'I'm always looking for the Hows and the Whys and the Whats,' said Muskrat, 'That is why I speak as I do. You've heard of Muskrat's Much-in-Little, of course?'
'No,' said the child. 'What is it?'
- The Mouse and his Child. Russell Hoban.

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Wednesday 8 February 2012

Who Ya Gonna Call?


One dark night a few weeks back I was feeling my way across the lounge to the kitchen for the proverbial glass of water, when I just about leapt out of my skin. There, on the newly-painted white wall was a smear of slowly-moving ectoplasm.

No, nothing so exciting as an apparition from 'Ghost Busters' (why do I like that silly music so much?).

It took me a few heart-stopping seconds to work out what it was.
The glow from the street-lamp, now unimpeded by the palm that we recently removed, was shining through the warped old windows. But it was first being broken up by the gently moving leafy twigs of the oak tree way down at the letterboxes.

As you can see, the effect is quite spooky. You'll have to imagine the wraith-like movements. There was only a light breeze, so it was quite slow, like drifting smoke.

The first is an oblique view along the wall.



In this one, you can just make out the shape of branches...



Close up, it looks like ripples on a stream-bed.



2 comments:

  1. Nature's art. I can well understand why it spooked you. I find one of the problems of the night is that reason is so easily overtaken by irrational reactions to things - such as my very noisy fridge or things that walk across the roof of The Cottage.

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  2. Things That Walk On Roofs - that reminds me of my sister thinking there was a 'man in boots' on the roof once. She nearly shrieked the house down. A possum of course. We had dormer windows in our upstairs attic bedroom and the roof went right past them on an angle, so she saw the shadow of the 'man' as well. Brrr!

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