I admit that while I was (and still am) a huge fan of the original Ghostbusters movie (II is still growing on me) , I was a little too old for these toys when they first came out. So I was unsure as to what type of ghost one would “bust” with a Ghostpopper.

Turning to the ever-faithful YouTube, I was able to track down this commercial which, while not fully explaining the ghosts my Ghostpopper worked against, made me happy David hadn’t found a Proton Pack in the attic. I for one am far too intimidated by the phallic-looking nature of that thing to ever consider whipping it out on an investigation!

Every October, I am usually asked to participate in several walking/ghost tours. And while some of them mark return visits for me and others are first time endeavors, the one that I always look forward to the most is the Lima Lantern Tours. Most people think that’s because of the tour’s truly unique way of dragging guests down the main streets of Lima in a horse-drawn carriage. And while I’ll be the first to admit that the horses are a huge part of it, for me, the best thing about these tours is it allows me to help create a special moment in time for some of the guests, all because of something I did on a whim.

Back in 2009, while I was attending my first Lantern Tour, I was just hanging out in the back of the carriage with the guests. Since it was my first time on the Tour, I wasn’t actually sure what was expected of me. When we arrived at the Ohio Theatre, the carriage stopped and we were all allowed to go inside. As we were standing in the lobby and the tour guide was talking about the reported hauntings, I instinctively reached into my bag and pulled out an EMF meter. I saw some of the guests look at me kind of strange, so I began explaining to everyone why ghost researchers use EMFs on investigations. Off to my right, there was a young girl, no older than 9 or 10, who just kept staring at the EMF in my hand. Without thinking, I handed it to her and said “here, give it a try.” And boy, did her face light up! She grabbed the device and immediately started scanning the walls, the floor, and, of course, her family and friends! Others in the group looked on, with perhaps a hint of jealousy in their eyes. Before long, I was digging into my bag, dispensing EMFs, ELFs, and IR thermometers to the crowd.

I allowed everyone to keep the devices for the remainder of the evening. Provided, of course, they shared them with the group. At the end of the tour, everyone thanked me and said that they had been dying to use “ghost” equipment ever since they had seen them on television. Even the young girl admitted to me that once she saw her first episode of Ghost Hunters, she wanted to try out an EMF for herself. She said that I made her night. And in saying that, she made mine.

Every year since then, I make sure to pack plenty of handheld devices to take on the Lantern Tours. Recently, I bring so much that I must have a member of The Ghosts of Ohio, usually Darrin or Steph, drag along a big ol’ duffel bag full of stuff to hand out. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t think I will ever get tired of seeing the look on someone’s face, young or old, when I had them a piece of ghost-hunting equipment and they hold it in their hands for the first time. It’s priceless.

Tickets for the Lima Lantern Tours sell out quickly every year, but you can purchase them here.  Hope to see you all out there! I’ll be the one hanging on the back of the carriage with a big duffel bag!

Note the big bag of equipment Ghosts of Ohio member, Darrin Boop, has draped across his chest!

To enter, here’s all you need to do:
• Come on out and see The Ghosts of Ohio at any of their fall presentations and appearances (visit ghostsofohio.org for a full list of dates and times).

• Take some pictures of The Ghosts of Ohio. These can be posed or action shots. Heck, we don’t even need to be in the picture—snap a shot of our booth or logo. Be as creative as you want! Just please don’t go hunting us down in our hotel rooms!

• Go to The Ghosts Of Ohio’s Facebook page and “like” us:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Ghosts-of-Ohio/60704381381

• Upload your photos to The Ghosts of Ohio’s Facebook Wall, making sure to name the event in the caption and, above all, tag yourself in the photo to ensure we know it’s yours!

• You can post as many photos as you’d like, but only 5 photos per venue/appearance will be entered in the contest.

• Cross your fingers that you are one of the 5 lucky winners chosen at random to receive your very own limited-edition “I see people who see dead people” shirt!

