From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of iHeartRadio.
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt. Our colleague Noel is not here today, but he will be back shortly.
They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer Alexis code named Doc Holliday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you. You are here. That makes this the stuff they don't want you to know. Hold up, something's weird, something's weird here. It's Monday evening, and we are we're arriving with listener mail rather than our typical strange news segment.
Matt, God, that is so weird.
Well, we talk pretty often about the deceptive nature of time as a flat circle. We did some, We did some juggling around. Never fear, fellow conspiracy realist, Strange news will be coming to us all later this week. So as you are hearing this, some very strange news is on your way Thursday. For now, we are over the moon. Can we say over the moon since that Russian pro crashed? Or is that too soon? Yes, anyway, here is our listener mail Matt. Quick shout out to our returning super producer.
Several of our fellow conspiracy realists have written in and asked, Hey, what happened? Where's Code named Doc? Code Name Doc is always doing amazing things. Currently she is a space scoundrel and has made some time to hang out with us, despite the fact that Starfield, a game we're all very excited about, has just officially entered the world.
Yeah, she said, she paused the game just to be here with us. So thank you, I.
Know, thank you, thank you for classing up the show as always.
Doc.
It's good to have you back tonight, Matt. We're going to explore a lot of strange stuff. We got so many interesting pieces of correspondence. We're going to explore some urban legends. We recently did an episode on how to build your own and we're going to hear from a former adherent of the Mouse. We're going to talk about some deaths at the Brooklyn Mirage. And before we do
any of that, we talked off Aaron. We thought it would be interesting to begin with a follow up email from our old pal Nemesis, and you read this one as well, Matt did.
Yeah, this is a great message from somebody who has hands on experience attempting to stop people from tracking all of the stuff they do online. And I don't know, I think we should just read it because we can break some of this down.
Yeah, agreed. So here we are from Nemesis, dear esteem, gentlemen, Professors of intrigue, seekers of sedition, mission and doc as a follow up to my July email on Google side on and thank you for including that in a listener mail segment. Recently, my area was fortunate to be connected to gigabit fiber, and I took the opportunity to install a nine hundred, nine hundred megabit service up from sixty
to sixteen IMBET. While this service has been spectacularly fast, it highlighted the restriction of the VPN I was using, which lost two hundred to three hundred magnets when active.
Can can we go ahead and just say that's the nine hundred slash nine hundred or sixty slash sixteen is download speed versus upload speed.
One hundred percent?
Yeah?
Yeah, good note, And Nemesis continues and says I switched to a higher end VPN package from another company, which reduced this loss to around fifty megabits, but it also came with further added benefits. The first of these is a threat protection service which targets ads, web trackers, infected files, malicious websites, tracking URLs and deep file scans. Once activated
in conjunction with VPN, the majority of websites worked without interruption. However, as expected, the main players Google, Amazon, et cetera really didn't like it, requesting additional verification or reporting my actions as suspicious activity. Let's pause there, Matt, and maybe unpack that a little bit for people who are who might feel this is a lot to take in. Also, happy birthday, Google, you creepy jerk. You're twenty five, which means Leo DiCaprio is not going to date you.
But what if they're not evil enough? Right? Right?
They changed from don't be evil? So this idea of targeting ads, web trackers, malicious websites, all the scoundrels of the online experience, Matt, do you think it's safe to say that most people are encountering this stuff and maybe aren't aware of it?
Oh? For sure. Even if you don't have anything installed and you've used something like the native browser for Apple. You're using Safari, it will tell you how many trackers it has prevented over the past, like whatever span of time. It'll let you know that because it's already got some
built in stuff that's attempting to stop that. If you're using Chrome, you can get a lot of add ons, you know that or what do they call like tensions, I don't know they call them anymore, But you can get things that will do the same and you can get a report of, hey, look how many times we stopped a website from literally trudging up your entire Internet history or whatever they were doing while they're hanging out with you.
And to continue with nemeses letter here they say. Another example was a credit check service which I had used before, but which then responded with an Oops, your log on didn't work, Please try again later. When I contacted them, their response was that to access their site, I would have to turn off my VPN, AD blocking, et cetera, and allow automatic script execution. Needless to say, I will
no longer be using their service. By the way, my record for items blocked on a single visit to a website is one hundred and forty eight whoa one website? One website?
