AP Strange: 00:22

Pardon me while I have a strange interlude. There is nothing else. Life is an obscure hobble, plumbing a ride on the omnibus of art. In the misty carotters of time, and in those carotters, I see figures. Strange figures.

AP Strange: 01:04

Welcome back, my friends, to the AP Strange Show. And, this week's show is brought to you by Van Helsing brand Dracula Detectors. If you need Dracula detection, if you're worried about Dracula's descending on your house, It's good to have the old Van Helsing model, Dracula detector handy. The it comes with a few parts that or, you know, you can send away for extra parts to help you detect whether there's Frankensteins or mummies in your area as well. But, it will definitely keep you abreast of any draculas in your immediate area.

AP Strange: 01:45

So if that is a concern of yours and you don't like the smell of garlic, look into Van Helsing brand Dracula Detectors. And, on tonight's show, we have, someone that I became aware of recently. He is the founder of Dripless Times Media, a writer and editor by trade, and he has a lot of interesting ideas on his site and on his substack, which I highly recommend reading. And, I've been sharing around some articles on the socials because I think they're pretty darn cool. Please welcome to the show, Walker Yarrow.

Walker Jaroch: 02:27

Thank you, AP. It's a delight to be here. Thank you for the kind words. I've been looking forward to this since you reached out to me, over the weekend. And, I just have to say quick, I love it.

Walker Jaroch: 02:38

Anybody anytime anybody uses Dracula as to, describe vampires in general, so I need to pick me up some of those, Dracula detectors.

AP Strange: 02:47

Yeah. Well, I like Dracula as a plural term. So that I love that.

Walker Jaroch: 02:54

Uh-huh. There's, like, something just inherently comedic about it that it tickles me every time I hear it. So this is already off to a great start.

AP Strange: 03:00

Alright. Great. That's good to know. I I have often said that's the only way I would get back into music is if I could start a band called the Space Draculas.

Walker Jaroch: 03:12

That that brings up a interesting question. Like, what planet does, do Draculas reside on? And do they all dress and look like Dracula?

AP Strange: 03:21

It is. I mean, it raises all kinds of questions, and I think that kind of mystique would draw people in to the to the show when you're when you're playing somewhere. So it would be good. I actually that was inspired by a a report I read at one point from Transylvania, some battle that was happening in, like, the 5 100 or something, and there was some wonder in the sky that was seen. And I was like, it was Space Dracula's, and that was kind

Walker Jaroch: 03:49

of the That would be wonderful. It it is like cryptoterrestrials, the whole UFO phenomena, but it's actually Dracula's. An underground, enclave of Dracula's manipulating humanity. I could get behind that.

AP Strange: 04:01

Industrial Draculas. They're breaking new ground right now.

Walker Jaroch: 04:05

It's perfect. We're making history already.

AP Strange: 04:10

Yeah. Well, you know, I I did I was kind of inspired to do the Dracula's bit just because, there there actually are some vampire legends, close to where you are that you've written a bit about. The the, you're in the Wisconsin area. Right? So Correct.

AP Strange: 04:31

And, around around Halloween, you posted something about the Mineral Point vampire. Mhmm. I thought it was, really kind of a cool thing.

Walker Jaroch: 04:40

Yeah. For sure. Let me ask you first just out of curiosity because I'm always wondering how far this story has traveled outside of Wisconsin. How, like, aware were you of the Mineral Point Vampire before, kinda reading that?

AP Strange: 04:55

I was completely unaware. That was what was really cool about it as I was like I I I got the sense that you were kinda like, well, this is, this is a well told well trodden path. This tale has been told many times, and I'm like, well, it's news to me. Like, lay it on

Walker Jaroch: 05:09

me. Good. Yeah. We

AP Strange: 05:11

have New England vampires here, but it's more of a historical thing that has to do with historical hysterias, you know, like, the, the the the Rhode Island Exeter Vampire or, like, the ones in Vermont, and the Jewett City ones in Connecticut. But, yeah, this was a really interesting kind of urban legend, folklorist sort of tale. So it was really cool.

Walker Jaroch: 05:36

Yeah. And it it it's interesting because the only reason it really gets, described as a a vampire, is because the the guy who first sees it, describes it as wearing like a cloak or a cape, and then all the local townsfolk start dressing as Dracula essentially to mock him and go around to the bars. So it just from there, it becomes the Mineral Point vampire. But, yeah, let me get into the the story of it. So kinda as you alluded to, it's a pretty common, bit of folklore around my area.

Walker Jaroch: 06:14

I think I first heard it back in the 2nd grade, but even I remember, like, we had a kid who moved from Mineral Point, told us the story. But even I remember when he told it to us, I was like, I, like, know this for summer. Like, this I've heard this story before. So I think it's it's fairly popular around here at least in the eighties nineties. So it took place March 30, 1981, Mineral Point, Wisconsin.

Walker Jaroch: 06:42

Officer John Pepper was on a a routine patrol of Graceland Cemetery, which I believe at the time it had some vandalism taking place at it. So he was just doing his job shining his flashlight through, the bars of the cemetery fence, and he sees, some guy just standing in the cemetery. And he gets in. He's, like, ready to apprehend this vandal. But as he gets closer, he realizes this, this man, this creature, this whatever it is, is incredibly tall.

Walker Jaroch: 07:15

Pepper himself is over 6 feet, and this thing's taller than him. He describes it, like I said, as wearing like a cape or a cloak. It's super pale, and as soon as it sees him, it just takes off running. And Pepper says that it's just navigating the, cemetery with ease, because you gotta remember this takes place at night. There's no lights in that cemetery.

AP Strange: 07:40

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 07:41

You know, it's pretty dark. You would think you're gonna trip on a tombstone, but this thing is just running around, without any care in the world. And Pepper is like, I'm an athletic guy, and I could not keep up with whatever this was. And the kicker is it reaches this, 4 foot fence, barbed wire 4 foot fence, they say. And the legend is it leaps it in a single bound and runs off into the, Wisconsin countryside, never to be seen again, until the late or or the early 2000 if you believe those stories.

AP Strange: 08:18

Right. Yeah. And then you kinda get into unpacking that. And I mean, can leave it you know, we can leave some things unexplained here for people to dig into because, I I I feel like this is this this is a kind of thing that you see with a lot of paranormal stories where there's there's myth making and legend stuff and, you know, modern folklore.

Walker Jaroch: 08:42

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 08:42

Where you have almost copycat things going on. Like you said, people dressing up like Dracula just to make fun of the guy. Or, you know, 20 years later, somebody else claims the same thing and then those details are really hard to verify when you go back to look at it. Mhmm. You can almost understand why a lot of people think that all of the paranormal and every weird story is just nonsense and not worth dealing with because it's so hard to unpack.

Walker Jaroch: 09:09

No. And this is, like, the the perfect example of that because when I went into it, like, I didn't really wanna even cover it when I first started. It was like something I felt almost, like, obliged to just because I had heard about it. It's pretty close to where I am. Like, Mineral Point's only, like, an hour, hour and a half drive from me.

Walker Jaroch: 09:28

So, like, I could go, like, see where this took place. So I was like, well, you know, it's more than likely a prank that, the officer who supposedly saw it, you know, it's claimed he was a prankster, like, the run around town in the gorilla suit. So it's like, well, this is gonna be, like, an easy one to cover. That's why, I I approached it from, the standpoint of or I was going to approach it from the standpoint of, movies because the seventies were, like, full, just vampire media, like, more vampire media than you could shake a stick at. So I was like, well, you know, that's an interesting angle to look at this folklore from because we could, you know, do like a co creation y thing or maybe this guy was just inspired by all these movies.

Walker Jaroch: 10:08

But the more you dig into the actual story, it's like, once you lay out all the facts and can find what you can find on it, it's like you can make a compelling case that it was either a hoax or something actually strange happened to this guy. It's really interesting. At the end of it, it it's totally up to kinda your opinion reading through it as whether you believe, somebody pranked this guy, he did a hoax himself, or this was truly a strange event that took place.

AP Strange: 10:38

Yeah. And I mean, it can be a combination of all of those things. It is funny because looking into any kind of paranormal case, I feel like those are generally your options upfront is, was this real or fake? And then you do a bunch of digging and you pull on all the different threads. And at the end of it, you're like, well, it's either real or fake.

AP Strange: 10:57

Don't know. But here's all this evidence I found.

Walker Jaroch: 11:02

Yeah. Right. It's it's it's intriguing. It keeps the mystery going and and, like, what compels me to, like, keep digging for it. But, yeah, at the end of the day, it's like, well, great.

Walker Jaroch: 11:14

It it either happened or it didn't. So somehow, I did all this research and work. It wound up right back at square 1.

AP Strange: 11:19

Right. But it's a lot of fun getting there. Like, little details like a policeman running around town in a gorilla suit is hilarious to me because I have not known very many policemen with a sense of humor. And that's that sounds really really kinda refreshing to have one that just puts on because, I mean, that's one of my bigger regrets in life is I have yet to own my own gorilla suit. I I feel like, I really should have, by this point, gotten one.

AP Strange: 11:47

But

Walker Jaroch: 11:48

It's something everybody should own once, once at least in their life.

AP Strange: 11:52

Yeah. I would think so too. But, alas, I am still failing at that. But but yeah. So, I mean, I guess, this this is a good good segue into, your interest in all of this.

