After a long break, here is episode 7, the first of 2026. This story isn't what I started out intending to read, but I enjoyed it and wanted to share it. Over the past month I've been thinking about the values of different things, including the value of stories. Many stories are aiming to teach something, or encourage thought about something. We can just enjoy the stories, but there is often more to find if we choose to look. And where else is there value that we often don't really notice?

This episode's story is from the Grey Fairy Book, collected by Andrew Lang, which I incorrectly call The Grey Book of Fairy Tales in the episode. You can find it here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/6746.

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