A SERIALIZED FICTION PODCAST: A gigantic Goldfish Bowl, three stories high, has appeared overnight in the university quad. No one knows where it came from. No one knows what it means. But the fish need feeding, a committee has been formed to determine how many subcommittees the situation requires, and somewhere in the Administration Building, a college president is too busy drowning in his inbox to look up. Welcome to the University of the Surreal, a campus where the impossible keeps happening — and somehow, that's not even the strangest part.
https://www.universityofthesurreal.com
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Afterword: Until We Meet Again: Greetings, next steps, and a brief reflective practice from the University of the Surreal's author and narrator.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is the Afterword of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E9: Chapter IX: Ready to Wake Up
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter IX: Ready to Wake Up: Cassie reports to the Circle of Elders, who discuss what's coming next; back at the University, the impossible has found a new way in.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 9 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E8: Chapter VIII: We Can Know Things Without Knowing Them
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter VIII: We Can Know Things Without Knowing Them: Three more doppelgangers arrive with their explanations for the Goldfish Bowl — and Cassie tries a different approach entirely, one that gets somewhere none of the arguments could.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 8 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E7: Chapter VII: The Default Option
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter VII: The Default Option: Three versions of Alan arrive to explain, with great conviction, why a trash can is exactly where it should be — and none of their reasoning quite holds up.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 7 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E6: Chapter VI: The Eighth Floor
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter VI: The Eighth Floor: The elevator stops on a floor that doesn't exist, Alan steps into an office that is almost but not quite his own, and Cassie is already there, waiting for a mysterious meeting to begin.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 6 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E5: Chapter V: How to Read
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter V: How to Read: A literature professor turned president, Alan has spent his career believing the world is a text to be interpreted; standing before the Goldfish Bowl at night, he's no longer sure he knows how.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 5 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E4: Chapter IV: Most People
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter IV: Most People: An invisible wall stops Alan from crossing the street — and the words he overhears from a stranger on a bench land hard enough to stop the world around him.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 4 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E3: Chapter III: What Has Worked Before
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter III: What Has Worked Before: The consultants arrive with their pitch — Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt — and Alan sees through the spin while being unable to resist its spell.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 3 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E2: Chapter II: We All Wear Many Hats
Learn more and join the conversation: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com/)
Chapter II: We All Wear Many Hats: A last-minute dinner is already an unwelcome addition to Alan's calendar; the server who seems to appear everywhere on campus at once makes it considerably stranger.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 2 of Season One: Office of the President.
24 Mar 2026
S1E1: Chapter I: TLDR
For more, including sources of inspiration for this story: https://www.universityofthesurreal.com (https://www.universityofthesurreal.com)
Chapter I: TLDR: Meet Alan, university president: he's so exhausted that he doesn't even blink when Googly Eyes sprout from his blueberry scone.
Written and narrated by Melanie Ho (https://www.melanieho.com (https://www.melanieho.com))
Background Music: Wild Soul by Reveille
University of the Surreal is a serialized fiction podcast best listened to in order. This is Episode 1 of Season One: Office of the President.
17 Mar 2026
TRAILER: Welcome to the University of the Surreal
TRAILER
A gigantic Goldfish Bowl, three stories high, has appeared overnight on the university quad. No one knows where it came from. No one knows what it means. But the campus bureaucracy gets to work. The Faculty Senate forms a committee to determine how many subcommittees the situation requires. Consultants pitch a new software system to track Goldfish Bowl activities.
There was, of course, another campus that once had a similarly-sized Snow Globe appear on its quad. It eventually consumed the entire campus. But that was another century, another country — so probably not relevant here.
Have you ever watched something completely unprecedented happen — and then had to answer your emails?
Have you ever been in a meeting about a meeting — and laughed so that you wouldn’t cry?
I’m author and storyteller Melanie Ho, and I hope you’ll join me in a journey to the University of the Surreal, a campus where the impossible keeps happening — and somehow, that's not even the strangest part
Subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, and find more campus updates at universityofthesurreal.com.
Music: Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy by Who Did That Music
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