Ghost stories, part 18 and last
I live in a basement suite in Surrey BC, Canada. About seven years ago, I was walking around the side of the house towards the gate to get to the backyard. My creepy landlord, Roger, was standing at the side of the house sipping on a glass of red wine with an odd and large smile on his face. The image is stuck in my head. He greeted me kindly... we may have exchanged a few words, and then I continued on my way through the backyard gate and around the corner, which leads to the stairs down to my basement suite door. At the top of the stairs is a door that leads directly into the garage.
I walked in our door and yelled, "I'M HOME!", otherwise my mom gets startled and has a triple stroke when I come in the house unannounced. I went in my room, slipped on my big earphones from my stereo and slumped down at the head of my bed, and listened to some LOUD music. At least half an hour later, I heard an extremely high-pitched scream from my mom! This scream was loud enough that I could hear it clearly with my massive earphones blasting at nearly full volume. I ripped off my earphones and sprinted out of my room and saw that our front door was wide open and my mom was clearly screaming from up at the top of the stairs and probably from the garage...
I booked it up the outside stairs to ground level and into the garage to figure out what this screaming was all about. There in front of my face was good ol' Roger... thick wire around his neck, HANGING from a beam from the garage door opening track!!! He was turning purple in the face and had pissed himself a bit. I was F'n STUNNED. My mom was in complete hysterics, screaming like a banshee. My dad quickly entered the garage and we both lunged for the stepladder that Roger had kicked over. My mom and I held Roger up while my dad climbed the ladder and cut him down... Roger slumped down deadweight onto us. He must have just finished dying.
A few minutes later, Roger's wife opened the garage door and drove her car in. It ends up that Roger's big plan was to jump off of the ladder just as his wife pulled in so she could watch him die... but my mom F'd his plans up when she opened the garage door instead of his wife. :\ I don't assume he was very happy about this.
NOW ONTO THE GHOST PART....
A few days later, I laid in my bed and passed out. I eventually opened my eyes and turned my eyes to my digital clock on my dresser at the head of my bed. The time was 8:23 AM. My body was COMPLETELY CONSUMED with a chilling feeling, and my head felt extremely heavy... My room went completely cold. I tried to move but I couldn't. I could move my eyes around, but I couldn't move my head or body!!! I looked to my right and a slow-moving blackish figure walked into my view. I opened my mouth and was trying to scream at the top of my lungs, but nothing was coming out! I clenched my eyes shut in fear. I could FEEL the figure walk around the side of my bed and could feel when he stopped beside me. It was seriously cold on my side where he was standing! For the life of me... I was too F'n scared to open my eyes!!! He stood there for a few minutes as I struggled to move.
He began to walk again... moving slowly around to the head of my bed, and there he stood again. Maybe waiting for me to open my eyes and look at him? Maybe he wanted to show me something? I have no idea. I THINK he was angered that I wasn't watching... I felt an icy grip on my ankles and I was pulled around violently around my king-sized bed! Meanwhile, my mouth is wide open and I'm trying as hard as possible to scream and only a tiny whisper was coming out. I was hanging halfway off the foot of my bed and all of a sudden, I could feel the figure walking back in the direction that he came from... I opened my eyes and turned my eyes to the right side and I could see the black haze leaving. I looked to my left at my digital clock... 8:25 AM. The INSTANT that the haze left my room, my screams came roaring out of my mouth. I was still hanging halfway off the foot of my bed with my sheet and blanket twisted around.
My parents came running into my room and I was now sitting up, pouring cold sweat, apparently 10x whiter than the normal pale skin that I got my nickname Kasper from. I was completely in a state of shock and I could barely speak.
This continued to happen to me almost every night / day over the span of a couple months. The first few times, I was scared SHITLESS... but after that, I just clenched my eyes shut and waited for "him" to stop yanking me around my bed by my arms / legs and leave my room. I always looked at the before time and the after time on my clock and they always were only a few minutes apart. My parents were insisting on me going in for counselling and so I didn't want to tell them about it anymore, or scream / yell when he would leave. One time I used enough strength to slowly squirm off the edge of my bed and try and wiggle out of my room. He left before I made my way out anyways. The less scared I became, the more I could move when he came in. Eventually when I wasn't scared anymore, he stopped coming.
I tell myself that it's just a subconscious illusion that I'm seeing in a half sleep daze... allowing me to see my clock with the current time, but also allowing me to see things that my mind is creating in my sleepish state. I don't really understand about what was causing me to be pulled around my bed. I wish my family could have afforded some sort of camera surveillance for my room at the time... Maybe I should have stopped being such a bitch and LOOKED at him directly at least once.
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I can tell a few of mine. I've never really seen anything except one when I was little.
My bedroom and all the bedrooms are on the top floor of my house. My mom and dad's door is across from mine, and my brother's is at the end of the hall. My parents' bedroom door is loud, and they always closed it at night (and yet could ALWAYS tell if I was up past my bedtime!) so you could hear the loud click as the knob closed.
I was afraid of the dark so my parents left the hall light on, and my door open about 4 inches.
One night I was up reading, and heard a sound. We lived out in the middle of the woods and I was used to hearing frogs, crickets, house settling noises, and such. This was more like a step on the stairs. I figured it was nothing, but looked at the door.
I saw a shadow pass by my door. I have never been so terrified in all my life. Even writing this, my eyes are tearing up (my usual reaction to good ghost stories). It passed by and I was laying there frozen. Then it came back. And stopped right by my door. I couldn't even close my eyes, I was so afraid. Eventually, it moved back toward the stairs and I fell asleep. I woke up with bookface the next day.
No one else was awake - I would have heard their doors open, and I didn't. This shadow was up past the top of the door, blotting out all the light in the little strip I could see.
On the plus side, after my grandma died, my mom says she gets visits from her now and then. She got the most when she was finishing the quilt my grandma started for me. Mom says she was helping her keep going when it got frustrating, since she never quilted before.
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My house was built in 1943, and I purchased it about 10 years ago. There is one bedroom and a converted garage that is used as a second bedroom. I used to sleep in the original bedroom. The first few nights I was there, I was having horrible nightmares, scarier than anything I had ever experienced. I thought it was just buyer's remorse and stress from the whole housebuying experience, and shrugged it off. After a while, things settled down... however, I did start to get the idea something was wrong with the room. All of my cats all desperately want to sleep in that room. Even the ones that hate each other will happily sleep in that room together. They all meow to get in and scratch at the doors. Unfortunately, they all liked to use the closet as their catbox, so they are banned from that bedroom... I figured there was just some strange energy in the room that the cats liked and called it that.
During the first year or two I lived in my house, I had a roommate. I knew she liked to tipple, but I never knew she was a blackout drunk 6 nights a week and was a good Catholic on Sundays. Aside from the usual problems of living with an alcoholic, like the oven / stove left on all night, "things" used to follow her home. Mostly, they were nuisance things that would get bored and leave again. However, one night, I am lying on my bed in my room, reading, avoiding the roomie, when I felt somebody walk into the room. It was the most awful, oppressive force I have ever felt and I could feel it willing me to look at it. At first, I though it was one drunken, angry roommate, so I kind of glanced with peripheral vision to where I thought she was standing, but there was no body there. No feet. Just this incredible urge to really "look." I had to force myself to look back at my book and ignore it and start reading again. Finally, it turned and left and I could feel the "weight" lifted from my mind. Eww... Fortunately, that is the only really bad thing I have ever experienced.
After I finally threw the roommate out, I was living alone and decided it was time. Time to rip the ugly, dark brown 1/4" 70's cheap panelling off the walls in bedroom and make my room brighter and more liveable. I did so... A few nights later, I had the worst nightmare of my life. I woke up convinced there was something bad outside my window, and I could see the shadow of it out there. I ran out of my room and into the living room, grabbing the phone, ready to call the cops about some bogeyman outside my window.
Not wanting to sound like a punk bitch crying to popo, I tried to relax and it slowly came into focus. The whole terror experience had been engineered by: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! I don't know why I never noticed him before, but at the time, I was working in medical insurance, which made me a very non-creative person. Apparently, he was very, very angry about me removing the panelling. After that experience, I have never slept in that room again and merely used it for storage for a while.
