**Episode 71: The Paranormal Terrors of Green Tea** In this episode (recorded Halloween 10/31/2025) of **The Spooky Coop**, hosts **Paul and Michelle** explore classic Victorian gothic horror through J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s eerie 1869 short story, **"Green Tea."** Framed as a medical case log from pioneer occult detective **Dr. Martin Hesselius**, the tale recounts the disturbing fate of **Reverend Robert Linder Jennings**. While pulling late-night writing sessions fueled by heavy doses of loose-leaf green tea, the devout clergyman inadvertently opens his "inner eye" and finds himself endlessly stalked by a filthy, pitch-black phantom monkey with burning red eyes. In addition to dissecting the story’s 19th-century medical theories and psychological dread, Paul and Michelle draw from their past fieldwork with the Northeastern Paranormal Research Society (NEPRS). They share personal ghost-hunting experiences—including flying kitchen knives, self-ringing broken clocks, and slamming windows—while discussing how to handle negative spiritual energy. Grab a warm mug of chamomile or Earl Grey, settle in, and join the hosts for a mix of classic gothic analysis and real-world paranormal investigation.
1. Episode Context & Production Details
2. Story Breakdown: J. Sheridan Le Fanu's "Green Tea" (1869)
3. Host Discussion & Paranormal Fieldwork
EP 71 Green Tea - Transcript:
Paul: [00:00:00] And we're gonna go in five, four, three, two, and one. And hello, Michelle.
Michelle: Hi, Paul.
Paul: Hello, everyone. Welcome from e- everybody who's joined us here in North America and around the world. We're glad that you've joined us.
Michelle: My hair's in my face.
Paul: We are recording on Halloween's Eve.
Michelle: Ooh.
Paul: The children are going to be coming by very soon.
Michelle: Yeah, so we've gotta get this done. So- We gotta give out candy.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Say you're a subscriber, and you get extra.
Paul: You get a whole candy bar.
Michelle: Or four fun size.
Paul: And all the accoutrement ac- that comes along with a bar.
Michelle: It is fricking freezing in here. That's why Dragon's not down.
Paul: I'm from Canada, so this to me is balmy.
We- But to Michelle, she is about to run-
Michelle: We forgot to put- ...
Paul: screaming upstairs ...
Michelle: we forgot to put the heat on. See? This is my chicken [00:01:00] quilt.
Paul: So-
Michelle: It's cold S- so this is Dragon's friend. She, she's hanging out.
Paul: Given that it's Hallo- that it's Halloween still, and we, we published the Halloween special last Wednesday, we hope that those of you who wanted to got a chance to listen to it.
So even though we're recording now on Halloween's Eve, we've already, we, we- It's
Michelle: Halloween's Eve? It's Halloween.
Paul: Halloween. Halloween. Yes, that's right. Yeah, the eve was the night before.
Michelle: Yep. It's-
Paul: So we are diving into a Victorian terror.
Michelle: Oh.
Paul: Ooh. And I'm not talking about tax law or Victorian dental hygiene, which in it of itself is horrifying.
Michelle: Mm. Or, or, uh, you know.
Paul: Or something else-
Michelle: Yeah, you know they didn't- ... specifically ... have deodorant back then.
Paul: Yeah, that's right. Yes, that's true. More bacon-
Michelle: All, all of you who watch Bridgerton, go read what's real.
Paul: We're gonna talk about a story from [00:02:00] 18- By the
Michelle: way, I love Bridgerton. Go ahead
Paul: We're gonna talk about a story from 1869 that managed to make standard Earl Grey tea look like a biohazard.
Michelle: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Paul: Yeah. And if you think energy drinks give you the jitters, today's story is going to make you reconsider your late night caffeine habit. We are covering J. Sheridan Le Fanu's classic Victorian horror story, Green Tea.
Michelle: Yeah, now this is a fiction story, which makes it just as creepy. But about this guy, I gotta tell you, even though he was a classic and very famous fiction writer-
Paul: Mm-hmm
Michelle: his wife was deep into the paranormal. Mm. So were all of her friends, and they would tell him all these creepy paranormal stories, and that, they say- Mm ... was his catalyst and his, what would you [00:03:00] say? His-
Paul: Impetus?
Michelle: Impetus. Incentive? His, no, not incentive 'cause that means they paid him. But that was his, uh-
Paul: Creative force?
