#night vale a memory of europe

[astoryaboutyou]

A thousand ways in, no way out, eat fresh. Eat so terribly, terribly fresh.

[sacred-dust]

so i start listening to welcome to night vale for the first time a couple years ago and i believe i stopped somewhere around episode 57. (i know you don’t technically have to listen in chronological order, but i’m autistic.)

about two weeks ago, i decided to start listening again, starting on episode 1. and my gods, i forgot how much i fucking love this podcast.

it’s terrifying and absurd and fascinating and unsettling and comforting and wonderful.

[littlebetesofeverything]

Welcome to Night Vale Ep 21

Alright, I have a shot of Fireball, my tabs are locked so I can't multitask, and I am ready to ignore the news for the next hour or so. I'm in the US so thoughts and prayers for the next little bit. But on to the show!

Let's preface this with I am now one shot deep and I plan on taking a few more before we are done.

Teddy Williams is an incredible name and an incredible man. You protect your place, man! Although, I wouldn't make the games illegal per see.

"Man in the Tan jacket" just call him Cas already. This is already the SPN era and it's destiel time, baby

Cecil, what did you study in college? Curious minds want to know.

Well, let's start with Svitz not being real Cecil. And maybe you...

Excuse me, did you just say a decade? Dude, how old are you, Cecil???

Yes, denial is definitely a skill.

I want to know what classes Night Vale community college has on offer.

Now see, from this point in 2024, I can say the world should have ended at least 5 times since I was born.

World ending to me is when I have finished my TBR list tbh.

can we have this aquarium pump on loop? very relaxing.

Francia? okay Cecil, I need to ask to see your birth certificate AND your passport. also any pictures you have of Stonehenge, please.

See, haze of cheap wine is plausible for why your memories are a little skewed.

"no visit can last forever" up the deep quote tally, everyone.

Dude, you were fucked by a werewolf? deep respect.

Love the sleeping agents that this message was meant to be for. If seat belts are marketed accessories, what about air bags?

Shot time, folks! Love the poem here Cecil, *snaps*

No, Europe is about the monuments. The people aren't the tourism pull, you think.

Cecil, I do not think they thought you were American.

I am going to be in agony for the next week at minimum, bud. yeah, that tracks.

Whoo! Weather time!

Damn Cecil, hit me in the feels with that nostalgia quote. and follow it with the wax allegory? Shut up, that's what I'm sensitive about. TTnTT

With this night being so... well it is election night. This outro is a little more solemn. "We are in a moment that is still, still volatile." I need more alcohol for this.

Nope, we are going on to the next one. Too much time awake still before I can go to sleep.

[thenightisland]

“But here is the truth of nostalgia: We don’t feel it for who we were, but who we weren’t. We feel it for all the possibilities that were open to us but that we didn’t take.

Time is like wax, dripping from a candle flame. In the moment, it is molten and falling, with the capability to transform into any shape. Then the moment passes, and the wax hits the tabletop, and solidifies into the shape it will always be. It becomes the past, a solid, single record of what happened, still holding in its wild curves and contours the potential of every shape it could have held. 

It is impossible, no matter how blessed you are by luck or the government or some remote, invisible deity gently steering your life with hands made of moonlight and wind, it is impossible not to feel a little sad looking at that bit of wax, that bit of the past. It is impossible not to think of all the wild forms that wax now will never take.

It can be overwhelming, this splattered, inert wax, recording every turn not taken. What’s the point, you ask. Why bother, you say.

But then you remember, I remember, that we are even now in another bit of molten wax. We are in a moment that it is still falling, still volatile, and we will never be anywhere else. We will always be in that most dangerous, most exciting, most possible time of all: the now, where we never can know what shape the next moment will take.”

-Welcome to Night Vale, ep 21, A Memory of Europe

[autistichalsin]

For the sake of some variety in your inbox, I shall present my birthday well-wishes to you in the form of a small collection of my (many) favourite Welcome to Night Vale quotes that I believe are at least semi-relevant to the occasion.

I started listening to it at the malleable age of 11 years old and it fundamentally altered my speech and thought patterns like a bone marrow transplant altering its recipient’s blood composition. I highly recommended it, if you’re not already a fan. 1000/10 comfort podcast and the first unapologetically queer piece of media I ever listened to (from episode one!! :D).

