If You Feel Judged, That Would Be Me

I want to start doing book reviews on here again, only, you know, better this time. But I'm always torn between not saying enough about the book and possibly saying too much.

Maybe this time I'll be able to strike a balance. We'll see.

In the mean time, I'm working late tonight - the guy who usually works weekends is in Cuba visiting his family with his son - and listening to my podcasts. The one I'm listening to right now is Real Ghost Stories Online.

Basically, people call or write in to this podcast which is run by a husband and wife and tell their 'haunting' story. I use the quotes because sometimes I'm certain that these people are definitely making a mountain out of a molehill or are misinterpreting what is happening around them. They believe, so they believe that everything is a ghost or a demon or what have you. Which is just ridiculous, and I say that as someone who really does believe in ghosts.

Also, the people calling in clearly do not practice what they're going to say before they say it. Which they really should because my God, so many of them ramble and go on tangents and I would really like them to stop that. This is not, most of the time, a live call-in show. The calls are recorded and then played later, or the emails are read out loud by the husband half of the hosting team.

Anyway. For an example of people who are interpreting something wrongly (in my opinion), there was a woman who called into the show a couple of episodes back from what I'm listening to now. Her grandparents were apparently murdered and it was gruesome and horrible. After the murders, she started having nightmares about a 'woman' showing up in her room at night with her grandfather's head, demanding that she look at it. She wouldn't, and the woman would eventually go away in the nightmare.

The hosts validated her belief that it was some sort of spirit visiting her but reassured her that it was probably just a 'predator' ghost and not a demon.

Or maybe she's just dealing with a really traumatic experience via her subconscious. But that's not even brought up. Maybe I shouldn't blame them, I mean the show is supposed to be about ghosts, right? But if you believe everything that's thrown at you, there's no...standard, I guess. I think, if something has an alternate, realistic explanation then that's the explanation. It's only once you hit the wall of normal explanations that you can go to the supernatural.

I believe I've seen ghosts. But I also admit to myself and everyone else that there is a good chance that there are other explanations for what I saw or what happened. I don't go around declaring every bump in the night or speck of dust a ghost.

Because I'm a reasonable human being, okay?

ALSO, it seems like every other caller/writer on this story is an 'empath'.

That's not a real thing.

That's not a real thing the way Hannibal uses it, though I'll allow it since it's a *fictional* show about the love between two *very* strange, lonely men.

That's not a real thing the way they mean it.

Ah, Inigo Montoya. You feel my pain.

People can be empathetic. They can feel *empathy* for other people. But you do not literally experience other peoples' emotions as if they are your own. It's...it doesn't work that way.

It's not a real thing.

Then again, psychics. *throws confetti in the air* I don't believe in them either. So maybe my chakras are blocked or something.

Okay, that was a little sarcastic.

Still true.

Unrelated, I love how I already had tags for every random thing in this post.

I'm consistent.

Additionally unrelated. I never get rid of anything that might still be useful. So I still have my scarves and snoods and such. I've discovered that snoods are fabulous for doing yard work since I've grown my hair out. It's long enough that even putting it up in a pony tail doesn't get it off of my neck and it's too thick to do that doubled up thing that some girls do. All that ever manages is to make me cut the hair tie out later so I don't rip off my scalp.

Score one for the snood.