It's Fright Night! Gather 'round for some Halloween stories!

Happy Halloween everyone! Are you up for a few ghost stories?

I thought it would be fun to tell you a few spooky stories. I chose stories that either scared or fascinated me when I was a child. Just press play on the video below to travel back down memory lane! Story time lasts about 15 minutes.

You won't see anything in this video, but I posted a virtual campfire you can watch while listening to me tell a few tales:

Did you remember a few of these spooky stories or urban legends? They really stuck with me! Credit goes to Alvin Schwartz, the author of the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. I chose to read the versions of "The Hook" and "The Golden Hand" that were retold by S. E. Schlosser. There are so many variations on "The Golden Hand", but I preferred the one that's closest to how I heard it when I was young. The man in the story has to be wicked and the ghost has to exact her revenge, otherwise it's just boring!

If you're around my age or older, you'll be familiar with the original illustrations that accompanied some of these stories.  They were drawn by Stephen Gammell. The books have been redone with new less threatening illustrations. I find this strange, because I could handle those drawings as a kid! That one with the zit exploding with spiders traumatized me a bit, but only in the way where you enjoy being creeped out! Here are some of the original illustrations.

"The Hook" illustration with a nice bit of dripping blood, hair, and skin fragments:

"The Red Spot" illustration that really got to me! She's actually pretty icky looking even without stuff hatching out of her face.

Our little Vindow Viper, who is almost too cute for this book:

The Hearse and a bit of the music sheet that goes with "The Hearse Song":

I love all the shadows and drippiness in the artist's work.

Did I read any of your favorite old stories? Maybe you've heard them told differently. It's always interesting to hear the many different spins given to an urban legend or campfire tale. I always like hearing a new urban legend, so if you know any good ones, send them along! 

I hope you all have a scary night in the best of ways!

Leap Year Fears From My Childhood

February 29, 2012 is a leap day. Leap years always remind me of a legend I heard in my younger days. OK, it's probably not so much a real legend, as it is a plot made up for a TV show. Still, it's funny how the stories you hear as a child stick with you. Even if they're ridiculous. These stories seem to live on in that special part of your brain, the part where things don't need to be completely logical to make sense.

Like many kids at the time, I was obsessed with the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books. The urban legends in those books really stuck with me! Especially the one about the teenager who thinks she has a some kind of blemish, but instead it's an immense sack of spider eggs. The eggs are shown hatching in one of the more gruesome illustrations I've ever seen. I haven't had one bug bite (even now) that doesn't make me think of that story.

Don't worry, I'm changing the topic back to leap years now...

Aside from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books, one of my obsessions during grade school was a show called Are You Afraid of the Dark? If you are relatively my same age and reading this blog, chances are you were obsessed with the show too.

If you're not familiar with the show, here's a quick summary. Each week, the teenage characters met in the woods at night and told scary stories around a campfire. The TV audience would see the stories re-enacted. One of the stories was about leap day, specifically a full moon on the night of February 29. The story was called "The Tale of the Whispering Walls" and featured this groovy guy:

This character is the story's villain, Master Raymond. The story isn't amazingly scary, but Raymond is creepy acting and I loved his jacket. It sort of looks like a rib cage.

As the story goes, you need to be careful if you're out during a full moon on February 29, because that's when spirits will come back to earth and try to change places with you. The story seems ripped off of old Halloween legends a bit. Anyway, here's the first part of the episode. I'm afraid that you'll have to follow this link to watch the video, because whoever posted the video won't let anyone embed it!

The Tale of the Whispering Walls

I don't expect you to watch the entire thing, because it's not spectacular. I do think the intro is worth watching, since you'll get an explanation of the legend. That and Betty Ann is wearing a cool mask (which looks like it was borrowed from her Day of the Dead stash).

"The spirits who prowl on a full moon leap year are hunting, and it may be for you."

That was pretty scary stuff to me back in the day...

Even those of us with large imaginations have no reason to be afraid this year, because the moon won't be full on leap day. I have to wonder if there has ever been a full moon on February 29.

I had wanted to share more about the full moon on February 29th legend, but there's really not much out there. Well, not aside from all the questions posted online by the other people who clearly watched Are You Afraid of the Dark? back in the day. Evidently, a lot of us are still thinking about the leap day episode 20 years later!

I suppose everyone carries childhood stories and superstitions into their adulthood. Probably each of you can think of a story that still seems scary now because you first heard it as a child.

