Episode 130: Your Urban Legends XXII - We Survived Spaghetti Warehouse
/If you’ve come across these field recordings from the Spaghetti Warehouse, it means that we didn’t make it. Or we did, and had some fun. But before we head to Spaghetti Warehouse in the second half of the episode, we coin the term “SCAPEGHOSTS,” hear a PSA about quitting that spooky life, and discuss how we’d deal with a shadow in our bedrooms.
This week, Julia recommends WWE’s Money in the Bank PPV and the wrestler Naomi’s fantastic Bumblebee-inspired ring gear.
Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about mob-related murder and subpar chain Italian food.
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Transcript
Amanda: Welcome to Spirits Podcast, a boozy dive into mythology, legends, and folklore. Every week, we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world. I'm Amanda.
Julia: And I'm Julia.
Amanda: And this is episode 130, Your Urban Legends, Part 22.
Julia: God, I love an urban legends episode. Honestly, I do.
Amanda: It's so fun. We get to creep each other out. We normally record it in the morning, which is a strong choice, and it's just a good, good time for the whole team.
Julia: Sometimes you just want a Bloody Mary, but with beer. What is that called, Toasty Mary? That's what it's called.
Amanda: Oh yeah. I'm a big fan of the beermosa, as you know. In the house of Eric Silver, they only drink beermosas.
Julia: That's true.
Amanda: I very much enjoy it with a SeaQuench, so that is what I was drinking this urban legend episode.
Julia: I love Dogfish Head, and the SeaQuench is such a good beer.
Amanda: It's so true. Man, and now that we're playing The Bell Show this summer, I think we have to come up with a new dream venue, and totally Madison Square Garden, obviously, just like my godfather, Billy Joel. But I would love to record in the Dogfish Head brewery. Oh my god.
Julia: Oh my god, yes.
Amanda: So much fun.
Julia: We could do that. I bet we could do that.
Amanda: Oh, I bet we could try. The Mountain Goats played there, and I wasn't able to see them this spring, and it broke my heart.
Julia: Let's start looking. Delaware's not that far. It's an easy travel.
Amanda: Julia has a look in her eye like, "Wait, what if we made a podcast?" That's that look.
Julia: That was three and a half years ago, Amanda, Amanda.
Amanda: Well, Julia, you know who I would totally rope into making a podcast with me at a Happy Hour?
Julia: Is it our new patrons?
Amanda: Our new patrons, Cody, Mr. Folk, Hannah, Willis, and Gary. Welcome. You joined the ranks of such beautiful, wonderful, mer-people souls as our supporting producer level patrons, Philip, Eeyore, Mercedes, Christopher, Kathy, Danica, Marissa, Sammy, Josie, Neal, Jessica, and Phil Fresh.
Julia: Phil Fresh, always coming in with a clutch ending there.
Amanda: Such a good thing to end on. Julia, I have a beermosa waiting for our legend level patrons, Talia, Haley, James, Jess, Sarah, Sandra, Audra, Jack Marie, and Leann.
Julia: You guys, we'll make you brunch cocktails any day of the week.
Amanda: Julia, could you please also tell us about the update we received from last week's patron, Celine Dion's barista?
Julia: So Amanda, Celine Dion's barista commented on our post and said, "Celine actually drinks a lot more coffee than you'd expect, but in the mornings, she likes a few shots of espresso in her coffee. She then drinks regular cappuccinos after that."
Amanda: Amazing. I am on the floor. Amazing.
Julia: Flabbergasted.
Amanda: Canada's own, Celine Dion. Oh man. I feel like I'm so attuned now to Canadian celebrities after Brooklyn Heights' reign has come on Drag Race into the finals, along with official Spirits drag queen, Yvie Oddly. Go Yvie. Love you, girl. Can't wait.
Julia: Beautiful. Love it. So I think I have a recommendation this week. I didn't write it down. I'm just-
Amanda: Oh, please.
Julia: ... on the fly. This weekend was Money in the Bank, the wrestling pay-per-view. And it's not so much a recommendation as a shout out. Out of my favorite wrestlers, Naomi, wrapped an absolutely stunning ring gear inspired by the DC Comics Teen Titans character, Bumblebee. I'm still blown away. It's been two days and I'm just blown away by that outfit. It was so good.
Amanda: Amazing. That sounds absolutely beautiful.
Julia: I will link in the show notes.
Amanda: Speaking of things that we watch in our spare time, we're actually going to take a break next week. This is the first time we've done this in three and a half years. We thought because there are five Wednesdays in May, we thought we would take the last one off. This will let us take a little bit of a break, go on a little bit of vacation for Memorial Day weekend here in the US, and just try to take care of ourselves, take a little bit of a rest, and then come back with a vengeance in June.
Julia: I'm going to nap. I'm going to nap a whole bunch.
Amanda: Going to nap a whole bunch and pack, because we're also hitting the road for Nashville, which I'm very excited about. But we don't want to leave you in a lurch, y'all, so in the meantime, please check out the other shows on Multitude. Join the party. Just finished an arc. It is an absolutely wonderful time to catch up. It was buck wild this past story arc. Julia was in it. There was an almost dog kidnapping. There was a wrestling match. A lot of good stuff coming up.
Julia: There's also Potterless, which if you haven't checked out Potterless after we've recommended it so many times, what are you doing? What's up? It's our friend Mike. He is reading the Harry Potter books as a 27-year-old man for the first time. It's wild.
Amanda: He also has an excellent Instagram where he regrams people taking reactions of themselves as they hear his jokes and predictions. It's extremely good, and there's also Horse. There is so much drama this year in the NBA, as there is truly every year, and I find myself, Julia, when I am home with no other people there, watching goddamn basketball because it's so interesting and I want to see my son, Jonnis, who just loves to dunk. He just loves to dunk, Julia. I know about him and his beautiful story because of Horse.
Julia: Yeah. I'm in a Discord with a bunch of people that I'm in a cast with and two of the guys are always talking about basketball, and I actually know what they're talking about now. It's kind of wild.
Amanda: Beautiful. Well, that is, if you put into your podcast player, Multitude. Just put in that word. All of our shows will come up. You can binge on Weigh Station, do whatever you feel, and let us know what you think.
Julia: Yeah. Check it out. Honestly, the shows are all about loving things critically, just like Spirits is, and we know that you're going to love it as much as we love it.
Amanda: We really hope you do. We hope you have a wonderful week next week, and we will see you first Wednesday in June with our next episode. In the meantime, enjoy episode 130, Your Urban Legends, Part 22.
So, we visited the Spaghetti Warehouse, and we survived.
Julia: We did. We did the thing. Thank you to our patrons who were able to fund that trip.
Eric Schneider: We survived, but will our intestines ever be the same?
