Episode 99

You're listening to a Tenderfoot TV podcast. Is the government hiding proof of intelligent life beyond our planet? A new season of High Strange is here. The explanation keeps changing, but the stories don't go away. Videos appearing to show UFOs flying through the air are real. My name is Payne Lindsey, and my new season of High Strange goes deeper into real encounters, first-hand accounts, and the explanations that never seem to stick. Images of that rotating thing captured by U.S. Navy aircraft. I talked to scientists, military witnesses, pilots, and people who saw something they can't unsee. There is no other explanation for what we saw that day. I remembered those faces and they weren't human. High Strange is available now. Listen for free on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To binge the entire season of High Strange now, ad-free, subscribe to Tenderfoot Plus at tenderfootplus.com. It's the holiday season, and radio rental merch deals are here. The Tenderfoot shop is fully stocked with new items like the open late mug and hoodie, as well as new bundles and up to 50% off. Your favorites are back too. The classic black open late and uniform tees have returned from the merch vaults. And for the first time ever, you can literally bring the Radio Rental store home with our limited edition Radio Rental Lego set. Build it, display it, and make sure you post it. Head over to shop.tenderfoot.tv to unwrap all the deals and snack holiday pricing while it lasts. Hate waiting a week for the next episode of Radio Rental? Subscribe to Tenderfoot Plus to get early access to episodes, ad-free listening, and even some bonus scary stories. Visit tenderfootplus.com for details. The following podcast includes scary stories with content that could be triggering to some listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Take a break from the same old boring blockbusters and experience a new kind of movie night with Radio Rental. At Radio Rental, horror videos come to life in your living room. defy all logic and reasoning and make you question your own reality this is not your ordinary video rental store at Radio Rental we carry one of a kind videos so frightening, so mind bending you won't be able to sleep at night you've gone Radio Rental Hey there, man. Hey, welcome back to Radio Rental, everybody. It's me, it's me, it's Ricky Lee. Oh, my word. Hey, hey, y'all don't play with me. You know you're happy to see me, because I have got what you need. I got you fixed, baby doll. I have got the keys to your engine. 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 just the way you like it. Now, before we get started, I got some bittersweet news for y'all. This is the last day Radio Rentals is going to be open this season. And I know, I know, calm down, yes siree or no madam, whatever. Look, y'all, you know it, end of the year is upon us. We got Yuletide and all that. And we're going to close up the shop for just a little while. And I'm sorry to say it, I didn't make the rule, but that is the rule. Damn. Hey, don't worry about that. That's just Vince, the new junior associate clerk. And I'm telling you, that boy is a good kid. Good, good kid. I think he's like in his 40s. But yeah, that's a good kid right there. But anyway, as I was saying, it is the end of the year. Thus, I will be giving you my end of the year forecast. Check it out. Free of charge. Free of charge. out of the goodness of my yuletide heart. But first, I'm going to give you a scary story. I know that's what you came for. All right, so let me pop in one of our tapes. I kind of feel like Santa Claus. Ho, ho, horror story coming right up. I was 16 years old. I was living at home, obviously. It was summer. I'd just gotten back from summer camp with one of my best friends. We had kind of gotten into Pokemon Go, more so her. I was just new to driving as of June that year, so I was really excited to just be the driver and take my friend everywhere. And so that's what I did. One night, she was like, hey, I'd love to go collect some Pokemon. We had really no other plans. I was like, perfect, I'll drive, let's get in the car. And so we headed out from my house. My curfew was 11, and so my mom would always be texting me around 10 o'clock like, you better be home soon. And so I was like, okay, we're on last rounds. Like, do you want to go pick up other Pokemon? You want to just head home? And she was like, you know, there looks like there's one over by the college. Do you want to go pick it up? And I was like, sure, let's go over there. We drove over to COCC's campus, which is Central Oregon Community College. We're listening to our favorite songs from camp and talking about all the nostalgic things from just two weeks ago at camp. We're being girls. We're just having fun. We're stopping at random places in town, starting to enter into the college, and we're just driving and listening to music. All of a sudden, I see lights in my rearview mirror. What is that? I turn to my friend, and I'm like, I think we're being pulled over. And she was like, what? And I'm like, yeah, but it looks like it's just campus security. Like, it