Now, some ghosts like to scare you to give themselves some energy to keep going, so I figured if I stayed away, the ghost would calm down and then maybe he would go away. A few years later, I got a new roommate. He slept in that room. Apparently, he and the ghost are okay with each other as he's never really had any problems, just some strange dreams. But he asked me about: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! I never told him there was a problem, a) because I always think I'm just nuts; b) maybe my roommate would never notice anyway. Some people seem to never be bothered by such things.
I used to have this neighbor who patrolled the neighborhood in a Rascal -- one of those carts for the disabled. He was in his 60s or 70s, but had multiple sclerosis, so had problems with -- well, at his age, everything. I asked him about my house and who lived in it previously. Apparently, some guy decided to kill himself in there. I assume that this is: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET!
I have a new roommate now and I made the mistake of telling her about the closet, so now she is not wont to sleep in there. We shall have to see how she gets along with: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! He doesn't seem to be evil, more like chaotic neutral, so I don't try and shoo him or anything. But the cats sure like him.
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When I first moved out from home, I lived in a townhouse in the shitty part of town. The townhouse was halfway decent and surprisingly affordable, so my two friends and I moved in with glee. The very first night, the hijinks began.
I woke up at 3:30 in the morning feeling like large insects were crawling all over me. There weren't any. I checked my blankets / bed / carpet for some kind of infestation left over from the previous renter, but found nothing. Eventually, I went back to sleep. The next morning, my roommate(let's call him "A") commented on the fact that he didn't sleep well last night. When I asked him why, "A" just said that he woke up at 3:30 feeling uneasy with a vague but powerful sense of something "wrong" in the house.
My other roommate, who shall be known as "B," reported strange happenings as well. She had a pet pit bull named Tabitha. Being a former dog owner, I'd always play with Tabitha, take her for walks, etc., so the dog and I were pretty good pals, in the non-bestiality kind of way. Tabitha would sleep in "B's" room typically. One day when I was making a joke about "the goddamn ghosts in this house," "B" told me that on more than one occasion, she had woke up in the small hours to find Tabitha staring at her closed bedroom door, growling and shaking. "B" thought this was odd, but would usually just tell her dog to sit down and go to sleep.
One night, however, Tabitha would not lie back down and go to sleep. "B" eventually got curious enough to get up and open her bedroom door, which led to the hallway that all three bedrooms shared upstairs. Tabitha left the room and slowly crept down the hallway, hackles raised, growling and shaking, until she reached my closed bedroom door. At this point, the dog looked back at "B" and whimpered, before turning back to face my door. "B" stood there a minute (as she told it), watching her dog shake more and more violently until she got scared. She grabbed her shaking, 75-pound pit bull and dragged it back down the hallway to her room, where she locked the door and hid under the blankets.
So what wackiness was going on in my room that scared the dog? Fucked if I know, but here's a related anecdote: One night around midnight, I was getting ready for bed. The only other person living in the house at this point was a new roommate, who was sound asleep at the time. So I turn out the lights and get in bed, locking my bedroom door as usual. As I'm about to fall asleep, I hear someone walking around downstairs. I don't pay it much mind. The footsteps move slowly up the stairs, which creak in the same way they always do. I think that this is a bit odd, because my roommate always hurtled himself up and down the stairs. A little bit more awake now, I decide I'll get up and prepare for war if I hear someone try to turn my doorknob... in case it's a burglar, you know?
The footsteps continue quietly down the hallway from the stairwell towards my room. They pass my roommate's door without stopping. Still beneath my blankets, I wait for the sound of someone trying to open my door, while scanning the room for a suitable bludgeon. After a minute or two of silence, I tell myself that I'm just imagining things and it's probably just my roommate being considerate and trying to walk quietly for once. I put my head back on the pillow and start to drift off to sleep again, resolving myself to not get all jumpy about stupid shit. At this point, I notice a small, dark figure lean over the foot of my bed into my field of vision. The floorboard creaks as it moves towards me and I'm out like a light - like it MADE me go to sleep.
I woke up the next day and wondered what the fuck it was all about. I asked my roommate if he was up last night and he said that he went to sleep in his room at ten and stayed there until morning. He then told me that the next time crazy shit happened, I was to wake him the fuck up.
Before we moved out of there, I ended up talking to our neighbors. During neighborly small talk, they asked how much we paid to live in the townhouse. I told them and they were amazed because it was $300 cheaper than their equally-equipped townhouse. Then they commented that the last people that rented our place had said that it was haunted and the realty office couldn't find renters to stay there, which is probably why we got such a good deal on the place. God damn right.
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I'm a police officer and I pull security duty at the local ER / Hospital several nights a month... it's fun money for ten bucks an hour, so I can make an easy $240 a weekend free and clear. Most of the time, it is easy money (i.e. sit around and read a book or play a computer game on my laptop)... other times, it is hell (like wrestling some meth-head, helping get a tube down an overdose victim, or transporting someone to CT who just put their head through a windshield at 65 MPH). There seems to be no middle ground... it's either full bore balls to the wall, or dead as a crypt. The last analogy will come into play now.
My detail runs from 7 PM until 7 AM, and after midnight is when the spooky stuff starts to happen. The hospital I work at is not the most advanced facility in the area, and some of the stuff at the hospital kind of spooks me because it's so old. Down near the cafeteria and the admin offices is what I call the "Wall-O-Death" which shows all the doctors which used to work there but who have passed on. The last one died over ten years ago, but some of those guys died a loooong time ago... there's one guy in a picture, sitting at a desk, that looks like it could have been taken in the 1930's or thereabouts. That should tell you how old this hospital is. Some of our equipment looks like it was rejected by the old 1970's TV series Emergency.
On the same wall, at the other end of the hospital is what appears to be some type of call / paging box that as best as I can figure out used to indicate which doctor was in their office or available through the use of a series of lights which illuminated their names on the front panel. It looks kind of like a fuse box in your house, but instead of fuses, it has little lights and those lights have names on them of the doctors that once worked at the hospital. None of the current doctors whom I work with have their names on this device, though I recognize at least one of the names as being the pediatrician my wife used when she was a little girl.
There are old rusty wires protruding from some of the vacant sockets on this device and some of the lights without names have been broken out and have spiderwebs in them, etc. so I can tell this is another piece of interesting albeit archaic equipment that hasn't been used in a very long time. Out of curiosity one night, I jotted down some of the names on the old paging / calling / fuse box piece of equipment and compared these names to the names down the hall on the WOD. Many matched! What really bothered me is that on most nights, this call box is unlit. Other nights, it will light up randomly, to show that doctors that are long dead are apparently now "on call." It should be noted that while some of the names on the device are still alive, they no longer work at the hospital and have their own practices in the city.
The only lights that come on are the names of dead doctors.
I had heard many stories from other officers and hospital workers that the hospital is haunted by numerous ex-residents and old faculty. Various nurses have told me that they have seen old supervisors, long dead, wandering the floor late at night, entering rooms to check on patients and the room would be empty. Typical ghost stories and I don't let them bother me too much. But two things happened to me that I could call my own personal ghost experiences in that hospital. I will tell you about them in a little while on this thread.
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This one is kinda bland, but most true ones are. The house that me and 2 roommates are renting has made some weird sounds. My girlfriend sometimes sleeps over and hears stuff in the morning after we all have gone to work.
I've heard stuff too, but only alone, so I wrote it off as overactive imagination, or just something outside / wind / the house settling. The 2 roommates I have are not the original ones I had when I moved in... one of the guys living there had lived there all his life even after his Dad moved out, which is how we came to begin renting it.
Well, his mom died of cancer, with I believe her last few days living back at home (the house I am currently in). Anyways, like I said I wrote it all off until my girlfriend made some comments to me and so I started trying to recollect things I have heard, I present them to you now:
Incident #1
This one happened about 10 months ago:
* One night, Jason and Tim (the roommates at the time) had gone to a mutual friend's house to go party or something, and I decided to stay home because I felt sick like I was coming down with a cold. I kept hearing what I thought was them walk around downstairs for like 30 minutes, so I yelled something like: "Better hurry or the party's gonna be over before you get there," and I was greeted by the sound of a door shutting. Well, the walking around noises don't stop... I keep hearing doors open and shut, so I honestly get a bit concerned and go downstairs to dispel ANY sort of growing anxiety I have about "someone" being downstairs. I go downstairs, and every room is empty, and all the doors are locked. I grab a candlestick holder for peace of mind, and went back upstairs to my room and as soon as I laid back down, the fucking walking around and doors opening and shutting happened again. I run downstairs in my boxers waving my candlestick holder and yelling at whoever was down there to break the silence (and hopefully regain my sanity) but nothing was down there. So ultimately, I returned to my room, and turned on my TV on full blast and concentrated on it until I was tired enough to pass out before the sounds downstairs started getting to me again.