Michelle: Yeah, that's what made- The
Paul: seeds of
Michelle: his creative force ... they say that's what enticed him.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: That's what made him write these stories. That was the- Yeah ... the ideas, the, the ... That's why he wrote creepy stories that really touch the heart.
Paul: Right, and Green Tea is one of the best known of the, of the 19th century, and most latter 19th century, and most scary story-
Michelle: Now-
Paul: among the three that have been-
Michelle: Now Green Tea- ... written ... is a public domain story 'cause it was written a long, long time ago.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: You know, so, but the premise of it is something that if you twist it a little, some people actually have some stuff like this going on today.
Paul: I, mm-hmm. I, I think that it is a
You vanished. How did you do that? Oh, there you are. [00:04:00] You came back. Ooh,
Michelle: I'm a ghost. Didn't you know that? I say that every time.
Paul: Yeah. I think
Michelle: that- It's still cold down
Paul: here ... that this story goes to the heart of the nature of fear itself and, and why people become afraid. And as we get towards the end of it, afterwards, we'll, we'll touch on that briefly.
Michelle: Yeah, now green tea has no LSD in it. Remember that as we go along?
Paul: Mm-hmm. Yes. It was not hallucinogenic back then. It wasn't like-
Michelle: Still isn't ...
Paul: Coke in the, in the Coca-Cola or anything like that. Yeah, there's no floating bedsheets or jumpy scares or people jumping out of closets going, "Booah." None of that nonsense.
Michelle: It's just about a- Mm ... clergyman who had a bad run, I think you could call it. Grab your mugs. Make yourself some tea. Mm. Don't make green tea, maybe some chamomile or-
Paul: Mm-hmm ...
Michelle: um, Earl Grey.
Paul: Mm.
I hate [00:05:00] Earl Grey tea. I don't know how you're, I don't know how you're equating a b- a bad run with a visit by a demon. That, those are very incongruous things to me. Yeah, well,
Michelle: you know, if a demon ever came by and said, uh-
Paul: No, don't go there.
Michelle: No.
Paul: So let's set the scene. It's 1860- ... 1860s England. The story is presented as a case file from a guy named Dr.
Martin Hesselius.
Michelle: Um, uh, a gentleman.
Paul: A gentleman. And-
Michelle: It is 18.
Paul: Dr. Hesselius became a key character in later stories.
Michelle: Yeah, he's basically- Mm ... the granddad of occult detectives. It's sort of like the- Right ... Sherlock Holmes of the day of- Mm-hmm ... but of the, um, paranormal detectives. Right. And, um, this was before, uh, uh, what's his name?
John Constantine, whoever he was- Right ... 'cause I don't know, or of the Warrens. Remember the Warrens? They were, you know, the Warrens.
Paul: They were real. Yeah. Yeah, the Warrens were real. He- [00:06:00] Hes- Hesselius was a completely made up
Michelle: character.
Paul: Fictional,
Michelle: fictional person. A fiction character. Yep.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: And-
Paul: And he belie- oh, sorry, go ahead.
Michelle: No, no. He believed, go ahead. He believed in the spiritual world, and he was, he said it was connected to the physical world.
Paul: And hence thought that he could-
Michelle: He was like the Sherlock Holmes of the metaphysics.
Paul: Yes, and he thought that he could affect- Jesus ... the physical world or the, the spiritual world through the physical world.
Michelle: He called it metaphysical medicine.
Paul: Medicine, yes. And-
Michelle: He wasn't into bloodletting.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: He was into blood drinking.
Paul: So in this- ... story, he's reading through old letters and medical logs, and he stumbles upon the tragic case of the Reverend Mr. Robert Linder Jennings.
Michelle: Ooh, always three names back then. Mm-hmm.
Did you ever notice that?
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Anyway, Robert Jennings, the reverend, was absolute pillar of his community. He was so righteous and so Bible-thumping, and [00:07:00] all of a sudden he, you know, well-educa- educated, well-liked, a man of conviction, devout. Mm. And, um, so he meets him for dinner, but there's something wrong.
Paul: Mm-hmm. He's jittery. He keeps glancing over his shoulder at-
Michelle: He's probably in this room. It's so
Paul: cold ... empty corners of the room. He looks like a man- It's not
Michelle: even haunted, and it's this cold
Paul: He looks like a man who hasn't slept since the French Revolution.