Julia: No, probably not.
Amanda: I don't think so. I now understand why everybody was like, "LOL, it's so random that you guys have such a thing for Spaghetti Warehouse, because I get it now."
Julia: When it comes to chain restaurants that could've been haunted, I kind of wish an Outback had been haunted or maybe a Chili's.
Amanda: I know. Cheesecake Factory would've been great. We're going to tell you all about our trip to Akron after we get to some listener urban legends.
Julia: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Eric Schneider: Wait, real quick, who said Cheesecake Factory there?
Julia: Amanda did.
Amanda: Me.
Eric Schneider: Amanda, you do not need an excuse to go to a Cheesecake Factory.
Amanda: Yes, I do. There's none in New York.
Eric Schneider: Yeah, but anytime we're not in New York, that's the first place you go to.
Amanda: It's true. I mean, the bread is just so good, and the sodas are so big, and there's just so many choices.
Julia: I just want an excuse and for patrons to help fund my way.
Eric Schneider: That's fair. That's fair. Well, unfortunately, our next Patreon goal is to buy a castle in Ireland I think.
Amanda: Listen, I'm ready.
Eric Schneider: We'll have to do Cheesecake Factory on our own dime.
Julia: If you really want that Cheesecake Factory, all you have to do is go over the Hudson River, because there's one literally right in Jersey City.
Amanda: All right. I will consider it for desperate times.
Julia: Apparently it's busier than usual right now, according to Google.
Eric Schneider: What does that mean?
Amanda: Let people know.
Eric Schneider: It is 10AM on a Monday.
Julia: I don't understand it.
Eric Schneider: How many people are at the Cheesecake Factory in Jersey City right now?
Julia: Too many, apparently.
Amanda: Well, I do have a mimosa in hand, so who wants to entertain me with some creepy stories from our beautiful, beloved conspirators?
Julia: Why don't I start, because I feel like you would appreciate this one, Amanda, because it's about a protective lake ghost that wears flannel.
Amanda: Hell yeah.
Julia: So this comes from our listener, Rosie. Rosie said some very nice things about us, and then says, "I have personally never had an encounter with ghosts, but I will never rule them out as nonexistent. Plus, ghost stories are always fascinating, and the good ones stick with you for years to come. These two stories of lake ghosts, which have been shared among my family and friends for several years. I know y'all will tell me to move out or get as far away as possible, but I promise, the ghosts are friendly, and real estate on the lake is low and the view of the lake is amazing."
Eric Schneider: That is tricky. There's a lot happening there, because one, you definitely should be getting out, but also lake views, lake views are pretty good.
Julia: Lakes are nice. I was not a lake child growing up, but I do appreciate a lake.
Amanda: Love a lake.
Eric Schneider: What is lake child in the context of Spirits Podcast? Because I feel like a lake child is different. I feel like Jason is a lake child.
Julia: That is true.
Eric Schneider: Right?
Julia: I didn't die in a lake at summer camp. Thank you for clarifying, Eric.
Eric Schneider: Okay. I just want to make sure that we're on the same page with the definition of lake child.
Amanda: I think Julia meant that we grew up going to the ocean and not the lake.
Julia: Yes.
Amanda: But yeah. Lakes are ... I just love them, just those murky depths.
Eric Schneider: I mean, all this has come out about me being very weird since I slept walked apparently, so I just want to make sure that you guys aren't keeping weird dark secrets as well about being lake kids.
Julia: Oh yeah. I drowned as a child, so now I'm a ghost.
Amanda: No, no. I did, though, spend a lot of time visiting my grandparents using a mask and diving for mussels, which was super fun.
Julia: That is cool. I appreciate that. We did clamming when I was a kid. Anyway, sorry. Back to the story about the lake.
The lake is located in Blue Ridge, Georgia, right under the mountains. It was built in the 1920s as a reservoir to feed into Toccoa River with a dam holding everything place. The man watching over the building of the lake owned two houses in a small cove. One is a large log cabin, which was originally two buildings before later owners combined them, henceforth the big house, as well as a smaller house across the lawn mostly used for guests, henceforth the little house.
All of the stories I will tell you take place in the big house, however. The house has seen several owners and several renovations before my grandparents owned it, but the ghost stayed with it.
The city around the lake was thriving well before the lake was introduced, and this included a secret underground moonshine business at the height of prohibition. This business was exposed to the police by one of the owner's sons, and the family was sent to jail for several years. However, when the family was released and the lake was full, two of the moonshiners and the rat went out onto the lake, where he was dropped in wearing cement shoes. This was in the early 1900s.
Amanda: Oh no.
Julia: The family's logic for this action was that he needed killing. This is in quotes, "He needed killing," and when someone rats out the family business and sends them to jail, one isn't prone to disagreeing with them.
Amanda: Fair.
Julia: Very good. Solid. Good choice.
My grandparents bought the house in 1999, and it basically became a vacation/holiday house, mostly used in the summer as well as for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Now, my grandparents are retired and they live there full-time with their two dogs, Birdie and Lulu. Very good dog names.
Amanda: Aw.
Julia: The property has two houses on it, the big house, which is the main gathering place for family and friends, as it has a large gen in the winter and a wraparound porch that spans almost half the house for the summer. The little house was basically my parents' house, because only our family stays there, three bedrooms, two people each, and a connected kitchen, dining room, and living room. It is small, but is a good place to escape the chaos of my family, as well as offering many the peaceful morning. Now we get to the ghost story aspect to it.
Amanda: Love a good setting. Set the scene for me. Appreciate it. Paint a word picture.
Julia: I appreciate we get murder in the setup, which is always very good in my opinion.
Amanda: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Julia: But starting with the flannel ghost.
About 10 years ago during the first renovation of the big house, my grandparents needed work done with their washer and dryer, so they called a plumber, who was working at the house alone all day.
In the middle of the day, the man looked up from his work to see a figure dressed in a flannel shirt and jeans staring at him from the doorway. Not fully registering the figure, the plumber returns to the work for a few seconds as his thoughts settle.
Realizing he hadn't heard anyone come into the house while he was working, the plumber snaps his head up to look at the figure again to make sure that the house was safe. However, in the few seconds the plumber was looking away, the figure had vanished, making no noise. Reasonably, this terrified the plumber and sent him running from the house, never to return.
Honestly, good for the plumber. As long as you have a certain level of reservation when you're working in houses by yourself alone, I think you're pretty set.
Amanda: Very good survival instinct.
Julia: So this story has been told to anyone and everyone who wants to hear it and is one of the classic stories of the lake house. From a young age, this ghost has been referred to as George. No real reason why, but it has stuck. Now just anything weird that happens at the lake or not is blamed on George.
