The Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters Club

Greetings once again good people of the Internet. It has been a while since my last report of paranormal activity in the Midwest area, but I assure you this does not mean we at the club are slacking off on our ghostly investigations. Although now that I am back to writing every week again after the various threats against my life and my loved ones, making me cut back my time curing cancer in homeless retarded puppies, I am still as devoted as ever to discover the truth behind the haunting in my regional area. Thanks the club's vice president Josh "Livestock" Boruff's active recruitment techniques involving delicious mixed drinks and a sprinkle of Spanish fly, our ranks have grown in number. We even bought some really cool ghost hunting equipment like an animal tag gun we acquired from a nature preserve so if we are able to capture a ghost we can tag its ear and track its eating habits. This is not to say we haven't had a few setbacks though. One of our members, who goes by the name of Dan Esteece, defected from the club and spoke out against the existence of ghosts, exclaiming that they are the inventions of a hyperactive imagination that can be explained scientifically. We challenged him to a public debate on the matter, and when he showed up we stoned him harshly with our ghost debate rocks. Take that non-believer!

Once the muffler of the Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters Club’s Escort was fixed, we were able to do some more research out in the field. The locations we investigate are haunted spots which are picked by clairvoyant dreams sent to me by the spirits during my afternoon naps. If after having one of these dreams my sheets are moist and fragrant, this means I will bring it before the ghost council for a vote. Although the vote is merely a formality, and only my decision as the club's founder and elite ghost hunter extraordinaire really counts, it makes the club feel like a democracy even though it's really a dictatorship running behind a puppet government. The sites we've visited in the last couple months have been quite exhilarating and a learning experience, as well as a nice tax write-off. Please print these reports so you can add them to your ghost files, and then send three box tops of Boo Berry cereal to our head office and we'll give you the secret decoder ring to find the hidden message. ~Hidden Message: I slept with your mother.~

The Hotel of Horror
History: The history of the Overlook Hotel dates back as far as the 1920's during the prosperous time of flappers and gangsters, where parties would go on into the night. The caretaker of this establishment was a very valuable man to the hotel, especially during the winter months when the hotel was all but deserted. But the long winter had a terrible effect on his mind, and one day he went insane and killed his family with an axe, and then filled the elevators with their blood so when somebody would open them they would get totally owned by a blood tidal wave. Years later, another caretaker took over and the same thing happened to him. After having a brief affair with a sea hag, he decided to chop his wife and son up with an axe. But really I don’t blame him because his wife was a really whiney scarecrow of a woman that would drive anybody insane. In the end, the boy outwitted the father in a hedge maze, and the father froze to death with a really funny expression on his face. In this investigation, we hope to uncover what really happened at the Overlook Hotel and get some pictures of that really hot chick in the tub before she turns into the ugly droopy old lady.
Midwest Internet Ghost Hunter Report: As we drove to the Overlook Hotel in the Ghost Hunter Escort, I debriefed the team on the history of the hotel and what kind of trouble they could expect. After telling them everything, there was a minor rebellion in the ranks as they claimed that I was just talking about the plot to the movie “The Shining”, and that the Overlook Hotel didn’t really exist. This angered me greatly so I pulled over for a pep talk using my natural leadership abilities and the “pep bat”. Once I had them all on my side again, we drove around all night trying to find the hotel. After the 6th hour I started to think that maybe my underlings were correct and I was just thinking of a movie I watched. In order to verify their suspicions, we stopped at Blockbuster and rented "The Shining". It was true, I must have been watching the movie while it was showing on late night TV and fallen asleep, thinking it was one of my ESP visions. The Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters club was pretty mad at me for wasting their time, so I busted out my illegal Internet copy of Return of the King from China. This won them over and we settled back for the rest of the night and watched the final chapter in this epic struggle of good over darkness.
Spook Factor: (A healthy three ghost rating for when Aragorn meets that scary ghost army and Legolas shoots an arrow at the ghost leader but it totally goes through his head. Stupid Elf!).

Farm of Fear
History: The legend of the Farm of Fear is spoken of in hushed whispers between farmers at blue ribbon fairs and pie eating contests. While farmers are known for their tall tales of lore to pass the time, this haunting is widely regarded as a true story in the farming community. Because of the large amount of animal killings that are commonplace on farms, sometimes the restless spirits of the wronged beasts will come back and haunt their former masters. The story goes that at this particular farm, there lived an extremely large and handsome hog called Harold. Harold was very well thought of on the farm by all the other animals, and looked up to by his fellow pigs. But the farmer, Old Man McGee, was a drunken brute of a man that would punch Harold harshly after long nights of drinking moonshine. On one such night, Harold had enough and bit the farmer on the knee. This enraged Old Man McGee, prompting him to bury his axe into poor Harold and killing him. Weeks later while he was drunk again, this time chasing chickens, he heard Harold's squeal pierce the darkness of the night. Old Man McGee stumbled backwards letting out a drunken wail of terror and screaming "Nooo! I killed you, you son of a bitch!" Then he backed up right into a thresher that Harold had turned on using his ghostly powers. Old Man McGee was shredded into ribbons, ending his reign of terror and providing a feast for all the farm animals that gathered around his remains. Our job as paranormal detectives is to see if this farm is still haunted by the restless sprit of Harold the hog.
Midwest Internet Ghost Hunter’s Report: The team arrived at the farm at approximately 18:00. We set up our base of operations in the barn, positioning the sensitive ghost recording equipment (tape recorder and some sketch artists) in various strategic positions. The smell was very unpleasant and one newbie lost his lunch, much to the amusement of the veteran ghost hunters. We sat around for a long time playing gin rummy in the hay, when we heard what sounded like a pig's squeal. The team assembled into their respective positions, and I readied my camera to capture the porkish ghost. Just as we all started to think it was our imaginations, a specter of a hog wandered into the barn, squealing in an ancient tongue I dare not repeat until the light of day. I bravely snapped this photo of the pig spirit as he was charging towards us. Josh took out the photon pack and blasted the ghost, knocking it against the back of the barn and filling the air with the smell of charred bacon. When the smoke cleared, it looked like we might have made a mistake, for before us lay a real hog, now dead due to the hole bored through its side. Just then, the new owner of the farm came running in with a shotgun and pelted our behinds with birdshot. We fled as fast as we could, leaving the angry farmer to tend to his dead pig. You might say that this outing was an epic failure, but I like to call it a reversal of success instead.
Spook Factor: (Lack of paranormal activity and the painful birdshot made this investigation totally suck).

