1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? Yeh.. there's just too many "coincidences" out there to really be coincidences. :p Plus, I'd like to think there's a little more to us than just this.. and maybe that's one way we show it. A sad way, since all you ever hear is that a ghost has unfinished business.. :C But still.
2. Are you superstitious? A little. Sometimes. :)
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? Um, possibly within the context of my family's creepy story. But because I was so young at the time, sometimes I wonder if I've just imagined it into a memory, ya know?
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. We had this house we called "The Green House" because it had a lot of green walls - well, they looked white or green depending on the light. Anyhoo, even though this house was relatively new (probably 60s/70s), my mother insists there was a ghost of a young girl that haunted it. We would wake up in the morning to find that all of our cupboard doors had been opened. And sometimes my mom and sister would say they say her walking down the hallway. I have a memory of seeing her in the hallway, but I honestly wonder if I just imagined it in an impressionable young mind. ;D
5. What's your favourite scary story? The chick with the ribbon around her neck? :D BUT SHE'S BEHEADED MWAHAHA. ..yeah, not so scary in the condensed version. ;P

YAY! \o/ You know it! :D Yeah, it just always kinda stuck with me. XD

'How bout the related one with the girl who grabs the stranger in the dark and sighs in relief as she feels her friend's fur-collared nightrobe.... then feels a bit higher and realises the friend has no HEAD? ;D (I love how mobile dead bodies are in these stories.)

You just love finding dead ppl, don't you? XD

CREEPY GIRL! ;P

When're we gonna hit up some haunted houses, ehh??

Whenever you want bb! Whenever you are actually off work and have free time. XP (How is Halloween working, anyway? Don't you have to work the next day? D: FAIL.)

Yah, um. Still trying to switch with someone. Otherwise, might be a sick day. XP

Wow, I totally forgot about that story! I hated ghost stories as a kid, but loved that one. I remember it being kind of sweet and romantic, right? A guy was madly in love with this girl who always wore a red ribbon around her neck. And then the ribbon is untied for some reason (which I've repressed) and her head falls off? Or am I just crazy...

That's the one! :D

For some reason, The Hiwayman comes to mind when you mention the chick with the ribbon around her neck. But...that wasn't a scary story so much as a folk song, right?

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
Absolutely! How can you not? There's a lot of evidence out there.

2. Are you superstitious?
Nah. I've never really gotten into the superstition thing.

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
Not that I can recall. If I ever encountered the paranormal I would want to be with somebody because it would be way too creepy alone.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
Nah. The only creepy thing that ever really happened to us is when we moved into this house when I was 7 and found out a few years later the that used to live there committed suicide in the kitchen. You couldn't see the blood, but you could see where they painted over it. Seriously creepy and messed with my head a lot.

5. What's your favourite scary story?
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. \m/

Crystal//Gryffindor

I live 10 minutes from Sleepy Hollow now! I really want to explore there around Halloween, I heard there are some really creepy graveyards around.

Awesome! I'm sure it's a really cool place to visit on Halloween night!

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? Not reeeeeeeally...
2. Are you superstitious? No.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? I spent the night in my friend's house alone when I was dog-sitting, and she always claimed she had a ghost, right? But I didn't believe it. Yet, when I was ALONE in the house, I heard things moving upstairs... Yeah. 0.o
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. See above. Best I can do.
5. What's your favourite scary story? Mmm... I don't know any good ones! I'm boring! Lol...