doesn't look like it's a legitimate cop car. I'm not sure. Let's just pull over just in case and see what he needs. She was like, what do you think we're getting pulled over for? I'm like, I don't know. Maybe our music's too loud. Like, I have no idea. I'm 16. I just got my license. I'm freaking out because not only am I close to curfew, but my mom will kill me if I get a ticket. So we pull over into a parking lot. I rolled down my window, as anyone does when they get pulled over. And he comes up and he's like, hey ladies, what are you guys doing? And I was like, immediately, like, make sure he knows you're not on your phone. And I'm like, we're playing Pokemon Go, but I'm not the one playing. My friend's the one playing. Like, I'm just driving. That's when he's like, well, you know you can't be on campus past 10 p.m. We have a curfew. Oh. I turned to my friend, like, kind of shocked. I'm like, oh, I had no idea. I'm so sorry. Like, we're high schoolers here in town. We don't go to school here on campus. We didn't know about the curfew. We'll get off. Sorry. Are we all good? And he was like, well, what did you guys say what you were doing? And we were like, oh, we're playing Pokemon Go. Oh, well, I know where a really good one is. It's up by the gymnasium. I can show you. I was like oh um you know actually I think we should probably go but thank you we'll come back for it and he was like no no really it'll just take like five minutes it's no big deal and then I'll send you on your way immediately feel chills down my spine because I'm like this is weird he just wanted us off campus and now he wants us to stay on campus and he wants us to come with him something? Like, I don't know. Things just felt weird. And we're like, okay, yeah, maybe we'll come back another day. And he was like, no, I can show you really quick. It just felt weird. I was not game for that. I actually have a curfew at 11 and my mom will kill me if I'm late. But are we good here from like a law point of view? And he was like, yeah, you're all good. And it Felt like he kind of just like let go of the reins. Like he was really in on wanting to show us where the Pokemon was. But the moment that I was like, I have a curfew. My mom's waiting for me. I'm going to be in trouble if I'm not there. I was like, OK, thank you, sir. And drove away. And I'm like, that was so weird. I just turned to her and I like did you think that was weird Yeah a little Did you think that was weird I like yeah What was his deal And she was like I don know Maybe he weird I was like yeah that true Maybe he is weird I drove home. I went inside to my house. My mom was there and that's when I asked, did you know that COCC has a 10 p.m. curfew? No, I didn't. Why? And I'm like, well, we got pulled over by campus security for being on campus past 10 p.m. I had no idea. That's weird. I didn't even know they could have a curfew on the road like that Because it's not like you have to really go out of your way to go on the college campus It's in the middle of our town That road that goes through is a very main road to take from one part of town to a neighborhood of houses Like people probably take that every day to drive to their house And so the fact that there was a curfew set on it was strange to say the least I'm home safe. My friend was home safe. I made it for curfew. It didn't become a thing until about a week later. I was playing soccer at the time, and we had daily doubles. And so we had to wake up early and start getting ready to go to the morning conditioning portion, which was at COCC. There is a story blasted on the news, and I see the campus security guard's face on the screen. Mom, that is the guy that pulled me over the other night. And so we turn up the volume. It turns out they're currently chasing him down the interstate in California because he had murdered a girl on campus and was now kidnapping another family and going to partake in another murder later on. They were doing a speed chase. He was going like 120 miles down the highway, and they had the camera over him. I'm shocked and my mom's shocked. I'm like, that's the guy that tried to get me out of my car. That's the guy that said he had a good Pokemon to collect by the gymnasium. And I start to kind of spiral. I just remember going to that conditioning that morning and that we were running to the college. And all I could think was, this can't be real. There's no way this happened here on this campus that someone was killed here and that that someone that killed that innocent girl was a guy that pulled me over right there, and I'm just on the campus running laps and stairs, and my mind is spiraling. There is no way that this actually happened as any 16-year-old would do. I just dissociated. I was like, I can't even think about it. That's something that I am going to pretend never happened. This is the most uncomfortable thing to think about. It was eerie, and it was one of those things that you just, you know is weighing on you. But 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. Nothing more was going to come from it. There's all these things that go through your