November 3, 2023 • 53 mins
Due to a ghost in the machine (plus a ridiculous run of bad luck), Jonathan screwed up and didn't get last week's episode out. So our hosts gather together to talk about spooky geeky things because we keep Halloween in our hearts all year long.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hey, everybody. Welcome to Large Nerdron Collider, the podcast that's
all about the geeky things happening in the world around
us and how excited we are about them. I'm Ariel
Castin and with me as always is my super awesome
friend and co host Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Last week was so spooky it scared the episode right
off my computer.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Oh no, how will people know about all of our
favorite spookdum stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, we're gonna do it again this week, but no,
I owe I owe everyone out there. In apology, I
already apologize to Ariel, but I was trying to put
together our episode from last week because we actually did
record one, it just did not publish, and in the
process of editing and everything, a series of unfortunate events
(01:02):
befell your co host. Jonathan Strickland broke my toe, which
is still broken. It's nice and fun, and I got
a kidney stone and I still have some long COVID
symptoms that are bothering me on occasion. And these are
not excuses but merely explanations of I was dealing with
(01:23):
stuff and forgot, and so that's really all on me.
And as punishment, I'm going to redo last week's episode again.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
It will be a delight. Besides, now we can talk
about what happened this spooky season for us ah Man,
which I should have told you one of the things,
because we can't talk about it on air.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah. So one thing that's kind of funny is that
before we even started recording, Ariel and I were just
chatting and we got into a really great, deep discussion
about some things that we're looking forward to in the
Geeks space, specifically in television and film, and how we
were interested in them or excited by them, or in
(02:05):
some cases, you know, feeling like, oh, that's not what
I was expecting. But obviously the strike is still ongoing.
Though as we record this today, SAG, AFTRA and the
AMPTP are supposed to come back together in negotiations. SAG
is expecting a response to a counter proposal that they
(02:25):
presented the producers. So maybe things are starting to head
toward a resolution where the strike will be over. That
would be fantastic if that happens, but for the time being,
we're still operating under those pesky strike rules.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah. When we first got back to the bargaining table,
the mptp's like you're being unreasonable. We're walking away, and
we're like, cool, we'll wait.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
And by unreasonable, it's like saying, we want to make
sure that in this new era of streaming in particular
as well well as the dawn of generative artificial intelligence,
that certain protections are in place so that people can
actually make a living as an actor. As we have
said numerous times, it is a very small percentage of
(03:14):
actors who actually make a living acting like that is
the one and only source of income in their lives.
Most actors are holding down other gigs in order to
be able to support their habit of acting.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Yeah. Yeah, and like it wasn't. I did laugh a
little bit because a bunch of like higher echelon actors
came together and said, no, we're going to hold out
for a deal, And I'm like, I get that, and
their support is amazing and I'm not knocking it at all.
The actor union needs their support. They're a part of it.
(03:50):
They are affected by this too. But you know, as
we've talked about before, it's about the the the working
level actors, not the big stars. So it's also good
that the working level actors are like, no, we'll wait,
we've waited long enough.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, I mean it's it's important, right because this is
this does determine their compensation moving forward, and if if
those working actors want to be able to get closer
to making a living wage doing their work, it's absolutely
imperative that these changes happen. The problem is, they're also
the ones who are the most at risk the longer
(04:27):
the strike goes. They're the ones who have the least
amount saved up, the least. They don't have the safety
nets that the massive movie stars have. And so like
the massive movie star might be saying, well, shucks, I
was gonna buy another private island, but I guess I'm
gonna have to wait till next month. Meanwhile, you have
(04:47):
working actors saying, can I make this sandwich stretch for
two meals?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Which you know I've done before I really got into
film acting, I did that too. But you know, the
the working class actors are also that's that's not the
right term for it. My brain is not functioning today
in that area. But you know they're willing to hold
out to because otherwise they will continue having to make
(05:13):
a sandwich stretch for two meals. Yes, so that's all good.
I'm glad that things are moving forward. You know, there's
a lot of like holiday slate in twenty twenty four
slate is all going to have to get pushed back
if things don't get resolved soon. So you know, the
producers are starting to feel the crunch.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yes, yeah, I mean and like all those big companies
out there, like there's the one that starts with d
and ends with Isney that had put out like massive
slates of film and TV projects that span the course
of several years. Obviously those schedules are going to change.
(05:53):
In the case of that particular company, this might be
for the best because they have a whole lot of
things that they need to fix beyond compensation and benefits
for their actors. But again, we can save that conversation
for later when we're out of the strike. But for now,
what we' thought we'd talked about is spooky stuff, because,
(06:17):
like I said last week, the episode was really focusing
on that in advance of Halloween. Now Halloween has come
and gone, but spooky remains in our hearts. So we
thought we'd talked a bit about some spooky, geeky things
that we enjoy that aren't related to TV and film
and that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, first of all, I want to say I really
enjoyed this Halloween. I watched a spooky movie with my husband,
and obviously I can't name which one, but Jonathan, if
you remember, i'll tell you after I probably won't remember.
And we had three whole trigger treats this year, which
(06:59):
is better than previous sears.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Yeah. Last year she got half of one and that
was disturbing.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
Yes, and they were all like barely too, so it
was adorable. And then another super fun thing that happened
was some some of our listeners jumped in the cosplay
channel of Discord and chatted about cosplaying costumes and Blake
MoU love the costumes you shared with us. I wish
I had that talent, I told you in Discord, but
(07:26):
thank you for sharing your costumes with us. That was
brilliantly awesome. Jonathan, what happened for you?
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Nothing?
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Okay? So Monday Halloween een, the Eve of all hellos, Eve,
was when I got my kidney stone and I still
had it on Tuesday Halloween, So my Halloween was there
was a lot of like ghostly moaning, but it was
all coming from me, and we did not have any
(08:00):
trick or treaters, which is what has happened the last
several years. But then again, I live in a townhouse.
It is kind of tucked back from the street a
little bit. We have like a yard kind of thing
that's in front, and we're on a street corner. And
the way that the street lights are it doesn't put
a whole lot of light into the courtyard area, and
(08:21):
the lights in front of our doors and stuff are
fairly dim as well, so it's not a very inviting place.
Like all of my neighbors are awesome. The houses are
in a very modern style. It doesn't look for boating necessarily,
but because it's dimly lit, it doesn't look welcoming either.
So we didn't get any trick or treaters. I did
(08:42):
watch some seasonally appropriate entertainment that obviously I'm not gonna
go into more detail, but I watched some stuff that
I'd never seen before, watched a couple of things I
had seen before but been years, and enjoyed that. And
that's about it. I didn't I couldn't go anywhere because
(09:02):
I was in so much discomfort. I did before that
a weekend before, not the weekend before Halloween, but the
weekend before that, I went to Six Flags over Georgia
to attend fright Fest for the very first time. So
fright Fest is like a lot of amusement parks around
(09:24):
the United States will have a Halloween themed or a
seasonally spooky themed element to their amusement parks. For six Flags,
it's called freight Fest. I had never been. I had
been to Six Flags a couple of times, thought I
would check that out, and let me just tell you,
I was thoroughly disappointed.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
That's very sad because I went to fright Fest years
and years ago and had a lovely time. So why
were you disappointed, Jonathan?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
So some of it was just purely circumstantial, Like we
get to fright Fest and went by we I mean,
friend of the show, shay Lee took me to fright Fest.
She had actually worked at fright Fest once upon a
time many years ago and had not been back since then.
So we go, and first entry into any of the
(10:16):
haunts was on top of your entry into the park,
so you had to purchase a wristband in order to
go into any of the haunted houses. And they had
like five or six different haunted houses when we got
in the line to get the wristbands was so long
that we said, all right, you know what, let's just
go ride a ride. We rode the best ride in
(10:39):
all of Six Flags. And it's not our roller coaster
and Ariel. You know what ride it is because I
talked about it last week, But.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
Yes, it's the Monster Mansion.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
Yes, is that it is?
Speaker 2 (10:53):
It is? It used to be called the Monster Plantation.
They have changed that because obviously plantation has some some
real ugly baggage attached to it, so they turned it
to a mansion instead of a plantation, although it does
still have a you know, classic anti Bellum south Field
(11:13):
to the locations and stuff inside it. It is a
dark ride. You're on a boat, you go through a
little river, and you can definitely tell that the former
imagineers were responsible for building this ride. It actually is
a replacement. Do you know what was in the place
of Monster Mansion before Monster Mansion was there?
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I don't think I do. I think that was there
ever since I first started going as a young child.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
You wouldn't have encountered it because they swapped it out
in the early eighties. But before it was Monster Mansion,
it was a ride that was themed after the works
of Joel Chandler Harris, who's the guy who wrote all
the Brear Rabbit and Brear Fox stories.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Gotcha.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
And it was called the Okefinochi or Tales of the
Okie Fan or something, which is odd because that's not
where the Brain Rabbit stories are necessarily set. But it
was still a water dark ride. There are some videos
on YouTube that show footage of it, and it is,
fittingly for a show about spooky stuff, really unsettling. But
(12:17):
it's because it's because the the art style of the
figures and the limited amount of movement is really off putting.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Gotcha, gotcha. I just thought you meant story wise. But
either way, I will say in the summer, like Monster Mansion,
it's not like the best ride ever, but it is
one of the coolest rides you can go, like temperature wise. Yes,
in the middle of summer, so that makes it decent.
(12:46):
The line is very long.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
This line was also very long. We waited in line
for about an hour to get on this ride. The
ride does not last very long. It's like maybe five
or six minutes, even for a dark ride. It's not
super long, but it's one of those rides where it's
like it's kind of lighthearted, and we knew all the
roller coaster lines were going to be even longer, so
(13:08):
we rode that. Then we started to walk around in
areas that are called scare zones, which are set up
in different themes around the park. So they had one
that was themed after like zombies and the Grim Reaper
and stuff. They had one themed after insects, they had
one themed after aliens. Because there's a place in Georgia.