Camden//Slytherin

Name//House

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
If I believe in multiple polymorphisms of genetic disease, I am pretty sure the paranormal exists.
2. Are you superstitious?
No, except for seating on test days. If you sit in my seat, I will MAKE YOU MOVE.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
Yes, in my apartment growing up, I got the distinct feeling that there was a very tall man standing in the dark hallway, just barely in the shadows, from the dining room where I did my homework. And then the same feeling whenever I was doing kitchen chores.
And once we were sitting in the theatre of my high school. In the 1970s the theater director died inside and he had a play written that has to this date never aired. We sat around with a tape recorder after a show and we asked random questions like 'Did you like our show?' and 'Would you like us to perform your play?' Nothing happened so we went to the cast party. We played the tape to prove to everyone that we tried to get something and then a voice came on the tape answering our questions. Like it was PUT THERE not recorded because there was a definite LACK OF STATIC. It said "If it's good for you" after we asked our question about performing his play. SPOOKY
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
My dad was a fourth year medical student at St. Louis University in Baguio when his mom died, they lived in Manila. He was in his hardest rotation and no one could contact him (this was 25 years ago, no cell phones, natch). He was on hour 35 of being awake and still couldn't sleep in the resident room and he woke up and saw his mom standing in front of him dressed in white and then promptly slept for ten hours.
My mom heard some noise coming from her dorm neighbour's room while she was in nursing school and she needed some ice and someone to look at her ankle to see if it was broken. So she went to go find the hall director who was a little woman with long white hair. Thinking she saw her, she followed her calling "Miss P! Miss P!" but she never turned around and my mom thought it was odd... until she passed through a wall.
5. What's your favourite scary story?
STRIKE THAT. IT I HATE CLOWNS BECAUSE OF THIS MOVIE. i'm not really scared off by stories, BUT THIS MOVIE/BOOK/WHATEVER CLOWNSDA;LKDFJAWER
Charyse//Gryffindor

Edited 2008-10-18 04:34 am (UTC)

Ok, that theater director story has sufficiently creeped me out. My roommate just sneezed and I nearly jumped out of my skin after reading all these tales. Hey, literally jumping out of one's skin... that would make for a good scary story!

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?Yes to all.
2. Are you superstitious? A little bit.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?All the time. A group of my friends and I go ghost hunting. After seeing and hearing what I've seen and felt, there is no way that there isn't something out there.
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.Many. Most involve my childhood. All the women of my family have some special ESP, especially my Grandmother. My mother has thid gift too, only she refuses to "believe" that anything paranormal exists. She's kind of like Petunia Dursley, yrying very hard to ignore anything not "normal". When I was little, my parents and I lived in a small, old house. While my mother tried and tried to deny the strange things that happend there, and swear that, "There are no such things as ghosts, Rosie dear, it's your imagination", everyone else knew it was haunted. The ghost wasn't malevolent in the least, and liked to stand next to people in the hallway, or climb the ceiling. I caught him a couple of times talking on my Talk-Girl tape recorder. When I would say, "Who said that Mommy?" She would tell me that it was just static. When I asked my Dad, he said it was the ghost, and not to be worried.

5. What's your favourite scary story? I like the one where a woman in a white dress hails a cab, tells the driver to take her to a house, and tell the man inside to meet her in the car. When the driver goes to the door, and tells the man abot the woman, he says, "Oh, that's my wife, she'd been dead for four years."

Luna Rose//Gryffindor

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
Yes and no. No in the sense that I do not think there are a bunch of wayward souls floating around with "unfinished business" or filled with rage or whatever, and I think if ghosts were what popular culture makes them out to be we'd have some legitimate evidence of their existence by now. Yes, absolutely, in the sense that I think sometimes (rarely) weird freaky shit happens which we are presently unable to sufficiently explain.

2. Are you superstitious?
Again, yes and no.. I know it's all a load of bunk, but I grew up steeped in it so it can be hard to get over since irrational superstitions are so tightly wrapped up in just general customs/traditions/social norms in my family. For instance, if you know someone is going on a trip, you damn well better with them a safe one. Obviously your well-wishes don't safeguard their journey, but I will seriously feel awful (as will anyone in my immediate family) if I don't manage to talk to someone I care about before they got on a plane, for instance, and wish them a safe flight. Likewise I am compelled to knock on wood when speaking about something I don't want to happen, the same way I must kiss my fingertips and touch the top of the car when going through an ember light. And though I've gotten over this one finally, for years I was unable to yawn in the dark without covering mymouth for fear a demon would possess me and/or steal my soul. XD

