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4. Haunting Arizona with Randy Gregory · Spooky Butt

• speaker-0: Mm. Mm-hmm. hello, and welcome to Spooky Bud. Today I'm joined in Spooky Bud Studio by one Mr. Randy Gregory. Randy Gregory is a design director at a big tech company by day, and by night he's a miniature painter, cat dad to two wonderful cats, a hobby writer for the blog Gaming Trend, and he is powered by ADD, a million hobbies, weird references from many obscure films, and absolutely thinks that spooky things could happen. You can find his artwork on Instagram at Weirdbeard underscore minis. Randy Gregory. My God, welcome to Spookybutt. speaker-1: I'm already terrified. speaker-0: You are almost I'm I'm all I'm not sorry, actually. speaker-1: That just hearing you give that intro, it was so spooky. speaker-0: So spooky. I want my guests to be very afraid when they come into the spooky butt studio. speaker-1: Yeah, no, it it's it's crazy, like being in the spooky butt studio. It feels familiar but at the same time absolutely scary and terrifying. speaker-0: Wow. That's wow. That's exactly what I was trying to capture. Thank you so much, Randy. speaker-1: It feels like I'm at home, but at the same time, I'm not. speaker-0: Maybe you're you're in a place you've only seen in your dreams. All right. So first sorry, go ahead. speaker-1: I was gonna say look at us, we're already getting into the spooky stuff. speaker-0: We're so spooky. so first and foremost, maybe the spookiest, well, one of the spookiest things we'll talk about today is I want to get into your interest in just horrible movies. Horrible, horrible, bad movies. So for those tuning in, Randy and I met several years ago living in Austin, Texas. And Randy used to host an in-person event called Best Bads. So what he would do is he would go to a local video store. which is now, I believe, closed. I love video, correct? my god, I didn't know that. Yeah. speaker-1: There's a new one. Yeah, yeah. So after I Love Video closed, which I guess for your listeners, I Love Video was one of the more iconic video stores that was still in the United States boasting a massive library. I think outside of Scarecrow Video up in Seattle, I Love Video had one of the largest collections of physical media. 2020 happened and they shut down. it was very sad. And then a few years later, a group of nonprofit nerds got together for their love of film and they were like, we want to have a new video store. it's called We Love Video. Nice. They have the entire library. and I volunteered and I put a nice little chunk of cash in that to help bring it back to life. And I have not been back to that store in like a year and a half. speaker-0: Nice. Okay. Wow. So where exactly is that located in Austin? speaker-1: Remember the Northloop area of Austin? Yes. Yep. it's right there. in the old Vulcan video space, which is next to the workhorse bar. speaker-0: okay. Well a great location. Cause you'd think it would be out in like Cedar Springs or something like that, 'cause Austin real estate is so expensive. Man, that makes me so happy. speaker-1: It's wild, right? I know Yeah, yeah. It's like it's down the road from where the original I Love was, and now the original I Love building is now a brewery. Yeah, which is wild. They knocked it down, built a brewery, as you do in Austin, Texas. Right. and the the store itself is fantastic. Like it's all volunteer run, which I think is just great. when I volunteered there, I helped sort that library of movies, and it was pretty, pretty wild. speaker-0: Okay. speaker-1: Like there were so many things that that store had that I never even saw on the shelves. I remember the day that we that someone opened up the gay porn box. god. They were like they were like, I'm uncomfortable looking at these. And I was like, what is it? And I looked and I was like, okay, I'll catalog these. I don't care. I don't give any shit. It was like 30 tapes of, you know, various, various gay porns. And it was just funny seeing all that history. and then yeah, the store launched and They're just on their cusp of three years. speaker-0: Wow. That's awesome. So that's okay, so it has the it has the original I Love Video catalog, right? speaker-1: Yeah, and more because we the community have donated films. I've donated a bunch of stuff. the Alamo Draft House, they they threw out their their DVD collections. Like they you know Draft House used to sell movies when when the draft house was cool, yeah. They used to sell movies and then they stopped selling them and they ended up in a dumpster. So myself and another person drove over to the Ritz. Not the yeah, not the Ritz, the South Mueller location and pulled movies out of the dumpster and then put them in the store. Yeah, because they're like good movies. that was like from the Alamo Drafthouse print. I actually still have like five boxes in my garage that I need to just get out because I you know I think I'm gonna bring them to work and just start giving people movies. I think that might be the right thing. And then all these like all these like, you know, Gen Gen Z people I work with, they're gonna be like, what is this thing? Is this a is this a C D? And I'll be like no, it's a D V D back in the old speaker-0: Floppy disc. speaker-1: For real, one of one of my designers c said I was from the nineteen hundreds and Claire, I I I died a little bit. Became a bit of a ghost. But it's great. speaker-0: You passed man. Well, you can always haunt them, you know. True. True. Wow, I wonder so with the extra DVDs that maybe people at work don't want, you might be able to donate those to the library. speaker-1: That's the second thing to do. Yeah, yeah, because the Austin library system has a great place called Recycled Reads. you bring it to them and they actually sell it. They sell stuff and they put it back into the the the library system, the money. I don't know if they take like straight up donations, but you can definitely give your media to the Austin Public Library and they will sell it for monies and then they put the monies back into the library. This is turning into a great look, listen, I will ha happily push the Austin Public Library system. It's fantastic. speaker-0: my god, that's awesome. Well, that makes me happy because I thought in asking this first question, I was like, man, we're gonna get kind of sad about I love video, but hey speaker-1: No, it's it ended well, right? It ended well. It was good. but yeah, okay, bad movies, right? Bad movies in me. so I had always had like kind of like a an interest in horror films. like when I was in college and had like untethered access to the internet, we'd like download movies, pirated movies and stuff. And one of the first films that ever like Really, really shocked me and kind of changed some brain chemistry was the movie Cannibal Holocaust. Jesus. Which is an Italian horror film from yeah, I want to say the 70s, yeah, 1977. And it was such a intense film that the director was put in front of a judge and he had to bring the actors to prove. speaker-0: Heard that story. speaker-1: They hadn't hadn't killed anyone. and I just found out Recycled Reads is closed immediately. All right. So if anyone wants to donate stuff in the Austin library system, you gotta go on their website. But anyway, it's very funny. My wife is in the other room texting me. So I'm really grateful for that. Yeah. I watched like, you know, because of having like a a pirated server at my college, I was exposed to a bunch of media. speaker-0: She's your producer. speaker-1: You know, 'cause like, of course, you're gonna go and download the latest Fast and Furious movie or you know, whatever's hot out there. But then there would always be like weird things that popped up. And so it was like, Cannibal Holocaust, you know, Nightmare on Elm Street Part Two, which is fantastic, by the way. and then let me think, it was a bunch of other just like, yeah, off the wall films. And then like I met people. one of my friends, his name's Adric, which is a crazy weird name. He's from Tucson, Arizona. He was like, You gotta see Night of the Leapus, which is I wanna say 60s film, starring the only actor in it that's of any notability is Forrest De Kelly, who played Bones on the original Star Trek. Okay. He plays like a sheriff in a town where giant rabbits overrun the town, eating people. And it's like a lot of like Miniatures with rabbits tromping through it, and then there's like big fake like rabbit heads and stuff in it. And then I kind of like developed a an appreciation for these like off the wall weird films, low budget stuff. and then I moved to Austin, Texas in 2013, you know, started going to the draft house when the draft house was cool and they had things like terror