Morbid Podcast – Listener Tales 104: Your Grandparents Might Be Criminals!

Hosts: Ash Kelley & Alaina Urquhart
Release Date: November 20, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode is another round of Listener Tales, where Ash and Alaina (in full costume mode and high-energy, thanks to bad sleep scores) read stories submitted by listeners. The common thread: each tale is wild, spooky, or downright criminal—sometimes in the literal sense! From haunted childhood homes and chilling family secrets, to vigilante laptop "justice," to haunted houses with helpful ghosts, it's a lively, emotional, and darkly hilarious episode that shows just how weird (and crime-adjacent) people's grandparents—and everyone else—can be.

Key Discussion Points & Listener Tales

1. Listener Tale: The Chained Man ("Rose’s Story")

[05:22–24:08]

• Setup
  • Rose shares a multi-generational story full of paranormal and emotional events. Her mother was known for electric energy (even streetlights reacted to her presence), piano-key jeans, and the mysterious recurrence of the number 23 throughout her life.
• Haunted Childhood Home
  • Rose's mother grew up in a haunted house in Santa Fe, NM. The original owner had murdered her own children in despair.
  • Paranormal activity included a ghost boy playing, flushing toilets, and a series of recurring dreams featuring “the chained man” in the closet.
    • "My mom would wake up in her dream to his moans. And she would get out of bed, feed him, bathe him..." (13:17, Coraline)
  • After years of comforting the spirit, the narrative reversed; the chained man turned on her, and the dream cycle grew darker.
• Mother's Passing & Signs
  • Her mother, after a battle with cancer, saw comforting golden light and spoke to unseen visitors before death.
  • The number 23 keeps appearing (license plates, ashes tag, etc.), seeming to be her mother’s way of signaling she’s still present.
  • Rose's friends and children have paranormal experiences involving her mother—one calling out her mother's signature jeans with piano keys (which no photo existed of).
    • “She said her long brown hair … and her jeans had piano keys on them… I immediately started crying as Luna repeats the words I have held dear... ‘I love you, sweetie.’” (21:29, Coraline)
• Hosts’ Reactions
  • Both Ash & Alaina are genuinely moved:
    • “That was terrifying and really beautiful and touching. I loved it. That hit like every damn—everyone. That hit every bone in my bodies.” (24:04, Coraline)

2. Listener Tale: That Time I Peed on a Rapist’s MacBook Pro ("Sam’s Story")

[24:08–34:56]

• Funny Start, Serious Turn
  • Sam recounts drunken college days at UGA, including the shameful trend of college students peeing in their sinks.
    • “I promise you, everyone was doing it in college. We were repulsive…” (28:13, Miranda)
  • One night, Sam drunkenly mistakes a roommate’s open laptop for a sink and urinates on it.
  • After being extorted for both the laptop and the rental replacement by the increasingly unpleasant roommate Butch, Sam’s tale takes a sharp turn.
• Butch: The Real Criminal
  • A year later, Sam learns Butch is arrested for attempted rape. Despite clear evidence, he serves almost no jail time due to family connections.
    • “For those who can’t see this article, Butch is shown with bloody claw marks all over his face. He attacked a girl and attempted to rape her on a sidewalk…” (33:11, Miranda)
  • Sam reflects: the universe putting her in the right place and time to engage in some unintentional (and gross) vigilante justice.
    • “To conclude: you, Butch, that wasn’t a spilled drink. That was my piss.” (34:01, Coraline)
• Hosts’ Reactions
  • Utterly delighted by Sam’s revenge-by-accident:
    • “The universe just knew that you should have pissed on that guy’s laptop.” (34:48, Miranda)

3. Listener Tale: Hoarders Have Secrets ("Casey’s Story")

[38:50–47:36]

• Family Hoarding and a Chilling Discovery
  • Casey describes her grandma’s extreme hoarding house in rural Utah, housing 13 children (5 biological, 8 adopted, mostly special needs).
  • After her grandmother’s move to assisted living, the family has to clean out decades’ worth of filth—dead animals, 17 dumpsters of garbage, and then...
  • A severed finger is discovered preserved in a glass jar in the basement.
    • “It was preserved pretty well from my non-medical opinion, in a small glass jar.” (44:19, Coraline)
  • Grandpa claims he once saw it but ignored it; the police do little. There’s also a history of a missing foster child whose family suspects foul play, but the finger appears to be from an adult.
• Hosts’ Reactions
  • Unanimous: yes, your grandparents are probably criminals.
    • “Here’s the thing. We don’t know a lot of things, but one thing is for sure, your grandparents are criminals. And that’s the name of this episode...” (46:40, Miranda)

