Lucille’s Late Night Snack Shack | CreepCast

37:22I laid there staring at the ceiling, that taste keeping me just on the edge of sleep until the rising sun bathed the room in a pale yellow glow. I skipped breakfast that morning. My stomach had decided to riot against what I had done last night. Marcus looked at me with some concern. Are you feeling okay? You usually never skip breakfast on Pancake Day. I am vibing with the story, but Pancake Day is another millennialism. I'm telling you, man, we're in it. At least it's consistent. I'll give it that. It is not a temporary guest that it is here to stay. You usually never skip breakfast on Pancake Day.

38:04Like, all right. I smiled weakly as I grabbed my keys off the counter and pecked him on the cheek. Sorry, babe. My stomach was a little upset last night and I don't want to risk anything too heavy. I'll just grab a granola bar before I go to work. He didn't seem placated, but he nodded and tucked into his pancakes as I slipped out the door. My hands, which I had been trying to keep steady in front of Marcus, shook as I put the key into the ignition. Even after my minty exorcism, I could still taste the content of the lamp warmth a great flavor all the undertones that somehow made warm grape flavoring not completely gross the softness of the wax i shuddered thinking that maybe a pancake or two might have helped to overpower the taste but it was too late for that now i drove to work blasting the local generic pop station and trying to focus on the day ahead instead of the night prior again it's so it's so well written like a private shame that you have to keep yourself it's about drinking a lava lamp well i kind of like how also tasty a lava lamp sounds too like i would not expect any of those you know what i mean but it's like i believe that it would you know it kind of just makes you question how much money would it take for you to drink a lava lamp god dude nothing that's like fuck no it wouldn't kill you it's just wax and water what right really that's it I thought I thought I don't know why I thought it was chemicals and stuff the water may have some light chemicals in it for preservation but it's nothing deadly you'll probably get a stomach ache but that'd be it I don't know why my fat ass dude I'd feel like I would I'd buckle I'd buckle under a lava lamp now there's a dollar amount if someone came up and was like here's a million dollars to drink a lava lamp yes so that So that means there's a price between zero and a million.

39:54I mean, like maybe, maybe a thousand dollars. That is way closer to zero than a million. Still my price. It would need to be at least for me to finish a lava lamp. It needs to be more than 10 grand. I feel like I, I feel like I could see probably hidden it for a thousand. You're not, not just even a thousand, not a thousand. No, no, not a thousand. No. Uh, 10 grand. Yes. Not a thousand. I like how it's like, well, a million dollars. You know what? One thousand dollars. Well, you throw it a million. I was like, well, God damn. I mean, yeah, I will. But then I kept thinking about it. I'm like, realistically, also, I don't know the size of it.

40:36But if someone's like, I have a thousand dollars. Do you want to drink this lava lime for a thousand dollars? I mean, I think a lot of, I think, I think I might. I think I probably could, even if I would be nervous. I'd just be nervous that the wax or whatever would get caught in my throat. and I'd be like because it's not going to be like as smooth as like an egg yolk. You know what I mean? Even though that's what it looks like. I feel like it'd get like hard in my throat. So I've got a lava lamp here and actually looking at the size of it this is comparable to a large water bottle. You know they do just have a screw cap on top.

41:08What color is your lava lamp?

41:20that wax does look pretty soft

41:25I've never thought about the logistics of eating one of these oh my god are you doing it Isaiah are you doing it no I'm not going to do it I'm just saying looking at it right now even if you don't even if you don't drink the whole thing would you take a swig take a swig on camera for us would you no I feel like it's bad I think I have to break it this is like a pop cap bottle top instead of a screw I think I'd have to break it to do that what what chemicals are lava lamps lava lamps contain two primary components a dense colored paraffin wax the surrounding liquid usually water propylene glycol or mineral oil oh yeah you'd be fine with all those you shouldn't take a lot of propylene glycol but you'd be fine uh solvents it's used in food preservative and stuff like that so yeah you'd be you would you could eat a lava lamp no problem then okay i need to i need to stop thinking of it okay i'm gonna continue all right work was a mess which i was eternally grateful for the servers were still acting wonky and the ensuing chaos totally distracted me from any untoward thoughts about lava lamps.

