Haunted House Hero

One of my favorite times of year when I was in college, had friends, sorority activities, and things in general to occupy my time, was October. 

Why?

I got to work at a haunted house.  It was AWESOME.  More awesome than anything.  More awesome than a swarm of killer bees teaming up with a pod of killer whales and attacking Nebraska.  More awesome that the Large Hadron Collider not destroying the world with a huge wormhole of doom.  So awesome that I can use the word awesome in its intended context.  (That Awesome!)

They would give me free dinner which consisted of a cheap hot-dog, fritos and a diet coke, and it was delicious because hotdogs are the best.  They are the best even though they are probably made out of eyelids and earthworms.   And while I was eating my awesome dinner made of awesomeness they would dress me up; that was also awesome.

The first year was nice, because I was a grim reaper and I got to have a real live fake femur club and jump out of the wood beating on a (probably stolen) stop sign and scaring the living shit out of everyone.  Except for those assholes.

You know who you are.

You prance around the haunted house to show how tough you are.  You are not tough my friend, you are just incredibly silly.  You went to haunted house, ruined it for your friends, and wasted your money because you had to prove how tough you were in the face of a 5’4 sorority girl in a nylon cape. (Nothing screams toughness like being tougher than a sorority girl.)  That chick you brought with you?  She’s gonna have a lot more fun if you hold hug her when she screams than if you walk around explaining how ‘gay’ everything is.

The next year I was a witch, (watch this kids) which was fun because they gave me one of my all time favorite things. Fire.  Also, I got to dance around it like a hippy and I was far enough away from the haunted forest path that I didn’t have to hear Debbie Downer be logical at a Halloween attraction located in a forest in middle of Nowhere, Michigan. 

My last year, that year was… intersting.  I got this part because they asked me “Are you a screamer?” Now what I wanted to say was “That’s what she said!” and squeal with delight at my own cleverness. What I said was “Yes.  Yes I am.” 

I should have known right there that this could not have ended well.  I was the girl being eaten by a giant spider.  This was interesting because I was tied to a table in a bloody pink nightgown with spider web glued all over my face.  On the plus side, I got to be in a room, so I didn’t freeze to death (Michigan is never warm, just tepid in the afternoons and it plummets to glacial once hte sun sets).  Also, I got a friend who job was….hide in the shadows and lurk?  I instantly congratulated myself on getting a way more awesome job.

Oh wait, her job was to make sure that the people I couldn’t see while I was tied to a table didn’t pick me up and carry me away just like the child snatcher in ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang‘.  At first, this was hilarious.  I thought “my very own body guard, I am finally moving up in the world, next I will get a segway, followed by a small but lucrative color crystal mine.”  Until I felt the sweaty hand of fate on my neck.  Oh wait, that was some guy and his friends who didn’t understand rules about personal boundaries and who were being tough in the face of a spider made of a trash can and crepe paper.  Boy did I feel silly, thinking I was too tough for a body guard.

Dear asshole, don’t be that asshole.  Also, you got chased off by my 5’2 sorority sister who weighs as much as a Holland Lop, but is slightly less threatening.