Tuesdays and weird things days. Yeah. but really it all accelerated when I met my wife. when I met my wife, my wife was really into like weird films, and she was like, Have you ever seen The Room? And I was like, N you mean that Oscar Award-winning film? And she's like, No, The Room. And so like she showed me Tommy Wiseau's The Room. And that movie, it once aga it was the second movie. thing in my life that like changed the brain chemistry of my my films because nice in college it was like horror films and then I was like into like horror and we I had some friends that loved watching like Japanese action films which if you get far enough in the Japanese action area you hit like insane movies where there's like a girl whose arm is replaced by a minigun and like she's still wearing schoolgirl clothing. So it's like Exploitation, but then there's like blood and don't know, crazy stuff. And so then after I met my wife, I then got into like I categorize them as movie like movies that are not intentionally bad, but just end up being that way, where they are being earnestly made. Like Tommy Wiseau put his heart and soul and money into making the room. He did not intend on making a bad film. I think he still I think nowadays he's he leans into it and he's like, Hm, yeah, he knows what he's made. Yeah. But because you know, it gets him money. But back then, no, that was like, this is this is we're making this. We're serious about this. that's also how I discovered movies like Miami Connection, which is like the only film made by a guy named my gosh, what my my my memory is not working out correctly. Made by a guy who came to America from Korea because he wanted to be a director. He put his all of his money into into having a taekwondo school. And then his taekwondo school is where his actors came from to make his movie. And he made this movie, Miami Connection. And it is 1987. It's so good. it's this weird independent martial arts film about a house of Of they're all orphans. They're all orphans that all live together. They do taekwondo and they spend their nights playing as a band. Not even in Miami, in Orlando. And like this movie comes out and critical bomb when it came out in nineteen eighty seven. And the director, YK Kim, I remember now, YK Kim, he basically walked away. He was like, no one ever likes my movie. So he went off to, you know, go and, you know, teach Chai Taekwondo. And then like, I think in like the 2000s, the the draft house found a copy of the movie and they started screening it. And then they were like, we gotta contact this guy because we want to talk to him. and he didn't believe them at first. And it was the story goes, it wasn't until the draft house sent him a video of like a full theater watching and enjoying his film that he believed it because he thought they were just people that trolling him. Yeah. And then they did like a whole, you know, remaster the film and stuff. And and sure enough, like I got to see that on like a weird Wednesday with with my wife and it just next level. and I don't know, we've we started a movie night back in I mean, back when I met you, which was what, twenty seventeen. Yeah. So we we decided we were like, we want friends to come over to our house and stuff. And so we started the best bads. we opened the best bads with Troll Two, which is probably one of the most famous bad films. speaker-0: Yes, twenty seventeen. speaker-1: and the idea of it was, you know, we're gonna watch these bad movies, but I was also gonna curate a food menu and come up with like ephemera prizes and stuff like that. So, you know, for troll two, I won't give away too many spoilers, but fried bologna sandwiches are a part of the plot of Troll Two. So I made fried bologna sandwiches. A bunch of my friends were like, I've never eaten this before and I'm like, you're about to experience glory 'cause like it's salty and delicious. But we would just do that like once a month. and then during the COVID era, we went on Twitch. And so I was broadcasting bad movies on Twitch. and and that was that was that was fun until you know you got banned. I got banned like twice on Twitch. Yeah. Okay, this movie called Q the Winged Serpent. It's 80s film about Quetzal Kotl, the mythical deity of Mayan lore. living in the Chrysler building in New York City. And there's like a whole like subplot involving mobsters. It's insane and David Carradine is in it. And but I got banned on Twitch because there's a scene of a woman sunbathing topless on a building and then a giant claw comes down and grabs her and picks her up off the screen. And I guess that was too much for Twitch. speaker-0: Fuck yeah. My god. So they just they don't like art over there on Twitch. speaker-1: I don't like art indeed. but yeah, the I don't know, it gave me I I love all those weird old films. And then I'm really, I'm really annoying because someone will come to me and they'll be like, Sharknado. And I'm like, no, that was intentionally made to be bad. I don't care for the intentionally bad films. I care about the ones that are like, everyone signed on to make Troll 2. They're like, all right, this is work, we're doing this, we're making this movie. speaker-0: Get out of here. speaker-1: It just so happens that it turns out being bizarre and horrible. Like it wasn't intended. So yeah. but that was that was a whole thing. It was it was really fun. It was really great to build community around watching obscure films that for the most part, most of our friends had never seen, nor would they have seen. and I think that's actually an important point about media itself. And like, you know, wherever you're listening to this listener, go find a physical media place, like a video store, because There's so much out there that is not streaming. that is like really cool and great artwork. And I don't know, I feel like we're in this era with media where like TV shows are engineered to last forever. You know, based on viewership or memeability, virality. And don't know, it just bums me out. There's a lot of crap that's out there or a lot of like. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: genuinely interesting stuff that doesn't get enough viewers. So Netflix is just like, we're just gonna kill it. I think back to I was actually talking to someone the other week about this. there was a whole series of shows on Netflix that I actually really enjoyed. Resident Evil like like people may not remember they made a Resident Evil TV show and it was pretty fascinating because it actually kind of followed the plots of the games. So like there is bizarre things like a giant zombie alligator. like weird, weird stuff. didn't get enough viewers, so they just left it as a as a you know, a hanger at the end of the show. We'll never know what happens to those characters because they're all gone. what else was there? There was Archive eighty one, a really fantastic horror, like spooky, eerie horror show about a guy like who's who's archiving physical media speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: And he starts seeing stuff in the media, like in the static, in the time codes. that show, super fascinating, killed after one season because it didn't have enough viewership. Cowboy Bebop, which was a remake of like one of the most arguably one of the best animes ever made, ended on a really great note, never gonna come back. And like I hate that. So like I don't know, go go get physical media, go to your library, go rent stuff, stop giving money to these massive streaming companies and maybe they'll start making good stuff. Soapbox rant over. speaker-0: No, that's a good point 'cause it's also like w everything is kind of you know, there are jokes about like everything's going to be a subscription service, like what's gonna happen when you don't pay your four ninety nine a month toilet subscription and you can't open the lid. So people I think there has been some pushback and people are starting to be like, Hey, get get a Blu-ray player, go out and buy physical media because that's means that you've you own it, you don't have to rent it. It's just the eternal renting cycle. So no, that's a great point. speaker-1: That's why like movie stores should exist, like video stores, like come on, go and r I mean, not like, you know, Blockbuster will never come back, but you know, having local places in its place, I think, is a great idea. 