Fragments from Night Vale

by Father Dugal Wed Apr 16, 2014 5:29 pm

So perhaps some of you have read the posting I made about the podcast series Welcome to Night Vale. Perhaps you found the courage to listen to an episode or more. Or perhaps, I am merely the vassal of a broken vessel, a musician in an empty wasteland gently touching sublime melodies meant to melt the human condition.

Whatever the condition may be, I now present to you a small smattering of quotes from the show as it exists up to this point. Read these and judge them to be madness or saving grace. The choice, as always, is yours.

The City Council voted this week to make death a meritocracy. “For all of human existence, death has been a communistic sort of event,” the Council said in a prepared statement, and that “we live in America, where it is not the government’s job to give death to every single citizen.”

The Council noted that from now on, death would be earned through hard work and productivity, not just as a handout for every resource-sucking freeloader on the street.

"If you want to die," the Council said, "you will have to achieve death yourself. Not everyone gets to die, and that’s just how it will be."

The vote won by a small margin, with the opposition split between keeping death universal and others pushing for banning death altogether.

Listen, Night Vale, I don’t know about you, but I am for this new merit-based system of death. If everyone gets to die, then no one will really value death. I used to be young, and idealistic, and think that death was a human right, that everyone deserved to die. But now, I realize that dying is very hard work. I’m working hard every day, trying to die, but you don’t hear me complaining, “Oh, government, where’s my free death?” No. When I die, I want to have earned it.

I don’t mean to sound insensitive to those less fortunate, who don’t have the means to die without government help, which is why I support our local non-profit shelters, that will help ease our more ‘down-on-their-luck’ brothers and sisters toward the death they truly want, but just can’t afford.

by **Casey** Thu Apr 17, 2014 3:52 pm

Wow. Bizarre. Political commentary, or Twilight Zone stuff? Both, I suppose.

I downloaded the first few episodes, but haven't listened to them yet.

by Father Dugal Thu Apr 17, 2014 9:40 pm

Yes. This show is a bit difficult to put to words. It makes sense when you listen to it; but, when it is over you have trouble putting the experience into actual words. Much like a dream. Or a Man In Black who is always standing in your blind spot.

by Father Dugal Tue Apr 22, 2014 6:04 pm

Here's a friendly community message.

And now, a public service announcement from the greater Night Vale medical community.

Are you feeling run down? Even after eight hours of sleep? Are you having trouble breathing between the hours of 2:00 and 4:00? Are you gaining several extra pounds of weight, only to lose those pounds suddenly and then gain them back, all in five to six hour stretches of time?

Are you craving soil, like, all the time? Rich, dark soil that you just want cooling your tongue, filling your throat, your sinuses, your lungs, your belly? Are you digging up the earth in the early morning, screaming at the half-formed sun as if it would cordially leave, returning you to the darkness you so richly deserve and psychologically demand?

If you answered yes to all of those questions, then you’re fine! The program is working. All tests have been successful, and Phase Four is imminent.

This has been Community Health Tips.

by **Casey** Wed Apr 30, 2014 8:25 pm

Some Twilight Zone radio theater, Lovecraft, X Files, and the one sided conversation of the schizophrenic whose ramblings make sense to himself in prison of his own mind.

by Father Dugal Wed Apr 30, 2014 9:44 pm

Some Twilight Zone radio theater, Lovecraft, X Files, and the one sided conversation of the schizophrenic whose ramblings make sense to himself in prison of his own mind.

Yes. I certainly enjoy it.

by **Casey** Wed Apr 30, 2014 9:53 pm

A few years ago KSL (the AM station) had a radio theater program that they would play Sunday evenings. I don't know if they still do. Meagan and I listened to them occasionally. I really enjoyed the media. The ability of voice actors is apart from screen actors. The narrator in this Night Vale series really fits the bill, I think, homey, yet simultaneously creepy of the 50s McCarthyism/cold war kind.

by Father Dugal Wed Apr 30, 2014 10:01 pm

A few years ago KSL (the AM station) had a radio theater program that they would play Sunday evenings. I don't know if they still do. Meagan and I listened to them occasionally. I really enjoyed the media. The ability of voice actors is apart from screen actors. The narrator in this Night Vale series really fits the bill, I think, homey, yet simultaneously creepy of the 50s McCarthyism/cold war kind.

Yes. I'll point out that as creepy as those old anthology horror radio shows were, they never really pushed the envelope into the lovely madness that is utter entropy. Nightvale, I believe, does a fine job of pushing that envelope.

by Father Dugal Sun May 04, 2014 10:12 pm

And now a Public Service Announcement from the Night Vale SPCA.

Thinking about getting a dog? Dogs are not only great family companions, but also help childhood development. By regularly feeding, walking, fighting, denying the existence of, and ultimately soul-merging with the family dog, young children learn about responsibility, empathy, and pyrokinesis.

There are, of course, some breeds of dogs that are not right for children. Those breeds include spider wolves, double wolves, switch-bladed mountain dogs, secret terriers, flesh-eating spaniels, pit vipers, and table saws. Visit the SPCA for more information on the right dog for your family.

by Father Dugal Thu Jun 05, 2014 10:32 pm

Today’s sponsor is Hulu.com.

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Let’s talk about watching things. Let’s talk about watching, rather than actually watching. Let’s think about talking about watching a second-hand experience. Let’s continually abstract ourselves from what we believe is the world.

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The pulsing life of your body is an undeniable fact! But deny it anyway. Looking for the answers to all of life’s problems? We recommend obstinate denial. Accept no substitute. Accept nothing.

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Water circles the drain of our planet, always coming back for one more go to see if, this cycle, it will be different. It will not be different. The sky will break open, and water will fall, one more time.

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The terror you feel in quiet moments is not misplaced, just mistimed.

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by **Casey** Mon Jun 09, 2014 2:07 pm

Children who take firearms to school are much more likely to shoot other children at school, than are children who don't take firearms to school.

Haha probably my more favorite Nightvale quote so far.

by Father Dugal Mon Jun 09, 2014 11:01 pm

Hnmm. Kids and guns. I can see why you would find that quote interesting.

by **Casey** Mon Jun 09, 2014 11:22 pm

Well, guns, yes, shooting, yes. But what really is funny about it is the way he says it, just like the way he says anything else, which is the way anyone would talk about the weather, or the traffic, or the city council, in any other radio broadcast....

Wink

by Father Dugal Wed Jun 11, 2014 9:31 pm

In honor of construction season here in Utah, we present a friendly reminder...

The Night Vale Highway Department is asking all motorists to please turn on your headlights when driving through construction zones. If you see workers, please turn on your headlights. If you see workers in orange vests and black balaclavas holding large metal devices that look like miniature satellite dishes, and whispering coded instructions into walkie-talkies, while low-hovering disc-shaped aircraft of the like you have never seen before zip about quickly overhead, please: turn on your headlights.

Please, for the safety of our workers, slow your vehicle. Please turn on your headlights and slow your vehicle. Slow your vehicle, with your headlights clearly in the ON setting, to a crawl.

Come to a complete stop.

For the safety of our highway workers and their vast interplanetary secrets, please get out of your vehicle and walk toward the hum. You will hear a loud humming from above. Please, follow the humming until you are completely lifted from this earth, from this world, never to return.

Well, to return eventually, but not to this time. To a completely different time. Maybe millennia from now. Maybe millennia ago. Who knows? You will! Eventually.

This public service announcement has been brought to you by the Night Vale Highway Department.

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