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
Not really. The closest I've come was seeing a B-2 Spirit back when they first came out. XDD (The "silent black triangle" "UFO"s.) I had a few instances of getting freaked out and "seeing things" when I was a teenager, but they were just products of my overactive imagination. XD OH although once, this really freaky horse statue (like 2 foot tall, made of wood) which my mom was gifted by a friend and me and my sister hated because it freaked us out (the eyes would watch you) was IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STAIRCASE on the landing instead of being up in its little display niche. My sister and I both freaked out and when we chided my mom later when she got home for forgetting to put it back after dusting, she acted totally bewildered and swore up and down she never moved it. XD Haunted horse, lying mom, scheming sister? You decide.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
YES I WILL SHARE THREE. You know that urban legend about the bride, or little kid, or whoever who hides in a trunk playing hide and seek and the lid locks on them and their body's found years later? Happened to my great uncle Stewart when he was little, true story. Fortunately he didn't have to suffer the second half of the legend, because my grandmother happened by looking for something (she was older and not playing with the kids) and heard him wheezing and choking and opened the trunk to get the fright of her life. XD He recovered, though everyone always said he was a little slow in the head after that 'cause of the oxygen deprivation.. 8D

The second's not really a ghost story, just spooky, especially if you hear my grandfather tell it. I can't remember if this was during his time in the Royal Navy or on those deepsea fishing boats, but they were out in the middle of nowhere and the seas were a bit rough and it was the middle of the night so hardly anyone was on watch, and apparently one of the sailors stumbled out onto deck in his pyjamas - DEAD ASLEEP AND SLEEPWALKING. He then proceeded to meander over the deck, climb up on the railing, and circle the ENTIRE length of the ship. The few guys on duty almost shit themselves but they were terrified to go near him in case they knocked him off. (And they were also, being sailors, deeply superstitious, and it creeped them the hell out, and it's bad juju to wake a sleepwalker). So they just stood and watched this guy make his circuit. At the end he climbed back down onto the deck and went back to bed as though nothing had happened, still asleep.

Hahaha I massively exceeded the length limit. XDDDD TBC.

The third story is ABSOLUTELY TRUE. My aunt Linda and her husband lived in Norway for a few years in this REALLY CREEPY house they were renting fully-furnished. It had a living room and kitchen that were connected by an open doorway, the bedroom was in the basement with creepy basement windows, and in the front hall was an EMORMOUS, ridiculously heavy ship's bell. Linda HATED this house and with good reason - first, they were broken into TWICE (one time they didn't discover it until they couldn't open the door to the kitchen from the hall, went around through the living room and in that way, and there was a CHAIR PROPPING THE DOOR CLOSED. Creepy as hell y/n?), her husband went on short one-two day trips all the time and left her alone, and THE SHIP'S BELL WOULD RING ON ITS OWN AT ODD HOURS. She insists this would happen every so often, and this thing was way too heavy for it to be the wind, and it would be a proper full-out ringing that went on for several minutes. One time my grandparents were visiting them with my little cousin, who was maybe eight (who was raised by said grandparents). Linda was in the kitchen fixing tea and everyone else was in the living room. The ship's bell started ringing. They'd told my grandparents about it so they each thought the other was playing a joke to freak everyone out - and started calling back and forth like "Stop ringing that bell, it's not funny!" "I'm not doing it, you are! Stop!" Linda moved so she was clearly visible through the doorway as her and her husband continued accusing each other of ringing the bell.... and meanwhile, the bell just kept on ringing, and my little cousin sat there with his "eyes like saucers." XD She was sooo happy to move out of that house and back to Scotland.

5. What's your favourite scary story?
Hmmm, this is a tough one. I think my favourite is the one popularly known as "Drip Drip Drip" where the girl keeps putting her hand under the bed for the dog to lick every time she gets up to investigate the weird dripping noise. Of course, eventually she discovers the source - her dog's severed head hanging in the shower. Some versions have "Humans can lick too" written in blood on the bathroom mirror, but I think that's less classy. ;D I also love the dead roommate one ("Aren't you glad you didn't turn on the light?"). I guess I like the horrifying idea of the killed being RIGHT THERE and you don't know. 8D

Aand since I just love telling scary stories, here are three VERY short ones - so short I guarantee you'll be able to remember them next time someone asks you to tell them a scary story!

1. The last man on earth is sitting dejectedly in a hotel room when there comes a knock on the door.

2. Yes, living alone can be a bit frightening. I was awoken last night by a strange noise; I reached for my candle, and the matches were delicately placed into my hand.
(You can tell this is OLDSCHOOL. My mom knew it from when she was little. XD)

3. A young man takes a seat on a crowded bus next to an old lady reading what appears to be a collection of scary stories. "You don't really believe that stuff, do you?" he asks rather rudely, interrupting her reading. "Well, yes, I believe I do," she answers. "Why wouldn't you?" "Well, I've never seen a ghost," the man scoffs. "Haven't you?" she replied icily, and vanishes.