head, like what could actually make this heal? And the only thing that could really make it heal was forgetting about it. They end up getting him. He ended up confessing to everything. Two years later, the Dateline episode comes out. Of course, I'm like, I have to watch this. This is crazy. And so we watched the episode together, my mom and I, and it turns out that it was entirely premeditated and that he was looking for a specific kind of victim and that victim fit my appearance entirely. It was really, really terrifying to see that kind of thing come out because you trust someone that's campus security. You see them, you see them in their uniform, in their car with the lights, 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. In fact, they ended up instilling the Kaylee Sawyer Act, and that was to prevent this from ever happening again. And what the law bans is campus security from using patrol cars or uniforms to be confused as real law enforcement. That's what I saw in my rearview mirror was the lights. And so they no longer can do that. I look back on this and I still can't believe that Pokemon Go is what got me there. But also the fact that my curfews would probably save my life. Also my intuition. It makes me feel sick. It makes me feel grateful. I've been in a lot of weird situations in my life. This is one of those situations that I'm like, I have a purpose on the earth, and I'm not sure what it is, but I'm still here for a reason. I'm supposed to live out that purpose. It's really eerie to just remember being face-to-face with him, feeling something weird, and the fact that when you watch the dateline and you see what he actually did to her, you recognize that there is that evil that you felt when you looked him in the eyes and that that was that was truly there he talks about his urge to kill in the dateline and it makes you like want to get emotional but at the same time you're like I wasn't the actual victim there's someone out there who truly was and their family is I'm sure still grieving from that it's crazy you watch your life flash before your eyes but after the fact like in the moment you don't realize that There's no chance I would have survived if I had gotten out of the car. Dang, that's, hey, that right there, that's sad to hear that there's creeps out there like that. And I know there are, but every time I hear something like that, I'm surprised. And my greatest sympathies to all the women that have to deal with this on a regular basis, good granny. But anyway, let's take a break for ads. I'm going to Google what is a Pokemon Go, and then we're going to meet back up on the other side. If there was a big red button that would just demolish the internet, I would smash that button with my forehead. From the BBC, this is The Interface, the show that explores how tech is rewiring your week and your world. This isn't about quarterly earnings or about tech reviews. It's about what technology is actually doing to your work, your politics, your everyday life, and all the bizarre ways people are using the internet. Listen on bbc.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back, folks. Welcome back. Well, all right, as I promised, I would now like to tell you my forecast for the upcoming year. For context, this year, 2025, was the year of the wood snake. The year of the wood snake is marked by wisdom and transformation, and I think we can all agree that has happened. We saw a lot of changes around Radio Rental this year, And I, for one, have brought a lot of needed wisdom into these four walls within which I sit. So let's pop in another tape. And when we come back, I'm going to tell you a little bit more. I will. I said I would. I will. Here we go. So it was the fall of 2015. We were at a small liberal arts college in rural Pennsylvania, kind of in the upper corner of Appalachia. Our college was really unique because it was celebrating its bicentennial, so it was 200 years old. And kind of one of the lures of the college was that it's haunted, right? It's been there for 200 years. Everybody knows it's haunted. I think my boyfriend and I, who's now my husband, didn't really buy into any of that, but it was fun just feeling the energy. Throughout the late summer and kind of early fall, my boyfriend and some of his friends had been sneaking up to our college's football field, sneaking onto the field late at night and just playing casual games of football. Most often they would be chased off by either a maintenance worker or a janitor or somebody like that. But when he was up there, he had noticed that he could see all of these beautiful stars. And so he got it in his head that it would be a great idea to take me up there and go stargazing late at night one night. Before we knew it, we were kind of walking up late at night, blanket in hand. We were both just really excited. Young love. The plan was to kind of walk about a mile up to that football field. And these are dark college streets, right? There's not a whole lot of lighting in rural Pennsylvania. And so we walking along the sidewalk and eventually the sidewalk kind of dwindles down into really what amounts