Yeah, you don't say he does its?
Hey, Neimesis says, I didn't log in browse et cetera, just called up the home web page.
I'm gonna guess weather dot com.
I'm gonna go USA dot gov. O'kodd it.
They don't.
They don't have the sophistication for that.
It's probably like Facebook.
It's probably like Facebook. I hope it's something so seemingly innocuous, you know what. I hope you looked up a recipe.
I hope you.
Were like, how do I make donner kebab at home? God? At almost one hundred and fifty entities went this guy. So anyway to sew this up, there's a second part of this email that I think fascinated both of us and Matt. Do you want to do the honors on this one because it's I feel like the correspondence feels better when we're kind of double dragoning.
Sure, here we go, Nemesis says. The second and more interesting feature is a quote incognito service, which I was unaware was a thing. Now, hold on, when you say incognito, I'm just thinking a new incognito window on Chrome or one of these other browsers. But that's not what we're talking about. So let's jump back into Nemesis here. I am aware, unlike most people, that the majority of the Internet exists because the sites I visit monetize my metadata,
so the global social media and browser companies can exist. Basically, what I hadn't realized is the massive ecosystem that exists to support this metadata industry. I signed up to the service, the Incognito service here that he's talking about, which in my case is provided by Incogniti ncog ni, and it reported that fifty three companies were gathering, holding, trading, and selling my data. See I'm going to call it data and data in the same little section here, just on
purpose to make you upset. I'm just joking. I just interchange them, that's all I always think of data in my head. And you know which one company had initiated removal requests with these companies. Note that's really cool. It already like once you sign up, they already started saying, hey, hey, get my stuff off your thing. So cool, Nemesis says. Note I'm from the UK. Oh interesting, So the GDPR
regulations may be helping here. Those are the regulations we've talked about in the past that are actually for protecting individual privacy on the internet. That's pretty cool. But I will say if we want to stop here for a second, Ben, I found that website in Cogni dot com and it does appear that if you live in the US or other countries you can sign up. They are offering a monthly plan for thirteen dollars plus tax us every month. That seems like a lot. But what are you getting?
I don't know. Oh it says US, UK, EU, Swiss and Canadian residents only.
Ah. I see. Also, by the way, everybody, GDPR is the store brand, acronym or street name for a set of laws known as General Data Protection Regulation m H.
And it's for individuals. It's not for the companies. It's for you. Theoryically, if you're.
In the EU.
Yeah yeah, yea yea yah yeah yeah yeah yeah. Well or the UK huh, because they're not the same thing anymore.
Oh, how how quickly things move on.
But then Nemesis sent us a screen shot I believe, Ben, I'm gonna pull that up right now, and this is direct from Incogniti, which we are not sponsored by PS true, no sponsorship, just shouting them out here, and it does look like there. Yeah, the service is already attempting to get data taken down from these other brokers, I suppose.
And the next part is perhaps one of the most disturbing. Our pal Nemesis says. The results are shown in this attached screenshot. And what do we learn from that screenshot?
Uh, Nemesis says, so far, thirty one companies have removed my data. However, only twelve of those stated that they will no longer quote, collect, trade, or store my information. This means that this is an iterative process where the Incognito company will make ongoing requests to move my data. Ooh, that's kind of sick.
Yeah, and it's sick on both levels of the meaning of that word. It's sick that this company will continue to pursue what is an iterative process. It's also sick in a bad way that it has to be a continual struggle.
You see. Do you see how like intricate My use of the word sick was, Ben, Wow, I'm so smart.
It's yeah, man, it's nuts because the it reminds me of a story that I don't think we got to in our strange news segment because we move stuff around on the fly. But look into Mozilla's study of all your favorite car companies nowadays, because they are doing the same thing. Nissan is particularly egregious according to this study. That's just the edge of the rabbit hole to dive in. And Nemesis says, what are your thoughts about this? I'm happy for this mail to be broadcast if it deemed
interesting enough. I don't know, man, it might be a losing battle at this point. Off air, you and I have talked a bit about network hygiene, whether or not the horse has already left the barn, so to speak.