AP Strange: 12:10

You you mentioned that you probably heard this story in the 2nd grade and, felt like you had already heard it at that point. Were you always interested in, like, paranormal stuff and monsters and weirdness? Is that pretty much, like, since childhood for you?

Walker Jaroch: 12:25

Yeah. It really is as far back as I can remember. And I I can't put, you know, my finger on what, kinda sparked that interest in these subjects. I would, you know, maybe the the romantic thing to say is I've always been kind of a writer and storyteller at heart. So there's, like, kinda natural overlap with, like, the folklore, odd history, paranormal stories.

Walker Jaroch: 12:49

If you wanna go, like, the kind of, you know, interesting in its own way psychology route, I am a a an October baby. So all my earliest happy birthday memories would involve ghosts and goblins and trick or treating and stuff. So, you know, just reinforce that goodwill over the years. But but, yeah, this stuff has always kind of intrigued me and, seeing, an opportunity to combine the the professional skill set from working in journalism and publishing and stuff while getting to cover these things has been a real joy. Like you said, just digging into news newspaper archives and kinda putting dots together.

Walker Jaroch: 13:27

I never thought I'd enjoy an evening of sifting through just newspaper archives, but it's a it's a lot more fun than I thought it would be.

AP Strange: 13:34

Oh, I'm a big fan. Do do you get the old microfilm readers out sometimes at the library?

Walker Jaroch: 13:41

I haven't had to do that yet. I've been able to get

AP Strange: 13:45

everything out.

Walker Jaroch: 13:46

I know. Someday. Someday. But right now, my trusty library card and their archives online are making the way. But sooner or later, I'm gonna have to go old school.

AP Strange: 13:56

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, la de da, mister fancy pants with the online archives. Yeah. The my local library has has, like, their town paper on microfilm still.

AP Strange: 14:09

It's not it never been digitized. So if I wanna find something, I go in there and they they'll set it up for you, and then you just like, you can have it on the computer screen and clip it. But I'm so spoiled on things like newspapers.com that I did a ton of research at one point using microfilm and clipping articles and then failed to include the date of those articles. So now it's like I have to go back and find them all again so that I can properly, cite them if I ever wanna use them.

Walker Jaroch: 14:39

I've I've fallen into that same trap. I well, I think I bookmarked something or, like, made a note of it only to go back and find that I didn't save that note or the bookmark didn't get saved. And now I'm just frantically googling trying to remember what string of keywords got me to this information, and it never works. It's

AP Strange: 14:57

Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 14:57

It's terrible.

AP Strange: 14:59

Well yeah. I mean, I like, with newspapers.com, if you use that, it it's gonna automatically tell you the publication of the date. So that's that spoiled me because that that is not the case when you clip something from an image on the screen. So Yeah. Yeah.

AP Strange: 15:16

But, but, yeah, I mean, that is one thing that struck me, and I I kinda had to ask you ahead of recording is, like, oh, you you have a background in in writing, don't you? Because, not to be not to be dismissive or or mean to people in this field, but there's a lot of them that aren't great writers. I mean, the then this has always been true. Like, you you look back at, like, contactees writing their own accounts and stuff like that, even though a lot of that was ghostwritten or, you know, people writing their own books on the subject. Like, there there's a lot of, very amateur writing out there.

AP Strange: 15:54

And then when I was reading yours, I'm like, oh, this is refreshing. This guy really like, this seems like professional writing on this. And somebody taking these subjects seriously with kind of nuance, which is something I don't see all the time. So that's really kinda cool. So I applaud you for that.

AP Strange: 16:09

Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 16:10

Yeah. I appreciate you saying that. I I thank you very much. Yeah. I I got my start in newspapers, all things, speaking of community journalism.

Walker Jaroch: 16:18

So my heart lies in newspaper writing, but, I was in b to b publishing for 5 years. At the tail end of that bit of my career, I was the lead editor of, an aircraft maintenance brand. So, you know, b to b publishing, it's like sort of journalism, but it's not, you know, as great of journalism as, like, the New York Times or something. Yeah. But still very, writing content creation focused.

Walker Jaroch: 16:49

Like I was telling you, on the the chat before we started recording, this is my first time, I think, being on the other end of the interview microphone, being interviewed. So this is a lot of fun. But no. Yeah. My I've I've been lucky enough to make a career out of writing.

Walker Jaroch: 17:09

I don't know how many of my other writer classmates out there can say the same. I really just kinda lucked into it. The newspaper took a flyer on some, kid with an English degree, and I was able to spiral that into, so far, fingers crossed, a decent career. But, yeah, my heart's always lied in fiction writing, and the the nonfiction stuff, just pays the bills.

AP Strange: 17:37

Yeah. Well, I mean, writing about the paranormal is kinda great because you you can do a little bit of both, really. I mean, it's not quite thick fiction, but as you mentioned with, like, the vampire story, like, it's it's it kinda borders on urban legend or folklore or a hoax, which that kind of all blends with fiction well. Or and this is entirely likely in my mind, something actually happened that night. And, and even if that one part of it is true and everything else that spirals off of it is false, it's kind of like this interesting juxtaposition between reality and unreality.

AP Strange: 18:19

And I think somewhere in the middle of that is where a lot of this phenomena, really lives and is really active.

Walker Jaroch: 18:27

Oh, a 100%. Yeah. I I always take the the kinda x fire x files Mulder approach of, like, I want to believe every story. Like, when I went into the Mineral Point Vampire 1, you know, I got to those, kinda 2,000 stories and trying to find out the details on those. And, like, I don't set out to debunk anything, but I'm just trying to present the information as it is.

Walker Jaroch: 18:51

And sometimes, yeah, you wind up like, oh, there's no actual source for these stories that I can find. But back to your kind of original point, like, yeah, that's the great thing about these kinda topics is that they have one foot in reality and then one foot in whatever you wanna call the other unreality, just myth making. And those are really the 2 components of any good story is, like, something based enough in reality for people to to to engage with, but then enough ambiguity for them to put their own spin on it and interpretation. So, yeah, they're they're they're naturally just compelling from, like, the human brain storytelling what it likes.

AP Strange: 19:40

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I I think that's why we all like these stories too. You know? It's, the story itself is very important.

AP Strange: 19:49

That's why, like, I don't be grudge hoax hoaxers and or even people that that embellish tales or, leave out, like, the information that that that she shines doubt on the story.

Walker Jaroch: 20:03

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 20:03

Because, yeah, yeah, I mean, you need a little bit of hucksters hucksterism to make make the thing flow. You know? I think that Oh, yeah. No. You know?

AP Strange: 20:15

And it's it's just so interesting to pick it all apart and and look at it from different angles. But I I feel like there's a little bit of everything in this field, and it's it's it's really fun to, to to pick it apart.

Walker Jaroch: 20:31

Yeah. That's Let's see.

AP Strange: 20:32

You were worried about rambling before, and I'm I'm trailing off right now with a bad thought. No. No. No. Don't worry.

Walker Jaroch: 20:39

I can't. Just let me go. I I'll start rambling if you want rambling.

AP Strange: 20:42

Okay. Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 20:45

No. It's it's it's it's definitely it's interesting, especially when you come to the Hoaxters thing. And the the mineral point vampire because because like I said, there is I want to believe that this wasn't a prank. It wasn't a hoax by John Pepper that this was a truly strange event. Whatever it was, be an actual vampire or I don't know.

Walker Jaroch: 21:16

Whatever else. Some ghoul or goblin of some sort was actually in that cemetery doing something. But, you know, if you said, Walker, would you bet all the money in your bank account that this was an actual vampire? It's like, I no, I can't say that. I can't I can't do that.

Walker Jaroch: 21:34

I can't take that leap of faith, but I very much want it to be. Yeah.

AP Strange: 21:40

And how would you ever prove it? I mean, unless you have a time machine and you can go back and look, you know. You can't. And, you know, like, the thing is that I feel like this is less vampire ish to me. It reminds me of, like, Spring Hill Jack.

Walker Jaroch: 21:56

Oh, yeah.

AP Strange: 21:57

And, closer to home for me, there was one in Provincetown, Massachusetts in, I think, the 19 forties. It was called the Provincetown Phantom, and he was seen a bunch of times. But it's the the leaping over the fence thing. Like, it just seems like a superhuman feat, you know, so that's yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 22:15

Yeah. And it's it's interesting how kinda often that pops up. Yeah. That was another angle I was going to explore because obviously, I have, like, the the most famous one in, like, Spring Heel Jack and stuff. But even Wisconsin has its own, like, just weird ghost guy.

Walker Jaroch: 22:33

He's called the Ridgeway ghost, and he and it actually existed, like, not far away from Mineral Point. Ridgeway was like an old kind of trading route that got, you know, eventually dried up as the industry changed and things and mining moved out of the area. But there's all this folklore about this ghost, and it's one of those ghosts that's not like a singular ghost. There's like a story about this butcher encountering ghost pigs that grow bigger as they get to them. And that's classified as, like, the Ridgeway ghosts swines.

Walker Jaroch: 23:09

So you have this, like, built in, kind of entity or folklore, whatever you wanna call it in that region. But then flash forward to the eighties and somebody encounters what, you know, a 100 years ago, what we call the Ridgeway Ghost, and it becomes the Mineral Point vampire.

