Haunting

Well, it's my very favorite time of year, horror movie season, as Halloween draws ever closer. For a horror movie junkie, you just can't beat Halloween. Although I would like to point out to the Scyfy channel that torture week is not the same as scary week, enough with the Saw movies. Also, Timber falls and all the rest of that crap that's about maniacal people who get their jollies torturing others.

I can find that on CNN, when I want to be entertained, I like to suspend reality. Start suspending.

Anyway, I saw a really entertaining movie last night, and I thought I would review it for you. It's called Ghost Town and foolishly, I thought it might be about ghosts. Well, it is in a way, but oy vey, what a twist!

Here's the thing. It's about a group of people fighting the vengeful ghosts of satanists using wicca. Neat trick. Apparently research did not provide the information that Wiccans don't believe in satan, they consider him a Judeo-Christian myth, a corruption of Cerranos (No, I can't spell that, the guy with antlers) or sometimes Pan, a satyr. So it escapes me somewhat why they would want to fight some satanic ghosts.

Also, the story started in 1850 or so in the Old West and Wicca was not actually invented until the 1920's or 30's in Great Britain. And before you bind me with some white ribbon--or, if you are a pantheist, curse me all to hell and gone, be advised that you're not the only one with power and curses come home to roost.

So leave the Crone alone. You have been warned.

Then, after you're done burning that incense, partaking of cakes and wine, sprinkling the sea salt around and enjoying some of that fine candle magic, just burn the parchment with my name on it and head off to the library where you can research Raymond Buckland and get a whole new perspective on your "old" religion.

So, anyway, back to the movie, where some college kids who were returning on a bus from a Hockey game/debate match, get stranded in Hope Springs, which is not only a cute play on words but--in a tip of the hat to Brigadoon--only appears once every thirteen years.

It seems the satanists failed to read the fine print in their contract regarding the exact definition of "immortality" and that's how they exist now. Twelve years in the Hell the Wiccans don't believe in, followed by 24 hours in which they get to kill anyone who wanders in. Not exactly something one would sell his soul for, but then, apparently Buckland himself wasn't averse, so, go figure.

The Nice Girl who lost the debate, thus incurring the hatred of her teammates, is (but, naturally) the daughter of a practicing Wiccan (Can I get a "no more the burning times!"? Which, incidentally is the "Hallelujah" of Wicca). And so she leads them all to the miraculous symbols of pentagram and ankh--so original, these Wiccans, borrowing from other cultures like that--and there is much killing and treasure hunting as we look for the symbols to mark the pentacle.

Interestingly, you can kill a ghost, you just have to use a rifle or other weapon from the time he was alive. And, while ghosts can walk through walls, they are defeated by the bank vault because it is thick. Too thick for a ghost to float through, density apparently being a factor in the afterlife.

I don't know how it ends, after awhile I just couldn't quit obsessing over the errors and so was not able to suspend belief in reality long enough to finish the movie. I do know the coach gets buried alive in an old west casket made of barn boards, but surprisingly solid after all those years. And some people end up hung on the back of the barn door, but no one notices either the weight of the bodies, the dripping blood or the glimpses of the corpses through the gaps in the board while closing the doors.

Singularly unobservant, these folks. Personally, I would have made the kids stay on the bus while the hockey coach hiked to the nearest town to find a phone. Or--even better--I would not have made the mistake of thinking that a bunch of hockey players in college would be physically unable to make the four mile hike back to the last town, I would have instructed them to each grab a debate geek as a buddy and set out.

What I would NOT have done is assume young, healthy college students were in worse shape than the 50 year old coach, unable to stand the cold on a hike, but perfectly able to endure it in an old saloon full of whiskey, and afraid of the dark but able to brave sequential murders of their friends, one by one by one.

Face it, we would have all grabbed a bottle of whiskey, grabbed a geek and been three miles down the road, pleasantly intoxicated before the first ten minutes were up. No one would have died and unprotected drunken sex would be the worst thing that happened.

As a movie, I realize that's not much, but as a reasonable scenario, it listens.