Yeah, I gave up. If somebody's watching what I'm doing, hanging out with me while I'm on this webcam right here, or recording my audio while I'm working, I kind of gave up. So just do your thing, do whatever you gotta do. I'll be here with you. I'll spend time with you while you're hunched over your computer.
There we go, Yeah, there we go. And also there's something here that I think we should highlight, and it's this. It's not necessarily for you if you're listening now, though it does apply to you in the current human generation. This applies more to the generations that come after you, your children, any younger folks that you have mentorship over, or that you are some sort of authority figure. For this kind of recognition of the dangers of this data gathering, it
needs to be something that other generations understand. A lot of people listening this evening are on the cusp right. You existed before a great change swept the world. It is a change that erodes privacy. It is a change that arguably improves a lot of aspects of human life. However, the information gathered can and will be used toward you. Notice we're not saying it's going to be used quote unquote against you, unless you're you know, unless you're doing
supervillain stuff. But it will be used ultimately to predict your actions, and then from prediction it will be used to steer your actions. That is the end game. It's way deeper than just selling you case ideas right. It's deeper than saying, oh, this person just bought a new toilet seat, let's try to sell them twelve new toilet seats. The technology is far beyond that. We're talking about state level actors, and we were talking at that point about
a very large and somewhat dangerous playing field. So for that, I think we thank Nemesis for following up and showing us just how difficult it can be to attempt to preserve this information. Like you, Matt, I also made the decision to do you know, a couple like horterizations or air walling, firewalling of information, et cetera, just out of necessity. But again Pandora has loosed the lid right every everything
is out there now. Privacy will increasingly become a reserve currency of the very, very wealthy in the world.
Yeah, but I don't think they're gonna want it. I think I think it's going to be necessary to hand over all that you are in order to be a part of some of the things coming. So I think I think, I don't know. Look, I'm gonna I'm gonna say it right now on this podcast. I think the ultra wealthy are going to get a service that costs a lot of money, and it's basically like, we will know everything about you in twenty four hours. That way, you can sign up for whatever service requires all of
your you know, data, A concierge service. Yeah, Yeah, like give us one hundred grand, we'll get we will make sure you're up and run on every single platform right now.
Well, not to sound like a cheapscape, but for one hundred grand, they should also be automating those posts, you know what I mean? They should create the separate digital version of you.
I think it will be a whole thing. Yeah, it'll be like that. William Shatner spend one hundred and fifty thousand dollars and get your DNA on the moon.
Hey, you gotta believe in something, right. So one of the questions we would like to end on, and we're not sure where the answer goes. Tell us tell us your thoughts please won eight three three STDWYTK conspiracydiheartradio dot com. Should people have to present government issued identification to use the Internet? Just gonna drop that one on there.
Yeah, well yeah, we're to leave it there. Just gonna leave it at that one.
How many stuff they don't want you to know? You can call me Pink Fairy Angels. So I would really love if you discussed and got the word out that there's been some mysterious and murderous activity going on in my longtime neighborhood, New York club called Avant Gardner also
known as the Brooklyn Mirage. On June eleventh, twenty seven year old psychologist Carl Clemente was denied entry to the club allegedly due to intoxication and later was seen running in a lumberyard before being found dead five days later in the Newtown Creek right next to the club in
the lumberyard. On July third, I'm aware of some Twitter screenshots which explained a friend of someone being attacked by a random man when walking in that area, which is near Johnson and Metropolitan Avenue in the East Williamsburg, Brooklyn industrial business own in New York City. On July twenty third, two men were arrested for allegedly kidnapping a Norwalk, Connecticut doctor from outside the club and holding him for suf days.
And on July twenty ninth, twenty seven year old Golden Sax analyst John Castick disappeared after leaving the club and his body was found at the creek three days later. I just hope dal can shed some light on this because in the first case, demand seen on video running before he turns up in the creek dead five days later, makes it seem like the crops could be wrong to call the case unsuspicious and not look into it as a potential murder. Also, I wanted to point out that
these men are all professionals. I have had numerous male friends drugged and lugged or had identities phones and while it's still in after one drink in NYC over the years and last year there were many articles about several professional men leaving gay clubs getting rubbed and murdered in LAC. I wonder if this is all connected. Hope you can shed some light on this. It hasn't gotten enough attention.
