Get Sponsored

---

By: Lina.litonjua@LOSANGELES.AF.MIL
 

For some reason ghosts like to hang around me at work.
 At least they did at my last two jobs.
The first place I worked at was a shipyard.  I used to run a technical
library there, dealing with technical manuals and blueprints of ships that
were being worked on at the time, as well as handling the office supplies.
 When projects were well underway or near completion things would get
pretty quiet. For the most part I worked there by myself with only
occasional customers or visitors.  These experiences happened during lulls
in activity.
One day I was sitting at my desk in the office area of the library,
which faced the customer service window.  Between the window and my desk was
another desk that no one was sitting at that used to be mine and in which I
still kept some files in a drawer.
 The desk was facing me, with the drawers facing the window at knee
level.  I only rarely would get into that desk.
I was busy sorting through a new pile of blueprints that had just come
in, separating them by ship and classification, and then labeling them for
filing in the back filing system.  This was usually pretty tedious work,
requiring not much brainwork on my part.
Suddenly, I felt a very cold beam (only way I can describe it) of air at
my right elbow.  It pulled me right to attention, believe me!
 It was a comfortable temperature in the rest of the office, but when I
would stick my arm in this one area to my right it would be freezing cold.
I got the impression that there was some curious entity there who was
hanging around seeing what I was doing and didn't mean me any harm..
I talked to it and commented that what I was doing was really dull but
it was welcome to stay and watch if it really wanted to, which it seemed to.
After a while I was finished labeling and picked up a large postal tub with
the blueprints in it to take it in the back and file.
 The spirit followed me there too.  This time as I was filing the cold
beam was on my left, and as I moved around the office filing the blueprints
it would always be right there, very close.  I didn't feel any fear, but I
was a bit amused by the activity, wondering who it was and why it was there.
After a while it seemed to go away and I kind of forgot about it.  But
apparently it didn't forget about me!
A little later on a customer came to the window and I went up to find
out what he needed.  As I walked around my old desk my knee bashed into an
open drawer.  This was really strange as I hadn't been near it all day and
hadn't opened it in a while.  Plus, it was really heavy and was latched
shut, although not locked.  Since I had to take care of a customer I just
rubbed my leg and pushed the drawer shut, figuring it must have been
slightly open to begin with and had for some reason come out.  But I made
sure it was latched this time.
After the customer left, I went back to my regular desk and went back to
what I was doing.  A few minutes later another customer came to the window
and again I got up to see what they needed.  I wasn't even thinking of the
drawer and again bashed my leg right into it, pulled almost completely out!
OUCH!  I started to think this was strange, as I knew I had shut it well the
last time.
I closed it again and took care of the customer at the window.  I saw
the beginnings of a bruise on my leg where it had hit against the drawer and
examined the desk again.  I pulled out the drawer and saw that there was no
way it could have come out on it's own, it was too heavy.  All I could do
was slam it shut again, making sure it latched.  I pulled on it to make sure
this time.
So I go back to my desk, get busy again.  About 10 minutes later another
customer came up.  This time I was paying attention as I rounded the desk
corner, and sure enough the drawer was out again!.  I realized that the
spirit was probably playing>  a trick on me, and once the customer was gone
I told it that fun was fun but enough was enough and my leg hurt so could he
please cut it out?
I shut the drawer again and checked it and luckily the next time a
customer came up the drawer remained closed.
There was another kinda nicer incident that happened at that job that I
will recount in a later entry.  But right now I will recount what happened
at the job I had after the shipyard.
 The shipyard was being closed and they were trying to find new positions
for those of us who remained and were too young to retire.
I was lucky enough to be one of the first to be picked up and began
working at an Army Recruiting headquarters.
At the time I started there, the original building that housed them was
being renovated and we were operating out of some trailers for a while.
Nothing really happened there, but a few months later the building was
finished and we moved into our new quarters, along with the recruiters for
the other military services.
 I had become friends with another female coworker in my office, and we
would discuss all sorts of topics as she was pretty open minded.  One time I
was talking about some of my paranormal experiences, and she asked if I'd
seen the ghostly woman in the bathroom we always used there at work.
I hadn't seen anything, although all of us women who worked there when
asked would mention that a lot of the time it felt and sounded like someone
was in there, even if they happened to be the only one in there.
 Usually what would happen was that you'd hear sounds like soft sighing
coming from another stall ( I would always check all the stalls before going
into a stall to make sure no one was there and there wouldn't be), or it
would sound like someone would be walking into the bathroom but there
wouldn't be anyone there.  Also, a few times I heard what sounded like long
skirts rustling as the footsteps made their way through the room.
 What my friend told me was that many times when she would go into the
bathroom she would use the first stall nearest the entrance.
 When she would push open the door of the stall, for a split second she
would see what looked like a woman crouching by the toilet bowl, as if she
were sick.  She described her as possibly blonde or white haired, wearing a
light colored dress, and looking quite miserable.
 We continued to use the bathroom and even the haunted stall, but never
really felt any fear.  I was hoping to get a look at her sometime myself,
actually, but never had up to then.  Then, both my friend and I ended up
getting new job offers at another facility within a week of each other, and
were in the bathroom discussing it shortly before we both left for the day.
 My friend was standing at one sink washing her hands, facing me; I was
at a sink two removed from her, washing my hands, and was talking to her so
I wasn't really paying attention to anything else.  Directly behind me was
the entrance to the bathroom, and to my right was this small corner shelf
installed where you could put your purse down while washing your hands.
Just above that shelf was the paper towel dispenser, and I turned around,
still talking to my friend, to get a paper towel.  I was suddenly startled
to see this woman leaning over the shelf, peering at me very intently, with
a kind of curious look on her face!  I turned back around to my friend,
thinking that somehow or other I must have missed someone walking into the
bathroom, although that would have been impossible.
 I did a double take and the woman was gone.  I asked my friend if she'd
seen anything, and she hadn't.  So I told her I thought I had just seen her
ghost.  She was an older woman, but not very much older, possibly in her
late 40's or early 50's wearing what looked like a tiny floral print cream
or white blouse or dress (I didn't notice beyond her upper half in that
second), and had either very light blonde or white hair, and gave the
impression of being scared or confused, but not a threat at all.  When I
described>  her my friend confirmed that yes, that sounded like the woman
she'd been seeing.
 That incident happened about two weeks before we left our jobs, and we
didn't experience anything more dramatic than the usual sounds and feelings
in the time we were there.  That happened at the end of Sept. '97.
 So far nothing very interesting has happened at my current position, but
give it time!  ;-)