Don't use this ghost as a scapegoat, as a scapeghost.
Amanda: Ooh, scapeghost, though.
Julia: Scapeghost.
Eric Schneider: I mean, what's the worst a ghost is going to do that's being scapegoated?
Julia: I mean, we've seen some bad things that ghosts have done in the past. This one seems chill for the most part, but ghosts bad, usually. All right, moving onto the second story of the haunting of the big house.
My grandparents were close friends with probably half the people who live on the lake, especially their neighbors across the street from them. For fluency's sake, they are known as the Grape family. My grandparents have been friends with Mr. and Mrs. Grape for as long as I can remember, and at this point, they are more like my aunt and uncle than neighbors.
Before my grandparents lived there full-time, the Grapes would have a bunch of guests up, and their house couldn't hold everyone, so my grandparents offered for some people to stay at their house instead. That's very nice and neighborly. I appreciate that.
Amanda: Yeah, yeah.
Julia: One afternoon, the guests staying in the big house decided to take naps, and careful to not waste energy, they turned off all of the lights in the house. I appreciate that, as well. Good, neighborly consciousness there.
Amanda: Did anyone else's parents walk around the house being like, "Why is this light on? No one's in this room."
Julia: Sometimes.
Eric Schneider: I mean, that's me. That's what I do.
Julia: So they decided to turn all of the lights in the house off. Everyone who was staying there was asleep, but by the time they woke up, every light in the house had been turned on.
Amanda: My dad's worst nightmare.
Julia: To display the extremity of the situation, at the time the house had three bedrooms upstairs, each with their own bathroom, a kitchen, a dining room, a small living room, a den, a nook, and a large porch. Many of these rooms had multiple lights and multiple light switches, not to mention lamps on lamps on lamps.
Amanda: No.
Julia: So no human could've gone through the whole house and done this, especially not while people were sleeping in an old house with creaky floors.
Amanda: Damn.
Julia: This is-
Amanda: And it couldn't have even been a circuit situation, too.
Julia: No. I don't know.
This is a lesser told story among my family, but I still enjoy it and it goes to show that not all ghosts are evil. Sometimes they just want to brighten your day and probably don't know what electricity bills are.
Amanda: That's extremely sweet. I love it a lot. It does remind me, anytime there's a blackout and then as soon as the lights come back on, everything in your house turns on that was on before the blackout. It always startles me. I also have some motion-activated nightlights. You might know these from my house, but basically, you just stick them to the wall and when you walk by them, then it turns on. That way, if you're going to the kitchen in the middle of the night or whatever, you don't trip. But when the batteries start to die, they do turn on and off intermittently.
Julia: Oh no.
Amanda: The first time that happened, I just stared at my hallway, which is a hallway and therefore inherently creepy, just like frozen in place, holding my grapefruit pillow, which it looked like a grapefruit, until I put together, "Oh wait, maybe the battery's dying."
Julia: Oh no, that's very, very bad. God, I'm so sorry. Anyway, to wrap up.
These are the two main ghost stories of the lake house, at least the ones that my parents know about, but the former owners might have some more. The ghosts have never done anything malicious, and we've always viewed them as protective, as they only seem to strike when there's someone in the house when none of our family is around.
I have been raised on these ghost stories and only know them as friendly, protective friends who are just looking out for us. Sadly, there haven't been any sightings since the major renovation of the house, but I still hold out hope that George is peacefully watching over our family making sure only good people enter.
Amanda: Aw.
Julia: It's very sweet. Also, I'm very concerned now that during the major renovation, some sort of cursed object was taken from your home, which is why there were the ghosts, and now some poor contractor is being haunted. He probably shouldn't have stolen that cursed object from your home, but I think that he did and now he's cursed.
Eric Schneider: I want to point out that ghosts not having a concept of electricity bills furthers my concept that there's not enough new ghosts.
Amanda: That's true.
Julia: Fair.
Eric Schneider: Because a newer ghost would be like ... You know what would actually be really good? A ghost who died in the '90s, like late '90s, and is like, "Oh my gosh, night and weekend minutes," a ghost that just tries to make cell phone calls as a malicious thing. It's like, "Everyone's got unlimited minutes now, so it doesn't matter."
Julia: It's like, "Oh, why did I get butt dialed?"
Eric Schneider: That's the kind of very niche modern ghost I'm looking for.
Amanda: That's very good, or figures out the frequency to set your pager off at all hours.
Julia: Oh no. I like that. That's very, very good.
Amanda: Or maybe it's a climate change denier ghost who's like, "Fuck you. I'm going to use all the electricity I want."
Julia: Interesting. Interesting choice. I'm curious, but I'm into it.
Eric Schneider: That's honestly possibly the worst ghost we've ever come across.
Julia: I agree.
Eric Schneider: I have a slightly smaller story in the sense that this is about a ghost in my new apartment.
Amanda: Ooh.
Julia: Okay.
Eric Schneider: So yours was a house. This is an apartment.
Julia: I got very confused for a second and thought you meant your apartment.
Eric Schneider: Amanda's is going to be in a cardboard box.
Julia: Just getting smaller and smaller.
Amanda: My haunted story can indeed fit in a cardboard box, so I'll leave you all on that little tenterhook.
Julia: Uh-oh.
Eric Schneider: This is the decreasing size episode. This story comes to us from Martha, and they say, "Hello. Let me just first start by saying I love your show and I started listening to it a few months ago, and I've been hooked ever since."
Julia: Thanks.
Amanda: Thanks.
Eric Schneider: Thank you so much.
Well, onto the story. A few months ago, I moved into my new one bedroom apartment. It is the first time I've lived completely alone and I was a little scared at first, as you are. I have always believed in the spiritual and have had several dreams that came true.
Once, when I was 18, I dreamt that my brother died and I was so distraught that my mom had to come sleep beside me. Not long after, my friend's brother died. And when I was even younger, I had a dream that I was in a burning room and just a few weeks later after, I was in an accident and my friend got third degree burns on most of their upper body.
Julia: Oh shit.
Eric Schneider: He's okay today.
Amanda: Wow.
Julia: The prophetic dreams. I guess dream happier things? I don't know.
Amanda: Yoinks.
Eric Schneider: Similar things to these have happened throughout my entire life. The first few nights in my new apartment were fine. I didn't sleep well, but I just thought it was because this was a new place. On the third or fourth night, I was sitting in my bed watching a movie when someone grabbed the handle to my front door, which spooked me out quite a bit.
Then, clever as I am, my friend and I were using tarot cards and oracle/angel cards, and I was giving my friend a reading when suddenly, I started to feel weird. I had a feeling that someone was looking at me from behind, even though there wasn't 50 centimeters from me to the wall behind me.
