Ep. 60.5: Dear David (Part 2)
Gina (00:10)
Hello, everyone, and welcome back to I Scream You Scream. I'm And we are coming at you live, not live, because it's a podcast. But we do have a second part of a two-part episode that I'm dying to hear. So we're just going to dive right into it. Kathryn what the hell happens next?
Kathryn (00:16)
I'm Kathryn.
you
Excellent, okay, so yes, just on that note, if anyone's tuning into this before our previous episode, you do want to go back and listen to the one we posted on Tuesday. This isn't like a, you will be very lost because I'm not giving much of a recap, but the small recap I will give is back in 2017, a cartoonist in New York City was live tweeting about this haunting he was experiencing from a
Gina (00:38)
Yes.
Kathryn (00:59)
little boy ghost with a dented head named Dear David. So this is kind of where we are at this point. He's been haunted for what would that be three months through four months? I think three months since he's been tweeting but four or five months since he started experiencing the haunting. So where we left off. ⁓ I mean, that's kind of where we left off. Just go back and listen to the previous episode because I'm not gonna recount the whole thing. Okay, so this
Gina (01:12)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (01:29)
I'm just going to jump right into the tweets. This one was November 6th, so a few weeks after his previous tweet.
he literally says, this might be long, but it's like, you've been tweeting for four months straight, of course it's long. Okay. So it says, this might be long, but stick with me. Last night, I dreamed about him again. It was almost exactly the same as the first time I saw him.
Gina (01:41)
You
Kathryn (01:53)
In the dream, I saw him in a chair again. I don't have that green chair in my room anymore. This time, it was a recliner I've had for years. He was staring right at me, just like the first time. Again, I felt paralyzed, and I could barely move. But this time, something was different. I still felt mostly immobile, but I could squirm just a little bit. I felt more alert. I could move my hands somewhat. David glared at me.
I dreaded what I knew was coming. He was going to get out of the chair and come toward me like before. I had to do something. I keep my phone next to me in bed and somehow I managed to get a hold of it. I thought if David is going to kill me, maybe I can at least get evidence on my phone. I started snapping pictures in the dark. Sure enough, he crawled down off the chair and began shuffling toward me.
He moved slowly, like it was a struggle for him. I felt terrified, but I kept taking photos. David limped closer to me, never taking his eyes off me. Soon, I was face to face with him. He started muttering something.
too quiet for me to understand. I watched as his eyes rolled back into his head until they were all white. I tried to ride away from him, but I could barely move. I stared in horror. I stared at the hoarder. I stared in horror as he began crawling up onto my bed, still murmuring something. I know, I know. that's when I woke up. Same as before.
Gina (03:16)
Hehehehehe
Kathryn (03:32)
broad daylight, no trace of David anywhere. It's almost routine now, but it was a dream after all. So I got up and went to work and after a while the stress of the dream melted away. I wasn't even going to write about it since it wouldn't really be new information. But tonight I noticed something that petrified me. I went into my phone to find a picture from a couple days ago and I saw dozens of pitch black photos in my camera.
I just got chills. All from last night. It's better to just show you. So he shares like a bunch of like photos. They're all pitch black. You can kind of see like the outline of the chair and in one of them you can see the outline of something else. So this is where I'm like ready for your feedback. Okay, hold on. As I search, I'm trying not to need to...
Gina (04:22)
God, okay.
Yeah.
Kathryn (04:30)
Okay, I think it's this one.
Gina (04:32)
I'm gonna look on my phone instead of my computer for better zoomability. Just to keep you updated. Okay. ⁓ what is that? that looks like a five-year-old child. With a dented head! What the hell? What? Okay, what?
Kathryn (04:35)
smart. Just so you know how I'm consuming your content.
So this...
you
So this is a photo that he found on his phone in a string of dozens of photos where there was not a picture of a boy with a dented head. And this was one that he did show up.
Gina (05:12)
I just turned up the brightness on my phone. my gosh. ⁓ it's clear as day.
Kathryn (05:15)
don't do that.
It's clear as day. Yes, it is. So he goes on to tweet, usually I can come up with some excuse for what's happening, but I have no logical explanation for this. So now I'm sitting here on my couch freaking out. I certainly won't be able to sleep. I just feel like I needed to get this out there. So yes, this is the first official image where you can like actually see what, you know, appears to be Dear David. This isn't like a smudge. This isn't
weird little blur, arguably the one on the roof. If you look closely you can quote unquote clearly see something, but it's still very hard to see. This one is the first one where you can like really actually see something. So this is where it gets very polarized. Like people are like, my god this is like the most compelling image of a ghost I've ever seen in my life. Others are like
Gina (06:01)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (06:15)
this is clearly a doll like blah blah blah blah blah. I, this is the point where I am going to admit when I was consuming this content back in 2017 I wasn't looking at the pictures because I was too scared. So the first time I ever saw the pictures without like looking through my hand like this like the way I watch horror movies was when I was researching this episode. So.
Gina (06:25)
He
Yeah, relatable, yeah.
Kathryn (06:43)
all these years I have like vague images of what the pictures might look like because I was too scared to look at them head on. So kudos to you for turning the brightness all the way up. I did not even do that when researching this episode. So I was in the camp that this was all real. Like I was still like very strongly, like we said at the end of last episode, there could be logical explanations for all of this.
Gina (06:53)
Hmm.
Kathryn (07:08)
but I was like choosing to believe this was a haunting based on several factors. So this is where we are. And he's quiet for a couple of weeks again. Or maybe about a week. So on November 17th, he tweets, for everyone asking, yes, I'm alive. I've been on the quiet side because there's something I'm trying to investigate and I'm not sure how to yet.
I'd rather not tweet unless I have something substantial to share.
It's sort of hard to explain the logistics of what I'm trying to find out, but I'll do my best. Basically, there's a part of my apartment that I'm just now learning about. At least that's what I think. To refresh your memory, I live in a duplex. I used to live on the first floor, but now I live on the second. It's a long boxy building that looks over the business next door. So that's why he could see onto the roof so easily.
His window basically looks out onto the roof that's like a floor shorter than his building.
The other week, I was tweeting the most recent update from the living room couch. About 30 seconds after I sent the last tweet, I heard a thump directly above my head, as if someone above me had dropped something on the floor above, which is impossible since I'm on the top floor apartment. There's also no way to access the roof. There aren't any ladders on the outside of the building. The only way you'd get onto the roof is through the skylight in the hallway.
There are no trees in the immediate vicinity either. It definitely wasn't the pipes. It was distinctly the sound of something falling on the floor. My building is old and makes lots of noises, but this was a new sound that startled me. And I have to pause on that because that is so real. Remember when I first moved into this place and literally every text between me and Phil was, what was that noise? Was that you? What was that? Did you hear something? Because we were new to the house.
Gina (09:00)
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Kathryn (09:05)
Now we know what sounds are the house and what sounds are the ghosts. Like we can tell at this point, like we know when it's just the house shifting. So you know the sound of your own house and he has been in this apartment for several months at this point and that is plenty of time to learn the sound. So if you hear a sound that is not a sound your house makes, that is alarming. Like I just get that vibe so hard.