AP Strange: 23:26

Wow. Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 23:27

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 23:28

I mean, the ghost pigs in particular really freaked me out. But It's

Walker Jaroch: 23:33

a it's a fun story. I was, in preparation of this, I was flipping through, this book called Wisconsin Lore. Just a huge collection, all different folklore from Wisconsin. And, yeah, he essentially was coming home from, like, a butchering job, and he saw some pigs ahead of him. He was like, oh, whatever.

Walker Jaroch: 23:51

Loose pigs. But they kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and then they got, like, the size of cows. And, apparently, he gets close enough to them. He, hits them with his butchering knife, and then they disappear. And he's like, oh, no.

Walker Jaroch: 24:03

That was the Ridgeway ghost swines. And he goes home and, apparently dies of fright, like, a few days later.

AP Strange: 24:11

Wow.

Walker Jaroch: 24:12

Yeah.

AP Strange: 24:12

Wow. Yeah. I love a good animal ghost story, and that one is, that's exceptional even for animal ghosts. Yeah. I was that's that's, that's one of

Walker Jaroch: 24:24

the more fun ones. I mean, not that some guy died of fright supposedly a few days after it, but the fact that they're, you know, enlarging pigs is is pretty great.

AP Strange: 24:34

Yeah. Growing pigs.

Walker Jaroch: 24:36

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 24:37

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm trying to think of of precedent for that, because, I mean, one of my favorite ghost stories ever is of, the phantom chicken of Highgate Cemetery.

Walker Jaroch: 24:53

Oh, I don't know if I know this.

AP Strange: 24:55

Or a pond square, actually, in London. Have you never heard of this one?

Walker Jaroch: 24:59

No. I don't think I have.

AP Strange: 25:01

Oh, it's the story of sir Francis Bacon was trying to prove that food could be preserved with a cold temperature because this isn't an era before people knew that. And, to prove it, he killed the chicken and plucked all its feathers and stuffed it in the, snowbank so that you know, to prove that it wouldn't it wouldn't, you know, decay at all in the in the time that it was left there. And then later, he died, I think, either from salmonella or from being out in the cold like a bronchial infection. But, the chicken was said to haunt that area. So every once in a while, people would see, like, a spectral chicken with, like, a broken neck and, like, a bunch of feathers missing, like, running around.

AP Strange: 25:49

And it would, like, run around and cluck a bit and then disappear, like, vanish before their eyes. So

Walker Jaroch: 25:55

That's awesome.

AP Strange: 25:58

Yeah. The phantom chicken. I love that. So, yeah. So, Phantom Pigs.

AP Strange: 26:07

Ridgeway Ghosts Pigs. So was the Ridgeway Ghost supposed to be, like, a local farmer? Or do they have, like, a, like, a an a historical antecedent, or was that all just legend?

Walker Jaroch: 26:18

I can't remember off the top of my head. I think it's one of those that there's a whole bunch of different origin stories for it. The one I remember the most involves let me try and get this straight in my head. Essentially, back in the day, the area was big in mining. I wanna say lead and zinc mining.

Walker Jaroch: 26:44

And all the miners were having, like, a a rowdy kind of party in the tavern. And 2 boys walk in, and they're coming out of the cold, and they're just looking for a place to to warm up, get some food, get some drink. And they accidentally sit in, like, the biggest, baddest guy's chair. Like, he's left to go take a whiz or something. And the other the other guys at the poker table are like, oh, yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 27:12

You can sit here, like, thinking it's gonna be a funny prank, but he comes back and he gets real violent real fast. Supposedly, he throws 1 of the boys into a fire, and he beats the other boy when he tries to help him and casts him out into the snow. I think the other boy finally, like, claws his claws his way out of the fire and also, like, runs out into the snowstorm, And their bodies are found, like, a few days later, maybe even come springtime in, by, like, a nearby river. And that is supposed to be one of the origin stories of the ghost, but I'm having a hard time remembering that one because I actually heard that at a Halloween event, at the historical society, as, like, the origin. So that was they told that one in person.

Walker Jaroch: 28:07

So I'm a little foggy on all the exact details of it, but I'm trying to remember out of the the Wisconsin lore book. I don't think they give an origin for the ghost because he's not like a singular ghost. Like, sometimes people see, like, a willow the wisp thing, and that gets attributed to the Ridgeway ghost. It's one of those where if something spooky happened along this road, they were just like, oh, it's the Ridgeway ghost. Be it ghost pig, ball of light, or sometimes it is like a guy, like, chasing somebody off.

AP Strange: 28:42

So does it have any of the attendant legends? Like, if you slow down and turn your headlights off for a couple seconds, it'll appear or anything like that? No. Most of the people,

Walker Jaroch: 28:54

really went out of their way to avoid it. And the one thing the one thing about it is that it was known kind of for prankish stuff, which is why I'm a little little suspicious of the kind of the violent origin story that I told of

AP Strange: 29:11

Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 29:11

The ghost. Because one of my favorite stories, of it involves, poker again. But all these guys playing poker, and then suddenly all the playing cards and stuff start floating around the room. And then they look, and there's just kinda like a phantom apparition sitting there at the table, and they're like, that's the Ridgeway ghost, and they all rush out. So it usually did kinda like harmless prank stuff like that would, like, come up along your horses and freak them out.

Walker Jaroch: 29:37

So it'd make your carriage go super fast or whatnot. Yeah. Yeah. Even, you know, the swine thing. They didn't try and, like, hurt the guy.

Walker Jaroch: 29:45

You can even make the case. He was kind of the jerk in the situation because he's just tried to cut a couple of really big pigs. But, yeah, he's it's more kinda like a lighthearted prankster ish entity that just freaks people out more than something like, you know, you would think if it's the spirit of some poor kid burnt alive, he'd be a little more pissed off.

AP Strange: 30:06

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, especially, I always feel that way with ghosts in general where there's a lot of people that wanna come in and go over how they died with them, like a 100 other ghost hunters already did. You know, like, when you get really sick of as a ghost having to answer all those questions.

Walker Jaroch: 30:25

Yeah. Like, man, like

AP Strange: 30:28

I I I think I would rather have a ghost with a sense of humor, you know? Mhmm. But, what's funny to a ghost may not be funny to us. And that's that's assuming it is a ghost too. And I I think I picked this up a little bit in I don't I don't know that you addressed this directly in, some of the stuff you wrote, but, the the the underlying assumptions, there's a lot of built in assumptions in these stories and tales that we're we're told, And they can be kind of limiting, in our in how we look at it.

AP Strange: 31:06

So, I mean, if you say ghost, I mean, even I'm doing it. Well, like, is there a story? Like, is there a guy that the ghost is based on? And, but there's a range of phenomena, so probably not. Right?

AP Strange: 31:18

But that tends to be how how this stuff is approached.

Walker Jaroch: 31:22

Yeah. That's one of the things, kinda that journalist side that drives me in looking into these stories is trying to get to the as close to, like, the origination or the source of them that I can. Because especially in something like the Mineral Point Vampire, like, the source for some of these stories is, like, it's a blog that cites a blog and that blog cites another blog and that blog cites a listicle. And that listicle, well, it cites another blog and it's like, well, the police were apparently involved. Like, there has to be a report.

Walker Jaroch: 31:55

Right? Like, where did this come from? So, yeah, it's it's getting to the bottom of some of these things. And then, yeah, going into the actual, like, what was the thing that was seen is even more interesting to start speculating. Like, can you put it in some box, a ghost or a vampire?

Walker Jaroch: 32:13

And and should you even do that? I mean, I don't think there's probably a right or wrong answer, but, I like to be as kinda open minded. And like I said, I want to believe as possible when it comes to these things.

AP Strange: 32:30

Yeah. I mean, there's something something to be said for letting the story speak for itself. Mhmm. And, one thing that I've often done is thrown out, like, the wackiest possible speculation, kind of as a joke. But then I find that upon revisiting it, I'm like, you know, that's not so that's not the stupidest thing I could have said.

AP Strange: 32:52

That's actually pretty interesting. It is worthwhile to go way out there sometimes, you know. But

Walker Jaroch: 32:59

That's the best way to do it. I had a a professor in college who encouraged, like, go out on a limb. I would rather you go out on a limb and be able to, like, connect your crazy ideas that probably aren't, you know, anywhere remotely, you know, close or accurate or the way other people would think than just stick to the easy kind of mundane explanation for something. Even going back earlier in the conversation, you said the different ways you can kind of look at this stuff. And that's one of the the kind of endlessly fun things to me is that just the different lenses you can apply to these topics.

Walker Jaroch: 33:35

Like, I love movie guy, film nerd, hell bent on never making money in my life. I minored in film theory in college. So I like to apply kinda film theory, film philosophy to the phenomena just as a different way to look at and examine it and maybe understand it. Again, might not get you any closer to the truth, but if, like I said before, half of these things have their foot in reality, half of them have their foot in folklore and digital and natural elements of mystery and storytelling, like movies as a, like, almost a perfect narrative medium are like a great way to look at them.

AP Strange: 34:19

Yeah. Yeah. And, I mean, I think that's something that I'm I'm always kind of hinting at the way I've approached stuff, especially with this show, because I'm doing one one interview style one and then one movie one seems to be the pattern that I've developed with this show. So, I will have to have you back for a 3rd Time's the Charm episode if you if you wanna pick a 3rd movie in a franchise that we can talk about. But,

Walker Jaroch: 34:47

We'll talk about that. Yeah.

