Fright Night

While I love halloween, I don't like scary movies or haunted houses.  Maybe because my childhood home looked exactly like the Amityville Horror house.  No joke, creepy attic windows and all.  That and that haunted house I went to when I was in college in Alabama.  Where one of the gory characters chased me down through the enitre house.  Ok, it's because I lost a barrette and he was trying to return it to me.  Of course, at the time,  I had no idea that was the reason.  And that year I spent in Alabama for college?  That was a horror story of a completely different kind.

So when Craig suggested it would be fun to go to The Haunted Mines here in town, I was immediately looking for an out.  Until he told me he already bought the really expensive tickets for all of us and then broke the news it would take 30 minutes to go through it.  Then I searched even harder for an exit strategy.  But, in the end, I couldn't come up with one.

Before I even stepped foot inside, I was terrified.

It started in line, where we waited for over an hour just to get to the front for our turn.  It's not that the suspense was building so much as it was the teenage couple who made out directly in front of us during our wait.  Talk about grotesque!  Then they started to play guess which movie on the outdoor screen, yup, Amityville Horror.  "Look kids, where the flies attack the priest, that was where my bedroom was in grandpa's house." 

Then finally, it was our turn.  

And a funny thing happened.  I became hilarious.  Oh, I'm not joking.  Let me assure you, I definitely didn't go in first, cause the only funny thing about that would've been me peeing myself.   But, when I knew exactly what was coming because Jade's brave friend went through first, then I could devote myself fully to trying to make the actors break character and laugh.  And it worked.  Not just once, but several times.  

Cause when I'm trying to cover my unease, I always try to make people laugh.

So, when a zombie crept up behind me and whispered in my ear that he wanted to take one of my children, I responded the only way I could.  "Take them all, they're expensive.  Dude....the college years are coming.  Oh, not the really blond girl though, she's not mine.  But, the other four, definitely."  This was after I complimented the creepy dolls on their synchronized messy pigtails, asked the guy in the haunted saloon if they served alcohol and introduced a guy to the group the Pet Shop Boys by singing West End Girls to him.  He even stopped my husband, who was at the end of the line, to ask him what the name of the song was again, so he could look it up later.  That's how compelling my performance was.

OMG, zombies and other creeps totally get me!

Since my family doesn't laugh at my jokes anymore or acknowledge how funny I am, even though I've assured them many times that I am, I think I'm just going to have to go to haunted houses just for the validation.  Although,  I'll make sure I'm completely barretteless first.