Michelle: And that was quite a while
Paul: before him. That
Michelle: was a while.
Yeah. It's too bad he hasn't... Uh, never mind. Jennings knows that this guy is a specialist doctor, so he pulls him aside and he says, "I need to tell you something."
Paul: You're muffling yourself from the microphone. They need
Michelle: you- "I need to tell you something." "But you have to promise you won't tell anyone else because they'll throw me in an [00:08:00] asylum."
Paul: Mm-hmm. "
Michelle: They'll think I'm crazy."
Paul: And that's, that's the classic horror hook right there. If anyone ever starts a conversation with, "Promise you won't put me in a padded cell"- You sit down and listen
Michelle: Or you run like heck
Paul: Or you run like heck
Michelle: You know, it depends. Are you into it?
Paul: And is he holding a knife?
Yeah.
Michelle: So he explained that sometime back he was writing this, uh, scholarly paper, right? Mm-hmm. And he, he was doing this scholarly paper on paganism. Mm-hmm. He couldn't have been doing a scholarly paper- Right ... on grapefruit jelly, right? And
Paul: this is back at his house. Yeah. Dr. Hasseli is going back to his house, right?
'Cause
Michelle: he was into ancient- Yeah ... pagan religions- Right ... 'cause every pastor of that time was an ancient pagan.
Paul: You know, if you took a profile of this man today, the first thing that pops up in everybody's mind about everything being so perfect around his psychological framework is bad person, hiding something.
Really? Yes.
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: Anyway, he was [00:09:00] up all night drinking green tea. Mm-hmm. Now, we know if you're up all night drinking green tea, you probably have a yoga class the next day. But but back then they thought green tea coming from- Mm ... you know, the eastern, uh, countries back then, which was very, very new-
Paul: Mm-hmm
Michelle: had some kind of strange properties to it.
Paul: Mysterious, mystical stimulants.
Michelle: Yeah, so loose leaf green tea was spooky.
Paul: I don't think there is anything, such a thing as a green tea cleanse, is there?
Michelle: Yeah, of course there is. There's a cleanse for everything.
Paul: That, that's true.
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: That, that's a good moniker.
There's a cleanse for everything.
Michelle: Yeah, yeah.
Paul: Radioactive exposure- Did
Michelle: you know some people- ... there's a cleanse for that ... believe that if you eat- No ... only eggs for two weeks you'll lose weight? Hey, no medical advice.
Paul: No medical advice. Don't listen to us.
Michelle: I am not a medical doctor.
Paul: We believe in doctors.
Michelle: I'm not a doctor of any kind.
Paul: Eating steak. Well, well, not, not so
Michelle: much anymore. You, you want a steak cleanse? That's only good to cleanse vap- [00:10:00] vampires. A steak cleanse gets rid of vampires.
Paul: Okay, so anyway.
Michelle: That's how you get rid of a vegetarian- Back- ... you put a steak through their heart.
Paul: Yes.
Michelle: Oh,
Paul: boy. Rich with the metaphors
Michelle: tonight.
Paul: So anyway, with the view of green tea being a, this sort of mysterious green fluid, um, people thought drinking too much of it could inflame your nervous fluid.
Michelle: Yeah, yeah. You have a- Then you'd have to, you know, I'm
Paul: not That sounds- ... sane ... don't, no, it sounds rather naughty, doesn't it?
Michelle: You have a nervous fluid. Darling, lie down, your nervous fluids are getting to you. Yes, dear, I shall rest my nervous fluids. Will you excite my nervous fluids again?
I'm losing it.
Paul: We're getting very close to having to edit sections of this.
Michelle: No, I'll let it go. Uh, what sounds hilarious [00:11:00] now was that the story's logic about the tea made perfect sense back in the 1890s.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Yeah. This was a time, like, you know, 1890s, right?
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Um, you know, my great-great-grandmother was born then.
Mm. I wonder if she read this story. Um- Anyway, uh, they thought the tea was a chemical catalyst that burned away the n- nervous veins- Mm ... between the physical world and the spiritual world. And the doctor believed- Not
Paul: nervous veins. The n- The natural veil.
Michelle: The natural veil.
