Be Afraid...be very afraid

Ok always leave your readers wanting more eh.?
I did a shift last night at Samaritans and didn't get home until 11.30
By the time I had fed and walked the dogs it was midnight
So I was in bed a few minutes after the witching hour
I had almost fallen asleep 
When I heard it
coming out of the dark.....
The hesitant plink plonk of a musical box coming from Chris' office
The music started, stopped, started again  and stopped again
And William, who was lying next to me started to growl.
I put my head under the duvet and all was quiet again
But
A few seconds later it started again
Plink......plonk......plink
This went on for a few minutes more
Then it stopped

Chris rang this morning
Apparently it happens occasionally
since he tinkered with the mechanism 
NOW HE TELLS ME



88 comments:

  1. OMW That IS scary. Did William also creep under the duvet with you?

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    1. I was up turning on the lights by that stage

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  2. Brilliant! I read the first post about half an hour ago, and have been coming back for the " denouement " every few minutes…..thank goodness you have posted before I have to go out with the pup!! Have a nice day, as they say!

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  3. Is he 'gaslighting' you perchance?
    Run, John, we'll save you.
    lol
    x

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  4. LOL! That would have had me quaking too. Will it stop if you leave the lid open?

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    1. It's been tinkling away again this morning....bloody thing

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  5. Reminds me of the time when I kept hearing random saxophone music in my flat. Eventually transpired that our remote doorbell had tuned into a neighbours doorbell which played sax everytime their doorbell rang. I thought I was going mad.

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  6. .........like straight out of a horror movie!!!

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  8. and it was Paranormal Witness night on TV!

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  9. eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek! I'd be scared shitless too! the dogs will protect you!

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  10. cripes ... id be off .x

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  11. Be honest: you rang Chris in the middle of the night.

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  12. Funk that for a game of soldiers .....I would rather sleep in the car than have that going on ..

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  13. I feel a bit let down John …… I was hoping for some ghostly apparitions, ectoplasm, spirits and the paranormal, even aliens would have been good ….. not a poxy musical box !!!!!!!!!! Sorry John ….. love you !! XXXX

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  14. Naaah it was definitely ghosts.....

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  15. I was scared just playing the clip......worse than any ghoul!

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  16. You effing drama queen. You had all sorts of U.S. Christian fundamentalists praying for you last night - all because of a music box.

    Well, Pandora is out of it now. Expect some real visitations in the nights to come. Now I am really praying for you...

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    1. Anonymous1:16 pm

      Tom, I'd recommend your comment on many counts a thousand times. However, it's me who holds the record of being a drama queen and - on top of it - sit on Pandora's box to keep all ills in. Unfortunately, like John's the other day, there are holes. With the best will of my world I can't keep them all watertight. So, whatever you do, don't read the news. Ever. Your faith in the world will be eroded and, worse, you'll ask yourself where the good fairy was at inception.

      U

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    2. How VERY dare you Thomas!
      Meeeeee a ddddrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaammmmmmmaaaaaa queen?
      Never
      ( swishes away in a cloud of channel no 5 )

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    3. There is a hole in the thing you use to sit on Pandora's box, and this is where I guess the spirits are getting in/out. The news for me is breaking constantly in a little village called Trelawnyd,

      'Channel No. 5' sums it all up - up being the key word, (Did you mean, 'Chanel'?...)

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    4. I did
      Automatic spell check didn't
      Trelawnyd is a sleepy little village.......just like the set of
      Rosemary's Baby

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  17. I am glad it turned out to be a funny situation.

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  18. Spooky!
    I hope you moved the box to a different place in case it happens again................there's always the chance that Chris knows the house is haunted and just wanted to reassure you.............

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  19. Is there also a gateway to hell in the cellar?

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  20. feets don't fail me now!

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  21. That music box needs to be moved to the trunk of Chris' car...pronto

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  22. When your dogs hair stands on end you know there's a ghost about.