And now for all the fun disclaimer stuff: Contest opens at 12:01 am on Monday, October 3, 2011, and closes at 12:01 am on Monday, November 7, 2011. Winners will be chosen at random on Saturday, November 12, 2011, and their names posted the week of November 14, 2011. Shirts will be mailed out at that time.

Any questions? Send them to info@ghostsofohio.org.

THE GHOSTS OF OHIO 2011 SCHEDULED APPEARANCES
Unless otherwise noted (by a $ symbol), all presentations are free and open to the general public. Seating is often limited, so please call the venue beforehand to reserve your seats.

Saturday, October 8th, 2011
Rotary Ghost Walk: Tales and Tombstones $
Bowling Green, OH
http://www.woodcountyhistory.org/pr_halloween.html

Saturday, October 14th, 2011
Dinner & Spirits with The Ghosts of Ohio $
Michael Anthony’s at the Inn of Versailles
Versailles, OH
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Michael-Anthonys-at-the-Inn-of-Versailles/113263002025635

Saturday, October 15th, 2011
Delaware Ghost Walk 2011 $
Delaware, OH
http://www.delawarenna.org/ghostwalk2011.html

Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
Meet The Ghosts of Ohio presentation
Marion Public Library: Main Library
Marion, OH
http://www.marion.lib.oh.us/

Friday & Saturday, October 21st & 22nd, 2011
Lima Lantern Tours $
Lima, OH
http://www.limalanterntour.com/

Saturday, October 29th, 2011
The Strange & Spooky World of James A. Willis presentation $
Riverbend Recreational Area: Brugeman Lodge
Findlay, OH
http://hancockparks.com/

Thursday, November 3rd, 2011
Just How Weird is Ohio presentation
Southern State Community College: South Campus
Sardenia, OH
http://www.sscc.edu/visitors/news/2011/september/2011-fall-quarter-events-south-campus.html

My first stop was to be Criminal Records, a local record store owned by Jeff Wamsley, which was supposed to be filled with lots of Mothman memorabilia. Sadly, the store was closed when I got there, so I never got the chance to see what was on display there. Oddly enough, years later, I would be contacted by Jeff and asked to speak at the annual Mothman Festival. And while I was sad when I showed up and found that Criminal Records was no more, I was quite excited to find that Jeff had turned his collection of Mothman memorabilia into a full-blown Mothman Museum.

On that particular day, though, there was no memorabilia to be found. There were a few stores that were still open, but there was nothing Mothman-related anywhere (which is quite surprising because today, every store on the main strip has a wide selection). Feeling rather dejected, I decided to stop in at the Harris Steak House to take a few pictures since it had been featured in the Mothman Prophecies movies that had just been released. Peeking inside, I noticed a few Mothman t-shirts hanging on the wall behind a woman sitting quietly at the counter. I walked in and immediately saw this Mothman plush toy and quickly snatched it up. I haven’t seen another one like it since! Right after paying for it (along with several shirts), I placed him on Ol’ Blue’s dashboard and let him lead the way out to the TNT Area.

Acquired in late 2002. Purchased from the famous Harris Steak House before heading out to check out the TNT area.

Looking back, while I must admit that I had no idea who she was at the time, the woman who waited on me was none other than Carolin Harris herself! Today, I’ve not only had the opportunity to speak with her at several Mothman Festivals I’ve attended (and spoke at) over the years, but I even had the unique opportunity to be part of one of Ms. Harris’ evening tours through the TNT area.

As for the plush toy himself, how old he is remains a mystery. A search on the Internet proved fruitless, although versions of him pop up on a few web sites, including Roadside America. No information about the plush is given, however. The tag attached to him reads simply “Mothman / Made especially for Point Pleasant, WV / www.moth-man.com”. The web site no longer exists.