So, anyway, check it out. It's no worse than that Hills have Eyes movie, and you already know how I felt about that. I think I'll just go read some Stephen King. Now there's a guy who can tell a story.

Bored, Bored, Bored

Couldn't one of you children fail dismally at life and move home with some of my grandchildren? I mean, I hate to wish misfortune upon you, but it's not like you'd be homeless, you know. I WOULD take you in and ruin your children.

Oh, well. Woe is me.

So anyway, now that mother has helped me redecorate with all those beautiful rugs and pillows she made me, there's nothing to do but play the Sims. I LIKE the sims and everything, it's just that I realized that all my families were basically my age, even if they were toddlers.

None of my children ever do anything but study and build skills that will help them later in college. Where was this me when I was young? I still can't leave the house without serious bribery, but I've got sim toddlers who know that eight points in mechanical skills will get them a scholarship to Harvard when they are thirteen and I have them move to college.

I've got goal oriented parents that achieve their lifetime wants ten minutes after they graduate and thus have platinum mood for the rest of their gloriously extended lives.

I think of reasons to kill my old sims because there's nothing for them to do but garden and relax and none of them wants to, and they also are sick of visiting the Orient, Twikii Island and the mountains.

What brain surgeon decided to send elderly sims to the mountains? I've been to the mountains, any sim over 50 can't breathe at that altitude and is going to have a major coronary right after learning that slap dance. Also, none of them would ever make the local gesture and if someone made it at them first, they would certainly make a gesture in return but it would involve only one finger and be universal in translation.

None of my sims want to learn to teleport from a ninja in the orient, either. It's a complete waste of time and I'm sick of people becoming invisible at the zen garden while meditating. Elderly people are feeling invisible enough, just trust me, there is no need at all to have them go meditate at the zen garden.

And as for that annoying old fellow that wants to tell you the legend of the dragon scroll, I can tell you it really isn't worth making him tea and listening to his jokes.

And by the way, Bigfoot lives in the mountains, do not help him rake his leaves and then invite him home. No one in your actual neighborhood is going to understand a large smelly man covered in fur who sleeps with his teddy. Leave him in the wood s where he belongs. I tried to get some spinster schoolteacher to marry him, as I thought they might have interesting children, but apparently that would be bestiality and it would offend the family rating of the game.

Your sims can woohoo all to hell and gone, in the bed, the hottub or the closet, but they cannot enter into holy matrimony with bigfoot. Just so you know.

There's a ghost in the pirate ship on Twikii Island, but if you let them learn to sing the sea chanty, forever afterward they will break spontaneously into "Yo ho ho, a zider bee for me" even when entertaining the boss in an attempt to gain a promotion. People who have never been to Twikii Island do not seem to understand the significance of "Yo ho ho, a zider bee for me", so it is better not to ever learn it. Once learned, they cannot control themselves at all and will sing it anywhere, under any circumstances, even upon viewing the tombstone of their beloved relative you just drowned in the swimming pool because you couldn't stand it anymore.

Also, I once decided to make serial killer sim, and all through college she murdered everyone who came to visit and saved the tombstones in her inventory for when she moved home. This leads to very strange desires in your sim, things like witchcraft, vampirism and the desire to sleep in coffins. Who says a sim can't learn?

I got a few men pregnant with that alien abduction option, and they like their green babies, but their wives a re a little bitchy about it and won't hug them unless forced, so be advised that mom is going to need to build a relationship with bug eyes from the get go. Otherwise the aliens end up with a complex and want to kill all their visitors at college. I think we already know where that leads.

Sometimes your sim is gay. Just learn to deal. It has been my experience that a male sim who loves music, dance and cooking and gets crushes on his male roommate should not be forced to be straight. It just makes him cry a lot and die young, so just let him go his own way. If it bothers you, there are many other sims to play, just send him to the island and don't visit him.

Marrying a robot is possible but unnatural and they always want children and tend to run amok when discovering they can only adopt. I haven't had any werewolves yet, but your plant sims have some interesting babies. All these creatures--and vampires--can reproduce, but no one can sleep with bigfoot. Go figure.

