2267. A bag of trash for Halloween

Every Sunday evening Herman would put all the trash into one big black plastic bag and tie it by knotting the pull-string threaded through the top. He would then place the bag into a wheelie-bin and pull it out to his gate where the City Council’s waste collection vehicle would empty the wheelie-bin early on Monday morning.

He had just finished knotting the string tightly when something moved inside the bag. There was a rustle. Herman froze. Had there been a rat inside nibbling on kitchen waste? What if it was a skunk? Perhaps it was a snake? A racoon? A possum?

The thing inside the bag moved again. He had double knotted the pull-string. He wasn’t going to go anywhere near the bag, let alone unknot the tie without wearing thick gloves. And if he wore thick cloves he would be unable to untie the knotted string without delicate fingers. Perhaps it was a copperhead. It could strike a lethal blow if he put his hands near.

It moved again. It wasn’t a movement of panic. It was a quiet movement as if the creature was contentedly eating. Perhaps it was a little mouse. Little mouse or not, Herman was not going to go near the bag. A swish. A crinkling. A slight flutter. Maybe it was a bird?

Fortunately he was in his garage. He backed the car out onto the driveway. It provided space in the garage. Now he needed to find something sharp with a long handle. He would then try to rip the bag open from a distance, release the entrapped creature, and use a new bag for the trash. The rake! He could hopefully tear the bag using the rake’s prongs.

It took Herman a while to gash open the bag. There was no longer much movement. Maybe the creature was so terrified that it had backed down to the security of the bottom of the bag. Things spilled out over the concrete floor: a used jam jar, teabags, wet coffee grounds, food scraps, screwed up paper, junk mail fliers, an empty tissue box… What a mess!

And then he saw it! The creature was free!

Herman had let the cat out of the bag.

Music 356-361: Six Dances from the Afterlife

Hi Everyone

Here are some dances for the piano called Six Dances from the Afterlife in honour of Halloween! (The computer is playing them as my mic is broken – so even though the electronic piano sounds a bit tinny it’s probably better than my piano playing these days!)

I had set out inspired by Bach’s various suites, but by the time there was a sort of Allemande, Courante, Sarabande and Minuet completed, the Air and Gig got thrown out the window in favour of a kind of Two-step for Two and one called Kick Off Your Shoes.

Click on a title in the first list to listen to the music, and click on a title in the second list to download the written music.

Thanks

Click on a title to listen:

• 1. Allemande
• 2. Courante
• 3. Sarabande
• 4. Two Step for Two
• 5. Minuet in Boots
• 6. Kick Off Your Shoes

Click on a title to download the written music:

• 1. Allemande
• 2. Courante
• 3. Sarabande
• 4. Two Step for Two
• 5. Minuet in Boots
• 6. Kick Off Your Shoes

1985. Haunted House Murder

Steve’s next door neighbour, Noel, was a pain in the proverbial. He was forever “popping over” to visit Steve. He’d pop over for this. He’d pop over for that. Steve was the practical sort; a down-to-earth salt of the earth sort of guy. He was sick of Noel’s intrusions. There was only one thing for it: he would have to do Noel in. Permanently.

Steve planned Noel’s demise scrupulously. He would suggest to Noel in the jolliest of ways that perhaps they should spend a few hours together at Halloween at the Fair Ground that was coming to town; a sort of Halloween “Boy’s Day Out”. Then when they were in the Haunted House he would murder Noel. There was lots of screaming going on so noisy shrieks wouldn’t be a factor, and anyone who saw the deed and viewed the corpse would regard it as simply no more than further action in the Haunted House.

Steve went through the Haunted House several days before to plan in which room he would stab Noel to death. It would be in the third room of the four. It was dark enough, with rather silly holograms doing a sort of spooky dance to spooky music. Even on his first visit people were screaming. Dare he say it, but this murder could be fun.

Off Steve and Noel went to the fair. Steve had the knife (with folded blade) carefully concealed in his jacket. The time came to go through the Haunted House. Steve was nervously excited.

Jiminy Crickets! It was Halloween. They had upped the scariness since Steve had been through earlier. He was never so scared in his life as in that first room. In the second room Steve was screaming obscenities like they were going out of fashion. The third room was devastating. To hell with Noel – wherever he was – Steve just had to get out of that terrifying Haunted House. He ran through the fourth room. He escaped to the outside.

Son of a monkey! Suffering succotash! Dang rabbit! Steve was shaking like a leaf.

Noel appeared through the Haunted House’s exit. He was calm as can be.

“WOW!” he said. “That was great! Let’s go get some cotton candy.”

Music 337: For Halloween

This is what I heard last night coming from under the bed and out from the closet… Happy Halloween! Hee heeeeee!

1663. A day too early

(Thanks to Maddie for the starting sentence.)

I woke up at 3:13 a.m. to the sound of persistent scratching that came from the wall above the furnace.

“Too early!” I called out. “You’re a day too early! It’s not Halloween until tomorrow.”

The poltergeist, or whatever it was, took no notice. The scratching continued.

These noises were an annual event. Strange noises appeared every Halloween, but this time they were a day too early. Nor had I ever heard them at night before. The first time it happen I was terrified out of my skin. Now that it’s occurred on Halloween for the last nine years I find it more annoying than anything else. There are footsteps, and a little bit of giggling, the sounds of a boiling kettle whistling and of water flushing, and scratching, scratching, scratching. I have never heard any speaking. It seems that poltergeist don’t like to talk.

