My Paranoid Delusions
I am not a fan of horror movies. Let’s just get that out in the open. I don’t dislike them either though, but the first one I remembered watching was some pretty heavy material, and I still haven’t found the guts to re-experience that particular nightmare. It was The Exorcist. My father loved watching horror movies, so every sunday we would get video cassettes from the rental guy. My brother used to invite all his friends to watch. I would almost always run out of the house screaming bloody murder within the first 15 minutes of the movie, which obviously made me the brunt of all jokes that day. I dealt with it because the alternative was to sit through two hours of torment.
After about 6 months of this torture, I figured out I need two props in order to watch any movie from the genre successfully: a big pillow, and someone to hide behind. The pillow to dig my face into and scream all the trauma into, as well as a way of only being able to watch a certain slice of the actual screen I’m watching the movie on. My theory is that it the percentage of the screen surface I can actually see, equals the percentage of full-on horror I will be consuming (with 100% being all the horror the movie has to offer). The other person will just have to get used to the fact that I’m not going to let go once I’ve grabbed on (which happens earlier on in the movie, the scarier it is, obviously). We will be taking bathroom breaks simultaneously (and only when I say so).
Yeah, watching a horror movie with me is not a pleasant experience for everyone. I remember screaming, lots of pillow shuffling and toilet breaks where I would be jabbering about the whole time. My quirks were getting a little out of hand, okay maybe not a little; so, I gave up this not-so-pleasant hobby almost six years ago.
But when it comes to reading horror stories I am not as faint-hearted. I do indulge in the genre now and then. I am a big Stephen King fan, even though most of the stuff he writes gives me nightmares (I would not get into the specifics of me screaming my lungs off when someone knocked on my door when I reading Bag of Bones), but I read them anyway. Every time I go for Sunday book market I buy at least two King’s books. It’s a compulsion. Now, I have read almost all his books except for the Dark Tower series which I am in the middle of.
This brings us to now. After almost three years of hiatus I am reading an honest to god horror/fantasy series called Experiments in Terror. It’s about two amateur ghost hunters looking for a new story, very old school Mulder and Scully. I had these books on my Kindle for almost a month before I even tried to read them because 1. I don’t do horror stories these days and 2. The cover pages were really scary :(. But as it happens, I had come across so many good reviews for these series that I had to give them a chance and every one was gaga about the fourth book, which meant I had to read the first three.
I started with the series this Monday. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be too spooky for me. I was hooked to it because it was so refreshingly new and I loved the characters. So, I kept on reading till wee hours in the morning only to realize that I am alone in the house with the windows open. I like living by myself but that night I would have given anything to have my roommate sleeping in the next room (she was staying at her friends’). The creaky noises from my bed were freaking me out. I had to watch two episodes of Mindy Project to get my heartbeat back to normal. I decided then that I would read these novels only till 11 PM and then watch something distracting before going to sleep.
The problem with this plan is that I still am subconsciously recording the events in the novel for the last three days. After feeding my mind on ghosts and murder for so long things started appearing really sinister to me. I was scared. For three days I wouldn't enter my bathroom before switching on all the lights in the house or even look at the attic. I was panicked and my stomach hurt. I had planted my subconscious mind with information it couldn't really handle, and my paranoia was the consequence.
I still need to finish the series so I just have to just buckle up and deal with my paranoia for two more days and then I hopefully everything will be back to normal. I know, I sound stupid but I have to know what happens. I am still watching True Blood because that asshole of a director changed the story line from the books so I have to go through the torture just to find out how it’s going to end.
So, the conclusion is that I am still a chicken-shit when it comes to horror movies/books and I shouldn't do something so moronic again. Lesson learnt, if only I knew this about me last Friday when I was reading that idiotic blog post. We live and learn.
After about 6 months of this torture, I figured out I need two props in order to watch any movie from the genre successfully: a big pillow, and someone to hide behind. The pillow to dig my face into and scream all the trauma into, as well as a way of only being able to watch a certain slice of the actual screen I’m watching the movie on. My theory is that it the percentage of the screen surface I can actually see, equals the percentage of full-on horror I will be consuming (with 100% being all the horror the movie has to offer). The other person will just have to get used to the fact that I’m not going to let go once I’ve grabbed on (which happens earlier on in the movie, the scarier it is, obviously). We will be taking bathroom breaks simultaneously (and only when I say so).
Yeah, watching a horror movie with me is not a pleasant experience for everyone. I remember screaming, lots of pillow shuffling and toilet breaks where I would be jabbering about the whole time. My quirks were getting a little out of hand, okay maybe not a little; so, I gave up this not-so-pleasant hobby almost six years ago.
But when it comes to reading horror stories I am not as faint-hearted. I do indulge in the genre now and then. I am a big Stephen King fan, even though most of the stuff he writes gives me nightmares (I would not get into the specifics of me screaming my lungs off when someone knocked on my door when I reading Bag of Bones), but I read them anyway. Every time I go for Sunday book market I buy at least two King’s books. It’s a compulsion. Now, I have read almost all his books except for the Dark Tower series which I am in the middle of.
This brings us to now. After almost three years of hiatus I am reading an honest to god horror/fantasy series called Experiments in Terror. It’s about two amateur ghost hunters looking for a new story, very old school Mulder and Scully. I had these books on my Kindle for almost a month before I even tried to read them because 1. I don’t do horror stories these days and 2. The cover pages were really scary :(. But as it happens, I had come across so many good reviews for these series that I had to give them a chance and every one was gaga about the fourth book, which meant I had to read the first three.
I started with the series this Monday. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be too spooky for me. I was hooked to it because it was so refreshingly new and I loved the characters. So, I kept on reading till wee hours in the morning only to realize that I am alone in the house with the windows open. I like living by myself but that night I would have given anything to have my roommate sleeping in the next room (she was staying at her friends’). The creaky noises from my bed were freaking me out. I had to watch two episodes of Mindy Project to get my heartbeat back to normal. I decided then that I would read these novels only till 11 PM and then watch something distracting before going to sleep.
The problem with this plan is that I still am subconsciously recording the events in the novel for the last three days. After feeding my mind on ghosts and murder for so long things started appearing really sinister to me. I was scared. For three days I wouldn't enter my bathroom before switching on all the lights in the house or even look at the attic. I was panicked and my stomach hurt. I had planted my subconscious mind with information it couldn't really handle, and my paranoia was the consequence.
I still need to finish the series so I just have to just buckle up and deal with my paranoia for two more days and then I hopefully everything will be back to normal. I know, I sound stupid but I have to know what happens. I am still watching True Blood because that asshole of a director changed the story line from the books so I have to go through the torture just to find out how it’s going to end.
So, the conclusion is that I am still a chicken-shit when it comes to horror movies/books and I shouldn't do something so moronic again. Lesson learnt, if only I knew this about me last Friday when I was reading that idiotic blog post. We live and learn.
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