 China Ghost

By:jq32645@csun.edu
 

Hi my name is Amadeo. About four years ago(why is Pink Floyd playing
here?) I was going to school in China, Tsing Hwua University. Some
friends and I went to eat at a resturant called the, "Sunny City
Market". At the end of dinner, I got up to use the men's room, and my
Chinese teacher asked if I would take her little boy Ma' with me, as her
husband was not there to do it. I said sure and took Ma' by the hand and
went to the boy's room. Inside I was surprized to find western
tolits(the common Chinese tolit is a ceramic hole in the floor one must
squat over) on the wall were two urinals, but they had duck tape criss
crossed over them so I assumed they were out of order. Ma' and I walked
to the tolits which where seperated from one another by connected metal
walls. I reached to pull open(restroom doors open inward in China) the
metal door, and it suddenly flew open and hit me in the face. I steped
back, and looked to find nothing was there, next bitterly cold and dank
air blew over my shoes and lower pant legs. The air hit the wall behind
me with enough force that climed upward and I could feel it hit by back.
The next part happened fast. Ma' let out a scream, I picked him up and
ran toward the door, I am still not sure if I opened the door or ren
though it but next I was out in the restuant with Ma' going crazt with
tears, and me so pale blue my friends thought I had been shot. The
Chinese women who had brought our food saw all this and went in to the
kitchen, moments later out came the cooks and dish boys-banging pots and
pans together(In front of the bath room door) and chanting something.
They must have said they were sorry a thousand times-and gave us our
food for free. As we left the head cook told our Teacher(thing that I
could not understand Chinese-Misstake!) "I am sorry, It has never hurt
anyone."