Every year that I’ve spoken at the Mothman Festival, I have taken the plush down off my shelf with the intent of showing it to Jeff Wamsley and asking him if he knows anything about it. And every year, I forget it when I’m packing. Maybe this year, I’ll remember. But if you have any information you can shed on this little guy, drop me a line. I’m all ears!

Until then, here’s some links to more information about the whole Mothman mythos, including Jeff Wamsley’s Mothman Museum, as well as dates for this year’s Mothman Festival. Oh yeah, and if you happen to visit the Museum and bump into Jeff, be sure to tell him that Weird Willis sent you!

Mothman Museum

Mothman Lives!

Annual Mothman Festival

According to this mini-documentary, the tokoloshe is some sort of weird, hairy creature that runs around South Africa, creating havoc. A tokoloshe can either be conjured up by a powerful witch doctor or else created by an unholy union between a human and a female animal. Once a tokoloshe is let loose, it will stop at nothing to destroy its intended target’s life. And I do mean stop at nothing.

Apparently, one of the tokoloshe’s ways of breaking up a marriage is to literally climb into bed with its female victim and have intercourse with them. Since the tokoloshe is said to be extremely well endowed, the woman will eventually find sex with her husband to be unsatisfying, causing the marriage to fall apart. Pretty twisted, huh?

As if the actions of the tokoloshe weren’t bizarre enough, the ritual required to rid oneself of the creature is truly mind-boggling. I won’t give away the ending of the documentary, but let’s just say the ritual includes gag-inducing smoke, stripping down for a bath, and a razor blade.

All things considered, the tokoloshe is one crazy beast!

If you missed the embedded link to the mini-documentary above, just follow the first link under this paragraph. The “dramatic reenactments” are well worth the 12:37 you’ll spend watching it. Keep in mind that there is some brief nudity (both human and tokoloshe) and some razor work that might make a few people wince a bit. But overall, it’s a video you will not soon forget!

VBS Special: Tokoloshe 

For additional information on the tokoloshe, visit these sites:

The Tokoloshe 

What Is A Tokoloshe?

That’s right; there’s no concrete evidence to support that Edison was creating a communications device for ghosts to use. There are no prototypes, no plans, and more importantly, no patents. And ask anyone who knows anything about Thomas Edison and they will tell you that above all, Edison loved his patents. And if there were even a ghost of a chance (sorry) that he was going to start working on something, he’d apply for a patent. In fact, there are numerous stories out there alleging Edison saw other inventors working on devices and then went and filed for (and received) patents on them, thereby stealing the other inventors’ work. I’m not saying that actually happened. Rather, I’m just saying that I firmly believe that if Edison was planning on working on such a groundbreaking device as something that could talk to the dead, he would have tried putting a patent on it. And yet, no such documentation exists. Don’t believe me? Take a trip up to Milan, Ohio, Edison’s birthplace, and ask anyone working at the Edison Birthplace Museum.

So why do so many people still claim Thomas Edison was spending so much time trying to talk to the dead? More importantly, how did such a story get started? These are the questions that have long-since fascinated me. So much so that I keep a list of all reported places (magazine articles, newspaper reports, etc.) where Edison himself is alleged to have made statements about building his spirit communication device. Most of the publications, while often quoted, are quite rare, which opens up the door to Edison’s words being misquoted or entirely fabricated. Case in point, while Edison is quoted as saying in the October, 1920 issue of The American Magazine that he is “building an apparatus” to communicate with the dead, a quote attributed to Edison that same month and year in Scientific American states that he is “thinking about” creating a device. I make it a point not to put forth anything as “fact” until I see it with my own eyes. I have yet to track down a copy of either The American Magazine or Scientific American, so I can’t comment on the validity of the statements. What I can comment on is something fascinating that I came across inside a new edition to the Strange & Spooky Museum.

Seems that my loving wife, Stephanie, not only got ahold of my Strange & Spooky Want List, but also managed to track down two Edison-related magazines I was looking for: the 1970 Fate magazine and the rare 1933 Modern Mechanix and Inventions magazine. It’s the latter magazine that is often pointed to as “proof positive” that Edison was working on a communications device to use with the dead.

