The Creature From The Abingdon Basement

Just in time for Halloween come pictures of the now infamous Abingdon Alligator discovered almost by accident in the basement of a local home a week or so ago.

The story, as I heard it, goes something like this: the resident of an Abingdon home was missing for a few weeks and was apparently murdered (that’s a hell of a start for any story about alligators) and the Harford County Sheriff’s Office went to the house with Animal Control Officers to wrangle up a few of the deceased homeowner’s dogs.

It wasn’t until the crew was leaving the house that some neighborhood children asked if they knew about the alligator in the basement. Upon closer inspection, there was indeed an about a four-and-a-half foot long alligator in an aquarium set up in the basement. Animal Control Officers subdued the creature, wrapped its muzzle in duct tape and evidently snapped a few pictures before putting it in a cage and removing it from the scene. Continue reading The Creature From The Abingdon Basement

A Long Lost Friend

What with it being Hell Night (the night before Halloween) and the middle of my honeymoon, I’m off to raise some high Hell. In the meantime, please enjoy this wickedly good feature of mine which was published just last week in EERIE PA Magazine Issue 4 (www.eeriepa.net). In the spirit of All Hallow’s Eve, it examines the reality and belief in witchcraft among some in our society. SPOILER ALERT: It involves murder, magic, me and is pretty spooky. Happy Halloween!

Somewhere in south-central Pennsylvania, a family is worried.

A child has fallen ill and shows no signs of improving.

After a fair amount of hand-wringing and soul-searching, a man enters the house to fetch the remedy – not medicine, not a doctor, but a short passage from a small book. Its pages contain neither the telephone number of a trusted physician nor the recipe for a therapeutic elixir, but nonetheless hold a tried and true method of healing.

Quite simply, it’s faith. Continue reading A Long Lost Friend