———

“Don't let numbers tell you what to do. You are blood and earth, not theory and chalk.” — @ NightValeRadio twitter account. 18/02/13

“Born? Living? Going to die some day? You may be entitled to compensation.” — @ NightValeRadio twitter account. 26/03/13

“The universe is vast. You are also vast. So is an ant. There are different sizes of infinity.” — @ NightValeRadio twitter account. 17/08/13

“One foot in the grave. Wow that thing is at least six feet deep. Is one of your legs super long?” — @ NightValeRadio twitter account. 18/06/19

———

“Proverb: Today is the last day of your life up to this point.” — Episode 11: “Wheat & Wheat By-Products”

“Sleep heavily and know that I am here with you now. The past is gone, and cannot harm you anymore. And while the future is fast coming for you, it always flinches first and settles in as the gentle present. This now, this us? We can cope with that. We can do this together. You and I, drowsily, but comfortably.” — Episode 12: “The Candidate”

“We have survived all the way from birth to this very moment, and we look at each other, and some of us start laughing, and others start weeping, and one or two of us break out into a wordless humming song. And all of us mean the exact same thing. Look at us! Look at us out in the honey light of the finished day! Look at us and rejoice in our sheer being! […] You too have survived. Survived everything up to this moment.” — Episode 15: “Street Cleaning Day”

“Proverb: If I said you had a beautiful body, would it even matter because we are so insignificant in this vast incomprehensible universe?” —Episode 16: “The Phone Call”

“[…] But then you remember – I remember – that we are, even now, in another bit of molten wax. We are in a moment that is still falling, still volatile – and we will never be anywhere else. We will always be in that most dangerous, most exciting, most possible time of all: the now. Where we never can know what shape the next moment will take.” — Episode 21: “A Memory of Europe”

“But give reason a shot. It has never, not once in history worked, but it might just work this time!” — Episode 28: “Summer Reading Program”

“Are we living a life that is safe from harm? Of course not. We never are. But that’s not the right question. The question is are we living a life that is worth the harm?” — Episode 46: “The Parade”

———

There are countless others, but I’ll leave the rest of them for you to discover yourself, if that interests you. I find these quotes funny and deeply comforting (they’ve been tattooed onto the fabric of my very soul), and I hope they made you feel similarly cozy.

Happy Birthday!! 🥳 🎂🎈

Thank you!!

[thegalaxypanda1996]

WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE YEAR 1 REVIEW

I fairly recently started listening to welcome to night vale because I listen to the magnus archives and this was in my more like this section on Spotify and I had heard about it before and that if you like the magnus archives you'll like this so I decided to give it a try

And I got to say I am really enjoying this shit it is absolutely batshit crazy balls to the walls if I stop paying attention for even one second I have no clue what is going on and have to backtrack but it is so weird and interesting it's not as structured as the magnus archives is but there is structure there is continuity there is reactions to things that happen in the episodes but it's also a bunch of crazy shit and a town where all the conspiracy theories are true The ordinary is extraordinary and the extraordinary is ordinary

I just finished listening to the first year of episodes because it's not really divided by seasons and I really love where this is going definitely going to keep listening

I especially love that literally from episode 1 Cecil has such a huge crush on Carlos freaking love it not to mention all the other characters and I know eventually that some of these characters will get voices so far there's only been one other voiced character but it will be interesting once some of them have voices besides Cecil

It's nice that it's still ongoing but also bad because it's going to take forever for me to catch up lol it's got like 200 something episodes currently out with more releasing every other week we'll see how fast I can catch up

Favorite Episodes

Pilot

Glow Cloud

PTA Meeting

Wheat & Wheat By-Products

Street Cleaning Day

Valentine

The Sandstorm A&B (Kevin😰😳)

A Memory of Europe

Eternal Scouts

One Year Later

[tlcartist]

But here is the truth of nostalgia. We don’t feel it for who we were, but who we weren’t. We feel it for all the possibilities that were open to us, but that we didn’t take.

Welcome to Night Vale | A Memory of Europe

Night Vale had some of the BEST one off quotes that would just suckerpunch you in the chest leave you breathless

Like the one that stuck with me was this one:

"when a person dies and no one will miss them, the mourning is assigned to a random human. This is why sometimes you just feel sad."