The humans can lick too thing? I feel like that's a slasher film in the making. That being said, slasher films really disturb me and so did this story. I have some sufficiently creepy images in my mind now, whether it was the first version with the dog's ghost licking OR the second version with a potentially psycho dog killer hiding under beds and licking girl's hands.

Dead dog...human licking little girls...can't sleep now...


Luna Rose//Gryffindor

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? I don't believe in ghosts, but I believe in spirits. My definition of a ghost is a spirit that can take physical form and is capable of doing things as if it were still alive... Uhm.....
I've felt spirits, but I don't want to see.. No no no no no no. LoL.
2. Are you superstitious? To an extent. I'm superstitious when it comes to common sense stuff like putting your shoes on a dining table, walking under a ladder..
As I'm Asian, I'm more superstitious when it comes to Feng Shui stuff like having a mirror at the foot of a bed or having an aquarium in my bedroom for small examples.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? Yes. ;) All the time.
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
One day my aunt was cooking in the Philippines. My 3 year cousin ran into the kitchen crying and scared to death. My aunt picked him up trying to soothe him, asking what was wrong. He told her this...
"Mom. Make her stop! Please make her stop crying!"
My aunt looked at him in disbelief. His sister has already gone to school so she had no idea who he was talking about. She put him down and asked, "Who? Who's crying, Jo-art?"
He took her finger and led her to the playroom. And he pointed to a crawl in cupboard space. "There mom. She's there. She won't stop crying..."
But when my aunt looked, there was no one she could see in the cupboard.
5. What's your favourite scary story?
Here's one of them to tell around the campfire: The Knife and the Driver

Along the roads of Lake George, NY, there are certain points where the only light you'll see is your headlight (and if you're lucky, the moon). The twists and bends and curves of the streets are eerie because if you're driving alone and you look in your rearview mirror, you will see nothing but blackness.

One day, a man was following his friend home. It was midnight. There was no moonlight. As he followed his friend on the road, his eyes caught the glimpse of a shadow of a man with a knife in the backseat of his friend's car -- ready to strike....

He honked his horn furiously trying to get his friend's attention. His friend slowed down, took out his phone and called on the cell as to why he was being honked.

Out of breath, his friend was screaming into the phone. "THERE'S A MAN IN YOUR CAR WITH A KNIFE! HE'S GOING TO KILL YOU!"
Feeling his hairs prickle on his neck, he looked at his rearview mirror into the backseat of the car. He saw nothing. "Are you sure? There's nothing back here," he replied.
His friend shook his head. Maybe he was hallucinating. Maybe he was tired and anxious to get home.

They begin driving again. The man at the rear sees the outline of a dark shadow forming. A head. A hand raising. A knife. He honks his horn like mad again. This time, his friend pulls over and stops the car to put an end to the nonsense. Getting out of the car, he yells, "HE WAS THERE AGAIN!"
His friend rolls his eyes in disbelief. "I already checked the back, the---"
He stops midsentence and opens the door to the backseat. He saw something glisten.

On the floor. Was a lone knife.

Mary || Gryffindor

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? Omgosh, yes.

2. Are you superstitious? Meh, not really. But I have lucky numbers.

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? A few too many...
*When I was 6, I was sleeping over a friend's house and was woken up by clashing plates and silverware around 3am. I figured it was someone else in her family having a late night snack, but I asked the next morning and no one had been in the kitchen. I became convinced it was a ghost.

*When I was 8, a neighbor and I were playing with a Ouija Board. We asked if there were any spirits around for them to identify themselves. At that point I saw a small glowing/fiery orb zoom in from the open window, fly around the room, and exit again. I was the only one who saw it, but it petrified me.

*At 10, I had a premonition someone had died. Someone I didn't know but that my family cared about. I burst into tears and told my parents this. An hour later, she got a call that her uncle died.

*In Sept 2000, I had an incredibly vivid dream that I was in NYC on a field trip and that there were planes through all the skyscrapers and they were all falling down on me. I was so traumatized the next morning I called my friend to talk it out and wrote about it in my diary. The next year, I was terrified, because the terror in real life so closely mimicked my dream.