Gifts from Steph: the 1933 Modern Mechanix and Inventions and the 1970 Fate magazine.

The first thing that struck me was that there is no byline for the article and no author listed in the table of contents. And aside from the fact that the article was written several years after Edison’s death, it also describes events that allegedly took place over a decade earlier, in 1920. The article, which describes Edison conducting some late-night experiments with a group of mediums, does not list any of the names of the participants, making it rather hard to research any further. Finally, the article appears in the October 1993 issue of the magazine, which might explain why the whole thing reads like a spooky ghost story drummed up merely to give readers a few chills for Halloween.

But by far the most intriguing part of the article is the type of device it describes Thomas Edison using. Despite what others have claimed, the device is not any sort of telephone-like instrument designed to allow one to hear the voice of a ghost. In fact, the experiment (if it really took place) seems to be based on the idea that ghosts are made up of matter than can be detected. Instead of a communication device, what is described in the article sounds more like what today we would refer to as a sort of laser grid or motion detector. The idea being that the mediums would ask the ghost to come closer to the light, at which point it would break the beam, announcing to all in the room that there was a ghost present. For the record, the article says the experiment was a failure with no ghosts showing that night, which is why the results weren’t made public until years later.

Second page of the Modern Mechanix and Inventions article

All in all, the article raises more questions than it answers. Granted, simply because the article doesn’t mention a telephone-like device doesn’t confirm Edison wasn’t building one. But you would think that if such a device existed at the time, Edison would have been using it in conjunction with the experiments described in the article. Of course, the entire article is written in such a vague, almost urban legend-like style as to make one wonder if the events described really happened at all.

So I guess I’m no closer to finding out the truth about Thomas Edison and his mysterious “talk to the dead” device than I was before. But at least I’ve got a couple of totally cool new additions to the Strange & Spooky Museum!

I’ll let everyone know if/when I come across some new bits of information. Until then, I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts on the whole subject. So what do you think? Was Thomas Edison really working on a device to talk to the dead with?

Additional Reading:

Thomas Edison And His Spirit Phone

Edison’s Own Secret Spirit Experiments (contains the full Modern Mechanix and Inventions article)

Regardless, when last we spoke, I had just completed an investigation of a museum for my book, leaving on a Friday night from work and arriving back home in the wee hours of Saturday morning. Although I didn’t even bother to unpack Ol’ Blue when I got home, I still got very little sleep that night/morning. That’s because I was so excited at the prospect of taking my daughter, Courtney, on her very first investigation for my book!

Let’s be honest here, though. No matter how excited I was, it didn’t change the fact that I still had to figure out how to jam all of Courtney’s travel accessories into the car. Since Ol’ Blue couldn’t hold anything other than the equipment (and me), Steph and I had made the decision that we would caravan, with my wife and daughter leading the way. Yup, that’s right; we needed two cars for everything.

Still, I was very excited about this trip. For Courtney’s first investigation, I had decided on a place that, while it needs to remain a secret until the book comes out, was still near and dear to my heart. Not only had The Ghosts of Ohio investigated the building several times in the past, but we were also the first paranormal organization to be allowed inside to conduct an investigation. The fact that it was also one of the most unique museums I have even been inside of only made me more excited.

But what really made me decide to make this Courtney’s first investigation was the interesting combination of ghosts and family that I’ve come to associate with this museum. You see, when The Ghosts of Ohio was first contacted by one of the museum’s Board members for an investigation, it wasn’t at the Board’s suggestion; it was because of the Board member’s mother! Turns out that mom was a big fan of the ghost reality shows and, after doing some online research, decided The Ghosts of Ohio was the group for the job! Not only that, but as it turned out, the Board member’s daughter was also a fan of the ghost shows. The result was that during The Ghosts of Ohio’s first investigation of the museum, 3 generations of one family took part, making it a truly unique evening. These three lovely ladies would come to take part in all subsequent investigations of the museum, making it feel like one big family. So it seemed the perfect choice for Courtney’s investigation debut.

