Haunted

You already know that I'm easily scared...as shown here, here...and here. There's not much I can do about it - I guess conditioning might work. I could go live in a haunted house for a year and I'll come out with nerves of steel. I will also be a psychopath.

Recently Coop decided to throw a fit all night long (turns out he was sick) and keep me up fetching him water and blocks of gold. After being up most of the night laying next to a toddler that is apparently made of elbows and spastic tendencies I finally drifted off. I was hanging on for dear life to the edge of the bed since a King size bed is just big enough for a 2-year-old.

Someone whispers in my ear. I shot up and out of bed so fast that all of the bedding came with me, there I stood in attack mode (read: defense mode) glaring around the room for the offender (read: witch). I say witch, because this happened recently:

 

It's true.

There's no one around. I re-make the bed and try to sleep with my eyes open - I'm not great at it. I went on about my day as normal, scared of everything. The next morning...it happens again. The voice didn't wake me up entirely I just knew it was there and it scared me but my sleepiness out weighed my need to evacuate the room. I also knew that it was the creepiest voice I had ever heard but I couldn't figure out WHAT she was saying. It was just scary.

I thought perhaps it was my new alarm clock app on my phone. I checked all of the settings, nope - no "ghost witch" capability. I set my alarm for a few minutes later so I could listen to it, I thought maybe if a certain amount of time passed without turning it off a voice would come on and say "wake the fuck up". Nope, that wasn't it either.

The next morning I actually woke up a few seconds before it happened. I lay there groggy and I hear "There is a secret." hissed into my earhole. HISSED. I jumped out of bed and stared at my phone, that's where it was coming from. I wondered if the warranty covered demon possession...hmm. I drank my coffee while staring at the clearly possessed cell phone when it dawned on me - I recently installed The Secret app. 

You know, The Secret - book, movie, inspiration, life changing, yada yada. Well, I have it set up to remind me to read my daily "secret". Apparently they decided the best way to remind their customers to read a secret is to have a demon ghost whisper it to them. It disturbed me so much that I had to leave a glowing review:

(click the picture to see the entire image)

Please go to the app store from your phone and mark my review as helpful...the world needs it.

The Secret

Crouching Amber. Hidden Monster.

So. (Yes, I notice that begin a lot of paragraph's and stories this way.)

So. I was super exhausted yesterday. Like, so exhausted that while I was playing a math game with Madison (A math game? MY spawn? Wow. I was in pre-Algebra as a senior.) I actually fell asleep sitting up. I opened my eyes to find her face about an inch from mine. "Are you sleeping?"

Yes. There is no shame.

After I get everyone tucked in and read to and talked to I am ready for bed myself. I have a process of going to bed. Well. Kind of. I leave the closet light on so that in the middle of night if I have to get up I won't have to turn on the lamp or big light (don't you love my terminology? "big light", where the hell do I get this stuff?). The bathroom light is turned off and the door shut. Bocephus sleeps outside my bedroom door to ward off any crazies and I keep a sawed off on the pillow next to me....maybe.

So, I do all my stuff and I'm all snuggled in. Right now I'm reading Rant, by Chuck Palahniuk. I'm a big fan of his books. Invisible Monsters is probably my favorite. Oh, sorry, I'm getting off topic. Okay, I'm reading, and this book is a little graphic on the creepy/nasty level. I'm reading and then I hear it.

"Crinkle crinkly crinkle."

Hmm. Strange. I think, maybe it was just Cooper moving around in his crib and that I misheard the typical rustling of a blanket and confused it with the sound of an insane person dressed as a clown hiding at the end of my bed crinkling a cello bag.

"Crinkly crinky crink."

I bolt straight up in the bed. I promise that it sounds scary in person. I grab the phone.

"MORGAN. ARE YOU AWAKE." This is said in a quiet loud whisper scream. By this time I am perched like a bird at the end of my bed. I'm up on my toes, crouched, ready to pounce...okay, who am I kidding...I'm ready to will myself to die at the sight of any random psycho that happens through my bedroom.

"Yes. What's up?"

Me: "There's a noise in my room...like a crinkly crinkle. Like...a noise."

Morgan's voice get's very serious. This is the reason I called him, he understands the seriousness of the situation. (Momma was asleep.)

Morgan: "Where is it coming from? Is your light on? Turn your light on!"

Me: "My lamp is on. My closet light is on. My big light isn't on though...I would have to walk on the floor to get to it...sooo."

Morgan: "Can't you lunge at it or something?"

I tell him that I can see just fine between the lamp and my closet light. The crinkling noise is sporadic and coming from next to my dresser. He says maybe something is at the end of my bed, I say, no, I'm at the end of my bed, it's only laundry.

Morgan: "Well, Amber. I'm doubtful that a bad guy would break into your house, hide in your bedroom and crinkle paper."

Me: "Hmm."

Me: "Ohhhhhhhh. I see. It's the diaper pail. It's almost full and it's pulling more plastic bag down on its own."

