Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Picture a Day - Day 161

For one mostly long forgotten summer I became engrossed in the Discovery Channel's show Haunting.

It prepared me if I should ever find myself the sudden owner of a haunted house, a run down bar, or a long abandoned cemetery.

The first trick is to check out the neighborhood. Make sure and ask everyone if they are Satan worshipers (preferably before they offer you free snacks). But of course a Satan worshiper would lie so you may want to check the bathroom and basement for any goat heads or pentagons drawn in blood.

If; however, you do find that the house you just bought is in fact haunted there's no big reason to worry.

Ghosts seem to get their jollies out of opening doors, turning on faucets, and rearranging cupboards. Just treat it like any four year old with access to your entire house that's had a bit too much sugar. I'd suggest looking into radioactive baby gates, that should be good at keeping unwanted anything at bay.

There is only one place where a ghost becomes dangerous, the stairs. If you have a haunted Ranch home then you're golden, but if you find yourself the owner of a split level then you better invest in some crash pads for when he inevitably tries shoving, pushing, or tossing you down the stairs.

If all this becomes too much and you're tired of your 4 year old spectre you really just need two things, a mystic native american guide (because nothing pisses ghosts off more than Catholic priests it seems) and a ton of sage.

Apparently the smell of burning of sage is the universal eviction notice to ghosts. Though I think it'd probably scare off just about any one with a pulse within a half a mile radius.

Yesterday I felt like I had to banish myself some ghosts from the office:My lab mate pruned her rosemary bush and kindly offered up some for all of us in the office. I do have some plans for it involving a piece of pork but I couldn't get the idea out of my head to light the poor thing on fire and wave it around mumbling about going back to the nether region ad naseum to get rid of any lingering evil final's spirits.

Rosemary sure makes a nice practice bouquet too. To hell with the traditional ribbons and bows off the shower gifts, someone needs to restart the old tradition of carrying herbs down the aisle. It's a whole lot more fragrant than any old flowers.Has anyone else watched way too many ghost shows? Got any other good banishing evil spirit tricks?

What would you do with a couple of sprigs of rosemary if you had the chance?

2 comments:

Chesney said...

Never ran into a ghost yet, but we tried. Last summer we stayed at the haunted hotel "The Stanley" in Estes Park (the hotel "The Shining" was based off of). We scoped out the music room and the top floor after midnight and ran in to no ghosts (at our disappointment)! :) If we did run into one, who else would you call, except GHOST BUSTERS! LOL

Carrie Mae said...

I watch too many ghost shows, but lately they just drive me nuts.

A friend from work dragged me to a few Ghost Hound meetings a few years ago -- I like their approach. Less 'scare them away' and more 'see if we can prove that they are even here.'

Fascinating stuff.