Goodnight V

Yet another collection of the sign-offs that have eased so many troubled minds.

Goodnight…

• The last thing intruders will be expecting is a staircase completely smothered in butter. It could save your life.
• Lullabies are only calming when you know where they’re coming from.
• Achieving forced perspective effects with tapering hallways will convince an intruder things are too far away to bother with.
• Intruders are easily scared off by shouting. Set your alarm to wake every 15 min, shout a bit, then back to your secure slumber.
• Why not try gluing salt into a hula hoop? The saline circle will offer a shield against evil spirits, and keep you fit too.
• Be very careful when cleaning your ouija board. It can be very like ‘pocket dialling’, but with random dead people.
• Spirits are often said to create unpleasant smells during visitations, but those saying this are probably passing the blame.
• There’s no reason to assume the noise under the floorboards is rats. For one thing rats don’t whisper like that.
• Afterlife communications are charged by the character. This is why mediums only ever get initials, and ouija sessions are garbled txt spk.
• Replacing your bulbs with strobe lighting will deter seizure-prone intruders. Do place a warning notice on the front door though.
• Don’t worry, monstrous creatures don’t suddenly appear because of the full moon. They’re just easier to see now.
• Poltergeists like to scribble messages in the margins of books. Don’t forget to check all yours before you go to bed.
• Deposit a mere hundredweight of cat dander in your porch to deter most intruders with allergies. Unless they use the back door.
• The average mattress contains two million dust mites. They can normally be found queuing up to use inadequate toilet facilities.
• If you’re in a position to borrow an airport body scanner, do try and get your poltergeist to walk through it.
• Entirely filling a house with jelly makes it child’s play to track the movements of an aggressive poltergeist.
• Covering your floor with used chewing gum will delay an intruder as they repeatedly attempt to remove it from their shoes.
• Intruders can’t resist opening gateways to hell. Leaving a Lament Configuration puzzle cube in the hallway will keep them busy.
• Setting up a series of arcade cabinets on free-play all along your hallway will distract an intruder till morning.
• Gluing all your possessions together will make it hard for an intruder to get them out through a door or window.
• Taking out the stairs in your property will make an intruder’s progress difficult. You’ll need to make alternative arrangements.
• Inflating several hundred balloons in your hallway each night will slow down an intruder and provide advance warning.
• Painting stern faces on the inside of all your windows looking outward will deter an intruder.
• Having a hallway that solely connects the front door to the back door will foil an intruder. Have a separate door for yourself.
• Spreading cling film across all the doorways in your property will delay and potentially suffocate an intruder.
• Surrounding your possessions (e.g. telly) with many more fancy and gaudy ones à la The Last Crusade, will confuse an intruder.
• Moving all your furniture into the garden and sleeping outside will confuse intruders.
• Setting up a complex one-way system in your property via a series of signs and floor-painting will perplex and delay an intruder.
• Painting twenty or thirty trompe l’oeil doors around your home will significantly delay the progress of an intruder.
• Installing monkey bars throughout your property will enable you to electrify the floor. A powerful intruder deterrent.
•  Sleep dangling from gravity boots in a doorway, and tuck the door into bed. This will befuddle intruders. Advantage : you.
• Digging a moat is a good way to keep out intruders. Council planning officers won’t be able to complain if they can’t reach you.
• Removing all interior walls would make it much easier to see an intruder coming.
• To deter intruders, you may find it helpful to put a sign on your back door reading “NO JEWELS KEPT HERE OVERNIGHT”.
• In the event intruders do get in, you’ll need an escape route. Best leave the window open and a ladder outside.
•  Don’t forget to trace all your framed photos again and make sure none of the foreground characters have increased in size.
• Obviously you have a CCTV trained on your external bins, but have you considered filming the kitchen flip-top? You never know.
• Replacing your carpeting with flypaper will render weaker intruders immobile. Strike that balance between convenience and safety.
• The main worry with the giant moths is that they will be able to turn the lights on themselves. They will have no need of us.
• The only real solution to the giant moths is giant moth balls. Strung from a lamp post as an example to the others.
• A lullaby being played out on the chimes of a music box is either soothing or sinister, depending on whether you own a music box.
• The sound of snoring can really keep a person awake. One can’t help but worry where it’s coming from.
• Don’t worry, the number of spiders swallowed by people as they sleep is fairly low. They rarely go in after the cockroaches.
• If you’re using a dreamcatcher, remember to dispose of your dreams properly in the morning.
• Eyewitness reports state that ghosts tend to be clothed. This means fabrics have an afterlife too. Beware the vengeful curtains.
• If the idea of all the insects in your bedroom disturbs you, try conditioning yourself to think of pillows as mattress larvae.
• Hopefully the camera will never be invented that shows the mass of insect ghosts writhing over their respective human murderers.
• The number of insects in your bedroom pales into insignificance when compared with the number of insect ghosts.
• All lost socks turn up eventually, tucked away in a corner somewhere, possibly wrapped round dolls crafted from sticks and hair.
• Maintain (and refer to) a log of everything you ever utter in front of a mirror, to avoid saying anything evil-invoking 3 times.
• Always keep beetles on the bedside cabinet so you can throw them speculatively into the darkness and listen for crunching sounds.
• A few Latin phrases appearing in the fridge magnets are nothing to get worked up about. Don’t speak them out loud though.
• In addition to the standard viewfinder mode, mirrors also feature cue, review and playback, but the controls are on the inside.
• There’s a subtle difference between how one thinks their vital functions into ceasing, and simply falling asleep. I forget what.
• One thing your poltergeist may do is to leave messages on your old VHS tapes. When did you last check them?
• Watching horror movies just before bed will help to acclimatise you for your dreams.
• None of this exists while you’re asleep, so do hurry back.