(13:28):
Ariel knows this very well called Roswell, Georgia. Yeah, so
they named it Roswell Georgia, but Roswell in the style
of Roswell, New Mexico, the supposed site of alien crashes.
The thing that bothered me was that, with the exception
of the Graveyard one, we didn't see any scare actors
(13:49):
at all, not a single scare actor in any of
the other zones. So it meant that the zones were
just these static tableau of a horror scene. But there's
nothing horrifying about it because it's just like it's you know,
it's just obviously like plastic figures and stuff like that.
There's no there's no interaction. It wasn't immersive, and I
(14:13):
was deeply disappointed. And I watched a video. Actually this
is since we tried to record last week, but I
watched a video on YouTube where a guy went to
six Flags the weekend before I did, when it was raining,
and he was like also commenting on the fact that
there were no scare actors in any of the scare
zones and he thought, well, maybe it's because of the rain. Well,
(14:34):
I can tell you it wasn't because of the rain,
because the weather was perfect when I was there.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Yeah, and I thought maybe it was because like they
had all got pulled to an event or were on
break or something happened. But you went through the scare
zones a couple of times.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Right, Yeah, And I saw two actors and they were
both in the little cemetery, one as grim reapers, and
mostly what they were doing was the living statue routine.
I'm staying very still and only occasionally moving to creep
someone out, So there wasn't a whole lot going on there.
And yeah, I just I feel like I feel like
six Flags cut way way back on their budget for
(15:13):
live performers for a freight fest. And I mean, from
what I've heard Six Flags has been in kind of
a decline financially over the last couple of years, so
maybe that has something to do with it. They just
didn't have a budget for that. That's a possibility. I
don't have any confirmation on that. That's just guesswork on
my side. But it really bummed me out because it
(15:35):
reminded me. We've talked about this at length before, but
it reminded me of the Renaissance Festival and how street
characters aren't. They do not appear to be valued very highly,
at least on the management side of the Georgia Renaissance
Festival from my perspective, and that's a shame because I
feel like they create so much atmosphere and flavor that
(15:58):
it elevates the experience, because I can tell you walking
through those scare zones was just kind of sad as
opposed to scary.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Well, what did you think of the haunted houses? Right,
because they have to have actors in the haunted houses.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
I'm sure they do. Never got into one because that
riskband line was so long, and when we finally went
by and the line was short at that point, it
was like we might have been able to get the
lines for the haunted houses themselves were super long as well,
so even if we had gotten a wriskband, we would
have then have to go and wait in another very
long line to experience the haunted house. So I didn't
(16:33):
get to go in one, which means, dear listeners, to
this day, this man, who is now eight and forty
years of age, has never been into a haunted house.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
You know that's a shame. I think you'd enjoy one.
We should go at some point. I'm not a huge
fan of haunted houses, and I'll tell that story, but
I really think you'd enjoy one, and if I have
enough people to hide between, then I will go. So
I have been to the haunted houses at fright Fest once.
At the time, I had a couple of friends working
(17:06):
the specifically the dark one. They give you little flashlights
and you basically walk through a dark house, but there's
scary actors and costumes and things all throughout, kind of
behind like they were like chain walls if I remember correctly. Anyhow,
I also had to stand in a very long line
to get in, which gave these two friends who were
kind of managing the haunted house, a chance to see
(17:28):
me in line and tell all the actors inside the
house my name is what I was wearing, which really sucked. No,
it was very funny in hindsight. It was very scary
at the time because I walk in and the first
like scared person's in the lobby and like some sort
of like dark hood something and walks past me and
(17:50):
says like welcome Ariel or something whispers it in my ear,
and I'm like, I must have just heard things. So
we go in and I didn't just hear things. By
the time I got to the middle of the haunted house, ever,
scare aacter was like focusing on me and screaming my name,
and I like I jetted out the exit being chased
by a chainsaw, and like thankfully my friends were there
to catch me, because I was ready to jump over
(18:10):
like the railing and into the line below me just
to get away. But that has been my general I
don't think i'd have that experience now. For one thing,
one of the friends that helped run that no longer
lives in Georgia. But also at the time, I knew
a lot of people like the other big haunted house
in Georgia is another world. They used to be seasonal
(18:34):
and now they're actually just full time in like East Georgia.
They've got like escape rooms and various different haunted House
themed haunted houses that you can go through. And I
would go there and I'd usually again sandwich myself between people,
and like there were times where I'd put like the
person I was with behind me and then introduce myself
(18:56):
to the people in front of me and be like, Hi,
my name is Ariel. Do you mind if I hide
my face in your back if I need? And I
would go through like that because a lot of the
scared acters knew me, and so Haunted House actors are
not supposed to touch you, you know. And that's for
their safety too, because if you get scared new punch them,
you know they're gonna get injured. I actually know someone
(19:17):
who worked I think at Another World and got like
her tooth punched out because someone had affect sort of
a flight reaction. Yeah, but they would come I'm not
that kind of person. I'm the kind of person that
just like cries and screams and huddles into a little ball.
And so many people would come up and like touch
my hair or touch my shoulder or get like like
extra mess with me, which is not cool, but also
(19:39):
like they knew they they knew that they would be okay. Again,
funny in hindsight, but.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Yeah, well Another World has like super high production value.
Speaker 3 (19:53):
I mean they they do.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
They spend a lot of money creating really really effective
you know, costumes and makeup effects and actual effects within
the haunted houses. Again, I haven't done one, haven't been
in it, but I did get to interview some of
the folks who created the effects there because I did
(20:20):
a years and years ago. I did an episode of
tech Stuff where I talked about the technology behind haunted Houses,
and it was absolutely fascinating because obviously there is that
balance there. You want something that's going to have a
big impact and be really effective, but you also have
to obviously keep safety first and foremost in your mind.
(20:40):
So yeah, it was really really neat just to learn
from it, and it made me want to on a
technical level experience it. I wasn't sure how I would
handle it, like from an anxiety level. I mean, I love,
I love scary movies and stuff, but like, I don't
know how I would react in the actual, more immersive
(21:03):
kind of experience because I just haven't ever done that.
But yeah, it from a technical perspective, I respect the
heck out of it.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Yeah, and nether World does something really cool, or they did.
I haven't been since the pandemic and it was a
couple of years since I had gone before then even
but they have like different hottay houses. So they've got
one that's like very real fears like trucks and bugs
and surgery and stuff like that, and I don't like that.
I don't like fears that could actually happen. I don't it,
just why. But then they have like the the dark
(21:34):
fantasy Coathulian, you know, clowns, cannibals whatever, I guess not.
No clowns and cannibals are in the real one, sorry, Mermaids,
things like that, vampires and mummies that come to life,
and just a little bit more fantastical. And then they
used to have I don't know if they still do,
like a black light one, so you'd put on like
three D glasses and everything was painted with like black
(21:56):
light paint and it would pop out and it made
it hard to navigate something. One of the best scares
because you can kind of you can kind of prime
yourself if you want if you don't want to be
fully immersive it, or you just need to like not
be as scared and look for the scare actors and
just be like, oh, I see you're gonna jump out
at me. Ha haa, Okay, you jumped out at me
right like you can usually prime pretty well. This is
(22:20):
not a challenge. If I have any scareacter friends listening,
and I go to a haunted house that you're at,
not a challenge. Please don't extra scare me. But in
this three D haunted house, the black Light one, like,
they had a room that was just like a black
It was just like all black walls with like stars
painted on it or something like that, just some sort
(22:40):
of design painted on it, and a person in an
all black suit with the same design painted on it.
And because you're wearing the three D glasses, you have
crappy depth perception, and so they didn't even have to
scare you. They just had to kind of like walk
out in front of you a couple of feet and
it would startle the Jesus out of you because you
couldn't see them moving until.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
They were right.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
That sounds pretty incredible and incredibly effective. I'm so intrigued,
But I honestly, I don't know how I would react
in these situations. So part of me worries that I
wouldn't react in a way that was supportive. And that's
what I would most want to do. Like, I don't
ever want to be one of those guys who's like,
(23:23):
that's not scary, because I think that's so disrespectful. And
and if you're going to do that, why did you
pay to go and like scoff at the folks who
are trying to, you know, do this work. They're not
getting paid very much, y'all, and they're trying to make
your your spooky season extra spooky. So if you're just
going to and you're determined to be like that's not
(23:45):
scary or whatever, it doesn't make you seem like you're
a big deal or that you're super brave. It makes
you seem pretty like lame and not fun. So I
would want to make sure I reacted in a way
that made the actors feel like that was a good one.
This guy, this guy is a good patron.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I do think you should give
it a try at some point. Have you ever been
to like a corn maze or a haunted hay ride
or anything that's like haunted house adjacent.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yes, yes, two things that I can do that are
in the neighborhood the mister Rogers neighborhood of haunted houses.
And one is corn mazes or is I like to
call them maze mazes. And I've done that once no twice,
I think, and I loved it. I was like, this
is really cool. It was in the daytime, so it
(24:42):
wasn't like hard to navigate or anything. It was still
a great maze, like legitimately well designed, so it took
some time to make your way through, but I really
had a great time. It was like just a need
activity to do. There was a small group of us
and we were all kind of sticking together and navigating
through the maze, and I really enjoyed that. And I've
(25:02):
done some hay ride stuff too, although I would just
call it like here's a way to waste fifteen minutes
and to eat up some tickets at this little affair
like they wasn't particularly like a haunted hay ride or
anything like that. It was just it was more like
a fall festival kind of thing as opposed to a
Halloween specific kind of thing. But the other haunted house
(25:24):
adjacent activity I have done is that I finally, after
years of knowing about it, went on a ghost tour
in Marietta, Georgia. It was led by this really eccentric
tour guide, very very enthusiastic, very knowledgeable, very eccentric. Let's see,
(25:46):
I think her name was shay Lee. Yeah, it was shay.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Shaye was offered to let me tag along on one
of her ghost tours, and so I got to see
her do her work. And the stories that she tells
are not like terrifying and blood curdling. It's more of
like sort of the romantic ghost stories, right, Like not
the super spooky, scary, terrify you you're never going to
(26:17):
go to sleep kind of stories, but more of the sad, tragic,
romantic kind of stories. And they were really interesting, and
we got to walk around the historic Marietta Square and
learn about the architecture and some of the buildings and
the history of the buildings. Like it really was more
of a history walking tour with some ghost stuff added on.