Gina (09:06)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
And this was, sorry, what time of day would it have been at where this happened? Is it, what I'm asking is like, is it possible that someone was doing maintenance on the roof, maybe?
Kathryn (09:32)
Mm-hmm.
So that is a good question. And you're about to find out why that is not possible. But yes, that's a good question, because I don't know. I don't think he distinctly says what time. That's something we could find out, because he said this was happening shortly after he was sending the tweets of the last update. And for those listening, and for your information as well, because I have not said this yet.
Gina (09:49)
Okay. Okay.
Kathryn (10:11)
I found all these tweets archived in one long webpage that I will be sharing the link to for anyone who wants to read through all of this yourself. There are a couple of scenes I'm cutting out because this is the longest story ever. But yeah, so that you can see the timestamps of the actual tweets, but I believe he usually posts his updates at night. So it seems like this was happening at night, but I don't know for 100 % certain. So.
Gina (10:18)
sweet.
Yeah, okay.
Okay,
cool.
Kathryn (10:40)
Definitely wasn't the pipes. New sound started me. So I'm thinking, is there some secret crawl space in my home that I do not know about? I look all over my apartment, but I cannot figure it out. I cannot find anything. So I go out into the hallway. That's when something dawns on me. There's no real way to ease into this, so I'll just say it. There's a mysterious hatch.
in my hallway.
Such important information. Just casual hatch in the ceiling of his apartment. ⁓ I've been hiding something from you all for the last three, but four months. And I will share a picture of it with you slash in the video.
Gina (11:12)
be important information.
No easy way to say this, there's a portal to hell in my hallway. And I didn't think to mention it until now. Ugh, okay.
Kathryn (11:38)
looks like this
Gina (11:42)
Come on! Jesus!
Kathryn (11:44)
How do you just brush past that?
There's like cracks in the ceiling. It's all like disheveled and gross looking. So this hatch is very high above the stairs. you know, it's one of those things where like you have to have one of those weird professional.
ladders to get up to it because it's like there's no real way to get up there basically.
Gina (12:07)
Yeah. Yeah. So honestly,
like, kind of get that he would forget about it because you don't ever, like, I technically have one of those things and I always forget about
Kathryn (12:18)
I think that that is a very much it depends on the person because there has never been a time in my life where I've been in a room with a strange door or a hatch where it's not the first thing I notice and get scared of. that is very much like that would have been my first, like if this had been me, I would have been like, yo, some kid is haunting me and I got a weird hatch. Like genuinely like.
Gina (12:32)
Okay, yeah.
And I know where
he lives.
Kathryn (12:44)
This
would exactly like this would very much not be an afterthought for me So that's actually good feedback to have because from my perspective This is kind of when I personally was like you're making this shit up because ain't no way you would leave that out of the story Like no way, so it's interesting. Okay, so that's yeah, that's very that's very notable to me because
Gina (12:48)
Yeah, okay.
I would leave that out of the story. I would.
Okay.
Kathryn (13:07)
I'm like, my hatch is right outside in the hallway and I genuinely get scared. I have to pass it to go to the bathroom in the night and I genuinely will walk by like this because I don't want to see it. I literally won't look at it. I hate a hatch.
Gina (13:12)
too.
Kathryn (13:22)
The other part of this is the hatch. Because it's over the stairs, it like goes down a little bit, you know how the ceiling above the stairs like goes down kind of to like follow the same whatever like height of the stairs. So this hatch at first he's like, OK, maybe that's how you get into.
Gina (13:32)
Yeah.
Kathryn (13:42)
the ⁓ roof, onto the roof. But it's notable that the hatch opens up to a space about three feet lower than where the skylight opens up to. It's also the same level as all of the ceilings in his apartment. So theoretically, based on this, there's about three feet of empty space, there's three feet of attic between his apartment ceilings.
Gina (13:46)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (14:12)
and the roof. So there's like a proper crawl space that goes throughout his entire apartment. And he's I'm paraphrasing because he's explaining all of this in great detail, like dude is straight up crashing out over the discovery of an attic. Like he's describing it in a way that I'm like, man, you are such a city boy. That's literally just an attic. But he's like, like he's showing like measurements and diagrams of like, there's got to be space. I'm like, yeah, that's called an attic. You're fine.
Gina (14:16)
Hey.
You
Kathryn (14:40)
But you're not fine because it's probably a portal to hell.
Gina (14:41)
that's funny. Yeah. And also, the perfect amount of space for a small child to move through.
Kathryn (14:48)
Specifically with half of his head missing. Exactly. Yes. That's exactly the amount of space that he would
Gina (14:50)
Exactly.
Kathryn (14:55)
He literally refers to it as, it might just be some sort of insulated space that all residential buildings have. That's called an attic, bud. Like, like he's fully crashing out at this point. No judgment, I would be too, but I'm like trying to move past all that. Blah, blah,
Gina (15:02)
an addict.
Kathryn (15:12)
over the past week and a half, I've been hearing more things above me. A few days after the first sound, I heard a similar thump while I was in the kitchen. Then last night, I heard something small clink to the floor and roll about six feet before stopping. Something is d-
Definitely going on up there So that was him not me so He again he's describing all of this in great detail, so I'm trying to condense he decides to order this big long pole and He's gonna use it to stand on the stairs and like bust open the hatch ⁓ Which like I feel like you would do some shit like that I would just leave it alone and move to a different apartment, but like
Gina (15:48)
Yeah.
No,
I would get Tom to do it.
Kathryn (15:58)
you would be curious and you would, yeah, for sure. So a few days later on November 28th, sorry, skip past your birthday, that was not my choice. my God, wait, okay, happy birthday, okay. So this was happening on your dad's birthday. ⁓ It says a lot has happened in the last week, but I was away for Thanksgiving, so I'm just now able to write it all down.
Gina (16:00)
Yeah.
Okay, that's my dad's birthday, so, you know. Yeah, that's something. Yeah.
Hooray.
Kathryn (16:23)
The noises from the ceiling have not let up, but the pole I ordered didn't arrive before I had to leave for the holiday, so I didn't actually get in until late Friday night. I planned to investigate the next morning and went to bed. I'd barely fallen asleep when I woke up to an incredibly loud crash above me. It sounded like someone had dropped a bowling ball. I bolted upright in bed and immediately felt strange. There was a weird energy all around me. I can't explain it.
After a minute, I heard another crash. I briefly thought about grabbing my shoes and booking it, which is what I would do, but that would mean passing under the hatch and that seemed like a bad idea. So instead, I just listened and waited, though I'm not sure for what. The crash happened again and then again, probably 15 times in a row, followed by a long silence. Then I heard a smaller, creaky sound coming from the hallway.
Gina (17:00)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (17:22)
It sounded like a footstep. I stayed still, but there were no more sounds. I lay back down, still tense and nervous, but I must have fallen asleep at some point because I woke up the next morning and everything seemed normal again. I got dressed and left to go get a bagel. Same as every Saturday. As I made my way down the stairs, something crunched under my feet. I looked down and noticed a pile of debris on the stairs, directly under the hatch.