Paul: Veil between this world and
Michelle: the next.
But they were held down by your nervous veins. Anyway.
Paul: You did that on purpose, didn't you? I know you did. You did it just to see if I'm awake here.
Michelle: It opens the third eye.
Paul: Uh-huh.
Michelle: And course, your inner eye opens you up to all kinds of strange things.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Mm-hmm.
Paul: Yeah. Mm-hmm. So one night, around 2:00 AM-
Michelle: Like Pokemon cards that [00:12:00] don't exist
Paul: no filter
Michelle: I have no filters No
Paul: timing
Michelle: I have a T-shirt that says, I- Can't- "Warning, I have no
Paul: filters" ... can't read the room. Paul's started a sentence, I'll jump in right here. So one night around 2:00 AM, Jennings- Oh, it's
Michelle: usually 3:00 ...
Paul: Jennings finishes a late writing session, and he gets on an omnibus. And, and this is where I have just learned about what an omnibus is, was when researching this, which is, was back then a horse-drawn public carriage to head home.
Hmm. Now that word means so, makes so much more sense.
Michelle: It was really dark inside- Mm-hmm ... because they didn't put oil inside those things generally- Mm ... 'cause bumping would catch on fire. Anyway, when he was in the dark, he looked across the seat, 'cause he's usually seated, you know. Anyhow, he looks and he sees two glowing red ambers.
And like I said, fire isn't not very cool inside these things. Mm. So he's looking at them and he's thinking, "Somebody's-" Fire
Paul: is never cool
Michelle: [00:13:00] Ha-ha. He's thinking, "Somebody's..." See, that's your humor, right? Mm, yeah. I love you. My- Anyway, people think I- ... dry
Paul: Canadian humor ...
Michelle: think I s- people think I patronize you, but I patronize you, and I send you a monthly stipend to watch your videos.
You guys should join. Any- we don't have a Patreon yet, so don't join yet. Um, join this channel. I'm getting way off topic. So anyway, he sees these little red ambers and he's thinking- Mm-hmm ... "Somebody must've been smoking a cigar or something and they've dropped some ambers." So he's thinking, "That's not good.
Maybe, uh, it'll catch on fire." So he looks down closer thinking if it's something, he better stamp it out. But when he looks down, the ambers start to come up to greet him, and he realizes they're red eyes.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Creepy, creepy red eyes. And Paul, what are they attached to?
Paul: Yeah, out of the shadows steps a [00:14:00] small, dark, mangy monkey.
Michelle: A monkey. Monkeys those days were-
Paul: And this is not a cute monkey. This is not a funny zoo animal or a fluffy little thing.
Michelle: It- Or
Paul: a
Michelle: organ grinder's
Paul: monkey ... or an organ grinder monkey. No. It's a filthy, pitch-black spectral monkey with a look of pure malevolence, and it just stands there on the floorboards staring- I
Michelle: can't do malevolence
Paul: staring at him with these burning red eyes.
Michelle: And he's horrified. I mean, I would be, too. Monkeys were not, like, the most common animal back then. You know, I mean, this is one of those things. Uh, they didn't have TV or anything, so monkeys weren't something they saw every day. Anyway, he was so scared, he took his umbrella 'cause they always carried umbrellas back then, and he poked it.
And instead-
Paul: He poked the monkey.
Michelle: We don't talk about that.
Paul: I knew something was wrong with him.
Michelle: The umbrella went right through the vision of [00:15:00] the monkey- Oh ... 'cause it l- it was an apparition. Oh, dear. Hell. But it looked solid. Mm. So he was, like, really, "Oh my God," and he poked and poked the monkey, but his umbrella went right through it.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: So he- But the monkey remained ...
Paul: so he knew it was spectral at that point. So he gets off the omnibus, and the monkey, the monkey, it hops out with him, and it follows him down the street-
Michelle: That would freak me ...
Paul: up his front steps, and it follows him into his house and sits down on his desk.
Michelle: And he never thought to throw a banana out the window.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Now-
Paul: Dum-dum
Michelle: Yeah. See, this is the 1890s. They don't think about things like that
Paul: And, and so we should say probably very few of, of our listeners
Michelle: Yeah, well it gets, it gets creepy. I wouldn't throw one of our listeners out the window
Paul: No
Michelle: Even to get rid of the monkey. Anyhow, it gets creepy from there, if this is not creepy enough- Mm-hmm.
