Radio Rental – Episode 99 Summary

Released: December 5, 2025
Host: Payne Lindsay, with Ricky Lee (Store Manager)
Podcast Theme: True-life horror stories—bizarre crimes, disturbing brushes with evil, and chilling encounters with the paranormal—framed inside a fictional 80’s video rental store.

Episode Overview

Episode 99 of Radio Rental closes out the season with a blend of real terror and unease. The episode features two primary stories: one a hair-raising personal account of surviving a near-miss with a murderer, the other a chilling brush with a ghostly presence known as "the Umbrella Man." These stories delve into the unpredictability of evil—human and possibly supernatural—while playful horror-tinged humor from Ricky Lee lightens the mood between tales. Ricky shares "end of year forecasts," and the show closes out with an optimistic look at next year's adventures.

Key Discussion Points & Story Summaries

1. Storefront Banter and Season Farewell

• [04:02 - 06:21] Ricky Lee introduces the episode, noting it’s the last one for the season, closing Radio Rental’s doors until after the holidays. Ricky promises his “end of the year forecast” later, but first, a scary true story tape.

  Memorable Ricky Lee Quotes:

  • “I’m the custodian of creepiness. The dealer of dread—that is right. Today we are going to get back into some unsettling stories told by real, breathing people.” (05:04)
  • “This is the last day Radio Rental’s going to be open this season… End of the year is upon us. We got yuletide and all that.” (05:27)

2. Story #1: The Campus Security Killer

[06:29 – 16:12]
Storyteller 2: Young woman (16 at the time) recounts an encounter with a man posing as campus security, who later turned out to be a murderer.

Story Breakdown:

• Setting: Central Oregon Community College (COCC), summer, late at night.
• Inciting Incident: The storyteller and her friend are playing Pokémon Go and are pulled over by “campus security” for supposedly violating curfew.
• Unsettling Interaction: Security guard insists they come with him to catch a Pokémon by the gym. She refuses, feeling something is off, and cites her strict curfew as a reason to leave.
• Chilling Aftermath: Days later, she learns via news broadcast that the same campus security guard murdered a girl and kidnapped a family. The storyteller realizes her life was likely saved by her curfew and instincts.
• Legislative Impact: The “Kaylee Sawyer Act” was introduced to prevent campus security from impersonating law enforcement—stemming directly from the murder case.
• Processing Survival and Guilt: The storyteller reflects on the randomness of survival, the lingering trauma, and the evil she sensed:

  “You trust someone. That’s campus security… and you just expect that they are going to take care of you and that they uphold the law. Of course they’re not going to break the law. It just turned out to not be the case.” (15:23)
  “You watch your life flash before your eyes… After the fact, you realize there’s no chance I would have survived if I had gotten out of the car.” (16:05)

Notable Quotes and Moments:

• On instinct and survival:

  “The best thing you can do is just pretend that it never even happened, because I was never going to get any sort of comfort from the situation.” (13:12)

• On learning the truth:

  “Mom, that is the guy that pulled me over the other night.” (11:19)

• Impactful realization:

  “My curfews probably saved my life—also my intuition.” (15:46)

Takeaway:

A chilling reminder to trust instincts, the thin line between ordinary life and hidden evil—and how seemingly trivial rules or feelings can save lives.

3. Ricky Lee Interlude: Sympathy and Humor

[16:12 – 16:45]
Ricky reacts to the harrowing first story:

“That's sad to hear that there’s creeps out there like that… My greatest sympathies to all the women that have to deal with this…” (16:12)

He then provides comic relief with a brief ad break and prepares the audience for the next tale.

4. End of Year Forecast—The "Wood Snake" Era

[18:19 – 19:14]
Ricky shares that 2025 was “the year of the wood snake,” marked by wisdom and transformation—a nod to supernatural folklore and the show’s playful tone.

5. Story #2: The Umbrella Man

[19:14 – 34:37]
Storyteller 1: A college student recalls a surreal, possibly supernatural encounter while stargazing with her boyfriend at their haunted rural Appalachian college.