42:44I was too busy trying to figure out how to process patient information without my computer betraying me to be worried about weird urges. I was going to stay put past my shift like last time, but my manager sent me packing, telling me that I looked like hell. I wasn't about to argue. As I drove home, I kept a lookout for that freaky snack place. I saw it just where it had been before. Same rundown building and all. The open sign was off, thank God. Still, a little twinge in my gut as I passed it, like I would have stopped if I could have. I could taste the liquid on my tongue again, and my mouth started to water in response.

43:26I put my foot on the gas and sped to Chick-fil-A to pick up dinner for me and Marcus. There's nothing quite like the sweet chicken of Jesus to cleanse a tainted palate. after that that the jesus chicken thing that's also millennial coded you know what nothing wrong with it dude nothing wrong with it i'm not saying i'm not saying that i'm just saying referring to it as jesus chicken is a millennial beat for sure after an eight-piece nugget mill some white wine and the affection of a very grateful marcus i was feeling more or less myself again drifted off comfortably in a light haze of alcohol and pleasure around 11 p.m did it wait didn't you do a chick-fil-a ranking and you put the fries low or something like that no i put i i put chick-fil-a really high i'm pretty sure i think that we haven't talked about expected it to be high we've done sandwiches that's what it was that's what it was the hunger hit around three i felt the awful clenching in my stomach before i was even fully awake I tossed and turned until my eyes snapped awake, the forbidden taste of the lava lamp filling my mouth faster than my own drool.

44:41Marcus snored next to me, completely oblivious to my torment. I checked the alarm out of the corner of my eye. The number 213 was illuminated with the purple light of the lamp, which was doing nothing to help with my craving. Shit, so much for getting a good night's sleep. I snuck down to the kitchen and opened the fridge. We were well stuck thanks to the convenience of the Kroger right across the street, but nothing in there appealed to me. I knew what I really wanted, but I attempted to silence the urge with a few cookies and a glass of milk. It made me feel okay for a few minutes, but as soon as I climbed back into bed, the craving hit me again at full force.

45:23I sat there fighting back tears as the little voice in my head told me what I needed to do. He told me to get inside my car, drive to the snack bar, and get myself a bottle of the good stuff. It was either that or down the lamp by my bedside. I didn't want to. I really, really didn't want to. But at the same time, I just knew that I'd go crazy if I didn't. So I threw on a coat, hopped in my car, and took off. Peeling out of the neighborhood before I had a chance to change my mind. even as i was driving i tried to reason with myself still had options even at this ridiculous hour i could go to taco bell i could go to a gas station and load up on regular human snacks hell i could even try to hit up one of my friends for late night munchies although they probably wouldn't have appreciated such late company anything would have been better than pulling up to that store grabbing an armful of lava lamps and standing at the register in my pajamas, being judged by that bored redhead with the lethal nails.

46:28You can guess, of course, which one of these things I actually did. I threw in a Twinkie like that would make me feel less bad, but instead just made me feel like even more of a weirdo. I started to hustle out of the store with my haul when I nearly bumped into someone on my way out. This episode is sponsored by Tushy. Tushy is the luxury bidet that your bathroom has been missing. Tushy e-bidets instantly modernize your daily routines and bring maximum comfort during the trips to the bathroom when you're taking a stinky stinky wet shit i blast water in my asshole and it feels great and it cleans it it's awesome i like how cold the water is i like when my asshole gets frostbite i love using tissue because it gives you two in one benefits reducing irritation and preventing micro tears while using less toilet paper which is great for my hemorrhoids that's the size of like a green a green apple jelly or a green apple jolly rancher it's so i don't have to press on it my fingers because it's hard that's actually true i'm in joe i actually started using bidets because of that i'd wipe my ass and it'd be so hard it was disgusting but what's weird about hemorrhoids is they literally it'll pop out and be angry and then all of a sudden it's like and it goes away so now when i wipe my ass there's no hard jelly ranger it's cleaner healthier and saves your money in the long run that's because with tushy you use up to 80 less toilet paper and less toilet paper means less clogged toilets and less gross bathroom experiences other thing that i really like about tushy is that it's really easy to use you can sit turn a knob clean your asshole and dry it using the built-in air dryer plus tushy bidets go on easy in 10 minutes or less over existing toilets no power tools needed restore your balance to your bathroom and get the bidet everyone is talking about tushy enjoy spotless clean where it matters most and make going to the bathroom in the most comfortable thing you do all day for a limited time our listeners get 10 off their first bidet order when you use code creepcast at checkout that's 10 off your first bidet order at hellotushy.com with promo code creepcast thank you tushy for sponsoring this episode now back to this episode startled i looked up to see a stranger also in their pajamas looking as flustered and embarrassed as i probably looked she mumbled something that might have been a greeting then pushed past me with her head down and made a beeline for the back room i left the store still feeling sick but also a little bit vindicated at least i wasn't the only person in this town with a problem I drove home to the soft music of the lamps clinking around in their paper bag, almost lulling me to sleep now that my panic had faded.