Right ... right? It turns into, like, this really cycle-- I got [00:16:00] this hair hanging in my face. It turns into this really psychological trauma, right?
Paul: Mm-hmm
Michelle: This monkey never attacks him physically, but it follows him everywhere. Everywhere
Paul: Right
Michelle: Right. Everywhere he looks, there's a monkey
Paul: There's,
Michelle: there's a monkey He goes to the bathroom and there's a monkey.
He lies in bed, the monkey's standing at his footboard. Everywhere he goes, he sees a monkey, and he still doesn't get a banana
Paul: Right. And the worst part is nobody else sees it except for him
Michelle: That's right
Paul: Yeah. He brings visitors over to his house, and they walk right past the monkey- Yeah ... without batting an eye
Michelle: Yeah, they l- they're not like, "Hey, what the heck is this monkey doing here?"
Paul: It would literally sit on the guest's lap, and the, and the guest would feel nothing, but he could see it
Michelle: Yeah, and he... And they're like, "Why are you staring at me?"
Paul: Right
Michelle: And, and he's like, "Oh, nothing."
Paul: Nice "
Michelle: Nothing to see." Yeah "No. Nothing,
Paul: nothing." So
Michelle: that, that- And the monkey's like, [00:17:00] "Ho-ho."
Paul: Can you imagine the isolation with that?
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: Sort of what would happen to you
Michelle: He's going crazy. He sees this monkey just sitting there on his friend's lap, and he can't say anything
Paul: Right. He's being actively stalked by a mangy monkey, an evil, demonic mangy monkey.
Michelle: Yeah, and he still hasn't gotten a banana Yeah I don't even know if they could get bananas back then I don't
Paul: know
Michelle: Anyway, it gets worse.
He tries to return to his duties as a clergyman. Remember, he, this guy's a pastor, and when he steps up onto the pulpit, guess what? There he is in front of his congregation, giving a sermon-
Paul: Right, and- ...
Michelle: opens his Bible, and guess who jumps up and sits on his Bible?
Paul: Right, and it starts making mocking, grotesque faces at him.
Then eventually the entity starts speaking to him
Michelle: Mm-hmm. Starts speaking to him. Not loud
Paul: Not out loud
Michelle: Not out loud either But in his head.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: He starts whispering things, [00:18:00] terrible blasphemous things in his head as he's trying to pray. It tells him he's being damned. Mm. It tells him that he should have fed it a banana.
He tells him, he tells him all these terrible things, tells him that it's gonna hurt him. He tells him he's gonna hurt himself. He tells, it tells him terrible things. It jumps into the area where the chor- choruses- Mm ... and when they sing, it starts singing other things. Right. You know, it jumps into the pews and it starts making pew.
It does all these terrible things.
Paul: And tries to encourage him to jump off a cliff and kill himself. Anything to- Oh, it's
Michelle: terrible ...
Paul: yeah. So Jennings, as a result of this, tries running away. He moves to different cities, but the second he stops running, he looks, and in the corner of the room, there's those red, glowing eyes again.
Michelle: He runs faster than the monkey.
Paul: Yeah. But
Michelle: the monkey always catches up to him. [00:19:00]
Paul: Right.
Michelle: Yeah. So that doctor, what's his name? Hesselius?
Paul: Hesselius.
Michelle: Hestelius. No. Why do they always have to make-
Paul: Not Hestelius, Hesselius ...
Michelle: Hesseli- I said that.
Paul: It's Andrew, Hesselius.
Michelle: Hesselius listens to the entire- Don Juan ... story, and then he examines him.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Like, what is he looking for, monkey hair?
Paul: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Michelle: He examines him.
Paul: Banana peels, I think, right here.
Michelle: Tells him to rest.
Paul: Right.
Michelle: Gives him temporary medical directions, meaning don't drink green tea-
Paul: Right ...
Michelle: I assume. You know, and, um, promises that he'll return the next morning and give him a treatment plan.
Paul: Right. I love this part here. He thinks he can, Hesselius thinks he can cure him, and he believes it's a temporary congestion of the spiritual nerves brought on by the green tea and overwork.
Michelle: Now-
Paul: Who writes like that?
Michelle: I have no idea.