*Freshman year of college, myself and a few others saw an apparition on the stairs to our res hall, there one minute and gone the next.

*Senior year of college, I had chem class and statistics in a really creepy basement of an old building. I would always get the chills and feel like someone was watching me, or that something was brushing up against me. One day I heard a whisper and there was a translucent blonde girl sitting in front of me (I was in the front row and thus no one would have been there). I blinked and she was gone, but I still remember exactly what I saw.

*My 23rd birthday, this year, I was getting ready for bed when I heard someone whispering my name over and over. I thought it was one of my parents but found them both asleep. I explored more and the closer I got to my downstairs, the louder it got. I freaked out and ran and woke up my parents in tears. They couldn't hear anything and tried to calm me down. I spent the rest of my night in tears, curled up in my room with the lights on. It was like - piercing, the whispers. I always wonder what would have happened if I went downstairs and followed the voice. And whenever I visit home now, I sleep with a light on.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
One my parents and I shared, that's more sweet then creepy. When our beloved dog died, we were all crying in the master bedroom and reminiscing together. Suddenly, I heard footsteps much like a dog would make. The door creaked open slightly and suddenly I felt this amazing sense of closure. My parents and I then looked at each other and recounted hearing and experiencing the exact same thing at that moment and we're convinced it was our dog's spirit saying goodbye
5. What's your favourite scary story?
Ummm, all of the above. Honestly, I have enough freaky stories of my own that totally creep out the few friends I've chosen to share them with. I swear that they're all true and that I'm not delusional. I'm not saying they were ghosts or esp, only recounting my personal experiences/impressions of the encounters

Allie//Hufflepuff

I should get to know you better. After reading about your experiences, I saw that we have a lot in common. =)

Luna Rose//Gryffindor

Yeah, definitely! I'd love to hear some more about your experiences. I was nodding along reading your comment, about the 'special esp' between the women in your family. I don't know if my grandmother has ever experienced anything, but my mom and I have always had a really peculiar seemingly-psychic bond between one another. And a few people who know me IRL are pretty convinced I have some sort of ESP.

Well, not to creep you out, but a few years ago, I was with my High School choir, and we took a trip to NY for a music festival. On that trip we went to all the touristy places,including the World Trade Center. I kept on getting the feeling while we were standing in line for the elevator to the top, that this place reminded me of an Airport, because I kept on thinking I saw airplanes, which was strange, because there were buildings surrounding us, not open air, and I had a mini panic attack at when we got to the top of the building. I'm not a panic-y type of person, and I don't have a big fear of heights, so my friends knew something was wrong, and figured it was the high altitude messing with my breathing. Three months later, to the day that we were their, I was sitting in my Botany class, and my teacher informed us about the first plane crashing.

I'm going to add yoo to my Friends list so we can talk more, ok?

Luna Rose//Gryffindor

Friended!

Wow, envisioning planes and all at the WTC... Honestly, its reassuring to know that I'm not the only one who had a premonition of sorts about the things to come. I've almost felt guilty about it, since that day, like my mind was encroaching where it had no right to be, upon this epic tragedy in which so many real people experienced such wrenching loss...

Seconded on IT. The book was so much better, but they usually are.

Sonja | Slytherin

Edited 2008-10-18 06:27 am (UTC)

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? I suppose I have to at this point. I've yet to be a real witness to anything paranormal, but I've heard enough convincing stories from sober people.
2. Are you superstitious? Not especially. My superstition is more of an OCD.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?...I might have...The dorm I live in is supposedly haunted by a little child ghost nicknamed, "Marbles". Marble's mother was a prostitute who would take clients while she left her son out on the roof of the building to play marbles. Apparently, one client killed the poor woman, and her son died up there. So now, every now and then, you can hear what sounds like lots of marbles falling on the ground. I'm pretty sure I heard that a few times over the three years I've lived here.
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.My family doesn't, unfortunately. My roommate did have a bedroom that was haunted for a while though.
5. What's your favourite scary story? Oh man, I love scary stories so I can't pick just one. Some of my favourite books when I was a kid were the Scary Stories (http://www.amazon.com/Scary-Stories-Boxed-Alvin-Schwartz/dp/006440465X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224307937&sr=1-1) series. I think the illustrations were freakier than some of the stories though. The tale about the wedding dress soaked in formaldehyde is one I can actually recall right now.