(26:37):
But to me, that was perfect. It's exactly the kind
of thing that I'm into, and I really enjoyed it.
She did a great job. Also nice got to learn
a lot about a wild tunnel system that's under that
town that's actually dates back to the eighteen hundreds. It's
pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
Oh, very cool. Yeah, I've never been to the Marietta
Ghost Tour, but I I've done the Roswell one a
couple of times, and it is interesting because you know,
the ghost stories are tied to the architecture in the
history of the town and historic Roswell. One of the
things that's big is there was like a textile mill
that got burnt down during the the Confederate the Civil.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
War, Sherman's March to the Sea.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Something like that, and so like a lot of it's
like just really cool ghost stories. Like there's one about
I don't want to ruin it for you or anybody,
but there's one about like a building that when it
got rebuilt, the walls kept like getting like water leaks
in them, and it was suspected that it was the
(27:45):
ghosts of the women waiting for their husbands to come
home from the mill. When the houses got rebuilt with electricity,
they didn't understand electricity and they thought it was fire
and the walls, so they kept trying to put out
the fire. So really fun and cool ghost stories, Like
there's a couple about like people getting like scares of
like ghosts running at them, but it's never super grotesque
or anything. Yeah, but you don't believe in ghosts.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
I do not believe in ghosts. I have heard various
ghost stories about places that I lived close to. Like,
for example, I used to live in a place called Gainesville, Georgia,
and there is a college in that area called Brenew.
It's a liberal arts college, and Brenew has a really
(28:30):
really really nice theater and that's where like the community
theater stuff between Brenew and Gainesville College, which is now
part of the University of Georgia. They would do these
amazing productions at this theater, and so often as a student,
we would take like a field trip to go see
(28:50):
a show that was meant for like, you know, kids
or whatever. And I remember hearing stories about how a
building that faced out toward the front of the theater
there was supposedly a ghost residing in one of the rooms,
and that on occasion, if you looked up at just
the right moment, you could catch a ghostly face looking
(29:11):
out at the window and would always move out of
the way shortly after being spotted was the story, and
that this was supposedly a former student of Branow. I
don't think I ever got the full story about, you know,
supposedly how they became ghostified, but I remember that one clearly.
My favorite ghost in all of Georgia is the ghost
(29:33):
of Captain Flint, who supposedly haunts a restaurant in Savannah,
Georgia called I think it's called the Pirate House. And
the reason why he's my favorite is because Captain Flint
is a fictional character in Treasure Island. It never existed,
so the ghost of the ghost of a fictional character
(29:54):
haunts this pirate restaurant. It is in one of the
oldest buildings in Georgia, so it's it le yet is
a building that has a ton of history associated with it.
But it just it made me laugh so hard the
first time I heard that this this restaurant is haunted
by the ghost of Captain Flint, I'm like, oh, I
wonder could it also be haunted I don't know, by
the the ghost of Gaston or maybe the ghost of
(30:19):
Darth Vader.
Speaker 3 (30:20):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
Yes, one hundred percent now you've you've had the chance
to stay in a haunted area before, right, Yep?
Speaker 2 (30:34):
A couple times, mostly in London, because everything in London
is older than the United States is as a country.
I've stayed at a few places in London that were
supposedly haunted. Never saw anything spooky, apart from like really
bad plumbing, which isn't so much as spooky as it
(30:54):
is terrifying because you'll step into a shower and you
don't know if you're gonna boil your skin off or
freeze yourself. But when I was honeymooning in London many
many years ago, my spouse and I we were ready
to fly back to America. And my spouse works for
(31:17):
an airline, and so she and I were going to
fly stand by from London to the United States, which
means you haven't purchased a seat, You get a seat
if there's one available, and if there's not, you gotta
wait for the next flight. Well, we get there and
there are a ton of standby passengers. And my wife
(31:39):
did not have a lot of seniority with this particular
airline at this point. She had not been working there
for many many years. She had been working there for
a few but it's all based on seniority, and so
it became very clear that we were not going to
make the flight, and that meant that we had to
start trying to make a decision. Do we stay in
London and try again the next day because there were
(32:02):
no other flights that were going to work, or do
we fly to a different city in the UK and
try to fly out the next day from there instead.
And the thing that made this decision very, very difficult
is that one of the other passengers who was trying
to fly stand by was on a buddy pass, which
is an even lower priority than where we were. And
(32:28):
this gentleman was a Yeoman of the Guard, meaning he
was one of the members of the British Armed Forces
who was assigned to the Tower of London, possibly the
most supposedly haunted place in all of England. So many
famous people met the end of their life at the
(32:50):
Tower of London. And he was offering to other stand
by passengers the chance to stay in the apartments at
the Tower of London if they needed a place to stay,
because they weren't going to be able to fly out
that night. And it was torture because everything in us
(33:10):
told us we wanted to take that opportunity. I mean,
you could stay in the Tower of London on your honeymoon.
That's an insane story. But when we did the math, awesome, yes, awesome,
truly like it would have been like a fantastic one
to tell and I would have been absolutely head over
heels in love with the idea. But we did the
(33:34):
math and it just it looked like there was no
possible way for us to get out of London the
next day. So instead, what we did was we took
a local flight to Manchester and then stayed overnight in
Manchester and the next day we flew from Manchester to
the United States, and we were you know, it was
the right decision to make because we needed to get
back in order to get to our jobs and stuff.
(33:55):
Our vacation was running out. But it still was very
sad that we didn't get the chance to stay in
like the most haunted site of all of London. Not
that I think I would have seen any ghosts, but
from a historical perspective, I would have loved it.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Yeah. Yeah, I've never had the opportunity to say somewhere
that cool, that's haunted you know. But I have my
very first community theater that I was a part of
as an actor. Like I have memories of my parents
working in community theater or in theater when I was
(34:33):
very young, but as a teenager, I acted at a
theater and I hung out there and I helped out there,
and I stage managed and even assistant directed once, and
I ran concessions and all this other stuff. And I
would get there early in the morning, and like in theory,
it was haunted there, and there would be someone who
would go up into the orchestra and play the piano,
or who would play with the scrims, and sometimes you'd
(34:54):
hear stuff like that when you knew you were the
only person in there. I never saw a ghost, and
I assumed that some of it was probably like music
coming from the alleyway behind or footsteps echoing from outfront.
But in theory, that was haunted. And then I've gone
to hard Labor Creek State Park, which in theory is haunted.
But I think that might just be because a lot
(35:17):
of state parks are in theory haunted. But I think
it just might be because that's where they filmed a
bunch of like scary Halloween movies.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Yeah, And when we recorded this the first time last week,
I told a story about how I at first thought
that that particular camp was haunted because I was there
for an SCA event and I was walking back toward
the cabin I was staying at at night and there
was very limited light. I didn't have a flashlight or anything.
(35:44):
This was before I had a cell phone, so I
didn't have a phone to hold up or anything. And
I heard a noise of someone making like a very
rushed exhalation, like and it was very loud, and it
came immediately to my right and I turned to look
and I couldn't see anything until I saw this big
(36:08):
shape start to move, not toward me, but in front
of me. And it turned out it was a buck.
It was a deer. But yeah, for a while there,
I believed in pretty much every supernatural creature that you
could put your finger too, because I had no idea
what the heck had made that noise. I can't even
express to you how terrified I was. Even when I
(36:32):
found out it was a deer, I was still scared
because those suckers can mess you up.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
Yeah. Yeah, I've had plenty of shares scares at state
parks that like, I know what caused them, and it's
perfectly logical, but it has caused irrational fear in me
since then. So I completely understand.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
You know, Ariel, something we didn't talk about last time,
and I don't talk about it much at all because
I have complicated feelings about it. You and I participated
in a spooky theatrical immersive murder mystery type thing once
(37:12):
upon a time.
Speaker 1 (37:13):
Oh yeah, we did.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
We did this was this was like a decade or
more than a decade ago.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah, I had fun with it. So, like we went
to this courthouse and it was like a dinner theater,
and we each got a group and we brought them
to a room and we would do like a sam
like call ghosts kind of a thing, and everybody had
like their own little stick to it. And in this courthouse,
(37:41):
of course, also in theory was actually haunted. Uh. I
think the the rumors like clocks would reset themselves or
change time.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Oh, we definitely had issues with that during the production.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But yeah, yeah, because we were all supposed to have
like the penultimate ski point of our room happened at
the same time, but it didn't yeah, no, we were.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
We would synchronize so so, to give you more of
an outline of what was going on is that each
person was playing a sort of paranormal investigator and from
all different backgrounds, and for some reason we all wanted
to be foreign. I don't know why, but we all.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Yeah, I could not be Australian.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
I am sad that I went with German, but yeah,
I should have just gone with American. It would have
been much easier.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
But yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
The idea was that we would have a small group,
a subset of the overall group, and that we would
give some information to them that would give them part
of the picture of this tragedy that happened, and that
at some point in the process of doing this, theoretically
synchronized across all the rooms, we would a par normal
(38:56):
thing would happen, and we would act out our part
like we had been possessed by a spirit. We would
act out our part of the drama. But you again,
the people gathered would only see that bit of it.
Then at the end, when everyone regathered together, we would
come together and still possessed by these spirits, would act
out the full scene that would explain what had happened
(39:19):
and what had led to this place supposedly being haunted
by these different spirits. It was a neat idea. I
think we probably needed another month to really workshop it
so that it would have really good execution, because ultimately,
I think it was it didn't live up to the
premise it It was so technically challenging to do that.