4. Listener Tale: Moved In, Moved Out Two Days Later ("Mark’s Story")

[48:21–60:21]

• A Not-So-Evil (Or Is It?) Ghost
  • Mark (65, zero fucks to give) tells a 1975 tale of buying their first home just as their first child was born.
  • A series of increasingly unsettling but oddly nurturing events occur in the new house: doors unlock, coffee is brewed, a rose and baby powder appear, and the baby is mysteriously attended to overnight.
    • “I saw no baby powder this morning. However, the coffee was already brewed and mine and Angie’s coffee cups were set beside… along with the sugar bowl and the creamer.” (54:07, Miranda)
  • Culminates in all the shelves and heavy books stacked in their baby's crib—had the baby been there, tragedy would have struck.
    • “In the center of the crib … was stacked all of our books. Not just the bedtime stories, but Dungeons and Dragons books as well.” (55:48, Miranda)
  • Hosts speculate: one ghost, or two? Helpful or sinister? Mark later follows up: the new homeowners (descendants of the first owner Mabel) describe the ghost as protective.
    • “She went on to say that Mabel had been a huge help … kept them safe from everything from a fire in the basement to a break in.” (59:27, Miranda)
  • Hosts’ Conclusion: Initially skeptical, but end on a warm note about generational protection and family spirits.

5. Show Highlights, Banter, & Notable Quotes

• Lots of spirited back-and-forth about costumes (Ash as Coraline, Alaina as Miranda Priestly), being "feral children," and getting older.
  • “We both got really bad sleep scores last night on our aura ring, so this is gonna be crazy.” (03:09, Miranda)
• Ongoing inside jokes (ASMR, strange Gemini energy, trashy college habits).
• Frequent and loving shout-outs to listeners by name after each story — great sense of community (“You guys rock!”).
• Unabashed judgment of the hoarding grandparents and Butch (“Yeah, your grandparents are criminals, but.” (47:58, Miranda))
• Meta-reference to how they pick and read stories:
  • “Brought to you by you. For you. From you. And all about you. That’s all. That’s all.” (04:22, Miranda)

6. Timestamps for Important Segments

• [05:22] Listener Tale 1 (The Chained Man / Rose)
• [24:08] Listener Tale 2 (Peeing on the Rapist’s MacBook / Sam)
• [38:50] Listener Tale 3 (Hoarders Have Secrets / Casey)
• [48:21] Listener Tale 4 (Moved In, Moved Out / Mark)
• [60:21–61:50] Hosts recap all listener tales and reactions
• [61:50-end] Show community shout-outs and calls for more submissions

Memorable Quotes

• On Rose’s mother and the uncanny recurrence of the number 23:
  • “Her mother telling me that she’s there and still supporting me from the afterlife? Yes, it is.” (23:18, Miranda)
• On Sam’s accidental act of justice:
  • “To conclude you, Butch, that wasn’t a spilled drink. That was my piss.” (34:01, Coraline)
• On encountering a severed finger:
  • “It was preserved pretty well from my non-medical opinion, in a small glass jar.” (44:19, Coraline)
• On Mark’s ghost encounter:
  • “I placed Angie’s breakfast on a tray with a cup of coffee prepared to her taste…” (54:07, Miranda)
  • “She went on to say that Mabel had been a huge help… It seems I may have jumped the gun on moving out.” (59:27, Miranda)
• Episode Title Drop:
  • “Here's the thing. … one thing is for sure, your grandparents are criminals. And that’s the name of this episode…” (46:40, Miranda)

Episode Summary

This episode of Morbid is equal parts chilling, funny, and heartwarming. With listener tales ranging from haunted family history, to accidental justice against a future criminal, to the dark secrets lurking in hoarder houses, and finally to a ghost who might be more guardian than ghoul, Ash and Alaina bring their signature camaraderie and dark humor to every weird twist. If you think your own family history is wild, this episode dares you to reconsider—maybe your grandparents are criminals too.

Listener call to action:
Keep sending those double-spaced pu feu tales with snappy headlines to morbidpodcast@gmail.com!

Hosts:
Ash Kelley (“Coraline” this episode)
Alaina Urquhart (“Miranda Priestly” this episode)

Podcast: Morbid | True crime, history, and all things spooky, but always with a healthy splash of irreverent humor.

For future listener tale submissions:
"Keep it weird, but not so weird that you have a severed finger in your cold storage and don’t tell anyone about it." (47:31, Coraline)