Listener Mail: Holidays on Ice-Nine

Albert's email. Okay, Albert says, Hi, Robert and Joe, it's been a while since I rode in and I have much feedback, and I think we're gonna skip over a section or two of the email to condense, but maybe we can start with these comments about our episode on the invention of the mirror. Albert says, I'm surprised you did not mention the dreaded iPhone selfie image. I thought we did, but maybe you're right. Um it goes on.

I personally hate it that it is always a mirror image, not obvious unless you see lettering or wearing an asymmetric clothing such as the Japanese kimono, where it is always worn with left over right. In the iPhone selfie, this becomes right over left, and the only time you wear a kimono right over left is when you are dead. Ghosts in Japan also wear the kimono right over left, as they are usually wearing their white funeral kimono. I've

never heard this before, No me neither. Alright. Subsection three concerning the invention of the chainsaw, Albert says, you mentioned the limitations of the circular saw in this episode, but in cartoons they will cut through beyond their center attachment point.

Remember what we were talking about. That was one of the limitations of like using a circular saw to try to cut down a tree is they've got to be mounted from the middle, and so you can only go like half the diameter of the of the saw into a tree. But Albert is correct. He has attached a clip of speed Racer showing speed Racers mock five. I guess that's the name of the car. I never really watched speed Racers, so I don't know anything about it.

But uh, this scene is showing It's like the scene in James Bond where they show you all the new gadgets on the car. This is like a collection of here's what the mock five can do. And in this clip, one of the things that happens is it puts out a couple of circular saws on bars that are sweeping around in front of the car as it drives, and it shows the car just plowing through a forest of giant trees, just cutting right through them without even slowing down,

which was very funny. Oh yeah, I mean, I guess we touched on this a little bit that. But cartoon saws and chain saws and circular saws are just unstoppable. They'll just cut through everything like a like a hot knife through butter. Okay. Now, regarding our episodes on crabs, Albert says, you mentioned you wanted to know about any crab stories. I remember one from my childhood, a Japanese folk tale called the Monkey Crab Battle. Uh. And then he attaches some links and so on this one. I

sort of went deep. I went and found a translation of the story, and I I wrote up a little summary here that we could relay to you, because I know, Rob you were you were burning for more crab folk tales. So the monkey Crab Battle, also known simply as the Monkey and the Crab, is apparently a a classic Japanese fairy tale. There there are apparently many variations with different characters and plot details. So the version I'm about to

tell is by no means definitive. This is just one that I happened to find in in a full text English translation. So this is the translation by Yea Theodora Ozaki, which uh and I think I've read that this one might take some liberties with the source material, but it'll give you a gist of the story. It begins there were once two friends, a pink faced monkey and a yellow crab, and they like to play together by the

river banks. And one day, while they're playing around together, the crab finds a rice dumpling and the monkey finds a persimmon seed. The crab holds up his rice dumpling and he says, look at this nice thing I found, And then the monkey also shows off the thing he found, the persimmon seed. But inside the monkey is immediately jealous because he wants that dumpling. Persimmons are one of the monkey's favorite foods, but you can't eat the seeds. They're

just you know, hard, crunchy. You know it's not very good. Um. So he tries to convince the crab to trade. He's like, hey, wouldn't you rather have this seed than the dumpling? And the crab says, no, I would like to keep my rice dumpling, thank you. But the monkey comes up with a plan, because monkeys often it's often the case in these stories that monkeys are crafty. So the monkey says to the crab, and this part's a direct quote from the translation, how unwise you are not to think of

the future. Your rice dumpling can be eaten now, and is certainly much bigger than my seed. But if you sow this seed in the ground, it will soon grow and become a great tree in a few years, and bear an abundance of fine ripe per simmons year after year. If only I could show it to you then, with the yellow fruit hanging on its branches. Of course, if you don't believe me, I shall sew it myself, though I am sure later on you will be very sorry you did not take my advice. And this does the trick.