(39:43):
I don't think. I don't know how people who visited
felt about it, but as a performer, I was like,
I wanted that to be better than what it was.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Yeah, it was very technically challenging. I agree that. I mean,
I know everybody involved in they're all good actors, but
I think, you know, yeah, some more tech rehearsals definitely
would have not hurt. Yeah, because yeah, it was. It
was very It was very intricate in its design, and
I think that's really cool, like you said, a fun concept.
(40:13):
But I also found that, like in my room, I
maybe like where I going to do it again? Would
figure out more to do because I felt like I
kind of ended up having to stall a lot.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Yeah, I had like electronic voice phenomena stuff that I
had made by myself, Like I'd use some audio recording
software and then I did some like reversal of voices
and things like that so I could have something to
like a prop to play with, and that helped me
eat up time. But like I that was something I
(40:47):
did on my own so that I could have something
to eat up time. Like we were also given a
ton of freedom to determine how our room would actually
play out. And again, like without having that incredible uh
integration and to be able to rehearse it over and
(41:10):
over to make sure that you have the timing down. Uh,
it just it just became a little less polished than
what I would prefer. I don't think it was bad.
I just don't think it was as good as it
could have been based upon the idea was incredible. We
just I think part of the also, the part of
the challenge was that none of us had ever done
anything like that before, like that specifically, I had theater,
(41:33):
Oh you.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
Had, Oh I had done. I had done a murder
mystery with OH.
Speaker 2 (41:38):
I had done murder mysteries, but I hadn't done murder
mysteries where everyone is split up and everything is supposed
to be happening simultaneously. I had done murder mystery where
the scenes play out in front of everybody in a
centralized location.
Speaker 1 (41:55):
Yeah, that's how That's how the other murder mysteries with
this group have done, where we all had characters and
we'd go around the party and we'd have interactions that
would drop clues. But it was it was it was
like we had some planned interactions, but they were also
just like motivations, and then you could drop scene improv
scenes about it, which went really well. We did it
quite a few times. But yeah, if I think another
(42:17):
part of the problem is that you and I are
kind of perfectionists, and so I think I recall hearing
that people really liked it, and I think that you
and I are just also very very particular about yes. Yeah,
so you know, that's something to keep in mind. I
(42:37):
would do it again. I would, especially knowing what I
know now, and probably do better.
Speaker 3 (42:45):
Yeah, I would.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
If I were to do it again, I would. I
would take a much more methodical approach, because the whole
thing was very like we weren't working from an existing
script when we started. The whole story was craft from
the beginning, Like we started with, all right, what's the tragedy,
how does it unfold? That's the starting point and then
(43:08):
we broke up and like each person was playing a
particular character in this unfolding story and then working backward
from that, how does your paranormal investigator encounter that particular
spirit and how does it play out in the room
that you'll be in? And I think that's not a
bad idea, but I think that having more of it
(43:32):
kind of set up in advance so that you have
a really satisfying payoff would be would be easier, like
not putting the load on all the performers who already
have to worry about actually executing the thing. But we
weren't just performers, We were technically performers and writers that
for that project.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Yeah, yeah, we are getting close to time, so real quick, Johnathan,
and any favorite scary books or podcasts you could recommend
for people who maybe are not quite ready to jump
into the happier holiday spirit like me, Oh like, I'm
sorry that was confusing. I am ready to start decorating
(44:14):
for Thanksgiving and Christmas and all of that happy, good
cook for everybody time. But for the people who aren't,
any book or podcast recommendations.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
Absolutely so for books like I'm a fan of early
Stephen King books, but also up to like the middle
I think of the middle of his career. I haven't
read most of his work over the last decade and
a half, but like the book Needful Things is possibly
my favorite Stephen King book. I think it's really well done.
(44:47):
It's incredibly atmospheric, it's super creepy. So check that out
if you can find a copy of it. My dad's
horror novel, Shadow Show, is really good. And I know
I'm biased, but I really think that that is an
amazing horror novel. You can actually, I think, find an
electronic copy. It's been out of physical print for many
(45:10):
years now, but it's well worth a read. Just remember
that it was written like in the eighties because it's
a different, different vibe. I would also say that for podcasts,
the Thirteen Days of Halloween podcast. I know the people
who work on that because that's an iHeart podcast show,
(45:31):
and they get some incredible performers to do some really
great audio work, some immersive audio, three D audio stuff
for that series. And if you listen to season two
of Thirteen Days of Halloween and you look at I
think it's episode ten, but it's called The Doctor, you
(45:52):
might very well hear a certain llenc host playing a
part in that show.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
Yeah, yeah, you do good job, you do good works.
Thank you. I talk good. I don't really have any
book recommendations. A lot of like the scarier books that
I've read have left me in a place to not
want to read scarier books, like scary Stories to Tell
in the Dark, or anthologies of like HP Lovecraft. I
(46:21):
do like classic like Dracula or Frankenstein, and those aren't
that scary. Some suspenseful stuff, But as far as podcasts go,
I've got two that I really like. And one is
Limetown and it's kind of suspenseful, and there's definitely some
like scary, disturbing stuff in there, but it's more suspenseful
than that, and I really enjoyed the journey. The other one,
(46:42):
and this I will say, is just like flat up scary.
It is true horror. You wouldn't think I would like
listening to it, but the execution is really good. It's
called The White Fault, and it's like a bunch of
people go to a remote area and they encounter like
evil supernatural stuff happening as they explore, like the ruins
(47:02):
of the place that they're at. And it's like truly terrifying,
but it's so well done because they bring in a
lot of voice actors from different countries and then they
do this you have to listen on good audio system
because they will have like the actors speak in their
language and then transition to English. But sometimes that overlap
makes it a little hard to understand, So if you're
(47:24):
listening like with a lot of excess noise around, it
might be hard to follow. But I really enjoy it
for horror, it is incredibly well done.
Speaker 2 (47:31):
Awesome that I think that sounds great. I think those
are great recommendations. And you know, obviously in some upcoming
episodes we will transition into other holiday geeky stuff. Hopefully
we'll be able to start talking about geek news and
more detail again because they strike will be resolved at
(47:52):
some point and I look forward to doing that.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Oh and I can actually talk about the other podcast
I'm doing. It's called Monster, because it's already on social media.
There are a couple of trailers out. It's a lot
of fun. It's a very cool story. If you want
to keep up to date for when it comes out,
because it's not out yet, you can go to the
Monster Universe Audio Drama dot substact dot com and register
(48:17):
for updates.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Everybody involved in it is super super talented. Yeah, so
take a listen. All right. So that's it, Jonathan. If
people want to contact us, how should they do that?
Speaker 3 (48:32):
Well, you're gonna go across town. You're gonna head on
out down that one old state route that no one
takes no more since the highway moved in. As you
go down that way, you're gonna.
Speaker 2 (48:47):
Pass yourself a cornfield. At the end of that cornfield,
there's gonna be a little dirt road jutting off to
the ride. You're gonna take a ride, gonna go down
that dirt road aways, and then you're gonna start noticing
that you've been on this dirt road for a while,
and you could swear that you're just passing the same
landscape over and over. It's just that cornfield on your
(49:08):
right and an empty little wooded area on the left.
But you're pretty sure you've seen that tree before. You're
gonna keep on driving because there ain't no way to
turn around. Roads too narrow. You're gonna keep on going.
And as the sun is going down and your gas
gauge is getting low. You're gonna start feeling nervous. And
as that light starts to twinkle off into the distance,
(49:30):
you'll notice there's another light up ahead. It's an old house.
There's one room lit up over at the top of it.
Otherwise it's just as dark as the grave. You're gonna
pull up out front of that house just as your
car is running on that last set of fumes, and
somewhat trepidaciously, you're gonna approach that porch and you're gonna
(49:53):
climb a couple of steps and hesitate for a moment
before you knock on that door. But you don't have
many options open to you, do you. So you'll set
those knuckles to that door and it'll swing open with
a low creak. Then you call out, knowing someone's gotta
be home. There's a lot on upstairs, but it ain't
no response, So, wondering what you should do, you feel
(50:16):
like there's no other choice but to take a step inside.
You do so, and you hear a soft sound coming
from upstairs. Sounds like it's someone asking you to come
on up. Can't be sure, you can't really make it out,
So you get on that staircase. You climb it step
by step, listening to the sounds of the house settle
(50:37):
around you, and smelling the dust in the air, and
walking your way through cobwebs and doing that crazy karate
thing you do when you step right into a spider's web.
Then you go over and you see that there's a
door off to your left, and there's some light coming
out from underneath, and that right there must be where
(50:59):
you heard the voice. You call out again, there ain't
no return to your call, so you just kind of
walk slowly, and you see that the door is actually
slightly open, it's not actually closed all the way too.
And as you reach the end, you're gonna put your
palm on that door. It's gonna feel so cold against
your skin. You're gonna give it a gentle push. It
(51:21):
swings noiselessly open, and inside you see a bunch of puppets,
and there's also like a clown and a giant spider thing,
and there's also like Jack Nicholson for some reason. But
in the middle of it it's me and I'm gonna
have a hatchet in one hand and a sewing needle
in the other. I'm like, yeah, what is that. Come on,
(51:43):
I'm busy here, and then you can ask a question.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
Geez if that is too scary for any of you.
If any of your poor hearts can't take it, you
can reach us on social media on Twitter, where llenc
underscore podcast, Facebook, Instagram, threads, everywhere else. We're discord were
Large Nerdron Collider. If you want to drop us an
email instead, you can do that. It is Large Nurdron
(52:07):
pod at gmail dot com. And if you need an
invite to discord, you can either check our website www
dot Large nurderun Colider, which is sorely out of date
but has active invites, or you can email us and
I'll send you one. We really do love hearing from you,
and until next time. I have been Aeriel drowning in
full size candybars.