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  23. Anonymous1:19 pm

    Gosh wouldn't that give you the chills? Especially when your dogs reacted to it. You know I lay awake half the night worrying about you? Don't do that to us again lol.

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  24. Sounds haunted to me.

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  25. What song was it playing, or did you notice?

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    1. It's a classical tune but I'll be f&cked if I remember it

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  26. That would have freaked me out too, esp since William barked!

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  27. My dog only barks or growls very rarely, and only for a good reason- I would have been seriously freaked out too! Glad you are ok.

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  28. Tell the truth, dear John, you were shiting yourself thinking it to be a ghost, were you not? xx

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  29. You sound pretty sure about this. I don't know.....

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  30. Next time see if you can't work up a farting chorus to go along. Sorry you missed out on a good night's sleep, but it's all in the name of entertaining your faithful followers.

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  31. Place the Bastards at the door and that should b e good protection!

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  32. BTW.............Albert was mooching around the office...I suspect it was him that set the bloody thing off

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  33. Even before I feed the diabetic dog plus meds I had to read your post. After reading it I thought of "Gaslight: too.
    I will be almost asleep and thehamish will all of a sudden tense raise his head and growl very low. After a few times I realize that it is usually a javelina, coyote or fox moseying by. Early morning I have to be careful of mountain lions and bobcats though.

    cheers, parsnip

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  34. Are you sure it wasn't one of the geese that had crept in, just to let you know who is boss?

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  35. Haha, you had me worried ..... YOU BIG WUSS!!

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  36. Or did he just tell you that to calm your nerves. The music box probably is haunted....

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  37. Cool! You had me going.

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  38. I think I would have remained rational until the dog growled. Then I may have had to change my pjs.

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  39. It's 'heebie jeebie time' down on the farm...

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  40. Well, at least you have a good explanation for the nighttime noises! Got your blood moving well, I'm sure!

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  41. That sort of thing we take in our stride after living with a house ghost for the last 35 years. I have posted about life with Lucy back in September 4th through the 10th of 2010. Last Saturday we had two friends over for an evening of board games and Lucy sat in the rocking chair three feet from one of our guests, rocking quite fast for about ten minutes. We can always tell she is in the room because we get a rush of cold air.

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    1. Off to read of your ghost' s exploits
      Hope I don't frighten myself

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  42. Very Hitchcockian. With the William growling and all the carrying on, I expected to hear that the devil had made a personal appearance at the cottage. A defective music box is a bit of a let down, but then I suppose it was one of those "You had to be there" moments.
    I check back to see if any more strange things happens today, like - When you go out to feed the animals & notice that Bingley is moaning your name in a strange manly deep voice. Suddenly, Bingleys' beady eyes are glowing white orbs in the misty twiligh of the desolate Welsh countryside. As his head begins randomly spinning in circles, Bingley begins to waddle creepily towards you across the field. You become aware that he is heading for the hatchet next to the wood pile. RUN,JOHN, RUN for YOUR LIFE!!! Now that would require a stiff drink & leaving all the lights on.
    Hope you sleep like a baby tonight.

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  43. Very gothic Ellen............you should write a ghost story

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  44. soooooooooo creepy !

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  45. I think you need to find a large hammer and use it on the musical part of that box!

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  46. I'd be tinkering the business end of the apparatus right out of that box.

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  47. I hope you don't have a clown doll in the house anywhere!

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  48. well now, how do you intend on getting back at Chris for his tinkering and scaring the hair off your chest?

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  49. The music box would be sleeping with The Bastards tonight if it were me.

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  50. Lol...we have a ship's clock that occasionally decides to sound twelve bells, ordinarily it is silent.
    ~Jo

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  51. That would put the heebies up me too - one for the bin when he wasn't looking.

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  52. I would have been a bit unnerved by a mysterious nocturnal plinking and plonking as well.

    My granny had a musical box that played Greensleeves, and she played it about very half hour. I absolutely hate that tune....