Julia: Oh no. Very close. The walls have eyes.
Eric Schneider: I couldn't quite control my arm and had to write, "I can't do this anymore."
Julia: Oh no.
Eric Schneider: It was in big, childish letters that isn't anything like my typical writing. My friend looked freaked out and tells me that her dead aunt wrote precisely that when she died of muscular dystrophy. We're obviously both freaked out, and my friend leaves not long after because she felt unwell.
Julia: I would, too, probably, after that situation.
Amanda: Fair. Fair.
Eric Schneider: It should probably be noted that I live almost directly across the street from where her aunt and uncle lived right before they died.
Julia: Oh, Jesus.
Eric Schneider: This is in the middle of February and Denmark is very cold at that time of year, but it was so hot in my apartment that I had to turn off the heating, and I was still sweating like crazy. Then, one night not long after, I woke up to see a woman and a child at the head of my bed.
Julia: This has escalated very quickly.
Eric Schneider: Her bed is not against the wall, to make a note. So there's some room over there for these spooky guys.
I did the smart thing, or at least I decided that it was the smart thing at the time. I closed my eyes and went back to sleep.
Julia: I would not be able to do that. I just can't.
Amanda: I have a lot of respect, though, for people who see spooky shit and then decide, "Nope, sleeping," because I can't sleep well on a good night.
Julia: That's true.
Eric Schneider: I feel like I would always get after a scary movie, I would just envision the scary thing in my room.
Julia: Sure.
Eric Schneider: I feel like that's a pretty typical reaction to that. I could usually just be like, "You know what? If I just close my eyes, The Ring from the girl isn't here and I won't keep imagining it if I just can't see anything."
Julia: Mine was always The Grudge, you know the weird hair that would come out of the corner, the shadowy hair that would grow out?
Eric Schneider: Yeah.
Julia: That was something I would always picture as a kid.
Amanda: Mine is a hand coming through the basement stairs, which did not have a back to them, and grabbing my ankle.
Julia: Ah, good. Solid.
Eric Schneider: Ooh. That's no good.
Amanda: No good at all.
Julia: I'm glad we could all be honest about this.
Eric Schneider: Now, did you have a finished basement or an unfinished basement?
Amanda: It was finished while I was growing up, so the stairs used to be mad creepy, and then were carpeted, but the light switch to the basement was at the bottom of the stairs.
Julia: That seems dangerous.
Eric Schneider: Yeah. I recall this, being in your childhood home once.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric Schneider: It was a weird setup.
Amanda: It was a weird setup.
Eric Schneider: The next day, I wrote my friend and told her about it, and she told me to light some incense and pray to the universe. After that, it seemed that my apartment got cleaned out and I haven't had any of those major experiences since, just the random noise here and there. Once again, I love your show, and apologies for the very anticlimactic ending to my story. Much love from Martha.
Julia: No, we're glad, Martha, that your apartment is no longer super creepy.
Amanda: Yeah, definitely.
Julia: To be fair, random noises are apartment living, so I think you're okay.
Eric Schneider: Yeah. This is the best possible outcome is the end of the scary stuff.
Julia: Yeah. We're not encouraging y'all to be like, "And I'm still haunted to this very day." We want happy endings for y'all.
Eric Schneider: I mean, I've made it explicitly clear that people need to stop inviting all the spooky stuff and just chill. Just have a non-spooky life. I know it's cool to have a spooky life when you're a teen and you want those Tumblr reblogs or whatever's going on these days, but there's a point where you just got to stop living that spooky lifestyle, or don't. I mean, you do you. I'm just saying for me personally, I want a very unspooky remaining 60-ish years or so.
Julia: Here's the thing. I think that this is why we do our urban legends episodes so that y'all can live vicariously through other people's spooky life stuff and you don't have to do it yourself.
Amanda: It's true.
Eric Schneider: Yeah. The problem is, we do have a lot of emails in that inbox.
Julia: Yeah, we do.
Eric Schneider: So actually, I feel like we might be doing that opposite thing where we actually encourage people to get spookier to write in.
Amanda: Yeah. We've heard from several people who have seen shadow people while listening to Spirits, and again, I love your stories, but I don't want to plant that seed in more listeners' heads because I don't want you to have an experience like Lucia did, who wrote in to us to say, "Yeah, I saw a shadow person. Had to hide under a tree in Germany while it was raining a lot," and I was like, "I don't want this for you."
Julia: No, we don't want you to be haunted by shadow people, we promise.
Amanda: I want better for you, like any parent and their children.
Well, I have a very kind of isolated and limited haunting that I still felt was extremely fun. So why don't we end on that before we get a refill?
Julia: Please.
Eric Schneider: Sounds good.
Amanda: This comes from Rina, pronouns she/her. Haunted Art: The Crying Guanyin.
Julia: Oh yes. I saw this one. I'm very excited you're reading it.
Amanda: Hi. I'm Rina from Thailand. I just listened to your Urban Legends 14, where Eric said he wanted to hear more about haunted art. I think this thing that happened to my family might be perfect for it.
Julia: You ready for some haunted art, bud?
Eric Schneider: I'm so ready.
Amanda: Julia talked about Guanyin, a little bit in Genderfuck the Gods episode and said that this God had been called many names across Asia. So because I'm Thai, I would like to call him how Thai people call them, which is [inaudible 00:24:39] Guanyin or Guanyin for short.
Before getting into the haunted art, I want to share with you what I've been told about the gender transformation of Guanyin. I was told that he used to be a male god. One day, he was traveling across a forest, where he heard a cry of pain from a woman who was all alone in the woods and about to give birth. It was a difficult labor and both the mother and baby wouldn't have survived without any help.
Now, for some reason, a male god cannot touch mortal women's blood. So Guanyin, knowing full well that what he's about to do can't be undone, transformed himself into a woman to help with the birth. Both mother and child were safe.
Julia: That's very sweet.
Amanda: It really is, and Guanyin after that continued living as a woman and adopted that name, Guanyin.
The haunted art I want to talk about is the high relief sculpture of Guanyin in my uncle's possession. One day out of the blue, my uncle had three wood carving sculptures made. All three were of Guanyin. He'd had a dream that Guanyin told him to do so. So despite never really having shown interest in praying for them before, he did.
The sculptures are identical, but one of them stood out. He gave one to my grandma and the other one to his wife's mother, and guess which one he keeps? The one he keeps is said to be the most beautiful because the natural pattern of the wood matches every part of the sculpture, curved lines on their cheeks, wavy lines on the hem of their dress, and even spiral lines on their fingers. It sounds more holy than haunted, doesn't it?
Julia: It does. Correct.
