Billy the Mountain and Ethel's presence in the story are hinted at early on during Greggery's escape, both by their identities as a mountain and tree with eyeballs on it, but also with a brief instrumental quote of the musical theme which accompanies the line "Billy was a mountain, Ethel was a tree growing off of his shoulder" as Greggery drives within the cave. Another possible reference to "Billy the Mountain" may be in the bizarre and somewhat atonal assembly of the calendar, which oddly resembles the passage of time in the former piece.