Entry 8: The Haunted Train

"The legend of the haunted train!" Oh brother, have you ever heard something so stupid?

It's like old people have nothing better to do than sit around and make up stories they feel are half as exciting as they wish their lives COULD have been.

I was walking down the street when I just happened to overhear…

"Did I ever tell you boys about the time I worked for the railroad...and first heard the legend of the haunted train?!"

Practically every kid on the block made sure to get a front row seat for the old prune's 'urban legend.' Pttss...bet Geraldo was kicking himself for never having heard that one. Oh brother.

According to Mr. Storyteller of the Year, flickering lights, crappy music, and a long ride with no air fresheners was supposed to be the scariest experience on the planet.

Perhaps it would have been...had I believed a word of his malarkey!

"I don't believe a word of it! I won't physical evidence! Indirect photography! Ectoplasmic samples! Physical energy fields!"

"Some things can't be proven with scientific evidence. It's a question of faith."

Pttss...faith! Like I was supposed to believe there's a train driven around town by a ghost!

Football head decides to test my confidence by challenging me to show up at that piece of junk train station an hour after the street lights came on.

I wasn't scared of his lame test. I wasted my Saturday night at the station listening to him and Geraldo audition to be the next harmonica playing engineer.

"That's it! I'm out of here! There is no haunted train! There is no mad engineer! And you two chuckleheads are driving me nuts! And stop playing that harmonica!"

After my beloved pointed out the noise wasn't coming from him, he, Geraldo and I made our way onto what seemed to be a train with a blinding light.

Blinding light? Pttss... So what if it was one of the signs. Any light will blind any idiot who stares at it long enough.

Then I notice a disgusting stinch that Geraldo seemed to believe was me denying I had ripped one. Oh brother.

After deciding it smelled like rotten eggs, another coincidence, I began to hear the most horrifyingly ear-splitting music! It made football head's crappy harmonica performance not seem like such a bad thing to listen to.

My nerves may have begun to have gotten the best of me after that…

"We're all gonna die! We're all gonna die! I do believe in mad engineers! I do believe in haunted trains! I do! I do! I do!"

Hey! Would you be calm as could be if you were riding what was said to be a 'ghost train' without any explanation as to why every sign from it's haunted story was happening one by one?!

Trying to get ahold of myself didn't go as planned when the lights began to flicker on and off. What kind of workers don't bother to replace their crappy merchandise when the time comes? Sheesh!

Football head's need to relieve himself and Geraldo from their boredom had lead to nothing but me feeling as though I was on the verge of my deathbed. I fell to my knees, feeling my neck growing warmer and warmer, knowing we must be approaching the firey underworld.

I might as well say we did. I turned around to see Brainy standing there. I don't know if the loser was stalking me as always, or if he just needed a lift somewhere. Well, I took care of that for him, when the guys held open the door for me to throw his wheezing butt out into the river.

Having took care of his wheezing self, I turned around to see Geraldo pointing to our unwanted destination.

"I see it! I see the fire!"

My beloved as usual, came up with a plan. He and Geraldo grabbed the fire extinguisher from the back of the train, as I stood aside and shouted…

"Ready! Aim! Fire!"

Did we hit our target? Yes. Was it an actual fire demon? Pttss...what do YOU think?

That was when the UN-ghostly engineer decided to come back to see what all the fuss was about.

"No one's allowed on this train except for the steel mill workers."

Apparently his excuse for the signs was that the train wasn't haunted, just a cheap piece of junk.

Well now that that's over and my logical sense has once again outweighed football head's dream big imagination, maybe I can get some shut eye!