The hardest part of adult life—other than health insurance, inflation, student loan debt, and imminent climate disaster—is not being able to embrace the full-body terror and joy of Halloween like you could in childhood.

From disturbing PG-rated Nickelodeon cartoons to the good old days before every costume was bastardized with a "sexy" version, Halloween should be the time of year we embrace our inner witch, demon, zombie, or punny Optimus-Amazon-Prime identities.

But you can't. Since Halloween falls on a boring Thursday this year, you'll probably be stuck working or trying to supervise hellish children so they don't die or get kidnapped or whatever. So while you're stuck at the office, or holding a smelly plastic orange pumpkin full of stale chocolate eyeballs, or holding a smelly child's hand while he fills an orange plastic pumpkin with stale chocolate eyeballs, you should listen to these creepy and chilling podcasts. Some are true crime stories, some are urban legends, and some are real-life unexplained events from listeners' traumatic childhoods, but all of them set the mood for the perfect adult Halloween: sleepless, paranoid, and full of f-bombs.

​Jim Harold's Campfire

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Jim Harold's Campfire

Thousands of listeners write to Jim to share their eerie and unexplained experiences. Each episode is like an hour-long reading of r/creepy if Reddit were filled with better writers who didn't lie their faces off but claim it's real. Or, think of it like Post Secret postcards except with demons.