    Now I most likely would have blown this of, if it were not for what
happend the next morning. I woke up after fitfull sleep to find that the
tips of most of my hair had turned grey. I put on a cap and went to
drink tea before class. I saw Ma' and my teacher in the tea room, and
asked how they where. My teacher took off Ma' hat to reveal that the
tips of his hair had gone white as well.

    I will never forget this. What do you think it was?
 

Cemetary Spirits
 

By:melodycc@earthlink.net
 

My ex girlfriend used to rent an apartment in a complex that abutts the
east wall of Fairhaven Cemetary in Santa Ana, California. Upon moving
in, we didn't notice anything really strange (some wierd noises - but
that's it), but a friend who visited soon afterward mentioned that she
felt "something", a distinctly male presence.

Anyway, we started to believe her as strange little things began, and
then continued to occur. A large decorative glass, set way back on a
shelf and full of heavy hematite pellets somehow ended up broken on the
living room floor one afternoon, and at night we'd often hear loud
thunks, thuds and pops in the living room area, so loud and "real" that
I would get out of bed to investigate if there was an intruder or
something. It sounded as though a heavy object had been dropped on the
floor from up high, like a big book or something, but when I'd check it
out, there was never anyhting out of place.

Her roommate also mentioned that she didn't like being there alone at
night when my ex and I were out of town. She complained that she heard
the kitchen cabinets slam behind her as she sat and watched t.v. We
actually began to experience this with regularity as well. Also, my ex's
cat would, sporadically in the middle of the night, sit by the patio
sliding glass door (three floors up and looking out over the cemetary)
and hiss, scratch, yowl and throw a mad fit at something outside on the
balcony, but there was never anything there when we checked. Strange.
The presence wasn't always there though, and sometimes weeks would go by
with no activity. But when "he" was around, we definitely knew it.
Eventually she moved to a different unit that didn't look out over the
cemetary, and nothing ever happened there.

Other rumors surround this Orange County cemetary, I am curious who else
out there has experienced anything there.

Auto-Matic writing and a Demon named Sam
 

By: girlyblue13@hotmail.com

Two of my friends were over last night(one of my friends and i are both
phychic)she kept saying there was someone in my room,like a really hostile
person. We just shruged it off b/c were aren't always right, afterwards we
tried to meet at a beach (we were trying OBE) she had a weird feeling to
open her eyes and when she did there was a figure of a man leaning over
her.
It wasn't like a detailed one (I saw it too) we could only see a grayish-
blackish shadow standing next to her.  My other friend say the shadow too.
We went somewhere afterwards b/c we got really creeped out. When we came
back we tried automatic writing we all tried it at once and we got
different
ppl. My friend who saw the man first talked to him first. He said his name
was Sam and that he was I demon (I asked him that for some reason) He said
he was after me but didn't say why,(what he said)was just b/c he doesn't
like me (when we finished talking to Sam our hands were really hot and
looked like they had burned spots on them, but didn't stay for very long).
We talked to alot of spirits last night.  Another was alittle girl that
didn't know what was going on. She said she was on a farm (a farm was here
before my house was built) Then my friend talked to someone from her past
life (her true love) but then we found out by him that we were best
friends
in our past life and we talked to alot of other ppl in our past life.  But
then all of a sudden Sam jumped in and said that he ate Nate (the guy i
was
talking to) my friend said that we had to banish Sam in order to get Nate
back (she's into wicca but i'm not, so I don't know what she means) I know
that Sam took alot of our energy me and friends that were there.  I was so
tired today that i slept til noon and I hardly do that, and I was still
tired!
Sorry this was so long but I don't know what this stuff means, like I
don't know why Sam is after me and my friends