Of course, I had to get her up there first. Surprisingly, the Pack & Play went into Steph’s car rather quietly. Likewise, all of Courtney’s other trappings managed to squeeze in, too. Not having taken Courtney on many long rides before, we wondered how she was going to do only a multi-hour one-way trip. But other than a brief pit stop about an hour into the ride for food and a diaper change, Courtney came through like a trooper and actually seemed to enjoy the ride.

After a brief check-in at the hotel, I made my way over to the museum to begin my interviews, leaving Steph to wrestle with the Pack & Play. I had roughly a dozen people to interview and had decided to do a round table discussion (which I would record) to knock things out all at once. Also, I’ve found that having several people share their ghost stories at once often makes for a more lively discussion. I was about 30 minutes into the interviews with Steph and Courtney arrived. Shortly thereafter, I began to realize that perhaps it was a mistake bringing Courtney along.

Strategic placement of Courtney's Pack & Play at the hotel

No, it wasn’t due to anything Courtney did…unless you want to blame her for simply showing up. Because the second Steph wheeled her in, all bets were off. Simple fact is, it doesn’t matter how much people love telling ghost stories. If there’s a baby present, everyone’s going to focus on that. Guess you could say that the dead don’t have a chance of being recognized when there’s a living, breathing baby in the room. And all it took was one smile from my daughter and I had pretty much lost control of the interviews…and there was no turning back.

I did manage to finally get all the interviews down on tape and then, while Courtney took a nap, the three of us went out for a nice quiet dinner. It was over said dinner that I suddenly realized something; I would be setting up the equipment all by myself! In all the excitement over bringing Courtney, I had totally forgotten that no one from The Ghosts of Ohio had been able to make the trip with me. Sure, I was more than capable of setting up the equipment solo. And since I had done several other investigations here, I was familiar with the location of all the nearest power sources as well as a general overview of where to place things to cover all the “hot spots”. But to be honest, I had never flown solo on something as big as this museum before. Another first!

My initial plan has been to have Steph push Courtney around in her stroller so she could “supervise” and get a first-hand look at the madness that is her dad’s “other career.” This became next to impossible, though, based not only on the fact that Courtney was sound asleep, but also because yours truly was running around like a madman trying to run cables throughout an entire museum! Sadly, the decision was made to bring Courtney’s first investigation to an end and Steph brought her back to the hotel room for the night while I stayed behind, promising to join them before dawn the next day.

For the record, a fully staffed Ghosts of Ohio team has set up for an investigation here in a little under 2 hours. Flying solo, I did it in about 3 and a half. Not bad, if I may say so myself, although I had to change my shirt halfway through as I had sweated through the first one. Good thing I still had my overnight bag in Ol’ Blue.

DVR camera placement

As for the investigation itself, while it was a rather quiet evening, we did have a rather interesting occurrence that took place in one of the “hot spots” involving myself, all 3 generations of the Board member’s family, and a K-II meter. Over the course of about 10 minutes, the K-II seemed to be flashing in response to questions we were all asking aloud. And I was able to capture most of the event on videotape.

Now before you go screaming at my about how bogus it is to be using a K-II, allow me to explain. I believe in using a device until there is concrete proof that it serves absolutely no purpose in paranormal investigations. Sure, the K-II is notorious for picking up cell phones, batteries, and just random signals. But it also picks up energy fields. And since I admit, much to the chagrin of many of those in the paranormal field, that no one can say for any certainly what exactly a ghost is made up of, I am willing to use a K-II because it lets me know if there’s an energy field out there (ghostly or not).