And I feel especially bad that I saw posters for cal Clemente having gone missing and he turned up dead, you know, after being seen running from something, you know, back in June, and there really wasn't a public outcry until a white man was found dead, you know, from Golden Sass a month and a half later, and the local representative got involved. But I really feel like it was obvious that there was something to look into from that moment or earlier with the mirage. Look into City Fox.
They have a huge history of corruption in YC for decades. By the way, Eric Adams, our mayor, has been written about recently that ties to that business, which is strange and interesting. Love y'all, you're amazing. I listen to every show. Thank you bye.
Oh wow, Okay, there's a lot in there. First of all, thank you very much Pink Fairy Angel for writing to us with that. I'm imagining you in a club as a Pink Fairy Angel. I think, just because of the context of the message, I would just say, right at the top, here been I I've read a Curbed article on this a little while ago, randomly, just on my phone. That's a I think that's It's not The New Yorker. It's like called New York Curbed, New York Magazine. Yes,
that's what it is. That's what it is. And it was titled, is there a serial killer stalking the Brooklyn Mirage? Or maybe this EDM club is just too big and messy? Which is kind of the dichotomy at least that I've found in the story between you know, the thoughts here, right, is is there a serial killer someone killing people? Or is it a huge club that is very difficult to manage and the infrastructure isn't there for that part of town. So that's what I know. Of this story.
Right.
Yeah, there are a lot of specifics that Pink Fairy Angel mentions in here that I guess we should jump into. And I have to say, I don't think we're going to have all the answers right now. Maybe we need to look into this further, but let's talk about what we know.
Agreed, and thank you Pink Fairy Angel. This is exactly the This is exactly why we want to explore listener mail every single week, at least one evening per week. This is news to us. I also read that curbed article in the Flags for different reasons. Whenever there's the mention of possible serial murderers, your friendly neighborhood algorithm will exacerbate its visibility right to you. And we learned a
lot of stuff very quickly. Brooklyn Mirage is the outdoor part of a really really big space called Avante Gardner, right, Yes, three different venues in that space.
Yeah, it's huge, and it's located in an industrial part there of Williamsburg. That actually there is a superfund site that runs through it. That's a title for a movie, A superfund runs through it.
Super Fun five Stars Get Wait for the sequel. It's also I mean, Matt, There's something really important that Pink Fairy Angel is pointing out here is the idea that we have discussed at length that people who do not fit into a heteronormative demographic, their murders are less likely to be solved.
Right.
Oh yeah, people who don't fit into people who fit into any kind of imaginable marginalized demographic.
Right.
What was that line, it took a white man from Goldman Sacks.
Yeah, before it hit everywhere, which is kind of true. I'm looking here at just something like New York Post. There was an article on August first titled body of Goldman Sacks. Again, it's right there in the title body of Goldman Sacks. Analysts John Castick, I think, are case Castick, who vanished after concert pulled from New York City waters weeks after another man was found in the same creek. What you can't find is the original article about that
first man, which was mentioned by Pink Furry Angel. There first man, Carl Clemente. Both of these men, I think she says twenty nine. John Castick is twenty nine, but he was twenty seven. Carl Clemente was also twenty seven, So two twenty seven year old men leaving club, both dead. No reporting on Carl Clemente until after John Castick dies.
One of the reasons for that, outside of, you know, the racism and other things, might be because Carl Clemente's death looked like it was an accident and there was no foul play, at least that's according to authorities. According to the New York Post, They've got an article here titled dad of dead doctor found in New York creek looks he answers after Goldman sax analysts suffers eerily similar death. So it's almost like it happens the first time. It
looks like a tragedy and an accident. Almost then it happens again. You start looking more closely at the first occurrence of something like this, and then you start to see the cracks in the official story, because the official story is an explanation of a crime scene. Right, Oh, well, this is maybe what happened. This person was found floating
in the water, which is a terrible tragedy. But again, if that occurs on a one time basis and there's no you know, discernible signs of a struggle, no discernible signs of a murder weapon or you know, a cause of death besides drowning that probably moves on and it's just cause of death is drowning, probably accidental. But that's that's what you would get when there's two eh, something fishing might be going on.