Paul: Who talks like that? Who thinks like that? It
Michelle: is your green tea-
Paul: Gosh darn-
Michelle: [00:20:00] overwork ...
Paul: it's awfully colorful. I wish we'd return to speaking like that.
Michelle: Now, how much does this guy charge?
Paul: I don't know, you know? Yeah. I think he took a, a, just an interest in it from
Michelle: looking through his notes. Maybe he just charges monkeys.
Paul: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, he knows the guys, uh-
Michelle: Yeah. Early the next morning, though, when he, he realized he made a fatal mistake because the next morning there was a knock on his door, and it was, uh, an urgent person.
It was the servant- Mm-hmm ... of this guy Jennings- Right ... who also didn't see a monkey.
Paul: He left him alone for the night.
Michelle: Yeah. Is what- And he, so he rushed back ... yep He ran up the stairs, burst through the door, and guess what? It was too late. Driven by absolute madness-
Nonstop whispering and the sight of this monkey. The reverend had taken his own life
Paul: The [00:21:00] monkey had pushed him over the edge
Michelle: And the doctor arrived
Paul: Just one hour too late
Michelle: I got a question
Paul: And what-
Michelle: What could a monkey say that would drive you over the edge? Ooh, ooh. Ah, ah, tookie, tookie.
Paul: The IRS is coming? Oh, no.
Michelle: Hey, hey, I'm a
Paul: monkey. Okay. So anyway, what's crazy about the ending of Doctor Se- is how Doctor Se- hel- Celliers- This guy ... reacts. He doesn't say, "Oh, ghosts are real, and we're all doomed." He writes in his notes instead, "If I had just been there an hour earlier, my medical treatment would have closed his inner eye and saved his life."
Michelle: If he closes his inner eye, wouldn't the monkey be stuck inside his
Paul: head? I don't know. He treats a demonic monkey invasion like a case of severe inflammation. Classic Victorian science confidence right [00:22:00] there.
Michelle: I
Paul: don't know. Over the top. And completely useless.
Michelle: Did this monkey have a tail?
Paul: Oh, I don't know.
'Cause
Michelle: it could've been a chimp.
Paul: Could've
Michelle: been. Chimps are really smart.
Paul: Mm.
Michelle: It could've been a spider monkey. Where's my spider?
Paul: I don't know.
Michelle: I don't know either.
Paul: It's, it was, I think, just demonic,
Michelle: is the key. What makes green tea hold up so well in today's modern world?
Paul: Right.
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: It's-
Paul: It-- Go ahead.
Michelle: I don't know.
You go ahead.
Paul: Yeah. Well, it, it isn't... Le Fanu understood that it isn't the scariest monster is the one that, that can-
Michelle: I think it's funny you can hear our c- parrot upstairs screaming ... that
Paul: can b- that can break down your door. It's the one that follows you home and refuses to leave. It's the one that lives inside of you.
It's the
Michelle: one you married.
Paul: It's total psychological dread. Ah! Oh. The limiter's not gonna catch that scream, I can tell you right now. Ah! The idea that your own mind or a subtle [00:23:00] chemical shift can open a door to something horrible that you can never close.
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: Yeah. So our lesson learned, drink water, get sleep- A-
which we have not done enough of lately.
Michelle: Avoid, avoid crazy tea that you don't know what's in it.
Paul: Yeah. And if you see a tiny monkey-
Michelle: Like blue tea ...
Paul: we may be better switched to decaf.
Michelle: So
Paul: yeah. So I was telling Michelle that I wanted to talk about this story today because it goes to the center of the nature of fear.
And being around Halloween, it's all about, boo, getting a good fear. Good, good shock of fear? Getting- I don't know ... experiencing a good fright. That is the word I was looking for. Okay. And it invol- You know, when, when you're looking at the paranormal and the mysterious, there, you don't, it doesn't just involve Wonder, joy, and fascination and intrigue and that sort of thing.
It, in many cases, it can also include instinctive reactions of fear.
Michelle: I want to drink your blood.
Paul: Um, well, think about [00:24:00] it, you know, whether you're ... Something's haunted or you see a UFO or something unusual, sometime ... People used to react with fear. A lot of people don't, they react with wonder. But, um, you know, the w- the worst thing, the worst fear is what comes from the inside because it can happen anywhere, anytime.