48:50I didn't bother bringing them into the house this time. I gulped them all down, one by one, right there in the car. The taste was absolutely indescribable. Blue, red, green, purple. they all tasted vaguely of fruit but also something deeper like the notes and wine i've heard so much about never had the palate to taste and the wax it was heaven on earth i finished all four of the lamps and wiped my lips totally satisfied twinkies had abandoned among the empty glasses shame that i felt that first night was weirdly absent the first time had been a curious mistake this time it was an act of choice and i had no other option than to own it you're talking about this being like a sexual kind of thing but i i keep it almost keeps reading to me like a drug use or something it's like a drug use or like a food addiction you know people who are like you know trying to lose weight and they're really big but they hide food from their family and stuff like that.

50:01And, um, they don't eat with the family because they're claiming that they don't have a problem, but then they binge by themselves and stuff like that. Uh, it reads like a lot of addiction, like a lot of addiction that derives from pleasure. I shoved the empty lamps in my glove compartment for lack of a better disposal idea and went upstairs and brush the taste and smell of their contents out of my mouth. I crawled back into bed with a snoring Marcus and pretty soon I drifted off easy as ever. I really wish I could tell you that that was the last time I went, that my curiosity had been sated and I had purged whatever sick urges I'd had for my body with that last bench, but I didn't.

50:43I found myself back there again and again, sometimes in my work clothes, sometimes in my pajamas, but always late at night and always, always unbearably thirsty. i veered for my usual snacks sometimes just to see what they were like the flavors of these things were so hard to describe every single thing tasted like an approximation of what it would taste like in real life dirt was earthy and gritty the richness of the mineral varying by type and giving each variety a depth of flavor more complex than anything a world-famous chef could whip up. Cleaning supplies were acidic with a sharp chemical smell capable of curling your nose hairs, but a milder fruity taste could overpower the less desirable parts of the experience, not unlike strong booze.

51:36Legos were horribly bland and only fun to eat because of the colors and sizes. I never knew why those went as quickly as they did. I avoided the teeth entirely, but I could see from the fluctuating level in the jar that they were a popular item. despite my experimentation the lava lamps my sweet tacky saviors were always my number one go-to i would walk out of that store with at least a couple of lamps clinking together in my brown paper bag my satisfaction overpowering my guilt that line right there drives home that a lot my satisfaction overpowering my guilt yeah the uh her also trying all the different stuff is surprising too i almost thought that she would only stick with the lovelace but it's almost like uh just testing everything now like it's just so the addiction has spread so much it's kind of like what you said about drug addiction like typically heavy drug addicts will try whatever they can get their hands on right it's weird what do you think the psychological effect of this story so far is with because if you just did this the psychological effect is i am now looking at my lava lamp in a new line yeah now i'm like okay well maybe this is good no i'm wondering you you could do this story again and literally it's i stopped on the side of the road and i picked up crack like you could that would be that would be the same story yeah right then you go back to the drug dealer for my nursing shift and i saw the crack bag on the side of the road yeah yeah but you know what i mean like like it's you could replace this immediate with drugs it would be the same kind of story of hiding it i wonder what doing it could be like like it's it's very intentional being like lava lamp going specifically like fabuloso legos i'm wondering i'm wondering does that disarm does that disarm the threat of what it is like it's gross but if it's do you do is it supposed to be a thing where we're sympathizing with the person of like well this is just a weird tick it's not like it's bad you know what i mean does that make sense i think i think the addiction metaphor is pretty fitting and i think that's what is being implied by the author like you know sure it's weird to up that anyone can fall prey to addiction.

53:46I'm wondering if the psychological thing, though, of just making it like normal objects has like I was saying, like a psychological effect of like, it makes the viewer not as like not as judgmental as wrong, but you don't think it's as much of a threat I guess. Yeah, you see it as something odd instead of something dangerous. Yeah. I don't know. Just that was interesting. It's kind of like, I mean, honestly the way people view food addiction a lot where it's like, yeah, it's food. You know, like, what's their problem? Just stop eating as much. But similar to any other addiction, like, people with addictive personality types can fall into it and stuff like that.

