The last day of the Big Bad Blogger Challenge

I'm sorry it's over! I had a great time with it and it really helped me get back into blogging. I loved discovering all these new blogs so thank you Alicia! It was a great idea and I'm so happy I did it! I'm going to try and keep it up every day even when I don't have anything "blog worthy" to talk about. It's a good writing exercise and helps me think through any issues or thoughts I have going around in my head.

Last night I had quite the experience. I was watching a show on ghost-hunting and it was very entertaining. I went on the internet and searched for haunted places in my area. Lo and behold I found something immediately about the bridge over the river Rick and I go to all the time. Apparently it's got quite a spooky past and has had numerous ghost sightings and weird happenings. So I told Rick and he suggested we drive down there at midnight and try and catch a ghost on film. I know this might seem weird but sometimes we get carried away with just being silly. We packed the camera and a rattle to scare away ghosts. We packed a hideously ugly "voodoo doll" we had and a baggie full of crushed garlic just in case there were vampires. We were laughing and just being silly. We even brought the guitar for some strange reason. The car was packed full of junk. We drove down there and spent about 10 minutes trying to take pictures but we couldn't really capture anything because it was so dark. It was very creepy. Almost pitch dark with the mountains looming above us. We heard some very strange, loud, metallic sounds and were starting to let our imagination run away with us. We both headed back towards the car and Rick got really freaked out when he almost tripped over the backpack we had left on the side of the road. He swears it moved.

We hadn't driven a mile when three police cars stopped us. They had police dogs barking their heads off in the back and they all got out and came over to us to question us. I wasn't nervous because I knew we hadn't done anything wrong and we didn't have anything to hide but it was a bit strange and I had this insane urge to start laughing hysterically. Apparently it's a big drug area there at night. People go there to do their nefarious business because it's so dark and isolated. So the police thought we were up to no good. They asked Rick all these questions about who he was and how old and where he worked and if he's ever been arrested. Then they asked me the same questions. They even made Rick sit on the ground while they questioned him. I got to stay in the car. They were VERY suspicious and weren't buying the explanation that we had gone out there to try and catch a ghost on film. Rick said they could take a look at the car if they wanted. This was when the fun began.

The police searched very thoroughly. Out came the guitar and the voodoo doll and the rattle. One cop pounced gleefully on the bag of garlic and then looked very disgusted when he smelled it. One cop scrolled through all the pictures on the camera. Mostly of darkness, a few of some random trees and some graffiti on the bridge. A few of Rick holding a flashlight up to his face and looking spooky. I was almost hysterical with laughter at this point because it was just so hilarious watching the cops go through all our strange, random props. The car needs to be cleaned. It's very cluttered. I felt kind of bad for the police having to sift through all our stuff. Sleeping bags from a camping trip, a bag of toothpicks, so many CD's and tapes and candy wrappers and a broken dashboard hula monkey.

Eventually, the cops had to admit that they hadn't found anything incriminating even though we were obviously some of the most eccentric people they had ever questioned. They just couldn't fathom why anyone would want to go ghost-hunting at midnight. They were quite nice and polite after they realized we weren't doing anything wrong. They apologized for the inconvenience and just warned us that it might not be a good idea to wander around out there at night. Rick and I drove home laughing our heads off and I've been laughing all day about the incident. I loved seeing how strange we are through other people's eyes. I'll never forget the sight of that poor police officer with a voodoo doll in one hand and a bag of garlic in the other!!