Before I go, I'd like to mention something you've probably noticed already ~ My blog is wearing a new look! The new layout has two columns instead of three, and only one blog post will be displayed at a time. I hope these changes will cut down on my blog's loading time. I also designed some new icons to direct you to my Twitter, Pinterest, and Halloween Forum profiles. See the magnifying glass? Beneath that is a place for you to search my blog. Say you were interested in any posts I've written about vampires. Just type "vampires" in that search box, and a list of all my vampire posts will pop up. Pretty handy, hey? Please let me know if you have any trouble reading my blog on account of these changes, and Happy Leap Day!

Don't go making phony calls

A few days ago, someone left me a very weird voice mail. I was going to write about it earlier, but my awesome prize of spooky pins took precedence. Basically, it was a recording of either coughing, sneezing, or gagging. A man was making some guttural noise, anyway. I'd love to know what was so thrilling about coughing into my voice mail!

This is maybe the third weirdest voice mail I've ever received. The second weirdest was a recording of a drunk man pretending to be Matt Damon. When I traced that phone number, it actually went to the South East chapter of our local Chess Club. Seriously. But the weirdest phone call I've ever received came when I was still in high school. I remember picking up the phone only to hear someone breathing loudly. I sat there for maybe 5 minutes listening to them breathe, when it occurred to me that they probably weren't going to hang up any time soon. I just left the phone off the hook (yes this was back in the day when phones had hooks and cords) and decided to take a walk. When I returned 45 minutes later and picked up the phone to listen, he was still breathing away. At this point I hung up.

Other phone silliness has included a phone call from inside a port-a-john, during which the guy dropped the phone...Not to mention the time some guy decided to pick my number, of all numbers, to give out to girls he wasn't interested in. So, they were calling me all the time asking for him, and then not believing me when I said I didn't know who he was! Think about what happened to me, if you like to give fake numbers to those you're uninterested in. Some unfortunate person will still be hearing from those people! But moving on....

Creepy phone calls figure into a lot of urban legends and movies. In honor of the coughing caller (since he did provide me with today's blogging material) I present to you...

A video exploring the famous "babysitter gets a creepy phone call from inside the house" urban legend:



I remember thinking about this story when I was a teenage babysitter. It would be night time, the kids would be tucked into bed, and I'd be alone on the couch trying to read. Except I'd be distracted thinking about fun stuff like this...

On a more positive note, here's the inspiration for this blog post's title:

Don't go making Phony Calls ~ A Weird Al classic!

I'd love to know...What's the weirdest phone call or voice mail you've received? Or maybe you were the prank caller! Have you ever left someone an um...interesting phone message? Don't worry, I won't report you to the phone police. :)

Out of the fog

Last night, I took a walk in the fog and captured some interesting street scenes with my camera. There is something about being outside as a foggy night turns from a hazy blue to pitch black, that reminds me of several urban legends from my childhood. Every time a car drove by, I thought of all those old stories involving a ghost car! I got a few photos of car headlights driving through the fog, although they appear more as neon streaks of light than cars. Those probably would have been cooler shots, had the cars been sitting still in the fog. Oh well, they're still fun and weird in their way! You can click on these photos to see them a lot larger.

There's a car in the distance...I like this one because it's not clear what the glowing orb of light is.

Here's one of a fast moving car. The lights show up, but I can't see any other part of the car!

A photo of a street lamp that gives me a nostalgic autumn feeling.

Just dark and spooky goodness. :)

I titled this blog post "Out of the fog" because last night it seemed like someone or something would be emerging from the fog at any second. Every time I think of a headline for a blog post, I check to see if anyone else has used that phrase online. I was surprised when my search turned up an old movie titled "Out of the Fog" because I'd never heard of it! I'm not really sure if it's spooky enough to fit with my blog, but it is strange. At least it's fitting with what seems to be my theme this week: movies from 1941. Although, aside from the overacting done by the female lead, this doesn't have much in common with "The Wolfman." Dramatic acting sure seems different now from what was being done in the 1940s! Some of the lines that are spoken in this trailer made me laugh, although I doubt that was the intended reaction. :)

Is anyone out there familiar with this movie, or the actress Ida Lupino?

P.S. ~ I was going to include something about the movie "The Fog" but both the 1980 and 2005 version of that look beyond lame to me. At least the trailers look bad. If for some reason you think either version of "The Fog" was a masterpiece, let me know. I might be willing to give it a chance!