And then I heard it! A faint and muffled voice. “Help! Help!” followed by more scratching. “Help! Help!”

“Too early!” I called out again. “You’re a day too early! It’s not Halloween until tomorrow.”

The noises stopped. The call for help faded away. I went back to sleep.

The next morning, quite early, there was a gentle knock on the door. It was a distraught woman. Had I seen her husband? Every year he came to clean my chimney at this time. She remembered because it was always on Halloween. But this year he was two days early because of a daughter’s wedding, and she hadn’t seen him for two days.

1453. The last scream

It was very spooky. Within seconds of Natasha getting wet in the shower (this is at night time) the bathroom light would go off. It started only about a month ago, and occasionally. Now it happened automatically, every time.

“Blow it,” thought Natasha, not as yet equating the event with supranatural causes, “I shall walk dripping wet across the bathroom floor and turn the light back on.” She did just that. But no sooner had she got back into the shower the light went out again.

Next above the sound of water falling, she heard “hee hee hee”. It was a woman’s voice. It was coming from the direction of the light switch. Natasha began to feel scared. The “hee hee hee” had certain nasty overtones.

Natasha stepped immediately out of the shower, strode to the light switch, turned it on and reached for a towel. All the bathroom towels had gone. Not even the usual hand towel was there.

And then she saw it. OMG! She saw it! Natasha screamed. That scream was the last sound ever to come out of Natasha’s mouth.

Hee hee hee!

1167. Burning bus

When Garth set fire to the bus it was so he could drive it while still burning into the wing of the local hospital. It was an old wooden building. He did it because his life time enemy, Josephine, was in a bed somewhere there.

It so happened that all patients were able to walk, and very quickly they gathered at the bottom of the staircase ready to make a hasty retreat outside.

Garth was still in the bus, laughing his head off. His aim, once the building was aflame, was to dash outside and never be seen again.

As Garth alighted from the bus ready to make his dash, Patient Gwendoline tripped him up with her crutches. Patient Josephine, who had just finished reading “Fifty Shades of Grey” and whose husband, while she was in hospital, had brought her some grapes and a pair of handcuffs to cheer her up, managed to handcuff Garth as he passed and close the other end of the handcuffs over the springs of a bed on wheels.

All traipsed quickly out, except for Garth who dragged the bed behind him and got stuck in the doorway. He burned to death. His dying screams could be heard all over the suburb.

Now, children, tomorrow’s Halloween. The bed Garth burned to death in is the very bed you’re lying in. I managed to get it cheap at the secondhand place. I’m going to turn the light out and you’re all to get a good night’s sleep. We don’t want kiddies yawning their way through trick or treating tomorrow do we?

1006. Halloween

I think I’ve put a stop to this nasty little practice of kids knocking on my door and asking for candy. I have lots of delicious confectionary. It looks so tempting. Then the little snotty-nosed neighbours arrive dressed up completely unscaringly and ask for sweets.

I tell them, holding out the big basket I have, I tell them “Here, take some, but know that one of them is poisoned”. Isn’t that a scream? Trick and scream, I say to myself. Trick and scream! Scream your little hearts out you snotty-nosed neighbour’s sprogs dressed as Hiawatha. It works every time.

Of course, one of the sweets IS poisoned, but I know which one. Then when they’ve all screamed and run off I get to eat them all myself. All except for the poisoned one of course.

This year I got some Mackintosh’s Toffees and some Peanut M&M’s – best before February 2017. I’m already drooling at the thought of devouring them.

I’ll just have a wee peek. Which one is the poisoned one? Which one? Oh. There’s several of the same sort. I think it’s this one here.

752. All Hallows

(Today, in some Christian traditions, it is the Feast of All Saints. Some call it All Hallows. It is where we get the word “Halloween” from: “All Hallows Evening”. To commemorate this day I’m going to re-tell a traditional tale from Italy. I didn’t make it up; but it’s one of my favourite folk stories! It could be added that hagiography is a genre that today rightly suffers – mainly through its own fault – from a great deal of unpopularity…)

Saint Joseph was married to Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

There was this man who prayed only to Saint Joseph. He completely ignored God, and Jesus, and everyone else. The only person he ever prayed to was Saint Joseph.

Eventually the man died. Saint Peter met him at the gates to Heaven.

“You can’t come in,” said Saint Peter. “You only ever prayed to Saint Joseph. You never prayed to God. Only those who prayed to God can enter.”

Saint Joseph appeared at the gate.

“Let him in,” he said. “If you don’t, I’m taking my wife and Kid elsewhere.”

Listen the story being read HERE!

751. Bit by bit

(A story for Halloween)

Warren lay in the hospital bed. He couldn’t move but he could hear.

“We’re sorry, but he’s clinically dead. When you’ve said your goodbyes, the machine will be turned off.”

Don’t pull the plug! Don’t pull the plug! screamed Warren inside. I’m still alive!

“Thank you, doctor. We would like to switch the machine off ourselves. Goodbye, Warren.”

Warren heard the switch click. He knew they were wheeling him to the morgue. He heard the mortician complain about the amount of fluid in his system.

“It must’ve been one hell of a gigantic cyst. Look at all that stuff draining off.”

He heard them injecting him with embalming fluid. He felt it. It was excruciating. He heard his funeral; every word. He heard them lowering the coffin into the grave.

I’m not dead! I’m not dead!

He heard the clunk of the dirt falling.

He heard his body rot; bit by bit; piece by piece. Decaying bones take centuries.

He was dead, but this was Hell.

Listen the story being read HERE!