I might have a new obsession; I’ve spent most of my day researching the Winchester “Mystery” House and Mrs. Sarah Winchester.
(Prepare for an essay)

Background story

Sarah L. Winchester (1839 – 1922) was married to the son of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. They had one daughter, but she died after just a few weeks. About 15 years later, her husband died from tuberculosis.

After the death of her husband, she was heartbroken (obviously) and contacted spiritualists, and was apparently told by a medium that the family was cursed, haunted by the spirits of those killed by the Winchester rifles. According to the story, Sarah was told to build a house and never let it be finished. Constant construction on the house would save her from the spirits.

The House

Construction on the Winchester House, or the Winchester Mystery House as it came to be called after a visit from Houdini, was started 1884 (that’s 100 years before I was born, harhar).

It turned into a huge, 7 floor mansion, built like a maze. The house is scattered with false doors, dead end corridors, stairs leading to nothing and so on. Apparently this was to confuse the spirits.

The stories say that the spirits instructed her, and inspired the design of the house, which is why some people call it “The House built by/for the spirits”.

In 1906 there was an earthquake, and the house was purposely never fully restored; Mrs. Winchester had the damaged areas sealed off rather than repairing them. Since then, the house has “only” been 4 floors high, and big parts of it are still inaccessible.

Why this is awesome

First of all, whether or not I believe it, it’s still an interesting story. Either she really was hunted by spirits, or she just thought she was. Or perhaps she was just a rich, eccentric woman who wanted to build a really weird house because she wanted to, or because she was a terrible (or brilliant) designer.

I would love to see this house. I really would. With all the weird design elements, which I just find ever so awesome. And I find it utterly gorgeous. And creepy.

Good shit:
There are guided tours inside the house.

Not so good shit:
It’s in California. It would be a long and expensive trip. Also, I creeped myself out writing this ¬_¬

I went snowboarding.
How perfectly awesome!

There’s a slope not far away from where I live. Not very big, but enough to be amusing.

It was around -30°C when we left in the morning and our friend Majk had to spend about half an hour getting the ice off the car before he could come and pick us up. My hair grew frost and turned white.

After a few hours of absolutely lovely time spent in the slopes we went back to the car to pick up our lunch which, luckily, hadn’t frozen solid. Parts of my hair was white from the frost by then.

And a question: is it considered sane to talk to your snowboard the way some people talk to their kids (and/or pets)? Because I… know… someone who does. *shifty eyes*

I so need to create a shifty eyes emoticon that matches the rest of this set.

PS: Thanks for the lovely, supportive comments on my previous post!

We’re still friends though. In fact, I’m going to visit his place tomorrow. This isn’t a drama break-up, although things are slightly awkward at times.

And as for the question “why?”, let’s just say it’s a very long story and I don’t want to go into details about it. This post is mostly because it had to be said.

The stupid thing is that we get along so much better since we separated. It’s silly how things like that work sometimes.

New Years 2009-2010 was spent in the house of some lovely friends of mine (the same couple who’s flat I lived in when I’d just moved out from my boyfriend’s place). They’ve just bought the house and it’s absolutely gorgeous.

The theme was The Phantom of the Opera, so everyone was in pretty dresses and/or suits, and of course sporting fancy masquerade masks. I made mine myself and I’m rather proud of it.

As for clothing, I was excited to get another chance to wear my prom dress. Ended up being a tad overdressed since the other ladies were in pretty cocktail dresses. But hey, it’s new years.

→ Outfit photos here!

The mask was made to suit the dress in terms of colours. I glued my fingers together quite a few times in the process of making it, but it was fun.

We had dinner, dancing, wine spilling incidents (I’m sorry ^^;), karate shots, golf in the garden, champagne during the countdown and much more.

The day after (or well, evening) I went into the city and had dinner with Cross and Q Nat and Roy (ahoy, WoW people) who were utterly charming. It’s always a bit interesting to meet internet friends IRL, and I rarely do, but I’m glad I did.

All in all, a very lovely time. ♥

Unfortunately (?) it turned out that I wasn’t the only one having problems finding an outfit in white, so the theme was cancelled and everyone was said to dress in whichever colour they preferred.

That’d all have been lovely unless my friend hadn’t forgotten to tell me. I’m so very thankful it was just a colour theme and not a costume party.

So I’m making a mental note to wait that long before wearing white again, because some of my friends reactions were priceless.

And I actually wrote this post a few days ago, but I… forgot to press “publish”. Go me? ^^; Also, thanks for the lovely compliments on the layout. It makes me very happy!