It looked like dirt, but I couldn't tell for certain. It could have been old plaster or something. I glanced up at the hatch and noticed something else peculiar. The edge of something was caught in the door of the hatch, barely poking out. It's hard to see because it's so far up, but I took a photo. And it is just as he described it. It's photo of the hatch with a little piece of something sticking out.
Gina (18:19)
Frogger?
Is this a frog? ⁓ okay. Okay, all right, all right. And you said, remind me, okay, so he has his own private entrance. This is like his, in theory, someone should not be there messing around with the hatch without him being aware, especially in the middle of the night.
Kathryn (18:24)
Perhaps? I don't know. Perhaps.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yes,
so the whole stairwell is not his property. It's like at the bottom of the stairwell is his neighbor's door. But then if you, but there is no reason anyone should be going up those stairs. Like there is nothing else above him but the roof. You know what I mean? So he's the top of a duplex. So that outdoor space is his space. There shouldn't be anyone up there for any reason. Correct. Yes.
Gina (18:49)
Yes, okay, okay.
Yeah, okay.
Okay.
Yeah.
Okay. Okay.
Kathryn (19:07)
So he goes and gets his handy dandy pole and he sets up his phone at the top of the stairs. So you're like viewing him like pop open the hatch. And when he's doing that, he busts open the hatch and the thing, whatever it is, falls onto the stairs. So he like goes and retrieves it
He shares a picture of what has fallen, and it is a leather shoe. So he was thinking the same thing. Like, there is somebody in my attic. Like, at this point, it's almost like this could be completely unrelated to Dear David. Like, there's just someone living in this attic, you know? So.
Gina (19:40)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (19:50)
He calls the landlord because he's like, there's something going on in the attic. Landlord comes over with a big old ladder and he goes up into the hatch and he's looking around and he doesn't see anything. Because at this point, he's even like, maybe it's raccoons that they're like stealing stuff and bringing it up there. Like, it doesn't even need to be human. Right. Doesn't see anything. There's no nest. There's no human. There's no animal. Like the landlord is like, there is nothing up here. The only thing
that he found was a little green marble that was dented on one side.
Gina (20:27)
What material was the marble? Glass, a dented glass marble? Okay.
Kathryn (20:28)
You
It was glass. It was a glass marble. Yeah.
Yeah. Yes. Yes, it is.
Gina (20:37)
Okay, that is strange. That's weird,
but it's also like in isolation not that weird.
Kathryn (20:43)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (20:44)
What's up with the shoe though? Why was the shoe caught in it?
So the thought is nobody, as far as we know, there's not a person living in the attic because we didn't find like sleeping bag, no food, no like whatever.
Kathryn (20:51)
Mm-hmm.
There was, yeah.
yeah, was a shoe and a marble and that was all that they could find. Yeah, go ahead.
Gina (21:00)
Okay, I have a question about, was
the shoe like an adult-sized shoe? It was a child-sized shoe.
Kathryn (21:09)
A child. Yes. Speaking of the late 2010s, yes. Classic. If you don't know what we're talking about, you're on the younger end of our target audience or older.
Gina (21:11)
A child. OK. That was a classic video. I love that video so much.
Yeah,
we can't repeat what happens in that video on this podcast, but everyone else go look it up. ⁓ Okay, a child's tune attended. Okay, this is sounding very haunted. Very haunting-y. Very haunted. Okay, okay, yeah.
Kathryn (21:29)
No, we can't. We can't.
Okay, okay.
I love this. I love being on this journey with you, because I'm over here like... Okay, yeah. Yeah, and this is all, like, we're going on several months of this. blah, blah, blah. So now the next time he tweets, December 12th, 2017, a couple weeks go by, more radio silence. There's not much going on.
Gina (21:45)
This is crazy.
Kathryn (22:05)
He says, haven't been feeling great the past couple of weeks and haven't had time to update. There also wasn't much to say for the most part. I wasn't sleeping well and I was having weird dreams, but they were vague and hard to describe. I'm sleepy all day long and I've been getting sudden bouts of dizziness. I checked it up to always having earbuds crammed in my ears and made a mental note to get my ears checked. Which I think is just so cute. Like not in condescending way, but it's like I'm being severely haunted. I should probably go.
to the ear doctor. Like, I would be straight up like, the devil has got me. Like, them ears,
Gina (22:36)
⁓ That's something
Tom would do. If Tom even sneezes wrong, he goes to the ear doctor.
Kathryn (22:43)
Yes.
my God, I love that for you so much. Phil would need to be like, his skin would need to be melting off to even think goes to the doctor regularly, but like, my God, it's like pulling teeth every single time. Anyway,
Other than that,
things were pretty quiet, I sort of fooled myself into thinking that finding those items in the attic somehow ended all of this. Not that that would make much sense. But late this past Wednesday, I woke up with a start. I felt strange, like something had just been watching me. I turned on the light, but I was alone. Still, there was this tangible feeling of badness. Everything just felt wrong. Sort of like when you have the flu and you wake up at night and can't
can't really tell where you are for a minute. Which, I honestly love that feeling, as an aside. I don't know why. I really like that, when you wake up and you're, like, kinda confused for a second. I only like it when I can go back to sleep, though. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah.
Gina (23:45)
That's the important piece of it. Yes, if
it was like, don't know where I am and I have to get up right now, sucks.
Kathryn (23:52)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, it just feels like that connotation to me is like a like that was a real deep real good sleep You know what I mean where you're just like who am I? Yeah, but that was not the case for him. So anyway He says it was a feeling that I was used to it always accompanies David
Gina (23:59)
Yeah, yeah. Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yes.
Kathryn (24:11)
People tweet at me a lot saying he might just need help, but I'm certain that's not the case. Every time he shows up, I feel palpable sense of malice. That's what it felt like that night. Malice, dread, but still I was alone and I was so tired. I wound up just going back to sleep. I've been so exhausted recently, I can barely function. The next night, the same thing happened. I woke up suddenly feeling like I had just missed something.
like a candle had just gone out and I could still smell it. I thought about using the pet cam from the living room to monitor my bedroom while I slept, but the cord was too short to get the camera high up enough to see the entire room. So I improvised. I downloaded an app that takes a photo every 60 seconds and I set my phone on top of a bookcase. Yeah, I know, I would never do any of this.
Gina (25:00)
No, that's just asking to be
terrified.
Kathryn (25:03)
Absolutely. Ugh, I hate it.
I don't want to hear what's going on when I'm asleep. Like, what I don't know can't hurt me.
Gina (25:08)
No, that's scary.
Kathryn (25:10)
I already am sure that weird shit happens in the night. I don't want confirmation. So what, what? I'm just gonna know this and have to continue sleeping there? Like, what?
Gina (25:19)
Yeah, in direct opposition
to my Frogger scare where I did want to know everything that was happening in my house. But like scary haunted sounds, it's different from ghosts because I can't control what the ghosts do and if they're not harming me, fine. They can hang out, they can have a party while I'm asleep, fine.
