What's Scarier: Chips or Cillian Murphy

My husband is reading over my shoulder right now. He's telling me I should call today's post, "Things He'd Like To Forget."

I think "I Scare Nice People" is a better title.

We have been through this before, my spouse and I, it's not that there is any one thing wrong with me or even red flags about me—they're more pinkish, and more white than red. And not even flags at that, more flagettes.

But here it is: I like to scare people. I like to scare the nicest people of all, my husband.

I can't resist the urge to turn him into a dancing bug-eyed fool. And before anyone jumps on me about His age! His heart! What about the children?? I can tell you that my husband's premature grey is no reflection on his physical state. I know his family history and follow his most recent physical exam results. His BP, heart rate, cardiac risk factors, would be the envy of any 18 year old. He's so healthy when I asked his Dr. for his opinion on my husband's nightly snack favorite of chips and ice cream, the Dr. told him to have at it. So there you go, the man will live to 98, but back to the story.

October is scary movie month, and for me, it's opportunity like no other to hatch plans in my wicked wicked brain.

You all know the movie Batman, the one with the heart pounding 20 second segment of breathtakingingly mad Cillian Murphy, playing the role of the mentally unstable character, Scarecrow, who drives an asylum patient into further breakdown? Well, in this scene, the angel-faced pucker lips sociopath psychiatrist--gorgeous beyond words--but still a nasty, nasty human being, knows just what he is doing and he psychologically skewers this knowledge in.

The scene is cinematography wonder; filmed in broken, twitchy frames showing close ups of an unevenly stitched burlap sacked head. It is the unexpected beauty of Cillian Murphy inside that bag, with him being so sadistic mastermind certifiable, that makes this scene pure horror.
As wonderful as the acting and the torment by the villain is, it's so much more many degrees of unsettling is what it is. Especially alone, in a dark living room, at 11 PM. After seeing this scene, it took all of half a second for me to know just what I'd be doing before the film was over.

I excused myself to go to the bathroom and left my husband sitting in the silence of the house--watching the horror of the psychoness of Scarecrow unfold.

On tiptoe, I went upstairs to our bedroom. I pulled a pillowcase and scarf out of the bedroom closet and tiptoed back down to the bottom of the stairs, just ten feet from where my husband was watching Scarecrow drive some poor hanging on to sanity by his fingernails asylum patient to the edge of reality. I sat on the bottom step and placed the pillowcase over my head, tying the scarf loosely around my neck.

For the final step, I slipped my shoe off, and threw it, hard, against the staircase wall.

And then I waited.

I knew my husband would come check on the noise and the delicious anticipation almost had me dizzy.

When I heard him call my name, I just about yelped in glee.

Alexandra? [omg omg omg]

At the sound of him getting up from the sofa, I had to bite my thumb to keep quiet.

Alexandra?

The sound of his footsteps coming in my direction had me holding my breath and chewing the inside of my cheek.

HE WAS COMING toward me.

I tucked myself into the corner of the stair, crouched into the very wedge, pillowcase over my head, scarf securely around my neck. He was just steps away now. It was dark, he took one step up and stumbled into me with his knee.

I heard "What the..?" and then....THEN, I felt his tentative hand reach out in the pitch to see what he kicked and the universe is good to me because his fingers landed perfectly on my clothed head.

His hand sprang back and he looked down to see the rough shape of a head enclosed in a burlap bag that was tied closed at the neck with a scarf.

OH! OH! The long awaited prize of his yell was just about to happen. How I live for moment when things are moving too fast for a brain to understand.

I couldn't chance missing seeing his reaction so I pulled off the pillowcase, blessedly in time to see him staring at me, blinking faster than a strobe light and hopping from one foot to another as he tried to process what was going on.

After seeing it was me, he leaned over and rested his hands on his knees. Shaking his head he mumbled about one of these days my pranks will take their toll.

I reminded him that he was grey when I met him, and that if anything is going to take him from longevity of 98 years to 95 years, it won't be my pranks but the nightly fright that I witness of a popcorn bowl filled with Ruffles followed by a hot fudge sundae chaser.

Tell me witnessing that as a 10:30 PM snack doesn't strike terror in the hearts of partners across America.

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