Speaker 2 (52:27):
Cast in, and I have been Jonathan. All work and
no podcasts makes John a dull boy. Strickland. The Large
Nerdron Collider was created by Aeriel Caston and produced, edited, published, deleted, undeleted,
published again. Curse That by Jonathan Strickland. Music by Kevin
(52:52):
McLeod of incomptech dot com. Protationeentiontution
Hey, everybody. Welcome to Large Nerdron Collider, the podcast that's
all about the geeky things happening in the world around
us and how excited we are about them. I'm Ariel
Castin and with me as always is my super awesome
friend and co host Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Last week was so spooky it scared the episode right
off my computer.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Oh no, how will people know about all of our
favorite spookdum stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, we're gonna do it again this week, but no,
I owe I owe everyone out there. In apology, I
already apologize to Ariel, but I was trying to put
together our episode from last week because we actually did
record one, it just did not publish, and in the
process of editing and everything, a series of unfortunate events
(01:02):
befell your co host. Jonathan Strickland broke my toe, which
is still broken. It's nice and fun, and I got
a kidney stone and I still have some long COVID
symptoms that are bothering me on occasion. And these are
not excuses but merely explanations of I was dealing with
(01:23):
stuff and forgot, and so that's really all on me.
And as punishment, I'm going to redo last week's episode again.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
It will be a delight. Besides, now we can talk
about what happened this spooky season for us ah Man,
which I should have told you one of the things,
because we can't talk about it on air.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah. So one thing that's kind of funny is that
before we even started recording, Ariel and I were just
chatting and we got into a really great, deep discussion
about some things that we're looking forward to in the
Geeks space, specifically in television and film, and how we
were interested in them or excited by them, or in
(02:05):
some cases, you know, feeling like, oh, that's not what
I was expecting. But obviously the strike is still ongoing.
Though as we record this today, SAG, AFTRA and the
AMPTP are supposed to come back together in negotiations. SAG
is expecting a response to a counter proposal that they
(02:25):
presented the producers. So maybe things are starting to head
toward a resolution where the strike will be over. That
would be fantastic if that happens, but for the time being,
we're still operating under those pesky strike rules.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah. When we first got back to the bargaining table,
the mptp's like you're being unreasonable. We're walking away, and
we're like, cool, we'll wait.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
And by unreasonable, it's like saying, we want to make
sure that in this new era of streaming in particular
as well well as the dawn of generative artificial intelligence,
that certain protections are in place so that people can
actually make a living as an actor. As we have
said numerous times, it is a very small percentage of
(03:14):
actors who actually make a living acting like that is
the one and only source of income in their lives.
Most actors are holding down other gigs in order to
be able to support their habit of acting.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Yeah. Yeah, and like it wasn't. I did laugh a
little bit because a bunch of like higher echelon actors
came together and said, no, we're going to hold out
for a deal, And I'm like, I get that, and
their support is amazing and I'm not knocking it at all.
The actor union needs their support. They're a part of it.
(03:50):
They are affected by this too. But you know, as
we've talked about before, it's about the the the working
level actors, not the big stars. So it's also good
that the working level actors are like, no, we'll wait,
we've waited long enough.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah, I mean it's it's important, right because this is
this does determine their compensation moving forward, and if if
those working actors want to be able to get closer
to making a living wage doing their work, it's absolutely
imperative that these changes happen. The problem is, they're also
the ones who are the most at risk the longer
(04:27):
the strike goes. They're the ones who have the least
amount saved up, the least. They don't have the safety
nets that the massive movie stars have. And so like
the massive movie star might be saying, well, shucks, I
was gonna buy another private island, but I guess I'm
gonna have to wait till next month. Meanwhile, you have
(04:47):
working actors saying, can I make this sandwich stretch for
two meals?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Which you know I've done before I really got into
film acting, I did that too. But you know, the
the working class actors are also that's that's not the
right term for it. My brain is not functioning today
in that area. But you know they're willing to hold
out to because otherwise they will continue having to make
(05:13):
a sandwich stretch for two meals. Yes, so that's all good.
I'm glad that things are moving forward. You know, there's
a lot of like holiday slate in twenty twenty four
slate is all going to have to get pushed back
if things don't get resolved soon. So you know, the
producers are starting to feel the crunch.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yes, yeah, I mean and like all those big companies
out there, like there's the one that starts with d
and ends with Isney that had put out like massive
slates of film and TV projects that span the course
of several years. Obviously those schedules are going to change.
(05:53):
In the case of that particular company, this might be
for the best because they have a whole lot of
things that they need to fix beyond compensation and benefits
for their actors. But again, we can save that conversation
for later when we're out of the strike. But for now,
what we' thought we'd talked about is spooky stuff, because,
(06:17):
like I said last week, the episode was really focusing
on that in advance of Halloween. Now Halloween has come
and gone, but spooky remains in our hearts. So we
thought we'd talked a bit about some spooky, geeky things
that we enjoy that aren't related to TV and film
and that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, first of all, I want to say I really
enjoyed this Halloween. I watched a spooky movie with my husband,
and obviously I can't name which one, but Jonathan, if
you remember, i'll tell you after I probably won't remember.
And we had three whole trigger treats this year, which
(06:59):
is better than previous sears.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Yeah. Last year she got half of one and that
was disturbing.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
Yes, and they were all like barely too, so it
was adorable. And then another super fun thing that happened
was some some of our listeners jumped in the cosplay
channel of Discord and chatted about cosplaying costumes and Blake
MoU love the costumes you shared with us. I wish
I had that talent, I told you in Discord, but
(07:26):
thank you for sharing your costumes with us. That was
brilliantly awesome. Jonathan, what happened for you?
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Nothing?
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Okay? So Monday Halloween een, the Eve of all hellos, Eve,
was when I got my kidney stone and I still
had it on Tuesday Halloween, So my Halloween was there
was a lot of like ghostly moaning, but it was
all coming from me, and we did not have any
(08:00):
trick or treaters, which is what has happened the last
several years. But then again, I live in a townhouse.
It is kind of tucked back from the street a
little bit. We have like a yard kind of thing
that's in front, and we're on a street corner. And
the way that the street lights are it doesn't put
a whole lot of light into the courtyard area, and
(08:21):
the lights in front of our doors and stuff are
fairly dim as well, so it's not a very inviting place.
Like all of my neighbors are awesome. The houses are
in a very modern style. It doesn't look for boating necessarily,
but because it's dimly lit, it doesn't look welcoming either.
So we didn't get any trick or treaters. I did
(08:42):
watch some seasonally appropriate entertainment that obviously I'm not gonna
go into more detail, but I watched some stuff that
I'd never seen before, watched a couple of things I
had seen before but been years, and enjoyed that. And
that's about it. I didn't I couldn't go anywhere because
(09:02):
I was in so much discomfort. I did before that
a weekend before, not the weekend before Halloween, but the
weekend before that, I went to Six Flags over Georgia
to attend fright Fest for the very first time. So
fright Fest is like a lot of amusement parks around
(09:24):
the United States will have a Halloween themed or a
seasonally spooky themed element to their amusement parks. For six Flags,
it's called freight Fest. I had never been. I had
been to Six Flags a couple of times, thought I
would check that out, and let me just tell you,
I was thoroughly disappointed.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
That's very sad because I went to fright Fest years
and years ago and had a lovely time. So why
were you disappointed, Jonathan?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
So some of it was just purely circumstantial, Like we
get to fright Fest and went by we I mean,
friend of the show, shay Lee took me to fright Fest.
She had actually worked at fright Fest once upon a
time many years ago and had not been back since then.
So we go, and first entry into any of the
(10:16):
haunts was on top of your entry into the park,
so you had to purchase a wristband in order to
go into any of the haunted houses. And they had
like five or six different haunted houses when we got
in the line to get the wristbands was so long
that we said, all right, you know what, let's just
go ride a ride. We rode the best ride in
(10:39):
all of Six Flags. And it's not our roller coaster
and Ariel. You know what ride it is because I
talked about it last week, But.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
Yes, it's the Monster Mansion.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
Yes, is that it is?
Speaker 2 (10:53):
It is? It used to be called the Monster Plantation.
They have changed that because obviously plantation has some some
real ugly baggage attached to it, so they turned it
to a mansion instead of a plantation, although it does
still have a you know, classic anti Bellum south Field
(11:13):
to the locations and stuff inside it. It is a
dark ride. You're on a boat, you go through a
little river, and you can definitely tell that the former
imagineers were responsible for building this ride. It actually is
a replacement. Do you know what was in the place
of Monster Mansion before Monster Mansion was there?
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I don't think I do. I think that was there
ever since I first started going as a young child.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
You wouldn't have encountered it because they swapped it out
in the early eighties. But before it was Monster Mansion,
it was a ride that was themed after the works
of Joel Chandler Harris, who's the guy who wrote all
the Brear Rabbit and Brear Fox stories.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Gotcha.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
And it was called the Okefinochi or Tales of the
Okie Fan or something, which is odd because that's not
where the Brain Rabbit stories are necessarily set. But it
was still a water dark ride. There are some videos
on YouTube that show footage of it, and it is,
fittingly for a show about spooky stuff, really unsettling. But
(12:17):
it's because it's because the the art style of the
figures and the limited amount of movement is really off putting.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Gotcha, gotcha. I just thought you meant story wise. But
either way, I will say in the summer, like Monster Mansion,
it's not like the best ride ever, but it is
one of the coolest rides you can go, like temperature wise. Yes,
in the middle of summer, so that makes it decent.
(12:46):
The line is very long.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
This line was also very long. We waited in line
for about an hour to get on this ride. The
ride does not last very long. It's like maybe five
or six minutes, even for a dark ride. It's not
super long, but it's one of those rides where it's
like it's kind of lighthearted, and we knew all the
roller coaster lines were going to be even longer, so
(13:08):
we rode that. Then we started to walk around in
areas that are called scare zones, which are set up
in different themes around the park. So they had one
that was themed after like zombies and the Grim Reaper
and stuff. They had one themed after insects, they had
one themed after aliens. Because there's a place in Georgia.
(13:28):
Ariel knows this very well called Roswell, Georgia. Yeah, so
they named it Roswell Georgia, but Roswell in the style
of Roswell, New Mexico, the supposed site of alien crashes.