'cause also, yeah, I don't know, it gives some when you go into a store and you talk to people about film or TV, it's so much more rewarding than just like clicking through a streaming service. And you don't know, you learn because like when you're on a streaming service, I've I've learned this because like, you know, I work in tech. the way how like stuff like Netflix and Amazon and Hulu and all them, they're all set up is through like various metrics that change what appears on the screen. So like one day you'll open up Netflix and Stranger Things will just have like the Stranger Things logo. Then one day you'll open it up and it'll be like one of those kids with like a dumb face. And And and they do that on purpose. It's all testing. Like they're they're doing what's called A B testing on all of us without really our consent. I guess outside of the the EULA we agreed to and user license agreement, because we said, yes, I'll watch this. And and I I just think it's really a dumb way to get people to watch stuff. It's like, you're gonna show me Love Deaf and Robots, but you're gonna show like a random shot from it as the artwork instead of like what would be like if you're in a store and you picked it up. Yeah. And you're like, ooh, there's some cool artwork. You flip it to the back. I'm gonna read about it. there's gonna be a video clerk that'll tell you, hey, you should check that out. Like, I don't know. Yeah. I miss that stuff. So physicals physical media just so much more fun. Human connection. speaker-0: I have like a funny quip about Blockbuster because that was like so like Friday nights, that was like Blockbuster night with my family. So that's just like such a comforting memory. But I remember specifically, I would not walk down the horror movie aisle unless someone went there and turned around the puppet master VHS. my gosh. That was the one cover that scared the absolute shit out of me. I was like, I cannot do it. Yada yada, I'd make like my brother or maybe we had like neighborhood friends. Like you have to take that VHS and turn it around so you can only see the back with all the like you know, all the text and all of that. Yeah, Puppet Master just couldn't handle it. speaker-1: Have you watched those movies now that you're an adult? speaker-0: so I th I well, so I grew up with an older brother who's five years older than me. And then on my cul-de-sac, it was like it was weird. It was a bunch of elder millennials who were all boys. And so it was like me and my friends, but we all had older brothers. So we were subjected to this shit at a very, very young age. So yes, I've seen Puppet Master. I've also seen Tales from the Hood more times than I can count. speaker-1: That's amazing that you've seen Tails Puppet Master and Tails from the Hood. Like, that is wild. speaker-0: And like leprechaun and like all of that shit. speaker-1: Love Leprechaun. amazing use of Warwick Davis. Like you just being like, all right, Warwick Davis, you're gonna run around and just quip at people and then make like gold appear out of their bodies. Like I always like, I think about the worlds that are in these movies where it's just like, okay, in the leprechaun world, it's like, all right, well then leprechaun's real, which means at some point, like speaker-0: So bad. speaker-1: the police are gonna come across like a horrifying scene of a person who like blew up full of money and they're gonna be like, How did this even happen? Like, what's the investigation? Are the like they'll reveal evidence that there was a little tiny McGremlin man running around. I just I love that stuff. Like Puppet Master, that whole universe, it it's so like those movies I actually do enjoy. There is one Puppet Master film that I always recommend the people. It is, I forget which one it is, because there's like 45 Puppet Master movies or something like that. but it it's like it takes place in the past. and it's just basically the puppets killing Nazis the entire film. Like it is. It's it's very funny. Cause it's like it's like the prequel. It's like, where did the puppets come from? speaker-0: They were good at one point. my god. speaker-1: That's the idea is 'cause like I feel like they had like two movies where they were just like, you know, a few movies where they're like, Okay, there's these killer puppets, what do they do? I don't know, the puppet gets on a person and one's got drills. but then like some brilliant person's like, yo, what if the puppets kill Nazis? And I'm like, I love that 'cause now the puppets are the heroes. Like like you're rooting the whole time for like, I don't know, the little flamethrower puppet to light a person on fire. It's great. speaker-0: my god. speaker-1: And then like I don't know, realistically you look at them, you're like, It's a puppet? I like I don't know, kick it. Like it should Right. That was my thing with child's play. You ever watch a child's play movie? Like, why is Chucky terrifying? He's like two feet tall and made out of I don't know, spiritual material and fluff. speaker-0: Mm-hmm. yeah, of course. Mm-hmm. speaker-1: Not that scary to me. speaker-0: I've seen Bride of Chucky more times than I can count with god, what is her name? Her name Jennifer Till Tilly. my god, so fucking funny. And then speaker-1: Yeah, Jennifer Tilly. She rides that thing still. Like that she does so I know so many people that are like Jennifer Tilly goes to like comic conventions because of that. Like that is her thing, is like everyone's like, You're the bride of Chuck. speaker-0: Bright of Chucky. my god. That is speaker-1: That's great though. I love I love that for her. Like, be successful. I yeah, I just there there's a there's a really funny video on YouTube. I forget who makes it, but it's like a short film about a haunted puppet living in a house. And when the puppet reveals itself, everyone in the house is just like, This is the funniest thing I've ever seen. Like they don't take it seriously. I think like we've I think a lot of us have seen clips of it on like Instagram or whatever. Okay. But it speaker-0: okay. speaker-1: I've watched the whole thing. It's like 15 minutes long. It is absolutely riotous. Like, like there's a scene where the puppet tries to throw a a toaster into a into a bathtub. And the girl's like, Well, it's not plugged in. And the pu and the puppets like holding it. And then she's like, she's like, All right, I guess. And the puppet throws it in and nothing happens. And she's just like, It's not plugged in. What are you doing? Why are you even trying this? And eventually they bully the puppet back into the attic. speaker-0: my god. speaker-1: But then there's there's a twist. There's a there's a really fun twist. Okay. So I encourage people to go find it. I forget who makes it, but it is so funny of like a little haunted like the reality of an actual haunted doll is not that scary. It's just movies are really good at I don't know, through blocking, lighting, the sound effects. We're all like, my gosh, that puppet is so scary. And it's like it's like it's a puppet. Just like kick it. speaker-0: Well that's just like a core memory from like growing up in the nineties. We were all just scared shitless speaker-1: I know. Dolls. I know, I know. Like, like you in Blockbuster, I would I would move quickly through the horror section as a little kid. though whenever there was like the 80s ones where there's like a hot lady on the cover, hot lady. it was funny though, because some of those movies would be like Slepaway Camp, the the driller killer, or I think it was the driller killer, those movies actually were not sexy films. They were like transgressive films. Sleepaway Camp is iconic for having like an incredible twist in the film and in fact itself is actually more of a feminist empowerment film than it is like a horror film. if people haven't watched Sleepaway Camp, I will not spoil anything, just watch it. And the end of the movie is iconic. It's it's incredible. But it's funny because the way that they put them in these boxes to get people to watch them was like, you gotta have like a busty lady on the cover. Sure enough, you grab like a movie, or like Night of the Comet, and it's like, wait, this is actually it's actually a very like not. It is very positive for women film. horror is such an interesting area of of movies. Like you get the whole thing of like You can watch a horror film to kind of process emotions and stuff like that. I think it's why people love like the the gory things. But then like stuff like ghosts, it's like, I can like live through that through a film without actually experiencing it. you know, it's like, I watched some kind of possession film and and you know, I hope that never happens. And I don't know. It gives people that that release to kind of get into those things. I don't know. I I love ghosts and and speaker-0: Mm-hmm. speaker-1: possession stuff and big monster films, even though like I mean, I've never experienced any of that, but it's kind of funny. I know, I know. I'm only 42. There's a lot of time left to encounter a poltergeist. speaker-0: There's still time. Hell yeah. Mm-hmm. So I do want move on into your