to a game trail something that animals might follow You have the chance to either follow that along this two highway or you can hang a sharp left and go up this really steep, unmaintained gravel ravine that takes you out into this beautiful clearing, maybe 500 yards away from that football field. That was our goal. That's where we wanted to be. That's where we wanted to set up shop and do this stargazing. We cross the street. We hang this sharp left up through this really unmaintained, rocky, dark ravine. It was just super, super dark. And we kept commenting on how we couldn't even see our hands in front of our faces because it was so dark. When we broke out of the ravine, we were huffing and puffing because it was really steep. It was just so beautiful. You just come out of the woods and there's just this huge clearing. stars up above you, but there's also this really dense, thick forest. So behind you, to the left of you, and way in front of you, just kind of these impenetrable walls almost, it felt like. So we kind of make our way through this meadow, this field. We're kind of walking through this thick grass, ambling over all this uneven ground. And we set up shop on a little embankment. We are laying on our stomachs and we notice that maybe 250 yards ahead of us, there's this field house and we see one of these maintenance workers working in the field house. It has these big doors for trucks to get in and out of. Those are open, but the field house is surrounded by all of this gravel. So if anybody were to walk up around it, it would just be really, really noisy. All of a sudden, we are just looking out and I see these two quick, bright flashes in the woods. I thought, that's really weird. There's nothing back there. And it wasn't like it lit up the whole sky. It wasn't like it lit up the whole woods. It was just like somebody who was trying to mess with their phone light to turn on the light, to get out of the woods. And I started to kind of chuckle to myself and think, oh my gosh, I wonder how high or how on something somebody has to be to be that lost in the woods and not being able to find their way out. And I'm getting ready to turn to my boyfriend and say that. And all of a sudden, I just see this figure glide out of the woods. And I say glide because the ground was not even. The ground was bumpy. It was unmaintained. It wasn't mowed. There was really no discernible cadence to its movement. And I'm kind of trying to process what I'm seeing, not because it's hard to see it, but because it really does not make any sense. What I'm seeing is this really tall, almost lanky figure. And I see in the wind, it's kind of buffeting. It looks like it's wearing a trench coat. And then my hair starts to stand on end because I see that this person or this thing is also wearing what looks like to be a top hat on top of their head and then extended out away from their body, open, above their head, they are carrying an umbrella. And the umbrella isn't moving up and down as if they're trying to walk through this field. It's just steady. It's just gliding right along with them. It literally looked like somebody was riding on one of those hoverboards across flat ground. We're in a field. It's unmaintained. We're in rural Pennsylvania. There is no manicuring of lawns. It's boggy. It's wet. There are divots. There are holes. That did not make any sense. There was no up and down movement. There was no looking like somebody was kind of, you know, using their muscles to get across this ground. It was literally just a flat motion of gliding across this uneven terrain. My boyfriend and I just kind of glanced at each other to, I think, kind of check in and make sure, are you seeing this? Yes, we're really seeing this. What's going on here? And I'm staring at it. I'm trying to process. I'm trying to kind of get whatever the punchline is here. My brain is trying to catch up. And before I can even say anything to my boyfriend, this figure immediately on a dime pivots and moves and starts making a beeline for this field house where this maintenance worker is. We're tracking it. We're watching it. It's moving under these really big field lights that are super bright. And now my heart's sinking even more because there's no contrast to this thing when it goes under these lights. It's almost as if it's absorbing all of the light that is coming into contact with it. And again, we're looking at each other like, are you still seeing this? Are you still tracking this? We're debating about whether we're about to see a mugging or an assault, we're whispering back and forth, do we go down there? Do we wait here? Do we see? I think we both felt obligated to kind of stay locked in to see if we needed to intervene. But we're whispering back and forth, kind of deciding, I think trying to will ourselves to walk down there and see what we should do next and see exactly what this thing was and what that person wanted. I can't make out a face if it's a person, if there is skin, it literally looks like it is in a morph suit with a top hat and a trench coat and an umbrella. This thing finally makes it to the field house and the