Kathryn (25:26)
That's different from ghosts though. Yeah.
If there's
exactly, if there's someone in your home, there's something you can do about that. Like you can call help to get them out of your home. What are you gonna do if there's someone just haunting you in your sleep? Theoretically, you can also, you can get cleansing, you could do whatever.
Gina (25:41)
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
I'll call
you. That's what I do.
Kathryn (25:52)
Yeah, as I'm speaking, I'm like, guess there are some things you could do about it, but it's just, it's a lot more, it feels more invasive because there's so much more question to it, you know? Like, what do you do? Anyway, blah, blah. I went to sleep. Just like before, I jolted awake hours later, feeling the same unease. I turned on the light and hurried out of bed to get my phone from the bookcase.
There were probably 350 photos to scroll through, because it had been, whether something was there or not, it's not like the previous one where it captured it when there was sound or movement. It was just every minute it was taking a picture. The vast majority of them were me sleeping in an empty room. It's sort of dark, but you can see me sleeping. I'd left a couple of nightlights on just in case anything showed up. But for the first hundred or so photos, it was just me in an empty room. Then, suddenly, he was there.
Gina (26:21)
Yeah.
Kathryn (26:47)
standing on the chair at the foot of the bed staring at me. And I'm going to just roll through these and through this and then I'll show you the photos afterwards. In the next photo from a minute later, he seems to be staring straight up at the ceiling, just staring at it. Then he appears to collapse on the chair. The next dozen photos are all the same. He's there but completely lifeless. At first, I thought he was dead.
Gina (26:56)
Okay.
Kathryn (27:16)
which obviously doesn't make any sense. I looked over at the chair still expecting him to still be there, but it was empty. But then in the next photo, he's gone. The room is totally empty again. He's gone in the next several photos too. I figured maybe that was it, but I kept swiping through. About 15 pictures later, he was back standing next to the bed. It was just like the last time I saw him.
That's when my heart started to race. I didn't want to look at the rest of the pictures, but I knew I had to. I swiped it to the next photo and my heart sank into my stomach. He was on the bed now, inches from me, staring down at me sleeping. The next one is worse. In the next photo, he's staring right at the camera. After that, there's nothing. He's gone again. And the rest of the scroll is just me alone in my room. That is until the last photo. Then he shares an image.
of what appears to be a child's head right in front of the camera. I'm going to share them with you now.
I'm cool with that.
Gina (28:25)
I'm glad we're, yeah, I'm fine. I'm glad
we're doing this during the month where we're drinking. That is making this exponentially easier.
Kathryn (28:31)
Yeah
Gina (28:34)
ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew.
⁓ I don't know why the texture of the hair is really freaking me out.
Kathryn (28:47)
Sorry, I warned you. Yeah,
it's weird.
Gina (28:50)
Why does his head change shape so much? Okay, okay. And then the one where he's the kid standing on the bed, the face looks really demonic.
Kathryn (28:51)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yes, it does.
Gina (29:02)
Like, I guess you could fake this, but, because this was also, this was before the days of AI-generated imagery. So when you saw a picture, you more or less trusted it. Like, not 100%, because we knew people could doctor things, but it was a more specific skill set. And I don't know anything about Photoshop and this kind of thing. do feel like this, wouldn't this be tricky to do? Because the picture looks like it's very grainy, and like, would that make it more complicated and diff, I don't know.
Kathryn (29:05)
Yeah.
Yes!
Yes.
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
This would be tough to do in Photoshop.
Yes, I'm just, I'm wanting you to like go through your emotions because like I have, we'll go through, we'll go deeper into that. We'll go deeper into that. Like keep feeling what you're feeling. I'm gonna continue and we'll dissect in a little bit. Okay.
Gina (29:43)
Okay.
All right,
I'm good.
Kathryn (29:53)
He says, I'm at a loss for words. That malformed ear, that stringy hair. Gina's going through the same thing, Adam. ⁓ It's there. I didn't even know what to think. I looked all over my room, but I couldn't find anything. And honestly, I've been so exhausted, I didn't know how to process it. Even now, all I want to do is just sleep. So then tweet happened at the beginning of the December, and he...
Gina (30:01)
The hair, yes!
Kathryn (30:19)
Didn't tweet anything again until January 2nd. he mentions that he went to Montana to visit his family for the holidays. And he shared that he started to feel better almost immediately after leaving the city. He was less tired, less groggy, and just feeling a little bit freer. He wasn't feeling David around.
Dear David, I should say. He wasn't feeling Dear David around like he was at his place. He goes on to say, Up until now, I haven't really entertained the thought of moving, thinking that David would probably just follow me wherever I went. But when I left for Montana, everything seemed to improve. Like maybe David wouldn't follow me after all. Maybe he was tied to the house, not me. Being home felt safer and I managed to relax a little bit. But after a few days, I started to feel strange again.
One night I got up to go to the bathroom and as I stood there in the dark, I couldn't help feeling like there was something moving outside the bathroom window. The bathroom looks out onto the backyard and it was pitch black. I could barely see anything, but it's Montana and there are animals passing through all the time. Sure enough, in the morning I found animal tracks through the wind, through the snow. The next night the same thing happened. I got up in the middle of the night and I thought I saw movement outside.
This time, I stood at the window and I gazed out, straining my eyes to see, waiting for them to adjust to the night. For a long time, I stared out into the snowy darkness, but I couldn't see any movement. Then, just as I was about to turn away, I saw something lurch off to the right and disappear from view. Again, it was too dark to make out the animal, but it could have been anything, maybe a coyote or something.
In the morning, as I was getting out of the shower, I glanced out the window and noticed tracks behind the garage. I couldn't tell what they were from the bathroom. So I got dressed, put on my coat and went outside. When I got up close, my heart practically stopped. They weren't tracks. They were footprints. Really small footprints. I followed them across the backyard.
but they disappeared into the ditch out back. I stood there in the snow, not knowing what to do. What could I do? Call the cops and tell them I found footprints in the snow? The last...
Gina (32:43)
What am I gonna do?
Kathryn (32:45)
Look at it, got the caps? The last couple of nights I was too scared to leave my room If it had been David out there in the snow it meant that he could follow me anywhere No matter where I moved he could find me. I felt helpless I flew back to New York the day after Christmas back in my apartment. It seemed like I was at square one yet again I've tried everything I can think of I've saged my apartment. I've hired a medium. Nothing has worked
And worse, I still feel him at night, watching me from different corners of my room, always getting closer and waking up at night before something happens. For the past few nights, I've been using my app that takes photos every minute, but nothing has shown up. For whatever reason, it doesn't seem to work anymore, but I've left it running just in case. It's picked up absolutely nothing except for one thing from last night. Last night was particularly bad. I felt sick and had nightmares all night long.
I dreamed that David was hovering in the corner by the ceiling, far off the ground. He was mouthing something, but I couldn't hear any words. And then he was hovering above my bed, staring down at me, his mouth moving faster than it should be. I couldn't move. I could only look up at him. Suddenly he plummeted downward and I felt this huge pressure crash into my chest. I woke up gasping. The wind completely knocked out of me.