AP Strange: 34:49

Yeah. Because I I I I didn't catch the film buff part of it. But yeah. I mean, you would get we could set that up. But, but, yeah, I mean, it gets to kinda, like, the phenomena element of it and the noumena element of it, which is just kind of like the imaginal realm of it.

AP Strange: 35:08

The what those symbols are and what they mean, what the meaning is. And and there so, there's a meaning apart from it, and there's a meaning that can be taken away from the act of storytelling that can, that can then fracture off into a 1000000 different directions. And, in the end, it's all equally real because it's meaningful, and it it has real life effects. You know, It it seems like splitting hairs to say something isn't real if it if it has a, profound effect on somebody's life, for instance, or changes the course of history. So

Walker Jaroch: 35:43

Yeah. A 100%. I I can't agree with you more. Even going back to, like, the hoaxing stuff, it's like, if it was a hoax, but it had impact on people and someone took something meaningful away from it, like, does it matter that it wasn't, you know, actually what the person thought it was. You know, as long as they don't go, you know, do something bad with that information and start a cult or something, but as long as it has, like, a positive impact on them.

Walker Jaroch: 36:10

Yeah. At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what what box you put this stuff in or, again, if it was even what the witness actually thought it was.

AP Strange: 36:23

Yeah. I mean, I think the ultimate reality to get a bit metaphysical about it is, defies our our our human categorization. So, and it will actively defy it. So there's no real point. Other than that, just seems to be how we process reality.

AP Strange: 36:43

You know?

Walker Jaroch: 36:44

Yeah. I've that's what's really been, kinda driving my interest ever since I got back into this stuff, kinda passionately because, like I said, I've I've been into it since I was a kid. But for a long time, I I just got bored with it because it was just all, you know, like, flesh and blood, nuts and bolts stuff.

AP Strange: 37:07

And I was like, I've been hearing about Roswell and people hunting Bigfoot and EVPs for so long.

Walker Jaroch: 37:14

It's like, none of this is is interesting. And and all I care about at the end of the day is, like, a fun idea. The if the idea is fun to me, I run with it even if it's completely ludicrous. But, you know, thankfully, over over COVID, I kind of stumbled into podcasts, kinda like yours, exploring these things from interesting different angles, rediscovered, you know, kind of my love for the subject through some of the things I read early as a kid, like Kiel and Forten stuff and coming back to as an adult and really being able to digest these ideas and see like, oh, there are people talking about this stuff in, like, a fun, interesting metaphysical way that isn't I wonder how the Martians, fine tune their propulsion system before they come here.

AP Strange: 38:04

Right. Yeah. I mean, it's it's absurdly darkly funny when you think about people that that obsess over those little details in from from that kind of strictly rationalist, materialist perspective. Because I always get the sense that people are trying to force something absurd into a scientific box, and they want credibility, and they wanna be credited for being scientific in their approach when really they're anything but. They're just, you you know, even when they try real hard I I mean, you you have to have a sense of humor about this stuff.

AP Strange: 38:46

And I think that that the phenomena, whatever it is, whatever specific one you're talking about, is, I I think humor is part of part of the propulsion, if you will.

Walker Jaroch: 39:00

Oh, a 100%. Yeah. I Yeah. My my family and I have had, like, just, like, these these odd experiences that, my dad, essentially will say, like, oh, that's just the universe or something reminding you, like, not to take any of this seriously. Like, I think not to speak for him because I wanna, like, I didn't ask him if I could share any crazy stories.

Walker Jaroch: 39:25

But, one recent thing happened to him. He was just having, like, a conversation with a friend. He was telling me and one of their glasses just, like, slid across the table like a coffee cup. And he was like, oh, yeah. That's just the universe reminding us, like, don't take this too seriously, man.

Walker Jaroch: 39:41

Like, just kinda have fun with it. Go with the flow. Don't get too bogged down.

AP Strange: 39:46

Right. Right. And, I mean, I think if you do, if you get scared, I think it I think whatever it is plays with that. So it's almost like you you curate your own experience. I do feel bad saying that sometimes because I realize a lot of people have traumatic experiences that there probably is no way around.

AP Strange: 40:05

But, like, they're scary no matter how you look at it. But but, yeah, I mean, I think perception plays a lot into it, and the way we talk about this stuff also does. Because I think there's a lot of fear mongering in the paranormal world, which begets that kind of suffering, which is unfortunate. But, to the point I was I was making before, I think the first one that I read on your website was the, hypernormalization of the paranormal in mass media. And I I found that to be like well, first of all, it was pretty long.

AP Strange: 40:45

I didn't expect it to be as long as it was, but I was like, oh, wow. Alright. This is in-depth. And I'm like, well, I I I don't like to read things that are too long on my phone, and I I was already reading it. I'm like, well, I'm in for it.

AP Strange: 40:55

So I read the whole thing and I'm like I I thought that was a really cool way of looking at it because I think I would classically refer to that as people taking themselves too seriously or just kind of stagnation in a lot of these fields. But the the way you framed it around hypernormalization was was actually like, a cool kind of cultural take on it. I don't know if you wanna kind of unpack that one a little bit. Yeah. That's, that's one

Walker Jaroch: 41:26

of those, like I was saying, this is just kinda like a fun idea, and I'm gonna run with it.

AP Strange: 41:31

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 41:32

I should I should note I'm not beholden to anything, and I'll I'll, be the first one to admit I don't know what I'm talking about, especially when it comes to something as complex as, like, the idea, like, hyper normalization. But I'll do my best to explain it in a nutshell here. Essentially, the idea, was first, proposed or described by a Russian scholar of history, describing kind of the the cultural condition at the end of the Soviet Union. So, like, right before the collapse, and there's, like, a great quote by, oh, I can't think of his name. The British documentarian.

Walker Jaroch: 42:21

He did, his own documentary that's, also very long. It's 3 hours long. You can find it on YouTube, though. Same name hyper normalization. But he has this quote describing it where it's like everybody knew everything was broken, and everybody knew nothing was working, and everybody knew everything.

Walker Jaroch: 42:39

Like, everybody knew that everybody else knew it from everybody running society down to the people, just everyday workers, but, like, nobody could imagine an alternative to it. And I think the when we look at that in the the kind of paranormal sense, I think the imagine is like the critical word there, because I've been on this kind of kick on the substack, kind of parsing out ideas from this, this longer essay into more digestible bites, where it just comes down to, like, there are these boundaries, kind of we have in society, and then in ourselves. But this really looks like you can, use it to kinda push yourself kinda out of that boundary. Like, going back to the if the coffee the coffee cup slides itself across the table, You know, what do you make of that? That just defied, like, a whole lot of things that, you know, most people would say are impossible.

Walker Jaroch: 43:41

So that's like, even though it's a minute thing, it's kind of a boundary breaking event. So I think that that either on purpose or just by kinda like the natural way of these stories and these events is is a positive baby thing we should we should take away from it. Is that ability to kind of break out and have and, like, force you by way of it happening to imagine an alternative out of this essentially just, like, feedback loop ingrained, status quo.

AP Strange: 44:20

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, it gets right back to what we were talking about about, like, whether or not the story is true. Mhmm. The myriad effects it has are quantifiable and real, you know?

AP Strange: 44:32

So, so imagination is incredibly important because I think, a lot of this stuff inspires people toward things like invention. I mean, that's the whole I I have sometimes said, the function of these mysterious things is to be mysterious.

Walker Jaroch: 44:51

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 44:51

And that's it. Like, because when then when you you sit there and you try to figure it out, you become inventive, and you find new ways to look at the world. And and, I don't think progress really happens without that. So

Walker Jaroch: 45:08

Yeah. A 100%. It's, it's interesting. I was I was thinking about this in kind of preparation for our our conversation tonight, and I went back, to just kinda, like, some of the folklore roots, of Wisconsin because I was, like, I was in in anticipation of talking about hypernormalization. I was like, how do I talk about this without just, like, 1, sounding insane and 2, making sense.

AP Strange: 45:38

We're all mad here. You don't have to worry about that.

Walker Jaroch: 45:41

Okay. That's good. I'm glad I'm in good company. But I went back to, like, some of the lumberjack folklore from Wisconsin because these guys were working in winter. That's when they'd go out, they cut all the trees down in Wisconsin.

Walker Jaroch: 45:59

And they they kinda quite literally, like, if there was a tree in the state that could be turned into lumber used to build a house or whatnot, they cut it down. They essentially cleared cut all of Wisconsin, and they have all of this folklore. I mean, Paul Bunyan's the most well known one, but there's all these different animals they'll claim to see and stuff. And I think that's, like, a a good example of the of kinda what I'm talking about in the essay is are these guys, you know, freezing cold around a fire at night talking about these these miss mythical elements and these creatures that, you know, never actually existed, but they're claiming to see in things. And it's like, if Paul Bunyan can be out there somewhere fighting a whatever a hoe dag, you know, we can we can cut down this tree.

Walker Jaroch: 46:45

We can put up with the winner, and we can do this work. And it's rough, but somewhere out there is something more fantastical and greater than myself. So in comparison, cutting a tree down really isn't that hard.

