Hello and welcome to the Drabblecast, episode 496. The Drabblecast is an audio fiction podcast magazine that brings strange stories by strange authors to strange listeners,

such as yourself. I'm your host, Norm Sherman. Happy Thanksgiving, folks. Hope you're getting to

spend some time with family, and if not, hey, here we are, your drabble fam. Grab some bird and think of what

you're thankful for. I'm obviously pretty thankful for you. Without listeners enjoying our stories and podcast, I'm just a guy talking to himself into a microphone, so thanks for not making me that. And I'm thankful for weird stories, too. I don't know where I'd be without them. Genres are, meh, am I right? Weird as an umbrella we can all get under to get out of the rain. Well, we've got a weird story about family for this week, folks. An original story by Zachary Olson called Sundays with Pop Pop. Zachary Olson is a freelance writer and composer from Phoenix, Arizona, currently residing in Chicago. Updates on his work can be found on Twitter at obfuscating God and at Zachary Olson.com.

So without further ado, we bring you Sundays with Pop Pop by Zachary Olson.

Popp's cabin lay on unincorporated land just across the county line.

Calling it a cabin is a bit of a misnomer, really. It's a mansion, an anemic, bootstrapped,

sprawling one, but a mansion nonetheless. A winding gravel path welded it to State Road

336 like a taxidermied limb. Getting from the property's edge to the house itself was nearly 20 minutes on

its own. The path was made of hairpin turns, the kind of place that radiated, get the fuck away.

Fit the man himself, I guess. It's simple, said Popop, all sharp edges and vacuum-packed bones.

He wasn't the kind of old man who got there with healthy eating and exercise. He'd gotten

there with grit. Every Sunday something comes through that hedge, and every Sunday you're going to

kill it. He said it more than matter of fact. He said it word of God, like we were talking about watering a

house plant or feeding a dog, and not something that required the shotgun he was holding out.

I still took it, of course.

That way, at least he didn't have a shotgun. He used to be we had a horn to call him. He continued,

turning away and hobbling up the garden path behind the house. Old tin thing, sounded like a dying

goose. Charlie went and broke it, and now we wait old-fashioned like. Pop-pop, what in the hell are you talking about?

Why is Charlie in a wheelchair?

That's the problem with your generation, grumbled Pop-pop.

Your ma never asked questions.

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