Yeah, yeah, and that's that's something that stands out here. There's been some been some scuttle button some issues with the Brooklyn Mirage specifically for a time. There's a there's an article by the Bushwick Daily written by Capote Duncan from August eighth of this year that talks about a seven point five million dollar lawsuit levied against the Mirage with allegations of to be frank with allegations of sexual assault on the part of the security detailed there.
Wow.
And of course this is a club. This is a place where people go and party and dance and drink and make merry. Right, So, of course, whenever there is an intoxicant involved or multiple intoxicating substances, you have to be very careful and know that people will behave in ways they might not ordinarily behave. And Pink Fairy Angel, We're sure you saw this as well. But there's been
great debate about the location of the neighborhood. There are people who are regulars who say, you know, I'm walking out of this amazing venue and experience and all of a sudden, I'm in a different world. I'm very nervous. I don't know if there's a safe way on foot to leave the venue something like that.
Well, let's talk about it, because there's no lighting. There's absolutely no lighting along the stretch of road there to get you know, back towards other parts of that city, that neighborhood that are more accessible, right for ride sharing services, for tax shoes, right, I mean like you.
Have to, like any big concert or an airport, you have to walk aways before you get the uber or the lift or even you know New York so hail a taxi. Yeah, I heard that there were people getting into fake cabs.
Yeah, oh no, I think that might be our culprit here, our connecutive tissue. Which yeah, and again this is me not an expert, but from that Curbed article, it sounds like there are multiple instances, and it's a pretty common thing to see cars parked out front of the club with a person holding a physical sign saying like you know, uber or taxi or you know, I'll give you a ride, and it's not an official service. Nobody called for that car to be there. They're just waiting to pick people up.
And here's why it's weird. A lot of people who get picked up are intoxicated by one substance or another and may not be you know, may not have their full wits about them, and could be easy targets like that one doctor that was reported, the Connecticut doctor there was reported being picked up, driven around basically to take money out of multiple ATMs to go shopping at various locations, and then he had to go to a strip club with these guys. There's some crazy reporting about this whole
thing that you can find everywhere. Shout out to News twelve the Bronx.
Yeah, and you know, a kidnapping of that sort of nature. It's not uncommon for the assailants to force someone to visit an ATM right or to you know, you can steal the cards, but the moment you use the cards as a criminal, the tracking begins, right, So it's not uncommon to force someone to pull out cash as soon as possible. It's also you know what it reminds me of. I'm just connecting dots here, Matt. It reminds me in some ways of the debate surrounding the alleged smiley face killers.
Remember those, yeah, I do.
Yeah, the idea that there was someone purposely killing young men in the US on an interstate level by drowning them.
Yeah.
To be clear, at this point, there's nothing indicating those things are related. The smiley faced murders theory itself remains incredibly controversial. But in both of these cases, what we see is this same debate. Is there a serial murderer, Is there just a higher likelihood of tragic, heartbreaking accident right or there is this a place where opportunists and criminals can thrive. I feel like that's a logical way to lay out the questions.
Yeah, right now, it does feel like a place to pick up victims if you are of the mindset of some of these people who want to take advantage of somebody, Because I would jump to foxnews dot com. Actually, really seriously, go to foxnews dot com. There's an article titled doctor kidnapped from NYC music venue tied to mysterious deaths of men after concerts, And in this article you will find
a vivid description of what that person went through. When the doctor, thirty two year old, when he got into the car, thinking it was just going to be, you know, someone taking him home, but no, there's already somebody in the car waiting for him who showed him a gun and then basically took him on that spending spree. Uh.
And that was it. And the only way this doctor got out of it is he convinced his captors to take him to the emergency room because he had a shift and things are going to look really weird if he, you know, doesn't get back to get out of there, there's a patient that had an emergency and he has to get there immediately, Like I gotta go. You have to take me basically, So like they had another friend come over, I guess because one of the dudes couldn't
operate a stick shift. And they got to the they got to.
This this is a crazy story, come on.
But they got to the er and the doctor's like, okay, yeah, I gotta go get it. You know, I have to go in there. They're expecting me. They're going to be weirded out if you show up, you know, with a gun at my back. Probably, So I just need to go, I'll tell security that you're with me. He went and told security. Those guys got arrested, which was pretty smart moves, pretty smart moves.
