Current mood: STILL GEEKING OUT!!! Current thoughts: Why haven’t I done this before?!!
For me, Halloween had always been a season of expectation and disappointments. From my childhood, there had always been a feeling of not having enough. Not enough trick or treating; not having a cool enough costume; too much chocolate in the candy bags when there should have been Skittles or Jolly Ranchers. In short: Halloween has been cool but never stellar.
In fact, let’s face it: Halloween had gotten downright LAME!
I keep thinking, “I am so going to do something fun this Halloween. Something… Halloween-y.” But year after year, I am frustrated by the amounts of homework, the lack of money, the “Hell NO!-ing” of parents, ker-plunking of cars or- let’s be honest- the "normal folk" who say that X years old is too old to dress up as anything- period.
The end.
Drop the mic.
Pull fedora over the eyes and moonwalk offstage.
The feeling only got worse the older I became. You know the feeling you have as a kid when you think: “Man, if only I were older, taller, prettier, more muscular, things would be perfect?” You never realize that a lot of cool things vanish as you get older. Despite my best efforts, I was forced to grow up and live in an adult world. An adult world where wearing costumes or props or Gothic Lolita mini-top hats or even a mere skull-and-crossbones ring put you into a category of the strange and unusual. Or at least a walking Hot Topic mannequin who retarded-ly works for free.
As the years passed by, I would watch as the best movies and the coolest clothes and accessories would come briefly only to be shooed back into the dark corners of Tim Burton’s mind by Charlie Brown specials at Christmas and Thanksgiving.
Well, I stood up this year and said, “Not this time! Not this year! This is my year! I am going to do something super awesome if it kills me!”
The only problem was What? What was missing? I’ve sung along to Nightmare Before Christmas and Sweeney Todd, laughed at Zombieland and Young Frankenstein, and rolled my eyes at Saw, Saw II, Saw III…. Saw XXIII: Zigsaw Might Need Glasses, and flinched at From Hell (with Johhny Depp. Watch him. He’s always hot when he’s brooding…) I’ve eaten candy that should have gone to small children instead….I’ve done everything that I normally do on Halloween. What else do I need? I’ll tell you what it was, boys and girls:
All I wanted for Halloween was to have the utter hell scared out of me. That’s right! I had a fever and the only prescription was more monsters!
Enter new life experience: Netherworld Haunted House.
First of all, my friends had been raving about this place all Halloween but I looked at where it was: (Norcross GA, down I-85) and automatically assumed that it was somewhere near Suicidal Deer, Georgia and crossed it off the list. But the closer I got to Halloween, the more I thought, “Yeah… let’s do that!” So the night finally came after all those irritating days of schooling and learning (and OWNING of organic chemistry tests btw!). But I digress. Allow me to set the mood.
Ahem.
The night was cool, crisp.
We had only gotten slightly lost and then, with the help of GPS and positive thinking, we arrived at the place. It looked like giant abandoned warehouses… but where else would monsters and mutants roam? We get our tickets and stand in line. Suddenly, we hear a terrified shriek and turn around just in time to see a group of young girls fleeing. They’ve left one girl behind- as a human sacrifice, I suppose- and I watch her scream and huddle against the concrete as a Swamp monster growls and stands over her.
Adrenaline levels rise. “Holy crap! This is awesome!” Completely irrational, right? A monster is snarling at a young girl- who was apparently the oen douchebag that nobody minded leaving for monster s’mores- and I can’t wait to get as scared as her! Monsters are coming left and right, sneaking up on people and snarling into their ears. Running up and skidding on their knees, making sparks. Surprising foolish texters with loud sound effects. In a word: FREAKING AWESOME!!!! And the closer we get to the entrance, the wider my grin becomes until I am sure that my face is going to freeze that way.
Attraction 1: Nightmares: where all the creatures of the Night have banded together to recreate all of your worst nightmares (or so the website says).
We enter past this creepy-looking guard who sends us through this portal to another world which was this disorienting illusion of light and swaying motions. My friend Brittani made it through without a problem. I, however, wobble and lurch to the left and cling to the railing like a drunken sailor on shore leave. The fact that I can only inch my way forward slowly is only made worse by the fact that the couple behind me are asking me whether I was all right and a man camouflaged in the dizzying light is right next to me and, apparently unsympathetic to my motion sickness, is jumping at me.
It’s dark and smoke is all around us.
On the one hand, people are jumping out at us. They hide in corners; swing above you on wires; or just blend into the not-so-pleasant scenery and scare the bejesus out of you. The animatronics hopping out at us is an entirely different thing altogether. Dead bodies come to life with the help of pressurized air and robots are hissing and dripping on you. Here’s where they got me:
The website lied. LIED I say! They said that the monsters cannot touch you. Little too late, I realize that they meant the monsters that provide ghoulish delights while you’re waiting in line. But in the haunted house? Oh yeah. The animatronics can reach out and touch you as I found out as a giant… thing extended out and literally grabbed me in its jaws. Real talk! This thing made me scream when it popped out but, as Brittani passed it without issue, in the back of my head I thought, “It’ll only extend so far. I’m good.” But when those jaws grabbed me from chest to knee, even my brain was screaming! I’m having trouble describing the African dance that I did trying to get out of those jaws but I’m sure it was a mixture of the “icky- cockroach” dance and a Whitey Duvall seizure (Watch 8 Crazy Nights if you don’t get the reference). Never again will I giggle at the Audrey II eating people in Little Shop of Horrors and think that’s silly. I’ve freaking LIVED it!
In between the scares are dizzying mirror rooms and claustrophobic hallways that press in on you (oh and these halls can be made of black material, bones, or- my personal favorite- squishy-looking entrails). When that wasn’t enough, the floors would shake in some hallways, creating yet another disorienting effect.
But the absolute worst part was- if you can even consider a worse part than the near heart attack provided by the “feed me Seymour” plant- was when Brittani would disappear behind black curtains ahead of me. Every time that happened, I felt a moment of panic. In the dark, it looked like she just vanished and I thought, "Holy #*&%!!! I’m ALONE!" That’s it! That was the worst part by far for me. I felt like I HAD to keep moving or else I’d lose her and be stuck in this house of tricks all by myself! (So, tell me why I was trying to slowly tiptoe through the house like a Scooby Doo reject with a pizzicato sound effect for every step?)
Finally, we make it through the house and reach the exit! But the house isn’t through with us yet. Waiting for your return is- what else? - a madman wielding a chainsaw. What?! I know! Calm down. The blade doesn’t have the little cutting thingies on it but- let’s face it! You don’t know that! And it looks like a chainsaw, sounds like a chainsaw and smells like what I assume a chainsaw smells like, so guess what? RUN! And you do...
Right into the second swamp monster that’s waiting for you and, if you manage to notice past- you know- the blind terror, the gift shop.
Phew! That was AMAZING!!!!
Oh. Wait… There’s another attraction that we paid for... Raw Meat...