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  53. Nick....
    You mentioned your granny's" musical box"
    Tom Stephenson is sure to

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  54. John,

    Beautiful music box. Chris should have said something to you.
    Nothing like being startled a wake to a surprise.

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    1. It's not that pretty but it does have sentimental connections for chris.....
      It stil freaks me out x

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  55. That's a creepy bloody music box. Couldn't wait to wake up this morning and check your blog to find out what the hell had frightened the wits out of you (Australian time). :-)

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    1. I am enjoying playing Jamie lee curtis

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  56. It has a corpse in it. A very, very small corpse.

    Love,
    Janie

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  57. John, this fright night of yours reminded me of the Dybbuk box story of a few years ago - reported to hold a fiendish devil. Whatever you do DO NOT open the box. You should really be on the stage!!!!!! You really got us all going,

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  58. I would have thought more likely to be a spirit of some sort. And maybe still so. Perhaps Chris upset the spirit after tinkering with the box. ;-)
    Have a great weekend!

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  59. I think I saw that on an episode of a show in the US called "A Haunting". It started with a music box playing in the night, progressed to apparitions, and ended with the family fleeing in the middle of the night...

    Or something like that..... :-)

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  60. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

    seriously; i would be sleeping with a big butcher knife AND all the lights on...heck, forget the sleeping!

    xoxo

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  61. That would have done my head in. And I would have given Chris an earful when he confessed. I hope you did.

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  62. Derek Acorah still wants to come and check it out (he needs the work).

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  63. I would have moved it to the car for the night. maybe someone has been winding it too much?

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  64. OMG! I had such a similar experience. In late 1994, I was going through a particularly tough time in my life. It was the first time I didn’t have the benefit of my mother’s advice or support. My mother had passed earlier that year in May.

    I spent many a night unable to sleep, my mind spinning with so many thoughts trying to sort out my troubles at the time, and inevitably tangling a myriad of past events and experiences, and their impact on my psyche into the mix. It was all too much. If I was going to reach a positive outcome to my difficulties it was imperative that I be lucid. I could not afford to allow complex emotions cloud my judgements. In an effort to sort it all out and get to that point, I spent countless hours during those sleepless nights writing down everything swirling in my head. And then it started...plink. Then nothing. Initially, I thought maybe I was hearing things. Time passed. Plink...plink plink. This repeated almost nightly for several weeks. I was at a total loss as to what it was or where it was coming from. But soon my thoughts (or shall I say the rantings in my head) became secondary to finding the source. As soon as I would hear the first plink, the world ceased to exist. My sole focus was rooting out this mysterious random plinking, a tone here, a tone there. I can only imagine how mad I would've appeared, especially given my state of mind at the time, silently poised, sometimes for hours, waiting for the next plink . Ultimately, I succeeded, I found the source of my discontent. And then, it never plinked again. It stopped, just like that.

    I was the executrix of my mother's estate. To add insult to injury during this same time, I was in the throws of going through her home (where my brothers & I were born & raised), disposing her worldly possessions and a lifetime of memories. Several weeks prior, I found a Snoopy, the Red Baron, music box from the early 70's which had belonged to my brother. It was a bi-wing airplane with Snoopy in the cockpit, made from wood. It had not been wound in years. I brought it home and placed it on the bookshelf. What would cause it, after several weeks to suddenly randomly plink one note here and there? Why did it stop? Normally I would have been afraid, very afraid, just as you said. but honestly, I instinctively felt it was my mother's energy letting me know, or possibly helplessly agonizing from beyond, I don’t know, but she was with me, watching over me during those most difficult of times. It never plinked a tone after that point. But oh how I wished it would have. I longed for it to plink. All these years later, there are still days I long to hear just one plink, if only to reassure me she is still with me. Your story brought it all back to me & as I type these words I'm longing yet again....Thank you for reminding me of my mother's love.

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