AP Strange: 47:00

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, those must have been some hardy folk that were out there cutting those trees down.

Walker Jaroch: 47:08

Yes. Far more manly than myself.

AP Strange: 47:13

It's funny too because I think I see a lot of the, what did they call them? The fearsome critters. Is that the name that the lumberjacks used for for their their kind of yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 47:26

I believe so. Yes.

AP Strange: 47:27

Yeah. You see those pop up sometimes, like, alongside cryptids and people just kinda lump them in. Mhmm. You know, and, like, I don't I don't particularly take issue with it, but there there is kind of a difference between the stories that Lumberjacks told and things that, you know, like a Bigfoot that somebody caught on film. You know, they're

Walker Jaroch: 47:48

Yeah. They're they're they're their own interesting classification of thing.

AP Strange: 47:52

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 47:52

Like a a hoop snake and stuff.

AP Strange: 47:55

Right. Yeah. I mean, I I remember reading about one that basically looked like a walking coffin. It was like an oblong box with legs. It was, like, bizarre.

AP Strange: 48:05

They're a lot of fun, but, it it is kinda funny how they get they get rediscovered and and put out there in in the form of, art or, like, stickers or graphics and and, like, lumped in with cryptozoological, specimens. But, and Paul Bunyan's an interesting thing too. Because, is is is that where, like, Wisconsin claims to be the home state of Paul Bunyan?

Walker Jaroch: 48:33

I think so. Yeah.

AP Strange: 48:34

Because I think there's, like, 7 states that do. I'm not really sure. I looked into it at one point because, there are people that claim that Paul Bunyan was based on somebody from Maine That was a lumberjack up in the great North Woods of Maine. And if you if you go to Bangor, Maine, there's a giant onion statue in the middle of the city. So, I think I took a picture of it once and, I'm like, the home of Paul Bunyan.

AP Strange: 49:01

And I think, like, Johnny El Tenney commented on it. He's like, well, if you went to Wisconsin, they tell you differently. Like He

Walker Jaroch: 49:10

he just came from a really big family. There's, like, you know, 7 of them.

AP Strange: 49:14

And they were all named Paul. Yeah. There we go. And they were each given a blue ox to take them out into the world.

Walker Jaroch: 49:22

Well, of course.

AP Strange: 49:23

Yeah. 7 7 babes as well. So, yeah. I mean, so this kind of is is American folklore and and and storytelling. And I think I think a lot of the the modern day stuff gets lumped into that as well or follows a similar pathway into into our media.

AP Strange: 49:48

Because, I mean, when you're talking about the hyper normalization of it, you're talking about as portrayed in mass media. Right? Mhmm. Media and stuff too.

Walker Jaroch: 49:57

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a really interesting element to it is how it gets portrayed to the masses. Because if we go back to, like, you know, did this guy because of, a decade full of vampire media, is that why he saw a vampire in the graveyard? And if you apply that to today, where, you know, every thing on a ghost hunting show is a demon or like a malevolent poltergeist or something

AP Strange: 50:27

Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 50:27

Does that mean you're more likely to encounter that? And what sort of, negative consequences, you know, does that have if if the the potential upside is that this could otherwise, you know, be a boundary pushing, force if Yeah. When you encounter it, it's just, a boogeyman because all you ever consumed about it is scary stories.

AP Strange: 50:54

Yeah. It makes me wonder. I was thinking about this recently too. If, the the universe needs to find ways to get your attention through weirder and weirder things. The the more that people come to accept the reality of these weird things.

AP Strange: 51:11

But maybe eventually it just loops around so more mundane things become the more significant things.

Walker Jaroch: 51:18

You know what? I would I would take some, mundane in my life. I feel like past 10 years, they've been a little too off the rails for me. I I I'll go back to mundane any day now.

AP Strange: 51:29

Yeah. I agree with you. I'm damn tired of living in interesting times. I can tell you that much.

Walker Jaroch: 51:36

Yeah. I never thought I'd crave boredom, but let me just be bored for a little bit, man.

AP Strange: 51:41

Yeah. I'd like to hear some political or world news and not be dejected and, in pain afterwards. Like Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 51:53

Yeah. Oh, the simpler times if there ever were any.

AP Strange: 51:58

Yeah. I mean, one wonders if there ever were, but it it does seem like we've we've really ramped up in the past couple decades to almost a a point of no return. We did talk a little bit before recording about how we're rapidly approaching the singularity. And Yeah. The robots are all taking over and writing our news articles for us.

AP Strange: 52:24

And just to cover their butts, some of these, media organizations are like, by the way, some of this was written by a robot, but we're not gonna tell you how much or what. So,

Walker Jaroch: 52:36

Yeah. It's it's wild. I I was, in a meeting with, like, our our CEO is visiting our local offices when I was in, the b two b space. And this is, like, just when, chat gpt and stuff was taking over. And one of the graphic designers was like, hey.

Walker Jaroch: 52:56

Do you guys ever think about, like, adopting this to make writing easier? And all the writers were like, shut up. Don't put that in his head. But it's crazy. Like, that was a couple years ago, just how far it's come and how I mean, I guess it's not surprising because you don't have to pay AI, but how willing yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 53:15

Like, a a otherwise reputable news organization is to adopt this technology that, like, everybody knows, hallucinates, and makes up stuff.

AP Strange: 53:27

Yeah. But even if it doesn't, on principle is

Walker Jaroch: 53:30

Yeah.

AP Strange: 53:31

Yeah. Like, I think people crave authenticity, you know, and, as much as I don't really understand the form, I think, like, things like reels, or TikTok videos and, like, little short form content. I think that's really appealing to a lot of people and partly because it has a feel of authenticity because you're you're watching somebody in their home. Like, they're taking a little selfie video and talking to you and and things like that. But it's heavily edited or chopped up and just like has a lot of effects on it and editing going on, but it's short form content for short attention span world.

AP Strange: 54:15

But at least it's people doing it. You know. And I I think I think people are crave authenticity in one way or another, and and, I don't think I don't think AI is ever going to replicate that in a in a way where it's an adequate replacement.

Walker Jaroch: 54:34

No. And that's that's, like, my silver lining hope with this whole AI uptick stuff is that maybe it'll, like, force people back into, I don't wanna, like, sound totally Luddite y and be, like, off the Internet entirely or out of digital spaces, but maybe it'll, like, reinforce some of that, like, shared human experiences, like concerts and stuff. Maybe people eventually learn to be a little bit more savvy towards, like, disinfo and things, because you'll just have to know how to pick out what's an AI generated image versus an actual photograph. So maybe my hope is it'll, like, loop around to something good, but we're going to have to wade through some very interesting and frustrating times with it first, I fear.

AP Strange: 55:25

Yeah. And, I mean, I think, you know, there are people saying that the AI thing is it's an AI bubble, and it's gonna burst at some point. A lot of guys that know a lot more about tech than I do are forecasting that, but, I think you could actually say the same thing about social media because, I'm no longer on Twitter, which kinda kills me because when I started writing, I just went on Twitter and put stuff up there, you know, and

Walker Jaroch: 55:54

a lot

AP Strange: 55:54

of people I know were from that, but it's weird to have, like, a sentimentality towards any kind of social media. But, now at the time of this recording, they're talking about the imminent banning of TikTok and, the recent Mark Zuckerberg has made recent changes to, fact checking on the meta sites like Instagram and Facebook where he's no longer gonna do it. And it's causing a lot of people to leave those sites specifically because he's now, you know, saying it's okay to tell people that that are gay, that they have a mental disorder, you know, like that that, you know, they're pretty much explicitly saying that. It's, I I'm thinking that maybe social media itself is kind of a bubble that's gonna burst where maybe people are gonna get really sick of that, and I don't know what the alternative looks like. Because even if it's not in person get togethers, there's gotta be ways to connect, that that are a little bit more authentic in person to person.

AP Strange: 57:01

You know? Part of the reason I started the show, actually, I think, is just because I wanna talk to people, and I wanna have an excuse to interview people and talk to them. But

Walker Jaroch: 57:11

No. I think I think maybe the alternative is more avenues like this, like a like a podcast where you can talk to somebody 1 on 1 or go back to, the early Internet where everybody just had their own site or, like, a forum where you talk to people on it, and you know it's like a human being you're talking to. You know, maybe that's what comes after, Internet 2 point o here. Maybe that's 3 point o is a return to more direct connections even if it is still, you know, mediated through some sorta, digital space where you don't know if, you know, car mechanic 101 in the form is a real person or, like, what they look like as a real person, but you know that they're a real person because they have to get past the AI bot check or something.

AP Strange: 58:03

Right. Right. Yeah. I mean, I have heard people suggest that bringing back, like, message boards and things like that. But, yeah, I think I I think social media has broken a lot of people's brains.

AP Strange: 58:18

And, certainly

Walker Jaroch: 58:21

Yes.

AP Strange: 58:22

No small part of where we're at now. And and with that comes, ways to game that system, which in some cases means paying the social media company money to promote your stuff or, having to alter the way that you you express yourself so that it aligns with some kind of SEO.

Walker Jaroch: 58:45

Yeah.

AP Strange: 58:46

I I consider these to be kind of great evils of our time.