The thing that bothered me was that, with the exception
of the Graveyard one, we didn't see any scare actors
(13:49):
at all, not a single scare actor in any of
the other zones. So it meant that the zones were
just these static tableau of a horror scene. But there's
nothing horrifying about it because it's just like it's you know,
it's just obviously like plastic figures and stuff like that.
There's no there's no interaction. It wasn't immersive, and I
(14:13):
was deeply disappointed. And I watched a video. Actually this
is since we tried to record last week, but I
watched a video on YouTube where a guy went to
six Flags the weekend before I did, when it was raining,
and he was like also commenting on the fact that
there were no scare actors in any of the scare
zones and he thought, well, maybe it's because of the rain. Well,
(14:34):
I can tell you it wasn't because of the rain,
because the weather was perfect when I was there.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Yeah, and I thought maybe it was because like they
had all got pulled to an event or were on
break or something happened. But you went through the scare
zones a couple of times.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Right, Yeah, And I saw two actors and they were
both in the little cemetery, one as grim reapers, and
mostly what they were doing was the living statue routine.
I'm staying very still and only occasionally moving to creep
someone out, So there wasn't a whole lot going on there.
And yeah, I just I feel like I feel like
six Flags cut way way back on their budget for
(15:13):
live performers for a freight fest. And I mean, from
what I've heard Six Flags has been in kind of
a decline financially over the last couple of years, so
maybe that has something to do with it. They just
didn't have a budget for that. That's a possibility. I
don't have any confirmation on that. That's just guesswork on
my side. But it really bummed me out because it
(15:35):
reminded me. We've talked about this at length before, but
it reminded me of the Renaissance Festival and how street
characters aren't. They do not appear to be valued very highly,
at least on the management side of the Georgia Renaissance
Festival from my perspective, and that's a shame because I
feel like they create so much atmosphere and flavor that
(15:58):
it elevates the experience, because I can tell you walking
through those scare zones was just kind of sad as
opposed to scary.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Well, what did you think of the haunted houses? Right,
because they have to have actors in the haunted houses.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
I'm sure they do. Never got into one because that
riskband line was so long, and when we finally went
by and the line was short at that point, it
was like we might have been able to get the
lines for the haunted houses themselves were super long as well,
so even if we had gotten a wriskband, we would
have then have to go and wait in another very
long line to experience the haunted house. So I didn't
(16:33):
get to go in one, which means, dear listeners, to
this day, this man, who is now eight and forty
years of age, has never been into a haunted house.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
You know that's a shame. I think you'd enjoy one.
We should go at some point. I'm not a huge
fan of haunted houses, and I'll tell that story, but
I really think you'd enjoy one, and if I have
enough people to hide between, then I will go. So
I have been to the haunted houses at fright Fest once.
At the time, I had a couple of friends working
(17:06):
the specifically the dark one. They give you little flashlights
and you basically walk through a dark house, but there's
scary actors and costumes and things all throughout, kind of
behind like they were like chain walls if I remember correctly. Anyhow,
I also had to stand in a very long line
to get in, which gave these two friends who were
kind of managing the haunted house, a chance to see
(17:28):
me in line and tell all the actors inside the
house my name is what I was wearing, which really sucked. No,
it was very funny in hindsight. It was very scary
at the time because I walk in and the first
like scared person's in the lobby and like some sort
of like dark hood something and walks past me and
(17:50):
says like welcome Ariel or something whispers it in my ear,
and I'm like, I must have just heard things. So
we go in and I didn't just hear things. By
the time I got to the middle of the haunted house, ever,
scare aacter was like focusing on me and screaming my name,
and I like I jetted out the exit being chased
by a chainsaw, and like thankfully my friends were there
to catch me, because I was ready to jump over
(18:10):
like the railing and into the line below me just
to get away. But that has been my general I
don't think i'd have that experience now. For one thing,
one of the friends that helped run that no longer
lives in Georgia. But also at the time, I knew
a lot of people like the other big haunted house
in Georgia is another world. They used to be seasonal
(18:34):
and now they're actually just full time in like East Georgia.
They've got like escape rooms and various different haunted House
themed haunted houses that you can go through. And I
would go there and I'd usually again sandwich myself between people,
and like there were times where I'd put like the
person I was with behind me and then introduce myself
(18:56):
to the people in front of me and be like, Hi,
my name is Ariel. Do you mind if I hide
my face in your back if I need? And I
would go through like that because a lot of the
scared acters knew me, and so Haunted House actors are
not supposed to touch you, you know. And that's for
their safety too, because if you get scared new punch them,
you know they're gonna get injured. I actually know someone
(19:17):
who worked I think at Another World and got like
her tooth punched out because someone had affect sort of
a flight reaction. Yeah, but they would come I'm not
that kind of person. I'm the kind of person that
just like cries and screams and huddles into a little ball.
And so many people would come up and like touch
my hair or touch my shoulder or get like like
extra mess with me, which is not cool, but also
(19:39):
like they knew they they knew that they would be okay. Again,
funny in hindsight, but.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Yeah, well Another World has like super high production value.
Speaker 3 (19:53):
I mean they they do.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
They spend a lot of money creating really really effective
you know, costumes and makeup effects and actual effects within
the haunted houses. Again, I haven't done one, haven't been
in it, but I did get to interview some of
the folks who created the effects there because I did
(20:20):
a years and years ago. I did an episode of
tech Stuff where I talked about the technology behind haunted Houses,
and it was absolutely fascinating because obviously there is that
balance there. You want something that's going to have a
big impact and be really effective, but you also have
to obviously keep safety first and foremost in your mind.
(20:40):
So yeah, it was really really neat just to learn
from it, and it made me want to on a
technical level experience it. I wasn't sure how I would
handle it, like from an anxiety level. I mean, I love,
I love scary movies and stuff, but like, I don't
know how I would react in the actual, more immersive
(21:03):
kind of experience because I just haven't ever done that.
But yeah, it from a technical perspective, I respect the
heck out of it.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Yeah, and nether World does something really cool, or they did.
I haven't been since the pandemic and it was a
couple of years since I had gone before then even
but they have like different hottay houses. So they've got
one that's like very real fears like trucks and bugs
and surgery and stuff like that, and I don't like that.
I don't like fears that could actually happen. I don't it,
just why. But then they have like the the dark
(21:34):
fantasy Coathulian, you know, clowns, cannibals whatever, I guess not.
No clowns and cannibals are in the real one, sorry, Mermaids,
things like that, vampires and mummies that come to life,
and just a little bit more fantastical. And then they
used to have I don't know if they still do,
like a black light one, so you'd put on like
three D glasses and everything was painted with like black
(21:56):
light paint and it would pop out and it made
it hard to navigate something. One of the best scares
because you can kind of you can kind of prime
yourself if you want if you don't want to be
fully immersive it, or you just need to like not
be as scared and look for the scare actors and
just be like, oh, I see you're gonna jump out
at me. Ha haa, Okay, you jumped out at me
right like you can usually prime pretty well. This is
(22:20):
not a challenge. If I have any scareacter friends listening,
and I go to a haunted house that you're at,
not a challenge. Please don't extra scare me. But in
this three D haunted house, the black Light one, like,
they had a room that was just like a black
It was just like all black walls with like stars
painted on it or something like that, just some sort
(22:40):
of design painted on it, and a person in an
all black suit with the same design painted on it.
And because you're wearing the three D glasses, you have
crappy depth perception, and so they didn't even have to
scare you. They just had to kind of like walk
out in front of you a couple of feet and
it would startle the Jesus out of you because you
couldn't see them moving until.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
They were right.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
That sounds pretty incredible and incredibly effective. I'm so intrigued,
But I honestly, I don't know how I would react
in these situations. So part of me worries that I
wouldn't react in a way that was supportive. And that's
what I would most want to do. Like, I don't
ever want to be one of those guys who's like,
(23:23):
that's not scary, because I think that's so disrespectful. And
and if you're going to do that, why did you
pay to go and like scoff at the folks who
are trying to, you know, do this work. They're not
getting paid very much, y'all, and they're trying to make
your your spooky season extra spooky. So if you're just
going to and you're determined to be like that's not
(23:45):
scary or whatever, it doesn't make you seem like you're
a big deal or that you're super brave. It makes
you seem pretty like lame and not fun. So I
would want to make sure I reacted in a way
that made the actors feel like that was a good one.
This guy, this guy is a good patron.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I do think you should give
it a try at some point. Have you ever been
to like a corn maze or a haunted hay ride
or anything that's like haunted house adjacent.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yes, yes, two things that I can do that are
in the neighborhood the mister Rogers neighborhood of haunted houses.
And one is corn mazes or is I like to
call them maze mazes. And I've done that once no twice,
I think, and I loved it. I was like, this
is really cool. It was in the daytime, so it
(24:42):
wasn't like hard to navigate or anything. It was still
a great maze, like legitimately well designed, so it took
some time to make your way through, but I really
had a great time. It was like just a need
activity to do. There was a small group of us
and we were all kind of sticking together and navigating
through the maze, and I really enjoyed that. And I've
(25:02):
done some hay ride stuff too, although I would just
call it like here's a way to waste fifteen minutes
and to eat up some tickets at this little affair
like they wasn't particularly like a haunted hay ride or
anything like that. It was just it was more like
a fall festival kind of thing as opposed to a
Halloween specific kind of thing. But the other haunted house
(25:24):
adjacent activity I have done is that I finally, after
years of knowing about it, went on a ghost tour
in Marietta, Georgia. It was led by this really eccentric
tour guide, very very enthusiastic, very knowledgeable, very eccentric. Let's see,
(25:46):
I think her name was shay Lee. Yeah, it was shay.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Shaye was offered to let me tag along on one
of her ghost tours, and so I got to see
her do her work. And the stories that she tells
are not like terrifying and blood curdling. It's more of
like sort of the romantic ghost stories, right, Like not
the super spooky, scary, terrify you you're never going to
(26:17):
go to sleep kind of stories, but more of the sad, tragic,
romantic kind of stories. And they were really interesting, and
we got to walk around the historic Marietta Square and
learn about the architecture and some of the buildings and
the history of the buildings. Like it really was more
of a history walking tour with some ghost stuff added on.