Morgan: "Goodnight."

Yes. 10 minutes of my life were stolen by a diaper pail.

No shame.

Stages Of Seeing A Scary Movie

I use the term "scary movie" loosely. Just because I think it's scary doesn't mean that it is in fact scary. Just wanted to point that out. Since, during a conversation with me you could randomly yell out "boo" and I would hit the floor in defense mode, I understand that not everyone is as easily frightened as I am.

Not very long ago I was a big horror movie fan. Weekends were spent at momma's house watching whatever one of us found in the deepest darkest pits of the video rental joint. I'm not sure when it happened or why but all of a sudden my nerves just couldn't handle it anymore. There are still a few things I can watch but my tolerance is limited. I'm talking to you Human Centipede.

I specifically rememember a weekend that Morgan and I were supposed to go see a movie. I will break it down for you based on my stages of seeing a scary movie.

Denial: "Morgan. I'm not going to see that movie." (driving to theatre) "I don't want to see that one, let's see something else."

Anger (with some denial mixed in): "I'm NOT seeing this Morgan! It's going to be TOO SCARY!" (this is standing in line and purchasing tickets to scary movie that I am vocally refusing to see)

Depression (plus denial): "I don't wanna...hmph." (pouting, standing in line for nachos and hot dogs)

Bargaining (no longer in denial): "Morgan, please, let's leave now. I'll buy you something! Anything...if it costs less than $5. Do you want to go for ice cream?" "PLEASE!" (in theater, in the middle of the movie that I haven't seen more than 3 minutes of because my head is behind my coat, people are throwing things at me)

And that's about it. Apparently ice cream isn't good enough for him even though at one point I wasn't the only one behind my coat...so, I win. Kind of.

This isn't me, you know, because you can see her face. I'll be the one hiding behind a jacket or someones head.

Read Signs Closely Before Entering

Just for the record, my memory sucks and I need to compose an actual descriptive list of all of my blog posts because I can’t remember what I’ve written about…

Okay, enough of that.

Yesterday Morgan called to review with me the awesomeness of the previous day that he spent with Angelo at the fair. He talked of fried and dipped foods. Perfect weather (which we never get at fair time, by the way). More perfect and awesomeness and heaven’s sunshine and halo’s and bacon and donut’s.

Perfect day. Except that when they thought they were going into the funhouse, they quickly realized that this was not fun. In fact, it was the exact opposite of fun. It was a haunted house. Trying to just make it through with their wit intact was a feat. There were heads flying around and black trash bags and attack poses and screaming and some pee. He didn’t say that, but he didn’t have to.

I asked, “chainsaws?” and he said, “no”. Phew. I hate a fucking chainsaw.

This reminded me of my own haunted house experience. Well, the one that I can remember clearly. Momma took me to at least one as a small child. What I remember is this: chainsaw guy, me screaming, momma laughing and screaming, and sliding out of the building from the roof. I’m sure the roof thing wasn’t real but the chainsaw guy was.

A few years ago a friend and her boyfriend were going to the local haunted house that they put out every Halloween…I can’t remember the name of it exactly but it should be called, “Come pay us to scare the shit out of you.” I, forgetting who I was, agreed to tag along. What? Dumb.

When you arrive there is a line… of course…seems logical to stand in line for terror. There are also these little children in scary masks yelling at you and calling you names. After you pay you are then ushered into a little black hallway, they only let about 3 people in at a time. So here we are. Boyfriend in the center, we are on either side of him holding on for dear life. We walk into the first room. It’s huge and dark with a cardboard house in the center. Then. CHAINSAW NOISE. PEE. From behind the cardboard house emerge two figures. Both in masks. Assholes. One carrying a chainsaw. Bigger asshole. The other is just walking calmly next to chainsaw guy. We are now running, well we girls are running, boyfriend is being dragged, around this room. It’s dark; we can’t find our way out. So, we are ineffectively running in circles and screaming. We plastered ourselves to the wall and just kept moving unable to escape. Finally, bigger asshole turns his chainsaw off (this is after about an hour of our escapade) and says in a small calm voice,

“Are you actually scared?”

We, now sitting atop the boyfriend’s head, shriek, “YES!”.

Then what did he do?

Turned the saw back on.

What did I do?

Ran. Ran like hell for the front door, which I knew I could find if I punched through enough sheetrock. As I’m leaving, nay, escaping, the small children are screaming “scaredy cat, scaredy cat”. “SHUT UP!” I scream at the ankle biters as I finally see daylight. I get outside and can finally breathe.

I find the exit door and sit outside of it, waiting for the idiots who continued with the terror to come outside. I can hear the screaming and then what do I hear? CHAINSAW! AGAIN! There was another bout of chainsaw dude when you get to the end! I should call the cops, this has got to be some sort of crime.

I’m glad I left when I did. I would not have made it. No way. No how.

Here is a puppy and kitty reenactment of my scaredness.