Casper
(October 14, 2004)

In order to watch my expenses, I have resorted to baking muffins instead of purchasing them at my local Starbucks.  It's not as bad as it sounds.  Every Sunday night, I put on my cute violet apron and white chef cap and bake two dozen muffins.  I find that two dozen muffins suffices my fix for the week. 

Late last October, one dark and spooky Sunday, just after the clocks had been set back, I was home baking my muffins.  As I took my last bunch from the oven, I heard a whimpering at the door.  I peaked out my door's window to see a white object, the size of a little kid, crying into its lap.

I opened the door.  "Can I help you?"   It looked up at me and wiped away its tears.

"Will you be my friend?"
"Who are you?"
"I'm Caspar."

Oh me, Oh my!  How lucky was I?  
Casper the Friendly Ghost here there on my stoop!
"I can't believe it.  Of course I will be your friend.  Come in, please."
Casper grabbed his ghostly hobo stick, complete with handkerchief, and came into my home.

"Have a seat.  Let me get you a muffin - they're freshly made."
I walked into the kitchen.
"This is so cool.  Tell me, what's Christina Ricci like to work with?  How about Hilary Duff?  They were both in your movie.  Were they egomaniacs back then?  If only I could have my own film like you did.  Suzy TooToo:  Muffin Patrol or Suzy TooToo: Freedom Fighter or..."

"No thanks for the muffin.  Ghosts don't eat..."
"Right, right."  I came into my living room eating a muffin.  It was great as I am an amazing chef.
"How about we play some Monopoly or Clue or... say, what are you doing?"

The handkerchief was unfolded on my coffee table.  Inside the handkerchief was an electric chainsaw and a big sharp knife.  My new friend was plugging the chainsaw into an outlet.

"Gas is so expensive.  It's cheaper to use an electric one."
"Umm... why do you need a chainsaw in my house?"
"Why to kill you of course.  Why else?"
"Yes...hmmm...good point, 'why else?'.  Umm... I hate to be a party pooper but wouldn't you rather play Monopoly than kill me?"
"Not particularly.  Don't you have a three prong plug anywhere in here."
"Oh - over by the TV."  

Rats.  Why did I say that?

"You know Casper, I know you are new to the whole friends process but 'friends don't let friends kill their friends - especially if the friend is the friend that the friend is going to kill'.   Remember you are Casper the Friendly Ghost."

"Actually I'm not Casper."
"You lied to me!  How dare you!  Shame on you Impostor Casper.  I will ask you to leave my dwelling."
"Hold on, I didn't lie to you.  My name is Cas-par not Cas-per.  And I never said I was a Friendly Ghost."

I thought back and Impostor Casper was correct.

"So you're Cas-par the Killer Ghost, I presume."
"Yes and here we go."

He turned on the saw and ran at me.
"I think you can do better than 'here we go' for a death catch phrase."
In defence of my retarded comment and the madman ghost approaching me with a chainsaw, I threw my muffin at my attacker.  The muffin went right through him.

"See you in..." as he raised the chainsaw, he ran out of cord causing the cord to sever off of the chainsaw, rendering it useless.

"Ha, ha cheapo.  I guess someone should have bought a gas chainsaw.  Are you sure your name isn't Cas-par the Cheap Ghost."

He pulled the knife from his handkerchief.

"Boo!!!"
"Ahhhhhh!!!"

I ran deep into my apartment shutting each door as I passed it.  It was no use.  Caspar and his knife floated through solid objects.

"Think Suzy, think.  You've wasted enough of your life watching mindless drool on TV.  What stops ghosts?.... Aluminium.  Aluminium stops ghosts.  That's why crazy people where aluminium foil dunce caps."

I turned to my closet where my aluminium baseball bat was located.  I grabbed it and gave one mighty Casey swing.  Oh how at that moment I wished I was on the same juice that propelled Barry Bonds to homerun king status.  I swung and to my surprise the bat went through the ghost.  I can't believe the store clerk sold me a fake aluminums bat.  No wonder I couldn't hit a ball!

I jumped into my closet and closed the door.

"Think, Suzy, think" I said as I looked around in my dark closet.  I had about 3 seconds to save my life.

"Is this the untimely death of Suzy TooToo?"

No way!  My last words would not be something so corny, so formulaic.  Remembering Halloween 1987 when I dressed as a Ghostbuster, I grabbed my vacuum and turned it on as ghost came through the door.

"You're about to suck - big time."

Caspar was sucked into the vacuum bag.  I ran into the kitchen with the vacuum in hand looking for aluminium foil.  It didn't matter as I read the ingredients for my vacuum bag.  It was internally lined with aluminium foil.  However, just to be sure, I wrapped my vacuum bag in 3 and 1/2 layers of aluminium foil.

I have never learned how to dispose of a ghost so I keep Caspar as a pet in the vacuum bag.  It's a great pet.  Doesn't require food or a walk or even air and best of all, whenever I feel tense or in a bad mood I pull out my aluminium foil ball, complete with ghost, and use it as a stress ball. 

It has a good bounce to it too.