Amanda: Now, there's a belief that Guanyin devotees are not supposed to eat beef because some say the cow is Guanyin's main boy, and some say it has something to do with the story of one of their past reincarnations. The problem is that my uncle loves beef and he doesn't know that he wasn't supposed to eat it.
Julia: Okay.
Amanda: He'd started having these dreams of Guanyin crying, tell him to stop eating beef. When he had these dreams, he started to notice a crack on the sculpture.
Julia: Oh no.
Amanda: But my uncle was stubborn. He wasn't going to stop eating something so delicious that easily.
Julia: Okay. Hold on. When a god tells you to stop eating a thing, like I love cheese, if someone I was devoted to came to me in a dream and told me to stop eating cheese, I fucking would.
Amanda: Well, Rina's uncle was stubborn and it still kept happening, so every time he had some beef, sure enough he had more dreams and the sculpture had more cracks.
Julia: Oh no.
Amanda: He ended up having to swear he would never eat beef again for the dreams and the cracks to finally stop. Fast forward to about a year after all this had happened, my uncle got drunk and ate a little bit of grilled beef.
So relatable. As someone who used to be a vegan, every time that I would get drunk, all I wanted was just pulled pork. Anyway, I never broke. Didn't lose my vegan powers until I decided to, but very relatable.
So when that happened, the cracks came back. Now he is off beef for good and no more crying or cracking Guanyin.
Julia: Good. I'm glad we appeased Guanyin.
Amanda: I'm not telling you to [inaudible 00:27:32], the Thai word meaning to believe wholeheartedly without any evidence or factual support, because the belief that Guanyin devotees are not supposed to eat beef is only practiced in southeast Asia and not in China, Tibet, or India. I don't think there's a good reason for a goddess to really cherry pick which region gets to eat beef, and the beauty of the sculpture could have come from the masterful hands of its sculptor, but I'm not really sure. What do you guys think?
Julia: I think that certain things just align and happen in a way that sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't. I don't know. I love that there's a word for something to be believed wholeheartedly and without any logical backup for it. That's very cool to me.
Amanda: Yes. Thai speakers, I did my best, and Rina gave me some pronunciation guides, but I tried.
Julia: Thank you, Rina. But yeah. I dig that story a lot. I don't know. I'm always really intrigued by stories of devotion.
Eric Schneider: I think that if a god wants to pick and choose who does what where, then I mean, that's the higher power. That's their choice. It's not for the minds of man to decide what gods want to do. That famous quote.
Amanda: That famous, beautiful, mellifluous quote. Well, thank you very much, Rina, for writing in. Let's go grab some refills and then we will get to our Spaghetti Warehouse story.
Julia, as you know, we moved last week into an office for Multitude.
Julia: We did.
Amanda: It is incredibly exciting. My body's also never been so sore. This is a true story. Got home from moving into our office carrying so many acoustical panels and boxes of equipment and computer monitors and sat down on my couch and was like, "Oh no. I have no groceries. I need to eat because I have just burned more calories than I have since running the mile in gym class in high school. What do I do?" The answer was DoorDash. I used DoorDash to order some sushi. They have all kinds of restaurants on demand, getting you meals right to your home.
Julia: And I bet the best part, too, about moving into the new office is you get a bunch of new options for DoorDash.
Amanda: Absolutely. New neighborhood means new restaurants to check out on DoorDash. There are over 310000 of them in total and they're representing in 3300 cities. So here in New York City, of course, we're spoiled, but it's in all 50 states and Canada. So no matter where you live in North America, you're going to have a DoorDash option.
Julia: That's so many states, and also provinces.
Amanda: Totally. You can actually get $5 off your first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app from your phone's app store and enter the promo code SPIRITS at checkout. That's $5 off your first order when you download the DoorDash app from the app store and enter promo code SPIRITS.
Julia: Yep, $5 off your first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and use the promo code SPIRITS at checkout.
Amanda: Thanks, DoorDash.
Julia: Amanda, I love learning. We know this.
Amanda: Yeah, you do.
Julia: I love learning. I feel like I should be a lifetime learner, and I can be because I love Skillshare and I use it all the time. Skillshare is an online learning community where you can learn and teach just about anything.
We've talked about Amanda's incredible Skillshare class already, but I have a new one to recommend for you this week, and it is Going Viral: Write Film and Make Content People Share. Sometimes you want to make stuff just for the sake of making stuff, but sometimes your side hustle has to become the thing that brings in your money. This is a great class to kind of learn how to monetize the thing that you love doing, that you love being creative about, and find a way to bring joy into making money, which God, I wish I could do more of that.
Amanda: Absolutely. That's a great point. When you're designing new stuff, you want to know what the experts suggest. Whether you decide to take their advice or not, I think it's really useful to kind of know the framework behind #content online before you decide what your next project is.
Julia: So, you can join millions of students who are already learning on Skillshare today with the special offer just for our listeners. You can get two free months of Skillshare. That's right. That's two free months of Skillshare. You get unlimited access to over 25000 classes for free. To sign up, you can go to Skillshare.com/Spirits2. Again, that is Skillshare.com/Spirits2, for two free months right now.
Amanda: We are also sponsored this week by Calm. Now, with so much airplane travel coming up, Julia, you know that obviously we love listening to podcasts, we love listening to music, but sometimes I just want to be standing in a little moment of zen in a really crowded situation. So when I am waiting in security or when I'm waiting to board a plane, I just want to forget where I am.
What's really helpful are the soundscapes that are in the Calm app. Now, you know, we have told you before, they have guided meditations. They have sleep stories, but they also have these wonderful sound designed scapes of rainstorms or jungles or just a crackling fire. It is so calming.
Julia: That sounds absolutely beautiful. I imagine that's really good for productivity and stuff like that, too. Sitting down, you just want to focus and all of a sudden you're like, "Ah, this calming rainstorm." I love a little bit of thunder, a little bit of rain pattering on the panes my window. This is the perfect moment for it. Unfortunately, it's May, so I'm not getting beautiful thunderstorms right now, but I can use my Calm app.
Amanda: You can, and you as well as all of the Spirits listeners can get 25% off of a Calm Premium subscription at Calm.com/Spirits. That's C-A-L-M dot C-O-M slash Spirits.
Julia: Yep. That is Calm.com/Spirits for 25% off your Calm Premium subscription.
Amanda: Which gets you unlimited access to all of Calm's content. I pay for Calm with my own human dollars because I really enjoy it. I really like it for sleeping, for stopping getting stressed out, for meditating, and also for these lovely little moments of zen in the airport. Thanks, Calm.
Julia: Thank you, Calm.
Amanda: And now let's get back to the show.