gravel outside of the field house. The gravel is loud and this maintenance worker is not responding. We can see him in the windows going about his business, doing whatever he is doing. Now we're a little bit far away. We can't hear anything. But that maintenance worker is making no indication that he knows that anybody is there. We're watching it and we lose it behind the field house. We can't see where it's gone. It's just disappeared behind the field house. And now my boyfriend are looking at each other. We're kind of whispering to each other, trying to decide, do we need to go down there and tell somebody? Do we need to go and warn this maintenance worker? We were honestly thinking that we were about to see either a mugging or an assault. Maybe this really mean or ill-intentioned prank go down. But before we could actually, you know, decide what we wanted to do in this situation, we see this same black figure come out from behind the field house, still with that umbrella up and over its head. Now it's coming around the front of the field house and it just turns and makes a beeline straight towards us. We are up on an embankment and so any ambient light is illuminating my boyfriend and I. It can see us. We realize in an instant that this thing knows where we are and it is headed straight towards us. There's no infrastructure behind where we are. There's no trails. There's no destinations, if you will, behind us. 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 ears raise. It wasn't like a chill up the spine. It was an immediate instinctual, I am being hunted, and this thing is coming. We're kind of getting to a crouching position. We're whispering really frantically, do we make a run for it? Do we book it? What does this person want with us? Do we know this person? We are both just silent. I think we're both trying to decide, is this really happening? Is this person really coming at us now? And we're just in this collective panic of what do we do next? And is this really happening? So it's still gliding towards us, right? Like there's no discernible running. There's no discernible, like hoofing it up this embankment or anything like that. It's just gliding straight towards us, but fast. Now what we're trying to do is we're trying to get up without making any real, you know, big movements that would draw even more attention to us. And so in the process of doing that, we're watching it. We're trying to get up. We both kind of look forward and all of a sudden when we decide that we are about to take off, this thing just immediately on a dime turns, does an about face and goes left into the darkness and we completely lose it. We cannot see it. Now this thing is blocking our only way out and we have no clue where it is, if it's armed and what it's about to do. We can both run pretty fast, but it's still about a mile back to campus through the dark. We can't hear any footsteps. We can't hear any heavy breathing to say that somebody just covered that amount of ground that quickly and they're messing with us. We kind of pinned down I just remember feeling like I physically could not move from my crouching position I could not move my body I was so afraid This thing knows where we are Before it kind of felt like we were being hunted when it was headed straight towards us, almost like we were about to be attacked. And now that it's behind us, it feels like we're being stalked because it knows exactly where we are and we have no idea where it went. We need to get out. This thing most likely is standing right at the top of the ravine where we have to go back down through and out to get back to campus safely. I have never felt adrenaline move my body in the way that it moved my body. We stood up, my husband scream-whispered, now? And we took off off of this mound back through the darkness. I have no clue where the hell I'm headed. I don't know where I'm running. I could have run into a tree. I don't know. Something instinctual took over my body and just kept pushing me forward. So eventually we get across this meadow and I can feel my foot hit the gravel on the ravine. And I'm telling myself, this is the most dangerous part. Do not stop right now. Do not lose it on the downhill. We have to go. Can you give it more? Can you push it faster? Can you go more? I remember being in this ravine, just sprinting down this hill and feeling like physically the trees were about to collapse in on me. 100 more meters. 50. 