To: Snay, M
From: Boss
Subj: Meeting

Hello Mr. [Snay]. Do you have any topic ideas for next Monday’s presentation? -Boss

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Re: Meeting

To: Snay, M
From: Boss
Subj: Re: Re: Meeting

I don’t understand?

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

To: Snay, M
From: Boss
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

Two things:

1. I don’t need your permission to use the restroom.
2. Am I to understand your topic idea involves cats? Our topic needs to involve technology.

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

To: Snay, M
From: Boss
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

You are the reason I have gray hair.

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

To: Snay, M
From: Boss
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meeting

To: Boss
From: Snay, M
Subj: Does the term NSFW mean nothing to you?

I scare easily. Not as easily as some. There’s a guy I work with who, if he doesn’t see you come up behind him, and you tap him on the back, will scream and jump around for as long as it takes him to realize he isn’t being attacked by a giant man-eating spider. Then he’ll glare, get over it, and go back to normal. I don’t scare that easily, but it’s easy to startle the living whatever out of me. In any case, I usually stay away from horror movies because, y’know, I’d be jumping all about looking for someone to hold me.

Anyway, back story time:

Usually, my Friday nights are planned for me: I go to work, and by the time I get out of the Bookstore, having an eight-hour day at the Office beforehand, I somehow summon the energy to walk home and collapse promptly into bed, where I usually get a pretty decent night’s sleep, waking up somewhere in the six-o’clock hour on Saturday.

However, due to some strange quirk of fate, last Friday? I had the night off.

What to do, what to do! I suppose I could’ve gone out for a night of drinking, but the truth is, I’m pretty lame broke and I already had some boozin’ planned for Saturday. So practical matters sapped my time: I did three loads of laundry, I washed my dishes, took out the trash, and cleaned the litter box. I moved some furniture and vacuumed — there’s nothing like dark-furred cats, a light carpet, and shedding season to make your carpet look absolutely dirty.

And when all this was done?

I watched The Exorcist.

Let me say this: I am not a fan of horror movies.

Oddly, I don’t mind horror books — I own a couple of shelves worth of Stephen King mass-markets. I think this might be because a lot of books classified as horror aren’t really scary, and also because a lot of books that are supposed to be horror really aren’t. Off the top of my head, I can think of only one book that actually filled me with horror — like, as in, while reading it during high school I refused to go downstairs to the kitchen for a snack because it was two a.m. and I couldn’t help but think the creature was going to kill me halfway down the stairs — was The Relic by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Childs. It was made into a fairly shitacular film, but the book was terrifying.

Top five scariest books? I have a limited selection, but I’d say The Relic, Stephen King’s IT, Cujo, and The Shining. Fifth? Keep reading.

I have also never seen The Exorcist before. For some reason, a few weeks ago, I decided to pick up the Bookstore’s only copy, by William Blatty, and it scared me. It’s a damn scary book: not quite so much in the vein of, “Oh my god, there’s a woman going around blowing shit up and kill us all!” like I might describe Carrie (which, honestly? not that horrifying), but because, I mean, okay, the mother’s a famous actress, but it all seems so normal, and then here’s this girl who may or may not be possessed, and there’s all this freaky stuff happening, what I think is so scary is Chris’ lack of control and options over what’s happening to her daughter and what can be done about it.

So, I decided, fuck it: I’ve got the night free, my apartment is relatively clean, and it’s either this or reruns of CSI: Miami on A&E. I mean, honestly, right there, I’d rather throw myself out the window.

And you’re goddamn right I watched the movie with the lights on.

And, really? Not that scary. The only point I jumped was when Regan spiderwalks down the stairs and barfs blood. There were certainly some spooky, spooky scenes, and the movie captures a lot of the psychological torment from the book, but in terms of actually jumping and screaming and diving under my futon looking for safety? Yeah, not so much.

It helps that Tippy was sleeping right next to the TV. Kind of hard to be scared when there’s a furry little calico snoozin’ away to her heart’s content.