And let's be clear, this person who is kidnapped, they're doing everything right, you know what I mean, except for arguably going to a secondary or tertiary location, which sometimes cannot be avoided. There's other scuttle butt too, man. Once you get once you get into local conversation, you'll see that. Months back, there were people saying they left the mirage and they were warned about a possible serial killer by someone outside, just a stranger. Yeah, watch out.
That's creepy because you imagine if you're in that situation where someone has captured you, is using all of your money, having you go stand at ATMs and withdraw funds, knowing that your picture as the person with that card is going to be on that camera. I don't know. I feel like not very often they would let a captive person live, right. I don't know. That's creepy to me, but it feels like you wouldn't want to leave a witness if you were doing that kind of activity. That's
scary to me. Does feel like it could it could explain some of these deaths. But curiously, the two men that were found Carl and John, there doesn't appear to be any evidence whatsoever of what actually happened to these guys, which you know, in the case of Carl Clemente, he was just running around in a lumberyard, maybe running away from something, and then he was found dead. That's all we know. That's literally all we know.
And we also know that law enforcement is putting intense scrutiny into this series of events. Right at this point, there is no conclusive answer about what may have been happening, what may continue happening, right, but we know that we know that locals are saying, hey, the mirage itself, the venue should increase its security, right, should ensure safe passage as much as you can. And I think there's validity to that argument.
Well, yeah, and according to the Curved article, that's what the you know, that's what they're trying to do. It is weird with the corruption angle that was mentioned by our caller here. You know something about was it the mayor's got some weird activity going on. I don't know what city Fox is and I've got to look into that.
Whatever that corruption is there in New York City. But it's weird because it does feel like it would be either the venue or the city, or the venue working with the city to get just lights up along that stretch of road, right or to get some kind of network so that it's a known stop for Lyft and Uber and other related services. Right, absolutely, I don't know.
I mean it could be a win win situation because if you are a ride share operator then and you have your timing right, then you know that you will be able to pick up potentially profitable fares.
Right, get vomit all over your car? Am I? Right now? I'm just joking.
I'm just sing and finally get that vomited interior that everybody dreams about in a nice automobile. But Pink Fairy Angel PFA, if I may be so old, PFA, you're raising something that we want more people to hear, want more people to know about this. If you have experience with Avant Gardner Brooklyn Mirage, let us know. If you are a local of the area, let us know what you're hearing on the streets that may not make it to the press releases. What do you think about that man that's perfect.
Why don't we take a quick break here where from our sponsor and then we'll be right back.
Stay safe, folks, And we we have returned as mission control and doc No. Matt, you and I always always catch a vibe. We we know there's a great letter when both of us say, ooh, this one right, So we.
It's happening more and more lately, I think, and with news stories for strange hus we're both just like, this is the one. Here's the analysis that we both show up and we're like, oh, oh you got it, bro Okay, all right.
I think it's cool because we can. I think it's cool because we're we're exploring these different yet complementary angles and this is just this is a great story. So a little bit of background here. Recently, we we did something we don't always do, which is a bit of a tutorial episode how to build an urban legend. Matt, you built an excellent urban legend that will.
A workable urban legend.
A workable urban whatever. It was great and light spoilers. You'll hear more about that and see more about that in the future, folks. But we asked our fellow conspiracy realist to tell us some Urban Legends from your neck of the Global woods, and we got we got several great ones. Just like when we asked about billionaire pranks and folks. This one, this person you're about to meet, they've got a doozy.
Oh yes, introducing Gracie and the actually haunted mansion. I guess that's what we'll call this this in the anthology series. Let's just get to start it, Gracie says. Hi, guys, longtime listener, first time writer. I just listened to your Urban Legends episode, and oh boy, do I have a good one for you. Let me preface this by saying that I was a Disney World cast member on and
off for about a decade, starting in twenty twelve. In that time, I worked in several different areas and have heard dozens of internal CM legends that's cast me legends over the years. However, the best story I have is much less a legend and more of a personal experience.
Oh oh, I'm just hyping you. Okay, we got it, we got it.
Okay.
Many people have heard the story. The Disney guests who have recently lost a loved one will occasionally scatter said loved ones ashes inside of the Haunted Mansion so that they can join the nine hundred and ninety nine Happy Haunts in the Afterlife. Editorial note, I don't know about you, dude, I have never heard that one.