It's been almost 11 years... It haunts me in a good way

[cecilsaid]

hang a map of a place you’ll never go on your living room wall, draw new streets, tear off bodies of water, wait for news crews to arrive

welcome to night vale

[vilevilescorpio]

[wwpbviiid]

The Faceless Old Woman isn’t really historical fiction, more alternate history? It doesn’t try at all to be historically accurate. If you’ve heard the episode “A Memory of Europe”, some of the countries will sound familiar (Luftnarp, Franchia, etc.) A lot of it takes place in the shadow of a revolution that never actually happened.

It feels as night vale to me as the others, even if most of it doesn’t actually take place in night vale.

As for It Devours, it does indeed feature Carlos, although most of the characters haven’t appeared much (or at all) in the podcast

(This is @wwpbviiid, thought it might be better to continue here rather than spamming the book poll?)

I’d definitely say the faceless old woman is my favorite, but also I get not wanting to ruin the mystery around her, and it probably would do that. (Although a fun thing is we never find out her name)

Also, for the record, It Devours is about science and religion and the relationship between them, and it’s also about something of a cult, so if you have any religious trauma or whatnot it could be somewhat difficult?

Oh hey hi, so sweet of you!

Yeah the other thing that made me shy away from it a bit was that it sounded like partially historical fiction (if I recall correctly?) and I'm VERY picky about historical fiction. Is that a big part of it?

What drew me more to It Devours! out of all the available ones at my bookstore of choice was that I already know some of the characters (I think Carlos is in it right?) and I was hoping it would feel the most "familiar" in a sense of feeling at home in Night Vale and just walking to a new part of town not often explored before, you know what I mean? I went to one of their live shows about a month ago and it temporarily supercharged my obsession with it and I wanted to get back into indulging in that feeling of bizarre homey-ness and that's when I looked up the books (but haven't decided on one yet because other stuff came up in the meantime that distracted me)

I don't mind a culty/religious theme (that sounds actually rather intriguing and reminds me that just a couple of weeks ago or so I made a post asking for recommendations for books with themes about religious trauma! What a coincidence) but thank you so much for the heads-up, that's so considerate ❤️

(I hope it's okay if I post this publicly so that I can come back to it / reply to it right here)

[badpodcastcrossovers]

Theoretically, since the world is now divided into fear domains, it's not impossible that other podcasts' settings would also creep in.

In the small island of Piffling Vale and all the way over in Crestfall, Idaho you find domains of the End. In Europe you will find the Hunt in Franchia, the Corruption in Luftnarp and the Spiral in Svitz and, somewhere out there, Eskew. Ny-Ålesund has developed another horror all of its own. There's a transcontinental bridge that wasn't there yesterday, where a hundred domains seep into each other and out in space, a thousand more are stirring...

[stars-and-galaxys]

I love listening to old Night Vale episodes and rediscovering plot points with context. I’m on A Memory of Europe and there’s Huntokar foreshadowing and the creature in Cecil’s mirror from Come To The Mirror. And time machines in the wires like in Triptych

[constellationlepus]

wolf 359, episode 9, the empty man cometh // jeremiah 8:20 // a headline from horrorfreaknews // t.s. eliot, the hollow men // welcome to night vale, episode 21, a memory of europe

[the-mental-menagerie]

“I remember heading down to the local ale house, where the proprietor stared at me, frozen, with a gaping mouth and gray, ashy skin. So did everyone else in the place. All of their mouths were stretched to almost cartoon-ish dimensions, outside of the bounds of known medical science.” - A Memory of Europe, Welcome to Night Vale. 

[cosmic-giraffe]

Currently relistening to WTNV and feeling pretty existential rn

[italwaysflinchesfirst]

And now, a word from our sponsors.

Seven lights in the window. Seven lights in the hall. Seven lights, seven lights, all in all.

Six notes in the melody. Six notes in a dirge. Six notes to rid you of the urge.

Five ways of escaping. Five ways all blocked off. Five ways, each one broken and lost.

Four words in a whisper. Four words in your ear. Four words that fill you up with fear.

Three taps of a finger. Three taps on a wall. Three taps as you try to stall.

Two eyes, wide and desperate. Two eyes squinting, scared. Two eyes open, yes, but nothing there.

One light in the window. One light in the hall. One light, one light, all in all.

Taco Bell. Live Más.