Gally//Slytherin

OMGGGGGGG GALLY OMG OMG SCARY STORIES.

The HORSE. BESSIE THE HORSE WITH THE SNAKE IN HER SKULL AND THE ILLUSTRATION AAAHHH

AND HOWARD, WAS IT HOWARD? THE SCARECROW WHO SKINNED THE GUY AND LAY HIS FLESH OUT ON THE ROOF TO DRY... AAAHHHH.

Those books traumatized me SO MUCH as a kid yet we had the whole collection and I read them a billion times. The freakiest illustrations, imo, seemed to be the ones to the least scary stories - the guy running from shelter to shelter in the storm being chased by a big scary thing, and the girl who was raised by wolves freaked me out. (The girl who had spider eggs in her cheek also.) Those illustrations were EVIL. D:

Hah hah, can you believe they sold those books through Scholastic catalogues? That's how I got them if I remember correctly. I think there was a story about two guys who had been dead for years but slept in the same bed and didn't know the other was dead? It has a really weird illustration of two dead guys in a bed and was a ridiculous story.

Man, when I'm home I'm going to have to find those books.

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
Yes, based on personal experience.

2. Are you superstitious?
No.

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
I was working in a sex shop overnight, and there were absolutely no customers in the shop. Zero. In order for someone to come in, they would have had to pass me (the till was at the front, so we could check IDs as soon as people walked in). In my shop, we had an upstairs room that was cleared out every night by the second shift, so there was no one up there, either. Again, anyone sneaking in would have had to pass me, and as I worked overnight, I was all about Constant Vigilance!

I was doing something at the front when I saw a man walk down the stairs and into the gentlemen's toilets. I was so angry that someone thought he could be up there without permission (and when it was closed), that I started yelling at him and chased him into the toilets. Only, there was no one there. I checked the women's; no one. To get by me, he would have had to push me out of the way, the hall was so narrow, so I knew he didn't make a run for the door. He just...disappeared.

A few weeks after that, I was sitting at the front and reading, when I heard a voice to my right say, 'Excuse me'. Again, I was the only one in the shop- no customers. And the only thing to my right was a wall.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
My stepfather swears he had an out-of-body experience once, but he's a dramallama, so I'm not sure if I believe him.

5. What's your favourite scary story?
Anything by Neil Gaiman, really. Or Richard Matheson.

Sonja | Slytherin

Ughhh that freaks me out, the vanishing guy and the voice. XD; I worked retail for one summer in a video store (totally not as exciting as a sex store) and I HATED closing up, especially when there were only two of us, so the other employee could be in the back or cleaning the bathroom or whatever and you'd be alone in the dark. 8D I think if anything spooky had happened I'd have been OUT OF THERE. XD It was nerve-wracking enough knowing video stores get robbed ALL THE TIME and ours had been robbed a couple times before (I even had a friend who worked at Blockbuster and he got held up at gunpoint - TWICE 8D). Ghosts + robber = way too high risk for me. XDD

OH AND this made me recall also waay back in like early highschool, I worked one summer at a Marble Slab (overpriced "gourmet" icecream) and although there were always at least three people closing because there was so much to do, someone would have to go out to the dumpsters with the trash and it was SO SCARY BACK THERE. And homeless guys occasionally hung out back there too. Not long after I started working there they instituted a policy that all employees had to clock out and leave at the same time on the closing shift for "safety reasons," so we could all walk out to our cars together, because we had to park in the back by the dumpsters where it was dark and sketch. I was like "if they know this is unsafe whyy do they make us park back here? And WHY DO I HAVE TO TAKE THE TRASH OUT MYSELF? 8D"

So.. yeah. /ramble Nothing ever happened, thank goodness, or I think that would have been it for me at either job. XD

Kai//Slytherin

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? I don't want to, because it is frightening, but I do believe in ghosts. I don't know how much of the rest of the paranormal pantheon I believe in.

2. Are you superstitious? I don't think I am particularly superstitious, although if a superstition is easy to avoid, I will give into it. For example, if I don't have to cross under that ladder or if I can easily avoid the black cat, why not? It can't hurt, right?