ANGEL IN DISGUISE
 

By: BUBBYBOOP@aol.com

 DURING THE DELIVERY OF MY SECOND CHILD, MY FAMILY WAS TOLD THAT AS I LAY
IN THE DELIVERY ROOM GIVING BIRTH I ONLY HAD A FEW HOURS TO LIVE.  THERE WERE
SEVERE COMPLICATIONS.  AS I LAY THERE AWAKE, I ACTUALLY SAW A GREY CLOUD
COVER THE WHOLE CEILING OF THE ROOM AND IT BEGAN TO SLOWLY MOVE THROUGH
EVERYONE IN THE ROOM, AND WAS ABOUT TO TOUCH ME.  AS I LAY THERE, I COULD
FEEL DEATH, AS WELL AS SMELL IT.  I COULD NOT SPEAK OUT LOUD, SO MY
THOUGHTS WERE, GOD IF YOU'LL SAVE ME, I'LL DO ANYTHING YOU ASK OF ME.  TO THE
DOCTORS AMAZEMENT, I SURVIVED, BUT WAS TOLD THAT ANOTHER CHILD WAS REALLY OUT OF
THE QUESTION, AT LEAST FOR SEVERAL YEARS.
LO AND BEHOLD, I BECAME PREGNANT AGAIN WITHIN A FEW YEARS.  I MUST SAY
THERE
WAS A GREAT FEAR THAT FILLED MY SOUL DURING MY WHOLE PREGNANCY.  AGAIN,
WHEN TIME CAME FOR ME TO DELIVER, AGAIN IN THE DELIVERY ROOM A STRANGE THING
HAPPENED. AS SOON AS THEY WHEELED ME IN, EVERY PERSON IN THERE WALKED OUT.
I MEAN THERE WAS NOT A SOUL IN THERE BUT ME!!!  THEN ALL OF A SUDDEN, A
WOMAN WALKED IN.  SHE WAS DRESSED IN WHITE GARB, WITH A WHITE MASK ON.  AS SHE
WALKED CLOSER, I NOTICED THE HAIR STICKING OUT FROM HER CAP,  IT WAS
GOLDEN IN COLOR, AND LAID IN RINGLETS.  AS SHE DREW CLOSER TO ME SHE BENT DOWN
AND LOOKED ME STRAIGHT IN THE EYES,  AS I LOOKED INTO HER EYES, WORDS CANNOT
EXPRESS WHAT I SAW, BUT I'LL TRY.  HER EYES WERE THE COLOR OF BLUE THAT I
HAVE NEVER SEEN BEFORE, NOT AN EARTHLY COLOR.  I COULD ACTUALLY SEE RIVERS
OF WATER FALLS WITHIN.  THEN SHE BEGAN TO SPEAK TO ME.  HER VOICE WAS SO SOFT
AND TENDER, AND SHE HAD A MILD ACCENT.  SHE TOOK AND BENT DOWN AND KISSED
MY FOREHEAD, SHE THEN LOOKED DIRECTLY AT ME AND SAID.           "EVERYTHING
WILL BE ALRIGHT,,,,REMEMBER WHAT I'VE SAID". SHE THEN TURNED AROUND AND WALKED
OUT.    AS SOON AS SHE LEFT EVERYONE STARTED FILING IN THE ROOM.  MY SON
WAS BORN WITHIN A FEW MINUTES.   EVERYTHING WAS NATURAL, AND THERE WERE NO
COMPLICATIONS.    AS THEY WHEELED ME OUT OF THE DELIVERY ROOM I ASKED THEM
TO STOP AT THE DESK, AS THEY DID, I ASKED TO SPEAK TO THE LADY IN WHITE GARB,
WITH THE GOLDEN HAIR, AND THE MILD ACCENT......AS YOU CAN IMAGINE, THEY
THOUGHT I WAS CRAZY,AND SIDATED ME.......I DO HAVE SOME GOOD NEWS
THOUGH,,,MY SON THAT I GAVE BIRTH TO THAT DAY, HAS HAD SEVERAL ENCOUNTERS WITH HER
DURING HIS LIFE..........MICAH IS NOW 29 YEARS OLD...............