So I’m not saying there was a ghost causing the K-II to go crazy on this particular night. I’m not even saying that there was a ghost there. I did, however, have the opportunity while it was going on to test cell phones and other devices to see if I could get the K-II to react, and it didn’t. But this jury’s still out. I look at the tape sometimes and I clearly think “something” is using the K-II to provide answers to the questions we’re asking. Other times, I think I’m reading too much into it. So I’m still on the fence…so I guess it’s a good thing that the book’s not due for a while, giving me more time to ponder.

Location of K-II went it started acting crazy (sorry for the blurry image).

But back to the investigation at hand. After needing several hours to set up the equipment, I was miraculously able to break it down and get it loaded back up in under 2 hours. Good thing the hotel was less than 5 minutes from the museum, though, as I basically walked in the hotel room and collapsed on the bed. Courtney was sound asleep alongside the bed, safe and sound inside her Pack & Play. Guess all the excitement of her first investigation wore her out!

The following morning, we began our uneventful caravan back home. Of course, we did decide to stop along the way so Courtney could enjoy another first: her first post-investigation pancake breakfast at Denny’s!

Visit Recap

• Time spent at location: 11.5 hours
• Total hours of audio recorded:  12.0
• Total hours of video recorded:  30
• Total # of photographs:  95
• Roadside Oddities

1. Pickup truck traveling down I-76 with a goat roaming freely in the cab
2. McDonald’s billboard with a Ronald who really creeped me out for some reason

• Radio Nuggets Unearthed

1. Another Rainy Night (Without You)—Queensryche
2. Only Women Bleed—Alice Cooper
3. Mother—Pink Floyd

• BBBJ?  No

• Total mileage for both days: 274 miles

Might have been just me, but I was a little worried what Ronald might do to me and my family if I decided to "exit now"

As my father grew older, he stopped hanging his flag out. But he taught me to respect it. There were numerous occasions, funny now but not at the time, when my 80-year-old father was inches away from, in his words, “kick da s**t outta some horse’s a**” who had refused to stand up or take his hat off during the Star-Spangled Banner at sporting events. During those years, I’d have to say that it was hard for me to see an American flag anywhere and not smile. That was because those stars and stripes immediately conjured up images of my dad, fists raised old-school style like the Notre Dame leprechaun, challenging some disrespectful guy to a fight over Old Glory.

My dad, who golfed well into his 70s. Note his "USS Missouri" hat.

The flag took on a totally different meaning for me in the fall of 2008 when my father passed away. He had been ill for a while and being the proud (and stubborn) man that he was, refused help from any of his family, including me. In fact, during one emotional outburst, my father told me that the only thing he wanted me to do for him was to accept the flag the US Navy was going to drape over his coffin. And so, on a chilly November morning, I stood as tall and proud as I could alongside my father’s gravesite with my three sisters and accepted the flag from his coffin. The two officers who had folded the flag thanked me for my father’s service to his country, saluted me, and then announced to the congregation “a member of our United States Navy has just departed.” That’s when I broke down. It was, after all, November 11^th—Veterans Day. The flag returned home with me to Ohio, where the following June 14^th I would look at it hanging on the wall, and cry.

My father's flag and medals

All that changed on June 14^th, 2010. That was the day my daughter, Courtney Leigh Willis, came into the world. Of course, she wasn’t supposed to be born on the 14^th. Stephanie and I had gone to the hospital on the morning of the 13^th for Steph to be induced. But then again, nothing my wife and I do is ever done the “normal” way, so why should the birth of our first child be any different? And so, after a long and sometimes frightening ordeal, in the wee hours of June 14^th, the nurse in the operating room handed me my daughter and for the fist time ever, I looked into her bright blue eyes—my father’s eyes.

Courtney at 9 months

Several hours later, Steph and I were in our hospital room and I began to text my family and friends to let them know the great news. That was when I heard about the fiery demise of the Big Butter Jesus.

