all ghosts are interior decorators

Last night, on a whim and because S invited me, I went to a ghost tour of City Hall.  I was kind of imagining an intimate group as I figured there would just not be that many people interested in this sort of thing.  I was wrong.  Even when you took into account that half of them were attending the Filipino heritage ceremony in the rotunda, there were still a ton of people there.  Probably 2 tons.  While we were milling around waiting for kickoff, we glanced at the program and noticed that there was a whole page of medical disclaimers saying that you weren’t allowed to be there if you had hypertension, vapors, PTSD, ADD, or Extra-Sensory Perception.  At that point S had to leave.  No, not really.  Although it was a pretty comprehensive list, and I was surprised that no one with ESP walked out.

The tour itself was interesting not least because I had never explored City Hall, which is sort of mysterious and beautiful.  The guide regaled us with stories of assassinations (Harvey Milk, George Moscone) and how 1-2 tons of guards had heard footsteps and their names being whispered in their ears, which if it happened to you I’m sure would be pretty terrifying, but when you hear about someone else hearing footsteps it’s just not that creepy.  This is probably why movies like Saw X, are more commonly made than movies like An Ambiguous Noise at City Hall.  The more I heard about these ghosts the more I started to wonder why ghosts are so, well, lame.  I mean ghost stories are always about going into the living room and finding three CDs laid out in a straight line and the throw pillows rearranged.  Is rearranging someone’s living room in almost imperceptible ways really the only thing ghosts can think of to do?  Are all ghosts wanna be contestants on Design Star?  Ghosts these days lack imagination.  Must be all the TV.