Expect the Unexpected

Mood: Inspired (my muse seems to have decided that my cold germs have officially left town and so she's speaking to me once again)

What I'm Watching: Ghost Hunters Academy (Ghosts rock. People who hunt ghosts rock. People being trained to hunt ghosts? Seem to be a bit wussy but we'll see)

Current Word Count: 9,602 (I know...the same as the last time. But, I've been working on plot points and character expansion by hand. That's right. When I plot, I go all old school with a pen and paper).

The hubs and I were sitting on the sofa tonight, eating KFC right out of the box in the manner of two lazy, tired, thirty-somethings with no kids and therefore no worries about setting a good example for anyone when one of the hubs many computers turned itself on. Now, we're not talking about bringing itself out of a sleep state or the hard drive spinning up...nope. This computer was completely powered off and it powered itself on.

A hint that we may have lived a little too long in a haunted place? Neither one of us jumped up or freaked out. Scott? Stopped chewing for half a nano-second and shrugged. Me? I was just frustrated and told "Bob" (our ghost) that if he was capable of physically turning on a computer, he could also be capable of doing some housework around here. I mean really, is there any reason for me to come home to a sink full of dirty dishes if he's here all day not really doing anything constructive? I didn't think so!

On a more serious note...

On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month in the year 1918, the guns of WWI fell silent. The "war to end all wars" was over & Nov. 11 became known as Armistice Day, a day when we could celebrate the sacrifices of those who had fought during WWI. Eventually "Armistice Day" gave way to "Veteran's Day". So, on this, the ...11th day of the 11th month, take some time to give thanks to those who keep us free.

Things That go Bump in the Night

Mood: Frustrated, irritated, annoyed...well, you get the idea (had a very rough day at work)

What I'm Watching: Hoarders (Am suddenly overwhelmed w/ the need to clean any rogue bits of clutter around my own home lest they rise up and mount a hostile take over).

Current Word Count: Am not willing to talk about that right now! (translation: No meaningful writing has been accomplished over the last week or so and am currenly suitably ashamed of the lazy writer within me).

It's mid-October, the weather has started turning colder, the leaves have started falling from the trees and suddenly thoughts of the spooky and macabre begin to fill my head (and my television) as the calendar inches ever closer to Halloween.

Personally, I've always accepted that there are things "out there" that I can't begin to understand but that doesn't mean I'm jumping at my own shadow either. I tend to walk the line, looking for the rational and logical explanation before resorting to paranormal explanations.

When Scott and I moved into our current apartment, we immediately began to notice things weren't quite "right". We heard things going bump in the night. We would go to bed and be lulled to sleep by a symphony of drawers in our kitchen opening and closing, kitchen chairs shuffling around and stuff banging down on our tables. At first, the logical explanation seemed to be that our upstairs neighbors must be very noisy night owls....until we learned that we, in fact, had no upstairs neighbors.

I kept smelling a very nice, light musky floral scent every time I was cooking in the kitchen. The hubs? Couldn't smell anything unusual for months. No matter how strong the scent was to me, he couldn't smell a thing. Until one morning when I'd grown so accustomed to the scent that I no longer noticed it, he finally smelled it. It was early one morning and I'd gotten up to use the restroom...on my way back into bed he finally smelled it. That's right. Our ghost? Was a perv who had followed me into the bathroom.

We've now lived in this apartment for over 7 years and over that time we've experienced everything from disembodied voices, to things moving, hearing people walking around our bedroom in the middle of the night, to actually feeling someone sitting on the edge of our bed. Once? I even saw 'something' sitting on the end of our sofa but it's getting late so that's a story I'll save and share later.

So, what about the rest of you? Ever see or hear something you couldn't explain? Ever experience something that just made your skin crawl (I mean, of course, besides the 'D' list celeb reality tv on VH-1)? Leave a comment and share your stories. It is after, all, nearly Halloween...so pull a chair up around the old campfire, put that flashlight under your chin and scare us all!