Walker Jaroch: 58:51

Yeah. There's there's a a really interesting book, like, 10 arguments to delete your social media right now by Yeah. I wanna say his name's Jaren Lanier. I don't know if you've read it or not.

AP Strange: 59:03

No. I haven't.

Walker Jaroch: 59:04

Okay. Good. I hate explaining things to people who already know it, so I try not to.

AP Strange: 59:08

But Yeah. No.

Walker Jaroch: 59:10

No. He talks about in there, what you just said is, like, these algorithms are really the issue. And he made a point I never realized is that, like, nobody knows how they work. Like, Pentagon secrets will get leaked, but the source code for Facebook or Google's algorithm has never been leaked. Like, these things are so lock and key, and they're obviously doing a lot of damage, and nobody really understands how they're working or what they're doing.

Walker Jaroch: 59:37

And maybe since then, this book's probably 10 years old now. Maybe they have leaked. But it was a really interesting insight in the moment just to realize, like, wow. This thing that nobody understands, like, is in almost every part of my life right now.

AP Strange: 59:53

Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty unsettling, and it's pretty terrifying.

Walker Jaroch: 59:57

It's just a little tricky.

AP Strange: 59:59

Yeah. I try to be aware of it and then think that I can as long as as long as I'm aware that I'm there are attempts to manipulate me constantly, which is easy for me because, I'm an inherently paranoid person, and my paranoia has served me well over the years. It's like

Walker Jaroch: 01:00:19

Yeah. It's no. You need you need a little bit of a paranoia these days, I think.

AP Strange: 01:00:25

Yeah. But the the trouble is everybody isn't like that. So a lot of people, would take at face value what they see, and they don't they don't question it beyond that. And it's like, I worry about, you know, boomer relatives when I see stuff that some of, like, my aunts and uncles would share or something like that. I'm like, don't please don't share that.

AP Strange: 01:00:48

You know, that's disinformation. Right? Like yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 01:00:54

It's it's it's wild with, like, the obviously AI generated, like, images people share and things. It it really makes you wonder, like, is the dead Internet theory true? Are these just bots sharing bot posts? Or, like, are there actual people who are so, like, gone that they can't tell that this picture isn't real?

AP Strange: 01:01:17

Yeah. I mean, there are the bots sharing bot posts, and there also is AI cannibalizing itself where it's

Walker Jaroch: 01:01:24

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:01:25

Training itself off of other AIs, which is just it's it's crazy. But there there's there's a certain tastelessness to some of it that I think is inherently human. But no machine could be that tactless. Because I've seen these ones recently where it's just a picture of the only standing house left in the Palisades after the fire ripped through, and it's surrounded by burned down homes. It's like a Christian person lived here.

AP Strange: 01:01:55

Isn't this a miracle? It's like, oh my god. Like, only a human would make that. Like, that's not an AI generated.

Walker Jaroch: 01:02:02

Yeah. There there's a certain sort of, like, moronic beauty to humans that the machines will probably never be able to replicate. That's like the real the real, Turing test. It's like, is this too stupid for the machine to have come up with?

AP Strange: 01:02:16

Right. I mean, that's our that's our, that's our superpower is good old fashioned human stupidity, I think. Yeah. Well, you know, it's like, it's like Frank Zappa said that there's a certain charm to stupidity, but when you do it over and over again, it becomes tiresome.

Walker Jaroch: 01:02:38

Yeah. It's it's okay to, like, make a mistake and just, like, be dumb and have fun, but you can't make that your whole personality in life.

AP Strange: 01:02:46

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 01:02:47

Gotta have a little critical thought.

AP Strange: 01:02:49

Yeah. Yeah. And I I find I I find that that lacking these days, but I don't wanna be too much. I don't of a downer in demoting this sort of thing, be because, you know, as I was saying earlier, that's what was refreshing to me about your your writings is that, you you do have that ability to to look critically at it. And, this brings me to one of your other posts, which, was kind of a reaction to another article that was written.

AP Strange: 01:03:24

Because, I think you'll agree with me that a lot of journalists these days, and it really ever since QAnon started being a very public problem, have had to contend with a lot of new age, spiritual, paranormal, and conspiracy stuff that they're not adequately prepared for at all. And there is this one article that was kind of talking about the rise of astrology and alternative healing and stuff and and kind of making fun of it. And then he kind of responded by looking at this stuff through an economic lens, which I thought, you know, that's that's that's a good example of of nuance that a lot of people don't bother pursuing, you know, that you did. So I applaud you for it.

Walker Jaroch: 01:04:13

Thank you. Yeah. It was really like I think the line that got me in there was she was writing that people were choosing tarot over, therapy. And I was like, which one's cheaper? Like, how do you write that and then not put those dots together?

Walker Jaroch: 01:04:30

Like, there's a reason they're not going to therapy and choosing something they can get off Amazon for $20 at most. And I I think a lot of it comes down to, yeah, the the the writers and sort of like people who've been out there in the media space, myself included, haven't had to engage with these topics.

AP Strange: 01:04:58

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 01:04:59

You know, they can always be, you know

AP Strange: 01:05:00

for voting. You know? It's kind of like these were taboo subjects. So, like, even, you know, classically, media hasn't wanted to dignify a lot of this stuff with column space, unless they're making fun of it while they're doing it. And now they have to contend with it, and they're still trying to make fun of it, which is just really strange.

Walker Jaroch: 01:05:22

Yeah. And more people are starting to to come around to it, partly because, obviously, they're seeing some benefit and some truth to it. And and these people who who have always, not had to contend with it don't, you know, understand how something they've always viewed as being, like you said, worthy of ridicule. People are finding some some form of solace in. So the default is to go back to ridicule, but then you also have, like, she was correct in the column that there is like a weird self help Jordan Peterson, like pipeline to outright thinking.

Walker Jaroch: 01:06:00

And I think the problem is, like, you can't lump in all of this stuff with the problematic stuff even if, like, the lines can get blurry quick because then you're just demonizing. I got like like, a whole group of people. Like, she's lumping in, in that column, like, the Jordan Peterson stuff with the people who are just going on, like, spiritual retreats. And it's like, there's those are very 2 different camps, I think.

AP Strange: 01:06:31

Yeah. And I mean, it's almost like the evangelical Christian saying that yoga is satanic or something like that. You know, like, it's lumping everything together in false equivalency. And also just a, complete ignorance of the history of any of these subjects. Because when you don't deign it worthy of of investigation until you feel like you have some point to make about how dumb it all is.

AP Strange: 01:07:03

And you you you're not gonna know the history and know that the problematic stuff has always been there. Like, there has always been a direct line that you can draw from any of this stuff to, deeply troubling, violent, and hateful stuff. And and towing that line, needling a path through it and unpacking history for the fun stories or the spooky stories or, you know, magical traditions or whatever it may be. The the it's always a tight roadblock. You know?

AP Strange: 01:07:34

Mhmm. And and I I I think yeah. And I I mean, to your point in this article is kind of like a really good deconstruction of it because it's just like, you know, yeah, not everybody has time or money to get therapy or the insurance for it or an insurance plan that covers it. Like, there's a whole question of of what the health care system is in this country.

Walker Jaroch: 01:07:59

Yeah.

AP Strange: 01:08:00

You know?

Walker Jaroch: 01:08:02

Yeah. Those are those are the questions. And, like, in in this columnist defense, you know, they they only have so much time and so much column space, and and they're on a singular mission. So so I get it, but I think the more pertinent question is, like, why if you think this is a problem, then investigate, like, the root of the problem. And I've seen it happen to, like, friends of mine.

Walker Jaroch: 01:08:29

I've written about this before in one of my articles looking at an conspiracy theory. I've known this guy for years, and then out of nowhere, he's, like, spouting off that Joe Biden's a lizard person and things. And it's like, where did, like, where did you get this? Like, where is this coming from in you? You always had, like, a passing interest in UFOs.

Walker Jaroch: 01:08:50

And now we've gone, like, way off the rails here. But at the same time, he's like, he can't afford health care. He has bad mental health problems. He can't afford therapy. He's a single dad.

Walker Jaroch: 01:09:04

And along comes somebody with a worldview that's like, oh, the problem is lizard people. That's why all this stuff is affecting you. And you can't afford any of it. As where the alternative reality is, like, so complex, and so hard to wrap your head around that like, just like monkey brain is like, yeah. Okay.

Walker Jaroch: 01:09:24

Lizard. Yeah. That makes sense. That's easy to get, rather than like, economic forces that go back decades.

AP Strange: 01:09:33

But there's an easily identifiable enemy that

Walker Jaroch: 01:09:36

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:09:38

It operates as as an all inclusive umbrella over all all of life's maladies is is the thing. Easy to understand, like you said. I mean, Alan Moore had a great quote about that about how, conspiracy theories are actually more comforting than people choosing to believe it because, it's it's a lot more comforting to believe that than to believe that we're we're cast adrift completely rudderless in a ocean of chaos, you know.

Walker Jaroch: 01:10:10

Yeah. Exactly. It's and it doesn't, like, excuse these these problematic and, like, sometimes very deeply troubling world views. But, again, it's like you have to get to the source of it. And Right.