For the uninitiated, the statue known as the Big Butter Jesus sat only I-75 outside of Cincinnati for many years. I had first covered it for my 2005 book, Weird Ohio, and since then, I always had a soft spot in my heart for it. It was just so absurd and, well, weird! But as fate would have it, June 14^thwould also be the day that a stray lightning bolt would whack the Big Butter Jesus in all his creamy goodness, burning it to the ground and sending burnt pieces of fiberglass into the nearby pond.

Big Butter Jesus, before the lightning strike...

...and after

If I hadn’t yet realized that I had a rabid (and somewhat eclectic) fan base, Flag Day 2010 wasn’t even half-over before I found out just how crazy it was! For as word spread about the birth of my daughter, so did the fact that the Big Butter Jesus had been struck by lightning…on the same day! And leave it to my fan base to start wondering if perhaps the two events, when combined, could be taken as some weird sign of the apocalypse! That still makes me smile.

But there was still more to come! When it comes to Steph’s parents, Steve and Carol, while they have never been anything but loving and kind towards me, I’ve always wondered if they thought perhaps I was missing a few screws. Sure, they would laugh at my jokes or listen to my stories, but I couldn’t help but wonder if they sometimes, while on their long trips back home to Oxford, Ohio, would ask each other “what’s wrong with that guy?”

As Courtney was Steve and Carol’s first grandchild, they had stayed the entire night at the hospital with us, heading back down to Oxford on the morning of the 14^th. They returned early the next morning, but not before making a little detour. Steve and Carol were both giggling when they handed me what appeared to be an empty cardboard Diet Coke 12-pack. It wasn’t empty, though. Inside were several charred pieces of the Big Butter Jesus. That’s right, my in-laws think so much of me and my weird ways that they fished pieces of burnt fiberglass out of a pond for me!  If that’s not true love, I don’t know what is.

The charred remains of Big Butter Jesus

As I sit here writing this on the eve of yet another Flag Day, I’m amazed at how much of an impact a somewhat minor holiday has had on me over the years. Over time, it has come to represent a lot of different things for me. Tonight, after having kissed Courtney goodnight and typing in the shadow of my father’s flag and the burned pieces of the Big Butter Jesus, I realize what Flag Day represents to me now. It means “family.”

Happy Flag Day!

What in God’s name am I rambling on about? Well, put it this way; I feel that since I haven’t updated this blog in a while, I have let some of you down who have taken the time to subscribe to it. So I just wanted to let you all know that I’ve been in your shoes and I know what it feels like to have a blog abandon you. But I’m back now…and I’m not going away any time soon!

Truth be told, while I was still plugging away on my labor of love (and inspiration for this blog), The Ghosts of Ohio book, I was also writing another book, Haunted Indiana. That book ended up having to be in the editor’s hands on May 31^st. So I spent a lot of sleepless nights making sure I had everything wrapped up by then. Of course, being a new dad put a new wrinkle into my usual MO of “stay up for 72 hours straight and polish it off.” But I plodded on and the editor is now happily reviewing my manuscript. And I’ve come away from the experience with a brand-new appreciation for the fine art of Fatherhood, as well as a modified way of going about writing my books.

What does this all mean for you, my devoted readers? Well, thanks to the fact that I use of reams of paper during my research (yes, I still put actual pen to paper when I write), so all of my escapades have been well documented. Which means I just need to get back in gear and do some catching up with my blog!

In other words, there’s going to be a lot more updates and new stuff popping up here more often, even if it means keeping my rambling down to a minimum until I get a bit more caught up. But no worries; there will be plenty of stuff to read and look at, especially since the Strange & Spooky Museum got a lot bigger in the past few months, too! And as crazy as it may seem, my October is already fully booked with presentations and appearances across the state, all of which I will be chronicling right on this very blog.

So hang in there! And if you haven’t yet subscribed to my blog, why don’t you go ahead and do it now? It will let you know when new stuff pops up on here and it’s as simply as clicking the “sign me up” button near the bottom left of this page. New posts get announced on Facebook and Twitter, too, so feel free to stalk me there, too.