I sat up and looked around frantically, heaving for air, but there was nothing there. When I caught my breath, I retrieved my phone from the dresser. The photo roll showed nothing of note except for the last photo, taken just a moment before.
So I'll share this last image with you. I'm struggling to understand what exactly I'm looking at.
It's just like an odd blur of what appears to be... Like it kind of looks like theoretically David is on the bed, but it's so blurry it's hard to tell what it is.
Gina (34:53)
It look, the hand looks particularly, it's very like claw-like. If there wasn't a hand, I don't think I would know what I was looking at. That looks really freaky.
Kathryn (34:59)
Yeah.
Yeah, like it looks like,
so if you compare it to the previous photo, it's in the same, the camera's in the same spot, but just zoomed in. So it looks like this is meant to, it looks like this is meant to be showing like David falling onto him, but it's very blurry and hard to tell.
Gina (35:11)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Kathryn (35:23)
So the vibe is David seems to have fully, not that he hadn't before, David seems to have fully infiltrated this guy at this point, right? He's making physical contact now. ⁓ So a few weeks go by, don't really get any information, you don't really get any updates, but then...
Gina (35:37)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (35:49)
Adam posts a selfie with a friend to his Instagram story while they were out to brunch back to his normal social media presence. He then goes on to say that a bunch of people have replied to the story asking if he was OK. And he was like, what is going on? I understand what's happening. And he shared a screenshot of what they had. Like people were sending him screenshots of like what they were seeing.
And it's basically like a very glitchy photo and pixelated. Like it looks again like that electrical interference. Like it's all like colorful and pixelated and weird. And over the spot where his head is supposed to be, you can kind of see like a pixelated Dear David looking thing.
Gina (36:41)
Okay.
Kathryn (36:41)
so.
This first version is what he posted.
Gina (36:46)
Okay, okay, so a ⁓ quick glance looks completely normal and fun.
Kathryn (36:51)
What I'm about to send is the screenshot that he was apparently getting from people and what they were seeing on the glitched out mode.
Gina (37:07)
Dude. Okay.
That's like a completely different picture.
Kathryn (37:15)
⁓ let me see.
Gina (37:15)
Her face looks completely
dip because her face in the original picture that he says he posted, her face is a little bit blurry because it was like she's in the middle of posing. Then if you go to the next one, her face is crystal clear. There is no blur. I think doctored. I think that's not real.
Kathryn (37:32)
Okay. So we're getting to the end of the story. So I'm going to give my feedback in a second, but good, good, good notice. Good notice. Okay. So after this, there's very little update on the topic. A few weeks later, he shares a video of his cat hissing at the camera with no caption or commentary. Then a few days after that, he simply says, everything is fine. Then
A full month later, on February 14th, he says, Please don't worry about me. I'm okay. Everything will be like it was before. Smile, emoticon.
And that was it. Nobody ever heard about Dear David ever again. It was never mentioned again. He did, like a few months later, he did post another like, I'm just working on projects. I'm just minding my business, blah, blah, that type of thing. The next time anyone would hear about Dear David was four months later when BuzzFeed Studios announced that they were making a movie called Dear David.
Gina (38:40)
I think we have our answer.
Kathryn (38:42)
So, it's interesting you say that because everyone felt the same way and everyone was like, okay, this was a hoax,
Gina (38:49)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (38:52)
Because yes, that was a different selfie. The woman's head was faced in the complete opposite direction as it was in the first photo. But that's not the first inconsistency that could be found. And I never noticed this. No one ever commented on this. I noticed this while I was doing research from this episode and reading all of the tweets from top to bottom, the whole five months worth all at once. There were little inconsistencies here and there. And one of the biggest ones that I found
Gina (39:07)
Okay.
Kathryn (39:22)
could be explainable, like could be explained away, when he first noticed the thing up in the hatch.
He allegedly noticed that when he was on his way to get a bagel in the morning. But there is a photo where you can see the skylight in that photo, and the skylight is pitch black. I don't know what time this guy is getting up on Saturday mornings to get bagels, but I guarantee you not a single fucking
Gina (39:30)
Yes.
Okay.
Kathryn (39:58)
cartoonist in New York City is waking up before dawn just to get a bagel on a Saturday morning.
Gina (40:04)
Do you know what time of year it was? Because that could play a part in it too, like if it was dead of winter.
Kathryn (40:08)
It was winter.
It was winter, but that still would have needed to be... It was pitch black outside. There was no light coming in this window whatsoever. But he was posting these updates after 9 p.m. at night.
So like the likelihood that he was up before dawn to get a bagel is, I just think that's super weird. Like if you roll out of bed on a Saturday morning and run and get a bagel, like, I don't know. I don't know his schedule, but like.
I don't know, I don't know. So I found that very strange. The selfie is very clearly two different selfies. Maybe you could argue like in the distortion, in the pixelation, it like moves her head.
Gina (40:45)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
It wouldn't get rid of the pixelization, if anything it would make it worse.
Kathryn (41:03)
Right, exactly. Her face is like clear, completely. Yes, exactly. There was also something else. I don't remember what it was. Everyone can go read through the tweets and like find, but here's the thing. Oh, here's what it was. And this is why don't 100 % agree we have the answer, only because there are a couple different things that could be happening, in my opinion.
Gina (41:05)
Yeah.
I believe you.
Kathryn (41:27)
And this is where we get into my opinion. there is a shift in my opinion. I will say like this is me theorizing and conspiracy creating. There is a shift in the way he tells this story at a certain point. At the beginning, it's like, this is weird. Shit's happening. Here's a video of my cat doing weird shit.
maybe it's nothing. At a certain point it turns very lyrical and very poetic and very like it reads very polished like I looked out into the golden green light and blah blah blah blah blah it's no longer just I saw a smudge could be weird but I don't know you know so there are three things that I think could have happened
Gina (42:00)
Hmm.
Yeah. Yeah.
Kathryn (42:18)
One.
this whole story is completely true and Buzzfeed just scooped it up and decided to like make a movie out of it. Two, this was an immersive storytelling project that Adam Ellis was putting out into the world. And then Buzzfeed decided to scoop it up and make a movie out of it. Or what, Cinnamon, mama's theorizing, can we not? Okay.
Gina (42:39)
Mm-hmm.
What cinnamon thinks? ⁓
Kathryn (42:47)
What I think, what we over here in my household, including Cinnamon, think, I think it started as real I think that he was haunted by these nightmares of a young boy and weird shit was happening in his apartment. Buzzfeed, whom he worked for, was like, we can make shit out of this. And they got involved halfway through and turned it into this big old something. To like, make it scarier.
Gina (43:05)
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Kathryn (43:16)
so that they could turn it into a movie. Because to this day, Adam Ellis maintains that he really was haunted by a little boy named Dear David and that Buzzfeed stole this story from him and he never saw a dime from the making of this movie. yes, even up to like a few months ago when I first
Gina (43:18)
Mm-hmm.
Man, BuzzFeed.