Walker Jaroch: 01:10:24

I cite a couple of, like, conspiracy researchers in that article, and they're, like, part of the drive behind these these, you know, quote, unquote, ludicrous beliefs that people just wanna outright mock are people looking for comfort and security and trying to understand a world that gets harder and harder every year for them. So, again, it doesn't excuse this, but if you wanna root out the the issue and actually solve it, you just have to address what's driving people to start thinking this way.

AP Strange: 01:10:59

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I I can relate to that as well. It's just I mean, even today, on my way home from work, I flipped on the news and listened to the news on the radio. And I'm thinking, you know, projecting ahead, like, what's gonna be happening?

AP Strange: 01:11:15

What's gonna happen in the next couple of weeks? Like, what's happening with these world events right now? And then, it it kinda did pop into my head for just a second. Like, man, this would all be a lot easier to take if I just thought that there was one guy, like, calling all the shots and being like, alright. We're gonna move, like, this politician into this spot and this one into this spot, and, this nation's going to attack this nation and this nation's gonna withdraw.

AP Strange: 01:11:43

Like, some, you know, some cosmic board game of of, like, risk is set up and there's there's a hand moving all these things around. Because then I'd have somebody to be mad at.

Walker Jaroch: 01:11:55

Yeah. Yeah. No. I when I was feeling very kinda down, after the election and stuff, I was, something in the news had had sparked it. I forget what.

Walker Jaroch: 01:12:08

But I was telling my wife, I was like, you know what? I think I might be okay with a false flag that's in our favor. Like, yeah, like, give me give me, like, some actual, like, conspiracy easy to understand. There's, like, a master pulling the strings behind this. Because it is.

Walker Jaroch: 01:12:23

It's, like, easier for the brain to default to, like, let somebody actually be in control of this rather than the truth of, like, no. The the universe is just inherently this chaotic.

AP Strange: 01:12:36

Yeah. I mean, it's funny too because you mentioned the X Files earlier. And I was, I was watching the X Files last night for research purposes for a future episode, which that's my favorite thing about writing about and podcasting about paranormal and weird subjects is I can watch a show like The X Files for research purposes and, say that and actually mean it. But after I watched the episode I set out to watch, I watched the the one about it's basically, like, the whole history of of the cigarette smoking man. Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:13:11

I I don't know if you if you watched or remember this episode.

Walker Jaroch: 01:13:16

I don't think I I don't think I do.

AP Strange: 01:13:18

Oh, okay. Well, Fro Hickey of the lone gunman uncovers, like, the whole history of this guy. So it operates all those flashbacks and tells you the whole cigarette smoking man's life history. And it hits all the beats of, like, the Kennedy assassination and, like, Martin Luther King's assassination, all the way up to, like, the present day in the show. And I'm like, this all this stuff all seems, like, quaint now.

AP Strange: 01:13:42

It's, like, really weird that, like, an assassination of a sitting US president and the intended conspiracy theories around the JFK assassination and, you know, UFOs and, like, actual aliens and all this stuff. It all just kinda seems quaint because it's like, the world is so nuts. Right? Yeah. You you can't even you can't even have a character like the cigarette smoking man lurking in the shadows and and, have that be believable in any any real way.

AP Strange: 01:14:11

It's it's gonna be way more nuts than that because people wouldn't buy it now.

Walker Jaroch: 01:14:16

Yeah. It's it's it's all it's almost like just a feedback loop that keeps getting more and more and more intense. Yeah. It's it's it's like, how do you even, like, satirize this stuff? Like, God bless the people over at the onion for still finding a way to put a spin on it.

Walker Jaroch: 01:14:35

But like, how do you get how do you get more kinda off the rails and what's actually going on in real life?

AP Strange: 01:14:45

Yeah. I mean, it's it's a good question. You have to wonder if satire is dead at this point because it it's difficult to do satire when

Walker Jaroch: 01:14:55

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:14:56

Yeah. When when your subject is is completely nuts. And, and people don't understand it anymore anyway. And I guess isn't so much for Nuance these days. People getting the joke.

AP Strange: 01:15:12

I'm depressing myself here. We get you know, we don't we don't want that.

Walker Jaroch: 01:15:19

Well, maybe it's that like, the AI stuff. Maybe it loops back around. Maybe it gets so ludicrous that the only way you can move forward is back to the mundane. Because people have to get burnt out on it some type. Right?

Walker Jaroch: 01:15:36

Hopefully.

AP Strange: 01:15:37

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I would assume so. And, I actually really appreciate mundane weirdness. You know?

AP Strange: 01:15:45

Mhmm. I don't think people it's a pretty easy way to reenchant your world is when you start start just noticing little things. You know? So

Walker Jaroch: 01:16:01

Oh, yeah. That's the that's the whole drive behind, like, my interest in folklore and stuff. I mean, go back to the beginning of the conversation, with, like, some of these stories, half their foot is in reality. Like, you can go to the literal place. Some guy saw a vampire.

Walker Jaroch: 01:16:19

You can't do that. You know, you can't go to, you know, a location in a Stephen King book and go see it. But you can go see where a police officer saw in real life, a vampire, quote, unquote. And, yeah, there's there's a a certain beauty to that aspect of it. Like, the like you said, the the mundane weirdness of every other point in time, this cemetery is just a cemetery.

Walker Jaroch: 01:16:45

But for one moment on one night, it was home to a vampire.

AP Strange: 01:16:51

Yeah. That's a really cool way to think about it. Although, if the vampire is in the cemetery and there's no policeman there to shine a flashlight in it, Can we say that the vampire wasn't there?

Walker Jaroch: 01:17:06

I would like to think he's there, and I would like to think he makes a sound if he falls over.

AP Strange: 01:17:11

Yeah. I would like to think that too. Or when he flutters his cape as he jumps over the, the fence.

Walker Jaroch: 01:17:19

Yeah. That's the more incredible part of the story now that I think about it. How did that cape not get caught on the barbed wire?

AP Strange: 01:17:26

Yeah. I mean, that's a damn good question.

Walker Jaroch: 01:17:32

That's the real mystery here.

AP Strange: 01:17:34

Yeah. But, I mean, when you're talking about, like, symbols and and meaning behind things, like, the fence is like a really cool kind of like a barbed wire fence around a cemetery, and somebody leaping over it is kind of a cool, like, metaphorical, symbol. It's that liminality thing, the division point boundary between, you know, the realm of the dead and the world outside. It's kinda

Walker Jaroch: 01:18:01

I hadn't even thought of it that way. Yeah. You're right.

AP Strange: 01:18:04

It's very poetic.

Walker Jaroch: 01:18:05

And the vampire being, an undead, half alive, half corpse. Yeah. Yeah. You got something there. That's interesting.

AP Strange: 01:18:13

Yeah. Yeah. Because, yeah, I mean, the the well, you know, that that's that's what I was getting at with your writing is I think that there is a lot of different, lenses through which you can look at this stuff that you're already exploring. To be clear, because I don't know that we established a timeline, when did you when did you establish Driftless Times Media and your Substack?

Walker Jaroch: 01:18:40

It was, May of 2024. Okay. Yeah. Because I got

AP Strange: 01:18:47

You're not even a year in.

Walker Jaroch: 01:18:49

No. I'm I'm still I'm still fresh.

AP Strange: 01:18:52

Okay. Yeah. So I I don't wanna yeah. Well, that's that's good for me to know because I'm like, oh, wait. Has he been doing this for longer than I thought?

AP Strange: 01:19:03

I don't wanna I don't wanna make it sell it short. But yeah. No. I mean, that's an impressive amount of interesting things to have up for a short period of time.

Walker Jaroch: 01:19:11

Thank you.

AP Strange: 01:19:12

Relatively short period of time because, I got really down on myself for a while for the amount of writing that I did, and I had to, like, push myself to get, like, one thing a month out for a while. But, but yeah. No. You've got a significant amount for that time period. And speaking of lenses for things, I I've found really interesting the recent article you you did about, the Manhattan UFO production series that was on Netflix.

AP Strange: 01:19:42

Because it really what you're talking about in in is the use of color and lighting

Walker Jaroch: 01:19:46

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:19:46

As the show goes and how that, kind of literally and figuratively colors our expectations and conclusions when we're hearing the story. I don't know if you wanna get into that a little bit.

Walker Jaroch: 01:20:00

Yeah. For sure. I mean, this was, really the the, that film, theory minor I talked about earlier coming into play. Always looking for an opportunity to put my, school loan money to use. But no.

Walker Jaroch: 01:20:15

It's yes. It got brought up on an episode of, Tim Bernal's podcast I was listening to. And I didn't really I didn't have, like, this documentary on my radar at all. And then, they mentioned on there, like, oh, the lighting in this is really weird. And that perked up that film theory part of my brain and said, like, oh, a director or something making like a weird lighting choice in a movie.

Walker Jaroch: 01:20:38

I can get into that. So yeah. Yeah. I went into that. And, yeah, it's it's some really interesting kind of fun choices they made with it.