I do have this weird thing, though... Sometimes, when I am in the shower, and my back is facing the rest of the room, I become convinced that there is a vampire just outside of the curtain, waiting, lurking, watching me in my naked vulnerability. The feeling of eyes on me just grows stronger and stronger until I have to poke my head out, just to check. Invariably, no one's there, but when I close my eyes to wash my face, I just feel that twin pinpoint pressure on my neck again, of a gaze with no owner.

The one way for me to counteract the fear that a vampire is waiting for me when I am wet and naked and have my eyes closed, is to imagine 101 Dalmations, because no vampire can harm me if I'm thinking about tons of adorable puppies.

I'm dead serious. It's the only thing that works. And when I'm wet with my eyes closed, I'm afraid of vampires behind me. :( WTF.

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? Nope. Other than my above insane imaginings.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. My paternal grandfather was a guerrilla resistance fighter in World War 2 Yugoslavia. He was killed when my father was five. My dad swears that for many nights afterwards, he could feel his father come to tuck him and his older sister into bed.

5. What's your favourite scary story? "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" by Harlan Ellison. Because of the horror of endless torment, endless despair, and being deprived of that most human of facilities, expression, through which to channel it all... the sheer, horrific loneliness, the epic scale of the fucked-uppery...

Amasa//Slytherin

OMG, I am so with you on that someone's-behind-me syndrome! Not with vampires, though; but I always have the strongest feeling that someone is behind every closed door, waiting to surprise-attack me. I NEVER close any doors in my flat and when I lived home I drove my mother crazy with my open door hysterics. I also always make sure I face the bedroom door when I sleep and I never go to sleep without checking under my bed.

OMG I get freaked out in the shower too! I'm not afraid of a vampire, but when I have to close my eyes to rinse off my hair, or worse, rinse my face so my back's to the room, I get so freaked out that SOMETHING is looming RIGHT BEHIND ME and when I open my eyes it's going to be RIGHT THERE.

This is TOTALLY not helped by the fact that this actually happens ALL THE TIME in my life now since I have two cats. I'll be minding my own business and go "Oh hay. I haven't seen the cats in awhile. Where are they?" and look all over. Normally I'll spot one but the other will be missing, so I'll get up or turn my chair to find them, and they'll be RIGHT THERE, either right at my feet or otherwise right next to me just outside my field of vision. XD And they also do the thing from that hilarious video Adam linked where one minute they're on the other side of the room, glance away and glance back and they're RIGHT THERE. They like to do this in the shower where they'll SUDDENLY APPEAR on the edge of the bathtub and scare me. XD (I have a clear liner inside the tub wall and a semi-opaque cloth curtian outside, so you can see shadows when something moves on the other side, but they like going from totally not there to right between the two curtains, so I open my eyes and there's a big dark shape and I go "AAHH" and then it's just Artemis. XDDD

Kai//Slytherin

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? I think so. I mean...I used to completely, because I saw and sensed things...but then my doc put me on a mental med and all of that stopped. So either I'm just crazy, or the med blocked something that allowed me to see ghosts.
2. Are you superstitious? No, I don' tthink that I am
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? Being raised by a ghost and my parents for my first two years, seeing random ghosts, having them touch me recently or shake the bed...
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. Just your normal encounters with ghosts. I never had any bumps or bruises or anything until I was 2 1/2 years old. They started after a family friend spoke with a ghost, wanting her to move on. She used to take me out of my crib while my mom slept, and my mom would find me playing [I was way too young to do it myself at that point] on the floor.
5. What's your favourite scary story? I don't know, I generally don't like stories about ghosts or anything weird. It's a side-effect of being sensitive, sometimes it makes more either paranoid or more sensitive, depending on what you believe.

Jake//Slytherin

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? Yes.
2. Are you superstitious? Partially. It depends on the superstition.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? Yep, considering I work in a haunted building.
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. I could tell you guys a different story everyday for months. Lemme pick one. When I was in high school a group of my friends decided to go to one of the battlefield monuments that was supposedly haunted. I stayed in the car because they had not told me where we were going and I was unamused. A large form swooped down over the monument and slapped the rear end of the car. It left a huge print on the car that NEVER came off. That one's probably sucky but I'm tired.
5. What's your favourite scary story? The call's coming from inside the house one.

