone Podcast and on Twitter at Xanderstone10.

SPEAKER_03

Mama's coming up on the cabinet, and if you don't see Mumma's coming up on the