So anyway, I guess I'll go see if Francis Worthington the second has produced an heir, yet. Unless some of my kids fall on hard times and bring the children to live with me.

Peace

It occurred to me the other day--because I have a lot of time to think now that the kids got their own house--that where I went wrong in my early life was in not being to identify the exact category I occupied.

Because I realize now I was a nerd not a cool person and trying to achieve cool personness really screwed up my basic propensity to just la la through life happily, assuming it a would all work out if we just kept going.

The internet would have been a profound help, but we didn't have it then. Of course, it would have also almost certainly gotten me killed, but still. I do remember me in those days to a certain degree.

If I hadn't died from meeting a serial killer in the vampire chatroom I would have ended up in trouble with some branch of extreme witchiness, joined a serious religious cult that ended in things like gunfire, or possibly just trusted enough completely wrong and crazy people to ensure I would have ended my days in the asylum, completely barking mad.

Ah, youth. You couldn't pay me enough to make me do it again.

Anyway, back to the story. I should have realized I was a nerd. It's why I had never heard of Lynrd Skynard but could tell you how Mozart played piano at age three and why I love his music and his life story. No one but me cared, but still.

I cared about things like the six wives of Henry the Eighth, what happened to England after the whole Tudor thing, what the French revolution said about social welfare in our own age and how you (traditionally speaking, anyway)got that little divot above your upper lip.

I may have stopped encouraging my inner nerd (who I should have been embracing) because there was also that whole Aspereger's thing and I had a tendency not to notice the eyes glazing over until some kid did something rude and obnoxious to make me shut up.

And I can entirely see why, when one is fifteen or so, one is not too adept at nice ways to deal with complete sensory overload. It's unfortunate, but there you are, that's life and you can't change it. I mean, I could have dealt with it nicely, but then I think we can agree I was the nerd, and my experience was not average.

So anyway, I don't remember why I started this, but it had something to do with too much time to think, and WAY to much time to study and reflect since my horrible second son and his horrible, cruel wife had the unmitigated gall to get their own place and actually think they had the moral high ground when they wanted my grandchildren to live with them!

It's completely absurd.

So there's nothing to do but clean the house and I already did that. I also reorganized the cupboards, put all the dishes in the sideboard according to color and function, thus making sure Chad cannot even find the silverware without a map, did the fall cleaning, waxed all the floors, sanitized the bathroom and even considered whether I could shingle a roof if I were bored enough and wore a blindfold so I didn't have to know I was more than twelve inches above the ground.

I've decided that no, I probably couldn't. I have not entirely dismissed the idea, however. Jean's rabbit got loose and I could go try and catch him, but he's not nearly as much fun as Aiden and anyway, I think he went to live in Morrie's yard (that's my neighbor) and why shouldn't he get to have Mr. Bun for a companion and flower bed critic?

Mr' Bun just eats the things he figures you shouldn't have planted anyway and occasionally deigns to nibble on a weed. Rarely.

So, anyway, now I'm going to take my nerdy self over to Lacey's so i can take her and the girl's to the clinic, again. Oh, happy day, more blood drawing and analyzing of bodily fluids.

I wish I were a forensic pathologist, but only if I could do it here and never have to actually speak to anyone but the dead. The rest of you could just read my report, it would work out quite nicely. I like to take apart the dead, I just don't like to talk to the living. The dead are quiet and perfectly acceptable as subjects.

But the chances are, no one is going to let me do that and since that whole incident with the sheriff's deputy and the gun and the insane people and that whole Xanax thing, I probably am not going to get to go play with the dead anytime soon.

More's the pity.

But that's another story and one I can't tell you until after it's been sorted out. But I still say anyone would have lied about the damned gun. It's not like the actual presence of a firearm was going to somehow improve the whole situation, it was perfectly reasonable to lock the thing up.

Okay, lying might not have been strictly speaking the best policy, but telling the truth was just going to lead to the ridiculous complications that have now occurred and all because some Deputy couldn't just trust my judgement and shut up.