"A Memorable Coincidence"
 

By: Terence M. Mahoney
 

Tonight I stumbled on your site by chance. I find it very impressive.
I'm not sure if the following anecdote qualifies as a ghost story, but it is the closest thing to one that I claim from
personal experience.Back when the movie "The Exorcist" first played in theaters, the news media didn't treat it so much as a movie but as some kind of serious national problem.  I recall a national news magazine reported that there was a movie theater where the floors had to be swept up after every showing because people kept vomiting during the movie.  There was also a story in the press about three young men who claimed to have become possessed while watching the film.  The studio probably didn't mind this kind of publicity; on the contrary, it played up stories about how members of the cast and crew had claimed to have weird, unexplainable  bad luck while the movie was being shot.  (Stories of this kind were later used to hype a number of other horror movies, including "Poltergeist" and "The Omen II").   Director William Friedkin even managed to get a Catholic priest to perform a rite to purge the studio of any demonic influences during the shooting.I also recall hearing an urban legend shortly after the movie was released about how a "demonic face" had inexplicably appeared on a frame of the film as it was being shot.  I suspect this derived from the presence of two real subliminal shots of a weird face, lasting two frames each, which appear in the film.  One is during Fr. Karras' nightmare early in the movie,and one is during an exorcism scene.  A duration of two frames is generally just long enough to make a shot clearly visible
to a viewer who is paying close attention.  A one shot frame, such as was used in the movie "JFK" to show a skeleton  dangling in the apartment of suspect David Ferrie, merely results in a rushing blur.
I was in high school then.  Back when the film "The Exorcist" was first released, it was treated in the popular press not so much as a movie but as some kind of serious social problem.  The film first played in theaters during the Christmas season,oddly enough, and when classes resumed it was the hot topic of conversation at the all boy school I attended.  Our interest was especially high as it was widely publicized that the story was based largely on an anctual exorcism which was performed in the late 1940s in St. Louis.  Our high school was in a Clayton, Mo., a St. Louis suburb, and only a couple of miles from the neighorhood where all of this was supposed to have taken place.   There was one especially impressionable young man in my class who claimed he had been unable to sleep for two nights after seeing it.   When I eventually saw the movie at a film festival in 1980, I wondered just what all of the fuss had been about.  In any case, one night shortly after school started again in January my family got to talking about the movie, and all of thehysteria surrounding it, as we sat at dinner.  The question was raised as to whether any good could come of this--might people be brought to a sincere appreciation of religion, for instance?
I thought it would not have that effect.  After all, I said, there is a parable in the Gospel According to St. Luke in which God says that if people won't believe the prophets, they won't believe one who comes back from the dead.
An instant after I quoted this, there was a tremendous bang.  It sounded as though it was coming from directly overhead, which would mean it came from my bedroom.  My parents and I rushed upstairs.  It had sounded to each of us as though my heavy wooden bed had suddenly collapsed.  I turned on the lights (this was January, remember, when the nights get very dark very early), and saw that everything looked fine.  I walked across the hall and turned on the light in my parent's bedroom.  My mother and father slept in twin beds which they kept pushed together.  As I turned on the light, I found I was staring  at an object on the wall directly the crack where the two beds met.  At first I couldn't tell what it was; it looked to me as though a wooden board had somehow thrust out of the wall.
Then I realized what it was.  When my parents married in 1945 my parents had been given a present by his pastor: a large crucifix, consisting of a heavy metal statue of Christ nailed to a wooden cross.  We moved into our house in 1958 and, with the exception of being taken down a couple of times when the room was painted, that crucifix had hung on the wall over their beds that whole time.  Just as I said "they won't believe one who has returned from the dead", that crucifix had come apart.  There was nothing left of it on the wall except the vertical piece.  We found the cross beam, the statue, and the nails all scattered on the floor under their beds.  The nails had twisted by about 90 degrees.