Kathryn (43:44)
Decided I was doing the story. I was I went to his social or no, that's not what happened. Let me rephrase I was thinking about doing this story and was going to check him out see what his socials looked like my algorithm could read my mind and I was scrolling one day and A video of his popped up on my for you page and it said something to the effect It was just like a selfie video of him
It said, whenever I remember that my old apartment was haunted by a ghost of a kid with a dented head and then Buzzfeed made a movie about it after I quit. So he's like still maintaining that this is a thing that this really happened. But he's never come out and said, this was not a hoax. This was not a story I was writing. This really happened. So there is still a question mark of like,
Gina (44:16)
Hmm. Yeah.
Kathryn (44:31)
Is this still just part of the story? Because remember, he's a cartoonist. He's an artist that like tells stories like this. And he does have multiple. Yeah, I know, but he does have multiple graphic novels that are horror graphic novels. And there are like pieces of this story in those books. Like you can see something weird happening through a peephole. You can like see all this stuff. But like.
Gina (44:37)
Mm-hmm.
Hehehe.
Yeah.
Kathryn (44:57)
Art imitates life, but also life imitates art. Like it's very much a like, which came first, you know, the haunting or the story, you know? ⁓ The movie is horrible. I've never watched it. I've seen pieces of it. I've seen clips of it, mostly from a, it is, it's one of those movies that it is objectively agreed that it is.
Gina (45:06)
Mm-hmm.
I was gonna ask, yeah.
Kathryn (45:23)
horrible movie. Like it has like a 4 % on Rotten Tomatoes. Like it is just objectively bad. I found a review of it from Wired and let me find, hold on one second, ⁓ they described it as quote, a journey to the psychedelically cringe heart of the 2010s internet and it described it as a tepid attempt at horror about a narcissistic blogger.
Gina (45:24)
Gaha.
god.
Kathryn (45:50)
as he's menaced by a ghost with an oddly wholesome anti-cyberbullying agenda, which had nothing to do with the original story. That was like the theme. Yes. It's, yes, it is. Wired straight up says, quote, Dear David is not a good movie. It then says, this is my favorite part, but it is the most epic bacon amazeballs doggo I can has cheeseburger.
Gina (46:00)
That is so Buzzfeed. That is so Buzzfeed.
⁓ God.
Kathryn (46:20)
film of all time. Yes.
Gina (46:23)
it's
kind of selling it to me. kind of want to watch it now.
Kathryn (46:26)
Me too, I know me too.
They described it as an ironic mustache finger of a movie.
Gina (46:32)
⁓ Jesus Christ, okay.
Kathryn (46:35)
So this is where we are now. The movie is out. The movie was optioned in 2018 shortly thereafter. Like I said, it was announced a couple months later. he was still there. I don't want to say he gave his permission, but it was implied that he was involved in the decision to make this movie, which is what made people think, this is a hoax. This was a marketing ploy.
Movie never gets made. Fast forward to 2023. Adam Ellis no longer works at BuzzFeed. BuzzFeed still owned the rights to the movie, though, so they end up making it. And he didn't work at BuzzFeed anymore, so that's why he wasn't he didn't get any money from it. So. All of this is to say, I'm going to go on record saying my official opinion is I don't like the word hoax. I do not think it was a hoax.
Gina (47:12)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (47:27)
I choose to believe it started as real haunting that inspired a larger story that may or may not have been real and then inspired the movie. But the deeper we got and the more evidence there was, like it is very creepy. But to answer your question previously, I didn't want to say anything until we were done.
that would be very difficult to Photoshop, it would not be difficult to use a doll.
Gina (47:58)
I didn't even think about using a doll And with resources like Buzzfeed, like we really cannot overstate how huge Buzzfeed was. They must have had so easily. Yeah, yes, agreed. Okay, I think I'm in the same, of the same opinion as you, because it was very convincing at the beginning, but where it took a bit of a turn for me and where I started believing things less is when.
Kathryn (48:01)
Like... Mm-hmm.
They could very easily have made a weird demonic dented, yeah. Yeah.
Gina (48:27)
It felt like there was a change where originally at the start he wanted help to like make himself safe. And then after a while it became a, don't want to make myself safe. I want to gather more evidence and learn more about what it is, which I don't think you would do if this was happening to you in real life. Cause there was the bit where he said like,
Kathryn (48:34)
Yes. Yes.
Yeah!
Gina (48:51)
I've been contacted by a lot of ghost shows, a lot of professional mediums. I've had one friend over, she did a cleansing, and then after that there was just never an attempt again to make himself safe. It was all about getting the pictures and the shoes and the marble, things like that. Clickbaity stuff.
Kathryn (49:04)
and
Mm-hmm, and he kept
yeah exactly and on the clickbait note This is something that like you you I never noticed it until I was sitting reading everything back to back to back I Removed a lot of it just because I didn't want to be repetitive in this episode I know I was I left a lot of them in but he ended almost every thread with like I just don't know what to do like I'll let you know when I figure it out and it's like
that feels very scripted. I don't know how else to, like, you can't just keep saying this and then not try to figure it out. Like, you're not trying to figure anything out. You're just trying to find things to post, you know?
Gina (49:39)
Mm-hmm.
Especially if like you were saying, people were responding and saying, hey, do this, do this, we can help with this, use these resources. And he was receptive at the start. He's using the salt.
Kathryn (49:55)
Mm-hmm. Because at the beginning...
He was staging, he was doing the salt circles,
and then by the end he's crawling up in attics? Like, what? That's like, yeah. So, and again, I don't wanna call it a hoax. That feels not correct, the way I'm understanding this story, but I do think that, I agree, I do think there was a shift, and I think it turned into...
Gina (50:06)
Yeah. Yeah, okay.
Kathryn (50:24)
an immersive creepypasta, basically. But I do think he was haunted, and I do think that Buzzfeed did cheat him. Those things I do think are true.
Gina (50:26)
Mm-hmm.
Which from what I've heard about
Buzzfeed, sounds like an insanely shitty, like it does not treat its people well. Yeah.
Kathryn (50:36)
They were, yeah.
It was a millennial quote unquote news place in the early 2000s. None of them, none of them treated anyone well. It was very like they paid you like a cent a word for your articles type like, yeah. That one was awful.
Gina (50:53)
Yeah. And you know, I wouldn't be
surprised if the reason why he hasn't come out saying, Buzzfeed stepped in and editorialized my story or whatever. It wouldn't surprise me if Buzzfeed made him sign something that said he would never do that. Yes. Yeah.
Kathryn (51:03)
Mm-hmm.
For legal reasons, right. Yeah.
Because he has said that I never saw a dime from this movie, but he's never come out and said, well, to my knowledge, based on what I could find, he's never come out and been like, fuck Buzzfeed. It's always been implied. I did not make money from this. They made this movie after I quit. It's always been very buttoned up. So yeah, I never even thought of that. Yeah, that could be it. ⁓
Gina (51:20)
Hmm.
Yeah.
I will say though, mean, kudos to him, it's a phenomenal story.