Incident #2
About a month and a half or so ago:
* I live in Memphis and about a month ago, we had a crazy storm that knocked out most of the city's power. Our house did not have power for a week, and during that time, I stubbornly stayed at the house with a generator running (just a 5-gallon one to keep our fridge running [lots of food that would have spoiled], and to occasionally flip on the TV and watch a little of the news. But for the most part, it was just me there alone, as my 2 roommates decided to sleep over elsewhere due to the uncomfortable heat. I would always hear thuds and pops, the same sort you here when someone is walking upstairs or down the hall.
Incident #3
About 3 weeks ago:
* This is the last one I can remember off the top of my head that is recent, and happened in plain daylight. I got home from work and walked in the den. I usually get home 1st, so once again I am alone when the odd thing happens. I go get a drink in the kitchen and hear knocking on the walls. I walk back in the den and just kinda curious... stay really still and then I hear what sounds like crawling inside the walls. I start wondering if it's a raccoon, but then I hear what sounds like hammering and sawing, and knocking, and not just random knocking, but like the knocking and pounding you would hear if someone was trying to get your attention. This went on for about 5 minutes... the crawling would go up my wall, over my ceiling where it would be right over my head, and then I heard labored breathing, and I knew this couldn't be an animal. I contemplated either running out of the house or running into the attic: I chose the attic because I do NOT believe in ghosts or whatever, but wanted to prove to myself for sake of my sanity that nothing was there, so I go up in the attic and of course, there is nothing there. A minute later, my roommate pulls up and of course I hear nothing else the rest of the day.
The ONLY thing that I can attribute all this crap to since I have NEVER experienced anything like this in my prior 23 years in other houses I've lived in, is that it is something that I cannot explain. I half-jokingly was like "well, you know, it's not like anybody died in this house" to my girlfriend once when she was freaked out, and then I said "Oh wait, Tim's mom did" and made a kinda OH SHI expression like "Hmm, that's kinda an odd coincidence" but I still remain a skeptic to this day as to what it is I keep hearing.
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Two Stories: the first is not paranormal, but included for creepiness. The second is paranormal, but isn't terribly scary at all.
We have mountain lions in North Georgia (where I'm originally from). Although not paranormal, they are weird because of their scream. And I do want to emphasize "scream."
The only time I've encountered one was about a year ago. The strange part is, we weren't in the mountains but in the flats of middle Alabama... I was at my cousin's house. We were sitting around one night watching TV, and the phone rang. It was a neighbor of theirs who lived about a mile and a half up the road. She said a mountain lion was in her backyard, heading in the direction of my cousin's house, and to get all our pets inside. She said it seemed to be following the spring that connected both places. Naturally we gathered the pets inside, but we figured it was a wild dog or two, or a bobcat at best.
Anyway, about half an hour later we were still watching TV and we heard the most cold, shrill, godawful howl I've ever heard. It was a mixture of a baby crying, a dog howling, and a few other things... but multiplied in volume several hundred times. Absolutely beastly. It made my heart stop beating for a second or two, not to mention goosebumps for hours afterward and our hair was standing on end.
We went outside (guns in hand) to see if we could spot it, but we could only hear it crunching around in the underbrush. We could easily tell it was big and stealthy, and we certainly did not intend to mess with it. I think I would rather take my chances with a ghost or a poltergeist than that fucking thing.
Okay, story 2:
I worked in the rides department at Six Flags Over Georgia 2001-2002. Toward the back end of the park, we had a few coasters separated from the main part of the park by Carousel Hill. Could they have named it anything more dreadful? Perhaps. But the present name does just fine.
Anyway, the park bought a giant old Carousel from Chicago's famous Riverview Park and plopped it down right on top of the hill. Allegedly, Al Capone himself rode it. Anyway, aside from the Carousel and the roof over it, there are only a lot of old pine trees surrounding it. Even on noisy days, the Carousel is a splendid retreat because you can catch a nice breeze and slip into a trance as the thing turns.
But it gets weirder. At the center of the carousel is a race with ball bearing in it -- this supports the entire ride. The pivot point is mounted right on top of -- and I am not making this up -- a small part of the mast of a tall ship (you know, sails and all). Why this was chosen to support the carousel... no clue. My guess is that since Six Flags was a pretty normal company, the mast was used by the builder to support the ride to keep expenses low and simply to be practical with available materials.
Carousel Hill gets eerie at night. Not so much as when the lights are on and guests are around as it is past closing time. No music, no life. The quiet of the park around being closed makes it dead quiet at the top of the hill. Crews have to clean up the ride before they can shut off the lights and go home. They do this quickly, believe me. No one likes being up there at night. Even security only goes up there in the evenings if they have to.
To "turn off" the ride, the operator removes a key from a switch in the center portion of the ride, which houses the rotation motor and sound equipment and a couple of electrical breakers. It is graffitied with past crew members all the way back to when it opened in the 70s. Anyway, once you remove the key, the ride can no longer be operated... well, that's the plan at least.
After the park is closed and crews have gone home, some odd things have happened. The ride has been known to turn on by itself, complete with lights, music, and rotation. Upon inspection, the key switch in the center of the carousel was still "off." There was no trace of anyone around, certainly. What's more, even if someone did turn the ride on, it only has a cycle of about 2 minutes before it automatically stops. The carousel had been turning for at least 5 minutes before an officer actually reached the ride itself once the phenomenon started.
The ride has done this more than once. Is it Al Capone? Something emanating from the ship's mast? Or just the ghosts of former employees trying to fuck with their supervisors? ANOTHER UNSOLVED MYSTERY. One thing is clear, though -- carousels at any park are inherently odd and creepy things.
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I live in Spokane, Washington... a shitty town with not much to do. My cousin and a few of his friends like to go to this place outside of town called "Hangman's Valley." Hangman's Valley is where they had an old military fort back in the 1800's... supposedly the general of the fort called for the nearby chiefs and leaders of Indian tribes to come for a peace treaty. However, no such "meeting" took place. The chiefs were captured and hung, and I hear the gallows is still standing somewhere.
The place they go to is a rundown old farm house in a field. The field has a creek that runs through the middle, and each side of the field has stands of trees forming sort of a wall around it.
My cousin, his little brother, my aunt, and 2 of my cousin's friends heard about it and thought they would go see what was up at this place. They arrived and got out of the car, but my younger cousin and a friend were too scared, so they stayed in the car and watched. Everyone else headed off into the field without a flashlight or anything. They get halfway across the field somewhat close to the creek when some weird shit starts to happen. My cousin said it got really quiet, but they paid no heed. They went on a bit, but noticed the people in the car began flashing the lights on and off. They wanted to see what was up, so my aunt called their cell phone in the car. She asked why they were flashing the lights... my little cousin starts telling her they saw these bigass shadows moving in closer and closer to where my aunt and cousin were. The second my aunt hung up the phone, she heard footsteps in the creek. They all freaked out and bolted back to the car. When they got there, my cousin’s friend was all pale and freaking out... they got in the car and he pointed towards the house. He said, "Watch that big shadow over by the house." Everyone watched for a bit, but nothing happened... they were about to tell him he was full of shit when the big thing moved about 15 feet to the left. They said whatever it was, was really freaking tall. They left in a hurry... but came back later.
When they came back, my aunt decided to stay back in the car this time. So it was only my cousin and his friend in the field. This time, they only got about halfway when everything got quiet again. He said the only noise was the rushing of the water. Then something in the woods started moving and breaking branches. He described it as something big hauling ass through the woods mowing down everything in its way, not just branches being stepped on. Everything that I can think of... people, deer, bears, and pretty much every other animal avoid branches since it's just a natural reaction... whatever this was didn't and just kept breaking shit. They had enough and went back up to the car. The people in the car said they saw the big shadows moving along side the tree line: this time, there was a few of them... but they didn't warn the people because they were far off by the trees.
They have gone back numerous times since and each time something scares them back to the car. Like one time something ran out of the woods, ran in between the group of people, and disappeared into the other stand of trees. In all the times that he has gone, they have never made it past the creek. This weekend, I get to go with them and see how far we can get... the more people, the closer we can get to the house without being scared shitless (in my thoughts, that is).