The Haunted Hayride
History: One day I was sitting around watching that Fox reality show where a midget gets married (the whole concept is crazy!), and during a commercial break saw an advertisement for a local haunted hayride! During the commercial, they showed ghosts and ghouls jump out of cornfields and scare the children that are being pulled around the haunted site by a tractor. It was amazing that a spectral haunting of this level was captured on film and played on TV. I taped it when it came on again and showed the club at a special red alert meeting. If a haunting of this size was taking place under our very noses in our hometown, it was up to us to put a stop to it. We geared up with our ghost swords (mail order sabers that have been dipped in holy water) and ninja suits, ready to battle the legions of undead.
Midwest Internet Ghost Hunter’s Report: It was awesome. There was a man at the entrance collecting five dollars to be let into the grounds. I told him that it was sick that he was profiting off this phenomenon, but he just laughed and said he liked our costumes. We hopped on the hay wagon, knowing full well that we were walking right into an ambush. The driver of the tractor started to ramble on about the haunting in this area, and seemed a bit frightened. Then a multitude of ghosts and zombies sprang out from the corn and attacked the wagon! We screamed out the Ghost Hunter battle cry and pulled our swords, jumping from the wagon and into battle. The driver exclaimed, "Holy shit!" and ran away, obviously afraid of ghosts flanking us from all sides. Some of the ghosts fled from our sight, but some counter attacked, punching and kicking while yelling, "What the hell are you doing!?" The battle was hard, but in the end we drove off the foul spirits into the corn, probably back to their own dimension. We walked back to the Ghost Hunter Escort, exhilarated at our first victory over the forces of darkness, and as we drove away we saw a few police cars pull up, obviously bamboozled over the supernatural clues left behind. Silly cops, they will never learn the truth without thinking outside of the box.
Spook Factor: (A huge victory for the Midwest Internet Ghost Hunter Club, and it was good exercise too).

The Arby’s Encounter
History: This was not a planned investigation, and took place the same night as the haunted hayride outing. Feeling that we deserved a victory supper, the club stopped by an Arby's next to the interstate highway. What we discovered was truly frightening and made us question our own existence in this strange, strange world.
Midwest Internet Ghost Hunter Report: We entered the Arby's with rumbling stomachs, famished from the battle we just had with our enemies from the spirit realm. We all ordered combo meal number one from the pleasant lady working at the register and sat down to consume the food. But a strange thing happened when unwrapped our delicious looking roast beef sandwiches. The EMF reader we had with us started to pick up huge levels of activity around the hot sandwiches. We were amazed at this discovery and took pictures of the roast beef to document these findings. We questioned the manager of the origin of the meat and let him know that it was haunted, but he was an ignorant man and asked us to leave. We were planning to forgo our hunger and save the specimens, but Josh ate all the haunted roast beef sandwiches while we were looking the other way. When we got back to the lab and developed the film, we found some amazing evidence of class 4 spectral activity in the sandwiches. Later on during the night, Josh was afflicted with a severe case of the plop plops, concreting the evidence that the roast beef was indeed haunted. It was an amazing night of discovery.
Spook Factor: (A five rating was given for the fully documented spectral encounter of some really scary food and some non-haunted tasty curly fries).

Wow, don't all these adventures into the arcane sound exciting? If you live in the Midwest and would like to join our club, please send me your resume or qualifications. Please note that once you are a full member of the Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters Club, you may not leave without consent from the ghost council, all your property and valuables belong to the club, and you must cut all ties with your family and friends. If for some reason the U.S. Government tries to shut down the Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters Club by storming our facility with tear gas and sub-machine guns, please pick up your anti-matter eliminators (rifles) in an orderly fashion, and go to your designated defense locations. Just like in the X-files, the government is always trying to cover up any paranormal activity, so we must defend the truth to the death, even if that means strapping on a vest full of explosives and jumping into an ATF van. Also, we are changing our name from "The Midwest Internet Ghost Hunters Club" to "The Michigan Militia". We feel it rolls off the tongue easier. Until next time fellow ghost hunters, this is your friend Frolixo Von Paskiewicz, keeping the dream of a world without ghosts (and non-Aryans) alive.

– Reid "Frolixo" Paskiewicz