The crab is persuaded to trade, and the monkey takes the rice dumpling and gobbles it up, immediately hands over the persimmon seed to the crab, and then the crab takes the seed and plants it in the ground. And then we cut two years later where the crab's patients has paid off. One spring, he finds his persimmon tree full of glistening ripe fruit. But there's a problem. As a crab, he can't climb the tree to get the persimmons,

so he's just gazing up at them. They look delicious, but he can't get to them, I guess because he is not an arboreal species of crab. But he knows somebody who is very good at climbing tree, the monkey. So he goes and he finds the monkey, and he asks if the monkey will climb the tree and bring him some of his per simmons. The monkey agrees, but the monkey is not a very good friend. He climbs up in the tree and as soon as he's up there, he's like, no, I'm just gonna eat all these myself.

He's hungry, and he just gobbles up all of the right per simmons until there is nothing left but the green fruits. And the green fruits are as hard as rocks. And this whole time, the crab is frantically running around the base of the tree, calling out to the monkey to remember what he promised. And apparently this is annoying to the monkey, so he begins to pelt his crab friend with unripe per simmons. Again, these are as hard as rocks, and so when they hit the crab, they

wound him. They bash him up real good, and eventually the monkey pelts the crab with so many unripe per simmons that he dies. That's a dark turn. Now here's where it actually turns into like a seven in the style Grindhouse revenge flick. The crabs son comes along and finds his dead father's body. I should menage. I think in some variations of the story, at least it's the it's the crab's mother, not father, But I'm not sure

about what the frequency of those variations is. Anyway, In this version, he finds his his crab dad's body, and he weeps bitterly, and he looks around and sees the persimmoncy it's littered all about, and he knows that it must have been the monkey that killed his father, and he swears revenge, and then there is sort of an

assembling the team montage. The young crab recruits his friends to help execute the plan of revenge, and his friends are again this is this list of friends is another thing that varies by version, but there is a bee like honey bee, a chestnut h a mortar like like a mortar, and pestle like a stone mortar. And then some versions also include some kind of slippery substance like a pile of cow dung or a puddle of oil. Okay, all right, so this is quite the team involving animals, vegetables, uh,

inanimate objects um, slime or dung, which I love. So they hatch a conspiracy. Meanwhile, the monkey is off by himself. He is congratulating himself greatly for getting away with his crime, and he, you know, he thinks himself so clever. He's like, well, I killed that crab and nobody's ever going to know. And later he is invited to a feast commemorating the life and death of the elder crab. And starting here, I'm going to read directly from the Ozaki translation. Maybe

we'll do some voices for the characters. Quote the feast over. He was next invited to the tea ceremony room to drink a cup of tea. When the young crab had conducted the monkey to the tea room, he left him and retired. Time passed and he still did not return. At last, the monkey became impatient. He said to himself, the tea ceremony is always a very slow affair. I am tired of waiting so long. I am very thirsty

after drinking so much sake at the dinner. He then approached the charcoal fireplace and began to pour out some hot water from the kettle boiling there, when something burst out from the ashes with a great pop and hit the monkey right in the neck. It was the chestnut, one of the crab's friends, who had hidden himself in the fireplace. The monkey, taken by surprise, jumped backward and then started to run out of the room. The bee, who was hiding outside the screens, now flew out and

stung him on the cheek. The monkey was in great pain. His neck was burned by the chestnut and his face badly stung by the bee, But he ran on, screaming and chattering with rage. Now the stone mortar had hidden himself with several other stones on the top of the crab's gate. And as the monkey ran underneath the mortar and all fell down upon the monkey's head. Was it possible for the monkey to bear the weight of the mortar falling upon him from the top of the gate.