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About a year ago, I moved into a big old house that the previous owner had died in. For the first week, I would hear the creepiest noises coming from the kitchen at night. It sounded like moaning and someone walking around and knocking stuff over. It scared the shit out of me.
Finally, one night, I had the courage to go investigate. I snuck out into the kitchen after hearing the noises. Nothing was there. I heard the noise again. It was coming from one of the cabinets. It was a big kitchen and there were lots of cabinets. so I couldn't tell exactly where it was coming from. I heard it again and was able to locate the cabinet it was coming from. I tiptoed up to it and slowly opened the door and peered in with a flashlight. To my horror, I found a big, ugly........... icemaker. It was a stand-alone giant ice maker built into the cabinet. Makes good ice.
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Through the years, a lot of weird stuff have been happening in my house... from shadows in mirrors, to the sightings of already-dead family by our neighbors. Now, for the first time ever, I'm going to narrate them to someone outside of the family: enjoy, and goodnight.
The mirrors
Common, cheap mirrors: you might have one in your bathroom, your study, maybe even next to you as you read this. But you might not have one like those in my house... why? Because ours reflect the dead...
You see, it's fairly common to wake up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, and when you do, most of the time you will find yourself in front of a mirror... surprise! It's you at 2:00 AM taking a leak, but when you are in my house, you won't only find that... but a wide array of shadows, sitting / smiling / who knows?
This normally happens everyday at random hours: you enter the bathroom or one of the dormitories and there they are... moving / hiding. You can look at them for one second and see a man sitting on the bed... the next one, a cat sleeping on a pillow... everything inside the mirror, looking at you, dumbfounded, as you make your way out of the room.
What are they? My parents say they are the spirits of the ones who have died in the house watching over us; others think they are the spirits that have been carried with the house. The only thing I know is that they exist, and maybe, just maybe, you will find them the next time you look at a mirror....
The Dormitories
Ahhh, it's nice to relax in your bed, right? Well, some things also happen here and I'm going to tell you about them.
"The old blanket"
In the first room, you can find the "old blanket"... what's so special about it? Well, it was made by my grandmother... just some time before she lost her arm due to sickness... isn't that fun?
We received it last year at a family reunion: it's a beautiful blanket, a gift from one of my uncles. We took it back home, and since that day, it covers the bed on which my dad sleeps. But now again, "What's so important about it?" you might ask yourself. Well, the weird thing is that only my father can sleep in that bed... family, friends, and even I cannot find rest when we have to sleep there. But if you remove the blanket, everyone can sleep like a baby.
My dad says he finds it extremely comfy, so why can't everyone else sleep? I say it's the spirit of my granddad who, I forgot to tell, died a couple of years ago...
So if you ever feel someone trying to tuck you in bed when you are all alone, remember the ones who loved you in life and death.
"Cold and warm"
The other two rooms have some of the weirdest elements I've seen: one is always cold as a winter night, and the other one is always hot as the sun that gives us its light. Why this is no one can tell... I remember trying to warm the "cold" room once with a heater, nothing. I also remember leaving the windows and the door of the "warm" room open once, in the middle of an storm, mind you... and still when I entered, the room was warm and wet.
Why does this happen? It's still unknown, specially knowing that the rooms
are next to each other... why does one refuse to warm up, and the other refuse to cool down?
The family
You see, my family is not exactly "normal"... sometimes, we feel when it's going to rain or when something bad is going to happen. Maybe it's some weird instinct, or maybe the help of those who watch over us, even when they are dead...
"But... I saw her yesterday!"
Every three years, it's the same story: But I saw her yesterday! She said hello to me!
You see, my town was founded by a beer company building homes for the workers. This was a town full of young men and their families, but, oh... who would have known? Working for a beer company, the workers soon became alcoholics because of all the beer they drank at work... thus ending in hundreds of deaths, leaving families alone with no support at all. During these hard times, the families survived supporting each other... when the children became men, they went in search of work. My family was one of those, and my grandma (maternal) managed to give her family a good life and became a good friend with a lot of people for her kindness.
Fast forwards to these days: those families who knew her so well are still in contact with us, and every tree years we hear the same story. But... I saw her... in her white dress she always wears.... And we always answer: yeah, we know... those who know her still see her, walking, happy as always... even after she has been dead for 6 years....
"It smells... like an orange"
We have been keeping pets since the old days: dogs, cats, birds, you name it. And sometimes, these animals leave a bit of themselves behind as they go to that great garden up above. (Heaven, you tard)
Before I was even born, my mon used to keep a black cat, with the simple name of "Black." He was a loyal pal for my mom... mind you, this cat liked one thing above everything else: Running on the roof playing with an orange. My mom would always throw an orange, and Black would climb and play with it for hours. Of course, when he came back, he smelled like an orange and this was how my mom knew he was around.
Some years later, Black got really sick... some ass had kicked him so hard. After some days of taking care of him, my mom lost all hope and walked to the kitchen to tell my grandma about Black. When she was about to tell her, she noticed a strong smell of oranges and ran back to where the cat was lying. My mother says that when she arrived, the cat was there, motionless. She moved next to him, and the aroma disappeared as the cat purred for the last time: Black was dead.
Nowadays, you still can hear running on the roof some days: is it some stray cat, or maybe something else?.......
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I used to do Ouija boards when I was a kid and I had some experiences that made me believe in the supernatural, but that's all irrelevant here.
Let me tell you what happened tonight. I was out at the local bar where I know one of the barmen, who had been telling me about how the place was haunted. He said one of the bouncers could "see" ghosts and that he had this crystal with him, that would spin around when a "presence" was near and you could then ask questions, to which the crystal would swing back and forward for yes, and sideways for no.
I was somewhat skeptical about this, but after having heard the stories about how two people had died in the building about 30 years back when it used to be a cinema, I stuck around to see what would happen.
About 6 of us went up to the second floor after closing time: including me, my friend, and the bouncer with the crystal. The crystal was on the end of a string and it began to spin round after a while: at which point we took it in turns to ask questions, the crystal always getting the right answer. After everyone had pretty much run out of questions, I figured I'd ask it if it would show itself, but it wasn't my turn so I stored the question in my head. The crystal started to swing sideways, indicating no, yet no one had asked a question. The guy with the crystal (we'll call him Dave from now onwards) asked if any of us had said anything: no one had, so I told him that I was about to, but hadn't yet. He asked me if I'd thought the question and I said yes, so he told me that I'd just received my answer.
That was one of the things that made me less skeptical: the fact that no one had asked anything for a good couple of minutes, but as soon as I thought that, it swung sideways. After that had happened, Dave asked if it wouldn't show itself because of Suzanne (the one female present), who was pretty fucking scared by now, and it swung forward and back to indicate yes.
One of the other guys was pretty skeptical and was going on about involuntary movements and all sorts of stuff, so I offered to hold the crystal.
I swear that I NEVER moved my hand or my arm and kept them as still as possible, and the crystal began to spin and people started asking questions again. All with the correct answers supplied, but whenever anyone asked for some kind of proof, it swung quickly sideways.
After about an hour, we gave up and started to head home. I was pretty spooked by then, even though I hadn't actually seen anything.
Next Sunday, we're going to do it again without Suzanne in the building, which should hopefully prove it one way or another.
Couple of sidenotes: Loads of staff say they have seen ghosts, especially late at night when there's very few people in the building.
Last week, some of the people tried this (I wasn't there) and Dave asked the spirit or whatever if someone else could hold the crystal, to which the reply was No. But he gave it to a guy called Bernie anyway who held it for about 30 seconds, at which point the string became too hot to hold and burnt his fingers (he still has the marks now).
The same night, Dave got four perfectly lined up and symmetrical scratches on his neck which appeared after he asked for evidence there was a spirit there.
The crystal also started spinning really fast and got tangled in the string after someone asked if the spirit wanted to be here. I can't believe there is any way that could happen without any noticeable hand movements in the person holding the crystal.
Tonight, Dave's dog was up there with us. After spending about 5 minutes going barking mad and running around, he lay down on Dave's feet and never moved an inch til we left.
Anyway, I really want to believe... but without some kind of proof, I'm finding it hard, no matter how spooked how I am right now. I just hope next Sunday brings something tangible.
Does anyone know anything about these crystals? Has anyone had any kind of experiences like this? Either where you believe or don't believe, I'd like to hear both sides of it. Not really interested in ghost stories, as there are threads about that all the time... more in times you've actively sought out contact with the supernatural and succeeded or failed.