You know, there's other- You're
Michelle: right ... there's other- I can remember all my kids scare me.
Paul: Yeah. Yes. The-
Michelle: They all came from the inside.
Paul: It, it has no ... Oh, and it has no limits- ... because it's based upon the limitless ability of the mind to create. You know, sometimes there are things that happen around us that generally create fear, like for me, being hit by lightning, um, having a bear walk into my camp, um, uh- Do
Michelle: you remember the raccoon that walked into our camp and ate right through our, um, well, g- that cooler, that really high ex- expensive- Mm
cooler? Ate right through it.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: Ate all our chicken.
Paul: My, took my teriyaki.
Michelle: Yeah, I know. And [00:25:00] that time you said, "Don't worry, hon, there aren't any bears around here." And-
Paul: Bad on me, sorry.
Michelle: We left the tent door-
Paul: One of the things I find interesting
Michelle: is- ... bear footprints everywhere. Rawr. Thank you ...
Paul: is, is that the-
Michelle: Thank you very much.
Paul: One of the themes that I find interesting, and maybe you do too, Michelle- ... is the, that the spiritual and ph- Dr. Hesselius' idea that the spiritual and physical are connected.
Michelle: Look at that black creature behind me.
Paul: And he believed he could solve the problem with a medical treatment that would close the reverend's third eye so he couldn't see or hear the monkey anymore.
But it takes a l- a little bit more than that to dispel evil, I think.
Michelle: Yeah, it does.
Paul: In our experience, that, um, you know, you can ... S- I guess somebody could, you know, t- take Valium to calm down and become less sensitive, but- Why would that get
Michelle: rid of evil?
Paul: But that won't get rid of evil, yeah. You- Yeah ... there's more that has to be done.
And just a little bit about the author here. We, uh, Michelle touched [00:26:00] on it, but, uh, he was, uh, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, who lived from 1814 to 1873. He was an influential Irish writer of gothic tales, mystery novels, and ghost stories, and often remembered as the premier ghost story writer of the 19th century.
This b- book we were, or novelette we were talking about, Green Tea, from 1869, was a groundbreaking short story.
Michelle: Yeah, weird, huh?
Paul: Yeah. Le Fanu's eerie-
Michelle: Nowadays it's like, huh?
Paul: Lufano's eerie, introspective style remains celebrated for turning internal anxiety and paranoia into tangible, haunting monsters.
Michelle: Hey, we should tell them someday about some of our weird internal ghost story stuff like, uh, like when we've gone, um, and done house clearings of ghosts.
Paul: There was, I, when you say that, w- I, one of the external things that caused me fear was, uh, when we encountered that poltergeist in that haunted house, and a, [00:27:00] a knife flew across - ... the kitchen and stuck in the wall beside me.
Michelle: Yeah. Yeah.
Paul: That- That was fun ... that, that was a reasonable thing to be afraid of. That
Michelle: was a good fear.
Yes. Yeah, when a knife flies from a countertop- Mm ... unbidden. Mm. No reason for it, and s- flies, and if you didn't move, it would've hit-
Paul: Yeah ...
Michelle: it.
Paul: Yeah, that's, that's a, fear is a reasonable response in that
Michelle: case. A reasonable response when a knife with- Yeah ... no one near it flies across a room- Mm-hmm ...
Paul: and
Michelle: beds in the wall.
Paul: Right.
Michelle: Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah, we, we should tell you the whole story about that sometime.
Paul: Yeah, we have-
Michelle: That was a great place.
Paul: Yeah. We, we've had our share of, uh, clearing houses over the years, and, uh, uh, talking to ghosts and getting them to move on. And, uh, we used to do a lot of this work when we had the NEPRS, the Northeastern Paranormal Research Society.
Uh, if you check any of those domains right now, we don't have any of the websites up, but we used to for many years.
Michelle: Mm-hmm.
Paul: And, uh, lots of pictures. Some of those pictures you will see here. I'll try [00:28:00] to remember to put some in right-
Michelle: Put some in- Here ... right there, up, up above my head.
Paul: Yes, and- Our green screen, I, we just have to fix that.
Yeah,
Michelle: we have a haunted green screen.
Paul: It's a
Michelle: green screen. Yeah, we gotta get a little bit better with our tech.
Paul: Right.