He lay crushed and in great pain, quite unable to get up. As he lay there helpless, the young crab came up, and, holding his great claw scissors over the monkey, he said, do you now remember that you murdered my father? Then you ah, my enemy, gasped the monkey brokenly. Of course, said the young crab. It was your father's fault, not mine, gasped the unrepentant monkey. Can you still lie? I will soon put an end to your breath. Uh. And with that he cut off the monkey's head with his pincher claws.

Thus the wicked monkey met his well merited punishment, and the young crab avenged his father's death. Alright, alright, that's that's pretty good, I applauded as a strong crab centric folk. Taylor Methrow, What have you? Does this have a moral? I've started to think like, uh, I mean, I guess the monkey, Yeah, there. Maybe the moral for the monkey is like, hey, don't betray and kill your friends or else you will you will meet a similar fate. I

don't know. He kind of started off feeling, you know, like kind of like a Subs Fables, but then it ended up feeling more like a shot Brothers picture. Yeah, so I don't know. I don't know. Um, I guess the lesson is don't trust monkeys or even if they're there there that they have, you know, a good what seems to be a good, you know, business offer for you because ultimately, like the monkeys trick pays off for the crab, he's just betrayed by the monkey a second time. Right,

that's the funny part. So you think the monkey is tricked to the crab, but everything the monkey said was true, like he gives the crab in the long run the better deal, but then he just he just cheats him a second time. Yeah, anyway. To finish off, Alberts email one last note, he mentions the Dunwich horror. He says, for some reason, I remember this movie being in black and white. After watching it, I remember thinking that film is a very hard medium to adapt. The dread and

horror of Lovecraft's mythos. You clearly like Lovecraft, so I can recommend Daygone. It is an adaptation of the novella The Shadow Over in Smith and then attaches a link. Okay, that's it, thank you and keep up the great work, Albert Albert. I. It's been many years now, but I do remember enjoying Dagon when I was in college. I think it's one of those movies that's maybe not great in every way, but it it has some things that

that really work. I remember having a kind of uh, pleasing color contrast, because most of the sets and and locations in the movie are are very kind of dark and blue and green, you know, the colors of the sea or like caves in the ocean. But the main character wears a bright orange sweater and that always stuck in my head. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's a fun flick. It is um it's a Stewart Gordon movie, so you can go into that. You know you're going to get

a certain amount of of grizzliness and gruesomeness. But it has some fun monsters, some over the top gore, and it has um a Kidnas style mermaid if memory serves. So that's a pretty fun one. Um. I haven't seen this one in many years, but I was always partial to the Dan O'Bannon directed film The Resurrected from which who let's see who starting that? Oh yeah, it had it had Chris Surrandon in it. I've not seen that one,

Like I said, it's been a long time. I think that when I saw it was on VHS, So I'm not sure if it's aged well or not, but it but it may have. I mean, it's Dan O'Bannon, so it has that going for it totally. Now, speaking of Dan O'Bannon, who was also like another one of his his films that he directed is worth noting, as of course, the Return of the Living Dead from nineteen eighty five.

Uh So, here's little bit of listener mail from Alan, Alan writes in during the podcast, and this is responding to our Wholy Undead episode from back in October, which, by the way, is also a holiday episode, so it's both Halloween episode and a Christmas episode. So if you didn't listen to it, then listen to it now and maybe listen to it again. Um. Alan writes during the podcast, I recall you wondering why a bunch of pious undead would attend services, but then also try to attack and

kill the living who accidentally wander in. Presumably, the undead want to live on live as much as anyone, and having been discovered, realized that the living would be a huge threat to their continued existence if word got out, so they would need to eliminate any source of leakage that arise. Uh. They to see sister would of course

feel the need to warn her living sister. Okay, so under your idea here alan, Uh, the reason somebody might wander into a night service of the pious undead listening to a sermon in the church, and and they attack her because they're afraid that if she spreads word, people are going to come in. And I don't know what do do? An exorcism or something that will not allow them to dwell there in the church anymore, I guess.