That came up. I believe in the episode. I want to say, when Disney theories were discussed, maybe not. I've heard of this though.
No one dies of Disney.
Yeah yeah, shout.
Out to a code named Doc and our longtime poll Lare and vogel bomb. That's right, scattering ashes at the Haunted Mansion amusement. Well, Gracie, you have brought us a plot twist with some boots on the ground.
Oh yeah, Gracie says. Unfortunately, this isn't a legend at all, the whole spreading of ashes thing, and is in fact incredibly common. They rarely make it more than a few days without having someone's dead relative scattered throughout the ride. In fact, it's so common that it has its own radio code for when they have to call custodio to clean it up. It's an ongoing thing, and I doubt it'll stop anytime soon.
But okay, you know what that means. That means this is at the very least happening on a weekly basis. Oh yeah, that is troubly, Gracie continues. Here's where it gets crazy. Sometimes it actually works. When I worked at the Haunted Mansion, I personally had an experience with one mischievous spirit who like to hang out in the tunnel between the unloaded platform and the loading platform, the space between where guests exit their doom buggies doom buggies and more guests enter them.
Again, guests are almost never on the ride in that small length of the track unless they are wheelchair users or for some other reason need additional assistance getting on and off the ride. Side note, if you're on the ride and it stops for a few minutes in the middle, this is usually the reason we stop the ride and load and unload these guests at this exit. And here's where Cracie's letter gets crazy. On several occasions, I heard my name being whispered from behind me while I was
on the very end of the moving walkway. Oh, it was impossible for anyone to be in that space while the ride was in motion. If they were there, I would have known, because I would have been the one putting them there, or at the very least I would have seen them ride past me before they got there, but the shifts were sometimes long, and that entire hallway echoes, so I always chalked it up to just hearing things.
That was, of course, until the day I felt the very distinctive sensation of a hand reaching out and slowly closing around my upper left arm.
Oh no, pause there even for a like a living person to grab you there, that's not a good place, really, yeah, no, man like, think about it every time. You'll or you'll see it when we go to Vegas. Okay, So when someone gets escorted out of a nice establishment quote unquote and you don't want to cause a fuss, Yeah, they will have maybe a hand cupped on your elbow, there's usually gonna be to them. They'll have a hand cupped on your elbow, and there will be an arm subtly
right here on your upper on your upper arm. Yeah, because that's kind of a command and control position from people. So that's not cool. Did you meet a ghost bouncer?
That would be nuts? Well, let's find out. Let's it keeps.
Going, It keeps going, Gracie says. I immediately jumped, turned around and hit the ride stop because I was certain some wayward guest had snuck behind me and made their way into an area that was not only off limits, but incredibly unsafe to be while the ride is in motion. My arm had only been inches from the ride vehicles. There was very little space between my back and the wall separating the on and off limits areas, so there was no way for anyone to get there without crossing
over into dangerous territory. I grabbed my flashlight and checked the area, even having the other made on the unloaded belt take a look while I was at it. Nobody was there.
We cleared the track and started the ride back up within about thirty seconds, and I brushed it off. It had been a long day already and I had just come in from the floor to midsummer heat, so I assumed my overheated mind was just playing tricks on me. I went on with my task of walking slowly and making sure nobody fell while stepping off the moving walkway. Five minutes later, it happened again.
This time I immediately reached behind me to swat whatever it touched me. Assuming a fellow made or butler those are the terms for the employees here. Assuming a fellow maid or butler was just messing with me and running off before I could catch them. But my hand passed through nothing but air. Frigid, dry, ice, cold.
Air in Florida in July.
Okay, maybe the AC is acting up, I thought. I slowed the ride this time, and gave the tunnel a quick glance again, just to be sure no one was there. But of course it was clear.
The exit hallway behind me was quiet as well. In fact, no one had been behind me at all for several minutes because there was a lulland loading. It was just me and one other person operating the tower in front of me. I went back to my menial task. Now somewhat shaken up by the odd occurrence. I focused on what I was doing more than was strictly necessary, mostly to take my mind off of it. I wasn't frightened necessarily.
I wasn't feeling any malevolent vibes or anything good. You weren't feeling those, But by that point I was annoyed and possibly a little worried about my own sanity.
