On Eerieness (and Parentheses)

Last night I had my first encounter with the Corporate Pizza Joint Ghost.

I was in the bathroom at about 10 p.m., putting a new bag in the trash can. I had my head tilted away from it, staring into space, seeing nothing (the way one does during menial tasks). My particular gaze happened to encompass the non-handicapped stall, of which the door was already open.

As I automatically knotted the bag with one hand, no joke, I am NOT making this up, the toilet seat LIFTED ITSELF UP about 20 or 30 degrees and SLAMMED DOWN.

I squealed like a little girl and ran away. My manager was concerned, though not shocked, as this was only the most recent report of the Corporate Pizza Joint Ghost.

(Oh, yes, I still work at Corporate Pizza Joint. After I quit, my manager didn't technically terminate me; rather, she put me on leave of absence until should could ask me to come back less than a month later. I worked Tuesday nights for a year, and now I'm back to a real live part-time position.)

...

The eeriest things always happen when you don't expect them (obviously). About a month ago, when my brother, boyfriend, and I were playing with my brother's new Nintendo Wii (you have to use the company name or else it sounds like a third-grader's dirty joke), there was a sharp "knock-knock-knock" at my now his bedroom door. Thinking nothing of it, I got up to answer, fully expecting my mom or dad to be there. Not a soul present. Not even one of the cats. Thus, we concluded that it must be Annie, our name for one of the resident ghosts in our house (the other is Orville--both names are estimates at who the supposed presence might be, based on the abstract we obtained from the courthouse). My parents got the story from the three of us separately, and all corroborated.

It occurs to me that I might not have typed up an analysis of Annie yet. I ought to do that sometime.