54:22It's easier said than done. Yeah. I wasn't the only one either. I had some company during some of my late-night snack runs. Sometimes someone would be wringing out a bottle of Fabuloso while another person picked through the rocks to find ones that looked appetizing. Sedimentary was a favorite of one of my neighbors, who never acknowledged me whenever we made fleeting eye contact. In fact, no matter how many people were in the store, the place was always dead silent. The regular snacks in the front remained so unpopular, I was sure that some of those wrappers were collecting a fine layering of dust.

54:57A tea or a soda would sometimes disappear, presumably to wash whatever horrible junk they had purchased from the back down, but that was the extent of it. Through it all, the cashier with fire engine red hair and scary nails sat impassively at the register, ringing out all us freaks without outward judgment. I had begun to suspect that she was none other than Lucille herself, but I never got the courage to ask. I would just pay for my stuff, dip my head in an awkward half-nod, and be on my way. If there wasn't another customer behind me, her eyes would follow me all the way to the door. Marcus began to notice the frequency of my late-night trips.

55:37He didn't say anything outright at first, but I could tell that he was regarding me with a little suspicion and more than a little concern. I wasn't ever gone long enough to justify any worries about an affair, but I was increasingly furtive and distant. I didn't want to hide it from him, but I also didn't want my husband to know I was a lava lamp guzzling weirdo. Still, it weighed on me, and my guilt seeped through my actions and words. Eventually, he set me down after we had an unusually quiet evening of pizza and game shows. Babe. He started, then stopped, looking down at his bare feet. I knew him well enough to know that he'd start and stop and start and stop again whenever he had to talk about something serious, but I didn't have the patience to deal with it.

56:24A nod of dull anger was beginning to form in my stomach, right next to where my unusual hunger sat. I know. This is about where I've been going. I snapped. As soon as I said it, I shut my mouth with an audible click, ashamed of my reaction. He looked at me as if I just slapped him. Jesus, babe, calm down. His voice wavering. I'd never been the type to get too upset, especially about something like this. I took a deep breath through my nose and blew it out slowly, willing myself to calm down. Sorry, I've just been pulling a lot of long hours at work. I'm just a little on edge. It was technically the truth.

57:03I'd been leaving later and later, but only because I was distracted and not getting enough work done on time. My manager had yet to say anything about it, probably because I'd seen her at Lucille's to the plastic bag labeled baby cheeks and black Sharpie. Eww. Jesus. My gosh. Eww. The occasional lateness of our paycheck indicated that she was experiencing the same issues I was, so she wasn't about to point the finger. Marcus seemed to accept my work explanation. dropped the subject and started talking about his upcoming business trip i could tell that my outburst had scared him a little and it tore me up inside to think that i made the love of my life feel that way but there's nothing i could do about it now i decided to quit going to the store again back to the addiction thing hurting family members your boss suspecting it but not being able to like call you out stuff like that the connections are pretty numerous i decided to quit going to the store.

57:58Consuming whatever the hell was in those lava lamps probably wasn't good for me, physically or mentally, and I didn't want my secret driving a wedge between Marcus and I. I started taking a different route to and from the hospital so I wouldn't have to pass the store and bought a ton of my favorite snacks from my pre-Lucille days so I would have something to munch on in case I got cravings. I thought that it would be easier, like going on a diet for bikini season or drinking a little less coffee. Reality was much, much crueler. The first thing to go was sleep. I couldn't fall asleep for the life of me, and when I did, I'd only get an hour or two in before I woke up in sweat, shaking.

58:39I lost focus at work and started making mistake after mistake. Mistakes that I took out on my co-workers due to my increased irritability. My skin had started turning dry and dull, and my eyes were constantly red. If I had been worried about my relationship with Marcus, cutting out the lamp certainly wasn't helping. We were fighting on a weekly basis about the littlest things, and I was always too wrapped up in my own suffering to realize how rational I was being. My breaking point came one day when I was sitting in bed, crying after getting into yet another fight with Marcus. Through my blurred vision, I could see my faithful lava lamp, wax floating gently through the purple glowing water.