I walked in our door and yelled, "I'M HOME!", otherwise my mom gets startled and has a triple stroke when I come in the house unannounced. I went in my room, slipped on my big earphones from my stereo and slumped down at the head of my bed, and listened to some LOUD music. At least half an hour later, I heard an extremely high-pitched scream from my mom! This scream was loud enough that I could hear it clearly with my massive earphones blasting at nearly full volume. I ripped off my earphones and sprinted out of my room and saw that our front door was wide open and my mom was clearly screaming from up at the top of the stairs and probably from the garage...
I booked it up the outside stairs to ground level and into the garage to figure out what this screaming was all about. There in front of my face was good ol' Roger... thick wire around his neck, HANGING from a beam from the garage door opening track!!! He was turning purple in the face and had pissed himself a bit. I was F'n STUNNED. My mom was in complete hysterics, screaming like a banshee. My dad quickly entered the garage and we both lunged for the stepladder that Roger had kicked over. My mom and I held Roger up while my dad climbed the ladder and cut him down... Roger slumped down deadweight onto us. He must have just finished dying.
A few minutes later, Roger's wife opened the garage door and drove her car in. It ends up that Roger's big plan was to jump off of the ladder just as his wife pulled in so she could watch him die... but my mom F'd his plans up when she opened the garage door instead of his wife. :\ I don't assume he was very happy about this.
NOW ONTO THE GHOST PART....
A few days later, I laid in my bed and passed out. I eventually opened my eyes and turned my eyes to my digital clock on my dresser at the head of my bed. The time was 8:23 AM. My body was COMPLETELY CONSUMED with a chilling feeling, and my head felt extremely heavy... My room went completely cold. I tried to move but I couldn't. I could move my eyes around, but I couldn't move my head or body!!! I looked to my right and a slow-moving blackish figure walked into my view. I opened my mouth and was trying to scream at the top of my lungs, but nothing was coming out! I clenched my eyes shut in fear. I could FEEL the figure walk around the side of my bed and could feel when he stopped beside me. It was seriously cold on my side where he was standing! For the life of me... I was too F'n scared to open my eyes!!! He stood there for a few minutes as I struggled to move.
He began to walk again... moving slowly around to the head of my bed, and there he stood again. Maybe waiting for me to open my eyes and look at him? Maybe he wanted to show me something? I have no idea. I THINK he was angered that I wasn't watching... I felt an icy grip on my ankles and I was pulled around violently around my king-sized bed! Meanwhile, my mouth is wide open and I'm trying as hard as possible to scream and only a tiny whisper was coming out. I was hanging halfway off the foot of my bed and all of a sudden, I could feel the figure walking back in the direction that he came from... I opened my eyes and turned my eyes to the right side and I could see the black haze leaving. I looked to my left at my digital clock... 8:25 AM. The INSTANT that the haze left my room, my screams came roaring out of my mouth. I was still hanging halfway off the foot of my bed with my sheet and blanket twisted around.
My parents came running into my room and I was now sitting up, pouring cold sweat, apparently 10x whiter than the normal pale skin that I got my nickname Kasper from. I was completely in a state of shock and I could barely speak.
This continued to happen to me almost every night / day over the span of a couple months. The first few times, I was scared SHITLESS... but after that, I just clenched my eyes shut and waited for "him" to stop yanking me around my bed by my arms / legs and leave my room. I always looked at the before time and the after time on my clock and they always were only a few minutes apart. My parents were insisting on me going in for counselling and so I didn't want to tell them about it anymore, or scream / yell when he would leave. One time I used enough strength to slowly squirm off the edge of my bed and try and wiggle out of my room. He left before I made my way out anyways. The less scared I became, the more I could move when he came in. Eventually when I wasn't scared anymore, he stopped coming.
I tell myself that it's just a subconscious illusion that I'm seeing in a half sleep daze... allowing me to see my clock with the current time, but also allowing me to see things that my mind is creating in my sleepish state. I don't really understand about what was causing me to be pulled around my bed. I wish my family could have afforded some sort of camera surveillance for my room at the time... Maybe I should have stopped being such a bitch and LOOKED at him directly at least once.
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I can tell a few of mine. I've never really seen anything except one when I was little.
My bedroom and all the bedrooms are on the top floor of my house. My mom and dad's door is across from mine, and my brother's is at the end of the hall. My parents' bedroom door is loud, and they always closed it at night (and yet could ALWAYS tell if I was up past my bedtime!) so you could hear the loud click as the knob closed.
I was afraid of the dark so my parents left the hall light on, and my door open about 4 inches.
One night I was up reading, and heard a sound. We lived out in the middle of the woods and I was used to hearing frogs, crickets, house settling noises, and such. This was more like a step on the stairs. I figured it was nothing, but looked at the door.
I saw a shadow pass by my door. I have never been so terrified in all my life. Even writing this, my eyes are tearing up (my usual reaction to good ghost stories). It passed by and I was laying there frozen. Then it came back. And stopped right by my door. I couldn't even close my eyes, I was so afraid. Eventually, it moved back toward the stairs and I fell asleep. I woke up with bookface the next day.
No one else was awake - I would have heard their doors open, and I didn't. This shadow was up past the top of the door, blotting out all the light in the little strip I could see.
On the plus side, after my grandma died, my mom says she gets visits from her now and then. She got the most when she was finishing the quilt my grandma started for me. Mom says she was helping her keep going when it got frustrating, since she never quilted before.
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My house was built in 1943, and I purchased it about 10 years ago. There is one bedroom and a converted garage that is used as a second bedroom. I used to sleep in the original bedroom. The first few nights I was there, I was having horrible nightmares, scarier than anything I had ever experienced. I thought it was just buyer's remorse and stress from the whole housebuying experience, and shrugged it off. After a while, things settled down... however, I did start to get the idea something was wrong with the room. All of my cats all desperately want to sleep in that room. Even the ones that hate each other will happily sleep in that room together. They all meow to get in and scratch at the doors. Unfortunately, they all liked to use the closet as their catbox, so they are banned from that bedroom... I figured there was just some strange energy in the room that the cats liked and called it that.
During the first year or two I lived in my house, I had a roommate. I knew she liked to tipple, but I never knew she was a blackout drunk 6 nights a week and was a good Catholic on Sundays. Aside from the usual problems of living with an alcoholic, like the oven / stove left on all night, "things" used to follow her home. Mostly, they were nuisance things that would get bored and leave again. However, one night, I am lying on my bed in my room, reading, avoiding the roomie, when I felt somebody walk into the room. It was the most awful, oppressive force I have ever felt and I could feel it willing me to look at it. At first, I though it was one drunken, angry roommate, so I kind of glanced with peripheral vision to where I thought she was standing, but there was no body there. No feet. Just this incredible urge to really "look." I had to force myself to look back at my book and ignore it and start reading again. Finally, it turned and left and I could feel the "weight" lifted from my mind. Eww... Fortunately, that is the only really bad thing I have ever experienced.
After I finally threw the roommate out, I was living alone and decided it was time. Time to rip the ugly, dark brown 1/4" 70's cheap panelling off the walls in bedroom and make my room brighter and more liveable. I did so... A few nights later, I had the worst nightmare of my life. I woke up convinced there was something bad outside my window, and I could see the shadow of it out there. I ran out of my room and into the living room, grabbing the phone, ready to call the cops about some bogeyman outside my window.
Not wanting to sound like a punk bitch crying to popo, I tried to relax and it slowly came into focus. The whole terror experience had been engineered by: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! I don't know why I never noticed him before, but at the time, I was working in medical insurance, which made me a very non-creative person. Apparently, he was very, very angry about me removing the panelling. After that experience, I have never slept in that room again and merely used it for storage for a while.
Now, some ghosts like to scare you to give themselves some energy to keep going, so I figured if I stayed away, the ghost would calm down and then maybe he would go away. A few years later, I got a new roommate. He slept in that room. Apparently, he and the ghost are okay with each other as he's never really had any problems, just some strange dreams. But he asked me about: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! I never told him there was a problem, a) because I always think I'm just nuts; b) maybe my roommate would never notice anyway. Some people seem to never be bothered by such things.
I used to have this neighbor who patrolled the neighborhood in a Rascal -- one of those carts for the disabled. He was in his 60s or 70s, but had multiple sclerosis, so had problems with -- well, at his age, everything. I asked him about my house and who lived in it previously. Apparently, some guy decided to kill himself in there. I assume that this is: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET!