Walker Jaroch: 01:20:49

You know, the beauty of film theory with, that's like this stuff, the paranormal folklore stuff, is that maybe this wasn't the director's intention at all. And it was a happy accident, but it sure seems, to my eye, like there are some definitely some intentional choices made here to kinda let you know what they were thinking. Because essentially, the documentary is oh, I can't I think of their name. Carol Rainey and Linda. Linda,

AP Strange: 01:21:24

I I always wanna say the Paula Tano because that was her name in the original accounts. They used a fake name for I I think that was the fake name, Napolitano. But, yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 01:21:37

But but those 2 kind of pitted against each other in a in a, essentially, this abduction story actually happened versus, Carol side, which is, I don't think they're telling the truth so much. Right. And both of them kind of get cast in, Linda Blue, Carol Orange, but then those colors, get utilized throughout the documentary in really interesting ways that I'm saying is maybe the the director's letting you know which side their their feelings about this story lie because they they to their credit, they present it in a really neutral just kind of fact based way. But then if you look at it through the way they're using color, there's like a shot that I didn't include in the article. But if you look when Carol is at, I think, a deck of monitors, either a computer or she's like rewatching the film above her head is a blueprint that's done in orange ink.

Walker Jaroch: 01:22:45

So it's orange ink on blue paper, and it's of a bridge, which is, you know, a STEM engineering hard scientific reality thing over this color that of blue, which the filmmakers are utilizing for Linda side of the story, which is paranormal. So I found like that choice is really interesting, just in and of itself. Because, you know, you have the the STEM engineering, hard material done purposely in this orange ink over a blue paper. And that's just one of like the the bunch of little details if you look in the documentary, where they're kind of pitting these two colors against each other, and one color, Carol's orange is always really kinda coming out on top.

AP Strange: 01:23:33

Yeah. And I mean, they are, completely opposite each other on the spectrum of colors too.

Walker Jaroch: 01:23:39

Mhmm.

AP Strange: 01:23:39

So they couldn't contrast any more than they do. And, yeah, that I mean, this is an extremely interesting way to look at this stuff because we're we're talking about a, I I guess, the best way to call it would be an infamous UFO story. I remember talking about this briefly online at one point, just posting something about about the case, and it just inspired this huge thread of of people, not not even really necessarily arguing with each other, but, it's like this is a case that people have very strong feelings about. I mean, Carol Rainey in particular, and she passed away a few years ago, Or was it last year? I think it might have been more recent.

AP Strange: 01:24:27

But, yeah, she obviously lived long enough to be in this documentary and then passed away before it was released. Yeah. I mean, it's a contentious one. So it's kind of interesting to have that contrast, and it's certainly interesting to have the visual examples that you have as you're describing it throughout the the the article you wrote.

Walker Jaroch: 01:24:50

Thank you. Because Yeah. Yeah. Oh, go ahead.

AP Strange: 01:24:53

Yeah. Yeah. I was just gonna say it's like aesthetic choices that are subliminally kind of, influencing the viewer's perception of it, whether or not that was intended by the filmmakers, because you can't say either way. But, but you kinda feel like they probably were trying to to lead the audience one way or another.

Walker Jaroch: 01:25:16

One of the really, defining lessons that one of my, film professors kinda imparted was that everything you see in the screen in, like, a good movie was done with purpose. So even if you think, like, a background detail or something was just, you know, a happy accident, they chose to left it to leave it in for some reason.

AP Strange: 01:25:39

Yeah.

Walker Jaroch: 01:25:40

So when you approach, you know, like, a critical analysis of a movie or a documentary in this case, you know, just start coming at it from that question, like, why these color choices? Why are they using them this way? They could have done anything, you know, in this scene, this framing, this lighting, but somebody made a deliberate decision to portray this in this way. So why did they do that? And that's where the fun of, you know, like, film analysis comes in is trying to to understand why a director or a cinematographer shoots something in a certain way.

Walker Jaroch: 01:26:11

But especially in a documentary like this, like, these are real people, real stories, so it has that extra layer to it.

AP Strange: 01:26:18

Yeah. And, I thought it was cool looking. And I mean, that might just be the reason that they did these things is because it looks cool.

Walker Jaroch: 01:26:28

Oh, 100%.

AP Strange: 01:26:29

Might just be that simple, but it it is really cool to, pull it apart and really analyze it critically the way that you did. One thing I thought was funny is the way they portrayed Peter Robbins, because, I mean, I've seen Peter Robbins in real life, at, like, UFO festivals and things. And, they've got him kinda he looks like somewhere between a film noir, like, PI sitting in his his office waiting for for a case, like, some some dame to wander in with case

Walker Jaroch: 01:27:02

for him.

AP Strange: 01:27:03

And, like, kind of like an MIB almost, character. It's really weird the way he's kinda dressed up and lit with with, in kind of like a dark room almost. You know?

Walker Jaroch: 01:27:15

Yeah.

AP Strange: 01:27:16

Yeah. And he's got kind of the blue hues as well on him.

Walker Jaroch: 01:27:21

Yeah. They were definitely definitely having fun, with the way they were shooting him. And I was curious watching it because he's got, like, that really big hat on, which I kinda love. Yeah. I was like, is that, like, a costume choice?

Walker Jaroch: 01:27:33

They gave that to him, or is that his hat?

AP Strange: 01:27:35

I feel like it had to have been because like I said, I've seen him in real life before. I don't think he always wears a hat like that. And it was just kind of a really weird choice. I mean, maybe he does, but, maybe I just go to UFO Festivals in the summer when it's really hot, and it's not ideal to wear a hat. But

Walker Jaroch: 01:27:53

Right. Yeah. Yeah. It goes back to that, like, they're real people. And if this is like, you're putting them in a costume, like, I don't know.

Walker Jaroch: 01:28:02

Not that it's a ethical thing or something, but it does make you wonder, like, you have to give them a silly hat.

AP Strange: 01:28:10

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I feel like some of the stuff like, I tend to be kind of a nerd about it and like to learn these little things like the the inside baseball of production, but sometimes I wish I didn't because I you're kinda happier not knowing how much how much how much choice goes into it.

Walker Jaroch: 01:28:31

Yeah. That that's the one thing they warn you when you start getting, like, really nerdy into these subjects. Is it, like, you can never really just enjoy a movie again the same way?

AP Strange: 01:28:39

Right.

Walker Jaroch: 01:28:40

I went to go see, Nosferatu, like, the day after I published that. And just the whole time I'm watching that movie, I'm like, I wonder why they're dressed in that color. I just couldn't my brain had been so hardwired by doing this. I was like, She's always wearing white. That's weird.

Walker Jaroch: 01:28:56

Like, no. Just watch the movie and enjoy

AP Strange: 01:28:58

it. Right. Well, I like to think I could turn it off. I I I think, at my best, I I can. But I feel like whenever I'm watching a movie kinda to your point earlier with the vampire movies of the seventies, I'm always looking for some kinda connection to, I don't know, like, paranormal or cults or 14 lore.

AP Strange: 01:29:25

And, so I'm making these connections in my mind or making mental notes about it while I'm watching it. But, but, yeah, I mean, you're better off not knowing some of the tricks because it's almost like knowing how a magic trick is done. And and it never seems magical after that because you know how it's done already.

Walker Jaroch: 01:29:43

Yeah. Yeah. It it's like good skills to have when you're watching, like, a David Lynch movie. But if I'm just watching, like, you know, Friday 13th or something, I don't need to, you know, have my brain trying to analyze the framing of Jason.

AP Strange: 01:30:02

Although, I mean, I I think there are some pretty good artistic shots in Jason 8. You know?

Walker Jaroch: 01:30:13

Oh, which one is that one? We just binge watched all of them for Halloween. Yes. That's my favorite one for all the wrong reasons.

AP Strange: 01:30:22

Yeah. It's terrible. I let my son watch that when he was probably way too young. But I was like, alright. You're gonna watch a Jason movie.

AP Strange: 01:30:30

Jason takes Manhattan. That's the way to go.

Walker Jaroch: 01:30:33

And he spends, like, 3 fourths of the movie on a boat, and he's in Manhattan for, like, 30 minutes of it.

AP Strange: 01:30:42

It is good stuff, though. Yeah. Alright. Well, we are getting close to to myself and post time limits here. But, this really has been a blast.

AP Strange: 01:30:59

It's great to actually kind of meet new people, and it's like like I said, when, you know, you you you've been at this since last year and as soon as you popped up as actually, I don't know how we connected if you called me or I followed you, but I think Instagram was what how I discovered your writing. And I'm very happy that I did because, I think it's all very interesting stuff that people should go check out. So, where are they to do that? How should they how should they go about it?

Walker Jaroch: 01:31:28

Yeah. The easiest way is, driftless times media.com. From there, you can get to the newsletter, which we put out on Substack, because I figure people are just really familiar with how Substack works as a newsletter delivery system. So that's why we kinda broke it up into 2 separate, entities there. But if you go in Substack, you look up Driftless Times Media or the name of the newsletter, the sidebar, you can find it there.

Walker Jaroch: 01:31:55

Otherwise, driftlesstimesmedia.com. It's got the links to to everywhere we're at on the interwebs.

AP Strange: 01:32:02

Alright. Beautiful. Yeah. And I really do recommend this to people because, because you won't be you won't be mad about it. It's not gonna it's not gonna waste your time.

AP Strange: 01:32:11

It's quality writing and some interesting ideas to explore that you don't see just everywhere. So, Walker, it's a pleasure to actually meet you and talk with you a bit. Thank you so much for coming on the show.

Walker Jaroch: 01:32:24

Yeah. This has been awesome. Thank you so much for inviting me. I've had a blast.

AP Strange: 01:32:28

Alright. Beautiful. We'll talk soon.