59:20Without even thinking about it, I grabbed it, started to undo the cap, ready to down it like I had done with so many others like it. If the plug hadn't popped out of the socket and turned the lamp off, I may very well have attempted it. I sat with the hot, dull lamp in my hands, shoulders shuddering as I cried even harder over what had happened to me. something was really really wrong with me and i knew who might have some answers i drove to lucille's late night snack bar for the first time in weeks going nearly twice the speed limit my rage was accelerated by a clear and attainable target and i stormed into that dingy shop buoyed by my righteous fury my target looked up from her magazine at me a sort of fear or excitement registering in her eyes.

1:00:08She chewed lazily on what I was beginning to suspect was not gum at all. I walked up to the counter and slammed my hands down in front of her. Tell me what the hell you're putting in those freakish snacks! She looked at me blankly for a second, then smiled. I don't know what you mean, honey. Her voice sounded like someone taught a garbage disposal how to talk. It set my teeth on edge and took all the wind out of my sails. I tried to collect myself and lay into her again. You know damn well what I mean. She continued to smile, but closed her magazine and focused the full brunt of her gaze on me.

1:00:42I don't make the snack, sugar. I just sell them to y 'all as is, just at a discount, because I'm a generous woman. I'm just trying to make a living just like anyone else, you know what I mean? She smiled wider, and I could see what she had between her teeth. Yeah, that was definitely not gum. I swallowed hard and considered going home with my tail between my legs, but I still wanted answers. This stuff! This stuff, though! You have to be lying! It's fucking rocks and poison! No one can eat that! She cocked her head to one side. But you do. But everyone does. I just make it a little easier to swallow is all.

1:01:28Her smile never wavered as she spoke, even though her voice deteriorated and became less and less easy to understand. The pupils of her eyes distorted until it looked like I was staring down a goat. Her nails extended and retracted like a cat's claws, and I saw the faintest flicker of a forked tongue before I backed away, certain that she wasn't human. And since I had been greedily sucking down whatever she'd been giving me, not so sure I was one anymore. Just before I reached the door, she returned to her normal state and winked at me before returning to her magazine. I climbed back into my car, shaking.

1:02:05When I reached into my purse to grab my keys, I heard a familiar clink. Purple lamp with pink wax, sticking slightly out of the paper bag with a note that read, This one's on the house. I didn't question how they'd gotten there. I think that I had always known there was something not right about that place. But I was too driven by curiosity to listen to my instincts. And now, I was paying the price. i drove back in silence knowing full well what i should do and what i do instead i like that again it's like a dealer who's like oh no just take another hit just get back into it yeah and it's that last line i knew what i should do and what i would do almost like uh i mean it's like a new way like a different take on doing a deal with the devil kind of deal you know i mean yeah yeah like the fort tongue's obviously devilish but it also makes me think of that this is some like a troll almost.

1:03:02There's some folklore creature I'm trying to think of that I can't remember right now, but like a shapeshifter. Yeah, some kind of weird. Yeah, some kind of like, not goblin, but some kind of weird folkish demon kind of thing. I reached a kind of equilibrium after that night. I was broken, and the best I could do was work around my brokenness the best way I knew how. I resumed my nightly snack runs, taking care to be sneakier about it than I used to be. I just downed my lamps in the car outside the store in the dead of night, looking for all the world like the attic I had become. I'd chuck all the tubes in the dumpster and go on my way, leaving my crimes and my dignity behind me.

1:03:44My mood stabilized, and I was back to my normal, agreeable self with a few slight caveats. I had a bevy of excuses ready for my late-night trips, not that I needed them anymore. Marcus had stopped asking I thought that he had just let it go but one night when I pulled up to the store I saw his car parked outside I skipped my binge for that night he never told me I never asked we shared the rest of our lives together and we indulged in our shame alone our relationship was a ghost of what it had been but we were limping along and that's all we could expect to do I really like that detail yeah that's yeah that's that's tragic but man like like if this is a metaphor for addiction it's like everyone it's like you could imagine everyone in the town visitors visits the store just at different times and they're all ashamed of it but everyone carries their own private shame that's really cool also not even be able to talk also like the the the description that it's across the street from a church right it feels very much so like uh the the heaven or hell like the duality between the two things, you know, to give in to your lust, your temptation, or to reject it.