I have a new roommate now and I made the mistake of telling her about the closet, so now she is not wont to sleep in there. We shall have to see how she gets along with: THE DEAD GUY IN THE CLOSET! He doesn't seem to be evil, more like chaotic neutral, so I don't try and shoo him or anything. But the cats sure like him.
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When I first moved out from home, I lived in a townhouse in the shitty part of town. The townhouse was halfway decent and surprisingly affordable, so my two friends and I moved in with glee. The very first night, the hijinks began.
I woke up at 3:30 in the morning feeling like large insects were crawling all over me. There weren't any. I checked my blankets / bed / carpet for some kind of infestation left over from the previous renter, but found nothing. Eventually, I went back to sleep. The next morning, my roommate(let's call him "A") commented on the fact that he didn't sleep well last night. When I asked him why, "A" just said that he woke up at 3:30 feeling uneasy with a vague but powerful sense of something "wrong" in the house.
My other roommate, who shall be known as "B," reported strange happenings as well. She had a pet pit bull named Tabitha. Being a former dog owner, I'd always play with Tabitha, take her for walks, etc., so the dog and I were pretty good pals, in the non-bestiality kind of way. Tabitha would sleep in "B's" room typically. One day when I was making a joke about "the goddamn ghosts in this house," "B" told me that on more than one occasion, she had woke up in the small hours to find Tabitha staring at her closed bedroom door, growling and shaking. "B" thought this was odd, but would usually just tell her dog to sit down and go to sleep.
One night, however, Tabitha would not lie back down and go to sleep. "B" eventually got curious enough to get up and open her bedroom door, which led to the hallway that all three bedrooms shared upstairs. Tabitha left the room and slowly crept down the hallway, hackles raised, growling and shaking, until she reached my closed bedroom door. At this point, the dog looked back at "B" and whimpered, before turning back to face my door. "B" stood there a minute (as she told it), watching her dog shake more and more violently until she got scared. She grabbed her shaking, 75-pound pit bull and dragged it back down the hallway to her room, where she locked the door and hid under the blankets.
So what wackiness was going on in my room that scared the dog? Fucked if I know, but here's a related anecdote: One night around midnight, I was getting ready for bed. The only other person living in the house at this point was a new roommate, who was sound asleep at the time. So I turn out the lights and get in bed, locking my bedroom door as usual. As I'm about to fall asleep, I hear someone walking around downstairs. I don't pay it much mind. The footsteps move slowly up the stairs, which creak in the same way they always do. I think that this is a bit odd, because my roommate always hurtled himself up and down the stairs. A little bit more awake now, I decide I'll get up and prepare for war if I hear someone try to turn my doorknob... in case it's a burglar, you know?
The footsteps continue quietly down the hallway from the stairwell towards my room. They pass my roommate's door without stopping. Still beneath my blankets, I wait for the sound of someone trying to open my door, while scanning the room for a suitable bludgeon. After a minute or two of silence, I tell myself that I'm just imagining things and it's probably just my roommate being considerate and trying to walk quietly for once. I put my head back on the pillow and start to drift off to sleep again, resolving myself to not get all jumpy about stupid shit. At this point, I notice a small, dark figure lean over the foot of my bed into my field of vision. The floorboard creaks as it moves towards me and I'm out like a light - like it MADE me go to sleep.
I woke up the next day and wondered what the fuck it was all about. I asked my roommate if he was up last night and he said that he went to sleep in his room at ten and stayed there until morning. He then told me that the next time crazy shit happened, I was to wake him the fuck up.
Before we moved out of there, I ended up talking to our neighbors. During neighborly small talk, they asked how much we paid to live in the townhouse. I told them and they were amazed because it was $300 cheaper than their equally-equipped townhouse. Then they commented that the last people that rented our place had said that it was haunted and the realty office couldn't find renters to stay there, which is probably why we got such a good deal on the place. God damn right.
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I'm a police officer and I pull security duty at the local ER / Hospital several nights a month... it's fun money for ten bucks an hour, so I can make an easy $240 a weekend free and clear. Most of the time, it is easy money (i.e. sit around and read a book or play a computer game on my laptop)... other times, it is hell (like wrestling some meth-head, helping get a tube down an overdose victim, or transporting someone to CT who just put their head through a windshield at 65 MPH). There seems to be no middle ground... it's either full bore balls to the wall, or dead as a crypt. The last analogy will come into play now.
My detail runs from 7 PM until 7 AM, and after midnight is when the spooky stuff starts to happen. The hospital I work at is not the most advanced facility in the area, and some of the stuff at the hospital kind of spooks me because it's so old. Down near the cafeteria and the admin offices is what I call the "Wall-O-Death" which shows all the doctors which used to work there but who have passed on. The last one died over ten years ago, but some of those guys died a loooong time ago... there's one guy in a picture, sitting at a desk, that looks like it could have been taken in the 1930's or thereabouts. That should tell you how old this hospital is. Some of our equipment looks like it was rejected by the old 1970's TV series Emergency.
On the same wall, at the other end of the hospital is what appears to be some type of call / paging box that as best as I can figure out used to indicate which doctor was in their office or available through the use of a series of lights which illuminated their names on the front panel. It looks kind of like a fuse box in your house, but instead of fuses, it has little lights and those lights have names on them of the doctors that once worked at the hospital. None of the current doctors whom I work with have their names on this device, though I recognize at least one of the names as being the pediatrician my wife used when she was a little girl.
There are old rusty wires protruding from some of the vacant sockets on this device and some of the lights without names have been broken out and have spiderwebs in them, etc. so I can tell this is another piece of interesting albeit archaic equipment that hasn't been used in a very long time. Out of curiosity one night, I jotted down some of the names on the old paging / calling / fuse box piece of equipment and compared these names to the names down the hall on the WOD. Many matched! What really bothered me is that on most nights, this call box is unlit. Other nights, it will light up randomly, to show that doctors that are long dead are apparently now "on call." It should be noted that while some of the names on the device are still alive, they no longer work at the hospital and have their own practices in the city.
The only lights that come on are the names of dead doctors.
I had heard many stories from other officers and hospital workers that the hospital is haunted by numerous ex-residents and old faculty. Various nurses have told me that they have seen old supervisors, long dead, wandering the floor late at night, entering rooms to check on patients and the room would be empty. Typical ghost stories and I don't let them bother me too much. But two things happened to me that I could call my own personal ghost experiences in that hospital. I will tell you about them in a little while on this thread.
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This one is kinda bland, but most true ones are. The house that me and 2 roommates are renting has made some weird sounds. My girlfriend sometimes sleeps over and hears stuff in the morning after we all have gone to work.
I've heard stuff too, but only alone, so I wrote it off as overactive imagination, or just something outside / wind / the house settling. The 2 roommates I have are not the original ones I had when I moved in... one of the guys living there had lived there all his life even after his Dad moved out, which is how we came to begin renting it.
Well, his mom died of cancer, with I believe her last few days living back at home (the house I am currently in). Anyways, like I said I wrote it all off until my girlfriend made some comments to me and so I started trying to recollect things I have heard, I present them to you now:
Incident #1
This one happened about 10 months ago:
* One night, Jason and Tim (the roommates at the time) had gone to a mutual friend's house to go party or something, and I decided to stay home because I felt sick like I was coming down with a cold. I kept hearing what I thought was them walk around downstairs for like 30 minutes, so I yelled something like: "Better hurry or the party's gonna be over before you get there," and I was greeted by the sound of a door shutting. Well, the walking around noises don't stop... I keep hearing doors open and shut, so I honestly get a bit concerned and go downstairs to dispel ANY sort of growing anxiety I have about "someone" being downstairs. I go downstairs, and every room is empty, and all the doors are locked. I grab a candlestick holder for peace of mind, and went back upstairs to my room and as soon as I laid back down, the fucking walking around and doors opening and shutting happened again. I run downstairs in my boxers waving my candlestick holder and yelling at whoever was down there to break the silence (and hopefully regain my sanity) but nothing was down there. So ultimately, I returned to my room, and turned on my TV on full blast and concentrated on it until I was tired enough to pass out before the sounds downstairs started getting to me again.