But the other stories seemed to suggest that the churches, or at least the regional church, is powerless to stop the undead, So like, what are they gonna do? They they're afraid the Pope's gonna show up and squash everything, or you know, or some higher member of whatever. The uh, you know the church organization is in place. Um it it seems like they kind of get whatever, they get to do whatever they want because they own the night. It's good to own the night. Uh. This reminds me.

We did hear from another listener though, who was telling about a local folk tale about a parish somewhere in Poland where Um, I think the idea was that the priest was believed the ghost of the former priest was believed to haunt the churchyard because it had never been consecrated, and then once it was consecrated, Uh, he his spirit could leave or something. And am I getting that sort

of right? Remember that that sounds right? Yeah? Yeah, So sometimes I guess there are things that that the undead actually want the church to do on some level. Anyway, I guess it depends on like do you want to keep hanging out at the church or do you want to move on to that, I don't know, the afterlife or wherever else you're supposed to go. Yeah, and then

what afterlife are we dealing with? Are we dealing with like the the new Christian afterlife or remember these are ideas that are that are kind of embedded in older systems of relief. Are we're talking about something a little grayer, a little um maybe less appetizing, or maybe something that is a little more like the midnight Mass itself, you know, And in a sense, this is the afterlife. They're already there, and it consists of going to church in the middle

of the night when the humans aren't around. Another way of thinking about it is maybe they're afraid if word gets out to all the living that they're doing these things, that the living are gonna everybody's gonna come swarm to see them, and it'll just get too crowded in there. You know. There were the restaurant principle. Sometimes you love a good restaurant, you kind of don't want people to find out about it. Okay, we got one message regarding

our Weird House Cinema episode on blood Beat. This is just a quick little hello from Maria. The subject line was just to say hello parentheses blood Beat. Um. I have to thank you because today's episode Weird House Cinema was so hilarious. I was walking and laughing with my dog. I hope that doesn't mean your dog was laughing as well, because that sounds demonic. But Maria finishes saying lots of love from Italy, and then she attaches an image of

her dog this. Uh. We don't know the dog's name, though, I would like to know that. This is a gorgeous looking animal that is lying down in the snow and chewing on a blue plastic toy of some kind. Looks like it looks like this dog is having a great time. Yeah. I don't know. If this dog laughed, I don't think it would necessarily be demonic. Seems like a good dog. No, I mean, this looks like a great dog. This is the kind of dog that would not laugh, because dogs

don't laugh. Everything is serious to dogs, all right. Here's the one from Matt, who also wrote in about blood Beat with the subject blood Beat a better way to hunt Good Day Fellas. The weird House episode on blood Beat was hilarious. I've not seen it, but love your description of the chaos. I'm an active hunter, and no, the way the film portrays hunting strategies is rather off target.

There are many ways to hunt deer alone in a group, moving and stalking, standing still in seasons designated for specific tools, archery season as opposed to rifle season, for example, etcetera. Rules and times change from jurisdiction to jurisdiction for blood Beat, though these things don't matter. A fun film is a fun film. I hope to give it a watch in

the near future. Thanks for the show and your time, Matt. Oh, thanks, Matt. Yeah, if you're if you're looking for a holiday experience viewing experience like leod Beat, um, nothing but blood Beat will do. It's the reason for the season. All right, We're gonna go and close the mail bag on this one, but we'll be back in the future with more listener mail. Just a reminder that our core episodes of Stuff to

Blow your Mind air on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On Wednesdays we do the Artifact that's a short form episode on Monday's at the listener Mail, and on Friday's That's Weird how Cinema. That's when we set aside most serious concerns to just discuss a weird film such as blood Beat. You know, I think technically this is gonna be our last listener mail of one, right, I believe you're right. Yeah, but we'll read plenty more of your messages in the

new year. Yeah, so keep them coming, keep them coming, huge. Thanks as always to our wonderful audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other to potentially get a message featured on a future listener mail episode, just to say hello, or to suggest a topic for an episode. Any of that, you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio.

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