Little Badges - I ain't afraid of no ghost

Hi

The virtual kettles on..... So while I let it boil i just have this to say

"We came...We saw...We kicked it's ass" shout's Dr. Peter Venkman. Ghosts everywhere, coming out of the sewers, in closets, on buses. Great film and like everyone else at the time I went a bit Ghostbusters mad.

But that was then and this is now, So why on earth do I still believe in ghosts. I could not put a time frame on when I started believing in other things and other worlds which can crossover but I am sure that Ghostbusters helped seal my belief.

I remember somebody bought me a fantastic colour book about the paranormal and the unexplained one Christmas. Apart from the usual stuff, Nessie, the Yeti, curses on Egyptian tombs and a particularly gruesome picture of the remains of a burnt leg which was the result of self combustion, there was a section on Ghosts, and Poltergeists.

They had some amazing photographs, that I am pretty sure have been debunked now, of a white ghost coming down a staircase. But that did not matter to me, it was the text really that opened up the possibility of what if? From there on I sort of Searched out local history ghosts from where I used to live, and when you start looking there is an awful lot of stuff about the subject.

One story that grabbed me was about a female ghost or male ghost depending on your sex that would appear to people at an old unused cemetary where I used to live. The story goes that if you see the image of a woman (you being a male) and she attracts you over and kisses you, you have 48hrs to live. Likewise if you see a man (you being female) and he does the same you will only have 48hrs to live. It was something to do with being a spurned lover and their body was buried at this old disused cemetary.

So after reading that the first thing I did, was get my gang of mates to saddle up on our BMX's (they had BMX's, I had a cheap heavy copy by Raleigh in Copper and black) and head out to the cemetary. Mind you it was the middle of the summer holidays and blazing sunshine, but we camped ourselves outside the cemetary for hours just waiting. One of us would suddenly say something like, "there, something moved" and our heartrates would jump a little higher. Nothing, not a sausage. But what on earth would we have done if we had seen and been enticed by this lady ghost. Panicked!

But I still hold out for something to this day. I watch all the normal rubbish on TV to do with it. Sit there for hours upon hours watching Most haunted live for nothing to happen apart from a load of screaming for no apparant reason, and camera work just like the Blair witch project. And as usual at the end of the night they sit around and discuss just what did not actually happen, but could have. I am getting to the point where I want Carl and Yvette Fielding to be attacked in front of a locked off camera!

And of course there was the great Derek Acorah who would go into a trancelike state and start hurling obsenities into the face of Yvette, which looking back was probably more to do with his contract and the fact that they no longer got on, than any paranormal occurance.

But much later in my life I had my one and only ghostly experiences. I was working in a pub while I was at college. It was the Old Queens head in Penn. The place used to be an old Tithe barn with a coaching Inn attached. It had just gone under extensive refurbishments when I joined.

First of all I worked as the Kitchen Porter, washing up into the wee small hours on a Saturday night and Sunday night. I always felt when I was left alone at the end of shift to finish cleaning and shutting down that there was something behind me, but nothing ever happened. Later I moved to being a barman, and would finish bottling up around 3am, and sit down with the others and grab a drink. The first experience happened regularly enough around 3am on a Saturday morning. The church opposite had a security light and this would go on, and then a couple of moments later the door to the pub which had a gate latch, would click up and open fully and close with a latch as we all sat there. Not that remarkable some might say, but the door was a heavy wooden door and had a fire hinge at the top which was hard to push at the best of times. This happened so regularly, the same pattern, that we named this thing George. And would raise our glasses and say "Morning George".

The next strange occurance was much more personal. The Tithe barn area, the oldest part of the pub, had just gone under major refurbishments to house an new set of toilets. Well I was in there not long after they had finished and was....Well doing my business having a pee. There was only me and two other staff there and I could hear them down stairs. There was nobody behind me, nobody else in the toilet and the squeaky door would have alerted me if someone had dashed out. All of a sudden I felt a focused hard push on my left shoulder, which spun me around a bit. Nothing no one there. I had not finished peeing so had to finish up quick smart but then again another harder more violent push to my left shoulder. That was it for me, and I can only apologise for not washing my hands that night, but I was gone, Out of the loo and very quickly out of the pub. Oh yes and I had had a few pints that night but even so, it jolted me out of any slightly merry feeling I was having.

It wasn't that long after that I quit my job there.

So until I find out otherwise I am AFRAID I am going to carry on believing. I could have told you about the night where flying cutlery and knives went by my head but that was just the chef. He was a nutter!!

Well, I can hear the kettle has just finished boiling so

Milk and sugar?

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