Incident #2
About a month and a half or so ago:
* I live in Memphis and about a month ago, we had a crazy storm that knocked out most of the city's power. Our house did not have power for a week, and during that time, I stubbornly stayed at the house with a generator running (just a 5-gallon one to keep our fridge running [lots of food that would have spoiled], and to occasionally flip on the TV and watch a little of the news. But for the most part, it was just me there alone, as my 2 roommates decided to sleep over elsewhere due to the uncomfortable heat. I would always hear thuds and pops, the same sort you here when someone is walking upstairs or down the hall.
Incident #3
About 3 weeks ago:
* This is the last one I can remember off the top of my head that is recent, and happened in plain daylight. I got home from work and walked in the den. I usually get home 1st, so once again I am alone when the odd thing happens. I go get a drink in the kitchen and hear knocking on the walls. I walk back in the den and just kinda curious... stay really still and then I hear what sounds like crawling inside the walls. I start wondering if it's a raccoon, but then I hear what sounds like hammering and sawing, and knocking, and not just random knocking, but like the knocking and pounding you would hear if someone was trying to get your attention. This went on for about 5 minutes... the crawling would go up my wall, over my ceiling where it would be right over my head, and then I heard labored breathing, and I knew this couldn't be an animal. I contemplated either running out of the house or running into the attic: I chose the attic because I do NOT believe in ghosts or whatever, but wanted to prove to myself for sake of my sanity that nothing was there, so I go up in the attic and of course, there is nothing there. A minute later, my roommate pulls up and of course I hear nothing else the rest of the day.
The ONLY thing that I can attribute all this crap to since I have NEVER experienced anything like this in my prior 23 years in other houses I've lived in, is that it is something that I cannot explain. I half-jokingly was like "well, you know, it's not like anybody died in this house" to my girlfriend once when she was freaked out, and then I said "Oh wait, Tim's mom did" and made a kinda OH SHI expression like "Hmm, that's kinda an odd coincidence" but I still remain a skeptic to this day as to what it is I keep hearing.
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Two Stories: the first is not paranormal, but included for creepiness. The second is paranormal, but isn't terribly scary at all.
We have mountain lions in North Georgia (where I'm originally from). Although not paranormal, they are weird because of their scream. And I do want to emphasize "scream."
The only time I've encountered one was about a year ago. The strange part is, we weren't in the mountains but in the flats of middle Alabama... I was at my cousin's house. We were sitting around one night watching TV, and the phone rang. It was a neighbor of theirs who lived about a mile and a half up the road. She said a mountain lion was in her backyard, heading in the direction of my cousin's house, and to get all our pets inside. She said it seemed to be following the spring that connected both places. Naturally we gathered the pets inside, but we figured it was a wild dog or two, or a bobcat at best.
Anyway, about half an hour later we were still watching TV and we heard the most cold, shrill, godawful howl I've ever heard. It was a mixture of a baby crying, a dog howling, and a few other things... but multiplied in volume several hundred times. Absolutely beastly. It made my heart stop beating for a second or two, not to mention goosebumps for hours afterward and our hair was standing on end.
We went outside (guns in hand) to see if we could spot it, but we could only hear it crunching around in the underbrush. We could easily tell it was big and stealthy, and we certainly did not intend to mess with it. I think I would rather take my chances with a ghost or a poltergeist than that fucking thing.
Okay, story 2:
I worked in the rides department at Six Flags Over Georgia 2001-2002. Toward the back end of the park, we had a few coasters separated from the main part of the park by Carousel Hill. Could they have named it anything more dreadful? Perhaps. But the present name does just fine.
Anyway, the park bought a giant old Carousel from Chicago's famous Riverview Park and plopped it down right on top of the hill. Allegedly, Al Capone himself rode it. Anyway, aside from the Carousel and the roof over it, there are only a lot of old pine trees surrounding it. Even on noisy days, the Carousel is a splendid retreat because you can catch a nice breeze and slip into a trance as the thing turns.
But it gets weirder. At the center of the carousel is a race with ball bearing in it -- this supports the entire ride. The pivot point is mounted right on top of -- and I am not making this up -- a small part of the mast of a tall ship (you know, sails and all). Why this was chosen to support the carousel... no clue. My guess is that since Six Flags was a pretty normal company, the mast was used by the builder to support the ride to keep expenses low and simply to be practical with available materials.
Carousel Hill gets eerie at night. Not so much as when the lights are on and guests are around as it is past closing time. No music, no life. The quiet of the park around being closed makes it dead quiet at the top of the hill. Crews have to clean up the ride before they can shut off the lights and go home. They do this quickly, believe me. No one likes being up there at night. Even security only goes up there in the evenings if they have to.
To "turn off" the ride, the operator removes a key from a switch in the center portion of the ride, which houses the rotation motor and sound equipment and a couple of electrical breakers. It is graffitied with past crew members all the way back to when it opened in the 70s. Anyway, once you remove the key, the ride can no longer be operated... well, that's the plan at least.
After the park is closed and crews have gone home, some odd things have happened. The ride has been known to turn on by itself, complete with lights, music, and rotation. Upon inspection, the key switch in the center of the carousel was still "off." There was no trace of anyone around, certainly. What's more, even if someone did turn the ride on, it only has a cycle of about 2 minutes before it automatically stops. The carousel had been turning for at least 5 minutes before an officer actually reached the ride itself once the phenomenon started.
The ride has done this more than once. Is it Al Capone? Something emanating from the ship's mast? Or just the ghosts of former employees trying to fuck with their supervisors? ANOTHER UNSOLVED MYSTERY. One thing is clear, though -- carousels at any park are inherently odd and creepy things.
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I live in Spokane, Washington... a shitty town with not much to do. My cousin and a few of his friends like to go to this place outside of town called "Hangman's Valley." Hangman's Valley is where they had an old military fort back in the 1800's... supposedly the general of the fort called for the nearby chiefs and leaders of Indian tribes to come for a peace treaty. However, no such "meeting" took place. The chiefs were captured and hung, and I hear the gallows is still standing somewhere.
The place they go to is a rundown old farm house in a field. The field has a creek that runs through the middle, and each side of the field has stands of trees forming sort of a wall around it.
My cousin, his little brother, my aunt, and 2 of my cousin's friends heard about it and thought they would go see what was up at this place. They arrived and got out of the car, but my younger cousin and a friend were too scared, so they stayed in the car and watched. Everyone else headed off into the field without a flashlight or anything. They get halfway across the field somewhat close to the creek when some weird shit starts to happen. My cousin said it got really quiet, but they paid no heed. They went on a bit, but noticed the people in the car began flashing the lights on and off. They wanted to see what was up, so my aunt called their cell phone in the car. She asked why they were flashing the lights... my little cousin starts telling her they saw these bigass shadows moving in closer and closer to where my aunt and cousin were. The second my aunt hung up the phone, she heard footsteps in the creek. They all freaked out and bolted back to the car. When they got there, my cousin’s friend was all pale and freaking out... they got in the car and he pointed towards the house. He said, "Watch that big shadow over by the house." Everyone watched for a bit, but nothing happened... they were about to tell him he was full of shit when the big thing moved about 15 feet to the left. They said whatever it was, was really freaking tall. They left in a hurry... but came back later.
When they came back, my aunt decided to stay back in the car this time. So it was only my cousin and his friend in the field. This time, they only got about halfway when everything got quiet again. He said the only noise was the rushing of the water. Then something in the woods started moving and breaking branches. He described it as something big hauling ass through the woods mowing down everything in its way, not just branches being stepped on. Everything that I can think of... people, deer, bears, and pretty much every other animal avoid branches since it's just a natural reaction... whatever this was didn't and just kept breaking shit. They had enough and went back up to the car. The people in the car said they saw the big shadows moving along side the tree line: this time, there was a few of them... but they didn't warn the people because they were far off by the trees.
They have gone back numerous times since and each time something scares them back to the car. Like one time something ran out of the woods, ran in between the group of people, and disappeared into the other stand of trees. In all the times that he has gone, they have never made it past the creek. This weekend, I get to go with them and see how far we can get... the more people, the closer we can get to the house without being scared shitless (in my thoughts, that is).
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About a year ago, I moved into a big old house that the previous owner had died in. For the first week, I would hear the creepiest noises coming from the kitchen at night. It sounded like moaning and someone walking around and knocking stuff over. It scared the shit out of me.