Kathryn (51:41)
It's a great story. He's a great artist. I have one of his books and it is like, yeah, it's, I bought it as a result of this episode. I did not previously own it, but I like, it's spooky. Like he has a good storyteller and that's why I don't want to say hoax. Cause I'm like a hoax implied you're just an internet troll trying to be a piece of shit. Like he created a good story that will continue to be told. like.
Gina (51:45)
No.
nice. ⁓
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (52:08)
Even though I'm sitting here dissecting it and trying to figure out what's real and what's not, I am not doing it with disrespect. Like mad props to Adam Ellis. Like I genuinely like shout out to him because the fact that we're even still like, is this real? Is this fake? Most stories like this are just assumed to be fake. So it's like the fact that we're people are to this day still believing it and still, and I don't know, maybe we're wrong. Maybe this is genuinely like a real story, but.
Gina (52:15)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (52:37)
It's just the movie that made everyone like, I don't know.
Gina (52:41)
Yeah. But you know
what? That's something else that I think about a lot. ⁓ In one of the recordings we did within the last month or so, we were talking about how if we were ever witnesses to a crime and we were interviewed by the cops and they asked us what we were doing on that day, we wouldn't know. We wouldn't remember. And in that same vein of not trusting own
Kathryn (52:55)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Gina (53:04)
kind of judgment or memory sometimes. I saw, if this genuinely is a true story, if all of these things genuinely happened, if those pictures are 100 % real, that little ghost boy was actually in his room, there would still be a part of me that didn't believe it. And it's like, if there might be actual evidence out there somewhere that ghosts are haunting somebody and there's pictures that they really are ghosts.
Kathryn (53:17)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (53:28)
But it's just so many people are like, it's doctored, it's AI, it's, you know, Sora, it's, you know, a doll, you know, whatever. And we just wouldn't know because our brains aren't wired to trust things like that anymore.
Kathryn (53:32)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, I think that all the time because people say that about that Stanley Hotel photo that we shared that is such compelling evidence. And people are like, it's just some kid, you know, because like,
Gina (53:47)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (53:53)
It could be. I don't think it is, but it could be. yeah. Anyway, that's dear David. Thank you for joining me on this journey.
Gina (53:57)
Yeah.
Okay. Damn.
Thank you for doing all of that research and for guiding me through it, but also letting me have my own emotional journey with it. That was very nice of you.
Kathryn (54:11)
I
really thought that once, part of the reason I didn't tell you my thoughts is because I was really curious what you were going to think about the pictures of him standing on the chair in bed and stuff. Because I was like, this was the spot where people were like, no, this is fucking fake. So was curious what your reaction to them would be. And I was delighted that you were scared by them because I was too. They are scary. Even if they're fake, they're scary.
Gina (54:23)
Mmm.
They are scary. They're objectively scary even now that I'm more... Yeah, even
if they're fake, they're still scary. My stomach dropped when I saw the one of the head with the hair.
Kathryn (54:47)
I that's why I warned you that that one was first,
because I was like, this is out of order. ⁓
Gina (54:51)
That's very scary.
Kathryn (54:55)
All right, but all that's behind us now. What do you have for me?
Gina (54:56)
⁓
have a scary on top. I want to tell you about a demon dog, a legendary demon dog. His name is Black Shuck, AKA Old Shuck, or just Shuck. ⁓ And he, like I said, is a supposed demon dog that prowls around Eastern England.
Kathryn (55:00)
Lovely.
Okay.
Gina (55:24)
And I find him fascinating. So if you've ever heard a story about a big black dog being an omen of doom and gloom or whatever, this is one of those stories. But it's specific to East Anglia, the eastern bit of England. And stories about Shuck specifically date back to at least the 1500s. Some people think as far back as the 1100s. So we're working with like,
centuries and centuries and centuries worth of here. And he's still something that gets brought up and quote, spotted today. And the lore tells us that if you go walking in places like graveyards, crossroads, or dark forests in East Anglia, you might catch a glimpse of an absolutely massive shaggy black dog with huge fiery eyes walking soundlessly through the countryside.
And also, some of the stories say that instead of two huge fiery eyes, he just has one massive eye, kind of like a dog cyclops. I have a hard time picturing that because it freaks me out. So in my version, he just has two eyeballs. But I do, for a second, I want to land on the locations that Shuck appears in because I find them really fascinating. ⁓ Graveyards, crossroads, forests, those are all very common in the stories about Shuck that we have. But also, we see him a lot near big bodies of water.
Kathryn (56:25)
you
That's cuter, yeah.
Gina (56:47)
including the coastline, because that's like right on the coast. So these are all places where you might feel a bit uneasy or a bit nervous anyway, particularly centuries ago when going out and traveling alone in the countryside was seen as more dangerous than it might be now. But also the crossroads part I think is really significant here. And I know we've both been watching Supernatural. How far are you in it now, by the way? OK.
Kathryn (57:10)
Yes.
Not far enough. They're taking it
out. By the time this is published, it will be off Netflix. So I'm trying real hard. I'm still only I'm like about to start season two. I'm not far enough for comfort. But yes, yeah, yes. And that is like a thing. That's like a big I'm yeah. Yeah.
Gina (57:20)
Ugh.
OK. But have you gotten to any of the Crossroad references yet? OK. Yes. Yes. It's a total thing. Yes.
Yeah. So Crossroads, especially in Western folklore, are very often associated with demons and devils, places where you can make a deal to make something happen. But even outside of that, Crossroads have been associated with kind of otherworldly things for over 1,000 years now. So.
For example, the ancient Greeks would perform ceremonies for Hecate at Crossroads, and it was also believed that followers of Mercury, and particularly Odin, would have forms of worship at Crossroads as well. throughout history, literally for over 1,000 years, there's always been kind of an uneasy, nervous significance to Crossroads. So for Shuck to show up here, I think
Makes a lot of sense to me because stories like this are kind of born out of fear. Like you see a normal sized dog, but you're scared. So in your memory, it turns into a massive dog, that kind of thing. But also, an extra layer of this, which is that a lot of people think that the legend of Shuck actually came to England when the Vikings did. And that originally Shuck in the stories was Odin's dog.
Kathryn (58:27)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (58:47)
and he just is now has been separated from him. and I will say there's not super strong evidence to support this being the case, but when you're talking about stories this long ago, particularly ones that cross an ocean to get to a specific place, like, yeah, there's not going to be super strong evidence because, yeah, Vikings weren't like absolutely massive on recording things that they were doing. anyway, but.
Kathryn (59:04)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Gina (59:11)
The crossroads piece, in particular with the association with Odin, really speaks to how significant the fear of seeing Shuck was slash is. ⁓ It's the fact that we ascribe one of the most powerfully intimidating liminal spaces to this one particular dog, which, again, makes a lot of sense the more you know about him. So the name Shuck itself.
Kathryn (59:24)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (59:40)
comes from an old English word that means devil or demon. And if you see Shuck while you are wandering the countryside, you are supposedly doomed to die within a year. That's what it means. And the thought here, it's not that Shuck causes you to die. It seems to be more like he's warning you that you're going to die, which is like kind of for a dog that's like a demon dog, a bad guy, a villain.