Story Breakdown:

• Setting: Rural Pennsylvania, historic 200-year-old college, late at night in the autumn of 2015.
• Lead Up: The storyteller and boyfriend walk to a remote football field for stargazing, traversing dark woods and isolated trails.
• Supernatural Encounter:
  • They spot quick flashes of light in the woods, then a bizarre, gliding figure—tall, wearing a trench coat, top hat, and holding an open umbrella. Its movement makes no sense—it glides smoothly over rough terrain, unaffected by holes or grass.
  • The "Umbrella Man" pivots toward a field house but makes no sound, absorbs light under powerful lamps, and seems almost featureless.
  • The figure loses interest in the field house and turns, heading directly for the couple. Panic rises—they feel hunted, “pinned down,” and stalked by something unnatural.
  • As they are about to flee, it abruptly changes direction and vanishes, heightening their terror. They finally make a desperate sprint back to safety.
• Aftermath:
  • The experience leaves them anxious for days. Campus lore has stories of "the Umbrella Man," and the pair continue to puzzle over whether it was a person or a specter.
  • The storyteller describes lingering feelings of being watched and ongoing uncertainty:

    “We are the only things in this field and it is barreling down right in front of us. My heart just sinks in my stomach. I can feel all of my hairs raised. It wasn’t like a chill up the spine. It was an immediate instinctual—I am being hunted and this thing is coming.” (27:09) “If it was a person, what was their whole point? Why were they sneaking up on us? … It really does not make sense to me how somebody was able to cover that amount of ground without any… shaking to the umbrella, without any cadence to the movement.” (33:37)

Notable Quotes and Moments:

• On the visual eeriness:

  “It's almost as if it's absorbing all of the light that's coming into contact with it.” (25:22)

  • “No, sirree. No, thank you. I am good. … I will not be sticking around to find out more about Demon Mary Poppins. Supercalifragilicate Ex Biala. Don't come near me is what I say.” – Ricky Lee, comic postscript (34:37)
• On instinctual terror:

  “It wasn’t like a chill up the spine. It was an immediate instinctual—I am being hunted and this thing is coming.” (27:17)

Takeaway:

The “Umbrella Man” story fuses classic campus-ghost spookiness with a genuinely unexplainable sense of dread, emphasizing how easily reality can tip into the uncanny.

6. Year-End Forecast & Playful Banter

[36:52 – 38:31]
Ricky Lee returns with his trademark humor, looking to the future:

• Declares 2026 “the year of the fire horse,” predicting a year of energy, adventure, and new stories. Suggests listeners pursue bold adventures and teases big things for Radio Rental’s next season.
• Lighthearted jabs at his feline companion, Malachi, keep the tone fun and personal.

“I do think next time you’re back in Radio Rental, we’re going to have plenty of adventure in store for you here… that’s what they call the double whammy.” (37:42)

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• “I have got the keys to your engine. I'm the custodian of creepiness. The dealer of dread—that is right.” – Ricky Lee [05:04]
• “My curfews probably saved my life, also my intuition. It makes me feel sick. It makes me feel grateful…” – Storyteller 2 [15:46]
• “I am being hunted and this thing is coming.” – Storyteller 1 [27:17]
• “No, sirree. No, thank you. I am good… I will not be sticking around to find out more about Demon Mary Poppins.” – Ricky Lee [34:37]
• “2026 will bring us a year full of passion, energy, independence, and a thirst for adventure.” – Ricky Lee [36:55]

Episode Timestamps for Major Segments

• Season Farewell & Introduction: [04:02 – 06:21]
• Story #1 (Campus Security Killer): [06:29 – 16:12]
• Ricky Lee’s Reaction (Sympathy & Humor): [16:12 – 16:45]
• 2025 in Review (“Year of the Wood Snake”): [18:19 – 19:14]
• Story #2 (The Umbrella Man): [19:14 – 34:37]
• Post-Story Banter: [34:37 – 36:52]
• 2026 Forecast (“Year of the Fire Horse”): [36:52 – 38:31]

Tone & Style

The episode continues Radio Rental’s signature blend: chilling, immersive true stories bookended and punctuated by Ricky Lee's endearing, irreverent humor. The storytelling is confessional, verging on therapeutic—emphasizing vulnerability and aftermath as much as the “scare.” Ricky's playful analogies and metaphors lighten even the darkest details, keeping the fictional “video store” world alive.

Conclusion

Episode 99 of Radio Rental delivers two contrasting but equally unsettling stories—one confronting the hidden horrors in everyday authority, the other the pure inexplicability of a brush with the Other. Ricky Lee’s blend of comic relief and spooky forecasting bookends an episode that lingers in the mind, prompting listeners to question how they would respond in the face of real, or possibly supernatural, dread.

Next season promises the “Year of the Fire Horse”—and if past stories are any indication, the adventures (and chills) will only escalate.