I was just getting to the 3rd paragraph of the story I was telling when I accidentally hit the "delete" key and erased it all. Please excuse the mood and shortness that will undoubtedly be cast over this entry.

Phone calls from people you love that you aren't expecting are always good. I received one such call on Saturday from Matt, who had been on mini-vacation with his family since Friday. He had the wonderful idea of visiting a haunted lighthouse he had just been to.... The strange thing about this is that when he called me he was still in Standish. So the plan was to see if Jennifer wanted to come (the lighthouse is close to Alpena), arrive home, load up my stuff and then head back up. And this is just what we did. We arrived at Jennifer's at 11:45 PM and quickly set out for the lighthouse. On the way we discussed scary things to get ourselves worked up, and imagined all sorts of horrible things that could happen ("Murders happen here." Me while driving down a lonely, curvey, forest surrounded road). We drove through the deserted park that housed the lighthouse and parked our car in the opening of the path to the house. It was very cold and windy and we were on a lake. The path was about a mile long and full of nice creepy noises to get you going. Pine trees creaked in the wind and unknown creatures rustled bushes.

Finally we were at the lighthouse, a small, squat, white lighthouse that is said to be haunted by the ghost of the guy who worked hard to have it restored. After he passed, the house lost its funding and its restoration ceased. According to Matt's mom, they met the man while he was alive when Matt was a kid. She was really creeped out because the guy wanted them to go in the house very badly.

So anyway, the lighthouse is supposed to light up even though there is no light inside anymore. Unfortunately, we didn't see it do so, but I must admit that I thought I saw other flashes of light in the surrounding woods. Matt also got a creepy feeling about the place. We got to stand on part of the frozen lake for awhile while our chins froze off.

The rest of the visit with Jennifer was fun. We convinced Matt to drive us to the Community College to throw the raw Dejorno pizza at the door and their impressive statue of Paul Bunyan. The first half splattered pleasingly on the side walk of the school, and now it is just waiting for some student who is on the brink of suicide to step in it. The other half was by far the best, donning a dust mask found in Matt's glove compartment(!?), I ran out to the statue of Paul Bunyan and posed for a pretend picture with my arms in the air and my face pointed skyward. I then proceeded to launch the pile of thawed, greasy pizza at the general direction of Paul Bunyan's loins. I did manage to hit him in the abdomen with a resounding metallic "bonk". I was laughing so hard I could scarcely make my get away. Ah I love Alpena!

Love,