Eric Schneider: So we are back from the refill and we are about to dive into what happened just a few weeks ago in Akron, Ohio. Amanda, Julia, and friend of the show, Eric Silver of Join the Party and Horse joined them and came into Cleveland for the weekend. Stayed at a very spooky-
Julia: It was very haunted.
Eric Schneider: ... house for the time.
Amanda: All right. Let's talk about the house a little bit, because we didn't mention this I think in the recordings that we're going to play you.
Eric Schneider: I don't think we do. I don't think we do.
Amanda: We had booked an Airbnb near Eric's home, and then they spookily canceled on us about a week before we were supposed to arrive. So, looking at the other options, I was like, "Oh, giant Victorian mansion? It sounds like that's exactly the house that we should stay in."
Julia: It was meant to be. It's all of the things coming together to create the perfect horror movie.
Eric Schneider: This is a giant side-by-side Victorian mansion, so there's a house on one side, house on the other side, attached one building, five bedrooms over three floors, $200 a night.
Julia: Wild.
Eric Schneider: An amazing deal. An amazing deal. I mean, just really, really nice wood carvings and moldings, just straight out of Spooksville.
Julia: Some beautiful craftsmanship, for sure.
Amanda: Yeah. It was totally gorgeous, definitely very haunted. None of the doors met the door frames quite right. The floors all slanted a little bit. It was very creaky, but very pretty.
Eric Schneider: It had a bush in the front yard that was cut in the number of the year that the house was built.
Julia: I didn't notice that.
Eric Schneider: Yeah, yeah, that giant hedge bush right up front said 1901 in huge, huge bush carvings or whatever you call them.
Julia: I just completely missed that.
Eric Schneider: Topiary, I believe is the term.
Julia: That is the correct term, yes.
Amanda: Yeah. It was extremely good. Again, I was very happy with the deal that we got, patrons, using your dollars in a smart way. But we got in on a Friday. We hung out with Eric Schneider here and some other friends that we have in Cleveland. It was very, very fun.
And then on Saturday, we drove out to Akron, home of Lebron James. It was very exciting for me and I know for Eric Silver to be in that holiest of places. And then we got to Spaghetti Warehouse. We had made a reservation because we really wanted to sit in the trolley car, obviously.
Julia: Yes, we did.
Amanda: But getting there, we realized how absurd it was that we had had to do that because there were about 10 other people in the restaurant and it was like 11:45 in the morning on a Saturday.
Julia: There were 10 people in that restaurant that probably could've seated about 2000.
Amanda: Yeah, at least several hundred. It was a very big restaurant.
Julia: It's a huge restaurant.
Amanda: I totally get the warehouse vibe.
Eric Schneider: It's massive. It's just truly, truly massive. There is no décor from section to section that matches in any way.
Amanda: None at all.
Eric Schneider: It is a buck wild-
Julia: It makes no sense.
Eric Schneider: ... buck wild place.
Amanda: So why don't we play you the clip of us in the car before walking in as we kind of shared our first impressions of the restaurant.
We made it. We are here outside the Spaghetti Warehouse at exactly noon on a Saturday. There is no one here. How's everyone feeling?
Julia: Nervous.
Eric Silver: I'm so excited.
Amanda: Why? Why? Because we don't want our boy to get kidnapped again?
Julia: Yeah, I don't want him to get kidnapped again also. I just want some good spaghetti.
Eric Silver: I don't think we're in the right place for good spaghetti.
Eric Schneider: Someone said this place has a 2.5 rating on Yelp.
Julia: It does.
Eric Schneider: [inaudible 00:36:59] good.
Julia: It's because of all the ghosts.
Eric Schneider: Someone also said there's an item menu that has like three different kinds of meat. It's called pasta extravaganza or something.
Julia: Yeah, it is.
Eric Schneider: So I might go for that. We'll see. We'll see how it works out.
Julia: We might die, not from ghosts, just from an overload of meat.
Eric Silver: I feel like I've inoculated myself against everything that's happening, because I went to Olive Garden intentionally last week-
Julia: Oh, okay.
Eric Silver: ... to make sure that I had a baseline.
Julia: You built up your immunity.
Eric Silver: Exactly, and then yesterday, we've been inside of a haunted mansion-
Julia: That is true.
Eric Silver: ... since we've been in Ohio. So, I feel like spaghet-ghost is not something that's going to get me.
Julia: All right. It might not be Spaghettigeddon, but it's still going to be haunted.
Eric Schneider: I inoculated myself by taking a Pepcid AC.
Julia: Good choice. Probably should've done that.
Amanda: We also brought three witnesses. In case something happens to us, they will be here to document our tale.
Julia: They'll be silent witnesses.
Amanda: Yes, on the recording, but if you hear from them, something has gone terribly wrong.
Julia: They've uploaded this file as our last will and testament.
Amanda: All right. Any final remarks or predictions before we go in? I predict that I'm not going to eat anything because I unfortunately can't eat garlic, and I think that that is all that Spaghetti Warehouse has to offer in terms of flavor.
Julia: Yeah, that's fair.
Eric Schneider: I bet they've got just a plain cheeseburger-
Julia: Like a salad.
Eric Schneider: ... or a salad. A salad.
Amanda: A cheeseburger at the warehouse?
Eric Schneider: There's a spaghetti cheeseburger someone said [crosstalk 00:38:22]. I don't know what's on that. I have no idea-
Julia: I don't know we'll find out, though.
Eric Schneider: ... what that would be.
Eric Silver: I predict that Amanda's going to order something that she suspects doesn't have garlic on it.
Julia: And then it does.
Eric Silver: And then it's going to have garlic on it, and then I'm going to eat it.
Julia: Yep.
Amanda: All right. Let's see how it goes.
From there, we walked into the restaurant. We ordered some food. We saw the trolley car itself.
Julia: We sat in the trolley car itself.
Amanda: We did. We did. It was a little bit spooky. So this is what we saw.
Spaghetti Warehouse volume two. We have ordered our foods.
Eric Schneider: And drinks.
Julia: And drinks. We have drinks.
Amanda: I got a margarita and a cheeseburger with almost nothing on it, which you're right, there was a cheeseburger.
Julia: I got a frozen Italian lemonade because it seemed refreshing. It is.
Amanda: A boozy lemonade.
Julia: Yes, it is a boozy lemonade. There's like Absolut Lemon or something in there. I don't know. It doesn't matter.
Amanda: What did you get to eat?
Julia: I got a Caesar salad because I ate a big old crepe right before we came here.
Eric Schneider: I got a ... I think it was called a spaghetti mule. No, warehouse mule, a warehouse mule for my drink, and a spaghetti feast for my lunch, which is spaghetti, meatballs, Italian sausage, and garlic bread. It is too much.
Eric Silver: I got water, and I got the lasagna that was known as the all-time guest favorite, so I have to go with the masses and really just see what all that's about. There are 15 layers. I'm going to count all of them.
