I'm Gonna Keep On Creepin' On

One of my favourite things to do is to try to scare myself and others. I have a hard time scaring myself though, even with all of the creepy things online to look up. I once watched Silent Hill and IT in the dark, by myself, and then went to bed with no lights.

Hello, kiddies!

I believe my fascination with the creepy began as a very small child. Tales from the Crypt ran from 1989 to 1996 and for several of those years I was enamored with the Crypt Keeper, whom I dubbed, "My Funny Man."

Not exactly the best bed time stories, but I don't ever remember being scared by it. The only time I ever remember being truly scared by a movie or show was after I saw Candyman.

In 1993, when I was five, Candyman came out on VHS. After seeing it, I got scared in the middle of the night and ran to my dad. In a decidedly insensitive move, he held me up in front of a mirror and said, "Candyman, Candyman, Candyman, Candyman, Candyman!"
I screamed bloody murder. (I'm freaking out just writing this.)

While I'm sure he was just trying to show me that nothing would happen, it terrified me and to this day I still haven't been able to watch the movie again. I like being creeped out, paranoid, and scared, though. I'm not sure why, but I'm sure there's some deep psychological reason that I couldn't give a crap about.

In the 4th grade, my classmates were starting to read the Goosebumps books, but I was already cutting my teeth on R.L. Stine's Fear Street series. It didn't take long before I was reading Stephen King and Robin Cook. I remember my 5th grade teacher being horrified when I presented a book report on Pet Semetary.

Most recently I've delved deeper into the scary and the supernatural. The show Supernatural helped remind me how much I love being unnerved. I started watching more scary/creepy movies and ended up joining a livejournal community called ontdcreepy where I have wasted many hours trying to scare myself.

(Image credits:Vivo (Ben) via: BoredPanda)

One of my favourite things to do is look through photos of abandoned buildings. Photos from Chernobyl are especially haunting.

This is a photo of the Pripyat Funfair. It was to be opened on May 1st, 1986, but was left unused after Reactor Four at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant suffered a catastrophic power increase on April 26th.

This April 26th will be the 25th anniversary of the disaster, and the town of Pripyat, Ukraine, is still abandoned. The radiation levels are slowly returning to normal, and the Ukraine is getting ready to allow tourists in to view the abandoned city.

Viewing Pripyat and seeing the devastation is something this creepy would love to do.

The Hillbillies Come Out in the Afternoon

Needing a fun day, my friend Tara and I drove about an hour away to visit the Weiderkehr Winery for tasting and to eat at their 'authentic' Swiss/German restaurant.

Except her GPS tried to get us killed.

One of the many dead vineyards.

After inputing the address into the GPS, we set off on the road. After reaching Altus, we followed the GPS's directions to get to the winery. We missed the original turn off, so it recalculated and told us to head up a bit and there would be another entrance.

We ended up turning onto a dirt road. Being a popular Arkansas tourist destination, I was a little bemused at the fact it was up a dirt road.

We passed miles of dead vineyards and finally ended up in the middle of a feild somewhere in front of a locked gate. 

Somebody doesn't want anyone to know
where we are.

We turned around and headed back. And when we turned around, I noticed a mangled street sign lying in the brush.

Cue Dueling Banjos.

Confused, since the street sign said the correct road, we decided to head back slowly down the dirt road and back to the first turn off the GPS directed us to.

That was also a dirt road. We kept following the navigation of this little machine and ended up on top of a mountain, miles away from a real road or people we knew probably wouldn't kill us or go all Deliverance on us.

Dishwasher? Dryer? Oven used to cook people?

Along the road, we found several things, including a dishwasher and a pull out couch . At a cross roads, there were also two very large dirt mounds, covered in brush and grass.

Hey, this pull out couch just
needs a little Fabreeze and it'll
be just fine!

We finally ended up at the only house in the area and had to turn around in their yard as the road was too narrow to do so. It really freaked us out too because we just knew these people were going to run out and attack us and feed us to their goats, pigs, and chickens.

Finally we made it out and back on the highway, where we went the other direction and stopped at a very populated tourist shop and asked for directions to the winery. After an hour of creepy backwoods driving, we finally made it and enjoyed tasting the wine.

Super creepy statue at the winery

Oh, mother.

Ladies and Gentlemen, my mother is a smart person, but like any of us, she makes some pretty dumb mistakes.

Last night at dinner, she mentioned she was tired and how inconvenient that was for her to be at that moment since we had quite a bit more decorating to do.
I started telling her about 5-Hour Energy Shots and how I know many people who swear by them. After saying the name a few times during my sales pitch, she pipes up with, "How long do they last?"

I know, Patrick Stewart. I know.

So, after laughing for the rest of the meal, I had her stop and get one at a gas station before we headed back to do some more decorating. She bought one of the extra strength ones and instead of throwing it back like an actual shot, the moron took three goes to get it down. Each facial expression of disgust was exponentially greater than the last.  It was hilarious.

After about twenty minutes, she started to get hyper. She was walking like one of those weird speed walkers and talking a mile a minute. She got silly, too. Things that weren't funny became hysterical to her. Mom was acting like I do when I'm on a manic wave; it was nuts! I don't know how many times I saw her walk in a circle or whip her head back and forth looking at two different things.

I can't wait until she buys another one. Has anyone got a camcorder I can borrow?