Supernatural

Supernatural is my new favorite show. I know, I’m late to the party. It’s been the favorite show of lots of people for over a decade. But better late than never, right? 

This all started a few months ago when we finally got the miracle of Netflix (imagine a choir of angels singing when I say “Netflix”). Again, late to the party, but life’s a journey, not just a destination, and my journey goes at a slow, meandering pace that often deviates from the marked trails. Anyway, we got Netflix (angels singing) and I was able to catch up on a few seasons of Shameless and Orange is the New Black that I had missed back in the dark ages when all I had was cable and no commercial-free Netflix (wake up those angels again). I watched a couple episodes of that show where the girl gets turned into a zombie, but she continues to work. It was good, and I plan to go back to it, but it bothered me that even after a person is dead, she still has to have a job. Then I got diverted when a friend recommended all 153(ish) seasons of Supernatural.

Episode #1 hooked me. Some woman was pinned to the ceiling and caught fire! That was quite an image. I’m now in Season 10. Thank goodness there are so many seasons—and all available commercial-free through the miracle of Netflix (somebody nudge those angels and get them harmonizing).

Supernatural has it all: demons, vampires, angels (not the nice choir variety that sing when I say "Netflix"; most of these angels are total jerks), ghosts, werewolves, and a couple of funny, handsome Winchester brothers at the heart of it all. It’s especially fun how they switch back and forth between more serious episodes that move forward an overarching plot, and one-off episodes that focus on a “small” monster that the guys have to deal with. For instance, there was a season where the guys were fighting back against the leviathan that were trying to take over the earth and harvest people for dinner, but then sometimes they’d get diverted with a comparatively mundane problem like a ghost or something. It’s a blast.

In addition to being entertaining, Supernatural is educational. It offers ideas for using excess table salt to ward off ghosts and how to attract crossroads demons that can grant your fondest wish—for 10 years until the agreement expires and your soul is cast into the pits of hell. The Big Bang Theory doesn’t do that. Although Big Bang Theory is pretty funny, too.

So everyday I watch one or two episodes of my new favorite show and am gradually working my way through the seasons through the miracle of Netflix (angels: you know what to do). The only downside is that I’m not spending enough time working on the sequel to my novel Bigfoot CSI. What would really help is an entire Bigfoot season on Supernatural. Talk about the perfect crossover! Can somebody please talk to the Winchesters about making that happen?

Dead People!

Sometimes I worry about dead people. In horror movies, zombies are pretty creepy because of their single-minded focus and complete inability to be reasoned with. Individually they're not a huge threat, but in large numbers (and they always come in large numbers), they're a force to be reckoned with. Vampires as depicted by Hollywood aren't terribly scary. Sure they're merciless murder machines, but it's usually over quickly and they're still human enough to maybe be talked out of killing a victim. In fact, if movies and TV are to be believed, vampires are more interested in falling in love and spending ridiculous amounts of money on humans than slaughtering them.

Ghosts freak me out because I actually believe in them. I make a point of avoiding movies and TV shows about hauntings or general ghost activity because they might prevent me from ever sleeping again. I worry about someday buying a house that's haunted, then not knowing what to do to get rid of it. You've got to disclose that to a potential buyer, right? And they'd probably insist that you drop your asking price. Talk about scary.

Anyway, speaking of scary things, I've just released a new book. I started writing it years ago when my husband and I moved into a house located next door to an old cemetery. (Much as I worry about dead people, old cemeteries aren't scary – just cool.) On one of our many walks through the graveyard, we noticed a headstone that marked the grave of a woman who had been born 150 years ago. Oddly, it didn't have a date of death carved on it. She had to be dead, but why wasn't her year of death on the gravestone? It piqued my curiosity, and I started doing some research to figure out what had happened. Unfortunately, I knew nothing about genealogical research, so the whole thing was a learning experience.

This new book of mine, called Graveyard Kids, is the fictionalized account of my search to figure out what happened to the tombstone's owner. It's a fascinating story that I tell from the perspective of a seventh grade girl who's living at the cemetery because her father is the graveyard's caretaker. And I might have added a little vampire intrigue to keep the readers' interest. The book is available at Amazon in both hard copy and Kindle versions, and it's also available everywhere else as an ebook. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Happy reading!