Eric Schneider: Now, do you think those are layers of pasta or layers of sauce, cheese ... sauce, a cheese layer. Are each of those a different layer? What do you think is a layer?
Julia: I think it encompasses all layers, so it's like one, noodle, two, cheese.
Amanda: That doesn't count.
Julia: Three, meat.
Eric Silver: No, I think that's what it is. I can't imagine it's 15 layers of noodles. That's a full box of lasagna.
Eric Schneider: I mean, I fully agree. I was just wondering what your thoughts were.
Eric Silver: Yes. I think I'm going with the rational thing. So we're in the-
Julia: Trolley.
Eric Silver: We're in the trolley.
Amanda: Oh yes. Importantly, we're in the trolley. I'm just confused who this restaurant is for. There is a lot of Americana, like grandpa, grandma décor, and also, clearly this is for kids because there's two froggers in the trolley.
Julia: And also board games.
Eric Silver: It's a board game section.
Eric Schneider: Operation is just sitting at the front of the trolley car.
Julia: There's a bucket full of chalk.
Eric Schneider: Oh yeah. There's a chalk-
Eric Silver: Hey, was that there when we sat down?
Eric Schneider: Yep.
Amanda: There are some mysterious smudges next to Schneider's head. I think that was probably a baby standing up on the ledge, but we documented it just in case, and we will report back. I will also say, it is noticeably hotter in the trolley than elsewhere, and as soon as we sat down, I was like, "Oh wow. It's very hot. Also, it's very cold," and I got weird goosebumps.
Julia: Because you're sitting in a ghost.
Eric Silver: There are heaters in the trolley, but nowhere else in here.
Eric Schneider: There is a non-zero chance that this trolley car when it was in operation did run over someone.
Eric Silver: Oh no.
Julia: That's why it's haunted.
Eric Schneider: So it's very possible that just the victims of this trolley car are haunting it. That's my theory.
Eric Silver: Listen, obviously, when they got the trolley car, they were just like, "You know what? Jimothy, you can run the heater."
Amanda: All right. We're here for the post-game analysis. Everyone immediately wants to take a nap.
Eric Schneider: I feel good. I feel great. I ate my feast. I ate half my feast, which was a very symmetrical meal. I had-
Amanda: Please say more.
Eric Schneider: So on the left and right side, you've got a piece of garlic bread and then on the top part, you've got two meatballs. Bottom part, you've got sausage, and then you've got a big thing of spaghetti right in the middle. I ate half of it, and it was quite tasty. It was quite tasty. I mean, not impressive by any means, but it did its job. Filled me up.
Amanda: I must say, I feel like Sarah Koenig here holding a microphone toward you in a public place. It's very surprising.
Eric Silver: In Cleveland, for that matter.
Amanda: This is true. Julia, how was your gigantic Caesar salad?
Julia: I ate about a third of it. It was on par with most chain brand Caesar salads that I've had. It was fine. It was a little warm.
Amanda: Ugh, not a quality I look for in my Caesars, unless it's warm chicken on top of a cold Caesar.
Julia: Yeah, no, not what I meant.
Amanda: I had a deeply well-done hamburger. Deeply well-done. I must say, overall, this does feel like a spot that ... Oh, okay.
Eric Silver: Wow.
Amanda: Mr. Silver, how was your lasagna? Also, why are you here?
Eric Silver: First of all, I'm the one who documented the first spaghost reckoning in the first place. Also, I was here in the beginning of this interview. You just kind of ignored me. I think I was possessed, because I don't remember eating the lasagna, and then all of a sudden it was not there. So I don't know if some spell came over me, but now all of a sudden there's nothing on my plate. There were only seven layers of pasta, I will also say.
Julia: Also, your lasagna came with a small Italian flag on it, and now it's gone. Did you also eat it?
Eric Silver: No, I put it somewhere.
Amanda: It is here under the plates that I have condensed.
Eric Silver: No, it's not.
Amanda: Wait It's under my second bun because I could not eat the full bun. I could do it. It was too dry. Everything was so dry, so dry. That's the true haunting.
Eric Schneider: We need to talk about these windows that are inside of the building leading into a different part of the building.
Amanda: Please say more.
Eric Schneider: They look like just two intertwined penises. It's like two just ... I mean, I guess more like just a double-
Eric Silver: Oh, they do look like peens.
Eric Schneider: More like a double-ended dildo, kind of just two double-ended dildos just wrapped around each other.
Amanda: Yeah, it's true, like layered like an artistic piece.
Julia: It's actually a summoning ritual for just horny ghosts.
Amanda: Horny lesbian ghosts, which sounds like an interesting opportunity for us, because as we learned today, there are four times as many closed spaghetti restaurants as there are open ones, which is extremely tragic.
Julia: So sad.
Eric Schneider: I mean, I feel like it's more of [inaudible 00:44:43] for mankind than a tragedy.
Eric Silver: It is so hot.
Julia: I'm very cold.
Eric Silver: Because you're next to the window. I'm in the middle [crosstalk 00:44:54].
Eric Schneider: It is weird because me and Julia are sitting next to a literal window because we're in the trolley car, and you do kind of every so often get a breeze, even though nothing is moving.
Amanda: So maybe-
Julia: It's the ghosts.
Amanda: Maybe the source of the haunting is that there is poor temperature regulation in here.
Eric Schneider: I'm pretty sure the first haunting that we documented on in an urban legends episode was near a piano, though. So, I mean, I don't even see a piano in here.
Amanda: No. There is a skeeball. There is maybe a jukebox. But overall, I would give Spaghetti Warehouse like a 3 out of 10 on the haunting scale. I think there's enough old stuff that I definitely see how it happens. The food certainly was not for the living.
Eric Schneider: I saw your burger, Amanda. I was just like, "Oh man."
Julia: It looked like it went through the pits of hell.
Amanda: You know what's not there? Salmonella.
Julia: That's true.
Eric Schneider: It's true. You definitely won't get sick. You definitely won't get sick from that burger.
Eric Silver: That's true. Your food likes you eat and then you automatically are in Hades' indentured servitude for like 10 years.
Eric Schneider: I mean, just as good, just as good.
Eric Silver: It's fine. It's good.
Eric Schneider: I like that this place just has a very ... It doesn't have any particular one vibe, but it does feel like this chain started in the 1940s and did not evolve past that except for one random thing every decade.
Eric Silver: Why did my lasagna have an Italian flag in it?
Eric Schneider: I mean, I think the question is why didn't my feast-
Eric Silver: But everything did.
Amanda: Yeah. Why is that the most Italian of foods? I don't know.
Eric Silver: I don't know. Who can say?