Nina//Ravenclaw

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
No, not really. I beleive the souls of the departed can come back to check on the ones they left behind, but actually hauntings and the like, I think are a load of bunk.
2. Are you superstitious?
I can be - I try not to be because I feel that it's turning your back on God to believe in that sort of stuff, but it's a different story when the lights are out and it's a stormy night.
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
No, although my daughter occasionally looks at a blank wall laughing and waving like there is someone there. That can creep me out a bit.
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
No, not anything but I'm from a long line of Catholics.
5. What's your favourite scary story?
I think you can't go past the classics. My personal, gives-me-a-little-thrill-down-my-spine story is the one about the baby sitter and the calls coming from INSIDE the house.

Mel//Hufflepuff

Name//House

Uh, yeah! The babysitter one's CLASSY! I used to tell this to my classmates on a field trip at night and it scared the living daylights out of some. One of the comments in my graduation yearbook actually reads "she tells the most horrible horror-stories". Haha!

Aaaaahhh@your daughter. The idea of little kids seeing things adults can't freaks the hell out of me. (Same with animals. When my cats both jump and stare at the same place at night and there's nothing there, no bugs or anything, I tend to freak out. XD)

Kai//Slytherin

I know, right?

My cat does that too - just stares at a spot and I'm all like, "What is it, a bug?" and there is nothing there!

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)? Yes
2. Are you superstitious? I can be sometimes
3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience? I think so
4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE. Nope
5. What's your favourite scary story? Hmmm...

Deborah//Hufflepuff

1. Do you believe in ghosts (or more generally, the paranormal)?
Totally, dude. I practically grew up on "The X-Files". I never even doubted the existence of paranormal stuff, faeries, unicorns and the like.

2. Are you superstitious?
Hm, I'm not sure. I guess I'm a little superstitious, i.e. when I spill salt, I immediately gather it up and throw it over my shoulder to neutralize the bad luck. But I have to admit, I do this more out of fun.

3. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?
Yes. In the house of the family where I used to babysit I constantly feel watched. Especially at night when I was lone in the living room babysitting, but also during the day when I am with people. I always have the feeling that someone is standing in the hallway, watching me. Not in a scary way, but actually I always felt like I was being watched over, that someone was standing there, making sure everyone was all right.
When I spoke to the mother about this, she said she was experiencing the same thing ever since they had moved into the house. She said she was sure it was an echo of the former tennants. She, too, agreed it wasn't threatening at all, but rather as if someone was watching over them.

4. Does your family have any creepy true stories? SHARE.
Nah, my family's a bore! NOBODY believes in anything in my family. Sad, but true.

5. What's your favourite scary story?
The one about the woman who was driving all alone at night through a forest road, when on the side of the road she beheld a figure that was simply lying there, motionless. Naturally she stopped, but just as she was opening the door, she remembered warnings from her friends and family never to pull over on such occasions. So she closed the door again and hurriedly drove away. At the next gas station she told the man at the counter about the body and they called the police.
When the police finally arrived, they told the woman that, yes, there had been a body right where she had said it was. They explained it was a man and that he was dead, he had apparently bled to death.
When the woman got in her car again, she noticed three severed fingers right next to the driver's door...

Every time I drive through a forest at night (which is often, I live suburbian) I think of this story and it still creeps me out.

Sally of Hufflepuff

OMG! Finally! A scary story I've never hear before! :O That is hella freaky omg. XD Fits right in with all the other "someone in the car is almost murdered by a madman" legends except she gets away on her own through her own sensibleness. What a refreshing change from the usually screaming women victims in these things. XDD

I do the salt thing, too. XD It's kind of funny, because I'm an atheist, but there are all these 100% religious superstitions (like the yawning and being possessed by a demon thing XD) which I was nonetheless terrified of as a kid. I always throw the salt over my left shoulder, and try never to look over my left shoulder if I'm all freaked out and I think I hear a noise, because that's supposedly where the DEVIL lurks. I don't even believe in the dude and the idea still creeps me out enough to go along with the traditions! XD

Kai//Slytherin

Yeah, I like the underlying horror in this one, the feeling that something horrific *almost* happened.