Finally, one night, I had the courage to go investigate. I snuck out into the kitchen after hearing the noises. Nothing was there. I heard the noise again. It was coming from one of the cabinets. It was a big kitchen and there were lots of cabinets. so I couldn't tell exactly where it was coming from. I heard it again and was able to locate the cabinet it was coming from. I tiptoed up to it and slowly opened the door and peered in with a flashlight. To my horror, I found a big, ugly........... icemaker. It was a stand-alone giant ice maker built into the cabinet. Makes good ice.
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Through the years, a lot of weird stuff have been happening in my house... from shadows in mirrors, to the sightings of already-dead family by our neighbors. Now, for the first time ever, I'm going to narrate them to someone outside of the family: enjoy, and goodnight.
The mirrors
Common, cheap mirrors: you might have one in your bathroom, your study, maybe even next to you as you read this. But you might not have one like those in my house... why? Because ours reflect the dead...
You see, it's fairly common to wake up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, and when you do, most of the time you will find yourself in front of a mirror... surprise! It's you at 2:00 AM taking a leak, but when you are in my house, you won't only find that... but a wide array of shadows, sitting / smiling / who knows?
This normally happens everyday at random hours: you enter the bathroom or one of the dormitories and there they are... moving / hiding. You can look at them for one second and see a man sitting on the bed... the next one, a cat sleeping on a pillow... everything inside the mirror, looking at you, dumbfounded, as you make your way out of the room.
What are they? My parents say they are the spirits of the ones who have died in the house watching over us; others think they are the spirits that have been carried with the house. The only thing I know is that they exist, and maybe, just maybe, you will find them the next time you look at a mirror....
The Dormitories
Ahhh, it's nice to relax in your bed, right? Well, some things also happen here and I'm going to tell you about them.
"The old blanket"
In the first room, you can find the "old blanket"... what's so special about it? Well, it was made by my grandmother... just some time before she lost her arm due to sickness... isn't that fun?
We received it last year at a family reunion: it's a beautiful blanket, a gift from one of my uncles. We took it back home, and since that day, it covers the bed on which my dad sleeps. But now again, "What's so important about it?" you might ask yourself. Well, the weird thing is that only my father can sleep in that bed... family, friends, and even I cannot find rest when we have to sleep there. But if you remove the blanket, everyone can sleep like a baby.
My dad says he finds it extremely comfy, so why can't everyone else sleep? I say it's the spirit of my granddad who, I forgot to tell, died a couple of years ago...
So if you ever feel someone trying to tuck you in bed when you are all alone, remember the ones who loved you in life and death.
"Cold and warm"
The other two rooms have some of the weirdest elements I've seen: one is always cold as a winter night, and the other one is always hot as the sun that gives us its light. Why this is no one can tell... I remember trying to warm the "cold" room once with a heater, nothing. I also remember leaving the windows and the door of the "warm" room open once, in the middle of an storm, mind you... and still when I entered, the room was warm and wet.
Why does this happen? It's still unknown, specially knowing that the rooms
are next to each other... why does one refuse to warm up, and the other refuse to cool down?
The family
You see, my family is not exactly "normal"... sometimes, we feel when it's going to rain or when something bad is going to happen. Maybe it's some weird instinct, or maybe the help of those who watch over us, even when they are dead...
"But... I saw her yesterday!"
Every three years, it's the same story: But I saw her yesterday! She said hello to me!
You see, my town was founded by a beer company building homes for the workers. This was a town full of young men and their families, but, oh... who would have known? Working for a beer company, the workers soon became alcoholics because of all the beer they drank at work... thus ending in hundreds of deaths, leaving families alone with no support at all. During these hard times, the families survived supporting each other... when the children became men, they went in search of work. My family was one of those, and my grandma (maternal) managed to give her family a good life and became a good friend with a lot of people for her kindness.
Fast forwards to these days: those families who knew her so well are still in contact with us, and every tree years we hear the same story. But... I saw her... in her white dress she always wears.... And we always answer: yeah, we know... those who know her still see her, walking, happy as always... even after she has been dead for 6 years....
"It smells... like an orange"
We have been keeping pets since the old days: dogs, cats, birds, you name it. And sometimes, these animals leave a bit of themselves behind as they go to that great garden up above. (Heaven, you tard)
Before I was even born, my mon used to keep a black cat, with the simple name of "Black." He was a loyal pal for my mom... mind you, this cat liked one thing above everything else: Running on the roof playing with an orange. My mom would always throw an orange, and Black would climb and play with it for hours. Of course, when he came back, he smelled like an orange and this was how my mom knew he was around.
Some years later, Black got really sick... some ass had kicked him so hard. After some days of taking care of him, my mom lost all hope and walked to the kitchen to tell my grandma about Black. When she was about to tell her, she noticed a strong smell of oranges and ran back to where the cat was lying. My mother says that when she arrived, the cat was there, motionless. She moved next to him, and the aroma disappeared as the cat purred for the last time: Black was dead.
Nowadays, you still can hear running on the roof some days: is it some stray cat, or maybe something else?.......
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I used to do Ouija boards when I was a kid and I had some experiences that made me believe in the supernatural, but that's all irrelevant here.
Let me tell you what happened tonight. I was out at the local bar where I know one of the barmen, who had been telling me about how the place was haunted. He said one of the bouncers could "see" ghosts and that he had this crystal with him, that would spin around when a "presence" was near and you could then ask questions, to which the crystal would swing back and forward for yes, and sideways for no.
I was somewhat skeptical about this, but after having heard the stories about how two people had died in the building about 30 years back when it used to be a cinema, I stuck around to see what would happen.
About 6 of us went up to the second floor after closing time: including me, my friend, and the bouncer with the crystal. The crystal was on the end of a string and it began to spin round after a while: at which point we took it in turns to ask questions, the crystal always getting the right answer. After everyone had pretty much run out of questions, I figured I'd ask it if it would show itself, but it wasn't my turn so I stored the question in my head. The crystal started to swing sideways, indicating no, yet no one had asked a question. The guy with the crystal (we'll call him Dave from now onwards) asked if any of us had said anything: no one had, so I told him that I was about to, but hadn't yet. He asked me if I'd thought the question and I said yes, so he told me that I'd just received my answer.
That was one of the things that made me less skeptical: the fact that no one had asked anything for a good couple of minutes, but as soon as I thought that, it swung sideways. After that had happened, Dave asked if it wouldn't show itself because of Suzanne (the one female present), who was pretty fucking scared by now, and it swung forward and back to indicate yes.
One of the other guys was pretty skeptical and was going on about involuntary movements and all sorts of stuff, so I offered to hold the crystal.
I swear that I NEVER moved my hand or my arm and kept them as still as possible, and the crystal began to spin and people started asking questions again. All with the correct answers supplied, but whenever anyone asked for some kind of proof, it swung quickly sideways.
After about an hour, we gave up and started to head home. I was pretty spooked by then, even though I hadn't actually seen anything.
Next Sunday, we're going to do it again without Suzanne in the building, which should hopefully prove it one way or another.
Couple of sidenotes: Loads of staff say they have seen ghosts, especially late at night when there's very few people in the building.
Last week, some of the people tried this (I wasn't there) and Dave asked the spirit or whatever if someone else could hold the crystal, to which the reply was No. But he gave it to a guy called Bernie anyway who held it for about 30 seconds, at which point the string became too hot to hold and burnt his fingers (he still has the marks now).
The same night, Dave got four perfectly lined up and symmetrical scratches on his neck which appeared after he asked for evidence there was a spirit there.
The crystal also started spinning really fast and got tangled in the string after someone asked if the spirit wanted to be here. I can't believe there is any way that could happen without any noticeable hand movements in the person holding the crystal.
Tonight, Dave's dog was up there with us. After spending about 5 minutes going barking mad and running around, he lay down on Dave's feet and never moved an inch til we left.
Anyway, I really want to believe... but without some kind of proof, I'm finding it hard, no matter how spooked how I am right now. I just hope next Sunday brings something tangible.
Does anyone know anything about these crystals? Has anyone had any kind of experiences like this? Either where you believe or don't believe, I'd like to hear both sides of it. Not really interested in ghost stories, as there are threads about that all the time... more in times you've actively sought out contact with the supernatural and succeeded or failed.
Labels: alcoholic drinks, canada, computer, corey, death, dreams, generators, ghost stories, halloween, jason, maxed-out tags limit, mom, music, parents, reading, something awful, suzanne, tim, tv shows, weird stuff
posted by Flami at 9:52:00 PM
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