hobby of painting miniatures. So with that, I wasn't really aware of that entire world until kind of recently, like the algorithm on Instagram was kind of like flooding me with all of this miniaturist content. And it's it's enormous. It has a ton of people who are active in the community. It seems really, really fun. You read the comments and it's like You can tell there are a lot of inside jokes and things like that. So, how long have you been painting minis? And like what kind of got you into this? speaker-1: it was back in like twenty thirteen. I I had just wrapped up my master's degree in New York City and I was in like super intensive program that was like a year long, pretty much I lived in a studio most of the time. At the end of it, a friend of mine came out to New York and and he was visiting my ex-wife and I and we were just like having a blast, and then at the end of it speaker-0: Okay. speaker-1: He was like, hey, guess what? I'm like, what? He's like, You're coming with me to Indianapolis. And I'm like, For what? And he he'd surprise me with tickets to go to what's called Gen Con, which is like a huge gaming convention out in out in Indy. and yeah, we flew out there. It was super awesome, surprising. and then I met some of like his friends who are now my friends, and I took a class in painting miniatures. I'd they were just like, Yeah, let's go take this class. And like I'd never done it before. I found it to be extremely meditative. just the act of being able to hyperfocus on a 28 to 32 millimeter subject and just paint is very relaxing. super chill, cool. And then like I play Dungeons and Dragons. So it's like there's nothing better. Like DD is really fun. D with a bunch of miniatures on the table that represent your heroes, your villains, the location. It just adds so much more to the experience. so then like I was scratching that itch of being able to like paint things for friends and being like, ooh, ooh, someone on our group is a dwarf. So I have a miniature and I painted it for you. And and like to this day, like I have a single friend of mine who every time like we start like a D campaign, she finds a miniature for me and she's like, paint this for me. And so I I do that for her. I don't take commissions because that's scary. But speaker-0: No. speaker-1: But yeah, I started that in like 2015. And then when 2019, 2020 came around, I actually decided to double down on the hobby because of a lot of the reasons that you brought up. So in in my career as a designer, there's a lot of pressure to go and be on stages and talk and have podcasts and write books. It's true though. It's true though. It is one of those things of like speaker-0: excuse me. speaker-1: eminence. You gotta put yourself out there. And so I did that very well for a long time. but I got really burned out on the people. there was just a lot of not very supportive folks in that industry. everyone there's to be like, I worked on this. Well, I worked on this. And I'm like, I don't care. What do you do outside? I like movies. And the miniature painting community is just like a bunch of nerdy artists supporting each other. Hell yeah. Like especially from the art side. So like in the art side, there is like a competitive angle to miniature painting. But and you would think those people are like, they don't want to talk to me. No, they're all super chill. Like I've met people who have won like multiple awards, like at the highest levels of miniature painting. And they're all just chill. And they're just like, yeah, yeah, you painted that. do you want some feedback? And like everyone's really cool to give each other feedback. Like, I think the community is what won me over. And then, like I said, I doubled down and I started getting into display painting, which is like making it look really nice. And then competitive painting, which is like cool, I'm gonna spend 80 hours painting a space marine to put in a competition and have it judged. which is crazy. It's just a crazy thing. because then like I'm taking the hobby and it's kind of becoming a job. So I have that weird balance of like hobby versus job because there's a level of fun associated with that. and then yeah, it it it tumbled downhill into more things. So there was a a guy who used to live in Austin who he got aged out of the design industry. So he then decided to double down on his hobby, which was running a gaming blog for like the last 20 years. And he reached out and he's like, Hey, I love your stuff. Would you want to write for me? And I'm like, Do I get paid? And he's like, I can send you free stuff. And I'm like, okay. Three years later, I'm now like the lead hobby editor, and I've got some staff. You know, I have some staff. And we we write about painting, we write about gaming. it's really fun. I love the focus on the art and I love the focus on like the art from the learner's mindset. where it, you know, the once again, this hobby is it's it feels like it's just more about. being able to give to others. while I love like spending 60 hours on a piece to put it up in a case and hopefully get like a a nod or kudos. I really do love like becoming a part of this community, even though like I'm a writer in the community. Right. And I've hit that point now where like we're we're known, which is weird. like other people have reached out to us. They're like, yeah, I was talking to so and so at a con and they mentioned you guys. And I'm just like, this is so weird. Like, not at all what I expected. and then yeah, I I now have to like manage all these games. Like I never cared to play like a big war game like Warhammer 40,000. and then sure enough, a company sent me their version of it, which is Star Wars. So now I've got like sixty stormtroopers that like I had to try to paint, and I'm like, this sucks. But at the same time, it's fun because then I can go play the game. which is which is cool. there's many areas of it, and I think that's why the hobby is stuck with me. my ADD tends to make me go from thing to thing, and it's gotten stuck in the miniature painting realm because it's like, I could paint minis for my friends, I could paint DD minis, I can go do stuff for a board game, I could go paint like an actual like you know, artistic bust that's like big. I could like do that stuff. There's you know, I could learn how to paint non metallic metal, I could paint with true metallic metals, I can use fluorescence, I can, you know, there's all these areas of growth that exist in the art. And I think that's why it's like stuck with me for so long. everything else is just kind of like on the side. my my wife says that the reason why I have all this stuff is just because of who I am and how welcoming and nice I tend to be. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: hate compliments, I really do. But like I can't help but think how correct she is in that like I don't know why these companies trust me. They're like I'm I'm looking at like two sets of paints on my desk. This is like hundreds of dollars of paint. And I'm just like these companies just sent it to me to be like, test this, tell us what you think, write about it. I know. It's really cool. And so I'm trying to figure out my next step is what do I do with all this stuff? speaker-0: Cool. speaker-1: How do I get other people into it? So like in Austin, I'm slowly working on an idea to like get like a group of people together to like do painting and like there's already groups that do that here, which is cool. So part of me is like, I just glom onto them and just be like, Here, here's a whole set of paints, like go hog wild. because like not everyone's gonna have that opportunity that I have been able to to grab. so like I'd love the I'd love to share with others. So yeah, it's been it's been fun. It's been really fun. Also, I don't know, I get to paint like cool stuff. Like, this is Marvel. There's like Marvel robots from the X-Men. Cool. I I kind of remember these characters when I read comics, but like, I don't know, just like the is cool sculpts, cool art. The I don't know, everyone in the in the hob in the scene is really nice. So like that part's really great. And who knows, maybe it turns into a new revenue stream. Maybe it becomes like job number two, like. Am I gonna be a design director forever? I don't know. I I'd like to be, but at the same time, it's like, I don't know, the world's changing. So maybe something comes out of all this paint and plastic. speaker-0: Right. That's yeah, that's such a great mindset. And it's funny that you mentioned gaming trend because that's the next section that I wanted to kind of touch on. so gaming trend is the website that was set up by that colleague of yours who worked in design. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. He started it he worked in design. He was like a web designer. And then and then, you know, he just yeah, like he he told me. He's like, I got aged out. we met through a flaming lips fan group. When I first came to Austin, I was really into the lips and so found like the Facebook group of people in Austin. went to a bunch of really cool parties with them, you know, fun stuff. Everyone, you know, listening to psychedelic bands, people are doing drugs everywhere. speaker-0: Nice. Hell yeah. speaker-1: were all like flail I remember like at the Museum of Human Achievement, like there was like a big old like remember those like big circus banner things that you would wave as kids in like elementary school during like the gym? They'd be like, All right everyone, you know, the big old like banner thing. speaker-0: Is that the thing that you would like you would wave up and then like go down under? speaker-1: Yes. Yes. Yeah. So they had that stuff. And it was just like, cool, this is like a weird group of artists and weirdos. and then yeah, Mike left Austin. And then yeah, he he's been working on this blog, gaming trend. And their whole their whole jam is they're they're for humans by humans. Nice, nice. There's there's a big emphasis on like we do really like we don't just like do reporting, we don't just like say like speaker-0: Remember that? speaker-1: This game rules a ten out of ten. Like instead it's like we dive deep into that stuff. And so the way I write is kind of how I talk. And so I like pulling in personal anecdotes into what I write. and and it really works well with them. the first article I wrote that got v I guess viral was Dungeons and Dragons. They have a podcast called Critical Role. Lot of people like it's huge. they put out a cookbook. And so we got sent the cookbook. The cookbook got sent to me. and of course I have like 30 cookbooks. So I was like, I am well prepared to write about this. And sure enough, it's a baller cookbook. Like it it's not just like it's not they're just like they took like a grilled cheese and sandwich a grilled cheese sandwich and they're like, it's the wizard sandwich. Cause like most cookbooks that are like speaker-0: It's really funny. speaker-1: this is the Witcher cookbook or the Star Trek cookbook. It's like the most basic shit that is just like it's Captain Kirk spaghetti, even though it's just spaghetti and meatballs, but someone just slapped Captain Kirk spaghetti on and you're like, my god, I'm in Star Trek spaghetti. No, this D cookbook gets into like a little bit of like harder to do cooking techniques and weird ingredients. Like there's a recipe for bugs. There's like a bug recipe in it. And I was like, of course there is. It's Dungeons and Dragons. Go eat some crickets. Who cares? Like, and and so I wrote the book, I wrote the review from the perspective of a person who knows cookbooks and was and I was like, This book has heart. Like some a group of people put effort and energy and poured into making this cookbook unique. speaker-0: Well yeah. speaker-1: Yeah. And then yeah, like the people that wrote it, they were over the moon. The critical role people were like, this is awesome. And and and then like eventually, we landed like a paint company called the Army Painter. And I got like my first set of paints and it kind of started from there. And so like I always try to write from like that learner's perspective of like, I have no idea what I'm doing with this paint. Let's just go in and see what happens. you know, because I think the other thing about this hobby is that it's okay to fail. speaker-0: Nice. Yeah. speaker-1: It's just it's paint. Like you can like put paint on like like my god. I have these little robot models for a a company. There's a company out in Spain called Corvus Belly and they sent me their game and their game uses little metal miniatures. And metal miniatures, like I glued it together. It sat here for two weeks. I picked it up last night to start painting it, and the thing just fell apart. speaker-0: No. speaker-1: There's all this like stuff, but like I think about that in terms of writing about painting, being like the everyday person's gonna run into this, so how do they solve it? Okay, like sure, it totally fell apart. That's fine. It's super glue and some baking soda and it's you're you'll be fine. And so like I I try to I try to teach people through my writing. which once again like goes into like when I'm talking to someone, because like some people don't paint speaker-0: yes. speaker-1: miniatures because they're like, it's too hard, or it's gonna look really bad, or I'm not gonna know what I'm doing. And and the reality is all three of those are true. And when you accept that, then you can start learning and have the learner's mindset and being like, Yeah, the first miniatures you paint aren't gonna look good. Right. But done is better than perfect. And then you move on to the next and you move on to the next. and and yeah, and like it it's been a fun ride. And it continues to be a fun ride. So I don't know. I'm happy I can like share it with people. And it's funny because every now and then you, my friend, like other friends, don't know this side of me sometimes until like I'm like, yeah, hey, I also do this. And they're like, What? Like, I I did a post on my main the other day of the stuff I've been painting so far this year, and a bunch of my friends were like, I had no idea you did this. And I'm like, yeah, yeah. It's just the thing I do on the side. And and then they're all like following me. And I'm like, this is and then I'm like, God, now I have the stress of like they're all following me now. Now I gotta produce more content. But I have tons, tons to work on, which is great. yeah, it it's it's very fun. And we'll see where it goes. I I kind of want to paint bigger things. I want to build objects. So like another part of the hobby is like, you know, you're not gonna play your game on like a kitchen table with like glassware as as terrain, right? Right. Like go make some stuff. Go make a house. Go make a hill. Go make a giant skull fortress. And like people do that. Like there's there's an artist that I I see on on YouTube who he uses like garbage. He uses like garbage and sculpt the mold and he's able to make like castles and stuff. yeah. And he's like, hey, instead of like spending $500 on like plastic to buy like a plastic castle that you're gonna paint, he's like, you can just make this out of garbage. And I'm like, I love that. Like there's yeah, like sustainability, reusability. that is all stuff that I'm like, this is really fun for like an artistic hobby. though I will admit most of what I do is not as artistic as I'd want it to be, because I'm like, I'm gonna paint the box art for like a Marvel thing. speaker-0: Sustainable. speaker-1: I would much rather make like bizarre, creepy stuff. Right. that's what I really love painting is like things that are like rotting and rusting and you know, it gives me opportunity to play with texture and stuff like that. But yeah, it it's fun. It's still fun. Like I I can't I can't seem to get out of this hobby, so that's good. I tend to like I get into a hobby, go all the way, then go to the next one, like improv. Improv. speaker-0: Right. Me too. speaker-1: It was just like, all right, cool, I locked in and now I'm in Cold Town for all seven levels of the pyramid. Like and then afterwards there wasn't anything to do 'cause our group kind of disbanded and and then I was like, Well, there's no one around and I'm bored. So what's what's the next thing? Nice. What's the next thing? speaker-0: that's perfect. So on the subject of gaming trend, I do need to ask you in this the year of our Lord two thousand and twenty six, how many times did you play Resident Evil Nine? speaker-1: None. I have I okay. I have gone from being like the the the cool video gamer who's playing like everything to like I wait years to play a game. Like I it's the worst. It's the worst. Like okay, my wife has beaten Baldur's Gate 3. I cannot tell you how many times. Once. Once with her. I know. And she's beaten it multiple times and has done like hundreds of hours. I've beaten it once. speaker-0: my god. my god. Massive game. speaker-1: And I as recently thinking about this, because this is like this is like the trade-off. Like I used to be the big gamer. Like when I met you, I was still doing a lot of video gaming, tons of video gaming. when I really embraced the painting hobby, that kind of took the time. and I kind of had that moment where I was like in my head, I'm like, okay, I wanna play the video game and I wanna paint and I wanna go play board games and I wanna do this, but I don't have the time to do all that. So I had to be like, Okay, well video games are gonna