Well, it was interesting, anyway. Never a dull moment, really. I think I'll go wax the floor again.

Me and Emma have a day

Yes, I know the grammar sucks in the title. Thank you for pointing it out, again. Here's a little secret--I did that on purpose and if you say the phrase, "on accident" again, I will kill you.

BY accident. Unless it's your blog, of course, in that case say anything you like however you choose.

So, anyway, Emma.

Yesterday Ada had a well baby check at the clinic. I was pretty sure it was going to be a good day when Emma arrived, on account of her greeting was, "I'n going to the doctor's house!" All the way to the clinic we discussed the doctor and his "house" and worried he might not be home.

I assured her that the reason the doctor made us call first was to ensure he would be home when we got there.

To Emma, everyone who works at the clinic, including the cleaning lady, is a doctor. And so we have Dr. Kay the receptionist, Dr. Sue the nurse and Dr. Tammy, the physician's assistant. We usually don't actually see Dr. Bill the physician, so I don't think he's part of her cast of friends at the clinic.

Although one day as she sat behind the desk in the reception area playing with the pens and the computer mouse, he did ask her if she was the new receptionist and she perkily assured him she was. For all I know she might be able to do the job, she spells cat okay.

So, anyway, the doctor. We got to the clinic and the exam room and they tried to weigh Ada. Emma helped a lot. She gave everyone in the building a pair of latex gloves to wear, decorated Ada's diaper with a puppy sticker and offered to sit on the scale and hold Ada for the proceedings.

We declined that, with thanks, and she went on to measure Ada's head circumference with four or five of those adjustable headdresses they use, announcing to Sue several times that Ada was three, four or ten and advising she write that down.

We gave her a tape measure to play with after that so we could get Ada's length and she measured me a lot. I am four and ten, in case you wondered. Emma herself is three.

I took her with me to have an INR drawn so Lacey could have Ada's appointment in peace, and she was deeply interested in the whole finger poking thing, agreed with "dottor" Sue that getting poked looked fun and she likes to get poked, helped milk a drop of blood from my fingertip, read the INR machine results (guess what? My INR was three, four and ten) and then went with "dottor" Sue to get me a bandaid.

Usually I get one of those little round bandaids for my pinprick, but on this occasion I got a lovely silver holographic bandaid, chosen and applied by a three year old who told me as I was three, four or ten I would soon be, "All better."

I'm thinking of making Em my personal physician.

Meanwhile she was arranging the lab to her personal satisfaction, so we went and captured her and went back to Ada's room. Tammy was examining Ada's ears, afterward, Emma examined mine. My ears were three, four and ten, respectively. No surprises there.

Tammy found her a magnifying lens with a light and we spent twenty minutes blinding grandma by examining my eyes, which had no number value but were, apparently, Hilarious, if we are to judge by the reaction of doctor Em.

Not content with looking at my throat as I said "Ah" I also had to say the sounds for E I O U and Y. Emma is nothing if not thorough. She did want me to remove my teeth, but I declined, as that is a trick we save for at home when grandma is babysitting.

Then Emma stole the stethoscope and listened to everyone's heart, lungs, tummy and brain. Don't ask me what she heard on that last test, I'm pretty sure I don't even want to know.

You're probably wondering why I don't control her better at the doctor's aren't you? This IS me controlling her well, it is a significant improvement over how it used to be when no one could control Emma. Fortunately, it's a little clinic and they know and like her very much and are familiar with the size of her IQ. Which she is growing into--slowly. I may die before we get there. I'm pretty sure she's smarter than me.

So, anyway, then we went to the waiting area so Ada could get some shots. Em would have liked to help with that, too, but Emma and a live virus are not things you should ever combine.

The waiting area is tricky because it's less interesting. It DOES have that dandy water cooler with the disposable cups and spigots at the exact height a three year old needs to be perfectly comfortable getting water. I like to limit water to a cup or two, Emma likes to drink ten or eleven gallons and tends to think everyone waiting to see the doctor should have a glass or two, hand delivered by her.

