So I've led you along like a donkey with a carrot on a stick, alluding to a ghost hunt the night of the 3rd of July (actually the wee morning hours of the 4th)back in
this post here. Well, here tis with all the gory details so deserved from a night of hilarious stupidity and silly nonsense.
The Elms in Excelsior Springs Missouri is well known for the purported hauntings, appearances of spooks and assorted poltergeists, it's all over the interwebs... just Google it. Folks that get their razzles dazzled by this sort of stuff travel from all over creation with various Scooby Do equipment and cameras and meters and other junk in hopes of capturing a lazy spirit having a smoke, eating a sandwich or just hanging 'round behind you ready to say "boo" and make you crap yourself silly.
Maybe there IS unsettled spirits hanging out there. If you ask ANY of the employees there you get the response... *looking both ways over their shoulders* "Yeah, I've seen things". And then there'll be a story of seeing a hazy person walking down an empty hallway, words wrote on condensated glass by an unseen hand, a young boy that shows up regularly at night to visit the lap pool in the basement and on and on. Enough stories that you DO get a creepy feeling at times... even for big Bozos like me, that take very little in life seriously. I can attest, as can Ronnie, that the tiny little elevator (about a 6 person capacity)is an unnerving ride, with it's giant mirror on the back wall of it... in the middle of the night by yourself. Long walks down the endless "haunted hallways" at night will, I promise, make you glance over your shoulder once in awhile.
Go to the front desk of The Elms and just say "I want to see the picture", and the clerk will produce an enlarged photograph of a young lady sitting on the bed in one of the rooms with the TV in the background, which is turned off, with what can only be described as a pretty freaky face in the reflection of the glass. You WILL giggle nervously at it. You WILL have the hair stand up on the back of your neck.
So we got done playing in the bar there that night about midnite, a thunderstorm was raging outside giving it a creepy feel, and Daphne the gal that hired us play at the festival and the organizer of it as well said "Let's go on a ghost hunt!"
3/4ths looped and too wound from playing to sleep, we all fell in line giggling like a bunch of adolescents. Daphne, her sis Nikki and her bff (I can't remember her name... I'm sorry)with a total of about 8 or 9 of us, followed like good little lemmings up to the 3rd floor to gaze down the haunted hallway and be very very very quiet.
We failed at this last thing miserably.
As we stood looking down the hallway waiting for a ghost to wander down it towards us in his jammies I noticed a spot of light on the floor about halfway down. We all looked at it waiting for something big to happen. It didn't. So we walked towards it. Upon arriving I announced "Nope, no spooks. Someone just vomited on the rug and they cleaned it too good."
We went on down to the end and turned. Now I didn't wanna waste time with all this fun going on, by running my instruments back to our room... so we carried 'em like a bunch of fools. To the left was a door going out to the fire escape. It was pouring and lightning like crazy. Ronnie and I ventured to the doors and plastered our faces to 'em hoping to see some crazy dead lady in white dancing out on the fire escape.
There was none. But our friend Sue, who had had a touch more of imbibment than the rest of us, flung open the door and proceeded to step out on the fire escape. We reeled her back in. Someone mentioned alarms on the door going off at the front desk, Nikki said "too late now" and onward we went. Loudly.
Lots of shushhes and "be quiets" took place and I showed everyone how they should tiptoe to sneak up on 'em, exaggerated Elmer Fudd style.
Of course in the end this did nothing to quiet everyone down. Marybeth didn't go all the way to the floor, but it was close.
We went to the end of that hallway, Sue once again tried to make her exit via another fire escape door. We saved her life, but I'm sure set off yet another door alarm. Daphne, Nikki and her friend were now taking Blair Witch Project photographs of themselves and were coming completely undone. Nikki finally went to the floor, as they say. I dunno who "they" are, but...
More self photography was snapped with the same results...
Marybeth got creeped out by the door glass and wouldn't go up to it. I dunno why she's laughing so hard.
We ran into a service guy that walkie talkied to his boss and set up a ghost tour for us at 2 am. In the end only Nikki made that... the rest of us died from exhaustion before then.
Rounding another corner was an ice machine closet which I dived into. As the group rounded the corner I stepped out and grabbed a nameless person. Why nameless you say? Well as I grabbed the said nameless person, they did a Michael Jackson and grabbed their crotch, then said loudly "I JUST PEED!! I hate that!"
Further ruination followed as we headed back to me and Sal's room. I dunno how we ended up with the monster sized room, but it was a big sonofagun. Sal thinks it was the handicapped room... so that kinda fits. I took the opportunity to jam my carcass in the armmoire thing. In the end that didn't pan out as well as I'd hoped. People took too long to come in the room and I think the ones that came in were pointing at it and whispering "Jace is in there"... so when I fell out of it into the room like some drunken ghost hunter guy, there wasn't much scary stuff, just more laughing.
We all kinda fell into our room and were having a blast when "KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK". I opened the door and there was Bob or Steve or Stu or someone. Evidently some of our fellow guests were'nt having as much fun as us and called hotel security on us. So i stood there like a 10 year old getting a spankin' and told him everything was just dandy and that was that.
This is how you judge if the party is going well. When hotel security arrives... you've achieved party perfection in my book.
Everyone went to bed... cept Nikki. She said they didn't find any spooks and it was kinda corny.
No ghosts were seen, but like I said, it for sure IS kinda creepy 'round there. Oh and I've got one more picture for you. We did an "I'm scared shitless" pic, which is kinda entertaining... but little Sue over there on the right, with the Casper the friendly ghost expression... she stole this shot.
I think she missed the direction.
There's always next year it's rumored!
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