A Couple of Experiences Concerning My Father
 

By:  rupertoc@qvsd.org
 

I have had a few paranormal experiences. I come from a family that is very well educated and rather skeptical in nature. My father was a USAF Colonel and flew the most sophisticated, fastest airplane in service to date - the SR71. He absolutely had nerves of steel. However, he ended his life a member of MUFON, and an expert researcher of UFO sightings. He never said he believed in UFOs, only that he researched the possibilities...
The two incidences I wish to tell you about concern my father, who died of leukemia at age 64. He lived on a lake outside of Spokane, Washington. I live in Pennsylvania. During the 10 months of Dad's illness, my husband and I flew back and forth several times, last visiting with him at the end of May. I somehow knew he had about 6 weeks to live. He was still fairly active and hated discussing his illness, but I knew anyway. I was relieved when my brother and then my sister came to see him and stayed to care for him in his beautiful lake home. My brother lived an hour away, so he was readily availabe; my sister is a nurse who had cared for terminally ill people before and flew free through her pilot husband. It was summer, so my sister (who teaches nursing) was on vacation - you can see this was the best situation. My husband and I both work and the traveling was getting rather expensive. The deal was that my brother and sister would call us when my father's condition became such that death was imminent. We would come for our final goodbyes.  The call came one evening. My sister said we'd better come as soon as possible. I found that the earliest available flight was not the next day, but the day after that. We started laundry and made the phone calls to arrange care for the pets and my son. Then, exhausted, we went to bed.
I awoke around dawn. I went to the bathroom and came back to bed. As I was trying to get comfortable, I heard my father's voice say, "Christy." (He was the only person who called me this) I rolled over and my father was standing next to the bed. He said, "I just want you to know that I did my best." For some reason, I wasn't scared at all. The next instant, he was gone.
I woke up again later and at the time attributed what had happended to a dream, even though I really knew that although I was "out of it", I had been awake.  I didn't call my father's house the next day because I knew phone calls would disturb them. My sister had sounded like they had their hands full as my father's faculties began failing. But, she called me that evening. I asked her how things were going. She said that Dad had slipped into a coma at around 2:30 in the morning. They then tried to sleep off and on during the day and evening, while keeping vigil.
I was really surprised, because he was still aware and coherent when we last touched base. However, when I thought about it,the time coincided with when he visited me, being in the eastern time zone. I think he came to tell me that although he was often absent when I was young and rather hard-edged and distant as I grew older, that he had done the best that he could. Once upon a time I felt like he just didn't care. Now I understand that all any of us can do is the best we can with the cards we are dealt in life.
The next item is really, really strange. I don't know if it'll translate well to print, however. My dad died a seven months after I married my second husband. My ex-husband was still living in our old home and I still had some things boxed up in the basement. Things like old Christmas decorations that I didn't really need and what not.
Well, my husband Rick and I had just returned from the "good bye" trip that turned out to be my father's funeral trip. We were still unloading my Dad's Pathfinder (we drove back) and my ex called. He had finally (three years after our divorce) cleaned out the basement. There were a couple boxes that I might want. I told him to bring them on over, the house was going to be full of "stuff" from my dad's a little more wouldn't hurt. Two boxes came. Curious, I opened the first. Christmas junk. I set that aside and opened the second. Sitting on top of everything else was a brand new blue leather photo album. I thought, "What the hell is this?" All our photo albums have been red leather - I didn't recognize it at all - and thought I had taken all the albums that I should have.
I could not believe my eyes. Upon opening the book I came upon a note on the back of one of my Dad's business cards. It read, "Christy's book." Within it were all the old pictures from my childhood that my father had been holding on to. Some I had never seen. Being in a military family, we didn't keep much as we moved from place to place. We have very few truly prized posessions, but photos are at the top of the list. I had, up to this point, never seen the book. Yet, it had been packed away in a box in my ex-husband's basement over three years, only to appear JUST as we are coming from my dad's funeral.  Another strange thing is that the book contains pictures of my brother's grave. Stephen died in Africa before I was ever even thought of. I believe it was 1958. The pictures of my brother's grave are in color and look absolutely BRAND NEW. There are piles and piles of flowers on the grave, so I know it was just after the burial. Also, it's in Libya. Believe me, my father was a world traveler, but he wouldn't have set foot in that country again. The pictures are in very stark contrast to the faded, wrinkled, sometimes black and white photos taken of me - and I was born in 1961. I've shown people the book
while I've told the story and it freaks them out pretty good. The pictures look like they were developed yesterday.