I try to distract her from the water cooler without causing atomic meltdown that will seriously disturb the sick people. So far, so good. We went to the ladies room and Em returned without her pants but she was (thankfully) wearing her underwear on her butt at the time. It took ten minutes to get her to put her jeans back on. We played with some blocks.

Emma decided to play with a toy school bus, which she hauled down near the examining rooms and weighed. It was three, four and ten. Maybe those are the lottery numbers I should play, they seem deeply significant to Em for some reason. It took awhile to get her back to the waiting area.

Lacey brought me Ada to keep so she could see the doctor herself, and kindly brought me Ada's clothes, socks and shoes so I could dress her while running herd on Emma,because obviously she thought I was bored and lonely out there and really needed something to keep me distracted from everything. Like sanity, for instance.

Ada was lodging a protest about vaccinating babies at the time and did not particularly want to get dressed, Emma had already read all the children's books and refused to read one to Ada. Which was probably okay because all the books said the same thing anyway. Whatever the picture on the page was and the words three, four or ten.

At this point, for some reason, Emma decided to be a cow and refused to communicate with any words other than "Moo" in varying tones of voice with very diverse emotional coloring. Now and then she would throw in a human word but only if I was being particularly dense. You, know, like I was as she climbed into the windowsill, removed the screens, attempted to swing from the shade cords and mooed something about the mailman that was not flattering to him at all.

The clinic is directly opposite the post office.

She also insisted that I sit in a baby chair at the table, while holding Ada. My butt is somewhat bigger than the baby chair and besides, new arrivals at the waiting room clearly did not see why I would choose to sit at the baby table with a screaming infant while a maniacal toddler poured water on the floor and attempted to lick it up with her tongue.

Then Emma decided to go sleep in her barn, which interestingly enough seemed to be located somewhere under the chairs. At least it wasn't in the records office and don't think I haven't been in there a few times because, buddy, you don't know the half of it.

And at least she wasn't discussing symptoms with everyone in the room so she could find out why they had come to play with the doctor that day, although at one point she did deign to announce that the doctor was home that day, and therefore perfectly willing to play with them.

Which I am sure relieved their minds considerably. Ada, meanwhile was still not completely convinced vaccinations were either necessary or desirable and was considering making a powerful statement on the subject if there were not some walking and singing developing soon.

But Lacey came out just then and rescued me. I don't know what Emma did when she got home, but I had a nice, long nap. It was three, four or ten hours long, I'm not entirely sure.

Watching Emma

It seemed fairly simple, Lacey and Nick needed to go shopping, and I would visit their house and watch Emma, Ada was already asleep.

What could be simpler, more charming, than that?

Nothing really. If Ada had been asleep. But she wasn't. She also wasn't tired, wasn't hungry, wasn't interested in her pacifier and did not particularly enjoy anything that did not involve Grandma holding, walking and singing to her.

Despite many assurances that she liked her new walker so much she almost demanded to spend all her time in it, she wouldn't get within four feet of it for me, for any reason at all. She felt the same way about the bouncer, the crib, the high chair and the floor.

So I walked Ada and sang a lot. But then came Emma.

Emma rolled her tractor to the sink, stood on it, found a sharp knife and began slicing tomatoes. I put Ada down , ran to take the knife away, moved Emma from the sink and threw the tractor into the hallway outside the apartment door. Ada screamed.

I went and got Ada, turned around, and discovered Emma had left the apartment to go after her tractor and was headed down the stairs to the park.

I put Ada down (Ada screamed), captured Emma, carried her and the tractor upstairs, locked the tractor in the closet and went to get Ada.

While I was getting Ada, Emma pushed her slide over to the sink, climbed into it and poured all the cans of formula down the drain.

I put Ada down (Ada screamed) captured Emma, locked the slide in Em's bedroom, and went back to get Ada (who was screaming).

I walked Ada and as I got her to stop screaming for a minute Emma shattered the silence by gleefully shouting, "Gramma! I swingin!" Which she was, indeed, doing from the hand rest of the treadmill which her mother had left folded against the wall.