go over the side. which now makes when I play video games very rewarding. Like when I played Final Fantasy VII remake, I was like crying internally because that was me in nineteen ninety seven playing. and then I got the sequel and it barely works on my computer. So I'm just like, fuck. But I want to play Resident Evil 9 because like I've been seeing clips of like the more recent Resident Evil games. And the the last Resident Evil game I played was Resident Evil 4 on the GameCube, which was more of the action shooter. And I was like, this game kicks ass. This is awesome. Like, like I got really good at it. but I haven't like touched them since then. And I know they have like really good creepy stuff. Like there's one that's in a house, right? With like a there's like a house of like a creepy family. There's the other one with Lady? There's a speaker-0: Big lady game, yes. speaker-1: Yeah, the big lady game that the internet turned into many memes. speaker-0: Okay, the creators of Resident Evil fucking knew what they were doing with Resident Evil Village. So just want to throw that out there. So yes, it was infinitely memeable content. But yeah. speaker-1: And then nine is like that's like a first person one, right? speaker-0: Right, it's it's cool because it's it's almost like two games. So you have like the puzzle, ooky spooky, like tense, tense, tense portion of it, and then you also have kind of like Resident Evil four with like the action packed sequences. Yeah. It's it nails just a classic Resident Evil formula. It's good for people who are new to the series and then people who have been with it since I think nineteen ninety six is when the first game. So yeah, it speaker-1: Original. Yep. Back in the day. speaker-0: It rips. It's cool as shit. I tore through it and then I'm kind of on my second playthrough, but I'm just taking it kind of slowly because it is it's like a very tense, like yeah, emotionally exhausting game, but it's still, man, you gotta you gotta play it. You also I mean, you gotta play Resident Evil seven, eight, like all that good stuff. speaker-1: I know. 'Cause I played up till four. I played like one, two, three, and four. great times, like really great memories of of shitty controls getting you killed. speaker-0: Getting you just fuggin' massacred. speaker-1: But like at the same time, like great great environment, great depth. my like horror game exposure, the one that stands out to me always is Silent Hill Two. the original, the OG Silent Hill Two on the PlayStation. And I remember playing it and like my mom would came into the room and she like watched the whole section of it. Was like, This is freaky. And I'm like, Yeah, I'm like, watch mom and like I speaker-0: okay. okay. speaker-1: Pulled like the flashlight, and then you see one of those dilapidated nurse things walking past. And she's like, And I'm like, I'm like, Yeah, I only have two bullets. speaker-0: Alles gus. speaker-1: Well it's great though. It's like that those games they bring like a nice fun bit to it. in in 2020 I gamed a lot and I played a lot of like more immersive like horror games. There was one called Soma that still stands out because you you play as like an underwater worker at like an underwater science facility. Okay. So you already have the whole like the crushing depths of the water. stuff out of the darkness coming at you. And then of course there's spooky things in it. Like like there's spooky stuff. And then there's of course because it's horror, there's a huge twist like towards the end of it. great times. Great game. Like gives you the chills and I love that stuff. speaker-0: Well speaking of chills, I think we're at we're at the portion of the show where we're going to get into your spooky story that you are willing to share with us. speaker-1: Fun. See, look at that. That was a great segue. Yeah. This is this is easily like the two of us talking is just perfect segues. I think I think that's what made us great in improv together was being able to play off of each other. but yeah, spooky stories. Okay, so at the top of this, I had said something along the lines that like spooky things have never happened to me, but spooky things have happened around me and around my family. And that's what I want to get into because like speaker-0: Well, Mm-hmm. speaker-1: I feel like I'm like Molder, where I desperately want it to happen and I want it to be real. Like I wanna see a spooky lady in a window. I wanna feel a presence. Like I wanna have those moments. But to this day, I have not, but I still fully believe. I fully believe. but yeah, my family. Okay. So I'm from Phoenix, Arizona, and Arizona's got lots of spooky stuff in it. speaker-0: Yes, it does. speaker-1: you know, it Phoenix itself is in a valley that the original peoples that settled in Phoenix, the the the native tribes there vanished and no one knows whatever happened to them. Part of me is like, it's because it's hot as shit, and they were just like, We're out. Yeah, fuck us. And then the white settlers showed up and dug canals. But always kind of grew up around spooky things. in my house as a kid. in this suburbia part of Phoenix. I the the way that the house when I grew up was very like I don't know, it was small. It felt small. and then after I want to say like 10, 12, 13 years, my parents were like, we're going to build an addition on the house. And really it was just they wanted their own bathroom and they wanted a bedroom that was further away from mine. Cause the way our house was set up was like Kids bedroom, parents' bedroom, the one bathroom, and then like the rest of the house, right? Right. So they built out this addition that they that they had built themselves. 'cause my father still around, but he's retired home builder. so he built like making homes. So that's how he spent my summers, by the way, is I was building block homes in Arizona in the heat. Yeah, no, I learned the value of speaker-0: Okay. Fuck that. speaker-1: I don't want to work that job. I also learned how to respect wildlife because snakes and scorpions and all that. Yeah. Yeah. It's the desert. That's a solid sort of everything everything's mad that they're in the desert, so everything's gonna try to sting you. Okay. So we build out this addition to the house. And and as a child, and I don't know if it was a combination of me being a child or something else. speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. speaker-1: But whenever I was in that house alone, looking down that hallway into darkness, it always felt like there was something. Something weird. and like I remember as a kid, like if my parents like went on like a date night, right? And be like, I'd be at home alone. I would like go to the kitchen, get like a snack or like water or whatever, and I'd be going back to my room and just like just like something. Like Like the thing that sends shivers down your spine is just like, like past like the room that was my parents' former bedroom was the office. Past that was like their room. And it was always like pitch black. I remember sometimes as a kid I would like I'd like move quickly into the office just to grab the door and close it. Because something. and I d and and and it was weird because like as a child, like I had those feelings and stuff, but I never never experienced something myself. like a few years later, my mom was going through photos that she had taken because my mom was a hobbyist photographer. hobbies exist in the family. So she's a hobbyist photographer, and when they had built the expansion and they put their furniture in there, my mom was like, click taking pictures and stuff. And and when she took a photo of their bedroom on the left side of the bed, which is my mom's side of the bed. There is a shape. and I I I've asked her to send me the photo because I want to like send you the photo. Okay. it is like, and it's not like a chromatic aberration of the film or anything like that. Like, like normally when film fucks up, you you can tell that the film messed up. Either there's like a texture, like something that kind of breaks that fourth wall. This looks like something that is caught in the actual photo itself. and it is like. A shape best described as like a Victorian style dress. What? Yeah, yeah. And it has like a curve. It has like like the obvious like bell curve of the lower part of the dress. And the coloration itself is like like a darkish, like purplish, blackish sort of thing. Yeah. And so like my mom, big believer, she's like, that's just the lady. And I'm like, the fuck? The lady? And she's like, yeah, she's like, that's the lady. She's just there. And like speaker-0: Okay. speaker-1: My mom's like very much like she she she believes that she has had multiple ghostly encounters, which