Amanda: Was it a leaning tower of pasta? Is that why, perhaps, perhaps?
Julia: You did point out that your lasagna was garnished with additional pasta.
Eric Silver: That's true. There was extra pasta next to the lasagna, so who even knows?
Eric Schneider: I think the Yelp reviewers got it right with the two and a half.
Julia: Yeah, that's about right.
Amanda: Yes. This place has two and a half stars on Yelp. We've also noticed that there is a brand of soda served here called Norka, which as Mr. Silver pointed out, is Akron spelled backward. The subheading here on this explanational placard is, "An Akron icon comes back to life."
Julia: So the soda's haunted.
Amanda: Ooh.
Eric Silver: It's a ghost, soda. A polter-
Eric Schneider: The service has been completely fine here, but the food is definitely just nothing, nothing.
Julia: Our server is very nice. I just saw that dripping again for like the fifth time.
Amanda: Julia, say more about the dripping.
Julia: Well, we're sitting in the trolley car and there's a row of tables next to the windows next to us. I just saw it drip again. It looks like it's coming from a rusty pipe. It's definitely not ectoplasm, because it looks like the fire pipes or something like that.
Amanda: As old buildings want to do. Fair enough.
Julia: This building was built in 1874, I think.
Amanda: Yeah. This is among the oldest of the Spaghetti Warehouses currently in operation in terms of the original structure built in the 1870s.
Eric Schneider: We cannot explain enough how large this place is. I expected-
Julia: We're also like the only people in here.
Eric Schneider: But I expected it to be a normal-sized restaurant. It is massive. It is so large.
Amanda: It's almost like it was a former warehouse.
Eric Silver: It was a former warehouse. I feel like this is a place that someone would buy but put in a cryptocurrency company and be like, "Oh yeah, in the middle of nowhere, the industrial district, I bought this warehouse and now I'm going to make ghost coins."
Amanda: Ooh.
Eric Silver: Pastabits. Pasta with a Z.
Amanda: More like a bite coin, am I right?
Eric Silver: Oh no, Amanda, the microphone-
Amanda: To the tooth, al dente.
Julia: Oh no, the ghosts are dragging Amanda away.
Eric Silver: Oh no, no, the battery's low. Ah!
Amanda: Well, if we ever make it back, we will ... No, no.
Eric Schneider: I'm going to be asleep forever.
Amanda: Thank you, conspirators, for bringing us to the Spaghetti Warehouse. I feel like I have investigated the myth. I have not proved anything conclusively, and I look forward to hearing more of your urban legends from the comfort of my own couch.
Julia: Yes, please. Thank you.
Amanda: So remember.
Eric Schneider: Stay pasta.
Eric Silver: Stay al dente.
Julia: Stay creepy.
Amanda: Stay cool.
You may notice at some point that Eric just kind of cut himself off in the middle of a sentence, because the waiter was approaching and as if eight grown adults at a Spaghetti Warehouse at noon on a Saturday by themselves with no children weren't conspicuous enough, we also had microphones out. So we had to quickly put them away.
Eric Schneider: So that was our trip to Spaghetti Warehouse flush with food reviews and everything, but on the way out, we saw an old timey fortune telling machine that we all inserted our quarter into, and surprisingly, it didn't just say podcaster.
Julia: Yeah. What did everyone get?
Eric Schneider: So do we all remember what we got? I think I got adventurer.
Julia: I definitely got adventurer, as well.
Amanda: I don't think I used it because I didn't want to touch it.
Julia: Okay. That's fair.
Eric Schneider: Someone else got banker, I believe.
Amanda: Oh no.
Julia: Yeah. One of our friends got politics.
Eric Schneider: Yes. Yeah. It was just kind of ... It didn't seem like it had the exact right rhythm of who we were, but that wrapped up our whole adventure at Spaghetti Warehouse, and then we headed over to a brewery right around the corner from it and we hung out with eight or so of our listeners, which was a blast, so thanks to all of you guys that came out from pretty much all around Ohio. People came up from Cleveland, where we were, but down south. Someone drove like two hours, which is just like amazing, just for a meetup and not a show or anything.
Amanda: Yeah. It was super, super fun. I'm glad that I saw the warehouse in action. I really continue to appreciate all of the tweets and emails that people send us with their local Spaghetti Warehouses. I do think it would be fun to visit other ones. We were reading ... What was it, Julia ... the one in Houston that seemed pretty massive or pretty old?
Julia: Yeah, the Houston one. There's the Austin one, which is the original pharmacy, the pharmacist who died in the elevator shaft.
Amanda: Yes. If you conspirators have not heard the full spaghost chronicles, about a year and a half ago on our second anniversary, Eric Silver wrote a very entertaining five episode arc where we totally realistically and not in fiction whatsoever rescue Eric Schneider here from the spaghost. So you can go to SpiritsPodcast.com. Click the episode tab and then click spaghost as the tag, and it will let you browse all those episodes.
Julia: It's well worth your time.
Amanda: It is. Our next patron goal, Schneider mentioned, is buying a goddamn haunted castle, which if you don't think I will do, you don't know me very well.
Julia: That's true.
Amanda: So thank you, patrons, for your ongoing support. You make this possible. We love you deeply. Remember-
Julia: Stay creepy.
Amanda: Stay cool.
Eric Schneider: Stay pasta.
Amanda: Thanks again to our sponsors. DoorDash is the fast, convenient food delivery app. Get $5 off your first order of $15 or more when you download the DoorDash app and enter promo code SPIRITS at checkout.
Skillshare is an online learning community where you can learn and teach just about anything. Go to Skillshare.com/Spirits2 to get two months of Skillshare Premium for free.
And Calm is the number one app to help you reduce your anxiety and stress and sleep better. Get 25% off a Calm Premium subscription at Calm.com/Spirits.
Spirits was created by Amanda McLoughlin, Julia Schifini, and Eric Schneider, with music by Kevin McLeod and visual design by Allyson Wakeman.
Julia: Keep up with all things creepy and cool by following us @SpiritsPodcast on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Tumblr. We also have all of our episode transcripts, guest appearances, and merch on our website, as well as a form to send us your urban legends at SpiritsPodcast.com.
Amanda: Join our member community on Patreon, Patreon.com/SpiritsPodcast, for all kinds of behind-the-scenes stuff. Just $1 gets you access to audio extras with so much more available, too. Recipe cards, director's commentaries, exclusive merch, and real, physical gifts.
Julia: We are a founding member of Multitude, a collective of independent audio professionals. If you like Spirits, you will love the other shows that live on our website at Multitude.productions.
Amanda: And above all else, if you liked what you heard today, please share us with your friends. That is the very best way to help us keep on growing.
Julia: Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.