Kathryn (59:53)
no.
Gina (1:00:10)
That does seem kinda nice.
Kathryn (1:00:12)
Okay, you know what's so funny? description of him very much matches Mothman. A big, black creature with glowing red eyes. What if Mothman is Shuck?
Gina (1:00:20)
Mmm, mm-hmm. Yes.
And they're just like warning people.
Kathryn (1:00:27)
And he's just warning.
I also do have to say, I didn't want to say this earlier because I didn't want to scare you, but every single time you say shuck, you like glitch out a little bit. I don't think, I think it's going to, I think it's just my internet. There is a snowstorm right now, so I don't want to make it something it's not. You could just be glitching because of that, but I'm like, there's a pattern to it.
Gina (1:00:37)
Really?
⁓
Well.
If Shuck is here, we're cool, man. I have no issue with you. I think you're pretty sweet. You can hang out.
Kathryn (1:00:55)
interesting I
like the idea that he's warning like it's a yeah I like that
Gina (1:01:00)
Me too. Yeah, like so a lot
of people, particularly like nowadays, they tend to view Shuck not as like nice, like a friendly dog you would cuddle with, but like a helpful kind of, it's trying to give you a heads up that's exactly like a guard dog. But the most famous story about Shuck does not share that view at all. So that story comes in 1577 in the middle of a huge torrential
Kathryn (1:01:12)
Yes, like a guard dog. Yeah.
⁓ OK.
Gina (1:01:30)
storm. Like, my god, it's the end of days type of storm. And one town that was particularly impacted in England was a place called Bungie, which in my accent sounds horrendous, but it's a place called Bungie. ⁓ thank you so much. So the residents of Bungie, while this storm was going on, they gathered in their local church to pray for safety from the storm. When suddenly a massive black dog
Kathryn (1:01:34)
Mm-hmm.
cute.
I think it sounds great. What are you talking about?
you
Gina (1:02:00)
burst through the doors of the church and began running up the aisle through the congregation, leaving scorch marks on the ground as it ran. And as the dog was racing through the crowd, it did attack a man and a young boy, and it killed them. And then once the two people were dead, lightning flashed from outside, hitting the church's steeple and causing it to collapse through the roof.
And so it was kind of this big symbolic, there's a demon dog bringing the downfall of the church with this torrential storm again, end of day's thing. So the dog raced out of the church, and then it went to a second place called Blyberg, where it killed even more people before disappearing once again into the countryside. And apparently, if you visit the churches in both Bungie and Blyberg today, you can still see the scorch marks from where
shuck walked. I have seen the pictures of them. There are marks. Yes. So nowadays we do kind of like take this with a grain of salt. Like it's possible that the steeple just collapsed because it got struck by lightning. There was no demon involved. And also the scorched marks could have been caused by like literally anything else. Anything with fire, not a demon dog. But
Fun fact that doesn't stop Shuck's popularity from rising because in 2022, the first annual Black Shuck Festival was held in Bunky. And among a lot of like really fun, like a lot of family friendly kind of activities, think like county fair type deal, they had ritualistic banishing of Shuck.
Kathryn (1:03:40)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (1:03:48)
to keep Bungie safe for another year. And this has been going on since 2022. So I would love to go to the one next year. I think it's August time every year. But yeah, I know I do have to go. I really want to go. But yeah, there's all sorts of stuff. There's like scavenger hunts. There's like markets. There's music, dancing. And yeah, that's my scary on top, which is way less scary than the story you just fucking told. It's like a comforting on top of anything.
Kathryn (1:03:57)
Wait, I love that. You have to go.
Yeah.
Well, I think I
think it's less scary because of the way you and I are like inclined to think of a demon dog. Like as soon as you said it, I was like, ⁓ like that's just a little baby. Yeah. I do. I will say that that is very much the type of story that I think is. ⁓
Gina (1:04:25)
True. boy. Yeah, exactly.
Kathryn (1:04:40)
You already said it, just to parrot what you said, it seems very just born out of fear, basically, because crossroads, that's huge in witchcraft. Those are a great source of magic. You know what I mean? That's a very positive space in a lot of types of magic. So that kind of translation from, it feels very just born out of the fear of witchcraft and like...
Gina (1:04:52)
Mm-hmm.
I agree.
Kathryn (1:05:07)
you know, the whole demonic thing. So I think that's why it's easy to be like, ⁓ we're the boy. Yeah.
Gina (1:05:13)
Yeah, and
I found it so interesting because I knew that black dogs were a sign, like an ill omen kind of thing. I didn't realize that they were as regional as they are and that as many places as, you know, exist, lots of places have their own version of like this big black scary dog that is a precursor to death. I didn't realize that.
Kathryn (1:05:21)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
yeah.
Yeah.
And that's real. It's very similar to black cats. And that's a real tangible fear. If you look at statistics, black dogs and black cats get adopted way less than any other type of animal. Significantly. I know. So go adopt black cats and black dogs. They need homes. Yes. my god.
Gina (1:05:40)
Mmm.
Yeah.
which breaks my heart.
It makes me real sad. Bam, that's.
And then send us pictures. icecreamyscreamproud.gmail.com
Kathryn (1:06:05)
Yes, send us pictures of your animals, all the animals, especially the spooky ones. Yeah, well, we'll do another round of we'll share pictures of ours. I'll put spooky right here. Cinnamon right here. Rue will be right here. And if you're listening, just go to our socials. They're all all over there. We love it. We love a little animal. I love that. I love that story. I didn't know I knew about, ⁓ you know, like you said.
Gina (1:06:09)
Yeah. Agreed. Yeah.
Yes. ⁓
Yay!
Yes, we do.
Kathryn (1:06:33)
black dogs or a bad omen or whatever. didn't know there was like a named demon for it. Yeah, that's cool.
Gina (1:06:39)
me neither. So now we need to go hang
out at Crossroads in East Anglia. We'll set up camp, we'll bring a couple of lawn chairs, a couple of nice cold ones, and we'll just wait.
Kathryn (1:06:43)
Yes. Yeah.
Crack them open, wait for Chuck. Love it. Cool.
Gina (1:06:50)
Exactly. ⁓
But until then, this is a smooth transition. We'll be hanging out on Patreon, which you can also hang out on, if you so choose. Link is in the show notes. ⁓ As a quick reminder, if you leave us a review, take a screenshot, and then email it to us, we will also send you a free sticker. So really, anywhere you look, there is just buttloads of fun ways you can get involved in.
Kathryn (1:07:00)
Yes
Yeah.
Gina (1:07:19)
the ice creamies cream community, honestly. Yeah. Taking a hundred pictures as you sleep. One a minute. But until then, sleep tight. Or us.
Kathryn (1:07:22)
We'll be waiting there, watching you. One minute.
Don't let the bedbugs bite. Is that
our closing? Is that our closing today?
Gina (1:07:41)
Yeah, it can be. Okay.
Kathryn (1:07:42)
All right, bye guys.