I'll talk about all of her encounters. but also she thinks she was abducted once, which is also a whole thing. but yeah, like I can't not just like look at those photo photo and be like, yeah, there is something there. then like I don't know, what is it? Well years later, years later, I was living in that house again as an adult with my ex wife. And sure enough, sleeping in that room. Just yeah, but like but I didn't sleep on that side of the bed because like you know, we were like trying to figure out okay, well, who which side of the bed do you want to sleep in? I'm like, I don't want that side because like that's the ghost side. Yeah, that's the ghost side. So yeah, first ghost story of Arizona, second ghost story of Arizona. speaker-0: no. No reason. I have a question about the first So with the Spooky Lady, was that so that picture that was taken, was that the original house or was that the edition where she Weird speaker-1: Last question. Addition. So in the original house, never had any weird moments. Never weird moments. But then they built out, and now there's like that strange vibe, the darkness, and then like the lady in the photo. I know, and part of me is like like I really want to do like historical analysis and figure out what was in this part of Phoenix. Right. Like Back before the modern era, because like Phoenix was like a bunch of settlements in like a river valley. So I mean, who knows? Who knows what it could have been, that area could have been. But like it there was, yeah, after seeing that photo, I was like, okay, there's something there. There's something in this house. because like as a kid, like you, you know, I I think about as a child, I you know, maybe it's my imagination, but maybe it's not. Maybe it was like, there is something in that room. So I'm gonna run up and close that door quickly. Because Yeah, and it's funny because like we you think like, is it just because you're a child and your imagination's on the loose? Or do you detect something? Is there a presence? I don't know. so yeah, that that was that was definitely yeah, that was like the one like in the house growing up. which also in the house growing up is where my mom claimed that she was abducted. cause she said one day, you know, I was 'cause she would, you know, send me off to the bus. And speaker-0: Wait. my god. speaker-1: So she would stand outside like any good mom and and you know, holding a tea as I'm like leaving with my friend, walking with our, you know, backpacks and stuff. And she she claims that like she looked up in the sky, saw like a moving light, and then she doesn't remember anything until like daytime, like five hours later. Cause in Arizona, like when you when you go to school, it's like dark outside because Yeah, because it's like I don't know, six in the morning walking to the bus stop. Like, also that's like when it's cool outside. My mom's like, she's like, she's like, I looked up, and then the next thing I knew is that it's the middle of the day. And so she's like, she thinks she was abducted. I have no idea what because this is also the era before like everyone had doorbell cams. You know? speaker-0: I've kind of heard similar stories, like just in kind of like perusing the internet that like people it's like yeah, part of a day is gone. Yep. and then also I feel like maybe it's it could be who knows what, but I feel like the desert kind of has attracts a lot of that. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. I think so. speaker-0: Like think of Roswell and all of that. speaker-1: I mean, you know, I it's hard not to talk about spooky stuff and not talk about like northern Arizona, places like Jerome, Camp Verde, Prescott, Sedona. Like Sedona has a lot of vortexes. and there's yeah, and there's some parts of Sedona where like you walk into a flat room, but it's not flat because like there's like a magnetic thing and it causes stuff to like move around. there's weird stuff. Weird stuff in the desert. So Yes. speaker-0: Real quick on that note, my personal psychic, who is going to be a guest on the show a little bit later. she for some reason, so she is from New York, she now lives in the Bay Area. Yeah. She is always talking about Arizona. She's like, Arizona's just a really interesting, like energetically interesting place. So it's so cool that you're talking, like I thought that was maybe something that she was picking up on. And it's like, no, this is well known, like northern Arizona, we have vortexes and this and that. Yeah. So this is wild, but yeah, sorry, keep going. speaker-1: No, it's it's totally cool. No, there's there's a lot of just like strange stuff that happens out in Arizona. I was trying to remember things. Like as a kid growing up, I heard things about like the Lost Dutchman mine, which is allegedly a gold a gold mine hidden in what's called the superstition hills. Yeah, right. and the thing is is like people have tried to go find this mine and like people died. speaker-0: Fuck yes. Yes. speaker-1: Because you're in the desert. Like it's very it's it is stunningly easy to die in the desert, in Arizona. something that I learned as a kid is like, no, you always have to have tons of water and you don't like don't go out in the middle of the day, you know. but people do and you know, stuff happens. but yeah, so then yeah, my mother's second big ghost story is They were staying in Prescott, Arizona. and Prescott, Arizona is like a small town. It's like a w it's kinda like a wild west town. north north of Phoenix. it's it's like that place where like as a kid, it's like we're gonna go and there's gonna be like it's gonna feel like a t a town square from like the fifties or the forties. And then you know, there's gonna be more like kinda like felt like people be on horses walking around in town. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: You know, it felt felt old. there's a there's a historic hotel. there's tons of historic hotels up there. And I I forget the name of one of them, but there is like a historic hotel that has ghosts. and and so as my mom tells a story, like it was that like my father antagonized a ghost an incident. speaker-0: no. speaker-1: Which the incident was like, you know, they're in their bedroom, like mom my mom's like laying in the bed, you know, you know, not under the sheets, but on top of the sheets. and then the the the fan above them had like a little glass light bulb, had a like a light thing on it. And the way my mom says it is my mom says that the top, like the the the glass partition thing that like goes on it, I forget what you would call that. Like, you know, like One of those things. I don't know what that is. speaker-0: Is it a hurricane? speaker-1: I maybe something like that. One of those like glass balls. Glass the glass ball that goes over the light bulb. Look, look at this. We're we're very smart people. We are. she tells a story. She says that like it was the top of it, it was smacked down. It was smacked down from the fan, shatters over her leg, cuts her leg open, has to get stitches. The hotel, obviously, hotel comps everything. But they but the CoTel goes and investigates the lamp because they're like, why did this happen? There's no they're like, there is no physical way that this that this thing would have come unlodged unless by force. Yeah. And my mom's like, mom's like, it's it it flew down, like like poltergeist style. Like a thing that a poltergeist would do, just bring it down, and of course crash on her leg. speaker-0: Because was it like screwed in? Your poor mother. Geez. She can't speaker-1: It keeps going. my parents were hunters, and thus had hunted every animal in Arizona. and I went on those trips as a kid. I'm not a hunter. but in north north Arizona, north of the Grand Canyon, that's where buffalo live. So you can go and go and try to shoot a buffalo, and what have you. Then you got buffalo meat. so we we were on a buffalo trip. And my mom and I were hiking, and we were hiking in this like canyon area, and we found untouched ruins. Like Untouched ruins, yeah. So, like, first off, well shit. Uh-huh. Which is another thing that spookily happened. so like we we go up there, we investigate, yeah, it is like untouched ruins. Like, I am telling you. speaker-0: Whaaaa speaker-1: Over like a foot of rat feces everywhere. Like hantavirus, totally a thing that you could come across in Arizona. okay. Rattlesnakes everywhere, by the way. Like, like we're both armed. Like, I had like a pellet rifle, she had actual guns. But like we came across multiple snakes on our trips back and forth from the ruins. we we we come back with like face masks and stuff, and my mom and dad start poking through the ruins as you. speaker-0: No, I guess as speaker-1: You do as as you know, explorers, find