1:04:57Right. I tried to tell myself all kinds of things. I wasn't actually doing anything bad to my body. I was perfectly fine, really. I was in peak physical condition other than my weird sleep schedule and my perpetually shitty mood. Besides, I wasn't like those other freaks buying teeth and other human body parts. My cravings were totally benign. There were days that I could ignore my cravings, and that allowed me to pretend I was still in total control. I lied to myself like this until the day it all fell apart. That was the day that Lucille's late night snack bar closed down. I'd gotten off work late and was heading to Lucille's to pick up my usual, but when I pulled into the gravel parking lot, I noticed that the neon open sign wasn't on.

1:05:42Not only was it not on, it wasn't even there. I sat in my car, trying not to panic. Maybe the sign was broken, or she was getting a new one. I staggered out of my car and peered through the window. Nothing. The whole store was empty. No jars of Twizzlers, no gumball machines, no fridges full of soda, not even a wrapper left on the ground. The whole place was cleared out like nothing was even there. I leaned my forehead against the glass and fogged up the window, muttering, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, to myself like that would do anything to help me. I heard footsteps creaking up the stairs behind me, and I turned to see Marcus standing there, no doubt here to make his own late night run as well.

1:06:28I opened my mouth to speak, but the only thing that came out was a choked sob. He pulled me into his arms and hugged me tight and I gripped his jacket for dear life, knowing that without Lucille's, it would soon slip away. It didn't take very long for us, the addicts, to start breaking down. We started receiving patient after patient in the hospital suffering from poisonings. They'd ingest common household cleaners and sometimes even drain fluid. Some of them made it, more didn't. I heard whispers of people walking into dentist offices having broken their teeth to try to eat rocks one report on the news said a dental assistant was arrested for pulling patients teeth without clearing the procedure with the dentist first and storing them in a jar the reporters said that they didn't have a motive for such a bizarre crime but i knew i knew it from the trembling of my hands the bags under my eyes and the glow of the lava lamp that i couldn't bring myself to get rid of don't remember how much I needed to.

1:07:30Soon, the children started coming in. You know how your creepy aunt said she wanted to gobble you up when you were a little kid? Apparently, Lucille had capitalized on that urge, too. Kids with huge bite marks, some with entire chunks of their flesh missing, started to fill up our emergency room. The number of single-digit ages I was having to punch into the system was wearing thin on my already threadbare sanity. eventually i quit with little ability i had left to do my job evaporated after i looked over my desk and saw my manager's catatonic husband holding an infant with half its face gone jesus oh gosh just chewed on her child's face oh man i lost marcus one month after lucille shut down and one week after i quit i came home one day to find him lying on the floor of the kitchen and nothing but his boxers, a caulk gun clutched in his blue-tipped fingers.

1:08:28I called 911, sobbing into the phone, but I knew there was nothing that could be done for him. I was helping to plan his funeral instead of our wedding, and by the week's end, he was in the ground, and I was alone, staring into my lava lamp until exhaustion dragged me into sleep, night after night. The only reason I'm still here is because I received a letter in the mail a couple days ago. It was from the Lucille's Late Night Snack Bar corporate office. Apparently, despite their closing, business had been a thriving success and they expressed a desire to open more locations in other towns. I had been a loyal customer and since they heard I was recently unemployed, they were wondering if I would give opening a franchise across the state line a shot.

1:09:14And of course, I would have access to all the merchandise I wanted free of charge. I read the letter by the light of the lava lamp and then stared at the words for a long, long time. You might be driving in your hometown one day and happen to see a loose heels. It might look like mine with its rickety wooden building and the Coca-Cola sign. It might be in the shell of an abandoned Wendy's. It might look like a bodega or a mall kiosk or whatever unassuming place one can buy cheap snack from. If you do decide to go inside, only buy the items from the front of the store. Never, ever go into the back.

1:09:56And if you do go back there out of curiosity, don't pick up anything. If you do pick something up, don't buy it. And if, you idiot, you throw caution to the wind and buy it, and you see my face staring at you from across the counter, don't blame me. At least I tried to warn you.

