I am so behind as usual. But for once, I am all caught up in my paper haunted house journal! When will I ever grow out of this phase, sigh. I feel like I’m even more dumb about it these days because I am in my “washi tape and sticker” era.

Last weekend, we went to Castle Blood with Amy and Dick – it was their first time there! Fresh blood! I told them while waiting outside that I never feel more dumb than I do inside the walls of Castle Blood. I love being made fun of by the undead denizens! For anyone who has somehow missed me jawing off about this haunt for the last 25 years, it is NOT LIKE OTHER GIRLS HAUNTS, OK? You want to see animatronics barfing into a toilet and get chased through a maze by a chainsaw, then go somewhere else and prepare to not get your money’s worth. But Castle Blood is all about making it a personal, intimate experience. You go through in small groups (usually just who you arrive with) and get to interact with the denizens in every room by engaging in challenges for talismans or tokens of protection.

Every year, the theme and story line changes so it’s a brand new experience, making it a mainstay on the annual lists of any haunt thoosie.

When we were waiting outside, Boris started to float by and I said to Amy and Dick, “He’s my favorite but he never remembers me!”

That got Boris’s attention so he stopped and, in his patented snide and bored Easten Euro-accented tone, said, “And why should I?”

YES. BEAT ME UP WITH YOUR WORDS! You will also get a healthy dose of verbal bullying at Castle Blood. I live for this. PUT ME IN MY PLACE!

KNOCK ME DOWN A PEG!

And so on and so forth, etc. etc. etc.

Amy and Dick loved it! It is not often that I get to bring newbies to the Castle–most of my friends are not into haunted houses at all, sadly, so I stopped asking!–and it was a lot of fun experiencing it through them, you know?

My favorite was in Gravely’s office, where we had to take turns giving the denizen a “magic word” to use to get the beads of protection to appear under a box. When it was my turn, I confidently shouted, “갑자기!” and then I stage-whispered to Dick and Amy, “That means suddenly in Korean.”

“Well, unfortunately, the spirits in the Castle don’t speak Korean, so that didn’t work,” the office denizen (why am I so bad at remembering names) said in a total “eye roll” tone and I loved it.

The next night, Henry and I went to Sewickley Haunted Church. It had been a few years since we last came to this one but it’s always a good, chaotic time. Here are some pictures because I’m sure you care.

I just love that this is actually put on by the church’s youth group –  do not expect anything to be “toned down” because of it being done by church people, that’s for sure!

I really missed Chooch on this night. We have never gone to this one without him! :(

And then last night we went to a new one in Mercer, PA wherever that it – it took a little over an hour to get there. We actually had originally tried to go on Friday and got ALL THE WAY THERE just to see that it was closed. We don’t use Facebook but they had apparently posted there earlier that day saying that they weren’t going to be open that night.

MOTHERFUCKER.

That really pissed me off, but what can you do? If you’re me, you sulk and stare out the window with a pout the whole way home.

Anyway, they were open last night and it was “only” $10 because of “economical hardships” but I would have been pissed if we had to pay the usual $20 ticket price because it only took us 10 minutes to go through, and the first part only had two children scare actors in there. It was very rudimentary and old school which I am normally a fan of, but there was literally nothing happening in there.

The second part was in an outdoor livestock pen thingie and there were 3 guys in there being totally creepy and psychotic and honestly – that part alone made me not regret driving out here. They understood the assignment and it ended with me freaking out and fucking sprinting out of there like I was possessed by the ghost of a 1950s track star before the chainsaw guy even had a chance to fire up his saw.

I made it halfway back to the parking lot before turning around and watching Henry calmly strolling out with my three tormentors flanking him, laughing.

Then we listened to Seventeen the whole way home and talked about the concert which I still have to process my thoughts on before recapping it here, and that was just really nice.

The haunt season is almost over which means the fear of winter will hit me and my depression will probably come back before it even had a chance to leave, so I can’t wait for that. Ugh.

I think we have 1 or 2 or more haunted houses to squeeze in. If they weren’t so fucking $$ we would do more, but the days of legit haunted house hopping are long gone, yo. We are lucky if we can afford to do 2 in a weekend. God, I miss the $5-$10 little fire station or YMCA haunts that used to be everywhere in the 90s, piling into Lisa’s minivan and hitting 2 or 3 in one night. Granted, those outings were also funded by my mom back when the value of a dollar was lost on me (it still is in most cases, ngl).

OK, I have to go. Seventeen videos are calling me. And remember – if you’re going out to a pumpkin patch anytime soon, don’t fall on a pumpkin stem. That happened to me once at Trax Farms when I was a youngin! IT WAS NOT COMFY.

 

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