pottery, like shards of pottery, evidence of like life, that sort of stuff. And of course, they they they they they take my mom takes some shards of pottery. she had a gold necklace with my father's name inscribed on it. The gold necklace, which my mom Took off every night and she said she put next to her in the bed of the truck, like no conceivable way of this thing vanishing, is gone the next day. Completely vanished. And my mom's like, this is because I took pottery. And they took something back. speaker-0: Yeah. Like, cool, mine now. speaker-1: I'm like, I'm like, you're glad that they took just that. But it's like, yeah, I have always been around these spooky situations, but none of it's happened to me. It's all happened to my mother. and it and it's it's fun. It's fun. Like, and it makes me believe and it makes me desperately want to experience that. and I feel like maybe like as a kid, like, I don't know, maybe it is fair to say that whatever I felt in that room maybe was like the experience for me. but I but and that's where like I'm like molder where I'm like I want like the evidence. I wanna know like you know, I want to believe this happened. But yeah. It's it's it's something. It's something. and like I don't know, I could keep telling you stories, but you like yeah, that you wanna ask questions, you can, but yeah. 'cause then like you have my dad's side of the family, which is from which from northeast Pennsylvania, another spooky ass part of the w of the country. speaker-0: Yeah, like old, old, old American like lots lots of history. speaker-1: I found out in the last two years that my ancestor who came over was on like the third or fourth boat. speaker-0: So like in the 1600s? Wow. speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty wild. it it corresponded with my my my grandmother on my father's side passing away. and then people were like, yeah, here's all the books and stuff. And and sure enough, there is a a Henry Gregory who came from either Manchester or or Nottingham was a cobbler and came over on a boat, was like the first one to come over on a boat, and it was like boat number four or five. Crazy. Which also is like that's like the spo that's a very spooky time of like being in a country, you know? speaker-0: Wow. So like he he wasn't I mean, this was post Jamestown. speaker-1: I think so, yeah. Okay. Probably. Which I just heard that they solved Jamestown. I haven't looked into it, but apparently they've like allegedly solved what happened. Like people left. speaker-0: wow. Was it are you thinking of Roanoke? speaker-1: I was thinking Roanoke, yeah. That's what I was thinking about. Yeah, Roanoke. Yeah, Jamestown's the actual place where everyone went to. Yeah, so like I it's kind of wild. Like on my dad's side, like there's lots of spooky stuff, but the one thing I heard about was like the barn that was like on his parents' property when he was a kid. and and I have I have been given a lot of confirmation that this is all real. not to get too gold star kind of girl. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: But but the previous owner of the barn killed himself in the barn. and they just kept the rope up. And when I was a kid, the rope was still there. I don't know if it was the rope, but like there's an old dilapidated rope. And my d but my dad was like, yeah, he's like, as a kid, he's like, that's where they found the guy. And and my dad was like, my dad, even to this day, as like a 72 year old man, he's like, I will never I don't want to go up in that barn. speaker-0: no. speaker-1: And I'm like, what do you mean? I'm like, dude, you face down a bear. Like, my dad has killed a bear from a tree. And my I'm not going in that barn. And I'm like, and like as a kid, like I would be with like my cousins and stuff on like the the rare trips to Pennsylvania. Uh-huh. And once again, that's eerie sense of like there is something up here. Not to mention, not to mention it's a barn full of sharp rusted objects. Like it like speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: Yeah, like you can't help but feel like this is this is terrifying. It is a terrifying place. as an adult, I would be like, this would be a great thing to shoot like a hereditary style looking at the barn and then just like out of a shadow a person comes at you. Like, yeah, great blocking. Yeah. Exactly. but yeah, I mean like, yeah, the the spooky stories, it's funny, it all happened around me. speaker-0: my god. Yes. speaker-1: But yeah, I I have not had one yet of myself. but I want it. I know, like you said, there's still time. I'm I'm only I'm I'm young. I'm young gray bearded person. I'm only forty two, so there's tons of time. Give me like another forty years to get into a spooky moment. Was that was that a ghost? speaker-0: It c 'cause it just my internet connection is fine, but I just got a pop up from Riverside that said, Make sure you have a stable connection. We tr we just invited this into in the speaker-1: For reals though, like maybe. that is actually something that I wanted to talk to you about was like in this era of like doorbells everywhere, flock cameras on streets, there's not like there's not as many ghost sightings as I thought there would be, but I read I read a theory that because of the advent of Wi Fi, like it causes something in the electromagnetic spectrum, which causes like less sightings of things. speaker-0: jeez, yeah. Like I wonder if it could be harder for an entity to like interact, maybe because like it's competing with just const I mean constant radio waves from like everything. Maybe that could be it. But no, that's really inter because you like yeah, we have constant surveillance and yeah, you'd you'd think we'd see more ghosts. speaker-1: Right. That's something like I think about now. Cause like the stories that I thought of that I've known are like from before that time period. Like like I was there when my parents got dial-up, you know. And I think about where we are now, like there is at least like five devices in my house alone that are operating on the Wi-Fi. And I'm just like, that has to cause something, right? speaker-0: Right, yeah. speaker-1: Like why don't we have more ghosts just popping up on like security cameras or doors? speaker-0: Or well, I wonder too, like with all the data centers, that could probably also nuke a lot of that energy. I do love, not a fan of Tesla, not a fan of the person who runs Tesla, but I've seen these videos online where it's like people in a Tesla driving past a cemetery and it keeps registering humans. Yes. Those are fucking awesome. That's so speaker-1: Actually, pretty great. Yeah. I've I've seen that too. And then I'm like, they're still there. It's just, yeah, maybe something's going on. I it's gonna be terrible if we die and become ghosts, and then it's just like it's all like weird pop-up ads everywhere. speaker-0: my God. And subscri my God. And it's like you have to put in your email. speaker-1: You you you die, you come back to you you're sh walking around as a spirit and like the the advertising of the internet is flowing past us because it's like electromatic magnetic information and you're just like, cool, cool, I gotta get through my doom scrolling so I can get to the house to haunt some people. speaker-0: I have a message to deliver but I have to like sign up for this mailing list first. speaker-1: Get through the mailing list. Yes. speaker-0: my god. So on that note, Randy, do you have any last words here on Spooky But? speaker-1: This is this is terrifying. no, I I I think I think ever everyone should just always be open to the possibility. Like there's so much of the world that we don't know and we don't understand. So like that's why like while it hasn't happened to me, like I still choose to believe because I'm just like, yeah, there could be those things. you know, I aliens probably exist and ghosts and entities probably also exist. Flat Earth's not real, but you know some some stuff is not real at all. Cube Earth, not a thing. I'm sorry. It it's it's a big old sphere. but yeah, I I that's that's what I really want to leave it with. And I don't know, if you want to go and check out cool painted miniatures and stuff, follow me on Instagram. but yeah, for the most part, this has been a blast. Thank you. speaker-0: Thank you so much for coming. and on that note, goodbye. Thank you for listening to this episode of Spooky But. Music by Drew Mantia. Artwork by Lauren Seely. Listen to SpookyButt on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube. Please be sure to like, rate, and subscribe. Follow SpookyButt on Instagram at SpookyButt Podcast. Need to make contact? Send us an email at spookybuttpodcast at gmail.com. We'll see you on the other side. Goodbye.