(26:37):
But to me, that was perfect. It's exactly the kind
of thing that I'm into, and I really enjoyed it.
She did a great job. Also nice got to learn
a lot about a wild tunnel system that's under that
town that's actually dates back to the eighteen hundreds. It's
pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
Oh, very cool. Yeah, I've never been to the Marietta
Ghost Tour, but I I've done the Roswell one a
couple of times, and it is interesting because you know,
the ghost stories are tied to the architecture in the
history of the town and historic Roswell. One of the
things that's big is there was like a textile mill
that got burnt down during the the Confederate the Civil.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
War, Sherman's March to the Sea.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Something like that, and so like a lot of it's
like just really cool ghost stories. Like there's one about
I don't want to ruin it for you or anybody,
but there's one about like a building that when it
got rebuilt, the walls kept like getting like water leaks
in them, and it was suspected that it was the
(27:45):
ghosts of the women waiting for their husbands to come
home from the mill. When the houses got rebuilt with electricity,
they didn't understand electricity and they thought it was fire
and the walls, so they kept trying to put out
the fire. So really fun and cool ghost stories, Like
there's a couple about like people getting like scares of
like ghosts running at them, but it's never super grotesque
or anything. Yeah, but you don't believe in ghosts.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
I do not believe in ghosts. I have heard various
ghost stories about places that I lived close to. Like,
for example, I used to live in a place called Gainesville, Georgia,
and there is a college in that area called Brenew.
It's a liberal arts college, and Brenew has a really
(28:30):
really really nice theater and that's where like the community
theater stuff between Brenew and Gainesville College, which is now
part of the University of Georgia. They would do these
amazing productions at this theater, and so often as a student,
we would take like a field trip to go see
(28:50):
a show that was meant for like, you know, kids
or whatever. And I remember hearing stories about how a
building that faced out toward the front of the theater
there was supposedly a ghost residing in one of the rooms,
and that on occasion, if you looked up at just
the right moment, you could catch a ghostly face looking
(29:11):
out at the window and would always move out of
the way shortly after being spotted was the story, and
that this was supposedly a former student of Branow. I
don't think I ever got the full story about, you know,
supposedly how they became ghostified, but I remember that one clearly.
My favorite ghost in all of Georgia is the ghost
(29:33):
of Captain Flint, who supposedly haunts a restaurant in Savannah,
Georgia called I think it's called the Pirate House. And
the reason why he's my favorite is because Captain Flint
is a fictional character in Treasure Island. It never existed,
so the ghost of the ghost of a fictional character
(29:54):
haunts this pirate restaurant. It is in one of the
oldest buildings in Georgia, so it's it le yet is
a building that has a ton of history associated with it.
But it just it made me laugh so hard the
first time I heard that this this restaurant is haunted
by the ghost of Captain Flint, I'm like, oh, I
wonder could it also be haunted I don't know, by
the the ghost of Gaston or maybe the ghost of
(30:19):
Darth Vader.
Speaker 3 (30:20):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
Yes, one hundred percent now you've you've had the chance
to stay in a haunted area before, right, Yep?
Speaker 2 (30:34):
A couple times, mostly in London, because everything in London
is older than the United States is as a country.
I've stayed at a few places in London that were
supposedly haunted. Never saw anything spooky, apart from like really
bad plumbing, which isn't so much as spooky as it
(30:54):
is terrifying because you'll step into a shower and you
don't know if you're gonna boil your skin off or
freeze yourself. But when I was honeymooning in London many
many years ago, my spouse and I we were ready
to fly back to America. And my spouse works for
(31:17):
an airline, and so she and I were going to
fly stand by from London to the United States, which
means you haven't purchased a seat, You get a seat
if there's one available, and if there's not, you gotta
wait for the next flight. Well, we get there and
there are a ton of standby passengers. And my wife
(31:39):
did not have a lot of seniority with this particular
airline at this point. She had not been working there
for many many years. She had been working there for
a few but it's all based on seniority, and so
it became very clear that we were not going to
make the flight, and that meant that we had to
start trying to make a decision. Do we stay in
London and try again the next day because there were
(32:02):
no other flights that were going to work, or do
we fly to a different city in the UK and
try to fly out the next day from there instead.
And the thing that made this decision very, very difficult
is that one of the other passengers who was trying
to fly stand by was on a buddy pass, which
is an even lower priority than where we were. And
(32:28):
this gentleman was a Yeoman of the Guard, meaning he
was one of the members of the British Armed Forces
who was assigned to the Tower of London, possibly the
most supposedly haunted place in all of England. So many
famous people met the end of their life at the
(32:50):
Tower of London. And he was offering to other stand
by passengers the chance to stay in the apartments at
the Tower of London if they needed a place to stay,
because they weren't going to be able to fly out
that night. And it was torture because everything in us
(33:10):
told us we wanted to take that opportunity. I mean,
you could stay in the Tower of London on your honeymoon.
That's an insane story. But when we did the math, awesome, yes, awesome,
truly like it would have been like a fantastic one
to tell and I would have been absolutely head over
heels in love with the idea. But we did the
(33:34):
math and it just it looked like there was no
possible way for us to get out of London the
next day. So instead, what we did was we took
a local flight to Manchester and then stayed overnight in
Manchester and the next day we flew from Manchester to
the United States, and we were you know, it was
the right decision to make because we needed to get
back in order to get to our jobs and stuff.
(33:55):
Our vacation was running out. But it still was very
sad that we didn't get the chance to stay in
like the most haunted site of all of London. Not
that I think I would have seen any ghosts, but
from a historical perspective, I would have loved it.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Yeah. Yeah, I've never had the opportunity to say somewhere
that cool, that's haunted you know. But I have my
very first community theater that I was a part of
as an actor. Like I have memories of my parents
working in community theater or in theater when I was
(34:33):
very young, but as a teenager, I acted at a
theater and I hung out there and I helped out there,
and I stage managed and even assistant directed once, and
I ran concessions and all this other stuff. And I
would get there early in the morning, and like in theory,
it was haunted there, and there would be someone who
would go up into the orchestra and play the piano,
or who would play with the scrims, and sometimes you'd
(34:54):
hear stuff like that when you knew you were the
only person in there. I never saw a ghost, and
I assumed that some of it was probably like music
coming from the alleyway behind or footsteps echoing from outfront.
But in theory, that was haunted. And then I've gone
to hard Labor Creek State Park, which in theory is haunted.
But I think that might just be because a lot
(35:17):
of state parks are in theory haunted. But I think
it just might be because that's where they filmed a
bunch of like scary Halloween movies.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Yeah, And when we recorded this the first time last week,
I told a story about how I at first thought
that that particular camp was haunted because I was there
for an SCA event and I was walking back toward
the cabin I was staying at at night and there
was very limited light. I didn't have a flashlight or anything.
(35:44):
This was before I had a cell phone, so I
didn't have a phone to hold up or anything. And
I heard a noise of someone making like a very
rushed exhalation, like and it was very loud, and it
came immediately to my right and I turned to look
and I couldn't see anything until I saw this big
(36:08):
shape start to move, not toward me, but in front
of me. And it turned out it was a buck.
It was a deer. But yeah, for a while there,
I believed in pretty much every supernatural creature that you
could put your finger too, because I had no idea
what the heck had made that noise. I can't even
express to you how terrified I was. Even when I
(36:32):
found out it was a deer, I was still scared
because those suckers can mess you up.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
Yeah. Yeah, I've had plenty of shares scares at state
parks that like, I know what caused them, and it's
perfectly logical, but it has caused irrational fear in me
since then. So I completely understand.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
You know, Ariel, something we didn't talk about last time,
and I don't talk about it much at all because
I have complicated feelings about it. You and I participated
in a spooky theatrical immersive murder mystery type thing once
(37:12):
upon a time.
Speaker 1 (37:13):
Oh yeah, we did.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
We did this was this was like a decade or
more than a decade ago.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah, I had fun with it. So, like we went
to this courthouse and it was like a dinner theater,
and we each got a group and we brought them
to a room and we would do like a sam
like call ghosts kind of a thing, and everybody had
like their own little stick to it. And in this courthouse,
(37:41):
of course, also in theory was actually haunted. Uh. I
think the the rumors like clocks would reset themselves or
change time.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Oh, we definitely had issues with that during the production.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But yeah, yeah, because we were all supposed to have
like the penultimate ski point of our room happened at
the same time, but it didn't yeah, no, we were.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
We would synchronize so so, to give you more of
an outline of what was going on is that each
person was playing a sort of paranormal investigator and from
all different backgrounds, and for some reason we all wanted
to be foreign. I don't know why, but we all.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Yeah, I could not be Australian.
Speaker 2 (38:24):
I am sad that I went with German, but yeah,
I should have just gone with American. It would have
been much easier.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
But yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
The idea was that we would have a small group,
a subset of the overall group, and that we would
give some information to them that would give them part
of the picture of this tragedy that happened, and that
at some point in the process of doing this, theoretically
synchronized across all the rooms, we would a par normal
(38:56):
thing would happen, and we would act out our part
like we had been possessed by a spirit. We would
act out our part of the drama. But you again,
the people gathered would only see that bit of it.
Then at the end, when everyone regathered together, we would
come together and still possessed by these spirits, would act
out the full scene that would explain what had happened
(39:19):
and what had led to this place supposedly being haunted
by these different spirits. It was a neat idea. I
think we probably needed another month to really workshop it
so that it would have really good execution, because ultimately,
I think it was it didn't live up to the
premise it It was so technically challenging to do that.
(39:43):
I don't think. I don't know how people who visited
felt about it, but as a performer, I was like,
I wanted that to be better than what it was.