A Bad Night's Sleep
 

By: jeff@mail.intlsensor.com

May 10, 2000: I'm new to this site, and am amazed that there are so many people who have had otherworldly experiences. I had no idea! I have always been interested in the paranormal, but not much in that regard has ever happened to me, except for the thing I'm about to relate. I've always felt that some people are more attuned to the beyond than others. While I have been to many haunted places like Gettysburg, the Queen Mary, and both Whaley house and the Hotel del Coronado in San Diego, I felt nothing (of course, I didn't ask to stay in any of the haunted rooms in those places either). But in March of 1986 something happened that scared me very badly, although I'm not sure whether it was really a haunting or not. Here it is:Single at the time, I was moving from Houston, Texas to Southern California. I decided to take a leisurely drive along the I-10 all the way out. Leaving in the evening, I stayed the first night in a Holiday Inn in San Antonio, then set out the next morning across the state of Texas. It was a beautiful drive and I was in a great mood. That night I stopped in a small town named Van Horn, east of El Paso. I don't remember the name of the little motel I stayed at, but it wasn't a chain; it was a family owned business with rooms structured like garden apartments all strung together, and the adjoining restaurant
had really good food.That night I kicked back and watched a Charles Bronson movie while having a couple beers. NOTE: I was NOT drunk. By eleven I was pretty tired and went to bed. I don't know if I dropped off right away, but soon I was aware that I was lying there wideawake for some reason. Slowly it dawned on me that I was hearing noises in the bathroom.The room was pretty basic: You go in the door and the bathroom is on the right, and the room itself is straight ahead, with the bed off to the side. At first I thought it was just plumbing noises, but the more I listened, I became sure it was the sound of someone moving around in there, puttering around by the sink. I was sure that someone was in there. I figured that somehow my door was ajar and someone had wandered in and was using the bathroom by mistake. Slowly I got up and rounded the corner - the bathroom was dark and no one was there; my door was locked securely.Well, I didn't think my assumption about a stranger made any sense anyway, so I just stood there frowning. The noises had stopped. Shrugging, I went back to bed. I lay there for some time listening, but no further sounds were evident. Just as I was dropping off to sleep again, those same weird sounds started up again. I was starting to get the creeps. I tried to tell myself that I was hearing someone in an adjoining room; you know how you can hear others surprisingly loudly based on the local acoustics in motel rooms.
That's what I told myself, but I kept hearing it, and I didn't beleive it. And those swishing and clattering sounds seemed to be repeating themselves somehow, if that makes sense. Well, I got up again and went to look, and again the noises stoppedimmediately when I rounded the corner. Once inside the bathroom itself, all seemed normal.
This went on a few more times until about 2:00 or 3:00 AM, until I was pretty flustered. Finally at about 3:30 AM I was lying there hearing this crap and still telling myself that it was someone in another room. Then suddenly I remembered what the proprietor at the check-in desk told me - that I pretty much had the whole wing there to myself. It was off season. Then I freaked out totally. I jumped upand packed furiously, muttering to myself the whole time. Timidly I went into the bathroom (which quieted down again naturally) and got my stuff. I took off out of there right away at 4:00 AM. I was so rattled it didn't occur to me to ask anyone at the desk what might have happened in that little room. The guy there just asked if everything was OK, since I was looking pretty screwed up by that point. But I said nothing and just drove off down the freeway.
By noon I started to calm down. By that evening I had convinced myself that I was just being utterly stupid and a
scairdy-cat for no reason. But I've never forgotten those eerie sounds, like someone just puttering around in the bathroom at the sink. I didn't notice if anything had been moved around in there during the experience.
Well, that's it. Not very dramatic I suppose, but I was really unnerved, and I still can't explain any of it. If anyone has any ideas or comments, please e-mail me at jeff@intlsensor.com. I'd really like to hear from you. Thanks for reading this.