1:10:44gingerbread or whatever you know like the that the handsome gretel whatever but it does read to me like a like a warning or like a folk tale or a grim fairy tale that's like trying to teach somebody something of like you know this addictive habit or giving into impulses but i do like this idea of like very obscure temptations that get hold of you is really really fun but that's that that fairy tale element i think works really well and i like the end it's really cute like a really cute way to end it i like the ending too and it also to go back to the addiction metaphor it's like they eventually become the dealer right um they become so sucked in by it and they lose everything else that they had going for him in life so might as well fully commit over to your addiction right so uh so quickly tragic to the story was like the uh they really they lower your defenses quite a bit with like the millennial lines and stuff and yeah the rick and morty post-revention and stuff like that you almost want to throw up from how cute it is you know like oh like i'm booping your snoot with my fry that kind of thing but it just i mean it really does nosedive into just complete darkness so quick yeah yeah it takes all of that um all of the like apprehension we had with like the lightheartedness and it's like this is a story about addiction and then my husband died of the addiction and blah blah blah well i thought yeah I thought that was fun was like, it made me throw up from that.

1:12:14But then by the end of it, I was like, Oh, can we go back to that? I'd like you guys to go back to that time. Yeah. It's like, where's the Rick and Morty posters. It's still there. The idea to you that it was addicted to buying Rick and Morty posters. The idea that it was affecting the whole community too, is not maybe not the whole community, but enough people to warrant that many hospital visits and stuff is particularly interesting. It was a very, I see the connection between this in late night in the voodoo store, because it's like, you know, it's, it preys on the thing you want to do. And they're just the seller, you know, it's like, well, you ate it.

1:12:52I'm just the person providing the goods. And I like how Lucille might've been like, she was at some point. And she's Lucille to someone else. Maybe she, like, we can't tell because the story's narrating from her perspective, but maybe she's taking on these goblin-esque qualities. he's becoming the monster in someone else's story down the road it's a really good and of course obviously the fairy tale thing at the end that if you ever see in your town this place blah blah blah the uh yeah god i just i feel that it just kept getting worse and worse like you're like oh my god do you feel like it's the lowest point and almost immediately the next paragraph is like yep so i kept doing it and it kept getting worse and you're like oh my god dude holy hell it just was really unrelenting in that way which was uh kind of an unexpected turn that i thought this was going to take because it really is such a i still think that there's something to the idea of just these like weird ticks like not making it obviously not making it so obvious like if it was just literally drugs and this isn't really much of a horror story or it isn't kind of weird it gives it like a weird fantastical like i said fantasy or fairy tale kind of quality of almost being like almost you know like a house made of candy like but this being like a room full of like obscure treats that are not traditional is just it's a very interesting way to uh do a addiction story just wouldn't have expected that it's just very very very odd it was fun yeah yeah i uh i thought this was fantastic and it was really a sleeper to me because when it started i was kind of like all right we'll see where this goes uh but the metaphor worked really well and i dug it that was a lot of fun i enjoyed it so again everyone wants to check it out shesney on reddit shesney i know you haven't written a story in six years or at least posted one but get back to it that was come on shesney enjoyed that come back to the light shesney appreciate you there's a fun one though nice little fun quick story nice little drive-by kind of story bang bang and then we're out you know it's a fun one chesney they have a bunch of other like looking at some of their other titles too they have the night my church burned down i summoned an angel an even trade all of these i'm down i'm gonna i'm always like when uh when a story's called i summon an angel it's it's it's never never good i i would love to read a story it's like i summoned an angel and it was awesome i would love one of those i'm never they're my best friend and now i believe in God and everything's great.

1:15:29Yeah. And then at that point on, life was pretty badass. The end. But that's our episode this week, guys. Well, I'm looking at this lava lamp and it is kind of appetizing. I want you to drink it, dude. Next time we see this lava lamp, it better be empty and your lips better be caked in wax. I mean, I like it. Trust me. After reading that description, I get it a bit more, but I still wouldn't call this appetizing, especially with the little wax flakes floating around in there. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, especially dude eating caulk. When it's on, I get it a lot more. It's like moving around.

1:16:12So you're saying whenever the yolks are kind of dancing for you. Yeah, whenever they're moving for me a little bit. I got to do a little dance. Why not? Okay, well guys, that's our episode. So thank you so much to our listeners here, especially you crazy sons of bitches on audio platforms like Spotify and Apple podcasts. We appreciate you and giving us a nice rating there. And of course got a shout out to patrons. Thank you so much. And until next week, guys, we will see you in the next one. Stay creeped. Bye-bye. See you in the next one.

1:16:49I can, if someone gives me a thousand dollars, I'll convince Hunter to drink this lava lamp. I think I can probably make that happen.

1:17:25bye

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