Speaker 1 (39:52):
Yeah, it was very technically challenging. I agree that. I mean,
I know everybody involved in they're all good actors, but
I think, you know, yeah, some more tech rehearsals definitely
would have not hurt. Yeah, because yeah, it was. It
was very It was very intricate in its design, and
I think that's really cool, like you said, a fun concept.
(40:13):
But I also found that, like in my room, I
maybe like where I going to do it again? Would
figure out more to do because I felt like I
kind of ended up having to stall a lot.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Yeah, I had like electronic voice phenomena stuff that I
had made by myself, Like I'd use some audio recording
software and then I did some like reversal of voices
and things like that so I could have something to
like a prop to play with, and that helped me
eat up time. But like I that was something I
(40:47):
did on my own so that I could have something
to eat up time. Like we were also given a
ton of freedom to determine how our room would actually
play out. And again, like without having that incredible uh
integration and to be able to rehearse it over and
(41:10):
over to make sure that you have the timing down. Uh,
it just it just became a little less polished than
what I would prefer. I don't think it was bad.
I just don't think it was as good as it
could have been based upon the idea was incredible. We
just I think part of the also, the part of
the challenge was that none of us had ever done
anything like that before, like that specifically, I had theater,
(41:33):
Oh you.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
Had, Oh I had done. I had done a murder
mystery with OH.
Speaker 2 (41:38):
I had done murder mysteries, but I hadn't done murder
mysteries where everyone is split up and everything is supposed
to be happening simultaneously. I had done murder mystery where
the scenes play out in front of everybody in a
centralized location.
Speaker 1 (41:55):
Yeah, that's how That's how the other murder mysteries with
this group have done, where we all had characters and
we'd go around the party and we'd have interactions that
would drop clues. But it was it was it was
like we had some planned interactions, but they were also
just like motivations, and then you could drop scene improv
scenes about it, which went really well. We did it
quite a few times. But yeah, if I think another
(42:17):
part of the problem is that you and I are
kind of perfectionists, and so I think I recall hearing
that people really liked it, and I think that you
and I are just also very very particular about yes. Yeah,
so you know, that's something to keep in mind. I
(42:37):
would do it again. I would, especially knowing what I
know now, and probably do better.
Speaker 3 (42:45):
Yeah, I would.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
If I were to do it again, I would. I
would take a much more methodical approach, because the whole
thing was very like we weren't working from an existing
script when we started. The whole story was craft from
the beginning, Like we started with, all right, what's the tragedy,
how does it unfold? That's the starting point and then
(43:08):
we broke up and like each person was playing a
particular character in this unfolding story and then working backward
from that, how does your paranormal investigator encounter that particular
spirit and how does it play out in the room
that you'll be in? And I think that's not a
bad idea, but I think that having more of it
(43:32):
kind of set up in advance so that you have
a really satisfying payoff would be would be easier, like
not putting the load on all the performers who already
have to worry about actually executing the thing. But we
weren't just performers, We were technically performers and writers that
for that project.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Yeah, yeah, we are getting close to time, so real quick, Johnathan,
and any favorite scary books or podcasts you could recommend
for people who maybe are not quite ready to jump
into the happier holiday spirit like me, Oh like, I'm
sorry that was confusing. I am ready to start decorating
(44:14):
for Thanksgiving and Christmas and all of that happy, good
cook for everybody time. But for the people who aren't,
any book or podcast recommendations.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
Absolutely so for books like I'm a fan of early
Stephen King books, but also up to like the middle
I think of the middle of his career. I haven't
read most of his work over the last decade and
a half, but like the book Needful Things is possibly
my favorite Stephen King book. I think it's really well done.
(44:47):
It's incredibly atmospheric, it's super creepy. So check that out
if you can find a copy of it. My dad's
horror novel, Shadow Show, is really good. And I know
I'm biased, but I really think that that is an
amazing horror novel. You can actually, I think, find an
electronic copy. It's been out of physical print for many
(45:10):
years now, but it's well worth a read. Just remember
that it was written like in the eighties because it's
a different, different vibe. I would also say that for podcasts,
the Thirteen Days of Halloween podcast. I know the people
who work on that because that's an iHeart podcast show,
(45:31):
and they get some incredible performers to do some really
great audio work, some immersive audio, three D audio stuff
for that series. And if you listen to season two
of Thirteen Days of Halloween and you look at I
think it's episode ten, but it's called The Doctor, you
(45:52):
might very well hear a certain llenc host playing a
part in that show.
Speaker 1 (45:59):
Yeah, yeah, you do good job, you do good works.
Thank you. I talk good. I don't really have any
book recommendations. A lot of like the scarier books that
I've read have left me in a place to not
want to read scarier books, like scary Stories to Tell
in the Dark, or anthologies of like HP Lovecraft. I
(46:21):
do like classic like Dracula or Frankenstein, and those aren't
that scary. Some suspenseful stuff, But as far as podcasts go,
I've got two that I really like. And one is
Limetown and it's kind of suspenseful, and there's definitely some
like scary, disturbing stuff in there, but it's more suspenseful
than that, and I really enjoyed the journey. The other one,
(46:42):
and this I will say, is just like flat up scary.
It is true horror. You wouldn't think I would like
listening to it, but the execution is really good. It's
called The White Fault, and it's like a bunch of
people go to a remote area and they encounter like
evil supernatural stuff happening as they explore, like the ruins
(47:02):
of the place that they're at. And it's like truly terrifying,
but it's so well done because they bring in a
lot of voice actors from different countries and then they
do this you have to listen on good audio system
because they will have like the actors speak in their
language and then transition to English. But sometimes that overlap
makes it a little hard to understand, So if you're
(47:24):
listening like with a lot of excess noise around, it
might be hard to follow. But I really enjoy it
for horror, it is incredibly well done.
Speaker 2 (47:31):
Awesome that I think that sounds great. I think those
are great recommendations. And you know, obviously in some upcoming
episodes we will transition into other holiday geeky stuff. Hopefully
we'll be able to start talking about geek news and
more detail again because they strike will be resolved at
(47:52):
some point and I look forward to doing that.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Oh and I can actually talk about the other podcast
I'm doing. It's called Monster, because it's already on social media.
There are a couple of trailers out. It's a lot
of fun. It's a very cool story. If you want
to keep up to date for when it comes out,
because it's not out yet, you can go to the
Monster Universe Audio Drama dot substact dot com and register
(48:17):
for updates.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Everybody involved in it is super super talented. Yeah, so
take a listen. All right. So that's it, Jonathan. If
people want to contact us, how should they do that?
Speaker 3 (48:32):
Well, you're gonna go across town. You're gonna head on
out down that one old state route that no one
takes no more since the highway moved in. As you
go down that way, you're gonna.
Speaker 2 (48:47):
Pass yourself a cornfield. At the end of that cornfield,
there's gonna be a little dirt road jutting off to
the ride. You're gonna take a ride, gonna go down
that dirt road aways, and then you're gonna start noticing
that you've been on this dirt road for a while,
and you could swear that you're just passing the same
landscape over and over. It's just that cornfield on your
(49:08):
right and an empty little wooded area on the left.
But you're pretty sure you've seen that tree before. You're
gonna keep on driving because there ain't no way to
turn around. Roads too narrow. You're gonna keep on going.
And as the sun is going down and your gas
gauge is getting low. You're gonna start feeling nervous. And
as that light starts to twinkle off into the distance,
(49:30):
you'll notice there's another light up ahead. It's an old house.
There's one room lit up over at the top of it.
Otherwise it's just as dark as the grave. You're gonna
pull up out front of that house just as your
car is running on that last set of fumes, and
somewhat trepidaciously, you're gonna approach that porch and you're gonna
(49:53):
climb a couple of steps and hesitate for a moment
before you knock on that door. But you don't have
many options open to you, do you. So you'll set
those knuckles to that door and it'll swing open with
a low creak. Then you call out, knowing someone's gotta
be home. There's a lot on upstairs, but it ain't
no response, So, wondering what you should do, you feel
(50:16):
like there's no other choice but to take a step inside.
You do so, and you hear a soft sound coming
from upstairs. Sounds like it's someone asking you to come
on up. Can't be sure, you can't really make it out,
So you get on that staircase. You climb it step
by step, listening to the sounds of the house settle
(50:37):
around you, and smelling the dust in the air, and
walking your way through cobwebs and doing that crazy karate
thing you do when you step right into a spider's web.
Then you go over and you see that there's a
door off to your left, and there's some light coming
out from underneath, and that right there must be where
(50:59):
you heard the voice. You call out again, there ain't
no return to your call, so you just kind of
walk slowly, and you see that the door is actually
slightly open, it's not actually closed all the way too.
And as you reach the end, you're gonna put your
palm on that door. It's gonna feel so cold against
your skin. You're gonna give it a gentle push. It
(51:21):
swings noiselessly open, and inside you see a bunch of puppets,
and there's also like a clown and a giant spider thing,
and there's also like Jack Nicholson for some reason. But
in the middle of it it's me and I'm gonna
have a hatchet in one hand and a sewing needle
in the other. I'm like, yeah, what is that. Come on,
(51:43):
I'm busy here, and then you can ask a question.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
Geez if that is too scary for any of you.
If any of your poor hearts can't take it, you
can reach us on social media on Twitter, where llenc
underscore podcast, Facebook, Instagram, threads, everywhere else. We're discord were
Large Nerdron Collider. If you want to drop us an
email instead, you can do that. It is Large Nurdron
(52:07):
pod at gmail dot com. And if you need an
invite to discord, you can either check our website www
dot Large nurderun Colider, which is sorely out of date
but has active invites, or you can email us and
I'll send you one. We really do love hearing from you,
and until next time. I have been Aeriel drowning in
full size candybars.
Speaker 2 (52:27):
Cast in, and I have been Jonathan. All work and
no podcasts makes John a dull boy. Strickland. The Large
Nerdron Collider was created by Aeriel Caston and produced, edited, published, deleted, undeleted,
published again. Curse That by Jonathan Strickland. Music by Kevin
(52:52):
McLeod of incomptech dot com. Protationeentiontution
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