Finally, once I'd let my guard down, it happened a third time again, during a lull between guests. This time, the hand wrapped around my puffy costumes sleeve and gave it two solid tugs, and I might have snapped just a little bit. I turned around, stopped my foot, and sternly said stop that, before shining my flashlight down the chute.
The only response was an empty tunnel and a hint of quiet, barely whispered laughter floating in the air. Ha, you were in the dark with me. I like your puffy sleeve talk talk.
So that's just that's just us. That's a that's just us improvising soup top knock sound design. Uh float down here the hell? All right, Gracie says. I let out a dramatic sign, turned around, but ended up being bumped for my break a few minutes later. I immediately headed to the breakroom to tell someone what had happened, because I was certain by then that I'd either met a ghost or lost my mind.
It turns out he was actually the first one. Almost everyone else in the room had a story about the quote unload ghost. That's not his real name, though he does have. At least a few several people had even seen him getting off the ride, what or walking through the halls long after we had closed the doors for
the night. Hold on, come on now? What Apparently he gets testy when the person in that spot doesn't say hello when they take over the position, and when he he does, he spends the whole rotation messing with them, whispering their name, blowing in their ear, tugging on their sleeves, skirts, or coattails until they pay attention to him. What what?
Well? This vibes and follows along with what we know about spiritual encounters. We'll get to it in a second. Let's slip the story, so Gracie, you continue. I encountered him a few more times during my stint at the attraction, but as long as I said hi when I went over that way, he let me do my job in peace. I did have a habit of making faces at him when I got bored, though, and I heard him giggle at least once or twice because of it. I haven't worked there in some time now, but I hear he's
still around. So next time you ride the Haunted Mansion, make sure you give a wave to my spooky pal near the exit before you head out for the rest of your vacation.
I'm sure you'll make his day, and who knows, maybe you'll get a laugh out of a very bored spirit or two really lovely Thank you, Gracie. What a story, Gracie.
That was awesome, Matt, you, you and I may have had a little bit of editorial fun with it.
Hey to own Pekito and and you know, mostly we were we stuck to it. Yeah yeah. Oh then and Gracie, by the way, calls it the true story of the one thousandth Ghost.
That's right. Gracie also does something that I in particular immensely appreciate, concluding he's a good guy, and I often wonder if the newer cast members are keeping him entertained. So good on you for not villainizing right this spirit, you know. And and also, of course, there is a PSA which we will summarize. Don't do that. Don't dump human remains on a working ride at one of the
world's biggest amusement parks. Every human loss of life is a tragedy, right, but this also causes some extensive and avoidable chaos.
Grazie describes how they literally have to shut down the ride for a couple hours while they do a biohazard cleanup of your relative, and that biohazard cleanup. All those remains just end up in a dumpster somewhere, probably right outside Disney World.
Yeah, somewhere in Reedy Creek. And that's not what you want for your loved ones, one would imagine. So maybe maybe we end our nuctivigation here. We heard this amazing local urban legend. If you've listened to our episode on how to Build an Urban Legend, then you can hear several of the beats that are occurring. This one is a little bit different because our fellow conspiracy realist Gracie
has first hand experience with the phenomenon in question. If you have encountered something haunted at the Haunted Mansion, if you have an urban legend you'd like to share with us, we would love to hear it. And we're not blowing smoke here. We're huge fans of these, Matt. I had so much fun exploring that this story in particular with you, you know.
Oh and ps to the ps, Gracey signs off rip Gracy, which is just great. So it's just Grace, Gracey. Do do please send us your urban legends. We want to hear them. We want to just tell the stories. It's a whole lot of fun for us, just to I don't know, in a weird way ben kind of perform them, which is, I don't know, I enjoy it. Hopefully you enjoy it too, Send them our way if you do. If you want to be super kind, why not give us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows. We'd love to see what you think and if they're if they're super funny or weird or cool, we might read them on one of our episodes. So why don't you do.
That specificity above all honesty?
Right?
Yeah, And if you say I'm running and gunning, you know what I mean. I'm sticking and moving. I don't have time to write a review, but I do have a message for you and your fellow conspiracy realist. We would love to hear from you. We try to be easy to find online. What does that mean, Well, that means Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter currently known as X all the hits drop by, tell us what's on your mind, and keep your eyes peeled and I guess your ears
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