25. Can you go faster? Push, push, push. Let's go. eventually we just explode out of this opening in the woods and I remember looking back and thinking we didn't even look to cross the street we could have been hit by a car it didn't matter that would have been preferable to whatever was waiting for us in that ravine we're hauling it down the sidewalk we look at each other as if to say are you good what was that are you okay are you actually here is this thing following us we have never run so fast in our life we finally make it back to my boyfriend's apartment and we just kind of stayed quiet for a while and we both just kind of sit and process without really speaking to each other saying anything i think eventually he asked did you see that too was that thing coming for us did you see it while we were running back through the dark did you see it at all after we lost it when it turned? And just this conversation of trying to square in our mind why it happened, what had happened. Do you think that we are in danger? Are we overreacting? We didn't really want to acknowledge what happened. I don't think we ever really knew what happened. But I do remember I had to walk back to my own dorm that night and I had the distinct feeling of being watched. I remember being really, really pissed off because I had a major exam the next day and I could not sleep. I did not want to sleep. I felt like I had to be vigilant. I threw a blanket over the blinds that were on our dorm because I didn't want anything peeking in at me. Somewhere along the way, somebody named this thing, this figure, the Umbrella Man. We are going to a college that's 200 years old, so those ghost stories are a dime a dozen. I have gone back and looked to see in our college kind of lore or history if there was anything that would have made sense with that story, and I can't find anything. But we still really wonder how close we got to that thing while we were running through that ravine. it really does not make sense to me how somebody was able to cover that amount of ground without any, you know, arboration and putting down that umbrella without any shaking to the umbrella without any cadence to the movement if it was a person what was their whole point? why were they sneaking up on us? why all of a sudden were they going around back of where we were trying to stalk us? And it's interesting to me now all these years later that we're still kind of asking each other questions about what happened because it just doesn't make any sense. No, sir. No, thank you. I am good. Hey, and listen here, I will not be sticking around to find out more about Demon Mary Poppins. Super Califragilicum ex-Biala don't come near me is what I say. That's what I'm saying. I'll be back, boss. All right, buddy, sounds good. Boy, Vince sure does need a break. He deserves it because, I mean, what a go-getter. That kid wanted to work immediately. No time for a contract or even a background check. Now, you got to admire that kind of work ethic, folks. All right, well, let's follow Vince's lead and let's take a little break for ourselves. All right, folks, well, time for the rest of my end of the year prediction. Now, 2026, as everybody knows, is the year of the fire horse. That's right, the fire horse. So 2026 will bring us a year full of passion, energy, independence, and a thirst for adventure. And if you've been wanting to skydive or cave dive or any other kind of dive, My celestial senses tell me that next year is your year. And on top of that, I do think next time you're back in Radio Rental, we're going to have plenty of adventure in store for you here. So that's like what they call the double whammy. And I do think that the numbers 57, 23, and 8 are going to be looking good for the Powerball. I'm going to be honest with you, that came barreling down on me like a year of the fire horse styles, what that did. No, Malachi, no, next year's not going to be the year of the cat. That won't be again until 2035. Well, I sincerely hope you're still alive by then, too. How old are you anyway? Malachi, seriously, between your scraggly fur and your snaggletooth, you look like you're about on your 14th life to me, buddy. I mean, I ain't saying. I'm just saying. Radio Rental is created by Payne Lindsey and brought to you by Tenorfoot TV. Showrunner is Meredith Stedman. Lead producer is Eric Quintana. Executive producers are Payne Lindsay and Donald Albright Our host is Jeff Foxworthy Guest host is Tony Cavallaro Writing by Meredith Stedman Original score by Makeup and Vanity Set With additional score by Jay Ragsdale Editing by Eric Quintana, Payne Lindsay, Stephen Perez, Cooper Skinner, Meredith Stedman, and Dylan Harrington Sound design mix and master by Stephen Perez and Cooper Skinner Our production manager is Jordan Foxworthy Our social media manager is Caroline Orajema Video editing by Dylan Harrington Cover artwork by Trevor Eiler and Rob Sheridan Radio rental merchandise by Byron McCoy To shop radio rental merch, visit shop.tenderfoot.tv Special thanks to Orrin Rosenbaum and the team at UTA As well as the Nord Group and the team at Odyssey If you have a radio rental story that you'd like to share please email us at yourscarystory at gmail.com or contact us via the form on our website, radiorentalusa.com. Follow us on Instagram at Radio Rental. On behalf of the Radio Rental store, we'd love it if you'd subscribe, rate, and review. As always, thanks for listening. Hey, Radio Rental listeners. We want to hear from you. We just launched a survey and want to know about your favorite shows, your merch requests, and what you'd like to listen to in 2026. Give us the gift of your feedback, and you might be one of our winners to get free merch and a $100 Amazon gift card. Head over to tenderfoot.tv slash survey for more. Thanks again. Now here's the show.