I put Ada down (she screamed) I removed Emma from the treadmill, made her put her underwear back on her butt where they belonged instead of on her head where she was currently wearing them, settled her with a nice dvd and went to get Ada, who was still screaming but could be bribed with teething biscuits to be quiet as long as there was much walking and singing.

Coming back into the living room I found Emma had put a black garbage bag over her head which she wore while running through the house yelling, "Gramma! I a ghost!"

I put Ada down--she screamed--removed the garbage bag and all of it's friends from Emma and the apartment, settled Emma with a nice book and went to get Ada. Once again, singing and walking.

Meanwhile Emma opened the dishwasher and removed all the sharp cutlery she could find and prepared to make sushi on her tea tray. Put Ada down, screaming, removed cutlery, locked the dishwasher, got Emma interested in her dollhouse and commenced walking and singing to Ada,

Emma loaded her tea tray with glass apothecary jars, tripped over the cat, brained the dog with the tea tray and dropped a jar on her foot. I cried.

Then Lacey came home. Ada was still screaming, I was crying, the dog was unconscious, the cat had disappeared under the furniture somewhere, Emma was screaming "I need my Mommy" and boy was I in agreement with that, and now the neighbors think a lot of lullabies include the phrase, "Oh my God, Emma what are you...!!!!!!!"

Just another Towerville kind of day here in Viola. I don't just make this stuff up, you know. And that's why I went completely insane. And I do not want to be cured, either.

Hillbillies-R-Us

There is really nothing funny about the death of a friend, and yet, when that friend is remembered I think he would have enjoyed this last story about him very much.

His widow and his daughter chose to have the service at one of his favorite places on their land, a place where every spring he hosted a music festival that he called "Rock the Valley." And since his body had been cremated it was possible to do that, have a lovely service in a beautiful and familiar place, and in the end, put his cremains in one of the places he was happiest.

But then we come to the Pilly part of the story. I never can remember to tell everything, you know. You know how lawyers have that thing called 'assuming facts not in evidence'? Well, I'm no lawyer, but my brain does have a habit of assuming you've heard the details somewhere else and will, therefore, fill in the blank spots in my conversation.

So there I was at the emergency room (never mind that part because it doesn't have anything to do with the story) and I was passing the time with my sister-in-law's best friend, Jerry, and the subject of this great funeral happened to come up.

On account of if you're at the emergency room at night for any reason at all your mind just naturally seems to run to funerals, I don't know why. It's a rule. I don't just make this stuff up and I already said never mind the emergency room, so just forget the damned emergency room, okay?

So, anyway, we were talking about how they had this beautiful box made of barn boards for the remains and how it took place out in this beautiful field and how the band played music and then after awhile the widow and daughter went off for a private moment, and it was so hushed and lovely.

And as I'm telling this story the woman seems to get more and more distressed, which seemed weird to me as she had never met the man. And she kept looking so horrified that I began to think maybe she was just one of those people who can't stand to think about death or maybe has a great phobia about funerals, but as this was such a nice funeral I couldn't see what part of the story could be bothering her.

So eventually we all went home and nobody died and the whole emergency room thing worked out. But the next day I talked to my sister-in-law and it turned out that I had forgotten to say the part about how our friend was cremated.

So the mental image I was so descriptively giving was one where we built a box of barn boards, tossed in the corpse, drug it out to his favorite field and then at some point the widow and the daughter heaved it onto their shoulders and went into the woods, returning without it and God alone knew what they were doing in there.

And this would almost certainly make Steve laugh and wish he had planned it just like that, too.

The world will be a colder and quieter place without you, my friend, and I would give up writing altogether if I could trade the gift to have you back with us for awhile longer. I am grateful for what you did and were for my son, you were one of the people that carried the music to Jake because Scott was gone and couldn't, it breaks my heart that you are gone, now, too and one more link in the chain has broken.

But as long as there is kindness and love and laughter, as long as there is music, you will not be forgotten.

The drummer may be silenced, but the beat goes on.

In loving memory of our friend, Steve Holcombe.