Michelle: Yeah.
Paul: And we will.
Michelle: Someday.
Paul: Everybody, thank you very much for joining us.
Michelle: Mm-hmm.
Paul: Please subscribe.
Michelle: Yep.
Paul: Hit the thumbs up.
Michelle: Oh, Paul.
Paul: Ding the
Michelle: bell. I have to interrupt you at the end. It's tradition.
Again. Yep. We sh- also have to tell them about the time where, um, that clock we, in the house we were, uh, working on- Oh, the Greenville,
Paul: the
Michelle: Greenville clock ... the Greenville clock. Yeah. Yeah. Um, there was this big, uh, grandfather clock, and every time we were in there working on getting rid of ... That h- that place was ton full of spirits, and that clock would start, uh, ticking, and it would ring on the hour.
And we finally went down and looked at the clock, and all of the insides of the clock, all of it, were gone, and there was [00:29:00] nothing inside for it to ring the ... Everything was broken. Mm-hmm. Everything was gone, but every time we worked, it would start to- Right ... tick and ring on the hour. That was wicked cool.
Paul: Yeah, and-
Michelle: Yeah ...
Paul: when we would- S- ... check out the, um, the, uh, house extension, the anterior s- uh, upper section, it had all these h- huge windows. When we walked in and we, you could sense the ghosts that were there. We tried to talk to them. All the windows would bang, bang, bang, bang, bang,
Michelle: bang, bang. Shake, shake, shake, shake, shake.
Yeah, and the first time I went in just to do the prelim on it, um, we walked into the, uh, well, I and the owner walked into the great room, and, um, she said, "So, uh, we're sure that it's haunted. Do you think you can do anything with it?" And I s- pushed at it and said, uh, "So you guys, you wanna, y- you gonna work for m- with me, or you gonna get the heck out of here?"
And every single open window in the green room went, I mean, in the great room went slam, slam, slam, slam, all, [00:30:00] uh, 12 of them. Yeah. It was really awesome.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: Paul and I love this work.
Paul: Yeah. So-
Michelle: We help people, and we have a great time.
Paul: Y- Yeah, and you could see how if, um, something like that happened and you weren't familiar with this type of, of experience, it could cause you a great deal of fear.
And I was actually reading one of the, uh, paranormal investigators in New Hampshire, I forget his name, uh, but he said the scariest thing he's ever seen is what happens to a person when they believe they have a ghost. He said that was the scariest thing. They couldn't go and deal with it, but they started to fall apart inside, and that is something to take note of.
And- You don't, you don't have to be afraid.
Michelle: Yeah, and also never fight evil with evil.
Paul: Yeah.
Michelle: Never fight evil with anger.
Paul: Project energy in the form of unconditional love, and it'll be like [00:31:00] fingernails on a chalkboard to it.
Michelle: Yep, and that's what you gotta do. Mm. If Paul and I ever went into these places thinking, "We're stronger than you, we can beat you," we'd be dead.
Paul: Mm, flattened.
Michelle: Smooshed.
Paul: So may I sign off now?
Michelle: Okay.
Paul: Can you restrain yourself?
Michelle: Um, I'll put my- Okay, I'm restrained, me and my chicken quilt.
Paul: Thank you everyone for joining us. We're grateful you dropped by. Please subscribe. Yep. Our... And for those of you who- I've
Michelle: still got that hair, the hair in my face ...
Paul: for those of you who are listening to us on the podcast, you can find us on YouTube now.
Michelle: Our- And you won't see me trying to get all this hair- @- ... out of my face.
Paul: The handle is @TheSpookyCoop, and, uh, for the podcast, it's Spooky Coop Podcast. Everybody have a wonderful week. We hope you all have a great Halloween, or- We- ... had one by the time you hear this ...
Michelle: we kindly and [00:32:00] humbly beseech thee to subscribe-
Paul: I did ask
Michelle: and to hit the bell for notifications.
Paul: Mm-hmm.
Michelle: Use the hype button.
Paul: Be good to each other. Take care of one another.
Michelle: And if you got this far, we love you.
Paul: Love each other.
Michelle: We love you anyway.
Paul: And we'll see you soon. Be safe. Be good. Until next time, when we see you in... The Spooky Coop. The Spooky Coop. I think I sang Spooky Coop almost in key.